mr. fleming: yes. mr. akin: was that amendment passed? i assume it was passed. mr. fleming: my understanding is the amendment failed according to party line vote. mr. akin: so we have the president saying we are not going to be covering illegal immigrants. the bill from a completely unbiased source says there's nothing in it to protect against that, and the amendment to specifically prohibit is defeated on a party-line vote. that's why there's some tension, isn't there, on this subject? one person things something. i do yield. mr. gingrey: on that very point, dr. fleming made, mr. speaker, in regard to the amendment. that amendment back in july, on that two, three days of markup, was offered by my colleague from georgia, the ranking member, ranking member with 17 years experience on the health subcommittee of energy and commerce, he offered that very same amendment and it was rejected. mr. akin: reclaiming my time. and i appreciate doctors, your help. we've got just a couple minutes before i have to close. i would like to correct one other thing. it's assumption that

mr. shock: thank you, dr. fleming for being here. mr. thompson: i want to thank my good friend from illinois and good friend from louisiana for being here tonight and the constitution, when we were sworn in back in january, we placed our hand on the table, we swore to uphold and defend that constitution. one of the first responsibilities is for common defense. and i think that is the most important responsibility that we have as members of congress is safety and security. and this is all about safety and security. frankly, history shows and we know that a strong defense is a strong deterrent. we want peace. we pray for peace. i long for a day when the whole world is at peace, but we need a strong defense to achieve peace and i'm hopeful we will see the day and i believe it was the president of israel who longs for a day while rising out of the desert, we see buildings and not missles and we know that the economic impact that we have peace that we can all secure. mr. shock, thank you for coordinating this evening. mr. shock: mr. speaker,

mr. fleming: yes. mr. gingrey: and you mentioned a fact check, dr. fleming, and i have a number of facts on the poster board, on thiesle. i will uncover the first one and comment to the first fact that he mentioned last night. i'm not sure that my colleagues -- you may not be able to see that well, nor could dr. fleming. but here's what it says. and this is a quote from our president. "i will not sign a plan that adds one dime to our deficits, either now or in the future." congressman, can you see the fact, the true fact on that? mr. fleming: yes. yes, i remember him saying this and shaking his finger while he was doing that. and we have been totally unable to find anyone who can agree with this statement. the cost of the bill will be anywhere from $1.6 trillion to over $2 trillion. the president says the savings will either come from -- well, really a combination of raising taxes and in savings which really if i could digress for a moment, he's talking about savings, and you alluded to this a little bit, congressman gingrey, about he's going to gut m

mr. fleming: mr. speaker, the president's speak in his chamber last -- in this chamber last night was the 28th speech about the same old tired plan, and it totally ignored the facts. rhetoric and empty promises are not going to solve the health care challenges americans face. americans have spoken against the same proposals. americans want health care reform that will not expand government intrusion into health care or undermine what works in our health care system today. contrary to the president's claim that republicans have no solutions, i support h.r. 3400, the republican solution, health reform that will expand coverage to those who need it regardless of pre-existing conditions. it also expands insurance pools across state lines and encourages young healthy people to buy insurance to bring down costs for everyone. individuals and small businesses can be encouraged to ban together to purchase group health coverage for themselves or their employees and we can save billions by limiting frivolous law

mr. fleming: thank you, mr. speaker.the president has claimed that his policies are going to reduce the skyrocketing national deficit, but i'd like to spend just a moment to debunk this myth. rather than reducing the deficit, the president's budget calls for a $9 trillion deficit over the next 10 years. $6 trillion higher than the c.b.o. predicted just in january when he took office. even according to the white house, the national debt will more than double in 10 years. the president's own numbers show that the national debt will be $1 -- 107% of g.d.p. by 2019. in the month of august, there were 14.92 million unemployed individuals looking for work, the highest number in history. since february when the democrats passed their stimulus, 2.46 million people have lost their jobs. and while the president promised that billions of dollars would go into shovel-red construction projects that would help rebuild infrastructure and employ hundreds of thousands transportation spending from the stimulus is only trickled at a snail'

mr. fleming: mr. speaker, before the august recess i introduced a resolution to hold members accountable for their health care reform decisions. house resolution 615 simply states that if members of congress vote for the government takeover of health care, they agree to give up their private insurance paid for by the taxpayers and enrolling in the government-run plan. so far 78 republican members have joined as co-sponsors but not one democrat. over 750,000 americans from every state have contacted my office in support of this resolution. they are demanding that if government-run health care is good enough for americans, young and old, then it should be certainly be good enough for the members of congress and their families. how dare congress force government-run health care down the throats of our fellow americans and not be willing to choose it for theirselves. mr. speaker, you have heard people speak out on this, isn't it time for every member of this body to stand up and be accountable so people t

mr. fleming: thank you, madam speaker. as we debate health care reform, little attention has been paid to the impact that our nation's broken medical liability system has on rising medical cost. there are 125,000 lawsuits against physicians at any given time. 75% of the suits are closed without payment to the plaintiff. and in 83% of the cases, going to trial physicians are cleared. this means there's very little correlation between lawsuits and actual malpractice. more than that, the current system pushes doctors to overtest and overtreat to avoid being hauled into the courtroom costing americans billions of dollars in taxes and higher premiums. in the few cases in which there is a judgment,. of the money goes to pay lawyers not the aggrieved patient. furthermore, the current system is driving physicians out of needed specialties. recent studies show one in seven obstetricians no longer delivers babies. and 49% of american counties don't even have an o.b. largely because of high malpractice cost. if the president and demo

mr. speaker, i'm joined by two great physicians here in our body, one is dr. john fleming, and he's a new member of congress, great ideas, another member in our congress is dr. phil gingrey, who we are just so proud of for his courage he offered an amendment in his committee that would keep illegal aliens from having access to taxpayer subsidized health care. president obama told america that illegal aliens will not receive taxpayer subsidized health care. that was after the democrats in this body rejected dr. gingrey's amendment that would have denied taxpayer subsidized coverage to illegal aliens. we have a lot we can talk about, i want to turn over to my colleague, john fleming. mr. fleming: i thank my colleague, gentlewoman bachmann, for providing leadership in this hour and particularly on this subject of health care. you know, mr. speaker, there's really a fundamental economic that i think we always have to go back to. i practiced family medicine for over 30 years, still practice from time to time. there's something very important that we all need to learn, that is t