United States Congressman Mike Conaway made a stop in Brownwood Thursday afternoon to speak on health care reform and to take questions from local residents.
Conaway recounted that fact that a proposed health care bill passed the House of Representatives last Saturday and made clear his feelings on the bill.
“It is an effort to take about 17 plus percent of our economy and try and manipulate it,” Conaway said. “I think it is too bold and too aggressive. I would prefer a much more steady incremental approach.”
Conaway contrasted the current bill with proposed alternative legislation that Republican’s proposed to Congress which failed on a pretty much party line vote. He said that the defeated bill would have been more of the incremental fix and would have made more sense.
“It’s not enough for me to be against the version that the Democrats wanted to put forward, I need to be for something,” he said.
With passage in the House, health care reform legislation now will go to the US Senate where debate will begin next week on the issue. Conaway indicated that rules in the Senate allow more tools for the minority party to use in fighting against this issue. He felt that it would be much harder to pass in the Senate, but did not discount the possibility. If the bill did pass the Senate, he believes it would be much different than the House version.
“If the Senate can get a bill passed, then it will have to reconcile whatever that bill is with the house bill,” Conaway noted. “They are talking about some pretty dramatic differences between the two approaches to this widespread reform.”
Conaway said that if the bill passes the Senate, this reconciliation process would be a key issue.
He also felt that the best means of stopping passage in the Senate would be grass root efforts.
Several health care related questions and concerns were expressed by those in attendance. Conaway summed up many of his answers by saying, “If you read through what this new law does to insurance companies themselves, … it is difficult to come to a conclusion other than this is pretty much a takeover of the health insurance business of America.”
When asked if the public should be an afraid of the health care legislation, Conaway said that his fear is that whatever health care law is passed, it would be impossible to undo it.
“This health care bill, once implemented, I don’t see us ever unwinding it,” he said.
The forum soon turned to the recent tragedy in Fort Hood with a soldier turning on others in uniform.
“I don’t think we yet understand the betrayal that represents,” Conaway said.
Regarding the gunman, Conaway stated, “The President was correct to say let’s not jump to conclusions, but today knowing what we know about what he did, I am hard pressed to say that this was a terrorist event, that he was in fact a jihadist. “
Conaway indicated that the only good thing about the shooter surviving the incident is that if he is a true jihadist, he will brag about what he has done and this will lay to rest questions about his true motivations.
For more information about Congressman Mike Conaway, visit his website at
