tv U.S. Senate CSPAN July 14, 2009 12:00pm-5:00pm EDT
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fiscal circumstances require us to make difficult choices. chair levin has supported their efforts. they're willing to make hard choices. congress must follow their wise leadership. the media has recorded there are budget deficit now exceeds $1 trillion. we troyed middle-class tax cuts, first time home buyer tax credits and invested resources around. but we've got to reexamine our around. and say no to excessive spending. ft.-22 borrows spending to the excess and borrows from key operation and maintenance accounts to do so. the secretary of defense, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff and our commander in chief have said that we do not need any more f-22's. in fact, they say that the costs of acquiring and maintaining these aircraft, which have ballooned far beyond the pentagon's original estimates, are hindering our ability to make much-needed investments in
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our other necessary programs. but, madam president, it's not just the obama administration. president bush and secretary rumsfeld also agreed that this is an area where we can show restraint and help strain taxpayers. the levin-mccain amendment is the right policy for this country. armed services leadership and presidents from both parties agree. we should be listening when the air force tells us that the 187 f-22's that we have are enough. our president has shown the wisdom to listen to our uniformed leaders. now only congress stands in the way of saving taxpayers $1.75 billion. the f-22 has never supported a single mission in iraq or afghanistan. it's time to reassert the actual military priorities of today. it's true that the f-22 supports jobs sprinkled around our nation, but we need to focus on weapons programs that create jobs and also serve a modern
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military purpose. as the chairman and ranking member of the senate armed services committee have said, the f-35 represents the future of our fighter fleet. as we look to the future, i simply cannot lend my support to this effort to allow unnecessary expansion of a program at the expense of the american and coloradan taxpayer. there are far more useful ways to create and maintain jobs that actually enhance our military readiness. phasing out expansion of the f-22 fleet will allow needed funding to be reallocated to more important pressing needs of our military. let's pass a defense authorization bill that actually contains the requests that our military has made rather than giving them systems that they have asked us not to fund. $1.75 billion for the f 2450eu6 2 ha-22 hasnot been requested, e with chairman levin, senator mccain, presidents obama and bush. i urge my colleagues to join in this effort to show fiscal restraint, support the
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levin-mccain amendment. the best way to defend our country is to listen to our military when it tells us to change the way we invest. our fiscal health and our national security both depend on it. thank you, madam chairman. i yield the floor, and i note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:
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mr. levin: madam president? madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from michigan. mr. levin: i ask further proceedings under the quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. levin: madam president, i now ask that the senate stand in recess until 2:15. the presiding officer: without objection. the senate stands in recess.
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these comments came during a meeting with the prime minister of the netherlands in the oval office. other topics include the war in afghanistan. this is about 15 minutes. >> noir on behalf of a dutch company in exploring manhattan when and helping to lay the groundwork for the united states and that is going to be an incredible celebration and we're all looking for a two. with that history and minot, the united states and the
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netherlands have maintained and a star nearly close friendship for many years now. i wanted to express to the prime minister of the american people's appreciation for that friendship generally, but also our admiration for some of the specific international obligations that of the netherlands has taken on and the leadership it has taken on. we discussed the critical role that the netherlands has played in afghanistan as part of the isaf operation there, the dutch military has been one of the the most outstanding military is there as -- has shown extraordinary not only military capacity but also inside into the local culture and the local politics. i have the review that we conducted in afghanistan that
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emphasized the three d's of development, diplomacy as well as our ability to deploy troops effectively. that really was adopted from some strategy is that had ali been pursued effectively by the netherlands. wade discussed a range of international issues that we have been working together on in the g20 and i extended my personal invitation to the prime minister to participate in the next g20 in pittsburgh because we think that the netherlands not only is one of the world's largest economy is and must active internationally, but the prime minister has very specific expertise and experience in working with a whole range of
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world leaders and i think his contribution will be greatly appreciated. we discussed the issue of guantanamo and the importance of the european countries working with us to assist in that process and we are grateful for the encouragement we have received their. and we discussed the issue am of climate change. obviously the netherlands has a lot of experience in dealing whiff the battle against rising oceans and they have got a deep investments in dealing with this issue. there have also taken to reflect strides on issues of clean energy and we think that we can get some good advice there in terms of how we can work together, so overall we think that this partnership is strong and will continue to grow. we are grateful to the dutch people who for their
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extraordinary contributions to international peace and security and i look forward to seeing you in pittsburgh. >> thank you very much. >> mr. president, i want to thank you for the dutch delegation havingç us. the oval office. we have had a goodç meeting and you already referred to the effect that we are trends for centuries. the united states and the netherlands, of arrived in the area of manhattan and is good to underline that we share values. we talk about freedom and human rights. we talk about our common responsibilityç is, we talk abt democracy and we both are -- when you started as president he brought a message of hope and hope for a new future and we admire you for that. i want to thank you that you're
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taking your responsibilities domestically but also internationally. we met each other four times at several summits and you played an important role talking about the issues of today and we both are convinced that it is important that we are talking about not only the financial crisis, but also about the development goals, about the issue of energy, climate change. and so of the copenhagen summit must be successfulç and therefe is important that you how a very successful meeting in pittsburgh and i want to thank you very much for the invitation to be there. i'm convinced that we can only solve the problems if we were together and we also spoke about the issue of health and health system and. in my country we have had a lot of discussions and is now on the agenda in the u.s. and so it is an enormous responsibility to change a thing. we also talked about innovation and we feel is important we can do things in another way,
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innovation and the economic sphere but also on health issues. and we talked about the role of the private sector, the issue of corporate social responsibility so i am convinced he has so many things in common and we can work together. you already mentioned our work and the work in a dangerous area but it is important to work together. mr. president, i wish you all the best in your responsibilities here it is not an easy time to be president but you show the power and the courage to change things and i want to thank you very much for the french sub and i'm convinced that we will work together with the interests of the people in the united states and you are most welcome to my beautiful country. >> thank you. we're going to take one question each. representing the united states, sam nunn.
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>> [inaudible] >> well, i think it is fair to say that i want to listen up my arm a little bit. my general strategy the last time i drove a pitch was that the american league championship series and i just want to keep it high. now, there was no clock on ads. i don't know how fast it went, but it exceeded 30 miles per hour i would be surprised if. [laughter] but it did not clear the plate. with respect to the employment issue. obviously i don't have a crystal ball. in -- we have looked at a lot of the the economic data that is coming out right now and as i have said repeatedly, we have
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seen some stabilization in the financial markets and that is good because that means the companies can borrow and banks are starting to lend again, small businesses that might have a word in just a couple of months ago about closing doors are now able to get more local financing and that means they're less likely to lay off workers so that is on the positive side. what we have also seen is in that historic plea even after you start moving into a recovery positive and growth, hiring typically lags for some time after that. that has been the of the historic norm. this is a more severe recession than we have seen since the great depression so how employment numbers are going to respond is not yet clear. my expectation is that we will probably continue to see unemployment take up for several months end of the challenge for
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this administration is to make sure that even as we are stabilizing the financial system we understand that the most important thing in the economy is are people able to find good jobs that pay good wages. we have a problem even before this recession common even during times of economic growth where the pace of a job growth, wage growth and income growth was not moving as quickly as overall economic growth. the last recession that we have in their recovery was turned to recovery. we can to repeat that approach and that is why when i talk about things like health care reform or revamping how we approach energy and investing deeply in clean energy a, when i talk about improving our education system as i will discuss today when i go to michigan, those foundations are so critical because we've got to find a new models of economic
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growth particularly at a time when consumers are just not going to probably going to be spending as much as they were and that has been driving a lot of economic growth over the last several months. michigan obviously is a state that has just been battered not only during this recession but in the years leading up to this recession. we are pleased to see that gm now and chrysler have gone out of bankruptcy, they have an opportunity to compete internationally. had it not been for the steps that we took with respect to gm and chrysler the situation in michigan i think it is fair to say would be far worse. of the same applies to the recovery act. we have made investments that early on have allowed a state like michigan and to lay off fewer teachers, or cops come up your firefighters -- those are all jobs that would have been lost in the absence of a recovery package. but it's still not enough and so i would argue that in the single
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biggest challenge that not just the united states faced by countries in europe and all around the world are going to face as we come out of the recovery, is how do we generate enough jobs that pay good wages to keep up with population growth. and unless we are investing in energy, infrastructure, innovation, science, development, and eliminating the drag the health care system is placing on the overall economy, i think we will have a very difficult time generating the jobs that are necessary. if we make those investments that i have confidence we will be able to do so. >> [inaudible] >> well, as i said it, i think the dutch troops have been some of the most effective troops in
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isaf. i recognize that participation in the coalition in afghanistan can be controversial in the netherlands. it is never, it is never easy sending our finest young men and women into a field of battle. i shared with the prime minister was in the hope that even after next summer that there is the ability for the dutch to continue to apply the leadership and the experience that they have been able to accumulate over these past years and i think that all of us want to see an effective exit strategy where increasingly the afghan army, afghan police, afghan accords, afghan government are taking more responsibility for their own security and if we can get through a successful election in september and we continue to
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apply the training approach to the afghan security forces and recombine back with a much more effective approach to economic development inside afghanistan, then my hope is that we will be able to begin transitioning into a different face in afghanistan. the one thing i want to emphasize is that in the issue in afghanistan is not simply an american issue. is a worldwide issue and the vulnerability to terrorist attacks in europe are at least as high as they are here at the united states. if you look at how al qaeda it has operated, they consider the rest to be one undifferentiated said of countries and they will exploit whatever witnesses are their. so i think we have a common
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interest in dealing with this as an effectively as possible and i am grateful to the prime minister and the dutch people for their extra their contribution. >> we are following the 3-d approach, defense, diplomacy and development. i am very happy that it review of the american administration because you can say we are exactly on the same line so we have to go on with that. we talked about our decision, but it is also good to underline that the netherlands will not turn its back on the people. we feel also a responsibility. we will cooperation and consider that seriously. also i would like to underline what you said about economic issues. in last year we talked about the financial issues, the financial
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crisis and a financial architecture. it's important that they development of same strategies and i think we have ideas announcing question of implementation and. we're working on that and therefore it to the summit is extremely important, but other financial crisis it is also a matter of generating jobs. what to do with economic crisis and therefore we need to take a coordinated approach. there's also a link to the issue of confidence. confidence, it is important that we're working together in that we find the right strategy because if people are losing their jobs in a terrible situation and we are aware of the fact that we have to change things there that is your message in mime message and then message of the g20 meeting in pittsburgh. >> thank you everyone. [inaudible conversations]
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>> the senate health education and labor and pensions committee is on its 12th day of reviewing the cabins of health care bill. we will soon as much as we can of today's market before the senate returns at 2:15 p.m. eastern time. >> the senate committee on health education, labor and pensions will come to order. our chairman, acting chairman senator dodd has to chair a banking committee until about 10:30 a.m. so he asked me sit sit in here and i guess we have a quorum and now of aid and ready to proceed. did we have a pending amendments? >> i don't think so. >> we have now pending amendments and i guess we are open for business. >> mr. chairman, i have an
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amendment. first of like to ask i understand from last night's activity is that to the chairman and you intend to complete our work today, is that correct? >> in my conversations with senator dodd he wanted to plow through today is a wicked wish to leges. >> i just wonder if we have a cost estimates from cdl for in the amendments that we have adopted in? >> we do not. >> i am told we do not, that is a very simple answer. >> well, i would hope that we would try to achieve that goal before we voted. >> on final passage? >> yes i hope so. >> there and laugh. fair enough. >> anyway, the defense bill as you know is on the floor so
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maybe in this amendment that i have will probably take more time than that so maybe i could schedule a time later on today to try to have this amendment out here it is on malpractice. >> i think the chairman for his courtesy. >> i understand of the senator's concern, but on the issue of cbo scores of, i asked to find out how many times we have passed bills out of this committee without a cbo score and it is quite lengthy. i say to my friend from arizona, in the 109th congress reported out of health committee on april 27, 2006 the cbo scores
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released may 3rd, the house on health insurance markup modernization and affordability act. we never had a cdl score on that when we pass it out. no child left behind a marked up on march 7th reported out cbo score released under chairman jeffords at that time. s 952, the public safety employer employee cooperation act of 1992 marked up on september 13th, cbo scores released on september 24th. s 1248, and individuals with disabilities education improvement act. markup on july 23rd of 2003, cbo score wasn't released until november 13th and on and on and on. >> well, mr. chairman, i thank you and those are interesting information, those bills have no comparison to what we're considering here. none whatsoever and the chairman knows that full well.
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so if you want to go ahead, you've got the votes, you want to go ahead and pass this bill without us having an estimate of the cost, fine. you've got the votes and can do it, but let's not say that in the past we have passed bills which are minor in comparison to the cost of this gargantuan effort to the there is any comparison between those situations. so if you want to go ahead and have the final vote today i guess you can, you've got the votes, but i don't think that it makes for a fair deal for the tax payers especially when the budget deficit already is $1.1 trillion and we're talking about a trillion dollar cost of a this legislation. i guess we will try to take our case to the american people that this kind of a way of doing business is not fair to them because they're the ones who are paying for this and so i would strenuously object the final
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passage of this bill until this committee until we know what the cost is and i don't think that is a really big demand and i don't think my constituents in arizona think so either. >> so the debate is one on the great, how much something costs whether or not it reaches the threshold of whether we need a cbo's court because obviously we have had a lot of bills in the past all of which cost money which we did not have a cbo score with to the senator from arizona did not object to so it is a matter of degree on how expensive is and how much it costs and i don't know what that, point is right now. but i am told the cbo will a man before for considerations as we have all these other cases of before go to the floor we will definitely have a score for this bill. >> the senator from arizona may have objected on the other ones had he been on the committee at the time.
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[laughter] nobody else objects. >> but there is a huge difference in the range of costs we are talking about the and we covered a lot of different amendments. i don't know that we know where we stand on its. >> mr. chairman. >> i am told we do have scores on the coverage title -- we have a score on everything except the follow-on biologic. >> i understand that the bingaman amendment that has already been adopted, a murray amendment that will be adopted or will be considered and probably adopted. so i think i have made my point,
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mr. chairman. i don't want to hold up the proceedings of the committee and i thank you. >> mr. chairman, can i comment? just on the operations of the cbo, i found their conversations on policy within tremendously interesting, but what i found also was one i talked about just the physical and mechanical difficulties of and doing this boring. i think what the senator from arizona wants is a reasonable, rational and quite frankly required but when we go to the floor, but to also -- the cbo is not like a group of people sitting in a room with a supercomputer with well-established methodology is arriving at this and that they essentially just turned out to numerical and fiscal analysis. to think that they can do this amendment by amendment is really
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based on their own conversations to us and reasonable. as i understand it, they are working seven days a week to try to give us the kind of rational analysis that senator mccain and i both would like to have. and they talked about it also being both a physical, mathematical and technological limits of their ability to function because they're also not only getting our request, there are beginning to get requests from the finance committee and also get a request from the house. is that right, david? >> yes, i can personally attest that i get e-mail's from them all around the clock and they're working about as hard as human beings can work. >> ride in out hope maybe at the end we would actually need to upgrade them technological but i would agree that as we go to the floor and finding as it passes this bill, senator mccain, and we pass hours that there has to be an analysis and i would hope
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that even both committees to come together for discussions and so on to really see the consequences of what we have done which is then the adjustments that will be required. as i understand, mr. chairman, we will pass out our bill and the finance committee will pass out ago. there has to begin negotiations windows which would then give the finance committee -- not finance, cbo and the opportunity to truly give us totality of what we have done as well as section by section. am i correct in that? >> that is absolutely, correct. >> so we just need to have reasonable expectations of their ability to function in the way that continues to get very responsible information alisos rely on. a thank-you. >> senator mikulski made the point i was going to make that we really, the important thing
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is what cbo view is of the combined product from the two committees before we go to the floor. i think that is the key issue and we will just have to see what each committee reports and then see what the leadership and the leadership of the two committees can agree upon by way of a combined bill. >> senator enzi brianna i'm sorry. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i've got an amendment this morning, this is amendment number 215. >> burkowski teefifteen. >> and that the legislation that we have in front of us allows the secretary to enter negotiations that limits their rates for the public plan to no
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higher than the average rates paid by private insurance within a began when a plan. so if we are to remove this paragraph and require that the rates be on par with the private insurers each metropolitan area will ensure that at a minimum which you have it is a great blower reimbursement that won't be less than the private insurers. and the legislation of the rates that are set by the government plan there will be no more than what the average of all of the private plans pay, but it can be and medicare rates set significantly less than what the private insurer rates are. so to ensure access to care for these patients, government rates i think need to be negotiated with providers and on par with the private insurance rates within a metropolitan area. what we currently have within the legislation is a mechanism that sets a price ceiling so you
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can't exceed the average prime rate, but we don't have a price floor. so the reality is that as it is drafted in will allow the government to reimburse at the lowest rate which it likely will without regard to what the private insurer is paying and medicare is paying 20 percent less than private insurers on average so under this language the secretary can set the rate to the medicare or medicaid rates. so you've got a situation essentially where you're telling the doctors and medical providers what the rates of reimbursement will be. we are not saying exactly which a rate of reimbursement will be. what we are now doing is we're giving this authority to the secretary and if you go back to the cbo letter that we all read dated the second of july, it provides the provisions regarding a public plan did not have a substantial attack on the
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cost for enrollment projections largely because of the public plan would pay providers of health care at rates comparable to privately negotiated rates and thus would not project have premiums lower than those charged by private insurance plans and exchanges so what it means is thomas we payless than the private rates there won't be any savings. so it is important that we ensure that the secretary not set the rates so low that providers on participate in the government plans. i think we have all had discussion of round the table here about what is happening with this bill, fast tracking in health care bill which affects the entire country, 17 percent of the economy. but within this provision we are not spelling out to the medical providers with their rates of reimbursement will be. i have talked and i think in just about every issue that i have raised i come back to whether or not we truly provide
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for access to individuals, particularly with medicare and i've spoken about the challenges that medicare enrollees in alaska at saint. i have got to a map and you all have received a copy of it on the table, but what it's based tool is this is not just an alaska problem what we are talking about access to care for medical -- medicare enrollees. according to the gao and this is a gao study back in 2006, you can alaska, is bad colorado, nevada, oregon, new mexico who are really very compromise in terms of their ability to access primary-care providers. and is not just those five. you've got washington state, oklahoma and even california that have significantly reduced
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access to managed-care providers. so i think we need to be very cautious as we look at those policies that would pull back even further on access to medicare providers. we are treating a new government insurance program with rates that are very likely to be sent below government raids and, in fact, are cbo report provides had the government program won't pay any savings unless we reduce the reimbursement rates for medical services to less than private health insurance reimbursement rates. now probably for those that are seeking specialty care, those medicare recipients are being taken care of, there are fine and can see a specialist, but when they need to the preventive care when they can't get the screenings that they need, the examinations that they need
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because they can't have access and simply on a primary care providers available for them this is a problem. so if we really are seeking to reduce our cost which i think we all are, we need to ensure that primary care services or increase until a more readily available. so the concerns that i have expressed earlier that we have got to have a proposal here where we are bringing the inadequacies of the current medicare program with regards to primary care, bringing those into a government-run program. so what my amendment does is requires the rates be on par with the private insurers in each metropolitan area to ensure that at a minimum there is a rate floor and that the reimbursement will be less than the primary insurers and additionally and the secretary must work with carol and frontier brightest to ensure that their part of the government providers networks in
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these areas, this is to ensure again when talking about the issues in rural america that rural and frontier communities are not left out and the secretary is looking to establish these rates for providers in the communities. i think the amendment is one that makes sense. again not only in a state like alaska we're we're severely limited when it comes to access medicare enrollees, but in so many other parts of the country where we're saying that a shortage as well. >> senator bingaman. >> senator, let me give my reaction to the amendment. i think there are really two separate eminence in here. subsection aa is one amendment, subsection be is another amendment, subsection and be a i agree with and support to and think that probably that we
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should adopt and i would be glad to support that parts of it the senator's amendment. subsection a i do not support. to me it would prevent us from accomplishing one of the purposes that we have set out to try to accomplish this the establishment of the so-called option. to provide some real competition. i have passed out again, pass this out before but this is in this chart that shows the market share of the two largest health plans by states, 2006, and you can see in alaska, for example 80 to 100 percent of all of the market is controlled by the two largest health plans and it in my state is a 5269%.
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in alabama it is also a need to 100%. you can look at the map and see what the extent of the concentration in this. of my support for public auction is promised to a substantial extent on the idea that people should have choices particularly in states where there are just a couple of big health plans that dominate the market to. i do not want the secretary to negotiate the reimbursement rates the way the bill now reads as i understand and they can correct me on this, the reimbursement rates will be when everett the secretary is able to negotiate with health care providers. is that accurate? >> that is correct on page 80 of the underlying bill.
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>> so just as each health plan goes to the health providers and negotiants for the cost of different health services. the secretary will do the same. so is my view that the secretary is able to negotiate a lower reimbursement rates in some areas because of lack of competition, lack of real competition by health care companies, private health care companies and so much the better for people who are having to pay for the premiums and so i would not support a but i would support to be. that is my view on a two. >> well, it is a chinese menu because there are two separate eminence as i see it. there are two separate statements made or policies are
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stated in. clearly the paragraph be that reimbursement rate shall not be so low as to prevent providers in rural or frontier areas from participating in community health insurance option. i strongly agree with pat. i will now the secretary to set reimbursement rates of such a level that, in fact, providers would say what we are not going to participate in providing services through a public auction in our area. that would be contrary to the whole purpose. >> mr. chairman. senator enzi. >> i think one of the reasons for the paragraph is we have seen some other charts that have shown with the variations are around the country in prices and so some of the ones and is primarily the large metropolitan areas that have severely high
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costs and if it is set on an average of the people in the really populous areas may not be able to get medical care. >> so you are arguing against paragraph taken that no, i am arguing for the paragraph because it goes by area rather than -- >> but it says the secretary shall set reimbursement rates based on average reimbursement rates paid by health insurance issue words. and i don't know if the health insurance -- >> about the important part, for each metropolitan statistical area. >> right but i am saying there aren't metropolitan statistical areas in the country where i think health insurance insurers are probably paying too much. i don't know that but i'm not willing to say that the secretary has to be down by with the two largest health plans
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have agreed their reimbursement rates will be. and they may be the right rates, they may be the wrong rates, and i think the secretary should be able to negotiate for rates just like they negotiate for rates. >> mr. chairman. >> the whole amendment is pointing out that it isn't going to do is any good two have all kinds of health care reform if you can't get to a doctor and we have talked a lot about the need for primary care doctors and particularly primary care doctors. you have got to have those and if you utilize those better demanded the specialists that oversee at, a patient's case, we know that that can reduce costs significantly. so if we want to truly reduce cost, we have to agree that primary care services need to be increased and more readily available. i think the bill that we are working from has inadequacy is that will stifle the primary care marquette and i think that
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her amendment simply requires the rates to be on par with private insurers in the metropolitan area to ensure that at minimum there is a rate floor. there are other ways that through transparency and some other things that we can bring those rates down i think for everybody, but i don't think the best way to do it is by eliminating the doctors in these areas and that is usually, that is the main problem we have got in both medicare and medicaid, is being able to have people see doctors. and i think she has gone at a way that is assuring that we can still see doctors. there are other ways we can get of the variations but unusual costs for our and some of the areas. on the map that shows unusual costs i have one area in wyoming that has unusual costs, but when i checked into that as a place called lost, it is in khyber county a little bit bigger than delaware, has 1500 people in aunt and a kind of have a first
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aid station but it is a hospital. there is a physician's assistant air and so virtually everybody that comes in gets shipped out unless it is something relatively minor. when they ship them out they ship them out to a specialist in have to go along ways to get the care and that drives up the cost so that was a major problem in our area. if we had more doctors then we wouldn't have quite the same problem. and so i appreciate the way that she is going about trying to make sure that the government plan isn't going to drive away doctors. >> mr. chairman. >> senator white house. >> mr. chairman, it is my understanding that the committee held insurance option would set its provider payments by negotiation and locally, state-by-state. in rhode island improbably be a
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single statewide rate. in larger states where there may be multiple metropolitan statistical areas there's nothing in the community health insurance operation, option that would prevent those subcategories from being part of the negotiations by the secretary of the rates of providers to be paid in. so there is enormous geographical flexibility already in the community health insurance option. in fact, complete geographical flexibility so i don't see some power 68 as having anything in terms of flexibility. what it does by saying that reimbursement rates shall be based on average reimbursement rates paid by health insurance issuers is try per writer rates up toward the average and that will take away one of the best
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opportunities the health insurance option has which is to try to change a little bit the business model for health insurance to try to drive provider payments down not necessarily in ways that compromise providers but to do things like limit the cost that the health insurance option is putting on providers as we are discussed in this committee 12 to 27% of private insurance company cost is administrative overhead. and a great deal of that overhead is dedicated to what it provider would probably call a tormenting the providers overpayment and authorization. i have told the story about the princeton community health center were more than a 50% of their personal time is dedicated to fighting with the providers of repayments and authorizations plus a $300,000 payment a year to consultants every year to help them out so it is a huge
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piece of the provider of load and to the extent that the committed to health insurance option is able to find a better way to deal of providers then to create that arms race over claims and pain and that is running such huge costs into the system. i think the lewin group said it is nearly 30 percent of the overhead cost of the average provider so it's a big, big number and it's important target as we try to reduce the costs. i think you for been at the kennedy health insurance option to go to providers and say, look, we can work with a different way and be more efficient and much to be more efficient but the result is going to be to negotiate a lower price. you will more than make up for it and not fighting with us and of having to hire the three and a thousand dollar consultant that should be an open door with a secretary to pursue an afraid this amendment slams that door. i think it is an important door for us to be able to walk through. >> question for council?
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does medicare negotiate prices? >> medicare has a very different structure proposed for the committee health insurance option so is much more statutory set a price schedule then applies here. >> does medicaid negotiate prices? >> again, it's a very different set of structures so i'm not sure quite what the comparison is i'm sorry can access the answer would be no on both of those? >> much less so and this is a much more market-based kind of structure negotiation without a statutory schedule. >> we are talking about it being a more statutory structure of. we have no real indication that it will be and i'm mentioning to government plans that exist now in the way we operate those is to use price controls. we set the prices, we don't negotiate. we tell them of the costs are going to be. that is what government can do. i don't think there's every
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education -- indication that is what government will do. cbo said his government planned does not lower the costs, does not lower the costs of. and loss in its -- unless you use price controls. so unless we follow the model of medicare and unless we follow the model of medicaid, we don't drive across town and eliminate doctors. this amendment is to make sure that we don't eliminate doctors because we have the baby boomers coming up and without doctors they're not going to be there. so again i appreciate the amendment. >> mr. chairman, it is all fine, well and good to be talking about the negotiation aspects of this, but at the end of the day senator enzi is right. if you have providers that are looking at this and saying, i can't afford to keep my doors
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open and i continue to take medicare enrollees, and i have to be a part of a government run plan that says that this is what my reimbursement will be and that reimbursement go solo to be as low as medicare or perhaps even lower. i had a sit-down with about a dozen providers, this was about a month or so ago, when we were talking about some of the details at the time of this plan and i asked point-blank if, in fact, we were to pass legislation that says that and wanted to be part, in order to be providing care for medicare enrollees as part of this government plan your
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reimbursement would be medicare plus 10%. what would that do to your practice? into a number every single one of them said i would have to drop by medicare eligible patients. i could not afford to keep my doors open, i could not afford to take these individuals. we have already got a crisis in alaska. i thank you have a crisis in some of your other rural communities as well as bait -- senator enzi is right, this is all about access to providers and if we said to the rates so low that the providers say i am moving on, i am not taking these individuals, we have not provided them anything other than encarta that says you're eligible for caris to this government run plan but we haven't provided them care if we do not provide them with access to providers. so what we're doing here is we
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are saying there is a minimum floor, you know it can't go any lower than this and i think that that is patently reasonable can i senator isakson. >> i just want to say the senator makes a good point as does senator enzi, as i listen to enzi talk think about three issues i have been involved with in the last 12 months with cms on reimbursement for imaging durable medical equipment, there has been about negotiation, there has been set change in the way there are reimbursed all priced evan. is not a negotiation system at all in the senator is exactly right. you can drive prices down to something that looks great and meets the demand observing the trillion dollars that you're spending but if nobody is going to deliver the health care or delivery will be poor quality you're hurting folks. at the the senator makes a very good point. i am not from a state that is nearly as a girl as alaska -- wyoming, but i think the point
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to make is right on target. >> senator bingaman and then senator greg. >> i just was going to point out this language on pages 77, is the first paragraph in that the section dealing with this community health insurance option saying, no requirement for health providers to participate. nothing in this section shall be construed to require health care providers to participate in a community health insurance option or to impose any penalty for nonparticipation. and then, of course, of the next sentence is nothing in this section shall be construed to require an individual to participate in the committee health insurance option or impose for nonparticipation. so this will be a dead letter if the secretary sets reimbursement rates so low that it -- providers decide not to participate. nobody is going to participate.
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obviously if providers don't participate than individuals don't participate either so as i say, i have no problem with saying that the secretary in setting reimbursement rates shall insure that a provider's our incentive to participate or essentially that is what section being says, but to say that the secretary has got to set the rates at what the private plans in that area have already determined, to be takes away the competition. so that we are trying to encourage here by establishing this community health insurance option. >> well, i think the language of
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this bill makes it fairly clear that if the secretary has the authority to set rates lower than what the market is setting them at that the purpose is to take market share by reducing the cost of the premium to people that participate in as you take market share force people to use, to use the system and this is clearly, the only purpose in this is price control and to drive it lower prices using the clout of the federal government. and the result is obviously meant to force out of the system the private insurer and you end up with a system of a single payer. i don't understand why there is such resistance to admitting the
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purpose of this bill. i don't understand why there is such resistance to admitting that a fundamental purpose of this bill as it is drafted. which is to put us on a track to a single pair system. it has been admitted on the other side of this table but there are a number of those who support the single payer system. >> the way this bill is drafted essentially empowers the secretary to trade a series of scenarios which inevitably lead to a single payer system and i just don't understand this high and seek exercise that has been going on. i mean, why play this game? with the senator from alaska has suggested is that a government plan will not be used for the purposes of perverting the marketplace using the authority of a government. she is seeing if we have a government plan and this is not supposed, the purpose is not to
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create a marketplace for a single payer, moving toward a single payer system and the government plan has to compete in the marketplace on a level playing field of the private-sector. but what the bill says is a government plan doesn't have to compete in the marketplace on a level playing field because of the secretary has the authority to set rates. and there is only one purpose for that, that is to give the government disproportionate advantage in the capacity to drive the market -- drive out of the marketplace the private insurance. so e.u. put this language and that the senator from alaska has suggested that where you should just stand on the front of this plan, single payer. >> mr. chairman. >> senator white house. >> i would urge my colleagues to read the language that we are talking about before leaping to the conclusion that this steers
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toward a single payer. senator bingaman has just described and pointed us to the language and says no provider will be forced to participate and on page 80 that lines 18 to 21 we say the secretary shall negotiate rates with the reimbursement of health care providers. there is no authority for the secretary to set rates, that is just imaginary. the authority of the secretary has under this program is to negotiate rates and that the providers -- >> line is it's a higher or lower? >> excuse me, i did not interrupt you and i can finish my say i would appreciate it. the providers are free to completely refuse to participate in which case the option fails. there is a very strong market
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pressure for the secretary to negotiate in good faith. the second point i would make is that half of the states in this country including many of the state's of our republican members of this committee have health care that is delivered through a public plan in their states' in the workers' compensation system. it's the only way in which health care is delivered in wyoming. they actually have a single payer option in the health care for workmen's compensation. nobody is jumping up and down frantic about that, that is what we're arguing now -- we are arguing in a private plan can participate side-by-side and in 19 states i think -- i don't have the list in front of me now -- arizona is one i remember. there is a state-funded workers' compensation plan and that provides health insurance for
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the minor injuries, the chronic injuries, the catastrophic injuries that workers sustain and those markets continue and some of them have gone on for 60, 70 years. so the notion that the instant that is a government gets involved with health care program in the meeting the collapses into a single payer program is be lighted by the practical experience in a great number of states that are members actually present. so between in the clear language of the statute and the clear practice of private and public plans competing successfully side by side in many states, i just think that this is a red herring of an argument. i know that it is everybody's favorite whipping boy to say that we want to go to national health insurance and have a single payer, but that was taken
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away by president obama and the other candidates when i altogether said the the first promise of health care is if you like what you've got you can keep it. that was the end of a national health insurance and so do i. that battle now just seems to be totally at odds with what we're really talking about here. if we want to talk about that that is fine but it really does it make any sense in the context of the statute as written and proposed. >> senator reid. >> mr. chairman, let me follow up, i think senator white house has been a very compelling argument. clearly pointed out in the legislation at that the secretary of the has the authority to negotiate and her strength in negotiation it will be based upon the market power of this particular option. and if you look at the current arrangement in states of market
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power, it is not a bunch of smaller companies. senator bingaman pass out this chart which is very instructive. the dark blue is market share, the two biggest companies -- that is 80 to 100 percent. in my home state of rhode island, senator whitehouse my correct me because he was attorney general, but we have it to private companies and one company that is consulate, combination of art medicaid recipients so essentially it is just for the medicaid population so we have two companies -- we have three. but the two largest of between 80 and 100 percent of the market. this is the same case in alabama or arkansas, iowa, north dakota, montana. 7279% of the market, illinois, missouri, on and on, alaska summer between 80 and 100% with the two largest providers.
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so when the secretary comes in and starts negotiating, she won't have as much market power in any state as existing private private and nonprofit insurance and i will not sit back passively and say okay, do whatever you want. that is the whole point of negotiation. so i think essentially if this was a marketplace of pure competition where you had very small insurers and then you had the advent of a large federal program, we should be concerned. this is a market that is not monopolistic in many cases very close. and so i think, i agree with senator white house. >> senator enzi. >> mr. chairman, first i have to comment on the worker's comp example because it is wrong. yes we have a state on plan, the
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reason we try to change to a completely private market but the thing was so bankrupt at first had to have some money in it since it was all state money that was going in there. but it did not control doctors' prices. it didn't even control which doctors to see an hour in say doctors are very upset that people could go see addis a doctor's. so it isn't the same thing that we're talking about here, we're talking about making sure there are providers. >> in the chart above the two biggest companies with this says is we need more competition. one government plan does not provide that kind of competition. i hope people are taking a look at some of the other suggestions given out there for ways that we can increase competition across the united states. that's what we did with medicare part b before ever to providers and wyoming. to providers at all of the business people were giving them which was an a lot of i am sure.
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but was wearing an opportunity for a lot more business which is what we are providing health care reform, there were a lot more providers. there were 49 providers and the cost came down by 37%. some competition works if you're concerned about just having to health plans control in the market, what we need to do is get not just one more health plan, in whole bunch more health plans. competition is a whole bunch. it is not -- that is the problem we've got a lot of areas where we try to save the biggest companies when it is the smallest companies turning on a dime and providing differences. we are not doing that with a big government-run plan that will be able to control these other plans, they will meld in and we won't even know the difference. >> senator sanders. >> let's talk about big government-run plans. i don't want to be shocked
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anybody here and have people dashing out of the room, but the v.a. is a socialized health care system. right mr. mccain? socialized medicine, that is what it is. a public insurance. >> not exactly my description. [laughter] >> the v.a. has its problems but by and large i think it is fair to say we go home and talk to our veterans but a few pretty good about the v.a.. they go in and are treated and the staff usually is dedicated to them and not out busy raising money charging them money. at least in the city of vermont i've got to tell you people want more v.a., not less v.a.. out of socialized medicine and in abbasids of america and anybody here want to bring up an amendment to eliminate v.a. i would suggest the chairman except that. i don't hear too many people. let's talk about single payer. it is called medicare, medicare has its problems sure it does but if anybody wants to go out
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and compare the attitude of the people of this country toward medicare which does not throw people off a pre-existing conditions, doesn't pull you off of the program because you are committing the crime of getting sick the previous year, contrast to how people feel about private health insurance let's have that debate. and i suspect those of us who want to improve medicare rather than one to improve or support private health insurance will win that debate. the function of what we're doing here is not to support the private health insurance industry. i know that as a shock. the function of what we're trying to do here is provide the best quality health care for the american people in the most cost-effective way in 2007 just to make the point, a gallup poll 2007, 64 percent of respondents answered that they thought it was the responsibility of the federal government to make sure all americans have health care coverage. 2007, a pageyahoo poll -- since you represent of respondents
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said that the united states should adopt a universal health insurance program in which everyone is covered under a program like medicare that is run by the government. and financed by taxpayers. i think in every gathering in the united states of america most people think the government should play a strong role in providing health care to people except in the united states senate, probably the only institution in america where people think that the private insurance companies should be playing the dominant role. thatç is all that i want to sa, i want to get in the details of the debate, but i think it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to continue to defend how wonderful those private insurance companies are, what a great job they're doing. that's not what i hear in vermont and that's notç what im hearing all over america. should improve public health in all respects, of course, we can, but i would just conclude by saying our job is not to protect the private health insurance
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industry, it is to provide a quality cost-effective health care can i can entertain a question? that was an eloquent forceful defense of the single payer approach. >> actually it wasn't. >> well, i will give you credit and you have done that and in that position on the revocations. it will you be voting for this bill as is before us? >> i will be voting to get this bill based upon the amendments coming for that but everything being equal i will vote for this bill to get it out of committee. how i will vote in terms of final passage on the floor by most of the have not yet reached a decision. >> thank you. >> mr. chairman, hopefully to finish up, it makes no sense to me that we would pattern a government-run plan of medicare when we admit that medicare is a
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broken system, it is quickly moving toward insolvency. we recognize that. i welcome any of you to come up to a state like alaska where medicare. is it the death knell for people. they turn 65 and it is, my gosh, i bet to go on medicare now. it was the amendments i will be introducing this afternoon was requested by my constituents from constituents that have paid into medicare system in their whole working life and then they turn 65 and that they cannot find a provider to see them. they come to me and they say, there has got to be a way that i can just pay for the care out here that i don't have to go on medicare. i say, wait a minute, you have paid into this, this is the government's promise you that we will take care of you when you
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turn 65 and it doesn't make a hill of beans difference to me and i can't see somebody. so why we would say we are going to have a wonderful government-run plan and pattern it off of a system that is clearly failing, is clearly broken in so many parts of the country. that is what does it make sense to me. so i would ask for a roll-call vote, mr. chairman. >> we have had a good discussion on this. i haven't weighed in. i would just say that since i am in one of those states that is very dark blue on this chart where we have almost all of our health insurance covered by two companies and then looking at the rest of the country, it seems that this amendment at least in part a a would lock in a system where the high reimbursements states will continue to get high reimbursement and the low
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reimbursements states will continue to get low reimbursement. i thought one of the things we wanted to do here was to shift reimbursement so that we did based reimbursement more on quality rather than on quantity. if you're simply going to base it on average reimbursement rates, that takes us away from trying to move toward equality outcomes and to focus reimbursement based on the quality. it also moves us away from trying to even out the disparities in this country between states that have very high reimbursement rates and states like iowa that is very low reimburse -- reimbursement rate. and that is why it just seems like it is locked in place. roll-call vote has been called for, the clerk will call the roll. >> [roll call]
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amendment and we will keep working and may be able to come back and propose a resolution that me turn means. on the thing we just voted on, some compromises so we will continue to try to accommodate her concerns which is senator bingaman recognized some of her, some of the more very appropriate -- i think we can find a way through it and i just want to let the chair now. >> that is fine, i just understood that all the amendments had to be found by last week for something or what ever did that was. worked on a modification of it. >> we will work something out. in. >> i think that senator mikulski and senator rabbits and white house can work on one because senator roberts has one that is very similar to that so we have not brought up -- we can work
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with. >> i think senator reid had an amendment and i am ready. >> senator reid. >> mr. chairman, i do. i actually have five amendments over all. one of them is a grant program. the other four are i think technical modifications to information and that the gateway is contained in from the participants and i will proceed in any way -- i came off the first one and that if you like to take the other for up in block i can do that or i could simply wait again for my turn it and do them sequentially. >> if there is no objection we can perceive that way to mcnamee of for the first one. >> what is the first won? >> it is read 200. >> read 200. and as of the amendment is being passed out let me briefly describe it to, it is very straight forward and would
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authorize $50 million in grants to provide coordinated an integrated services through the location of primary and special they community based care and behavioral health centers. these health centers may use the funds for primary care services, diagnostic laboratory services, screenings. the individuals with serious mental illness die on average 25 years in a than other americans. extremely high rate of death due to the high rate occurring health conditions and the population and our overall lack of access. this amendment is really a provision for legislation which was introduced separately co-sponsored by senator burkowski and senator white house and it has been a supporting and by a wide portion of the provider committed a campaign of mental health care reform.
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it would be a very small program. it would allow for essentially pilots to colocate primary care in mental health facilities and i would urge passage. >> mr. chairman. >> yes, senator enzi. >> i agree with the concept, but this issue should be addressed simpson. we tried to pass and a number of times and tried to get this through this committee and people want to pick out one piece to do that, they don't want to do the whole reauthorization but that whole reauthorization needs to be done. we shouldn't just concentrate on some petty issues. it's a disservice for those living with mental issues and these disorders. we drafted a bipartisan bill in 2007. if you would like let's bring the entire kennedy enzi draft from the 2007 and vote on its inclusion in health care reform or amend your amendment to do so. i would vote for the draft as is
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with this provision in it, but at some point we've got to address it but there are difficulties and that is why it has never ever made it through the whole process. but i really do object to this kind of pulling it apart and try to stick little pieces and at arm pour into passing the whole bill. we need to do that. >> mr. chairman, i have no objection to the ranking members' comments, but this was not an attempt to cherry pick the mental health reauthorization del. this is a relatively small program that has been urged on us by many many providers as a way to demonstrate the it on the attractiveness of having the echolocation of primary care health services along with mental health services. it might be provide an opportunity to do this and i think it would provide a valuable lesson and we certainly provide inside when we finally
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>> there's no number in their for the 54 on plus senator reed new initiative care programs because they can't be scored. >> they do not score discretionary and their storylines. >> so the answer is? >> they are not included. >> if the authorized account were funded and one presumes they will be funded otherwise why would they be put in? >> i mean, if they are not going to be funded and putting them in makes no sense.
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>> this is sort of a black area where we don't know how much cost is going to be generated by all these new programs until they are funded, right? >> those decisions would be in the hands of the appropriations committee. i am not sure there is always a one-to-one relationship. >> we know there is not a one-to-one relationship, but we do know that most people don't authorize a program unless they expect to get an appropriation for it. so i just raise that as a point of interest and a flag of concern on the bill that's very expensive, that there are a lot of costs that are being accounted for yet. >> if i might ask the officer, as the senator reed. again, the thrust, what you're trying to do is to promote the co- location in primary health
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care of both mental health and physical health. and this is the right way to go. about the argument about waiting for samhsa are not. butts only times in my talking of discussions with the medical community, so many people that have mental health problems, that have physical ailment, those physical ailments have their genesis in mental health problems. and if you don't have the proper personnel who can understand that and diagnose it and work with people, a lot of times you treat the physical ailment without ever getting to the underlying cause. that's especially true among young people. especially among young people. i keep thinking about the term integrated medicine.
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integrator has a lot of different meanings but i think one of the meetings is to bring these things together so that in primary care you have the same focus on mental health problems as you would on physical health problems. and so that's as i understand the thrust of the amendment. >> that's right. >> i would move passage at this point. and i don't need to record a vote. >> yes, sir. i would like to have a recorded vote. >> rollcall vote has been requested. the clerk will call the roll. by proxy. [roll call] [roll call] [roll
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>> senator reed had these other four but he has to go relieve senator dodd who will then come here and assume his position. any other amendments while we are waiting? >> the senator is a. >> i would call of amendment 204. >> nz 204. >> and the purpose of this amendment is to permit individuals eligible for medicaid to opt out of medicaid and enroll in a qualified health plan. as we have discussed, expanding the medicaid program to 150% of poverty is proposed by previous version of the bill will bankrupt the state. if we want to expand health care, which medicaid is a terrible base onto which to build because the inadequacies of the program.
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according to the 2007 wall street journal, medicaid beneficiaries have poorer health than their peers of private insurance, even worse many medicaid patients can't find doctors. we have talked about that a lot. so they aren't getting the care they need. and california roughly 51% of the families physicians participate in medicaid while in michigan the number of doctors who will see medicaid patients has fallen from 88% to 64%. that was in 2005. it may be quite a bit lower than that now. so i can't believe that this bill forces medicaid beneficiaries to stay a dysfunctional system without providing beneficiaries without an opportunity to opt into a health care plan provided throughout the exchange. now, my amendment fixes this problem by allowing medicaid enrollees the choice to enroll in medicaid or in a qualified health plan sold in the gateway. page 50, line 22 of the underlying bill says choice for individuals eligible for jeff, children's health insurance
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program. a qualified individual who is eligible for children's health insurance program under title 21 of the social security act may elect to enroll in such a program or in a qualified health plan. my amendment inserts the word medicaid or before chip and inserts the medicaid program under the title 19 and social security act after children's health insurance program. my amendment is simple in nature and drafting but it would have a profound effect in every state, and we're just amending the underlying text of the bill. the argument i'm sure would be that we can't afford it. it will drive up the cost. i don't think that it will. i have mentioned that in wyoming, the chip program works through private insurance. and it's less expensive than most of the states that are running it through government insurance. i think that we would find the
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same effect that we might have the same effect with this, and it eliminates a statement. that's what i'm trying to do. and it also allows the combination of the plans, trying to get a waiver so that a number of kids in the program getting insurance could include the parents for the same cost. why not? so that's one of the areas where costs will come down, i think. so i would ask for your support on that amendment number 204. >> discussion? >> mr. chairman, i think senator enzi was right in suggesting that the main objection would be in cost. my understanding is cbo estimates that the more people we put into the subsidy regime we are providing for in this bill, and take out of medicaid, the higher the cost of the
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legislation. let me just ask david if my understanding of that is correct. is that basically what they have testify to? >> that's my understanding to. i think they discussed that in the session and some informal conversations have also indicated that would be it, a significant cost to at. >> and obviously, the decision about what level of income medicaid would cover when it comes to adults is something that is going to be a subject of substantial debate and discussion in the finance committee. but for us to say here that in this legislation before our committee, to say that regardless of the level of subsidy of the level of income, anyone covered by medicaid could opt to go into the gateway and obtain subsidies.
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i think would just add to the cost, and i would have to oppose the amendment. >> can i ask the staff a question? i believe senator bingaman has correctly stated what cbo's analysis was. but wasn't the logic behind cbo's analysis that medicaid is underpaying and therefore when you move somebody off of medicaid into the exchange, and maybe end up with a reimbursement rate which would be higher because it would be more accurate to the cost of the service were as medicaid is to service, that that's what skews the scoring? >> i don't think they use the phrase under bank, but they surely take into account that
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medicaid payment rates are less than those typically a bit of local under the plant. >> the reason you get a better score when you expand medicaid is because the cost of medicaid is cheaper because the private markets are basically reimbursed at a high rate. medicaid is reimbursing at last the market value of service and that's why so many doctors don't participate. >> yes, sir. they take into account that the commercial reimbursement rates are higher than those under medicaid. >> and so if we accept the logic of a part of this bill, which is by creating these exchanges and people going onto these insurance initiatives which will be hopefully more aggressive in getting people to be rewarded for healthy lifestyles and preventive initiatives. the logic of this bill is that a person who goes through the exchange is probably going to get a policy which hopefully in the out years will bend the
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cost, right, because the policy will be more competitive, will be, the person will be updating health care anymore health conscious way and in a more preventive way. >> if i'm understanding your question correctly, the legislation tries to build in measures that will improve the quality of coverage, yes. i imagine that the finance committee is also going to try to incorporate similar measures for medicaid as well, but senator bingaman could speak to do far better than i. >> i understand, but wouldn't we want people to have the ability to choose either medicaid or the exchange, especially if we think that the policies are going to get under the exchange are going to encourage them to believe i can live healthier lifestyles and pursue more preventive care? >> well, that's a value judgment. but what i would use a
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technically is that in addition to the cost aspect, there's also a very great difference as members know between the range of services that medicaid provides, particularly to those at lowering incomes, the actuarial dies of medicaid is actually higher. so these are all factors to take into account as the members make that judgment. >> well, i understand. but why should would have that option? >> again, that's a value judgment that i would leave to the members. >> of course, we know that medicaid is really a cost exercise, right? because it underfunds the reimbursement rates, shifting the cost of the care onto people who are bearing the full cost and therefore private insurance prices go up because doctors have to get old reimbursement when their private lives when they know they will not get full reimbursement for their service from the medicaid clients. i mean, there's a lot of studies to that. >> right, again, how
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uncharacterized is medicaid sort of depends on overall perspective. some have characterized it as a cost shifting mechanism. some characterize it as an essential safety net. you know, that's again i think it's accurate to say that the reimbursement rates are far lower. >> we all accept that. that's an appropriate safety net for people with certain income levels. but it's a safety net subsidized by the private sector to the extent that doctor participation, the odds are pretty good that he's not is not or she is not being reimbursed at a rate that is as competitive as what the service costs that doctor, relative to a patient on the private insurance. we know it's a subsidized event. and so it just seems, it just seems logical that you would want to give people a choice. you could use medicaid. this is all about choice. just medicaid or you can go in the exchange. it seems like a pretty reasonable approach to me. >> i just think one of the purposes of this exercise, of
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this bill we are trying to do, is to cover americans who don't have health insurance. medicaid, you do. you're covered. and secondly, i think about so many people with disabilities who qualify for title 19. and there are provisions in medicaid that provide certain supportive services for people with disabilities under title 19 that private insurers probably wouldn't do. third, i understand the senator from new hampshire's, people want to have a choice. but what would happen is the insurance companies then we go after the healthiest people. in medicaid and cherry-pick them and they would send a nice little flyers and stuff like this and think you can get out of medicaid and you can come into this, into this privacy of their private interest because we check you out.
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you're healthy and you don't have any pre-existing conditions and you don't have a disability. we will take you on. and then you leave everybody else that had the most severe illnesses and disabilities in title 19. so again, i think what we are trying to do here is we are trying to cover people that don't have any insurance coverage. and as i said, with medicaid you do. >> and we are covering that. we are talking about covering pre-existing conditions. we are talking about getting rid of the cherry picking. that's why we have the risk adjustment and that's why senator coburn emphasize that risk adjustment so much. it was confirmed that that was going to happen in either bill. so the cherry-pick and is going to disappear, i assume, if that provision is going to work. and so there won't be a discrimination against these various areas.
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>> how would you prevent him? if someone in medicaid has the option and private insurers know that, there is nothing prohibiting the private insurers from going to the healthiest people and saying, come over. you can join our plan. you're the healthiest. this and this and this. and lower them in with all kinds of little deals to get them out of medicaid, and so that is the cherry picking. i don't know how you prevent that. >> the way the bill provides for is to have a risk adjustment where those who make more money off of it has to pay into the pool to compensate those who do not have cherry-pick, who took those other people. i'm told that's in the bill. >> mr. chairman can i make a brief? i appreciate senator enzi's attempt and doctor cohen and senator coburn's support of it and we all do, but i watch portended our attempts on risk
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adjustment on medicare advanta advantage, medicare plus choice and the reiteration of that which ever it was called at the time. and we never could quite keep up with the insurance industry finding ways to game the system. and i don't blame the insurance industry. i'm not anti-insurance industry. their job is to make money for their shareholders. and be a profitable company. they are good at doing that because they have people trying to find a way and find ways to make the system work for them. it's up to us to write the rules, and, you know, i objected to the overpaying for medicare plus choice in medicare advantage. it started off in 95% as you remember of what medicare fee for service on the average paid, and ended up being increased every year or two to the point that it's now 10 or 12% more than a 100%.
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because you just can't do risk adjustment that precisely, so i think in this debate while we are making genuine efforts. it's the same issue in some sense as the insurance rules that we are doing, that the insurance company is accepting this year on community rating, on pre-existing condition and all that. the rules work, mostly, but that's why we needed a public option plan to sort of enforce the rules more honestly. so you have the enforcement of the rules but you have the competition working that way. and i think both of those need to sort of be looked at as we proceed. and i oppose the amendment as a result stack mr. chairman. >> hold on, council. >> just a technical question, technical issue on the risk-adjusted. the risk adjustment would not apply to medicaid so in a circumstance that senator harkin described where individuals had a choice and commercial insurers were able to selectively attracts those who are more
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healthy, the risk adjustment even if it worked perfectly would not apply to the medicaid program so there would be no mechanism to rectify that. snack thanks. >> in other words, the people that stayed under medicaid was to be covered under medicaid. >> people who stayed under medicaid would still be covered under medicaid, yes. but i was beaten nearly to the senator harkin's point about whether there would be a mechanism to compensate if there were a selection. and i think the answer is no. >> mr. chairman? >> under the bill, we have a requirement for guaranteed issue so the private plans have to take both the healthy and the sick. so are we going to just not apply that to some of it? that way the beneficiaries have the choice and they have to be taken. it's not the insurance company that is making the choice. it's the individuals making the choice. >> i would respond to that, my friend, by saying the insurance companies will only go after the healthiest. they will have nice families and
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things like that. they aren't going to go after the sick is. they just won't. it stands to reason. any other discussion? >> yes, sir. i think this is very enlightenenlightening because essentially what's being said here is that once you are in the medicaid plan, you're if you still qualify for the medicaid plan you don't get any choice of. you have to stay in medicaid. where as you have written a bill which says that once you are in a private plan you're going to have the opportunity to go into a government plan which is essentially government-run plan. there's some irony here if you're saying that medicaid recipients i'm sorry, you're going to have to stay with the government plan even if there is a private plan that you think will do a better job for you and your family. and which meets the test of medicaid reimbursement. i mean, it is slightly inconsistent to take this position it seems to me. >> i think the other thing, i don't know the percentage, maybe counsel does or someone does.
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a lot of times we tend to think as a medicaid as people get into medicaid and then they are just on medicaid for ever. a lot of medicaid are people who are working, they lose their job, and income. they go on medicaid for a while. they get reemployed again. they go off medicaid. people go in and out of medicaid all the time. i don't know -- >> my point was if you qualify for medicaid, you're on medicaid. you don't get a choice of getting out of medicaid unless you happen to disqualify yourself from medicaid by having an income go up. as long as you are a medicaid qualified recipient, you're not going to be given a choice under this bill to move over to the exchange where you might be a did a much better policy at the same price. >> any further discussion? if not we will have rollcall pulled on enzi 204. the clerk will call the roll.
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>> thank you very much, mr. chair. this amendment sets up a commission of nonpartisan health experts to provide recommendations to the health and human services secretary regarding the items and services that should be included in the essential benefits package. some of the core points on this is that it would be very helpful for the secretary to have such a commission of nonpartisan experts to provide insight from various perspectives on the element of this core package. and second, that having an open and public process would give the citizens of our nation and interest groups a chance to weigh in and make sure that every prospective is considered as a secretary reaches their conclusion. so an open and public process. this amendment also requires the secretary to assess whether the
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benefits package needs to be modified or updated to account for changes in medical evidence on an annual basis and provide a report to congress on that. so again we have an ongoing dialogue on that alone is his commission, has been disbanded. this amendment is endorsed, supported by about 70 organizations, which i could make available but it's a very long list of groups that feel there should definitely be a commission of nonpartisan health experts to provide advice in a transparent public process to discuss the items that should be included. >> mr. chairman, may i ask the senator a question? senator, how long would this commission take to do this? does this have a time limit? >> it does have a time limit, and i want to say that it's one
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year, but i'm going to consult and make sure that i have that correct. one year, yes. >> would this contribute to the -- first of all, we have an excellent benefit package so you and i are in agreement on the public policy but to have a commission that's going to take a year when i believe there's already a consensus at a consensus about a benefit package would be, wouldn't this delay the implementation when people are desperate and clamoring for access as quickly as possible if we pass the bill? >> you're asking an excellent question, and my understanding is that all of these groups understood that the work of the commission would happen on a timely enough basis to support the secretary in their decision. so their work would be timed to
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the schedule of the secretary. i'm checking to try to find a cause on the exact length of the commission. and so if anyone else. yes, so there we would be in existence for year and they would complete their work much more quickly as required by the secretary's schedule. >> mr. chairman? >> i don't understand his commission at all. i cannot we work scoring things that are put in at the moment, and now we are saying that we are going to have a federal health board of unelected people who we don't know who they will be. that are going to be able to
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and i hope that was not the intent of the way that this was done because it would have been part of the original bill we could have had amendments that could have suggested for limiting the commission's activities or whenever people thought were necessary on it, but what we get now is an up or down vote on a new federal commission of unelected people who get to make the decisions on who gets what treatments. those should be made by doctors and families. and it provides -- it could provide for future expansion of what we're doing with huge costs in addition to what we're doing here and i think it is the wrong way to go about it so i oppose the amendment. >> mr. chairman. >> senator bingaman. >> mr. chairman, let me ask senator merkley, just to clarify
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my own understanding of his amendments all this amendment is to the establishment of a commission to make recommendations. at the beginning of this process recommendations to the secretary from what should be in the benefit package and that is covered, is that accurate? >> senator, you have stated it very well. under the current bill what we have is a non transparent closed process in which the secretary makes a decision and i am sure the secretary would be lobbied from many directions, but is the thought of many citizens and many participants in this realm of health care that is much better to have a public process, transparent process in which people can express their recommendations. to senator enzi point, this commission has no decision making authority. it would simply serve as a mechanism to collect inside and
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pass those on to the secretary. >> let me also just clarify that one of the things we've got in the bill and that maybe david could respond on this is a requirement that the package of benefits specified by the secretary shall not exceed a certain actuarial limits and also have in this amendment as i see it a requirement that the commission considered at only the potential of adding or expanding benefits to increase cost and their action in between and the interaction between the addition or expansion of benefits and reductions in existing benefits to make actuarial limitations. so this is the knowledge and as well that there is an actuarial limits on these benefit package that has to be adhered to.
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am i correct in understanding that? >> that's absolutely correct. in 3103 come 82 n/a three there are import limitation clause is, one is general limitation on the extent of the benefit and an essential health benefits and paragraph three is the certification by the actuaries that limitation has been met. nothing in the merkley amendment would disturb those limitations and unlike the bill as previously filed as senator merkley said this was an advisory council rather than having an it decision making authority. >> end of the limit of the size of the benefit package is tied a to the benefits provided at by the typical employer sponsored plan to, is that accurate? >> that's, right. >> well, i support the amendment. i think it is useful for the secretary to have the benefit of this advice. i think it is very clear from
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the amendment that that is all this is his advice, it is still up to the secretary to make the decisions about what is in the benefit package. rajendra language and that we have in the bell appropriately is general and does not get into detail. the secretary is going to have to get into more detail and the bill does and i think it's useful for the secretary to have this advice before taking on the job of defining what we intended by the legislation. >> senator merkley. i am inclined to support, i just read through this. i wonder if the senator would be amenable to an amendment to his amendment. on page three at the bottom there are qualifications. first there is a number, committee shall be in general,
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the membership of the commission shall included individuals with national recognition for their expertise in clinical medicine, primary and preventative health care and signs of benefit design perrin i would like to suggest that we add after the preventive health care, and you're the words integrative medicine. an actuarial science and health plan benefit design. >> mr. chairman, i would certainly be very amenable to that amendment. >> i think the senator can modify his amendment if he so chooses. >> it is helpful, i choose to modify the amendment in the manner the chair has suggested. [laughter] >> mr. chairman, i want to follow up on what senator
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mikulski said, so we appoint a commission and they have a year to provide information to the secretary and then a the secretary has to begin the very difficult process of regulation that she has to do which is where we open it up to the public so that there is some transparency. so haven't read delayed the effect by a year by doing this? and also am a little bit concerned about the language on page two and i understand these are going to be doctors and other professionals that are going to be on this commission, but where is as the clinical appropriateness and effectiveness of the benefits coverage. that sounds a little bit like rationing. that always concerns made, but i recognize it has to go to the secretary but aren't we delaying by a year putting into effect this commission? >> senator, if i could respond to that.
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i will direct you to the guidance on page two. commission's responsibility is to hold hearings and other public sessions not less than three times to take testimony and receive such evidence as considered advisable just know the last thing they want to do is have a protected timeline now make their advice irrelevant because the secretary had already made a decision of ul and so that a modest amount of public input, the minimum of three public meetings can be taken to honor a time line in close coordination with the secretary to try to get that input on to the secretary's desk to make it useful. >> mr. chairman, further question. first of all, i like the idea of open and transparency and that people can have input. what i don't like is the delay of a year as stated by senator enzi. you have spoken eloquently about the people in oregon.
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how they are waiting for coverage. they really do think if we pass a bill that by the time the president gets to the state of the union we are going to be ready to go. so i'm concerned about that. the second thing i'm concerned about is that the membership is appointed by the comptroller general. what is the comptroller general know about appointing people to a commission to define your health benefits? i mean, what is the comptroller general -- he has a totally different function in our society. >> thank you, senator. first let me address the time line -- i absolutely agree with you that there should be no delay for this type of input. clearly the secretary is going to have to seek advice that can either occur in a non-public for hamas or that can occur in a public forum. i think it is only fair to the public that we have it in a
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public opportunity. now those three meetings could be held in the course of a two week time in three different locations around the nation were on whenever time line is a appropriate to get that input digested and pass it on to the secretary. in regard to your question about the individual who appoints the members. if you would like, i would be happy to take a break from this amendment and find out the answer to that question and bring it back to you. >> i think we agree on a policy of an open transparent discussion of the benefit package. and what i would really want to limit the time as in terms of ensuring proper functioning of a commission so it is not so sure that we really get on with it. the second thing is to see who the appropriate person to a point -- i'm not excited about
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the comptroller general making the appointments. >> mr. chairman. i think it is a very good point because it would be the gao pointing this board and they currently have a two-year backlog on the reports. so i am wondering how quickly they can make recommendations for individuals to serve on the board and as far as them holding three quick hearings and being done my experience with boards and commissions is that if you lock them one year it will take a. a half their funding will run out in a year but take him awhile to get the report and gao to get it approved. transparency is great, but transparency will take time. >> can i ask a question? since this bill is going to take about five years to be implemented anyway, this goes into effect right after the passage of the bailout and so it will be done concurrently if i'm not mistaken so it is not that
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we will have to wait until the bill is implemented and then another year after that. seems to me that this is done hideaway and i'm not mistaken so i don't understand with the problem is the delay in implementing the bill. unless i am wrong. i think it would run concurrently. i'm sorry, i have to recognize senator roberts and then senator higdon. >> thank you mr. chairman. it is on this amendment and as i indicated to you at some point i do have a short statement and a couple of amendments that we could consider an ad hoc and deal with in an expeditious fashion so that is up to you, sir,. it seems to me this amendment basically adds back in the federal health board that the chairman took out prior to the markup, it is a little bit like men pack. from a process standpoint i am
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concerned that the provision was taken out. we have some amendments that we would have applied to offer on its and now we've are trying to basically added back in. i am concerned that a federal health board and will set a very high minimum benefit levels which would result in raising premiums for everybody and then on the flip side i am concerned that the federal health board will become a rationing board. i know that is the scare word but i'll use it anyway. rationing board similar to the problems that we have experienced with cms and medicare already. as well as the obvious example in the united kingdom. let me just ask a question of the senator and/or council, could this board require a private plan pay providers
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certain medicare rates or at medicaid rates or something lower? >> no, it could not. it is charged only with making recommendations on the benefits which would be recommendations to the secretary still subject to the limitation and 31 of 382 and a three. >> i think the council. could this board require private insurers to deny coverage based on the results of comparative effectiveness research or cer? >> the short answer, senator, is a noted cannot. it has a function to provide recommendations to take public input and to provide recommendations to the secretary two just enhance the discussion, the point raised by the senator from maryland, the response is
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that this was modeled after the process of appointing members to medpac and that the medicare part d advisory board, all those are done by the comptroller general. absolutely, i'm happy to take a look and happy to have any recommendations for how we might have a better choice. >> i'm going to ask the question that probably nobody wants to hear, but at any rate, could this board suggest private -- can at this event is available online at c-span.org where you'll find leverage and that coverage now the senate returns to resume consideration of defense department programs for fiscal year 2010. live it senate coverage here on c-span 2
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the presiding officer: the senator from kansas. mr. roberts: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent if i could proceed as if we were in morning business to speak about the health care deliberate thraitionz we are undertaking -- deliberations that we are undertaking. i know we are on the defense authorization bill. my remarks shouldn't take that long. the presiding officer: without objection, so ordered, senator. mr. roberts: mr. president, as i
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indicated, i rise today to talk about health care reform but yet the hard truths that have so far been not hidden but i don't think that have been very much aware to many americans. i was inspired to come to the senate floor today because we're holding hearings in the "help" committee, we're holding hearings in the finance committee and a series of events in the health, education, labor and pensions committee that made me recall the observations of a well-respected public opinion analyst pollster, daniel yankolo viyankolovic, founder of the "nw york times"/yankolovic poll. now, the "help" committee has been struggling -- well, we've
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been working hard. struggling probably isn't the right answer, and many thanks to the chairman, chris dodd, our ranking member, mike enzi, and the members of the "help" committee. but we've been going through a multiweek markup that has been characterized by i think some very wishful thinking on the part of the majority members of that committee; namely, the hope or the wish that they can somehow not reveal the very real costs and tradeoffs raised by their health care reform bill. and i think the american people ought to become more and more and more aware of this. the bill that the "help" committee is marking up established all sorts of new government programs, all sorts of new government mandates and controls all justified by the need to rein in health care costs and increase health insurance coverage. now, those are two very good and noble pursuits which i support wholeheartedly. as a matter of fact, i think
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republicans now have about six bills to do the same thing. they don't get much attention but we have six bills. but there's a big problem with this bill. it does neither of these things, in my opinion. it neither reduces costs nor does it significantly increase coverage, mr. president. in fact, it significantly increases costs for very little gain. costs -- c-o-s-t-s -- remember that word. but my colleagues on the "help" committee continue to wish and to hope that they can absorb or, pardon me, obscure this reality through a a barrage really of speeches and rhetoric and what i call misleading figures. and it has been this behavior that has caused me to recall mr. yankolovic's observations on something called the evolution of opinion. i'm going to use that as the basis of my remarks, the evolution of opinion. the article was in "fortune"
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magazine and it jogged my memory in this regard, but in any event, i think it serves as an important illustration of the health care reform process so far. mr. yankolovic observed that the evolution of a person's opinion could be traced through a continuum of seven stages. that's a fancy way of saying there are seven steps that you go through when you're trying to think something through. first, we have had daun dawning awareness, the realization that our health care system was not working for every american and needed to be addressed. and i think everybody understands that. the second stage, greater urgency. the economy began to go south and people who used to rely on their employer for health insurance began losing their jobs. then, mr. president, there's the third stage, reaching for solutions. and our committee's held hearings and began to meet with stakeholders.
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the administration met with stakeholders. the stakeholders i think probably met in good faith and it's only been recently that they have discovered that they may have signed on to something that is very illusory, to say the least. fourth, the stage where many on the "help" committee and elsewhere have arrived at today, the wishful thinking stage. the well-intentioned, romantic, similar policic, perhaps -- simplistic, perhaps naive moment when all one sees are the benefits without considering the consequences, the law of unintended effects. for example, the totally misleading claim by the majority that the new data from the congressional budget office revealed a much lower score for this bill, $597 billion -- a lot of money -- while still expanding health insurance coverage to 97% of americans. this claim is the very definition of wishful thinking.
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but facts are stubborn things. the actual c.b.o. numbers say this bill leaves 34 million people still uninsured. that's not 97% coverage. in order to gain anywhere near 97% coverage, we would have to significantly expand medicaid, a very expensive proposition which, according to c.b.o., adds up to about $500 billion or more to the cost of this bill. more wishful thinking, mr. president. the $597 billion cost was further artificially lowered through seral budget maneuvers, such as a multiyear phase-in and a long-term care insurance program that will increase costs significantly clear outside the ten-year budget windodow that the c.b.o.s required to use. here we are passing a long-term
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insurance bill -- excuse me, mr. president. -- a long-term insurance bill that goes beyond ten years that c.b.o. cannot even score. after taking these realities into account, a more accurate ten-year score of this bill is closer to the $2 trillion. i said that right, wan not $1 trillion, $2 trillion. this is where we should arrive at the fifth stage of opinion making, weighing the choices. i see some strong objection to my -- to my commentary. since the true cost of this bill is approximately $2 trillion, we must own up to the american public about the tradeoffs. we must finally understand that the tradeoffs threaten a health care system that polls tell us has a 77% satisfaction rate.
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i would tell my distinguished colleague, mr. wicker, if he would take care of turning this damn phone off. [laughter] now, this is not to say we should not undertake any reforms, but we need to honestly discuss the costs and benefits of reform proposals. and the majority's proposal is high on costs and low on benefits. the number-one tradeoff that americans need to know is higher taxes. remember when the president promised that if you make under $250,000, you will not see your taxes increased, that you would actually see a tax cut? well, like so many other pledges, those promises had an expiration date and that state rapidly approaching. this bill raises $36 billion in the first ten years on new taxes on individuals who do not purchase health insurance.
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that's a penalty. it raises another $52 billion on new taxes on employers who don't offer their employees health insurance. and in a side guess, who suffers when an employer's taxes gets raised? it certainly isn't the employer. it's the employee who gets laid off or doesn't get a raise. it's the applicant who doesn't get hired. even president obama's own budget director admits this fact. and at least one economic survey estimates that an employer mandate to provide health insurance like the one in the kennedy-dodd bill would put 33% of uninsured workers at risk for being laid off. 33% of uninsured workers. and the study went on to say that workers who would lose their jobs are disproportionately likely to be high school dropouts, minority
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and a female. it's a job killer for the very people that the bill ostensibly seeks to help. now, these new taxes don't come close to paying for this bill and the ideas that have been coming out of the finance committee, of which i am also privileged to serve, the house, the house of representatives, the so-called people's body, and the administration prove that these new taxes will be just the first of many. one option, a new and higher income tax on taxpayers with earnings in the top income tax brackets -- some press on that as of now -- including small businesses. essentially, a small business surtax to pay for government-run health care. now, keep in mind that this surtax is in addition to higher income taxes that the president is already calling for in his budget. the president's budget proposal calls for raising the top two individual tax rates in 2011.
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many small businesses file their tax returns as individual returns and the national federation of independent business, nfib, estimates that 50% of the small business owners who employ 20 to 249 workers fall into the top two brackets. now, when these higher income taxes are combined with the proposed surtax to pay for the government-run health care, it means that a small business could see their tax bills go up by as much as 11%. 11% when this health care reform bill finally takes effect. an income tax rate increase of about 33% over what they pay today. mr. president, it doesn't stop there. under the proposal the house is expected to unveil possibly today, they leave the door open for even more tax increases on
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small businesses. that proposal is expected to allow in 2013 for the small business surtax to be raised by several additional percentage points if health care costs are higher than expected. which is likely. these higher income taxes would be a devastating hit on our nation's small businesses, the same small businesses that create roughly 70% of the jobs in this country and are the backbone of our economy. we should not be raising taxes on these job creators if we want our economy to rebound and grow and expand. small businesses in kansas tell me that they feel they are already stretched to the limit and they worry that to pay the additional taxes called for in the president's budget, not to mention an additional small business surtax to pay for a government-run health care program, that they will have to cut back elsewhere.
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cut back means layoffs. cutbacks meaning really the worst thing you could do for the economic catalyst of our count country, the small business community. make no mistake, these will be difficult choices. they'll have to reduce the wages and benefits of current employees. they'll have to pass their costs on to their customers. they'll have to lay off workers or not hire new employees. none of these are good options for workers, small business or our economy. but higher taxes are just one of the ways that the majority wants to pay for this massive expansion of government. the other method? the other method? the other method will be cuts to medicare. you're right -- you heard me right, medicare, cuts to medicare. cuts to the reimbursements to providers to our senior citize citizens, cuts that we have been
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trying to prevent and we have added in almost every session that we have been in $150 billion from the hospitals. now the hospitals have agreed to this with their national organizations. but funny thing, the hospitals from kansas came back to visit me and said, "not on your life." and for a person who has worked hard to prevent cuts in that market basket of provider reimbursements to keep our rural health care delivery system whole, it comes to me as a great surprise that their national organizations would sit down and say, okay, we're going to give up $150 billion only to learn a couple of days or weeks later that some in the house say that's not enough. so they really didn't have a deal. and another few hundred billion from the physicians. i haven't heard any agreement on that from the physicians. tens of billions from home
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health care agencies and radioology and home oxygen and far phafplt let's don't forget -- and phrma, who agreed to a certain amount of cuts, i think it was $80 billion, but now have learned that that figure isn't really firm. whoever else gets strong armed or weak kneed with making a deal with this administration, you better be careful. when hospitals and pharmacists and home health agencies get their reimbursements slashed by medicare or medicaid, who pays the price? it's not the provider, at least not at first. it's the people with private insurance who pay a hidden tax to make up the difference. some $88.8 billion a year according to a recent millimen study. and once the provider runs out of prior payers to shift this
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cost deficiency, who pays? it's the patients who lose access to a doctor or a hospital or a pharmacist or a home health agency. in addition to cutting medicare payments, this bill will dump, by some estimates, well over a million new people on to a government-run health care plan which will never pay providers enough to cover their costs, despite any rhetoric otherwise. and as this number grows and the private market shrinks, the decrease in the number of doctors and hospitals and other providers will be inevitable. and we see that already. we already have rationing. we already have shortages. we already have doctors and providers that say i'm sorry i'm not reimbursed to the extent i can stay in business and offer you medicare. so rationing is not a scare word. it's something that's happening now. it will simply not be possible for them to keep the doors open
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on the margins that the government will pay them. and that's when rationing of health care will become a way of life in this country. oh, i can see it now. it will either be by age or by test or by the comparative effectiveness research golden ring that c.m.s. -- that's another outfit that works with the department of human and health services -- these are the bean counters that work like this and don't work with the real effects. these are the trade-offs that the american people need to know about in this bill. yes, $2 trillion in new spending, higher taxes, job-killing employer mandates and rationed health care. and for what? and for what? to overhaul a system with which 77% of americans are satisfied. now i've offered several amendments in the "help" markup just this morning, attempting to force the committee to face
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stage 5. remember my "fortune" magazine and my stages of evolution of thought? to truly weigh the choices, that's the next stage. my amendments would have preventive federal health subsidies from being funded through higher taxes on employers, higher taxes on individuals or families or through cuts to medicare. all three were defeated in a party-line vote. and i wasn't alone in trying to get the committee to really weigh the choices in this bill. senator alexander spoke very credibly as a former state governor about the fiscal catastrophe that expanding medicaid eligibility will cause for the states. again, he was defeated by a party-line vote. how can we ignore the very real consequences of raising taxes, mr. president, on individuals and employers in a recession? some say the worst recession since in the 1930's. how can we deny that further cutting medicare will increase
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costs for everyone else and possibly eliminate access to health care for our seniors? how can we turn a blind eye to all of the states that are already facing a financial meltdown and force them to take on billions of dollars of new medicaid obligations? some of us are still stuck in stage 4, still hanging on to their wishful thinking. well i'm ready to move on to stage 6. probably everybody else is as well here on the floor. it's called taking a stand. i hope that we can all take a stand to preserve the system that works well for the vast majority of americans and to consider a more cost-conscious, realistic and patient-friendly approach to greater health care reform. by four, the most important stage for us is, yes, the final stage -- number seven. making a responsible judgment. the policies in this bill are very, very expensive, and the
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american people need to know that some way, somehow they will have to pay for them. so we must thoroughly examine the costs and the trade-offs in health care reform. we cannot simply engage in wishful thinking. the american people expect us to make responsible judgments. there is simply too much at stake. mr. president, i understand the leadership of this body is in a dash, a rush to finish the hearings in "help" to produce a bill -- the "help" committee -- and also to force the finance committee to come up with a markup of the bill to pay for all this. i don't know how you pay for $2 trillion, and the finance committee talking about $350 billion -- and those are very controversial. i have a suggestion. i think we ought to put a big banner right up here where the press is not. right over there. i don't think the press would
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mind very much. and you could just say "do no harm." and then maybe you could put something underneath that and just say "slow down." or maybe in the language of my state, "whoa." put that, in the back of the "help" committee, put it in the back of the finance committee, and let's do the job right. a senator: if the senator would yield? mr. roberts: i'd be delighted to yield. a senator: i thank the senator from kansas for his remarks. i think it's really interesting and perhaps symbolic that his cell phone was ringing off the wall or off of his belt when he was beginning to make his remarks. mr. wicker: i think perhaps that's symbolic of what we're beginning to hear in the senate and also in the house of representatives from the public. and it's not just from the right wing. it's from mainstream media. it's from "the washington post" last friday. it's from liberal commentators
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like michael kinsley last friday who say let's slow down on this. i think what the americans might be saying is that they've gone through this hierarchy of decision making and that this is not the kind of health care that they were promised last year. we were told health care would save money for americans. now we hear it's going to cost $1 trillion to $2 trillion, perhaps even $3 trillion. we were told that americans were satisfied with -- who were satisfied with their insurance would be able to keep t. now we're told will be able to move in a a public plan. we didn't hear about cuts to medicare when this was being debated last year in a presidential campaign. and we certainly didn't hear about higher taxes on middle-income americans. so i was glad to help the senator from kansas avoid taking those phone calls while he was
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speaking. mr. roberts: if my distinguished colleague -- well, i'll just take back my time, then i will yield to you for any other comments you might want to make. the person on the other end of the phone call, was he for the health care bill or was he against it? mr. wicker: i would not have presumed to answer the senator's phone call. i simply put it back in the cloakroom. but i'm hoping it's symbolic of the american people -- mr. roberts: -- against it, i hope you'd explain we have real concerns and i hope we can get real health care. mr. wicker: i thank the senator. mr. roberts: i also thank the senator. let me give you one quick answer of what i'm talking about here in regards to medicare. the president of the kansas farm assistance association is from a very small town out west. we go into the farm seufplt the pharmacists, we ought to give them a gs-15 salary because they are the people who deal with medicare part-d, the prescription drug program, very popular. let's say a lady named mildred
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came in to see her pharmaceutical and mill dead -- and mildred talk to tom and said what's this doughnut hole? tom said that's where you have to pay a bigger copayment. mildred said can't i get a new kind of program or something else that will help me out here? and he says there's 47 new programs that you can choose from. and, mildred, the one you want is right here. she says, good, then i'm not going to get hurt with the cost of the prescriptions that i need. he says, but i can't offer it to you. why? he says because i'll only get reimbursed 71%. and that is about the national average. now how on earth can we expect every pharmacist all around the country to administer -- and they are the ones doing the administering. it isn't the area aging place or the 1-800-medicare. try that. if i'm mad about my cell phone
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ringing, dial 1-800-medicare. you'll never get an answer. he had to tell her the one program in medicare part-d, he didn't get reimbursed enough and couldn't offer it. he helped her out. all pharmacists try to do that. that's where we are. or if mildred goes to a doctor and all of a sudden the doctor says i'm sorry, i can't take any more medicare patients. that's happening. it's real. and this bill exacerbates that. exacerbates it. that's why i'm so upset and why i came to the senate today. i'll go back to the "help" committee to work in good faith with my colleagues. i know we're supposed to have a markup thursday. marching orders from the leadership right in the middle of a defense authorization bill. we don't need marching orders. we need to slow down. we need to slow down and get this right. thank you, mr. president. i yield back the balance of my time. the presiding officer: the
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senator from delaware. mr. kaufman: i'd like to thank the members of the armed services committee for the tireless work on this bill, the defense authorization bill. thank senator levin and senator mccain for the language to strike $1 billion-plus. i support the bill which aims to support critical defense spending priorities such as providing health care for members of the armed services and their families. enhancing the capability of our troops to conduct successful counterinsurgency operations in iraq and afghanistan. improving our ability to counternontraditional and asymmetric threats and terminating troubled and wasteful spending programs in favor of those deemed more efficient and effective. also, i strongly support the recommendation of secretary gates that we must rebalance the defense budget in order to
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institutionalize and enhance our capabilities to fight current wars as well as likely future threats. as events in iraq and afghanistan have demonstrated, the military challenges currently before us are really unlike conventional wars of the past. and i am pleased that this bill provides the resources necessary to protect our troops in counterinsurgency missions by providing additional funding for mine-resistant ambush-protected vehicles or mrap's, u.s. special operations command and the joint improvised explosive device defeat organization as well as supporting equip missions for afghan security forces. this training is an essential prerequisite to achieving stability and security in afghanistan and succeeding in our ongoing counterinsurgency mission. these and other provisions of the bill aimed to
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institutionalize many of the administration's recommendations regarding the future defense priorities based on the conclusion of military officials. military officials including secretary gates, admiral mullen, and general petraeus. that irregular warfare is not just a short-term challenge. rather, it is a long-term reality that requires realignment of both military strategy and spending. as secretary gates has said, this rebalancing need not come at the expense of conventional weapons systems which are deeply embedded in the department of defense, in its bureaucracy, in the defense industry and in the congress. at the same time we must move away from funding cold war-era weapons programs with an eye towards the future and accept that threat requirements have changed. this requires difficult decisions and sacrifice and
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change, difficult decisions to sacrifice such as ending the f-22 production line which the white house and the department of defense have concluded will save valuable resources that could be more usefully employed. as president obama explained yesterday in a letter to the senate, this determination was not made casually. it was a result of several analyses conducted by the department of defense regarding future u.s. military needs and an estimate of likely future capabilities of our adversaries. the f-22 has never flown over iraq and afghanistan because it is not the most efficient or effective act to meet the current needs in the military. its readiness to be questioned. it has proven too costly and continued production will come at the expense of more critical defense priorities. i say "critical defense priorities." but this debate is really not about the future of the f-22.
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this is just the first test as to whether we are ready to end unnecessary spending so that we can rebalance the defense budget to better reflect the reality of counterinsurgency missions. today i want to voice my support for the levin-mccain amendment which terminates procurement of additional f-22 fighter aircraft when the current contract ends at 187 jets. in december 2004, the department of defense concluded that 183f-22's were sufficient to meet our military needs, especially given the future role of the f-35 joint strike fighter. , which is a half-generation newer aircraft and more capable in a number of areas including electronic warfare combating enemy air defenses. ending the f-22 production line at 187 meets the needs of our military and allows us to purchase equipment deemed more efficient and effective.
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according to secretary gates and admiral mullen, "if the air force is forced to buy additional f-22's beyond what has been requested, it will come at the expense of other priorities and require deferring capabilities in the areas we believe are much more critical to our national defense." some of my completion have argued that ending the procurement of the f-22's will have a significant impact in terms of jobs. of course i share the concern of keeping jobs and am focused first and foremost on preserving jobs and job creation. at the same time, however, i believe that job losses incurred in the f-22 line will be offset by an increase in f manufacture 35 production. i agree with my colleague senator mccain that "in these difficult economic times we cannot afford business as usual." we cannot afford to continue to purchase weapons systems that are not absolutely vital to our national security and interests. i urge my colleagues to join me
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in supporting the levin-mccain amendment which real affirms america's commitment to our troops by ending wasteful spending and enhancing militaray readiness. this reflects the sound and bipartisan judgment of two u.s. presidents, two secretaries of defense, three joint chiefs of staffs as well as the current secretary and chief of staff of the air force. i hope we can pass the defense authorization bill that supports the sound judgment of our military leaders and president and avoid wasteful spending of precious national resources. thank you. mrs. lincoln: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from arkansas. mrs. lincoln: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business. the presiding officer: without objection, so ordered. mrs. lincoln: thank you. mr. president, i also ask unanimous consent that sue son calsunis, a fellow in my office be granted floor privileges for
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the duration of my remarks. the presiding officer: without objection. mrs. lincoln: thank you, mr. president. i rise today to thank the senate for passing my resolution that authorizes a marker be placed in the new capitol visitor center. it recognizes the role of african-americans in the building of this great united states capitol building. i also want to thank susan and my legislative director jim stowers who have been tire unless their work and have done an incredible job in bringing forth this resolution along with many others we have been working on to try and recognize the tremendous work and labor that was put into building this magnificent symbol of our freedom and that particularly that which was done by the slave labor in this country when the capitol was built. but those two individuals have done a remarkable job in working on this, and i'm very grateful to them and all of the work that they've put into it.
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i'd also like to thank congressman john lewis for his unbelievable leadership in moving this resolution through the house and for his leadership of the slave labor task force. i had the privilege of serving with congressman lewis in the house and upon my election to the u.s. senate, we have worked together on a number of issues, including funding for the little rock central high visitor center and the slave labor task force. it has been an honor to work with him on these very important issues, and he's a tremendous gentleman to work with on al issues, but i've had the particular pleasure of being able to work with him on these two, and it has been -- it's been a great learning experience for me and certainly and honor. the crowning feature, mr. president, of our nation's capitol is the majestic statue that stands atop its dome. it was designed by an american, thomas crawford, who represents
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freedom triumphant in war and peace. it has become known simply as the statue of freedom to thoafs house come -- to those of us who come in and out of the capitol on a daily base60's. he crafted it at his studio in rome, italy before it was shipped to the united states to be cast, crawford passed away. once it arrived in washington, d.c., problems soon arose. a workman who assembled the plaster model for all to see, just as it is downstairs, soon got into a pay dispute and when it came time to disassemble it and move it to the mill in maryland where it would be cast into brons, he refuse -- into bronze, he refused to reveal how it had been taken apart. so work on the statue stalled until a man named phillip reed solved the mystery. he was an enslaved african-american who worked for the owner of the foundry
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selected to cast the bronze statue. mr. reed figured out how to disassemble the plaster model by attaching an iron hook to the statue's head and gently lifting -- he gently lifted the top section until a hairline crack appeared and the crack indicated where the joint was located and therch he repeat -- and then he repeated that operation until all five sections were visible. you know, mr. president, if you go down to the congressional visitor center, you can see this huge plaster cast, and you can see how large it is and how cumbersome it is and how difficult it would be to work with, even in today's age with the tools and all of the mechanics that we have, and yet this gentleman on his own figured it out with very little other than just a hook to be able to pull up and figure out where he would find that path of
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least resistance. we know about phillip reed today because fiske mills, the son of the foundry owner, told the story to an historian who recorded it in 1869. it describes phillip reed as an expert and an admirable workman and highly esteemed by all who knew him. phillip reed's story is probably the best-known among the enslaved african-americans who worked so diligently on our nation's capitol. unfortunately, there are many, many others who worked in obscurity, mr. president. when the capitol was first being built in the late-1700's and early 1800's, enslaved african-americans worked in all if a sets of its construction. they worked in carpentry and ma some of the nry, carting, roofing, plastering, painting and sawing.
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these slaves were rented from their owners by the federal government for about $60 a year. for nearly 200 years the stories of these slave laborers were mostly unknown to the visitors of this great building, our capitol. then in 1999, old pay stubs were discovered that showed slaves were directly involved in the construction of the united states capitol. to recognize these contributions, i sponsored a resolution in july of 2000 to establish a special task force to make recommendations, to honor the slave laborers who worked on the construction of this great capitol. the bicameral, bipartisan slave labor task force brought together historians and interested sphicials t fishes tn this issue. in 2008, the task force presented the leadership with our recommendations.
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this resolution fulfills one of those recommendations, the resolution that we have passed here in the senate. it authorizes a marker to be placed in emanages pacing hall to serve as a formal, public recognition of the critical role that enslaved african-americans played in the construction of the capitol. much of the original capitol no longer stands, due to the fires of war and renovations to create more space for the ever-growing body. in fact, some of the stones that were removed when the capitol was renovated have been stored in rock creek park and it is our hope that those stones, those very stones that were quarried years and years ago, which were quarried by the slaiives, will be used to make the c.v.c. marker that we hope to place in the c.v.c. strvment i also would like to take a moment to remember one of the members of the slave labor task force, curtis psyches, an original
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member of the arkansas black history advisory committee. i selected and asked mr. sikes if he would to come and serve on this committee, and i selected him because he was first and foremost an educator. and during his time on the task force, he was focused on the need to ensure that as many citizens as possible be made aware of the contribution of enslaved african-americans in the building of this great united states capitol. unfortunately, mr. president, mr. sikes passed away before our work www.complete. nevertheless, he made important and lasting contributions to our work, and i know he is looking down with a great sense of pride of the things that we have been able to accomplish. the heart of this effort and the mission of the capitol visitor center is education. it was at the root of what mr. sikes stood for and it certainly has been at the root of what our task force has been
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professing and wanting more than anything to create for the visitors that come through our nation's capitol. and that's why there is no more appropriate place nor this marker to regular those who built the capitol than our new capitol visitor center. an education model in itself. the plaster model of the statue of freedom, the same one that was separated by phillip reed, now stands tall in emancipation hall of the c.v.c. for all visitors to see. visitors look at the model each and every day and can compare it to the actual statue standing atop the capitol dome. i want to make sure, mr. president, that every visitor who comes to the c.v.c., our capitol visitor center, knows how that statue got up there and that they know the story of phillip reed and the other enslaved african-americans who played such a critical part in the building of this capitol,
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our symbol of freedom in this nation. in closing, mr. president, i would also like to thank chairman schumer and ranking member, senator bennett, of the rules committee for their help and guidance on this resolution and i would also, mr. president, certainly not finish my remarks with offering my tremendous thanks to my colleague and friend, senator chambliss, from georgia, who along with senator schumer was an original cosponsor of this resolution but congressman chambliss has done a tremendous job. he is a delight to work with, and i am grateful for not only the hard work that he's put in on this issue and others that we have worked on but without a doubt for his friendship in working on so many issues. so, mr. president, i thank you. i thank my colleagues for, again, moving this initiative and this resolution, passing it forward in the senate. we look forward to being able to add to many other of those recommendations from the task force as we move forward, and as
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our congressional visitors center -- our capitol visitor center continues to grow. thank you, mr. president. and i yield the floor. mr. chambliss: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from georgia. mr. chambliss: mr. president, i rise today to concur with my good friend from arkansas with respect to h. con. res. 135 which acknowledges the role that slave raib played in constructing the u.s. capitol and say to her that i thank her for her leadership on this issue. she and i have had an opportunity to work on an issue that is very important to america and to americans. and senator lincoln has been a true champion for the common man as well as -- as for -- as for all americans on any number of issues, and she and i have -- it's been a great pleasure to work with her on any number of issues over the years and i do thank her for her great leadership here.
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mr. president, the story of america -- the story of the very building in which we're standing is a story of free do. it's a story of how people from every corner of the globe arrived here and had a chance to steer their own lives, shape their own destinies and toil a task at their own choosing. not those dictated by birth -- by birth. that shot at freedom was not given to everyone. for those here who were forced to toil for someone else's gain, freedom was a vague concept for others, but not for them. slavery will be a shameful tarnish on a place known as america. slave labor helped to build our nation's capitol. it is one of the saddest ironies of our history, we're are debated the most fundamental questions of liberty was laid by
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those in shackles. they worked in the coal and qawries in maryland to cut the stone which rests this temple of liberty. we know very little about these workers and artisans. the few records kept at the time, only several first names survived next to those of their owners and sums paid for the grueling labor. from 1793 to 1826, 800 slaves painted roofs and perfected this building which represents a freedom most of them were never to know. they laid the foundation still visible at the capitol's east front. they carved the marble columns that witnessed to many -- and they erected and polished the tall marble columns that lend the hall such grace. as the civil war ripped this nation asunnedder over the
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issues of human liberty, a slave artisan named philip reeve crowned this building aptly named freedom. i'm proud to join with my colleague from arkansas and congressman john louis in introducing s. con. res. 135 which directs the architect of the capital to place a marker in emancipation hall of the capitol visitors center, acknowledging the role that the slave laborers played in the construction of this building and accurately reflect its history. i would especially like to thank congressman lewis for his work in heading the slave labor task force which recommended that such a marker be designated an erected. mr. president, this marker is a small way of showing our gratitude to these americans, but it is a necessary and proper one.
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mr. president, i now wish to move to another issue. it's the issue of the mccain-levin amendment that is before us on the defense authorization bill. in the defense authorization mark, we filed an amendment seeking to add seven f-22's for additional procurement by the united states air force and -- air force and as a part of that amendment we provided all of the offsets necessary within the budget to purchase those seven aircraft. that amendment passed in the full committee and now is a permanent part of the mark. the amendment by senators mccain and levin seeks to strip those seven airplanes out of that mark and to deny and to basically shut down the production line for the f-22.
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now, first let me, with respect to this debate, let me put it in context, and draw from a statement by a washington expert in this area who is known for being bipartisan, level headed, and that is john hammery, president and c.e.o. of csic, former pentagon assistant secretary. in an april newsletter he he stated as follows: all of the systems proposed for termination by secretary gates in his budget have valid missions an real requirements. none of them is a wasteful program. this is a case of priorities. secretary gates has decided that these programs don't enjoy the priority of other programs in a constrained budget. but congress can and should legitimately question spending
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priorities. every individual has a unique calculus for prudent risk. secretary gates has rendered his judgment. not only is it appropriate, but necessary for congress to pass final judgment on this question. mr. mr. hamre goes on to say: i admire secretary gates, but it is the duty and obligation of members of congress to question his recommendations. these recommendations merit serious and dispassionate debate, not slogannerring. he has made a series of recommendations. only the congress can decide what to do with the nation. and i close quote. mr. president, congress is the branch of government most directly connected to the american people. we have a crucial role in the budget process which we should not shy away from. some will say that this is a debate about jobs and pork barrel spending, unnecessary
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spending, and powerful defense contractors. hopefully mr. hamre's statements have at least partially dispelled what is truly a myth in this respect. clearly jobs are at stake, and lots of jobs, and good-paying jobs, about 95,000 jobs will be lost if the mccain-levin amendment passes. 95,000 good-paying jobs across america. several of those -- several thousand of those jobs are in my home state. but, you know, this is not really a debate about jobs. this is a debate about the national security of the united states of america. and i'm going to talk in greater detail about that in a minute. but, you know, since the korean war our military has been able to maintain what we call air dominance and air supporty. and what that means is that our united states air force has been able to control the skies, to rid the skies of any enemy
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aircraft. we've been able to control the skies by take -- having the capability of taking out any surface-to-air missile that might seek to shut down one of our planes in any conflict with an adversary. since the korean war, the united states of america has not lost a foot soldier to tactical enemy aircraft because of our ability to maintain air dominance and air superiority. well, if we do not have the f-22, our ability to maintain air dominance an air superiority is in jeopardy. over the years we've been in conflicts in different parts of the world with different adversaries. and there will be additional conflicts down the road at some point in time. we hope not. but we know one thing, and that is if we have an inventory, the capability of taking away the
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enemy's ability to come after us, then it puts our enemy in a difficult position from the standpoint of ever wanting to engage us. let me respond now to some comments that senator mccain made yesterday in which he and others have made often about the power of the military industrial complex. our industrial complex is powerful, but it's not all powerful. also, if there were not serious national security interest at stake here, we wouldn't be having this debate. also, there is absolutely nothing unique about the role of outside interest in the case of the f-22. anyone involved in the current debate we're having in this body over health care, and even in the week's hearing regarding judge sotomayor, those that outside interests, including industry, are intimately involved in trying to influence
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the process in regards to those issues. it is simply part of the process in a democracy. and there is absolutely nothing unique to it in relation to the f-22. we wouldn't be here if it were not serious national security issues at stake that are worth debating much however, most importantly, this debate is about what kind of military we need today and what kind of military these young people who are sitting before us today are going to need in the future. it's about the balance between needing to maintain both the ability to win current wars and guard against future challenges. the united states is a global power with global commitments and responsibilities that exceed iraq and afghanistan. we are also a nation that has fought and won wars through use of technology and not just a total reliance on manpower.
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lastly, we are a nation for whom a base irk war plan egg assumption -- basic war planning assumption for the last 50 years has been that we will control the skies, air dominance and air superiority. if that assumption goes away, so does one 10 enter of -- tenant of american military strategy and maintaining air dominance. a criticism of the f-22's in the bill is that it is funding something that d.o.d. does not want. defense budgets, as enacted into law, always -- and i emphasize that -- always contain measures, be they weapon systems or other programs that d.o.d. does and does not want. as john hamre said, it is the job of congress to assess what d.o.d. requests and render judgment thereon. if we do not do that, we have given up our oversight role in
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which the constitution entrusts us. congress is the branch of government most connected to the american people, has an important role to play and we should not shirk that role or be afraid to challenge d.o.d.'s priority when necessary and when we know they're wrong. this is a debate about military priorities and what kind of military we need. we cannot and should not assume that future challenges will be like today's. in predicting where the next threat will come from, the united states of america and our tacticians have a perfect record. we have been wrong every single time. jobs are at stake in a -- and a variety of different interests are at stake. but, most importantly, what is at stake is our national security and our ability to execute our global responsibilities. that's what's at stake and that is what i am going to focus on in my remarks today.
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i'd also like to rebut one point that critics make about the f-22 not flying in missions in iraq and afghanistan. senator mccain and secretary gates have made this point often over and over -- and over and over again. but there are numerous and very expensive weapon systems in this budget that we're gng to be voting on in the next couple of weeks that have not and hopefully will not be needed in iraq and afghanistan. the trident missiles, the dlissic missile system, -- ballistic missile, the d.d.g.1000, and there is a long list of the items that will not be used in iraq and afghanistan that are contained within this authorization bill. this does not mean the systems are not needed. it is merely that they are intended to address a different threat. to argue against the need for a system because it is not being
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used in the current conflict is shortsighted. and betrays a very short-term perspective on our national security. and, frankly, if the pentagon had wanted to use the f-22 in the current conflicts, they could have been used. now, i don't know whether a conscious decision was made otherwise or not. but the conflict in afghanistan is not over. and we're going to be in that area of the world for a long time to come. and i suspect that before it's over with, we'll have f-22's flying in the region. now, let me just add that -- that these numerous projects that d.o.d. did not request, that there are several d.o.d. projects which d.o.d. did not request that have drawn little or no attention. for example, 560 million for unrequested f.a.--- fa-18's.
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$1.2 billion for unrequested mraps and significant funds to support a pay raise above what was recommended by the president. now, we spent a lot more money on these items than what d.o.d. requested. so to come up here and say, that, well, d.o.d. didn't request any f-22's and therefore we're to salute and go marching on is something that we have never done, we did not do in this bill, and we should not have done in this bill. let me also address the veto threat regarding the f-22 funding. a veto is a serious step and one that should only be taken when the welfare of our troops or national security is at stake. after doing extensive research of defense bills as far back as data is available, i've been unable to find one single example where a veto has been
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threatened or issued in relation to funding that directly supports an unmet military requirement as funding for the f-22's in this bill does. it is regrettable the administration needs to issue a veto threat for funding intended to meet a real national security requirement that has been consistently confirmed by our uniformed military leaders. specifically in his letter to senator levin and mccain president obama states as follows: "the department conducted several analyses which support this position to terminate f-22 production at 187. i'm not sure who was advising the president on this but that statement is simply not true. "of the countless studies," and i emphasize that, study after study "that d.o.d. has done, only one recommended 187 f-22's and that study was based on a
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one major contingency operation that has not even been factored into our national security strategy o there are numerous other studies -- again, numerous other studies, including one commissioned by the d.o.d. itself in 2007, which supports buying a minimum of 250, f-22's and i'd like to offer a knew commends on the letter from secretary gates and admiral mullen. like general cart wright at last week's hearing, secretary gates and admiral mullen talk about the importance of u.a.v.'s and obviating the need for f-22's -- that means taking mights out of the year when it comes to destroying critical adversarial weapon systems trying to take our our men and women. what they don't note is that of
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the u.a.v.'s we're procuring in this budget, we will be procuring in additional budgets, virtually none of them will have any stealth capability and they will be useless in a situation that requires penetrating denied airspace. in other words, if we need to fly u.a.v. into a country and there are a number of countries in the world today that is the russian-made su surface-to-air missiles those u.a.v.'s are shot down each time. the f-22 is the only weapon system in our advisory that has the capability of penetrating that airspace and firing not one shot, thought two shots, but three shots and getting out of
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that enemy territory before the enemy ever knows the f-22 is in the theater. there is nothing in our inventory or on the drawing board that has that kind of capability. certainly not the u.av.'s. as they did in hearings before the armed services committee, secretary gates and admiral mullen also do not address the issue of surface-to-air missiles and that the f-22 is more capable against those systems. lastly, their letter notes the decision to terminate the f-22 program at 187 has been consistent across administrations. again, let me just say that it was secretary gates himself as the secretary of defense at the end of the bush administration who decided to procure additional f-22's and we just
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procured the f-22's in the supplement of a few weeks ago to keep the obligation for additional option for f-22's open for the next administration. that has not been a decision of previous administration but this administration that is making the decision to terminate the best tactical airplane ever conceived in the history of the world. now, in relation to the letter sent yesterday from secretary gates and admiral mullen i'd like to quote from a letter i received from rebecca graham, a military expert, at the mitchell institute for air power studies. here's what she says: "in the letter of july 13 from admiral mullen and secretary gates the characterization of f-35 as a newer aircraft than f-22 and
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more capable in a number of areas such as electronic air fare and combating enemy air defenses is incorrect and misleading i air force secretary donnelly and general schwartz have repeatedly stated 'the f-22 is unquestionably the most capable fighter in our inventors designed with twice the fighting speed to preserve u.s. advantages in the air even if adversaries can test our electronic countermeasures or reach parity with us. if electronic jamming fails, the speed, altitude and maneuverability advantages of the f-22 remain. the f-35 was designed to operate after f-22's have secured the airspace and does not have the inherent altitude and speed
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advantages to survive every time against those with electronic countermeasures. america has no unmanned system programs in production today that can cope with modern air defenses such as those possessed by iran. the navy ucas demonstrator program could produce such a system in several years for carrier-based operations only, however, together, china and russia have 12 open production lines for fighters and fighter bombers. only five f-35's are flying today. the f-35 has completed less than half its testing. and developmental tests are not complete until 2013. it is impossible to assess the full capabilities of the f-35 until operational test is complete in 2014." let me just add right here, that in the history of the united
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states of america when it comes to tactical aircraft we have never, ever purchased a tactical air fighter while it was still in test and development stage. we always allow that to be completed because we know there are going to be deficiencies there. going back to the letter from miss graham: "the united states air force will not have a robust f-35 force structure for another 10 years. in addition, the pentagon removed funding for the f-35 to reach the rate of 110 per year as desired by the air force. departing air force secretary for acquisition recently warned of potential cost growth in f-35 upon her departure. cost grove for a breach could slow down the rate at which the united states air force takes delivery of the f-35."
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the letter misrepresents the position of former chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, general richard myers. mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that letter be made a part of the record. the presiding officer: without objection, so ordered. as i mentioned earlier we see this debate about the need to maintain the ability to win current wars and to guard against future challenges. while respecting secretary gates in his desire to emphasize winning current conflicts, we feel his stance with respect to the f-22 does not adequately account for other kinds of threats. specifically, i find d.o.d.'s assumption that f32'-22 will ony be available in one theater is unrealistic. this is the assumption that the 187 number is based on. given the ability and proliferation of advanced surface-to-air missiles which
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require stealth to counter and numerous hostile nations desire for these "sames" the likelihood of an adversary requiring the systems in the need to midterm is increasingly likely. in fact, in the press recently, there have been reports about a potential adversary seeking to buy the s-30's from russia. the f-22 is the only weapon system that america has that is capable of penetrating the s-30. and there is a follow on, more sophisticated surface-to-air missile being produced by the russians today and that missile, again, will proliferate around the world at some point in time. and the only weapon systems in the inventory of the united states that has the capability of pen tritting airspace where those weapons exist is the f-22. the administration's country plan for f-22 basing would
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result in no f-22's being stationed in europe or being available to address a crisis situation requiring penetrating denied airspace in the middle east. at the press conference announcing his budget recommendations on april 6, 2009, secretary gates said that there was no military requirement -- and i emphasize that, "military requirement," beyond 187, f-22's and the air force agreed. on this issue either secretary gates misspoke or he was given incorrect information. in any case, this statement has been repeatedly contradicted by his air force leadership. the chief staff of the air force, general schwartz, in february of 2009 suggested that he would request some 60
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additional f-22's and present analysis supporting that number to the secretary of defense during formulation of the fiscal year 2010 budget. he commented this request was drive were by analysis as opposed to some other followlation and spoke of some 243 as being a moderate risk number of f-22's. on april 16, 2009, after secretary gates' budget announcement, while speaking at a national air nottic association event -- aeronautic association event general schwartz stated "243 is the military requirement," and he commented that 243 would have been a moderate risk inventory. on may 19, 2009, before the house armed services committee,
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general schwartz testified 243 is the right number of f-22's. before the senate armed services committee on april 21st of this year, general schwartz said that he gauged the risk of a fleet of 187, f-22's as "moderate to high." 187, f-22's puts america in a "moderate to high risk" category according to the chief of staff of the united states air force. now, there have been other generals who have come out and made statements with respect to the f-22 and i want to commend these gentleman because they are putting their military future at risk and i know they probably received some harsh phone calls from the leadership but they have also received a lot of calls from majors and captains
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and lieutenants and air force academy students today as well as army foot soldiers, just like i have. i know they have gotten those phone calls because i've gotten those phone calls thanking me for being willing to stand up and say, mr. secretary, you're rocwrong about this, and we need more f-22's holding a need for 321, f-22's to provide air superiority to protect against potential adversaries. subsequengeneral corley stated f 187, f-22's puts execution of our national military strategy at high risk in the near to
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midterm. air combat command analysis shows a moderate risk force can be obtained with an f-22 fleet of approximately 250 aircraft. the f-22 underpins our ability to dissuade and deter. simply put, 243 gives you the required global coverage with 180 combat coded jets versus 115 to 126 combat coded jets you will get if we terminate this program with 187, f-22's being purchased. 180 combat deployed f-22's allows you to quickly win major contingencies with a moderate risk. lower numbers of f-22's sacrifice global coverage encouraging adversaries to take advantage of a diminished ability to ensure air sovereignty.
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out of dozens of studies conducted by d.o.d. regarding the f-22 every study except one recommended procuring at least 243, f-22's and the one study that did not was conducted by the d.o.d. staff without any air force input and was based on the assumption that f-22's would only be required in one senator scenario. general schwartz and secretary of the air force donnelly spoke often on this issue including an op-ed they put in the paper on april 13. i understand that there's another letter coming from them and i look forward to reading it. and although i'm not sure that it can say anything new in order to better understand his position, i along with six other senators, sent general schwartz
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a letter on may the 4th of this year. and let me quote from that letter. general schwartz stated, "we have been consistent in defining a long-term requirement of 381 f-22's as the low-risk fleet and 243 as the moderate risk for both war-fighting capability and fleet sustainment. the f-22 program of record represents the minimum number for current force planning at higher risk. while 60 more f-22's are desirable, they are simply unaffordable." now, i think these comments from general schwartz confirms what we all already know, that the decision to limit production to 187 is budget driven, pure and simple. 187 is a high-risk fleet and does not meet the full military
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requirement. i would not simply like just to ask my colleagues, why should the united states of america accept a moderate- to high-risk situation in our ability to carry out the mission of the united states air force in the first place? substituting f-22's with other aircraft will not serve the nation's interests. some have suggested that filling the remaining f-22 requirement with other aircraft like the f-35, the joint strike fighter? now, i'm a big fan of the joint strike fighter. it is going to be a great airplane. but as miss grant stated, we've got five flying today that are being tested. we are simply a long ways away from the f-35 reaching full production rate and having the capability for which it was designed and that design is -- that -- the mission that the
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f-35 is being designed for is entirely different from the mission of the f-22. the joint strike fighter's designed for multiroll strike missions and not optimized for the air dominance mission of the f-22. all of the force structure studies have discerned that a complimentary mix of f-22's and f-35's is the best way to balance risk, cost, and capability. the f-22 is the only proven fifth-generation fighter in production. the air national guard is charged with providing homeland aerial defense for the united states and is primarily responsible for executing the air sovereignty alert mission. in addition to the over 1,600 air national guard men and women who carry out this mission on a daily basis, the air national
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guard relies on legacy f-15 and f-16 fighter aircraft. the projected retirements of these legacy aircraft -- and we have in this budget that we're going to require 250 -- retire 250 f15's and f-16's, i have no reason to believe that we won't retire at least another 250 next year, and this trend is going to continue. those retirements leave the guard short of the required number of aircraft to execute this mission. g.a.o. has commented -- and i quote -- "unless the air force modifies its current fielding schedules or extends the service lives of the f-15's and f-16's, it will lack viable aircraft to conduct a.s.a. operations at some of the 18 current a.s.a. sites after fiscal year 2015." the f-15's been a great airpla
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airplane. the f-16 has been a great airplane. it has served us so well over the 30 to almost 40 years that we've been flying those airplanes. in my home state at roins air ar force base, we have a maintenance depot for aircraft. last year, an f-15 literally fell out of the sky, it cracked. those airplanes were immediately tonight is robins air force base, a number of those airplanes were sent to robins air force base to be checked out, and they figured out what the problem was and we've now fixed the problem. but that's the kind of aircraft that we are putting our brave men and women who are flying for the united states air force in today. and we're talking about extending the life of those airplanes for a period of time to meet the mission of the national guard. no plan has been developed to
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fill the shortfall through either modernized legacy aircraft or through new proceed quiewrmts of aircraft if we stop the production of f-22's at 187. 80% of the f-16's will be gone in eight years. according to lieutenant general harry wide, the director of the national guard -- the air national guard, the nature of the current and future asymetric threats to our nature requires a fighter platform with the requisite speed and protection to address them. the f-22's unique capability in this arena enables it to handle a full spectrum of threats that the air national guard's current legacy systems are not capable of addressing. basing f-22 and eventually f-35's at air national guard locations throughout the united states while making them available to rotationally support worldwide contingency
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operations is the most responsible approach to satisfying all of our nation's needs. so the f-22 is not just needed to counter international threa threats. but as we look at a map of the united states and we look at our various air national guard locations around the country, we need the f-22, according to the air national guard, to supplement the support that's employing to be required for the mission of the air national guard. now, let me just for one minute talk about another issue that's a part of this overall long-term mission of the f-22 and that's foreign military sales. now, the f-22 is such a technologically advanced weapons system that a decision was made several years ago that we were not going to share this technology with other countries as we have done with the f-16, the f-15, and heretofore
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basically all of our aircraft, and that was probably the right decision to appoint. but today, with respect to the f-35, we are sharing the technology on that airplane which is based upon the technology of the f-22 with the brits, who are our primary partner with respect to the development and the production of the f-35. so we have made a decision that we're going to share the stealthy technology primarily that's available on the f-22 and the f-35 with the brits. and the f-22 and the f-35 contain a lot of otherer technologically advanced assets. but we now have the opportunity to develop and produce a somewhat toned down version of the f-22 to our countries. for the last several years, we've had interest expressed in
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a very serious way from other countries. one of those countries was in to see me about three weeks ago and said that they are dead serious about looking at purchasing the f-22 as soon as a foreign sales version can be made available. i happen to know that there are other countries that have talked to the contractor as well as the department of defense about the potential down the road for the purchase of that airplane and -- and obviously the contractor can't get involved in it but the department of defense has consistently said we have made a decision to this point that we're not going to share that technology with other countries. well, we live in an entirely different global world today than we did 10 years or 20 years ago, so it's time that we started thinking about the potential for foreign sales of the f-22.
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japan has been a very trusted and reliable ally. they need the best aircraft available to defend themselves over the long haul. and because they are an ally of ours in the part of the world in which they exist and because that part of the world has the potential for the development of future adversaries, it's critically important that we continue -- and i emphasize that, because we have sold them tactical aircraft in previous years -- it's important that we continue to share the latest, most technologically advanced weapons systems with friends and allies like the japanese. let me read you a statement from former chairman of the joint chiefs of staff general richard myers regarding the need for an exportable version of the f-22. general myers stated japan's
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f-15j force, one to the line, is now outclassed by the new generation of chinese fighters, such as the su-30mkk. moreover, china's air defenses, which include variants of russian-made long-range sa-10's and sa-20, which is the 1-300 family missiles, can only be penetrated by the fast, high-flying stealthy raptor or the f-22. japan's defense ministry has studied the problem closely and has produced a very impressive tactical rationale for buying the f-22 if its sale is approved by the united states congress. only under the umbrella of air superiority that the raptor provides can u.s. military endeavors succeed. let me quote from another well-recognized individual, retired general berry mccalf
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tririsinmccaffrey on the need fr adequate numbers of f-22. this statement is about a year and a half old, but it's applicable today. "there is no single greater priority for the coming ten years for the united states air force than funding, deploying, and maintaining 350 f-22 raptor aircraft to ensure air-to-air total dominance of battlefield airspace in future contested arenas." the f-22 provides a national strategic stealth technology to conduct long-range cruises at high supersonic speed without afterburner, penetration at altitudes greater than 15 kilometers, undetected into any nation's airspace at mac-2 plus airspeed and then destroy key targets, aircraft or missiles on the ground, radar command and control, nuclear stockpiled
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weapons, key leadership targets, et cetera, and then egress with minimal threat from any possible air-to-error air defense system. it cannot be defeated in air combat by any known current or estimated future enemy aircraft. now, that's coming from a ground soldier, somebody who depends on that f-22 and heretofore on the f-15 to maintain air dominance and air superiority so that the ground troops under his command could have the assurance in knowing that they could move freely without the threat of enemy aircraft, without more than 187 aircraft. mr. president, we are not going to be able to guarantee the foot soldier on the ground that capability. the f-22 raptor's at mature rate
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production and is aptly deployed around the world. continued f-22 acquisition is low risk as the aircraft has successfully completed its development program and passed a stringent set of real-world tests. by all measures, the f-22 is now a model program and continues to establish industry benchmarks for an aircraft production program. the f-22 program is on budget. the contractor team is currently delivering 20 f-22's per -- per year under a three-year multiyear program that was approved by congress three years ago. the multiyear contract is firm, fixed price, meaning that the u.s. government is buying a proven capability with no risk of cost growth. it's ahead of schedule. in 2008, every f-22 delivery was ahead of contract schedule.
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and this ahead-of-schedule performance continues into 2009. since early 2006, every f-22 has been delivered on or ahead of contract schedule. the contractors producing a high-quality aircraft. in military aircraft production, the high standard for quality is zero defect. a zero-defect aircraft is evaluated by the customer to be perfect in all respects. in 2008, nearly one half of the f-22 deliveries were evaluated to be zero defect, an exceptionally high level of aircraft quality. now, mr. president, still to this day no one can say for sure with any analysis to back them up that 187 f-22's is enough. the f-22's should be viewed in
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the collective as a tool in the toolbox. detractors argue that the f-22 is single purpose. we have been adapting the tools to the needs that we have. all tough do is to look at what we're doing today -- all you have to do is look at what we're doing today with the b-52. that airplane is 50 years old. older than that, it may be 60 years old. there was a point in time when we thought we would retire all the b-52's. they're a bomber. what are we doing with the b-52 today? today the b-52 is flying close air support for our troops in afghanistan. the ssbn's are being used by our special operations men and women, and they're doing a very effective job. a general once said that the most tragic error a general can make is to assume without much
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reflection that wars of the future will look much like wars of the past. if we're going to pass a budget and develop a weapons system inventory that based upon the wars of the past, then we're headed in the wrong direction -- excuse me -- that is not based on wars in the past, then we're headed in the wrong direction. the war we're fighting today is entirely different from any conflict in which we've ever been engaged. and i would simply state again that we've been wrong every single time when it comes to predicting the next adversary that we're going to have. senator mccain mentioned the july 10 "washington post" article on the peformance and maintainability of the f-22. well, let me say that we know nothing appears on the front page of "the washington post" by accident, particularly the week before an important vote. and i guess i ought to be
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flattered by that attention. but for the record, the same reporter that wrote that article on the day of an important hearing in relation to the f-22 multiyear contract in 2006 is the same author of the july 10 article. the article in question bore absolutely no relation to the issues which are at stake here. nevertheless, it led to a new study on the savings that would be achieved through a multiyear contract, a study which was conducted at government expense. despite the article's obvious attempts to obscure the facts and issues in the situation, that new study that was done pursuant to a request of this body concluded that the multiyear contract would save twice as much as the appear study. just briefly, in relation to "the washington post" article, by close of business day, the article was published, the air force had already issued a
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rebuttal on that article, and it concluded that of the 23 claims in the article, only 4 were true. 4 were misleading, 10 were false, and 5 required greater explanation and context beyond what the "post" article reported. now, mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that a copy of the air force's statement and rebuttal to the article in "the washington post" be admitted in the record. the presiding officer: without objection, so ordered. mr. chambliss: "the washington post" article is unique in some ways. i guess it may be s.o.p. for articles that are somewhat vicious and where they contained as many errors as the air force has pointed out with the facts supporting the errors that were made. and that is the july 10
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"washington post" article was based upon unnamed sources. it was based upon a couple of folks who said they were fired either by the contractor or by the air force. so we take that for what it's worth. one of the complaints that was cited in that article was the fact that there are problems with the skin on the f-22. let me just back up a minute and talk about the sophistication of this airplane. there is a problem with the skin. that's been a problem. but what you have to remember, mr. president, is that we've never had an airplane that could fly with the capability that this airplane has, that could fly completely undetected, completely through any radar system of the most sophisticated nature of any potential
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adversary in the world. and the reason that this airplane can do that is it's made of substance and material that is unique and different to this airplane, including the skin that's on that airplane. so are we going to have problems with something that that is unique and that has never been used before on any tactical air fighter? you bet we are. the position of the folks who are in support of this amendment is that we ought to stop production of the f-22 and buy the f-35 at a faster rate. well, let me just say that even if we do that, if you have f-35's flying tomorrow, they're going to have exactly the same maintenance issues as the f-22.
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it's made in the -- the f-22 is the model upon which the joint strike fighter is based. so let's don't kid ourselves, folks. we're not taking an airplane that costs "x" and substituting it with an airplane that costs half or three-quarters of "x." that is not going to be the case because we are learning from the f-22, and mistakes have been made, sure, but it's the first time we've ever had a weapons system like the f-22 manufactured by anybody in the world. and with the mistakes that we have learned, we're going to have a better f-35. but that f-35 is going to have the same skin problem, it's going to have the same weight problem that had f-22 had, the f-15 had, the f-16 had and probably every airplane we've ever developed in this country. it's going to have the same
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maintenance issues we're having with the f-22 today, although the article was wrong in one major area with respect to maintenance, and that is the article says that the maintenance of the airplane was having a success rate of 55%, and that's wrong. and as the air force points out, between 2004 and today, the rate of successful maintenance rate on those airplanes has gone from 64 to 68%, 69%. the future of t.a.c. air for the united states likely does reside in the f-35 and not with the f-22. even if we keep buying f-22's, it will never match the number of f-35's that we will eventually buy. everyone hopes, as i do, that the f-35 succeeds. but as the chair and the ranking
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member of the armed services committee themselves have stated, there is a good deal of risk in the f-35 program. and as risk, additional risk, what we need to put in place today when it comes to the lives of our men and women who are fighting our conflicts and who are flying these airplanes, the history of defense programs and aviation programs, in particular, has been remarkably consistent, particularly when it comes to building programs that represent a leap in technology. they cost more, they take longer, and they have more problems than we expect. g.a.o. has criticized the f-35 approach. and they, as well as the leadership of our committee, has state that had not p-frpbg sufficient development testing before we proceed to procurement is one of the primary drivers
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for cost increases and scheduled delays and major programs. and that is exactly what is being proposed with respect to the f-35. i am a supporter of the f-35. if we're going to build far more of them than we are f-22's, but i am not the only observer to state that we should think twice about staking the future of our t.a.c. air fleet on a program that has only five test aircraft flying today. i want to talk briefly about theoff sets which were included in our amendment and which are -- amended, used to purchase these additional seven f-22's. senator levin talked about theoff set at length and i would like to respond to some of his comments. most importantly, there is absolutely nothing in the off set we use and nothing that has not been used by the senate
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armed services committee or the chairman himself in previous bills. just last year senator levin reduced military personnel funding by $1.1 billion, which is significantly more than what my amendment reduced it by. for the ph*elgdz person o and m reductions in the markup, in each case it takes either less or approximately the same amount as the house armed services committee bill did for this year. in every case the amendment takes less than the g.a.o. reported average under execution, unobligated balances in those accounts. this includes the cuts that the senate armed services committee already took in their mark. the bill itself notes that g.a.o. estimates that d.o.d. has $1.2 billion in unobligated o&m
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balances and $588 million under execution in the air force pay accounts. this is from actual language in the senate report. in the civilian personnel area, the g.a.o. reports conclude that more funding is available than what my amendment takes. the g.a.o. report takes into account the expansion of acquisition personnel who will be hired this year. a g.a.o. analysis suggests there is on average over $1 billion available. my amendment leaves a balance of $200 million in that account. the chairman also commented on the provision in my amendment that assumes savings based on acquisition reform legislation authored by senators levin and mccain. let me just say that my inspiration for this particular off set was senator levin and senator mccain. i thought they did a great job
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with that bill. i hope we can continue to improve it, because it's an area where we've got to work harder to avoid wasteful spending. the chairman included a nearly identical provision as mine in s. 1416, which was the senate version of the fy 2002 defense authorization bill. that bill assumed a savings of $1.6 billion based on acquisition reforms bills. however, unlike my provision, which assumes savings based on provisions already in law, because of the passage of the levin-mccain bill, the savings assumed by the chairman were based on provisions that were not yet even enacted and based on the conference process may never have been enacted. based on inflation and large increases in the d.o.d. budget since then, that is probably the ekweufp hrapbt of $2 billion to
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$2.5 billion today. in any case, this is a tremendous amount of savings, and my amendment would assume far less. the offset is based upon predicted savings in the fy 2010 budget based on recently reform legislation such as the requisition reform act. also the business process reengineering provision in the s.a.s. mark and other management efficiencies and business process reforms. if senators mccain and levin and president obama are correct, savings from this acquisition reform measure could greatly exceed that number, because in their press conference after the successful passage of that bill, all three talked about the tremendous savings. and i agree with them, that that's going to happen. and that's what we used as part of our offset. now, mr.
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president, i want to end where irstarted -- where i started by agreeing with john hamre. john hamre says that congress can and should legitimately question spending priorities. not only is it appropriate, but necessary for the congress to pass final judgment on this question. secretary gates has rendered his judgment, but it is the duty and obligation of members of congress to question his recommendations and his analysis. there is absolutely nothing unique or in the least bit wrong about what we are doing. not to do so would be to advocate the role with which the constitution ant american people have entrusted us. if president obama believes the additional funding for the f-22's warrants a veto threat
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even though that funding addresses an unmet military requirement, then that is his decision much our job in congress, as john hamre has indicated, is to look at facts, weigh the risks, and rented the judgment -- and render the judgment. that our role, our independent role in the process and we should accept it and use our best judgment to decide what is right for the nation. with that, mr. president, i would yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from north dakota. mr. dorgan: mr. president, my understanding is that senator mccain will be making a response on the f-22 issue, but that he is allowing me to go forward. i'll be mercifully brief so that he will have an opportunity to gain the floor. i just want to say i appreciate his courtesy that would allow me to make a statement of no more than about 10 minutes. mr. president, in fact, i will perhaps come back later as well to speak on the f-22 and the work that my colleague, senator levin and senator mccain have
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done. but i want to speak about another amendment that i have offered that i hope might gain acceptance as we move forward. and that's an amendment to the defense authorizationill that would require contracting officials in the pentagon to take into account evidence of bad past performance by a contractor when deciding who should get future contracts. now, that might seem like very logical -- a very logical thing to do. the fact is that is not now required over in the pentagon. and i want to go through some thoughts with you about this very quickly. i've held 19 hearings on contractor waste, fraud, and abuse, and i have to say that going back some years now, we have had the greatest amount of waste and fraud and abuse by contractors than we've seen in the history of this country. let me give you some examples. this is a man named efrain spfer diveroli, and he's a president and c.e.o. of a company.
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the company is a shell company that his father used to have. he took it over and hired a vice president. the vice president's name is david, 25-year-old, david packouz, and he's a massage therapist. this company in miami, florida, does business out of an unmarked door. it has a 22-year-old president and 25-year-old massage therapist who is the vice president. guess what? these two guys got $200 until in -- $300 million in contracts. can you imagine? $300 million in contracts from the pentagon. there have been arrests in this case. i called a three-star general to my office to say: how on earth could you have done that? how could you have possibly have done that? did you not check? well, i checked. these guys had small contracts with the state department that turned out to be bad contracact.
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but, you know, i mean, they could have done a small amount of checking before you commi commit $300 million of the american taxpayers' money and what they did for that money is ship a bunch of shoddy products to afghanistan to the freedom fighters made from the 1906's and that's one of the reasons that company and these folks have ran afoul of the law. the question is, how did all of this happen? this guy with the striped shirt, his name is frank willis. he's holding a saran-wrap pack of money. and this is part of a couple of million dollars that went to a company called kusse custard ba. he said, you bring a bag, because we pay cash. he's talking about defense -- this is security for the baghdad airport that had no commercial airplanes flying in and out it was alleged that they took the fork lift trucks off the airport
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and put it in a granary -- not a granary, but some sort of machine shed and repainted them blue and sold them to our government or the collision of -- coalition of pr provisional authority. here is what the guy at the baghdad airport said. i'm telling you this because we've held 19 hearings much i've done 19 of them. sheer what the guy of -- the airport director of security in a memo to the coalition provisional authority, which was us. here is what he said about custer battles, they have ove over $100 million in contracts. custer battles have shown themselves -- themselves to be unresponsive, uncooperative, incompetent, deceitful, manipulative. other than that, they're swell fellows. what do you think of these contract snors this is cheryl harris with her son, ryan, a
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green beret, special forces. ryan, unfortunately, tragically was killed in iraq. he was not shot by an insurgent he was electrocuted in the shower. his mother was told that he went into the shower carrying a radio and therefore electrocuted. it turns out that was not the case at all. he took a shower in the place where the wiring was done improperly, why? kellogg, brown, and root hired third country nationals in most cases didn't speak english and didn't know the wiring codes and wired up the shower and this poor soldier loses his life. and another soldier is power washing a humvee and is elect cuted and dies. now, i held hearings about that. eric peters, who was working in iraq as an electrician, said that third country nationals performed the authority of
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k.b.r.'s electrical work in iraq. much of this work is not throughly inspected by licensed elect terrorists. i personally have refused to sign off on work they have performed because i knew it was not up to code. that's when we paid for and some soldiers have lost their lives. and the list goes on and on and on. eric peters, a brave soul who worked in iraq to do electrical work. worked for k.b.r. testified that i concluded that k.b.r. was not capable of performing quality, legal electrical installationings in iraq. i worried every day that somebody would be injured or killed by this defective work. not only have soldiers lost their lives, but the task orders for which that work was done, the traffic orders resulted in award fees, bonus fees to the company that did shoddy work. as a result of my hearing, they sent a task force over to investigate all of the billings
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in iraq. and the fact is we have testimony and evidence that there was a massive amount of wiring that was done improperly that put soldiers at risk. and, yet, the pentagon provided aid ward fees, which are fees designed for only excellent performance, awards fees of $83 million of the taxpayers' money to a company that did shoddy work. work that we had to come back around and do what's called i believe a car order, where you had to go back and inspect everything and redo the work. the question is: how is all of this going on? i'll -- just two more things. i say to senator mccain, i thank you for your courtesy while you were out. thank you for allowing me to proceed for a couple of minutes. i know you have some important things to say about the f-22. finally, bunny greenhouse. a lot of people don't know bunny greenhouse. what an extraordinary person she is. grew up in southern louisiana in
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a family that had nothing. two in their family teach college. her brother is he'll vin hayes -- elvin hayes, one of the top basketball players of all time. bunny greenhouse has a couple of masters degrees, rose to become the highest civilian in the corps of engineers in the pentagon. here is what she testified with respect to the contract. she lost her job as a result of having the courage to speak publicly. i can unequivocally state that the abuse related to contracts awarded to k.b.r. represents the most blatant and improper contract abuse i have witnessed during the course of my professional ka reermt for that, -- career. for that, she lost her job. i mentioned kussers -- custers battle. this is something that everybody should remember when you talk about waste, fraud, and abuse. this is call the whale.
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it is a picture of a prison in iraq that was never completed and will never be used. $31 billion was paid to the parsons corporation for building a prison the iraqis said they didn't want and wouldn't use. the $31 million was wasted in unbelievably bad construction, and that is after this same company was given a couple of hundred of million dollars to rehabilitate 140 health clinics in iraq and we were told that most of those were imagine air in yich -- imaginary. the $250 million is gone. the same company was contracted to build the prison in iraq. it is referred to as the whale and here's what it looks like. we spent $40 million. the first d $31 million to parss
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before they were kicked off the project and the rest to another company, never to be finished. paid to contractors that did shoddy work and kicked off the site. the question is: what do we do about all of that? now, i propose an amendment that is pretty simple. there is no requirement that contracting officials over in d.o.d. take into account shoddy work practices or shoddy performance by contractors. there's a requirement that they take into account criminal actions, civil fines that are leveled against contractors. but no requirement that there -- that they must consider bad past performance. it's unbelievable, but it's true and i offer an amendment that says, you know what? time has passed when bad performance by big contractors gets you a slap on the wrist and a pat on the back and another contract. it is long the past the time to put an end to this.
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i know my colleagues, senator levin and senator mccain, feel strongly about this as well. i appreciate the work they have done. all of us need to do everything we can to assure the american taxpayers that they're getting their money's worth. defense is something we invest in for this country. it's very important. and as i conclude, i want to say this: i put together a chart and i'm going to speak about it in the next day or two. but it relates to this question of the f-22. this chart shows federal deficits, budget deficits. we are on an unsustainable path. it is not a republican path or democratic path. it is an unsustainable path that can't work for this country's future and you take a look at this, here is the middle of a deep recession. $1.9 trillion in deficits. and it gets a little better and goes back down. we are in an unsustainable path. and it doesn't matter if you're talking about an airplane or some other area of federal
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budget responsibility, we finally have to decide things have changed. we have to invest in things that provide dividends for this country's future. we can't continue to spend money on things that we don't have that we don't need. that is not a sustainable course for this country. ly speak on these issues including the f-22. but let me thank my colleague senator levin and senator mccain for -- for their time. mr. levin: let me thank senator dorgan for his work in the area of waste, fraud, and abuse, not just in the department of defense, but in so many other areas as weapon. he is surely a foremost -- as weapon. he is surely a forehost leader -- foremost leader in this institution. he has been doing cuttle-edge kind of -- cutting edge kind of leadership. we need it, we need more of it.
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every taxpayer in america ought to be grateful to senator dorgan. i would ask unanimous consent that his remarks and my remarks relative to his remarks be inserted in the record after the conclusion of senator mccain's remarks, which are going to follow. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. levin: and, mr. president, let me urge members who are going to be speaking on the f-22 to let us know, come to the floor, because we are hopeful to include this debate no later than early tomorrow morning and to bring it to a vote. we're making every effort to see if we can't agree upon that. i yield the floor. mr. mccain: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from arizona. mr. mccain: mr. president, i rise to -- for two purposes, one is to make a quick response to senator chambliss' remarks concerning the f-22 and a couple of remarks about what i
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understand is going to be next on the agenda, which i understand will be proposed by the majority leader which is a hate crimes bill. which is very difficult for me to understand. senator chambliss, very appropriately, pointed out that many times when we put together an authorization bill, we find offsets, as we call them, ways of paying for whatever addition that we want to add in the authorization bill. but i think it's important for us to point out that the chambliss amendment, during the markup, during putting this bill together, provided $1.75 billion for f-22 procurement and it took funds from presumed, unobligated balances of several accounts. in all candor, they were
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unjustified assumptions. the amendment cut $850 million from o&m accounts. that's operation and may not -- operations and maintenance. that means the maintenance of much-needed supplies that provides for the readiness of our troops, enabling them to stay ready. for today's conflicts and for toms challenges. -- and for tomorrow's challenges. the account also covers day-to-day costs for the department. this includes aircraft, combat vehicles, recruiting, education support, procurement of general supplies and equipment and repairs and maintenance of department of defense facilities. our military is engaged around the world. it's irresponsible to cut the resources they rely on to
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prepare successfully for their mission to protect the united states and its security interests worldwide. we tow to our military to -- we owe it to our military to provide them with every resource. based on historical data, reductions that are in this -- in the chambliss amendment to pay for the additional $1.75 billion would affect the following areas: army's training and operating tempo, including training additional helicopter crews for irregular warfare missions; navy's depot maintenance for service ships; air force contractor logistical support for critical airport and unmanned vehicles; and the special operations command mission support and training of its forces. furthermore, a reduction of this magnitude could affect the secretary's initiatives to hire and train additional acquisition professionals needed to improve
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the department's ability to contract, develop, and procure weapons systems and to replace contractors with federal employees, thereby reducing the $1.2 billion in savings that's reflected in the budget. in addition, these accounts will have to absorb the increased cost of fuel that's occurred since the budget was submitted, and additional civilian pay raises. that assumes that the congress sets the civilian pay raises at the same level as the military pay raise of 3.4%. the other two -- quote -- "offsets" -- are $400 million for military personnel funding. much of the funding in the military personnel accounts is entitlement-driven. thus, there is limited flexibility to absorb these reductions without affecting the readiness of u.s. forces. thee reductions will directly translate into cuts to recruiting and retention bonuses
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and incentives and other important programs such as covering the cost to move members and their names to new assignments. -- and their families to new assignments. it will affect unit readiness by affecting the service's ability to meet end strength goals and fully staff operational units with critical personnel prior to deployment. if congress sustains these reductions, the services will need to submit a reprogramming action to make sure that our military forces are fully supported. finally, behalfinally, the senam georgia assumes $500 million in first-year savings from the weapons systems acquisition reform act and he referred to it in his remarks. i'm very proud to have worked under the leadership of senator levin and together coming up with a very important piece of legislation strongly supported by the president and the secretary of defense to reform the way we acquire weapons
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systems. the cost overruns have been outrageous, as we know, throughout the past few years. but there is no one -- no one -- in our wildest imagination that believe in the first year of acquisition that we'll save $500 million. i would love to see that happen. i would love to see pigs fly, but we're not going to save $500 million in the first year of a piece of legislation that has really not been implemented and won't be for some period of time. so i am very flattered by senator chambliss' reliance on $500 million in savings from the legislation that we recently passed through the congress and signed by the president of the united states, but in all due respect, it is totally unrealistic. so what we're really doing here is adding $1.75 billion and
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really not accounting for ways to reduce spending or impose savings in any other way. but, look, i also understand -- and i appreciat appreciate the , commitment, knowledge, and contributions of senator chambliss of georgia. there is no more valued member than the senator. we simply have an honest disagreement on this issue understand u.a.eand iappreciate2 aircraft and the contributions it makes to our nation's security but the fact is we don't need nymph them and that comes from the secretary of defense, the secretary of the air force, and others involved in these issues for a long period of time. now, mr. president, just for a minute -- because i know colleagues are waiting -- it is my understanding that following the disposition of this amendment, which we hope would
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happen tomorrow morning, that the majority leader will move to put -- to take up a hate crimes bill, and the hate crimes bill is, to say the least, a very controversial piece of legislation. and it may deserve the debate and discussion of the members of this body, but the fact is, it has nothing to do with the department of defense authorization bill. what the defense authorization bill has a lot to do with is the training, equipping, taking care of reenlistment and retention and all of the things necessary to defend our nation's national security. we're in two wars. we're in two wars, and we need to pass this legislation so the majority leader's priority is a hate crimes bill. a hate crimes bill which has nothing to do with the defense
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authorization. i hope that if the majority leader does that it will be the last time he will ever complain about an unrelated amendment being brought up by this side of the aisle. look, there are important amendments that need to be debated and considered on this legislation. this has got to do with the defense of this nation. so what are we going to do? we're going to type the senate for a number of days -- for a number of days, we're going to type the united states senate on a totally unrelated, very controversial, very emotional issue that has nothing to do with defending this nation. so i urge my colleagues on this side of the aisle -- i urge the distinguished chairman, i urge the majority leader, let's move forward with addressing the defense needs of this country, save the hate crimes bill for another day. and let's do what's necessary for the men and women in our military rather than putting an
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agenda item that has nothing to do with defense next before this body. mr. president, i predict again that when this bill comes up, if the hate crimes bill is proposed by the majority leader and agreed to by the distinguished chairman, it will lead to a great deal of controversy and unnecessary debate and discussion on a defense bill. if the majority leader, who controls the agenda, wants to bring up hate crimes, i would imagine that -- bill, i would imagine that he would be able to bring it up on his own. instead, he wants to stick it on to the bill that the men and women who are serve in our military in harm's way today are depending upon. it is not right. it is not the right thing to do. i hope that the majority leader and the chairman of the committee will reconsider their position and wait and bring up hate crimes bill as a separate piece of legislation for deliberation, discussion, and vote on this body -- from this
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body and not be tied to the defense authorization bill. mr. president, i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from connecticut. mr. lieberman: mr. president, i rise to speak on another amendment that i have filed that is at the desk, but i know there is a pending amendment of so i suppose i should ask to speak in morning business for 10 minutes. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. lieberman: i thank the chair. first, i'd like to ask unanimous consent that major brian forest of the united states army, who i'm privileged to have working with nigh -- working in my office for a year, be granted floor privileges for the time that the senate is debating s. 1390, the national defense authorization act for 2010. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. lieberman: thanks, mr. president. this amendment that i rise to speak about is numbered 1528. i'm hopeful that that before too
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long it will be the pending business. i believe -- i know it has now, and i believe it will, enjoy broad bipartisan support. this amendment would increase the authorization for the active duty end strength of the united states army over the next three years by 30,000 additional soldiers. i want to say right at the outset, it is an authorization. it's not an appropriation. it is -- it says within its terms that it is contingent on a decision by the secretary of defense that he chooses to fill these positions, and if he does, then he has two options -- two major options. one is to reprogram from other funds at his -- under his control to support these additional troops, and the
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second of course is to return to congress for a supplemental appropriation. in my opinion, mr. president, for all that we have said and done in reaction -- in expression of our concern about the stress that the members of the u.s. army are feeling -- and their families are feeling, based on the fact that they are carrying the overwhelming burden of the wars that we are involved in in iraq and afghanistan -- we have done a lot to improve living conditions, to offer more support for physical and mental health services, to provide better housing for families, but this is about how much time the soldiers can be back at their home bases and back with their families. i'll get to this in detail as we go on.
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last month the house and senate armed services committees voted to give the secretary of defense the authority to increase the army's end strength by an additional 30,000 soldiers for fiscal years 201111 and 2012. this new authorization will provide the secretary of defense with the ability to increase the size of the army to the extent he thinks it is necessary for the national defense or for other purposes, such as reducing the stress to which i've referred on our troops today. i was privileged to introduce the amendment along with senator thune, my rankin ranking membere air-land expheevment i introduced the bill in the
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subcommittee along with senator graham to provide this authorization. and i am glad to be joined in introducing in amendment, 1528, by a bipartisan group, including the two formerly mentioned senators and others. this amendment would extend this authorization where it logically must begin, t to the fiscal year 2010, beginning on october 1 of this year, 2009. we introduced this amendment because it will provide our soldiers with the reinforcements that they will need to execute the missions that we as a nation have sent them on. indeed, our soldiers will be under more stress, even more stress in the coming months because of the -- this fact. as we begin the responsible strategy for drawdown in iraq
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based on the extraordinar extraordinarysuccess of our troops and the iraqis in turning down the war in iraq, we are also disee ploying additional soldiers under the direction of our commander in chief, president obama, to afghanistan. at an even faster pace than they are returning home. general casey, the army's chief of staff, warned us on the arm earlier this year that the effect of these two facts -- a slow and methodical draw down from iraq of our armed forces, army, and increased deployment to afghanistan, means the total number of soldiers deployed to combat will be increasing through the rest of this calendar year and into the next. as general casey said to us, this matter of dwell time that i'll speak about if more detail in a moment, is really a matter
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of supply and demand, how many soldiers do we have? and what's the demand for them in the battle zones, the war zones? general james cartright, vice chairman of the joint chiefs of staff recently confirmed the critical challenges that the united states army will face in the near term and the importance of increasing army active duty end strength. speaking before the senate armed services committee just last week, general cartwright said -- and i quote -- "there is that period of 2010 and 2011 in particular where that stress is going to be there, during 2010 because of execution and in 2011 because units will be coming back, refilling and trying to retrofit. you are going to have stress on the army in a significant way." and i add "stress on the army," means stress on the families of
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those who serve us in the army. general cartwright continues by stating that the "joint chiefs of staff are working with the army to find a range for growth that would reduce this strain on the service." -- and i quote -- "we have looked at this, we have worked in a range," and i adhere, of -- adhere, of 15,000 to 20,000 to 30,000 which would give us the range in which to work to allow us to do that." that is end of the quote from general cartwright. that is what this amendment would do, give secretary defense, joint chiefs, secretary of the army, the latitude to increase the army temporarily by as much as 30,000. why? to reduce the -- to increase the dwell time, the time our troops
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can spend at home and thereby reduce the stress in the most significant way imaginable. mr. president, i deeply appreciate that general cartwright would speak so clearly about the army's requirements for additional soldiers in the coming months and about how hard he and the secretary, secretary gates, are working to support our troops. i believe it's our duty to make sure they have all the room, all the authority they are required to do so. let me just speak a word or two more about what dwell time is. dwell time is the time that our soldiers have between active duty deployments. time they spend recovering and preparing for their next deployment. and most significantly, to our soldiers i would guess, precious time they can spend at home with their families. this dwell time ratio for many of our soldiers today is little more than 1-1 which means that
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she have but the one year at home for every year they spend in the theater. everyone agrees -- everyone agrees -- this dwell time is absolutely unacceptable. it may also be unsustainable. when general casey testified before the senate armed services committee earlier this year he said that it is his goal to get to a point where we have at least two years back home for every year our soldiers spend deployed. and, in fact, he said his ultimate goal at which he believes the army would be most effective would be to have three years at home for every year in the field. general casey hopes a responsible drawdown from iraq will allow him to achieve that goal. i share the general's hopes but frankly do not believe that we
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can bet the well-being of our army on them without providing the authority to the army and the secretary of defense to expand the troops, to reach those dwell time goals of at least 2-1 that general casey talked about. chairman of the joint chiefs, admiral mullen told our committee that the light at the end of the tunnel is still more than two years away for the army. and that is only if everything goes according to plan in iraq. i believe that two years is too long to wait especially when we can take steps now to turn on the light, if you will, to provide our soldiers with the reenforcements and relief they need. i think it's person for my colleagues to know this amendment has the strong support of many of our soldiers and those organizations that fight
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for them. mr. president, i ask unanimous consent to insert into the record two letters. one from subsequent gordon sullivan for the association of the u.s. army; second, from add mrl nor boateadd -- from admira. the presiding officer: without objection, so ordered. mr. lieberman: just sullivan is a retired former chief of the u.s. army, a great american soldier. i just quote briefly from his letter to me about this amendment supporting the amendment. "as you know the troop increases in afghanistan will precede decreases in iraq causing the number of deployed soldiers to increase into next year." he testified it will be difficult to increase dwell time at home over the next 18 to 24 hours mos
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with our current end strength and factored in 30,000 soldiers on the roles but not deployable and it is obvious that a strain that -- what a strain that would be to our current troop levels. i hope that your floor amendment and the debate of it will help your fellow senators see that. the army, general sullivan says, is in dire need of sufficient troops to increase dwell time for active duty soldiers, increase support for operational missions and help the army achieve reorganization objectives i he concludes, "we say we want to ease the stress and strain on soldiers and their families and now is the time to do the one thing that will provide immediate relief." that is, to increase the authorization of the u.s. army end strength. that is the number of troops it
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can have actively deployed by 30,000 and then to fill the 30,000. second, admiral ryan, another distinguished servant of the united states patriot says on behalf of the military officers so of member, today's combat forces and their families are paying a terrible price -- this is a very personal letter and i will start again. "today's combat forces are paying a terrible price in family separation and stress for our past failure to grow our armed forces at a pace sufficient to accommodate the extraordinary wartime deployment requirements of the past seven years. for years we have relied on the patriotism, dedication and resilience of our men and women in uniform to bear 100% of the nation's wartime sacrifice.
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but with thousands experiencing their third or fourth combat tour since 2001 and the prospect of a decade of persistent conflict ahead, reasonable action must be taken to ease the extreme strain our military members and families have been required to absorb for so long." and then he says "this amendment recognizes that the only way to do so in the face of increasing deployment requirements in the near term is to authorize a substantial increase in army end strength for fiscal year 2010." that is exactly what this amendment would do. mr. president, the authority provided in the amendment is temporary in nature and will expire in 2012.
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we hope and pray by that time we will be able to return the army end strength to 547,000. if congress increases the end strength of the army now as this amendment would authorize, we would be able to reevaluate that judgment as conditions on the ground and in the world justify. and i say in conclude, again, there's no money attached to this. this gives authority to the defense department to raise the army end strength, the number of troops in active duty, by 30,000. if secretary gates decides in his judgment that it is necessary to do in our national interest he will have to come back and ask for the money to do so or he will reprogram funds that are now under his control. i ask my colleagues for their support when this amendment comes up and i hope it comes up so.
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i thank you, mr. president, and i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from tennessee. mr. alexander: mr. president, i ask to speak as -- concepts to speak as if in morning business for up to ten minutes. the presiding officer: without objection, so ordered. mr. alexander: thank you, mr. president. president obama was in warren, michigan, today, and made an announcement, announce add new $12 billion national community college initiative. that sounds very good. at first. at a former governor and secretary of education for the united states i'm a big fan of community colleges. i think they're our secret weapon for helping men and women in this cup go from one job to the next and to improve our workforce. but i would like to respectfully suggest that what the president in his education secretary and economic advisors -- and the education secretary may be the best appointmentee of all --
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they ought to be asked to stay after school out there at the community college and write on the blackboard 100 times in a year in which we have runhe for example deficit up by another $1.8 trillion, i will never again add another penny to entitlement mandatory spending. then i think we in the congress as we legislate this year ought to do some truth-in-lending. and that is to put a little card with every one of the 15 million student loans that the, if the president's proposal goes through and say the money you are borrowing, paying interest on, the interest you are paying, is almost all being used to pay for somebody else's scholarship and the president's community college. i think it's important to say that. because as good as it sounds to
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say let's help the community colleges i'm afraid this is a familiar refrain we've been hearing from the white house for the last six months. instead of reducing entitlement spending, mandatory spending which is driving up our debt to unbelievable numbers, the situation where the president's proposal for the next 10 years is more new debt than we spent -- three times as much money as we spent in world war ii -- instead of reducing mandatory spending it adds mandatory spending and it's one more washington takeover in addition to banks and insurance companies and car companies and maybe health care, it's the student loans of the country. it also changes the way we fund our education which is usually to take almost all of our money and just give it to students and pell grants and student loans
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and let them choose the college rather than to give gntses the . now let me take a few moments to explain why i say this. the idea the president has is to spend $2.5 billion for community college facilities, buildings. almost every state has community colleges and one of our major jobs as governor and state legislators is to fund those. traditionally the federal government gives scholarships and the pell grand grants pay fr almost the entire tuition making them very important to had american students but this moves the federal government into expwrutionz and renovation and $9 billion for competitive college grants and $500 million for online curriculum so the choice is instead of more money for pell grants and for administration of student loans we're going to spend it on direct grants to some community colleges. in other words, we're going to
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start funding higher education, community colleges and the way we funds kindergarten through 12th despite the fact that higher education is by far the best in the world, the most admired system. one reason is because we don't have a lot of federal direct programs. we give the money to students. they choose the school. we will start doing it more like k-12, not the most admired system in the world. the $12 billion would be paid for out of savings from the regular student loan program that we have now, because under the president's plan, all new student loans would go through the u.s. department of education. so let's take that idea first. we have about $75 billion in student loans every year. that's a huge bank. 15 million students borrow money for student loans.
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12 million of them borrow through 2,000 different institutions, banks, and spend the money at 4,000 institutions, higher education. 3 million choose to go through the government. they get a direct loan directly from the government. i was the secretary of education when this program was created. i didn't see any reason for the direct loan program because i didn't think the u.s. department of education ought to be a bank. i thought the secretary of education ought to be trying to be the educator of the year, not the banker of the year. but the argument is, well, we can borrow money more cheaply here in the government, we can borrow it for a quarter of 1% and then we can loan it out at 6.8% to students. and banks can't do that, so we'll do it and we'll take it over and do it all here. we'll do all 15 million loans from the u.s. department of education. he'll be the banker of the year. now, mr. president, the federal government is getting real busy.
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you know, this is becoming the national headquarters for automobiles. we own 60% of general motors. we're running a bunch of banks. we run some insurance companies. we're talking about government-run health care programs. and now we're going to take over and make a huge national bank out of the u.s. department of education. and the reason is because we can borrow money more cheaply here. why don't we just abolish all of them, all the financial institutions in america and say, you know, we can borrow money more cheaply than you can. you go away. we'll did it all? do it all? that's not the american way. in fact, most americans would like to get the government out of the car business, out of the banking business, out of the insurance business, and committee guarantee you, as soon as 15 million students start lining up outside the u.s. department of education to get their student loans instead of going through their local banks and dealing with their local universities, they're not going to be very happy about this either, because they've had a choice for nearly 20 years and they've chosen -- they've chosen -- to go to their priva
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private -- private lender. so that's the first problem with this. we're canceling the choice that 12 million students are exercising this year to get a private -- to get a private loan even though they could have gotten a government loan. then we're saying, all right, because we're canceling that, we're saving $94 billion so we've got money to spend. well, in the first place, that's not right, mr. president. by my calculation, according to the congressional budget office estimate of what it costs to operate the current direct loan program, it will cost about $32 billion over the next ten years at least to operate the entire student loan program out of the u.s. department of education. and my common sense just tells me -- and i've thought this for years -- that there's not any way that a group of educators in the department of education, a relatively small department, are going to operate more efficiently than banking institutions across america in making loans. that's not their business. they're supposed to know about
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scholarships and graduation rates, not to be bankers. my common sense tells me that and i think it does of most americans. plus, we have a free market system -- or at least we did -- where we try to get things out of government, not into government but -- so that's the proposal, yet $32 billion of the dollars over the next ten years are illusory savings to we're really adding to the debt. and then the president is saying, well, let's take the $90 billion he says, let's take some of that -- and this is mandatory spending. i know this gets a little complicated but it's not that complicated. he's saying that the money we now spend to pay the costs to the government of loaning out this $75 billion every year is automatic, mandatory spending so let's spend it -- let's take it away from how we now spend it, on administration with banks, and let's spend it instead on mandatory spending for community colleges. in other words, he has an opportunity here to say, let's
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take away some money that's being automatically spent every year and save it. let's save it. let's put -- or he could say, let's put it for students, but i think most of us would say -- and he has said in his summit on entitlement spending -- that we need to stop adding entitlement spending. but that's not what he's doing. and, indeed, his other proposal, which is not announced today, but the rest of his proposal is to say we have this $94 billion, which i think is really closer to $60 billion or $50 billion, that we could save, he's going to say we'll make pell grants entitlement spending. well, pell grants are -- are terrific grants. there are 5 million of. we appropriate them every year for 14 million students. $9 billion was appropriated for that purpose last year. the congress is always enormously generous with that.
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we appropriate a certain amount. it's almost automatic but it's not automatic. in other words, we appropriate what we think we can afford and then we spend it on the students who need it. this says it doesn't matter what we can afford, we're just going to do it. again, it's the kind of thing, exactly the kind of thing that most economists, most americans and the president himself has said we need to stop doing, yet in the full light of day we're saying and announcing we're going to create a community college program and later a pell grant program and we're going to pay for it with mandatory automatic entitlement spending. and while the president says it's $94 billion that could be saved over ten years, the congressional budget office says it's $293 billion over ten -- nearly $300 billion in automatic spending over ten years that we could avoid -- that we could avoid if the president is saying we should -- we should spend it. i'm very disappointed. i'm have disappointe very disap.
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and then here's the last point that i would like to emphasize. the president is saying, i'm here today to -- well, there are two points really. i'm here today to do a favor for you. i'm going to spend $12 billion on community colleges, but what he doesn't tell you is the people paying for that are the people borrowing money to go to college. so if you're getting an extra job at night so you can go to college, so you're taking out a student loan, then the government's going to borrow money at a quarter of one cent and loan it to you at 6.8% and use the difference for its ow own -- for its own purposes. we're making money on the banks of students who are borrowing money to go to college and then taking credit for spending it for somebody else's scholarship or some community college program. we're not telling anybody that. so we need a little truth in lending here. and finally, i'm concerned about the -- about the change in direction for the way we support higher education. you know, we're very fortunate in america to have this terrific
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higher education system, including our community colleg colleges, and in a way, we got it by accident, because with the g.i. bill, when the veterans came home in world war ii, 1994 and 1995, and 1996, we just gave the money to them and they went anywhere they wanted to. that's not the way we do with kindergarten through the 12th grade. we have all these programs, it's command and control, and -- and we support the institution instead of the student. we called the argument about that vouchers. and when we have arguments like that, we get all excited. we did in the appropriations committee the other day, the senator from illinois and i argued, we each got 15 votes, about the d.c. voucher program. shall we give our money to students and let them choose a school or shall we support the school? well, in higher education, 85% of the dollars we spend, or some figure about like that, goes to the student who then chooses the school. it may be a community college or a jewish school or an african-american school or a -- or a catholic school or a public
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school or a private school or a for-profit school. we don't care, as long as it's accredited. and as a result, we've got a higher education system that attracts the best foreign students wherever in the world and that gives americans choices and we have almost all the best colleges and universities in the world. so this is just a little shift from that to say that the federal government will start taking the money we have, which i'd argue we really don't have, but this $12 billion we're going to give to grants in higher education instead of to students. i'd rather r give it to student. so i applaud the president for his interest in our education and community colleges, but i would suggest to him that we have too much debt and too many washington takeovers and we shouldn't be funding his program on the backs of students who are borrowing money and working an extra job to go to college. i don't think they'd appreciate knowing that the interest they're paying is mostly going
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to pay for somebody else's scholarship. they might ask, why do i have to do that, why doesn't that person in the same -- why isn't that person in the same shape i am? and the president was in warren, michigan, in the middle of the auto business and we've got some suggestions -- or i would have -- for other ways to deal with the problems we have with the economy today. one would be since we're near the general motors headquarters, to celebrate their emergence from -- from bankruptcy by giving the 60% of the stock that the government owns in general motors back to the taxpayers who paid taxes on april 15. that we should focus on cheap energy so that we can reindustrialize america, including our automobile industry, by a hundred nuclear power plants. that we can take the mandatory spending and instead of spending it, save it and have less debt. that would be a greater favor to the students.
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and to revitalize housing, we could have senator isakson's $15,000 tax credit to help get the housing market going again. and then in our health care debate, we could stop talking about more government takeovers and instead take the available dollars and give the money to low-income americans and let them buy their own insurance, like most of the rest of us have. so this is a big difference of opinion that we have. as noble as the idea of supporting community colleges is, this is not the way to do it. another washington -- the presiding officer: the senator has used 15 minutes. mr. alexander: i thank the president. another washington takeover, too much debt. there's a better way. i thank the president and i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from minnesota. ms. klobuchar: mr. president, i ask to speak for five minutes to be followed by the senator from new hampshire, senator gregg, who wishes to speak for ten minutes. the presiding officer: without objection. ms. klobuchar: mr. president, i come to the floor today to voice my support for the
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levin-mccain amendment to strike $1.75 billion added to the bill that is on the floor to purchase additional f-22 aircraft that have not been requested by the pentagon. i believe this amendment present us with an important choice of what our national security priorities will be going forward. will we continue to pour billions and billions of dollars into weapons systems despite the fact that they are not request requested, despite cost overruns, program delays? will we make the hard choices necessary to ensure that our troops in the field have what they need to fight present and future conflicts? i believe the choice is clear. now, i'm aware that this means for some states that are making this plane or subcontracts -- we have some of them in our own state -- that this means jobs. but if we don't move forward what we really need to produce for our troops today, we're
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never going to be able to do the best for our troops and do the best for our country. and, by the way, as we move forward, that means jobs. i was just up in northern minnesota visiting a little company that had no contacts with the military, no political connections to get contracts and they had been in a very open, transparent process because they make an incredibly light backpack that's good for the troops, good for their backs and they got the contract. this is a new era. and part of this new era in transparency and part of the new era means that we actually look at what our military needs. no one can dispute that the f-22 possesses unique flying and combat capabilities or that it will serve an important role in protecting our nation in the future. the question is not whether we should keep the f-22 in service. the question is whether we should purchase additional planes at the expense of more urgent needs for our troops. our armed forces are currently fighting in two major conflicts
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in iraq and afghanistan. after more than seven years in afghanistan and more than six years in iraq, the f-22 has not been used in combat. it has not flown over those countries. and over the course of these conflicts, we have seen the tragic consequences when our troops don't have the equipment and resources they need, such as enhanced body armor or vehicles to protect them from i.e.d.'s. we've seen what happens when we don't give our troops what they need. we cannot continue on this course. we must focus our defense resources on the personnel, equipment, and systems necessary to respond quickly to unconventional and evolve conflicts while retaining the ability to counter conventional foes. for years, members on both sides of the aisle have come to the senate floor to denounce wasteful spending in our defense budget and called on the pentagon to be more responsible
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