[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 203 (Monday, December 18, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H15068-H15075]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from California [Mr. Dornan] is recognized for 5 minutes.

  [Mr. DORNAN addressed the House. His remarks will appear hereafter in 
the Extensions of Remarks.]

[[Page H15069]]


                   GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN AND THE BUDGET

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of May 
12, 1995, the gentlewoman from Connecticut [Ms. DeLauro] is recognized 
for 60 minutes as the designee to the minority leader.
  Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, I am delighted to be here tonight and join 
with several of my colleagues to talk about the budget agreement or the 
lack thereof and what the concerns and considerations are about a 
budget agreement in this body.
  It will be the topic of conversation over the next several days. Not 
the prior speaker but the gentleman who spoke before the prior speaker 
made reference to the November 19 agreement that was agreed to by the 
President and the Congress in terms of a continuing resolution which 
would open the Federal Government that had been closed in those few 
days beforehand. The gentleman referenced this agreement, but what he 
did not do was to talk about the full scope of what this agreement was, 
a commitment to a balanced budget. I would like to read what the 
commitment included. It had a couple of parts to it.
  My colleague intimated that the President had talked about a balanced 
budget in 7 years and that, in fact, that that was the scope and the 
sum total of this agreement and under the economic assumptions of the 
Congressional Budget Office and leaves the impression in the public's 
mind that the President has backed off of that agreement and has not 
been true to his word about the balanced budget and the economic 
assumptions.
  It is not only the President who he intimates has reneged on this 
effort, but, in fact, the Congress and those of us in the Congress who, 
in fact, supported that agreement.
  But the full scope of that agreement includes the following. It said 
that the President and the Congress shall enact legislation in the 
first session of the 104th Congress to achieve a balanced budget no 
later than fiscal year 2002, that is a 7-year period, as estimated by 
the Congressional Budget Office and the President and the Congress 
agree that the balanced budget must protect future generations, ensure 
Medicare solvency, reform welfare, and provide adequate funding for 
Medicaid, education, agriculture, national defense, veterans, and the 
environment. Further, the balanced budget will adopt tax polices to 
help working families and to stimulate future economic growth.
  Part B, the balanced budget agreement shall be estimated by the 
Congressional Budget Office based on its most recent current economic 
and technical assumptions, following a thorough consultation and review 
with the Office of Management and Budget and other government and 
private experts.
  My colleagues on the other side of the aisle would like the American 
public to believe that the agreement was only to a 7-year balanced 
budget and solely on the economic assumptions made by the Congressional 
Budget Office. It is a total reneging on the part of my Republican 
colleagues and the Republican majority in this body to, in fact, what 
that agreement was all about.
  First and foremost, it was about ensuring the values and the 
priorities of this great Nation of ours and that has to do with 
Medicare and Medicaid and education and tax policy that is equitable to 
working middle-class families in this Nation. This agreement was signed 
and voted on by two parties and yet the only people who have been 
intransigent on this budget agreement and will not move off of $270 
billion in cuts in Medicare and $163 billion in cuts in Medicaid is the 
Republican majority in this House of Representatives. Thank God, the 
President is holding firm on those priorities and the values of this 
great Nation of ours.
  I will say to you that Members on both sides of the aisle feel 
passionately about their positions on the debate and we should feel 
passionately. We are debating the future of this country and the 
listening public should make no mistake. Sometimes you think that there 
is an argument, that we are bickering back and forth. I will just tell 
you, as this Member, and I know my colleagues feel the same way, these 
are issues that are worth fighting for.
  If we are not fighting here for the values of this Nation and the 
priorities of the people of this country, then we do not deserve to 
represent those people who put their faith and thrust in us and asked 
us to come here on their behalf.
  This debate is more than just about numbers. It is about those 
values. It is about those priorities of the American people.
  Democrats and the President are opposed to the Republican budget plan 
because it makes deep and devastating cuts in Medicare, Medicaid, 
education and environmental protection, and we truly believe that those 
cuts go too far, too fast, and are going to hurt too many people in 
this country.
  Let us talk about Medicaid for the moment. Medicaid is the Federal 
program that provides health care to tens of millions of needy 
children, of the disabled and the frail elderly in this country. 
Speaker Gingrich's budget plan cuts Medicaid by 28 percent, $165 
billion. At the same time it rolls out $245 billion in new tax breaks 
and loopholes to the wealthiest individuals and corporations in this 
country, to the richest corporations in this country. They will see a 
$17 billion windfall. And at the same time Medicare beneficiaries will 
see their deductibles go up, their copayments go up, and they will lose 
the choice of their doctor and many rural hospitals in this country 
will close down.
  If you are a hard-working American listening tonight, you might think 
that the cuts in Medicaid do not affect you, that they only affect 
people on welfare and that it is just a program for the poor. Well, 
that is wrong, and it is a mistake. The changes in Medicaid proposed in 
the GOP budget would have a devastating impact on middle-class working 
families in this Nation. Do not take my word for it, Everyone is 
familiar with something called the Consumer Reports. It is a 
publication that tells you if you are getting a good deal or a bum deal 
when you go out to buy a new car or a computer or a refrigerator or 
some sort of an appliance in your home.
  The group which publishes that famous report has taken a look at the 
Republican Medicaid plan from a consumers point of view and, guess 
what, they say it is a bum deal for America's working families. That is 
right, the Consumers Union has said, do not buy the Republican plan 
because it is a lemon. That is what it is.
  The reports looks at the impact that the GOP Medicaid cuts would have 
on nursing home residents and their families. According to its 
findings, millions of American families would be impoverished by the 
Republican plan. Medicaid covers the cost of care for 60 percent of 
nursing home residents in this country, and it includes guarantees and 
insurance that families are not saddled with the financial burden of 
that care. But all of that is about to change if the Republicans get 
their way on this budget.
  According to Consumers Union, families of nursing home residents can 
expect the following changes if the Republican budget is approved. 
First and foremost, and understand this, if you have a parent, if you 
have a loved one who is in a nursing home and the cost of nursing home 
care is about $38,000 a year these days, that in fact if this bill gets 
passed, if this budget goes through, ladies and gentleman who are 
listening out there, adult children may be held financially liable for 
the nursing home bills of their parents.
  Second, family assets, including homes, may be sold or seized by 
Medicaid liens. Let me tell you that what it says in the fine print is 
that if you make above the median income in your State, your assets, as 
an adult child or a parent who is in a nursing home, can be tapped to 
pay for that nursing home care.

                              {time}  1945

  It was Ronald Reagan who wanted to protect adult children from having 
to be destitute in terms of having their funding taken away in terms of 
paying for health care and nursing home coverage for their families who 
put those laws into effect in this Nation. In the State of Connecticut, 
if you make more than $41,000 a year, the State can come after you to 
pay for the cost of your parents' nursing home care. Heed this well: 
Further, no one is guaranteed nursing home eligibility, no one. States 
may set unreasonably low income levels so that thousands of people 

[[Page H15070]]
will be denied help in paying the high cost of nursing home care. 
Families may be forced to spend their life savings for long-term care 
of a loved one.
  Speaker Gingrich has put together a budget that reflects his 
priorities, not America's priorities. It is a budget that will hurt 
those who would need our help when helping those who are doing just 
fine. Over and over again the budget socks it to working families while 
cushioning the blow for the wealthy. Balancing the budget is an 
important goal, but balancing the budget has to be not about just 
balancing the books. It has to be about what balancing what our 
priorities are about.

  I am going to stop at this juncture for my colleagues who are on the 
floor, and I want to open up the discussion to them, and we can make 
the continued points, and I am happy to yield to and to recognize my 
colleague, the gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Pallone], who has spent 
endless hours on the floor of this House, and in meetings, and in his 
own district to try to truly educate the public on what is in this bill 
which is so hurtful to people in this Nation and particularly takes 
away health care, that security and that safety net of health care in 
this country. I am happy to yield to my friend from New Jersey.
  Mr. PALLONE. I want to thank the gentlewoman from Connecticut [Ms. 
DeLauro], and I certainly want to follow up on some of the comments 
that she made.
  Mr. Speaker, I want to follow up on what the gentlewoman from 
Connecticut said, particularly when she started out in the beginning 
and she read from the concurrent resolution that was adopted a few 
weeks ago, just before Thanksgiving, that set forth the basis for the 
negotiations over the budget. That is the continuing resolution which, 
of course, expired Friday. I wanted to, again in following up on what 
she said, I wanted to make a couple of points:
  First of all, I think everyone has to understand that there were 
three parts, at least three parts, to that continuing resolution that 
everyone agreed on. One was that while we negotiated the budget between 
the White House and the Congress, between the Democrats and the 
Republicans, that the Government was not going to shut down, that the 
Government was going to continue to operate, and on Friday, when the 
Republican leadership walked out of a meeting with the President, 
whereupon they were continuing to negotiate the budget, and when the 
Republicans leadership in this Congress refused to bring up a 
continuing resolution Friday, Saturday, Sunday, or even today during a 
normal business day so that the Government continues to operate, they 
broke the commitment that was made a few weeks ago that the Government 
would continue to operate while we worked out our differences over the 
budget, and I think it is particularly tragic that we went through 
another business day today with close to 300,000 Federal employees 
going home. Remember these people are going to be paid, they are not 
working, and the Government and the people that are serviced by the 
agencies that are closed down lose out. And I made the point over and 
over on the floor of this House that we need to put our ideological 
differences aside and let the Government continue to operate while we 
negotiate this budget.
  Now, as my colleagues know, I do not even know if it was mentioned 
today during the short debate we had on this joint resolution that the 
gentlewoman mentioned, but you have to understand that Social Security 
offices are closed, that the national parks, the national recreation 
areas, the national monuments are closed not only in Washington, DC, 
but throughout the country. People who depend on Government agencies 
for certain services which their tax dollars are being used for cannot 
obtain those services. It makes absolutely no sense for any of that to 
occur while we continue to argue over and negotiate the budget.
  That was No. 1.
  The other part of the resolution that the gentlewoman mentioned was 
the fact that the priorities, the priorities whether they are Medicaid, 
Medicare, the environment, education, and the other things that were 
mentioned in that continuing resolution, this agreement that was 
reached a couple weeks ago, they have been completely ignored by the 
Republican leadership. In fact, in the joint resolution that was 
brought up today, which most of us voted on, including myself, that 
resolution made no reference to the Government shutdown or the need to 
continue the operation of Government, no reference to the priorities 
such as Medicare and Medicaid, and simply said that negotiations should 
continue based on the most recent technical and economic assumptions of 
the Congressional Budget Office. Well, we already understood that we 
already agreed that we were going to operate with a 7-year budget 
essentially based on CBO numbers. We did not need to argue or debate 
that today.
  Mr. Speaker, the problem is that the Republican leadership has 
refused to come up with a resolution to let the Government continue to 
operate so that everybody goes home and gets paid anyway, and they 
refuse to talk about the Medicare and Medicaid and the other 
priorities, so, you know, this agreement that was reached, as the 
gentlewoman from Connecticut said a couple weeks ago, this agreement 
has--the other part of the bargain here, to keep the Government open 
and to deal with the priorities such as Medicare and Medicaid are 
basically out the window. I think that is very unfortunate because I 
think that the President--it is abundantly clear that the President has 
used the time over the last 2 weeks to set forth a budget wherein he 
preserved those priorities, and basically on Friday, when the 
Republicans walked out of the negotiations session, he came back and 
said, ``Look, I can't make the level of cuts in Medicare and Medicaid 
that the Republicans are asking me to make and still preserve the 
programs,'' and they made a commitment, the Republicans, that they 
would provide adequate funding for Medicaid, insure Medicare solvency, 
and work for sufficient funding for the environment and other 
priorities. They have broken that commitment, and I just wanted to talk 
about one aspect of this, and then I am going to yield to the 
gentlewoman from California [Ms. Pelosi].
  Earlier today the President--earlier this evening I should say--the 
President vetoed the VA, HUD and Independent Agencies Appropriations 
Act which includes the Environmental Protection Agency, and most of the 
programs that protect the environment and most of the funding for the 
programs that protect the environment, particularly the EPA, and the 
President again articulated his priorities. He noted in his veto 
message that the bill includes a 22-percent cut in requested funding 
for the Environmental Protection Agency, including a 25-percent cut in 
enforcement that would cripple EPA efforts to enforce laws against 
polluters. Particularly objectionable are the bill's 25-percent cut in 
Superfund, which would continue to expose hundreds of thousands of 
citizens to dangerous chemicals and would hamper efforts to train 
workers in hazardous waste cleanup.
  Now my Republican colleagues, the chairman of the Committee on 
Appropriations, the chairman of the subcommittee that brought this bill 
up, when they got on the floor, they responded to the President's veto 
by saying, well, the President has not come up with a 7-year balanced 
budget; where is the balanced budget? Again, neglecting the priorities.
  Here is one of the major concerns that the President has. Why is it 
that the EPA, and the environmental protection programs in general, 
take the biggest cuts of any Federal agency or any Federal programs and 
basically their whole enforcement program is crippled? Well, the reason 
is very simple, and that is because the Republican priorities are 
neglecting the environment in the same way that they are neglecting 
Medicaid and they are neglecting Medicare. They have basically hoisted 
up the notion that we have to have a 7-year balanced budget, and it 
does not matter how it is balanced, it does not matter where the 
priorities are. Well, I should say maybe even go further and say that 
the priorities, as they have always have been in this whole budget 
negotiation, give the tax breaks to the wealthy, give the tax breaks to 
the corporations, and take the money away from Medicare, Medicaid, as 
well as the environment.
  The President today, as he has for the last 2 or 3 weeks, indicated 
what 

[[Page H15071]]
his priorities are. He indicated his priorities on the environment 
today very clearly in his veto message, and I think that the main thing 
that we have to do over the next few weeks, as these budget 
negotiations continue, is hold the Republican leadership's feet to the 
fire and say, ``Look, we're all in agreement with a balanced budget, we 
will even go along with your 7-year plan and your CBO numbers, but 
we've got to protect our priorities,'' and I have not seen any effort 
at all over the last few weeks on the part of the Republican leadership 
to protect those priorities that we have articulated and that were very 
well articulated in the agreement a couple weeks ago.

  Ms. DeLAURO. I just want to make one point and then yield to our 
colleague, the gentlewoman from California [Ms. Pelosi]. The point that 
you have made is that there truly is nothing balanced about rolling 
back environmental protection in order to, at the behest of corporate 
polluters, which is what has happened in this portion of the budget, is 
those people who--will want to continue polluting, have had the 
opportunity, in fact the most egregious points about this effort is 
that they have the opportunity to help to draft the legislation in this 
body, and we are rolling back those environmental protections for the 
aggrandizement of these special interests which is an integral part of 
this budget.
  One of the last pieces I wanted to mention is that we have in this 
tax break package rolled back the alternate minimum tax. For instance, 
you are going to cut student loans that allow working families, middle-
class families to get their kids to school. We all went to school with 
student loans. They are going to try to cut out these programs and at 
the same time do away with the alternate minimum tax. That is the tax 
that again was put in by Ronald Reagan to have the richest corporations 
in this country pay their fair share of some taxes at a 20-percent 
level. Nobody was asking for that repeal. This is being repealed, and 
they are telling us at the same time that we have got to bring our 
fiscal house in order, we are going to give this--you know millions of 
dollars of windfall to the richest Americans, and at the same time we 
are telling working families we are sorry we have got to cut back on 
the student loan, your kid cannot go to school, and you are going to 
have to figure out another way to do it, or a veteran in this with, you 
know, sorry we are going to cut $6 billion of veterans' benefits, but 
we are going to give all these billions of dollars to these folks who 
at this time do not need it. It is truly mind-boggling to think about 
what this says about the priorities of this Nation.
  I now would like to yield to my colleague, the gentlewoman from 
California [Ms. Pelosi], who has really been fighting the fight on this 
issue in talking about how all of this affects her constituents in the 
State of California.
  Ms. PELOSI. I thank the gentlewoman from Connecticut for yielding, 
and for her leadership, and her persistence and her relentlessness on 
presenting this issue to the American people, and to my colleague, the 
gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Pallone], for his leadership as well.
  It is very clear listening to the two of you and to our other 
colleagues who have been making this fight to protect Medicare, and 
Medicaid, and student loans, and school nutritional programs for young 
children, et cetera, that what this fight is about here in Washington, 
DC, is not about politics, it is about philosophy and values and 
priorities.

                              {time}  2000

  When we talk about balancing the budget, you have heard it a million 
times, the budget should be balanced in its values as well as fiscally 
balanced in terms of taking in and spending the same amount of money. 
That is why it is so very hard if you call a balanced budget your 
driving issue, why you can in the same breath talk about a tax cut of a 
quarter of a trillion dollars for the wealthiest people in our country.
  How can it be a statement of our national values, as our budget 
should be, for us to talk about cutting back on what our colleagues 
mentioned here, Medicare, Medicaid, student loans, school nutritional 
programs, et cetera, while we are giving a tax break at the high end?
  Our colleagues on the Republican side in this session, in this 
budget, make the folks who talked about trickle-down look good. 
Trickle-down never worked, but at least it gave some recognition that 
somewhere, somewhere along the line, there should be something for 
folks at the bottom of the economic scale. Their view was if you give 
it all to the top, create wealth at the top, the benefits will trickle 
down.
  Our colleagues now in this budget, in this Congress, do not even care 
if it trickless down. ``If you are at the low end, if you are poor, if 
you have not had the same opportunities as others, you are not going to 
get them. So be it.''
  In our Labor-HHS we cut, or the Republican leadership cut, $1 billion 
out of aid to disadvantaged children, the Chapter I education 
appropriation, $1 billion. That is 1 million children in our country 
who will not get the kind of assistance they need early on in their 
education to help them fulfill themselves and make a valuable 
contribution to their society, as well as become taxpayers.
  I am very interested in showing what our colleagues spelled out in 
terms of the cuts and the values and the unfairness of the tax cut 
while we are, in many cases, increasing the taxes for people who make 
$30,000 or less, and we remove the earned income tax credit for 
families, too. Some people are making the minimum wage. If two wage-
earners in a family are working at the minimum wage, full time, they 
bring home the rip-roaring sum of $17,000, and they will get a tax 
increase, because they will not, unless they have children, they will 
not receive the earned income tax credit. These young couples are 
preparing to have children, they are saving up to have children, and 
our colleagues are increasing their taxes, while giving the 
preponderance of this tax cut to the high end.
  I want to show once again what this means to California. Last week 
when we had our special order, I talked more specifically about what it 
meant to San Francisco. I do this because I think each of us, and I was 
pleased to be invited by my colleagues to do this last week and now, 
because we represent our districts here and are members of a delegation 
from a State, and we should all evaluate what it means to the people in 
our districts and our State, the budgets of our local communities and 
our State budgets, and the economies of our region.
  I am proud to be part of the California delegation in the Congress. 
My district is San Francisco, 80 percent of the city of San Francisco. 
I share representation with the gentleman from California [Mr. Lantos]. 
This budget plan that the Republicans are proposing has a devastating 
impact on the State of California.
  First, let me tell you what California brings to the country. In 
terms of the balance of payments, in terms of trade, this dynamic, 
incredibly resourceful State of California has, and we can go top to 
bottom with many of these issues, and some of them are throughout, has 
contributed enormously to our exports, and therefore our balance of 
payments, and therefore to our national treasury in terms of high tech, 
biotech, agriculture, entertainment. This list goes on and on. There is 
tourism. Many people, of course, come from all over the world to visit 
California, so dollars from all over the world flow into our State. We 
have invested in our people. Our country, when our country invests in 
its people, we reap the benefit.
  Our particular State has been a very dynamic one, very resourceful in 
terms of when we have a setback, we can bounce back because of the 
deiversity of the economy in our State. We are taking a beating on the 
base closures and the cutbacks in defense spending, and that is 
appropriate as we wind down after the cold war, but that means that we 
also have to recognize that there are needs that we have in our State.
  Under this Republican balanced budget, the State of California, in 
the 7 years of the budget, will lose over $72 billion just in the 
reconcilitation part of the bill, not including the appropriations, so 
it will be closer to $100 billion in the 7 years.

  Just to put it in perspective, our State budget in California is 
approximately $57 billion a year, so it will be nearly 2 years in the 
next 7 years of a State budget which will be removed 

[[Page H15072]]
from California in terms of assistance to individuals, Medicare and 
Medicaid, student loans, et cetera, school nutritional programs, in 
terms of the cutbacks for localities and to the State budget. What that 
does to the economy of the State also has an impact on what happens 
nationally, because California is one-eighth of the country.
  I encourage my colleagues to look to your own States and districts to 
see what this really translates for you. Is it dynamic? Does it 
contribute to your people becoming more prosperous, and therefore 
paying more taxes, producing more revenues, enriching their lives, 
building a better future for our country, or does it have the opposite 
effect?
  Unfortunately for California, the impact of this budget is 
devastating, and one that we simply cannot absorb without severe 
economic setback for us in our State. When we hear people talk about 
this balanced budget, you have to say why are we here at this point, 
one week before Christmas, when we would all much rather be working in 
our districts with our constituents or spending time with our family, 
or preparing for a religious holiday? Instead, we are here. Why are we 
here? Because we have not finished our business.
  Every year the Congress must pass 13 appropriations bills. We have 
not done that. On top of it, the ones that we have done are so out of 
balance in terms of the values of the American people, the President 
could not possibly sign them. And three cheers for President Clinton 
for vetoing most recently the VA-HUD bill and the Interior 
appropriation bills, because if there is one thing that we all agree on 
in this country, it is that we want our children to breathe clean air 
and drink clean water and eat food that is not contaminated by 
pesticides.
  This antipollution insistence of the President is one in which I 
strongly support him. We all have to, too, because if there is one 
thing that is beyond all of us, as much as we want the best for our 
children, we cannot control the atmosphere and the water that comes out 
of the tap in our homes; or if we go to the market and we want to buy 
meat, we want to know that it is inspected, and what we bring into our 
homes, to our families, is safe. Government plays a role in that. I 
thank the President for vetoing.
  I remind you, veto means ``I forbid.'' I thank the President for 
forbidding these huge cuts in EPA, which protects the water and air our 
children drink and breathe. I thank the President for vetoing the 
Interior bill, which does damage to our environment. Hopefully our 
colleagues on this side of the aisle, the Republican colleagues, will 
see the light and come to terms with the President on these bills.
  When we have agreement on this appropriations bills, there will be no 
need for a continuing resolution, and we can debate the priorities of 
our budget in the appropriate time frame. Remember, when we talk about 
a balanced budget and we throw in a quarter of a trillion dollar tax 
cut, overwhelmingly at the high end for the wealthiest individuals of 
our country, you are, de facto, imposing severe hardship on children 
and senior citizens in our country.
  One other point, in closing, that I would like to make. In the Los 
Angeles Times--yes, we San Franciscans read the Los Angeles Times, 
too--there is an article today which I will submit for the Record, and 
it is called ``Offspring May Pay Medicaid Tab.'' ``GOP plan to balance 
budget would let States require adult children of nursing home 
residents to contribute to cost of parents' care.''
  Mr. Speaker, I have already addressed this at length, but this 
article does so, too. From the National Senior Citizens Law Center, 
Patricia Nemore says, ``This is hitting families when they have their 
children's education and their own retirement to save for.''
  As my colleague, the gentlewoman from Connecticut, said, if you are 
above the median income level your assets will be called upon to pay 
for your parents' nursing home care if they are on Medicaid. This is 
after families have paid down so many of their resources already, and 
that is why they are on Medicaid and in the nursing home. This is when 
families in middle age, middle-income families, are raising their own 
children and sending them to college.
  This is at a point where you use an arbitrary figure, like median 
income. Certainly there are people in our country who can afford to do 
this, but using an arbitrary figures like median income, and to say 
that that is a burden that the States may now put on families, I think 
contributes enormously to the economic as well as the health security 
of America's families.

  Mr. Speaker, at this magnificent time of the year, when we should be 
heeding the words of Matthew in the Bible and feeding the hungry and 
giving shelter to the homeless, et cetera, as the Bible called for, and 
as the gatekeeper in heaven said, ``When you did this for the least,'' 
and I would rather say, ``the poorest of our brethren, you did it for 
me,'' when we do that, certainly we honor acts of charity, we honor the 
God who made us, we honor our creation. But these people should not 
have to be dependent on the largesse of individuals. We must have 
public policy that recognizes that the way we are going to have a 
strong country is to invest in our people, to give them education and 
opportunity, and to understand that they cannot be exposed from a 
health or economic standpoint in the ways that this so-called balanced 
budget proposal of our colleague proposes.
  I am so pleased that President Clinton had the courage, in the face 
of all that has happened, the close down of government, to say ``No, I 
forbid,'' to these proposals that the Republicans are making on the 
appropriations bills. When they come to the reality that the public 
will not accept those false priorities on the Republican side and the 
President is proposing what is good for America's future, only then 
will these bills be passed. There will be no need for a continuing 
resolution anymore, they will be passed and signed by the President, 
eliminating the need for the CR and taking us to a place where we can 
truly produce a balanced budget, balanced in money, balanced in values, 
balanced in priorities.
  Once again, I want to thank our colleagues for calling this special 
order and their ongoing leadership on this issue, and call again to my 
colleagues' attention the impact on our State. See what it does to 
yours.
  Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank our colleague from 
California for reiterating the effect on adult children, and how their 
assets are at risk if they have a family member who is in a nursing 
home. One other point in terms of continued education, a number of our 
colleagues this afternoon, Republican colleagues, talked about how the 
President has been derelict in his duty and at this last hour is 
vetoing these appropriation bills.
  I say to my Republican colleagues, you cannot talk out of both sides 
of your mouths. You cannot be in charge of this institution, hold the 
majority on all of the committees, and in the final votes in committee 
and on the floor of the House, and when you get to the appropriations 
bills, when you cannot get them completed in the House and in the 
Senate and send them to the President, that has been the single biggest 
issue in holding back what has been going on here in terms of getting 
to the budget, is they have not done their job on any of these 
appropriations bills. I thank the gentlewoman for bringing that point 
out.
  Ms. PELOSI. If the gentlewoman will yield, I just want to make one 
further point in that regard. Yes, if this House had done its work on 
time, September 30, midnight, had the bills to the President, we would 
not be here now. Certainly in years gone by, there have been times when 
appropriations bills have not been passed on time and we have had a 
need for a CR, but to this extent it has not been seen before.
  I want to make the further point that if we had not spent the first 
half of the year on the Contract With America, which had no prospect 
for Presidential signature, and only one bill, I think of which has 
even been signed into law, fine, if you have an agenda you want to 
bring to Congress; but make sure you do the work the public has sent 
you there to do, too, and that is to pass the appropriations bills, to 
debate the priorities, pass the bills so Government can function.
  Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Washington, 
Jim McDermott. In terms of the Medicare issue, the gentleman from 
Washington has really led the way in terms of heeding what the trustees 
said in terms of solvency, and $90 billion to be 

[[Page H15073]]
able to deal with that issue, because none of us view that there are 
not changes that could be made in the Medicare Program, but the 
gentleman has had the foresight to think about the future and what 
happens with baby boomers and setting up a structure to deal with that, 
and not sending the balance of that $90 billion from the $280 that the 
Republicans want to cut from Medicare for their tax cuts for the 
wealthy, but has been someone who has worked diligently on trying to 
deal with the Medicare issue. I am proud to yield to my colleague, the 
gentleman from Washington.
  Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman. I want to 
commend my colleague, the gentlewoman from Connecticut, for having this 
special order, because at time like this, it is confusing. Many Members 
wonder if anybody is paying any attention whatsoever to what the real 
issues are. As I walked into the Chamber a moment ago, my colleague, 
the gentlewoman from California [Ms. Pelosi], put her finger on what 
the real question here is. We are arguing about philosophy.

                              {time}  2015

  Now, people can get confused. I went home to Seattle this week, and 
it is always good to go home and talk to people in your district, and I 
talked to my mother and father. My father is 90, my mother is 86, and 
their questions were, what is this all about? What is it all about? Why 
is all this fighting going on? Why do you not just resolve it and get 
it over with and come on home?
  The question is one of philosophy. I personally, like Ms. Pelosi, 
take my hat off to the President for standing up for a philosophy that 
says that people are entitled to health care.
  Now, that is at the root of it. You can have all of this argument 
about CBO figures and whether this is honest scorekeeping or whatever; 
all it does is confuse people. But if they would simply remember that 
the issue here is whether people are going to wind up at the end of 
this session with entitlements to health care in this country, they 
would understand what the President has put his foot down on and will 
not move; and I hope he does not move off of that.
  Mr. Speaker, the programs Medicare and Medicaid get all mixed up in 
people's minds. The names sound sort of the same, so people confuse 
them, even when they talk about them. Medicare is basically a program 
of providing health care for senior citizens and disabled people in 
this country, and Medicaid is another program. Medicare is all funded 
by the Federal Government. Medicaid is half State and half Federal 
Government, and it deals with poor women and children, and with senior 
citizens; and two-thirds of the money in Medicaid goes to pay for 
nursing homes.
  There is another program in Medicaid which people know very little 
about called the QMB Program; that is, Qualified Medicare Beneficiary. 
That means if you are a poor senior citizen, you do not have very much 
money--you have to remember that there are 9 million widows in this 
country living on less than $8,000 a year; now, that is just getting 
by. If they do not have the money to pay for deductibles and copays, 
the QMB Program of Medicaid pays for their part of the health care 
plan.
  Mr. Speaker, it is the Republicans' intention to take away the 
entitlement for both Medicaid and Medicare from all Americans. That is 
their long-term goal. Speaker Gingrich has said that he does not want 
to do it now because he knows that politically it is not acceptable, 
but they want it to kind of wither away and die on the vine. They are 
simply after that program.
  To understand what is going on in Medicare, and I do this because I 
wound up explaining to my parents, right now Medicare is a program of 
guaranteed benefits; no matter who you are in this country, no matter 
what color you are, how much money you have, no matter where you live, 
no matter what, if you are 65, you are in the Medicare Program and you 
are entitled to a guaranteed set of benefits.
  Now, the Republicans say, look, we do not want to guarantee anybody 
any benefits. We will guarantee a fixed contribution. We are going to 
give them a certain amount of money. You could call it a voucher. They 
are going to give $4,600 to every senior citizen next year and say, you 
take your little $4,600 out there and buy a benefit package like you 
have now, and next year we will give you $4,900, and the next year we 
will give you $5,200. That is why they can say we are putting more 
money in.
  However, the fact is that the second year, that $4,900 will not buy 
the guaranteed benefit package you have today. So your benefit package 
is going to shrink, and each year it is going to shrink until you do 
not have, in the year 2002, what you have presently in that guaranteed 
benefit package. The guarantee of benefits is gone. All they are going 
to do is send you the voucher and send you out into the street.
  Mr. Speaker, I look at my parents, and I think every American ought 
to look at their parents, if you are in my age range. I am 58, so from 
58 down to about 35, you ought to look at your parents and say to 
yourself, how will it be when my mom and dad go out in the street with 
that voucher in their hand looking for a friendly insurance company to 
take care of them?
  My dad is 90. Now, you just tell me which insurance company in this 
country wants to have my father as one of their beneficiaries? I mean, 
he has had a heart attack, he has had a stroke, he has had a whole 
bunch of things. He is doing just fine right now, but nobody is going 
to bet on him.
  Mr. Speaker, that is what they are doing to senior citizens in this 
country. They are taking away the guarantee that he will be covered and 
say, ``Mr. McDermott, take your money out there and see if you can find 
anybody who wants to take care of you.''
  Now, I would not have come over here, because I was sitting over in 
my office reading letters, and a lot of people think it does not do any 
good to write a letter to their Congressman. I am here to tell you that 
everybody ought to be writing to their Congressman or Congresswoman and 
telling them what they think about this whole idea, because I read a 
letter which was sent out, this was in California, and somebody through 
that I ought to read this, and I will read it to you because it tells 
you what senior citizens are sitting there facing.

  ``Dear non-HMO Medicare patient,'' that means a patient, a senior 
citizen who does not belong to an HMO, ``As of December 31, 1995, the 
San Jose Medical Group will no longer provide care to non-HMO Medicare 
patients and, as such, I will no longer be able to provide your care. 
Non-HMO Medicare reimburses our doctors at rates so low that the San 
Jose Medical Group cannot cover costs. I am writing to you now because 
I wish to continue to provide care to you and would like to inform you 
about the senior HMO Medicare plans which are available to you. I can 
continue to serve you when you enroll in one of those senior HMO plans 
listed below. Should you wish to locate another physician who accepts 
non-HMO Medicare patients, you can call,'' and they give a number here.
  Mr. Speaker, they go on. I mean, they are selling HMO's. This is a 
doctors' group shoving people into HMO's. ``Selecting a senior HMO plan 
is an option you have under your Medicare health benefits. With a 
senior HMO, you no longer need to buy Medicare supplements. This saves 
some of our patients thousands of dollars a year. HMO's have no annual 
deductible, but you do have to pay $5 or $6 for each office visit. 
These plans cover everything that Medicare allows and most add in 
extras like eyeglass benefits, physical exams and prescription drug 
coverages. Some plans even cover hearing aids, mental, and dental care.
  ``Now, what is the downside? Well, you do need to select a primary 
care doctor from whom you must get a referral to see a specialist.'' 
Think about what that means to older people. Most of them have things 
wrong with them. I mean when you get to be 70, 80 years old, you have 
something wrong with you, and you are not going just to see the GP, you 
are going to see somebody dealing with your diabetes or with your lung 
problems, or you will see your cardiologist or something special.
  Before you can see that specialist, you have to have this primary 
care doctor who must give you a referral. Why? You already know Dr. 
Johnson takes care of your heart, why can you not just go to him? Why 
do you have to go to Dr. Thomas and get Dr. Thomas 

[[Page H15074]]
to refer you to Dr. Johnson? It is crazy. It is simply adding cost 
over, being used to keep the senior citizen from getting the referral 
to the specialist.
  Now, this is what is going on, and I always say, with all due respect 
to my California colleagues, in Washington State we always say, go down 
to Los Angeles an watch what is happening, because it is going to be in 
the whole United States in the next 3 years; whether it is Hula-Hoops 
or music or clothing or whatever, it all starts there.
  Well, they are starting with the letters now, sending them out in 
California, and they are going to be sending them out to every senior 
citizen in this country. You have to ask yourself, why does the doctor 
put down the name of six HMO's? I will tell you why he does, because I 
am a physician. He belongs to those. I will bet you he belongs to them. 
What he did when he signed in, they said to him, now you have to bring 
your practice in here, otherwise we are not going to need you. So this 
doctor is writing to all of these senior citizens saying, please join 
these HMO's, because if you do not join, they are going to kick me out. 
That is how the HMO's operate; if there are no patients, they throw the 
doctors out. So the doctors are in the business of urging people to get 
into HMO's.
  The President has said, I want to protect people's right to choose 
their own physician, not have to join an HMO if they do not want to, 
not be forced, either ecomonically or by an subtle pressure from the 
doctors, even; I want people to have the right to choose whoever they 
want.
  Now, at the end of what the gentlewoman from California [Ms. Pelosi] 
talked about, she also brought up an issue which I think, I have said 
to senior citizens groups all over my district and I think everybody 
ought to be thinking about it, they asked me, what can we do about 
this? I said, tell your children, because most of the people under 65 
in this country think, well, this has nothing to do with me, this is 
Medicare, that is for old people; or Medicaid, that is for poor people. 
I am not poor. But the fact is that Medicaid takes the burden and 
Medicare takes the burden of health care off people like me.
  Mr. Speaker, most people my age and a little bit younger are 
struggling to help their kids get through college, so they are busy 
paying college tuitions, and they have never in my lifetime, in my 
adult lifetime, no one has ever had to think about paying their 
parents' health care bills. It simply was off the table.

  That is what Medicare did in 1965 and Medicaid. When President 
Johnson signed those bills, he lifted the burden off individuals and 
said, as a country, we are going to take care of everybody. Nobody is 
going to be stuck with their particular problems; we are going to share 
the burden.
  What this Congress, what the Republicans are doing is trying to put 
it back on people and say, well, if you are lucky and your parents died 
young, or if your parents are healthy or whatever, you get off. 
However, if your parents are sick, you are going to get stuck, because 
as they take away that guaranteed benefit package in Medicare and your 
parents are out there with that voucher that does not buy what they 
have today, they are not going to have it and you are going to say, 
well, mom, why are you not going to see the doctor?
  Well, I did not have the money; I could not afford it. So people like 
me and younger than me are going to be stuck saying to their parents, 
you go see the doctor; here is the money. So while they are paying for 
tuition for their kids, they are also going to be paying for their 
parents' health care.
  The real impact, though, is if your parents, and our health care 
system has worked so well that people live and live and live and we 
have lots of people 80 and 90 years old in this country who ultimately 
wind up for some period of time in nursing homes. Now, if you have to 
go and live in a nursing home, the cost is $30,000 a year at a minimum. 
And if you take the Medicaid Program, as the Republicans are intending 
to do, and throw it back to the State legislatures, there is going to 
be a fight in 50 State legislatures about how you pay for Medicaid and 
how you pay for nursing homes.
  A very easy thing for Members of a State legislature to do is to say, 
well, why do we not get some money out of the children of the old 
people and that will be a way that we can reduce our costs for nursing 
homes in this State. So they are going to pass laws in the 50 States 
saying that the parents, or the children, if they are at whatever level 
of income, have to pay $1,000 or $2,000, or who knows what they will 
decide, because if the States are short, like they are in the State of 
Washington, there is no extra money.
  We passed a tax initiative that says, they cannot raise taxes except 
with a two-thirds vote. The Republicans put a phony rule in here that 
you had to have a two-thirds vote to raise taxes, but every time it 
comes up out here, they waive the rule. In our State, it is law. So the 
State legislature cannot come up with additional money, and if the Feds 
do not send down the Medicaid money, the State legislature is going to 
start looking for somebody else to pay the bills for their senior 
citizens, and they are going to look to the children.
  It is going to happen. People are going to wake up here in about a 
year or two and say, where did this come from? How did it happen? It 
happened right now in December 1995, and the only one preventing that 
from happening is the President of the United States who continues to 
veto this kind of legislation. The chaos that is being wreaked through 
the health care system is on every level, and the President is the only 
one at this point who is holding firm, and he is really protecting the 
American people and their health security net, health safety security 
net in this country.

                              {time}  2030

  I think that what you are doing here tonight by giving people a 
chance, and Members of Congress to come and tell what is happening, is 
a way of educating people about what the real issue here is.
  It is not about whether the CBO numbers are better than the OMB 
numbers and all that kind of gobbledygook that I hear out here. It is 
about whether or not people in this country are going to have the 
entitlement to have health care at a level that they have come to 
expect in this country. We have been able to do it in the past and it 
is certainly not out of our reach now. I commend the gentlewoman for 
having this special order.
  Ms. DeLAURO. I want to thank my colleague for helping in terms of 
public education and for focusing on this and what it is, and that is 
values and what the values are in this country as they are not 
reflected in the Republican budget.
  I yield the balance of our time, we have about 5 minutes left, to my 
colleague the gentlewoman from New York [Mrs. Lowey].
  Mrs. LOWEY. I thank my colleague, the gentlewoman from Connecticut 
[Ms. DeLauro], for organizing this special order, and thank the 
gentleman from Washington [Mr. McDermott] for coming down and talking 
to us about Medicare and Medicaid. I, too, was sitting in my office 
when I heard the gentleman from Washington [Mr. McDermott] talking.
  There is a lot of confusion out there. People are wondering what this 
alphabet soup is all about. OMB, CBO. Frankly, we know that it is hard 
enough to predict what the budget is going to be next year. It is hard 
enough to predict what economic conditions are going to be next year.
  For the Republicans to tell the President that his numbers are not 
right because they differ 7 years from now does not make sense at all. 
So what really counts is that the President is standing firm and 
saying, ``I will balance the budget in 7 years but I have got to 
protect Medicare, Medicaid, the environment and education.''
  Really I think the public is a little bit fed up at this point and 
would like us to get together, come to some conclusion. I was at the 
Statue of Liberty this morning, frankly, and to see the Statue of 
Liberty closed because the Republicans are saying do not use these 
numbers, do not use those numbers, use these numbers. The public really 
wants to know why the Social Security offices are closed, why the 
Statue of Liberty is closed, why they cannot get their passport.
  I would suggest that while we are debating these very serious issues, 
we get a continuing resolution and get the 

[[Page H15075]]
Government going again, because it is unfair to penalize the people for 
what is going on here in this House of Representatives. So we should be 
adults, get the Government going, and then continue to debate these 
very serious issues.
  Frankly, I want to applaud the President again for standing firm. 
Medicare, Medicaid, education and the environment are issues that are 
worth us standing firm on.
  Frankly, I was in my office looking through my mail, and rather than 
talk in generalities, I was looking at a letter from a constituent of 
mine by the name of Lorie Kraft. She is from Forest Hills, NY. She has 
a 79-year-old mother, Rena Payne. Like many children, Lorie is her 
mother's primary caretaker.
  You were talking about your father. Her mother has a form of 
dementia. Her mother needs a lot of care. What Lorie was saying, ``I 
already supplement my mother's income by buying her groceries, paying 
her utility bills, purchasing health care supplies. If Medicare 
benefits are cut,'' Lorie says, and I quote, ``it would be absolutely a 
devastating strain added to an already very difficult burden.''

  We have to know that what the Republicans are proposing is the 
largest cut in history. We know we have to reform Medicare and 
Medicaid. Yes, there is fraud in the program and we have to continue to 
make it better, but cuts of $270 billion just do not make any sense.
  I hope all the people out there understand that there is no reason to 
shut the Government down. We should be adults, get together and come up 
with proposals that make sense for the American people.
  If the Republicans would stop tacking on these extremist proposals on 
all the appropriations bills, and the gentlewoman from California [Ms. 
Pelosi] and I sit on the Committee on Appropriations, we know that the 
Republicans did not do their work. They should have completed their 
work by October 1. That is why we are in this pickle that we are in, 
because they did not complete the work. It is because on all these 
bills they want to tack on extremist provisions, whether it is 
provisions in the environmental bills that cut back on our protection 
for the environment, or cutting back on education, or cutting back on 
health care.
  We were sent here to stand up and fight for the Lorie Krafts of this 
world and their mothers, and I am very proud that our President is 
standing firm, that we are here tonight to make it clear to the 
American people. I hope you let Members of Congress know that we have 
to continue to fight to make sure that Medicare and Medicaid are 
preserved.
  This is an important battle, and it is a battle for the soul and the 
values of our Nation. I thank the gentlewoman again.
  I want to turn to my colleague the gentleman from Kentucky [Mr. 
Ward].
  Mr. WARD. I just wanted to make one short comment. That is, that we 
have heard lately about the importance of charities helping out and we 
have heard about churches maybe stepping in.
  I want to observe and make sure that people understand that if each 
of the 250,000 or so churches in America, there are about a quarter of 
a million churches, if each one had $1 million, $1 million that they 
could add, that would not even equal the tax breaks that are in this 
budget. It cannot be done in that way.

                          ____________________