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“IMPORTANT ISSUES WHICH DEFINE THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN REPUBLICANS AND DEMOCRATS IN THE 104TH CONGRESS” mentioning the U.S. Dept of Labor was published in the House of Representatives section on pages H5042-H5049 on May 14, 1996.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
IMPORTANT ISSUES WHICH DEFINE THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN REPUBLICANS AND
DEMOCRATS IN THE 104TH CONGRESS
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Chabot). Under the Speaker's announced policy of May 12, 1995, the gentleman from California [Mr. Riggs] is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
Mr. RIGGS. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate this opportunity to address my colleagues in this obviously empty Chamber, even at this late hour, because I am going to be discussing some issues that I think are of paramount importance and which define the differences between the Republican and Democratic Parties in the 104th Congress.
In fact, Mr. Speaker, I happened to hear the first half hour of the last hour, which involved comments by my good friend, the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Pallone], regarding our budget proposal, which will be coming to the House floor here in the next couple of days. This is the budget proposal for the coming Federal fiscal year which will begin on October 1 of this year.
As is very typical, he made very disparaging remarks about our plans to save Medicare from bankruptcy and our plans to reform Medicaid into a block grant program for the States. These tactics are not isolated to the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Pallone] alone. They run rampant through the national Democratic Party today, as the Democratic Party has seized on this particular issue to frighten and scare Americans in the hopes that they can, by employing these kinds of tactics, regain control of the House and Senate in the November elections.
Mr. Speaker, what we get, instead of constructive debate on the House floor, are what I would prefer to call drive-by special orders. In fact, the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Pallone] is still present. He is standing toward the rear of the Chamber, grinning. I would invite him to return to this very podium where he made his comments and engage in actual debate, rather than stand up and demagogue on these issues.
The first thing, Mr. Speaker, the American people need to know is that the Republican and Democratic Party, if you use President Clinton's budget proposal as their blueprint for reforming Medicare, are roughly $30 billion apart. In the context of a 6-year balanced budget plan, that is a very small difference between the Republican and Democratic Parties.
But again, we would never know that to listen to my Democratic colleagues, who insist on demagoguing this issue, and who, frankly, never mention that President Clinton, the leader of their party, has put forward a plan to reform Medicare by reducing the growth in Medicare expenditures.
Another way of putting that is that both the Republicans and Democrats want, at least, again, if you use President Clinton's proposal and not the comments of the far left wing of his party in the House and Senate, if you use his proposal, we both want to increase Medicare spending but at a slower rate, at a sustainable rate, in order to save the program from bankruptcy.
Before he might have to depart, I yield to my good friend, the gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. Kingston].
Mr. KINGSTON. Mr. Speaker, even though there are only a few of us present now, I am going to pose a pop quiz to the House. The question is who made the following statement:
Today, Medicaid and Medicare are going up at three times the rate of inflation. We propose to let it go up at two times the rate of inflation. That is not, I repeat, not a Medicare or Medicaid cut. And we have kept private sector increases so they won't go up as much. So only in Washington do people believe that no one can get by on twice the rate of inflation. So when you hear all this business about cuts, let me caution you, that is not what is going on.
Now, who made those comments: President Clinton or Newt Gingrich, the Speaker of the House? If you guessed President Clinton, you were right. He made those comments on October 5, 1993. On May 16, 1995, more recently, he said, ``I believe we have to slow the growth of Medicare.''
Mr. Speaker, compare the comments of President Clinton to what you hear tonight on the House floor from people like the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Pallone]. Then think for a moment on this particular quote. This is a quote by the former Democrat Governor of Colorado, Gov. Richard Lamb, in Newsweek May 13, so just the other day: ``I am awed by his,'' referring to President Clinton, ``I am awed by his understanding of this insolvency of Medicare, which just makes his demagoguing worse. He knows what is happening, yet he is poisoning the well. Medicare is not as bad off as the Republicans said, it's must worse.''
So that is what we hear nightly out here during special orders, is Democrats demagoguing this issue and poisoning the well, and ruining any chance of a bipartisan proposal, a bipartisan solution to save Medicare from bankruptcy.
Mr. Speaker, I will be happy to yield to the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Pallone], as well. I do want to continue in the vein of a pop quiz, since it is getting near the end of the school year, and since there are a lot of kids there, students who are picking up the brunt of this huge, massive debt.
Let me give you a number. As of today, by the way, our debt is
$5,092,815,215,000. To help senior citizens, to help the middle class, to help the young folks, we have to get our head out of the sand and say, OK, it is time to act like we do have a debt out there after all, and let us be responsible and work together in a bipartisan fashion and quit all this election year sniping, which apparently is so addictive and tempting these days.
The pop quiz. I would say to the gentleman from California [Mr. Riggs], your final exam: Which number is larger, $179 billion, or $304 billion. Which one is larger?
Mr. RIGGS. I think I can answer that one, even though I do not pretend to be any kind of mathematics expert, but obviously the $300 billion figure is much larger.
Mr. KINGSTON. You are doing well so far. Question No. 2: If the House raised Medicare from $179 billion to $304 billion, would they be increasing Medicare, decreasing Medicare, or leaving it level?
Mr. RIGGS. They obviously would be increasing.
Mr. KINGSTON. Increasing. So why do you suppose there are Members of the House who say increasing Medicare from $179 to $304 billion is a cut? Can you explain that? That is the discussion question.
Mr. RIGGS. It is. In fact, let me just add, to personalize it a little bit more for our colleagues and for any Americans, our fellow Americans who might be listening to us, our plan to save Medicare from bankruptcy, while increasing Medicare spending and increasing Medicare health care choices, increasing Medicare spending per senior citizen from $4,800 per citizen per year in 1996 to $7,300 per senior citizen in 6 years. Obviously when you go from $4,800 today to $7,300 over the next 6 years, you are increasing Medicare spending per senior citizen. No matter which way you slice it, that happens to be an increase.
Let me stop and see if the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Pallone] would like to join me at this point in time.
I yield to the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Pallone.]
Mr. PALLONE. I certainly would like to debate these issues, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the gentleman yielding to me. I do not think the issue really is whether we are talking about a cut in the increase or an overall cut after inflation. To me the problem here is----
Mr. KINGSTON. A cut is not the issue at all. As a matter of fact, we just said, beyond a doubt, that if you, if I could point out----
Mr. RIGGS. I yield the gentleman from South Carolina.
Mr. KINGSTON. If we want to have a discussion, let us get on the concrete foundation that the figure $179 is smaller than the number
$304, and remove from the discussion that Medicare is cut. Could we agree that $304 is bigger than $179?
{time} 2245
Mr. PALLONE. I would like the gentleman to yield me some time if I could talk about this. If not, there is no point, if I am not going to be given a couple of minutes or so to respond.
Mr. RIGGS. Mr. Speaker, I want to give the gentleman a chance to respond, but I appreciate the statement of my colleague from Georgia and again we hope that you can perhaps tell us what your proposal is to save Medicare from bankruptcy.
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, that is a very good question. If I could have a couple of minutes to respond.
Mr. RIGGS. I yield to the gentleman.
Mr. PALLONE. I thank the gentleman. First of all, I would point out that the level of cuts that the Republicans are talking about in this budget are not necessary for Medicare solvency. Basically what the Republicans are proposing are cuts that are $44 billion more for Medicare than what President Clinton has proposed in his budget.
Let us keep in mind that the President proposed a budget earlier this year, and now the Republican budget that is coming up this Thursday for a vote is basically a counterproposal to that. The President acknowledges, as every Democratic Congress has in the past, that it is necessary to deal with the Medicare program and make sure that the trust continues to be solvent. That is why he has proposed a certain level of cuts in Medicare. But those are strictly to keep the trust fund solvent.
Mr. Speaker, the level of cuts that the Republicans are proposing, which is significantly more than the President, these are the things that I have a problem with, and I believe that those are being used primarily to pay for tax breaks. More important than that, and I stressed earlier this evening, is that the very nature of the Medicare program changes with this Republican proposal. Basically what you are doing is cutting down and eliminating choices. You are pushing a lot more seniors, in fact I think eventually all seniors, into managed care or HMO's where oftentimes they are not going to have a choice of doctors or even hospitals. You are allowing for a different reimbursement system, basically providing a higher level of reimbursement for HMO's or managed care than the traditional fee-for-
service system where you can choose your own doctor, and then you allow balanced billing. In other words, doctors can charge more for people who stay in the traditional Medicare so there will be a larger out-of-
pocket expense for those who continue to stay in the traditional fee-
for-service program where they have their choice of doctors.
In addition to that, you have introduced this notion of medical savings accounts, which basically establishes a catastrophic health insurance policy which only the healthiest and the wealthiest senior citizens are going to be able to afford.
So three major points in the existing Medicare Program have existed essentially for the last 30 years. One is unlimited choice of doctors and hospitals. Second is a limit, I think it is 15 percent, on the amount that can be charged as a co-payment by the physician beyond Medicare, plus the guarantee that if you are in Medicare, you are going to have a certain level of health services that are provided for. All three of those things are negatively impacted by the Republican proposal.
What I am saying is that those are not necessary in order to guarantee the solvency of the program, if you simply implement the level of cuts that the President has proposed, and then you will keep the Medicare Program solvent.
Mr. Speaker, we are going to have a choice Thursday. It is going to be the Republican budget. There is going to be the President's budget, and there may be a lot of other alternatives. What I am saying is the President's budget is far superior and solves the problem of solvency. So, the Republicans in raising this issue of solvency are using it as an excuse to cover all the other changes that they are suggesting to make in the Medicare Program.
Mr. RIGGS. Let me reclaim my time and give the gentleman a chance to catch his breath.
Mr. Speaker, let me first of all point out that our plan very clearly says right on its face that no older American who is currently receiving Medicare health care benefits will be forced out of the traditional fee-for-service program. It does provide other options for health care, and the gentleman from New Jersey mentioned a couple, managed care, and medical savings accounts. We think those are both progressive ideas, designed to build more flexibility into the program, ultimately give more choice to Medicare recipients and frankly to empower them to be more involved with decisions having to do with their own personal health care.
Let me point out that, second, a fact that the gentleman kind of skipped over. Let me back up for just a moment.
Let me also stipulate that our plan requires that any savings from reducing the rate of growth in Medicare expenditures must stay in the Medicare Program. As a consequence, the Congressional Budget Office says that our program will extend the life or the solvency of the hospital insurance trust fund to the year 2008, which is 3 years more than the President's proposal.
So, yes, we are bolder because we are trying to think not just of the needs of today's seniors but the needs of the next generation of Medicare recipients as well. But I want to come back to one point because I really want to understand this in terms of the gentleman's position.
Do I understand correctly that your position is that the roughly $120 billion I believe that is in Medicare savings that the President proposed is OK? That is to say, you are comfortable with that? You can support that level of savings? You will vote on this floor if you have the opportunity for that level of savings? But you object to our figure which is roughly now, and I know we are talking ballpark figures here, but our figure is roughly $30 billion more in savings, which you characterize as cuts.
Mr. PALLONE. If the gentleman will yield further, let me say this. I am not in charge of the rules process but I believe that there will be an opportunity on Thursday to vote on the President's budget as an alternative and, yes, I will vote for that assuming that that is in order and that we have that opportunity. I am also concerned about the level of cuts in the President's budget but obviously I think it is far preferable to what the Republican leadership has proposed and I will support it. The concern I have is that the level of cuts, and obviously even more aggravated in terms of what the Republican leadership has proposed, is going to have a very negative impact on hospitals. In other words, if you look at the level of cuts in the Republican budget, most of the money that is proposed to be cut comes out of Part A which is of course primarily paying or reimbursement for hospital care. We know, because that same level is basically what was proposed in 1995, that many hospitals will not be able to absorb that level of cut primarily because they are 50, 60 in some cases better than 60 percent dependent on Medicare. So I do think that there is a danger and that we are kidding ourselves here if we think that we can continue to make these level of cuts that you propose. I know it is a little better than 1995 overall but it is not really better in terms of Part A and what that means for the Nation's hospitals.
I would venture to say that the President's proposal is significantly less in terms of the level of cuts to hospitals and that is far preferable because it will mean that many of these hospitals, and I think in particular of my home State, will be able to survive with that level of cuts, whereas they may not be able to, or most likely will not be able to under what the Republican leadership has proposed.
But even beyond that again it is the changes in the Medicare Program that you are proposing that bother me the most. I think it is going to significantly change the nature of the Medicare Program and not provide the guarantee that seniors have had for the last 30 years in terms of the unlimited choice of doctors and being protected against additional costs that would be charged by physicians.
Mr. RIGGS. Let me reclaim my time and state to the gentleman again so he is absolutely clear on this point, we have made, I think emphatically clear to the American people from day one that anyone presently in the Medicare Program under the traditional fee-for-service arrangement could stay in that program. That is explicitly built into the legislation.
I also want to make the point, then I am going to yield to the gentleman from Georgia, and I hope the gentleman will stay because I will yield him more time, but I also want to point out that the Democrat plan does not contain the same incentives for rooting out waste, fraud, and abuse, not the same aggressive incentives that ours have, including a financial incentive to those Medicare recipients who do report waste, fraud, and abuse in the system, and I think we all know that there is rampant waste, fraud, and abuse, almost endemic to the system.
Second, it does not provide the same flexibility in choices that we have offered Medicare recipients in our plan. I am a Californian, I admit California is on the cutting edge of the Nation in terms of introducing the idea of managed care on an outpatient basis for all age groups, not just older Americans, and I am absolutely convinced that managed care is a viable health care alternative for those Medicare recipients who are either already enrolled in managed care programs that are quite satisfactory in terms of their needs, in their opinion, meeting their needs, and, second, in terms of giving Americans again more say, more of a role, in making their own health care decisions.
We are not forcing anyone out of the program. We are trying to bring a 1950's style program into the 1990's. Again I say to the gentleman, he insists on continuing to use the term cuts to describe our program. But as that gap between the Republican proposal and the Clinton proposal narrow, at what point do you cease to describe our program as a cut? That was the question posed to the President at the press conference last week, and he sort of hemmed and hawed. He ultimately, as many times he does when he is pinned down, he ultimately blamed the media for introducing the use of the term cuts into the debate, and nothing could be further from the truth.
Mr. Speaker, the truth is that that term has been used out on this floor of the other body repeatedly. I believe it has been identified by the Democratic Party strategists as the key wedge issue to be used as a political football, if you will, to try to regain control of the House and the Senate.
Mr. KINGSTON. If the gentleman will yield, there is no question that this is the liberal Washington keep the status quo propaganda machine using the word cut. And the gentleman from New Jersey, who I respect, I think maybe it is a reflection of the New Jersey school system when he refers to going from $304 billion from $179 billion as a cut, where all the rest of the States across the country would call that an increase.
Moving on, though, with his concern about hospitals, I am concerned about hospitals but only after I am concerned about patients and senior citizens. I think that the patients, you have to put the patients first. I am sorry about the hospital system in New Jersey, but again I am more concerned about the patients.
My mother, as I believe your parents are, as well, is on Medicare. It is a 1964 Blue Cross/Blue Shield plan. I like the idea of mom having choices because I trust her and I trust other people's parents and their children's ability to choose what health care plan fits them best. Right now it is Medicare or Medicare, period. Under the proposal they would have a physicians service network as an option. They would have a managed care plan as an option. They would have traditional Medicare as an option. They would have medical savings accounts as an option.
Mr. Speaker, all these are actuarially worked into the formula that increases the benefit from around $5,000 to $7,200. The numbers vary slightly, but the fact is that it does give more choices while cracking down on fraud and abuse.
My dad lives in a condominium complex in Athens, GA, where there are a number of other seniors. My dad has macular degeneration, is legally blind, he has diabetes. But all the seniors in his complex work together and go over each other's bills, medical, food needs, and so forth. He says just about without exception when they go to the hospital for a head cold, they get billed for x rays or something just totally ridiculous. I do not think it is all fraud, but it is just a general sloppiness that Medicare is paying for it, so do not worry about it. We have got to crack down on that abuse because it is right out of our seniors' pockets.
One other thing that the gentleman from New Jersey mentioned was this tax cut thing, and maybe we could just at this point agree that we disagree on Medicare. We want to save and protect it one way, and the President wants to keep patching it up another way until the next election. I think that it is important--and one of our great challenges, where he saves the program until 2008, we need to save it ad infinitum but at least get beyond the election cycle.
I note with interest that one of the things about the Clinton budget is that 74 percent of the reductions, the deficit reductions in the overall budget come the last 2 years, which is 2 years after he is out of office if he was to be reelected. So here we have got the pain, as usual, coming later, whereas the Republican budget overall reduces spending and savings, consolidates the size of Government over a 6-year period of time. It is more fair and more equitable that way.
Mr. Speaker, the thing, though, our profamily budget also calls for a tax credit of $500 per child for families under $110,000. I have always thought of New Jersey as having higher incomes than Georgia; $110,000, you can live well. But the fact is that is a combined income, and that still in many cases is very middle class.
I would like to ask our friend from New Jersey when we talk about tax cuts for the wealthy, which I have heard him and many of his colleagues expound on over and over again, who are the wealthy that we are talking about in this budget that would benefit and maybe even why it is so bad to do anything for the wealthy. I would like to just throw that question out to the gentleman.
{time} 2300
Mr. RIGGS. Let me pose that question to him, and then maybe the gentleman from New Jersey will also tell us where he stands on the repeal of the Clinton Democratic gas tax increase, which will be coming to this House floor early next week. I will yield to the gentleman from New Jersey.
Mr. PALLONE. Well, you are probably asking the wrong person, because I did not vote for the original gas tax increase, and I would have no problem and would certainly vote for the repeal.
I only mentioned the tax breaks because of my concern over the fact that the Medicare cuts as well as the Medicaid cuts I believe will be used to finance them. I know that one of the things that the gentleman said before, which I am very concerned about, he said we were going to have a guarantee that you could stay in the traditional fee-for-service plan and that whatever cuts were implemented by the Republican leadership would stay in the Medicare Program.
I would say that those promises are not real. First of all, because in 1995, when we discussed the issue, we tried to put an amendment in the budget that would say that all the money that was saved in Medicare and Medicaid would only be used for those programs. That amendment was actually defeated on the floor of this House. I voted for it. So I think it is a false promise.
Second, when you talk about the guarantee that you will be able to stay in the fee-for-service or traditional Medicare Program, again, the guarantee does not mean anything if you build into your proposed changes in Medicare a different reimbursement rate for managed care and HMO's versus the traditional fee-for-service program where you can choose your own doctor.
That is the problem here. You are building in incentives that basically make people or force people to go into HMO's, because the reimbursement rate because of the caps will be higher for HMO's and managed care and lower for the traditional fee-for-service system. Under the traditional fee-for-service system you are going to allow balanced billing. You are saying the doctors can charge more than the 15 percent now allowed under current law. Basically what is going to happen here, even though there may be something written in the legislation that says you can stay in the traditional Medicare system, the reimbursement rate, and money drives everything, is going to push people into managed care and into HMO's.
I am not saying managed care and HMO's are always bad. There are some that are very good. The bottom line is a lot of seniors are used to having their own choice of doctors, and depending on the area, they may not be able to get into an HMO or managed care system where their doctor is covered by that system. So this notion of choice, that somehow the Republican leadership plan is going to guarantee choice or provide lots of other choices, I think is a false promise, and particularly when you talk about the MSA's.
I believe you brought up the issue of the medical savings accounts. That is nothing more than catastrophic health care coverage. What I think is going to happen is once again the healthy and wealthy people will choose that because they can afford to put the money aside and not worry about whether they are going to have to pay out of pocket for the health care and just have this catastrophic coverage.
The people remaining in the Medicare system are going to be the sicker and probably the poorer people. That is going to drive up the cost for the Government for those that remain in the system. I am fearful what you are doing here is creating a sort of two-
tiered system, pushing certain seniors into managed care, having a lot of them opt out for this catastrophic coverage that they may not necessarily know what they are getting into.
When you say you are still going to be able to have your traditional Medicare, the bottom line is you really are not, because you are creating incentives that will make it more difficult for that to happen.
I also wanted to address the issue of fraud. This was a big issue for the Democrats in the last Congress. Again, I was in the Committee on Commerce, I am a member of the Committee on Commerce, and we specifically tried to change the language that was in the Republican bill that made it easier for those who were committing fraud or were basically abusing the Medicare system to get away with it.
The standard of proof that was put into place in that budget last year, and I suspect it is the same this year unless you show me differently, was actually watered down, so it would be more difficult to prosecute those who were violating Medicare and abusing the system.
I am 100 percent for trying to crack down on fraud and abuse. I think you can save a significant amount of money if you do that. Do not weaken the standard of proof and make it more difficult for the Justice Department and others to go after those committing the fraud and abuse. Otherwise you will have a worse system in terms of prosecuting those people.
Lastly, I do not want to get into semantics. I have said over and over, I think the gentleman from Georgia was here when I said it in 1995, we are talking about a cut in the growth of the program. I keep using the term ``cut.'' Maybe you do not like the term ``cut'' in growth, but I will say one thing, I use it for both the President and for the Republican proposal. The bottom line is that if you do not have enough money in Medicare to continue to service to the growing number of people who are going to be in the system, because we know there are going to be more seniors, the baby-boomer generation is getting older and there are going to be more and more seniors in the system, if you do not have enough money to cover that growth, in reality what you are doing is cutting the amount of money to be available to these people and the need is going to be there and there is not going to be the money to take care of the growing number of seniors.
I do not see this as a political issue. I know that has been raised many times on the floor. I am someone who has cared about seniors for a long time. I have worked for protective services for the elderly in various capacities. There is a lot of politics in this House of Representatives. The bottom line is we have to look at the substance of what is going on here. We are talking about the substantive changes of what would happen, what changes would exist in the Medicare Program, if this Republican proposal goes through.
That is why I think we need to continue to fight against it. Even if it passes on Thursday, which I suspect it will, I will be continuing to speak out against it as I have tonight.
I appreciate the time that you gentlemen have given me this evening.
Mr. KINGSTON. The gentleman does not want to talk about taxes?
Mr. PALLONE. I will be glad to talk about taxes.
Mr. RIGGS. I am going to reclaim my time. We will talk about taxes in a moment. The point I want to make is that House Republicans and Senate Republicans have acted responsibly in this session of Congress. We sent the President a viable piece of legislation known as the Medicare Preservation Act and he vetoed that legislation. What is coming to the House floor, I believe the gentleman said Wednesday or Thursday, later this week, is a budget resolution for the Federal fiscal year 1997. It assumes a certain amount of savings in the Medicare Program, but it is not a comprehensive plan to preserve and protect Medicare from bankruptcy, such as the legislation the President vetoed.
I also want to make a point, and that is the gentleman repeatedly refers to HMO's. But I am perplexed, because there are literally thousands of older Americans today who are already in Medicare health maintenance organizations. I hear from many of them, I am sure the gentleman must have heard from some of them, that there is a high level of satisfaction for the most part with the services that they are receiving through those HMO's. After all, no one has forced them into those HMO's. They still have the option of relying on the traditional fee-for-service arrangement, yet they have voluntarily opted to enroll in Medicare health maintenance organizations.
So I believe that that is evidence that HMO's or managed care can be introduced alongside the traditional fee-for-service arrangement, with again the ironclad guarantee that we built into the legislation, which is that no older American currently receiving Medicare benefits would be forced out of the traditional fee-for-service program.
I also want to point out to the gentleman that I hope he is committed, and he makes some constructive suggestions, it sounds like he would like to, if we could agree on the ultimate level of savings to be achieved, to help us fine tune this legislation. But I want to point out that if we do not act, we will be remiss in our leadership responsibilities as elected officials, at least in my view, especially since we now know, every Member of this body, every Member of the other body, knows that Medicare will be bankrupt no later than the year 2001, just 5 years from now, and that is a year sooner than the Medicare trustees warned Congress a year ago last month, April 1995. As both gentlemen know, several of those Medicare trustees are members of the President's Cabinet.
Now, those estimates of Medicare going bankrupt sooner than we had projected come from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. So let us assume that because of the partisan wrangling, because of those who are more interested in preserving Medicare as an issue for the fall election campaign than in actually preserving Medicare for the next generation, let us assume nothing happens and we continue down that road with Medicare going bankrupt. And I should point out at this juncture that this is not Frank Riggs, Republican, speaking now. Of course, these warnings are coming from not just the Congressional Budget Office, as I just mentioned, but from the mainstream media.
For Pete's sake, the Washington Post, not exactly a conservative publication, editorialized on April 29, just a short time ago, ``By the end of the fiscal year 2001, the trust fund will have a deficit of $2.9 billion because of rising costs. In other words, the fund will be bankrupt a year earlier than projected last year by Medicare program actuaries.''
They go on to say, ``According to the Congressional Budget Office figures, the trust fund will be in the red by $331.6 billion by the end of fiscal year 2005.''
You heard me right, a $331 billion deficit, $100 billion worse than the cumulative deficit forecast a year ago by the CBO, the $150 billion worse than the cumulative deficit projected by the Medicare actuaries last year.
The last comment I wanted to quote, ``The new numbers appear to lend support to Republican charges that the Medicare hospital tust fund is deteriorating faster than had been realized and that steps must be taken quickly to arrest the decline.''
So, if the gentleman happens to share those sentiments, I think he has an obligation to contribute constructively to the debate, rather than to come down here and do, as I suggested earlier, sort of join with the President in, to use the terms of former Colorado Democrat Governor Richard Lamb, poisoning the well. Because make no mistake about it, colleagues and the American people, the alternative, if we allow this program to go bankrupt, is a substantial increase in payroll taxes on the backs of every working American. The Medicare trustees and actuaries estimated roughly a 40-percent payroll tax would be necessary to replenish the hospital insurance trust fund if we did nothing, or we would be looking at the possibility of rationing health care benefits. In fact, by law, of Medicare goes bankrupt, no benefits can be paid, and therefore no services rendered or received.
So I really want to urge the gentleman and his Democratic colleagues to start contributing constructively. If you have suggestions for how to save Medicare from bankruptcy, on how to modify or fine tune the Medicare Preservation Act which President Clinton vetoed, then, by all means, please put them on the table and stop poisoning the well.
Mr. PALLONE. If the gentleman will yield further, I have said over and over again that the President's budget which came out earlier this year guarantees the life of the Medicare trust fund in my opinion for as long as the Republican proposal. What I am saying is the additional Republican cuts, this additional $44 billion more in Medicare cuts, is not necessary for Medicare solvency.
There is over $120 billion remaining in the trust fund. Although it did not perform as well as projected in 1995, the difference between the actual and projected performance was within the typical margin of error.
The fund comes out with a report every year. In 1993 the President made certain corrections and signed into law a bill extending the life of the trust fund for 3 years. Now, he had an additional proposal to extend the life of the fund. We are not talking about his agreement about the fact that Medicare has a problem that needs to be tinkered with. I am saying these Republican proposals go much further than that and are not necessary and are proposals to change radically the nature of the Medicare Program. If we adopted the President's position and budget, we would solve the solvency problem, just like the Republican budget does as well.
I wanted to say one more thing in closing. I know the gentleman mentioned there are some seniors in HMO's. But they are still a relatively small percentage. My point only is we should not be pushing seniors into HMO's establishing a different reimbursement rate and providing a financial incentive to go into HMO's.
In my home State of New Jersey, there happen to be very few seniors in HMO's. Some of them are good. I think there are a lot of problems with HMO's in terms of disclosure, advertising, in terms of seniors and people in general not knowing what they are getting into.
I would say one thing. You are right when you talk about the budget we are going to be voting on this Thursday basically being a skeleton. I know once that is adopted, and I am not going to support the Republican budget, that over the next few months we are going to be hammering out the details as to how this is going to be implemented until we get to reconciliation in the fall.
The point I am making tonight is let us not in trying to hammer out that budget end the details, because the devil is in the details. Do not do the types of things that the Republicans proposed last year in terms of changing the Medicare Program, because I think that, going beyond the financial aspects and the level of cuts, that would be the most damaging thing that could be done to Medicare as we know it.
But, again, I want to thank the gentlemen for giving me some of their time tonight to participate in this debate.
Mr. KINGSTON. Let me ask the gentleman this: Having been turned down getting time from you guys last Thursday when you controlled the time, would you, in the sense of fairness, make it a practice and tell your Democrat colleagues that Republicans do yield time and it would be very, very appreciative if Democrats would yield us time? Could you maybe take the lead on that, because I see there is some reluctance on your side.
Mr. PALLONE. Let me say this: I think there are times when having a debate like this back and forth is valuable, and there are other times when it is available to just have one side represented for 1 hour and the other side for another hour. Why do we not see how it goes.
Mr. KINGSTON. It is valuable if you believe in what you are saying. If you are saying stuff, as a couple of your colleagues were the other night about Newt Gingrich's statement regarding HCFA, and trying to imply that was a Medicare statement, which the people who were using that knew that to be a total lie on the House floor incidentally, I would say I would not want to yield the floor either if I was lying. But if I was truthing, I would yield the floor.
I hope you will yield the floor and encourage your colleagues to yield the floor, not because of Republicans and Democrats, and one might look better than the other, but because we have problems in America. We all have parents and children and folks back home dependent on us.
{time} 2315
I read a statistic the other day that something like only 10,000 people in the history of the United States have served in Congress, and indeed there are only 435 of us right now. Folks curse Congress and kick Congress and laugh at politicians, rightly so, and yet they still depend on us to do this job, which is to work together and put the needs of American people and Government first, and not Republican or Democrat problems. I think it is always important to back up a step and remember what our job mission is and who our boss is.
Mr. RIGGS. I appreciate the gentleman making that point. In fact, I was going to make a similar point, just reminding the gentleman from New Jersey that I think the exchange, and I think it has been a very civil and polite conversation that we have had tonight, is much more constructive for both our colleagues and for the American people.
I do not want to violate House rules. We have to be respectful of those rules, but I think we should acknowledge at any given time we have a vast viewing audience watching the proceedings on this House floor. I think we have duty to inform and instruct them, and in the process I think we can still make clear the distinct differences between the two political parties in the House of Representatives.
Again, I want to thank the gentleman for his comments and participation tonight. I get the last word because I control the time, and I will just conclude this section of our special order, before we turn our attention to the budget, by quoting from the nonpartisan American Academy of Actuaries form December 21 of last year.
They said--now, bear in mind these are nonpartisan actuaries, people who do this kind of financial forecasting for a living--they said that the President's budget does not protect Medicare from bankruptcy, and went on to say:
It is similar to the quick fixes enacted in the past that have allowed the Medicare program to fall into its current financial state. This proposal also includes accounting tricks. In the long run these tricks undermine the economic discipline of the trust fund.
So I hope our colleagues will realize that we are interested in preserving Medicare. We are interested in addressing, forthrightly and immediately, the problem of the Medicare trust fund going bankrupt, as projected by the Medicare trustees and by the American Academy of Actuaries.
For the 37 million Americans, older Americans and disabled Americans who rely on Medicare, exploiting Medicare as a campaign issue is, in my mind, well, it is a very cynical thing to do. We ought to get about our business in the 44-some-odd legislative days remaining in this session of Congress, the 104th meeting of Congress in our Nation's history, with a plan to protect Medicare from bankruptcy.
Again, I thank the gentleman for joining me tonight. I challenge him and all my Democratic colleagues to join us in doing the right thing.
Now, speaking of cynicism, I want to take a moment more because I think it is a logical segue of sorts. We have been talking about some of the facts behind the so-called mediscare campaign that has been waged by the National Democratic Party against our plans to preserve Medicare from bankruptcy, and that is part of what I believe will be viewed ultimately as a legacy of cynicism left behind by President Clinton when he leaves office.
For the past 4 years the American people have witnessed President Clinton say one thing, then turn around and do something completely different, beginning of course with his promise to cut middle class taxes, which he made the centerpiece of his economic plan in the 1992 campaign called ``Putting People First.''
At first these promises might have been attributed to inexperience, a new President getting started in office. They were certainly fodder for a lot of jokes around Washington. But over time the President's utter failure to be true to his word on anything has worn very thin.
Just last week the President held a news conference and said, with a straight face, ``The main point is that we are not yet in an election, at least we shouldn't be.'' Yet as he spoke his political party, the National Democratic Party, the Democratic National Committee I guess is actually what it is called, they were airing an advertisement that reeks of electioneering at its worse.
In fact the Democratic National Committee attack ad against Senator Dole is a phony attack, not supported by the facts whatsoever.
In fact, one media commentator, Brooks Jackson of CNN, went so far as to call these television advertising spots false advertising. He described the Democratic strategy as one, ``not to let the facts get in the way of pro-Clinton political spin.'' That was on CNN's Inside Politics show on April 4.
So the President is continuing with mediscare, with these Democratic National Committee ads, a very cynical approach to this year's election which overlooks one fact: The American people are a lot smarter than he or his party give them credit for, and they will not be fooled by deceptive advertising that distorts his opponents' records.
Now, let us do a quick reality check. I know the Democrats supposedly have their truth squad, or whatever it is called, instant response, but here is what the Democratic National Committee ad currently airing around the country says. The announcer said:
The facts? The President proposes a balanced budget protecting Medicare, education, the environment. But Dole is voting no. Well, here is the reality behind that claim. President Clinton has never proposed a detailed budget plan. He never proposed a plan until he was forced to do so by the new Republican majority in Congress.
Senator Dole of course voted ``yes'' for the first balanced budget plan in 26 years, the first balanced budget proposal put forward by a Congress in 26 years, and as we all know, the President vetoed that legislation.
As I just mentioned a moment ago, and as my good friend the gentleman from Georgia mentioned, the President's so-called balanced budget plan is backloaded. Most of the spending cuts, which occur in one-third of the Federal budget, which is discretionary spending, occur in years 5 and 6, after the President would be out of office, assuming that we wins reelection. And of course, as the American Academy of Actuaries has told us, the President's plan does not protect Medicare from bankruptcy. Again, they describe it as accounting tricks and quick fixes such as those that have been enacted in the past.
Mr. KINGSTON. If the gentleman would yield.
Mr. RIGGS. I yield to the gentleman.
Mr. KINGSTON. I would also like to join in this. The President's budget calls for 14 new Federal Government programs. What a way to end the era of big Government. He also has a tax increase in his budget that is only there until the year 2000. Again, conveniently, if the President were reelected, right when he gets out the tax cut, which he has $129 billion in tax cuts, I guess for the wealthy also, our colleague from the other side of the aisle did not define wealthy a minute ago, but the President calls for tax cuts, and then only temporarily. Once he gets out of office, the taxes go back up.
And I would tell the gentleman that 15,800 new Federal employees are added to the rolls under the President and 451 to the Department of Labor. For the Secretary of Labor alone, 83 new positions. That is not ending the era of big government.
There is a spending increase on 75 different programs, including a 248 percent increase for the EPA, 277 percent of the community development group, 66 percent for bilingual education, which, to me, that is a State issue not a Federal issue, but a 66 percent increase on it.
This is a budget, as the gentleman and I have both pointed out, where all the savings are on the back end. It is a phony election year budget, and it is right on the wake where the President actually, on May 8, called for a 90-day freeze on politics. Right when he was doing an $11 million fund raiser, incidentally.
Mr. RIGGS. I appreciate the gentleman's points. They are so well made and taken. He mentioned the President's proposed tax cut. In these nationwide television ads run by the Democratic National Committee, the ad goes on to say the President cuts taxes for 40 million Americans, Dole votes ``no.''
Well, any observer of Washington these last 17 months knows that President Clinton never proposed cutting taxes until Republicans won control of Congress. To the contrary, in 1993, President Clinton, who, as a candidate, promised a middle class tax cut, raised taxes $258 billion, the largest tax increase in history, which impacted every American household or some 260 million Americans.
As we know now, that tax increase, the 1993 Clinton Democratic tax increase, and I say Clinton Democratic because not a single Republican in the House or the other body voted in support of that Clinton tax and budget plan, but that Clinton Democratic tax increase included the 4.3-
cent-per-gallon gas tax that we will repeal on this House floor next week, in time to give American motorists a little tax relief before Memorial Day.
It also included the increase on Social Security benefits. And if we were really interested in demagogueing, we would probably be coming down to this well every day and night reminding our fellow Americans that the President and congressional Democrats increased taxes by $258 billion, including a gas tax increase, including a Social Security tax increase.
In fact, now the President admits that he raised them, referring to the taxes, too much. That is what he said in Houston on October 17 of last year to a gathering of prominent donors. And as the gentleman from Georgia pointed out just a moment ago, his new budget increases taxes by more than $60 billion, according to the Senate Committee on the Budget.
We all know Senator Dole voted yes on tax cuts for working families and for economic growth, and that, ultimately, the President vetoed those tax cuts.
Mr. KINGSTON. If the gentleman will yield. Here we have a President who in 1992 did run on a middle-class tax cut. In fact, one of his ads said, ``Hi, I am Bill Clinton, I believe you deserve a change, that is why I have a plan to get the economy moving again, starting with a middle-class tax cut.'' And that ad ran from New Jersey to Iowa.
Then, of course, when the middle-class tax cut package that Dole supported and worked to get out of the Senate, when it got to the White House Oval Office it was vetoed.
Medicare. The President says let us save Medicare. Well, on a bipartisan basis we worked very hard to try to save, protect, and preserve Medicare. Bob Dole worked for it. When it got to Bill Clinton's desk, it was vetoed.
On welfare reform the President promised to end welfare as we know it. Now, he may have promised to extend welfare as we know it. We were not sure. As we look back, that is exactly what has happened. But let us say he did say end welfare as we know it. We had a bipartisan welfare bill that just passed the Senate 87 to 12.
I mean the Senate has been his biggest ally. Frankly, Republicans and Democrats alike in many respects. President Clinton has worked with the liberals over there to twist the system and throw a monkey wrench in the process and so forth, but Senator Dole worked very hard to get this major reform out, and got it out and it was vetoed again, even in bipartisan fashion.
Product liability reform, something that American businesses need to keep their competitive edge internationally up. So important these days with NAFTA and GATT and so forth. Passed the Senate in a bipartisan fashion. Senator Dole worked for it, President Clinton vetoed it.
And the balanced budget. Passed the House, bipartisan fashion. Passed the Senate. Senator Dole worked very hard to get it out of the Senate. Got to the White House and it was vetoed. Dead on arrival.
{time} 2330
So a major difference, between Bob Dole tax relief, Bob Dole saving Medicare, Bob Dole reforming welfare, Bob Dole balancing the budget, Bill Clinton vetoing tax relief, Bill Clinton vetoing Medicare reform, Bill Clinton vetoing welfare reform, Bill Clinton vetoing a balanced budget. You have a very clear choice.
It is interesting that people say to us, why are you not getting the word out? I tell you one thing, a clue came out the other day: 92 percent of the press admitted to voting for Bill Clinton in 1992.
Mr. RIGGS. That is the Washington-based press corps.
Mr. KINGSTON. I could not report objectively on, let us say, my son or daughter if they were in elected office. I went to a school play this weekend. My daughter had a small role in it. I loved it. I tell you what, that was the most important role in the play. But all the other parents probably thought their child's role was just as important.
That is the relationship that you have with the press and the liberal Washington status quo community. It is not an arms's length objective relationship. The press has totally lost credibility because they are so cozy with the liberal Democrats, and they are doing everything they can to keep Bill Clinton in office because they do not want to change the status quo.
Mr. RIGGS. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, of course that press bias, which was so clearly pronounced in that survey released the other day, has been reinforced by these Democrat National Committee ads and by the big labor union bosses who have also been spending millions and millions of dollars in the mediscare campaign.
The gentleman from Georgia mentioned welfare reform. That is the other claim made in the Democrat National Committee television ads. The ad concludes by saying, President Clinton demands work for welfare, while protecting kids; Dole says no to the Clinton plans.
Well, President Clinton, Mr. Speaker, has never submitted a serious welfare proposal to the Congress. The one he submitted, in 1994, exempted half of American adults on welfare from work, the work requirements for able-bodied welfare recipients, in exchange for their welfare benefits. And the President himself later agreed with well known national columnist Ben Wattenberg that his welfare proposal had been ``soft and weak.'' That was the quote that Ben Wattenberg attributed to President Clinton.
President Clinton, as the gentleman from Georgia points out, vetoed bipartisan welfare reform not once but twice and now he is threatening to veto a plan endorsed by all 50 of the Nation's Governors. Unanimity, that is truly remarkable for this town. You have all 50 of the Nation's Governors, big State, little State, Republican and Democrat alike, all endorsing welfare reforms. And now the President is saying that he is going to veto that plan.
Senator Dole said yes to genuine welfare reform. As the gentleman from Georgia points out, President Clinton, who as candidate Clinton in 1992 promised to end welfare as we know it, President Clinton said no. I thank the gentleman from Georgia for his comments.
Mr. KINGSTON. If you think about it, how many people do you know in your district in California have been able to provide for their family based on a 20-hour work week. I would be willing to bet zero. I asked this question of an audience in Georgia recently: How many of you pay for your kids, your house with 20 hours work a week? Nobody.
Yet the President vetoed welfare reform because we required in the bill 20 hours worth of work each week for able-bodied recipients, 20 hours. That is all. But it was too much for the President. No tough love here. Veto, giveaway, giveaway, giveaway. That is all he seems to want to protect is the status quo giveaway system. We think he should have some tough love out there. Give a helping hand to those who need it. Give a little push, a living push to those who need that. But it is not fair to America's middle class to be shouldering the burden for those who could be working and contributing.
Mr. RIGGS. I thank the gentleman for his comments. I know that the time for our special order is concluded.
I would end by noting that as President, Bob Dole will sign a balanced budget which will allow Americans to earn more and keep more of what they earn so that they can do more for themselves, for their families, for their communities and for their churches. That is, again, one of the distinct differences between the two political parties.
I want to thank the gentleman from Georgia for his participation in this special order. I want to thank the speaker and our wonderful House staff.
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