[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 5]
[House]
[Pages 7242-7245]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




           THE ECONOMY AND THE STABILITY OF THE MIDDLE CLASS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 5, 2011, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Tonko) is recognized 
for 30 minutes.
  Mr. TONKO. Mr. Speaker, the opportunity this evening for the 
Democratic Caucus in the House to address this budget and to go forward 
with a discussion on our stand on the issues and solutions that we're 
proposing is an important opportunity for us to be able to dialogue 
here amongst each other on the House floor and also to share that 
messaging with the viewing public.
  Certainly, the general public out there is watching many of these 
proposals. They are concerned about the stability of the middle class. 
They're concerned about the economy, concerned about job creation.
  We are now well into the 112th session of Congress. We watch as many 
weeks and months have passed without one single measure that would 
increase jobs in this country coming before the House. Nothing that 
deals with the economy, nothing that deals with the retention of jobs 
or the job creation situation has been produced here as legislation and 
voted upon on the House floor, a rather dismal track record when the 
clarion call, the message that resonated from the voting booth to these 
Halls of Congress on the Hill in Washington was very clear: Start 
growing the economy, stop shrinking the middle class, and people are 
concerned about the opportunities that will be passed by. As we walk 
through these very difficult times, it is about job creation and 
retention.
  There's also a concern that there has been this very strong attempt 
to make the comfortable even more comfortable with the new Republican 
majority in the House. And we'll talk about that. Let's talk about it.
  We have a situation where people will allow for corporate loopholes 
that cost our economy money. They'll allow for a continuation of 
millionaires and billionaires to receive tax cuts; they'll advance the 
reducing of Medicaid, where two-thirds of those dollars go toward 
sustaining the elderly in health care settings; and they want to end 
Medicare. And all of this is professed to be some sort of savings in 
Federal Government.
  Well, that is only part of the story. The real truth is that these 
savings quickly dissipate. They're gone because they are used as 
payment for tax cuts for millionaires, handouts to the oil companies 
that sit on historic profit that has been realized, $1 trillion nearly 
in profit realized by the big oil companies of this Nation, and that is 
the vulgar outcome that has so infuriated the middle class.
  As I travel to my district, I hear repeatedly about the concerns to 
end Medicare. People will say, we're not ending it, we're fixing it; 
that we're not really providing for an end, we're offering, at first 
what was a voucher, now it's called ``a transformation.''
  Look, as we shift risk from the government to the individual senior 
household, we are ending a benefit that has lasted for some four and-a-
half decades, that came about for the very reasons that seniors could 
not access an affordable health care plan, that there was cherry-
picking going on, that only the easiest to insure would be covered, 
that those who might have come with some preexisting condition would be 
passed by, and where the notion of an affordable health care insurance 
premium, a policy that was unaffordable, was just beyond the grasp of 
our Nation's seniors. And so it's why the program grew in strength and 
popularity, and why it has provided stability for our Nation's seniors.
  Now, when we look at what's happening here, we'll talk about the many 
dynamics, but there are those who professed very boldly that what we're 
doing here is exactly what the Congress has in terms of an insurance 
policy.
  Well, Congress has about 72 cents of its premium costs covered. With 
this plan, with this voucher plan initiated in this Republican budget 
approved in this House, the Republicans suggest with their plan that it 
would be every 32 cents on a dollar covered with their voucher program. 
And just what guarantee is there that the senior who shops will, in 
fact, land a policy that will cover them? So it's very concerning.
  We just recently did a mailing that informed people of the various 
reforms that are being proposed. We also solicited their input on what 
priorities they believe we should hold in our hearts and minds here as 
we move forward, and we've received a great supply of information 
already in the very infant days in responding.

                              {time}  1830

  As they come in, they keep growing more and more one-sided.
  Let me just hold up what the first few days has produced. We have one 
pile here of speaking out against the Medicare end. This is one copy. 
We have yet a second pile all received in the first few days of people 
receiving their mailing. We saw those two bulky piles. This is the 
response in favor of. Well beyond 90 percent of the returns to date is: 
don't mess with benefits.
  Now, mindful, when we were addressing the Affordable Care Act, when 
we were holding town forums, when we were holding some 3,000 to 4,000 
forums across this country discussing the health care reforms, how to 
improve it, what exactly is included, what the priorities ought to be, 
there were clarion calls of ending Medicare, of death panels, and all 
sorts of risks to the seniors, and denying access and affordability. 
Well, we proved that that was not the case, that it was misinformation.
  This one walks right into that argument, because it ends Medicare. It 
ends Medicare and it turns it into a voucher system, and it has 
everyone shopping in the private sector insurance market to get their 
coverage. We can't allow this to happen.
  We have seen, since the initiation of Medicare, the growth in 
premiums in the private sector market, and that equates to some 5,000 
percent. That's a huge increase. But there are friends out there that 
helped to bring the wrong candidates to this House, and I think it's 
time for them to come forward, as they believe, to get some sort of 
return on that investment.
  Well, we cannot afford to have that investment come down onto the 
senior community, because we know it will be devastating. So we are 
going to continue to do battle to fight that Medicare issue. To end 
Medicare would be devastating to our Nation's seniors. Can we make it 
stronger? Absolutely. Can we provide more stability? Absolutely. That 
began in the ACA, the Affordable Care Act. We are going to continue to 
work on it. But seniors did not tell me--and I talked to my colleagues, 
they did not tell colleagues across this Nation: go back to Washington. 
We want to return to Washington. End our Medicare program. They said 
absolutely the reverse, and they knew they were benefited by it.
  There are a number of others that attacked the middle class, working 
families of this country. We are going to work to make certain that 
there is not an attack on the middle class, because that attack drains 
worthy programs of dollars and then gets transferred over to payments 
for millionaire tax cuts, billionaire tax cuts, Big Oil handouts, and 
corporate loopholes to be paid for.
  We are joined this evening by a very good friend who has entered the 
House this year as a freshman Member. He is the former mayor of 
Providence, Rhode Island. He now represents Rhode Island's First 
Congressional District. He has been an outspoken voice. I am impressed 
with David Cicilline's absolute impassioned voice to save Medicare. He 
has been outspoken on the House floor, and he has been outspoken in our 
caucus. It is a pleasure, Representative Cicilline, to have you here 
this evening to talk about this Medicare situation and perhaps what you 
are hearing in your district.
  Mr. CICILLINE. I thank the gentleman for his kind words and for 
giving me an opportunity to be a part of this discussion tonight and 
for your leadership on your importance of preserving Medicare for 
seniors in this

[[Page 7243]]

country. I hear from constituents in my district about the importance 
of strengthening and protecting Medicare.
  To give you an idea of how important this issue is in Rhode Island, 
more than 170,000 Rhode Islanders rely upon Medicare for a reliable, 
quality, and low-cost hospital and medical insurance as well as 
prescription drug coverage. More than 65,000 seniors and people with 
disabilities in Rhode Island rely upon Medicaid coverage for their 
long-term care.
  When I participated in the debate, and actually when I listened 
during the debate on this very floor about the Republican budget 
proposal and about what it did to Medicare, my friends on the other 
side of the aisle said this will strengthen Medicare. And I thought, 
how could they make that claim? Because I knew what their proposal did 
was ending Medicare as we know it, as a guarantee for people 55 and 
under; and it ended this important safety net and turned it into a 
voucher system for our seniors.
  Now, I unfortunately no longer have my grandparents; they have all 
passed. But the idea that my grandmother or grandfather in their later 
years would have to go into the private insurance market and buy 
insurance because they would have lost the protection of Medicare is 
something which I think nobody should be prepared to accept.
  What is even more disturbing is that what the Republicans passed in 
that budget when they ended Medicare as we know it also resulted in 
increased costs for our seniors. See, the difference is nothing in 
their proposal will reduce costs of health care. That's really what we 
need to do. We don't need to shift the cost to our seniors and visit 
that problem upon them, because then they have the burden of enduring 
additional health care costs. We need to obviously eliminate fraud and 
waste and abuse, invest in wellness and prevention, invest in 
information technology, all the things that will drive down health care 
costs. But shifting the burden to our seniors should not be the answer.
  The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office--this isn't Republicans 
and Democrats. This is nonpartisan--they said that this Republican 
budget, which was passed by the Republicans, would actually increase 
health care costs for our seniors, provide less costs and be more 
expensive, and it would restore the doughnut hole and make prescription 
drugs more expensive for our seniors. And in addition to that, when you 
take their budget proposal in the aggregate, it would add $8 trillion 
to the deficit over the next 10 years. So it doesn't even reduce the 
deficit.
  We all recognize we have got to reduce the deficit; we have to cut 
spending. We have to be serious about it, but we can't do it at the 
expense of our seniors, of protecting Medicare, strengthening Medicare 
so that our seniors have access to quality health care, and that's a 
responsibility that we have.
  There are lots of ways that we have to look at every part of this 
budget, eliminate fraud and waste, get rid of programs that don't work, 
be serious about looking at our military spending and what is happening 
in Afghanistan; we are spending $2 billion a week or more than that 
now. Look at the billions of dollars that we are giving in subsidies to 
big oil companies. They proposed in their budget another tax cut for 
the richest Americans, the millionaires and billionaires. At the same 
time, we are ending Medicare as we know it. It is the wrong priorities. 
We can do better than this. Our seniors deserve better than this.
  I thank the distinguished gentleman from New York for giving me an 
opportunity to share my observation that Rhode Island seniors are 
depending on me and this Congress to protect and strengthen Medicare. 
They expect us to deal with this deficit in a responsible way, be 
serious about budget cutting, but maintain our commitment to our 
seniors.
  Mr. TONKO. Thank you, Representative Cicilline. And, again, thank you 
for your outspokenness, because we need to make certain that all of 
America is involved in this dialogue, because this is a critical 
tipping point in this Nation's history. We can raid on the middle class 
and cut domestic programs that feed their very heart and soul, or we 
can do it intelligently, where we share the pain.
  Speaking of sharing the pain, a budget, as you indicate, is nothing 
more, nothing less than our values, our principles, our priorities. And 
we have seen where the priorities lie with the majority of this House. 
They have said it is about Big Oil first; it is about corporate 
loopholes first. It is about millionaires and billionaires first. The 
people now see this. They see this because they know they are going to 
have to pay two times what they pay today for Medicare coverage out of 
their pocket. They know it's shifting risk from government to the 
senior citizen household, the senior citizen individual. They know 
that, by the year 2030, triple the amount of money, plus the risk of 
going out there and making certain that you can find a carrier that 
will cover you, because they will put your coverage at the whims of the 
insurance company. If they want to cover some of your health care 
needs, they will. If not, they won't. And that is really what will ache 
here. What really happened was that we are taking this moral compass 
that has been expressed by a program like Medicare and denouncing it, 
saying that, look, go fend for yourself, find your program.
  What I find most generous about my district seniors, and I'm certain 
this is across the country, coast to coast, they are saying: I'm not 
just talking about myself or my generation. I am talking about my 
children and grandchildren. We know what comfort, what security, what 
stability this brought our household.

                              {time}  1840

  What comfort does it bring to adult children to know that their 
relatives, their parents are sitting in a situation that is responding 
with dignity?
  And when you talk about the principles, about the priorities, look at 
the road to ruin. They call it the ``path to prosperity'' with the Ryan 
plan with the Republican budget. The road to ruin, as I refer to it, 
really takes money from our seniors on Medicare, $4.3 trillion, that 
then goes and transfers itself over to, guess what? $4.2 trillion worth 
of benefits for Big Oil and millionaires and billionaires.
  So the scales are balanced in terms of where the dollars are, but the 
real pain here is that they get emptied from the seniors' coffers, 
programs that address a basic core need of health care, and then get 
emptied into the pockets of millionaires and billionaires and Big Oil.
  I know our friend from California, Representative John Garamendi, who 
is always leading us on the floor with wonderful, interesting 
discussion, has something to say about big oil companies, and it speaks 
to this flipping from one side of the scale to the other, where an 
equal amount of money found in savings by cutting the middle class, by 
cutting our seniors is now going to be spent. It is not savings. It was 
accruing the dollars necessary to just transfer over in some sort of 
way and some sort of painful way that finds itself with oil companies, 
millionaires and billionaires.
  Representative Garamendi, please.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Tonko, thank you very much for what you are doing, 
bringing up this critically important issue. As you were saying, 
nothing is more important than the question of who we are as Americans 
and our values; what is it that we really care about and how do we 
structure, how do we create a society that reflects those values.
  Before 1964, the largest segment of the American population that was 
in abject poverty were seniors. They had no health care. They couldn't 
get insurance. They were basically the poor of the poor. But as a 
result of the fundamental goodness of America, Medicare was created, a 
medical insurance program for seniors so that they would have available 
to them doctors' services and hospital services. And it worked.
  Now, I was the insurance commissioner in California for 8 years, 
elected

[[Page 7244]]

statewide by 34 million people to oversee, to regulate the insurance 
companies. And in that process we were looking and watching the 
Medicare program. It wasn't private insurance, but it was part of the 
health insurance system; and we knew that it worked.
  It is exceedingly efficient. It works for less than 2 percent. You 
got a nationwide insurance policy. Wherever you are in America, you get 
the exact same insurance policy. Doctors know how to bill; hospitals 
know how to bill. It is efficient; it is effective. It works. More than 
that, it is an expression of the basic goodness of America.
  I was surprised, shocked, angered when the Republican budget came 
forward and proposed that Medicare be terminated for all who want to 
live to the age of 65. Terminated. Ended. That wasn't all that the 
Republicans proposed. They proposed that not only would it be 
terminated, but that all future Medicare enrollees would be given a 
voucher worth about one-half the cost of insurance and told to go to 
the insurance companies and buy a policy.
  Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Time out, Mr. Republican. Time out. 
What are you saying? You are going to take the population that has 
preexisting conditions--there are very few that are 65 years of age 
that don't have preexisting conditions--and you are going to turn them 
over to the most voracious sharks in this Nation, the health insurance 
companies? No way. No way. They are going to get chewed up, spit out 
and uninsured, or else charged a small fortune. This is the most un-
American, the most inhumane thing that could be imagined for seniors, 
for tomorrow's seniors. We cannot let it happen.
  Then, on top of that, in the very next breath they proposed to 
continue billions of dollars of subsidies, taking money literally out 
of the pockets of seniors and working men and women and giving it to 
Big Oil, who happens to have big profits, just as you have on your card 
up there. Not only Big Oil, but the wealthiest people in America, 
people whose incomes are $1 million, $10 million, $1 billion a year 
income, and give them an additional tax break, so that in 10 years it 
is $4 trillion of tax breaks to the big oil companies and those, not 
millionaires, but those whose annual income is in the millions. What is 
going on here?
  Mr. TONKO. Representative Garamendi, if you will suffer an 
interruption and yield, you talk about those Big Oil profits. You talk 
about the trillions they are willing to spend. And then they have the 
audacity to say it is a spending problem.
  Well, where are we spending? We are making the comfortable more 
comfortable. With those Big Oil handouts, up to 90 percent, according 
to studies released, up to 90 percent are going toward bonuses for 
executives in the oil industry--up to 90 percent. What quantifiable 
societal good is there from these handouts? They are mindless. And 
today, today, someone from the industry was quoted as saying to not 
offer these handouts is un-American. It is unbelievable.
  Mr. CICILLINE. If the gentleman will yield, I think what is just 
shocking is that that claim was made today, and really what is un-
American is to end Medicare. The reality is Medicare reflects our 
values as a country. We decided as a Nation that we wanted to ensure 
that our seniors in their final years, that they have lived a life and 
played by the rules, done what is right, that they can live with 
security and dignity and without the fear, the anxiety of worrying how 
they would have access to basic health care, because we decided as a 
country that we wanted to ensure, to guarantee that our seniors could 
live with dignity and with proper health care.
  The idea of ending that and requiring them to go buy it with a 
voucher, that is un-American.
  Mr. TONKO. Right. And when you look at the statistics, the median 
household salary for our seniors is $19,000; the average individual 
salary is $19,000. When you look at the onerous outcome of having to 
reach for thousands more dollars out of your pocket on a base of a 
median of $19,000, when we are looking at millionaires and billionaires 
getting even more assistance, that is spending. So let's not get off 
track here. It is spending.
  Where are we going to invest? Investing in health care, a basic core 
need, when premiums in the last decade have risen over 130 percent and 
where the administrative costs of the private sector and insurance are 
higher, where they are much lower in Medicare, where the advertising 
costs aren't there, where we know we have had coverage. And now we are 
going: here is your voucher payment. It is not going to be indexed 
appropriately so that with time it becomes less and less valuable.
  This is the kind of un-American behavior that we are witnessing here 
and that people get upset about saying they are lies, they are fear 
tactics. This is what is happening. It ends Medicare.
  Once you remove the risk that falls with government and transfer it 
over to our Nation's seniors, you have ended the core principle. When 
you deny a given bit of certainty and stability to our seniors, you 
have ended Medicare. When you are going to inflate the cost of health 
care, you have ended Medicare. And we have now taken that money and 
transferred it over to the big oil companies.
  Representative Garamendi.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. Thank you for yielding. If you add to that 
destruction, the termination of Medicare, the way in which the 
Republicans have already voted for on this floor to end the Health Care 
Reform Act, which regulated the insurance companies and said the 
insurance companies could no longer discriminate based upon preexisting 
conditions, discriminate based upon age and whether you are a woman or 
a man, all of those protections that are in the health care reform law 
would be terminated.
  So not only are you taking the Medicare program and ending it, giving 
the seniors a voucher that is perhaps half of the cost of a health 
insurance policy, you are eliminating the restrictions that were placed 
on the insurance companies for discriminating against people that have 
preexisting conditions.

                              {time}  1850

  So you've literally taken these people and thrown them to the sharks. 
On top of that, the rest of the proposal was to take the Medicaid 
program, which is health insurance for impoverished children, and give 
a block grant to the State that's worth about half of the cost, a $700 
billion cut out of that program for children's health care, and you 
say, What's this? This is not us. This is not America. These are harsh, 
cruel programs that are being foisted upon the American citizens.
  Mr. TONKO. Representative Garamendi, if you will, that Medicaid cut 
also will impact the Nation's seniors because when they're in 
institutional settings we know about 66 percent of the expenditure is 
for our seniors. Again, we understand the compassion that is required. 
We know the American spirit to respond to those who have served society 
so well. And in their golden years they need the assistance. But every 
attempt that is being made here, we have tried every which way to 
inform the public of the attack on Medicare, the attack on Social 
Security, to privatize Social Security. This is about giving Big Oil, 
big insurance companies, big banks more business. This is like cashing 
in on being good to some people here. That is not how this government 
should be guided. It should be guided on the principles of providing 
the basic core needs in a way that's most effective, most efficient.
  We have even attempted--the House was addressing the Republican 
version of the budget. I introduced an amendment on the Budget 
Committee where I serve and presented it before the Budget Committee, 
and it went down by party vote to stop the attack on Medicare, to end 
Medicare. There was an absolute amendment that said, Let's pull out 
ending Medicare from your budget plan. It was denied. Then, I traveled 
to the Rules Committee and attempted once more before the bill came to 
the House, Let's stop the effort to end Medicare. It was denied at the 
Rules Committee again with the Republican majority at the Rules 
Committee.

[[Page 7245]]

  So now we're visiting this situation. And the budget was approved in 
this House with this raid on the middle class and the attack on the 
values of the middle class, of working families. It is really 
disturbing that the most comfortable continue to get that effort made 
their way. And especially when history speaks--and speaks so abundantly 
well to us. It should resonate. When we put people to work with FDR's 
programs back years ago, decades ago, the result was 8.5 million people 
put to work and public projects built that still serve us well today. 
JFK investing in global technology to win the space race. Those are 
examples of things that worked. LBJ promoting a Medicare program. Now 
we're repeating this driving the car into the ditch scenario. 
Reaganomics and its trickle-down didn't work. The Bush II Presidency 
and its cuts to the millionaire, billionaire companies didn't work. Why 
would we revisit that as we crawl out of the most painful recession and 
propose ending Medicare--ending Medicare--denying dignity to our 
Nation's seniors and avoiding the fundamental responsibility of good 
government, efficient government, which is what I think the voters 
asked for in November, not this sort of pain.
  Representative Cicilline.
  Mr. CICILLINE. I thank the gentleman. In addition to that, the other 
part of the Republican budget that passed in this Chamber was also to 
restore the doughnut hole; to make prescription drugs more expensive 
for our seniors and to eliminate the free preventative care. I know, 
from talking to seniors in my own district, there are too many seniors 
faced with a choice of, do I buy my groceries, or do I buy the 
prescription drugs that are necessary to keep me healthy. No senior in 
America should be faced with that choice. And this bill, this budget 
that the Republicans passed, will raise prescription costs for our 
seniors.
  Mr. TONKO. Thank you.
  Representative Garamendi, we have about 4 minutes remaining in our 
one-half hour here of dialogue.
  Mr. GARAMENDI. I'll take a lightning minute here.
  It really comes down to a question of: Where do you stand? Who do you 
stand for? It's very, very clear. If there's ever a dichotomy and a 
clear opportunity to see where you stand, it is in the Republican 
budget. Let's be very clear. It terminates Medicare; gives seniors a 
voucher that is worth perhaps half of the cost of insurance; takes $700 
billion out of Medicaid. And that is, as you said, the long-term care 
for seniors in nursing homes. And it continues the tax cuts for people 
whose income is millions, billions; continues the tax subsidies for Big 
Oil--$4 billion, $5 billion a year to companies that have made over a 
trillion dollars in the last decade. And just in this quarter, Exxon, 
$10.7 billion; Oxy, $1.6 billion; Conoco, $2.1 billion. This is one 
quarter, 3 months of earnings. Billions and billions of dollars. And 
then they want to continue.
  Where do you stand? Do you stand for the working men and women, the 
seniors, those people that need to be able to get health care, or do 
you stand for the very, very rich and the big oil companies? The 
Republicans have made it clear. There's a difference here between where 
we stand as Democrats and where they stand as Republicans.
  Mr. TONKO. Thank you, Representative Garamendi. I appreciate you and 
Representative Cicilline joining in this important half-hour of 
discussion. But I can clearly state that no one that I talked to in 
this House, no Representative, was hearing advocacy to end Medicare 
during our campaigns last year. I didn't hear one individual tell me 
that--senior, non-senior. I didn't hear anyone ask me to give more 
profits, more handouts, to big oil companies. I didn't hear one person 
say, Protect the corporate loopholes for corporations out there. I 
didn't hear anyone say, Hand more tax cuts to millionaires and 
billionaires.
  I did hear, Make my budget work at home. I need the basics. I did 
hear, I can't survive with the situation as it is. I did hear, We need 
jobs. I did hear, Start growing our economy. Stop shrinking the middle 
class.
  Well, evidently this majority was not listening. There was anger--
undeniable anger, understandable anger--that existed out there. But 
this is not this quantification that they were looking for. They did 
not want to see this as a result, as an outcome. I think we need to 
continue to fight this effort to end Medicare, and we're going to 
continue that fight.
  With that, I thank the gentlemen for joining me in this half hour.
  I yield back the balance of my time, Mr. Speaker.

                          ____________________