Clinton Hits Obama For Wavering On Single-Payer Health Care

Pivoting off of one of the few policy spats in Monday night's presidential debate in South Carolina, Hillary Clinton hit Barack Obama on Tuesday for wavering on his support for a single-payer health care system. In a video put out on YouTube, the Clinton campaign contrasts portions of the debate - in which Obama says "I never said we should go and try to get single payer" - and a speech Obama gave to the AFL-CIO in 2003 - in which he says, "I happen to be a proponent of single-payer health care coverage."

In Monday's debate, Obama found himself flanked by his two primary opponents as the only candidate whose health care plan did not include a mandate. During the campaign the Illinois Democrat has argued that, if he were starting from scratch he would support a single payer system. In a profile of the Senator in the New Yorker this past spring he offered that, "a single-payer system-a government-managed system like Canada's, which disconnects health insurance from employment-'would probably make sense. But we've got all these legacy systems in place, and managing the transition, as well as adjusting the culture to a different system, would be difficult to pull off. So we may need a system that's not so disruptive that people feel like suddenly what they've known for most of their lives is thrown by the wayside.'"

Comments

[researcher]

it was a dumb thing for obama to say unless he wanted a fight with hillary to get her to fight with him on stage at the debate right before SC primary election. the blacks will not like hillary for picking on one of them.

also if this was out to get calif votes. good move.

if that was not his objective that it was really dumb. something a college professor would state but not a demo politican.

reagan sold his trickle down theory to the middle class the rich have been getting richer ever since. brillant move for reagan.

in a dumb downed society this can be done. get real most middle class americans would vote for him again. the middle class appears to loved to be screwed again and again.

the repubs are just smarter than the demos when it comes to politics and wealth generation. they have human greed and individualism on their side and after decades of capitalism greed is alive and well in america.

[seymour]

Here is all we need to know about Clinton's great political skill.

1992-2000 Clinton is elected President with a Democratic majority in both houses of legistature and a survivable majority on the Supreme Court.

2000- 2006 The Democrats lose the White House,Congress and we have to deal with a radical right majority
on the Court.

As for Hillary's health plan covering every body
Her plan covers no one until it passes. Our experience of her experience is that she failed
in 1992. It experience is so telling, that is what it tells.

[chiguy80]

Hillary's campaign is one BIG lie after another... what gets me is why the American people can't see that. If Barack doesn't get the nomination, I hope McCain does cause I would rather vote for him then Hillary.

[OhPlease2007]

In my opinion, it was a complete bone-headed move for Obama to ever name-drop about Ronald Reagan, under ANY circumstance. REAL Democrats don't pander to Reagan supporters, for votes!

Edwards '08!

[lovethesinner]

The distortion is saying that Obama is somehow waffleing, (flip-flopping if you will) on his original statement. He is not.

His original statement was conditioned upon a hypothetical situation in which we could START OVER at the point in time where there wasn't any government assisted health care of any kind.

Hillary and Bill appear to have either hired Republican media producers, or to have studied the tactics of Lee Atwater and his understudy Karl Rove well enough to produce the same system of conflating soundbites and outright lying to tear down their opponents.

I can only think this is what The State meant when the endorsed Obama this morning, saying, "But we also have a good idea what a Clinton presidency would look like. The restoration of the Clintons to the White House would trigger a new wave of all-out political warfare. That is not all Bill and Hillary’s fault - but it exists, whomever you blame, and cannot be ignored. Hillary Clinton doesn’t pretend that it won’t happen; she simply vows to persevere, in the hope that her side can win. Indeed, the Clintons’ joint career in public life seems oriented toward securing victory and personal vindication.

Sen. Obama’s campaign is an argument for a more unifying style of leadership."

[independentrepublicrat]

Yes, the Clintons are liars. Yes, the will do and say anything to get elected. No, the Ad doesn't tell the full story. Yes, the Ad is effective and since they have the words coming out of his mouth (whether out of context or not), it looks bad. They set a trap for him last night and he walked into it. I said it while we were watching last night that I smelled a set-up because Hillary was far more scripted and intent to bring up issues out of relevance than usual. Senator Obama walked into it and he will pay a price on this one.

[Arg]

Another example of brazen, distorting spin by Hillary. Barack distinguishes between the ideal and realistic options and advocates the realistic one -- and, of course, Hillary presents his ideal option as being the one he's advocating. Pure deception from a couple whose record of mendacity goes back decades (and I'm a Democrat). What I find striking about all these attacks is that the Clintons have so little to attack Barack with that all they can do is twist words and records and downright lie. Meanwhile, through these distracting deceptions, Hillary can skip and dance over issues of truly huge implications: her support for the war in Iraq and the bankruptcy war.

[Mystery954]

I like this better -
http://youtube.com/watch?v=O-TBA14dczc

[godlessclif]

The HMOs will never let a single payer President get elected. Obama is not for Single Payer, neither is Hillary. Only Dennis the Menace was for single payer.

[OSUMercutio]

If you read the 2nd part of the article - Obama explains it perfectly.

[Trace8089]

Can't wait to hear Obama explain this away.