Roger Hickey

Jacob Hacker’s 2006 book, The Great Risk Shift, helped politicians understand the economic pressures on the average family — including the rising costs and increasing loss of health insurance — or the threat.

Like most participants in President Obama’s Health Care Summit last Thursday, I was thrilled to be invited to the White House for the big public meeting on health care. At the Summit, the President did what the leaders and activists of the 800 organizations in our Health Care for America Now coalition have been urging:

At a press conference today by Wall Street mogul Peter Peterson, he and his invited speakers informed Americans who are losing their jobs and homes in record numbers that our nation’s biggest problem is the national deficit—and that the solution is to cut Social Security and Medicare.

Long before anyone had been nominated or elected, the voters of 2008 had gotten one message across loud and clear: Fix our dysfunctional health care system! For obvious reasons (and big reasons that aren't so obvious), the leaders of 2009 must heed that call.

This year Americans want to talk about health care – and most of us want to talk about covering the uninsured and reducing the costs of health care – but often what we get from the media is just cynical double talk. Case in point: a column by Robert Samuelson in the September 10 Washington Post and this week’s Newsweek.

On Tuesday, July 8, a new campaign will be launched – for Health Care for America Now! – at press conferences in Washington and 55 other cities and towns. We at the Campaign for America’s Future are proud to play a leadership role in launching this much-needed campaign, led by 100 national and local organizations.

Jacob Hacker’s 2006 book, The Great Risk Shift, helped politicians understand the economic pressures on the average family — including the rising costs and increasing loss of health insurance — or the threat.

Like most participants in President Obama’s Health Care Summit last Thursday, I was thrilled to be invited to the White House for the big public meeting on health care. At the Summit, the President did what the leaders and activists of the 800 organizations in our Health Care for America Now coalition have been urging:

At a press conference today by Wall Street mogul Peter Peterson, he and his invited speakers informed Americans who are losing their jobs and homes in record numbers that our nation’s biggest problem is the national deficit—and that the solution is to cut Social Security and Medicare.

Long before anyone had been nominated or elected, the voters of 2008 had gotten one message across loud and clear: Fix our dysfunctional health care system! For obvious reasons (and big reasons that aren't so obvious), the leaders of 2009 must heed that call.

This year Americans want to talk about health care – and most of us want to talk about covering the uninsured and reducing the costs of health care – but often what we get from the media is just cynical double talk. Case in point: a column by Robert Samuelson in the September 10 Washington Post and this week’s Newsweek.

On Tuesday, July 8, a new campaign will be launched – for Health Care for America Now! – at press conferences in Washington and 55 other cities and towns. We at the Campaign for America’s Future are proud to play a leadership role in launching this much-needed campaign, led by 100 national and local organizations.