Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards said on Sunday that his universal health care proposal would require that Americans go to the doctor for preventive care.

 

"It requires that everybody be covered. It requires that everybody get preventive care," he told a crowd sitting in lawn chairs in front of the Cedar County Courthouse. "If you are going to be in the system, you can't choose not to go to the doctor for 20 years. You have to go in and be checked and make sure that you are OK."

 

He noted, for example, that women would be required to have regular mammograms in an effort to find and treat "the first trace of problem." Edwards and his wife, Elizabeth, announced earlier this year that her breast cancer had returned and spread.

 

Edwards said his mandatory health care plan would cover preventive, chronic and long-term health care. The plan would include mental health care as well as dental and vision coverage for all Americans.

 

"The whole idea is a continuum of care, basically from birth to death," he said.

 

The former North Carolina senator said all presidential candidates talking about health care "ought to be asked one question: Does your plan cover every single American?"

 

"Because if it doesn't they should be made to explain what child, what woman, what man in America is not worthy of health care," he said. "Because in my view, everybody is worth health care."

 

Edwards said his plan would cost up to $120 billion a year, a cost he proposes covering by ending President Bush's tax cuts to people who make more than $200,000 per year.

 

Edwards, who has been criticized by some for calling on Americans to be willing to give up their SUVs while driving one, acknowledged Sunday that he owns a Ford Escape hybrid SUV, purchased within the year, and a Chrysler Pacificia, which he said he has had for years.

 

"I think all of us have to move, have to make progress," he said. "I'm not holyier-than-thou about this. ... I'm like a lot of Americans, I see how serious this issue is and I want to address it myself and I want to help lead the nation in the right direction."

 

He said he would not buy another SUV in the future.

 

The Ford Escape, the first hybrid SUV on the market, gets an estimated 36 mpg in the city and 31 mpg on the highway.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070902/ap_on_el_pr/edwards_2

I drive an SUV and I love it. Oh and BTW, I get better gas mileage in hilly Tallahassee than most people around here get in their normal cars.

 

21-22 MPG in Tally City Driving......take that treehuggers!

It appears that Ron Paul is the only candidate that does not want the government to run every single facet of your life.

wow if John Edwards is President (thankfully he wont be ) i guess i can sit back and allow him to make every decision for me

Why is he being a lunatic for saying something like that? Preventive medicine is the best medicine... if you're going to have universal health care it would make sense to require people to do this so that it is more manageable.

 

If you're against universal health care, then say so, but don't make him sound like a lunatic because he supports something that makes sense in this context.

 

Personally, I am against universal health care as these candidates propose it... I prefer a more market oriented universal health care approach.

Yes, requiring me to go in for health checks and letting the governement dictate when I go to a doctor = lunatic.

 

It doesn't sound like lunacy because you are a liberal. Liberals don't see a problem with the government taking complete care of it's citizens. Nothing wrong with having that view but for me it is absurd.

Why is he being a lunatic for saying something like that? Preventive medicine is the best medicine... if you're going to have universal health care it would make sense to require people to do this so that it is more manageable.

 

If you're against universal health care, then say so, but don't make him sound like a lunatic because he supports something that makes sense in this context.

 

Personally, I am against universal health care as these candidates propose it... I prefer a more market oriented universal health care approach.

Clearly the idea is that he thinks people are too stupid to take care of themselves, but he's honest. Out of all the frontrunner candidates, he is the only one without lying, wierd marriages, corporatist connections, and flip-flopping (besides the Iraq vote). I mean, he never released a press release declaring to whatever it takes to get out of the war while attending a conference and endorsing the "Korea Plan" like Hillary Clinton.

 

However, leftist politics people are too stupid to take care of themselves. People are supposedly too dumb not to buy products from sweatshops/polluting factories/from questionable companies, so leftists think the government should step in and tell you what not to buy. They think people are too dumb to take care of others through charity, so they want enforced charity. Leftists believe that consumers and producers are too stupid to come up witrh fair market rates for everything from labor to cheese, so they propose price ceilings that fail every time they are implemented. Leftists believe that people are too dumb to talk on cellphones in cars or smoke in public and private places, so they illegalize it. They believe we are too stupid to use guns, knives, and pepper spray in a proper and mature fashion, so they want them to all be confiscated. Any ideology that asserts that increased government to fix problems assumes people are increasingly stupid.

 

And maybe they are. Maybe Edwards is right. Perhaps his wife was too stupid to get to the doctor concerning her cancer and now in result she is going to die--and he wants no one else to be victim of their own stupidity ever again. We may very well be victims of our own stupidity.

 

However, who is to judge what is indeed stupid and then force the model of normality (aka "normalcy") upon everyone else? The more the government intervenes, the higher the probability of needless or malicious force may be used. So perhaps, one may argue, our stupidity victimizes us the most when we are so stupid we sign off all our liberties away in fear we are too dumb to defend and take care of ourselves.

 

 

Edwards is merely honest--but the insanity of his proposal merely underscores the insanity of government intervensionism. And as I alluded to before, our acceptance of interventionism makes us victims of the worst kind of stupidity.

John Edwards was a tobacco lawyer.

 

/thread

Yes, requiring me to go in for health checks and letting the governement dictate when I go to a doctor = lunatic.

 

It doesn't sound like lunacy because you are a liberal. Liberals don't see a problem with the government taking complete care of it's citizens. Nothing wrong with having that view but for me it is absurd.

 

QFT.

Yes, requiring me to go in for health checks and letting the governement dictate when I go to a doctor = lunatic.

 

It doesn't sound like lunacy because you are a liberal. Liberals don't see a problem with the government taking complete care of it's citizens. Nothing wrong with having that view but for me it is absurd.

 

I'm not a liberal. I'm moderate. FYI.

I think almost every liberal says that.

 

I want to meet a liberal that embraces the title besides my brother.

You don't even have to give it that much thought, penguino.

 

It basically boils down to, why the hell should I have to listen to anyone else on when I should go see a doctor?