Jim McDermott: “You have done a good job for your people in California and for the committee.”

We have made some substantive bipartisan progress recently. We need to build on our success.

Now, the reason I raise this issue is that we all know that about 70 percent of healthcare costs occur in the last 6 months of life.

Let me take an example, because we hear a lot of examples given up here.

The best way to improve and sustain Medicare is by expanding it and strengthening it because, unfortunately, there are holes in the program that weaken health security of our beneficiaries.