Former President Clinton’s speech in support of Obama administration health care policy was to begin at 10 a.m.
Surprise, it’s running behind.
It’s being streamed live on the Clinton Foundation website.
David Ramsey is in attendance and will be reporting.
Clinton arrived at 10: 29 a.m.
Gov. Beebe, A.G. McDaniel, former Sen. David and Barbara Pryor, Speaker Davy Carter, Senate President Lamoureux were called out in preliminary remarks. First speaker was Mara D’Amico, student body president at the Clinton School of Public Service. She’s still on her parents insurance thanks to the Affordable Care Act. But she turns 26 this year and must purchase her own insurance. She needs it because of a pre-existing condition — diabetes. Options once limited are “now wide open,” she said — a “dream come true.”
Clinton began with information that should be familiar to all Americans, but apparently isn’t: We pay more than other developed countries for health care that produces worse outcomes, while leaving more people without coverage and forced into bankruptcy by medical care. We pay more for drugs, too.
The Affordable Care Act makes coverage more widely available and more affordable and reimbursed based on results. He lauded Arkansas’s bipartisan effort to address the issue. But he said there’d be problems in implementation, as with any complex law, and that improvements could be made.
The Arkansas Republican Party sneered at the speech. Obamacare isn’t working, they say, even if it hasn’t fully taken effect yet.