Ad Touts Gore Health Plan in an Indirect Swipe at Bush

Democrats on Monday opened another front in their television advertising campaign in support of Vice President Al Gore, airing a commercial trumpeting his plan to reform managed health care.

The 30-second spot, the third to be released by the Democratic National Committee since June 7, at least indirectly challenges George W. Bush on one of his most often-touted accomplishments as governor of Texas: his signing of a patients’ bill of rights.

Moreover, the spot represents the latest piece in a mosaic being assembled by Gore’s media consultants, one that would portray the vice president as a principled person intent on advocating consumers’ interests. An earlier DNC spot showed Gore complaining about “ridiculously high” prescription drug prices.

The spot was paid for in part with “soft money” donations, the unlimited contributions that are supposed to be used for “party-building” activities. The ad script does not mention the Democratic Party.

The new spot starts with an announcer saying, “The issue: a real patients’ bill of rights.” Gore is shown speaking to a town hall meeting and walking down a hospital hallway with doctors.

Gore says, “You’d better believe that there are insurance companies out there that don’t want to see changes that will give the decisions on your health care back to the doctors and the nurses.”

The announcer then says, “The Al Gore plan: ensures patients’ access to specialists. Safeguards to make sure doctors, not bureaucrats, make medical decisions. Stops HMOs from withholding information on treatment options to save money. Taking on the insurance companies to pass a patients’ bill of rights once and for all.”

By touting a “real patients’ bill of rights,” the ad indirectly attacks the version Bush signed as governor. In Washington, discussions over a bill that would include some provisions Gore backs have been stalled in a House-Senate conference committee for months.

In Congress, the parties have split over whether patients should have the right to sue their HMOs if they are injured as a result of their health plans’ medical decisions, but the ad doesn’t address that issue. In Texas, a 1997 bill allowing patients to sue their HMOs became law without Bush’s signature.