[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 6]
[Senate]
[Page 7553]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                                SCHEDULE

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, following leader remarks, if any, the Senate 
will be in a period of morning business until 3 p.m. today. During that 
period of time, Senators will be allowed to speak for up to 10 minutes 
each.
  At 3 p.m. the Senate will resume consideration of the motion to 
proceed to S. 1039, the PATRIOT Act extension, and the time until 5 
p.m. will be equally divided and controlled. At 5 p.m. there be a 
rollcall vote on the motion to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed 
to the PATRIOT Act.
  Mr. President, this will be a busy week in the Senate. We have to 
renew the PATRIOT Act. It is not a perfect law, but it plays an 
important role in keeping our country safe. We also have to reauthorize 
the FAA bill, the Federal Aviation Administration bill.
  We all know what will be the focus of this week's biggest debate and 
biggest headlines. The primary conversation this week will be about the 
Republican plan to kill Medicare. People are talking a lot about that 
plan because there is a lot people have to fear.
  The Republican plan would shatter a cornerstone of our society and 
break our promise to the elderly and to the sick. It would turn our 
seniors' health care over to profit-hungry insurance companies. It 
would let bureaucrats decide what tests and treatment seniors get. It 
would also ask seniors to pay more for their health care in exchange 
for fewer benefits.
  That is a bad deal all around. So it is easy to understand why the 
American people do not support it. Democrats, Republicans, and 
Independents do not support the plan to kill Medicare or to change it 
as we know it. I will not support it, and though the Republican House 
passed the Medicare-killing plan almost unanimously, sometimes it is 
difficult to tell where the Republican Party stands generally.
  We all saw how quickly one prominent Republican Presidential 
candidate spun himself in circles last week. First, he called the plan 
for what it was--radical. He said it was ``right-wing social 
engineering.''
  Hours later, after Republicans jumped all over him, he reversed 
course and said he would support the plan to kill Medicare. Remember, 
he said it is ``radical''; it is ``right-wing social engineering.'' And 
now suddenly he said it is OK. That is some real interesting 
gymnastics.
  Another prominent Republican, one who serves in this body, has been 
all over the map as well. First, he said--in his words:

       Thank God for the Republican plan to kill Medicare.

  Then he said he was ``undecided.'' Now he says he opposes it. Well, 
tune in tomorrow or maybe this evening to see if he changes his mind 
again. Our Republican colleagues cannot seem to believe the same thing 
today they said yesterday.
  But when Democrats talk about Medicare, we still believe today the 
same thing we believed years ago, decades ago, generations ago. We 
believe in our responsibility to each other and especially those in 
their golden years. Forty-six years ago this summer, President Lyndon 
Johnson, a former majority leader of this body, signed Medicare into 
law. As he did so, he said the following:

       Few can see past the speeches and the political battles to 
     the doctor over there that is tending the infirm, and to the 
     hospital that is receiving those in anguish, or feel in their 
     heart painful wrath at the injustice which denies the miracle 
     of healing to the old and to the poor.

  Those injustices do not exist like they used to because of Medicare, 
but they still exist. Potentially, they are still out there. The old 
and the poor among us still seek help and healing, and it is still our 
responsibility to act not on political impulses but with human concern 
and compassion. It is still our responsibility not to be motivated by 
short-term politics but to be moved by the people who need Medicare, 
the people who count on the safety net to keep them from poverty, 
illness, and worse--death.
  If we pay attention to those people, we will notice something else 
also. While Republicans are tripping over themselves trying to decide 
whether they want to kill Medicare, do you know who has not changed 
their minds at all? The American people. We are on their side. They 
have not wavered one inch. They have been as constant as the 
Republicans have been erratic. They have been consistent, and they have 
been clear: They do not want us to destroy their Medicare--their 
Medicare. We owe it to them to listen.

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