Health care law becomes a campaign rallying point

AP photoRepublican presidential candidate Mitt Romney speaks about the Supreme Court ruling on health care in Washington. President Barack Obama and Romney say the Supreme Courts decision last week upholding the presidents health care law gives them each advantages in the roughly dozen of states they are contesting most aggressively.

DES MOINES, Iowa President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney both are using the Supreme Court decision upholding the federal health care insurance requirement, loved by liberals and hated by conservatives, to rally core supporters in the most competitive states in the presidential race.

Yet while each side may be benefiting from groundswells of volunteers and money, the ruling seems unlikely to sway the legions of undecided voters who are focused heavily on the economy not on the health care debate that has raged in this country for years.

As a result, Republicans and Democrats alike say how the health care ruling influences a race that polls show is close will depend on how the campaigns use it to ramp up activity in the dozen or so states that Obama and Romney are contesting most aggressively.

Whoever gets the organizational advantage ... thats the real impact of the decision, said Jesse Harris, who led Obamas 2008 early vote effort in Iowa. In a state like this, that could be decisive.

A week after the decision, Democrat Obamas campaign is pointing to swollen ranks of campaign volunteers, in places like Iowa and Michigan, who have been emboldened to protect the health care overhaul now that it has been declared the law of the land. Opponents had argued that the requirement that all individuals to buy health insurance was a constitutional overreach.

The law I passed is here to stay, Obama said to applause in Ohio this week.

Republican challenger Romney says the anger on the right has boosted fundraising in presidential battlegrounds, with millions in small-dollar contributions pouring in from conservatives who see the former Massachusetts governor as the last hope for getting the law repealed.

What the court did not do on its last day in session, I will do on my first day if elected president of the United States. And that is I will act to repeal Obamacare, Romney said last week in response to the ruling.

Americans across the country, and in the most hotly contested states like Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Ohio and Virginia remain skeptical about Obamas signature policy accomplishment. Several polls taken in the last year in key states show narrow majorities opposing the law and supporting its repeal.

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Health care law becomes a campaign rallying point

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