UPDATED: Edwards calls out Clinton (again)

No UHC for regular Americans, no health care for the President, Cabinet, House, or Senate. I love it.

One of the pitfalls of childhood is that one doesn't have to understand something to feel it. - Carlos Ruiz Zafon

Yesterday, the details came out, and lo, they are good. Her plan includes an individual mandate to ensure universal coverage, offers all Americans access to the same menu of regulated private insurance options that members of Congress use, creates a new public insurer based off of Medicare that anyone can buy into, bars the insurance companies from price discriminating based on preexisting conditions, and uses refundable tax credits to limit the percentage of a family's income that health costs can consume [...] If those planks sound faintly familiar, they are: They're very close to what the Edwards campaign proposed back in February, which is to say they're very close to the best health care plan proposed by a national Democrat in 15 years.

I take that to mean that he thinks Edwards has the best health care plan proposed by a national Democrat in 15 years.

One of the pitfalls of childhood is that one doesn't have to understand something to feel it. - Carlos Ruiz Zafon

• John Edwards may not have the biggest war chest or national organization, and yes, he built himself a colossal pleasure dome of a house in North Carolina, but he has honed himself into a pretty convincing man-of-the-people populist. He has learned a lot in six years of non-stop campaigning for the presidency. He and his wife, Elizabeth, have been listening to voters and the feedback loop is working. Seeing him here was like encountering a decent but unfocused rock band that finally had found its groove after years on the road. In NASCAR terms, I thought he blew the doors off the event here. He touched every chord – war, health care, taxes, global warming – with precision, personal narratives of real folks, and a real urgency. His polish surprised me.

One of the pitfalls of childhood is that one doesn't have to understand something to feel it. - Carlos Ruiz Zafon

On the eve of Hillary Clinton's much anticipated health care speech, John Edwards focused on health care in his speech at the Harkin Steak Fry.

"Brothers and sisters, when are we finally going to stand up to drug companies and insurance companies?" he asked to a roar of approval from the record-setting crowd of more than 12,000.

After grilling steak with Sen. Tom Harkin, he took a swipe at the forthcoming Clinton plan. His campaign promised that he would respond directly to her plan in his Monday morning address at the Laborers Convention in Chicago and offer a "unique way to get universal health care actually passed in this country."

...An early Clinton supporter, Hatfield said he also liked Edwards' College for Everyone program in North Carolina.

"I needed to see someone with a different approach," he said of his switch.

Other Edwards supporters at the steak fry cited a variety of reasons for their choice.

Jerry Dingman of New London, a third-time steak fry attendee, said he caucused for Kucinich in 2004 but would caucus for Edwards in 2008.

"Edwards is more electable," he said. A retired factory worker and farmer, he said that he appreciated Edwards grew up in a "working-class" family.

Carma Armstrong of Indianola, who caucused for Edwards in 2004, said she believed Edwards is the only Democrat who could be elected to the White House.
...
Jackson Hawks, who got his ticket to the event from the Obama campaign, said that he caucused for Edwards in 2004 but this year is still undecided.

"On domestic policy there is nobody better than John Edwards," he said.

One of the pitfalls of childhood is that one doesn't have to understand something to feel it. - Carlos Ruiz Zafon