Thank you Senator Dodd for all you have done in support of our program over the years.

There is 1.5 more that is--the number is stacked.

the passage of national health reform that you helped to shepherd through Congress earlier this year

Thank you for all that you have done for Bridgeport children.

The future belongs 100 percent to them, and that is why Arlen Specter and I, almost 30 years ago, started the Children's Caucus in the Senate.

I can see that already having a positive impact on the children in that classroom and the parents.

Thank you for great work on family and children's issues.

Thank you for championing big-picture issues like healthcare and financial reform and issues that directly affect kids, like Head Start and Childcare and Development Block Grants.

I wrote, along with Lamar Alexander, the infant screening legislation, which was designed primarily to deal with some of the--I think were eight originally.

How you take that program nationally could be very important.

It is simply a matter of getting the Congress to provide the money for Head Start, for afterschool, dental care...

Jim Horan, why don't you talk--I was curious because you have talked about this as well in getting services and programs, parents involved, community involved.

I want to come back to that. Your testimony about the oral health of children, I want to come back to it in a minute.

Connecticut is one of only two States in the country that spends more on corrections than on higher education.

To me, oral health, and this is such a window on so many of the problems. And for years, it has been just so neglected.

I am deeply grateful for Senator Dodd's compassion, wisdom and courage on behalf of American children.

It is labor-intensive.

I am always struck with the fact--and again, on the Lighthouse Program, which we have worked very closely with over the years, and I am a great supporter of it.

I am just alarmed. I went the other night to--Nancy Pelosi's, Speaker Pelosi's daughter Alexandra made a movie which HBO supported.

We are going to face, as we look at the arguments again, significant cost reductions in a lot of these areas...

I have always been very, very proud--a lot of the ideas that I have championed over the years... have come from this State.

What tremendous stories here that are going on in our own State.

Again, thank you for the opportunity to speak before you today.

Very excited about your project.

Senator Dodd's vision of a national body on children is a far-reaching, life saving initiative.