Frank Pallone: “Republicans continue to do everything they can to block the teen smoking and the campaign finance legislation. They want…”

“Republicans continue to do everything they can to block the teen smoking and the campaign finance legislation. They want to preserve soft money and keep the obscenely large contributions from big tobacco and other special interests rolling in to fill their campaign coffers. We know on Wednesday Senate Republicans killed the comprehensive bill to help stop teen smoking, and the GOP's efforts showed where the Republicans stand: in the pocket of the big tobacco companies who want to snuff out any real efforts to prevent kids from smoking. And now we see the same thing happening with regard to managed care reform, patient protections. We have not been able to get a hearing on patient protections; we have not had any effort really to try to bring a bill to the floor that would reform managed care in the way that most Americans want to see something happen this year in Congress, to make it possible for us to have quality health care in this country. What we are seeing here on a regular basis is Republican efforts to kill every major piece of progressive legislation, whether it is the tobacco settlement, it is campaign finance reform, or it is managed care reform.”