Today, only two groups in the United States have total immunity from lawsuits: foreign diplomats and HMOs. We believe it's time to end diplomatic immunity for HMOs. Holding them accountable is the only way to guarantee that you get the health care your family deserves.

Tom Harkin

Categorized in : Believe Two Guarantees That

America's health care system is in crisis precisely because we systematically neglect wellness and prevention.

prevention care america

If we are serious about combating the childhood obesity epidemic and improving child nutrition, then everyone must chip in -- parents, schools, and yes even Congress.

obesity-epidemic children school

Let's face it, in America today we don't have a health care system, we have a sick care system. We wait until people become obese, develop chronic diseases, or become disabled - and then we spend untold hundreds of billions annually to try to make them better.

sick america people

I don't know if there's any secret recipe. Just a lot of hard work. Pay attention to your constituents. I always had a great Iowa staff that did all my great constituent service work. And I found that people would forgive me for a lot of my "liberal sins" because I paid attention to the home front.

hard-work home people

It is long past time to eliminate bigotry in the workplace and to ensure equal opportunity for all Americans. It is time to make clear that lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender Americans are first class citizens. They are full and welcome members of our American family and they deserve the same civil rights protections as all other Americans. It is time for us to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. Such discrimination is wrong and should not be tolerated.

bisexual gay past

The planes were hijacked, the buildings fell, and thousands of lives were lost nearly a thousand miles from here. But the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon were an attack on the heart of America. And standing here in the heartland of America, we say in one voice We will not give in to terrorists; We will not rest until they are found and defeated; We will win this struggle not for glory, nor wealth, nor power, but for justice, for freedom, and for peace; So help us God.

struggle winning heart

Politics is like driving. To go backward put it in R. To go forwa... by Tom Harkin

Politics is like driving. To go backward put it in R. To go forward put it in D.

driving

When those pictures of Abu Ghraib came out, I thought, my gosh, this is like the tiger cages for prisoners in Vietnam all over again. Only we were actually doing it ourselves, we weren't hiring another government to do it.

hiring tigers prisoner

[A]s we celebrate 75 years of the minimum wage, we must also recognize that it is no longer achieving its potential impact in our economy or for America's working families. Every American deserves the chance to build a better life for his or her family - and raising the minimum wage will provide that opportunity.

impact opportunity america

The President must stop gambling with taxpayers' money and get the country back on the path of fiscal sanity.

gambling president country

I think the American people said, look, you know, we can't control what every government does to its people, but we shouldn't be aiding and assisting a government in having these kinds of repressive prisons. It added to the public outcry against our involvement in Vietnam.

kind people thinking

There is no such thing as a pro-nuclear environmentalist. by Tom Harkin

There is no such thing as a pro-nuclear environmentalist.

environmentalist nuclear

While President Bush's tax give-aways for the rich are pushing us further into debt, he compensates by increasing the out-of-pocket costs to our veterans.

vaccines our-veterans giving

I am a Democrat and I love my party and I want them to have good policies and good candidates, so I hope to be supportive in some way, but I don't intend to be any kind of 'godfather' or something like that.

supportive party love

The burning issue of our time is the growing inequality in income and wealth in our country, and it's got to be addressed. We've got to stop it. It's eroding our politics. It's separating our society into the haves and the have-nots. It's condemning a whole younger set of our population to not be able to enter the middle class. And, it hits hardest in the prairie areas of the United States, our small towns and communities, where the jobs just aren't available and the incomes are low.

wealth community country

I've always been for immigration reform; in 2007 I just didn't fe... by Tom Harkin

I've always been for immigration reform; in 2007 I just didn't feel it had enough protections.

had-enough reform immigration

Prions are highly indestructible. by Tom Harkin

Prions are highly indestructible.

indestructible danger

I fully support President Bush's decision to strike Al Qaeda's terrorist network. Now more than ever, we must stand united as a nation and support our President and our military. It is important to remember that this carefully targeted response is not an attack on a religion, nor a nation, but an attack on terrorism. In Congress, we will continue to work with the White House to do what's needed to bring justice to those who committed the heinous and evil attacks of September 11.

military evil white

When I first arrived to Congress in 1975, I would spend several hours every week with Republicans - having lunch, drinking a beer. But by the time I left last year, that was a rarity. Every moment of free time is eaten up by fundraising. And the advent of all these groups that can threaten passage of this or that with an avalanche of money or a primary opponent has poisoned our politics.

republican drinking beer

Obesity now contributes to the death of more than 360,000 Americans a year. The incidence of childhood obesity is now at epidemic levels. Alarm bells are going off all over the place. But our government has done virtually nothing.

epidemics government years