Heidi Alexander: “It was my privilege last Thursday, along with some other Members of the Senate, to attend a health care summit at the…”

“It was my privilege last Thursday, along with some other Members of the Senate, to attend a health care summit at the invitation of President Obama. It went on a long time. We learned one thing we already knew, that our President is smart and knows a lot about health care. So he stayed the whole time. But it gave those of us on the Republican side a chance we do not have the opportunity to have as often, which is, to be on center stage and let the American people know, A, who we are, and, B, what our ideas are. So it was a terrific way for us to show, for example, that our goal is to reduce health care costs, that we wish to move step by step toward that goal. We identified a number of areas, such as being able to buy health insurance across State lines, allowing small business health plans to pool together, reducing junk lawsuits--all of which will tend to bring down the cost of premiums, which is what most Americans want. During the discussion, early on, actually, the President and I had a little disagreement about whether his plan, which is based upon the Senate bill, which passed on Christmas Eve, would raise premiums. What I had said in my opening remarks on behalf of Republicans was that millions of Americans, under the Democratic plan, would pay higher insurance premiums in the individual market because of government mandates and taxes. The President says that is wrong. I cited a Congressional Budget Office report to show I was right.”