Political Quotes

“I hear often from many on the other side of the aisle that the Republican Party is the party of big corporations and corporate bailouts: This is a $66 billion, big corporation bailout being offered by Members on the other side of the aisle, $66 billion to corporate America that is already getting a huge benefit under this bill. We are already, by providing prescription drugs to all retirees, giving them the ability to basically back away, as has been discussed, from providing basic prescription drugs and still add on, if they want to add on additional benefits to the bottom line benefit. The cost savings already in the bill to corporations are in the billions and billions of dollars. But that is not enough. We have to give big corporate America another $66 billion so they can provide even more generous benefits to their retirees on top of the generous benefit we have in this legislation. I find it almost incomprehensible that we are arguing that at a time when we are providing literally tens of billions of dollars--maybe even more than that--to corporate America to help relieve some of their retiree health care costs, now we have to add $66 billion more over the next 10 years to corporate America. This is a very unwise amendment. It is a very costly amendment, $66 billion. In addition, you are seeing already that corporate America is getting out of the retiree health care business because it is very expensive.”