Thanks, Mitch and John. Mr. President, thank you very much for the invitation. Appreciate being here. Several of us were part of the summits that...

And more importantly, we want to talk about -- we believe we have a better idea. And that's to take many of the examples that you just mentioned about...

I'd like to say the same thing to you. I mean, we want you to succeed, because if you succeed our country succeeds. But we would like, respectfully,...

Your stories are a lot like the stories I hear. When I went home for Christmas, after we had that 25 days of consecutive debate and voted on Christmas...

Now, you've presented ideas. There's an 11-page memo on the -- I think it's important for people to understand there's not a presidential bill. There...

And in addition, it dumps 15 to 18 million low-income Americans into a Medicaid program that none of us would want to be a part of because 50 percent...

So our view, with all respect, is that this is a car that can't be recalled and fixed, and that we ought to start over. But we'd like to start over.

Our country is too big, too complicated, too decentralized for Washington, a few of us here, just to write a few rules about remaking 17 percent of...

And I'd like to just mention those in a sentence or two. You mentioned Mike Enzi's work on the small business health care plan. That's a good start....

Now, some say we need to rein in the insurance companies; maybe we do. But I think it's important to note that if we took all the profits of the insurance...

So this is the only place, the Senate, where the rights to the minority are protected and sometimes, as Senator Byrd has said, the minority can be right....

Senator Byrd in his book -- Senator Reid in his book, writing about the Gang of 14, said that the end of the filibuster requiring 60 votes to pass a...

And we know how to do that. I mean, John Boehner and George Miller did that on No Child Left Behind. Mike Enzi and Ted Kennedy wrote 35 bills together....

So if we can do that -- start over -- we can write a health care bill. It means putting aside jamming it through. It means working together the way...

Mr. President, if you're going to contradict me, I ought to have a chance to -- the Congressional Budget Office report says that premiums will rise...

That's my point.

Well, may I -- may I --

Mr. President, I've had my time --

Mr. President, let me -- let me show some respect for my colleagues here. They're all here eager to speak, all sure they could do a better job than...

So I appreciate the opportunity that Mitch and John gave me to talk. You've made some interesting points, and why not let other members of Congress...

One thing I think we need to be acutely aware of, ladies and gentlemen, we are here representing the American people. And Harry mentioned several polls....

The second thing we know is, from the Congressional Research Service, that most of the mal drivers today in health care come from government rules and...

So when you break down the cost, what we know is 33 percent of the cost in health care shouldn't be there. And how do we go about doing that, and what...

What's the other area? What we do know -- and I'm guilty of this; Dr. Barrasso is guilty of it; Dr. Boustany is guilty of it -- is a large portion...

What would happen to access in this country if tomorrow everybody's health care costs went down 15 percent? Access would markedly increase.

We also know there's some other real things that we ought to address. There are conflict of interests within the medical field. There's nothing wrong...

How do we do that in terms of creating an elimination of fraud? When you compare the private sector fraud rates, it's 1 percent, compared to Medicare...

In your new bill, you have good fraud programs, but you lack the biggest thing to do. The biggest thing on fraud is to have undercover patients so...

Well, Mr. President, I'd like to yield to Mr. Kline from Minnesota, who will talk about the small business health plans in terms of how we would propose...

We have proposed in both the House and the Senate in fact for a number of years that small businesses be able to band together in small business health...

And it will lower the cost of premiums for these small businesses and allow them to insure more people, and to keep people that are already insured...

The non-partisan actuaries at the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services say on page four of their letter on the Senate-passed bill that it would...

On page four of its letter to Senator Hatch, CBO found that this common-sense reform would reduce the federal deficit by more than $50 billion. Now,...

Now, another concern I have is the Senate bill, which on page 982 creates an unelected board charged with recommending even more Medicare reductions....

Well, I'm almost -- I'm almost done.

I'm almost done. I do want to say on this issue on premiums, CBO, in their letter, on page four, does say that the estimated average premium per person...

Yes, they do say that. And they do say that the value of the benefit is higher, and that is why it goes up.

But the reason the value of the benefit is higher is because of the mandates contained in the legislation. And this is one of our big concerns with...

Mr. President, could I just interject one quick point here very quick, just in terms of trying to keep everything fair, which I know you want to do....

And so we simply say, look, if the National Restaurant Association or the National Federation of Independent Business, on behalf of their members, wants...

And there are in every state. And so what we're simply saying is, look, lots of us have offered lots of different ideas. We've got dozens of Republican...

But should we regulate all this? Should people in Washington decide exactly how this works and what you can and cannot buy? It's just a difference...

And Jon Kyl would like to as well.

Thank you, Mr. President. I think you framed the issue very well just a moment ago, because there are some fundamental differences between us here...

Now, let me give you a couple of examples. Dave Camp, I think, pointed out the answer to the dispute that you and Lamar Alexander had a moment ago,...

Second example, you say, how can we help small businesses? Well, we know one way you don't help small businesses is by raising the payroll -- the Medicare...

The last quick point, one of the worst things about this is for people that have catastrophic medical expenses today after you've spent 7.5 percent...

Well, Mr. President, if I could clarify, that's for a very limited period of time, number one. Secondly, the incentives are set up so that employers...

Thank you, Leader Boehner, and thank you, Mr. President. I come at this as a physician, a cardiovascular surgeon with over 20 years of practice doing...

So how can we achieve all this? Well, we've talked about some of it. I think one of the things we ought to really look at is how do you simplify,...

We've talked about small business health plans. Again, I ran a small business; it was a medical practice. And when I wanted insurance when those premiums...

The same goes for purchasing insurance across state lines. I'm glad to hear our Democratic colleagues agree that this is an approach that needs to...

We all agree on prohibiting insurance companies from arbitrarily cancelling insurance policies. That's a no-brainer; there's strong agreement on both...

Now, what we propose is using risk pools, expanding these risk pools, and reinsurance. It's an affordable way to do it. It creates certainty for a...

So, again, I think it's clear that the American people have rejected the bills that have gone through so far because they see increases in premiums...

Well, thank, Mr. President, and thank you for doing this. And I understand the four categories, but there's a big category that the people in my state...

One of the things that -- as provisions of this legislation that was particularly offensive was the carveout for 800,000 Florida seniors exempt from...

So then we got into the special interests, whether it be the Hospital Association or the AMA or others. And one of them that was particularly egregious...

So when my constituents and Americans now who overwhelmingly reject this proposal, say, go, back to the beginning -- they want us to go back to the...

I thank you, Mr. President.

I'm reminded of that every day. (Laughter.)

Could I just say, Mr. President, the American people care about what we did and how we did it. And I think it’s a subject that we should discuss. ...

Mr. President, thank you again very much for having us and for staying with us for the six hours. I appreciate that. I don't know if you will after...

Well, actually, Mr. President, this is the Senate bill along with the 11-page proposal that you put up online that really I think is the basis for the...

We don't care for this bill. I think you know that. The American people don't care for the bill. I think that we've demonstrated in polling that...

First of all, the cost, and Jon Kyl laid out the tremendous cost in the nearly trillion dollars of this bill. And I don't quite know, because CBO said...

Well, the CBO sent a letter -- I think it was to Leader Reid -- about the Senate bill. And in that letter, it suggested that between 8 million and...

So I guess my question to you is, in the construct of this bill, if we want to find agreement, we really do need to set this aside. And we really do...

Mr. President, if I could respond.

We, again, have a very difficult bridge to gap here, because I know that this is something that we don't want to look at, but these are, as you say,...

Mr. President, if I could, it's not the -- it's the cost issue, but it's being driven by the fact that you've got in the bill -- which I assume that...