Pastoral Resources

The Parent Trap gave my career another boost, starring in family comedies.

I didn't let anyone push me into things I didn't want to do where my career was concerned. So why did I crumble when it came to men?

Clearly, society has a tremendous stake in insisting on a woman's natural fitness for the career of mother: the alternatives are all too expensive.

I don't care whether you're driving a hybrid or an SUV. If you're headed for a cliff, you have to change direction. That's what the American people called for in November, and that's what we intend to deliver.

But if you - if what - the reports are true, what they're saying is, is that as a consequence of us getting 30 million additional people health care, at the margins that's going to increase our costs, we knew that.

And so our goal on health care is, if we can get, instead of health care costs going up 6 percent a year, it's going up at the level of inflation, maybe just slightly above inflation, we've made huge progress. And by the way, that is the single most important thing we could do in terms of reducing our deficit. That's why we did it.

After a century of striving, after a year of debate, after a historic vote, health care reform is no longer an unmet promise. It is the law of the land.

And in my own life, in my own small way, I've tried to give back to this country that has given me so much. That's why I left a job at a law firm for a career in public service, working to empower young people to volunteer in their communities. Because I believe that each of us - no matter what our age or background or walk of life - each of us has something to contribute to the life of this nation.

Women in particular need to keep an eye on their physical and mental health, because if we're scurrying to and from appointments and errands, we don't have a lot of time to take care of ourselves. We need to do a better job of putting ourselves higher on our own 'to do' list.

The truth is, in order to get things like universal health care and a revamped education system, then someone is going to have to give up a piece of their pie so that someone else can have more.

I've been fighting with Acorn, alongside Acorn, on issues you care about, my entire career.

Community colleges play an important role in helping people transition between careers by providing the retooling they need to take on a new career.

Experience taught me that working families are often just one pay check away from economic disaster. And it showed me first-hand the importance of every family having access to good health care.

This country owes them all a debt of gratitude. The down payment on that debt is making sure that we live up to Lincoln's charge: to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan.

I think we have to be very careful when we toss around terms like 'cut health care costs.' We would do very well to expect a cut in the rate of increase.

We need to be careful when we talk about cutting health care costs. They are not going to be reduced - what we really want to do is do is slow the rate of increase.

We don't have enough people going into those fields and there is a high burnout rate in some health care professions, so it is very important that we get more people into the pipeline right now.

This is a very difficult question. If you take a look at the aging population and demographics, we are going to have a big increase in the number of health care jobs needed in the state and in the country.

If you want quality service, you have to pay for it. You don't buy into waste. I have great misgivings about the amount of advertising that we see in the health care field, some by hospitals, a lot by drug companies.

It puts the provider in a situation of looking for ways to have someone else pick up a piece of the cost. As a result, every customer who has insurance ends up paying a 'hidden premium.' It simply adds to the health care cost burden.