Insurance, Health Care Reform | featured news

Having grown up in one of the most conservative and Republican places in the country -- East Tennessee -- I understand why many of the people who are showing up at town hall meetings this month are reacting, sometimes violently, when members of Congress try to explain the need for an expanded government role in our health care system.

U.S. lawmakers plan far-reaching insurance market reforms, and would require that businesses and individuals purchase medical coverage as they seek to overhaul the U.S. healthcare system, an early draft of Senate legislation said on Saturday.

Senators are meeting behind closed doors to consider whether the federal government should jump into the health insurance business.

The Obama administration's senior healthcare official Wednesday flatly rejected the idea of taking over the nation's medical insurance system, saying the federal government did not want to assume management of healthcare coverage.