[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 10]
[Senate]
[Pages 14436-14440]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                              HEALTH CARE

  Mr. GRAMM. Madam President, we have had a health care debate for the 
last couple of weeks. The problem is that we are on appropriations 
bills. We are trying to pass a bill that will help stabilize the 
condition of farms and ranches all over America.
  However, our colleagues on the Democrat side of the aisle have seemed 
determined to talk about health care. I will talk about health care 
today.
  I begin by saying, first of all, this is not the beginning of the 
health care debate. Here are some bills we have debated on health care 
since President Clinton has been in office. This is the Clinton health 
care bill. We were told in 1993 there was a crisis in America and we 
needed to deal with it. The way to deal with it was setting up health 
care collectives where every American would be forced to buy their 
health care from one in their geographic region that would be set up 
with a local collective leader, appointed by the Government. Then all 
the doctors would work for this health care collective and the 
Government from Washington would issue mandates.
  Then people such as myself said that this is a terrible loss of 
freedom. When you adopt the Clinton health care bill that I have on the 
desk, when my mama is sick, she will end up talking to a bureaucrat 
instead of a doctor. We were told by Senator Kennedy and by President 
Clinton we have to give up this freedom because we have 30 million 
American families who have no health insurance.
  So in 1993, we were told if we would pass these bills and let 
Government run the health care system, if we would force every American 
into a health care collective where Government could run it efficiently 
and where Government could guarantee our health care, that we would 
lose some freedom, but we would deal with the problem of lack of 
coverage. We were told that the problem in 1993 was access.
  We had a big debate. At one point 82 percent of the American people 
thought these health care collectives were a great idea. Finally, a few 
Members of Congress stood up and said, ``Over my cold, dead political 
body.'' It was like somebody had taken a pin and stuck it in a big, fat 
inflated balloon. It just went whoosh, and suddenly everybody decided 
this was not a debate about health care; this was a debate about 
freedom.
  The reason I go back to this history is two things. First of all, 
please remember when we are debating the so-called Health Care Bill of 
Rights, it has the same authors who wrote the Clinton health care bill 
setting up health care collectives. They have not changed their minds 
about what kind of American health care they want. They really believe 
the Government knows best. They really believe if the Government ran 
the health care system that everybody could have access and everything 
would be better because the Government, through these health care 
collectives, could make decisions for us and we are basically ignorant 
people and we do not know how to make decisions for ourselves. This was 
and is still their goal.
  We defeated the Clinton health care bill because the American people 
decided it may have been Senator Kennedy's goal, it may have been Bill 
Clinton's goal, but it was not their goal. In

[[Page 14437]]

fact, I would have to say that during the months I debated this bill by 
talking about cost and about efficiency, it was similar to throwing 
rocks at a tank. But suddenly when the issue changed to freedom and the 
right to chose, we blew the tank up.
  The same people who several years ago said give up your freedom 
because the problem is access changed their minds once we defeated 
them. Now they have a new health care bill they call the Patients' Bill 
of Rights. Oh, it does have something I guess you could call rights. 
Let me explain the basic problem and then I want to explain what they 
call rights and then I want to explain what I call rights and what I 
think Main Street America would call rights.
  Here is the problem in a nutshell. First of all, having spent 2 years 
trying to sell us on the idea we should give up our freedom to get 
access, they now say: Access is not a problem. Forget the 30 million 
people who do not have health insurance. In fact, Senator Kennedy's 
bill would take health insurance away from another 1.4 million 
Americans by driving up costs. These are estimates by the Congressional 
Budget Office. For the people who did not lose their health insurance, 
they would pay $57.2 billion more in costs. And by losing their health 
insurance--by the way, that would mean next year, if we pass the 
Kennedy health care bill this year, there would be 150,220 fewer breast 
examinations given to people who might have breast cancer; it would 
mean there would be 42,194 fewer mammograms; it would mean there would 
be 107,628 fewer Pap tests; it means there would be 18,458 fewer 
screenings for prostate cancer.
  When I am saying Senator Kennedy's bill, by the CBO estimates, would 
take insurance away from 1.4 million people, and for the people who got 
to keep their insurance because they had enough income, it would cost 
them $57.2 million, don't think I am just talking about money. Don't 
think I am just talking about a piece of paper that says ``Insurance 
Policy.'' I am talking about breast examinations, mammograms, Pap 
tests, and prostate screenings. I am talking about lives. I am talking 
about families. I am talking about your mama. I am talking about people 
you care about. This is a big issue. It is an important issue.
  What is the problem that Senator Kennedy wants, or tells us he wants, 
to deal with this year. The problem several years ago was too much 
freedom, and we had to get people in these health care collectives 
where Government could provide health care. Now the problem is the 
private HMOs, after which these Government collectives were modeled, 
are not giving people enough choices. The same things the Kennedy bill 
denied when it was the Clinton health care bill, such as the right to 
sue the Government when it was providing health care, now, all of a 
sudden, Senator Kennedy wants to give you the right to sue your doctor. 
So under the Kennedy plan, if your baby is sick and running a 104 
fever, you may not be able to get a doctor, but you can sue. For most 
people, that is not what they want. But it is interesting that Senator 
Kennedy, who denied you the right to sue when he was going to let 
Government run the health care system, now is willing to attack the 
private sector and to expand lawsuits.
  What does he claim he wants to deal with? What he claims he wants to 
deal with is the following problem. People join HMOs to try to hold 
down medical costs. You have two people who are working, they have 
three children, they are trying to make ends meet in their family, they 
are sitting down the first day of the month at the kitchen table 
writing those checks, trying to figure out how they are going to pay 
the bills. So they join an HMO because it is cheaper. The one thing 
they are very much unhappy about is that the HMO too often gets in 
between them and their doctor.
  Let me just do a little analogy, if I may. It is similar to going 
into the examination room with your doctor--even with your doctor you 
feel a little bit uncomfortable taking off your clothes; everybody has 
had that experience. But with an HMO it is almost like the HMO 
gatekeeper is in the examination room with you. What you really want is 
to get him out of the room and leave you just with your doctor. What 
you want is what we show here--if you will just forget the symbols for 
a minute and just look at this stethoscope--what you want is you at one 
end of the stethoscope and your doctor's ears at the other end and you 
want to get any HMO gatekeeper out of the examining room.
  Senator Kennedy looks at this problem and here is his solution. His 
solution to the problem is: OK, you are unhappy because you are in the 
examining room and you have this gatekeeper in there with you and your 
doctor. Here is how he solves the problem: He solves the problem by 
saying, OK, you have your doctor in there, you have your HMO in there, 
and then what he calls your rights--his Patients' Bill of Rights--your 
right is not to get the gatekeeper from the HMO out of the examining 
room. That is not your right. Your right is to have a Government 
bureaucrat join the HMO gatekeeper and your doctor in the examining 
room with you, and then to have a lawyer join the Government bureaucrat 
who joins the HMO gatekeeper in getting between you and your doctor.
  So Senator Kennedy's solution to your problem is he puts two more 
people in the examining room with you. What kind of freedom does he 
give you? It is an interesting concept of freedom. I do not want to 
sound too partisan, but it sure defines the difference between the two 
parties. Freedom to Senator Kennedy is having a Government bureaucrat 
who is there who might take your side. Freedom to Senator Kennedy is 
freedom to hire a lawyer and sue somebody.
  That is not the freedom most Americans are talking about when they 
talk about freedom. Freedom is the right to choose. Freedom is the 
right to fire your HMO. Freedom is the right to make your own 
decisions. That is what freedom is about. This so-called Kennedy 
Patients' Bill of Rights may be about rights, but it is not about 
freedom.
  The Republican alternative, which we would like to debate and hope to 
adopt--in fact, to facilitate the debate, our leader has suggested over 
and over the most eminently reasonable proposal I can imagine. The 
eminently reasonable proposal is, let the Democrats write the best bill 
they can write, where they pick exactly the bureaucrat they want who 
will be there with the gatekeeper in the examining room with you, and 
then set up the system where you can hire the best lawyer you want to 
be there, all of them listening to your heartbeat with your doctor--the 
bureaucrat ready to regulate and the lawyer ready to sue. Let them 
write the best program they can write, and let us write our best 
program, and then let's put them before the Senate and let Members 
choose.
  Our Democrat colleagues do not want to do that because they know what 
will happen. They know that ours will be chosen. Now we have spent 
weeks and weeks fooling around with this thing.
  To get to the point I want to make, because I know our leader is 
coming over in a minute to start the debate, the Democrat bill is not 
what people want. This is not freedom. What people want is the right to 
fire their doctor, if they want to fire their doctor, to fire their 
HMO, if they want to fire their HMO, and choose for themselves. On a 
dark night when their baby has a 104-degree fever, they do not want to 
be given the freedom to call a lawyer, they want to be given the 
freedom to call a doctor. What good does calling a lawyer do after the 
fact? They want the ability to call a doctor to get the best medical 
care they can for their child.
  Our bill goes back to this chart. That is, there are two people in 
the examining room, and you choose to put both of them there under our 
bill. No. 1, you choose to put yourself there; and, No. 2, you choose 
the doctor who is in the examining room with you.
  How does it work? Under our bill, we give people freedom. We give 
people the right to choose. One of the choices--and I can go through 
many provisions of our bill. I am just going through one today, and it 
has to do with medical savings accounts.

[[Page 14438]]

  When we first started debating medical savings accounts, a lot of our 
Democrat colleagues were for them, but now that they understand them, 
they hate them, and they hate them because they empower people. They 
empower mothers and they empower fathers to make decisions rather than 
governments or HMO's.
  This is how it works. You have a choice, and one of the choices you 
can exercise is to set up a medical savings account. You would buy an 
insurance policy, and you would choose that insurance policy from the 
company you want to provide the services. It would guarantee your 
medical expenses beyond, say, $3,000 of expenditures, so that if 
somebody gets really sick, you have an insurance policy. But then you 
and your employee would together over time put $3,000 into a medical 
savings account, and that money would belong to you.
  Each year, if you had medical expenses, you could spend it out of the 
medical savings account, where you choose how to spend it on health 
care and who provides the service, and if at the end of the year you 
have not spent the money, it belongs to you. So you have an incentive 
to be cost conscious and efficient and to have a stake in your health 
care system. But also, you have the right to choose.
  Here is how Senator Kennedy's plan works. Under his plan--and let me 
take the Washington phone book because it is on top--under his plan, 
you have total freedom to look under ``lawyer'' and hire any lawyer you 
want to sue, but you do not have the total freedom to look under 
``physician'' and hire any physician.
  Under Senator Kennedy's plan, assume, to make a long story short, it 
is 2 o'clock in the morning. My youngest son Jeff, let's say he is 3 
years old--actually he is 22 now, but he was 3--and let's say he has a 
103-degree fever. I am never spooked fever until when I see it in my 
own children. When my children are sick, like any father, I begin to 
get nervous.
  Under Senator Kennedy's plan, I get out the telephone book and I look 
under ``physician.'' I am not interested in a lawyer. A lawyer cannot 
do me any good. If I do not get help quickly, I may want to look up and 
call a preacher. I figure he might do me good, but a lawyer is not 
going to do me any good.
  Under Senator Kennedy's plan, I get out the phone book and look up 
``physician'' and ``services.'' Under his plan, I have to call people 
up and say: I know it is 2 o'clock in the morning, but I am in such and 
such HMO. Are you a member of my network? Do you participate in the 
program I participate in? They may or they may not. Most of them do 
not. In fact, if one goes down the list and picks the biggest network 
available in Washington, DC, only a very small fraction of the doctors 
listed in the phone book are members of that network.
  How does our plan work? My wife and I have put money into our medical 
savings account. We can have it in one of three forms. We can do it 
with a checking account. This is an actual medical savings account 
program by Golden Rule Insurance. They give you a checking account, out 
of which you pay medical bills.
  This card is through Mellon Bank, and this is a medical savings 
account. It is a MasterCard.
  This is through Visa, and it is a medical savings account from 
American Health Value.
  It is 2 o'clock in the morning, and I have a sick child. Under our 
plan, I call up and I have to ask only one question: Do you take a 
check? Do you take MasterCard? Do you take Visa? If he does, that 
doctor is my doctor.
  I picked a page of the phone book and had my trusty aides call. This 
is on page 1017 of the DC phone book. On page 1017 of the DC phone 
book, there is not one doctor on that page who will not take a check. 
There is not one doctor on that page who will not take a MasterCard. 
There is not one doctor on that page who will not take Visa. In other 
words, under the Republican plan, if your baby is sick, you can go to 
any doctor. If your baby is sick, you choose.
  What is freedom? Freedom in health care is not the ability to have a 
Government bureaucrat second-guess the HMO which is second-guessing 
your doctor. That is not what freedom is about. Freedom is not being 
able to have a lawyer who can sue the HMO which is second-guessing the 
doctor and sue your doctor. That is not what freedom is about.
  Freedom is about the ability to fire your HMO. Freedom is about the 
ability to choose. Why don't we have a situation where we make 
everybody go to one kind of grocery store and we have the Government 
regulate it? We can set up the ability to sue them. We do not do that 
because, basically, it does not work. That is how we run Government, 
and that is why it works so poorly.
  If a grocery store does not sell what I like, I do not go there. If 
people do not clean my shirts or if the gas I put in the car makes it 
run poorly, I go to another station and buy another kind of gasoline. 
All through my life I exercise my freedom to choose. What the 
Republican plan brings to health care is the freedom to choose.
  We have gone so far down this road, where we are making American 
health care look like this, that even our hometown doctors are talking 
about joining labor unions because they want somebody to help them 
negotiate with the bureaucrat, they want somebody to help them 
negotiate with the HMO, and they want some ability to protect 
themselves from lawsuits.
  Is that what we want in American health care? I don't think so. I 
think we want freedom. We want people to have the right to choose. What 
our bill does is do that. It gives you an opportunity to hire anybody 
you want to hire, to pick up any phone book in any city--I have here a 
phone book from Atlanta, GA. Again, you open up the part of the phone 
book that has to do with the listing of physicians, and any time you 
pick up the phone, when you have a medical savings account, you can 
say: Do you take a check? Do you take MasterCard? Do you take Visa? If 
they do, you are in.
  Under our bill, you do not find yourself without health care because 
you are a member of some medical group in Washington but you happen to 
be in Atlanta when you get sick. Under our plan, the basic currency we 
use, which is U.S. currency, is taken everywhere.
  So that is the choice I think people want. This Democrat bill is not 
freedom. It almost abuses the English language to call this a Patients' 
Bill of Rights.
  What kind of right do you have in health care when you are guaranteed 
the right to pick your own lawyer? The right you want in health care is 
the right to pick your own doctor. The right you want in health care is 
the right to pick your hospital. The right to choose in health care is 
the right to say: I don't like how I am being treated. I don't like the 
kind of service being provided. I think your cost is too high, I think 
your quality is too low, and I am going to leave.
  Those are not freedoms guaranteed in Senator Kennedy's Patients' Bill 
of Rights. His freedoms are: Look, if you are not happy with the 
quality of service, then you wait right here--it may take several hours 
or you may have to come back on Tuesday at 4 o'clock--but we will have 
a person from Health and Human Services, and they will listen to you 
and they will talk to you. If you are not happy, you can meet with 
them. You will have to sign some forms. They will want to look at your 
medical records; they will go through them.
  It may take weeks and weeks and months and months and years and 
years, but under Senator Kennedy's bill you will have these bureaucrats 
who will be protecting you. That is freedom to Senator Kennedy.
  Then if that fails, Senator Kennedy said: Well, another freedom you 
have, you have the freedom to sue.
  So let's say you have this terrible health care problem, and you or 
someone you love may be on the verge of death. What Senator Kennedy's 
freedom is that first of all, you can talk to this bureaucrat. You may 
have to come back next Wednesday. You may have to wait in line. You 
will have to fill out a

[[Page 14439]]

lot of forms, but he will be there for you at some point. But if that 
doesn't work, then you can hire a lawyer, and you can sue. You may die, 
your loved one may die, but you will have a bureaucrat who will have 
been there. Maybe they did not make it in time--they meant to be 
there--but they were there for you. And then you can sue somebody if 
all that happens. That is what their ``freedom'' is about.
  Our freedom is the right to choose, not a lawyer, but a doctor. If 
your baby is sick, you have the right to choose the doctor. You can 
pick up the phone, pick up any Yellow Pages across America, look up in 
the Yellow Pages under ``physician,'' and then you can pick whoever you 
want. Under our bill, you can call them up and say: Do you take a 
check? Do you take MasterCard? Do you take Visa?
  If you are covered under our plan, you have the right to choose a 
program that will let you choose a doctor. So if you think your HMO is 
doing a good job, you can stay in your HMO. But if you do not think 
they are doing a good job, you do not have to wait in line to talk to a 
bureaucrat, you do not have to hire a lawyer, you just simply say to 
them: You are not doing a good job, and you're fired.
  If you like Senator Kennedy's freedom, you want his bill. If you like 
our freedom, then you want our bill.
  What is real freedom? It is the right to choose.
  I thank my colleagues for their patience.
  I see the leader is here on the floor. I yield the floor.
  Mr. LOTT addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader is recognized.
  Mr. LOTT. Would the Senator from Texas respond to a couple questions?
  Mr. GRAMM. Sure I would.
  Mr. LOTT. This is the Kennedy-care stethoscope you have there 
demonstrated on that board?
  Mr. GRAMM. If I may, what I first have here is the Kennedy bill that 
we call the Clinton health care bill which, as our leader will 
remember, we debated on the floor for 2 years. This bill was their bill 
where, if we would just force every American to go into a health care 
purchasing collective and let Government make the decision for them, 
they were going to guarantee that everybody would have coverage. This 
is what they wanted 3 years ago. We defeated that because we did not 
want our mama talking to some bureaucrat when she got sick.
  What they want to do is set up a system where if you have a patient 
who wants to be in the room with their doctor, they find themselves in 
a room with their doctor and a gatekeeper. Senator Kennedy would help 
them by putting a bureaucrat and lawyer in the examining room with 
them.
  Mr. LOTT. Let me ask you the critical question. For the average 
person out there--senior citizen who is worried about their health 
care--they are in an HMO or managed care organization and they have a 
problem and they want that problem dealt with, this very graphically 
shows what the problem is with the bill. It winds up that a bureaucrat 
is involved and a lawyer is involved.
  What I want to know is, the alternative bill that has been developed 
by you and Senator Nickles and Senator Collins and Senator Santorum, 
Dr. Frist, and others, does it provide a way for that patient's problem 
to be dealt with? Is it a timely issue? Is it dealt with in a way where 
lawyers are not necessary?
  Mr. GRAMM. Let me give you a concrete example. Under the Kennedy 
bill, if you are not happy with the kind of health care you are 
getting, you can meet with a Government bureaucrat. You may have come 
back----
  Mr. LOTT. I know that makes everybody feel good.
  Mr. GRAMM. You might have to wait in line and fill out a lot of 
forms, but they will be there, potentially, to help you. Then if that 
does not happen, you can hire a lawyer, you can choose any lawyer you 
want, and then you can sue.
  Under our bill, what we do is we get rid of this. Under our bill, we 
give you this. What we let you do, if you are not happy with your HMO, 
instead of fooling around with a bureaucrat and lawyer, you just simply 
say to your HMO: You're fired. You set up a medical savings account, 
where for care beyond $3,000 a year you have an insurance policy; and 
then you and your employer put money in, up to $3,000 a year, out of 
which you pay medical expenses, through a check. These are various 
medical savings accounts that are now available through MasterCard and 
Visa.
  So what it enables you to do is, if, at the end of the year, you did 
not spend the $3,000, it belongs to you, and you spend it on other 
things.
  Mr. LOTT. You give the patient that choice. They can choose to go 
with an MSA account. They can choose the doctor they want.
  But again, I want to ask the question, what if that person decides to 
stay in their managed care organization and a problem develops? Under 
your bill, there is a review process--an internal and external 
process--that has a specified period of time in which action has to 
occur; is that correct?
  Mr. GRAMM. That is exactly right. We have a time-sensitive system for 
decisionmaking. But beyond that, we give the people, if they are not 
happy with their HMO, the ability to go somewhere else.
  As you know, Mr. Leader, nothing makes somebody providing a service 
do a better job than to know that you can say to them, if they are not 
doing the job: You're fired.
  Mr. LOTT. All right, sir. I just wanted to emphasize those points. 
You always do an excellent job with your cards and even your unusual 
stethoscope.
  Let me talk about the issue of where we are. First of all, I think it 
is very important that we in the Senate act to do the people's 
business. This time of year, every summer, the Senate is very much 
involved in passing the annual appropriations bills--the bills that do 
keep the Government going, bills that have many programs that the 
administration has asked for and, quite frankly, many programs that the 
American people rely on.
  We are going to have four votes this afternoon, trying to bring up 
four different appropriations bills to try to get the people's business 
done: the agriculture appropriations bill, the transportation 
appropriations bill. So many of us in this country depend on an 
improved transportation infrastructure. I know that is true in my State 
and a lot of other States. We have dangerous bridges, narrow, two-lane, 
hilly roads. We have interstate systems that are in disrepair. We have 
mass transportation systems that need additional systems. All of that 
is in the transportation appropriations bill, which we hope to have 
considered in short order by the Senate.
  We have the Commerce-State-Justice appropriations bill. This is a 
bill that has to do with everything from fisheries in this country to 
foreign policy to law enforcement. Certainly, we need to get that bill 
up. We need to have all three of those bills done before this week is 
out.
  Another one is the foreign operations appropriations bill, a bill 
that has been masterfully put together by the members of the 
appropriations subcommittee in a bipartisan way, under the leadership 
of Senator McConnell of Kentucky, a bill that probably could go through 
here on a voice vote. Yet it appears that these appropriations bills 
are going to be delayed or obstructed.
  The one that is presently pending before the Senate, and has been 
here now for this being the third week, is the agriculture 
appropriations bill, a bill that is so important to our farmers in 
America and important to our consumers and to our children and to the 
poor people in this country. This bill does provide the farm programs, 
but it also has programs such as food stamps and school lunches and the 
Women, Infants, and Children Program. It is the one that determines 
whether or not in many instances the American people get access to the 
farm products from our farmers, who are the geniuses of the world in 
terms of production and what they have done in our lifetime to provide 
quality high protein food. They have done a magnificent job.
  Right now, they have fallen on somewhat hard times. For the second 
year

[[Page 14440]]

in a row now we will see a significant downturn in farm production in 
terms of money that comes to the farmers. This is being brought about 
by depressed prices, by the fact that we have not been opening up new 
markets, the fact that we have let countries block our farm products 
from China to Japan as well as Europe and get away with it. In the case 
of Europe, they are systematically ignoring WTO decisions with regard 
to bananas. Now we have the impending problem with beef.
  So at a time when our markets are not being expanded and opened up, 
at a time when prices are depressed, farmers are looking for any sign 
of hope and encouragement. And yet here we are, for the third week, 
tangled up with an unrelated issue to agriculture.
  This is not a small bill. This is $60.7 billion for agriculture in 
America. There is a strong feeling that there is probably going to be a 
need for additional disaster assistance. I saw where some States right 
now are looking at another serious drought. You add that on top of 
depressed prices, declining markets instead of growing markets, and now 
a drought on top of that, you have the prescription for a disaster.
  So we may have to come back and take a look at that later on this 
year. But farmers need some encouragement right now. They need to know 
what they can depend on.
  The schools need to know what they are going to be able to count on 
in the next school year that begins in August, by the way, not at the 
beginning of the next fiscal year. They need to know what they are 
going to be able to count on.
  So we have had this delay because an agreement can't be reached as to 
how to bring up the Patients' Bill of Rights. Frankly, for 8 months I 
have been trying to find a way to do just that. I have offered repeated 
suggestions--the fairest one of all probably just to have a jump ball 
and say, OK, we will begin here and at a date certain, after a 
reasonable period of time, we will be through with it. But we tried all 
kinds of variations.
  I read into the Record last week the complete unanimous consent 
agreement I had suggested on Thursday that would have allowed us to 
bring it up, would have had a reasonable time for consideration, 2 
hours on first-degree amendments, 2 hours on second-degree amendments. 
I don't know how I could be any fairer. That, too, was rejected.
  So I have tried repeatedly to make this happen. Add to that that this 
is a charade. This is a farce. This is not for real. So not only are 
the farmers being taken advantage of, they are being played with. They 
are being laughed at. Every Senator knows, men and women, Republican, 
Democrat, regardless of region, no amendment that is added from the 
Patients' Bill of Rights to the agriculture appropriations bill will 
ever see the light of day. It will be sheared like wool from a sheep 
before it gets to the conference just the other side of the Rotunda. It 
will not happen--not the Feinstein amendment, not some other amendment, 
not the Kennedy alternative. It will not be a part of the agriculture 
appropriations bill and shouldn't be. It is still legislating on an 
appropriations bill. It is an unrelated, nongermane amendment that is 
being insisted on by, I think, really a few on the Democratic side of 
the aisle.
  So this is a farce, ladies and gentlemen. We should no longer allow 
the people's business to be shunted aside and delayed and obstructed 
and held up by this kind of activity. We should treat it for what it 
is. It is a charade. It is a farce. But it is not a happy one. It is a 
sad one.
  I encourage my colleagues today on both sides of the aisle, don't be 
a part of this. We should summarily dismiss as frivolous these 
amendments that are being added or offered to be added to this 
agriculture appropriations bill. Maybe they are substantive. Maybe some 
of them have merit. But to offer them here, who are we kidding? Nobody, 
nobody in this room. I think most Americans know this is not a serious 
effort.
  Can we work out a way, an agreement to bring this up for a reasonable 
period of time and still get our work done in terms of the 
appropriations bills and other legislation that is pending, some of it 
in conference, some of it waiting to come before the Senate? The 
bankruptcy reform package is waiting for action. The flag burning 
constitutional amendment has been passed by the House of 
Representatives. Yet we are over here tangled up in a procedural 
activity.
  I think we should not be a part of that. I am going to insist that we 
dismiss it and that we move on and get our work done. I really hope and 
reach out to the leadership on the other side of the aisle and say: 
Let's see if we can't find a way to deal with this at another time in a 
way that is fair to all sides. Let's go on and pass these 
appropriations bills. Several of them that I have not even mentioned 
here today we could probably move through very quickly, in a limited 
period of time, with limited amendments, because there are just not 
going to be a lot of amendments offered, and do some of the other 
business, including the nominations that we all know should be at least 
given an opportunity to be considered.
  I just wanted to lay that marker down and get that word firmly 
planted in our lexicon. This procedure is a farce. It will not happen.
  And by the way, just to make sure I was on totally safe ground, it 
always behooves one to check with the appropriations chairman to make 
sure he agrees. He agrees. He obviously is offended and upset that his 
bills out of the Appropriations Committee are being delayed, and he 
agrees we should not have these legislative matters, these extraneous 
matters being used to delay very important appropriations bills so that 
we can get our work done.
  By the way, the President is out there saying: Let's work together. 
Great, let's do. I am ready for deeds, not words. I want us to have 
Medicare reform, but the commission, the bipartisan commission's work 
was basically rejected. The President didn't allow one of his nominees 
of the commission to vote for it. Yet we had Democrats and Republicans 
who were for it. The Finance Committee, I believe, is willing to move 
forward in a constructive way. If he wants to work on some of these 
issues, we would certainly be glad to find the time to do it.
  Madam President, 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. LOTT. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. LOTT. Madam President, what is the pending business?

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