John Cornyn: “I come to the floor to add a few words to the eloquent words spoken by the Senator from North Carolina about a national…”

“I come to the floor to add a few words to the eloquent words spoken by the Senator from North Carolina about a national crisis in access to good quality health care. Some have said we do not so much have a health care system in America today as a sick care system. We know there is a lot we can do to change that and improve that. But we, at bottom, need to make sure everyone in this country has access to good quality health care. One of the ways we do that is by making it less onerous for health care providers--doctors and hospital workers--to practice their chosen profession. But right now--because of soaring costs of medical liability insurance, because of our unpredictable, some might say, litigation lottery system in this country--we need to come up with some practical ways to solve that problem, to help bring down those costs, to make it possible for doctors and health care providers to practice their profession. In the end, that is the only way we are going to be able to follow through on this promise of universal access to good quality health care in this country. Now, we, fortunately--as Louis Brandeis described the States, he called them laboratories of democracy. And we know, as Americans, not all good ideas come from Washington, DC. Indeed, an awful lot of bad ideas come out of Washington, DC. What we need to do is to look for good models and good examples of success stories and to try to emulate those on a national basis.…”