[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 112 (Wednesday, July 12, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H6900-H6905]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                             MEDICARE CUTS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of May 
12, 1995, the gentleman from Washington [Mr. McDermott] is recognized 
for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight to discuss the impact of 
the proposed Republican Medicare and Medicaid cuts on American families 
and the health delivery system as a whole.
  The American people have heard a great deal of rhetoric from the 
Republicans about how Medicare must be cut to save the trust fund.
  The Republicans want you to believe that they are being forced to 
make drastic cuts in your Medicare benefits because the system is about 
to collapse. But the first thing I want to say to you tonight is that 
the Republican Medicare cuts have nothing whatsoever to do with saving 
the Medicare trust fund.
  We can all agree that health care costs in general and Medicare costs 
in particular must be contained to assure long-term security for our 
Nation and its senior citizens.
  In fact, if the Republicans were to be totally honest, they would 
tell you that the real problem for Medicare comes in 2010 when the 
first of the baby-boomers enter the program and Medicare enrollment 
expands dramatically.
  The Republican Medicare cut proposal does nothing to confront the 
real Medicare solvency problem.
  In the short run, we can and should stabilize the Medicare trust fund 
and assure that we can keep our promises to the American people, but 
this is nothing new. The stability of the Medicare trust fund has 
always required attention.
  In the mid-1970's, the Medicare trust fund was due to expire in 2 
years. The same problem recurred in the early 1980's. A 7-year window 
for the trust fund is about average.
  We have always moved quickly and responsibly to keep the trust fund 
solvent. Under a Republican majority, this will be very difficult, but 
Democrats are committed to preserving Medicare without breaking our 
commitment to senior citizens and their families.
  In trying to understand these Medicare cuts ask yourself, Why are the 
Republicans making such drastic and painful cuts? Can't you save 
Medicare without hurting older Americans?
  The answer is yes. But the Republicans need to cut $270 billion out 
of Medicare so that they can pay for their tax cuts to the well-off and 
balance the budget by an arbitrary date they picked from a campaign 
booklet.
  They need $270 billion from Medicare to pay for a $245 billion tax 
cut. They are simply using Medicare as the bank to pay for tax cuts and 
deficit reduction.
  The Medicare trust fund problem is not making these cuts happen. You 
do not need to take $270 billion out of Medicare--as Republicans 
propose to do--to save the trust fund.
  It is hard to fully understand the magnitude of the cuts proposed by 
the Republican majority in this Congress. Republicans have proposed 
cutting substantially more funds from Medicare in the next 7 years than 
the program spends for its entire costs in 1 year.
  Republicans want to limit the rate of growth for the program that 
provides health insurance to the oldest and the sickest in our 
population to a rate of growth per person that is almost one-half of 
the rate of growth per person for the private insurance industry.
  The private health insurance industry provides insurance primarily to 
people that are younger and healthier than the Medicare population. 
Yet, private premiums and payments still will be almost double the 
funding provided for the health insurance for the Nation's elderly 
under the Republican proposal.
  I put this chart up here because the blue is for the expected 
Medicare voucher, and this is the cost, the green is what it costs in 
the private sector. Each year you can see that the private sector is 
going up much faster than the voucher is, and that is what is written 
into their proposal. Senior citizens' out-of-pocket expenses are 
estimated to increase by at least $3,500 per person under the 
Republican proposal. Each Medicare beneficiary will have less health 
care and fewer benefits as the number of Medicare beneficiaries grow, 
while the dollars shrink, all to pay for tax breaks for the wealthy and 
a budget tied to Wall Street instead of Main Street.
  Now, as people are thinking about this, they really have to think, 
how will these cuts be achieved? The strongest possibility promoted by 
the Republicans is to issue vouchers to senior citizens to buy 
insurance. But the kicker is that the value of the voucher won't be 
enough to pay for an adequate insurance policy. Senior citizens will 
have to pay for the difference between the value of the voucher and the 
cost of the insurance policy. By the year 2002, the cost of private 
insurance is expected to be 18 percent more than the Medicare voucher 
is worth.
  That is really what this chart is all about. They start out easy on 
people. They give them the amount of money that an actual insurance 
policy would cost in 1995. The next year they give them a little less 
than it would cost, and by the year 2002, you can see that the voucher 
will be worth $6,500, and they estimate that the cost of an adequate 
policy to cover what is necessary will be $7,600. Now, that is $1,200 
that the senior citizen will have to come up with out of their own 
pocket because Medicare itself will not cover the cost.

                              {time}  2145

  The result will be that seniors will be forced into the most 
restrictive HMO's. Contrary, and I say again, contrary to the 
Republican rhetoric, the vouchers will not be used to give seniors more 
choice. They will not have more choice because they will not have the 
money to buy an adequate policy. They will have to buy the cheapest 
policy possible and if it is adequate or inadequate, that does not make 
any difference to the Republicans. All they want to do is save the 
money and force a tax increase on senior citizens of $1,200 a year.
  Underfunded vouchers will lead to a loss of choice. They will be used 
to take away the free choice of provider, the ability to decide which 
physician you want to see, which hospital you want to be in. You are 
going to be in an HMO, a managed care operation that will tell you, 
``This is the doctor you can see. This is the hospital you must go 
to.''
  In the present Medicare program, senior citizens have the maximum 
choice. They can go to any doctor, any hospital they want. Under the 
Republican plan, if seniors cannot afford the difference, if they 
cannot come up with 

[[Page H 6901]]
the difference between what the voucher gives them and what the actual 
cost is, they will have to go without health care or they will buy an 
inadequate policy.
  Remember, when the Republicans are ratcheting down the value of the 
Medicare voucher, they are doing nothing to control costs. They are 
simply holding down the cost of the voucher each year, but they are not 
doing anything anywhere in this Congress to control the overall costs.
  So the costs will continue to go up at a much faster rate. The gap 
between the voucher and the health insurance price will be even bigger 
over time.
  Just for a second, think about who Medicare beneficiaries really are. 
They are senior citizens, over 65, and they are the disabled in this 
country who need medical care. You do not get on Medicare as a disabled 
person unless you have a chronic illness and need the care; you have 
had kidney disease and have had the need for dialysis, you need care, 
so if you are 45 years old and you are on a Medicare program for 
dialysis, you are there because that is how we are paying for it in 
this country.
  An increasing number of people in this country are over 85 years old, 
and the overwhelming majority of
 people on Medicare have an income of under $25,000 a year. You are 
thinking about somebody making $25,000 a year having to come up with an 
additional $1,200 to buy an adequate policy. It is these people that 
the Republicans want to throw into the water to swim alone with an 
underfunded voucher through the private insurance market.

  Young healthy workers, for heaven's sakes, have great difficulty 
assessing their health insurance options even with the help of 
employers and with personnel counselors in their businesses. Senior 
citizens will have none of these advantages as they try to select the 
policy that will give them the greatest protection, provided they can 
pay for it and can overcome the subtle strategies of the health 
insurance industry to direct the less healthy customers away from their 
companies.
  Imagine if your father is, let's say, going to be 90 years old. He 
has had a heart attack, he has had a stroke, he has some skin cancer, 
he has a few problems, and he goes out with his little voucher in his 
hand looking for an insurance company that is going to want to take 
him. How many insurance companies are going to run out and meet him in 
the street and say, ``Come on in, sir, we want to sell you insurance''?
  They do not want these senior citizens who have illnesses. They want 
young, healthy people, so they are going to try and pick off the 
healthy seniors and let the sick ones, the ones who have got chronic 
illnesses--as you get old, that is kind of what happens to you--those 
people are going to be excluded from the system.
  If the Republicans have their way with these cuts in Medicare, they 
will be moving from a system of guaranteed health insurance for the 
elderly and disabled to a health insurance lottery for those who can 
afford it. Whether this policy will be adequate for you or not is going 
to be sort of luck. Guaranteed health coverage for senior citizens will 
become a distant memory.
  It is bad enough on senior citizens, but it is even worse when you 
think about it because imagine the families, the children and the 
grandchildren of these senior citizens. When they find out that Mother 
or Father or Grandma and Grandpa have not got adequate care, what are 
they going to do? They are going to say, ``Well, sorry, Ma, too bad''? 
Of course not. They are going to have to reach into their pocket and 
pay the difference for Mom and Dad. That is what is going to happen.
  For 30 years in this country there are people my age, 58 years old, 
and younger, who have never one time had to think about the health care 
of their parents. With the Republican proposal, they are going to be 
forced, we are going to be forced, me and everyone else younger than me 
is going to be forced to think about how they pay the difference for 
their mother and father or their grandparents in this system.
  The Republicans really want to put that obligation back on the plates 
of young families. For 30 years, families have not had to choose 
between Grandma's medical bills and whether they could send a child to 
community college. But if this Republican budget and cuts in Medicare 
passes, American families will be forced to face that decision.
  It is not just senior citizens and their families that will be 
affected The entire health care system rests on Medicare. it is the 
major source of funding in many respects in our system. Major community 
providers, the hospitals, doctors, nurses and so forth will be severely 
compromised.
  In my district in Seattle, these hospitals get as much as 60 percent 
of their revenue from Medicare and Medicaid. With cuts of the kind of 
magnitude suggested here, they simply will not be able to maintain the 
same level of services to any patient, not just to Medicare patients, 
but because they lose the Medicare revenue, they are going to have to 
drop the level of care that they can offer across the board.
  Academic medical centers. We are very proud in this country, we have 
the best medical research and the best medical education in the world. 
We brag about it. But the fact is that the funding for medical schools 
is from the Medicare program. Medicare assumes a disproportioned burden 
of the cost of training new physicians and the burden of the higher 
costs of academic health centers.
  With cuts of this magnitude, academic health centers will not be able 
to continue training the same number of highly competent physicians. 
The ability of academic health centers to provide our most 
sophisticated treatment and care will be greatly diminished. Many 
hospitals will not survive.
  I have a letter from the head of the Harbor View Hospital in Seattle, 
and he closes by saying this:

       Harbor View is the only Level One trauma center in the 
     State of Washington serving a 4-State area. The magnitude of 
     these cuts is so huge that it presents a doomsday scenario 
     for Harbor View.

  They expect to lose $125 million a year out of this proposal.
  So it is not just senior citizens. It is not just their families. It 
is not just the medical schools. It is the very highly trained and very 
highly sophisticated trauma centers in this country.
  Many hospitals, particularly rural hospitals, will not survive this 
kind of budget. Everyone's access to health care will be reduced, 
particularly in the rural areas.
  As hospitals try and make up the revenues lost through Medicare and 
Medicaid cuts, the private insurance rates are going to skyrocket if 
you do not have them adequately funded for the senior citizens who are 
there.
  The bill will be passed to a senior citizen who does not have the 
money. They are only making $25,000. If they have not got the money, it 
becomes a bad debt for the hospital. The only way the hospital can get 
that bad debt taken care of is to put it over onto the people who are 
buying private insurance. That is called cost-shifting. You shift from 
people who cannot pay to the people who are paying. If you reduce 
Medicare, private insurance rates in this country will go up.
  Medicare cuts for tax cuts and balanced budget politics will rob the 
middle class of much of the economic security as well as the health 
care security. We need to protect the entire American family, old, 
young, middle-aged, and the quality and stability of American health 
care, by opposing the Medicare cuts that the Republicans are offering.
  Mr. Speaker, I would like to yield to my colleague, the gentlewoman 
from Texas [Ms. Jackson-Lee], for some comments that she has.
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE. I thank and appreciate the very salient and focused 
commentary of the gentleman from Washington [Mr. McDermott], and 
reasoned explanation to the American people.
  The reason why we have taken the time to study this issue, I think we 
are all grappling with trying to clear away the smoke and mirrors and 
focus on reality. Clearly I think that when we begin to
 capture the numbers, we can reach out to the American people, 
particularly the 18th Congressional District in Houston where I come 
from, and really highlight $270 billion in cuts in Medicare, as the 
gentleman has indicated.

  Mr. Speaker, this is really sort of a surgical procedure that does 
not leave the patient in better condition but eliminates their limbs. I 
am just simply confused. If we are trying to protect seniors and talk 
about a better 

[[Page H 6902]]
health care system, and I would venture to say with your history that 
that is something that we are all prepared to come to the table to talk 
about, how we can get better health care for all of our citizens, we 
would certainly be responsible if we decided to come to the table in a 
bipartisan manner to deal with that issue.
  This is not a health care issue as the Republicans have put it 
forward. This is a cut issue simply to get some money to give some 
folks a tax cut. It hurts my community, because basically there are a 
large number of seniors in that district, a large number of seniors who 
in fact depend upon their Medicare, as well as working-class families 
who for the first time are gratified by the good health of their 
parents, many in the African-American community that have been able to 
maintain the high blood pressure, keep it under maintenance, other 
kinds of illnesses that have plagued those in my population or in the 
African-American population in particular.
  Certainly this question goes beyond racial groups, but certain 
illnesses that have now been able to be maintained because seniors have 
had access to preventative health care now may shoot up. What you will 
find out in a district like mine, and I cite mine particularly because 
there are a number of individuals, poor individuals there, you will 
find them now in the public hospital system, not there for maintenance 
but there because they have had a stroke or they have had some other 
catastrophic results of not being able to take care of themselves. Then 
that working-class family, maybe the bus driver and the school teacher 
or whatever combination, then will find mom or dad back home with them, 
needing to be able to be covered by whatever extra dollars or pennies, 
I might add, that that working family would have to be able to spend on 
that elderly.
  Let me cite for you just an example, spending a lot of time on this 
issue, because I really want to
 get the facts from those who are the beneficiaries right now, besides 
my parents. We have a hospital that is one of the oldest community 
hospitals in the State of Texas, Riverside General Hospital, and I took 
the time to visit with their nurses and their doctors and their 
patients.

  I might add, those soldiers on the battlefield in these community 
hospitals, anyone who thinks that they are getting a killing 
financially, that they are making a real profit, even the physicians 
that practice there or the nurses that work in those hospitals, they 
have another think coming. They are dependent on Medicare, not just to 
keep doors open but to serve that base of population, frankly, that I 
would tell you would not go anywhere else. They do not know about going 
to the sophisticated medical center in our variety of communities. They 
know about that community-based hospital that gives that special care.
  They gave me the facts that their doors would be shut. They were not 
there trying to push survival as a hospital, ``My job is on the line.'' 
They were not really focusing on that. They were talking about the real 
need of being able to reach these seniors, one, to help them with 
preventative health care, but as well to be accessible to them where 
they were not frightened to come into a hospital setting. A lot of our 
seniors are individuals who say, ``I have been healthy all my life and 
a hospital is not where I would want to be.''

                             {time}   2200

  Ms. JACKSON-LEE. So Riverside Hospital would be impacted with a great 
negative impact.
  And then, I walked in my community just this last week on one of the 
older sections in fourth ward and I met seniors there 80 and 86 years 
old living at home by themselves. Those individuals have a great need 
for Medicare, but they also are the same individuals that if those 
premiums went up--I understand we may be looking at $110 and numbers 
going beyond that--would be the ones choosing whether they have to eat 
or needed to eat over medication, other health needs. These are the 
seniors that would be relegated to the horrible stories of dog food or 
cat food that we have heard.
  These seniors are 80 and 86 years old. You made a very good point. 
They are living longer. What are the Republicans telling us about 
people living longer? I know they are not advocating anything that 
would undermine this good news that we have our seniors living longer, 
but yet, when we talk about this issue of slow growth, which, by the 
way, someone asked me, what does that mean because that
 certainly sounds like we are being really responsible? It means 
eliminating people. It means that you are talking about a whole pool of 
people the most sickly and the most needy possibly being eliminated.

  So I am convinced that we are headed in a very treacherous direction 
and I am a little bit incensed that we don't have the real facts, for 
Medicare is being attacked, for it now is a fact of life. Our seniors 
are living longer. And so when they argue that the system is crumbling 
because we have had massive abuse and fraud, there is not a person that 
I have chatted with that does not want us to clean up anything that 
needs to be cleaned up, and as responsible legislators, I think we 
should do that. But I think the real key is whether or not we are 
looking to solve the problem or whether or not we are using smoke and 
mirrors to frighten people to then make these major cuts and leave in 
the lurch, if you will, the public hospital system, small community 
hospitals, and again, not to keep their doors open for keeping them 
open's sake, but because they serve populations that are in need.
  And what we will do with the public hospital system is basically 
break it because all those people will be headed in that direction, and 
from that direction as well, the support of their family members will 
be required for them in terms of their health care.
  So I thank the gentleman for yielding and I would only ask as we 
proceed with this that we do it in a manner that reflects responsibly 
on our challenge that is to ensure good health care for our citizens, 
for Americans, but as well, to not disrespect what seniors have done in 
their work life, in their commitment to this country and the real need 
that they have for good health care.
  Mr. McDERMOTT. I want to thank my colleague. You have raised a very, 
very important point that I did not emphasize enough because as a 
physician, I sometimes forget it. The health care system in this 
country has worked. The average age when they started Social Security 
for a man at death was 59 in 1935. Today the average age is almost 80. 
It is around 77, something like that. So we are talking about extending 
people's life-span by some 20 years since that period of time, largely 
because of programs like the Medicare program.
  And the major thing you are talking abut I think that is so important 
is the whole issue of prevention. What we had before, everybody gets 
health care in this country. When you are sick, when you are really 
sick, they call the ambulance and drag your body in and there you are 
in the emergency room. Everybody gets health care at that point. But 
that is at the wrong time in the most costly way possible.
  What Medicare has made possible for seniors is to have preventive 
care; that is, to monitor the blood pressure, to monitor the glaucoma, 
to monitor all the things that have been problems in the past and wind 
up in these serious debilitating episodes like strokes. We spend 
millions of dollars on strokes that can be prevented with some blood 
pressure medication that is monitored on a regular basis, and Medicare 
has made that possible.
  Now, what the Republicans are proposing is that each year seniors 
would have to come up with more money out of their pocket to buy the 
same health care that they now have under the Medicare program. The 
voucher value would be less than the actual cost. In 1996, the average 
cost to a senior citizen would be $67. You say, well that is not very 
much, so what is the big deal? The next year it is $254. The next year, 
$447.
  What the Republicans are trying to do is slide this in in the first 
year where it isn't going to cost them any more. They will get the same 
thing for the voucher cost, but by the fourth or fifth year, you will 
be up to $645, and by the year 2002, it will cost you almost $1,140 a 
year per person more for the same health care benefit you have today 
and it will all come out of your pocket. 

[[Page H 6903]]

  Now, if you think about people who, when you are working regularly 
and you get a paycheck, you don't think about, well, you know, $67. I 
mean, I probably could squeeze and make it. But when you are a senior 
citizen living on a fixed income on a social security check, you are 
talking about people who are going to have trouble simply making it, 
much less coming up with this additional amount of money out of their 
pocket. And I believe that what is happening here that people fail to 
understand, and in these early years it looks pretty good, but the 
further out you get, you can say, well, I won't be here in 7 years. But 
some more and more people are going to be here and they are going to 
catch the brunt of this.
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. McDERMOTT. Yes.
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE. That chart is instructive because wouldn't you say 
as a physician that what we begin to do is create a chilling effect for 
those who have to make choices to begin now to not put medical 
assistance, preventative medicine, making sure they are keeping up with 
their health needs so that they can stay healthy? It begins to be on 
the second tier of their needs or their ability to pay, then the third 
tier, then the fourth, then just simply: I can't go to the doctor.
  It is a chilling effect because they have to make real choices, and 
you mentioned something else. Seniors, I love them because they 
represent history and wisdom, but they also, I think, are somewhat 
stubborn sometimes. They get a friendship with a physician because they 
trust them and they have confidence in them. And this physician guides 
them along to keep them healthy. All of a sudden, we deny them choice. 
We make them second class, third class citizens.
  They have gotten used to this physician who has been able to follow 
their history, and we are telling those in the Medicare system that 
that is not an option for them. It creates an amazing chilling effect, 
I believe, for good health care. And when I was trying to make the 
point on the hub hospital system, which we need to emphasize, all that 
chilling effect winds up with the bulk of those individuals that have 
not seen physicians now come by ambulance with a stroke in cardiac 
arrest, with possible need for an amputation if they are diabetic, 
whatever these ailments are, and this costs of course all communities, 
all races of people you will find using the public hospital system 
because they just haven't been able to go to the doctor and now they 
are in an ambulance coming. I am frightened about that.
  And lastly, I am frightened about us saying to those working class 
families, in addition to the possibility of the responsibility for 
their parents, scaring them in terms of what will happen to them as 
they reach the age needing Medicare. Rather than addressing this issue 
in a manner that responds to good health reform and provides for a 
legacy or a future for these families today, we are again giving, I 
think, falsehoods about what really needs to be done so that Mr. 35-
year-old or Miss 35-year-old will be
 protected in the next 20 or 30 years.

  It is not accurate that they need cuts of $270 billion in Medicare. 
That is not helping Mr. and Mrs. 35-year-old. Let it be known that that 
is helping the tax cuts of 1995 for individuals making over $200,000. I 
want to help Mr. and Mrs. 35-year-old. That is the commitment that we 
should make, and I want to help Mr. and Mrs. 65, 70, 80, 86, these 
numbers of seniors that are now living to that age. That is how we 
should bring those two together on a serious proposal of dealing with 
Medicare and its longevity, not the $270 billion cuts that does not 
help Medicare's longevity. It helps the current plan to give tax cuts.
  Mr. McDERMOTT. I think you raise again that issue, and I think it 
doesn't--we don't say it often enough. We are all in one family, and it 
is easy sometimes for people who are younger to somehow think that this 
is not affecting them, that what is going to happen, well, that is the 
Medicare program, that is for old people, but the fact is that it has 
been lifting the burden off the younger people and they are suddenly 
going to wind up with it suddenly being dropped down on them without 
them being aware, unless they begin paying attention.
  That, I think, is our biggest job as Members of Congress is to 
educate people about the fact that Medicare, although it has as its 
clients the disabled and the senior citizen, it is also a part of the 
economic security of the 35 year old. And sometimes young people sort 
of miss that. They don't see the connection because in their lifetime 
they have never had to do it.
  I remember when I was much younger, my grandmother and grandfather 
back in the 1950's did not have Medicare, and the way my father and the 
uncles took care of it was every Sunday when they went to my 
grandmother's house, they would slide a ten dollar bill under the 
plate. My grandmother was too proud to ever ask for money but when she 
picked up the dishes after lunch, she picked up 50 bucks around the 
table.
  That is how the subsidy was done in those days, and what this is 
going to do is drive that same system back on every family to look at 
their mother, their father, their grandparents and say, how are we 
going to take care of them? We can't just walk away from them, and that 
is, I think, why this is not just a senior citizen question, but it is 
a family question.
 And I think that you bring that well when you talk about that it isn't 
just Mr. and Mrs. 65; it is also Mr. and Mrs. 35.

  Ms. JACKSON-LEE. You remind me, as I have reminded you to remind me, 
of my grandmother as well and the good times at that time in the 1950's 
was that she could do something with $50 or so that is left. I think if 
we began to look realistically of what that will mean for this time and 
this range of cost, we are realizing that that is not what will be 
possible for these working families and these individuals in this 35 
year range, and we will also need to point out for any accusations that 
are made against this system that we do want to make work.
  There is a lot of cost containment already going on in Medicare, and 
many of the providers are aware that we must be judicious in how we 
cost out the particular procedures or services. That is where we need 
to focus, not to scare people with the fact that it is to be ended and 
at the same time tell them that they need $270 billion in cuts.
  And so your point is very well taken. We could have done that in 
years past and managed and survived. I think now with catastrophic 
illnesses and just the recognition of the cost, the legitimate cost of 
providing care in a hospital, we realize that that would be so extreme 
a burden. I have heard tell that there is a possibility of families 
going bankrupt trying to take care of a loved one who has come upon 
illnesses, and certainly if there was no coverage like Medicare for 
that senior, what could be expected for families who are trying to make 
ends meet and then be faced with the needs of their loved ones, of 
which they would want to be able to support.
  Mr. McDERMOTT. I hope that all the Members in the Congress let their 
constituents know they have to let the Congress know no on vouchers for 
Medicare. Vouchers in the Medicare system are guaranteed to be 
inadequate. That is what it is all about. That is how they are saving 
money, and people need to let their representatives know. I hope they 
will all call them, write them letters, tell them that they want to 
keep the kind of security that they presently have under the Medicare 
program. Thank you very much for your help.
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Thank you.
                              {time}  2215
   support house concurrent resolution 80, legislation calling for a 
        cessation of french nuclear testing in the south pacific

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Longley). The Chair recognizes the 
gentleman from American Samoa [Mr. Faleomavaega] for up to 22 minutes.
  Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Mr. Speaker, just weeks ago, French President 
Jacques Chirac announced that France will abandon its 1992 moratorium 
on nuclear testing and explode eight more nuclear bombs in the South 
Pacific beginning in September. Chirac said that the nuclear explosions 
will have no ``ecological consequences,'' and described his decision as 
``irrevocable.''
  After detonating at least 187 nuclear bombs in the heart of the South 
Pacific, France's intent to resume further nuclear poisoning of the 
South Pacific 

[[Page H 6904]]
environment has resulted in deep outrage and alarm in the countries of 
the region, as well as with the world community.
  I rise today to urge my colleagues to support legislation I 
introduced recently, House Concurrent Resolution 80, which recognizes 
the environmental concerns of the people of Oceania and calls upon the 
government of France not to resume nuclear testing in French 
Polynesia's Moruroa and Fangataufa Atolls.
  In a broad showing of bipartisan support, 15 Members of Congress have 
joined me as original cosponsors of House Concurrent Resolution 80--
including the ranking member of the House International Relations 
Committee, the Honorable Lee Hamilton; the chairman and ranking member 
of the Asia-Pacific Affairs Subcommittee, the Honorable Doug Bereuter, 
and the Honorable Howard Berman; and the chairman and ranking member of 
the International Operations and Human Rights Subcommittee, the 
Honorable Chris Smith and the Honorable Tom Lantos.
  I want to express my deepest appreciation to these gentlemen, as well 
as to other distinguished senior members of the House International 
Relations Committee--including the Honorable Jim Leach, the Honorable 
Gary Ackerman, the Honorable Jay Kim and the Honorable Dana 
Rohrabacher--for their strong support of this measure. I also want to 
thank members from districts touching the Pacific that have joined us 
as original cosponsors, including the Honorable Robert Underwood of 
Guam, the Honorable Patsy Mink and Neil Abercrombie of Hawaii, the 
Honorable Norman Mineta from California and the gentleman from Oregon, 
the Honorable Peter DeFazio. The distinguished Member from 
Massachusetts, the Honorable Edward Markey, must also be commended for 
his leadership in the field of nuclear nonproliferation and
 support of legislation opposing France's nuclear testing in the South 
Pacific.

  Mr. Speaker, like a wild boar on the ocean waves, or a ``bulldozer'' 
as described by his mentor, the late President Georges Pompidou, or a 
mad aberration of 21st century thought, French President Chirac's so-
called decision and insistent denial of consequence is what novelist 
Bernard Clavel called the Shame of France.
  Mr. Speaker, we all know nuclear bombs have only one purpose. They 
were created to destroy every living plant and animal, including 
humans. The result is they annihilate everything. The people of France 
know this. The government of France knows this. Mr. Chirac knows this. 
We all know why France explodes its bombs in French Polynesia and not 
in France. The leaders of France do not want to subject their homeland 
to this danger, if they have a choice.
  Historically, the people of the Pacific have had little choice. 
Nuclear nations, including France and the United States, have 
consistently deemed Pacific islanders and their way of life expendable. 
For example, in 1954, on Bikini atoll the United States detonated the 
``bravo shot,'' a 15-megaton thermonuclear bomb over a thousand times 
more powerful than the nuclear bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan. 
Marshall islanders residing on nearby Rongelap and Utirik atolls 
justifiably believe they were used as ``guinea pigs'' and test subjects 
for United States nuclear radiation experiments conducted during this 
period.
  After almost three decades of French nuclear testing in the South 
Pacific, French Polynesia's Moruroa atoll has been described by 
scientists as a ``Swiss cheese of fractured rock.'' Moruroa and its 
sister French test site at Fangataufa are water-permeable coral atolls 
on basalt, now contaminated in the worst way similar to the crisis at 
the Chernobyl nuclear plant. Leakage of radioactive waste from the 
underground test sites to the surrounding waters and air has been 
predicted, and is inevitable. Epidemic-like outbreaks in surrounding 
communities have already resulted, but symptoms including damage to the 
nervous system, paralysis, impaired vision, birth abnormalities, and 
increased cancer rates among Tahitians, in particular. It is no wonder 
that the French Government has kept medical records at Moruroa a top 
secret and has not even permitted long-term follow-up study of the 
local indigenous or Tahitian workers who were subjected radioactive 
contamination.
  Yet, Chirac, like so many other leaders of nuclear nations, insists 
that nuclear tests are harmless to the environment. As reported by the 
National Resources Defense Council in the Bulletin of Atomic 
Scientists, ``the five declared nuclear powers have acknowledged 
conducting a total of 2,036 nuclear tests since 1945.'' of this total, 
942 of the tests have been conducted within the continental United 
States, 710 in Russia/Kazakhstan, and 306 atomic explosions conducted 
by the United States, Great Britain, and France on Pacific islands and 
atolls.
  It is interesting to note that although France has detonated over 200 
nuclear bombs in the past 35 years, not one of these bombs has been 
exploded on, above, or beneath French soil. Mr. Speaker, in the truest 
form of colonial agression, France, instead, has exploded almost all of 
its nuclear bombs in its South Pacific colony, after being driven out 
of Algeria, a former possession also used a nuclear testing dump.
  France currently has the world's third largest stockpile of nuclear 
bombs in the world. But Chirac told reporters on the eve of his first 
presidential trip abroad that his decision to explode eight more 
nuclear bombs in the South Pacific was crucial to ensure the 
reliability and security of the coutry's nuclear weaponry. I made this 
decision, Mr. Chirac states, ``because I considered it necessary in the 
higher interest of our nation.''
  Whatever happened to the higher interest of some 170 non-nuclear 
nations?
  I say to the military establishment of France and to the President of 
France, if exploding eight more nuclear bombs is so crucial to ensure 
the security of your country's weaponry, explode your eight nuclear 
bombs under the Arc de Triomphe and along the rural and farm areas of 
France, and see if the citizens of France will support you in the 
higher interest of your nation.
  Mr. Speaker, the peoples of the North and South Pacific want nothing 
to do with nuclear weapons. They know firsthand the horrors of nuclear 
testing and have agreed amongst themselves to keep their part of the 
planet nuclear-free. Isn't it ironic that it is among these people that 
France is about to explode 8 nuclear bombs--one nuclear bomb explosion 
a month--with each detonation up to 10 times more powerful than the 
nuclear bomb that was dropped on the city of Hiroshima 50 years ago? 
Incidentally, this is not happening by the choice of the 28 million 
men, women, and children of a European world power playing the role of 
colonial master to the detriment of peaceful citizens on the other side 
of the world.
  When is enough, enough? Two hundred-plus nuclear explosions, with 
almost all in South Pacific waters, apparently is not enough for 
France. Mr. Chirac wants eight more. So what about the rest of the 
world? I suspect that the military establishments of every nuclear 
power want to perform more tests to ensure the reliability of their 
nuclear arsenals. But the fact is, all of the nuclear powers, except 
China, have given up this benefit and stopped testing programs in the 
interest of making the world a safer place to live.
  Government after government after government, in a firestorm of 
international outrage, have spoken out in opposition to France's 
resumption of nuclear testing. Demonstrations involving tens of 
thousands of protestors have taken place in French Polynesia, and 
around the globe. The United States, Russia, Japan, Germany, Austria, 
the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Belgium, Denmark, Italy, 
Switzerland, Indonesia, Malaysia, Canada, Chile, Ecuador, Peru, Mexico, 
Australia, New Zealand, Fiji, and the 12 other island nations which 
comprise the South Pacific forum have condemned France's decision to 
resume nuclear testing, noting that it would be a major setback to 
relations between France and the international community.
  Two months ago, the United States, France, and the major nuclear 
powers promised over 170 non-nuclear nations that the nuclear powers 
would exercise utmost restraint with regard to nuclear testing and 
would work toward a comprehensive test ban treaty. Despite 
reservations, these commitments were 

[[Page H 6905]]
accepted at face value by the non-nuclear nations, which make up the 
vast majority of the countries of the world, and it was only with the 
support of the non-nuclear nations that permanent extension of the 
nuclear non-proliferation treaty was gained.
  Weeks later, the French Government now sends the message that in the 
name of national interest, it is more than willing to undermine the 
Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and impede good faith negotiation of a 
genuine comprehensive test ban treaty.
  Not only does France send the message that world peace takes a back 
seat to national security paranoia, but it now sends the message that, 
as a nuclear nation, it shamelessly, shamelessly, Mr. Speaker, deems 
expendable the welfare and the fragile marine environment of 28 million 
men, women, and children living in the Pacific region.
  Nuclear bomb explosions constitute the ultimate rape of a people. The 
welfare of the South Pacific's 28 million people should not be the 
sacrifice paid in the name of France's paranoia and hypocritical policy 
concerning nuclear deterrence. For France to disregard its moral 
responsibility to the non-nuclear nations and world community is the 
eiptome of actions taken by a colonial master against its subjects, and 
it is about the ugliest form of colonial aggression taken by France 
against the indigenous people of Tahiti.
  ``It is regrettable that France has given in to out-dated 
arguments,'' respected French oceanographer Jacques Cousteau said. 
``Great wars are of the past. The struggle for peace is carried out 
first and foremost through education and the restoration of morality. 
Today's wisdom makes it necessary to outlaw atomic arms.''
  Cousteau's sentiments were echoed by former French President Francois 
Mitterand, who in condemning Chirac's testing decision, recently 
stated, ``The time has come to put an end to the nuclear armaments 
race.'' Cousteau and Mitterand's statements reflect how controversial 
Chirac's nuclear policy is domestically in France. French public 
opinion polls show an overwhelming 70 percent, Mr. Speaker, in 
opposition to resumed nuclear testing.
  Today, on trial of broken treaties and irrevocable decisions, with 
the United States still in flux on nuclear testing while promising to 
negotiate a comprehensive test ban treaty, the question now on the 
table for non-nuclear nations is: ``Do we depend on nuclear nations to 
restore morality through treaties and bans, or do we call on the good 
people of France and the United States to hold their governments 
accountable for violations of international disarmament agreements?''
  ``If men were angels,'' James Madison wrote in The Federalist Papers, 
``No government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, 
neither external nor internal controls on government would be 
necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men 
over men, the great difficulty lies in this: You must first enable the 
Government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to 
control itself.''
  In light of Mr. Chirac's irrevocable decision, and in consideration 
of opinion polls documenting Jacques Cousteau as the leading popular 
figure in France, I would again urge Mr. Cousteau to lead the good 
people of France in the fight to oblige its government to control 
itself. As the world's preeminent guardian of the environment, his 
place in history dictates that Mr. Cousteau play a greater and more 
forceful role in preventing this travesty against the health and 
welfare of the 28 million men, women and children who live in the 
Pacific region.
  Mr. Speaker, this planet has already been ravaged by more than 2,036 
nuclear bomb explosions. It is time that we stop the madness. I would 
urge most strongly that Paris reconsider its decision to resume nuclear 
bomb explosions in the South Pacific and would urge the citizens of the 
world community to take up the fight in holding nuclear nations 
accountable for the violent rape and utter destruction of non-nuclear 
nations, peoples, and the environment--until angels govern men.
  To this end, Mr. Speaker, I would invite our colleagues to cosponsor 
House Concurrent Resolution 80 and join us in sending a strong message 
of support for the peoples of Oceania and in opposition to France's 
resumption of nuclear testing in the South Pacific.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to share with my colleagues and my fellow 
Americans, a photo shot of a nuclear bomb explosion that was detonated 
on the Moruroa Atoll in French Polynesia.
   Mr. Speaker, the photo of the nuclear explosion--I must confess--is 
a very pretty one--but very, very deadly. You see Mr. Speaker, modern 
warfare is no longer something where there is honor to fight hand-to-
hand combat--at least combatants meet on the field of battle to fight.
  You see Mr. Speaker, nuclear bomb explosions don't just kill human 
beings--nuclear bomb explosions do not ask for permission to kill just 
soldiers and sailors--Mr. Speaker, nuclear bomb explosions literally 
vaporize human beings--you're not even going to have to find many 
bodies even to give the deceased decent burials.
   Mr. Speaker, this photo is an example of what nuclear explosions are 
like when the Government of France will resume exploding eight more 
nuclear bombs beginning in early September of this year.
  Mr. Speaker, I am making this appeal to my colleagues in the House 
and to all my fellow Americans who love to sail in the Pacific--who can 
appreciate the concerns of some 28 million men, women, and children who 
live in the Pacific--to write and call the officials of the French 
Government that exploding eight nuclear bombs in the coming months is 
bad policy, and President Chirac should wake up, and he should come to 
his senses and stop this madness--stop this insane and inhuman practice 
of exploding nuclear bombs not only against the fragile environment of 
the Pacific Ocean but anywhere else in the world.
  What a sad commentary on France's upcoming celebration of Bastille 
Day on July 14--how absurd and stupid can President Chirac be, Mr. 
Speaker, when 70 percent of the people of France are against nuclear 
explosions--and yet the President of France has totally disregarded 
this concern. Let's stop this madness, Mr. Speaker.
  Mr. Speaker, I submit for the Record the following article from the 
July 12, 1995 Washington Post:

               [From the Washington Post, July 12, 1995]

                     Why Not Atom Tests in France?

       France's unwise decision to resume nuclear testing was an 
     invitation to the kind of protests and denunciations being 
     generated by Greenpeace's skillful demonstration of political 
     theater. But even before Greenpeace set sail for the test 
     site, several Pacific countries had vehemently objected to 
     France's intention of carrying out the explosions at a 
     Pacific atoll. The most cutting comment came from Japan's 
     prime minister, Tomiichi Murayama. At a recent meeting in 
     Cannes the newly installed president of France, Jacques 
     Chirac, confidently explained to him that the tests will be 
     entirely safe. If they are so safe, Mr. Murayama replied, why 
     doesn't Mr. Chirac hold them in France?
       The dangers of these tests to France are, in fact, 
     substantial. The chances of physical damage and the release 
     of radioactivity to the atmosphere are very low. But the 
     symbolism of a European country holding its tests on the 
     other side of the earth, in a vestige of its former colonial 
     empire, is proving immensely damaging to France's standing 
     among its friends in Asia.
       France says that it needs to carry out the tests to ensure 
     the reliability of its nuclear weapons. Those weapons, like 
     most of the American nuclear armory, were developed to 
     counter a threat from a power that has collapsed. The great 
     threat now, to France and the rest of the world, is the 
     possibility of nuclear bombs in the hands of reckless and 
     aggressive governments elsewhere. North Korea, Iraq and Iran 
     head the list of possibilities. The tests will strengthen 
     France's international prestige, in the view of many French 
     politicians, by reminding others that it possesses these 
     weapons. But in less stable and non-democratic countries, 
     there are many dictators, juntas and nationalist fanatics who 
     similarly aspire to improve their countries' standing in the 
     world.
       The international effort to discourage the spread of 
     nuclear weapons is a fragile enterprise, depending mainly on 
     trust and goodwill. But over the past half-century, the 
     effort has been remarkably and unexpectedly successful. It 
     depends on a bargain in which the nuclear powers agree to 
     move toward nuclear disarmament at some indefinite point in 
     the future, and in the meantime to avoid flaunting these 
     portentous weapons or to use them merely for displays of one-
     upmanship. That's the understanding that France is now 
     undermining. The harassment by Greenpeace is the least of the 
     costs that these misguided tests will exact.
     

                          ____________________