Any time you have loose ballots, you have to worry about shenanigans. It's a shame such a hard-fought election has to come down to something like this.
But obviously, we're looking for all good ideas to help deal with our long-term debt problem. This is something that is going to affect our economy. It affects our kids. And we need to deal with it.
But we are not going to stand by and go back to allowing people with preexisting conditions to be discriminated against, go back to the situation where people can be thrown off their insurance simply because they become seriously ill or you can't get on your parents' insurance after the age of 20.
But you say, does it represent change? The change is that we are fighting an insurance industry that has killed health reform for generations. They're spending tens of millions of dollars right now to defeat this bill, and we're on the doorstep of winning a great victory for the American people.
I came to the conclusion months ago, and I said it to members of Congress, that the only way people are going to fully appreciate what this reform is if we pass it and implement it and it becomes not a caricature but a reality, and I still believe that. So I think it will be easier to sell it moving forward than it was to this point.
I have never believed in the Wizard of Oz theory of consulting, that I am all-knowing and all-seeing, and that everyone around me is kind of a backbencher.
I haven't given up on working... across the aisle on issues and maybe it'll take an election or two for that to fully ferment, maybe it you know sometimes it takes awhile for people to realize what the best path is.
I see my job simply as helping disseminate the message of Barack Obama, working with the communications team to make sure that we're true to the ideals and the values and the programs that he wants to advance in this country. And that's the extent of my involvement.
I think President Obama is a committed, practicing nonideologue. He's consumed by neither tactics nor ideology. He is more concerned about outcomes than he is about process and categorizations.
I think that more and more you're going to see people of good will on their side of the aisle say you know what, we got to get off the bus here, this is not headed in the right direction.
If you look at the themes that he struck from the minute he started running for president through today, there is a very high level of consistency, and there is a sense that he is who he is. Obama's governing is completely consistent with the way he campaigned and the themes on which he campaigned, the issues he highlighted, the vision he shared.
No one wants to go back to a situation where, if you have a pre-existing medical condition, you, you can be deprived of coverage. No one wants to go back to a situation where, if you get seriously ill, you can get thrown off your insurance. Seniors don't want to go back to paying more for their prescription drugs.
Now, China, India have set goals. We're going to be able to review what they're doing. We're going to be able to challenge them if they don't meet those goals. We're going to pursue this anyway, because the President understands that our future lies with a clean energy economy. We've doubled renewables this year. There are millions of jobs to be had there, more energy security, so we're going to pursue this.
People understand we're on the doorstep of doing something really historic that will help the American people and strengthen our country for the long run.
The fact is if we do our job right, if we keep worrying not about polls but about the jobs of the American people, about their health care, about their ability to educate their kids, stay in their homes and own their homes, send their kids to college, the basic pillars of a middle-class life, if we keep worrying about the future and building a stronger future for this country, these things will take care of themselves.
The place where we don't agree is on whether there should be some restraint on insurance companies and whether they should be allowed to run wild. We believe there should be some restraint; some on the other side don't think so.
The truth is that as we move forward, if one side says we can't raise any taxes on anybody or any interest, and the other side says we can't cut anything, we're obviously not going to make progress on this. And our interest is in making progress on this.
This ought to be a season for cooperation in terms of pushing our economy forward, job creation, steadying the middle class, and laying the groundwork for a better future. And that's what we want to work on with Republicans and Democrats.
