BUSINESS
March 24, 2012 | Michael Hiltzik
In today's world of 24-hour news and 15-second sound bites, every policymaker knows that managing the message is the key to winning over the public. So why has the messaging on behalf of one of the most dramatic public reforms of our lifetimes, the federal Affordable Care Act, been so incompetent? Provisions of the 2010 healthcare reform have already changed the lives of millions of Americans for the better. It has brought insurance coverage to more than 2.6 million previously uninsured young adults, cut prescription costs by a total of $3 billion for millions of seniors, eliminated co-pays on preventive services such as child immunizations and cancer screenings and eliminated annual and lifetime claims caps for more than 80 million policyholders.
ENTERTAINMENT
June 30, 2010
POP MUSIC Hot Hot Heat Post punk impresarios from British Columbia, Hot Hot Heat returns with "Future Breeds," its first album since 2007's "Happiness Ltd." The dudes have been burning up the Bootleg Theater every Wednesday this month, and Wednesday they'll be closing out their residency with Voxhaul Broadcast and the Union Line supporting. Bootleg Theater, 2220 Beverly Blvd. 8:30 p.m. $12. www.foldsilverlake.com. Damien Jurado With his ninth album, "Saint Bartlett," misty-eyed troubadour Damien Jurado has turned in a steadily affecting batch of rustic songs made lush with unexpected instrumentation and a wider sense of space.
NATIONAL
January 3, 2010 | By James Oliphant
The Senate passed its version of the healthcare overhaul on Christmas Eve. Here are some questions about what's next as the legislation continues to work its way through Congress: What's going to happen this month? The Senate's healthcare legislation must now be merged with the House version -- and that could be tricky. Senate and House negotiators could choose to meet in a formal conference committee to work out the differences or instead work out a deal in a looser, give-and-take fashion.
NATIONAL
December 19, 2009 | By Richard Simon and James Oliphant
In this season of good cheer and glad tidings, Congress has become one of the meanest places on Earth. Republicans recently angered Democrats by invoking a rarely used rule that required reading legislation aloud on the Senate floor for nearly three hours. Democrats infuriated Republicans by denying the customary courtesy of allowing a senator to speak on her amendment before it came up for a vote. When one senator was denied an additional minute to finish his remarks -- normally an unremarkable indulgence -- Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.
NATIONAL
December 6, 2009 | By Noam N. Levey
As the Senate healthcare debate stretched through the weekend, President Obama made plans to visit Capitol Hill this afternoon to meet with Democratic lawmakers at a rare weekend caucus gathering. The move comes as Democratic leaders are pushing the Senate to complete work on its bill before Christmas, a deadline seen as crucial if Congress is to send the president healthcare legislation by the end of January. A month ago, Obama visited the Capitol to rally House Democrats just before they voted to pass their version of the overhaul, which the president has made a cornerstone of his domestic agenda.
NATIONAL
December 4, 2009 | By Noam N. Levey
After days of delay, Senate Democrats pushed ahead Thursday with their drive to pass a healthcare bill by Christmas, approving the first amendment to their giant bill: a measure to expand women's access to preventive services such as mammograms. The proposal by Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski (D-Md.), which passed on a largely party-line 61-39 vote, would authorize the federal government to require insurers to cover women's preventive care and screenings without co-payments. The amendment is expected to cost about $940 million over 10 years.