STEVE PAGLIUCA has just made the boldest move yet in the US Senate race.
A barrage of paid media has rendered him a contender. Now he’s using Ted Kennedy’s signature issue - and the sentiments of Kennedy’s sons - to try to set himself apart from his principal rivals.
The goal of universal health care, he insists, is too important to let a bill die even if it includes sweeping restrictions on insurance coverage for abortion.
On a day when the Globe presented a positive Pags-to-riches profile, the wealthy businessman held a press conference to underline his stance - and to contrast it with the contrary positions of his main opponents.
The pressing need to bring coverage to the uninsured outweighs the abortion issue, says Pagliuca, who noted that many deaths from breast and cervical cancer could be prevented if more women had the access to routine preventive care that would come with health coverage.
Pointing to recent statements by US Representative Patrick Kennedy and Ted Kennedy Jr. suggesting that their father wouldn’t have wanted health care reform to fail because of the abortion coverage prohibition in the House bill, Pagliuca said he would support a final bill even if it included those restrictions.
“While I disagree with Stupak-Pitts, I do not believe that this language or a similar provision should stop the passage of health care reform,’’ Pagliuca said yesterday. “This represents a fundamental disagreement between two of my opponents and me.’’
Now, even in pressing what his campaign considers a pivotal distinction, Pagliuca seemed more like a panda gently munching on a bamboo shoot than a panther pouncing on his prey. Still, yesterday the Celtics co-owner was playing offense - and in news-making fashion.
Later yesterday morning, presumptive front-runner Martha Coakley reaffirmed that she would vote against a bill that included the abortion stipulation. But the attorney general seized on the Senate’s newly unveiled legislation, which has the usual federal-funding abortion restrictions rather than the tougher House language, to argue that Pagliuca’s distinction was “a false choice.’’
US Representative Michael Capuano, who voted for the House bill, has since said that he would not support a final bill with the same language. Although he wavered briefly, City Year cofounder Alan Khazei says the goal of near universal health care would justify supporting legislation like the House’s.
Ultimately that choice may not have to be made. When House Speaker Nancy Pelosi came to town last week to endorse Capuano, I asked whether she agreed with his contention that those abortion provisions would justify a no vote on the final legislation. The speaker sidestepped, saying she thought an acceptable compromise would be found.
Let’s hope she’s right.
Still, the issue does give voters a clear sense of the candidates’ priorities. For Coakley and Capuano, providing health care to the millions of uninsured would ultimately take a back seat to fighting abortion-coverage limitations that move beyond the usual federal delineation.
And make no mistake, the House bill would do that. No publicly subsidized public or private plan could cover abortions - which in most cases cost between $400 and $500 - other than for rape, incest, or life of the mother. Women could pay for separate abortion coverage, however.
Overall, only 13 percent of abortions are billed to a private insurer, at least initially, though that low percentage may be partly because of privacy concerns or lack of awareness that many plans cover abortion.
Complicating the issue further is a new analysis by the George Washington University School of Public Health and Health Services that predicts that the House bill would lead to an insurance-industrywide erosion of abortion coverage, even in plans that are not publicly subsidized.
So the matter is a genuinely difficult one for those who favor abortion rights.
But then, politics is about difficult choices - and the view here is Pagliuca has made the right determination.
Yesterday, he bet his senatorial ambitions on the hope that a plurality of Democratic voters will agree.
Scot Lehigh can be reached at lehigh@globe.com. 
