Andre Carson: “let me first and foremost enthusiastically and with a great deal of appreciation commend the gentlewoman from Wisconsin…”

“let me first and foremost enthusiastically and with a great deal of appreciation commend the gentlewoman from Wisconsin (Ms. Baldwin) for her leadership in bringing this issue to the fore, to the United States House of Representatives, and certainly to the United States of America. It is unconscionable, I believe, that there are over 40 million people in the country who are living without insurance. That is over 14 percent of the population of the most advanced nation of the world. I am a Member of the Democratic Party. This House represents, for the most part, a two-party system, and of course, we have a list of sundry Independents and Libertarians, et cetera, but it is like the mathematical axiom that the whole equals the sum of its parts, and there is not a Member in this House who does not have universal health care. We pay a pittance of a fee on an annual basis and we have top-drawer medical care, emergency care, we get all kinds of physical examinations, and it is just wonderful. So if anyone wonders why we stay here sometimes until 2 a.m. in the morning debating issues that have nothing to do with anything, it is probably because we have good insurance and we do not want to walk off and leave it. I am just going to be perfectly honest about it. I am very concerned about all the women in this country. We had welfare reform, which was needed in a lot of ways, but we threw a lot of women out into the job market with no insurance.”