Relief over House vote

By: | Inside NoVA
Published: November 12, 2009

We heard the news of the landmark vote on health care in the House of Representatives over coffee on Sunday morning. I looked at my wife and saw in her eyes a sense of relief that I hadn’t seen for many years.

She is a director of a nursery/kindergarten. Each and every one of their 200-plus pupils is precious to both the teachers and the directors. And when something happens that forces one of them to withdraw from the school, all share the pain.

That has happened more frequently of late, and most often because a family member has become ill and is without health insurance.

Thanks to a morally sound, fiscally responsible and far-sighted effort by congressional Democrats, the day is coming when no child’s education will be at jeopardy because of an unexpected family illness.

And what is so clear now is that educational opportunity is just one of many extraordinarily important and positive downstream consequences of health care reform.

I didn’t finish my coffee Sunday morning. Instead, I went to my computer to check the congressional Web site: On the motion to the pass the Affordable Heath Care for America Act, Mr. Connolly votes AYE.

On behalf of all the hard-working parents who are without health care: Thank you, sir.

Bennett Marsh
Haymarket