Well, I thank the gentleman for yielding and thank him for the recognition. The gentleman and I spent some time this afternoon up in the Rules Committee, a little hideaway up on the third floor of the Capitol. I don't think the air…

I came to the floor of the House tonight because I want to share with the House a letter I received from the Texas Medical Association. The letter says, ``On behalf of the nearly 45,000 physician and medical student members of the Texas…

Thank you, Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I want to take the opportunity--we've had a pretty full day with a lot of debate on the floor regarding the health care legislation that's going to be coming to the floor on Sunday--and I wanted to read…

I received a letter yesterday from a State senator in my State, Tommy Williams, who's from the Beaumont area, not my immediate area but he serves on their Senate finance committee in the State. He worked on the State budget last year and…

The last hour just ended, and you heard the admonition at the end of the hour that it is extremely important for people to pay attention. And during this hour, I am going to echo that thought. It is important for people to pay attention…

I thank the gentleman for the recognition. One minute is not much time to deal with what is a very complicated process. It is unfortunate we didn't have more time to actually look at this bill before it came to the floor on the concept of…

And I can be as critical of the insurance companies as anyone else, but they take the path of least resistance. Their capital is not necessarily any more courageous than anyone else's. The easiest way to get to what they want is an…

One interesting point. You have these groups that went down to the White House in May and June--and I'm not going to criticize them for going down and advocating on behalf of their industries, on behalf of their groups. But what is so…

So we have two problems. The Constitution says we have to vote on the bill. We say the mandates may be extraconstitutional in their scope. And then the whole question of equal protection under the law. We have a constitutional scholar with…

I would just go back, too, to that instance with the Deficit Reduction Act, where a small difference in the House- and Senate-passed bills led to a court challenge, and we came back in January. We left on December 21st or whatever day it…

But, and I am sure the gentleman feels the same way, I would not want to stand in front of the 2,000 people on a hot August morning in a town hall in Denton, Texas, and say, you know what, I never voted for that bill. I voted for the rule…

There is no question that they are. You are right, the American people can see through that. It's an elaborate charade. It will provide no protection.