When I first went to John McCain's health care plan on his website, it looks nice and neat with three bulleted "plan goals." But then, when I clicked on the button that outlines the McCain health care plan I found myself looking at a full page of back to back bulleted sentences. Even as someone researching the McCain health care plan to tell you about it, my first response was to close the page.
I Decided to Stay and Take a Look at McCain's Health Care Plan
OK, so I have been in this business long enough to know that just because information on the web may not be laid out user friendly, that does not mean it is not good information. So, I took the time to learn more about John McCain's health care plan and did find some good information.
Americans Need to Decide What is The Biggest Health Care Problem
Of course, being a republican John McCain does not endorse universal healthcare but he has some good ideas to help families manage health care. One of these is to reform the federal the tax code to allow more people to get a tax credit for their health care, but unfortunately, this is really the only direct solution McCain has outlined. The rest of his health care plan shows that he knows things need to be done like "bringing costs under control" and "reform the system and maintain quality," but unfortunately he has not yet outlined how he would go about obtaining these goals. And, I would say the worst part of his healthcare plan, is that he does not acknowledge that the 45-50 million American women, men, and children that don't have any healthcare at all is not the biggest problem but instead he feels "the biggest problem with American health care system is that it costs too much."
Let's Look at McCain's Health Care Plan
With that said, let's look at his basic health care reform initiatives and then check out what "the word on the street is." John McCain outlines three main areas in his health care plan:
1. Give families more control and choice of their health insurance choices and more choice in their medical care.
2. Make more individuals and families eligible for health insurance tax credits.
3. Improve health care by promoting competition among health care insurers and this in turn would reduce health care costs.
The Word on The Street
Although it looks like John McCain has taken the time to understand the health care issues, I would still like to see him do more to explain how he really plans to set about reforming the system and show that it won't just be more of the same past reform promises that have not made the health care system any more affordable or efficient. So, what do others around the web think? It looks like others agree that more explaining needs to be done by McCain. According to Robert Kraig of The Capital Times, McCain is "unable to make a realistic guarantee of quality affordable coverage" and that he does not explain "how dramatically more expensive insurance policies bought on the individual market could be made affordable with modest tax credits."
One Last Thought
I strongly agree with Kraig's opinion that "the Democratic candidates have gone much further in spelling out plans that would guarantee access to quality affordable health care and a real choice of good public and private plans." It is still debatable whether or not the democrat's universal health care plan is what is best for America and McCain certainly feels it is not, but by taking a look at McCain's whole site, I am convinced he is strongly dedicated to what is best for America in all areas and that he will give his all to America as a president. With him having such a strong conviction for the good of America, hopefully that conviction will spill more over into his health care reform plan. Hopefully he will see that good, affordable, health care for ALL Americans is and integral part of the success of the American people.
