Obama’s Health Insurance Reform Promises
President Obama made a lot of promises in his 2008 Presidential campaign, and many of them were around changes he wanted to see happen in America’s health care and insurance system. Unfortunately, many time politicians will talk the talk in order to get voters to punch their ticket a certain way on election day.
Walking the walk as far as campaign promises doesn’t always happen. Just look at the Bush administration…don’t even get me started. It is refreshing to hear Obama say that he is welcoming ideas on how to reform the health care proposal he created during his campaign, and I am all for a system in which many have a say in ideas to find a solution that works for everyone in the current state of the economy.
But the real question is, especially after hearing President Obama’s State of the Union address: What is the buzz around Obama’s statement of “come one, come all” for hearing opinions on health care, and will it work in creating a just and successful health care system for America?
Obama’s Campaign Trail Health Promises
Before one can look at the changes that could be taking place in the upcoming months and years, it is important to understand what Obama was telling voters was his stance and promise to reform the current United States health care system. According to President Obama’s campaign website, he had three main points he planned on addressing. They were as follows:
- President Obama promised to make health insurance affordable and accessible for all Americans. Very generically and vaguely put, he said he would provide this care for all building on the existing system and using existing doctors, providers and plans to implement his idea.
- He promised to lower health care costs. The plan Obama outlined in his campaign said that it would lower health care costs by $2,500 for a typical family by investing in health information technology, prevention, and care coordination.
- Obama promised to require coverage of preventative care by health insurance companies (including cancer screenings), as well as promote public health by increase preparedness for natural disasters and terrorist attacks.
Opinions on Obama’s NEW Health Insurance Promise
It’s not surprising that a statement like Obama has made is generating a lot of interest in the media and among politicians. Will he or won’t he? What will it do for America and Obama’s place in U.S. history if he makes significant changes to the way the health care system operates? Financial Times seems to be skeptical about how all of this will play out, nothing that Tom Daschle bowing out of the running for chief advisor for health care reform was a huge blow to the Obama administration.
The publication doesn’t seem to think that the runner-up, Kathleen Sebelius, won’t hold as much clout with Obama as Dachle would have. Morton Kondracke, who writes for Roll Call, seems to think that President Obama has bitten off more than he can chew. With all of these big changes lined up to get through the door of Congress (”bailouts, a big budget, new tax cuts and tax breaks, health care down payments and energy changes”), Kondracke says he’s worried that everything will get jammed up, making nothing a priority and bogging down the time it takes to just get one issue accomplished.
Charles Krauthammer of the Washington Post absolutely slammed Obama in a recent article, saying that around health care, President Obama was “intellectually dishonest to the core” in saying that a “‘day of reckoning’ has arrived,” stating that the President made bold promises of universalized and nationalized health care.
photo credit: ProgressOhio
Tags: barack obama, congress, health care, health insurance, politics, president, reform
