Political Quotes

“if my friend would again yield, I think my point on that would be we know that there is a tremendous amount of money and power and influence. This is a trillion dollar industry. The profits that are to be made in denying people their health care and pocketing the money is an extraordinary amount of money. In 1993 and 1994, those insurance interests were able to put the Harry and Louise ads on television, spend tens of millions of dollars, and they could make the public believe they do not want government health care. Today in America everyone knows the kind of health care that is available, but they also understand it is not available to them. Everyone we talk to has a horror story. Even those people who can afford the best health care know that when they go to the hospital, the hospitals have had to cut back on the number of nurses so they cannot get care. They ring the call button and no one shows up. I had a gentleman who manages billions of dollars of securities at one of the largest investment firms in Pittsburgh who told me a horror story about having a back operation. He has got money. That is not a problem. He goes to the hospital and because of the cutbacks forced by the HMOs saying to the hospital that they will take less of a reimbursement because all of these patients are ours; we are taking our piece off the top. He had to be turned X-number of degrees every so many hours or he will go crippled. He said, Congressman Klink, I could not get a nurse.”