On Health Care, the Messenger Changes, But Questions Remain the Same

By Dan Balz
The repeated applause President Obama received from members of the American Medical Association as he laid out his case for health care reform today illustrated anew why many people believe the political climate for action has rarely been better.

But as the president was speaking in Chicago, a leading Democratic polling firm was releasing the details of a new survey that underscored how divided the country remains over some of the basic choices in the reform package and why the president will need to do more before he can expect to see legislation on his desk for signature.

Though congressional committees have been working steadily for months on health care, Obama's speech marked the true opening of this health care debate. The speech represented his most comprehensive argument for acting now to reform the health care system.

At its heart, the speech was a rallying cry for political leaders to come together to fix a system whose costs continue to spiral upward and which leaves 46 million people without insurance. The current system is an unsustainable burden on the U.S. economy and, as Obama put it, "a ticking time bomb for the federal budget.

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