30-Something Working Group

30-SOMETHING WORKING GROUP

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Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Thank you so much to our colleague, the gentlewoman from Florida, Congresswoman BROWN. And I am so pleased to join my 30-Something colleagues here this afternoon, our newest 30-Something colleague from Connecticut CHRIS MURPHY. With our new-found responsibility, I have been a little tied up the last couple times we have had this Special Order hour, so I am really pleased to be able to be with you. And we have some fresh blood and some new dynamics that we will engage in. It will be really fun to work with you and banter a little bit.

But I will tell you that this being the day after the President's State of the Union Address, Mr. Murphy, I was particularly disturbed listening to the President. The privilege that we have here in this House, and it was yours for the first time last night, and I remember 2 years ago, I am just 2 years ahead of you in this process, and I remember the feeling that I had sitting in this Chamber and the awesome responsibility that I felt on my shoulders being this far from the President and having the chance to listen to him deliver that address, and the expectation that I had as a representative of my constituents, that the expectation that he would say something more than words.

And last year, if you recall, you were in your State legislature when he delivered last year's State of the Union. He talked about the need to end America's addiction to foreign oil, and subsequently that turned out to just be words because he ended up proposing in his budget, and they actually enacted, a cut in the energy legislation, that this Republican leadership that is no longer in charge here, they actually cut the funding to alternative energy, exploring alternative energy resources.

Now, last night he says the same thing in a different way. And we are just to the point, why should we expect that there is meaning and action coming down the pipe behind the words?

On the war in Iraq, I know I have heard from my constituents, and it is just shocking that after the response from the voters on November 7, that this President would not get the message that the American people were sending him. They want a new direction. They want to move the troops from a combat focus to a

training focus, get the Iraqi troops to stand up on their own so that that country can take care of itself. So it is just shocking the lack of understanding of his priorities and where he is on the issues that are most important to people.

On health care, the health care priorities. There are 47 million people in this country, 3 1/2 million in Florida, that don't have health insurance. And his solution to that problem is a tax deduction, a tiny tax deduction that he thinks will spur people who benefit from it to take that money and buy health insurance. That just shows a callous indifference. And you are an expert in health care; that was your focus. That shows a callous indifference to what the problems that the uninsured and underinsured are really facing.

You are probably familiar with the death spiral created by insurance companies where they cordoned off the people who are the most sick. Some States have adopted guaranteed-issue policies and modified community rating like we did in Florida so that there were only a few things that were taken into consideration when rates were set. But for the most part that is not what people are able to get when buying health insurance. So the sickest of the sick get cordoned off into a group; that group is priced out of the market, and then they don't have the ability to afford that health insurance.

A simple tax deduction is not going to make health insurance accessible and affordable for that group of people. It is just unbelievable, Mr. Murphy. And I fail to understand why this President only seems to keep his own counsel. It is just really unbelievable.

So I will yield to you or to Mr. Meek, but that was my feeling and my reaction in listening last night. And when I talked to our radio stations in south Florida this morning, I know the feedback that our radio hosts were getting was similar.

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Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Will the gentleman yield for 1 second on that point? Because on the health care issue specifically, the gentlewoman from Florida talked about being supportive of universal health care. And, I mean, I am supportive of expanding access to health care to everyone as well. But our good friends on the other side of the aisle like to use that as a bogeyman for us and imply that that means socialized medicine, and that we want to implement this single-payer system that is going to be government top-down health care.

There are ways to expand access to health care to large populations, to almost everybody who is uninsured, and then we only have to work hard towards ensuring that last phase of the population. We can expand access to health care for all children by expanding the SCHIP program. We can expand access to health care to more older Americans by simply expanding the Medicare program and letting people from 50 to 64 years old buy into that program. Those are bills that were filed when we were in the minority and that will be filed again and that we will have an opportunity to able to pursue now that we are past the 100-hour agenda. So just you having come just out of the State legislature and being a health care expert, I would just love to hear your thoughts about that.

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Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Thank you so much. One of the things that I think is important for the Members and other folks to know is we did this 30-something hour night after night in the minority for the last several years, and we want folks to know that we are not just shutting down and becoming complacent and resting on our laurels now that we are in the majority because there continues to be a need for accountability, as the State of the Union address demonstrated last night.

We are going to assert Congress's oversight role, reestablish the system of checks and balances that was totally absent the last number of years. We are going to use the 30-something Working Group forum to be able to do that and also talk about what Democrats are going to do, implement our agenda, talk about the priorities of the American people.

I am so thrilled that we have expanded our ranks and that we have an opportunity to interact and dialogue with you. I can tell you that on election night on November 7, I was cheering very loud that you were coming to join us in the 110th.

Mr. Speaker, I am going to yield to Mr. Murphy and he is going to give the Web site out and we will be ready to shut down.

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