President Barack Obama says requiring people to get health insurance and fining them if they don’t would not amount to a backhanded tax increase. “I absolutely reject that notion,” the president said.

Blanketing most of the Sunday TV news shows, Obama defended his proposed health care overhaul, including a key point of the various health care bills on Capitol Hill: mandating that people get health insurance to share the cost burden fairly among all. Those who failed to get coverage would face financial penalties.

Obama said other elements of the plan would make insurance affordable for people, from a new comparison-shopping “exchange” to tax credits.

Telling people to get health insurance is absolutely not a tax increase, Obama told ABC’s “This Week.”

“What it’s saying is, is that we’re not going to have other people carrying your burdens for you anymore,” said Obama. “Right now everybody in America, just about, has to get auto insurance. Nobody considers that a tax increase.”

Obama faces an enormous political and communications challenge in selling his health care plan as Congress debates how to pay for it all.

He told CBS’ “Face the Nation” that he will keep his pledge not to raise taxes on families earning up to $250,000, and that much of the final bill — hundreds of billions of dollars over the next 10 years — can be achieved from savings within the current system. Coming up with the rest remains a key legislative obstacle.

Obama put his support behind the idea of taxing employers that offer high-cost insurance plans.

“I do think that giving a disincentive to insurance companies to offer Cadillac plans that don’t make people healthier is part of the way that we’re going to bring down health care costs for everybody over the long term,” Obama said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

Obama’s network interviews were taped Friday at the White House. He became the first president to appear on five Sunday network shows in the same morning, an extraordinary effort to build public support for his top domestic priority.

The goal is expand and improve health insurance coverage and rein in long-term costs.

Yet despite so many weeks of speeches, town halls and interviews, Obama said he has found it difficult at times to make a complex topic clear and relevant.

“I’ve tried to keep it digestible,” Obama said. “It’s very hard for people to get their arms around it. And that’s been a case where I have been humbled and I just keep on trying harder.”

Obama told Univision’s “Al Punto” (”To the Point”) that the strong opposition to his plan is part of a political strategy.

“Well, part of it is … that the opposition has made a decision,” he said. “They are just not going to support anything, for political reasons.”

Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said Obama doesn’t understand Republicans’ opposition.

“I don’t know anybody in my Republican conference in the Senate who’s in favor of doing nothing on health care,” McConnell said. “We obviously have a cost problem and we have an access problem.”

But he told CNN’s “State of the Union” that the Democrats’ plan is simply too rushed.

It has been over two years since hurricane Katrina devastated Louisiana and Mississsippi. With many homes still not rebuilt, demolished or renovated, it raises the big question about flood insurance and whether or not there should be reform in the insurance industry.

In the September 2007 issue of Mortgage Banking it is reported that the decision of the U.S. House Financial Services Committee to reauthorize and reform the National Flood Insurance Program by moving the Flood Insurance Reform and Modernization Act of 2007 in late July and that the decision would curtail the coverage for second homes while adding for windstorm damage. However, the committee explained that the bill would give advantage to small business owners.

Mortgage companies require flood insurance for homes located in flood-prone areas, but homeowners in lower-risk areas may also consider coverage to protect their property, according to Terri Cullen of The Wall Street Journal. Average premiums for a flood insurance is about $600 a year, but those in high risk areas can pay as much as $5,400 a year. Tenants in low-risk areas may pay about $200 a year or $2,200 for high-risk zones. Leading to the fact that it is very expensive to those who really need it, spawning debate as to whether the government should step in and create legislation for flood insurance in those areas that desperately need it such as we`ve seen along the Gulf Coast.

Heightened interest in the natural catastrophe policy is a plus for supporters of the optional federal charter. Congress has dealt with several natural catastrophe related matters, including the House Financial Services Committee`s vote to expand the National Flood Insurance Program to cover wind risks. A definite win for those who need it.

National Underwriter / Property & Casualty Risk & Benefits Management`s Susanne Sclafane reports of the decision of the New Orleans federal appeals court on the need for the homeowners to purchase the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) in New Orleans, Louisiana. It is triggered by the claims on damages caused by the Hurricane Katrina. Justin Roth, senior federal affairs director of the National Association of Mutual Insurance Cos., said that the flood maps of the nation needs an update to make sure that claims are really due to floods to prevent other claims.

With the U.S. House of Representatives approving the H.R. 3121 legislation that intends to expand the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP), by a vote of 38-29, it aims to offer coverage for wind damage as well. It also includes provisions that would require the Federal Emergency Management Agency to revise the country`s flood maps by 2010 ,and terminate the subsidies for structures built before NFIP`s establishment, which Roth feels is vital.

Flood insurance is vital those homeowners and renters along our country`s coastline and those near larger bodies of water. Although many more bills remain being debated in Washington in regards to flood reform, one thing is clear, for those that need it most, reform can not happen quick enough.

By: Michael C. Podlesny