[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 161 (Wednesday, October 18, 1995)]
[House]
[Page H10292]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




          VOTE ``NO'' ON THE REPUBLICAN PLAN TO RAPE MEDICARE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Bunn of Georgia). Under a previous order 
of the House, the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Klink] is recognized 
for 5 minutes.
  Mr. KLINK. Mr. Speaker, there was a song back in the early 1970's by 
Janis Joplin, and the previous speaker, my colleague from Pennsylvania, 
kind of reminded me of it. I would like to change the words, and that 
is she said, ``Freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose.'' 
I think it is freedom is just another word for being forced to choose, 
and that is what the Republican Medicare plan is about. Senior citizens 
will be forced to choose whether or not they want to follow their 
doctor. That is as the Republican fail-safe, and he is right. If people 
want to stay in traditional Medicare as they have it today, they will 
be able to do it, but they may find out that their doctor does not do 
it because the fail-safe plan the Republicans have built into Medicare 
is going to squeeze the traditional medical fee for service, and so you 
may have to choose whether or not you stay with your doctor or whether 
you follow that doctor who decides to go out and get involved in HMO's 
or managed-care systems.
  So freedom to choose is being forced to choose, to have to choose 
whether you want to stay with your Medicare system as it is now or you 
want to stay with your doctor if that doctor decides to sever himself 
from the system.
  This Congress began the 104th Congress with very loud chanting of a 
Contract With America. Medicare, Mr. Speaker, is a Contract with 
America. It is a contract that was made 30 years ago at a time when one 
in three senior citizens in this Nation lived in poverty, when it was 
common for senior citizens to have to decide whether they were going to 
heat, whether they were going to eat, buy medicine, or pay the rent. It 
was a common problem prior to Medicare for the children of those senior 
citizens to have to decide what they would do with their assets, how 
much they would spend or how much they would sell off if mom or dad got 
sick. This is the 1930's, and 1940's, and 1950's, prior to Medicare 
that the Republican plan wants to take us back to. This is the $270 
billion that they want to cut, $270 billion they want to cut, and, yes, 
dollars are fungible. These dollars are not going into, this $270 
billion that we are cutting from growth of the program, is not going to 
prop up Social Security. It is not going to prop up Medicare. Dollars 
being fungible, it is going to pay for that $245 billion tax cut.
  Now, I know that my colleagues on the other side say we are not 
cutting, we are not cutting. We are slowing the increase. The question 
is this:
  Will seniors get less? Yes. Will seniors pay more? Yes. They are 
going to pay more and get less. That is a cut. Will the part B premium 
double over 7 years from $46.10 now to over $90? Yes, that part B 
premium will be doubling. Will it go back to prop up the part A that 
the trustees' report deals with and that seniors are upset with? No, it 
will not be used to prop up part A. Did one Republican vote for the 
Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1993 that at that time saved 
Medicare? Not one, not in this body and not in the other body, and that 
was in 1993 when we were told the same thing that we are being told 
now, that we have to make adjustments on Medicare. Not one Republican 
vote went up to save Medicare in 1993. Yet, now they have got all their 
concerns, and in fact how many Republicans voted for Medicare back in 
1965 when it went into law? The fact of the matter is 93 percent of 
them voted against it.

  The majority leader takes to the well of the House and says in a free 
country he would have no part of Medicare, and yet we hear Member after 
Member stand up saying, Trust us, trust us. We want to save Medicare. 
We are all for it now.
  I say to my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, Your actions 
speak much louder than your words and speak many more volumes than your 
words, that in fact it is evident to us that you have not ever 
supported Medicare and you are not supporting Medicare now.
  This whole idea of a Medicare savings account, what a joke it is. 
Senior citizens in my district, very poor to moderate income in coal-
mining and steel towns of southwestern Pennsylvania, many of my seniors 
live only on Social Security, and I know Social Security was not 
intended to be the sole support of people in their final years, but a 
point of fact: For many it is. Those people cannot afford to plow in 
thousands of dollars that they would spend in a few moments of having 
major health problems. They cannot afford it, and in fact I heard from 
a lady just several weeks ago who said to me, ``Congressman Klink, the 
fact of the matter is that after I pay the expenses that I have to pay, 
my rent, my utility bills, I've got $87 that's for food, that's for 
everything that I am going to spend for the rest of the time I'm 
here.''
  Medicare savings accounts will not help people like that. Vote no on 
the Republican plan to rape Medicare.

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