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The issues affecting the American health care system strike at the very heart of most problems facing Congress and the President. Debate over the role of government has dominated the legislation regarding Medicaid and tobacco control. Dealing with large and popular entitlement programs have controlled the discussions of Medicare. Morality and the law continue to play out in the ongoing abortion fight.
Health care in the modern United States costs $200 billion a year to administer and it has been increasing at a rate of nine percent a year since 1980. The health care issue loomed large enough to play a pivotal role in the last presidential election. Candidate Bill Clinton promised universal coverage for all Americans. Two years later, the partisan bickering over health care reform helped shift opinion against the Democratic Congress like never before and cost the party control of the House and the Senate. During the 104th Congress, health care continued to be a hot button issue, but it was no longer a national plan. Debate now raged over how to reform Medicaid and how "protect and preserve" Medicare.
Health care continues to absorb one seventh of the U.S. Gross National Product and continued growth seems certain. As the politicians debate the direction of the future Congress, they will have to address complicated and unpleasant political issues. How will Medicare remain solvent as the "baby boomer" generation nears retirement? Should the federal government regulate tobacco use and advertising? What role does the government have in assisting the poor and disabled? These issues and others are ones the 105th Congress will have to face regardless of whether they want to or not.
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