Clinton promotes expanded health care coverage in first appearance since announcing White House bid

Clinton promotes expanded health care coverage in first appearance since announcing White House bid
Beth Fouhy / Associated Press
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Printer friendly version Comment on this story Send this story to a friend Get Home Delivery NEW YORK -- Hillary Rodham Clinton promoted legislation Sunday to improve health care for children in her first public appearance since announcing her presidential candidacy.
"In the richest of all countries we have both the obligation, and now the opportunity, to make sure no child does go without health insurance," the Democratic senator from New York said at a community health center.
"It's simply wrong for any child to lack health care in America. That's where we start," she said.
Earlier Sunday, one of her White House rivals said Clinton is the favorite right now for the Democratic nomination, but the party is a "lifetime" away from making its 2008 choice.
"I think she's incredibly formidable and has got to be the front-runner and the odds-on pick right now. But this is a marathon. There's a long way to go," said Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del.
The former first lady and current New York senator joined the race on Saturday, hoping to become the first female president.
A crowded field of candidates is led by Clinton, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama and 2004 vice presidential nominee John Edwards. New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson jumped in on Sunday.
Biden, however, said he did not look at the race as Clinton's to lose.
"Look, listen, we're a lifetime away. Hillary Clinton is going to have to make her best case. And there's a lot of us out there that are known but in a sense not known, and we're going to make our best case. And I don't think Hillary's best case versus mine or Barack's or anybody else's necessarily trumps us," said Biden, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Clinton made her announcement on a video posted Saturday on her Web site. Obama said last week he was setting up a committee to raise money and gauge support for a run.
Former GOP House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who is considering a 2008 bid, said he thought Obama "forced Senator Clinton's hand by weeks. I mean, he has gained ground so rapidly that I think she sort of thought she had to remind her friends she was around."
Gingrich said Clinton "can raise far more resources than any other Democrat, probably raise more resources than all the other Democrats combined. And you'd have to say, given those assets, that she has a six-out-of-10 chance or better of being the Democratic nominee."
Clinton's controversial tenure as first lady left her a deeply polarizing figure among voters, leading many Democrats to doubt her viability in a general election.
"I don't think that's true," said Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich. "I think that we have a lot of candidates there that are able to not only win the nomination but also win the election."
Levin, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said "there's a Democratic tide that is running in this country for good reasons. I think six years of the Bush administration have given people a lot of reasons to look for Democratic alternatives."
It is up to Democrats now, he said, "to really show what those alternatives are in the next two years in Congress, now controlled by Democrats. And I'm very confident that the strongest candidate will emerge, but we don't know who that Democrat is yet."
Biden and Levin appeared on "Fox News Sunday," while Gingrich was on "Meet the Press" on NBC.
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