By Michelle Westgate and Samuel Rubenfeld
Health care and high fuel costs have become the top news in Sen. John McCain’s (R-Ariz.) campaign this past week.
McCain began his “Call to Action Tour” this week, speaking about the national health care crisis and visiting medical facilities in Florida. Later this week, he will travel to Pennsylvania, Ohio, Iowa and Colorado outlining his proposed health care reform, according to a press release.
“I won’t create another entitlement program that Washington will let get out of control. I won’t do it,” McCain said during a speech at the Moffitt Cancer Research Center in Tampa, Fla. His plan includes walk-in clinics and tax credits to allow families to purchase the health care plan they choose.
McCain’s plan would not require insurers to provide coverage for people with pre-existing medical conditions, as the plans from both Democratic candidate do, but he did say he would create a system of last resort that would offer federal assistance to those who cannot afford private insurance or who are denied coverage by other companies.
“The states have been very active in experimenting with ways to cover the uninsurables,” McCain said in Tampa. “As president, I will meet with the governors to solicit their ideas about a best practice model that states can follow a Guaranteed Access Plan, or GAP, that would reflect the best experience of the states. I will work with Congress, the governors, and industry to make sure that it is funded adequately and has the right incentives to reduce costs such as disease management, individual case management, and health and wellness programs.
“These programs reach out to people who are at risk for different diseases and chronic conditions and provide them with nurse care managers to make sure they receive the proper care and avoid unnecessary treatments and emergency room visits.”
On Tuesday, McCain launched an ad campaign supporting his health care plan.
“The problem with health care in America is not the quality of health care, it’s the availability and the affordability,” McCain said in the new ad.
In response to McCain’s ad, there is a counter-ad produced by the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), accusing McCain of supporting increasing medical costs and refusing health care for children. The ad is airing in Ohio and Washington, D.C., and it can also be viewed on YouTube.
In addition to health care reform, rising fuel costs have become a concern for McCain. He proposed an 18.4 percent federal gas tax cut for the summer, which was later supported by Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) as well.
Critics of the summer gas tax cut, including Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill), have called this a political scheme to get elected. Some analysts have said a tax cut now would not ensure a break for Americans and prices might still continue to rise.
“We’re working hard to balance our budget and make sure that we have an opportunity to cut gas tax as much as we possibly can,” said Gov. Charlie Crist of Florida, a key McCain supporter. “People need relief. Senator McCain understands that, and that’s why he’s pushing for it.”
McCain continues to have a lower profile in the press due to the drama of the Democratic primary campaign, during the week of April 21, he was the significant newsmaker in only 13 percent of campaign stories, with both Obama and Clinton significant newsmakers each in more than 50 percent of campaign stories, according to the weekly report from the Project for Excellence in Journalism.
Last Thursday, during a tour of the lower Ninth Ward in New Orleans, the area hit hardest by Hurricane Katrina in 2005, McCain attacked President Bush’s response to the natural disaster. “Never again will a disaster of this nature be handled in the terrible and disgraceful way that it was handled,” he said. “There [were] unqualified people in charge, there was a total misreading of the dimensions of the disaster, there was a failure of communications.”
A CBS News/New York Times poll released Wednesday evening has McCain tied with Obama in a head to head match at 45 percent each, and in the same poll, Clinton is leading him by five points, 48 percent to 43 percent.
This story was supplemented by reports from multiple news services.