California leaders back health program for the poor

Los Angeles Times, September 4, 2009

With a number of poor children about to be dropped from a publicly subsidized health insurance program, California lawmakers voted to levy a tax on insurance companies to help maintain the program, which had been slashed into near nonexistence as part of the state's budget. The deal may well presage efforts by other states to involve the health insurance companies in efforts to insure people as Congress debates similar measures at the federal level.