Senate panel OKs health reform bill; Obama: ‘We’re not there yet’

The health care reform debate reached a new milestone Tuesday as a key congressional committee passed an $829 billion plan projected to extend coverage to an additional 29 million Americans. The Senate Finance Committee’s bill would subsidize insurance for poorer Americans, establish nonprofit health care cooperatives, and create health insurance exchanges to make it easier for small groups and individuals to purchase coverage

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Pushback grows against insurance industry report

They’re angry and fighting back with full force. The White House, Democrats and health care experts are blasting a new insurance industry trade report that finds that health insurance premiums for the typical American family would increase by $4,000 by 2019 under a key Senate overhaul plan

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Health-Care Reform: Democrats Brace for Next Challenge

With the passage of health-care-reform legislation out of the Senate Finance Committee expected on Tuesday, the debate moves into a new and delicate stage. It is one that will test the legislative and political skills of Senate majority leader Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on a scale that no congressional leadership team has had to face in at least four decades.

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Taliban leader boasts of eventual victory in Afghanistan

The Taliban fight against American and NATO troops in Afghanistan “is forging ahead like a powerful flood,” according to a purported online message posted Saturday by the Taliban’s elusive leader, Mullah Mohammed Omar. “Anyone who opts to resist it will himself be washed away.

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Senate bracing for a ‘hard slog’ on stimulus bill

Democrats admit it’s going to be a tough fight to get President Obama’s economic stimulus plan passed with bipartisan support, but they are optimistic it can be done. On Thursday night, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, said it is going to be a “long, hard slog” with “late nights” after the $900 billion bill comes to the Senate floor Monday night

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