There are a lot of things driving up the cost of medical care in the U.S. Poorly managed chronic diseases and increasingly expensive medical equipment and drugs are partly to blame. But a lack of consumer awareness of how much health care actually costs is just as important. What was the full cost of the last medical procedure, surgery …
Today’s speech by President Obama was not the first in which he’s urged passage of comprehensive health care reform, but he’s hoping it will be his last. We’ll see.
Flanked by health care workers and wearing a bipartisan purple tie – a rarity for him – President Obama delivered remarks that carried a theme of finality. …
The White House has released parts of the health care statement President Obama will make today at 1:45 p.m. The President’s remarks are meant to give Democrats the confidence to follow the only available path left – a reconciliation package in the Senate and House passage of the underlying Senate bill. The statement will be a …
As Adam noted earlier, President Obama sent a letter to House and Senate leadership today outlining four GOP ideas he wants to integrate into Democratic health reform legislation. In his letter, the President called out some Republicans senators by name, describing which ideas came from whom. But this too is political theater – no …
Even if they still face an uphill climb on health care reform, Democrats have regained their footing since Scott Brown’s Senate victory in Massachusetts. Shortly after the election, it seems as though comprehensive reform was dead, at least for 2010. And now here we are talking about the not totally unrealistic Democratic strategy for …
TIME’s Sophia Yan has a dispatch from the frontlines of the PR war underway in the health care reform debate.
It’s now or never for health care reform and all interested parties know it — including Health Care for America Now, a grassroots reform advocacy group. In the past year, HCAN has urged Americans to come forward
…
Campaign Diaries has taken a long, hard look at the House and published a rundown of members who are potential swing votes on health care. (The Democrats’ current strategy appears to have the House pass the Senate bill and then have both chambers pass a package of changes to that underlying legislation via simple majority.) Daniel …
Let no one question that President Obama is still hoping to push health care reform across the finish line – he stayed put and moderated the entire seven and a half hour bipartisan summit on the issue today.
Let’s just get that out of the way. Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin, arguing against capping malpractice awards, just said doing so would cut only about 1/5 of 1% of health spending. The Congressional Budget Office said in October it could save 0.5% of spending. Either way, it’s not the sole reason the U.S. health care system is growing at …
Rep. Paul Ryan, a Republican deficit hawk, just made a compelling case for how the Senate health reform bill is actually not the cost saver the Congressional Budget Office says it is. His main point was that the Senate bill makes cuts and collects taxes for 10 years, but only includes 6 years of spending. He says the result is a …
When you’re a politician, talking about your own personal experience can be an effective way of connecting with voters on policy issues. It’s humanizing and makes you seem accessible. Politicians know this, of course, which is why we learned some interesting personal details at the summit today about senators Tom Harkin, Mike Enzi …
The summit just broke for lunch. They are running way over time and Demcorats are getting more of it, partly because President Obama is talking a lot in response to statements by Republican lawmakers. Make no mistake about it. This is Obama’s meeting. He’s running it – calling on lawmakers one by one and talking whenever he wants.
(UPDATE: One of the quotes below was slightly off in my original version – it’s been corrected. And here’s a link to video of the exchange described below.)
President Obama and John McCain just got into a little tussle that you’ll probably see on TV later.
McCain made a statement that the Democrats crafted their bills behind closed …
