[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 34, Number 12 (Monday, March 23, 1998)]
[Pages 456-458]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks on Proposed Legislation To Expand Medicare

March 17, 1998

    Thank you very much. Thank you. Senator Kennedy is even more 
exuberant than normal today, but you have to forgive him and me and 
Senator Moynihan and isolated others--this is St. Patrick's Day, and 
we're feeling pretty good, the Irish are. [Laughter]
    Thank you, Congressman Stark, for your long leadership and your 
willingness to push this legislation. Thank you, Senator Moynihan, for 
making it utterly clear, so that no one can dispute it, that this 
legislation presents no threat to the integrity of the Medicare program 
or the security of the Trust Fund. Thank you, Sherrod Brown, for your 
initiative and your leadership. As always, thank you, Senator Kennedy.
    And I'd like to say a word of thanks to one person who has not 
spoken here today, our Senate Democratic leader, Tom Daschle, who has 
worked so hard to help one particular group of Americans here: Americans 
who retired early, in part because they were promised health care 
benefits which were then denied to them. This will take care of them, 
and we can keep the promise that others made to them. And I think we 
have to do it. And thank you, Tom Daschle, for fighting for them.
    I'd also like to thank Leader Gephardt and Congressman Dingell and 
all the Members of the House caucus who are here--thank you very, very 
much. And I can't help noting that this may be the first public 
appearance in Washington for the newest Member of this caucus, 
Representative Lois Capps, from California.
    Let me begin with a point I have made over and over to the American 
people since the State of the Union Address. This is a remarkable time 
for our country. I look out at all these young people who are working 
here, and I think how glad I am they are coming of age at a time when 
America is working, when we are making progress, economically; we're 
making progress on our social problems; we're making progress in our 
quest for peace and security in the world.
    But everybody knows that the world is changing very rapidly. And so 
the question is, what should we be doing in the midst of good times? I 
believe the last thing we should be doing is sitting on our lead, if I 
could use a sports analogy. Good times give us the confidence, the 
resources, and the space not only to dream about the future we want in 
the 21st century but to take action to deal with it. It is wrong to sit 
idly by when we can

[[Page 457]]

be taking steps to prepare for that future. That's why I don't want us 
to spend a surplus that is only now beginning to materialize until we 
have saved Social Security for the 21st century. That's why I want us to 
work together to make sure we deal with the long-term challenges of 
Medicare.
    But it's also why I think we should not let a single day go by when 
Americans have problems that we can remedy in ways that will not weaken 
our present success but instead will reinforce it. That's why I hope we 
get a comprehensive bill through to deal with the tobacco problem, 
because there are a thousand kids a day whose lives are at stake. And 
that's why I believe we should be dealing with this issue now.
    President Johnson said when Medicare was first enacted that it 
proved the vitality of our democracy can shape the oldest of our values 
to the needs and obligations of changing times. That's what these 
leaders are doing here today.
    You heard Senator Moynihan say most people don't wait till they're 
65 to retire. But the fastest growing group of people are people over 
65. There are huge numbers of people in this age group. There are people 
62 and over who have lost their health insurance, but can't buy into 
Medicare. There are people under 65 who are married to somebody who's 65 
or older who had the health insurance, and that person retired, got into 
Medicare, but the spouse lost the health insurance. There are people who 
are 55 and over who have been downsized, or who actually retired, early 
retirement, because their employer actually promised them they would 
have health insurance, and then the promise was not kept.
    I want to say that this is not an entirely disinterested thing. In 
2001, I will be 55 and unemployed, through no fault of my own. 
[Laughter] And this bill has a lot of appeal to me. [Laughter] I say 
that to make you laugh. I get a lot of letters from people that I've 
known a long time who are my age, who are middle class people, people I 
grew up with, whose spouses are beginning to have the health problems 
that go along with just working your way through life--people who don't 
have a great health insurance coverage, like I've been privileged to 
have. And they are terrified that they will spend the years between 55 
and 65 with maybe the most challenging health problems in their entire 
lives cropping up, with no insurance.
    Now, I believe that this is an issue on which Democrats and 
Republicans should be able to unite. We ask the Republicans to come and 
help us on this. Let's don't play election year games on this. We don't 
want to, either. We want to do it in a bipartisan fashion and get it 
behind us. There are hundreds of thousands of people out there in 
America who need this initiative.
    People say, ``Well, why don't you wait until the Medicare Commission 
comes in and issues its report?'' My answer is Senator Moynihan's 
answer--because we have the Congressional Budget Office estimates. They 
told us that this will add nothing to the burden of the Medicare Trust 
Fund; it will cost less than we had originally thought, and we can 
insure more people.
    But remember the human dimension. Remember Ruth Kain, who spoke when 
we announced this program in January. When her husband turned 65, her 
employer dropped their insurance benefits. He got Medicare; she didn't. 
But she had a heart condition, and they couldn't afford health 
insurance. So, she didn't get health insurance. She went to the hospital 
one time, and the bill was $13,000. Some people have said of our 
proposal, ``Well, this bill costs a lot of money for retired people''--
$300 a month or something. One trip to the hospital for anything will 
more than likely be more than twice as much in one pop as a whole year's 
annual premiums--the most minor trip to the hospital. The Kains and 
families like them, the families that Congressman Brown mentioned, they 
ought to have another choice.
    Today I am releasing a report that shows State by State how many 
Americans need these protections--State by State. And we will see, State 
by State, the human lives we're talking about and the number of people 
that will be put at risk if we wait another year to do this.
    Tomorrow the Kaiser Foundation will unveil a study that shows that 
the individual insurance market often denies coverage or charges 
excessive premiums to older, sicker Americans, the very people this 
policy would

[[Page 458]]

help to protect. Senator Moynihan said--I want to reiterate, because I 
have heard Senator Kennedy mention the criticisms of this program--I 
want to say this a second time--the Congressional Budget Office--not the 
administration's budget office, the Congressional Budget Office--reports 
this plan will cost individuals even less and benefit even more people 
than we first estimated. It will give somewhere between three and four 
hundred thousand Americans new options for health care coverage at a 
vulnerable time in their lives.
    Let me say one other thing. The bipartisan Kennedy-Kassebaum 
legislation we adopted last year--or in 1996--was also designed to help 
Americans keep their health care when they changed jobs or when someone 
in their family got sick--a bill like this one, designed to give people 
peace of mind. But we now see on news reports today--another good reason 
why it's better for us to do this in this way--because just today we see 
that some insurers are finding ways around that law, giving insurance 
agents incentives to delay or deny coverage to vulnerable Americans. 
These practices have to be stopped. I am directing Secretary Shalala and 
the Department of Health and Human Services to conduct a thorough review 
of the options for strengthening the protections of the Kennedy-
Kassebaum law.
    And tomorrow the Department will send a notice to every insurer in 
every State in our country affirming what we already know, that impeding 
anyone's access to health care in violation of this law is illegal. It's 
not just wrong; it's illegal. The law is vital to the health and 
stability of America's workers and their families. We intend to enforce 
it vigorously.
    But let me say, you see the problems we have with that kind of 
approach. With this kind of approach, anybody who can afford the premium 
or whose children or relatives will help them to afford this premium, 
won't have to worry about whether they have health care coverage. We 
won't have to worry about some regulation or waiting for a report to 
come in to tell us whether this or that or the other person is 
complying. We will know that we're helping hundreds of thousands of 
people who have worked hard all their lives and played by the rules and 
been good citizens to have the decent, secure time in a vulnerable 
period of their lives. We can extend this opportunity in a responsible 
way.
    Medicare is one of the crowning achievements of this century for the 
American people. With this legislation, and with the other challenges 
that we intend to face and overcome, we can make sure, as we become an 
older and older and older country--which is, I always say, a high-class 
problem--that Medicare will be one of the crowning achievements of the 
21st century as well.
    Thank you very much.

Note: The President spoke at 11:35 a.m. in Room 1100 at the Longworth 
Office Building on Capitol Hill.