Pete Stark: “The hospitals are often second rate. Sometimes illegal. And it takes profitable business away from community hospitals.”

I think we have to ask ourselves, how do we do more good than harm in eliminating the compensation arrangements.

I strongly agree with that and yet, here we are where repealing the ACA without a replacement as the Republicans have already begun to do, would cost roughly $350 billion through 2027.

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that repealing the major coverage provisions of the Affordable Care Act will terminate coverage for--sorry, not 30, but 32 million people.

I would first of all like to try to make it the protocol in this committee--I am not succeeding too well--that we strike from our lexicon the word 'disability.'