Book TV: Books that Inspired President Obama

From McNally Jackson Books in New York City, a panel discussion on the books and authors that have been influential in the academic life of President Barack Obama. The list of books ranges from The Bible to the children's book, "Where the Wild Things Are" and the E.L. Doctorow novel, "Ragtime." The panel includes David Samuels, contributing editor at Harper's Magazine, novelist Colm Toibin, author Susan Jacoby, and Eric Alterman, author and English professor at Brooklyn College, City University of New York.

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[altosame]

@PimpCoop Such business decisions could deny ermergency care to a person who paid for insurance. A person who paid for insurance could be droppeed by an HMO if the HMO deemed the medical care too costly. With the new reform, such unethical practices can no longer occur. Everybody will eventually have to have some form of insurance -- but without the unethical practices of the insurance industry. So basically instead of regulating doctors, the government went after the insurance industry.

[altosame]

@PimpCoop There were good reasons for people to be uninsured. For one thing, people with preexisting conditions were denied insurance. As per the old insurance industry, a condition long undetected by a patient may be labeled a "pre-existing condition" and thus the patient would be denied by the insurer. With HMOS -- allowed into healthcare competition by the NIxon administration -- people who have insurance could be denied healthcare by a fickle business decision.

[altosame]

@PimpCoop Basically it's the insurance industry that needed the most reform -- this is why the government stepped in. Unfortunately, the government option that I mentioned earlier, that would've lowered the cost of pharmeuticals by allowing the government to enter the competition, didn't pass -- as it was deemed "socialist" by sound-bite knee-jerk Republicans. But bigger factors of healthcare failures were accounted for. The biggest problem of the healthcare industry were the uninsured....

[altosame]

@PimpCoop As for heatlhcare, regulating pharmaceuticals would be a nice place to begin. Don't except a Republican administration to do it, though, as they believe in a hands-off approach to business. As for doctors, the government doesn't really want to tell them to lower their fees. It's the system that primarily results in overcharging. The only alternative Republicans offered during the healthcare debates was out of state options for insurers -- hardly the necessary change that was called for

[altosame]

@PimpCoop I admit Cash for Clunkers wasn't one of the President's best pieces of legislation as it didn't specifically help the American automobile industry. This is why it only lasted two months. It didn't really harm the industry either. It hasn't been around for about a year now. Another factor was to get gas guzzlers off the road, a factor that's hard to calculate the success rate. Interestingly, it was Bush the first who first put a Cash for Clunker program into practice.

[PimpCoop]

@PimpCoop So he could buy a car yet he does not make enough to pay for car payments. I would be pissed off. Second if Obama wanted to help the people he should be telling the pharmaceuticals and doctors to lower there prices on things. That way it would not cost people and companies that much to get coverage. Not make a healthcare reform. I mean there is over 500 pages yet no one know what is all inside. I also hope you like France since we will be like them in no time!

[PimpCoop]

@altosame When I pay taxes I want them to be used to help are country. LIke fixing up the roads, Going to healthcare/medicare, helping the local school ect.. Now when you start to give the guy down the street some of the money I WORKED FOR he gets a sweet 5000 just for smashing his old car I feel that is wrong. That is what he basically did. He is spreading the wealth and like I said it is Communism. How would you feel if you made 1000 and I took 350 of it and gave it to your neighbor???

[altosame]

@PimpCoop As for healthcare, and business in general, an economic "invisible hand" is supposed to guide competition and keep the field regulated. But the invisible hand gets pocketed once these companies mutually agree to inflate their prices. This seems to have happened with pharmaceuticals -- which is why Canadian meds are priced substanially lower than ours. With gov't entering into healthcare, government would then enter the competiton but outside the mutually agreed upon inflatied fees.

[altosame]

@PimpCoop I haven't been answering your question because it seems kind of general and vague. The unemployment problem began with Bush, and it has been up and down with Obama . As you probably know, taxes -- the thing you're asking why you should be paying them -- fund the nation. The reason why it's good to put money into the community is because people generally don't live in ivory towers, but in communities where their neighbors living in good homes and in good health is generally agreeable.

[PimpCoop]

@PimpCoop to have to pay for someone else to get a car, buy a house, Get healthcare ect.. If you can not afford it in the beginning why should the government make you able to pay for it with the money I give them???