Cynthia Lummis

Mrs. LUMMIS

Mrs. LUMMIS. She is doing very well. She is cancer free. And I would indicate, also, that it is, of course, just another example. But I am from Wyoming. One of our Senator's wives, Bobbi Barrasso, was also diagnosed with breast cancer in her forties as a result of a mammogram and is also doing well. You look at our tiny little congressional delegation that consists of one Member of the House and two Senators, and of those three people, two have examples of breast cancer within their own families that was diagnosed in women in their forties due to a routine mammogram. That gives, even though anecdotal, a couple of examples that are repeated all over the country by people who may be tuning in tonight on C-SPAN. Many of you know women who have been diagnosed and successfully treated for breast cancer in the United States. Part of the reason the prognosis has improved so dramatically in the United States for this very serious and, unfortunately, very common form of cancer is the fact that following routine screening, we have the opportunity to receive aggressive treatment in a health care system that, while in need of reform, is not in need of the kind of reform that would increase the period of time between when we are diagnosed and when we are treated. We know, from around the world, from systems of government in Europe and in Canada that have the form of health care that was being advocated in this body by the majority party and a form which, in fact, passed this body and is now being debated in the Senate, that, indeed, when you add more government to the health care system, you do add time lags between diagnosis and treatment. And that is something that we should be trying to encourage our colleagues to prevent and prevent especially because of the United States' superior record when compared to other nations around the world with regard to breast cancer.

Mrs. LUMMIS. I would like to thank the gentlewoman from Ohio for bringing this issue to our attention once again this evening. You know, many of us have anecdotal information about friends, relatives, colleagues who have experienced the diagnosis of breast cancer in their forties simply because they went in to receive a routine mammogram. That was certainly the case with my sister-in-law who, in her forties, went in for a routine mammogram, had none of the genetic or typical markers that reveal the need to have mammograms, but, of course, since they were regularly recommended for women in their thirties and forties, she went in for her annual mammogram and was diagnosed with a very aggressive form of breast cancer. She was diagnosed, had her mastectomy, and began her chemotherapy all within the period of 30 days. Without that routine mammogram, that aggressive breast cancer would have had an opportunity to spread in a way that would have caused or exacerbated the chance that that cancer would not have been treatable and would not have saved her life. In fact, we learned during the health care debate in the House that in the United States both men and women have better rates of survivability for cancer in the United States than they do in Canada or in Europe. That is because cancer is routinely screened for and it is rapidly addressed following diagnosis. In fact, the opportunity in the United States to receive treatment quickly following diagnosis is directly related to the current health care system in the United States. As the gentlewoman from Ohio indicated, there are opportunities, due to the findings of this panel, for insurers to use it as a basis to decide not to provide covered health care insurance for breast cancer mammography screening for women in their forties. I believe that that is an indicator of how serious this issue is, and I want to particularly thank the gentlewoman from Ohio for calling it to our attention this evening.

Mrs. LUMMIS

Mrs. LUMMIS. I would like to thank the chairman and ranking member of the Judiciary Committee for the inclusion of language from my bill on statewide public television. Passage of this legislation will remove the legal obstacles for satellite carriers to offer statewide public television in Wyoming and other States. I don't care whether it's in high def or not. I just want public television carried in Wyoming and other States, and that's been achieved. So thank you kindly. I also thank the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Deal) who worked diligently to address the problem of local television market areas. Despite his good work, I rise today to express regret for the missed opportunity the passage of this bill represents. The decision to put off for another 5 years any real reform to the system of designated market areas carries with it very negative consequences for the citizens of my State. Out of Wyoming's 23 counties, 16 do not have satellite access to Wyoming-based stations. Over half of all television households in Wyoming do not have access to local television. For a rural State like Wyoming, satellite sometimes represents the only viable option to receiving television programming. The inability to receive local stations restricts access to local content and severely limits the reach of emergency notifications. Emergency situations, like the butane tank truck that recently overturned on an icy highway during a blizzard, should serve as proof that the availability of local stations on satellite television is not just an entertainment issue. The DMA system may make sense for the densely populated areas in the East, but it has created an absurdity in the sparsely populated areas of the West. I am grateful for the inclusion of a study to find a better way to determine what the local market is. But, Madam Speaker, people in Wyoming do not need a study to tell them that when their network TV station originates 400 miles away from a different State, they are not receiving the local content they need. For this reason, I cannot support passage of this bill despite its tremendous improvements.

Mrs. LUMMIS

Mrs. LUMMIS. Mr. Speaker, I stand before you today on behalf of the people of Wyoming, where individual freedom and personal responsibility are hallmark values. This $1 trillion tax-everybody-right-down-to-the-wheelchair debacle will impact every person in Wyoming. This bill will force my constituents to buy insurance, whether it makes sense for them or not. This bill will dump some of my constituents into a government-run health care program to which Members of Congress will not even subject themselves. I sought an amendment that would allow States to shield their citizens from government-forced insurance, from taxes and possible fines or imprisonment, from government policies that come between themselves and their doctors, from unfunded mandates on States. But my amendment and dozens of others were swept away by the majority, and American freedoms right along with it. Our Constitution was designed to empower the American people and shackle the Federal Government. This bill will shackle the American people while empowering the Federal Government. It is a sad day for Wyoming, Mr. Speaker. Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore

Mrs. LUMMIS

Mrs. LUMMIS. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this job-killing bill at a time when our Nation has 10.2 percent unemployment that cuts Medicare, piles debt on our children, and raises health care costs.

Mrs. LUMMIS

Mrs. LUMMIS. Mr. Speaker, while earlier this week the Wall Street Journal called the Pelosi health care plan ``the worst bill ever,'' the Chicago Tribune last week called the GOP plan a good plan and said, We don't agree with everything in these bills but we do agree with ideas such as these: ``Let insurers sell policies across State lines. That would loosen the strangling State-by-State regulations and unleash competition to drive premium prices down.'' And, indeed, that is what happens under the Republican bill. ``Give people who buy insurance in the private market the same tax breaks as those who get it through employers.'' That only makes sense. And, finally, ``Expand the ability of small business, trade associations, and other groups to set up insurance pools to offer coverage at more attractive rates.'' These are the advantages of the Republican plan. And to boot, ours cuts the deficit.

Mrs. LUMMIS

Mrs. LUMMIS. The gentleman from Minnesota has four really cute little girls, and I carried one of their Scooby-Doo backpacks through the Minnesota airport while we were transferring planes trying to get back to Washington for votes. A lot of us have kids or grandchildren that will be affected by this legislation because they will be paying for it for years to come. One of the things we all learned from our parents in this baby boom generation is the importance of handing a better America to your children, and that is something that I don't want to be responsible for being the first generation to renege on. That's why I am so much more supportive of these Republican bills than of the Speaker's bill. Among the things that are in the Republican bills that are so important are meaningful tort reform. I say this with a caveat; I am one of those Republicans who would rather see tort reform done at the State level. I think we see more innovation and creativity. We see some States that want to have caps on noneconomic damages. We see some States that want health care panels, States that want to make sure that expert witnesses, within the certain specialty that is charged with malpractice, are the ones that are designated as witnesses. There are a whole variety of ways to address tort reform. I prefer that it be handled at the State level, but I have signed on to several of these bills that have State tort reform provisions even at this Federal level because I think they take a much better approach to the overall subject of health care reform. In other words, the Republican plan has meaningful tort reform. Oddly, the Speaker's bill contains a provision that says they will give out grants for innovations in tort reform but not to States that have placed a cap on noneconomic damages. If you talk to some of the former legislators, now Members of Congress, who are from States that enacted caps on noneconomic damages and medical malpractice cases, you will learn that their medical malpractice premiums for their physicians dropped, thereby allowing their physicians to either charge their patients less or stay in practice in small communities where they don't have as many patients to spread out the costs of that extremely expensive malpractice insurance premium. Then we have interstate health insurance shopping. This is really what I think is going to be one of the most exciting keys to reducing the costs of health insurance, because it's going to create more competition. Coming from the smallest population State in the Nation, Wyoming, and not being able to buy insurance across State lines for health care the way I can for automobile insurance, I don't have the options, because of our little small pool of citizens, to spread the costs. It's going to be very important that we have the ability to shop for health insurance across State lines and that we do it in a transparent way. I see these ads on TV for car insurance. Well, there is a little sign that you look at that compares one company's premium to another, to another. You can go online and shop and compare and put in the kinds of factors that you want in your automobile insurance. We should be able to do that for health insurance. We should be able to buy our health insurance premiums that way, and the Republicans' bills will allow that to happen. Then, further, association health plans, the Republican plans have it; the Democrat plan does not have it. Association health plans, once again, would allow groups with some common interest to pool, to create a larger pool, whether it's your church denomination, your Rotary Club, your alumni association or any other group that wanted to form an insurance pool for purposes of providing health insurance to their member participants. This I call kind of an equivalent to what's available in the banking community. You have commercial Main Street banks, and then you have some credit unions. I kind of associated this kind of association health care plan with the notion of a credit union. These are things that we have that would increase and stimulate competition in the private sector, and these are in the Republican plans. They are not in our colleagues', who are members of the Democratic Party, plans. Now I would like to call on one of our colleagues who is from the State of Colorado. Mike Coffman is here this evening from my neighboring State of Colorado. I yield to you and thank you for attending this evening's discussion.

Mrs. LUMMIS. I thank the gentlemen from Minnesota, from Tennessee, from Pennsylvania and from Colorado for joining me this evening. People from all over the United States will be paying a house call on Speaker Pelosi on Thursday at noon this week on the Capitol steps. We will be there to greet them and hopefully discuss with them our concerns about the Democratic approach and to offer better solutions. I thank the Speaker this evening for his kind attention and tolerance of his fellow freshmen Republicans' efforts this evening.

Mrs. LUMMIS. We are blessed to have three physicians in our Republican freshman caucus who have been gracious in educating us about the medical practice in their parts of the country. It's a great privilege to serve with them in Congress and also the gentleman from Pennsylvania who spoke earlier, who has managed health care in his State. We are deeply grateful for his participation. I thank the gentlemen from the Republican freshmen for participating in this evening's effort. I can tell you that the women in the Republican Conference have been discussing health care as it relates to women this week, and we'll be doing so again tomorrow. I will look forward to pursuing that discussion again tomorrow. But to wrap things up this evening for the remainder of our time, I would like to turn it over to my colleague and cohost for this evening's Special Order by the Republican freshmen, the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Paulsen).

Mrs. LUMMIS. I thank the gentleman from Colorado for participating this evening, and I yield now to the gentleman from Tennessee.

Mrs. LUMMIS. You are well under your time. Thank you for participating. I yield to the gentleman from Colorado.

Mrs. LUMMIS. We are now down to the speed round, which means we have 2 minutes left for each Member of this discussion to summarize. And I would like to start with the gentleman from Pennsylvania.

Mrs. LUMMIS. We are all freshmen who have been talking here. Many of us served in some capacity either in our State legislature, in your case as a mayor, a couple of State treasurers; so we know how State government works. And what we see, as States could not print money, we had to live within our means. So when the Federal Government places an unfunded mandate, meaning they require States to provide a service and then don't provide the money for the State to provide the service, the State has to come up with the bucks. And this has been called the ``mother of all unfunded mandates'' by the Democrat Governor of your home State of Tennessee. And those of us who are here--I know that you were leader in your Minnesota legislature--tried to find good legislation that was sitting around and had been introduced by Members of either party. And in honesty, in my legislature, if a Democrat had a great idea, and we were Republican legislators, we'd go steal their ideas and put Republican names on it and sponsor it. It was the best form of flattery. The ideas were coming up. And you know who did that maybe better than anybody I have ever seen on a national scale was Bill Clinton. He took what was cultivated in the States and nurtured in the States a plan to reform welfare, and he slapped his name on it and he made it his. And he worked with Republican Members of this Congress to reform welfare. We could do that today. We have 53 bills out there that our Democratic colleagues could say, hey, this is a good idea or I like the idea of letting young people stay on their parents' insurance until they're 26 years old. That helps them out, especially in these tough economic times when it's hard to find a job. There are ideas out there that would solve these problems. Yet we are faced with a bill that is almost 2,000 pages long that we're expecting a big additional amendment to, that was drafted behind closed doors, that has some nonsensical language in it that people can't understand that we only get 72 hours to read. It all seems like a bad dream. But it's the American Congress. And there are so many better options out there. I just am so frustrated with the majority party that they won't look through our 53 bills that they could read online and say that's a good idea, let's put a Democrat's name on it and make it our idea. We'd be delighted. I yield to the gentleman from Tennessee.

Mrs. LUMMIS. I yield to the gentleman from Minnesota to introduce our colleague from Tennessee.

Mrs. LUMMIS. One of the math items in this bill that just doesn't add up is the fact that they are going to be paying for 6 years of benefits under this bill with 10 years of revenue collections. And yet when we get, then, to that magical 11th year where we need to be able to pay for it as we go, obviously we won't be able to just stop providing benefits and have the taxes run for 4 years where we don't tap into them before we involve ourselves in the benefit component of the program again. So that is a one-time in the first 10 years type of financial balancing act or financial gimmick that is being used in this bill to make it sound like it is in some way financially balanced. It is not, and it will suck more out of this economy in the second and ensuing 10 years and in decades when once again our children are going to be paying for it. So, this bill really does defer to our children and grandchildren huge financial obligations that the people in this room feel is not only unnecessary, but highly inappropriate.

Mrs. LUMMIS. And, in fact, we also learned today that the bill runs counter to the President's promise that this was not going to tax people who make less than $250,000 a year. Because of the taxes that the gentleman from Minnesota just described, 90 cents out of every dollar that applies in this bill in additional costs will fall on people that fall in exactly that category, the $250,000 and less income earners. I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania.

Mrs. LUMMIS. Before I yield to the gentleman from Minnesota, I wanted to remark on something I learned today. The Republicans had a little reading room where we could go and read the bill and share ideas, and especially learn from ranking members of the various committees who have been studying these concepts at least, even though they haven't seen it in bill form, for not only months, but years. One of the things that I learned today in that session is that the enforcer in the Democratic bill is actually the IRS. One would think that with 111 new government agencies that the enforcement mechanism for providing health care, what is supposed to be a very positive notion, would not be the IRS. What thinks the gentleman from Minnesota?

Mrs. LUMMIS. Reclaiming my time, I would echo some of your concerns in saying that in rural areas Medicare is not reimbursed at the same rates as it is in urban areas. So hospitals and physicians in rural areas receive less compensation for Medicare patients than they do in urban areas; so much less that in Casper, Wyoming, a town in central Wyoming, only about one-third of their actual out-of-pocket expenses are reimbursed from the Federal Government when they treat a Medicare patient. Well, the hospital, because it is a quasi-public hospital, is going to keep taking those patients. But private physicians don't have to keep taking those patients, and when they are undercompensated, some of them choose to no longer take Medicare patients. And in a State that has a dearth of physicians anyway because we have such a small pool of patients, we are losing more and more access to doctors, even today. My concern under the Democrats' bill is that we will be worse off as a State in terms of the number of physicians who will take Medicare patients and the hospitals that will take Medicare patients because of the poor reimbursement levels and decisions that are being made by the majority party in Congress to make further cuts in Medicare. I yield to the gentleman from Colorado.

Mrs. LUMMIS. The rumor I heard was 800.

Mrs. LUMMIS. That will do wonders in my State of Wyoming where a lot of people are small business people, in fact, mom and pop sole proprietors, ranchers, that are just the mom and the dad in the family, and they have individual insurance policies that they purchased as an individual because they are it, they are the business. Under the Democrats' bill, those are the very people who are going to be completely foreclosed from being able to purchase individual health insurance plans after 2013. We have been joined by our colleague from the State of Pennsylvania. Glenn Thompson has with him a very large stack of paper. Representative Thompson, what is that?

Mrs. LUMMIS. The gentleman is correct. In fact, we have found that studies determined that 5.5 million more jobs will be lost as a result of the taxes placed on small businesses under the Democrat version of the bill. Furthermore, there is a double whammy for small business. For businesses under 500,000 in payroll, there is not a big hit. But, of course, a lot of businesses in my State of Wyoming, there are 1,400 in my State of Wyoming that will be hit because they pay these taxes at the individual tax return, but they are small businesses that pay payrolls of more than $500,000. That means 1,400 businesses in Wyoming are going to be slapped with that tax. I yield to the gentleman from Minnesota.

Mrs. LUMMIS. I look forward to having our colleagues join us so we can discuss some of those. We have been maligned as a party for not having a health care solution to counter the Pelosi approach and the Obama approach to health care; but in fact, we have over 53 bills that you can read online which will address health care reform. We offer and challenge the Democrat leadership, who controls this Congress, to pick and choose from among the better ideas that Republicans have and to bring some of those bills through committees and to the floor so we can debate them openly in a transparent manner. They were not crafted behind closed doors as was the Democratic bill. They were crafted in the traditional manner with the help of legislative draftsmen and -women to address specific components of our health care system in a way that they can be aggregated into a larger reform package or addressed individually if we prefer. So we can have a healthy debate on a variety of subjects. Even the Chicago Tribune noted recently that Republicans have a number of great ideas. Here is an excerpt from a recent editorial in the Chicago Tribune: GOP proposals contain smart ideas to increase choice and competition in the health insurance market. These excellent ideas could expand coverage for the uninsured without cratering the Federal budget or curbing the competition and innovation that drive the U.S. health care system. My colleague Mr. Paulsen is on the Financial Services Committee, and I am on the Budget Committee. Among the things that he and I have seen in our committee work in the last 10 months is that we are aggregating more debt than George Washington through George W. Bush combined and that, while our colleagues on the Democratic side of the aisle criticize Republicans for spending too much and criticize their inheriting a deficit, in fact, since we arrived in Washington--we freshmen along with the Pelosi Congress--they have increased the deficit, doubling it in 5 years and tripling it in 10. So it is not an excuse that they inherited a deficit. Indeed, they did, and indeed, Republicans predating Mr. Paulsen and I did overspend, but you don't solve an overspending problem by making it two times worse in 5 years and three times worse in 10 years. Our approaches to the health care bill are to advance solutions that will not add a dime to the deficit. How many people believe that the $1 trillion-plus Democratic health care bill is not going to add a dime to the deficit? In fact, a poll recently showed that more people believe we'll discover life on other planets than the Democrats' health care bill will not add to the deficit. The Republican bills, however, do not add a dime to the deficit. Here are three of them that I'd like to highlight this evening. As I said, there are 53 on a Web site that I'll provide to you later in this discussion. One of them is H.R. 3400, Empowering Patients First Act. The prime sponsor is Representative Tom Price, a physician from Georgia. It is the product of the Republican Study Committee. The bill uses a mix of new tax credits and deductions to make the purchase of health care feasible for all Americans. The bill expands the individual health insurance market, using association health plans and interstate health insurance shopping to give people more choices. The bill encourages the creation of State-based portals so people can compare plan prices and benefits. For those with preexisting conditions, the bill redirects unspent stimulus funds towards State- based high-risk pools. Importantly, this bill is fully offset through redirecting stimulus funds, stepping up efforts to root out waste, fraud and abuse in our entitlement programs, reducing defensive medicine through medical liability reform, and capping discretionary spending. This bill scores in the favorable column. Another bill, sponsored by Representative John Shadegg of Arizona, entitled Improving Health Care for All Americans Act, has many of the taxation provisions incorporated into it that were eventually added into H.R. 3400. Then the Patients' Choice Act, which is a fun one to highlight, because it takes a little bit different tack, is sponsored by Representative Paul Ryan. The bill provisions include some reforms that are badly needed to Medicare and Medicaid without decreasing benefits. I yield to the gentleman from Minnesota.

Mrs. LUMMIS. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am going to be joined this evening by Republican freshman colleagues of mine, and this session will be cochaired by my fellow freshman from the great State of Minnesota, Erik Paulsen. Erik, thank you for joining me this evening, and our other freshman colleagues will be joining us shortly. We're going to be talking about health care from the perspective of freshmen. We're going to be talking about some Republican alternatives to the large bill that the Speaker introduced last week and unveiled and that we're discussing this week. We'll be doing some comparisons between bills that Republicans have to provide better solutions, to take incremental approaches, to address the most important concerns that the American people have about their health care system first, and about the need to take a very deliberate, careful approach to changing an American health care system that needs tweaking rather than throwing out and replacing. I yield to my colleague from Minnesota, Mr. Paulsen.

Mrs. LUMMIS

Mrs. LUMMIS. Mr. Speaker, I lament hearing that people who attend TEA parties are somehow uninformed or misinformed Americans. They're hardworking Americans who are informed and have taken the time to become informed, and they know what's in this bill. But if you think that they have been misled into thinking that this bill is an extreme bill by those of us who are in the Republican Party, listen to what the Wall Street Journal says. Go to wsj.com. They call this ``the worst bill ever.'' ``Epic new spending and taxes, pricier insurance, rationed care, dishonest accounting: the Pelosi health bill has it all.'' And it concludes by saying: ``Critics will say we are exaggerating, but we believe it is no stretch to say that Mrs. Pelosi's handiwork ranks with the Smoot-Hawley tariff as among the worst bills Congress has ever seriously contemplated.'' This is not TEA Party extremists; this is the Wall Street Journal.

Mrs. LUMMIS

Mrs. LUMMIS. Well, I thank the gentleman from Tennessee, who has tremendous experience with government-run health care in the State of Tennessee. And after he saw the 1,990-page bill that we received last week and saw how much government intervention is involved through that bill, how many unfunded mandates are being passed onto the States, how many government bureaucracies are created, how many times the word ``shall'' appears in that bill, this is truly transformational. Some of the Members of our caucus have said that this is the most significant debate that they have ever been involved in. So for those of us who are freshmen and did come here to reduce the size of State government, or to reduce spending, or to, as the gentleman from Louisiana said, reform health care, we are seeing things that we hoped would not be a consequence, and that being more government intervention, more spending, more involvement in our lives. And so we are here to protect people from more government intervention and to protect the relationships that you have with your doctor, with your local community hospital, with your health care provider so you all can make decisions regarding your own lives and your own quality of treatment and the efforts that you will make to enjoy the type of health care and quality of life that you hope to have in your communities. And that is reflected in this recent survey of women. Sixty-four percent of American women would rather have private health insurance than a government-run health insurance plan. Sixty-six percent describe their health insurance as excellent or good. Seventy- four percent describe their health care as excellent or good. Seventy- five percent want few to no changes made in their own health care. We all know that there needs to be some reform. The cost is too high, and in some areas access is limited. And certainly with regard to Medicare, in rural areas hospitals and doctors are not reimbursed for the full cost of providing the services they provide. In my home State of Wyoming, in fact, the hospital in Casper, Wyoming, has said they are only reimbursed for about one-third of the actual cost of providing care to a Medicare patient. Now, some doctors who are reimbursed at these very low levels have decided not to take Medicare patients anymore. So, when things like that happen, we really are denying access to care by having a government-run program. Not only that--and this is one of my greatest concerns--it's what we are giving up by taking on a government-run program. Let's compare ourselves to countries that have government-run programs. Let's look specifically at cancer. For men in the U.S., survival rates exceed 60 percent and also for women. In fact, two-thirds of women will survive. Spain, Italy, and the United Kingdom are all significantly below the United States in terms of survival rates. One of the reasons for that is, when diagnosis occurs in the United States, treatment follows much more quickly than in some of these countries. So, if you are rationing care, that is a consequence. You don't have the same survival rates that we do in the United States. Take, for example, my own sister-in-law. She was diagnosed with a very aggressive form of breast cancer on her annual mammogram. She had no symptoms. She had none of the usual markers or factors which would indicate she had a risk of an aggressive breast cancer. Yet she was diagnosed based on her annual mammogram. She was in surgery in the same month that she was diagnosed, and she then began a regimen of both radiation and chemotherapy. Shortly thereafter, it saved her life. So she falls into that category of two-thirds of American women who are surviving cancer. In fact, with breast cancer, it's a very significant number--the difference between survivability in the United States versus survivability in European countries--and that's because health care is rationed. This is a quote by the chief justice on the Canadian Supreme Court: access to a waiting list is not access to health care. In this bill, we have to have assurance that we're not going to be on a waiting list. Quite frankly, we don't have that at all. In fact, based on what I've read in this 1,990-page bill and based on what I've been told by my colleague, the gentleman from Tennessee who is leading this discussion tonight, in fact, we will have rationing. The cost will be tremendous, and the taxes that will be imposed on so many of us as a result will be exorbitant. So it sounds to me like health care reform, in the style of the bill that was introduced last week, includes higher taxes, penalties, less choice, more government, more costs to States, more costs to individuals, more costs to small business, and no guarantee of an improvement in access, in quality or in the ability to craft a plan of treatment between you and your physician or to seek a second or third opinion in the event you feel it's necessary for you, for your family, for your parents or for your children. This is not health care reform as was envisioned by my colleagues who are here tonight, the gentleman from Louisiana and the gentleman from Tennessee. Thank you kindly for allowing me to join you. I yield back.