[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 86 (Wednesday, June 12, 1996)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1064]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




               SAVING MEDICARE IS ``MISSION: IMPERATIVE''

                                 ______


                          HON. MARTIN R. HOKE

                                of ohio

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, June 12, 1996

  Mr. HOKE. Mr. Speaker, the Medicare trustees have just issued their 
annual report and the news isn't good.
  Medicare is now losing money for the first time ever, and will be 
completely broke by 2001 unless prompt, effective, and decisive action 
is taken to control costs.
  Last year the trustees--who include three members of the Clinton 
Cabinet--projected Medicare wouldn't run out of money until 2002. So 
the situation has worsened.
  But as bad as the news is, the American people need to know that 
regardless of who wins in November, Medicare's financial crisis will be 
solved.
  Letting Medicare go bankrupt simply is not an option.
  Both Congress and the White House have offered plans that limit the 
rate of growth in Medicare spending--by strikingly similar amounts. The 
White House would increase spending 7.2 percent annually, Congress 7.0 
percent. To put this in perspective, bear in mind that private sector 
health care spending is now growing at less than 3 percent annually.
  This no doubt comes as a surprise to those who already have suffered 
from overexposure to the semihysterical, patently false, and 
politically motivated mantra of ``cuts, cuts, cuts.'' President Clinton 
himself put it well: ``When you hear all this business about cuts, let 
me caution you that that is not what is going on. We are going to have 
increases in Medicare.''
  While the sides essentially are in agreement with respect to how 
much, there are significant differences as to how.
  The President and those who believe Washington knows best are 
committed to a top-down, bureaucratic solution that would increase the 
Government's role in the health care of our seniors, essentially 
identical to Mrs. Clinton's defeated health care plan of 1994.
  The far better solution is to modernize Medicare by giving seniors 
the kinds of options, including medical savings accounts, now available 
in some of the best private sector plans, while preserving their right 
to stay with traditional Medicare. In addition, we must mount the first 
ever attack on the waste and fraud that have helped bring Medicare to 
the brink of bankruptcy. The congressional plan to preserve Medicare 
contains both of these elements.
  Unfortunately, some folks, including politicians, Washington special 
interests groups, even the President, have indulged their partisan 
ambitions by intentionally trying to scare seniors into believing that 
Congress might take their Medicare benefits away from them. Helping to 
spread the poison are the big labor bosses in Washington, who have 
spent millions of dollars confiscated from their own rank and file 
membership on advertisements pusing that same big lie.
  Yet when you cut through all the political grandstanding, one thing 
becomes crystal clear: the longer a Medicare solution is put off, the 
harder and more unpalatable the choices become.
  We need all sides working together now--not as Republicans and 
Democrats, but as Americans--to solve this problem.
  So the next time you hear someone attack Congress for killing 
Medicare, ask them to show you their plan to save it. Chances are they 
won't have one. That's because they're thinking more about the next 
election than the next generation.

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