Mr. BERRY. Mr. Speaker, as I hear this discussion today, it is a heartbreaking thing to see this body completely engaged in partisan politics because it does not matter to the American people when they cannot afford their medicine, when they cannot afford health insurance anymore.
Health insurance, the cost has doubled under the Bush administration. They come and pretend and posture and try to give the impression that they care about what happens to the American people.
When America fails, we all share in that failure. We all suffer. We all get part of the pain. When we cannot afford to fill our automobiles up with gasoline, we all suffer. When Social Security is threatened, we all suffer. When the minimum wage is not raised to a reasonable level, we all pay the price.
It is very distressing to know that under the Bush administration and the majority Republican Party leadership in this Congress that we have failed on every count. Not only can we not afford our gasoline or our health care or to educate our children because they have raised the cost of student loans, we know what a mess we have in Iraq. We know what a failure our borders have been under the direction of the Bush administration and the Republican majority in this Congress.
It makes me very distressed to know that we are going to leave here this week very likely without doing anything substantive on any of these issues.
The good news is this: we can go in a new direction. We know how to provide health care to the American people. We know how to provide gasoline they can afford. Is it not a sad state of affairs when we think $2.15 gas is a good deal? We know how to provide prescription medicine to our people at a fair and reasonable price that they can afford and they will not need any government help to purchase it.
One of the great Arkansas companies just came out with a new plan this week that demonstrates the power of massive buying. That is Wal-Mart, and they have a new prescription drug plan that they are going to present to America.
All of these are good things.
We know how to get the job done, and the Democrats cannot wait to get started to see that our people do not have to go to bed wondering if they are going to be able to afford their medicine or their gasoline or their light bill, thinking that they are going to work tomorrow and still be working for $5.15 an hour, wondering if Social Security is going to be there for them. That should be something that there is no question about.
As I said, the Democrats cannot wait to get started in the right direction. We know how to do these things. We are excited about being part of it, and to continue to play these political games on the floor of this great institution is a sad commentary on the corruption of absolute power.
