quorum call:

mr. cornyn: mr. president, i'd ask unanimous consent that the quorum call be rescinded. the presiding officer: without objection, the quorum call is suspended.

mr. cornyn: mr. president, as we continue this week's vote-a-rama and executive branch nominations, i want to remind the american people how we got here today. and what it means to the future of our great country and our system of government. over the last five years, president obama and his administration have repeatedly bent the law to serve their own purposes in a way that really i think is unprecedented in my experience. we saw this when he gave special treatment to union pension funds during the chrysler bankruptcy process. we saw it again during the solyndra bankruptcy. and we saw it when president obama unilaterally announced a moratorium on the enforcement of certain immigration laws. we saw it when the administration unilaterally issued waivers from the 1996 welfare real estate form act and

the 2002 in child left behind law. and of course we've seen it multiple times with the president's signature legislative accomplishment, if you can call it that, obamacare, which effectively became a law, which means whatever the president wants it to mean. indeed, without any real legal authority, the administration has unilaterally delayed the employer mandate, unilaterally delayed the income verification required in the obamacare exchanges, it's unilaterally delayed the cap on out-of-pocket expenses, and its unilaterally delayed other insurance regulations. meanwhile, the internal revenue service has been hauled into court because it has said that it will flout the text of the law by issuing obamacare tax subsidies in the federal exchange, even though the law

that congress passed and the president signed made clear that those subsidies may only be used in the state-based insurance exchanges. i get constantly asked by citizens unitcitizensmyconstitut congress do something about it? and my response ordinarily is, wlg, the congress under our -- well, the congress under our system of government passes the laws, but it is the executive branch's obligation to enforce those laws, and indeed those the oath of president takes when he was inaugurated to uphold and defend the laws and to faithfully execute those laws. well, i think we've seen the kind of havoc that can be wreaked when the executive decides to pick and choose which laws to enforce based on expediency. political or otherwise. we used to say that we are a nation of laws angz no and not .

and that is indeed one of our country's, indeed our economy's great strengths. there is a great little book written by a peruvian economist on the nature of capital, which of course is so important to our economic growth, and the point he makes is, there are a lot of entrepreneurial societies in the world, but one of the things that really distinguishes the united states' economy and our success relative to those other entrepreneurial societies is the rule of law. it's the things that, for example, that mean when you invest money in a piece of real estate or in a contract or in some other investment, that you know with a reasonable certainty that that investment will be protected against arbitrary action by either government or some other person.

which, if you tbh think about it really is one of the unique characteristics about the united states system of laws. we know with reasonable certainty that if those rights are breached, if that investment is stolen, if it is nationalized by the federal government, you can go to court and seek compensation for that -- for that lawbreaking. well, if president obama wanted to continue to legislate -- and this time in effect from the white house -- by changing the laws that congress passed, he should have stayed in the senate. but his law -- but his responsibility, indeed, his sacred oath, is to enforce the laws, even if those laws prove awkward or inconvenient. you know, one of the other

important aspects of being a nation of laws is that if in fact it turns out that those laws prove inconvenient or awkward or undesirable for some reason, we have the capacity, through the legislative process, to change those laws. and in fact that's sometimes referred to as a conversation or a dialogue that the branches of government can with one another. so if congress passes a law that the president signs and then it's being implemented, either by the executive branch or by administrative agencies that are part of the executive branch, and they turn out not to have the result that congress thought they would have or the president thought they would have, the great thing about our system of government is, we have the capacity to change those laws when they prove to have resulted in unintended consequences or when testify a approved inconvenient -- or when they've

approved inconvenient or awkward or otherwise undesirable. now, i believe that, notwithstanding the greatest hopes -- and i would hope the good faith to those who actually thought obamacare was going to work, it sounded pretty good. the president said, if you like what you have, you can keep it. and if you think your premiums are too high, the average family of sphowr goinof four is going r premiums go down by $2,500. and if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. well, all of that sounded pretty good, especially when you look at the public opinion polling back in 2009 when the president first started saying those kinds of things, because 90% -- 88%-90% of the people polled said that they liked what they had. so when the president said you could keep it, they said, okay, that's fine. i guess this is all about dealing with that 10% or 12% of

people who had no coverage or had what they viewed as inadequate or otherwise undesirable coverage. so i understand that some people may have been lulled into this idea that, hey, this is -- this is the best thing that's happened in terms of health care delivery in a long time. as a matter of fact, we've talked about this approach for many, many years, even before i got to congress. we had during the clinton administration hillary-care, hillary-care. that was another grand scheme to basically commandeer the health care system in the country that again, i would grant, the good faith of those who actually thought they could make it work. but it didn't work, at least at manifest in obamacare. and now we are confronted not with a grant theory and good

intentions but with the hard facts and the reality. -- that obamacare has approved to be an unmitt gatted disaster. -- unmitigated disaster. i believe then that it is incumbent pounce, whether you were one of obamacare's primary or biggest cheerleaders or whether you were a skeptic like me and voted against it because you did not think it could work, i think it is incumbent upon us to figure out how to come up with an alternative, to hit the reset button and to pivot to a patient-centered health care reform that leaves the choices not in the hands of bureaucrats in the federal government but leaves the choices in the hands of hardworking american families and patients, where doctors that we choose and who we trust can work with us to come up with the best solutions, rather than to

have the federal government say, we've done a cost-benefit analysis, and you know what? you're out of luck. you're not worth it. the federal government, the bureaucracy doesn't think you should get that kind of treatment. well, what i don't want is for any president, including this president, to unilaterally waive or change or refuse to enforce a law for privileg political reasd that's what's havmentd we've --d that's what's happened. we've watched the president's poll numbers plummet, who the american people during his first term in office they wanted this president to succeed. i think the fact that president obama's presidency was historic is in many ways, as the first

african-american president ever elected in this country, i think it gave all of us a sense of pride that our country had come so far over admittedly a long period of time, but so far that a person who back at the beginning of our country might have been considered less than a fully -- fully human being would now be the president of the united states. that gave us all hope in the future and hope in this great experiment known as america. to have the first african-american president of the united states. so this president was elected in 200 l an2008 and reelected in 2h a huge reservoir of good will and hope that he would be successful, and indeed all of us, regardless of our political stripes, whether we're conservatives or liberals, whether we're independents,

republicans, or democrats, we are americans first, and we want america to succeed. that's what we want more than anything. but it's also important to remember that our system of government is important to our success over this last couple of centuries and that we haven't gotten here by accident. we've gotten here because of our constitution, because of the genius of checks and balances between coequal branches of government, and this is a lesson that this president seems to have forgotten. that too often he decides to go it alone or do an an end-run ard congress because he can't get what he wants. well, we're not guaranteed, any of us, in political life or in life in general to get everything we want. we know particularly when it comes to legislation, things like health care reform, that nobody gets everything they

want, if in fact it's going to be a bipartisan product. but rather than attempting a bipartisan product, this president and our friends across the aisle decided to jam the american people and to jam the minority party in congress and to pass a law which now they own lock, stock, and barrel. this was, again -- i am a he --m willing to concede the good faith and good intentions of those who thought it would work. but now we've gotten from theory to evidence and experience, and we know it hasn't worked. well, thankfully we have in our three coequal branches of government not just the legislative branch that passes the laws and the executive branch that is supposed to enforce the larks we have a -- enforce the laws, we have a third branch, and that's the judiciary.

and they've done their part, but they are a not through yet. -- and they're not through yet to stop executive overreach and uphold the rule of law enforcement i've heard some of my colleagues say, well, the supreme court has upheld most of obamacare and it is the law of the land. as if it's somehow sacrosanct and can never be changed. well, that's just not true. at least not under our system of laws. as i said to begin with, if we find that the laws that we've passed are -- result in consequences that we did not intend or we find out that the american people are dissatisfied with it and a it leads to undesirable results, then we can change tsm that's the way our system works. we're not bound forever by any law. we can change it, because that's the way our system works. so, when people say it's the law of the land, get over it move on

down the road, that's not an american perspective, at least under our constitution. so as i said, we've seen a number of times where this president and this white house have simply ignored laws, refused to enforce laws, and overreached. for example, the district of columbia circuit court has demanded that this administration follow the law on issues related to corporate governance, emissions requirements and recess appointments and the disposal of nuclear waste. now, this is the same court that this majority leader, senator reid, and his political party have decided to break the rules of the united states senate that have been in effect a long, long time in an overt power play in order to stack

this second most important court in the nation, the d.c. circuit court in the nation by breaking the senate rules in order to deny the minority a voice in the confirmation process and to pass or -- or to confirm these nominees in what we are engaged in this week, which is another oversight power play. but the stated reason for doing that and the supposed necessity of doing that is because the senior senator from new york, the majority leader and others say, you know, they're not happy with the way the d.c. circuit court of appeals has ruled on cases involving the bush administration. but as i said a moment ago --, the obama administration, but as i said a moment ago, in four areas, the d.c. circuit court has upheld the administration's point of view in important appeals before the court. at the same time, the d.c. circuit court has ruled in favor

of the administration on some issues related to health care, embryonic stem cell research and other environmental matters. but notwithstanding those successes in terms of policy approval by the d.c. circuit court of this administration's policies and of the bureaucracy's interpretation of those policies, we know that the majority leader was bound and determined along with his allies in the other party that they were bound and determined to make sure that the d.c. circuit court of appeals would issue no rulings which would undercut or fail to enforce this administration's policies. so they decided to pack this court which is what this process we're engaged in this week is all about with ideological allies that would rubber stamp their agenda. when the minority in the united

states senate -- and, by the way, i'm not just talking about my rights or senators' rights. we're just representatives. i represent 26 million people. when the majority leader shuts me out of the amendment process or the opportunity to have a say in the advice and consent over the nomination of judicial nominees or executive branch nominees, he's not affecting my rights per se but the rights of 26 million texans to have their voice heard in this process. that's something he ought to think about and reconsider. well, we know that the nature of the united states senate has been fundamentally transformed under the leadership of senator reid. when i first got to the senate, which was a while ago, doesn't seem like that long ago but it's dramatically changed. we had an open amendment process.

we would have bills come to the floor, things like the national defense authorization bill and we'd spend up to three weeks debating and offering amendments on that important piece of legislation as we've heard at different times, the national defense authorization bill is viewed as so important by both political parties and by the entire senate that we have passed a defense authorization bill for i think at least 50 consecutive years. now, that's quite a tradition. but instead of doing that, majority leader reid decided to cut off the opportunity for the minority to offer amendments to this important piece of national security legislation and now we hear the plan is when we were able to block cloture in order to protest that in order to provoke hopefully a negotiation which would result in a process

whereby minority rights would be respected and an opportunity to amend this legislation provided, now we learn that as part of this end-of-the-year sprint to christmas that in addition to jamming through these nominees that the majority leader's intention is to take a bill that was basically negotiated between four members of congress -- that would be the four members of the armed services committee on both the chairman and ranking members on both sides of the capitol -- to fill up the amendment try, file for cloture and pass it in the last week we're in session. it is beyond outrageous, this transformation in the senate, and i think the thing that shocks many of us the most is that majority leader reid is an institutionalist and by that i mean a compliment. i mean he has been in the senate

a long time, he understands how the senate works, why the senate rules are so important, yet nobody in my memory has done more to undermine the institution of the senate and its rules and traditions than the current majority leader. for what purpose? well, for short-term gain. why do i say it's short-term gain? well, they can get way with it when they're in the majority but it's temporary. because during the time i've been in the senate i've been in the majority and i've been in the minority. i have to admit, being in the majority is a lot more fun. but, in other words, what i'm saying is, this short-term power play by the majority party in the senate to break the senate rules, to jam through legislation and deny my 26 million constituents in texas an opportunity for me on their behalf to offer amendments to

important legislation affecting the national security of the united states is an outrage. it's an outrage. i'll just give you one example. four years ago at fort hood, texas, nadal hasan, a major in the united states senate army, killed 11 people and wounded about 30 more. this is about four years ago, and you'll remember it. the reason why it took so long for him to be brought to justice, i'm not sure i understand exactly why, but there was some concern -- and a concern i shared -- that if we identified this for what it truly was which was a terrorist attack on our own soil, that it might undermine the fairness of his trial and give him some grounds to appeal and perhaps escape the just punishment for what he did.

major hasan when there was initial review of what he did and evidence that he had shown absolutely clear signs of being radicalized and joining the fight of islamic extremists against the united states of america, against his own government, that those were completely ignored by the military. by the army, in an exercise of political correctness. and even though he stood up that day and he said god is great in the traditional cry of al qaeda and islamic extremists and others who are bent on suicidal and homicidal acts, initially when that was reviewed, the conclusion by the political correct police here when they he

reviewed it, this was workplace violence. workplace violence. in other words, they refused to call it what it was. which was a terrorist act on our own soil. i don't really understand why the reticence to identify it for what it is because we all know we had at least one other major terrorist attack on our own soil on september 11, 2001. when 3,000 americans were killed , more or less 3,000 americans killed by one of the most her risk terrorist acts to occur in our lifetime and hopefully ever will occur again. well, after that, the department of defense decided to use its discretion to award the people who were injured or killed in that incident the recognition and benefits that

they deserve under our laws. purple hearts and other death benefits. but when i and my colleagues on the other side of the capitol, congressman john carter and roger williams, sponsored legislation to recognize that this attack at fort hood that cost the lives of 11 americans, including 10 members of the united states military and 30 more people were shot and injured, many of whom bear those wounds even today, when we filed legislation on the national defense authorization bill in order to amend that bill in order to give that same recognition to these 11 americans who lost their lives and the 30 more who were injured in that terrorist attack on that day at fort hood, texas, in colleen, texas four years ago, that amendment has been shut out

of this process. so don't be confused. this is not about denying me my rights as united states senator. this is about denying those 11 americans who lost their lives that day justice and the 30 more who survived that attack the benefits that they're entitled to by virtue of being a victim of a terrorist attack on our own soil. so there are real human consequences to the machinations of the majority leader and this revolutionary change in the nature of the united states senate where the rights of the minority to be heard and to offer legislation on behalf of our constituents that has such far-reaching impact are simply denied.

well, you know, in many ways i think what we're experiencing this week and what we've experienced recently is an attempt to distract the american people from the train wreck known as obamacare. if i had voted for the president's signature legislative proposal and it was -- i was one of the democrats who voted for it, since no republican voted for it, i'd want to change the subject, too. as someone who served in this chamber for 11 years, it saddened me -- saddance me that our democratic friends choose to owe bill clinton wrait-rate the senate rules and gravely weaken minority rights for petty partisan reasons. and again it is so shortsighted it is just unimaginable. you know, it is as if members of this body have attention

deficit syndrome where they're so focused on immediate gratification that they forget or they ignore the long-term consequences of this revolutionary change in what once was called the world's greatest deliberative body which is no longer the world's greatest deliberative body at least not under this majority leader and under his rule breaking regime. over the years leading up to last month's showdown the majority leader repeatedly promised not to use the nuclear option. and, again, i know, this is about process, and the american people sort of their eyes begin to glaze over as we talk about the internal process and operation of the united states senate. but as i attempted to demonstrate a moment ago, they have real-world consequences. tell that to the people back at

fort hood who lost their family member in this terrible terrorist attack on our own soil, committed by an american citizen wearing the uniform of the united states army where he joined the enemy, islamic extremists, was radicalized by the same person who essentially tutored the underwear bomber who was arrested in detroit, tried to blow up another airplane on that day, those people are the ones who are suffering the negative impact of the majority leader's undermining of this institution. well, the majority leader reported -- repeatedly promised not to use the nuclear option, but he broke that promise. you know, my experience in public life is, again, we all

have different ideas about how to accomplish our goals, hopefully improve life for the american people, but one of the things that is even more important are the personal relationships between members of the senate. ther -- there is a lot of good work that can get done when there is good faith and trust between members of the senate, and indeed, those aren't the kinds of things that typically make their way into the newspaper or that people pay much attention to, because they're done quietly, behind the scenes, cooperatively, collaboratively. but when the majority leader, the leader of this institution, breaks his word repeatedly about undermining the senate rules in a partisan power grab, it

necessarily undermines the trust that has come to be so -- the important glue to this institution, and because it's important to this institution, it's important to the country. and when we learned that that trust is unjustified, that his promise is hollow and meaningless, well, it reminds me of another american who has made extravagant promises to the american people that were obviously false. and could not -- and cannot be relied upon, and i'm talking about the president's promise in obamacare, that if you like what you have, you can keep it. you know, i saw a poll recently that said 37% of the respondents in that poll believe that the president is honest and trustworthy.

now, i confess i didn't vote for this president, but he is still my president. and the ability of the president of the united states to actually govern and to be a respected, not only here in america but around the world and to be viewed as a person of character and substance, well, it's completely undermined by the kinds of false promises that this president has made in obamacare, so it's not just limited to health care. it has broad ramifications and a huge ripple effect. in terms of the way that, for example, al-assad -- bashar al-assad in syria views the president's red line on the use

of chesapeake. if bashar al-assad thinks that this president is not going to be honest or trustworthy in terms of his statements, then his threats of red lines simply will not be believed. same thing in tehran where 19,000 centrifuges are spinning, enriching uranium in iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons. a goal which, if achieved, and which is not too far off in the distant future, will destabilize the middle east, will threaten not only a regional war but a larger conflict because of iran -- if iran gets a nuclear weapon, iran is not just any average nation state. it is a state sponsor of

international terrorism in the form of hezbollah and other support particularly directed at our ally and friend, the nation of israel. but iran for many years has been killing american soldiers in afghanistan and iraq through their training and support for our more obvious adversaries there through the design and importation in iraq, for example, of explosively foreign penetrators which will melt through the metal of our vehicles and other protective armament that our military used and as i said resulted in the death of multiple american g.i.'s. so iran is not our friend, and so when the president says this is another red line, well, our enemies can read our newspapers. they read the same polls we

read. they see a president making false statements that cannot be relied upon, and it undermines his credibility when it comes to our -- our enemies. people who want to wipe israel off the face of the map. that can have very dangerous consequences, obviously, because when people don't believe that america -- what america says through the voice and in the person of our commander in chief, the leader of the free world, it emboldens our enemies. they push the envelope. in north korea, in iran, in syria and other places around the world. so when the -- this is not a minor issue. when the president acts as if the law does not apply to him

and if the law means just what he says it will mean at any given moment. it's as if the law doesn't really matter and his word cannot be trusted. just a few other thoughts on how obamacare was passed. i remember being in this chamber on christmas eve in 2009. i think it was 7:00 in the morning, maybe 7:30 in the morning where the final vote on obamacare passage, at least in its initial senate passage, passed with 60 democratic votes and no republican votes. i have often pointed out that before obamacare, every major domestic reform in modern u.s. history from civil rights to

medicare to welfare reform to no child left behind enjoyed significant bipartisan support at the time of its passage. why is that important? well, because obamacare was a pure partisan power play. it was shoved through on a party-line basis without a single republican vote, and despite high levels of public opposition. i remember people were told that, well, we just haven't done a very good job of messaging, of explaining. or the longer people -- when obamacare is implemented, people will learn to love it. well, we now know again that jamming through legislation which basically commandeers 1/6 of the american economy is a

recipe for disaster. it's a bad way to pass any major law, let alone a measure that affects everyone in the country, because our health care delivery system affects every man, woman and child in our country. but obamacare is a part of a broader pattern that should be deeply disturbing to anyone who cares about our constitution and the checks and balances that the framers of our constitution knew would be so important to maintaining consensus and maintaining balance. today's democratic leaders seem to believe that might makes right and the inconvenient legislation can be swept aside by executive fiat. and that when the senate rules

prove to be an obstacle to obtaining what they want, like stacking the secondmost important court in the nation in order to be a rubber stamp for the bureaucracy's ideological zeal, well, they can sweep aside those rules, too. so this debate is about far more than just policy differences. it's about respect for the rule of law and respect for our constitution. it's about preventing the executive branch from running roughshod over congress, and it's about safeguarding constitutional government. well, if we need any more examples, i am prepared to provide those. about the obama administration's abuse of power. we know the obama administration

showed contempt for the normal legislative process in a number of ways. when congress refused to enforce card check for labor unions, the administration turned unelected bureaucrats at the national labor relations bureau, the nlrb. when congress refused to on a bipartisan basis to pass cap-and-trade energy taxes, the administration turned to unelected bureaucrats, the environmental protection agency. indeed, now president obama has authorized the e.p.a. to regulate virtually every aspect of the american economy without congressional approval, even though the e.p.a. itself has acknowledged that its proposed greenhouse gas rule would not have a notable impact on u.s. carbon dioxide emissions during the next decade.

the obama administration is acting in a lawless manner in other ways as well. in early 2011, more than two years before the supreme court ruled on the defense of marriage act, president obama ordered his justice department to stop defending the law. even though it was passed with an overwhelming bipartisan majority of congress and signed into law by president bill clinton and broadly supported by the american people. now, the right way to deal with that is not for the executive branch to refuse to enforce the law, but it's to come back to congress and say you know what? we think things have changed. congress ought to reconsider. but rather than do that, the president decided to have the justice department refuse to enforce the very law that bill clinton signed. and then there is the independent payment advisory

board. this is part of obamacare, one that perhaps has one of the most pernicious impacts because what it does is it puts unelected bureaucrats in charge of deciding whether your mother, your father, your grandmother, your grandfather, in other words, medicare beneficiaries, whether they can get the health care that they need. how do they have an impact? well, these 15 bureaucrats under this obamacare-created bureaucracy, will have the authority to decide what sort of health care that medicare pays for. now, this is just a way to ration access to care. so if ipab, the independent payment advisory board, these 15 bureaucrats, say you know what, we think you're too old, we don't think it's worth it for you to get a hip replacement so

you can walk, so you can be productive, so you can be mobile, we don't think it's worth it for you to get bypass surgery. we're not going to pay for it. the federal government will not pay for it. and so it will not be delivered. what's worse is that ipab's recommended medicare cuts automatically take effect unless a congressional supermajority votes to cut health care spending by an equivalent amount. columnist george will said this is a travesty of constitutional law making. an executive branch agency makes laws unless congress acts to achieve the executive agency's

aim. this is the constitution turned on its head. indeed, ipab makes a mockery of our constitutional system of separation of powers, and it should be repealed immediately. not only does the administration use unelected bureaucrats to sidestep the normal legislative process and disregarded the rule of law for transparently political -- for ideological reasons, this also fostered a culture of deception and intimidation. one example is operation fast and furious. now, this has -- has particular impact to my state, a big border state. you recall that operation fast and furious was this boneheaded idea that the bureau of alcohol, tobacco and firearms would actually allow weapons to go

from american gun shops into the hands of the drug cartels without interdiction. i guess the idea was once they got in the hands of the cartels, we would somehow trace them and know who the bad guys are, but it broke down along the way and many of these guns were simply not recovered, and no doubt have been used to kill many people in mexico, but also an american citizen, border patrol agent, brian terry, three years ago. attorney general holder, who's responsible for administratively for the bureau of alcohol, tobacco and firearms, repeatedly obstructed a congressional investigation into fast and furious. and his sworn testimony was repeatedly contradicted by the justice department itself, by their own memos. one d.o.j. official, a u.s. attorney in arizona, tried to

smear a whistle-blower by leaking a private document. the department of justice's own inspector general called this behavior inappropriate for a department employee and wholly unbefitting a u.s. attorney. a separate d.o.j. official was forced to resign her position after she was caught collaborating with left-wing bloggers to slander both the whistle-blowers and journalists. and then there's the i.r.s. scandal. it's almost hard to keep up with all of the scandals, but we can't let these get away from us because they're so important to get to the bottom of one of the most important governmental bodies in the u.s. government,

and that's the internal revenue service that, again, touches all our lives. we found out, of course, that the i.r.s. agents were deliberately targeting people based on their political views. at least one conservative activist in texas, catherine engelbrek from houston, texas was targeted by multiple agencies, the i.r.s., the f.b.i., the bureau of alcohol, tobacco and firearms, and the occupational safety and health administration, osha. we also know that the administration, or at least the bureaucracy, has targeted political donors. the 2012 obama campaign bullied private citizens who donated money to governor mitt romney, including a man named frank van der sloop who was experience was

chronicled in the "wall street journal." in april 2012, mr. van der sloop found himself along with seven other romney donors being quoted in a obama web site as being less than questionable and had gotten rich at the expense of so many other americans. mr. van tker -- mr. van der sloop was singled out as a -- quote -- "bitter foe of the gay rights movement." mr. van der sloop didn't run for public office. he didn't volunteer to be treated like this. he was an american citizen engaging in a constitutionally protected right to provide financial support to a political candidate of his choosing. and rather than keep the fight

on the political opponent, governor romney, the obama campaign went after the donors. mr. van der sloop didn't have a criminal background, nor did any of the other romney donors that were similarly targeted. but shortly after he was denounced by the obama campaign in this manner, a democratic opposition researcher began researching his divorce records. meanwhile, the i.r.s. decided to audit two years worth of his tax filings, and the labor department announced a separate audit of the immigrant workers employed at his cattle ranch. as kimberly strawsell wrote for the "wall street journal," -- quote -- "ever thinking american must henceforth wonder if mr. van der sloop has been targeted for inbe kweurry

because of -- for inquiry because of his political leanings." we also know that this administration has harassed journalists, and although president obama said that this administration would be the most transparent administration in american history, it has proven not to be so. in the case of fox news correspondent james rosen, the obama justice department tracked him down like a common criminal simply for doing his job. the department of justice tracked rosen's movements, got a search warrant to examine his private e-mails and even obtained his parents' phone records. this is a journalist. as a washington correspondent for the new yorker magazine noted -- quote -- "it is unprecedented for the government in an official court document to accuse a reporter of breaking

the law for conducting the routine business of reporting on government secrets." we also know that the obama justice department has conducted a disturbingly intrusive investigation into the phone records of journalists who work for the associated press. and as i said, displayed an unprecedented level of contempt and obstruction for the freedom of information act. washington lawyer catherine meyer has filed foia cases under six different administrations dating back into the late 1970's. foia is the shorthand for the freedom of information act, of course. last year she told "politico" that -- quote -- "this administration is the worst on

foia issues. the worst. close quote. so much for the president's claim to be the most transparent information in this nation's history. in 2011, the obama holder justice department received a mock award from the nonpartisan national security archive which said that the d.o.j. had shown the -- quote -- "worst open government performance" of any federal agency that year. this is the agency that's supposed to enforce the freedom of information laws, and it was recognized as demonstrating the -- quote -- "worst open government performance of any agency that year. among other things, the department of justice was cited for its mistreatment of whistle-blowers and its efforts to undermine freedom of

information law. speaking of whistle-blowers, we know that the state department has also punished u.s. diplomats for cooperating with congressional investigators looking into the september 2012 terrorist attack that killed four americans at benghazi, libya. you know, this is so outrageous that it bears recall that susan rice, the president's u.n. ambassador, showed up at, on five, i believe it was, sunday morning talk shows and claimed that the attack at the american consolate in benghazi that took the life of four americans was precipitated by a video that was deemed to be disrespectful of

the religion of islam. well, it turns out that that wasn't true. and for a long time the administration denied this was even a terrorist attack, something which it now acknowledges. but when people come forward, like the whistle-blowers, diplomats that knew the ambassador and those who lost their lives on that terrible night in september 2012, then they're punished, not welcomed as truth tellers to get to the bottom of this terrible incident at benghazi, libya. then we know the intimidation continued with obamacare in 2010. actually this preceded the benghazi intimidation. in 2010, various health care insurance companies began

alerting their customers that obamacare was going to force them to raise premiums. this is back in 2010. fast forward, 2012, that's what has happened. so first of all, people saw the web site was a problem. now that's getting fixed. now they're experiencing cancellations. and then there's the sticker shock where their premiums have gone up. and in 2010, when the insurance industry tried to tell their own customers, your premiums are going to go up because of this law, kathleen sebelius responded, the secretary of health and human services, threatened to punish these companies and bar them from participating in the obamacare exchanges. it's really quite remarkable. i think in any other context we

would call this thuggery, intimidation, abuse of power. a few years later we learned that secretary sebelius was shaking down private companies to help fund the implementation of obamacare because congress, believing it had been misled on so many instances regarding obamacare, had refused funding. and then it's very disturbing to learn that the same i.r.s. official who led the division that targeted people because of their political beliefs is now in charge of administering large portions of obamacare. as i said a moment ago, one of the biggest casualties in all of this, particularly as it relates to the false promises of obamacare are the president's own credibility. the other day i had a chance to speak 0 on this topic, and i

said obamacare is the single biggest case of consumer fraud in american history. anybody else under any circumstance would find themselves hauled into court and be called to account. if you were a private citizen or a private company, you'd be sued for money damages. you'd likely be put out of business because there would be an injunction granted. or perhaps punitive damages. well, when the president speaks on behalf of the united states, whether it's in domestic affairs like obamacare or whether it's on international matters like the red line on chemical weapons in syria or the red line on iranian nuclear aspirations, it should count for something.

but according to a new nbc/"wall street journal" poll, only 37% of americans give president obama a very good rating for -- quote -- "being honest and straightforward." 37%. that compares with 63% in january of 2009. so the president's reputation for honesty went from 63% in january 2009 to 37% on december 11, 2013. or at least that's the date the "wall street journal" and nbc reported the results. well, we know that when the president approval rating, particularly his approval rating for honesty and truthfulness is

damaged, all of those who trusted the president as he led them down the gang plank with the implementation of obamacare, are bound to get pretty nervous because while the president was able to move the actual implementation of obamacare past his own reelection in 2012, i mean, this law was passed back in 2010, and the president himself was able to avoid accountability by and large by pushing the implementation past his election in november 2010. but 2014 will be a midterm election. the president won't be on the ballot but his allies will be. and people who trusted him as he told them and he told the american people that you're going to be able to keep what you have if you like it, even

though he knew it wasn't true. we know that back as far as 2010. senator mike enzi led the effort to expand the grandfathering flexibility in the health and human services rules and was, that was tweeted on a party line vote. all of our democratic friends voted against expanding the flexibility of these grandfathering provisions back in 2010 when h.h.s. and indeed the congressional budget office estimated that as many as 78 million americans on employer-provided plans would find that they were no longer able to keep their coverage either. so there is going to be a day of accountability in november of 2014 as those who happens unwisely trusted the president

who believed in this big government scheme that simply has not worked and that many of us believe would never work. there will be a day of accountability. well, madam president, my hour has come and gone, and i see the senator from oklahoma here on the floor. i would just say that in conclusion, i want to make -- ask unanimous consent that at the end of my remarks, that a summary of stories from texans who have been affected by obamacare be made part of the record. i'd ask unanimous consent that following my oral remarks, that those be made a part of the record. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. cornyn: and, madam president, i would yield the floor. a senator: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from oklahoma. mr. coburn: thank you.

i enjoyed listening to my colleague from texas. i would just comment to him is we're just beginning to see the series of untruths about what the president and his allies have said about this bill. i practiced medicine for 25 years, delivered over 4,000 babies, had a broad-ranging general practice, and i was belittled on this floor for the statements that are now coming true by the very colleagues who voted for the unaffordable care act. and let me just out line for you four things that are going to be untrue. you cannot keep your insurance. whether you liked it or not, you're not going to be able to keep your insurance. you can't keep anything. i'm going to read a story here in a minute about a young man who couldn't afford his employer based, but went shopping, had a vastectomy so he could qualify

for his insurance because it didn't have maternal coverage, they didn't want more children, his wife wanted to stop working, had a wonderful plan. can't do it now. now he can't get insurance because he can't afford it, and he makes about $500 too much to qualify for any subsidy. so you can't keep it. the second thing is you can't keep your doctor. i'm experiencing that right now. m.d. anderson, your own state, isn't covered by any of the plans. i have had a recurrence of cancer. my doctors now are at m.d. anderson. i can't use them under the unaffordable care act unless i want to go and spend $70,000 or $80,000 on my next procedure out of my own pocket. i'll have to go somewhere where the care is not what i would deem it. the third untruth is every family's going to save $2,500. it's going to be about the

opposite because every family will be spending about $2,500 more. and then finally is the quality of care is going to go down when they said the quality of care is going to go up. access is going to be harder, not easier. so when the american people really find out the intention behind trying to fix health care was a good one. the system was broke. we do need to do things. but the untruths associated with this attempt to micromanage people's lives in a market that wasn't perfect. i want to tell you, this is going to be so much worse than what we had, in terms of real care and real outcomes, and when it comes to individuals, the most important thing is the relationship between the doctor and the patient. and it's not just for the patient. the doctor having a relationship with the patient makes much better judgments, in terms of

the quality of care they give and the insight into caring for that person's whole, the whole of that person. and we're wrecking that. we're going to wreck that. a senator: would the senator yield for a question? the presiding officer: without objection. mr. coburn: i would be happy to. mr. cornyn: i would just ask my colleague, i'm aware of his own experience that he just recounted here with the fact that m.d. anderson, the world-class hospital located in houston that's really the premiere cancer treatment facility in america and perhaps even in the world, they're not in the exchanges so that -- so that you can't continue your treatment there, is that -- can you explain how that -- how that happens? because i think a lot of people think that if they -- they like their current doctor and they like their current hospital facility, but -- and they're expecting that when they sign up

for obamacare, that they're going to be able to continue to see that doctor and go to those same -- same high-class health care facilities. how did that -- how did that happen? mr. coburn: well, i'm sure -- i have not researched it yet. i guarantee my colleague i will research it and i'll find out, but the fact is is -- is the leading cancer -- sloan kettering, same thing, leading cancer centers in this country probably couldn't come in agreement at a price low enough that would pay for their costs for this advanced cancer care, so they didn't offer them a contract. because they wouldn't cut their prices enough for the insurance. so -- so here's the main point. we promised to increase access. what you're really seeing is decreased access. i can't go to chris logathitas, the number one oncological

urologic specialist in the united states, i can't go see him under my insurance. i can -- i'm fortunate enough. i had a career before i was in the senate. i'll pay. but think about how many people aren't going to be able to see chris logathitas and go to m.d. anderson and have their lives saved through the latest advances in pure biochemical and medical research put forward by a lot of people from texas, some money from the n.i.h., there is no question, some from the milliken institute, who -- private money that's gone into research. we all seem to think that n.i.h. is the only one that funds research around this country. there is a lot of entrepreneurs that fund tons of it. so -- so this idea of access, we can say you're going to have access. it's just like on medicaid. oklahoma chose not to expand medicaid. i agree with that.

the reason is we're never going to send the states the money. it's an impossibility, if you look at our budget situation, for us to ever keep the promise that the unaffordable care act said we would do to the states. but here's what's happening, is people who are going to be signed up for medicaid -- and there is a whole other story about people put on medicaid that aren't eligible but won't be able to sign up that the whole system has kicked wrong -- wrongly into medicaid. you can sign up for medicaid, where's your doctor? 75% of the doctors in california aren't even going to sign up for the affordable care act. in oklahoma, a recent survey said of the doctors over 52, 60% are retiring in the next year. our best doctors. the ones with the most experience, with the best -- with the most gray hair. they have seen it all. they have the best differential diagnosis. they're hanging it up. and now we have all these rules coming with the affordable care

act on what you have got to do on electronic medical records and you have icdm-10. 66,000 now codes versus 10,000 that the doctor is responsible for picking. what we have is a mess on our hand, and the final fifth line is the denial of the problems that obamacare, the unaffordable care act, has caused and sticking our head in the ground and say oh, it's not causing any of those things. it's going to be the most disruptive thing that has ever happened in this country to 1/6 -- 1/5 of our economy. i would be happy to. mr. cornyn: to your point about medicaid, in texas, i believe the number is basically only one out of three doctors, about a third of doctors, will see a new medicaid patient because it reimburses at about 50 cents on the dollar of what a private

insurance plan will. so i know there is the problem of coverage versus access that you alluded to. but i wanted to just ask you about sometimes our friends who supported this legislation said, you know, if you care about getting people with preexisting conditions coverage or if you care about young people being able to stay on their parents' health insurance coverage, you have got to take the whole enchilada. in other words, you have to accept all 2,700 pages of obamacare. that's the only way to address these concerns. are there ways to address some of these legitimate concerns like preexisting conditions without embracing all of obamacare? mr. coburn: sure. one of the things is adverse selection where sicker people raise the cost for everybody in a pool. but if, in fact, you look at the mitigation as a whole and you had a law that said any

insurance company that's cherry picking only healthy people, a portion of their profits will go into a pool at the end of the year for people with high risk of illness. that's what switzerland does. it works wonderfully. what it does is it changes the behavior of the insurance. they cover everybody. so the whole idea behind insurance is to spread the risk. and we didn't have good risk spreading. there's no question we need to address it. you were on a bill with me. the patient's choice act which actually wouldn't have created any of this mess and actually would have created a market with some of the parameters that would have spread the risk and had real indemnification in the country, but also would have had market forces driving and still let you choose what you want. you know, the biggest problem with the unaffordable care act is it takes any discretion away from you about what is best for you and your family, and it does it two ways. one, in terms of the details of what you can and can't buy.

you know, i have got 63-year-olds that have to buy maternity coverage. but the final point that i would make in that regard is it takes your ability away to do what is your free and correct right, to not buy health care if you don't want it. i mean, what is freedom about? you have to buy health care? and we say well, that's -- it really doesn't do it. it just charges you a tax, right? even though we said it wasn't a tax, we somehow got it twisted around in the supreme court, this is now a tax. i haven't figured that one out yet. i hope you have. what the -- what's that have to do with freedom? if i choose to not buy a product, what if i choose not to

buy high-definition cable? is there a penalty to me for that? in other words, does washington really know better? i think we have seen in the last ten years, in my experience in the senate, we're the last ones to really know. and the common sense of the american people is far greater than most of the ideas that ever thought about coming out of here, other than some of the original founding documents that our founders had. so i would make one other comment on medicaid. there is a recent study out of oregon which has done a good job of expanding its medicaid, but when they went to look at what difference expanded medicaid, what they found out is you still in oregon are better off if you didn't have medicaid. you were better off if you had no insurance at all than if you had medicaid. that's because we downward select through medicaid because of its pricing to the -- not the

best of the health care system. so when they looked at diabetes and control, when they looked at high blood pressure, when they looked at control of heart disease and congestive heart disease, they found one thing that was better -- treatment of anxiety. that was it. so in oregon when they actually looked at the studies. and part of that is is because even though they say you have got medicaid, if you don't have a great doctor-patient relationship where somebody is get in your face who loves you and cares for you and cares about your health and say you have got to do these things to change, you don't change, so there is no impact. so running it from washington versus having real markets with a real safety net, real safety, like the patients choice act had, a real safety net so that people are auto enrolled who are irresponsible against catastrophic illnesses, is a

much better answer. the other thing that's going to happen, i predict in april, you're going to see another uproar in this country, and that's when the seniors in this country pay their taxes and they find out that the little meager interest income they got off their savings because of what the federal reserve is doing or the few dividends they got, 3.5% of that is going to now come from -- quote -- to pay for obamacare because that's called investment income. 3.5%. so whatever your tax rate is, if you have any earnings in investment, you're going to be paying that. i'll never forget christmas eve morning 2009, not having an opportunity to offer the patients choice act or have it voted on through the raw brute political force of this body and

ignoring the rights of the minority, we voted on a bill that many of us predicted -- i'm not worried about the exchanges. they'll get that fixed. that's just incompetency of management. they'll get it fixed. it will eventually work and work well. what won't work is the rest of it. it won't work. the consequences of -- just look at centralized management everywhere else in the federal government. it is inefficient, most of the time ineffective, oftentimes complicated by fraud or incompetence. and we're going to do that to a sixth of our economy. we are doing that to a sixth of the economy. the other thing that's going to happen in april of this year is people who have a health insurance policy through their employment, not buying through

an exchange, are going to see their personal contributions through their employer rise significantly. and that's because the insurance industry is going to have to pay for all this, and they're going to have adverse selection in what is being signed up on the exchanges. and the insurance that sell to the medium-size businesses, the smaller businesses who aren't in a risk plans, they're going to be raising the cost for small businesses. and so what's probably going to happen is that those small businesses are either markedly going to increase their employees' share or they're going to drop insurance altogether and pay the fine, pay the tax. pay the fee, whatever it is, and pay the penalty. but the individuals that people

who we say we were helping, then will not be with the insurance they had. they'll be back to an exchange with a price, even with subsidy that's greater, one. number two, with a co-pay that's greater. two. and number three, with a massive deductible which says at $6,000 or $7,000, all you have is catastrophic coverage. why did we just do that? why didn't we just write catastrophic coverage for everybody in the country and let the market work on the rest of it? that doesn't allow the elites in our society to make decision the for you, and that's what we've done. let me share another story. this is tina willkerson.

she has been a school cafeteria worker for a long time. she called in. the last 14 years she's worked 40 hours a week for 10 months out of the year. she works for a food contractor company. she has now been changed to a seasonal employee because of obamacare so that the, her employer can avoid the obamacare mandates. it was costing her about $400 a month for her health care premium which included medical, dental, vision, plus life insurance, plus a short-term disability policy. she went to the web site, looked at plans, with her subsidy she would pay $645 a month premium with a $12,000 deductible, not have vision care, not have

dental care, not have life insurance coverage and not have disability coverage. that's middle income in oklahoma. here's somebody, because of what we've done, is now far worse off, far more exposed in our attempt to do good. and again, i'll give my colleagues credit. their ambitions, their goals are worthy, were worthy. but the results are a disaster and will become much worse of a disaster. i want to spend a little minute, just a little bit of time talking about the fact what's

really going to happen in the medical world. i have four former partners, and i go by there sometimes on friday and visit, and you can't believe the morale in the medical community today. it's unbelievably negative. you talk about worry. think about the average physician. they have an undergraduate degree. they spend four years in medical school. they then spend three or four years in specialty training, so they have 12 years at a minimum of higher education. and they come out all excited

about actually doing good, real god, making a difference -- real good, making a difference in individual people's lives, whether it's holding a hand when somebody's going through a rough time or diagnosing a very serious disease. the payment for being a physician is the relationship with the patient. it doesn't have anything to do with money. it has to do with helping your fellow man. i'm going to tell you that is totally upside down right now. and if you don't think that makes a difference, when you have a doctor walk into a clinic study and you're sitting there on an exam table and that doctor is focused on how am i going to pay the overhead, how am i going

to buy the next piece of equipment that i need to actually do care for you the way i need to care, how am i going to buy insurance for my own employees, how am i going to pay the necessary bills, and, oh, by the way, i've got the independent payment advisory board coming that's going to tell me what i can and can't do as a physician, regardless of how i'm trained, regardless of what i know, regardless of how much gray hair, regardless of how much experience i have in terms of really caring for folks. i'm going to have a group of unelected, appointed bureaucrats decide what i can and can't do for you. and then on top of that we have icdm-10, that's a diagnostic code manual that has just been expanded from some 10,000 diagnoses to over 66,000 with

federal penalties if you don't explicitly get it down to the detail. it's not enough that you broke a metacarpal in your hand. you now have to label which hand, which finger and describe in subsets the fracture. your nurse can't do that for you. you've got to do that. now we're taking more time away. and the penalties are going to be severe if you don't do it right. as a matter of fact, they won't pay you for medicare or medicaid if you haven't done that. no significant benefit to the health care community, but certainly a mandated bureaucratic cost on every physician practice in this country that will offer no long-term benefit to the individual patients. so now you have a doctor walking

in, may have been up all night the night before delivering a baby, carrying this added burden of all this bureaucratic mess that the affordable -- unaffordable care act placed on physicians in this country. you think that has any impact on diagnostic skills, on compassion, on empathy? think it will impact here? it certainly will. it's going to have a devastating impact. i want my physician focused on me. i don't want him worried about the federal government. i don't want him worried about ipab. i don't want him worried about icbm-10. i don't want him worried about whether or not they met the requirements of the electronic medical record. i want him worried about me. and i want him concentrating on me. and so we put this big distraction out there because we

know better than the market, than the trained professionals, and the arrogant assumption that we know better than the average american about what they need because we've already told them what they must buy. and we've told them if you don't buy what you must buy, here's the penalty. and thank goodness, the young people in this country have figured that out. which brings us back to the integrity of the statements of the president. what did he say? we've seen all sorts of rationalization. if you like your insurance now you got, you can keep it. is that right? right now for 5,800,000 and soon to be 15 million americans, that isn't true. they knew it wasn't true when

they said it, but it sounded good. the second deceitful thing, if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. period. oh really? can i, if i didn't have individual separate names keep chris logathites? no. no. you can't keep your doctor. you can have a new doctor based on what your insurance company, based on what the pricing mechanism is, you can have one of those doctors. but if your doctor isn't on that list, you can't keep him. so somebody that may have delivered all your babies, taken care of your parents, delivered

your baby's baby, cared for your husband's heart attack, knows everything about your family, knows your psycho social profile, knows your emotional needs, that's really been your ally in life, that's gone for millions and millions and millions of americans. but oh no, if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. every one of my colleagues voted against mike enzi's bill to allow you to keep your insurance under the grandfather clause. every one. mike enzi knew what was going to happen. he put a bill on the floor, and all my colleagues said no, we

don't want you to be able to keep your insurance. it doesn't work that way. what about the deceit of this? is it significant? sure it is. it's a matter of trust. the third thing, the promise of president obama that on average your health insurance costs will go down $2,500 a year. i don't know who told him that, dr. emanuel or who, i don't know what wiz bang accountant or financial forecaster told him that, but it's just the opposite of that. probably the average american is going to spend about $2,500 more trying to get equivalent care to what they had, not keeping their

same insurance and not keeping their doctor. and then finally, the deceit that is assumed but not spoken is that your doctor is going to get to make decisions with you, for you about your health care, because when the independent payment advisory board gets going, it's not just about medicare. it's about everybody. and if a group of unelected bureaucrats think i shouldn't run a nonstress test on a pregnant woman that i'm watching closely and they say you can't do that, i won't be able to do that. so we're going to have a group of people practicing medicine in this country that don't know the patient, don't know the situation, don't have their hands on the patient, haven't ever touched the patient, making decisions about what kind of care that patient will get.