[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 81 (Wednesday, June 5, 1996)]
[House]
[Page H5824]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      WARNING SIGNALS ON MEDICARE

  (Mr. UPTON asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Mr. UPTON. Mr. Speaker, I take the well today to remind my colleagues 
that you and I were not here in the House when the warning signals were 
up about the S&L debacle back in the early 1980's. Those scoundrels 
from Texas and California, Florida and Illinois took the taxpayers for 
$150 billion, and it was wrong. Congress should have acted in the early 
1980's, and they did not.
  Mr. Speaker, we have a great program that seniors in this country 
love called Medicare. The warning signals were out there a year ago 
that it was going to go belly up by the year 2002. This body did 
nothing. We tried to get bipartisan cooperation and nothing happened.
  Today a report is coming out saying that it is a year worse. Instead 
of going belly up in 2002, it is going to go belly up in 2001, $90 
billion worse than it was last year. Three cabinet members are going to 
sign that report as they did last year.
  Yet we read in the CQ facts record for Monday, Laura Tyson says that 
the trust fund is solvent. Bills will be paid and the administration's 
plan would assure solvency for a decade.
  Let us walk the walk instead of talk the talk. It is going bankrupt. 
We need to do something about it.

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