[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 113 (Thursday, August 1, 2013)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6144-S6145]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
OBAMACARE
Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, many of us will be leaving in the next
day or so and heading to States across the country. As we travel across
our States, we will be listening to our constituents and hearing what
is on their minds.
One of the things I hear about every weekend in Wyoming is that
people are concerned about the President's health care law, and
specifically how the law affects their lives, their families, and their
jobs. People all across Wyoming--and I believe all across the country--
are angry. They are angry that the White House is unfairly giving
employers a 1-year delay in the mandate to offer insurance but did not
delay the individual mandate that says every American must buy or hold
Washington-approved insurance. For many of these people this is very
expensive insurance.
Instead of granting a permanent delay or helping all Americans,
President Obama and his supporters are trying to convince the American
people that this health care law is working fine. Once again, the Obama
administration is lecturing the American people instead of listening to
the American people. They think if they give more speeches and deliver
more sales pitches the American people will finally like this law. It
is not going to happen.
Look at how far the Obama administration is willing to go with its
latest sales pitch. Last week CNN reported the administration called
together a bunch of Hollywood celebrities to help convince young
Americans to buy expensive health coverage. The youth of America are
not going to fall for it. Even though many of these Hollywood stars are
great actors who always remember their lines, young Americans
understand that ObamaCare is the wrong script for America. Even though
some of these stars deliver funny jokes on ``Saturday Night Live,''
they are about to find out that this health care law is no laughing
matter.
In fact, Americans of all ages believe the law is unworkable,
unaffordable, and deeply unpopular. They are also finding out it is
unfair, and that is what CBS found out last week. They did a poll. They
found that 54 percent of Americans disapprove of the law. They also
found that only 13 percent of the people say the law will actually help
them personally. Three times as many Americans in the poll believe the
law will hurt them personally. Three times as many people believe the
law will hurt them personally than the people it will help. So over the
next couple of months the American people can expect a barrage of
advertising.
There was a big story about it today in the New York Times. Musicians
are playing songs on the west coast and trying to get people to sign up
for the exchanges. It was all aimed at trying to distract the American
people from the health care train wreck that is coming.
According to the Associated Press, at least $684 million will be
spent nationally on publicity, marketing, and advertising for the law.
The Washington Post found that the States will be running ads not just
on TV and radio--and you are not going to believe this--they are also
putting slogans on coffee cups, on airplanes flying banners across
beaches, and even, believe it or not, on portable toilets at a cost of
nearly $700 million. It is a windfall for advertising agencies and a
hard sell for hard-working taxpayers.
The administration is picking the pockets of the American people for
advertising while the health care law is shrinking the paychecks of the
people who can only find part-time work.
Speaking of part-time workers, I wish to talk about a new story that
is out that demonstrates the height of hypocrisy surrounding the
President's health care law. Frankly, the story is so outrageous that
it is one of those things a person can't make up. The headline of the
article reads ``Half of Affordable Care Act call center jobs will be
part-time.'' Here are the details.
The article is about a new call center in Contra Costa County, CA.
This is part of the effort to have so-called navigators who will answer
Americans' questions about the health care law. The call center ran ads
for more than 200 jobs that said all of these jobs would be full time.
That is what people are looking for in America--full-time jobs, full-
time work. But once the new workers started training, some of them got
a different story. They found out that they would actually be part-time
employees with no health benefits.
Let me emphasize that point. Even the ObamaCare navigators are not
going to be covered by the health care law and are not going to be
provided health care. Even some of the navigators will not know how
they can get affordable health care coverage even though they are the
ones who are supposed to be giving advice to Americans. Some navigators
are being forced to work part time because the company cannot afford to
provide the expensive government-mandated, government-approved
insurance they are supposed to teach others how to get. It turns out
the ObamaCare navigators need their own ObamaCare navigators.
The article even quotes one worker saying, ``What's really ironic is
working for a call center and trying to help people get health care,
but we can't afford it ourselves.'' That is what this
[[Page S6145]]
administration has done to this country. I don't call that ironic; I
call it outrageous.
So the question is, Who are the navigators going to call for help and
how are they going to answer Americans' questions when many of them
don't know how they are personally going to be able to afford the
health care coverage the government and the President of the United
States mandate they have?
The bad news is this story is only one of many new examples of
hypocrisy recently surrounding the President's health care law. Week
after week we have seen labor unions--one after another--that
originally supported the law now express concerns about how the health
care law will impact their members' access to care. Late last week we
even heard from something called the National Treasury Employees Union.
It is important to know that this union represents most of the IRS
workers--the 100,000 IRS workers--who are going to be enforcing the
health care law. What about these IRS workers? What are they saying?
Well, it turns out the IRS employee union said they are very concerned
they might actually have to buy their own health insurance in the
exchanges, just as other Americans will. These are the exact same IRS
agents who will collect massive amounts of data--personal data--on
people's individual lives and their health care choices. They will
investigate whether people have the right coverage. They will apply the
tax penalties to anyone who doesn't. These are the agents who now say
they want no part of the health care law's exchanges for themselves.
They actually have sample letters the union has sent to the IRS agents
to send to Members of Congress to say: I am one of your constituents,
and we don't want it to apply to us, and we want to hear back.
This health care law is bad for all Americans. Each of those stories
demonstrates again that the President's health care law is
fundamentally broken. Instead of spending the rest of the summer trying
to sell an expensive failing product, the President should simply
listen. He should listen to young people who are about to see their
premiums soar. He should listen to ObamaCare navigators who can't find
affordable health care. He should listen to the IRS agents who enforce
the law and who don't want to live under the law. He should listen to
the American people and what they have to say about the high costs of
their health insurance coverage. He should listen to what Americans
have to say about how hard it is to find a doctor who will take care of
them.
Front-page story: So many people on Medicare cannot get a doctor to
take care of them. Why? Because of the health care law. Twenty percent
of family physicians in this country--this story was reported in the
Wall Street Journal--20 percent of family physicians are not taking new
Medicare patients. Thirty-three percent are not taking new Medicaid
patients. But a big part of the President's health care law was to
force people onto Medicaid--a program that is not working already.
The President should listen to what Americans have to say about how
hard it is to keep their current coverage. And the President should
listen to what the American people have to say about trying to make
ends meet on a part-time salary--a part-time salary because of the
health care law, because of the incentives of the health care law to
knock down employees' work hours to less than 30.
Then the President should come back to Washington after he actually
listens, not lectures, and sit down with Congress--Republicans and
Democrats working together--and work on real solutions that will give
Americans what they wanted in the first place with health care.
Americans want the care they need from a doctor they choose at lower
cost. These are the things that have not been provided under the health
care law.
Remember what Nancy Pelosi said: First we have to pass it to find out
what is in it. The American people now know more and more what is in
this health care law, which is why it is even less popular today than
it was the day it passed and why; for every American who thinks they
will be helped by the health care law, three Americans believe their
lives will be made worse by the law forced through this body.
Thank you, Mr. President. I yield the floor and note the absence of a
quorum.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so
ordered.
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