On the recordDecember 18, 2013
I wanted to talk about some solutions to our health care problems that have been out there for a while. Every time I hear someone say: There were no alternatives to the Affordable Care Act, there were no alternatives to what the President wanted to do--in fact, I heard the President say that multiple times last week, though it might have been multiple reportings of him saying it the same time. But there is no question he said it, that there were no ideas out there except his ideas. That is just not accurate. We had and still have the best health care system in the world. But it was not perfect. It does not mean it could not have been improved. It does not mean there were not ways to create greater access. For those of us who have held concerns from the very first about the proposals we are now seeing play out in front of American families and before the American people, before individuals who thought they could get insurance but did not, before individuals who had insurance that worked who are beginning to lose it--when we see that play out and hear: Well, this was the only idea out there--not the only idea at all. At the time I was in the House of Representatives and proposed these to the House. They were not just bills we filed and did not talk about. In fact, a lot of this was covered very widely, even on occasion we had to have Republican-only hearings because the other side did not want to talk about these issues.…
