"When my mom got cancer, she wasn't a wealthy woman. And it pretty much drained all her resources," Mr Obama said in a super-slick Hollywood-style campaign film that was released on Thursday.
"Watching your mother die of something that could've been prevented, I don't think he wants to see anyone go through that," Michelle Obama adds on the film, which is directed by Davis Guggenheim, the Oscar winning director of An Inconvenient Truth.
The 17-minute account of Mr Obama's first term is narrated by Tom Hanks and had been used to tease donations from Obama supporters who were invited to watch "premieres" at 300 screenings last night. Campaign strategists hope to make it an online hit.
Mr Obama used the story of his dying mother back in 2008 when the promise of healthcare reform was a key plank of his campaign for President.
His reforms were passed in a water-down version now often referred to derisorily as "Obamacare" by Republicans who accuse Mr Obama of "socialising" medical care. The reforms are now the subject of a challenge in the US Supreme Court.
The film was released on the day that Mr Obama launched a withering attack on Republican's for their love of Big Oil and what he describe as their "flat-earther" approach to renewable energies. » | Peter Foster | Washington | Thursday, March 15, 2012
