Sen. Clinton Attacks Sen. Obama Over Stance on Health Care

With the race for the Democrat presidential nomination revving up another notch, Sen. Hillary Clinton launched an attack on her rival, Sen. Barack Obama, about what she feels is his biggest weakness: criticizing her stand on universal health care.

The Democrat senator from New York said, both during a rally and an interview with the Seattle P-I that the two have had their own stance on the issue, and that it had been the one major area where they have had strong differences, especially in a campaign that has not thrown up too many major areas of disagreement in matters of policy.

During the interview, Sen. Clinton said while Sen. John Edwards and she “took the political risk and staked out the ground” in taking a stand for universal health care, Sen. Obama had surprisingly refrained from doing so. She said “Senator Obama chose not to, and he has spent the past couple of weeks attacking me for being in favor of universal health care, which I find astonishing.”

Criticizing Sen. Obama for his stance regarding universal health care, she said the stand he was taking in that matter was not a smart one for anyone to take, whether Democrat or progressive. She said standing for universal health care was very important.

Sen. Clinton went on to say, “But if you don't even try," she added, "you're ceding the ground to the health insurance companies, the drug companies, the Republicans, without a fight, and I think that's a mistake.”

Though Sen. Clinton did not mention Sen. Obama’s name in her speech, she made it amply clear it was him she was talking about when she said, “My opponent's plan would leave out at least 50 million people, 750,000 right here in the state of Washington.” She said her plan, on the other hand, ensured insurance companies could not have a discriminatory approach towards those people with pre-existing medical conditions.

She also attacked her opponent for his relative lack of experience and frequently inspirational oratory, saying the presidential election campaign was not merely about feeling good momentarily, as there was a huge amount of work still to be done.

The two battling Democrat senators were at different places in the course of their election campaign, one day before the presidential caucuses at Washington. Sen. Clinton was addressing a full house of 5,500 at the University of Puget Sound, the theme of her lecture being health care, while Sen. Obama was addressing a much larger audience at the KeyArena in Seattle.

The two senators have had different opinions when it comes to health care. While Sen. Clinton is asking for mandatory universal coverage, tax credits for working families so insurance costs become manageable, and the need for businesses to provide insurance to their employees or organize payments into a pool for those employees without insurance, Sen. Obama takes a different approach.

Sen. Obama’s stance is that insurance should be mandatory for children. His idea of universal insurance is for employers to share the costs arising out of providing insurance to their employees and also having in place an insurance plan that is like the plan for federal employees.