Christopher Shays: “There is a Democrat health care bill and there is a Republican health care bill, but ultimately, if we are to have a…”

“There is a Democrat health care bill and there is a Republican health care bill, but ultimately, if we are to have a bill, there will have to be a Republican and Democrat bill. I urge both sides on this issue, once the posturing of our various positions is known, to work in a bipartisan agreement to pass meaningful health care reform. Mr. Speaker, I stand before the Members to thank this Chamber for its support for campaign finance reform legislation that is moving before the House; the Meehan-Shays bill as it is sometimes referred to, or McCain-Feingold. We have had an extraordinary process that has allowed Members to debate this issue fairly extensively, and before last night we had 55 amendments. We have dealt with 20 of them. We dealt with the one that would have been a killer amendment, and I appreciate the House defeating it. The bottom line to campaign finance reform is that we need to ban soft money, not just on the Federal level but on the State level, for Federal elections. Soft money are the unlimited sums that individuals, corporations, labor unions, and other interest groups give to the political parties, unlimited sums. They ultimately get rerouted right back to the candidates to help them in their election, making a mockery of our campaign finance laws.”