Joe Kennedy III on health care bill - updated 5/8/2017

https://www.facebook.com/CongressmanJoeKennedyIII/photos/a.302354999886068.72564.301936109927957/1663327403788814

Health care is our ultimate equalizer. No matter your power or privilege, we will all wake up one day in need of a little mercy. Trumpcare rejects that common humanity and continues the Administration’s calculated attempt to divide up our nation based on fate, fortune and difference. It creates one system for the powerful and another for the poor, one set of rules for the strong and another for the suffering.

If there is any silver lining to this vote it is that the American people are engaged, awake and on notice like never before. It is a long road to the President's desk. We will be fighting every step of the way.


https://www.democraticunderground.com/10029021830

It is among the most basic human truths: Every one of us, some day, will be brought to our knees. By a diagnosis we didn't expect, a phone call we can't imagine, or a loss we cannot endure.
That common humanity inspires our mercy. It fortifies our compassion. It drives us to look out for the sick, the elderly, the poor, and the most vulnerable among us.
Yesterday's bill -- yesterday's devastating bill -- does the opposite.
The bill is more than premiums and tax cuts. It is a cold and calculated world view: One that scapegoats the struggling, and sees fault in suffering. One dead set on dividing us based on who we love, where we come from, the direction of our faith and the size of our fortunes.
We see it in their tax plan, their budget cuts, their immigration policy, their civil rights assaults -- and yesterday, in their cruel health care plan.
We must reject it.
We must decide, instead, to take care of each other -- because, but for the grace of God, we will all one day wake up in need of a little mercy.
This nation's character has never been defined by the power we give the already strong -- but by the strength we give the weak.
Joe Kennedy III

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/trumpcare-and-the-gop-legislating-cruelty_us_590e228de4b056aa2363d58f

Jim Moore
May 6, 2017

Congressman Joe Kennedy III (D-MA), in an eloquent Floor statement denouncing the healthcare bill, said, in part,

“TrumpCare codifies a worldview that divides America by fate and fortune. A worldview that scapegoats the struggling and suffering and that see illness as inadequacy. The ultimate test of our country’s character is not the power we give the strong, but the strength we give the weak. It is among the most basic human truths: Every one of us, some day, will be brought to our knees. By a diagnosis we didn’t expect, a phone call we can’t imagine, or a loss we cannot endure. That common humanity inspires our mercy. It fortifies our compassion. It drives us to look out for the sick, the elderly, the poor, and the most vulnerable among us. Yesterday’s bill — yesterday’s devastating bill — does the opposite.”