Speaker Nancy Pelosi didn't say Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) should apologize for his recent comments about Republicans and health care, but she did say that if he does apologize the Republicans who have used similar language on the House floor should apologize as well.

"If anybody is going to apologize, everybody should apologize," Pelosi said this morning at her weekly press conference. "Apparently Republicans are holding Democrats to a higher level than they hold their own members."

During a late Tuesday speech on the House floor, Grayson was criticizing Republians when he uttered the words that have caused an uproar within the GOP.

"If you get sick, America, the Republican plan is this: Die quickly," said Grayson. "That's right, the Republicans want you to die quickly if you get sick."

Republican Study Committee Chairman Tom Price (R-Ga.) has threatened to introduce a privileged resolution of disapproval for Grayson's comments if he does not apologize -- similar to the tack taken by Democrats following Rep. Joe Wilson's (R-S.C.) "You lie!" outburst during President Obama's speech to a joint session of Congress last month.

However, as Pelosi noted, Republicans have made similar comments on the House floor.

In July, Rep. Ginny Brown-Waite (R-Fla.) said from the floor that the Democrats' plan was a message to senior citizens to "drop dead."

"Last week Democrats released a health care bill, which essentially said to America's seniors, 'Drop dead,'" Brown-Waite said.

Pelosi said she'd prefer to move on to a discussion on the issues within health care reform, rather than focus on these distractions. "Republicans are using this as a distraction from the fact that they have no plan to move us forward," she said.

The Speaker reconfirmed that the Democrats' House reform bill will include a public option and reiterated that it will not go to the House floor until it is fully paid for.

"We will know we are ready when the bill is deficit neutral," she said. "We won't go to the floor until we're ready."