MSNBC "The Ed Show" - Transcript

Interview

SCHULTZ: Congressman Massa joins us tonight on THE ED SHOW. Congressman, were you surprised at how many people showed up at this? Or are you a target of the conservatives? What do you think?

MASSA: I think it may be a little bit of both. But frankly, I take great celebration in it. You know, Ed, this is a great national debate. And I fought very hard to have the opportunity to come back to my district and talk and make myself available to my constituents. And that's what's happening.

We're doing 17 town hall meetings. You just saw a video clip of one. Tensions are high. But I believe that if you appeal to all American's sincerity to try to solve this problem, it won't get out of hand and you can actually have a thoughtful and beneficial exchange.

SCHULTZ: Congressman, I don't know how else to ask this question. Are these just pissed-off Republicans? And I mean, you know, we haven't seen this kind of activity in America in the past. It just seems that they are-we know they're orchestrated. But these very people that are coming to these meetings, these are the folks that the president wants to help. Don't you find that rather strange?

MASSA: You know, one of the universal frustrations I've had is talking to the older voters in my district who look at me with great sincerity and say, I don't want the government involved with my medical care; I just want Medicare. And so you scratch your head by saying, that's a little bit juxtapositioned.

You know, when Representative Marsha Blackburn says there's a bureaucrat in every examining room, she's not telling the truth. In every examining room and in every operating room across this country there are three people: a patient, a doctor, and an insurance executive. And the insurance executive makes the decision about whether you get that prescription or whether or not you get that life-saving procedure. That is ground truth today.

To people who say, no public option, well, here's a news flash. We don't have a public option today. We have a whole bunch of for-profit health insurance companies running our health care system into the ground.

SCHULTZ: This is what-there's a disconnect for me, anyway. I don't know what they're so upset about. The president has said repeatedly, if you like your insurance, you can keep it. In other words, he's saying if you like getting gouged, we're going to continue to let you get gouged, if that's what you're all about. Congressman, what are they upset about?

MASSA: Let me sum it up in an encounter I had on Saturday that, frankly, broke my heart. A woman who told me she was 90 years old came up to me unsteadily, with tears in her eyes, and looked at me and said, Congressman, don't let them put me out on an ice flow.

SCHULTZ: Wow.

MASSA: And I was just-I was stunned. But you know, the day prior to that, I come to find out that a nationally recognized radio show talk host said that, quote-unquote, Obama-care is going to put our elderly on ice flows and let them go adrift. And she had heard that. And she internalized it.

And this is the great disservice that many are doing to this most important of national debates. That's why I'm putting myself out there to actually tell the truth.

SCHULTZ: You've also put yourself out there as a stand up guy, because you're not taking your benefits inside the Congress. Is that true?

MASSA: Well, this is one of the things they shout at me, just give us the health care you've got. My answer to that is, I'm on the public option because I don't take the Congressional health care benefits plan. I get my insurance and my health care through a subset of Medicare, which is exactly what I want every American to be able to access.

Marcia Blackburn's right, people have been paying into Medicare for 40 years; it's working great. Ed, why can't we make that system available to every single American citizen, cut and dry, straight forward?

SCHULTZ: Congressman, great to have you on with us tonight. Eric Massa from New York here on THE ED SHOW.

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