George Stephanopoulos informed ABC television watchers on May 11 that this is “probably the best chance we’ve had in 15 or 16 years to actually get a comprehensive health care plan through.” The major difference between now and 1994, when the Clinton administration failed to push through its healthcare overhaul, is that today’s industry groups would “rather switch than fight,” he said. 

With all eyes on the precarious global economy, 20th-century economic history has never been more relevant. Interpretations of the defining economic episode of the last century — the Great Depression — are plentiful (and often contradictory), but the economic history of the balance of the century, especially the 40-year period known as the Cold War, has not been the subject of very much serious scholarship.