Edwards: Free College for Everyone Is AchievableSen. John Edwards answers questions in our presidential mashup.

The following is an unedited transcript and may contain typos or omissions. Click here for more on the presidential mashup.

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Edwards: There's no way for me to know that. I think that anything that comes through the administration and the White House has a PR spin on it. That's been true through the entire war. It's one of the reasons that the American people have lost faith in this president. They don't think he's being open and straight with them, and they don't—he and the vice president, Cheney, and the result is they don't listen to what he says anymore. Anything that comes through the filter of the White House and comes through somebody speaking on behalf of the administration, I think has the same kind of issue.

Rose: Let me turn to health care. You were first out of the gate with a health-care program that you would initiate if you become president. In constructing that program, tell me how you came to the conclusions you did about universal coverage.

Edwards: Well, basically what I decided was, first, the only way to have universal coverage was to actually mandate it, in other words, to have a legal requirement that every man, woman, and child in America be covered. That was probably the single most controversial element of my proposal when I made it, and as you said, I was the first one out of the gate. I believed that that was important because if anybody's plan is not universal, then they should be made to explain to the American people and the Democratic primary voters why—what man or woman in America is not worthy of health care. I think they're all worthy of health care. And then I constructed it in a way that everybody required to be covered, that people could choose between a private plan and the government plan, which is essentially Medicare plus. I did that for a very simple reason. Because there is a very good and legitimate argument that we should go straight to single-payer health care as other countries have. I wanted—I've also heard the flipside of that from lots of people I've met around the country, who are nervous about going to a Canadian system, for example. So what I did is construct this plan so that Americans could choose, and then we'd see in a model of the entire country what actually works best. If Americans choose to go towards the government plan, this could gravitate in a single-payer plan. That's perfectly fine with me. But we're going to have the American people deciding what provides the most cost effective, most efficient health care. What provides the best health care. That's the reason it's constructed the way it is.

Rose: You would not eliminate necessarily a single-payer system as the best way to go?

Edwards: Oh, no, I would not. I mean, there are huge advantages to single-payer, which all the proponents speak about regularly. It's much more—much lower administrative costs. Medicare, for example, which is tantamount to single-payer for seniors, Medicare has a 3 percent to 4 percent overhead. I mean, most private insurers are somewhere between 30 percent to 40 percent overhead and profits. So there are serious advantages. But I thought it was something that we should let Americans decide. Get everybody covered, get rid of the holes in the system. Which means outlaw pre-existing conditions. Mental health parity. Put mental health parity in place. Make sure prevention care, long term care, chronic care, and dental and vision care are covered and then set up a system that everybody's health care goes with them wherever they go. If they're laid off or if they change jobs, or move, which is the big problem, not having coverage and cost, which I didn't speak about. We saved about $120 or $130 billion a year system-wide with a whole range of provisions to bring down costs.

Rose: How much would your plan cost?

Edwards: $90 to $120 billion a year. I know that there will be some who argue that they can do universal health care either for free or for very low cost. I don't believe that's the truth. And I think we need to tell people the truth about this. My plan is $90 to $120 billion a year. And I pay for by rolling back President Bush's tax cuts for people who make over $200,000 a year.

Rose: All right, say one other thing—

Edwards: Yes.

Edwards: Charlie, can I say one last thing about this? I won't take long on it. I do think that there's a fundamental issue that voters need to focus on in looking at these health-care plans, because I believe without taking drug companies, insurance companies, and their lobbyists on— head on, we will never have universal health care. And they are what has stood between America and universal health care for decades now. And I know that some of those who are running on my side, the Democratic side, argue that you should give them a seat at the table, you should negotiate with them, compromise with them. I fundamentally disagree with that. I respect their view, but I think that view will not work. If, in fact, you could compromise with drug company lobbyists, for example, and negotiate with them and reach a deal, we'd already have universal health care. The reason we don't have universal health care is these people have absolutely no intention of giving away their power voluntarily. We have to take their power away from them. Which means the president of the United States with the backing of the American people. I think that is an important and fundamental difference. I don't think you can defend the system in Washington and say you're going to work with the people in that system and say you're going to bring about the change we need in this country. I don't think that change will ever occur unless you're willing to confront what's wrong fundamentally with the way Washington and lobbyists work in Washington.

Rose: I assume that means you would not accept any contributions from lobbyists who represent the health care industry and you might seriously consider not accepting contributions from principal executives at insurance companies or pharmaceutical companies?

Edwards: I've never taken any money from Washington lobbyists. I've challenged the other candidates to not going back, not giving money back but going forward for us to make it clear we're not taking money from Washington lobbyists. Ultimately, the answer to this is public financing of all our campaigns, which is what I will fight for as president

Rose: Here's a question—a user question from Kathy Henry. She basically says, how do I encourage my children to attend college when they see their college-educated mother get laid off and has not been able to find gainful employment?

Edwards: You see she's got the same problem that thousands and thousands of families across this country face. What I proposed is something called college for everyone. It's a very simple concept. The idea is for any young person in America who graduates from high school, qualifies to go to college, and commits to work while they're there, a minimum of 10 hours a week, we pay for their tuition and books. So the notion is knock down the barriers, don't give it away, make sure that young people who want to go to college and are committed to go to college are willing to work for it. I think that work ethic is an American value. I worked when I was in college like millions of other people. And I think it's a good thing for me and I think it's generally been good for those who have done it. And in addition to that, you don't have kids graduating from college with this huge, crushing burden of debt. I will say we've actually put a similar model in place in the place you know, Green County, N.C., a relatively poor county in eastern North Carolina. It's just that we did it for the first year of college there. So far it's been hugely successful. We've had it there a couple of years, and I believe last count I saw was about 70 percent of the kids were signed up for college for everyone.

Rose: Let me just make sure I understand you. You're proposing free college for everybody for four years for a four-year program, not just community college for two years and not just the first year?

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