Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio). Mr. DeFAZIO. I thank the gentlelady for yielding. Mr. Speaker, during this health care debate over the last 6 months, we have heard we should listen to our constituents. And you know, I did. I did 14 town halls in August, and they were attended by over 8,000 people. And there was one item of agreement between the extremes in the debate, between the folks representing the tea party and those representing single payer, and that was consensus that this industry, the health insurance industry, should not enjoy a special exemption under the law. They should not be able to collude to drive up prices, limit competition, price gouge consumers. They should play by the same rules as every other industry in America. And this archaic exemption from antitrust law passed in the 1940s should go to the dustbin of history. There was consensus on that. Now come the Republicans, oh, wait a minute, we are not protecting the industry, we don't want to allow them to still have antitrust exemption, it is about the little guys. It is always about the little guys, isn't it? So let's give the little guys a loophole. And oops, wait a minute, the big guys can use the same loophole. Now, the other thing I have heard is let's be bipartisan. Well, there is nothing much more bipartisan than the report of the Antitrust Modernization Commission from April 2007.…”