pt. 1. The hard road to success : one hundred years of past failures. Nixon comes close : our plan looks like a slam dunk, but ends with just a dunk
Clinton chooses wrong : the colossal defeat of managed competition
The past foreshadows the present : early attempts with little success
pt. 2. Expanding health coverage piece by piece. The Hill-Burton program : how America's uninsured poor got a right to free hospital care
The three-layer cake : Lyndon Johnson, Wilbur Mills, and the epic battle to enact Medicare
Ooops! The brief life and death of Medicare catastrophic
Ted Kennedy and the Republican Congress : HIPAA and SCHIP add two more pieces to the puzzle
The unlikely saga of the Medicare prescription drug benefit
pt. 3. Why can't Americans afford their health care? The battle to control health care costs. Controlling health costs : many attempts but few successes
The last 20 years : health care spending keeps growing
pt. 4. Success at last! Obama develops his plan
Early players and done deals
Baucus, Grassley, and the gang of six
The summer of death panels
The speaker carries the day
The Senate and the Christmas Eve health bill
How he did it : a political strategy learned from history
The future is cost control.
