Senior Program Officer at the California Health Care Foundation
Senior Program Officer at the California Health Care Foundation, an independent philanthropy based in Oakland, created in 1996 as a condition of state approval for Blue Cross to convert from a nonprofit to a for-profit organization
Healthcare Reform in California The atmosphere in Sacramento is right this year for action on healthcare reform. That's according to Herb Schultz, the Governor's point man on the issue , who says there may not be another such opportunity for a decade or more. Democratic leaders of the Assembly and Senate have plans of their own and so do Republicans. All of them involve the insurance industry, which now provides the funding mechanism for healthcare in America. Democratic Senator Sheila Kuehl has a plan that does away with insurance company involvement altogether, replacing it with universal healthcare, free to everybody at the point of service, administered by the government. How does that stack up against the other proposals? We take a look with Kuehl and others.
Terrorism and tweets, hate speech and murder Just days before an election, Britain is coping with a rash of deadly terrorism, and Prime Minister Theresa May is on the defensive. And again today, President Trump has tweeted criticism of the Mayor of London. Later, a double murder in Portland, Oregon has revealed the ugly past of a supposedly “progressive” city. One immediate question: is “hate speech” protected by the First Amendment?
The week that wouldn't quit Will next week get even weirder? (Special one-hour episode)
Human Rights in the era of Donald Trump President Trump’s UN Ambassador, Nikki Haley, said today the US might pull out of the United Nations’ Human Rights Council. Serious violators of human rights are members of the Council itself–and a US resignation could make things worse. Later on today’s show, now that he’s into his second term, comedian turned US Senator Al Franken is telling jokes again.
Who's to blame for the opioid crisis? Some of the lawyers who took on Big Tobacco are now going after Big Pharma. It’s all about the deadly epidemic of opioid use. Are the drug companies to blame? What about the users? Later, on today’s Talking Point: making sense of Britain’s upset election.