that will tear down these last barriers of discrimination and exclusion. so that truly is a great moral victory, and it is a victory for america's soul. it is a victory that every american can be proud of. and on that score, i certainly include our republican friends. in the end not a single republican in either the house or the senate voted for health reform. i say that's unfortunate. but make no mistake, republican ideas are much a part of this new law. in our committee, the "help" committee, which i chair, republicans were full-fledged participants, as i said. they offered 210 amendments. we accepted 201. as others have pointed out, our national health reforms are similar to many respects, taken by republican governor mitt

remove any from massachusetts. i fully predict as with social security and medicare, the changes in the new health reform law as they become better known and take effect will win overwhelming bipartisan support among the american people. in the near term, however, it is disappointing that some republican legislators, i think, maybe taking their cue from the more extreme voices on talk radio or fox tv are pledging to repeal this new law. in fact, the distinguished minority leader, the republican leader a couple of weeks ago in a press conference said that their motto this year, their motto would be, like republicans, they'll repeal it. this strikes me as bad public policy. an, quite frankly, bad politics. do republicans really want to repeal the ban on denying insurance coverage due to a

preexisting condition? do they really want to repeal the ban on insurance companies canceling your policy if you get sick. do they want to repeal the ban on lifetime and annual payments. do they want to repeal the shrinking of the does the nut hole? do republicans really want to take away from you, the american people, the fact that now in law your child can remain on your policy until the age of 26? do they want to take that away from you? do they want to take away from you, right you have now, right under law, that your child, no matter how sick your child gets, maybe born with a disability, maybe born with an illness, an insurance company cannot discriminate against your child based on a preexisting condition. that's the law of the land. do republicans really want to take that away from you? mr. president, i would strongly

advise against these scorched earth tactics. this health care reform bill has been passed and signed into law. it is time for the bitter partisan rancor to stop. it is time november forward with the american people as we did with social security and medicare. it is time to put politic ace side and put our country -- politics aside and our country first. we have a reconciliation bill that includes modifications to strengthen the reform bill that president obama signed earlier today. the bill he signed earlier today was the exact same bill that we passed on christmas eve of last year. there's something else. this reform bill includes reforms for the student lending program that in their own way are profound and historic. let me mention a few of these provision that's will build on the new health reform law. the new health insurance, senator baucus said earlier, all families between 133% and 400%

of poverty will see lower health care costs. the bill will shraingd ultimately do -- have it rink and do away with the doughnut hole. we have new prescriptions to cut back on -- ways to cut back on waste, fraud, and medicaid. they were proposed by some of the republicans in the white house summit. and it increases funding for community health centers b by $2 million. new consumer protections for employer-provided health plans grandfathered in by the health reform law. in addition the bill provides a -- the bill includes a provision that is critically important to ensure that the health care providers are fairly reimbursed. many folks know that medicare varies reimbursement based on geography. that means rural states such as iowa, arkansas, minnesota and others are reimbursed at lower

rates regardless of the service they provide. this will right that. in addition we have received a written guarantee from health and human services secretary kathleen he i sebelius. this will move us to a more effective reimbursement model that emphasizes quality over quantity. mr. president, i said this reconciliation bill includes health care and education provisions. the education title of the bill includes landmark provisions to make college more affordable and accessible. it redirects most of the thrown to low-income college students in the form of increased pell grants. the status quo in student lending is just incredibly wasteful. it's like a bizarre goldberg process that makes no sense.

think about the present system. the federal government pays fees to private banks to make entirely risk-free loans using taxpayer money. the loans, which are already guaranteed by the federal government are then sold back to the federal government. the banks pocket tens of billions of dollars, taxpayers' dollars, in fees and totally risk fear profits. -- risk-free profits. this is a case of corporate welfare, a giveaway to bankers and to sally may it's time to end it. this bill does simply put this bill cuts out the middle man. saves $61 billion over the next 10 years and gives it to students. the remainder we have invested, as i said, for more generous pell grants. we reduce the deficit by $10 billion. we have deficit reduction in there.

we increase the pell grants from now from 2010 to 2017 fro from $5,550 to $5,975 and we nut a cost of living increase on pell grants based on the consumer price index. this $36 billion includes an investment of $13.5 billion right now to the pell grant. right now to fill a hole in the pell grant. that will increase student aid this year for students going to college. low-income students who need that help. it also invests $2.5 billion in historically black colleges and universities. it also provides money to -- to students services so that they can support students and give them support they need to stay in school and to graduate. money that will help nonprofits do that.

so again, mr. president, this reconciliation bill builds on and strengthens the health reform signed into law by president obama today. as i said many times in the past, i look at the health care bill we passed in december something like a starter home. we'll make modifications now and in the future there will always be modifications. it's a law. we make changes as we go along. so we're making sop of those -- some of those fixes today to bridge some of the changes between the house and senate to make some needed changes. the congressional budget office, again, said that the deficit reduction will be $143 billion in the first decade and an additional $1.2 trillion in the second decade. big deficit reductions. well, i am sorry that the republicans seem to take a pride in their reputation as a party of no. we all remember william f. buckley's conservative not yoavment the father -- motto of

the conservative movement, he sad i it is to stand athwart history yelling stop. well, that's exactly what our republican colleagues did in trying to filibuster and kill health care reform. they're trying to do that now to obstruct and kill this reconciliation bill. but it won't succeed. we are going to get the reconciliation bill done. we're going to get it passed and we're going to move beyond this. we're going to move beyond the rancor and bitterness and bring our american family together. bring them together so that everyone is guaranteed the right to health care that. we stop the abusive practices of the health insurance industry that we've seen in the past. so by any measure, this bill is good for the american people. it's today for students, good for our colleges, our community colleges, our private colleges in getting rid of the guaranteed loan program and going to a direct loan program. it is also good for the health of the american people.

madam president, as i said in the beginning, this bill is good for the soul of america. it's good to remind us that we're once again an american family. that no one should be discriminated against simply because they're sick or have an illness or because fate has dealt them a -- a blow of becoming disabled. that's what this bill is about more than anything else. it's time to get on with it. get it passed and move on. madam president, i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from montana. mr. baucus: how much time's remaining on this half-hour block? the presiding officer: no time remains for the democrats. mr. baucus: thank you. a senator: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from new hampshire. mr. gregg: we're about to hear from senator mccain who has an amendment dealing with a number of these special deals that were

in the bill. now it's -- first off, this bill's a real outrage on the body of politic to begin with the way it was handled. it was drafted in a secret room, behind a secret room, behind a hidden door somewhere over on the majority side, brought out on saturday night, put on our desk. told that we had to vote on it on christmas eve. sent to the house, the house didn't get it amended, in order to pass it, they have a trailer bill, and then had the buy it bill where they went around and bought votes. a lot of votes were bought around here using the buy-it bill method. senator mccain has been the conscience of the amendment on this type of issue where there are targeted benefits for special states which really aren't appropriate and have nothing to do substantively with the bill. and, therefore, we should address those openly. now, we haven't had a chance to

did that. because our side has never been able to amend anything on here on this bill of any substance. so it's senator mccain's intention when he gets here to offer an amendment dealing with one of these or maybe a series of these situations where there were special deals cut which were -- were -- have been given certain names like the cornhusker kickback and louisiana purchase and the florida-aid gator aid. that i believe is what senator mccain is here for and we're looking forward to it because it's appropriate that we bring out into the light these deals which no american has had a chance to participate in other than those small cadre in that shawl room, as i said the hidden room behind the hidden room behind the hidden door. but they didn't go to committee. they didn't go across the senate floor, these deals and they didn't go across the house and they should be voted on as to whether are or not they're

appropriate. does the senator from tennessee -- mr. alexander: i see the senator -- the presiding officer: the senator from tennessee. mr. gregg: i ask that we be able to proceed as if in a colloquy. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. alexander: i ask consent that senator mccain -- senator mccain be allowed to lead the colloquy? i ask consent that senator mccain be allowed to lead the colloquy. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. mr. alexander: the senator from arizona has been a consistent proponent of openness in government. i heard the senator from new hampshire say that a sweetheart deals have not been able to be voted on. will we have a chance to vote on them soon? mr. mccain: i thank my colleague from tennessee. i would offer an amendment that would remove some of the sweetheart deals. i don't think we'll find out all of what was in this 2,733 page

legislation for a long, long time. as you know, it's that size and it really takes an expert, even though i read the bill, to really know -- go from one point to another. for example, it took us a long time to figure out the that the universe -- that the state of connecticut has $100 million deal to build a hospital in connecticut. how, you wouldn't know that at first glance, but after going through it, you figure out that that's the only one. there's a lot of provisions in this 2,733 page piece of legislation that we will find. but we're going to try to get rid of some of them in this amendment. which, by the way, a commitment i thought had been made, but, obviously, has not. the most egregious has been removed. the cornhusker kickback has been removed. and i believe that the gatoraid provision has been removed as well. but we certainly have a number of others that remain in the

bill and we will be finding them in the future. so i would ask my colleague from new hampshire, is it in order for me to propose the amendment? mr. gregg: as i understand it, the majority would like to see the amendment which is certainly reasonable. so we'll give them a copy of your amendment and hopefully at the end of our debate time here you'll be able to set my amendment aside and offer -- we'll get you a copy of the amendment. mr. mccain: i say to my friend from new hampshire while we're on the subject, it's not only the sweetheart deals that are carved out for individual members, the latest being additional medicaid funding for tennessee hospitals which was just added, i understand, within the last 48 hours or so, but there is also the part that really is hard for us to amend

as i'm sure the senator from new hampshire knows. for example, the pharma -- the phrma deal. there was a story in "the new york times," -- i quote from the "new york times" story -- "drug industry lobbyists reacted with alarm this week to a health care overhaul measure that would allow the government to negotiate drug prices and demand additional rebates from drug manufacturers. in response, the industry successfully demanded that the white house explicitly acknowledge for the first time that it had committed to protect drug makers from bearing further costs and the obama administration had never spelled out the details of the agreement. we were assured, we need somebody to come in first. if you come in first, you will have a rock-solid deal. billy tauzin -- "by the way i understand salary of over over $2 million a year -- former

republican house member from louisiana who now leads the group said wednesday who is ever going to go into a deal with the white house again if they don't keep their word? they are just going to duke it out instead." the deputy white house chief of staff confirmed mr. tauzin's account of the deal in an email message on wednesday night. the president encouraged this approach, mr. macino wrote. he wanted to bring all the parties to the table to discuss health insurance reform. so i say to my friend from new hampshire as we're awaiting approval of the other side of this amendment, you know, how many deals were cut with phrma? who were the deals cut with the a.m.a.? what were the deals cut with the hospital association? what were the deals cut with all of these organizations that has caused americans to be so unhappy with this process that we have gone through? so there really isn't any way, i would say to my colleague from

new hampshire, that i can amend the phrma deal. we tried to have drug reimportation from canada. we tried to have pharmaceutical companies to compete for medicare recipients, but as mr. tauzin said, we need somebody -- they told him we were assured we need somebody to come in first. if you come in first, you will have a rock-solid deal. i don't know whether it was the president found himself on the road to damascus or what caused the conversion from then-senator obama who supported strongly drug reimportation from canada for prescription drugs to the administration now opposing it. but anyway, i understand that my amendment is -- has been agreed to. i call up the mccain-burr-coburn amendment. mr. baucus: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from montana. mr. baucus: i understand there is an amendment already pending. it is the gregg amendment.

i understand senator mccain would like to ask consent that that pending amendment be set aside so that his amendment could then be in order. if so, i have no objection. the presiding officer: is there an objection to set aside the pending amendment? without objection, so ruled. the clerk will rort. the clerk: the senator from arizona, mr. mccain, proposes an amendment numbered 3570, at the end of sub title f of title 1 -- mr. mccain: i ask unanimous consent that further reading of the amendment be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mccain: and i thank my colleague, the senator from montana, for his courtesy. this amendment removes some of the remaining egregious sweetheart deals contained in the health reform legislation. it removes the following items from the health reform legislation -- "additional medicaid funding for hawaii

hospitals, additional medicaid funding for tennessee hospitals, the louisiana purchase providing special medicaid funding for louisiana, special medicare funding primarily for reclassified hospitals in michigan and connecticut, the uconn proposal that provides provides $100 million for a connecticut hospital. the fronteer provision for montana, south dakota, north dakota, and wyoming. the provision allowing for certain residents in libby, montana, to participate in a new medicare program. now, let me say that i believe that many of these proposals, including the libby, be montana, proposal may be worthwhile. but what are they doing in a health care reform bill? what is the purchase except to put in a special deal for a

favored group? and they may need this help. they may possibly very badly and urgently need it. it seems to me that if that were the case, we could make that argument and provide the people in libby, montana, the ability to participate in a medicare program. as it stands, it is something that is not in keeping with health care reform. the funding for hawaii hospitals is there, and i want to say a word about the louisiana purchase. the senator from louisiana comes down and forcefully and very convincingly argues that this is very needed for the state of louisiana and louisiana was hit by hurricane katrina. i would point out the state of mississippi was also hit and devastated by hurricane katrina, but we don't have anything in here for the state of mississippi, and i believe the

governor of mississippi, i know, would argue that the devastation on the mississippi coast was equally as terrible as that for louisiana. instead, we have $300 million providing special medicaid funding for louisiana. there are also states, including my own, including others, that have suffered devastating acts of god, acts of nature also from time to time. so here we are at the 11th hour with a situation where there is still these back room deals done that possibly we could address with an amendment. the other deals we can't because they were like side agreements with the pharmaceutical companies which i just read from. like the deal with the american medical association, the ones with the hospitals, the others that were cut in order to get

them to come on board and support this legislation. so this provides for an opportunity to remove these provisions from the bill, and they -- and the comments made by senator reid's office, and i quote -- "you will find a number of states are treated different from other states. that's what legislation is all about. it's compromise. we worked on a number of things to get different people's votes. there are many things you will look at in this legislation and say -- quote -- i wonder why that happened. a lot of times you think something was done and that's how you got their vote. most of the time, that's really not true. some of the time it is." so if i could quote to my colleagues again the recent

article from march 21 called "inside the pelosi sausage factory," i quote from" the wall street journal "article, it said --" never before has the average american been treated to such a live action view of the sordid politics necessary to push a deeply flawed bill to completion. it was dirty deals, open threats, broken promises and disregard for democracy that pulled obama care to this point, and yesterday the same machinations pushed it across the finish line. as for those who needed more persuasion "-- i'm quoting from the" wall street journal "." for those who needed more pervasion, california rep jim costa bragged that during his meeting at the oval office, he demanded the administration increase water to his central valley district. on tuesday, the interior pushed

up its announcement, giving the central valley farmers 25% of water supplies rather than the expected 5% allocation. mr. costa, who denies there was a quid pro quo on saturday, said he flipped to a yes. florida rep susan cosmos whose district is home to the kennedy space center admitted that in her own thursday meeting with the president, she brought up the need for more nasa funding. on friday, she flipped to a yes, so watch the nasa budget. democrats inserted a new provision providing $100 million in extra medicaid money for tennessee. retiring tennessee rep bart gordon flipped to a yes vote on thursday. outside heavyies were enlisted to warn potential no votes that unions and other democrats would run them out of congress." the list goes on and on. you know, again, eight times the president of the united states

said in the campaign that all negotiations on health care reform would be conducted with c-span cameras in the room. he said we'll find out who is on the side of pharmaceutical companies, who is on the side of the voters. unfortunately, these deals were made out of the view of the c-span cameras. in fact, behind closed doors. so this is a pretty simple amendment, and i repeat, removes the additional medicaid funding for hawaii hospitals, additional medicaid funding for tennessee hospitals. the louisiana purchase, special medicare funding primarily for reclassified hospitals in michigan and connecticut. $100 million for a connecticut hospital, the frontier funding provision provided new medicare money for montana, south dakota, north dakota, and wyoming, and

the provision, the special provision for libby, montana. now, i know again that people will stand and defend each one of these provisions. they are provisions that were not allowed or provided to every other state in america. that's what makes them a special deal. that's what makes americans think that the way we do business around here is not in their interests. it makes americans believe that we are cutting these deals in order to secure votes. and whenever these deals are cut, then the residents of other states are the ones who foot the bill. so i hope that my colleagues will consider this amendment, remove all of these remaining provisions, and i cannot assure my colleagues nor my constituents that we have found them all, but at least it's a

step in the right direction. a senator: will the senator yield for a question? mr. mccain: i would be glad to. mr. gregg: it seems to me that what the senator is trying to do is get back to what the other side claimed they were doing, which is health care reform. what you're trying to do is take out of this health care bill a lot of special, you know, walking around money events that didn't have anything to do with work. it just had to do with getting a vote, getting a vote here, getting a vote there. and if they were going to do real health care reform, that issue should rise or fall of its own weight. it shouldn't require that the special deals be put in there to get a vote, should it? mr. mccain: well, i believe that all of my colleagues are of the highest integrity, honorable people, and i respect and admire their service to their states and the nation, but there is no doubt, i say to my friend from new hampshire, there is no doubt that these kinds of provisions in 2,700-page pieces of

legislation create the appearance that some states are favored over others because of the -- either the influence of their elected representative or the -- in order to secure those votes. that is the appearance that the american people have when we find these earmarks in legislation which are somehow inserted without votes, without debate, without discussion, and there they are. mr. gregg: i guess my point is independently of these amendments, members should be able to vote on this bill up or down without these amendments in it. i mean, these amendments are extraneous to health care reform. the core of health care reform has nothing to do with any of these amendments there. as you say, they may be worthwhile in some instances, but they are not tied to the purpose of this bill which was

allegedly health care reform. isn't that correct? mr. mccain: i totally agree. and again, i point out -- pointed out as short a time ago as day before yesterday, what was the rationale for adding adding $100 million in extra medicaid money for tennessee? why after a year, after a year of debate and discussion on this, all of a sudden sudden $100 million extra for medicare -- medicaid is deemed necessary for the state of tennessee? this is what arouses the suspicion of the american people, i say to my colleague. and there will be a stout defense of every one of these. but the point is that if they are done in the regular authorization and appropriations bills and certainly not in the name of health care reform. they're extra money. where is the reform in $100 million for a hospital in connecticut? what's that got to do with reform? nothing. so i -- mr. president, i

reserve -- madam president, i reserve the balance of my time. mr. barrasso barrasso: madam pr? the presiding officer: who yields time to the senator from wyoming? mr. mccain: i yield to the senator from wyoming such time as he may consume. the presiding officer: the senator from wyoming has the floor. mr. barrasso: thank you. and it's a privilege to be here on the floor with my -- with my colleague from arizona, because he talks so well on this topic. and he knows it so very well expens thousand read this -- and he knows how to read this legislation and look through the nooks and the crannies. and i will tell all of you and tell my colleague that i spent some of my time sunday visiting a friend, a veteran from world war ii, ted lee, in the hospital. he broke a rip and he's recovering and he's bothered by a -- he broke a hip and he's recovering in the hospital and he's bothered by a lot of things in washington. he's recovering from surgery and he said why are they taking my medicare money to start a new program and how in the heck did they get all of these votes that they needed to get this bill

passed? and he said, has it been vote buying, has it been sweetheart deals, is it a culture of corruption in washington? those are questions that are being asked by people all around the country. which is why when this bill was brought it floor in the house -- brought to the floor in the house, what we have seen is the fact that half of the people of america are vehemently opposed, strongly opposed to the bill. and only one -- and fewer than 1-4 supports it. and the thing that really touched the nerve of the american people before christmas was the cor cornhuskers kick -- cornhuskers kickback. and that actually hasn't been taken out of the bill. what they've done is said let's spend more money and give that same sweetheart deal to other states around the country, so that actually still is in there. and yet the president said well, we're not going to have any special deals. it happened when senator mccain and i were at the white house for the -- the summit, and senator mccain asked the specific question of the president, said, what about all these deals? he said, well, they should come

out. but yet we see today that not only have many, many of those deals not come out, there is a whole list of additional sweetheart deals put in to get in bill through the house of representatives. and the people of wyoming -- mr. gregg: would the senator on that point yield because i think he's made a very important point. i wasn't at the summit but i would like to -- the senator from arizona to relate to us what the exchange was with the president on the issue of these sweetheart deals, because i think if the president's position they should be out and they don't have anything to do with the fundamental reform exercise, shouldn't they be out? mr. mccain: i say to my frien friend, i had the exchange with the president specifically over the so-called gator-aid amendment because 330,000 of citizens of my state who are enrolled in medicare advantage were going to be passed at a great disadvantage because we had caived out -- carved out a special provision for 800,000 citizens of florida who were

under medicare advantage programs. and by the way, i'd remind my colleagues that i proposed an amendment to remove that on this floor from that bill. so does anybody really believe that if it hadn't have been for the publicity surrounding these special deals that they -- that they would have voluntarily taken out the $800,000 -- or 800,000-person carveout for the state of florida? i don't think so, because i proposed an amendment to take it out and it was -- and it was defeated, it was kept in on a party-line vote. but fortunately i brought it up at the white house with the fortunate and the president -- with the president and the president agreed that it was not a good idea. so after voting to keep it in, after defeating an amendment that i tried to remove it, now fortunately there was enough publicity, there was enough focus on it that it forced them to take out. unfortunately, there was not

enough focus on the hospital in connecticut and these other provisions which are special deals. mr. barrasso: so here we are, we're looking at a bill, madam president, that in my opinion, having practiced medicine for 25 years, taken care of families all across the state of wyoming, is fundamentally going to be bad for patients, bad for providers -- our nurses and our doctors -- and bad four payers, the people that are going to pay -- and bad for payers, the people that are going to pay the bill, the american taxpayers. which is why warren buffett, when he looked at this whole piece of legislation, he said, it's time to eliminate about 2,000 pages of the nonsense and just focus on cutting costs. in my opinion, having looked at this and visiting with other physicians and hospital administrators, it looks to me that with the president -- the bill that the president signed into law today, which cuts medicare by $500 billion, not to save medicare but to start a whole new government program, which raises taxes by another $500 billion on american families, i believe that this

bill's still loaded with sweetheart deals, is going to cause people to see that their own insurance premiums are going to go up, their taxes are going to go up and they're going to find out that the quality of their medical care is going to go down.we saw it in massachusetts, where with the result of this program, the -- a program very similar, it's now the most expensive state in the country for health insurance. it is breaking the budget of the state, and people have to wait 42 days to get a physician. but yet the president says we're going to cover more people and he's going to do it by cramming 16 million more americans on to medicaid, a program that many doctors won't even see those patients because the reimbursement is so low. so i see my colleague from new hampshire and i say that's what i'm hearing in wyoming, is that what you're hearing in new hampshire and then maybe our friend from arizona has some additional thoughts? mr. gregg: well, it absolutely is and the doctor has described it personally from his own personal experience, and that is

a lot of doctors aren't going to see patients, especially who are on medicaid or medicare, because the reimbursement rates are so low. but i think, you know, there's a philosophical issue here with whether this bill should be full of sweetheart deals. but i can't believe anybody on either side of the aisle would be against eliminating these sweetheart deals other than the people from the states that benefit from them. this is not going to be extraordinarily disruptive to this bill. if this amendment were to pass, which took out these various deals -- which shouldn't be in the bill to begin with -- the bill goes back to the house. the house doesn't like these deals. heck, they're for senators. i suspect the house would be happy to have these deals come out. so they just passed the bill -- just re-pass the bill without these deals. so why not vote for this amendment? why not positively vote this amendment? well, there's no logical reason not to do it other than i guess nobody wants to let any amendments pass that deal with this bill in any way, even if they're extraordinarily

reasonable amendments, such as this. which there should be unanimity on except for the folks who benefit from the specific deals. mr. mccain: madam president, i'd like to summarize by saying i hope that we will take out these deals. i hope every time we find another one in this 2,733-page legislation, that we'll take it out, too. but i hope also that my friends on the other side of the aisle and the president of the united states will learn a lesson from this. next time you want -- want to sit down and enact a major piece of legislation, bring us in on the beginning, bring us in so that we can have true bipartisan negotiations. and any allegation to the contrary is patently false. i know, because i've been involved in bipartisan negotiations, and this is what happens when you have to go around shopping for votes to finally put you over the top. and the american people, with the election of the new senator

from massachusetts, have rejected this process. they have rejected this process. so let's listen to the people of this country, who say they want these things out. that's not how they want the congress of the united states to do business. let's take them out. let's give them -- let's stop this legislation and let's start from the beginning, and let's really fix health care in america. and certainly let's all pledge to stop doing these things of backroom behavior that the american people have grown sick and tired of. mr. gregg: madam president, i just want to congratulate the senator from arizona again for being the voice of conscience for this body relative to making sure that we're playing straight with the american people and their tax dollars by not allowing these type of special deals to be put i into bills. and he has a long and very strong record in this area, and this amendment, i can't imagine why it would be opposed. i understand, madam president, that the two hours which we had

a time agreements under has -- has basically been completed. i would suggest that for the next two hours, we continue with the same course of action, if it's agrebl to the -- agreeable to the manager, to the democratic manager, and we have a half an hour on the democratic side, a half an hour on our side, a half an hour on the democratic side, a half an hour on our side. is that acceptable? mr. balks balk -- mr. baucus: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from montana. mr. baucus: i think at this point, let's keep it to one hour, a half-hour on each side. the presiding officer: is there objection? mr. gregg: so the next hour will be divided 30 minutes with the majority and 30 minutes with the minority. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mccain: has my time expired? mr. baucus: i'm sorry, what was the consent? the presiding officer: there will be one hour equally divided with the majority having the first half-hour. mr. mccain: do i have any time remaining? the presiding officer: the senator from arizona has one minute remaining. mr. mccain: thank you. i'll just summarize again. these deals were cut for special

situations. we've had disasters all over america. we had a disaster in the state of mississippi. there was no -- there was nothing in this for the state of mississippi that was struck by katrina as well. so the fact is that it was also done in a manager' package. there was no debate, there was no discussion. i certainly, and the rest of this side, was not told about it, and i wasn't the only one. so it was a deal that was cut. these deals have all got to be removed. i would certainly support doing anything necessary to help any state in america that's struck by a disaster. not just louisiana, but arizona and california and every other state that's been. but i won't do it by inserting a special provision in what is supposed to be a health care reform bill. i urge my colleagues to remove all of these sweetheart deals. i yield the balance of my time. mr. baucus: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from montana. mr. baucus: madam president, i yield to the chairman of the budget committee, senator conrad, 20 minutes from our time

in opposition to the mccain amendment. the presiding officer: the senator from north dakota. mr. conrad: i thank the chairman. i want to thank chairman baucus for his extraordinary leadership in the legislation that became the law of the land today with the signature by the president. that's the bill that came out of the senate, came out of the finance committee, came out of the health committee. and that bill went to the house, was passed and was signed into law by the president today. this is the headline from "the new york times" today: "congress sends white house landmark health overhaul." this was actually yesterday's headline. "landmark health overall" -- indeed, it is. the senate is now turning to a separate reconciliation bill passed by the house.

that bill includes modifications to the comprehensive reform measure president obama signed today. these are changes that have been negotiated with the house. the health care fixer bill represents a limited and appropriate use of the reconciliation process and the reconciliation bill also includes certain education provisions to make college more affordable and to support higher education. i want to begin by highlighting the impact of the comprehensive bill passed by the senate on christmas eve, passed by the house over the weekend, signed into law by the president today. that bill meets key reform benchmarks. it's fully paid for and, in fact, reduces both the short - and the long-term deficits. it expands coverage to 94% of

americans. promotes choice and competition. it contains critical insurance market reforms and bans the denial of coverage based on preexisting conditions. and it contains delivery system reforms that will bring us better quality at lower cost. and here's what this health care reform bill will mean for my state of north dakota. it ends insurance abuses. insurers will no longer be able to deny coverage for you or your children because of preexisting conditions or raise premiums when you get sick. it provides tax breaks for small businesses. small businesses will get tax credits to help buy coverage for their workers. i had a republican businessman tell a friend of mine just over the weekend that he has had to stop coverage of these employees, although he'd like to extend it to them, but believes that this bill now will allow

him to once again provide insurance coverage to his employees. it insures young people. young north dakotans will be able to stay on their parents' health insurance until they're 26 years old. it expands coverage. north dakotans without employer-provided coverage will get more choices and tax credits to make health coverage more affordable. it helps workers. workers will be able to change jobs without fear of losing health care coverage. it improves medicare. seniors will get preventive services without co-payments and the gap in prescription drug coverage will be eliminated. it lowers costs. premiums for the same level of coverage will be lower after health care reform than they would have been without it. despite claims from some of my republican colleagues that this health care reform does not -- that this adds to the deficit,

it does not. the congressional budget office, which is the official scorer, has said the comprehensive bill signed by the president today reduces the deficit by $118 billion over the first ten years. as i will show later, when you add in the impact of the reconciliation bill before us now, the total deficit reduction in this first ten-year period is $143 billion. it's not my estimate. it's not the democratic party's estimate. its he a not the democratic leadership's estimate. that is the estimate by the nonpartisan congressional budget office that officially scores legislation before this congress. and this reform continues to reduce the deficit in the second ten years. here is what c.b.o. said in its analysis of the reform signed into law by the president today.

c.b.o. expects that the legislation would reduce federal budget deficits over the decked after 20 1-9d relative to those projected under current law -- with a total effect during that decade that is in a broad range between one-quarter% andquarte r percent and one-half percent of g.d.p." and now we have the happy ability to inform our colleagues that with the reconciliation bill added in, that the total deficit reduction will be one half of one percent of g.d.p. in the second ten years or $1.3 trillion. this health care reform package also expands coverage. again, i'm referring now to the bill signed into law by the

president today. because that bill alone expands coverage to 94% of the american people by building off the existing employer-based system. it creates state-based health exchanges for individuals and small businesses. it provides tax credits to help individuals and small businesses buy insurance, and it expands medicaid eligibility while providing additional assistance to the states to pay for t this health care reform also includes dramatic reforms in the health insurance market, measures that will positively impact millions of americans. it prohibits insurers from denying consequently for preexisting conditions. it prohibits insurers from rescinding coverage when people get sick. it bans insurers from imposing lifetime caps and unreasonable annual limits on health care

benefits, and it prevents insurers from charging more beaverebased on health status. and this reform package signed by the president today takes a number of important steps to improve the quality of care. it covers preventive services. it provides incentives for healthy lifestyles. it promotes the adoption of best practices and the use of comparative effectiveness research to find out on a scientific basis what actually works. who's against using things that actually work? and it includes delivery system reforms that encourage quality over quantity of care, something that health economists have told us is perhaps the single-most important part of this package. these delivery system reforms don't get a lot of attention, but they have the potential to dramatically improve our long-term health outlook. these reforms include

accountable care organizations, primary care payment bonuses, readmissions, hospital value-based purchasing, comparative effectiveness research, a c.h.s. innovation center, an independent payment advisory board, and payment bundling. all of them recommended by democrats and republicans who are health care economists, who told us these are the things that can fundamentally change our system to lower costs overtime and improve quality. you wouldn't know it from listening to some of the coverage, but this health care reform has widespread support among health care experts and health care organizations. in my state of north dakota, this legislation has been endorsed by the north dakota hospital association, the north dakota medical association representing our states' doctors, the north dakota nurses association representing our

statestates's insureses, the noh dakota's aarp representing our state's seniors, the community health care association, and on and on and on. there's been a lot of misinformation spread about this health care reform package, so i want to take a moment to say what's not in this plan. it does not include government-run health care. there is no government takeover. this is private insurance. not government insurance. it includes no cut in guaranteed benefits for seniors. the medicare savings overwhelmingly are savings from providers negotiated with providers. why would they agree to hundreds of billions of dollars in lower payments than they were expecting? in other words, less of an

increase than they were anticipating. because they know with 30 million people more insured that their costs will be reduced, and they can afford less of an increase. it includes no death panels. it includes no coverage for illegal immigrants. and it includes no expansion of federal funding for abortion services. noid a like to briefly address the -- now i'd like to briefly address the reconciliation bill that is before us now. remember, we've already passed comprehensive reform. that was done on christmas eve. that was passed by the house this weekend. that was signed into law by the president today. what is before us now is a reconciliation package. it includes limited modifications or fixes to the comprehensive health care bill which earlier passed. it is fully paid for and includes additional deficit

reduction, over and above the comprehensive bill that became law today. and this reconciliation bill follows the requirements of reconciliation by including budget-related provisions only. no proposed changes on strictly policy matters. here are key health care fixes in this bill: it improves the affordability of health care. it eliminates the gap in medicare drug coverage also known as "the doughnut hole." it adjusts the amount of federal aid going to states for medicare and all states are treated the same, despite the rhetoric from the other side. let's be clear -- on complaid, all states are treated the -- on medicaid, all constituents are treated the same. it further educes overpayments to medicare advantage. and it takes additional steps to reduce waste, fraud, and abuse. and here are key innovations in

the bill as quell: it expands pell grants to make college more affordable, it eliminates bank-based student lending, which saves according to c.b.o. $61 billion of taxpayer money that can then be redirected to actually support students. i thought that's what student aid was about, to support students. and it supports historically black colleges and extends funding for higher education. now some of my colleagues of the party opposite have described reconciliation has an obscure and rarely used procedure. the fact is, it has been used 22 times, 16 times when they were in control of the united states senate. and we are using reconciliation to appropriately reduce the deficit, unlike our friends on the other side who used the process to pass unpaid for tax cuts that resulted in much

higher deficits. here's how senator gregg justified the use of reconciliation by the then-republican majority in 2005 in its effort to open up the arctic national wildlife refuge to drilling. he stated -- and i quote -- "reconciliation is a rule of the senate set up under the budget act. ... the fact is, all this rule of the senate does is allow a majority of the senate to take a position and pass a piece of legislation, and it does it with a simple majority vote. is there something wrong with majority rules?" he asked. "i don't think so," he said. "the reason the budget act was written in this way was to allow certain unique issues to be passed with a majority vote. this is all that is being asked for here."

that is the quote of senator gregg, who was then-chairman of the budget committee. he said, it allows a simple majority vote. he asked, what is wrong with that? it's interesting now to hear the other side say somehow that's wrong. as i noted, this reconciliation bill will add further deficit reduction to the health care reform estimate. here is c.b.o.'s estimates of the combined effect of the bill signed into law by the president today and the bill that is before us now. it shows that the deficits will be reduced by a total of $143 billion over the first ten years. $143 billion. that's according to the congressional budget office. and the two measures taken together will continue to reduce deficits in the second ten years

and beyond. here is what c.b.o. said in its cost estimate. "the combined effect of enacting the senate bill and the reconciliation proposal would be to reduce federal budget deficits over the ensuing decade, beyond 2019, relative to those projected under current law -- with a total effect during that decade in the broad range around one-half of pun percent of g.d.p." that translates into dollars of $1.3 trillion. .5% of g.d.p. in the second decade is $1.3 trillion of deficit reduction. not million, not billion; trillion. peds $1.3 trillion of deficit reduction according to the congressional budget office. anybody that doesn't want

additional deficit reduction ought to vote "no." those who want to reduce the burgeoning deficit and debt ought to vote yea. madam president, this health care reform bill does not represent the end of the story. it is a beginning. but it is an important beginningings one that reduces - but it is an important beginning, one that reduces the deficit and reduces the debt, according to the nonpartisan congressional budget office, that has the responsibility of giving us objective, objective analysis. that's their job. they do it well. this bill, combined with the bill signed earlier today by the president, reduces the deficit by $1.3 trillion. and, in addition, it has these

critically important insurance and delivery system reforms that every health care economist that came before us said would over time make a meaningful difference in reducing health care costs for american consumers. madam president, how much time do i have remaining? the presiding officer: the senator has three minutes remaining. mr. conrad: madam president, i would just like to end by talking about the matter that has been brought up by some on the other side, the so-called frontier amendment. the frontier amendment was opened -- was offered openly here on the floor of the senate by my colleague, senator dorgan. everybody had a chance to review that amendment. it does not affect one state. it affects five states. some of the states are represented by just republican senators. in fact, twa of the states are represented just -- in fact, two of the states are represented just by republican senators.

one of the states is represented by one republican, one democrat. the other two by two democrats. this is certainly not a partisan amendment of why was it offered by my colleague, senator dorgan? it was offered because these five states are at the bottom in medicare reimbursement and have been for many years. they are the most rural states in the nation. and the way the formula works, those states have been penalized. let me just say, in my state, to treat the exact same illness, the hospitals in my state get one-third to one-half as much as the more populous states in the country to treat the exact same illness. and when we go to get technology, we don't get a rural discount. in fact, we pay more because we are buying in smaller order quantities. and when we go to attract a doctor or nurse, they don't say to us, "well, gee, because you

get one-third or one half as much in medicare reimbursement, we'll only charge you one-third or one half as much to come to your state or to stay in your state." that isn't what happens. i have had the major hospital administrators in my state come and say unless as health care reform you get this fixed, we are going to begin to have to lay off people and to begin to reduce services and reduce them dramatically because we can no longer survive getting reimbursement for the majority of our patients because, remember, the majority of the patients in these rural hospitals are medicare-eligible patients. and they are getting one-third to one half as much as the more populous states, the hospitals in the more populous states to treat the exact same illnesses. that's not fair. that is fundamentally an issue for health care reform. that's why this amendment is

included, and that's why it deserves to be retained. mr. president, i want to just end by again thanking the chairman of the finance committee for his extraordinary effort. i've been here 20 -- i'm in my 24th year. i have never seen a member put in the kind of concentrated and focused effort as the chairman of the finance committee did on this bill. hundreds of hours of his personal times over a year and a half to get a good package, a responsible package. and i also want to thank chris dodd, chairman of the "help" committee, for his exceptional efforts. and certainly to our leader, harry reid, for bringing the two together in a way that enjoy the unanimous support of the members on our side of the aisle. that is a remarkable accomplishment. i thank the chair and yield the floor. mr. baucus: mr. president?

the presiding officer: the senator from montana is recognized. mr. baucus: mr. president, i thank -- mr. president, speaking on the bill, mr. president, i thank my friend from north dakota for a kind statement, noting all the hours, days, weeks, months put on this bill. i thank him because my good friend has been there for most of those hours, days, weeks and months spent on this bill. i thank him for his observation; as well as the senator from -- as well as other senators on the bill: senator harkin, senator dodd and others, and ranking members too in many respects. mr. president, i yield five minutes to the senator from louisiana from the time under our control on the bill. ms. landrieu: thank you, mr. president. i thank the chairman and want to add my compliments to him for his extraordinary leadership over the last several months in managing this very important piece of legislation through the

process. a major piece of legislation that garnered 60 votes on the floor of the senate. mr. president, you know because you've worked on many pieces of legislation, even in your short time here in the senate but your longer time in the house, how difficult that is, and particularly on an issue like this, that has eluded our country time and time again. even though great attempts were made by extraordinary presidents and wonderful congresses in the past, this victory has eluded them. but we are close to capturing it now. and so i want to thank the chairman of the finance committee. he probably spent more time, except maybe for harry reid himself, on ushering us to this point. and i was in many of those meetings, and his patience was inspirational, and his steady hand when things got tough. so i want to thank him, and i also want to thank the chairman

of the budget committee. no one has a command of this budget in this entire body than -- a better handle on it than kent conrad. and i think he's spoken in some detail and depth about the significant cost reductions and deficit reductions that will occur because of our work. but i came down to speak spaoefbgically about the -- to speak specifically about the amendment just offered by the senator from arizona. i actually went to the desk to get a copy of it because i wanted to read it for myself. i'd like to say this amendment is a stunt that really stkopbt deserve the time -- that really doesn't deserve the time that i'm going to give to explain the portion of it that refers to louisiana. the reason i say it's a stunt is because it's actually written for television or the internet. it's not written for any serious debate here, and in my view, it is beneath the senator from arizona, who at one time was a candidate for president of this

country. the reason i say it's a stunt is because the words "sweetheart" are actually written in this amendment. normal lit only time i see that word is when my husband sends me a dozen roses on valentine's day, which he dose most years -- which he does most years. not every year but most years. to actually draft an amendment like this that uses the words "sweetheart deal" is really an insult to the people of our country, and i would expect more from him. i've tried to explain this to him privately on any number of occasions. i've provided him with -- and his staff with every document ever requested. and hiram to say one more time -- and i'm here to say one more time, the people of louisiana do not deserve the derision from him or from any member of the republican team, or from my republican allies because of asking for a

correction in a formula that would have been devastating to the state of louisiana or to any state that experienced the kind of catastrophic disaster that we did. this amendment that i got on might have been unknown to senator mccain, but it was not a secret. how would i know that? because actually i called a press conference with the governor of louisiana, republican governor, and announced it. that's why i know it wasn't a secret. and we didn't have one press conference together. we had three. i've explained to the senator from arizona just because he didn't know about it doesn't mean it was a secret. there are lots of things that happen in washington. it's a big place, it's a big country -- that he doesn't know about. this is one of them.

there were three press conferences called, and our entire delegation wrote a letter, a public letter, which i had given to every reporter that's asked for it, asking for consideration for this. number three, how would i know it's not a secret? because my ledges tour, which is -- my shraeupblgs -- my ledges shra*eur -- my legislature unanimously passed it in a public forum. the people of louisiana that i represent, believe me, are sick and tired of hearing their name dragged through the mud. you want to hear their name dragged through the name, drag mine. we realized at the governor's request -- and i'd ask for a minute more, unanimous consent for a minute more. when the health care debate

started, our governor recognized that without this change, the state of louisiana would lose somewhere of about $450 million because under the formula that was calculated, which is done publicly, the federal government declared that the louisiana per capita income had increased 40%. it's never happened in the history of the united states of america. no state in no year, in no decade, even with the gold rush, even with discovering oil, even with the greatest inventions in the world, no state's income has ever, ever gone up 40%. and ours did not. the people i represent are not richer because of katrina. we are poorer. and i will make no back up amendment to ask for help for them. all i've asked for in this bill and we've gotten, and despite the effort on the other side to undo it, we will not undo it. all we're asking for is to let

us pay the same medicaid match that we have paid for the last ten years, as long as i know, louisiana pays 30 cents, the federal government pays 70. and our people are covered. i ask for 30 seconds, and i promise i'll end here. we're not asking for special treatment. we're asking just to pay the same amount of medicaid as we have paid for the last ten years. it was not done secretly. it was not the done behind closed doors. and it was not done to buy my vote. my vote was given to this bill because this bill deserves it, because it's a very good piece of legislation. and i told the leader i would vote for it whether this was in it or not. but i am tired and i am not going to sit down and not defend the people of my state. now the other members can speak about what they want. this isn't a sweetheart deal. it's a stunt from a senator that i would expect more from. and i yield the floor. mr. baucus: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from montana. mr. baucus: mr. president, i

think i have very little time left, perhaps maybe a minute or two in, this half-hour. i'll use it, but i want to speak more on this subject at a later time. i might also tell my colleagues that the next half-hour, allocated to the republican side will expire at roughly 6:40. at that time we'll try to work on an agreement where we trade both sides half-hour per side. so i alert my colleagues, if they wish to speak on this reconciliation bill, about 30 minutes from now roughly, we'll try to set up an arrangement for colleagues to speak. mr. president, how much time do i have left remaining? the presiding officer: 55 seconds. mr. baucus: 55 seconds. i think it more prudent not to use those 55 seconds, but to keep it and l theenat from new hampshire allocate time.

a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from idaho. a senator: i'd like to respond to a couple of the comments made. at the first available option i'm going to file a motion to recommit the bill. mr. crapo: before i get into a discussion of this motion, i'd like to respond to the argument that's being made, consistently made that the health care legislation that was signed by the president today and as supplemented by this reconciliation bill is going to actually result in deficit reduction. well, what we need to understand is that among the many other pieces of this bill, ultimately it will result in growing the federal government by about $2.6 trillion over the next ten years. now, this chart shows graphically or pick torely -- pictorally what will happen. under the original bill it was $2.5 trillion. now with the bill we have before

us today it is going up, not down. to $2.6 trillion of new spending. there are only a few ways that you can claim that that's going to result in a reduction of our deficit. nobody denies that it's going to result in a massive increase in the size of the federal government, regardless of the other positions or portions of this bill. how does a $2.6 trillion increase in spending result in deficit reduction? well, first of all, because there are massive new taxes in this bill that go along with this increase in spending that are offset against it. secondly, because there are massive cuts in medicare, over $500 billion, 610 billion of new taxes, $520 billion of new medicare cuts which results in about a $1 trillion offset, about $1.1 trillion of offsets. how do you get to the rest of the offset to claim that this bill is deficit-neutral or

reduces the deficit? that's what i call the gimmicks. for example, $29 billion of social security revenue is raided from the social security trust fund and allocated to this bill. the class act which has been called a ponzi scheme by members of the other side of the aisle is adding another $70 billion of revenue. the medicare cuts are actually counted twice because they are not used to sustain the medicare system. they're used to finance a brand-new system of -- brand-new entitlement system in this bill. and when you sort through it all, if you stop the gimmicks and if you do the math with the gimmicks taken out, we don't have a deficit reduction. we actually have a deficit increase, about $619 billion of increased deficit under this bill. mr. president, i think that we need to get the facts all out in front of us and discuss them, but i want to talk just a moment

now about the motion that i'm going to make. th motn that i'm going to make is the same motion i made when we debated the main it can bill last -- the the main health care bill last december. it is a motion that simply helps us make sure that this bill complies with the president's promise. what did the president promise? the president has said multiple times -- and here's one of his quotes -- "i can make a firm pledge. no family making less than $250,000 will see their taxes increase. not your income taxes, not your payroll taxes, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes. you will not see any of your taxes increase one single dime." that was the president's pledge. and when i brought this motion when we debated the original health care bill, it was signed into law by the president today; it was attacked and actually defeated on the floor on the

grounds that to do so, to adopt my motion would result in killing the bill. it would destroy the bill. all that my motion did was say let's temporarily send this bill back to the committee, have them strip out all of the taxes that hit the middle class. people making less than $250,000, and bring the bill right back to the floor. and i was told that that would kill the bill. that would gut the bill. well, first of all, if that's going to gut the bill, then that's a concession that the bill is full of taxes on people who make less than $250,000. as a matter of fact, that's true. again, the bill before this reconciliation bill was analyzed by the joint committee on taxation and their conclusion, not mine, is that by 2019 at least 73 million american households earning belo below $200,000 will be paying more taxes because of the taxes imposed by this bill.

that's $610 billion of taxes that is used to help claim that this bill does not increase the deficit. well, what happened last time when we tee baitd it? -- debated it? it was attacked because it would gut the bill if we took this out of it. and my motion was defeated. there was another argument made against the motion that time and that is the bill we were debating isn't actually a tax increase, as it tax cut. the way that argument went was, we have more tax cuts in the bill than we have tax increases. the only way that argument could be made is by saying that the subsidies that are provided to low-income individuals in this country are tax cuts even though they don't pay any taxes. yet, all of the subsidies in the new entitlement program were counted as tax cuts and they were offset against the true tax increases that are going to be paid by the middle class in america and the argument was made that it was a tax cut. well, first of all, it's not a

valid argument. there are 10 billion of - of -- $610 billion of new taxes in this bill. and, secondly, i don't think that's what president obama was talking about. he didn't say i will raise taxes more for some people than i will cut them for someone else. he said that he wouldn't raise taxes and this this bill would not be allowed to be used as a vehicle to do so. let's get back to the main argument that was my motion before, and that is that it would gut the bill. well, that can't be true anymore. that bill was signed into law by the president today. so it is law today. and now, mr. president, i think it's time for this congress to simply fix the problem. all we have to do with my motion, when i'm allowed to have an opportunity to bring it, is to recommit this bill back to the committee and have the committee take out of it all the taxes that apply to people who

make less than $250,000 as an individual or $200,000 -- excuse me. $200,000 as an individual o or $250,000 as a family. it's very straightforward. you can argue that there aren't such taxes in the bill. if they're not, my motion won't do a thing to the bill. but the reality is that the vast majority of the taxes in this bill are going to be paid by the middle class. 73 million americans by joint tax committee's analysis -- excuse me, 73 million households in america, by the joint tax commission's analysis, are going to be paying these taxes. and all this motion does is say that let's get back to the president's pledge and do what the president said. let's take out of the bill the taxes are going to be slamming the middle class in america as this bill becomes law. and, with that, mr. president, i would be glad to yield any of my colleagues here onhe floor who would like to make comment on

this issue. senator risch, the senator from idaho. mr. risch: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from idaho. mr. risch: i rise in support of my distinguished colleague from idaho. he has brought to the floor the language that the president of the united states gave to the american people in order to convince them to vote for him for president of the united states. it was a serious promise. it was a serious commitment. and he said, "i will not tax and i will not increase the tax on people making -- on individuals making less than $200,000 a year or families making less than $250,000 a year." my good friend from idaho points out that there are numerous provisions in this bill that break that promise. i'm disappointed that the president has done this. i'm disappointed that he won't

take responsibility for it. i'm disappointed that he didn't point it out when he signed the bill. he talked only about the good things that it did. the president should -- he really should keep the commitment he made to the american people. if we are going to have a country where people have faith in their government, particularly in its chief executive, they've got to believe what he said. well, my good friend from idaho has indicated he's going to brain amendment to recommit the bill to get all of these out of there. i want to talk about one that is very, very focused. i'm only going to talk about one of these taxes that the president of the united states is raising on people who make less than $200,000 a year. and the reason i bring this one to the floor is this is a direct

assault on some of the most vulnerable people in this country. this particular increase in taxes is on 14.7 million people who earn less than $200,000 a year and who have had substantial medical bills during the year. how this bill does it is it simply changes the percentage of which you can deduct on your income tax return if you incur medical expenses. it is not a slight amount. it is $15 billion that it -- that this tax takes from some of the most vulnerable people in america. when the president of the united states promised that he would not tax people who made less than $200,000 a year, he made

that promise and this provision in the bill, in the bill that has been signed into law by the president, breaks that promise. and it breaks the promise not just on people who make $200,000 or -- or less a year. but it breaks the promise as to the most vulnerable people in our -- in america. the provision in this bill that the president signed into law this morning affects 14.7 million people. today 14.8 million people take this deduction. they are people who have been injured, people who have been sick, people who suffer from diseases, and they take this deduction because the congress of the united states has deemed it appropriate that when you

expend this kind of money and you are in this vulnerable of a position, you should be entitled to deduct it from your tax. this bill changes that. and when the president of the united states put the pen to that bill this morning, it was in direct violation of his pledge not to increase taxes on people who make less tha than $200,000 a year. so what do we have here? we have a bill that is reaching into the pockets of 14.7 million americans and taking directly out of their pocket $15 billion in direct contravention of the president of the united states made to the american people when he stood up and asked them to elect him. not only does it do that, it hurts the most vulnerable people

in america. my fellow senators, i urge that you vote for this amendment when it comes up for a vote. and it will come up for a vote. it will help constituents in every single state in america. it will put that $15 billion back in the pockets of some of the most vulnerable people in america. it will restore the promise that the president of the united states made to these 14.7 million people, many of whom voted for the president, and voted for the president believing that he would take care of them and see that their taxes didn't increase. we can help the president keep his promise that he broke this morning when he signed that bill. and i yield to my good friend, senator brownback. mr. brownback: thank you very much. i want to rise to support my

colleague from idaho on his amendment. i think this makes sense. it's -- the senator from idaho helping the president fulfill a campaign promise. it made sense to everybody across the country. now i looked at it and i said i don't think we should raise taxes, period. i think it's taking money out of the economy. he said, raising taxes on people making under $200,000, many people who heard it thought, that's not me. i'm going to vote for it. i like that idea. i will take a particular piece of this bill that we wrestled with and that is the issue on the alternative minimum tax. it was supposed to be a tax on wealthy people avoiding income tax and we put it in place and it was people who are wealthy shouldn't be able to plan a way to get out of paying income tax. it would be an alternative minimum tax and it is not indexed for inflation over time.

and so now we get 10 years later on that and all of a sudden there are a number of people because of inflation happening over a period of time that get brought in and under the alternative minimum tax to where we fight about it in this body. how we're going to do the a.m.t. fix, that's an annual debate here. this tax on medicare plans or the health care reform plans where, ok, it's not supposed to tax people who make belo below $200,000, which i agree with, even though there are pieces where it does. over a period of time there will be a large number of people making over $200,000 or below who get taxed because of inflation. and we're looking at situation in the country now with the monetary policy, lots of money out in the money supply with the federal government's excessive spending, huge amounts

amounts, $1.5 trillion in deficit, that the likelihood of inflation coming along is pretty high. maybe it doesn't go this year, but it does next year. we normally run around a 3% inflation rate anyway. you get that stoking up and here's the chart the joint economic committee staff has done, what happens over a period of time when you don't index for inflation, which this bill is not indexed for inflation. so all of sudden you end up having middle class and people currently determined as poor actually pay the wealthy tax because of the index -- with the lacks of indexing for inflation over time. so you end up over a period of time having people currently classified as poor paying a wealthy tax unless you pass something like the crapo amendment that says if you're making below this figure, you don't get taxed. you don't get taxed. this ends up being pretty substantial and hitting a large number of people over time to

the point that you're going to have a large group, again this is joint economic committee, for every low to middle income family with a tax cut, three low to middle income families have a tax increase. the president said, that's not what i'm going to do. i'm not having to raise taxes on people who are low or middle income. unless you pass the crapo amendment, you're going to have this taking place. i think this makes sense overall to -- it doesn't kill the bill, it is signed into law as senator crapo pointed out. i think it should be repealed. but i certainly think we shouldn't have people taxed making below $200,000. we shouldn't have them taxed now. we shouldn't have them taxed into future. even though that is now built into the bill and part of it's paid for provision. but let's be sincere with the american public. let's fulfill this piece. and unless you pass the crapo amendment, we're not going to be able to guarantee that to the

american public. i think this is a very commence amendment. i think -- commonsense amendment. i think it is one that is honest with the american public. and it is certainly one that i hope we can pass. and i would ask my good friend from idaho to address this issue from -- as you put this forward, has the administration said, yes, we agree with you because this is what we said on the campaign trail and this only fulfills the promise? maybe they offered you an executive order that you could get this by executive order. mr. crapo: i say to my colleague from kansas i have not had any direct contact with the white house. although when we debated the original bill, there were some responses on the web that indicated that, in fact, i was not correct in my facts. the argument was made at that time that, in fact, the bill we

were debating did not have -- was not a tax increase bill, it was a tax cut bill. and you probably heard my response to that argument earlier. the way that the defenders of this bill claim that it is a tax cut is that they take all of the subsidies that are being provided for this new entitlement that's created in the bill, administer those through the i.r.s. and then claim that those are tax cuts and that they outweigh the tax increases that are included in the bill and that therefore the bill is a net tax cut. and as i said earlier, first of all, the president was not talking in net terms. he didn't say i wouldn't raise for taxes for this group more than i would cut your taxes for this group, but leaving that aside, the fact is i don't think most americans fall for that. most americans don't think that a subsidy which is scored as spending is a tax cut. mr. baucus: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from montana. mr. baucus: i ask my friend from

idaho if he wishes to have the pending amendment set aside so his amendment would be in order? mr. crapo: yes, mr. president, if that would be allowed. i would ask unanimous consent to set aside the pending amendment and make in order a motion to recommit with instructions which i have at the desk. the presiding officer: is there objection? mr. baucus: mr. president, i have no objection. i ask consent that if the time is consumed, the motion be set aside at that point. a senator: reserving the right to object, i do not believe the time has been consumed on this amendment. mr. baucus: i think that's correct. when the time is consumed. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection, so ordered. mr. crapo: mr. president, could i ask how much time does will report. mr. crapo: excuse me. the clerk: the senator from idaho, mr. crapo, moves to commit h.r. 4872 to the committee on finance with

instructions to report the same back to the senate within three days with changes that provide, that the combined effect of this act and the patient protection and affordable care act shall now result in an increase in federal tax liability for any individual with adjusted gross income of less than $200,000 or any married couple with adjusted gross income of less than than $250,000. mr. crapo: mr. president, could i ask how much time remains on our side? the presiding officer: there is an hour equally divided on the motion. a senator: under an agreement where the republican side had a half an hour and the democratic side had a half an hour. mr. gregg: how much time is available under that agreement to our side? the presiding officer: nine minutes. mr. gregg: thank you. mr. crapo: thank you, mr. president. i would ask at this time if my

colleague from tennessee or any of our other colleagues here have anything further to say at this point on the amendment? a senator: mr. president, i do, and that is that if we're going to grow the economy in the united states, we need to provide some sort of tax certainty. mr. brownback: we have learned over our history that when we deal with taxes, people don't react if they think things are up in the air. if they look at it and they say, i don't know, my taxes may go up, my taxes my go down, i'm going to sit on the sideline. one of the things that the crapo amendment does that provides some certainty to it says okay, if you're in this category, this is what your taxes are going to be. it isn't going to be going up on you. and that typically in our past when people can provide a level of certainty on tax policy, then people are more willing to act because they're saying all right, yes, maybe i can go out and i will invest and i will do this as a small business. this will help an investment and we have got a climate right now where people are not willing to invest because we don't know

what the rules are, they don't know what their tax rates are going to be so they are just sitting back. this will help provide that level of certainty. so i would hope that we would do this as a way to help the economy, as a way to fulfill the president's promise, as a way to help fix the bill and do what the president says he wants to see done and help grow the economy and get some certainty on our tax policy. with that, i would yield back to my colleague from idaho. mr. crapo: i thank the senator from kansas. let's put up the picture. i would just like to go back and summarize now as we conclude, unless the senator from new hampshire has any comments to make at this point? mr. gregg: i want to congratulate the senator from idaho for bringing this forward because there has been a lot of representation as to what this bill does, and much of it has been regrettably inaccurate. and certainly, one of the most inaccurate representations is the people over $250,000 are the only people who are going to pay

for this. the senator is absolutely right. this is going to be paid for by people who have incomes well under $200,000. there is going to be a significant tax increase for a lot of americans. equally important, premiums are going to go up for a lot of americans which is the equivalent of a tax increase. and so i -- i can't understand how anybody could vote against his amendment which essentially says let's hold the administration to its language which says that if you have income under $200,000 as an individual, $200,000 as a couple, you will not be required to pay taxes under this bill. they should have no problems at all with supporting the senator's amendment. they restated that position but it makes it legally binding. i congratulate him for his sition here. a senator: mr. president, how much time is remaining on our side of the nine minutes? the presiding officer: seven minutes is remaining.

mr. crapo: i thank the senator from new hampshire. i will just conclude in the last seven minutes. if any of my colleagues want to jump in, just let me know. i want to go back to where we started. as i indicated, when i brought this very same motion to recommit during the debate on the health care legislation in december in the senate, the response was not that these taxes aren't in the bill, but that to take these taxes out of the bill would kill the bill. now, why would those taxes being taken out of the bill kill the bill? because it would expose the cost of the bill, because the argument that the bill is not a deficit -- it actually reduces the deficit would evaporate if you take out the massive taxes that are included in the bill. that's why it was considered to be such a dangerous amendment then. now, i personally believe that for us to adopt legislation that the president has signed into

law that grows the federal government by $2.6 trillion dramatically increases the role and control of the federal government over our health care economy, cuts medicare by by $500 billion-plus and then engages in gimmicks of trying to adjust the numbers in our -- in the budget in order to make it appear that there is no deficit increase is the wrong way to approach this legislation, regardless of one's opinion on the merits otherwise of the substance of the bill. the bottom line here is that this is a massive growth of the federal government, massive increase in control by the federal government, financed by hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars of taxes that are going to be paid by the middle class in america as defined by the president. those who make less than than $250,000 as a family or or $200,000 as an individual. and again, all this amendment --

or all this motion would do is to say let's take out those taxes. if they don't exist, then it won't do anything to the bill. if they do exist -- and as i said, they do -- then they would be taken out of the bill and we would not be putting the massive cost of this phenomenally large growth of the federal government on the backs of the middle class in america. and again, the argument that was made in december cannot fly today because today the bill is law. it cannot be argued that to support this motion would kill the bill. the bill has passed the senate, passed the house and been signed into law by the president. what we need to do now is to make sure that the bill does not violate the president's pledge that nobody in america will see their taxes go up. and i want to again read that pledge. the president's own words were -- "i can make a firm

pledge, no family making less than $250,000 will see their taxes increase. not your income taxes, not your payroll taxes, not your capital gain taxes, not any of your taxes. you will not see any of your taxes increase one single dime." well, that's simply not the case and it's not the case to the tune of hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars that this class of people, the middle class as defined by the president are going to be called upon to pay. and, mr. president, that is only during the first ten years of this bill. if you start looking further out, as we get into the second ten years of this bill, the number of taxes, the amount of taxes that the american people will pay rises exponentially into the trillions and trillions of dollars as you get further out. and yet, we are expecting them to carry the burden of this bill when they were promised. and i'm sure many voted in the

last election on the basis of this, that they would not see their taxes go up. so mr. president, again, it's a very simple motion. a motion that simply says let's go back to the committee and take out any of the taxes that apply to individuals making less than $200,000 and families making less than $250,000. i urge my colleagues, all of them, to support this amendment. do any of my colleagues wish to make a statement? a senator: mr. president, how much time does the minority have left? the presiding officer: one minute. a senator: i want to speak very briefly about one of these tax increases for 73 million people. this morning when the president signed the bill, he bragged about how they were going to give subsidies to 13 million people so that they could buy insurance. mr. risch: he's absolutely right. but as frequently happens, we didn't get the whole story. the whole story is there is 163 million americans who are not going to get that subsidy and whose taxes are going to go

up. how many of those make under under $200,000 a year? 73 million americans who make under $200,000, from that little sleight of hand, will see a tax increase. thank you, mr. president. mr. baucus: mr. preside? the presiding officer: the senator from montana. mr. baucus: mr. president, in the spirit of back and forth, letting each side speak, i ask consent that the next hour be evenly divided, one half-hour each side. the first half-hour be allocated to the majority side, the next half-hour to the republican side. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection, so ordered. mr. baucus: mr. president, i yield myself three minutes off the motion. mr. president, i want to make it clear that this bill reduces taxes in the amount of about about $460 billion through americans who will get tax credits for buying health

insurance. that's a huge big tax reduction. about $460 billion in tax credits that people get for buying insurance. i don't think i have heard much about that from the other side of the aisle, but it's a fact. in addition, small business gets very large tax credits for offering health insurance. large, very large incentives. it was up to 35% if i recall correctly the first couple of years. it was up to 50% tax credit for -- for the employers' half of the health insurance that the employer would be providing. those are huge, big tax cuts. one other point i think it's very important to make is that it is true that in certain cases, the taxes will go up for some americans who might be making less than $200,000, but why? because they have more money in their pocket. if you earn your money, your taxes go up. you can earn more money when health employers -- because health insurance is going to be

less spend sieve, then health insurance -- the other companies are going to compensate you less for health insurance, more in wages. that's what c.b.o. says. don't take my word for it. this is what the congressional budget office says. so when wages go up, guess what? sometimes taxes go up when your wages go up, but on a net basis, americans are going to be better off, they are going to be wealthier. their health insurance will be less expensive. and for those who are finding that because health insurance is less expensive, their employers want to compensate the employees so they will compensate them with higher wages and higher wages will mean some increase in income taxes. so i want to be very clear here that that's what's happening. i also make a third point basically that gets lost esoteric, but it lowers the high premium excise tax as outlined in the bill. by doing so, that means that there are going to be -- that those wages will not increase as much as they otherwise might,

but rather it's offset with an increase under an income but only for americans earning above above $200,000 individually and families above $250,000. so i want to make it clear, this is a big tax cut for americans. c.b.o. has also said -- it's not directly on point -- c.b.o. has also said the big reduction in deficits, in debts this decade and next decade. the other side wants to make it sound like it is a big tax increase. it is not. it is a tax cut. it is an increase for some americans, but those americans in the main are earning more than $200,000. mr. president, i yield 15 minutes to the senator from vermont for time on the bill. the presiding officer: the senator from vermont. mr. leahy: mr. president, i ask consent my whole statement be be made part of the record. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. leahy: mr. president, this really is a new day of hope for tens of millions of americans who have fallen through the cracks or worry they may fall

through the cracks of our broken health insurance system. when president barack obama signed the comprehensive health insurance reform bill this morning, i could not help but think as i sat there, this ranks with the creation of social security and medicare. they've talked about reforming health insurance for decades, but it hasn't been done. of course it's been an arduous process but it's proven change is possible even though whef you have the pit stop position of wealthy special interests. america rose to meet one of its foremost challenges and renew its promises. america has some of the best health care in the world if you can afford it. millions of families in america and vermont worry they're just one paycheck away from medical and financial disaster. this is a new day for them.

and i'd ask all those members of congress who fought so hard against this health care and voted against it: are they willing to give up the great health care system that they have as members of congress, that they can buy as members of congress, trade places with the millions of americans who can't buy the great health care system that members of congress have? i haven't heard a single one of them who voted against giving help to these millions of americans say they'd give up their own. whenever i travel in vermont, i'm often stopped whr-rbgs it's in the gross -- whether it's in the grocery store, church, on the street or gas stations and listen to personal wrenching stories like a woman who needs to spend $500 a month on prescriptions, who would be uninsured if it were not her husband's job.

she's working two jobs to make ends meet. or the small business owner who works six and seven days a week, but she still can't afford the blood test her doctor recommended. if she becomes sick, she'll lose her business and her home. or the man from central vermont who told me of a sister-in-law who lost parts of both of her feet because she couldn't afford simple care that would have saved her feet because she did not have health insurance. when she needed medical attention, she waited, hoping things would get better, knowing she couldn't afford to go to the doctor. but by the time her family was able to step in, she had to be rushed to the emergency room not for a cure, but for amputations. this is america, mr. president, and i don't hear a single member of congress say they're ready to give up their insurance that

they're able to buy through the u.s. senate or the house of representatives and trade places with this woman. i grew up in my family's small business in montpelier, printing business. i know businesses want to attract and keep good workers and many want to be able to offer health insurance options as my parents did, but spiraling insurance costs are taking that option away. some of the most immediate and far-reaching new laws are tax credits that will help small businesses offer insurance to their employees. you know, health insurance is prevailed through a grueling gauntlet of obstructionism erected by the defenders of the status quo, worse than anything i've seen in my years here in the senate. and one remaining gauntlet remains in the senate where partisan opposition has prompted an effort to derail these

further improvements to this law. it is no wonder that while americans vastly support the individual components of these bills they have been skeptical when asked about the hazy concept of comprehensive reform. some have argued that doing nothing is a safe option. well, last month insurance companies planned a series of premium hikes as large as 39% in one state. last year the five largest for-profit insurance companies booked $12.2 billion in profit. and they raised the average family premium three times faster than wages. one company, wellpoint, is hiking rates by double digits in 11 states where the profits are 91%. with these soaring profits insurers continue to drop sick people from their rolls, spend less on care and because they have an exemption from the antitrust laws, they avoid

competition. now that this bill is law, caps on coverage are eliminated. insurance companies are barred from dropping people from their plans even if they had paid their premiums, simply because, gosh, they got sick. the thing they bought health insurance for. and denying children health insurance coverage because of preexisting conditions is now illegal. parents can keep their children on their health policies until they're 26 years old. mr. president, i think of the people who work so hard on this. i see chairman baucus and chairman dodd on the floor who would not be here without the two of them. and i think that we -- we must continue and must be able to finish this final step. the people of vermont have given

me the honor of representing them in the senate for 35 years. i've joined in many debates that were contentious yet ultimately productive. and as we leaf through the pages of history, we can read the many times when congress showed its remarkable ability to rise up to reflect the conscience of the nation. this body, especially, which should reflect the conscience of our nation. as many here have noted, our dear friend, senator ted kennedy, would have been remarkably proud that the president and this congress passed reform unachievable for so many years before. he reminded all of us in a letter written to president obama what the stakes are in this debate. he wrote "what we face is, above all, a moral issue. not just the details of policy, but fundamental principles of social justice and the character of our country."

when the emotions are calmed, i believe this effort will be viewed as a credit to this good and great nation and its good people. the president and the congress have responded to a pressing national issue. they have shown they can rise to the challenge before them. i'm proud to have the honor that vermonters have given me to represent and advance their interests in this effort. i'm glad to say to my fellow vermonters, now the day comes when you have the opportunity to have the kind of insurance that members of congress have. i'm sorry that some have voted to deny that to you. this senator votes to give it to you. i yield the floor.

mr. baucus: mr. president, i yield 15 minutes to the chairman of the banking committee, also the de facto chairman of the "help" committee, the great senator from connecticut who has devoted countless hours and creativity in helping shape the "help" committee version of health care reform. along with the finance committee, we have the "help" committee. chairman dodd has been just terrific. mr. leahy: mr. president, i would ask what time i did not use be given to the chairman of the committee. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. dodd: let me thank my friend from montana. we arrived on the same day back about 35 years ago. we've been friends for 35 years. we arrived at the senate at different times -- he got here a little before me. we've been here for 30 years in this institution. i can't describe the time i have limited to me here today what a

difference he's made. the fact that we're here debating finally the last piece of this legislative effort to give the americans what they've sought for more than a century, and that is the basic right to health care. i've always found it somewhat ironic in a way that we in this country provide for those accused of criminal offenses the right to a lawyer, the right to an attorney. i believe in that. i think it's correct. but isn't it somewhat ironic that the same country that would provide you with the right to a lawyer if you're charged with a criminal offense can't provide you with a doctor if your child is sick. something fundamentally wrong with that, in my view. for the first time here we're on the right track to correct that error. in years to come they can mark the calendar date of march 23, 2010, when for the first time in our nation's history an american president signed into law that will provide all americans the

opportunity to live free from fear that they or their loved ones will be faced with a health care crisis and they not have the financial ability to take care of themselves or watching a loved one lose their lives or become chronically or permanently ill because they couldn't afford to see a doctor. i rise today on this historic day to thank my friend from montana, thank the terrific staff of the finance committee, to thank the members of the health, education, labor, and pensions committee, chaired by my great pal and friend ted kennedy for so many years, that i was asked to take over in late fall, early winter of last year and to work through the efforts of that committee to participate and contribute to our part of this bill. on july 16 of last summer we completed our work. i see my friend from wyoming, mike enzi, here. we've worked together on issues over the years. and lamar alexander, my colleague from tennessee as well; part of that committee.

while we didn't come together on the final passage of that bill, i want to express my gratitude to them and to their staffs as well for contributions made to this product. even though they might not be anxious to acknowledge the contributions, they made contributions to this bill. we're all grateful to them for that. of course my staff as well, who did such a wonderful job. to mark mcgerk and jeremy sharp as well, here with me on the floor today, mr. president, along with many others who did such a fabulous job in providing us with the support and assistance on all of this. this legislation we've heard the words historic and sometimes those words are thrown around a little too lightly and a little too cavalier a fashion to describe other events. but today truly was historic. i've been here 30 years, and i can't think of another day quite like it in terms of the annals of our nation to provide at long last the ability to have a national health care plan. for tens of millions of ordinary citizens, the passage of this

bill means more than just a page in history, of course. it means real security for older americans who rely on medicare and still need help paying for prescriptions. it means relief for small business owners who are forced to choose between cutting off benefits and laying off the workers they need so much in their operations. it means an end, maybe more than anything else, to the sleepless nights for mothers and fathers spent worrying about how to pay for cancer treatments on a child's checkup. my colleagues know i'm a late pwhraorpl in the father -- bloomer in the father business. i've got a five-year-old and an eight-year-old. a few weeks ago my five-year-old got pretty sick, got a stomach virus. she was throwing up quite a bit, about every 20 minutes or so. we called her doctor, our family doctor. they said i can get her up to the children's hospital in the

emergency room about 7:00 on a saturday night. she was terribly dehydrated. spent the next 18 hours in that hospital getting hydrated. but i wanted to share with my colleagues what that emergency room was like that evening. again, i have a health care plan, all of us do. 8 million federal kpwhraoerbgs we have pretty -- employees, we've pretty good coverage. put that card on the table and things began to move and my daughter was going to get the treatment she needed. but that room was filled with other people that night, people who have no health care, people who showed up well beyond the point where you might want to see a physician because they avoided doing that because they didn't have the resources to do that. that goes on every single day across our country. if anyone has any doubts about it, i'd urge them in this break coming up, two weeks, if you get a chance, go by in the late evenings at an emergency room, at a hospital in your area, and you'll encounter exactly what i did a few saturday nights ago when i took my young daughter up

to receive the kind of help she needed. i kept on thinking that night that my daughter was not unique in having a stomach virus and getting dehydrated. how many other children in this city or across america that night whose parents were sitting around sleepless wondering whether or not that child was going to get better, knowing they were getting more dehydrated, putting them at greater risk, who didn't know what to do, didn't have the resources to do it, didn't have that kind of health care, didn't have the insurance or the money to pay for it and wondered when if ever they ought to show up in that emergency room to take care of that child. that goes on every single day in our country. in the united states of america, the 21st century. this bill doesn't solve all of those problems. but the idea that we can lift the burden of fear from those families, those people who work hard -- remember 65% of all the bankruptcies last year occurred because of a health care crisis in that family, and 65% of those

people who went bankrupt because of a health care crisis had health insurance. these were not people without insurance. it's just the co-pays were so high, the deductibles were so high, that they were going to get in finance financial trouble before the insurance kicked in. we're not just talking about the uninsured. even some people with some insurance find themselves in that situation. so what i would do -- and my daughter is fine tad an today ag well because i have a good health insurance plan. but for other countries across the family that don't have that security, that sense of confidence that if their loved ones end up ill or need attention or care, that unless they have the kind of coverage and ability to pay for it, their child might not have had the same outcome that mine did. that shouldn't happen in this country. and so for us here in congress to pasthe passage of this legisn represents more than just the

culmination of reform. i regret that president obama didn't mention richard nixon of he mentioned roosevelt and truman and clinton. but richard nixon also tried to get health care reform. it was democrats and republicans who tried to get this done. mr. president, what this effort represents is proof that while progress is not easy, neither is it impossible. and that, maybe more than anything else, is important about what we saw today. as president obama said, we didn't come here to the united states senate or the congress of the united states to fear the future. we a came here to try to shape t despite the complexity of the problems, the stubbornness of the status quo and even the refusal of tomorrow stress the urgency of reform, that is exactly what we have done. a broken health care system is

not the last challenge we will face. today our union became a little more perfect but far from it. there's still much to do to help american families build better lives for themselves. mr. president, i hope that when we again find ourselves at moments of great national import -- and we will and we're -- we can look back not at the polls or the petty partisan fights that too often contaminate our debates, that always seem to stand in the way of progress, but rather at the fact that we rose above it and we acted. we acted, mr. president. we have a chance again to act this evening or tomorrow, as soon as this process comes to and he, by voting up or down on the legislation designed to make this good law even a better one. we can strip away the overheated rhetoric, the false claims that have become commonplace during this debate. mr. president, this bill is nothing more than a set of commonsense fixes. let me quickly remind my colleagues and others what they are. the commonsense fixes will

extend the solvency of medicare. it will fill the prescription drug so-called doughnut hole and lower premiums for seniors. this commonsense fix will extend to all insurance plans the consumer protections in newly passed health care reform law. it will end the lifetime caps on benefits to people. it will also provide the guarantees that your coverage won't be taken away if you get sick. a prohibition on excessive waiting periods. the extension of coverage to adult children up to the age of 26. it will do away with a ban -- it puts a ban on discrimination against people with preexisting conditions. these commonsense fixes will increase the tax credits that help low- and middle-income families pay for insurance, boost funding for community health centers, strengthen provisions for cracking down on waste and fraud in the medicare and medicaid systems. mr. president, these commonsense fixes will improve the shared

responsibility of policies ensuring that employers and individuals do their part to keep america healthy, both physically and economically. it includes valuable protections as well for hospitals and physicians and more fairly distributes federal funding among the states so that state governments aren't overburdened at a time when there's hardly -- it's already, rather, disif to balance those budgets. it -- difficult to balance those budgets. it revises revenue provisions in the law to take some of the burden off middle-income families and put it on the pharmaceutical industry which can afford to bear those burdens. and on top of all these commonsense fixes, it includes a badly needed, fully paid for investment in pell grants, enabling more americans to go to college and get an education they need to compete in the 21st century world that these children will have to compete in. the bill increases pell grants, i know my colleagues know, up to $6,000 by 2013.

hardly enough to pay for the ever-growing cost of an education, but it can make a difference. and it links scholarship apartments to cost of living, so they never have to fall behind. because the legislation switches to the far less expensive direct loan program, it'll also reduce our deficit by more than $10 billion over ten years. that's what in this bill. that's the commonsense fixes. if you don't like the health care bill, fine. but don't tell me what we're doing here is a bad idea. i think it takes a good bill and makes it a better bill. that's why i hope we can get broad-based support for these provisions. i know to this asome of my friends have made plans to spend the reset of the week on delaying -- i know that some of my friends have made plans to spend the rest of the week on delaying passage of this. let's get on with the business before us. to go through some marathon of voting for the sake of delaying the process i don't think does a

great service to this great institution. that's not what we were sent here to do. and that's all you're going to witness, unfortunately, mr. president, if this goes on on a protracted basis over the next couple of days. one cute little amendment after another, see if i can't embarrass my colleagues in some way to get them to vote on something that may cause people to worry about their sense of sanity in all of this. and yet all of it is designed to do nothing else but one thing: and that is just delay instead of voting against or vote for the provisions included in these commonsense fixes. so, mr. president, i hope again that we can move on to other business, that the large issues in front of us require us all to work together. as the chairman of the banking committee, i have the responsibility of trying to bring to this floor some reforms in financial services. i am blessed with wonderful members on my committee, democrats and republicans. and the there is a growing desire in our committee to do just that. my intention is to do just that

in the coming weeks, working with my friends on the republican side as well as my colleagues on the democratic side of the aisle. it is a big set of important issues and that's what we ought to be doing. that's what we did here on this bill. unfortunately, we did it as one party, not as a senate acting together. and i am saddened by that fact, but my sadness is overwhelmed by the sense of joy that i have at this congress, that this president was signed into law one of the most historic pieces of legislation ever adopted by any congress in the 200-plus history of our nation. and i urge my colleagues to support this reconciliation bill. with that, i yield the floor, mr. president. a senator: mr. president? mr. dodd: i would yield back any time i may have to senator baucus for some later consideration he needs. i see the chairman now arriving

back out here. whatever time, if i have any left, i yield back to you. but if not, i think our cleelings on the other side -co- i'm fine. the presiding officer: the senator has several minutes remaining. mr. baucus: mr. president, i'd like to just speak a few minutes on the amendment offered by the senator from arizona with respect to the declaration of the public health emergency. under the 1980 superfund law, the administration -- and administration has the authority to issue a public health emergency whenever it determines based on science that there is a certain part of the country for which that declaration makes sense. it applies to any place in the country. an earlier administrator christine todd whitman was about to declare a public health

emergency in liby, montana, because the conditions were so dire. frankly, i read the e-mail traffic between her office, h.h.s., and the bush administration. the white house put the kibosh on that declaration. the e.p.a. was going to make that declaration. the administrator has now made that declaration. there is more asbestos connamings in libby, montana, than there is on a per capita basis in any other place in the country. it's appalling. people are dying from asbestos-related diseases, and mesothelioma, tre, tremolite, am of asbestos, is there. it is a small town. the company, w.r. grairks has left them high and drievment there is a criminal trial against the officers for potentially contaminating libby. frankly, that did not result in a successful criminal prosecution.

but it is my judgment, having read lots of transcripts, it is clear here that not only is the declaration of a public health emergency valid here, but it is a company that should have been brought to justice and has not. in fact, they moved a lot of assets off the books so they'd be judgment-proof. this is a company -- w.r. grace is the company. they are hay a very bad company, in my judgment. anyway, in law applies to all states in the nation, all states. but based on the science, the e.p.a. administrator thinks that the public health emergency should be declared to a certain site, then that's what's required of the law. and then screening is allowed and medical treatment is allowed to people who otherwise would not get any because they get very little because the company has cut back on any health care benefits that they had. so -- and this is in a sense health care reform. these are people who don't get

health care. they've been left without health care. there's no coverage, frankly. they have these so-called preexisting conditions because they get asbestos-related disease. i just think it's only proper that these people in libby finally get their due. i my timmy time is probably ove. mr. president, i believe now that the time is to be allocated to the republican side. the presiding officer: the time has expired. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator wyoming is recognized. mr. enzi: mr. president, i'm going to rise to offer an amendment in a while to protect american workers from the punishing job-killing taxes in this reconciliation bill. my amendment would send this flawed bill to the finance committee with instructions to report back a bill without an

employer mandate and with an offset. mr. baucus: if i might inquire of my good friend from wyoming if he has a copy of the amendment so we could see it, before he makes -- before make a request to set the current pending amendments aside. i'd like to seat amendment. wyoming i thought that a copy had been -- mr. enzi: i thought that a copy had been delivered to you. i apoll guys. -- i apologize. mr. baucus: all right, mr. president, i suggest the senator proceed with his argument. mr. enzi: that's all i was going to do was present the argument. mr. baucus: okay. let's look at the argument then. mr. enzi: of course this process that we're going through seems like groundhog day to me. i worked on health care with senator kennedy for three years. we came up with some principles. those were translated to what's on my web site of ten steps that would solve health care and actually do what the president

promised. i'm the ranking member on the "help" committee, so i went through the markup on that. as far as any pre-designed or drafting prior to the markup, i had no opportunity to do that. we were given a bill and said, here it is. and if you want, you can do amendments. well, it was put together pretty fast, so there were typos in it, and we thought maybe we ought to help solve those. and, as a result, there were 150 amendments that were accepted but none of substance, except a couple one of which was one that senator harkin and i both cosponsored. and it became part of the bill, and that was one that was the safeway plan that would have provided some prevention. it would have given companies the ability to provide incentive to their employees to do prevention. i would like to say that wound up in the bill, but when it was printed, that amendment wasn't in there.

i don't quite understand how that can happen. that's why i say this seems a little bit like groundhog day. because we tried to get things in. i was part of the group of six. one of the things i asked for was the gregg amendment that we had earlier which said, medicare money ought to just go to medicare. and i keep seeing the side deals made, which is the amendment that senator mccain did. each time we've been prntsed with a bill and said, here it is, take it or leave it. and we tried to do amendments. amendments lined up in it. the twhai it gets passed is by having -- the twhai it gets passed is by having side deals made. i'm not familiar with that kind of legislating. it's very foreign to me, and i don't think titsz a the right thing to do. but i also went to the white house summit. and again the president said, tell us your ideas. and we did. and every time a republican presented ideas, they were rebutted immediately. my idea is a listening session

is the person putting it on does a little preamble and explains the format that they're going to do and then they actually listen. and at the end of the listening period, when people have had the chance to voice their opinions, the leader, which in this case would have been the president, says, well, here's what i learned today. or, here's what i didn't learn today. but instead, what we got was a pitch for why we ought to accept the bill the way it was. and that's exactly the way that it's progressed every step of the way. so here we are again, another groundhog day, trying to do some amendments that will make this a better bill. in fact, it will make it a bill that will work, a bill that will be sustainable. right now i'm trying to save business in america, particularly small business, at a time that our nation's unemployment rate's 9.7%. millions of americans have lost their jobs and millions more go to work every day worried about keeping the job they have. many states are seeing

double-digit jobless rates which are weighing heavily on their local economies. businesses of all sizes are struggling to keep their doors open and are finding it harder and harder to make payroll. when our nation's business struggle, workers and their families struggle just as much, if not more. american workers depend on a strong economy to create jobs that help them feed their families and build their dreams. unfortunately, the employer mandate in the reconciliation bill will only make it more difficult for america's businesses to hire and pay their workers. this reconciliation bill being pushed through the senate contains $52 billion of new taxes. that used to be really big money. $52 billion of new taxes on business, businesses that can't afford to provide health insurance. now, especially at the higher rate being required, the bill

has in it a federal minimum standard. that's better than 50% of the insurance that americans already have. if you don't think your rate's going to go up, if you have something that's below that federal minimum standard and you like it, too bad. so we're going to force businesses to buy better insurance than what they've already got, and if they don't, they get to pay $52 billion in new taxes. most employers do provide health insurance to their employees but there are some that simply can't afford to. what does health care reform mean those businesses that can't afford health insurance? unfortunately, health care reform for them will mean higher taxes. these are the same businesses that are barely making it today. they're the same businesses that are currently laying off workers in order to keep the company afloat. they're the same businesses that are cutting shifts to prevent further layoffs and cutting employees to keep employees on the payroll, and much of that is with the agreement of the

employees. they understand they're with a small business, it's more like a family. they understand what the consequences are of new taxes and new requirements and new regulations. and it scares them. and they make whatever concessions -- well, not whatever concessions but they macon sessions so that they can continue -- make concessions so that they can continue to work. they work less hours than they used to work. productivproductivity is up bute less hours. the problem that we have is that congress doesn't understand business, especially small business. now, i go out and visit wyoming most weekend. i travel a different part of the state. one thing i like to do is get into some businesses and find out about them. and you know, i found that most businesses look pretty simple until you scratch the surface a little. now, we get a completely different opinion here because we print our own money, but that doesn't happen out there in the business world. they have a lot of things that they have to take into consideration. they have to figure out what it

costs them to be in business and they have to make sure that they bring in a little more revenue than what it costs them if they're going to stay in business. an example of that gives if you take a six-pack of soda, the store charges you $2. they didn't make the soda and it didn't appear magically out of thin air. the store had to buy it from a distributor. that costs money. the distributor had to buy it from a bottler and the bottler had to buy the water, the sugar and the flavoring to make the soda. you add up all those purchases plus the costs of renting and heating space, paying people and paying taxes and you get the price. they have to come up with that kind of a price in order to stay in business. nobody sells it for cost, not for very long. they can't. if they sell a product at a price that's the same as what it costs them to buy the product, rent the space, pay the

employees, pay the taxes, they don't make any money. they go out of business. now, one of the things we hear around here with all the -- is all the greedy businessman that there are. well, that isn't how you get to set your price. there's competition out there that forces you into the lowest price that you can do and stay in business. now, if that were not the case, if greed were the answer, why doesn't a loaf of bread cost 10 bucks or 50 bucks? simple answer is no one would pay that price. you have to be able to sell the product in order to stay in business, and it has to come in at a cost that you can afford to do. and one of the things that we're doing here with this employer mandate is piling more cost on the businesses. now, mr. president, economists have told us repeatedly that the new job-killing taxes in the reconciliation bill will be paid on the backs of workers.

the congressional budget office has repeatedly said that workers will bear the brunt of an employer mandate. in fact, c.b.o. has said that the $52 billion in new tax killing -- new job killing will result in a corresponding reduction in wages. and if the worker doesn't make enough money to cover the new taxes, that worker will be at risk of losing his or her job. low-income workers have been particularly hard-hit by the current economic conditions. low-income workers are typically employed by small businesses and see the demand for their services fluctuate wildly with the ups and downs of the economy. these low-income workers typically have less formal education and have an even harder time trying to find any job. in fact, workers without a high school diploma have a 50% higher unemployment rate than workers with higher education levels. the current economic situation for young, relatively unskilled workers is dire.

they are facing an increasingly difficult job market that's flooded with older, more qualified workers. unfortunately, the job-killing taxes in the reconciliation bill will actually make their situation worse. the bill creates incentives against hiring low-income workers and unskilled workers. in fact, we've got a problem in this country right now with businesses being concerned about what kind of additional regulations are going to come out of this body and the one at the other end of the building. and so they're not hiring peop people, they're waiting to see what it's going to cost them. and if the cost is too high, they won't hire people so we won't be able to absorb those people that are already without jobs. according to the congressional budget office, employer mandates like those included in the reconciliation bill would -- quote -- "reduce the hiring of low-wage workers."

and harvard professor kate baker reported that as a result of an employer mandate, workers who would lose their jobs are disproportionately likely to be high school dropouts, minorities, and women. so with the unemployment rate the highest among high school dropouts and minorities, this bill would actually make their situation worse. the job-killing taxes in this bill fall disproportionately on the people who are struggling the most, putting the jobs they have at risk and making it even more difficult to find a new one. at a time when americans across this country are looking for signs of an economic recovery, the senate should be debating a bill that helps the situation, not makes it worse. i offer this amendment to protect american workers from new job-killing taxes that will lower wages and cut jobs. senators can make a statement right now in support of american workers and who are facing the toughest job market since the great depression. i urge my colleagues to vote in favor of my amendment.

and my motion is at the desk, and so i would -- i would ask to call it up. mr. baucus: mr. president? the presiding officer: is there objection? mr. baucus: mr. president, mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from montana. mr. baucus baucus: reserving tht to object. i ask consent that once time on the enzi motion expires, the motion be set aside until a time to be determined by the leaders. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection, so ordered. the clerk will report the motion. the clerk: the senator from wyoming, mr. enzi, moves to commit the bill, h.r. 4872, to the committee on finance with instructions to report the same back to the senate within one day with changes that strike the employer mandate that will lower wages and increase unemployment and add an offset. mr. enzi: i thank the chair and yield the floor to the senator from missouri. the presiding officer: the senator from missouri.

mr. bond: mr. president, i'm proud to take the floor to support the amendment from my good friend, the senator from wyoming. i can understand his frustration, having been through what he described in the process and the committee where this bill allegedly was marked up, although it's unrecognizable the things that he was able to get in, thought were in, disappear disappeared. he also has another committee on which i join him and that's the small business committee, so there's no one better than an accountant from wyoming who has small business experience, who has served on the help committee in drafting this legislation to outline the problems with this bill. and we haven't even heard him speak at great length about his background in accounting -- in accountancy, but this bill, filled with gimmicks, ten-year taxes and six-year spending, is overwhelming. but he is correct when he says

that the costs, according to the c.b.o., will fall on the back of workers. the costs of the employer mandate. and they will fall disproportionately on young workers, teenage workers, particularly minority teenagers, who have a very high unemployment rate now. he said, and i'd have to agree with him, that it appears that congress doesn't understand how small business works. clearly, the administration doesn't. when you look at how it bill was done -- when you look at how this bill was done, on sunday, house democrats accomplished what we thought was unimaginable: they successfully passed the health care boondoggle that the democrats passed here on christmas eve, where they stuffed our stockings with a partisan, 2,700-page bill chock-full of political payoffs, kickbacks and sweetheart deals, some of which my friend from arizona mentioned. but this sunday, the house democrats ignored the will of the american people and on a petition-line vote passed this $2 trillion bill that will

increase health care costs, raise taxes, and cut medicare for seniors. despite the story democrats are now trying to sell to the american people, this $2 trillion bill is one the president as now signed into law, containing the louisiana purchase, sweetheart deal for connecticut hospital, several more deals on the side in exchange for votes and so on, is one that the american people don't want. they say no to this government takeover. i stand with the american people who say, repeal the bill and replace it with the things that we need. we need to repeal the bill and enact real health care reform that will lower health care costs and not break the banks of taxpayers or take medicare from seniors. and that's exactly what we've -- we've proposed to do. i've joined several colleagues in cosponsoring a bill that would repeal this monstrosity because we need to get back to

business to give the american people the health care reform they deserve. not the bill they don't want. if this christmas health care eve -- christmas health care bill is not the only legislation in which the american people have said no. they also don't want this so-called reconciliation bill which is going to force the american people to reconcile them to even higher taxes, even more cuts in medicare. this is the kind of thing that won't fix the problem of the american people, it will make them worse. if you thought the cuts to seniors in the previous bill were not bad enough, this reconciliation bill will cut it -- services even more and taxes will go up. but, mr. president, as my colleague from wyoming said, right now we need jobs, and that's what the american people are telling me they want. they can't be -- can't be any clearer.

one in ten americans is unemployed. a fellow missourian, harry truman, once said for these people, it's not a h recession, it's a depression. and with these kind of dismal unemployment numbers, it's no surprise that polls keep telling us that they want jobs created, not the government to take over health care. it's not just the polls. people in missouri have been stopping me on the street. i get e-mails, phone calls and letters from my office but they stop me wherever i go, from a grocery store to the post office to restaurants. they don't want this job-killing bill. they want a job-creating effort. they don't want the monstrosity of a health care bill. unfortunately, the majority in this body and the other body have ignored their demands. this bill undermines the employer's ability to create jobs and by extension it extends the recession an all the miseries associated with it.

most people i would hope would recognize that small business is the engine that creates jobs in the united states. people who are informed, as we would hope members of this body are, know that most small businesses are taxed as individuals as pro priet arships -- proprietorships, partnerships, that's why the small business tax relief in 2003 cut taxes and led to the creation of eight million new jobs. it's not a massive government stimulus bill that creates jobs in the private sector. the massive stimulus bill discourages the reconciliation bill will be even a bigger blow to job creation. and the timing when unemployment is still too high is a perfect storm. because the 2003 tax cuts are expiring so these small businesses are facing one boost in their taxes, now they're going to get several more. pair these two together and the

effect is that congress is piling an overwhelming burden on small business. the tax an health insurers will result in increased premiums. those who self-insurance like labor unions are exempt from this tax. it's not going to hurt them. this means that those forced into the fully insured market like small businesses will bear the burden of the premium increases. the president and majority may tell you that the tax credits, that they're giving tax credits to help small business. well they're not going to be fooled by that. the tax credit expires after only five years. and if you have -- if you have 11 employees an hire another one, it phases it out you can't have your business grow. if you raise the salaries, you lose the benefits. the reconciliation bill makes things worse. it increases the penalty under

the employer mandate from $750 to $2,000 per employee on top of all of the other taxes. and if you're already offering your employees insurance in this high-cost market and government decides it's not -- not good enough, they hit you again or it's too expensive. if that wasn't bad enough, both full-time and part-time employees will be counted. the majority wants the american people to think they aren't really hurting business with this reconciliation bill. they like to talk about sticking it to or raising taxes on the wealthy. they want the american people to believe -- and i believe the american people are too smart to know -- that these new taxes are not just going to hit the c.e.o.'s of fortune 500 companies or professional athletes or entertainers or wealthy lawyers or hollywood moguls or finance speculators.

that's what they charge. what my colleagues on the other side of the aisle won't tell you is that the collateral damage will destroy small businesses. who are these rich the democrats want to target? as high as 79% some figures say of those paying taxes at the highest rate have a large part -- at least a small part of their income from small business. small business is the backbone of the country. 99.7% of all employers -- firms are small business. over half of all private sector employees are in small business. 44% of the total u.s. private payroll and small business generated over 64% of the net jobs over the pass 15 years. despite this importance of small business, we are facing a new employer mandate which the enzi-bond amendment would strike. and i urge my colleagues to have a heart. understand that the people

they're hurting are not just small business. it's the people who work for small business or who would work for small business will be denied the chance to get a job in small business because of the increasing costs that this bill puts on them. this bill takes away incentives for small business to keep the workers they have. to hire and expand and some of these small businesses, the owners who think now's not a good time to expand their business or hire more people, they cite in a poll political climate is the second most cited reason they're not doing it after poor sales. the government is literally prohibiting the economic growth. small businesses are struggling. they're struggling in this economy to be able to offer affordable health insurance. i have worked for years with people like senator enzi and other colleagues to get small businesses permission to go

together in nationwide purchasing pools and buy their insurance in the national market like the big employers and the unions do so they can get better rates, get the administrative savings. we can't get it through. this would be the time to do that. it wouldn't cost the taxpayers anything. it would save taxpayers money. allow people to purchase health care across statelines. you can get -- you can see auto insurance advertised and their competition to get the best deal. wouldn't my folks in missouri, who are having trouble affording health care, be able to look for a national health care plan? they'd love it. if you care about the jobs in this country and future of the economy, you cannot vote for a reconciliation bill which will further devastate the most important job creating sectors. it's not only a bad bill, it will make the struggling market

worse. mr. president, how much time do we have remaining on this side? the presiding officer: six minutes remain. mr. bond: mr. president, i want -- i want to add one other thought. in the 20 years i've been in the united states senate -- i've traveled around the world and i've seen remarkable changes that have come in countries throughout the world. particularly after the fall of the soviet union. with the fall of socialism and communism, countries around the world immediately began to look to the united states as the economic model. they saw our progress. they saw what we were doing because of the system we have. our free enterprise system demonstrated successful business, successful entrepreneurs can provide opportunities. this is a classic case of a rising tide lifting all boats. that's why countries from some of the least developed to the reasonably well developed want to mimic our system. they're not looking to denmark or sweden with their very high

tax rates as a model. they see the difference between a government-controlledded economy and a free economy with appropriate regulations. they know in the free economy, the free marketplace, entrepreneurs can go forward and come up with an idea, take a risk, risk their fortunes, risk their ideas and go out, make money that will allow them to hire more people and provide benefits for the community. unfortunately when our president says that health care should be the model for the role of the government in the economy, i'm afraid that he's talking about the european socialist model which is demonstrated that the economy does not grow as quickly as the united states economy. they have high levels of unemployment. and what does government created high unemployment do? it generates more social welfare and transfer payments. these transfer payments put pressure on governments to make taxes higher, make people more depend on the federal government

and further depress the incentive for entrepreneurs, men and women with good ideas to want to build a job and want to hire people. last year's stimulus program did a tremendous job of putting more people on government payrolls at state an local level and the federal state and local level. but it didn't do much to create jobs in the private sector. the private sector in america, i believe, has historically been vibrant. it will create jobs and despite increase in government -- they may do that for a while. but i can tell you that the number of jobs will necessarily be far less than what the free market system could create if it were not inflicted with this increasing government role, government burden on businesses. using history as our guide, health care, the reconciliation bill, and the other proposals the majority has planned are likely to lead to a longer recession, continued high

unemployment, and a lower standard of living for all americans that would otherwise be possible that. is the source of the anger among the public. no one is against health care reform. you can tell that -- you can tell that from the angry people i've met. the clerks in a store, in a hardware store said, don't take away my health care. i want -- i want some reforms in it, but i don't want to lose my health care. and that person, i told her she would lose her health care. she wouldn't be able to get the same plan. i said, i agree with you. i want to stop this bill. i want to get commonsense reforms that will really help more people get insured, get better deals and do it without raising costs, cutting medicare. americans really understand what this type of health care reform will do to the -- to the good health care system we'll have now. what it will do to our economy.

this is -- this is a real danger that the people understand. that's -- that's why they're angry. and i'll tell you they are angry. they're -- they're angry at me. they call up -- they call up my office and they're yelling at me. i said, i'm on your side. they said, i know, but we're angry. we don't want to see it go through. they are concerned and we are concerned about our families, about the economic prospects for our children and grandchildren because they are going to be carrying the burden on the backs of the heavy spending that we do today. mr. president, sigh my colleague from wyoming -- i see my colleague from wyoming rising, so i will end my remarks here. mr. enzi: i want to thank the senator from missouri for his passionate remarks. he was a former chairman of the small business committee before he moved to the intelligence committee. and you can see the passion and his understanding, former governor, and one of j.c.'s

outstanding young men. we have exchanges, we have a shop act. we have other things, co-ops in the bill. but we should have put in more opportunities for competition. increased competition brings the prices down. so thank you for mentioning that. i believe our time's expired. the presiding officer: the minority time has expired. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from montana. mr. baucus: i ask that the first half controlled by the majority and the second half under the control of the republican side. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection, so ordered. mr. baucus: mr. president, i give 10 minutes to the senator from illinois for time on the enzi amendment. mr. durbin: mr. president, i want to thank the chairman of the finance committee for his leadership on this issue and

thank my colleagues for joining in this debate. we are now starting the fourth -- i guess the end of the fourth hour into the fifth hour into this debate. i have listened to many of the speeches that have been given. they're not only good, they're familiar. they're familiar because most of the speeches which we've heard on the floor are critical of the health care reform act which passed the house of representatives on sunday night and was signed into law by the president this morning. now, i can understand why some on the other side of the aisle didn't like that. they didn't vote for it. but the fact is to come before us in this chamber and to attack that now law of the land is to ignore why we're supposed to be here. we are here with a reconciliation bill that is basically designed to reduce the budget deficit. we have several provisions in this reconciliation bill which have not been addressed by most of the speakers on the other side. for example, do the republicans

oppose the reconciliation provision that makes health insurance premiums more affordable for those in lower-income categories? that's what's in the reconciliation bill. if they oppose that, then they should come out and say just that. do they oppose the expansion of community health clinics across america more than doubling the number of community health clinics so there's more primary care so every family has a family doctor? do the republicans oppose that? do they oppose family doctors for every family? if they do, step up and say so. do they oppose the efforts in this bill to close the doughnut hole? in other words, to make sure that seniors under medicare from help in paying for prescription drugs they don't have today? i have yet to hear the first republican say he opposes it. yet that is what the bill is before us. so the news flash to the senate chamber is this morning the president of the united states

of america signed into law the health care reform bill. to come before us and renew this debate is to ignore the measure that we are supposed to be considering, the rig bill. -- the reconciliation bill. i haven't heard all of the speeches on the floor. i want to know if the republicans oppose the provision in the reconciliation bill that ends a 60- -- $60 billion to $80 billion subsidy to changs across america on -- to banks across america on student loans? if you think that is a good thing, stand up and say so. i think it's a bad thing. it adds to the cost of loans, to the debt of young people and we eliminate it. if they think the banks should enjoy the subsidy, let's hear it. stand up and address the provisions in this bill, but they haven't done it. instead what they have done is to file, at latest count, some 22 or 24 amendments.

remember, this is a reconciliation bill about reducing the budget deficit, so now i would leave it to those who are following this debate to decide whether these republican amendments are serious efforts to address the budget deficit or something else. well, here's one we have seen so many times before by one of the republican senators attacking the acorn organization. unfortunately, this senator's newspapers have not been arriving on a timely basis because if they had, he would know this organization is going bankrupt. but he wants us to stop on this health care debate, stop on this budget deficit debate and go back and flog acorn again as they languish in bankruptcy court. common sense tells you that that doesn't have a darned thing to do with health care reform or budget deficit reduction. it's just another political amendment. here's another one.

here's an amendment by a republican senator that prohibit prescription coverage of viagra for child molesters and rapists. i'm not making this up. there is a fertile mind somewhere on the staff on the other side of the aisle dreaming up gotcha amendments. here's one, viagra for child molesters. let's see if they will vote against that. common sense tells you that doesn't have anything to do with health care reform or reducing the budget deficit. it's a gotcha amendment, a political amendment, and it's unfortunate. here's one that i think members should be held accountable for but the question is why would you debate it on this bill. an amendment to require all members of congress to read a bill before voting on the bill. well, i have been asked repeatedly did you read the health care reform bill? the answer is yes. i think our constituents should ask us that question. are we going to make this the law of the land? who is going to monitor the reading of these amendments and bills to make sure that every page is read by every member of

congress? is this a commonsense amendment or is this a political amendment? here's an amendment by a republican senator. you tell me what this has to do with health care reform or budget deficit reduction. to call for a referendum in the district of columbia on gay marriage. what does that have to do with health care reform? the answer is nothing. what we're going to face in the next few hours or days, whatever it happens to be, are more and more amendments like this that really are not serious amendments. they really don't deal with health care reform. they don't deal with the budget deficit. they deal with somebody's idea on a political gotcha, to offer an amendment to try to trap members. well, i don't think we're going to fall for that. i think members on this side of the aisle realize what's at stake. we need to pass this reconciliation bill so we can help pay for premiums, health insurance premiums for those in lower income categories, extend the reach of community health clinics, close the doughnut hole, make sure that we're helping states pay for the new

medicaid burden that they are going to face. i thought the republicans were going to support us on that, but obviously they are not. there is one thing i would like to add, too. i have heard so many speeches on the floor by the republican leaders including the republican minority leader that the reason why this whole effort is wrong is because the american people oppose health care reform. another news flash. i want to share with the members on the other side of the aisle this is a poll that was announced today when people were asked after the passage of the health care bill in the house of representatives whether they believe it's a good thing or bad thing that congress passed the bill. good thing, 49%, bad thing, 40%. by a 9% margin, the american people said it was a good thing to do. and america's emotional reaction on the bill. 50% enthusiastic or pleased, 42% angry or disappointed. i wonder if my republican

colleagues are now going to amend that to a premise that we should follow the opinion polls of america now that the bill has passed and the american people, a majority of them, support this. are they now going to change their position on whether opinion polls should drive our votes? i thought that was a pretty simplistic analysis to start with. here's what it comes down to, mr. president. many of us went down to the white house today to watch the president of the united states sign a bill that will be historic in nature. like social security and medicare, it extends the reach of health care protection and peace of mind to millions of americans who don't have it. it was a hard-fought battle, i'll concede that point, but the fact is at the end of the day we won that battle and the president signed that bill and it's the law of the land. and the so-called republican repealers, the ones who are going to run down in the next election to repeal it, they better come and explain to the small businesses across america, almost four million of them that are going to qualify for tax credits now to help pay for health insurance. i heard all the comments from the previous speaker from missouri, the senator talking about be sensitive to small business.

well, by opposing that bill, he opposed tax credits for almost four million small businesses. and that bill is also going to extend health insurance to some 30 billion americans who don't have it, americans who when they get sick and get treated, pass their health care bills along to other people. well, those 30 million will have health insurance, and that means less of a burden on those of us with health insurance to pick up their costs. so, mr. president, i would say to my colleagues on the other side of the aisle the political amendments don't make sense and most of the american people have had enough of it. amendments about acorn and gay marriage on a bill on health care, it really -- it doesn't -- it doesn't really fit. common sense tells you we shouldn't be delaying the senate's final decision on a critically important bill. and if the republican side of the aisle was waiting for american public opinion to express itself, the american people have spoken. they think we did the right thing in passing this bill on

health care reform, and the president did the right thing signing it into law this morning. they don't want to repeal this health bill. they want all the help they can get for affordable health insurance for quality care. i yield the floor. mr. baucus: mr. president, i yield ten minutes to the senator from michigan, senator stabenow. ms. stabenow: mr. president, thank you very much. the presiding officer: if the senator from michigan would suspend. off of what block of time? mr. baucus: i apologize. time off the bill. the presiding officer: thank you. the senator from michigan. ms. stabenow: thank you, mr. president, and thank you to the chairman of the finance committee. i am honored to serve with him and with colleagues who have been working very, very hard on this initiative, as all of our colleagues have. mr. president, i want to talk first about what is in front of us because it is true that today was a historic day and the president of the united states signed a very important bill that's been passed by the house and the senate that lays the groundwork for what we all

believe should happen in terms of making sure that every family has a family doctor. and that we tackle the costs that are crippling our businesses and our country of health care. so what we have in front of us now, mr. president, is a bill to make a good bill better. that's what we're doing. we're making a good bill better with what we are doing right now. and it really is tackling the issue of cost. we are saving money in this bill that we're going to be voting on, saving money for middle-class families by making health care more affordable, saving money for seniors by making their prescription drugs more affordable, and by saving money for our children and grandchildren because this is the largest deficit reduction effort that we have seen in many, many years. in fact, since president clinton brought us into balance when the democrats were last in charge.

we know from the congressional budget office and 43 leading health economists who all agree that health care reform will reduce the deficit. about $143 billion in the first ten years and over $1.2 trillion in the next ten years. this is important as we go forward and we get our house in order to be able to bring down the deficits and be able to fowf on -- to focus on jobs and the other parts of the economy that are so important. so what are we talking about as our colleagues talked about the broader bill that's already been signed into law? what does that bill really mean for families? what does it mean for small businesses? well, first of all, starting right now today, mr. president -- and i was very pleased to offer a provision to make the small business tax cut immediate, so as of today for this year, small businesses are

going to receive up to a 35% tax cut to be able to help them afford health insurance. mr. president, in my state, health care is very much about saving jobs. health care costs are costing us jobs. we have too many small businesses that are getting a 20% or 30% or 40% premium increase notice, and they are deciding do i keep people employed and cut the health insurance or do i pay the health insurance increase and lay people off? that's what's happening all across america. so our bill this year now begins a 35% tax cut for small businesses that have ten or fewer employees and a tax cut for those up to 25 employees, and in four years from now that tax cut goes up to 50%. so it starts at 35%, it goes up to 50% of the costs for small

businesses to help them pay for their health insurance. right now, we are going to begin to see the largest effort to provide community health centers that our country has seen. approximately 10,000 neighborhoods, communities across the country, will have the opportunity and the funding to create a community health center so that people who have lost their jobs don't lose their health insurance, so that people who don't today have health insurance will have a place to go to take the children to see a family doctor rather than into an emergency room, and it's estimated, mr. president, that we will be able to serve 25 million people by this effort that is starting today. starting today, seniors are going to receive immediate help for their prescription drugs if they are caught in that gap in coverage that's been called the doughnut hole. and we are going to be closing

that doughnut hole over time. so then what happens next? well, we're going to see lower costs for early retirees. mr. president, this is a very important thing in the state of michigan and other places where we have people being required or forced to retire at 55 because of their -- they are losing their job or because of cost-cutting efforts. i was very proud to join with senator kerry in an effort to create a way to lower the costs for employers who have early retirees on their health insurance or for early retirees themselves. between 55 and 65, we're going to be bringing down the costs of health insurance for people. very important. no pre-existing conditions for children. insurance companies are not going to be able to block parents from getting insurance for their children. i think that's pretty important. young people are going to be able to stay on their parents' insurance until age 26. mr. president, i wish that one

was a little bit higher in order -- i kind of missed that one myself, but the reality is for a lot of young people and a lot of parents, this is a very big deal, it's very important, and i'm surprised that colleagues would want to repeal something that would take that away. we have starting this year a set of insurance reforms that will, for one thing, say you can't cancel your insurance if you get sick. the insurance companies can't cancel your insurance if you get sick. i have so many people that have said to me well, i have insurance, but then all of a sudden somebody gets sick and they find on a technicality they get dropped. we're going to hold insurance companies accountable in a way that has not happened before in this country. we're going to eliminate lifetime limits on coverage. it's not your fault if you have cancer and you need treatments for a long period of time or you have some other kind of disease. there shouldn't be artificial caps and lifetime limits.

mr. president, what this is about for us is the fact that it's time to stand up for middle-class families and small businesses, and that's what we're doing. that's what we are doing by lowering costs, by saving money for families in this bill. saving money for seniors, saving money for future generations for our children by lowering the deficit, by focusing on small business where most of the people are that don't have insurance. most people who don't have insurance are working. they're working in a small business, who can't find affordable insurance. and so in the short run, we're going to help them with tax cuts, and four years from now a larger insurance pool so they can buy from the private sector in a larger pool like big business does that will bring down their costs, and that is about standing up for middle-class families, standing up forll