You can't turn it all over to the government. You can't just have a government-run operation.

I think it is fair to say that I wouldn't have any Republican sponsors on the Healthy Americans Act if I had tilted this effort to the public side.

the first bipartisan universal coverage bill we've had in the history of the Senate, we take two baby steps.

What has been so troubling about the discussions in the past is you see volumes and volumes written on everything except long-term care.

What Claude Pepper suggested on a number of occasions is starting a model so that people on a voluntary basis could start putting aside money for private, long-term care coverage.

I want you three and the advocates who have come here today to know that we're going to have some advocates at the White House tomorrow prosecuting your case.

You won't get much disagreement on that.

AIG has given the counterparties $20 billion. Those people could be just about anybody in the world. Why won’t the Fed disclose who those are?

the more that what we are doing focuses on these big institutions, the more it looks as if the masters of the universe who made this mess are not truly being held accountable

The time of the gentlelady has expired.

I want to make my last question one that I think is a basis for optimism.

Mr. Chairman, essentially taxpayers have been kept in the dark on this AIG issue.

Where I disagree with the Ranking Republican is that the President’s budget deals with two of the major concerns.

I believe the American people want you to be brutally honest about the true extent of our economic challenges and confident that the solutions to these challenges are being put in place.

I think Senator Graham has put his finger on part of the problem.

On the long-term front, we are looking at $50, $60 trillion worth of unfunded liabilities; i.e., we see the obligation coming, we have not set aside a nickel to pay for them.

How is this rewarding ability and achievement?

I think if you look at this debate, both sides are essentially proposing adding a whole truck-load of additional loopholes.

There have always been opportunities for innovators, and that is what the American dream has been all about.

Mr. Chairman, at what point will the taxpayer no longer be on the hook for the massive AIG failure? What is the end game for American taxpayers?

I think we ought to be disclosing at a minimum who these counterparties are.

The reason that AIG has gotten this money is because they are 'systemically important.'

My concern is born out of what I hear at home, and what I hear at home is tens of thousands of Oregonians get up every day to see their television broadcast--television that is important--coming from somewhere else and coming largely with…

do we want to be on the side of consumers or do we want to be on the side of special interests

the administration, the Obama administration, with all they have had on their plate, has not exactly laid out all of their goals for Satellite Home Viewer reauthorization