[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 80 (Tuesday, June 3, 2003)]
[House]
[Pages H4852-H4853]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




        VETERANS, CHILDREN, AND GREEDY, UNPATRIOTIC CORPORATIONS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, I rise this evening to talk about 
veterans, to talk about children, and to talk about greedy, unpatriotic 
corporations.
  First of all, I would like to say a word about our veterans. We 
passed a budget in this Congress which, over the 10-year budget cycle, 
will underfund veterans' programs by $6.2 billion.

                              {time}  1915

  And included in that budget are certain assumptions which will 
greatly increase the financial burdens that will be placed upon the 
backs of our veterans. First of all, a decision has been made that if 
you are a priority-eight veteran, considered high-income, and, quite 
frankly, in my district that could be someone who makes as little as 
$22,000 a year, you are considered high-income, and so you would no 
longer be able to enroll in the VA health care system.
  Now that is fairly shameful. In the Committee on Veterans Affairs 
earlier today, one of my colleagues said that he was a priority-eight 
veteran and he really did not object to being excluded. Well, the fact 
is that I and all of the rest of us who serve in this body make about 
$150,000 a year. It is probably a little easier for us to pay for our 
health care than it would be for a veteran who makes as little as 
$22,000 a year.
  Well, there are other things that this budget does. It assumes that 
we will charge priority-seven and -eight veterans an annual $250 
enrollment fee, something that we have never done in the past. So these 
veterans are now going to be asked to pay an additional $250 annual 
enrollment fee.

[[Page H4853]]

  But it gets worse: the budget assumption that the cost of a 
prescription drug for these veterans will go from $7 a prescription all 
the way up to $15 a prescription. Now, we just increased this co-
payment from $2 to $7 about a year and a half ago, and now we want to 
take it up to $15 a prescription. If you are on a fixed income and you 
make $22,000 a year and you get eight or 10 prescriptions a month, that 
is a big chunk of your disposable income.
  Well, it gets worse. The budget also assumes that we will increase 
the cost of a clinic visit for a veteran. I think the American people 
are getting the picture. We applaud our servicemen and women. We thank 
them for their service. But when they really need help from our 
government, we nickel and dime our veterans.
  What about our children? In this tax cut we passed a week before 
last, we left 12 million children out; 12 million children whose 
parents make somewhere between something like 11,000 to 25 or $26,000 a 
year will end up getting nothing, while a child whose parents make 
40,000 or $60,000 a year will get an additional $400 tax credit. It is 
just simply unfair.
  There is something else that ought to make every one of us who serves 
in this Chamber stay up at night and worry about our actions: many 
children of young men and women who at this very moment are serving 
this country in Iraq will have their children excluded in this tax 
package. Think of that. Moms and dads being sent to Iraq to defend the 
freedoms of this country and their children are going to be excluded 
from the benefits of this increased child tax credit.
  But I want to tell you, we can solve some of these problems if we are 
willing to do one thing. If we are willing to close the loophole, the 
tax loophole that allows large profitable corporations to go to Bermuda 
and get a post office box while keeping all of their operations in this 
country and doing that simply so they will not have to pay their fair 
share of taxes. Think of that. And many of these corporations who have 
chosen to engage in this tactic, which I consider highly unpatriotic, 
are benefiting by getting multimillion dollar contracts under the 
Department of Homeland Security.
  So here is what we have: corporations that do not want to pay their 
taxes going to Bermuda and yet getting multiple millions of dollars 
from this government under the Department of Homeland Security. We take 
care of the wealthy in this Chamber, but the veterans and the children 
are too often left behind.

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