Political Quotes

“Only in a free-market system would Congress pass a law to prohibit negotiating prices, which, I think, is kind of the essence of a market system. You raised a couple of points, and I just want to use a chart to expand on those points. The Affordable Health Care Act--ObamaCare-- really significantly enhanced benefits to Medicare recipients 65 and older. They got some really important benefits. You mentioned the drug benefit, benefit part D, the doughnut hole that is being closed. That's worth, I think, some $55 billion a year to seniors. There's other things that are in the Affordable Health Care Act that have already saved vast amounts of money to the Medicare program. For example, annual wellness visits for seniors. Why is it important? Well, you find out certain things, like you've got high blood pressure. And you take a pill--we ought to be negotiating that price--but you take a pill, and suddenly you're able to reduce your blood pressure and avoid a stroke, avoid some other kind of medical incident. You may find that you're on the path towards diabetes or other kinds of long-term, very expensive illnesses. So that wellness visit becomes exceedingly important, and also some treatments are available. Here's what's happened. Because of ObamaCare, the inflation rate in Medicare has been dramatically reduced.…”