assistant leader jim clyburn and we will join together in presenting our guests to you. a special -- is that it? calling you from the audience your grandson. that's what it's all about. i'd like to thank our friends bob meeks, brian england, felicia williams, elizabeth mart martinsteen and car min morales for being with us. imagine and this is not hard to do being a parent who has a child with a preexisting medical condition like asthma or diabetes. driving medical bills through the roof and forcing you to choose between paying the mortgage and paying the next doctors' appointment. imagine being a college senior getting ready for graduation, looking forward to a successful career, but you cannot accept your dream job because they don't offer health insurance. imagine being a senior who re relies on medicare for health and economic security but faces rise each year for medicare or prescription drugs. a woman charged higher premiums, women are up to the tune of $1 billion higher premiums than men for the same coverage or a worker locked in a dead end job unable to pursue y

[applause] >> i am jim clyburn and i represent south carolina's sixth congressional district. too often in this town, the conversation gets bogged down into process. the thorny policies and political calculations. you have heard the terms, bending the cost curve, motions to proceed, who wins, who loses? all of them really miss the point of this landmark legislation. it is not about this town. it's about real people, and their families and their health care. it's about saving lives, saving money and saving medicare. i am pleased to be here today with two people, to real people with some very powerful stories. the first one i am going to introduce, i can't really identify with as a grandfather of a preemie, who came here 90 days before we expected him, who weighed three pounds and four ounces, had three operations before he turned 20 pounds. so i can relate to fully show willems' story. felicia is from raleigh north carolina and she is going to tell you about her son, ethan. [applause] >> good afternoon. like you said my name is felicia willems and my son ethan was up here with

i am pleased to be here with my colleagues, democratic whip steny hoyer, assistant leader jim clyburn and we will join together and presenting our guests to you. is that it? calling you from the ibm, but that is what it's all about. i would like to thank our friend, bob meeks, felicia bond, elizabeth arden steamed and carmen morales for being with us. imagine -- and this is not hard to do, being a parent who has a child with three kids with medical conditions like asthma or diabetes, driving medical bills through the roof and forcing you to choose between paying the mortgage and paying the next doctor's appointment. imagine being a college senior, getting ready for graduation and looking forward to a successful career but you cannot expect your dream job because they don't offer health insurance. imagine being a senior who relies on medicare through your health and economic security that faces rising costs each year for preventive care and prescription drugs are a woman charged higher premiums of a billion dollars more a pioneer preamps demand for higher coverage. for a worker locked

i remember we interrogated congressman jim clyburn, the number three ranking democrat, where in the constitutionrized to manage health care. he looked at me, and he goes, judge, most of what we do down here is not authorized by the constitution. they are simply concerned with staying in power and with bringing home the bacon. they are not concerned with whether or not what they do is authorized by the supreme law of the land. i think that mrs. pelosi will be unhappily surprised when we learn finally how the supreme court comes down on this in june. but for her to suggest that there isn't even a constitutional argument to be made reveals an embarrassing indifference or ignorance on her part. jon jp there have been an awful lot of suggestions primarily from the left, talking heads on television and so forth, that if this court strike down the law, it is going to be legislating, it's going to be writing law and maybe subverting the will of congress. i suppose that last one could be accurate, but legislating? >> well, you know, that's an argument that both sides of the aisle make when a statute that

ago, madam president, i was privileged to lock arms with congressman john lewis and congressman jim clyburn, two men who i admire deeply, as we reenacted the march across the pettus bridge. it was a humbling experience as john lewis with throngs of people, but we were together, and explained to me what he remembered from that day. as we were starting up the bridge, there was a drugstore that doesn't exist anymore, but a lot of whites were gathered there, and they were, of course, up to mischief. and john lewis had on his back -- backpacks were not very familiar in those days, but he had a little backpack on his back. he had a book he thought perhaps he'd be arrested as he had been many times, and he had something to read while he was in jail. he had a book and an apple in that backpack. of course he was beaten very, very badly, and no one will ever know what happened to the backpack and the apple and the book. it was really a humbling experience -- i repeat -- one that i will never forget. on this day i think we should all pause to think while we have come a long ways, we have a long way to

. >> monday's show, congressman jim clyburn on set and we'll bring back dr.enator ron johnson will be on with dr. emanuel for round two of their debate on health care. >> joe, try not to make it about your private personal health issues. >> he is a doctor. >> he's a doctor. >> on the air. >> yes. >> you wouldn't believe what he said. >> we'll be right back. >> seriously, i've got goiter problems. okay? >> we'll be right back. ♪ one way or another i'm going to find you ♪ you know, those farmers, those foragers, those fishermen.... for me, it's really about building this extraordinary community. american express is passionate about the same thing. they're one of those partners that i would really rely on whether it's finding new customers, or, a new location for my next restaurant. when we all come together, my restaurants, my partners, and the community amazing things happen. to me, that's the membership effect. like in a special ops mission? you'd spot movement, gather intelligence with minimal collateral damage. but rather than neutralizing enemies in their

lee: i would like to yield now to the gentleman from south carolina, our assistant leader, jim clyburn. mr. clyburn: i thank the gentlelady for yielding me the time. madam speaker, i often quote the poet, robert frost, who admonished us that two roads difficult verge in the wood and i picked the one last traveled by and that has made all the difference. i would not quarrel with mr. froast, but i would believe that it's the people that as you travel the roads of life that really makes the difference with all of us. and several years before i came to this body, i met donald payne. i was a bit in awe of him because he struck out to us and in the race after i met the goal as he had hoped, as many of us had hoped. but don did not lose faith. he gathered himself and he tried again. and, of course, upon his success, all of us know whether successful congressman he made. i traveled with don often. we went to africa together and traveling with him on the in the event of africa, going in and out of country after country, sitting with him as he called heads of states by their names and to see the

moved fromut( myrtle beach t & ini]e1 an area that john0lp sprat and now nick mulvaney and some jim o clyburn moving that district forward and q block.aw a good c+ it was a fight up to the last twoxd hours of where republican couldn't gx along and democrats went back to a federal court. >> this question of whether or note1 people would understand their economic interests rather than partisan or racial ones. that's not typically how american politics operated, right? >> absolutely. i think one of the things to be careful about is that this is a race under a different name. been forbidden from doing something from thej'y front doo we can't allow it through the back door. i think that's the real danger with, as marc was saying, supreme court retreating andxd saying this is lefte1Ñi up to t politicale1 process. it left a crack open from that retreat or it left -- i'm mixing metaphors. >> cracks and doork and front ones and back ones. >> it left a loophole in saying that, look,w3 in this 2004 caset said that partisan gerrymand gerrymandering is not something -- going back to what marc was saying e