[Congressional Record Volume 163, Number 123 (Thursday, July 20, 2017)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4088-S4089]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                               Healthcare

  Mr. ENZI. Mr. President, my colleagues and I have been on this floor 
for the last 7 years talking about the problems with ObamaCare and the 
need to address them.
  In the early days, when ObamaCare was still being cobbled together, 
we talked about individuals losing their coverage. Promises were made 
that if you liked the plan you had, you could keep it. That turned out 
to be a broken promise.
  In 2009 and 2010, we talked about premiums skyrocketing. Today, we 
are still talking about it. Premiums are more than 100 percent higher 
in Wyoming today than they were when the law was passed. Our insurer 
has fortunately been more conservative in their approach. So premiums 
didn't spike the way they did in other States.
  I usually enjoy being right, but in this case, I am very sad to have 
watched the worst possible scenario play out. Time after time, 
President Obama was faced with problems in implementation and in 
outcomes, and he would dismiss them by saying: ``It just needs more 
time,'' or, as this cartoon shows, ``it just needs a tune up.''
  We and the American people gave it time and money--specifically, 7 
years and hundreds of billions of dollars. We are now left trying to 
pick up the pieces of health insurance markets all across the country.
  You can see here that this ambulance is ObamaCare. Behind it is its 
engine and other key components, and they have completely fallen apart. 
That is the private insurance market today. The part you don't see here 
is that there is a patient in the back of this ambulance. This isn't 
just about politics. This is about real people and whether they can 
afford an insurance premium that is in some cases higher than their 
rent or their mortgage payments each month.
  Even before its passage, my Republican colleagues and I talked about 
the danger that ObamaCare posed to private insurance markets.
  Insurers have already left the market in droves. In Wyoming, we are 
down to one carrier. We lost the others to the economics of ObamaCare, 
and we will be lucky to keep the one we have. I know many people in our 
country are going to be in the position of having no insurers offering 
plans in their county.
  How could this happen? It has happened because of politics being put 
before patients and an unwillingness to take on the hard task of fixing 
something that you have sold as the perfect solution.
  I can tell you that healthcare isn't a simple issue. It is incredibly 
complex and, really, there is no one right way to tackle it. I was the 
ranking member of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee 
when ObamaCare passed. We worked hard to find common ground. When it 
became clear that there was not a reciprocal commitment to that from 
our colleagues on the other side of the aisle, we did work hard to try 
to stop it.
  Now we are finally in a position to do so. We have a President in the 
White House who is committed to repealing and replacing ObamaCare with 
better care before more irreparable harm is done. Republicans have been 
working on an approach that attempts to address both the short-term and 
long-term problems caused by ObamaCare.
  We have problems to solve right now. We are proposing to stabilize 
insurance markets in the short term and to get insurance costs on a 
more manageable trajectory over the longer term. We are striking at the 
heart of ObamaCare by removing its mandates and taxes while putting 
Medicaid on a more sustainable footing.
  Doing this isn't easy. You may have read a little something about the 
challenges of moving a healthcare bill forward, but the alternative is 
to do what our colleagues on the other side of the aisle have done for 
7 years and watch ObamaCare crater. We don't think that is the right 
thing to do. We think we have an obligation, even if it is not an easy 
vote, to salvage our insurance system.
  Getting something done in Washington isn't always a pretty process, 
but I am proud to be working with the women and men in my conference 
who see that there is something larger at stake than themselves and who 
know that sitting this out means more harm and, perhaps, harm that 
can't be undone later.
  I will keep working. I am committed to passing the best product that 
we can deliver for the people of Wyoming and for our whole country. I 
look forward to continuing to work together to repeal ObamaCare and 
replace it with policies that will truly improve healthcare in America. 
I hope my colleagues will join me in this worthy endeavor.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Sullivan). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, yesterday, several of my Democratic 
colleagues spoke in opposition to the nomination of John Bush to serve 
on the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals. They were particularly concerned 
about his activities outside of the courtroom, especially his personal 
blog posts. The comments of my friend, the junior Senator from 
Minnesota, were representative of their concern.
  He reminded us that he has been serving on the Judiciary Committee 
for 8 years. He said that by confirming someone to the Federal bench 
like Mr. Bush, who has blogged about controversial political and policy 
matters, the Senate would be doing something unprecedented. 
Specifically, my friend from Minnesota--in angst--said, ``I don't think 
we have been here before.''
  ``I don't think we have been here before,'' he said. I would 
encourage my friend to think a little harder about his tenure on the 
Judiciary Committee. Just a few years ago, the Senate considered 
President Obama's nomination of Stephen Bough to be a Federal judge in 
Missouri. Mr. Bough had been quite an active blogger himself. His 
blogging and online commentary were not simply confined to political 
satire and sarcasm. His blogging didn't use merely flippant or 
intemperate language. His blogging demonstrated a real and palpable 
animus toward conservatives and Republicans in general, toward elected 
Republicans in particular, and by name--by name. He insulted and 
impugned people from his home State, such as Senators, his Governor, 
the President of the United States, and a Republican nominee for 
President, just to name a few.
  Mr. Bough's posts were truly mean-spirited. It wasn't just that he 
called Republicans ``knuckleheads''--which he did. That was when he was 
feeling especially kind. No, he said specific Republicans were 
``corrupt.'' They had done ``evil things''--``evil things.'' I can go 
on and on about his corrosive rhetoric.
  He approvingly posted an article describing how San Francisco was 
contemplating naming a sewage plant after President Bush as a suitable 
legacy for the President and posted another one that said his Governor 
was highly ``ignorant.''
  His invective was not reserved to members of the political branches. 
He said that his State supreme court was the most corrupt in the 
history of the State. I am not making this up. He is an officer of the 
court, calling the supreme court the most corrupt in the history of his 
State.

[[Page S4089]]

  For my Democratic colleagues who now profess to care about the 
judgment of judicial nominees who blog, I submit that impugning the 
integrity of the tribunal that has jurisdiction over their professional 
conduct and law license, as Mr. Bough did, is more than a few tweaks 
shy of exhibiting sound judgment.
  Mr. Bough also implied that President Bush made his Supreme Court 
appointments as some sort of quid pro quo. He harshly criticized 
sitting Supreme Court Justices by name, and he claimed that the 
Republican nominee for President wanted only Federal judges who would 
disregard the law and rule in favor of the ``religious right'' and that 
he was ``sucking up.''
  He made a crude comment about women that I will not repeat.
  Now, some of our Democratic colleagues have criticized John Bush 
because he said that he would try hard to be impartial as a judge. By 
contrast, in one of his blog posts, Stephen Bough flat-out said that 
he, himself, ``shouldn't be a judge.'' This is commentary on himself. 
But every one of our Democratic colleagues on the Judiciary Committee 
at the time, including our friend from Minnesota, obviously disagreed 
with his own judgment about himself. They all voted for him, which is 
especially curious in hindsight, given the superior weight our 
Democratic colleagues now place on blog posts. Only one Member of the 
Democratic conference voted against Mr. Bough. These are many of the 
same Democrats, of course, who are supposedly aghast--aghast--at the 
Bush nomination. Mr. Bough is now Federal District Court Judge Stephen 
Bough.
  Finally, I would like to set the record straight on the subject of 
the slur. Mr. Bush did not use the slur in a blog post, and he did not 
use it flippantly. In fact, he said he has never used this term and 
would never use it.
  Rather, Mr. Bush quoted by name someone else--a prominent author who 
had used the slur. Mr. Bush quoted him to show how various authors had 
viewed our hometown of Louisville over time--both those who praised it 
and those who criticized it. In short, Mr. Bush said that he used it to 
show ``the good, the bad, and the ugly.''
  So who was the author he quoted verbatim and by name? Why, it was 
noted liberal Hunter Thompson. I note that Mr. Thompson's use of the 
slur did not prevent liberals, including Democratic officeholders, from 
praising him. In fact, not one but two Democratic Presidential 
candidates went to his funeral--George McGovern and John Kerry.
  The Senate has considered a judicial nominee who did use this slur in 
a blog posting, who actually did use the exact same slur, in fact. The 
judicial nominee was not quoting any literary or published work, and 
this judicial nominee did not use the slur for any critical purpose. 
The judicial nominee used it flippantly and cavalierly. Who was the 
judicial nominee? It was President Obama's judicial nominee and current 
Federal District Court Judge Stephen Bough, who sits on the bench right 
now for life, after being confirmed by the votes of our Democratic 
colleagues.
  I hope I have at least refreshed the memory of my friend from 
Minnesota and some of my other Democratic colleagues.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.