James M. Talent: “I am hopeful that later in the day the Senate will be able to take up the Genetic Nondiscrimination Act. It is a bill I…”

“I am hopeful that later in the day the Senate will be able to take up the Genetic Nondiscrimination Act. It is a bill I sponsored in the past. I know discussions are going on right now about getting it done, and hopefully we will be able to get it done. If that happens, it will be in no small measure because of the leadership of Senator Enzi, who has already shown in the brief period that we have been in session a great ability to work with Senator Kennedy and others on the HELP Committee to pass legislation. I was moved by that to come down and to discuss another piece of legislation that a number of us are discussing with Chairman Enzi. I am grateful to him for his openmindedness to it and the discussions that have been going on. I am talking about the Small Business Health Fairness Act which the chairman of the Small Business Committee, Senator Snowe, will introduce today for herself and a number of others who have sponsored this bill in the past. I congratulate Senator Snowe on her great work on behalf of this bill. I am hopeful that we will be able to pass it this year in the Senate. It may be the most significant thing we can do to reduce the number of people in this country who do not have health insurance. I want to talk about that for a few minutes. There really is no problem in confronting small business and the economy greater than that problem. It is everybody's problem, even if you have health insurance.”