[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 37 (Monday, March 15, 2010)]
[House]
[Pages H1430-H1436]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              HEALTH CARE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 6, 2009, the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. King) is recognized for 
half the remaining time until midnight.
  Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate being recognized here on 
the floor of the House. I came to the floor tonight, Mr. Speaker, to 
address you and hopefully the American people listening in. We will 
give some more thought to what is going on in this country.
  There are many people across America that are having trouble sleeping 
tonight and last night and they will tomorrow night and the next night 
and the next night because they see what is happening to our country. 
They are watching the deals that are being made. They have got to guess 
what they are because, yes, they are back behind closed doors, and they 
are more creative than ever before.
  Even though the President believed that it was incumbent upon him to 
at least go through the demonstration of discussions on C-SPAN and 
having bipartisan discussions which took place here in this city at the 
Blair House on February 25, it didn't absolve the fact that intensively 
the weekend before and probably while the discussions were taking place 
and certainly intensively after, there had been all kinds of backroom 
bargaining and deals that have been taking place. Not that we have to 
do all the legislation out in the open. This is just the point the 
President made, Mr. Speaker.
  The American people are watching what is happening to our liberty. 
They are laying awake at night. They are talking with each other at 
work, at play, and not quite over the backyard fence where I live, but 
further south, yes, it is warm enough for that. They are wondering how 
it is that the American people have done everything that they know how 
to do that is legal and proper to redress their grievances with the 
United States Congress, and still this Congress' hearts are hardened. 
Still this Congress doesn't hear the message that has been sent by the 
American people.
  Over and over again, it goes clear back to the beginning of August of 
last year, right after cap-and-tax passed this House, a bill that was 
not read by anybody and a bill that didn't exist when it was debated on 
the floor, voted on on the floor. And when the House of 
Representatives, for the first time that I know, messaged a bill that 
didn't exist to the United States Senate, right after that--I should 
pause for a moment, Mr. Speaker, and let that soak in--this House 
passed a huge bill--cap-and-trade they call it, cap-and-tax I call it--
right before we left for the August break, a bill that didn't exist, 
that was messaged to the United States Senate; a bill that didn't exist 
messaged to the United States Senate, and then, Mr. Speaker, the debate 
over this national health care act began in earnest.
  Now, the American people are apprehensive about this. They love our 
liberty, they love our Constitution, and they love our freedoms, as do 
I. And here is how this unfolded.
  We had a Democrat Presidential primary that was the challenge between 
Barrack Obama and Hillary Clinton. Hillary Clinton, 15 years earlier, 
had produced a legislation. A lot of that was done behind closed doors 
and in backroom bargaining sessions, but at least they had the boldness 
to introduce a bill, a bill that went up on the flowchart, a flow that 
I still have somewhere in my archives. It scared the living daylights 
out of me, growth of government. But it was single-payer, socialized 
medicine, HillaryCare, rejected in this Congress 15 years ago, reared 
its ugly head in the Presidential primary on the Democrat side in 2007 
and 2008. The challenge between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama 
brought the focus on reforming health care before the Presidential 
race.
  Now, this is how these things happen. First, some experts out there 
go out and identify a problem, and then they get the media to pick up 
the problem. And then the political class begins to churn that problem 
and raise it to the level where, after a while, people hear it every 
day and they think, We must do something. We must do something.
  We got here because that contest in the Democrat primary side brought 
forward the health care issue as one of the top issues. Whether it was 
that important compared to our other priorities like war or a 
collapsing economy, I would say this is not the time. But Barack Obama 
believed he had a mandate as elected President. And as a candidate and 
early on as a President, Barack Obama, Mr. Speaker, consistently made 
the statement that he is for a single-payer plan. ``Single-payer plan'' 
is code language for socialized medicine, for government pays 
everything, government writes all the rules, government writes all the 
checks, government decides who works and who doesn't.
  I have seen some of this language that has emerged that has been 
filed in this Congress clear back as early as 1981 that said we should 
establish a national health care service and everybody working in 
health care will be either a salaried or an hourly employee. That means 
if you are a brain surgeon, you don't get to charge for your service. 
The government writes you a check once a month and you go operate on as 
many brains as you are given to operate on by the government. That is 
single payer. That is Canadian style. It's German style. It's British 
style. It's European Union style.
  We know that Canadian style isn't something all the Canadians want to 
live with. As a matter of fact, the Premier of Newfoundland and 
Labrador, his name is Danny Williams, a little over a month ago needed 
some heart surgery. And if he had submitted to the heart surgery that 
would have been available to him under the health care program in 
Canada, they would have

[[Page H1431]]

had to have gone in and split his sternum to do the surgery.

                              {time}  2220

  So there is a long recovery process to stitch that sternum back 
together, and it is painful. But the specialist in Mount Sinai Hospital 
in Miami had a procedure where they could go in under the arm, separate 
the ribs, and do the surgery. The recovery is a lot quicker.
  So what does the wealthy prime minister of Newfoundland and Labrador 
do? He walked away from the Canadian system, flew down to Miami, and 
paid for his surgery out of his pocket. Now, that is Canadian access to 
American health care.
  No one who has been proposing this idea of socialized medicine has 
told us where we are going to go for our health care if we morph into 
the Canadian, German, European Union, United Kingdom model. No one who 
is proposing this socialized medicine, government-managed everything, 
has pointed to a single nation that has produced a model of health care 
insurance and delivery system that they would point to and say, We want 
to emulate that. We want to model that. No.
  Of all the experimenting that has been going on in the world, the 
experiments haven't worked out for the rest of the world, Mr. Speaker. 
I happen to have an example of how poorly those experiments have worked 
out in the world.
  This would be the survival rate chart comparing the countries by 
color. If you look at the blue, the mauve, I guess that would be, and 
then the yellow and the light blue, it goes this way, left to right, 
generally: United States, then Canada in the reddish, Europe in the 
yellow, and then England in the lighter blue or the green.
  Here are the types of cancer and the survival rates: Prostate cancer, 
United States, 91.90, call that 92 percent, survival rate for prostate 
cancer, as compared to, going down the list: Canada is not as good, 85 
percent; Europe, 57 percent; and England, 50 percent, 51 percent. That 
is prostate. Clearly better than anybody else.
  Breast cancer. The United States above everybody else. The slope is 
the same, although the competition is pretty close between us and 
Canada.
  Then you underline all men's cancer lumped in together: Americans, 66 
percent survival rate; and then on down to 53 percent for Canada; 47 
percent for Europe; and 44 percent for England.
  A little bit different configuration here for all women's cancer, but 
still the United States' survival rate is better.
  These are the outcomes that we get. The innovations that Americans 
are providing, by the way, are being utilized in these countries. They 
just aren't utilizing them as effectively as we are here in the United 
States, and they certainly aren't innovating like we are here in the 
United States, Mr. Speaker.
  So President Obama believed that he had a mandate to produce a 
single-payer plan that emulated one of these systems that clearly, by 
survival rates, are failures.
  We have the best health care delivery system in the world. We have 
the best outcomes in the world. And, yes, we are spending a lot of 
money. We are a nation that makes a lot of money. We are apparently 
willing to pay that.
  So the President made this argument: The economy is collapsing, and 
we have to fix the economy.
  President Obama again, Mr. Speaker: We can't fix the economy without 
first fixing health care, because health care costs too much money.
  So the President's solution is throw another $2.5 trillion at a 
government takeover of health care. Spending too much money, you solve 
the problem by spending a lot more money. Now, that doesn't pass the 
third-grade logic test, but somehow that argument just drifts off into 
the distance, and we operate on that premise as if it were a premise 
that was stable and built on some kind of logic. Well, it is not.
  The second argument the President made is that we need more 
competition in health insurance companies. Now, he didn't get it done 
over there, but the President wants to establish an extra health 
insurance company that is the Federal Government.
  So you won't hear this number very often. It's certainly not 
something that would ever come out of the White House, the number of 
health insurance companies there are in the United States: 1,300 health 
insurance companies in the United States. Now, we can't buy from all of 
them because some of them are health insurance companies within the 
States that market to the residents within those States because they 
are prohibited from selling insurance outside of State lines.
  For example, a young 25-year-old man in reasonably good health in New 
Jersey would be paying $6,000 a year for a health insurance policy, 
where if he were in Kentucky he could buy a similar but not identical 
policy for around $1,000 a year. If you let that young man in New 
Jersey buy his insurance from Kentucky, I guarantee you he is going to 
buy the Kentucky insurance, the cheaper insurance.
  The President, though, his solution is to create another health 
insurance company so we could have 1,301 health insurance companies. 
Just one of them would be the Federal Government. And of the 100,000 
possible health insurance varieties to choose from, the President's 
company would produce, pick your number, 10 or 15 policies. So we would 
add a little bit to the number of choices we have there, but not to the 
competition.
  Meanwhile, the most expensive, unnecessary thing we have is the 
lawsuit abuse in health care and the defensive medicine that 
necessarily must be part of it. If you look at the numbers on the 
range, they go down to as low as 5.5 percent of overall health care 
costs are attributed to lawsuit abuse, much of it going into the 
pockets of the trial lawyers, and that number goes on up to 35 percent 
or so.
  The dollar figure that I would anchor to is health insurance 
underwriters' number: 8.5 percent of overall health care costs. That is 
$207 billion a year unnecessarily being wasted, a lot into the pockets 
of the trial lawyers, a lot being spent on defensive medicine. Some 
goes to plaintiffs. That is $207 billion a year. The Government Reform 
Committee produced a report that showed it was at $210 billion a year, 
but those numbers go on up to $650 billion a year. So there is a range.

  I will just take us back down to $207 billion. That is a number that 
I think is entirely defensible and very conservative. And if you 
calculate that for the duration of the bill, Mr. Speaker, that is $2 
trillion over the course of this bill.
  So the President is going to solve a problem of spending too much 
money by spending more, and he is going to solve the problem of not 
having enough competition in health insurance by creating a Federal 
health insurance company and regulating all the other insurance 
companies. Now, if they regulate the other insurance companies the way 
they are regulating Toyota right now, you can see how they can compete 
in the marketplace.
  Mr. Speaker, that is the framework of how we got here, and it is 
based on two flawed premises: One, we spend too much money, and the 
solution is to spend a lot more; and the other is, we don't have enough 
competition in the health insurance industry, so the solution is to 
create a Federal health insurance company.
  The solution is: Allow people to buy health insurance across State 
lines; fix the lawsuit abuse, reform the lawsuit abuse; and, provide 
for full deductibility for everybody's health insurance.
  I would be so happy to yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania, Mr. 
Thompson.
  Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. I thank my good friend from Iowa for 
hosting this Special Order tonight at a late hour, but it is important. 
It is important that we use every hour this week to stop what really is 
just a terrible attack upon the health care of this country.
  When I came here 15 months ago, I came out of health care, 28 years 
working in nonprofit community health care, serving people that were 
facing life-changing disease and disability. I came here with a 
commitment that there were some things we could do to improve the 
system we have, and I have that same commitment today. But I came here 
with almost 30 years of experience, 30 years of pride in the health 
care system that we have, how we meet the needs of the people that have 
needs, and people with varying amounts of means as well.

[[Page H1432]]

  There are many processes we have just in my congressional district. 
We have almost two-dozen rural hospitals. We also have other great 
facilities such as federally qualified medical centers that meet 
people's needs that frankly don't have a lot of means and don't have a 
lot of money to put towards health care, but they have access to 
quality health care.
  And that is one of the things that disturbed me since this debate 
began, because the President and the Speaker have made this debate 
about access to health insurance. That is the wrong debate, absolutely 
the wrong debate. We should be talking about and should have been 
talking about from day one access to quality health care. That is what 
Americans want. That is what Republicans are committed to. Those are 
the proposals that we put forward back in July.
  My good friend said a very important word when it comes to health 
care in this country and serving our citizens, and that is 
``innovation.'' The United States of America is a country of innovation 
when it comes to health care. The system we have allows us to find 
procedures, treatments, medications, even just medical equipment, new 
innovations that frankly help those survival rates that you referred 
to, many of those that contributed to those higher survival rates for 
cancer in the United States of America, innovations in health and 
recovery that, once we help people survive, help people to 
rehabilitate, to recover, to get back to the things that they did in 
their lives, to be able to return to work and return to a productive 
life, which is what everybody strives to do.
  My background actually was specifically rehabilitation, durable 
medical equipment, wonderful innovations that help people live and age 
with dignity, help people stay in their own home settings so that they 
don't have to go into any kind of an institutional setting. That 
innovation only comes from the health system that we have.

                              {time}  2230

  There are four principles I've led my life by as a health care 
professional and have guided me in this debate in 15 months, and that 
is that we need to do everything possible to, first of all, lower the 
cost of health care for every American. We need to strive to increase 
the access to quality health care for all. We need to improve on the 
quality and the innovation that we've enjoyed in this country, but we 
can do better. And the fourth principle for me is to strengthen that 
decisionmaking relationship between the patient and the physician, not 
allowing the government or a bureaucrat to insert themselves in that 
decisionmaking process.
  Yet, as I look at what was the Pelosi health care bill and what I 
look at now as the Senate health care bill, I see, as I tear that 
apart, and not as a Republican, not as a partisan, but as someone who 
spent their lifetime dedicated to providing health care services and 
meeting the needs of people facing life-changing disease and 
disability, my evaluation, assessment is these bills make all four 
dimensions of health care worse.
  They drive up costs. We can talk more on that as we go on this 
evening. It really will limit access. It will serve to decrease quality 
in the long run. And certainly it will kill innovation, which has been 
just one of the bright spots of this health care system in this 
country. Frankly, it provides a wedge--and that's a government or 
bureaucrat between the patient and physician in terms of 
decisionmaking.
  I yield back.
  Mr. KING of Iowa. Reclaiming my time and thanking the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania, we have talked these different pieces over. I just 
reiterate this: that the principles you laid out--lower the cost, 
provide for access to good care, improve the quality, and strengthen 
the doctor-patient relationship rather than intercede in the doctor-
patient relationship, which is what is going on--all of these 
discussions that we're making, and they claim that there is a 
bipartisan bill out here.
  It's pretty interesting. Some language--the shell bill--apparently 
has gone to the Rules Committee and they have debated and reported a 
rule out of the Rules Committee that's designed to be the 
reconciliation language. But the substance of this reconciliation 
apparently isn't in the bill. Seems to be only a couple of pieces about 
that bill, a shell bill, and then basically it's pieces of H.R. 3200 
that the House has passed that would be inserted supposedly as 
amendments.
  Well, it would be passed as reconciliation language that would become 
amendments to the Senate bill and also an attachment of student loan 
provisions in there. So it finalizes the complete government takeover 
of the student loan program. What student loans have to do with health 
care, what a takeover of our health care by the Federal Government have 
to do with student loans might just be what qualifies a piece of 
legislation before the United States Senate down the hallway to meet 
the standards of reconciliation for the Parliamentarian so that this 
fantastic bait-and-switch can take place.
  Here are the circumstances, Mr. Speaker: the House has gone through 
great pains to pass a bill, and it was very, very close. Well, the 
Senate wouldn't take up the House bill. The Senate took up the Senate 
bill. The House bill passed here November 7, 11 o'clock at night, on a 
Saturday night. Unusual for this House to be in session at a time like 
that. But even more unusual was the United States Senate passing their 
version of a health care bill. That was on Christmas Eve morning. They 
stayed in session on Christmas Eve morning and passed a bill with 60 
votes. That 60 votes was required to break the filibuster.
  And so we're in a circumstance today where the Senate can't pass 
their own version of the bill today because of the vacancy that was 
created by the death of Senator Kennedy, and was replaced by an 
appointment and then by a special election on January 19. They elected 
Scott Brown. They know Scott Brown is a ``no'' vote on the Senate 
version of the bill. He has said so.
  So here's the unique circumstance: the Senate can't even pass their 
own version of the bill today. They can run that bill back across the 
Senate, and it would fail. The Senate wouldn't pass the House version 
of the bill either. And so the House is being asked to pass the Senate 
version of the bill--the Senate version they can't today, remember, Mr. 
Speaker. The House is being asked to pass that even though the House 
rejects it--pass it on faith--so that this reconciliation package, this 
shell bill that Paul Ryan called a Trojan horse, can be brought here to 
the floor of the House and be passed, be sent over to the Senate, where 
the Parliamentarian could rule on whether it would be able to take it 
up and pass it on a simple majority to circumvent the filibuster in the 
Senate.
  This is unprecedented. Others will say this has happened some 21 
times in history--not in a government takeover of our health care, not 
in something as personal and private as this is. This is unprecedented. 
Then you have the Slaughter rule.
  The gentleman from Pennsylvania.
  Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Well, if the gentleman will yield, you 
have been here obviously serving the American people a lot more years 
than I have, but I have a question in this process. Obviously, we're 
supposed to--and I expect Friday night or Saturday we will see the 
Senate bill. It will be shoved at us, and we will be forced to take a 
vote on that. It will be a vote that we're supposed to take with a 
promise, under reconciliation, that all the very terribly flawed parts 
of this bill will be fixed under reconciliation.
  My question is: Relying on your experience, what if reconciliation--
if we take this and my Democratic colleagues pass the Senate bill, 
which they don't like, but they do it under a false promise that it 
will be fixed in reconciliation, what happens if reconciliation never 
occurs?
  Mr. KING of Iowa. Then I think the gentleman does know what happens. 
If reconciliation doesn't occur, the President will sign the Senate 
version of the bill that would have been passed by the House by hook 
or shenanigan, and that would become law. And it would be the law of 
the land. The law of the land would be the ``Cornhusker Kickback,'' the 
``Louisiana Purchase,'' the ``Florida Gatorade,'' which exempts Florida 
from Medicare Advantage cuts. It would include also billions of dollars 
for medical health clinics in the State of Vermont to satisfy the 
Senator from Vermont and six or seven other special deals, along with 
language that would

[[Page H1433]]

fund abortion and also language that would fund illegals. That's in the 
Senate bill, all of that.

  There's some margins there where it's not as egregious, the House 
version versus Senate, but Stupak language--Bart Stupak, as has been 
reported in the news, he has been advised that there will be no 
negotiations on that piece, that the Senate version of the bill that 
funds abortion is what they're going to stick with here in the House. 
And so they'll be forced to put up a vote ``yes'' or ``no.'' That's 
what happens.
  This is on the cusp of becoming the law of the land. And the effort 
to produce this House version of the fix, which, by the way, I reject 
it all in any combination, it's just the idea of circumventing the 
rules and trying to pass something through. They're actually trying to 
amend a bill that is not law and then the promise becomes maybe a 
signed letter from 51 Senators that says that they will vote for a 
reconciliation package that will amend the bill after the fact.
  The Founding Fathers never envisioned that there would be legislation 
that passed both Houses of this Chamber that neither House would 
accept. This House won't accept the Senate version on its face. They 
will only deal with it if there is a reconciliation promise. The Senate 
can't pass their own version of the bill today. They don't have the 
votes to do it. They just had the votes while they had another 
Massachusetts vote. Now there's been a special election. The American 
people have spoken.
  A piece of legislation that neither body can pass could very well 
become law in the next week. This city needs to fill up with people 
tomorrow.
  I yield to the gentleman from Texas.
  Mr. GOHMERT. I appreciate my friend yielding. You make great points. 
This is unprecedented, what is going on--to have the leaders in 
Congress and in the White House trying to ram through a health care 
bill that the majority, not just barely over 50 percent like the 
President won with, but way over 60 percent of Americans do not want 
this bill passed. Yet they're forcing it through. You wonder, why would 
someone work so hard to push through a bill that they know is grossly 
unpopular. Even if you think it's so grossly unpopular, why wouldn't 
you want to back up and start over?

                              {time}  2240

  There are a number of things that have been said that are not true 
about the Senate bill. Now, you could be cynical like some people and 
say, Well, I think they're lying. They're dishonest.
  I wouldn't say that. I think they're just completely ignorant. And we 
all have areas of ignorance where there are things we don't know. But I 
think that just like with the crap-and-trade bill, we had people come 
down here and say, This bill will not cost a single job. Well, that 
told you immediately that they had not read the bill, because toward 
the back of the bill, there was a fund created, and it said that the 
fund was explicitly for those who lost their jobs. So we know that 
there is a vast ignorance by people who don't read the bills that they 
come down here to talk about.
  Now, speaking of ignorance, we have David Axelrod down here. I see 
you have his quote there: The law of the land right now--this is what 
he said Sunday. I heard him say this. He seems like a really decent 
guy, so I'm sure that he didn't intend to deceive, but he said? The law 
of the land right now is that Federal funds should not be used for 
abortion services. There's nothing in the proposal that he's--Obama's 
advanced. There's nothing in what would be approved by the Congress 
that would upset the existing status quo.
  And I appreciate my friend for yielding because there are three 
things about this bill that allow for the Federal funding of abortion 
and, in fact, can require it.
  Number one, until now, all plans regulated by the Office of Personnel 
Management have been required to exclude nonfederally covered 
abortions. So the Senate bill allows all but one of the federally 
subsidized health care plans in each area to cover abortion. They'll 
say, Now, you may have one plan that doesn't take care of people like 
it needs to. We'll offer one plan over here that probably nobody's 
going to want to buy that will not cover abortions, but the plans that 
may well be what most people need will cover abortions. So if you want 
to buy the plan that you're going to need, then you're going to have to 
cover abortions. That's one thing that's very clear. So that's one way.
  A second way under the Senate bill, it authorizes and appropriates 
billions of dollars in new funding outside the scope of the 
appropriations bills covered by the Hyde amendment. And the billions of 
dollars that are here--this is under section 10503, Community Health 
Centers and the National Health Service Corps. Well, I don't want to 
make the President look bad, so I will call it ``corpse'' also. The 
Service Corps Funds, subsection B funding, it's authorized to be 
appropriated, and it is appropriated out of any moneys in the Treasury 
not otherwise appropriated to the CHC fund--that's Community Health 
Center fund. And then subsection 1 of that to be transferred to the 
Secretary of Health and Human Services to provide enhanced funding for 
the Community Health Center program; $700,000 for fiscal year 2011, 
$800 million for fiscal year 2012, $1 billion for fiscal year 2013, 
$1.6 billion for fiscal year 2014, and $2.9 billion for fiscal year 
2015.
  Now, the reason that's significant is that the Hyde amendment, which 
is existing law, only pertains to money appropriated--actually, 
appropriated in the Labor and HHS bill. This money is not being 
appropriated in the labor and HHS bill. It is not covered by the Hyde 
amendment, and that's why I'm sure that it's got to be ignorance 
instead of the lie that David Axelrod is demonstrating. He probably 
doesn't realize that the Henry Hyde amendment only pertains to money 
appropriated through Labor and HHS. This is separate money that is not 
restricted, and so it can go to community health centers to provide 
abortions. That is allowed under this bill, and people need to 
understand that.
  Mr. KING of Iowa. If the gentleman will briefly yield, is that out of 
the House or Senate version, Mr. Gohmert?
  Mr. GOHMERT. This is the Senate bill. This is the one that the House 
is expected to vote on this week, maybe Saturday. This is the bill that 
the House is going to vote on. So anybody that comes in here and 
thinks--or has been sold a bill of goods, because so often if you don't 
read the bill and you allow somebody to tell you who you think may have 
read the bill that, Oh, no, no, no. That's not--Oh, no, it doesn't 
change existing law, they just don't know. It does change existing law. 
You just have to read it and understand the implication of the Hyde 
amendment, what's covered and, you know, the implication here.
  But there's another thing, too. Section 1303 of the Senate bill that 
we're expected to vote on only limits the direct use of Federal tax 
credit to fund abortion coverage. The credit still could be used to pay 
premiums for health care plans that allow abortions. So the Federal tax 
law, the Federal tax dollars, through their credits, are going to fund 
health care plans that allow abortion. That's a third way that the 
Senate bill that we're going to supposedly vote on the end of this week 
will fund abortions.
  Now I know there are people in this body who think that's a great 
thing, to fund abortions with Federal funds. Others, like me and my 
friends here, believe that it is not appropriate to take money away 
from people who know in their hearts it's murder to kill an unborn 
child and make them take their tax dollars and pay for abortion. That's 
been the law of the land for over 30 years, and it is changed 
dramatically by the Senate bill. And people just need to understand, if 
they're going to vote for this bill or they're going to vote for a rule 
if it's self-effectuating, then they are going to vote for and bring 
into effect a dramatic change to the law on Federal funding of 
abortions.
  Mr. KING of Iowa. Reclaiming my time and posing a question back to 
the gentleman from Texas, having read through this language in the 
Senate version of the bill and done this analysis that you have so well 
delivered here on the floor, can you imagine that this would just be an 
innocent mistake created by the drafters?
  Mr. GOHMERT. Well, I can imagine that it's an innocent mistake by 
those who are talking about the bill. I do not

[[Page H1434]]

believe it's an innocent mistake by those who've drafted this bill. 
It's unfortunate that we don't know who they are. We were not privy to 
those private sessions that were not under C-SPAN cameras, that were 
not covered--or reporters were not allowed. Nobody was allowed to see. 
Certainly there were no Republican in the House or Senate that were 
allowed in there when this stuff was drafted.

  So, yes, I think it can be an innocent mistake, and I believe it is 
by many who don't realize what this does. But to answer the gentleman's 
question, it's certainly not innocent by those who've drafted this to 
spend billions in tax dollars of tax money that can fund abortion.
  Mr. KING of Iowa. Reclaiming my time, and I'm posing another question 
to the gentleman from Texas, the judge, and that is, was there an 
opportunity--would there be an opportunity for any Member of the House 
of Representatives to offer an amendment to fix those provisions so 
that abortion is not funded under the Senate language of the bill?
  Mr. GOHMERT. My understanding is we're not going to be given that 
opportunity to amend the bill here in the House. The House will have to 
pass the bill exactly as the Senate did. And actually, there was an 
effort in the Senate to amend the bill to put Stupak-type language in 
there, and they voted it down. Now, why would anybody in the Senate 
fight that kind of battle and work so hard to try to get that kind of 
Stupak language in the Senate bill and go to all the grueling fight 
that they had to try to get it in there if it was unnecessary?
  Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Well, I believe that some of our 
colleagues across the aisle are probably looking to vote for this 
Senate bill that may even agree with us on abortion and how wrong that 
is to publicly fund, let alone to complete procedure under the 
promise--the promise it will be fixed through a reconciliation bill. 
And I just want to talk a little bit more about what the probability of 
that is.
  We're going to be relying on the Senate to bring a bill to us, to 
pass a reconciliation bill to make these fixes that they're putting 
together, these sweeteners, these promises. Now, to the best of my 
knowledge right now, we've passed a number of bills in this Chamber in 
the past 15 months, and by my calculations, we've sent over 200 bills 
to the Senate that are just lingering in the Senate. They haven't taken 
action on them. So if there's 200 bills there already that they haven't 
taken action on, what is the probability, what is the chance that 
they'll actually do a reconciliation bill that would make these fixes?

                              {time}  2250

  Mr. KING of Iowa. Well, reclaiming my time, I think we should spend a 
little time on the Slaughter rule. And before I go to that, I want to 
make the point that, Mr. Speaker, I anticipate there will be a lot of 
Americans in Washington, D.C., tomorrow. I believe there are a lot of 
Americans that have come in tonight to be here to stand up for their 
liberty and stand up for their freedom, stand up for their 
Constitution. They've done this on 9/12, and April 15, and November 5, 
and November 7, and again in December on the Senate side. And then they 
went to Massachusetts, where we received an intervention in 
Massachusetts. And now it's up, again, to the American people to defend 
our freedom and our liberty and protect our health care.
  But one of the other maneuvers that is not off the table yet, and the 
majority leader last Friday talked around it every way, every way 
except taking it off the table, and that is the Slaughter rule, named 
for the Chair of the Rules Committee, who proposes that, rather than 
requiring Democrats who don't want to vote for the Senate version of 
the bill to vote for it, vote it up or down--they're afraid it would 
fail. I don't think they're worried about making them vote for it. I 
think they're afraid it would fail. Her proposal is that they would 
just bring a rule that would deem that the Senate bill had been before 
the House and been passed. So they wouldn't ever have to vote on the 
Senate bill. They would just pass a rule that would deem that it had 
been passed by the House, so there'd never be a recorded vote here in 
the House on the Senate version of the bill; and that way they could 
get it off the decks and over to the President's desk where he is 
salivating to sign anything that says national health care.
  We have another expert on the floor tonight, another Texan.
  Mr. GOHMERT. Will the gentleman yield for just a moment?
  Mr. KING of Iowa. And I'm going to go to the first Texan right before 
I quickly yield to Dr. Burgess, but Mr. Gohmert, Judge Gohmert.
  Mr. GOHMERT. I appreciate that. And my friend, Dr. Burgess, has done 
probably more work in the area of health care reform and potential 
legislation than anybody I know of in the House. And so, it'd be great 
to hear from him tonight.
  But I think it was critical, and it is critical for people to 
understand, who are really wrestling with whether or not they can 
satisfy their conscience and their concern over Federal tax dollars 
being pried out of people's hands to fund abortions against their will. 
It's important that those people understand that David Axelrod--
apparently, we're told he's an honorable man, so are they all, so are 
they all honorable men--but that he apparently was ignorant of the law 
of which he spoke because he's just wrong, completely, on three counts. 
And so if anybody's trying to salve their conscience over Federal 
funding of abortion, they need to understand there are three ways that 
Federal funding will pay for abortions if this Senate bill is passed. 
And I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. KING of Iowa. Reclaiming my time and thanking the gentleman from 
Texas, and yielding to Dr. Burgess from Texas--who has constantly been 
pounding against this socialized medicine plan, has a meeting in the 
morning at 8:00, again to put some more light on the subject matter--as 
much time as he may consume, the gentleman from Texas.
  Mr. BURGESS. I thank the gentleman for yielding. I actually came down 
to talk about some polling data that was in the Wall Street Journal 
today. You know, you talk about the Slaughter rule. And one of the 
talking pundits on television tonight, Hardball, at the end of that 
program, the moderator, the host said, it is only right that Congress 
allow an up-or-down vote on this health care bill. And he called on 
Republicans to stop obstructing.
  Let me remind everyone: Republicans are opposed to this bill, but 
Republicans lack the numbers to obstruct much of anything right now. So 
it is an internal fight in the Democratic Caucus that is obstructing 
this bill; it is not House Republicans.
  True, it is a bad bill. We all oppose it, as we should. But it is 
that internal fight on the Democratic side.
  Now, an up-or-down vote to me would mean that there'd be an up-or-
down vote on some bill, not an up-or-down vote on a rule that deems 
passage of a bill that was passed by the Senate on Christmas Eve. Up-
or-down vote means an up-or-down vote on an actual piece of legislation 
that has been filed with one of the clerks of either of the bodies.
  And I know I need to address my remarks to the Speaker. Mr. Speaker, 
if I would just ask, if you haven't thrown away your Wall Street 
Journal from today, you might want to take a look at it. There is some 
very interesting information in here, some polling data by Heather 
Higgins and Kellyanne Conway. Kellyanne Conway has spoken to many 
groups up here on the Hill many times. Their group is the polling 
company on behalf of the Independent Women's Voice. Twelve hundred 
people were polled in 35 Congressional districts; 20 previously had 
voted ``yes'' for the health care bill, 15 had voted ``no.'' But the 
survey shows astonishing intensity and sharp opposition, far more than 
the national polls reflect. For 82 percent of those surveyed, the 
health care bill is either the top or one of the top issues for 
deciding who to support for Congress next November. Seven in 10 would 
vote against a House Member who votes for the Senate health care bill 
with its special interest provisions. That includes 45 percent of self-
identified Democrats, 75 percent of independents, 88 percent of 
Republicans, which you would expect. Almost half of the Democrats would 
not reelect a Democratic Member who voted for the Senate bill.
  Reconciliation poses its own set of problems. People see through 
that.

[[Page H1435]]

That is a parliamentary trick. Yeah, if you can have an up-or-down 
vote, let's have an up-or-down vote on a bill, not on a procedural 
motion.
  But here was the part that really struck me. When they looked at 
various demographic groups, men and women, young and old, people who 
had voted for John McCain, people who had voted for Barack Obama, 
across all demographic groups, they described dramatic pluralities that 
say that if the legislation doesn't pass, they will be relieved.

  Well, I would submit that with what's left of this week and what's 
left of this bill, whether it's a long hard slog or what, we have a 
chance to provide the relief to millions of Americans by killing this 
bill and stopping it in its tracks.
  We can talk a good story about repealing the bill if it passes. The 
time for action is now. The action is to kill the bill. And I yield 
back to the gentleman.
  Mr. KING of Iowa. Reclaiming my time, I thank the gentleman from 
Texas for coming down and laying this part out and making it clear. To 
me, it's just breathtaking to think that the Rules Committee, up on the 
third floor, the hole in the wall committee, the people that rarely 
have a reporter in the room, and only once in the 7 years that I've 
been in this Congress has there been a television camera in the room, 
the people that conduct themselves as if they are operating out of the 
sight or the scrutiny of the public, would be the ones that would cook 
up the idea that they could bring a rule to the floor that would deem 
that the House had passed a Senate bill and dodge the idea of the vote.
  And I want to make this point over again. We are in this circumstance 
now where the Speaker, Mr. Speaker, the Speaker of the House, seems to 
be compelled to bring a Senate version of the bill to the floor of the 
House, a bill that could not pass the Senate today, a bill that would 
not pass the House today on its own merits, and in order to get a bill 
to the President's desk that they could chase with amendments to fix 
the bill--according to them, fix it. I don't think it actually improves 
it; it just makes it so that they can get the votes done. It's called 
reconciliation. And they don't even want to face that first vote of the 
Senate version of the bill.
  It is completely ironic that the House has to pass the Senate version 
of the bill that the Senate couldn't pass because the Senate won't pass 
the House version of the bill, but the House won't vote on the Senate 
version of the bill that they have to pass that the Senate can't pass 
so they'll pass a rule instead that deems that the bill, the Senate 
bill, has passed the House. That's what's up.
  Now, I hope that's really clear, Mr. Speaker, because I believe I 
said it precisely and exactly right. That's what's going on this 
Congress. No wonder people are revolted by the business that is going 
on here.
  And I don't think that we actually addressed the situation on how--I 
think Mr. Gohmert did a good job of showing us how abortion is funded 
under this. But I don't think we've addressed this very well at all 
tonight, on how either version of the bill, the one that, if we get 
one, we're most likely to end up with, is the Senate version, funds 
illegals in this process. And the President has said, and many of his 
mouthpieces at the White House have said, the President won't support a 
bill that funds illegals. Well, both versions, the House and Senate 
bill, do that. The Senate bill has tighter language than the House 
bill. But this language that protected the American taxpayers' assets 
from going to benefits to illegals was in the Medicaid legislation that 
existed for years and years. And 2 years ago, when the changes were 
forced through this House for SCHIP, the socialized, Clinton-style 
Hillarycare for children and their parents, that piece of legislation 
lowered the standards for Medicaid so that the proof of citizenship 
that did require a birth certificate and supporting documents, to keep 
it simple, was no longer required, and all that was required of an 
applicant for Medicaid then was to attest to a nine-digit number, 
presumably a Social Security number.

                              {time}  2300

  That is essentially the standard that is in the Senate, the standard 
that is in the House. It lowers the standard to the point where fraud 
is anticipated to the point where the Congressional Budget Office's 
calculations produce that it will open up health care benefits to as 
many as 6.1 million illegals. That is CBO's number. That is a number 
that is calculated from their estimates, not exactly their number. It 
is not mine.
  That is where we stand with this legislation that funds abortion--not 
so much the House version of the bill, we are not going to get that 
language--and legislation that funds illegals, legislation that takes 
away our very freedom and liberty, that nationalizes our bodies, that 
tells everybody in America the Federal Government can tell you how your 
health care is going to be managed, that you will buy a health 
insurance policy, what type of care it will be, what tests will be 
provided, and what will not be provided.
  This is a great theft of American liberty. And never before in the 
history of this country has the Federal Government produced or approved 
a product that they required every American to own or buy, let alone 
the transfer of wealth of taxing people and putting refundable tax 
credits in the hands of some people to buy insurance, while we expand 
the Medicaid rolls and tax others for their insurance policies so that 
we can afford to pay others to buy insurance.
  And the next argument that will be of the next generation if this 
happens in Congress will be the argument that will come from this side 
of the aisle, and it will be, gosh, hand-wringers, we are spending so 
much money on administration writing out checks to people to buy their 
own health insurance policy, why do they need to have a policy? Why 
don't we just provide them free health care? And then we can bypass all 
of this insurance business that is going on and put our money directly 
into the health care, because they won't have enough money to provide 
the care because of the costs that are being driven up. That is the 
next generation of this debate.
  I am watching the clock; I think we are down to about 3\1/2\ minutes 
left. But I want to yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania for any 
concluding remarks he might have.
  Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. I appreciate my good friend yielding.
  I appreciate Dr. Burgess sharing those Wall Street Journal 
statistics. There was one just a few weeks prior, a CNN poll that 
showed that 79 percent of independents say start over. Stop the bill 
that is going on now. That is independents, 79 percent of them.
  I was visiting a hospital earlier today, and I talked with everyone. 
As I talked with the staff, I went with the physicians, the nurses, the 
therapists, the secretaries; that was the same message they gave me. 
And these are folks that understand health care. They live it every 
day, long days in health care. And they said stop the madness, stop 
this bill, and start over.
  And I talked with patients, I talked with family members, and I 
talked with just visitors. It was kind of interesting. They had no idea 
who I was. And I was riding in the elevator with a couple folks, and 
you can tell what is on their mind. They looked at me and they said, 
What are those people in Washington doing to our health care? They get 
it. The people at home get it. We need to stop and do the right things.
  I just throw in here in terms of the unintended consequences here, 
one of my first principles was to decrease costs for all Americans. And 
you mentioned tort reform. Even the President has acknowledged for 
those folks who buy their insurance individually, non-group, you know, 
he has come out and said this is going to drive their premiums up 10 to 
13 percent. Ten to 13 percent. That is exactly opposite of what we 
should be doing.
  I appreciate you leading this tonight. I yield back.
  Mr. KING of Iowa. Reclaiming my time, I thank the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania and yield to the gentleman from Texas for any concluding 
remarks he might have.
  Mr. BURGESS. I think it is important for people to remember that what 
we are doing right now has nothing to do with health care, has nothing 
to do with health care policy. This is all about pure political power 
and solidifying a hold on political power for the next 2 or 3 
generations.

[[Page H1436]]

  This bill will be impossible to undo once it is passed. We need to 
step up and do our duty, stop this bill, then fix the things the 
American people want us to fix.
  Mr. KING of Iowa. Reclaiming my time, purely political about 
expanding the dependency class because the dependency class expands the 
political power of the left in America at the expense of our freedom 
and at the expense of our liberty, never to be gotten back again.
  I thank you, Mr. Speaker, for your indulgence tonight, and my 
colleagues for joining me.
  I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________