part 1 of obama’s press conference yesterday. before taking questions, he makes three points: on iran, on the climate change bill being voted on friday and lastly on healthcare.
i felt it was a successful press conference. although obama was visibly more frustrated and contentious with the press corps, however he stayed on message. he needs to be consistent in hammering out these key points on healthcare:
- healthcare plan will be “pay-as-you-go legislation” meaning money will be allocated beforehand to pay for this, it is not deficit spending, it will not increase the size of the deficit.
- healthcare plan will include a public program option that will compete with private insurance to help keep costs down and quality up.
- you will not be forced to take the public program option. if you’re satisfied with your own private insurance plan you’re set. however healthcare reform bill will help lower the cost of your private insurance premiums as well.
- insurance premiums double every 9 years, at a pace three times as fast as the growth of wages. at this pace, one out of every five dollars will soon be spent on healthcare-related expenses.
- rising insurance premiums make the cost of medicare and medicaid go up as well.
