The change we like

President Obama’s health-insurance reform bill recently passed in the U.S. House of Representatives by a tight vote of 219 to 212 amid Republican cries of “socialized medicine” (a phrase left over from Harry Truman’s health-care-reform defeat in the late 1940s) and claims that Americans do not want such reform.

The history-making bill will extend coverage to 32 million uninsured Americans in a country with a health-care system described by one major British political magazine as “truly dire.”

“This legislation will not fix everything that ails our health-care system,” Obama was quoted as saying, “but it moves us decisively in the right direction.”

How do Americans feel about Congress’ passage of the bill? According to a USA Today/Gallup poll conducted a day after the bill’s passage, 50 percent of Americans gave the bill the thumbs-up, with less than half those polled expressing opposition:

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  All adults Dems Inds Repubs Enthusiastic 15 29 10 4 Pleased 35 53 35 12 Disappointed 23 9 27 38 Angry 19 2 20 41 No opinion 8 6 20 6

Source: www.gallup.com