WASHINGTON   –  “Do we need health care reform in America?  You bet we do.  Do we need the bill on the table today, cutting off private insurance from Americans who like their plan and their provider?  No, we definitely do not.

Americans want a change in health care for a basic, obvious reason.  On the small scale, health care costs are so high that only 20 percent of Americans take the full, proper dose of the medications prescribed to them.  It’s been said, correctly, during the health care debate that all but a few of the wealthiest Americans are one serious illness away from bankruptcy.  On the large scale, medical inflation is out of control, and health care costs could easily account for a full 20 percent of our nation’s GDP in just a few years.  While that may be good news and a worthy goal for name-brand pharmaceutical companies and insurance giants, it is bad news for every American with so much as the flu.

Any health care overhaul voted on in Congress must be budget-neutral in total to earn my support.  Our nation is faced with an $11 trillion national debt, and we are issuing new annual federal deficits at record speed – more than $1 billion per week in new government debt so far this year.  Health care reform must be fiscally-responsible.  Fortunately, many solutions exist, and efficiencies can be made to streamline the system and minimize taxpayer costs on expenses like prescription drugs.

I don’t know if Congress will drop the proposal we have today in favor of a good bill I can support, but I hope so.  I would very much like to vote for a bill that would expand access to health care providers in the rural Eighth Congressional District, put more medical professionals to work in our Southern Missouri communities, and give pharmacists and their customers lower-cost options for the medicines they use to treat illnesses and conditions.  I’ve seen enough medical invoices, talked to enough Missourians, and held enough meetings with providers to know the system needs improvements – cost savings that make health care and prescription drugs more available by making them more affordable.

Furthermore, the proposals on the table today don’t start offering Americans any new health care options for several years.  There is no reason we cannot begin instituting cost-saving reforms today – and pass a bill to that effect now.  Many opportunities exist to find savings; prescription drug negotiation, authorization of more generic medicines, insurance reforms, and new efficiencies that also preserve Medicare benefits.

The pharmaceutical companies in the Fortune 500 earn enormous profits, which are proof to me that we can afford – as a nation – to negotiate a better deal on health care.

President Obama’s speech to Congress and the nation on health care earlier this month was a good step toward a compromise – but it was only a speech.  The real work must be done in the committee rooms in the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate.  Both Republicans and Democrats should be involved in this discussion, and we should have the good sense to work in good faith.

The American people are tired of two things – big government’s intrusion into the daily lives of citizens and the image of politicians standing over a table and bickering, rather than sitting down at that same table and working.  Health care shows how these problems are linked: when one party runs off to write its own bill, it takes pet projects and special interests along for the ride. 

If it were up to me, we wouldn’t have those discussions in Congress at all; we would all come down to Southern Missouri, sit at the kitchen table of a family, young or old, struggling with the costs and challenges of medical care, and we would resolve to stay there until we came up with reform legislation that would truly improve that family’s chances of getting quality health care at an affordable price, without breaking their budget and their spirit, without taking health care away from anyone else.  Special interests need not be invited.

Anyone in Washington who thinks that idea wouldn’t work is welcome to come to our part of the country for dinner and prove me wrong.”