Political Quotes

“This has been a fascinating 2 weeks here on Capitol Hill. We have had, last week, all night sessions in our Ways and Means Committee and on the Energy and Commerce Committee dealing with the Republican plan to dismantle the Affordable Care Act. At times, Mr. Speaker, it is really hard to process all of the claims and counterclaims that are going on. I feel occasionally like I am in an alternative universe, and it is not just because we were up until 4:30 in the morning debating this. People have lost track of how we got to this point--what was happening earlier, what has been the benefit and accomplishment of the Affordable Care Act, and what is going to happen moving forward were we to adopt a really disastrous proposal advanced by my Republican friends. Twenty-five years ago, I was in a different role as Portland's commissioner of public works. And one of the elements in my portfolio for several years was to deal with personnel and benefits and health care. I am fully aware of trying to deal with our 6,000 employees to provide them with affordable health care that the city, as the employer, could afford, and that wasn't too burdensome on our employees. We were caught in a situation with rapidly escalating costs, inflation for medical care twice the rate of the ordinary inflation; we were having problems with employers maintaining coverage in an affordable fashion; and the individual market was, frankly, very chaotic and troublesome.…”