The result was, of course, that today, tragically, more than 40 million Americans don't have health insurance, and for many, not having health insurance means they don't have access to good health care.
For people who have health insurance, we can provide health insurance reforms that make the insurance they have more secure. And we can do that mostly by using money that every expert agrees is being wasted and is currently in the existing health care system.
As a physician and a U.S. senator, I have warned since the very beginning about many troubling aspects of Mr. Obama's unprecedented health-insurance mandate. Not only does he believe he can order you to buy insurance, the president also incorrectly equates health insurance coverage with medical care.
We should all have the legal right to purchase health insurance from any insurance company in any state, and we should be able use that insurance wherever we live. Health insurance should be portable.
Gingrich first backed the concept in 1993, "I am for people, individuals - exactly like automobile insurance - individuals having health insurance and being required to have health insurance.
Health insurance costs in the United States are on an unsustainable path. I've heard from hundreds of Montanans who are paying thousands of dollars every year for their health insurance coverage and thousands more for deductibles before their insurance provides any benefit.
Health insurance in Germany continues with no change if you lose a job. We do know very well that people who become unemployed are at an increased risk of becoming ill, and therefore becoming unemployed is about the worst time to lose health insurance. So therefore, everyone who loses a job remains in exactly the same insurance system he is in.
While Free Choice Vouchers didn't fulfill my vision of a health care system in which every American would be empowered to hire and fire their insurance company, they were a foothold for choice and competition and a safety valve for Americans whose employers are already forcing them to bear more and more of their family's health insurance costs.
Obamacare mandates a largely uniform structure and set of benefits and insurance design across the entire country. It leaves consumers with very little real choice of the health benefits they want.
Even families with health insurance are quite vulnerable to a severe economic reversal if someone gets sick.
People are ready to say, 'Yes, we are ready for single-payer health insurance.' We are the only industrialized country in the world that does not have national health insurance. We are the richest in wealth and the poorest in health of all the industrial nations.
Providing access to a public option for health insurance would allow all Americans the choice to buy a government insurance plan, much like I buy for my family as a military retiree.
I'm a person who doesn't necessarily enjoy feeling vulnerable, so I think my loved ones and my family make me feel vulnerable. Also, being connected with people when I'm working is a very vulnerable place to be.
If you're self-employed, between jobs, or can't get insurance through work, you'll have access to affordable health insurance as good as Congressman Paul Ryan's.
In America, the average playwright makes less than a receptionist in a non-profit theatre. We don't have decent health insurance - or any health insurance at all.
If you have health insurance, then you don't have to do anything. If you've got health insurance through your employer, you can keep your health insurance, keep your choice of doctor, keep your plan.