Representative Dennis Moore

Congressman Moore reads from a letter he received from an employee who works in his district office in Overland Park, KS:

 "When I leave this job and have to seek new insurance, I will be largely uninsurable, due to my pre-existing condition, breast cancer, whether I show any signs of the disease or not... My husband and I would have lost every penny we had and then some if we didn't have this quality coverage. Without a bill like this one I will likely never have access to that kind of coverage ever again due to my cancer diagnosis at the age of 24. Without quality coverage, and if God forbid I should ever have to go through this again, it would undoubtedly break us that time around. We must have reform. Thank you, Dennis."

Representative David Obey

"There is one difference between my friends over here who are speechifying against health care today, and 50 million Americans. The difference is that the roughly 15 Americans over here all have health insurance. And it's largely paid for by the taxpayers. 50 million Americans don't have that good fortune. That is the difference. That difference is shameful, that difference is immoral, and I hope to God that this House has the courage to change that this week."

Representative Rob Andrews

"As a direct result of the White House summit of a couple of weeks ago, good ideas from both parties are in this plan. But there is a philosophical difference between the two parties that I think came out last night. On weekends I very often go to the supermarket and you see these notices for beef and beers and socials for people trying to raise money for a medical emergency in their family. Most of the people trying to do this have insurance, but their daughter has leukemia, or their son is on a ventilator, and they ran out of health insurance benefits because they ran up against the lifetime policy limit. Last night we took a vote to abolish those lifetime policy limits so no family should have to do that. Our side voted yes, their side voted no. For Members of Congress and our own health plan, if our own families have this problem, there is no limit on what we get. So we think that the American people should get the same benefit that the men and women who vote in this chamber every day do. We believe we should stand on the side of the families of this country, not the insurance industry."

Representative Jan Schakowsky

"The utter hypocrisy of the debate around process is absolutely astonishing. I just learned that Speaker Hastert used the technique of the self-executing rule 113 times. Then we hear the Republicans attack reconciliation, which really means a majority vote, and yet call for an up or down vote in the House. News flash: people in the real world don't care about self-executing [rules] or reconciliation and don't even know what it is. What they do care about process is the process of the insurance companies: ... the process of rescission (which means canceling policies when you get cancer), the process of refusing a child who has asthma, the process of raising prices 39%, 50%, 60% for your insurance policy. We each have the opportunity in the next few days to be on the right or wrong side of history. We can either stand with the American people or with the insurance companies. I hope that the vast majority of us stick with the American people."

Representative Sheila Jackson-Lee

"Madam Speaker, Medicare will be expanded, Medicaid will be expanded to allow more people to be insured. Children will have more health insurance. It will be a major change for America; a positive change. It is interesting that every time America makes a historic and catastrophic change for the better there are large voices of opposition, confused voices, voices without the facts. I'm reminded of the history of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and 1965 Voting Rights Act. They did not pass with large margins. The voices of Dixiecrats raised their voices in opposition. African Americans, Negroes, should be second class citizens forever.

It is time now for the courageous to recognize that Americans can not be second class and third class in the climate of needing health insurance. That they must be able to go to hospitals and not be kicked out. That they must be able to get insurance without saying you have a pre-existing disease. That women can not be discriminated against. Where is the courage to stand up as we did in the time when African Americans needed their freedom? It is now time to free others who do not have health insurance. Do you have the courage to make these hard decisions when others are chatting away saying the wrong thing? It is time to pass health care reform. I want to stand with the courageous on behalf of the American people."