[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]

 
                            WHAT'S THE RUSH?

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Torres). Under a previous order of the 
House, the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Saxton] is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. SAXTON. Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the gentleman from 
Texas [Mr. DeLay] for bringing to our attention something that I think 
is of very vital interest.
  I called back to my district office last night, and then again 
earlier today, and I asked my district director what it was that my 
constituents were saying about this health care debate that we are 
involved in. She went back, and got the records, and came out, and she 
said, ``It's pretty consistent. Almost everybody is saying, `Why don't 
they take their time? What's the rush?'''.
  Mr. Speaker, some of them have long enough memories to remember what 
we did with catastrophic care. We passed it, went home and found out 
that it did not sell, came back here and repealed it. It was a 
disaster.
  So, the basic message is:
  ``What's the rush?''
  ``Take your time.''
  ``Do it right.''
  ``It's too important.''
  ``It's not a political issue; it's a family issue. It affects my 
health. It affects my children's health. It affects my parents' 
health.''
  ``Please do this right. Don't do it for some ulterior reason. Don't 
do it for some political reason.''
  ``What's the rush?''
  Well, I brought this chart with me to tell my colleagues what I think 
is the rush.
  Here we are in the end of the chart in 1994 today. Today we learned 
that we are going to adjourn maybe on August 19 because somehow maybe 
the Democrat leadership can twist enough arms, or bend enough elbows, 
or find enough votes somehow to get something passed. Nobody knows what 
it is. But August 19 seems to be the drop-dead date.
  Then all the way out in 1999 is when this program, I am told, will be 
fully implemented, 5 calendar years away.
  What is the rush?
  Well, the rush is November 8. There is an election coming, and we 
have to do something because during the campaign it was a major issue. 
And then President Clinton came here, right there, held up his pen and 
said, ``If you don't do it my way, I'll veto it.''
  ``My way or the highway,'' he said.
  November 8 is coming.
  He went to Jersey City in my home State this week, and he stood at a 
podium and he pounded the podium until the presidential seal fell off. 
The message was, ``We are going to do this, and we're going to do it my 
way,'' because November 8 is coming; it's an election. All of a sudden 
it is a political issue.
  When I listen to my constituents, and I listen to their concerns and 
their questions, they do not care about November 8. They care about 
their health care. That is what this is about.
  Let me tell my colleagues what some of the questions are they are 
asking me:
  ``Give me the answers, tell us the answers, go slow so we'll know 
what the answers are before you guys and ladies vote.''
  ``How will health care reform affect my paycheck,'' they ask me, and 
I wish they would call everybody in this House and ask that question.
  My older American citizens are asking me, ``I hear they are going to 
cut Medicare maybe by $10 billion. How will that affect my Medicare 
plan? Will I have to buy extra supplemental? Will I have to make an 
appointment months ahead to go to the doctor? How does it affect my 
Medicare plan?''
  ``What kind of an effect,'' they say, ``will it have on my job if my 
small businessman employer has to pay an extra tax, 80 percent or 
whatever it is? Will he be able to afford to keep me, or will he find a 
way to do without me? How will it affect my job?'' they ask.
  ``How will it affect my small business,'' my business men and women 
are saying.
  ``At my drug store I have a certain markup that I can put on things, 
and, if I have to pay 80 percent of my part-time employees' health 
care, how will that affect my business?''
  ``How much will health care reform raise my taxes?'' my constituents 
are asking.
  Mr. Speaker, they are not asking about November 8. These are the 
questions they are asking.
  I had a lady call me the other day. She said, ``I just got back from 
England. I have an aunt there, and my aunt just went to the hospital 
and had an operation on her shoulder, and she told me how thankful she 
was that she thought enough to buy her own private health care plan 
because they have a government run health care system, and she said 
that in order to get her shoulder fixed she used her private health 
care plan because she would have had to have waited 3 years to get her 
shoulder taken care of otherwise.''
  So, in conclusion, Mr. Speaker, my constituents are asking these 
questions. They are not mentioning November 8. They do not care, and we 
should not either. We should take our time and do it right.

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