lobbying juggernaut that helped kill Clinton's health plan, plans to announce today that [it is] promoting access to affordable healthcare for all

Unlikely alliance forming on healthcare | By Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer | November 1, 2007

The top small business group, which helped doom a 1990s overhaul, is joining a diverse coalition in trying to forestall polarization.

WASHINGTON -- The leading small-business organization, a lobbying juggernaut that helped kill President Clinton's health plan in the 1990s, plans to announce today that it is signing up with a diverse political coalition promoting access to affordable healthcare for all.

The National Federation of Independent Business will join AARP, the Service Employees International Union and the Business Roundtable -- which represents chief executives of major companies -- in an umbrella group called Divided We Fail. The effort is aimed at ensuring that healthcare and retirement security are at the top of the presidential candidates' domestic agendas next year.
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"Access to affordable health insurance is the No. 1, No. 2 and No. 3 issue for small business across the United States," said Todd Stottlemyer, president of the National Federation of Independent Business. "For us not to be at the table in any serious conversations makes no sense. There really can't be a national debate about healthcare unless small business has a seat at the table."

The NFIB and AARP were on opposite sides of the hard-fought healthcare reform debate of 1993-94. The small-business group, with about 350,000 members and representatives in practically every congressional district, proved to be one of the more formidable adversaries of the Clinton plan. Its members were particularly incensed over a proposal that would have required most employers to contribute to the cost of coverage. ...