[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 152 (Wednesday, September 27, 1995)]
[House]
[Page H9572]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                  REPUBLICANS WORKING TO SAVE MEDICARE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Colorado [Mr. McInnis] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. McINNIS. Mr. Speaker, shame on you, to my colleague from the fine 
State of Florida. What are you trying to do utilizing these scare 
tactics? You know they are inaccurate. You know they are false.
  I just went to the Webster's dictionary. You like to quote the 
Webster dictionary. Let us quote another word out of the Webster's 
dictionary, called ``save.'' Save means to rescue, save means to keep 
safe. Save means to preserve.
  Do you think this is going to go away if you put your head in the 
sand? Do you think if you tell American people enough times that we are 
going to throw seniors out in the streets, that people are going to go 
hungry, that there is not going to be medicine provided by this fine 
and great country of ours, that they are going to begin to ignore the 
crisis that we have in Medicare?
  When are you going to come to your sense that this thing is going 
broke?
  Your President, my President, has. He appointed trustees and they 
came out and said if we do not do something about this program by the 
year 2002----


                announcement by the speaker pro tempore

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman will address his remarks to 
the Chair.
  Mr. McINNIS. I thank the Speaker.
  Mr. Speaker, when will the gentlewoman recognize the fact that the 
Medicare Program is in very serious trouble? The President's trustees 
themselves have said that that program will be broke by the year 2002.
  Is it the theory of some of the people--mind you, not all of the 
Democrats are opposing this. We have some bipartisan support to save 
Medicare, to rescue Medicare, to preserve Medicare. But there are some 
people out there who, by the way, do not have a plan of their own, who, 
by the way, do not talk about solutions, all they talk about is how do 
we use scare tactics, how do we scare the Republicans, how do we win 
the elections in November?
  Why do they not put that selfishness aside and talk about the senior 
citizens in such a way to save the Medicare Program for them, to 
preserve the Medicare Program for them? Sure it is easy to criticize 
the first person out of the foxhole.
  We have been willing to take that leadership challenge. We are 
willing to be the first people out of the foxhole, because if somebody 
does not do it, Medicare is going to go bankrupt.
  There are a lot of my colleagues who did the same kind of yelling and 
pulled the same kind of tactics on the deficit, a deficit that 
accumulates at a rate of $35 million an hour. They hid their head in 
the sand, they told the American people, ``Ignore it, ignore it, it's 
not happening, it's not happening, it's not happening,'' and they 
became convinced that some of the American people were becoming 
convinced that the deficit was not a problem.

                              {time}  2045

  Look where we are today. Look at the suffering that the American 
people have today because this Congress did not take the responsibility 
of running a balanced budget in the last 25 years. But to my colleagues 
on the House floor, we are going to face exactly the same kind of 
crisis with Medicare if we do not accept that responsibility. If you do 
not like the plan we have got, come out with a solution. Do not spend 
our fine time tonight addressing the people in this House, our 
colleagues, telling them criticism after criticism, quoting Webster's 
Dictionary. Go look up the word ``solution'' in Webster's Dictionary. 
That is where we ought to be working, Democrats, Republicans, 
unaffiliated. Let us all work for a solution.
  I think it can work. I want Medicare saved. I want it rescued. I want 
it kept safe.
  My dear colleague from the State of New Jersey, same kind of thing, 
same kind of rhetoric. Stand on this House floor, tell the American 
people that the seniors are going to go without health care, that they 
will not get to choose their doctors, mislead all you want, be 
inaccurate as you want, put in a scare tactic and ignore the true 
problem, that problem being that if we do not do something with 
Medicare, my colleagues, this thing is going to go belly up. It is not 
going to go belly up 20 years from now. It is going to go belly up 
while many of you are still serving in this House.
  It is our obligation, a fundamental responsibility of our duty to 
this country, to save that program, to save the senior citizens, to 
make sure that senior citizens of this country do have the medical 
attention that is necessary. When we are done with that, we have got a 
lot of other things that we need to address, the deficit. And we are 
trying to address it.
  I think we will get it done. I am optimistic we are going to be able 
to save Medicare.
  I am used to people criticizing and never joining the team. We have 
got a lot of people that like to ride the wagon and not pull it. If 
some of my colleagues preceding me speaking tonight would instead help 
pull the wagon instead of trying to get a ride on it or sitting on the 
side criticizing why we are not getting that wagon out of deep mud, we 
may not be able to get it out.
  If some of my colleagues who spoke earlier come up with some 
solutions, work with us in a bipartisan fashion, we can pull that wagon 
out of the mud, and we can save the program.

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