Obama's Healthcare Reform

President Obama has set healthcare reform as his highest domestic legislative priority and has begun an intense push to get a bill through Congress by the end of summer. Obama spoke at a town hall-style meeting in Green Bay, Wisconsin, Thursday, where he defended his call for a government-sponsored health plan to compete with private insurers. Private insurers have opposed a government-run program out of fear they’d be unable to compete with its cheaper costs. Obama did not, however, address his progressive critics who advocate the creation of a single-payer system that would eliminate for-profit insurance companies entirely. But Obama’s plan to create a “public option” to compete with private coverage is opposed by Republican lawmakers, private insurers and, most recently, the American Medical Association. The American Medical Association came out and said that they didn’t think that government had a role in assuring healthcare for all Americans. Really what that was all about was they were afraid of interference with the practice of medicine,blican lawmakers, private insurers and, most recently, the American Medical Association.