Obama accuses industries, lobbyists of blocking progress
HAMPTON, N.H. -- Health insurers block progress toward universal health care. Big Oil corrupts our energy policy. Banks and lenders make money on the backs of college students forced to repay huge loans. Agribusiness benefits from government subsidies at the expense of small farms.
This was Barack Obama's populist message yesterday at the Adeline C. Marston Elementary School in Hampton, one of three public campaign stops in the past two days in New Hampshire. To Republicans, casting business as an enemy of change may sound like a tired trope of the left. But Obama laid the blame for inertia on health care, on energy independence, and other issues squarely at the feet of select industries and their lobbyists.
On insurance, for example, Obama repeated his pledge to sign a universal healthcare bill by the end of his first term, saying, "I shouldn't have better health insurance than you since you're paying the bill for my health insurance."
"Every four years somebody promises to fix this and it doesn't get fixed," he continued. "And the reason is because HMOs, drug companies, and insurance companies are doing very well under the status quo, and they will fight to block change. And we've got to overcome that resistance."
At yesterday's event, which Obama's campaign said drew about 600 people, the Illinois senator also criticized Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzalez, vowing to appoint a replacement who Obama said would represent the people, not him.
He again called for diverting the billions being spent every month in Iraq to domestic programs, such as broadband network expansions and other infrastructure improvements rurally.
"I still can't get a cellphone signal when I'm driving through New Hampshire," he said.
WASHINGTON -- While on a tour highlighting poverty this week, Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards faced more questions about whether his focus on the issue was undermined by, among other things, his work at a hedge fund and his $6 million house.
A closer look at his campaign finance reports shows another potential contradiction: His campaign paid more than $200,000 in May and June to a Georgia-based media consultant that was working at the same time with an antilabor group dedicated to exposing the way unions have plowed "mandatory union dues" into their "radical political agendas."
While Edwards was launching his first campaign ads, the group Center for Union Facts launched its own advertising aimed at stopping unions from using membership dues for political contributions. (The ads can be viewed at www.unionfacts.com/ads.cfm .)
Edwards's consultant, LUC Media, operates from the same suite with the same chief executive as the agency that purchased advertising time for the Center for Union Facts, a company called 1-2-1 Interactive Media.
Christopher Werner, listed on Georgia incorporation papers as the chief executive of both firms, said the two companies are "totally separate entities."
"I have an interest from way back, but I don't do any work for" 1-2-1 Interactive, Werner said. "We're thrilled to be working for Senator Edwards."
Edwards' aides said they are looking into the matter. (
