Considering all of the political complexities of the new era we have entered, President Obama has done a remarkable job in his short time in office. Those of us on the left need to look ahead and refuse to let differences with some of the President’s decisions keep us from seeing the historic and positive changes that are happening.

President Obama grabbed the initiative in the health insurance reform debate by bringing a clear message to grassroots supporters via a national teleconference and webcast August 20. Because it will provide a quality public option and a raft of consumer protections, both people with and without health insurance have a stake in the fight for reform, the President argued.

A new vaccine for the swine flue (H1N1) will be available this fall as the flu season begins, officials at the Department of Health and Human Services announced August 19.

Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., D-Ill., hosted an overflow town hall meeting on health care reform August 18th. He hailed the meeting, held in a local church, as a model of civil and respectful debate and discussion. In lively back and forth with the crowd, Jackson fielded questions and invited participants to tell their stories.

On the heels of media reports that the Obama administration might support a Senate bill that excludes a public insurance program, the White House Working Group of State Legislators for Health Reform reiterated its support for a health reform package that includes a public insurance option.

The White House continued to knock down false information about the President's health reform plan by addressing false rumors circulated in the right-wing media that claim reform could force veterans out of the VA health care system.

The Rudd Labor government has embarked on a massive transformation of the health system in Australia that will turn Medicare on its head and firmly embed the private health insurers as managers of a US-style health system.

It probably comes as no surprise that conservative cable network Fox News opposes health reform. In addition to some of its major personalities promoting disruptions and even violence at congressional town hall meetings, the guests and commentators invited to appear on its programs seem to overwhelmingly oppose health reform as well.

Death panels. Euthanasia. ACORN. Abortion. Immigrants. An insurance industry-backed right-wing smear campaign wants to inject these highly emotional terms into the health reform debate in order to scare people into opposing a major overhaul of the broken health insurance system.

US Rep. Hank Johnson (D-GA) held a Town Hall meeting at Georgia Perimeter College on health care reform on Monday, August 10, 2009. He presented his opinions followed by personal testimonies of those seeking health care reform.

About 40 Metro Atlanta activists with Moveon.org rallied in favor of a public healthcare option at US Sen. Johnny Isakson's (R-GA) office on Tuesday, July 28, 2009.

Marilyn Clement, tireless activist and founder and former national coordinator of Healthcare NOW! – a group which advocates for single-payer universal health care – passed away Monday, August 03, 2009, after a long fight with multiple myeloma. She was 74.

Veterans returning from the fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq are displaying many of the same post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms of troops that fought in Viet Nam, yet most do not seek treatment.

Linking the corporate-financed misinformation campaign behind the Republican's anti-health reform push to the "birther" conspiracy, Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, encouraged the media to report the facts about health reform on a conference call with reporters last month.

An unidentified person (or persons), who sources say is linked to the Republican Party affiliated and insurance lobby funded Conservatives for Patients Rights, has circulated an e-mail containing a number of erroneous and misleading claims about the health reform bills in Congress.

A public plan could more easily control overall savings and level of quality. It is true that in some rural areas – not an accident that all of the blue-dogs are from rural states – coops function well and certainly at no worse cost than the Canadian National Health Service does in its remote rural areas.

Senator Evan Bayh (D-Ind.) is one of those so-called “blue dog” Democrats who remain ambivalent about parts of the Obama political agenda, particularly the Employee Free Choice Act (despite his long-time popularity with Indiana trade unionists) and health care reform.

These two sentiments, both of which I favor, flow from different aspects of the topic question. No one wants to charge a rich man a higher price for an appendectomy than a poor man. Even if you morally approved soaking the rich, you would have to acknowledge the dangerous exploding "fee schedule" that results often in more, not less waste, and worse health outcomes.

A New Yorker magazine investigative report about why McAllen, Texas, a city located in Hidalgo county – which has the lowest per capita income in the country – has one of the highest medical costs per person in the United States (surpassed only by Miami, Florida), has stirred an unusual controversy over the rarely discussed contradictions that affect the quality and coverage of health services in that country.

If nothing is done about health reform, as Republicans have indicated is their top priority in order to "break" President Obama, a typical family can expect to pay about 71 percent more for health insurance premiums within the next 10 years, says a new memo from the Center for American Progress Action Fund. According to the memo, the average family premium will total more than $22,000, if no health reform is enacted this year.