Obama's take on Healthcare in his State of the Union

In his State of the Union address, President Obama discussed healthcare and how he hopes Congress won't walk away from reform. He talked about how reform would relieve costs on middle class families and help ensure more people are covered. He also talked about how reform could actually reduce the deficit, contrary to what opponents say.He also cited how it would reduce costs to small businesses. He emphasized essentially how healthcare reform could help Americans more than hurt them. He mentioned anecdotes about people and businesses that could be helped be the bill which I think was a good tactic in trying to get people to identify with the need to pass the bill. However I fear this effort might have come to late.

The fact that Obama discussed heathcare towards the end of his speech leads me to think that either in a positive light healthcare something he wants to emphasize and push Congress to reform (which is most likely the case). However I fear very much that he might have spoken about it last because it could be considered as a dead bill now that Republicans have enough votes to kill it.

I was listening to NPR where a commentator said that the reform has failed because it wasn't explained well to the public and there was a lot of things that were unclear. I agree with this. I wish so much that Obama or someone in the administration had clearly explained to the American public what the bill would do, what it wouldn't do and how it could really help Americans rather than waiting until the bill might fail to emphasize these things. I wish people understood that as Obama said that this bill could reduce costs. If it doesn't go through I fear very much that healthcare costs will rise tremendously and even more people will be left uninsured. People seem so worried about rises in taxes and the influence of socialism/big government that they can't seem to get their heads around the fact that if the status quo remains in regard to healthcare, things will only get worse and if people get sick, they may not be paying higher taxes but they'll still be emptying their pocketbooks just to cover the high costs that care incurs in this country.

Since I'm pursuing a Master's in Health Communication, if I had had the chance, I'd try and get these messages across to people even if it meant going on every TV channel I could get on or getting interviews with magazines just to get clear and correct information out about the bill before people became misinformed. I feel like misinformation will be the real killer of this reform if it dies.

I want to be optimistic and hope that some reform will happen but at this point I can't help but feel rather pessimistic about it all. I feel like fear is keeping people in favor of the status quo even if its seriously flawed. Personally, I'm afraid that if this bill does die then it will take even longer to work a new bill out. As Obama pointed out its taken 100 years to get a bill this far I really hope that reform will come sooner rather than later.

I feel passionate about this issue because I have two preexisting conditions so if the status quo remains, after I graduate from grad school in the spring I will essentially be uninsurable unless I stay in Massachusetts where health insurance is guaranteed or get a job with the government or a large company. I realize I'm not badly off at all really in that I do have a lot of options but I still can't help feeling like my job search is dependent upon getting a job that will guarantee me health insurance. I feel its unfair that I and others with preexisting conditions are penalized for having diseases we can't help having. Its not fair.

I wish I could make people see things differently and see that its not the bill that's the evil, its the status quo that's toxic and it can't be allowed to continue.