[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 155 (2009), Part 13]
[Senate]
[Pages 17368-17369]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           HEALTH CARE REFORM

  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I wish to note, in the context of my 
remarks, the announcement yesterday that the deficit for the first 9 
months of this year is now $1.1 trillion, headed for, at the end of 
this year, $1.8 trillion, perhaps the highest percentage of GDP in the 
history of this country outside of wartime. We are now in the process 
of adding amendment after amendment in the HELP Committee without any 
idea of the cost. As one of my colleagues who proposed a massive 
expansion of women's health care yesterday said in the committee: It is 
not the cost that is important; it is the cause. A remarkable approach 
to the fact that we are mortgaging our children and grandchildren's 
futures in a fashion which is the commission of generational theft.
  Chairman Dodd received a new score on his bill last week by hiding 
the real cost of the bill. A few weeks ago, the preliminary cost was 
over $1 trillion. Now it is at $900 billion--same bill, just different 
numbers. On the one hand, we are told reform is urgent and, at the same 
time, they don't implement the bill for 4 years; conveniently, after 
the next Presidential election. Then they will tax employers with a 
job-killing employer health mandate, collect $52 billion from small 
employers, the engine that will take us out of our recession. Nobody 
disagrees about the role of small business in our economy. Then this 
latest proposal hides the cost of the additional hundreds of billions 
of dollars of Medicaid expansion.
  The State of California is offering IOUs to pay their bills. They 
have a $26 billion deficit. We are going to increase Medicaid's burden 
on the States to the tune, in the case of California, of several more 
billion dollars. How are they going to pay for it? It is an impossible 
task.
  I am told that is not about the cost, but it is about the cost. Just 
as the stimulus package was about the cost, just as the continued 
bailout of industries such as the automotive industry, banks, financial 
institutions and anybody who is ``too big to fail,'' when small 
business people all over America are closing their doors because they 
are too small to save.
  For the first 9 months, the deficit is $1.1 trillion. That is $800 
billion greater than the deficit recorded last year. The American 
people have a right to know what this health care bill will cost, what 
it will cost now and what it will cost our grandchildren.
  The Washington Post today tells us how not to reform health care, in 
opposing the government insurance President Obama now says is so 
critical. According to today's Washington Post:

     . . . it would be tragic if this issue were to drag down 
     health reform or make it impossible to secure Republican 
     votes. Restructuring the health-care system is risky enough 
     that Democrats would be wise not to try to accomplish it 
     entirely on their own.

  I certainly hope my friends on the other side of the aisle pay 
attention to that comment. It has turned into a partisan effort, and it 
is too bad.
  From today's Wall Street Journal, ``Democrats Hoodwinked the Health 
Lobby. Americans's health-care CEOs are being taken for a ride by 
Congress and their own lobbyists.''
  It is a very interesting article by Kimberly Strassel.

       The industry's calculation is that by cutting deals, it can 
     set the terms of its contributions to ``reform'' and even 
     wangle upsides. The insurers came first, promising to squeeze 
     $2 trillion in costs out of the system. Democrats are letting 
     Ms. Ignagni believe that in return she will get a mandate to 
     require all Americans to carry insurance (which her members 
     will supply) and be spared a public option (which would 
     decimate her industry).

  It goes on to talk about Mr. Tauzin who:

     . . . came along pledging that drug makers would cough up $80 
     billion to narrow a gap in Medicare drug coverage. He's been 
     led to think that Washington will forgo its plans to allow 
     drug reimportation or give him a hand on generics.

  The word is that the administration is now saying drug reimportation 
is not important, in exchange for this deal with Mr. Tauzin. How 
unsavory is that. Drug reimportation will save the American people $50 
billion a year. It is a fact. PhRMA, the large prescription drug 
lobby--a very powerful one here in our Nation's capital--in return for 
saying they will save $80 billion, the administration in return will 
give up their support for what would save the American people $50 
billion, when the $80 billion they are talking about is purely 
illusory, to say the least.
  The Wall Street Journal article goes on to say:

       Democrats have complemented their smiling encouragements 
     with behind-the-scene threats. After retaking the House in 
     2006, the party made clear that companies that did not hire 
     Democratic lobbyists would not get a hearing in Washington. 
     The ruling party is now seeing the fruits of its bullying. 
     These days a meeting of health-care lobbyists is better 
     described as a reunion of Senate finance Chairman Max 
     Baucus's former aides.

[[Page 17369]]

     Health-care lobbying has been turned on its head: The new 
     cabal of Democratic lobbyists does not exist to protect the 
     industry from Congress. It exists to present Democratic 
     ultimatums to business.
       When Senate Republicans last month hosted a meeting to 
     discuss reform ideas, Mr. Baucus's office called in a block 
     of these Democratic lobbyists to deliver a message. ``They 
     said, 'Republicans are having this meeting and you need to 
     let all of your clients know if they have someone there, that 
     will be viewed as a hostile act,'' reported one attendee to 
     the Baucus caucus.

  Interesting.

       All these actions--the White House meetings, the strung-out 
     negotiations, the muzzling--have been taken with one aim: To 
     buy silence. President Barack Obama is committed to a public 
     option. Liberal Democrats intend to make the private sector 
     fund their plans. They figure by the time they drop a bill 
     that contains odius elements, it'll be too late for any 
     industry player--big or small--to cut a Harry & Louise ad.
       Industry players this week got a glimpse of how they will 
     be treated. House Energy and Commerce Chairman Henry Waxman 
     dismissed the $80 billion drug deal, claiming it did not have 
     House support, and moreover that the White House ``told us 
     they are not bound to that agreement.''
       The question is just how long it is going to take for 
     America's health-care CEOs to realize they are being taken 
     for a ride both by Congress and their own lobbyists. 
     Americans are wary enough about ObamaCare to maybe appreciate 
     some straight talk from corporate America. If only corporate 
     America can find the smarts to give it.

  The debate and discussion continues in the House and the Senate. They 
still haven't found a way to pay for the health care reforms they want 
to make. It is still around a trillion dollars. We hear everything from 
a 10-cent tax on soft drinks to the employer benefit proposal which was 
so strongly derided and attacked during the last campaign. So far we 
are talking about laying another trillion or two of debt on the 
American people, in addition to the $1.8 trillion deficit we have 
already amassed this year.
  Again, I urge colleagues and the administration to sit down in true 
negotiations, in bipartisan fashion together, and maybe we can solve 
this issue. We all know the quality of health care in America is the 
highest in the world. But the costs of health care in America and the 
inflation associated with it are something we must address so that 
health care is affordable and available to all Americans.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BROWN. 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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