[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 40 (Thursday, March 18, 2010)]
[House]
[Pages H1605-H1609]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                ANNOUNCEMENT BY THE SPEAKER PRO TEMPORE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Members are reminded to address their 
remarks to the Chair and not to others in the second person.
  Ms. FOXX. Madam Speaker, I find it so interesting that our colleagues 
across the aisle talk about the problems with the filibuster in the 
Senate. But that is exactly why bills could not

[[Page H1606]]

get passed that Republicans in the House passed but couldn't get them 
passed in the Senate because Democrats filibustered.
  And about misinformation, there probably has never been a bill that 
has been more misrepresented to the American people than what is going 
on here in terms of this bill. And I do think the American people 
understand the truth, and they're going to act on the truth later on 
this year. They're doing it now. They're telling them, don't vote on 
it. But they feel obliged to do it.
  I want to say that while my colleague across the aisle keeps ranting 
and raving about corporate profits for insurance companies, he doesn't 
say a word about the corporate profits for the Big Pharma companies. 
And yet, these are, they are wholly-owned subsidiaries of the Big 
Pharma companies.
  Of all the single industry lobbies in Washington, the largest is the 
Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America. PhRMA sent $26.2 
million on lobbying last year. That's nearly three times as much as the 
insurance lobby, which spent only $8.9 million.
  And let's talk about profits. Drugmakers' combined profit margin last 
year--this is from an article of The Examiner from March 17, 2010, 
yesterday--profit margin was 22.2 percent, compared with the insurers' 
4.4 percent. Drugmaker Merck's net income, $12.9 billion, exceeds that 
of the 10 largest insurers combined. And I can go on and on. Madam 
Speaker, I'd like to put this article in the Record.
  And the reason they don't talk about Big Pharma and the drug industry 
is because Big Pharma helped write this bill, because it protects them. 
They know that they are going to get a windfall out of this bill, and 
they, again, our colleagues across the aisle, are wholly owned 
subsidiaries of them.
  Madam Speaker, our colleague, my colleague from Louisiana, brought up 
a very, very important point that I think needs to be mentioned again 
and again. What Chairwoman Slaughter has proposed, and what will be 
done here, is to use a rule providing for consideration of both the 
Senate and reconciliation bills to deem the Senate bill passed, 
avoiding the political problem that stems from taking a true up-or-down 
vote on the horribly unpopular legislation.
  If this legislation is doing so much good for the American people, 
then our colleagues should be proud to be voting for this in an up-or-
down vote. They keep saying it, but you know, saying it doesn't make it 
so.
  Even though, again, Speaker Pelosi said on page 23 of her ``New 
Directions for America'' document issued in the 109th Congress that 
``Every person in America has a right to have his or her voice heard. 
No Member of Congress should be silenced on the floor.'' Then on page 
24 she states that ``Bills should come to the floor under a procedure 
that allows open, full and fair debate, and Members should have at 
least 24 hours''--later expanded to 72 hours--``to examine the bill 
text prior to floor consideration.''
  Yet, as Mr. Scalise has said, all we've seen are broken promises. And 
now, Speaker Pelosi is advocating parliamentary trickery to avoid an 
up-or-down vote on the Senate health care bill. And he quoted her as 
saying, ``This is a great way to do it because it avoids an up-or-down 
vote.''
  This is not what the American people sent us here for. They didn't 
send us here to undermine the rule of law and to do things with tricks. 
They know this is the wrong thing to do. That's why they have been 
jamming the phones and telling our colleagues, vote ``no.''

                   [From the Examiner, Mar. 17, 2010]

          Dems Tap Drug Maker Millions for PhRMA-Friendly Bill

                         (By Timothy P. Carney)

       As they whip for the health care bill, Democratic leaders 
     pack a mean one-two punch of populist rhetoric and the hefty 
     financial backing of the drug industry.
       In the heated yearlong health fight, President Obama has 
     often accused his opponents of willful misrepresentation, 
     even as he and his allies have endlessly repeated the biggest 
     whopper of all--that the bill would rein in the special 
     interests.
       The Obama team regularly dismisses opponents as industry 
     lackeys. The Democratic National Committee blasted out e-
     mails this week warning that ``for every member of Congress, 
     there are eight anti-reform lobbyists swarming Capitol Hill'' 
     and ``Congress is under attack from insurance lobbyists.''
       But drug industry lobbyists, according to Politico, spent 
     the weekend ``huddled with Democratic staffers'' who needed 
     the drug lobby to ``sign off'' on proposals before moving 
     ahead. Meanwhile, we learn that the drug lobby is buying 
     millions of dollars of ads in 43 districts where a Democratic 
     candidate stands to suffer for supporting the bill. The 
     doctors' lobby and the hospitals' lobby are also on board 
     with the Senate bill.
       So the battle at this point is not reformers versus 
     industry, as Obama would have you believe. Rather, it is a 
     battle between most of the health care industry and the 
     insurance companies.
       (And the insurers are not opposed to the whole package. On 
     the bill's central planks--limits on price discrimination, 
     outlawing exclusions for pre-existing conditions, a mandate 
     that employers insure their workers and a mandate that 
     everyone hold insurance--insurers are on board. They object 
     mostly that the penalty is too small for violating the 
     individual mandate.)
       Pharmaceuticals are a far more entrenched special interest 
     than the insurers.
       Of all the single-industry lobbies in Washington, the 
     largest is the Pharmaceutical Researchers and Manufacturers 
     of America. PhRMA spent $26.2 million on lobbying last year--
     that's nearly three times as much as the insurance lobby, 
     America's Health Insurance Plans, which spent $8.9 million.
       If you include individual companies' lobbying 
     pharmaceuticals blow away the competition, beating all other 
     industries by 50 percent, according to data at the Center for 
     Responsive Politics.
       Given this Big Pharma clout, it's unsurprising that the 
     bill Obama's whipping for--Senate bill--has nearly everything 
     the drug companies wanted; prohibiting reimportation of 
     drugs, preserving Medicare's overpayment for drugs, lengthy 
     exclusivity for biotech drugs, a mandate that states 
     subsidize drugs under Medicaid, hundreds of billions in 
     subsidies for drugs, and more.
       PhRMA chief Billy Tauzin, who was vilified by Obama on the 
     campaign trail, worked out much of this sweetheart deal in a 
     West Wing meeting with White House Chief of Staff Rahm 
     Emanuel. Tauzin visited the White House at least 11 times. He 
     left his imprint so deeply on the current bill that it should 
     probably be called BillyCare rather than ObamaCare.
       Recall that pharmaceutical executives and political action 
     committees dug deep trying to save the flailing candidacy of 
     Democrat Martha Coakley in Massachusetts--a race that was 
     explicitly a referendum on health care. She took in more than 
     10 times as much drug company cash as Republican Scott Brown.
       This week, PhRMA, through a front group called Americans 
     for Stable Quality Care, is rolling out millions of dollars 
     in advertisements for the Democrats' jury-rigged package 
     consisting of the BillyCare bill and some as-yet-undetermined 
     ``budget reconciliation'' measure. The ads reportedly will 
     target wavering Democrats.
       But supporters of BillyCare will continue to attack 
     opponents as shills for insurance companies, demonizing, as 
     Obama puts it, ``those who profit from the status quo.''
       Let's look at those profits. Drug makers' combined profit 
     margin last year was 22.2 percent, compared with insurers' 
     4.4 percent. Drug maker Merck's net income, $12.9 billion, 
     exceeds that of the 10 largest insurers combined.
       Pfizer, which netted $8.64 billion last year, gave its CEO, 
     Jeff Kindler, a 12.5 percent salary increase, bringing his 
     compensation to $14.9 million. Pfizer, in a federal filing, 
     attributed the raise partly to Kindler's work ``developing 
     and advancing U.S. and global public policies that serve the 
     overall interests of our Company,'' including his 
     ``constructive participation in the U.S. legislative 
     process.'' Kindler contributed the maximum to Obama's 
     election, and Obama raised more money from the drug industry 
     than any candidate in history.
       On this bill, Republicans side with insurers, and Democrats 
     mostly side with the richer and more powerful drug makers. 
     The difference: Republicans didn't cut a backroom deal with 
     the insurers. Obama will still play the populist card, even 
     as the drug lobby is his ace in the hole.

  Madam Speaker, I am going to reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, let me just yield myself 30 seconds to 
remind my colleagues that there's a cost to doing nothing. There's a 
cost to embracing the status quo, as my Republican colleagues have 
suggested. For middle-income families alone, the number of uninsured 
people in this income group would increase by 7.3 million people. 
That's in the middle-income categories. Is that the direction we want 
to go? To force millions and millions of more people into the ranks of 
the uninsured, which will ultimately add to our deficit and to our 
debt? I don't think so.
  Madam Speaker, at this time I would like to yield 2 minutes to the 
gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer).
  Mr. BLUMENAUER. I appreciate the gentleman's courtesy in permitting 
me to speak on this rule, and for his unequivocal call for being 
realistic about

[[Page H1607]]

some of the outrageous things that we've heard on the floor.
  I just heard my friend from Texas talk about demonizing the Canadian 
system and calling it socialized medicine. It's really kind of ironic. 
First of all, Canada has basically Medicare for all. It is a 
government-funded insurance program, but Canadians pick who they want 
to be their doctor, just like Americans who are on Medicare pick their 
doctor. And I would say, frankly, that most Americans would be happy 
with the overall outcome of the Canadian health care system. They pay 
less, they get sick less often. When they do get sick, they get well 
faster, and they live longer than Americans.
  The sad truth is that our nonsystem of health care, which is very 
good for veterans, it's pretty good for senior citizens, but for other 
Americans, particularly the uninsured now approaching 50 million, it's 
a problem. And increasingly, if we don't do something, the increasing 
premiums that we're seeing for private insurance, higher copays, higher 
deductibles, and coverage that is getting skinnier and skinnier puts us 
on a path that is disastrous for American families.
  I hope that we'll be able to come forward, move past some of the 
outrageous rhetoric and the falsehoods, to look at the facts. Americans 
have, if they can afford it, some of the best health care in the world.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentleman has expired.
  Mr. McGOVERN. I yield the gentleman an additional 1 minute.
  Mr. BLUMENAUER. For those who can afford it, they have some of the 
best health care in the world. But Americans, overall, by any objective 
measure of performance, like life expectancy, or how soon babies die, 
we don't perform very well.
  And increasingly, the pressure on small business to deal with the 
failing system, what's happening on families who are having more and 
more insurance bureaucrats trying to prevent them from getting 
coverage, is a prescription for disaster. That's why this year there 
will be more than 1,000 people that I represent who will go bankrupt 
from medical costs, and most of them have insurance.
  Madam Speaker, that doesn't happen anywhere else in the world. And if 
we're able to move forward with this health care reform, it will no 
longer happen in the United States.
  Ms. FOXX. Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, at this time I yield 2 minutes to the 
gentleman from New York (Mr. Tonko).
  Mr. TONKO. Madam Speaker, I think it is so important for us to move 
forward and not be derailed in our efforts to reform what is important 
policy in this country. Health care, obviously, is something that needs 
to be provided in terms of insurance to our working families out there. 
We know the impact of delay and the impact of no reforms. Status quo 
simply does not cut it. We cannot afford to allow our families to 
continue with such gross injustice.
  Obviously, the increase projected, $1,800 per year for family plans, 
is a train wreck waiting to happen. Today the average of some $13,000 
for family plans would grow in the next decade to some $31,000. Which 
small business out there could afford to pay that or even a fraction of 
that for its employees?
  We know that what we're trying to maintain here is an employee-based 
health care insurance system. Well, the employer-based system needs 
some sort of relief. We need to know that there are assurances for 
containing those costs, for making certain that into the future we'll 
have a safety net for our working families and for our business 
community. In the measure we're advancing there is assistance for small 
businesses. It's providing them the opportunity to make this sharing 
affordable.
  We know that the benefits that come with reducing the deficit with 
our bill, having been scored by CBO, is looking at $130 billion for the 
first 10 years and some $1.2 trillion into the next 10 years. This is 
progress. This is a step in the right direction.
  We also know of the reforms where those who are denied, for whatever 
bias--for gender, for preexisting conditions, for acne, almost a 
laughable concept, but used to deny people. Toddlers who are denied 
because of overweight, individuals who have perhaps been violated, 
sexually violated, or domestic violence, have been denied. These 
reforms are essential, and let's do them now.
  Ms. FOXX. Madam Speaker, I'd like to yield 1 minute to my colleague 
from Arizona (Mr. Flake).
  Mr. FLAKE. Madam Speaker, you know, it's often said around this place 
that nobody cares about process. It's only the substance of the policy. 
But the process lends itself to the substance. And bad process equals 
bad policy, especially when it's done over and over again.
  Now we've seen over the past couple of years a shrinking of the 
ability of the minority party to actually come to the floor, offer the 
amendments it would like to offer, actually have an impact on the 
policy debate. Now, that's process. But it has an impact on the policy.
  Over time, if a majority simply asserts its rights under the House 
rules to minimize debate or to have a vote without having a vote, to 
deem something through, if you do that kind of thing continually, 
you're going to get a bad product. And I would suggest that the health 
care reform bill that we will vote on, maybe, or we will deem later 
this weekend, is a bad product, and it's partly because of a flawed 
process.
  Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I yield myself 10 seconds. You want to 
talk about process? Over the past year and a half the House held nearly 
100 hours of hearings. In 83 hours of committee markups we heard from 
181 witnesses, both Democrat and Republican. Two hundred thirty-nine 
amendments were considered, and 121 were adopted. I think that's a 
pretty good process.
  I reserve my time.
  Ms. FOXX. Madam Speaker, I continue to reserve.
  Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I'm the final speaker, so I would yield 
to the gentlelady to give her closing, and I'll reserve my time.
  Ms. FOXX. Madam Speaker, I want to say that what my colleague from 
Massachusetts just said about all those hours of hearings, it was a 
totally different bill. No hearings have been held on this bill; a 
totally different bill. That isn't the way we work around here.
  What they're asking people not to vote on is a bill that came from 
the Senate. It isn't the House bill. So let's, again, get real here and 
let's talk about what we should be talking about.
  You know, my colleagues across the aisle were against the Senate bill 
before they were for the bill, and I would like to quote my 
distinguished colleague who is the Chair of the Rules Committee when 
she said on December 23, 2009, ``Under the Senate bill, millions of 
Americans will be forced into private insurance plans which will be 
subsidized by taxpayers. That alternative will do almost nothing to 
reform health care, but will be a windfall for insurance companies.'' 
She went on to then say ``The Senate has ended up with a bill that 
isn't worthy of its support. Supporters of the weak Senate bill say, 
just pass it. Any bill is better than no bill. I strongly disagree.''

                              {time}  1130

  Now that very same person has done everything possible to get this 
bill passed in this House so that it will become law. It is no wonder 
that the majority is considering procedural tricks and sleight of hand, 
because the bill that they are proposing to pass doesn't provide true 
health care reform. And the process doesn't pass the sniff test.
  Republicans will never accept the status quo for health care. We can 
do better. We need to have a bill that will lower the cost of health 
care in America. But you do not lower the cost of health care by 
creating new government-run programs. We can lower the cost by putting 
patients, average, everyday Americans in charge of their health care, 
not insurance companies and not the government. Lower costs will result 
from putting patients in charge of their health care through 
innovations like expanded health savings accounts and by making sure 
that trial lawyers are not driving up the cost of health care with a 
blizzard of frivolous lawsuits.
  We should be revitalizing America's economy and promoting economic 
freedom. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates that the 
Republican plan will reduce the deficit by $68 billion.

[[Page H1608]]

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentlewoman has expired.
  Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
  My friends on the other side of the aisle would have you believe that 
there won't be a vote on health care in the next few days. Nothing 
could be further from the truth. My friends on the other side of the 
aisle are very good at making things up.
  Let me be clear: This House will vote to move the Senate bill 
forward. The process will work. The President will have a bill to sign 
and the Senate will have a set of corrections and improvements to the 
bill, much of what we have done here in this Congress. We will have 
corrections and improvements to the bill that President Obama will sign 
into law. This idea that the House will not vote on the health care 
bill is simply not true. It is I guess a good smoke screen, but it is 
simply not true.
  Madam Speaker, our friends are using this previous question to hide 
the fact that they simply do not want to improve the health care 
system, that they prefer to leave 32 million people uninsured. Because 
that is what will happen if we do nothing. And that they are happy to 
have skyrocketing insurance premiums and health care costs drive our 
country into further economic distress.
  No one in this Chamber, no Member of Congress has to worry about 
their health insurance. Why can't the American people have the same 
plan and the same choices and the same assurances as us? Why do my 
Republican friends think that somehow we should have some sort of 
special privilege? You know, if it is good enough for us, the American 
people ought to have the same thing. And that is what this bill would 
do.
  For political purposes, Republicans have been against this important 
reform from the start. Remember, it was Senator Jim DeMint, a 
Republican, who said that Republicans must oppose this plan at all 
costs, and that its defeat will be President Obama's, quote, 
``Waterloo.'' The debate and votes that we are going to have are 
simple. You are either on the side of the patients or on the side of 
the big insurance companies. You are either on the side of people who 
no longer want insurance companies to discriminate against them because 
of preexisting conditions or you are on the side of the status quo and 
the special interests.
  Let me close with one example. Eight States, including North Carolina 
and the District of Columbia, do not have laws that specifically bar 
insurance companies from using domestic violence as a preexisting 
condition to deny health coverage. Now, just think about that for a 
minute. In 2010 in the United States of America a woman can be denied 
health care because she has gotten beat up by a husband or a boyfriend. 
That is wrong. That is unconscionable. That has to change. And we are 
going to change it.
  I urge my colleagues to do what is right. Stand with the American 
people who are sick and tired of waiting for Congress to act on health 
care. Vote ``yes'' on the previous question and ``yes'' on the rule.
  Mr. COOPER. Madam Speaker, I will vote against the Previous Question 
Motion today because I think the American people deserve a clear, up-
or-down vote on health reform. They deserve to know how their elected 
representative voted, without any parliamentary confusion or 
obfuscation. In addition to being a transparency and fairness issue, 
this may also be a constitutional issue because of the consensus that 
the House and Senate must pass identical bills before they can be sent 
to the President for signature.
  With all the publicity surrounding the so-called ``self-executing'' 
rule, this procedure will not fool anyone back home, nor should it. It 
is, however, apparently designed to fool enough members of the House 
into believing that they did not support the Senate bill, even though, 
if they support the health reform package, they voted for it as the 
major component of the health reform.
  Unless we return to regular House procedure, we will never know how 
members would have voted on the Senate bill, by itself, and/or the 
reconciliation amendment, by itself. Since the President is apparently 
planning on signing the Senate bill before the Senate can take up the 
reconciliation amendment (as the Senate parliamentarian insists), no 
one will know who in the House of Representatives, in fact, supported 
the Senate bill. In simplistic terms, the White House will not know 
whom to invite to the signing ceremony.
  All this might be a parliamentary dispute if the possibility did not 
exist that a constitutional challenge would be brought against health 
care reform legislation. All it would take is one or two federal judges 
to void this law because of a procedural failing. Supporters of reform 
will then regret taking this procedural shortcut, while opponents will 
welcome the opportunity to overturn the law and reopen the debate.
  I realize that both political parties have used self-executing rules 
dozens, even hundreds, of times. But, to my knowledge, these rules have 
never been used on an issue larger than banning smoking on airplanes, a 
$40 billion deficit-reduction measure, or raising the debt ceiling of 
the United States. None of these issues compares with the scope of 
health care reform. To my knowledge, no serious constitutional 
challenge has been mounted against these rules, but one is certain to 
be lodged against the passage of health reform.
  Voting is the most important part of our job. We must vote honestly 
and openly on the separate issues that come before us.
  The material previously referred to by Ms. Foxx is as follows:

    Amendment to H. Res. 1190 Offered by Ms. Foxx of North Carolina

       At the end of the resolution, add the following new 
     section:
       Sec. 2. Immediately upon the adoption of this resolution 
     the House shall, without intervention of any point of order, 
     consider in the House the resolution (H. Res. 1188) ensuring 
     an up or down vote on certain health care legislation. The 
     resolution shall be considered as read. The previous question 
     shall be considered as ordered on the resolution to final 
     adoption without intervening motion or demand for division of 
     the question except: (1) one hour of debate equally divided 
     and controlled by the chairman and ranking minority member of 
     the Committee on Rules; and (2) one motion to recommit which 
     may not contain instructions. Clause 1(c) of rule XIX shall 
     not apply to the consideration of House Resolution 1188.
                                  ____

       (The information contained herein was provided by 
     Democratic Minority on multiple occasions throughout the 
     109th Congress)

        The Vote on the Previous Question: What It Really Means

       This vote, the vote on whether to order the previous 
     question on a special rule, is not merely a procedural vote. 
     A vote against ordering the previous question is a vote 
     against the Democratic majority agenda and a vote to allow 
     the opposition, at least for the moment, to offer an 
     alternative plan. It is a vote about what the House should be 
     debating.
       Mr. Clarence Cannon's Precedents of the House of 
     Representatives, (VI, 308-311) describes the vote on the 
     previous question on the rule as ``a motion to direct or 
     control the consideration of the subject before the House 
     being made by the Member in charge.'' To defeat the previous 
     question is to give the opposition a chance to decide the 
     subject before the House. Cannon cites the Speaker's ruling 
     of January 13, 1920, to the effect that ``the refusal of the 
     House to sustain the demand for the previous question passes 
     the control of the resolution to the opposition'' in order to 
     offer an amendment. On March 15, 1909, a member of the 
     majority party offered a rule resolution. The House defeated 
     the previous question and a member of the opposition rose to 
     a parliamentary inquiry, asking who was entitled to 
     recognition. Speaker Joseph G. Cannon (R-Illinois) said: 
     ``The previous question having been refused, the gentleman 
     from New York, Mr. Fitzgerald, who had asked the gentleman to 
     yield to him for an amendment, is entitled to the first 
     recognition.''
       Because the vote today may look bad for the Democratic 
     majority they will say ``the vote on the previous question is 
     simply a vote on whether to proceed to an immediate vote on 
     adopting the resolution .  .  . [and] has no substantive 
     legislative or policy implications whatsoever.'' But that is 
     not what they have always said. Listen to the definition of 
     the previous question used in the Floor Procedures Manual 
     published by the Rules Committee in the 109th Congress, (page 
     56). Here's how the Rules Committee described the rule using 
     information foci Congressional Quarterly's ``American 
     Congressional Dictionary'': ``If the previous question is 
     defeated, control of debate shifts to the leading opposition 
     member (usually the minority Floor Manager) who then manages 
     an hour of debate and may offer a germane amendment to the 
     pending business.''
       Deschler's Procedure in the U.S. House of Representatives, 
     the subchapter titled ``Amending Special Rules'' states: a 
     refusal to order the previous question on such a rule [a 
     special rule reported from the Committee on Rules] opens the 
     resolution to amendment and further debate.'' (Chapter 21, 
     section 21.2) Section 21.3 continues: Upon rejection of the 
     motion for the previous question on a resolution reported 
     from the Committee on Rules, control shifts to the Member 
     leading the opposition to the previous question, who may 
     offer a proper amendment or motion and who controls the time 
     for debate thereon.''
       Clearly, the vote on the previous question on a rule does 
     have substantive policy implications. It is one of the only 
     available tools

[[Page H1609]]

     for those who oppose the Democratic majority's agenda and 
     allows those with alternative views the opportunity to offer 
     an alternative plan.

  Mr. McGOVERN. I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the 
previous question on the resolution.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on ordering the previous 
question.
  The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that 
the ayes appeared to have it.
  Ms. FOXX. Madam Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX, further 
proceedings on this question will be postponed.

                          ____________________