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House Republicans put up their 38th and 39th efforts at blocking the Affordable Care Act – President Obama’s signature health care reform law. Two votes in the House yesterday to delay both the employer mandate and the individual mandate passed with overwhelming Republican support and came soon after Obama announced a one year delay in the implementation of the employer mandate aspect of the law.

The votes, which are being seen as largely symbolic, come at the same time that New York Governor Andrew Cuomo announced that individual premium rates will fall by at least 50% when the state’s insurance exchange is implemented next year. The so-called exchanges are a significant part of the law. New York joins California in being among the earliest states to begin implementing the Affordable Care Act.

President Obama will make a major speech today on the issue.

GUEST: Paul Song is a radiation oncologist and a member of the faculty at the Samuel Oschin Cancer Center at Cedars Sinai Medical Center. He is also a visiting fellow with the California Department of Insurance on healthcare policy and on the board of Physicians for a National Health Program, The Courage Campaign, and People for the American Way.

For more information visit www.pnhp.org.

On Thursday August 1st at 7:30 pm, there will be a screening of a documentary called The Healthcare Movie, a 65-minute documentary that tells the story of how the health care system in Canada turned out to be so different from that in the U.S., given that at one point they were essentially the same: how it originated, how it works, how it is paid for, and how it compares to its American counterpart.

Location: Aero Theater, 328 Montana Avenue Santa Monica, CA

Buy tickets at the door ($11 general, $9 senior/student) or online here.