[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 120 (Monday, July 24, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S10536-S10537]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                30TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE MEDICARE PROGRAM

  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I wanted to speak on the floor briefly 
today because this is the week of the 30th anniversary of the Medicare 
Program. I indicated last week, and will again this week, that I think 
it is important at a time when so much of our country talks about what 
is wrong with our country, for us occasionally to talk about what is 
right and what works, and to talk about success.
  We have been talking for the last several weeks about regulatory 
reform. I have come to the floor to talk about the fact that most 
people probably do not know in the last 20 years we have made enormous 
progress in cleaning America's air and water.
  We now use twice as much energy as we did 20 years ago, yet we have 
cleaner air in America. We have cleaner water, rivers, streams, and 
lakes in America than we had 20 years ago. No one 20 years ago would 
have predicted that would be the case.
  Why is that? Is it because the big corporate polluters in America who 
are dumping this into our airshed and the water--the pollution, 
effluence, and the chemicals--because they woke up and said, ``I know 
what I ought to do for America. I ought to stop polluting.'' That is 
not what happened.
  What happened is Congress decided that the American people deserve 
and want clean air, they want clean water, and we will put in place 
regulations that require it. We wrote regulations in this country that 
said polluters have to stop polluting.
  We have had enormous success as a result of it. It is a healthier 
place to live, better for us and better for our 

[[Page S10537]]
kids. Yes, it is a nuisance for those who used to pollute. But it is a 
better policy for our country, to stop the pollution, and make that 
cost a part of the cost of doing business.
  Now, we have a lot to celebrate, including successful clean air and 
clean water regulations and safe food regulations. We also have the 
opportunity, I think, to celebrate the success of a Medicare program 
that works. Yet, rather than celebrating the success of a program that 
works, we are now seeing that program under attack.
  This is a more and more curious, yet in some ways predictable, I 
think, agenda that I watch in this Congress. The Contract With America 
is the foundation of the agenda, and the Contract With America is 
billed as a set of new directions and new ideas. In fact, there is 
nothing new about it at all. It represents the same old tired ideas, 
the ideas that somehow if the big get more, the little will be helped.
  Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys, back in the 1930's, had a song with 
a lyric that stated it pretty well: ``The little guys pick the cotton 
and the big guys get the money; the little bee sucks the blossom and 
the big bee gets the honey.'' So it is with the agenda now in Congress.
  I could talk about the agenda at some length. I actually want to talk 
about Medicare. This is one part of it, in the Washington Post article 
``Curbs on Media Mogul,'' ``Congress Moves to Ease Media Ownership 
Curbs, Could Reshape Industry.'' What does this mean? That Congress is 
taking action to eliminate the restrictions on how many television 
stations one person or corporation can own. I guarantee in 10 years we 
will have half a dozen companies owning almost all of America's 
television stations. Good for our country? I do not think so. Good for 
a few rich companies and investors? You bet your life it is.
  Regulations--we ought to deal with silly and unnecessary regulations, 
but we ought not retreat on clean air, clean water, and safe food 
regulations in order to satisfy the appetite of the wealthy and the big 
interests. It does not make sense to me.
  ``Food Stamp Block Grants Eyed as a Way of Breaking Welfare Reform 
Stalemate.'' Some have an agenda of deciding that hunger is not a 
national issue. So we will decide we will not have a national food 
stamp program, we will have 50 State programs, if they choose to use 
the money for that. Curious agenda, in my judgment.
  ``The Treasury Subcommittee of House Appropriations Votes To Decide 
To Make It Easier for Felons To Purchase Guns.'' It is a curious and 
strange agenda but part of the same pattern. Same tired old ideas.
  Line-item veto--we voted for a line-item veto bill here in the 
Senate. I voted for it. I have voted for it a dozen times in a dozen 
years. Yet, we are now told by the Speaker of the House it does not 
look like we will have a line-item veto bill this year.
  Last week, a little article in the paper says ``Gingrich Gets $200 
Million in New Pork.'' Now, we will not have a Democrat President that 
will get a line-item veto to veto this sort of thing. Why? Because some 
who talked about the line-item veto are much more interested in 
producing pork than they are in producing a line-item veto.
  But I wanted to speak just for a moment about Medicare. I think the 
Medicare Program is a success. Yes, we have some financing problems in 
the outyears. Part of the reason that we have those financing problems 
is because of the success of the program. People live longer in this 
country today. They have better health care than they had previously. 
In fact, on a monthly basis, we now have 200,000 new Americans each and 
every month that become eligible for Medicare. That does cause some 
real strain.
  But the success is this: 40 years ago we had less than 50 percent of 
our senior citizens who had any health care coverage at all. This year, 
it is 99 percent of our senior citizens who have health care coverage.
  I have been to plenty of places in the world where there is no health 
care coverage for senior citizens. I have seen the sick and I have seen 
the dying who have no access to health care because they are poor. In 
many countries, that means 95 or 99 percent of the people. I have been 
to those countries.
  I have seen the hospitals with dirt floors--to the extent they are 
lucky enough to get to a hospital--with dirt floors and no doors in the 
tropics down in Central America. I have seen the worst of medical 
conditions.
  Most importantly, I have seen what it does to people when they grow 
old and have no access to health care. I saw it in my hometown before 
Medicare, at a time when my father asked me to drive an elderly 
gentleman to the hospital in Dickinson, ND, who was dying; a fellow 
with no money, no hope, an elderly man, no health insurance. Still, as 
he was 2 or 3 days away from death, he was worried about how he would 
pay a hospital bill.
  Part of that has changed because we put in place in the mid-1960's a 
Medicare plan. I might say those in my party--I was not here then--
those in my party who had the courage and foresight to fight and vote 
for it, had to do so at the expense of being called a bunch of 
socialists by a lot of folks who were not willing to vote for it.
  I think we ought to celebrate the success of the Medicare Program and 
what it has done for our country. This is a year, and this is a week, 
the anniversary of the 30th year of the Medicare Program, that has 
advanced the interests of our country and its seniors.
  I say to those who believe that we ought to give a big tax cut, the 
bulk of which go to the rich, and decide we need to cut Medicare, and 
they do not relate to one another, it is pretty inescapable to me when 
you advance a tax cut, the bulk of which go to the wealthiest 
Americans, and say to senior citizens, ``We are sorry, we cannot fully 
fund Medicare,'' that the tax cut for the wealthy comes out of the 
Medicare Program. We can do better than that. We can decide together 
what we voted on in the 1960's as a Congress has been enormously 
successful for the elderly people in this country--for all of America, 
for that matter. We can decide not to threaten the Medicare system, but 
decide to work together to strengthen it.
  That is a matter of public will. I hope the American people would 
decide that there is something to celebrate here in programs that work; 
most especially, the Medicare Program. I hope in the next 2 or 3 
months, as we sort through this fiscal policy dilemma, we will decide 
not to embrace the radical agenda that says a tax cut for the rich--
that they claim will help the rest--at the expense of total and 
adequate coverage for America's senior citizens who need it, earned it, 
and respect it. I yield the floor.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, is leader's time reserved?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Yes.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I ask that I may use some of my leader's 
time without interfering with the ongoing debate on lobbying reform. We 
are making progress on lobbying reform. I appreciate that. I hope we 
have will have a unanimous vote for a strong bill.

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