[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 33 (Tuesday, March 16, 2004)]
[House]
[Page H1098]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      THE REPUBLICAN MEDICARE BILL

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Brown) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, if the Republican Medicare bill is so 
good, why do they have to sell it so hard? That is a question I have 
been asking myself lately. I bet it is a question the American people 
are starting to ask too.
  When AARP boss Bill Novelli came out for the Bush Medicare 
privatization bill last year, he launched a $7 million ad campaign to 
convince seniors he had made the right decision. America's seniors knew 
better, and 45,000 AARP members quit in protest.
  Rather than learn from AARP's mistake, the President is repeating 
that same mission, this time at taxpayers' expense. The Bush 
administration is spending almost $14 million on a nationwide taxpayer-
financed TV advertising campaign, the goal of which is to ``educate'' 
seniors on why the new Medicare drug law is not as bad as it appears. 
Interestingly in this election year, he is running those ads at 
taxpayers' expense even though the Medicare bill does not take effect 
for 2 more years.
  The Bush administration's Medicare ads were suspect from the start. 
With the slick look of a campaign spot, they assure seniors that the 
bill guarantees the same Medicare, the same benefits. It is not the 
same Medicare. They would not be spending the money and trying so hard 
to convince us if it were the same Medicare. It is not the same 
Medicare. All seniors will pay higher deductibles. Millions of seniors 
will pay higher premiums.
  And in terms of more benefits, the new coverage is not even available 
until 2006. It is far from free, and it is actually less generous than 
the employer-sponsored retiree coverage many seniors have today. In 
fact, by jeopardizing these employer-sponsored benefits that some 12 
million seniors have today, the new Medicare law is likely to leave 
millions of those seniors with less coverage than they have today.
  ``The same Medicare, more benefits.'' It is a catchy soundbite. The 
Government Accounting Office, the nonpartisan Government Accounting 
Office, also said it is false advertising. In the people's name with 
their tax dollars. They said it was false advertising. Now newspapers 
tell us that the Bush administration is not just manipulating the news; 
they are inventing it. The administration is using the people's tax 
dollars literally to hire actors to portray reporters in staged 
``interviews'' that look more like the Home Shopping Network than they 
do legitimate news, and they do a public discourse.
  Even the conservative editors at The Plain Dealer, the largest paper 
in my State in Cleveland, called those ads phony. And that is just the 
beginning. News reports, real news stories written by real reporters 
say the $13 million ad campaign, the infomercial-like interviews are 
just the tip of the iceberg. The administration is reportedly planning 
to spend another 80 million of the people's tax dollars to push the 
Medicare bill which is now law. The drug companies, close allies of 
President Bush and the Republican leadership in Congress, the word on 
the street is that the drug companies are going to contribute $100 
million to President Bush's reelection. No surprise that the drug 
companies came into this institution and wrote that language and wrote 
that Medicare law, the parts that the insurance industry did not write 
in the Medicare law. Those drug companies are also partners in the 
marketing plan. Drug giant Pfizer recently launched a traveling road 
show to talk up the law's new coverage. A less credible champion for 
drug affordability would be hard to find, Mr. Speaker, less credible 
than Pfizer. After all, it is the same company, Pfizer, that cut off 
supplies to Canadian pharmacies when my constituents are trying to buy 
drugs in Canada because they are so much less expensive. The same drug, 
same packaging, same dosage, just much less expensive. By the way, 
Pfizer's pitchman is former U.S. Republican Senator Bob Dole, the same 
Bob Dole who voted against Medicare in 1965, its creation, who was 
still bragging about his ``no'' vote 30 years later.
  There is even more to this story. Last year Medicare's chief actuary, 
a government employee, the man responsible for actually drawing an 
honest fiscal picture to tell the Congress and to tell the American 
people, said the Bush plan would cost well over $500 billion rather 
than the President's promise and Republican leadership's promise that 
it costs $400 billion. After the bill was enacted, the administration 
released a revised estimate, surprise, and said actually it will cost 
about $530 billion.
  The Medicare actuary, a Federal employee, was forbidden by his boss, 
a Federal employee, a Bush political appointee, who is now, 
interestingly enough, a drug industry lobbyist, that Medicare actuary 
was prevented from releasing the plan's true cost under the threat that 
he would be fired if he talked to the American people about the real 
cost, if he talked to Congress about the real cost. When he was 
threatened, he was threatened with the loss of his job by a Bush 
political appointee who is now a drug company lobbyist.
  These actions, Mr. Speaker, by the Bush administration and its drug 
company allies raise serious questions of judgment and serious 
questions of conduct by those elected officials and appointed 
officials, by the President, by the head of the Center for Medicaid and 
Medicare Services, now a drug company lobbyist. I hope these questions 
will receive careful scrutiny. And still they raise the basic question: 
If the Republican Medicare bill is so good, why do they have to sell it 
so hard using 80 million taxpayer dollars?

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