Frank Pallone: “it is a sad day today in the House of Representatives on health care reform. We know that this process began in the…”

“it is a sad day today in the House of Representatives on health care reform. We know that this process began in the President's State of the Union address where he called upon this House, on a bipartisan basis, to pass the Kennedy-Kassebaum bill, with the goal essentially of expanding insurance coverage basically for people who have preexisting conditions, who have not been able to get health insurance, or for those who have trouble because they lose their health insurance when they lose their job or transfer from job to job. We had a bipartisan consensus to move on these two issues, portability and preexisting conditions, to expand insurance coverage. But, instead, from the very beginning, the Republican leadership insisted on these medical savings accounts, which is nothing more than a special interest way of providing catastrophic health care coverage that most Americans, except for the healthy and the wealthiest among us, will not be able to take advantage of. It was all done because essentially it was a payback. The Golden Rule Insurance Co. has made big contributions to the GOP, and they would reap big profits if the MSA proposal becomes law. They have given about $1.2 million basically to various GOP causes.”