[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 176 (Wednesday, November 8, 1995)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E2126]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        VETERANS AND THE BUDGET

                                 ______


                            HON. RON PACKARD

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                      Wednesday, November 8, 1995

  Mr. PACKARD. Mr. Speaker, this week we honor the veterans who have 
served our country bravely and selflessly. I find it absolutely 
appalling that as we honor them, the Clinton administration misleads 
them. It is reprehensible. The Clinton administration has resorted to 
bogus studies and scare tactics where our veterans are concerned. The 
Democrats only agenda is to deter the Republican-led Congress from 
doing what is right, balancing the budget.
  The Clinton administration cites flawed studies and spreads 
misinformation because they have no serious plan of their own. The 
latest campaign of fear, aimed at veterans, distorts our Medicaid 
reform using a general study on Medicaid--not a veterans-specific 
study. In fact, the study did not even use experts in the area of 
veterans' affairs. The GAO deemed the study questionable after 
discovering that the Urban Institute had used alternative assumptions 
or methods for their findings.
  The report contains numerous factual errors and conspicuously omits 
important facts like veterans spending increasing by $40 billion over 
the next 7 years, Medicare spending increasing 54 percent and Medicaid 
spending increasing by 39 percent.
  It really is not surprising that the Clinton administration has 
resorted to this kind of fearmongering. After all, it was only last 
week, an adviser to the President was quoted as saying ``I subscribe to 
terror. Terror tends to work because it is so easy to make people 
hate.'' A statement like this denotes the true character and the 
lengths to which the Clinton administration will go to mislead our 
veterans and the American people.

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