John Kerry on Heath Care
I love this ad. The way he says “43 million Americans don’t even have it” makes me really look forward to voting for him. Even if I don’t 100% agree with his plans, that ad (and this one) are reason enough to see why Kerry beats Bush 58% to 37% in the polling question “Who do you trust to do a better job handling health care?” (According to the same poll, Kerry also beats Bush on terrorism, the economy, the budget deficit, international affairs, taxes, and education. Ouch.)
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um, for the life of me, i can’t understand how kerry outpolls bush on education. i know bush’s numbers from texas sucketh, and i know all about hiding the dropout rates in austin and houston, but as far as no child left behind goes, i havent heard many complaints. personally, i find teaching to the test anti-productive and a waste of classtime, so i dont like the added emphasis on performance testing, but nclb has dropped a shitload of money into school systems. a friend of mine who worked on the kucinich campaign with me who teaches in orange has told me her school has more money than they know what to do with. she says some schools are actually sending money BACK to the feds.
of course, just throwing money at a problem doesnt solve it, as the right is so very quick to point out (unless you’re throwing it at iraq), but its not like i’ve heard anything about education out of kerry’s mouth besides calling for more funding. without cutting the military budget, where does this money come from? and what will he do with it?
mabey he beats bush in this category because most folks figure kerry has to be better on education than a dude who cant complete a full sentance when it isnt scripted for him.
Comment by josh — July 2, 2004 @ 3:11 pm
Well, tell your friend who teaches in Orange to send some of that money up here to Northern California, cuz in the past 2 years we’ve lost our Computer Resource teachers, our Science Teachers for the 1-3 grades, over half of our Teacher Aides, over half of our classroom materials budget (from $300 to $75 per year per teacher) all while seeing the government standards and requirements increase. Every year the requirements are different, by the way. Last year, most of our teachers were labeled as “fully qualified.” This year, most of them lost that qualification because of new requirements that just popped into being. Even online, these requirements are listed as a “draft” and could change again before the end of the summer.
NCLB has, quite simply, made it more difficult to be a teacher and given us higher standards without giving us any resources (monetary or otherwise) to meet these goals.
Your friend in Orange is extremely lucky. Every single other teacher I have spoken with, both in person and online, feels it is a miserable failure.
Good-intentioned, probably. Badly implemented, definitely.
Comment by Uncle Mike — July 2, 2004 @ 10:31 pm
Overall, I like Kerry’s ads. They’re upbeat and speak to issues that people care about. The healthcare ad is an important one, but it has a fundamental flaw. Kerry exaggerates the problem by claiming 43 million Americans don’t have health care when what he means is that they don’t have health insurance. Sometimes the two claims are equivalent, but many times, they’re not. Personally, I’d like to see him go farther and make the case that free basic health care is the right of all Americans, but for some reason, many people find that concept just too outrageous.
My only other problem with the spot is that at the very beginning, Kerry gives the impression that he’s floundering and grasping for something to say.
Comment by GoConfigure — July 3, 2004 @ 8:38 am
Using spellcheck would help
Comment by DoUCtheIronee — July 15, 2004 @ 10:37 pm