Phil Gingrey: “I was touched, though, in the letter that he received and read, the phrases ``hogwash'' and an ``old country dentist.''…”

“I was touched, though, in the letter that he received and read, the phrases ``hogwash'' and an ``old country dentist.'' I was sitting here thinking, I can see Charlie saying those things on this floor. That is the way he was and that is the way we remember him. He wasn't an old country dentist, let me assure you. He was a prosperous dentist in Augusta, Georgia, a population of 130,000, the home of the Masters; but that was Charlie. Let me join Joe Barton, the ranking member, in thanking Chairman Dingell. I mentioned this bill to the chairman last week, and he looked at me and said, Doc, and he had a little mist of tear in his eye, he said, Don't worry about this; we are going to do this. And I knew then that the chairman and Representative Inslee and others were fully supportive of what Charlie was trying to do. If he was thinking just of himself, Mr. Speaker, this bill probably would say the Living Lung Organ Donation Act, which also would be possible; but that wasn't Charlie. He was thinking about those 70,000 other people who are waiting for a kidney. Charlie himself had to wait a long time to get that lung. Too long, we think.…”