Political Quotes

“It is my privilege and I'm honored to be recognized to speak here on the floor and to address you tonight. Having listened to my friend and colleague from Ohio talk about the high moral calling that there is for them to pass socialized medicine, I'll just tell you, Madam Speaker, it's hard for me to reconcile those things. It's hard for me to think of a country--a beautiful country with a deep, rich, free tradition that would give up its freedom and its liberty and its sense of responsibility for the sake of the government providing something that 85 percent of people are providing for themselves. The statements that were made by the gentleman from Ohio about what is not freedom--it's not freedom to be able to start your business and have to worry about paying health care premiums or it's not freedom to see those premiums go up by a large percentage every year. That whole spiel, Madam Speaker. And I think it misses the point entirely. I think the freedoms that I'm hearing the gentleman from Ohio talk about are the types of definitions for freedom that I hear talked about by those that live in places like Canada or the United Kingdom or France or one of those countries that has socialized medicine; one of those countries that says freedom is having free health care provide by somebody else paying for it as a taxpayer. It's not the measure of freedom. It's not the measure of liberty. The measure of freedom and liberty is entirely different.…”