[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 205 (Wednesday, December 20, 1995)]
[House]
[Page H15210]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       WE MUST BALANCE PRIORITIES

  (Mr. KLINK asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. KLINK. Mr. Speaker, we have got some disagreements and, indeed, 
sometimes the rhetoric gets a little heated around here from both 
sides.
  Let me explain, we are not just talking dollars and cents as some of 
our colleagues on the other side who spoke earlier. We are not talking 
about the fact we are a few billion dollars apart.
  We are talking about balancing priorities as well as balancing the 
budget. There are a lot of us on our side of the aisle that say, look, 
if we are going to force adult children of the elderly who are in 
nursing homes to pick up the cost of that nursing home care because we 
have changed Medicaid, we have made a medigrant program, we have not 
guaranteed that all of these senior citizens are even going to have a 
nursing home, we have not guaranteed the standard of care, we have not 
guaranteed that spouses are not going to be impoverished.
  Let me tell you something, in the committee, 100 percent of the 
Republicans on the other side voted against each one of those 
amendments protecting adult children, protecting spouses from 
impoverishment, protecting people so that they have at least some 
standard of care.
  I understand, in the conference report, that may have begun to 
change. It has not changed enough. We must protect those care 
standards.

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