Responding to complaints that he is long on charisma and short on specifics, Senator Barack Obama unveiled a detailed heathcare plan today at one of the nation's largest teaching hospitals: the University of Iowa Hospital and Clinics (UIHC). For the advance text of his remarks, see "Obama Remarks as Prepared for Delivery," Des Moines Register, May 29, 2007.
John Deeth has one of the most detailed and timely reports of the event at his "JDeeth" blog. And congratulations to John for the press pass he now legitimately wears as a reporter for the Center for Independent Media New Journalism Program.
And see the Press-Citizen's early report online, Kathryn Fiegen, "Obama unveils universal health care plan at UI," Iowa City Press-Citizen, May 29, 2007, 12:36 p.m.
For video of a local TV station's interview with the Senator, go to KCRG.TV, look for local news, and click on the "Video" link in "Obama Uses Iowa Examples for New Health Care Plan."
Presumably details of the plan will be available soon on the Obama Web site; meanwhile for details see, Mike Glover, "Obama Offers Universal Health Care Plan," Newsday, May 29, 2007 (available from the Obama site). The Obama site has a "Creating a Healthcare System that Works" page, but it seems to be more a collection of random ideas (which is not to say they are not good random ideas) than it is an exposition of today's health insurance plan.
My photos of the event are available at http://picasaweb.google.com/NicholasIowa. (That site also has pictures of his April 12 Iowa City visit with roughly 10,000 Iowans on the Old Capitol lawn.)
It's too early, and too complicated, for me to offer any final judgments about this proposal. It doesn't look like a "universal single payer" solution to me. The vision seems to still involve an insurance-company-funded-and-administered system. But even if it's tweaking with bailing wire and chewing gum, there seem to be a lot of creative and useful tweaks. And, while any plan always needs more details worked out (otherwise it would be a 1200-page draft bill rather than a speech), however you may evaluate his details I think he's significantly responded to the critics who have called on him to produce more detailed plans.
The UICCU-Optiva story is essentially behind us. There may be occasional additions "for the record," but for the most part the last major entry, with links to the prior material from October 2006 through March 2007, is "UICCU and 'Optiva'" in Nicholas Johnson, "UI Held Hostage Day 406 - March 3 - Optiva," March 3, 2007. Since then there have been two major additions: Nicholas Johnson, "Open Letter to UICCU Board" in "UI Held Hostage Day 423 - March 20 - UICCU," March 20, 2007, and "'Open Letter': Confirmation from World Council of Credit Unions" in "UI Held Hostage Day 424 - March 21 UICCU," March 21, 2007.
[Note: If you're new to this blog, and interested in the whole UI President Search story . . .
These blog entries begin with Nicholas Johnson, "UI President Search I," November 18, 2006.
Wondering where the "UI Held Hostage" came from? Click here. (As of January 25 the count has run from January 21, 2006, rather than last November.)
For any given entry, links to the prior 10 will be found in the left-most column. Going directly to FromDC2Iowa.Blogspot.com will take you to the latest. Each contains links to the full text of virtually all known media stories and commentary, including mine, since the last blog entry. Together they represent what The Chronicle of Higher Education has called "one of the most comprehensive analyses of the controversy." The last time there was an entry containing the summary of prior entries' commentary (with the heading "This Blog's Focus on Regents' Presidential Search") is Nicholas Johnson, "UI President Search XIII -- Last Week," December 11, 2006.
My early proposed solution to the conflict is provided in Nicholas Johnson, "UI President Search VII: The Answer," November 26, 2006.
Searching: the fullest collection of basic documents related to the search is contained in Nicholas Johnson, "UI President Search - Dec. 21-25," December 21, 2006 (and updated thereafter), at the bottom of that blog entry under "References." A Blog Index of entries on all subjects since June 2006 is also available. And note that if you know (or can guess at) a word to search on, the "Blogger" bar near the top of your browser has a blank, followed by "SEARCH THIS BLOG," that enables you to search all entries in this Blog since June 2006.]
See above.
Technorati tags: football, athletics, academics, high school, college, University of Iowa, education, K-12, leadership, university president, Michael Gartner, Iowa Board of Regents, UI president search, Nicholas Johnson, FromDC2Iowa
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