The single most important thing

How much did you damage your standing with the Democratic base when you said that immediate withdrawal from Iraq wasn't possible?

Certain things are worth losing elections over. Certain things are worth losing primaries over. I have been critical of the Republican Party and this president for not Black Back Zip Latex Catsuit leveling with the American people. How can I as -- forget me as a presidential candidate -- how can I as one of the, quote "leading" or most often heard voices in the Democratic Party engage in the same series of non- truths to the American people? What about the mother, the wife, the husband who has a child in Baghdad -- who has a child in Fallujah -- a husband or a wife? What does it say to them to tell them something that is flat not true? Go ahead and elect me and I'll get them home next month. It is not fair -- it is not true. The truth -- speaking truth to power is what this nation needs, and the American public is much more sophisticated than those of us inside this Beltway give them credit for. They can handle anything.

My colleagues in the Senate are tired of hearing me saying it for the last five years -- I said it time and time again. I thought the one thing we all learned from the Vietnam War whether we went or didn't go -- whether we were for it or against it -- that no foreign policy can be sustained in America without the informed consent of the American people. The Democrats at a minimum have a requirement to inform the consent of the American people. It may have hurt me just like my vote may have hurt me -- the only Democrat to vote for that funding, but I fought like hell to get enough money to build 2,500 up- armored vehicles -- vehicles called MRAPs that the statistics show would save between 66 and 80 percent of the lives lost in injuries caused in Iraq. Seventy-five -- 70 percent of all the deaths in Iraq occurred because of roadside bombs -- 70 percent. Seventy percent of all the 25,000 injuries are caused by roadside bombs. How in God's name in good conscience, when you know you could put out up to 2,500 of those vehicles by the end of the summer, saving scores of lives, how could you to make a political point vote no when you know that absent having 67 votes you cannot stop this president? All if we had done -- we only got 14 votes by the way -- the strongest anti-war critics consistent -- Carl Levin, Joe Biden, Jack Murtha -- we all voted for it. So as I said, there's some things worth losing elections over.

Have some more political questions. Someone in the audience asks, "Senator, why aren't you attending the yearly Kos convention this week?"

To tell you the truth, I thought I was but I don't know the answer to that question why I'm not because I don't know my schedule. I either made a commitment to do something else -- it's not because my reluctance to go to the Daily Kos convention. They're a major part of the Democratic Party. They are not the Democratic Party -- they're a major part of the party. They warrant being listened to and they warrant hearing what we have to say, and -- but I am not failing to go for any political purpose. If I'm -- where -- oh, I know why I'm not going. I'm not going because ahead of time Random House had set up -- I know why I'm Black Latex Catsuit not going. There's a major event in Delaware where there's a book party and a book signing and

Isn't it wonderful -- isn't it wonderful -- you've got to raise $100 million to be the nominee. This is obscene, ladies and gentlemen. This is flat obscene. Let me say it again: it's obscene, the idea that you expect to have a free, unfettered ability to make decisions that affect the nation in a dispassionate way and you think you need $100 million to run.

The single most important thing we could do to change politics in America is what I introduced with a guy named Dick Clark, who runs the Aspen Institute now, in 1974: public financing of elections.

And the other thing I'd point out, when you all figure out -- find me a single poll in America -- in Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina or Nevada -- where it shows that more than 10 percent of the people in the Democratic Party have made up their mind for sure. Find me one. Find me a single poll at this time in the -- since 1952 that's turned out to be right. Find me a single time when the national press has been correct.

Remember, as late as I think it was December or January, just before Iowa caucus, the 50 leading pundits in the United States of America -- political pundits in the press -- were asked who was likely to win the nomination, who was likely to win Iowa. Not one picked John Kerry. I think it's time we all start to, again, tell the truth. The truth is no one's made up their mind yet in the Democratic Party. The truth is I may not be the nominee, but I may. And the truth is I believe at the end of the day ideas matter more than money, as long as you have just enough money to make sure your ideas get across. And I'll have enough money

The Commonwealth Fund says that none of the candidates have a comprehensive health care plan. Do you?

Yes and no. Let me explain what I mean by that.

There's a lot of good health care plans out there. But let me ask you all -- you're probably one of the most informed audiences in the country that I could speak to. I'm not being facetious. Can any one of you explain to me Senator Obama's health care plan? Can any one of you explain to me -- would you be willing to come up here and explain to me John Edwards' health care plan? I'm not -- they're good plans. I am not denigrating those two men. They're good plans.

But that's the point. The point is not the plan. The point is having the leadership ability to be able to take on the special interest groups so that you can, in fact, have a prospect the Black Latex Corset Catsuit plan can survive. Does anybody think we're going to take $2 trillion in the economy -- that's the amount of money we spend on health care -- and move it in one vote from here to here? Raise your hand. Anyone?

So, as they say in my old neighborhood, "Let's get real here." We cannot make the perfect the enemy the good. That's why I would immediately begin to build a consensus to undercut the ability of the insurance companies, who will spend a half a billion dollars this time, with Harry and Louise, as they spent a quarter of a billion (dollars) last time, taking one element or two elements of a plan out of context, as they did with Clinton, and beating the living bedevil out of the plan. If you can't explain it -- I'm experienced enough to know if you can't explain it to people, you can't win it.