[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 106 (Thursday, August 4, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: August 4, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                 IS THE CLINTON HEALTH CARE BILL DEAD?

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Torres). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of February 11, 1994, and June 10, 1994, the gentleman from 
Tennessee [Mr. Duncan] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. DUNCAN. Mr. Speaker, the front page of the Washington Post this 
past Friday had this headline: ``Health Bill Heads for House Floor--
Democrats Retain Clinton Provisions.''
  Now, the Washington Post is a very liberal newspaper.
  When they printed the headline--``Democrats Retain Clinton 
Provisions'' they did not mean that as a negative headline.
  However, as almost every recent poll has shown, a strong majority of 
the American people are opposed to the Clinton health plan.
  Yet I am afraid that there is a misconception out in the country that 
the Clinton bill is dead.
  The truth is that very minor changes have been made and as the Post 
said, the major provisions of the Clinton plan have been retained and 
are very much alive.

  Apparently, due to the President's great unpopularity, the Clinton 
plan has been renamed but the nuts and bolts or core of the program has 
been reworked into the bill we will deal with in this body in just a 
few days.
  Let's talk about the Clinton plan for a few moments.
  Paul Craig Roberts, the nationally syndicated columnist wrote this:

       President Clinton's health plan will fail, because it will 
     drive up demand but not supply. The result will be price 
     increases or rationing. Price increases, combined with the 
     expanded coverage Mr. Clinton wants, can mean an explosive 
     increase in health care expenditures. Rationing can mean a 
     deterioration in the quality and timeliness of care or 
     denying treatment in cases where the patient's prospects are 
     not good or the cost exceeds the value of the person's life.

  Mr. Roberts went on to say that:

       Government has never improved anything it has touched, and 
     the more deeply it gets involved in medical services the 
     worse they are going to get.

  Let me repeat that:

       Government has never improved anything it has touched, and 
     the more deeply it gets involved in medical services the 
     worse they are going to get.

  Medicaid is a perfect example that proves this last point.
  A few years ago, when Medicaid was passed, those who believe in 
government medicine, told us it would solve our medical problems.
  Today, even liberals admit that it is filled with waste, fraud, and 
abuse.
  Senator Rockefeller, who recently was quoted as saying he was going 
to give us a national health plan whether the people wanted it or not, 
said this is a few months ago about Medicaid: ``It is a horrible 
program, a vile program, and it ought to be abolished.''
  A scholar at the Brookings Institute, a liberal think tank, was 
quoted in the same article, as saying, jokingly: ``Medicaid is a 
success story of the American political process. We make something so 
bad that we have to go to total reform.''
  Talk about an omen of things to come. If we go to some type of 
national or socialized health care now, it may sound good at first, but 
a few years down the road, we will be sorry we ever did it.
  If we get the Federal Government even more involved in health care 
than now, I believe that in a few years, it will lead to shortages, 
waiting periods, a declining quality, and people in rural areas having 
to go further distances for certain types of treatment, and ultimately 
a black market, all at much greater cost than now.
  Before the Federal Government got into the medical system in a big 
way, our medical costs were about 5 or 6 percent of our gross national 
product. Now they are 2\1/2\ times that much.
  Why? The problem is twofold--first, too many Federal rules, 
regulations, and to much redtape already.
  And second, insurance. As Paul Craig Roberts wrote:

       Insurance, whether private or government, drives up the 
     pride of health care, because a ``third party'' pays the 
     bill. The patient will demand all he can get, and the 
     provider doesn't have to prescribe with the patient's budget 
     in mind. Government programs * * * simply load more demand on 
     the system.

  G. Scott Hunter, wrote in the Medical News:

       The real problem is that the system is backward. It 
     encourages people to use more health care. It should 
     encourage people to be thrifty about health care and practice 
     worthwhile activities like preventive care. This irony has 
     been brought on by a combination of citizen expectations on 
     government and government acceptance of responsibility for 
     the system, good or bad.

  The only system presently before us that gives people incentive to 
not overuse the system is through some type of medical savings account.
  This is because a person's use of the medical system goes up exactly 
in relation to the degree to which it is subsidized.
  The Clinton plan, or some version thereof, will force costs to go up 
at the same time that quality goes down.
  In the end, any big government medical plan will be all right for 
those with wealth or power or influence, or those who work for the 
Government, but the people will get the leftovers, or the crumbs, if 
anything at all.

                          ____________________