Senator John McCain, who had clinched the GOP nomination during the “Super Tuesday II” contests on March 4, had revealed his health care proposal on Tuesday, April 29. He talked about his health care plan was unveiled during his speech in Tampa, Florida. Currently, McCain is on his “Call For Action” tour, which started out in Alabama, in which he tried attempted to reach out to African-Americans, the core voting bloc of the Democratic Party.
McCain had also visited New Orleans, Louisiana, which is highly Democratic due to the large African-American population. But, McCain did not talk about Mississippi, which was hit as hard as Louisiana. There are still many parts of Mississippi still recovering; which caused post-Katrina recovery to be on the top of the minds of most of the Democratic voters during the Mississippi primary.
During his Louisiana trip, McCain said that he was not the “typical” Republican.
Mainly, McCain’s one platform has been a combination of Iraq and national security. Now, McCain has started to move onto the issue of health care, one of the main issues on the top of most voters’ minds. The economy is the number one issue.
Under McCain’s health care plan, individuals and families will get tax credits to help buy health insurance. This is the main core of McCain’s health care plan. He explains that these credits will trigger the health insurance providers to compete against one another. McCain said that in a nutshell, families and individuals will be placed back in control of their health care plans.
He said that it will enable many Americans to make their own choices again. Under the health care proposal by McCain, individuals would get a $2,500 tax credit while families will get a $5,000 tax credit for health insurance. This is for those that do not have health care coverage provided by their employers.
Also, the plan will allow for the import of generic drugs from Canada. That was a key topic during the 2004 Presidential Elections.
However, the proposal came under fire from critics.
Critics listed possible flaws such as the tax credits would not significantly reduce what families must pay to buy health insurance. There is weight in such a criticism in this as the number of members from one family differs from another.
The Kaiser Family Foundation said that it costs over $12K to provided healthcare for a family of at least four members. For families of at least five or six members, the costs would be higher. In the case of larger families, the cost would increase.
Critics also opened fire at McCain’s health care proposal saying that those with pre-existing conditions would also be hurt financially. For those people, the costs would be much higher.
While McCain has brought forth his health care proposal, this could open him up for attack from the eventual Democratic nominee.