[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 11]
[House]
[Pages 15735-15741]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                            A WEEK IN REVIEW

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 3, 2013, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert) is recognized 
for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
  Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, at this time, I yield to my friend from 
Florida (Mr. DeSantis).


                               ObamaCare

  Mr. DeSANTIS. I thank the gentleman from Texas.
  Mr. Speaker, I just want to say a few words about accountability.
  Normally, the way it works is that Congress can consider a piece of 
legislation. Maybe it passes. Maybe the President signs it. You 
implement it. Then the voters can decide whether they like it, whether 
it lived up to its billing, so to speak.
  With ObamaCare, it was interesting because this was rammed through 
Congress at the beginning of 2010; yet it is just now really being 
implemented. I am starting to get a lot of people in my district 
contacting my office who are really shocked at some of the stiff 
premium increases they are seeing. So I think it is useful just to 
review some of the promises that were made and whether any of those 
promises have been kept. I think what you will find is that this is a 
law not only that the public opposed, not only that was rammed through 
with no bipartisan support, but a law that in many ways is resting on 
false pretenses.
  Promise one, the President made this: it will lower premiums by up to 
$2,500 for a typical family per year.
  I have not seen that true anyplace. In fact, people are seeing $2,500 
increases. There was a family in California, it was reported, who saw 
an increase of

[[Page 15736]]

$10,000. So I think, right here, as this is being implemented, we know 
that that is just not going to be the case.

                              {time}  1830

  Promise number two, the President said this: ``If you like your 
doctor, you will be able to keep your doctor. If you like your health 
care plan, you will be able to keep your health care plan.'' Period.
  Well, we know that that is not true. We see spouses losing spousal 
coverage. We see people with major companies losing their employer-
provided insurance, getting pushed into some of these exchanges.
  So the idea that ``if you like your plan, you can keep it'' is 
absolutely not proving to be true for thousands of people throughout 
the country.
  This is just beginning. People who have looked at this from the 
Congressional Budget Office to other groups say you could have anywhere 
from 7 to 30 million Americans who actually lose their employer plans 
because of ObamaCare.
  Of course, if you are losing your plan and you are getting pushed 
into an exchange, you may not be able to keep your doctor because that 
doctor may not be in the network, may not be available based on the 
plan that you are having to take because you have lost your original 
plan.
  Promise number three--this is the President: ``I can make a firm 
pledge: under my plan no family making less than $250,000 will see any 
form of tax increase.''
  Well, we know that the individual mandate he said wasn't a tax. Then 
when it got challenged in the Supreme Court, his administration was 
saying, yeah, uphold it because it is a tax. That is eventually what 
the court did, saying that it is a tax. That is a tax that hits blue 
collar ``salt of the Earth'' people, forcing them to buy a product that 
essentially they may not even be physically able to obtain because the 
Web sites don't work, and if not, they are going to tax you. That 
certainly hasn't been true.
  But there are a whole bunch of other things in the law that hit 
middle-income and lower-income people. There is a cap on flexible 
spending accounts. It is actually harder under ObamaCare to deduct 
medical expenses from your income taxes. Even a tax on indoor tanning 
salons. I think there are a lot of people who make less than $250,000 a 
year who are doing the tanning salons.
  Then, of course, there are a whole bunch of other taxes--over a 
trillion dollars--that may not be directly levied on somebody making 
less than $250,000, but the costs will end up being passed on. For 
example, the employer mandate, the tax on health insurance plans, the 
medical device tax. Those taxes are on companies, but those costs are 
going to get pushed to individuals, and they are going to have to bear 
the cost of that. And, oh, by the way, certain good health care plans 
that a lot of union members have who are not making $250,000 a year, 
those are considered Cadillac plans, and those will be taxed extra 
going forward.
  Finally, the President said: ``I will sign a universal health care 
bill into law by the end of my first term as President that will cover 
every American.'' It is interesting--people on the other side of the 
aisle will say, oh, you Republicans, why don't you want everybody to be 
covered? The most recent analysis from the Congressional Budget Office 
said that in 10 years from now--so after 13 years of ObamaCare being 
the law--you will still have in this country 31 million Americans that 
don't have any insurance. Of course, we know ObamaCare is causing 
people to lose the insurance that they have.
  So this is not something that is a universal health care bill, by any 
stretch of the imagination. There are going to be a lot of people who 
aren't going to have any insurance.
  The point I just wanted to make with this is, there has got to be 
accountability in government. People want to have a redress of their 
grievances. These issues were not necessarily teed up in the election, 
and so now people are coming to terms with what has happened. So the 
point I would just make is, at a minimum when you are dealing with the 
broken promises of ObamaCare, we have got to communicate to the public 
that this has got to be based on some semblance of fairness.
  For example, the Members of Congress who wrote this law must live 
under the exact terms of the statute. They should not be granted any 
extra legal relief from the burdens of ObamaCare. The fact that 
businesses have had the law delayed for them--and, of course, Members 
of Congress have gotten special treatment as well--I think individual 
Americans have got to be given the same deal. It is just wrong to have 
the IRS tax people to buy something from Web sites that aren't 
functional--and buy products that they may not like.
  So accountability is key. This is a law that was passed. There were 
specific promises made over and over again. What we are finding now, 
unfortunately, is those promises are not being kept.
  Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate so much my friend from 
Florida. I am always greatly appreciative and thrilled when I find 
somebody who attended an Ivy League school that got a good education.
  The points are well made by my friend from Florida. There were many 
promises made and promises not kept. Go from top to bottom:
  ``If you like your insurance, you can keep it.'' Not remotely true.
  ``If you like your doctor, you can keep them.'' Not remotely true. So 
many stories are coming forward.
  ``It is actually going to be cheaper for Americans under ObamaCare.'' 
Not remotely true, unless perhaps you are in New York. There is a small 
part of the country, a small group of individuals, who were already 
paying so much because of a massive amount of waste or laws that 
allowed for a great amount of waste or abuse; in those there may be 
some people that actually saved money. But for most Americans, they are 
not only going to have to pay more, they are going to pay dramatically 
more.
  As we have seen the government shutdown play out, it has been 
interesting to note the things that have been open and the things that 
have been closed. We were told that only essential government services 
would be provided.
  We had also passed immediately before the shutdown and sent to the 
Senate a military pay bill. Now, that military pay bill was 
intentionally left broad enough so that it could take care of the need 
to take care of the death benefit, broad enough to take care of the 
needs of the family that are always provided by the military, by the 
Department of Defense, for those who paid the ultimate sacrifice in 
losing a loved one in the course of combat. And lo and behold, even 
though that was made clear, it also was made clear in the bill that 
civilian employees could be included. Even independent contractors 
under that law were allowed to continue working that were supporting 
the role of the military. So it was a very broadly worded act in order 
to give the Obama administration, and particularly the Defense 
Department, great latitude to make sure important things got done.
  Now as we have seen, the Secretary of Defense has laid off hundreds 
of thousands of civilian workers, though the bill gave him latitude to 
leave them working and they supported the military. It was only after 
about a week that they finally said, okay, we are going to let a whole 
lot of those employees come back now that we have made the 
determination that the bill gives us enough latitude to allow them to 
work.
  We told him it did. The bill gave him that kind of power. Perhaps he 
had talked to President Obama and they decided, yeah, let's put lots of 
people out of work, or perhaps he had not talked to the President. We 
don't know.
  But as Peggy Noonan pointed out recently, talking about things that 
have gone on here in the last couple of weeks, she reminded us of Harry 
Truman's sign that was on his desk: ``The buck stops here.''
  They didn't have to hurt all those civilian employees. They could 
have left

[[Page 15737]]

them working. But they chose to send them home, creating more hardship. 
They chose not to pay the death benefit for families who were entitled 
to it after losing a loved one who is a patriot. They chose to do those 
things.
  They have chosen to close parks, farms, different things that don't 
cost the Federal Government a dime, don't cost anything. But they have 
strategically chosen to close things that create suffering, some chaos, 
different problems for people. It is as if the park rangers, who were 
quoted recently, were exactly right in saying that they were told: make 
life as difficult as possible for people, because that is what the 
administration has done.
  But there is good news. This story was published by FOX News:

       National Parks Are Closed, the IRS Call Centers Have No 
     Staff.

  And I insert parenthetically here:
  The IRS is still getting your money in, the money is still flowing 
in, they are just not helping people as it flows in.
  The article says:

       Countless government Web sites have been taken down.

  We know even the panda camera was turned off, even though it required 
no monitoring.

       Yet despite these changes, which range from inconveniences 
     to major headaches, a number of not so essential government 
     operations are still up and running. Here are a few that have 
     evaded the partial government shutdown:
       The Denali commission.
       You have probably never even heard of the Denali 
     Commission. But the tiny Alaska-based economic development 
     agency gained some notoriety after it emerged that the 
     group's inspector general was petitioning Congress to defund 
     it.
       But guess what agency survived the shutdown? According to 
     its own contingency plan, because the Commission's staffers 
     are paid under the prior year's budget, all 14 employees are 
     exempt from furlough, and ``reporting to work.''

  That is a commission that its own inspector general petitioned 
Congress to defund.
  Another government function that was left up: ``The White House 
Twitter.'' Oh, sure, there were plenty of government help Web sites 
that would have made life easier for people having to deal with the 
Federal Government. They were shut down because they would have helped 
people. But the White House Twitter was left up and rolling. As the 
article says:

       Right as Congress missed the deadline last week to pass a 
     spending bill, First Lady Michelle Obama's office informed 
     its Twitter followers that: ``Due to Congress' failure to 
     pass legislation to fund the government,'' updates to the 
     official First Lady Twitter account would be limited.
       But the White House Twitter account is alive and well.
       The account has blasted out a series of tweets calling on 
     Congress to end the budget impasse.

  Another item that has been left up and running despite all of the 
government Web sites and help call centers and all that have been shut 
down, and that is ``Let's Move.'' The article says:

       While a number of government Web sites have been 
     temporarily taken offline, and the First Lady's Twitter 
     account has been largely abandoned, not so for Michelle 
     Obama's Let's Move campaign.
       The Web site for the First Lady's healthy-living initiative 
     remains operational--though it doesn't appear to have been 
     updated much since September. The top of the site displays 
     the message: ``Cheers to Water!''

  Another thing left up was the ``Park Rangers on Patrol.''

       Despite national parks and monuments being shuttered across 
     the country for lack of funds, the National Park Service is 
     devoting considerable resources to putting up barricades and 
     patrolling them.
       An innkeeper along the Blue Ridge Parkway who was forced to 
     close his business due to the partial shutdown told 
     FOXNews.com that park rangers have set up a ``24/7 blockade'' 
     outside his inn--to prevent would-be customers from coming 
     in.

  Another thing, the ``Obama Campaign Stop.''

       President Obama canceled a long-planned trip to Asia over 
     the budget impasse.
       But he, nevertheless, ventured outside the beltway last 
     week for a rally in nearby Rockville, Maryland, to pressure 
     Republicans to pass a budget bill.

                              {time}  1845

  The article says budget bill, but actually we are past the budget 
time. Now it is appropriation time, and that is what we need.
  The Patent Office. If you happened to invent something during the 
stalemate, good news. The United States Patent and Trademark Office is 
open for business. According to the office, it is using fees from the 
prior year to keep running and should be able to for roughly 4 weeks.
  The IRS is taking but not giving. IRS call centers are closed. The 
IRS is not issuing refunds during the partial shutdown. The agency, 
though, will gladly accept tax payments during that time. The IRS says 
in a statement on its Web site:

       The IRS will accept and process all tax returns with 
     payments, but will be unable to issue refunds during this 
     time.

  Another article from the Right Scoop had talked about the Amber Alert 
Web site being taken down. Although some have been kept up, the Amber 
Alert Web site was allowed to go down. And, thankfully, the 
administration realized there was enough pressure. For heaven's sake, 
it is for children who are kidnapped, lost. So, thankfully, the 
administration finally decided after enough pressure to bring the Amber 
Alert Web site back up.
  It has been amazing to me, and I saw it again today in some of our 
memorial sites, memorials that are down on The Mall, the Iwo Jima 
monument, or the memorial, we have spent--this administration, that is, 
has spent more money keeping people out of open-air memorials than it 
ever spends just to leave them open. They are open 24/7. I have been up 
to the Iwo Jima, the U.S. Marine Corps monument so many times since I 
have been in Congress, again, all hours of the day and night. I don't 
sleep that much while I am here on the Hill.
  Although we have some park rangers who don't know the parking laws 
and give tickets to people who are lawfully allowed to be there--
apparently not enough training for our rangers--but they have gone to 
the trouble to get barriers to make life difficult for veterans, World 
War II veterans that fought to secure Iwo Jima, being kept out of 
seeing the Iwo Jima monument. Why? Because they put barricades in the 
way to keep people from going up and being able to drive up there.
  One of the times I went up there during the last couple of weeks, 
there were probably 200 people up there, but they had to park over by 
the townhouses, go over rails, down steep embankments and get in there. 
Unfortunately, as this administration knows, our World War II veterans 
in their eighties and nineties that I have been with and that I have 
helped and pushed wheelchairs for, they are not able to climb over 
rails and go down steep embankments, although they sure did while 
fighting in the Pacific, European theater, and North Africa. But they 
cannot do it now. And for anyone to keep putting up the barricades at 
that Iwo Jima monument just to screw over our veterans is outrageous. I 
don't know who is doing it, but shame on the people who are doing it.
  I was gratified last weekend, on one occasion I went up there, and 
there were plastic barricades that had been filled with water to hold 
them in place, make them too big for a person to push over, and yet 
there were three busloads of World War II veterans up at the Iwo Jima 
monument, and someone had rammed those plastic barriers, knocking them 
over, spilling the water everywhere. Once the water was dispersed, 
pushed them out of the way. A wooden barricade looked like it had been 
run over so the buses could go up there. I don't know if those buses 
did that or not. I like to think they did, that those World War II 
veterans were not going to have some mean-spirited person in the 
administration up there to prevent them from seeing the Iwo Jima 
monument for one time before they left this world.
  Mr. Speaker, I hope the people in this administration that keep 
trying to punish the American people so that they can get the money 
that they are demanding, that S&P and Moody's has said you guys have to 
get responsible about the money you are spending, the money that 
American taxpayers gave

[[Page 15738]]

the Republicans, the majority, in 2010 to do something about. My 
friends across the aisle are constantly saying elections have 
consequences. That is right. The American people didn't like ObamaCare, 
and so they voted the Democrats in the House out of the majority with 
people running on that main issue. We will do everything we can to get 
rid of ObamaCare.
  It is true that the President won reelection. Many of us still 
believe that if we had had a candidate that could challenge the abuses 
of ObamaCare before the last election last year instead of one that 
gave a prototype for it in his home State, the President would not have 
been reelected. But Republicans chose a very nice man, a philanthropic 
man, a great businessman, a very caring American, but somebody who had 
already shown he supported a type of socialized medicine in his home 
State.
  ObamaCare, as it was passed, as it was originating in the Senate and 
then passed in the Senate, sent down to the House as bill H.R. 3590, 
should have originated in this House because it raises revenue, called 
penalties. It is called penalties throughout the bill. The Supreme 
Court noted that. In a very hypocritical opinion, the Supreme Court 
went to page 15 and noted that Congress called it a penalty. It only is 
applied if people don't do what is required. That makes it a penalty. 
Clearly, it is a penalty because the anti-injunction act makes very 
clear that if Congress passes a tax, then no Federal court can take it 
up and make a decision on it until the tax is actually imposed and the 
person suing has standing by virtue of having the tax actually imposed 
on them. That is a nutshell.
  So if the Supreme Court had found that ObamaCare contained a tax and 
not a penalty, then it would not have jurisdiction. But the Supreme 
Court opinion at page 15 decided it is a penalty; it is not a tax. If 
it was a tax, we couldn't go any further on the opinion. The opinion 
would be over. We would have to dismiss and wait for the tax to 
actually be assessed. But since it is a penalty, like Congress called 
it through the bill, and since it is a penalty, as President Obama made 
very clear to the American public--it is not a tax; it is a penalty--
the Supreme Court went on. Eventually, after determining that 
ObamaCare, as written, based on what the proponents said was the 
interstate commerce clause that gave it the authority to pass 
ObamaCare, the Supreme Court said, no, it doesn't. The interstate 
commerce clause does not give authority to Congress to pass a bill that 
takes over health care. That is not constitutional.
  Then eventually they got over and took up the issue of exactly what 
was involved in the individual mandate, the business mandate, and the 
Court concluded that actually, despite Congress calling it a penalty, 
the President assuring America it was a penalty and not a tax, the 
Supreme Court ends up saying it is a tax, and, therefore, it is 
constitutional. So we, as the Supreme Court, will rewrite the law and 
uphold it as we have rewritten; because as it is written, it is not 
constitutional, but we will rewrite it. Though that would be 
legislating and it would be unconstitutional, they did it anyway.
  So when I hear people say it has been upheld by the Supreme Court, 
no, the bill that was passed was not upheld by the Supreme Court. It 
was struck down as violating the interstate commerce clause, but the 
Supreme Court did them a favor. They rewrote it legislatively, violated 
the Constitution in doing so, and then sent it back.
  And now Americans across the country, by the millions, are suffering 
as a result of a tax the majority of Americans did not want, that all 
Americans promised was not a tax, and now it is taking away their 
insurance. It is taking a way their doctors. It is taking away, really, 
quality health care that most Americans had.
  So it would seem if the idea behind ObamaCare was strictly to help 
those who are uninsured, we should have dealt strictly with those 
Americans. But that is not what ObamaCare was about. It was about the 
G-R-E, the government running everything.
  I am amazed at how many friends across the aisle who have screamed 
and hollered about we don't want the government in our bedroom voted 
for a bill that puts the government in your bedroom, in your bathroom, 
in your kitchen, in your closets. It puts the Federal Government 
everywhere. And you combine that with what the all Democratic majority 
House and Senate passed with President Obama at the helm, that created 
a bureau under the guise of making sure that credit card companies were 
fair, and now that bureau is gathering everyone's credit card 
information and debit card information under the guise of making sure 
they are playing fair. This Federal Government has seized more private 
information. They have been more vindictive through weaponizing the 
IRS, and we are finding out about other agencies and departments. It is 
more than any administration has ever done, and American people will 
ultimately pay the price.
  I hope and pray that the Supreme Court will take up the origination 
clause litigation because that bill did not originate in the House; and 
the origination clause says any bill that raises revenue must originate 
in the House, and the only single thing in that bill that was left was 
the number. Even the title about being a change to the Internal Revenue 
Code to provide a tax credit for first time home buyers who were in the 
military or veterans, they didn't leave a single word of that bill; and 
they brought in something completely ungermane to that bill for 
veterans and military members.

                              {time}  1900

  And instead of taking care of the millions they said were uninsured, 
that was the whole purpose of ObamaCare, they have done tremendous 
damage across the country to so very many.
  As the shutdown has gone on that was brought on, not by the House 
Republicans, who passed a bill, we said, Look, Americans are being 
devastated by ObamaCare. The health care industry is being decimated.
  Since a majority of the American people didn't want it, gave us 
control of the House as a result of it, let's get rid of it. We have 
got to start acting responsibly about the money we spend. Taking away 
Americans' rights to decide whether they should have knee surgery, back 
surgery, get a pacemaker, taking away the right and the ability of 
Americans to determine what kind of treatment they should get is not 
something, when we are in financial difficulty, we should be doing. 
That was struck down. It shouldn't have been a surprise. Harry Reid 
didn't want to pass it. The President didn't want to.
  Then the House began sending down one compromise which was turned 
down. Okay, let's just suspend it for a year. That would be the fair 
thing to do. As so many have said, Republicans and Democrats across the 
country, it was not ready for prime time. It was a train wreck. It was 
a nightmare. Let's just suspend it for a year. We know the President 
wants it, so we are not talking about getting rid of it like a majority 
of Americans want to do. Let's just suspend it for a year.
  When that didn't go and the Senate said, No, we want a shutdown, we 
are not doing this, then we sent down a further compromise to basically 
suspended for 1 year the individual mandate just as businesses had 
gotten, as the President rewrote the law. The Constitution doesn't 
allow him to do it. Congress is supposed to step up, as happened in 
past generations where I'm told no matter whether a Democrat or 
Republican President, no matter who controlled the House and Senate, 
when a President overstepped his constitutional authority this far, 
usually there would be a trip down Pennsylvania from leaders of the 
House and Senate, both parties, that would privately tell the 
President, You overstepped your bounds. Back off, or we are going to 
defund everything that you are trying to push through on this, and it 
would get worked out.
  Unfortunately, at the other end of the Hall in the Senate, they are 
not bothered by the fact that the President, by a stroke of the pen, 
wrote legislation and undid what the law said and made up his own law. 
That is not supposed to happen under our Constitution, but it did. We 
were bothered by it

[[Page 15739]]

in the House, so we said, Look, let's work this out like gentle people. 
Let's just postpone it for a year. When that didn't work, we said, 
Let's at least suspend the individual mandate. You have suspended it 
for the business community. Let's do it for individuals. They wouldn't 
even do that.
  Then when that didn't work, we sent a bill to the Senate that said, 
Okay, we are not trying to push anything on you. Just sit down and 
talk. Here are our negotiators. You appoint your negotiators. That is 
what the Constitution, law, and the rules require, and we will have 
this worked out probably by the time people get up in the morning; and 
they would not even appoint negotiators. Why? Because I believe they 
believe the conventional wisdom from the last 3 years that if the 
Democratic Senate and President forced a shutdown, the Main Street 
media would blame Republicans. It would enure politically to their 
benefit, and it would be worth causing the pain of a shutdown. So they 
refused to even negotiate at that point. It was not until the polls 
showed that the President had dropped to 37 percent from a favorable 
rating of 53 percent to an unfavorable rating that we finally had a 
willingness to sit down and talk.
  During those times that so many things have been shut down, including 
the Normandy Cemetery--this story emerged yesterday from 
Marketplace.org:

       Coming Soon to Your Favorite TV Shows: Plot Lines About the 
     Affordable Care Act.
       Hollywood Health & Society, a program with the USC 
     Annenberg Norman Lear Center got a $500,000 grant this week 
     from The California Endowment to help TV writers tell better 
     stories about the new health insurance law.

  That is $500,000 to Hollywood for propaganda to tell people who are 
suffering from the ravages of losing their insurance, losing their 
doctors, losing the ability to make decisions under new policies as 
they once did, telling them how good they had it. That $500,000 would 
have paid to open a lot of memorials and parks. It would have kept the 
Moore farm going for years that doesn't get a dime of Federal money and 
hasn't since 1980, but may lose the farm because of the outrageous 
actions of the National Park Service in forcing it closed; as the park 
Ranger said, making it as difficult as they can for people.
  Here is an article from Ken Blackwell:

       When President Obama signed the Patient Protection and 
     Affordable Care Act on March 23, 2010, it was the starting 
     gun for a massive Federal effort to get the new system up and 
     running. The administration had deliberately allowed for 3\1/
     2\ years for the launch, October 1, 2013.
       That's a long time. It's 1,288 days. You would think, in 
     that length of time, we could have brought a system online 
     that would not be bedeviled with glitches. And more glitches.
       By comparison, FDR had 912 days from the Japanese attack on 
     Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941, to D-day, June 6, 1944, the 
     Allied invasion of Normandy. The D-day Museum at Portsmouth, 
     England maintains a Web site that offers some idea of what 
     was involved in mounting the invasion.

  It says further down:

       Today, Obama administration officials are making the rounds 
     of TV talk shows touting the millions of Americans who have 
     logged on day one of ObamaCare. They are not able tell us how 
     many of those millions have actually signed up for ObamaCare. 
     But that, of course, may be due to the fact that 85% of 
     Americans already have health insurance and the rest, 
     primarily healthy young adults, may have reasons for not 
     having health insurance.
       It's interesting to hear administration spokespersons 
     dodging and weaving about how many Americans actually are 
     eager to give all their personal data to the IRS and then be 
     guided about by navigators chosen by Mr. Obama out of his 
     compassionate concern for his people. Obama Cares was an 
     inspired idea for a bumper sticker last fall. It helped the 
     incumbent easily gain a second term in the White House.
       It's odd, though, that after 4 years of major liberal 
     legislation, the FDR comparisons have largely disappeared.
       Americans today can judge how warm-hearted President Obama 
     is. His administration has ordered the closure of the World 
     War II Memorial in Washington. Ninety-year olds on Honor 
     Flights faced barricades as they made that last trip to see 
     the monument to their heroism on D-day and a thousand days.
       White House spokesman Jay Carney raced to tell reporters 
     that it was not the intent of the Obama administration to 
     deny death benefits to families of soldiers recently killed 
     in Afghanistan. It just seems to have been another glitch. 
     The Obama spokesman's efforts to avoid responsibility were 
     strenuous. But he might have consulted another veteran of 
     that great WWII generation. Harry Truman kept a plaque on his 
     desk in the White House: The Buck Stops Here.

  That was the article I was thinking of earlier.
  Here's another article from October 10 by Jocelyn Maminta from New 
Haven, Connecticut.

       In the midst of major changes in health care, 
     UnitedHealthCare has sent thousands of pink slips to 
     Connecticut doctors.
       Termination letters went to physicians caring for Medicare 
     patients. Those letters were sent out to doctors caring for 
     ``Medicare Advantage'' patients. It's a plan, marketed to 
     seniors to provide additional services through 
     UnitedHealthCare.
       A mix of primary care and specialty doctors are affected by 
     it. And it comes at a questionable time.
       Open enrollment for Medicare starts next Tuesday, and it's 
     still not clear at this time as to which doctors are still in 
     the United network.
       The Connecticut State Medical Society is fighting back. The 
     biggest concern is patient access to healthcare.
       ``What the government is looking for is to manage better 
     care by adding a patient-centered medical home so that you 
     have a doctor who is totally invested with taking care of 
     every aspect of the patient and coordinating it. This is 
     clearly not a patient-centered decision,'' said Dr. Michael 
     Saffir, president of CT State Medical Society.

  Perhaps that is Connecticut Medical Society.
  Anyway, it has an update at the bottom:

       In an email statement, UnitedHealthCare spokesman Ben 
     Goldstein told News 8, ``With the many changes happening in 
     health care, we are building a network of health care 
     providers that we can collaborate with more closely to have 
     the most positive impact on the quality of care for our 
     members.

  And what a lot of people didn't realize, but they soon found out, 
ObamaCare, the so-called ``Affordable Care Act,'' actually cut over 
$700 billion in Medicare reimbursements. It took money that was going 
to be used for senior citizens' health care and put it towards trying 
to get this horrendous, this unworkable bill to the American people.
  May I inquire as to how much time I have remaining.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman has 15 minutes remaining.
  Mr. GOHMERT. In an article from WND Radio published October 10, they 
wrote:

       Sticker Shock! Americans Floored By ObamaCare Cost.
       The technical problems with the ObamaCare insurance 
     exchanges are no surprise, are further evidence the whole 
     program should be delayed or scrapped and Americans will be 
     even more horrified when they can get somewhere on the Web 
     site, according to health care policy expert Grace-Marie 
     Turner.
       The first 10 days of the ObamaCare insurance exchanges have 
     been a technological and public relations mess for the 
     administration. Many Americans have suffered through hours of 
     stalled or crashed Web sites, no reporter has yet been able 
     to navigate the site, and many people have entered personal 
     information that online security experts believe could make 
     them targets for identity theft.

                              {time}  1915

       When WND spent hours online and on the phone trying to get 
     a cost estimate for an ObamaCare plan, it was told to expect 
     a quote by January 1. As WND reported, anecdotal evidence on 
     the government's own health care Facebook page suggests both 
     problems are significant factors.
       A few users seemed simply confused, but the overwhelming 
     number of comments were critical, and many of those were 
     scathing. Complaints about the application process had three 
     recurring themes: long waits, glitches, and sticker shock. 
     There was also much ridicule of the site's ability to handle 
     ``tremendous demand.''
       Information technology experts told The Wall Street Journal 
     the Web site ``appeared to be built on a sloppy software 
     foundation.''

  Another article from WND published yesterday--I am not sure I like 
the title, ```Pulling Out Hair' Over ObamaCare Web Site `Nightmare.''' 
Sometimes people look okay with their hair out. Sometimes they don't.
  The article says:

       Forget, for a minute, all those arguments about the new 
     health care law's ``death panels,'' the forced cancellation 
     of existing coverage, the violations of religious liberty, 
     and

[[Page 15740]]

     the transformation of full-time jobs into part-time work. 
     Even people who want to sign up for ObamaCare are finding it 
     impossible.
       Digital Trends reports the healthcare.gov Web site already 
     has ``shut down, crapped out, stalled, and misloaded so 
     consistently that its track record for failure is challenged 
     only by Congress.'' That is even though taxpayers paid ``more 
     than $634 million'' for ``the digital equivalent of a rock,'' 
     the report said.
       The site itself, which apparently underwent major code 
     renovations over the weekend, still rejects user logins, 
     fails to load drop-down menus and other critical components 
     for users that successfully gain entrance, and otherwise 
     prevents uninsured Americans in the 36 States it serves from 
     purchasing health care at competitive rates--healthcare.gov's 
     primary purpose,'' the report said.

  It goes on to talk about the massive nightmares of the people that 
are trying to sign on to it.
  Here is an article from Peggy Noonan from The Wall Street Journal: 
``Now is the Time to Delay ObamaCare'':

       The Obama administration has an implementation problem. 
     More than any administration of the modern era, they know how 
     to talk but have trouble doing. They give speeches about 
     ObamaCare, but when it is unveiled, what the public sees is a 
     Potemkin village designed by the noted architect Rube 
     Goldberg. They speak ringingly about the case for action in 
     Syria but can't build support in the U.S. foreign policy 
     community, in Congress, among the public. Recovery summer is 
     always next summer. They have trouble implementing. Which, of 
     course, is the most boring but crucial part of governing. It 
     is not enough to talk; you must perform.
       There is an odd sense with members of this administration 
     that they think words are actions. Maybe that is why they 
     tweet so much. Maybe they imagine Bashir Assad seeing their 
     tweets and musing: ``Ah, Samantha is upset--then I shall 
     change my entire policy, in respect for her emotions!''
       That gets us to the real story of last week, this week, and 
     the future, the one beyond the shutdown, the one that normal 
     people are both fully aware of and fully understand, and that 
     is the utter and catastrophic debut of ObamaCare. Even for 
     those who expected problems, and that would be everyone who 
     follows government, it has been a shock.
       They had 3.5 years to set it up! They knew exactly when it 
     would be unveiled, on October 1, 2013. On that date, they 
     knew millions could be expected to go online to see if they 
     benefit.

  And it goes on. It is an excellent article. She says:

       A quick summary of what didn't work. Those who went on 
     Federal and State exchanges reported malfunctions during 
     login, constant error messages, inability to create new 
     accounts, frozen screens, confusing instructions, endless 
     wait times, help lines that put people on hold and then cut 
     them off, lost passwords and user names.
       After the administration floated the fiction that the 
     problems were due to heavy usage, the Journal tracked down 
     insurance and technology experts who said the real problems 
     were inadequate coding and flaws in the architecture of the 
     system.
       . . . The founder of McAfee slammed the system's lack of 
     security on Fox Business Network, calling it a hacker's 
     happiest nocturnal fantasy. He predicted millions of identity 
     thefts. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen 
     Sebelius--grilled, surprisingly, on ``The Daily Show''--
     sounded like--and that is unkind, but--she failed to justify 
     why, in the middle of the chaos, individuals cannot be 
     granted a 1-year delay, just as businesses have been.
       More ominously, many of those who got into the system 
     complained of sticker shock--high premiums, high deductibles.

  She goes on to say, talking about Republicans:

       They would make a mistake in dropping ObamaCare as an 
     issue. A few weeks ago, they mistakenly demanded funding--a 
     move to please their base. They will be tempted to abandon 
     even the word ``ObamaCare'' now, but this is exactly when 
     they should keep, as the center of their message and their 
     intent, not defunding ObamaCare but delaying it. Do they 
     really want to turn abrupt focus to elusive Medicare cuts 
     just when it has become obvious to the American people that 
     parts of ObamaCare (like the ability to enroll) are 
     unworkable?
       The Republicans should press harder than ever to delay 
     ObamaCare--to kick it back, allow the administration to at 
     least create a functioning Web site, and improve what can be 
     improved.

  There is an article from CNN from today about Utah's national parks 
will reopen despite ongoing government shutdown.

       Utah will reopen its five national parks by Saturday, as 
     well as three other nationally run locations. Utah's Governor 
     Gary Herbert made the announcement Thursday, saying a deal 
     had been reached with the U.S. Department of the Interior 
     Secretary Sally Jewell. ``Utah agrees to pay the National 
     Park Service up to $1.67 million--$166,572 per day--to reopen 
     eight national sites in Utah for up to 10 days.''

  The sad thing is, they don't have to do that. We passed the bill to 
keep them all going. We did it at a rate, at an amount the Senate 
already agrees to. All they have got to do is pass it, send it to the 
President, and it will be taken care of.
  I have an article here from the Mercatus Center, George Mason 
University. It is a research summary.
  Before I mention that, I want to mention something about one of our 
Senators, a Senator from Arizona. Some people have tried to take things 
I said in an inappropriate way.
  I know that Senator from Arizona. We owe him a great deal for what he 
endured on our behalf in North Vietnam. There is no question about it. 
And I know that Senator would never intentionally hurt this country. 
But he has made mistakes that have hurt it but certainly it was never 
intentional.
  Let me mention this Mercatus Center, George Mason University research 
summary. It says, ``The Debt-Limit Debate 2013: Addressing Key Myths.'' 
Mr. Speaker, I think it is very important the people understand that 
there are a lot of myths about the debt limit.
  One myth is this:

       Standard & Poor's U.S. credit rating downgrade in August of 
     2011 was caused by Washington's brinkmanship over increasing 
     the debt limit. Congress must, therefore, avoid attaching 
     spending cut demands to the current debt limit increase if 
     they want to avoid jeopardizing the Nation's fragile economy.

  The reality, it says, is:

       Washington's failure to deal with unsustainable Federal 
     spending mostly related to entitlement programs and debt 
     caused the 2011 S&P downgrade and is spurring warnings of 
     another downgrade by the credit rating agencies.

  Of course this administration went after them through the judiciary 
system--after they got a bad rating, they got a downgrade. But they 
point out that in June of 2011 that:

       S&P reported: ``If the U.S. Government maintains its 
     current policies, it is unlikely that S&P's ratings services 
     would maintain its AAA rating on the U.S. Government. From 
     the same report: ``One contributing factor in our negative 
     outlook decision is our view that there has, as yet, been no 
     significant progress in addressing these long-term cost 
     drivers nor any consensus developing among the Obama 
     administration, the Senate, and House of Representatives 
     regarding the specifics of a comprehensive plan to address 
     the long-term budgetary challenges.''
       On July 14, 2011, S&P warned it would downgrade U.S. debt 
     if ``Congress and the administration have not achieved a 
     credible solution to the rising U.S. Government debt burden 
     and are not likely to achieve one in the foreseeable 
     future.''

  So the downgrade was because we did not adequately address the 
massive debt that had been building up.
  Another myth--and there are plenty more to back up their contention 
about that, just facts: ``Had Congress and the administration failed to 
raise the debt limit by the Treasury's stated deadline in 2011, the 
Treasury would have been forced to default on the Nation's debt.'' Make 
it very clear. The reality, ``had the 2011 agreement to increase the 
debt limit been postponed, the Treasury could have met Federal 
Government obligations, including Social Security benefits and interest 
on the debt until the end of the fiscal year, possibly longer.''
  And then it goes into the options that the Treasury Department had. 
Another myth: ``If Washington agreed to significant spending reforms 
and cuts--and then actually followed through on them--it would cripple 
the recovery and devastate the economy.'' The reality is that ``the 
most dangerous thing Washington can do is continue on its current 
course. The economic literature is clear: Chronic overspending and its 
result, chronic excessive debt, lead to economic harm. Washington must 
agree on meaningful spending reforms--and begin implementing these 
policies immediately to satisfy markets about the credibility of 
spending cuts.
  ``Myth number four: The real problem with the last debt limit deal 
was that it failed to apply a `balanced approach' of spending cuts and 
tax increases.'' The reality is, ``Replacing

[[Page 15741]]

borrowing with higher taxes does not solve the fundamental problem: 
Federal spending--including Social Security, Medicaid, and especially 
Medicare--is unsustainable.
  ``Fiscal reform that focuses on large revenue increases and modest 
spending reductions is likely to inflict the most damage on the 
economy. A study of 21 countries looking at 37 years of data 
representing 107 episodes of fiscal reform, shows that reform efforts 
that focus on a package of both spending and revenue reductions''--that 
is, tax decreases--``tend to be much more effective than those that 
have modest spending reductions but continue to increase revenue.
  ``Of more than 100 attempts to reduce the debt-to-GDP ratio in all 
developed countries over the past 30 years, some 20 percent succeeded. 
They had two common components: one, a focus on spending cuts; and two, 
policy reforms that increased competitiveness.'' And that is the truth.
  With that, I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________