Major Presidential Candidates Discuss Health Care, Economy, Other Issues During Third Debate

Democratic presidential nominee Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.) and Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) on Wednesday during their third debate at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y., discussed their proposals for health care, the economy and other issues, the Washington Post reports (Balz, Washington Post, 10/16).

During the debate, moderated by Bob Schieffer of CBS, "Obama's most pointed attack ... came on health care, when he said Mr. McCain's plan would cause some businesses to drop their coverage of employees, putting even more on the rolls of the uninsured," according to the Washington Times. Obama said, "Don't take my word for it. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which generally doesn't support a lot of Democrats," said that the McCain health care proposal "could lead to the unraveling of the employer-based health care system" (Dinan, Washington Times, 10/16).

McCain also criticized the Obama health care proposal, which he said could force small businesses to pay a fine in the event that they do not meet a requirement to offer health insurance to employees. In response, Obama said, "Here's your fine -- zero," as the proposal would exempt small businesses from the requirement (Washington Post, 10/16).

Accuracy of Statements Examined
USA Today and the New York Times' "The Caucus" on Thursday examined the accuracy of statements on health care and other issues that Obama and McCain made during the debate.

According to McCain, the Obama health care proposal could force small businesses to pay a fine in the event that they do not meet a requirement to offer health insurance to employees, although the plan would exempt small businesses from the requirement. According to USA Today, the "key to this charge is what defines a 'small' business, and the Obama campaign has not said" (Wolf/Dilanian, USA Today, 10/16).

McCain also said that Obama seeks to implement a single-payer health care system. The statement refers to "several reports in which Mr. Obama has been quoted as saying that, if he were designing a health care system 'from scratch,' he would probably support a single-payer system," but Obama "has not proposed a single-payer plan," the New York Times reports ("The Caucus," New York Times, 10/15).

Health care-related excerpts from the debate are available online at health08.org.

McCain 'Presses' for Details on Obama Proposal
McCain at campaign events "regularly presses" Obama to tell voters the amount of the fine he would impose on employers that do not meet a requirement to offer health insurance to employees under his health care proposal, but Obama has not addressed the issue, the Wall Street Journal reports. At a campaign event in Davenport, Iowa, on Saturday, McCain said, "Under the plan he's proposed, (Sen. Obama) will fine employers who do not offer health insurance," adding, "What he doesn't say, and what nobody has asked, is how big his fine will be."

The Obama campaign does not plan to specify the amount of the fine before the election, according to Obama adviser Neera Tanden. She said that Obama has proposed the fine to encourage employers not to drop health insurance for employees, rather than to raise significant revenue. Obama spokesperson Tommy Vietor added that the specific details of the requirement for employers "are not critical to the program's success" (Meckler, Wall Street Journal, 10/16).

Opinion Pieces
Several newspapers published opinion pieces examining McCain and Obama's health care proposals. Summaries appear below.

• Rep. Jim McDermott (D-Wash.), Billings Gazette: "The current health care crisis in America looks a lot like the current financial crisis in America, and we are poised for another meltdown unless we act quickly and responsibly, which is exactly what Sen. Barack Obama proposes in his health care plan," McDermott, a psychiatrist and president emeritus of Americans for Democratic Action, writes in a Gazette opinion piece. He says, "Obama has proposed a health care program that offers certainty and freedom of choice to those Americans not eligible for Medicare," while McCain "has proposed a health care program that looks like the blueprint for the current financial crisis, and will produce the same dire results." McDermott concludes, "If the people demand that their government solve the care crisis, it can be done," and, "Obama's plan is the way to do it" (McDermott, Billings Gazette, 10/15).
  
  
• Grace-Marie Turner, Billings Gazette: "In a nation where four in 10 workers change jobs every year, McCain says we must modernize our health sector to fit this mobile economy," and the "crucial link is giving everyone the same tax break for buying health insurance, whether they get their policies at work or on their own," Turner, an adviser to the McCain campaign and president and founder of the Galen Institute, writes in a Gazette opinion piece. Turner says, "We learned during the last major health reform debate in the Clinton era that Americans want control and security," but "they are losing both as the number of people getting insurance through their jobs declines." Obama's health care proposal "is a grab bag of failed policies from the past that have been proven to drive up costs and deny people choice," Turner writes. She concludes, "The bottom line is choice and control. The American people will have a clear choice this fall" (Turner, Billings Gazette, 10/15).
  
  
• John Palffy, Detroit News: "McCain's proposal empowers the worker, retiree and the unemployed to get their family health care without an employer," which is "a huge step toward making health care more accessible to all Americans," Palffy, former chief economist for Sen. Dan Quayle (R-Ind.) and former Heritage Foundation economic fellow, writes in a News opinion piece. "McCain's simple, but potentially revolutionary change" -- allowing workers to keep their insurance when they change jobs -- "is a matter of fairness" because there is "no compelling reason why workers should be beholden to their bosses for insurance or why small businesses should be held hostage to this imposing burden," Palffy writes (Palffy, Detroit News, 10/15).
  
  
• Jay Ambrose, New York Post: "Both Obama and McCain have been faulted for not providing enough details about their [health care] plans," but "[m]aking too many specific or precise promises in the health of a campaign could put you in a bind later on or make you go back on your word," Ambrose, former Washington director of editorial policy for Scripps Howard newspapers, writes in a New York Post opinion piece. According to Ambrose, "The main thing is to know whether a candidate's proposed march is in the direction of socialized medicine or a market-based system -- and that's clear in these two cases." He writes, "The next step is to better explain the overall situation to the public and end political distortion," which "might be too much to hope for" (Ambrose, New York Post, 10/16).

Broadcast Coverage
PBS' "NewsHour with Jim Lehrer" on Thursday included a post-debate report on the statements of Obama and McCain about health care and other issues. The segment includes comments from syndicated columnist Mark Shields; New York Times columnist David Brooks; presidential historian and author Michael Beschloss; Amy Walter, editor-in-chief of The Hotline; and Chicago Tribune columnist Clarence Page (Lehrer, "NewsHour with Jim Lehrer," PBS, 10/15).