[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 60 (Tuesday, May 4, 2004)]
[House]
[Pages H2522-H2523]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         PRESIDENTIAL MISTAKES

  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, last month, not too long ago, the 
President was asked in a news conference, only his third news 
conference in prime time since he took office, What would your biggest 
mistake be after 9-11 and what lessons have you learned from it?
  President Bush said, ``I'm sure something will pop in to my mind here 
in the midst of this press conference, with all pressure of trying to 
come up with an answer but it hasn't yet.''

[[Page H2523]]

  Then on May 1, earlier this week, the President, joking about it, 
said, ``I was going to start off tonight telling some self-deprecating 
jokes.'' And the Republican crowd laughed. And then he said, ``But then 
I couldn't think of any mistakes that I had made to be self-deprecating 
about.''
  Now, it is hard to believe that anyone in my State of Ohio who has 
lost his or her job, 177,000 manufacturing workers in Ohio have lost 
their jobs since President Bush took office, it is hard to think that 
any one of them thought that was very funny, that the President could 
not think of any mistakes that he made; mistakes that he could learn 
from, that he could correct and do something about.
  It is hard to think that any veterans who have seen their benefits 
cut under this President think this was very funny. It is hard to think 
that those soldiers who do not have body armor in Iraq because the 
President and the Pentagon did not plan for it, that they think that is 
very funny, to say that he could not think of any mistakes. I do not 
think that too many Americans of the 43 million without health care 
think that is very funny that the President mentioned he could not 
think of any mistakes that he had made.
  Now, there are a group of us coming to the floor tonight. The 
gentleman from Washington (Mr. McDermott), the gentleman from New York 
(Mr. Nadler), the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland), the gentleman 
from New Jersey (Mr. Pascrell), the gentlewoman from California (Ms. 
Woolsey) and the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lee), that are going 
to talk about some of the mistakes, not to embarrass the President, in 
some sense not even to criticize the President, but just we hope to 
point some mistakes out tonight that the President has made so that he 
can correct them. Because we are all taught as children to learn from 
our mistakes.
  If the President is unwilling to admit a mistake, if the President is 
unwilling to acknowledge that he even made any, and then if the 
President is willing to sit around and joke that he has not made any 
mistakes when we have lost this number of jobs in my State of Ohio and 
across the country, when our soldiers in Iraq are in harm's way because 
we have not provided body armor, because we are not providing the armor 
underneath the Humvees and on the doors of the Humvees to protect 
American troops, it is not really not much of a laughing matter.
  Today the President was in Ohio and, again, the President continued 
the let us just kind of joke about this.
  AP reports, ``With humor and sarcasm, President Bush is trying to 
make John Kerry eat his own words. At every stop of his Midwest bus 
tour, the President is mocking Kerry to the delight of partisan 
audiences.''
  I understand this is a Presidential race. I understand that 
politicians need to attack each other and make fun of each other and 
all of this, but in light of the fact that the President is unwilling 
to admit any of these mistakes he made, we, tonight, the five or six of 
us, would like to help him talk about, whether it is a mistakes he made 
with weapons of mass destruction or Medicare or veterans' benefits or 
the tax cuts, a millionaire gets $123,000 in tax cuts; whether it is 
job loss, whether it is totally forsaking both small business and the 
manufacturing base in this country.
  The entire six Democratic-member delegation of Ohio wrote the 
President a list of questions as he arrived in Dayton, Ohio today in 
his Ask the President Forum that he is beginning to hold around the 
country. He did the first one in Dayton today.
  We had some questions for the President about the new Medicare bill 
because we recognize that the Medicare bill was a mistake. First of 
all, the President allowed the drug companies and the insurance 
companies to write the bill. He also allowed the drug companies, that 
are going to make $150 billion additional profits from that bill. The 
insurance companies will get a $46 billion direct subsidy from this 
bill. But no surprise there, the President has already received tens of 
millions of dollars from the drug and the insurance industry for his 
election.
  In fact, the word in the street in Washington, my colleagues and I 
have all heard, is that the President will receive a total of $100 
million from the drug industry for his reelection. Of course, he is 
going to support the drug industry. But, frankly, we consider that a 
mistake, when you write a Medicare bill that helps the drug industry, 
it helps the insurance industry, and then maybe you get around to 
dropping a few dollars for seniors.
  When they release this prescription drug discount card today, we 
asked the President a couple of questions. Is it true the Medicare law 
allows drug and insurance companies offering discount cards to change 
covered drugs and discounts weekly? Does this not mean that seniors may 
choose a card one week that will be worth little or nothing to them the 
next?
  In other words, seniors sign up for one of these discount drug cards. 
If you sign up for one of the 50 or 60 or 70 cards, you are stuck with 
it the entire year, even though the drug discount card company can turn 
around and take your drug off the list, can raise the price, can cut 
your discount.
  Mr. Speaker, the President also mentioned in this bill, this Medicare 
bill, there is also a prohibition on drug companies, on the government 
negotiating cheaper prices. We know we can get cheaper drugs in Canada, 
yet the President will not allow it. Something is wrong. I wish the 
President would acknowledge his mistake. Go back to the drawing board 
and write a drug bill for the seniors, not for the drug companies.

                          ____________________