[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 154 (2008), Part 10]
[House]
[Page 14554]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                       GETTING BACK TO THE BASICS

  (Mr. KAGEN asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. KAGEN. Madam Speaker, everywhere in Wisconsin and across the 
country, people are asking for help to reduce prices for their gasoline 
costs and their health care. Rural areas, like the district I represent 
in northeast Wisconsin, are affected most.
  We need to work hard here in Congress to provide meaningful solutions 
to these problems. And our first step must be to solve our health care 
crisis by ending discrimination in health insurance everywhere; by 
saying if you are a citizen you are in; and if it is in your body, it 
should be covered; and by leveraging down insurance costs and creating 
the largest risk pool possible, and creating an open and transparent 
medical marketplace.
  We must also design for the first time in this administration a 
meaningful national energy policy which includes three things: drilling 
for new oil across America with every single ounce of our oil sold only 
to U.S. citizens; investing in every source of renewable energy 
possible; and by preventing manipulation in the marketplace.
  These efforts will get us back to the basics of becoming energy 
independent and a healthy Nation once again.

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