"I think there's no question that he's a pragmatic politician, and I think he has seen the need to be bipartisan at least in rhetoric and maybe in practice, but I wouldn't over-emphasise this, in that the US is a very different kind of political system, " says James Cronin, a professor of history at Boston College.

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Personally, I could not be doing what I do on a daily basis, if I did not also practice medicine at AmeriCares Free Clinics for the uninsured because I need this piece to define myself as a physician.

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