WASHINGTON (AP) - Every American should have health care coverage within six years, Democratic Sen. Barack Obama said Thursday as he set an ambitious goal soon after jumping into the 2008 presidential race. "The time has come for universal health care in America," Obama said at a conference of Families USA, a health care advocacy group.
"I am absolutely determined that by the end of the first term of the next president, we should have universal health care in this country," the Illinois senator said.
Obama was previewing what is shaping up to be a theme of the 2008 Democratic primary. One of his rivals, 2004 vice presidential nominee John Edwards, also said as he announced his candidacy last month that he will offer a proposal for universal health care.
Obama said while plans are offered in every campaign season with "much fanfare and promise," they collapse under the weight of Washington politics, leaving citizens to struggle with the skyrocketing costs.
He said it's wrong that 46 million in this country are uninsured when the country spends more than any one else on health care. He said Americans pay $15 billion in taxes to help care for the uninsured.
"We can't afford another disappointing charade in 2008, 2009 and Obama said. "It's not only tiresome, it's wrong."
Obama's call was an echo of a speech he made last April when he said Democrats "need to cling to the core values that make us Democrats, the belief in universal health care, the belief in universal education, and then we should be agnostic in terms of how to achieve those values."
His argument Thursday not only will be considered through the prism of the presidential campaign, but weighed against rival Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's ill-fated plan to overhaul the health care insurance system when she was first lady.
Another candidate, Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich, also backs universal health care.
