be adhered to. the clerk will call the role of the mccain amendment. [roll call] aye by proxy. no. aye. aye. enzi --no. gregg -- no.

[roll-call] mccain -- aye by proxy. [root calloll call] senator roberts? no. senator kennedy? aye by proxy. we're waiting on senator coburn -- has he voted? pass. this is senator dingham boats no by proxy.

senator sanders -- aye. vote is 10 ayes, 12 nays. >> the amendment is not agreed to. all that i can say is that my nose count was correct. where are we at this point? are there any additional amendments? . . at this point now? are there any additional amendments? >> mr. chairman? >> senator casey. >> i just wanted to get back to the fraud and abuse section for a couple of moments. i know senator enzi had some comments before. we were dealing with senator

mccain's amendment so i wanted to just respond to a couple of things. first of all, i wanted to commend the way senator enzi, along with our chairman has conducted himself in this whole process over these many days and weeks, and grateful for the way he approached this bill, as difficult as it is. and as much as there is conflict on a lot of major elements. with regard to the fraud and abuse section, i wanted to do a couple of things very briefly. this will just take a few moments. one is to highlight and enter into the record, and i would ask consent that two letters be entered into the record. one is from the american -- america's health insurance plans dated june 24th, 2009, a letter to chairman kennedy and ranking member enzi about the fraud and

abuse section. that's number one. number two, the second letter dated the same date june 24th of this year from the national insurance crime bureau, the coalition against insurance fraud and the national health care anti-fraud association, also a letter addressed to chairman kennedy ranking member enzi. i ask those be made part of the record. >> they will be included in the record. i apologize to my colleague. those are the letters from the insurance commissioners? >> those two letters are not. this letter from the national insurance crime bureau, coalition against insurance fraud and anti-fraud association, the second -- >> okay. that's fine. i had those letters, as well. i thank my colleague for including them. i understand there was an effort

made on the bingham amendment. i don't know whether it can hold over till next week, as well. i don't want to keep members unnecessarily long. >> senator coburn and senator bingham are working on that. >> we are able to close out title v. >> there is a letter from the insurance commission. i didn't cite that here. >> that will be included, as well. >> as well. thank you. >> let me thank my colleagues. we did somewhere around 2 50shgs 260 amendments over the last eight or nine days. obviously, there is more work to be done. my intention is to get to all my colleagues, language and numbers from cvo and the joint tax on the other areas, the gap areas in the legislation introduced so we work when we get back as well. the coverage title and related matters including the follow-on

biologic, we'll get that as quickly as we get numbers so you'll have a chance to look at it review it, respond to those areas. we have to pick up as well as on the long-term care issues as we talked this morning and numbers on the tax. but i want to thank senator enzi who sat in this chair and senator gregg chaired it as wet, we've had senator kennedy and senator hatch, so we've had a number of former chairs who have sat if their this position with a gavel in their hand in the past so they have some appreciation for what it to keep everyone together. some described it as keeping frog that is wheelbarrow. people have a tendency to jump out from time to time. so i appreciate the fact that the foogs have stayed in the wheel barrow, i hope everyone has a healthy, happy, independence day break. i look forward to seeing my

colleagues on the 6th of july -- 7th of july, excuse me. >> today on c-span's "news makers," mike pence depiss cusses his party's legislative priorities this year, including his position on government involvement in health care. >> what we don't need is to introduce a government-run option into our private health insurance system. i know there's a lot of talk about competition and what's wrong -- americans love competition. and i do, too. but the federal government competes with the private sector the way an alligator competes with a duck. it consumes it. i think most americans -- and i saw this at my town hall meeting in richmond meeting on monday. if that option became available

to all americans, millions of americans would lose the health insurance that they have right now, not because the government would mandate that they would lose it, but because millions of employers seeing an available public option would simply inform their employees we're no longer incurring the expense of offering health insurance. you can call the government to get your health insurance. >> "newsmakers" with congressman mike pence today at 6:00 p.m. eastern here on c-span. >> conservation is the beginning of the battle. there were two sides of it, just like there were on land issues. should you draw in anwar or not. >> historian douglas brinkley on the early days of the conservation movement. >> he was not what you'd call by modern terms a wholistic -- he believed in hunting, but he did not believe in hunting so you make the species extinct.

so, yes, he cared about butterflies, he cared about wild flowers. he wanted to make sure we had a place for that in modern society. >> tonight on "q&a," part two with douglas brinkley on the wilderness warrior. theodore roosevelt. tonight on c-span or listen on x.m. satellite radio. watch part one of our interview with douglas prink lee at pan span.org. >> this week on "prim minister's" questions, gordon brown discusses an upcoming house inquiry on the war. he also discusses the economy and u.k. jobs. following that, we'll show you the ceremony to welcome their new speaker. "prime minister's questions" tonight at 9:00 eastern here on

c-span. >> americans for tax reform. they discussed what they see as the disadvantages to president obama's health care plan. this lasts about an hour and a half. >> i want to welcome you today to a discussion of how to improve health care in the united states without raising taxes, without reducing people's choices, and leaving people free to make their own decisions and work directly with their doctors. we have a congressman and innovative legislation to this effect. and then a panel of experts who have worked on this issue for years. as you know, a major american

corporation is making a rather sizable contribution to the obama campaign for government control of health care by giving them free air time over at abc. we thought that that's an infomercial being corporately financed that we would offer to the american people a real conversation about real health care reforge reducing the cost, not increasing it, reducing taxes, and not increasing it on health care. i'd like to first call to the podium, representative tom price from georgia, the chairman of the republican study committee. [applause] >> thank you. thank you for your leadership. it's a privilege and honor to be with this group today and to address some issues that's near and dear to my heart. in addition to representing the sixth district of georgia, i'm

a former physician. for 20 years, took care of folks' broken bones, and battered bodies on the north side of atlanta. i come to this discussion with some experience about what it means to take care of patients. i think that's oftentimes lost. i would mention at the outset that many of my constituents, many folks across this land believe that this administration and this congress are putting in place policies that truly endanger the future of our nation. i share those beliefs in some areas. but i do know one thing. if the fourth state in this nation remains in the tank for this administration, it does indeed endanger the future of this nation. i want to commend each and every one of you who are here working diligently to get the word across this land about this most important subject. i believe there were two things to the quality of american health care, that are incorporated in the house bill that came forward just last week.

one is a public option. one is a government-run program. it changes the dynamic in the private sector, makes it such that the private sector can't compete. we heard about it yesterday in committee and education and labor when it was presented. it makes the referee and the player the same person. when the referee and the player are the same person, you're on the other team, you lose. the problem is that the person loses the team that loses are the patients all across this nation. what's the public option? what's a government-run program look like in the united states? it looks like medicare part b, which is a fogs part of medicare, a volunteer program, crouts everything else out of the is. there are high quality reports that would give evidence to 110 to 120 million americans being crowded out of their private personal insurance if a government option is in place. second, any mandate, either individual or employer.

and the reason for that is not just because it's a mandate, which is a bad idea in the first place, but it's because when congressmandates something, what it mandates is the definition of health insurance. again, we see from the house bill that all of the dynamic bills that are out there in the marketplace, like high deductible catastrophic plans, all of those things will not only be unavailable, they will be illegal. and that's why a mandate would be a death sentence. at that point in time for that individual, the quality of american health care plummets for each and every individual, not just in this room, not just in this city, but across this

land. think about the principles that you have for health care. whatever they are, i've got six of them accessibility, affordability,alty, responsiveness, innovation, choices. whatever your principles are, i would suggest that none of those principles are improved by the intervention and the increased involvement of the federal government. not one. accessibility. already in any of the programs that the federal government has a hand in, accessibility is decreasing, including in medicare. affordability, all of the programs have overrun their cost estimates by sometimes 100 times, 100 times, so there's no way that the federal government can keep a hand on the cost of anything. quality, i would suggest respectfully that the quality of health care provided when the federal government gets involved gets worse, not better. responsiveness and innovation? federal government, you make the decision. i'm not sure that the federal government has anything to do with responsiveness and innovation in anything that it does. haven't seen it.

and choice is clearly the federal government makes choices at every single turn. there are positive collusions that we will put on the table, and they involve making sure that patients and their families along with doctors are able to pake health care decisions, making certain that individuals have an opportunity to be able to afford and purchase the coverage of their choice, not of the government's choice, of their choice. and that they own and control their health coverage, their health policy so that the dynamic between insurance companies and patients becomes one that isn't responsive. the insurance company has to be responsive. there's a patient center way to do it. we believe the patient center way to do it is the right way. thank you ever so much. [applause] >> we're now joined by the chairman of the senate steering committee from the state of south carolina with introduction of the health care freedom act.

[applause] >> thank you, grover. the only way we're going to stop a government takeover of our health care system is if americans are informed and engaged, hopefully outraged, and they contact their congressman and senators and talk about better ways to do this. so i think all the goods, rick -- thanks for your ads on tv. we need to move from just criticizing what the democrats and obama are proposing to actually proposing a solution that would work. i welcome the debate on health care, because it is time we give fair treatment to all americans. if you work for someone that offers health insurance, your employer can deduct the cost of that insurance and the employee is exempted from paying any taxes on that benefit. and that's the way we ought to keep it. but we ought to give fair treatment to the americans who don't get their health insurance through their employers and encourage the individual market by giving

every family a $5,000 certificate, which basically equals what that benefit will be in the workplace, or an individual $2,000. now just think about this as common sense. if you think about what works in health care today, what works the best is when an individual has health insurance, they can pick their own doctors, and they can decide what their doctor -- what their health care will be. the part of health care that is not working very well are the government plans. medicare, medicaid, tricare, schip. these are the plans that don't call doctors their cost to see patients. every year, more cost is shifted to those who are trying to buy private health insurance. these are the plans that are trillions of dollars in debt. these are the plans that offer americans no choice. if you're retired, on medicare, you don't have a choice. that's the end game of every

government plan. the last thing we need to do now is expand those plans that are in debt, that are not paying doctors enough to see patients, and basically take away all your choice. there's a common sense solution. you look at those americans who are uninsured. and i'm talking about americans. i'm not talking about illegals. i'm not talking about the folks who are sign up for medicaid and sign up for schip. we're talking about 20 million -- maybe between 20 and 25 million americans who need help. we don't need a multitrillion-dollar government takeover to make this happen. what we can do is we can take the tarp money, we can reclaim the tarp money, which is $700 billion, and pay for this plan that i'm proposing over the next 10 years. no new taxes. no new costs. no one loses anything from their employer, their government plan. if you like what you've got, you keep it. if you want to buy health insurance yourself, you can get 5,000 for a family plan or

2,000 as an individual. there are other things this bill does. it allows an employer, if they would like, to contribute to a health savings account for the employee and the employee could use that in addition to their health care certificate to pay for a premium. right now, we don't let americans use health savings accounts to pay for health insurance premium. we also create more of a national market for health insurance and more competition, allowing people to buy any -- from any state in the union to buy their insurance plan. so if their state has so many mandates their plans are expensive, they can look on the internet or go to an independent insurance agent and buy a plan from any state in the country where it is certified. and we provide block grants to states to help with those who have preexisting conditions, uninsureable conditions, to make sure that previous health or health situations don't keep people from buying health

insurance. we require more transparency from physicians and hospitals about pricing. i know if rick talks at all today about how you can simplify pricing and save money, everybody comes out a winner. we just need to have more disclosure there. we do have some lawsuit abuse reform in this bill, too. but all in all, it's simple. you like what you've got, keep it. if you want to buy health insurance yourself, you get a $5,000 certificate a year for your family and make it more competitive to buy insurance policies. folks, we need to advocate a plan that helps people get insurance. we don't need to compromise at all on the expansion of government health care. there will be no private insurance market if the government expands any more than it is right now. already, it is throwing such additional cost on to the private market that it has a hard time functioning. so let's work together and get behind plans that help people

get health insurance. thank you very much. [applause] >> if you and the congressman want to stay here and we'll take questions for the senator and the congressman, and then we'll move on to the panel. specific questions perhaps on the plan. introduce yourself. >> the question is -- up a up a [inaudible] cost compensation for doctors. in your opinion, is that just another form of a way to control doctors and price

controls for more public pans? >> all you have to do is look at the current government plans to see how exactly how this is going to work. we don't pay doctors enough to see patients. it takes years to approve new technology. so new things that come online that can save money. are delayed. they have thousands of codes that physicians and hospitals have to gain in the system. because if they do what the patient needs only, they're likely not to be able to make a living. i've been to a number of physician seminars and there's always a great session that has a title "coding for profit." they have to game the system that we put in place. we could greatly simplify this if we move toward consumerism and health care, allow people to buy most of their primary care from health savings accounts, eliminate the third party administrator until you get to more serious, expensive

things. what obama is talking about is not true. a government option will replace private health insurance. there's no question about that. if i pay doctors enough to see patients, it are shift more of the cost to private health insurers. so the competition there will basically eliminate those who are trying to operate in the free market. what the administration, the democrats are saying now i think is misrepresenting everything, creating a crisis. they are trying to exaggerate the number of people who are uninsured. they are talking about things that no government plan has ever done. it's really freedom that works, choices that work, competition that works. we know what works in america and government doesn't. >> [inaudible]

>> let me just expooned that very briefly. and i would echo the sentiments of senator demint. clearly the government running anything -- the public option in health care looks like medicare part b. public option and other kinds of things, for example, the housing market, secondary market for mortgages looks like fannie and freddie. it's a disaster. that's what happens when the government gets involved in these kinds of things that the private market can run so much better. i want to point out one thing that the president said yesterday. i would, again, echo the senator's comments. up to this point, the president simply has not been telling the truth about his proposal. yesterday, though, he began to march down a road that bore a little more resentment to the truth. when he was pressed on this notion, when he says, if you like your plan, you may keep

it. well, in fact, that's not what the bill says that was introduced in the house. frankly, that's not what the president has supported. what he clarified yesterday before the press was that if you like what you have, the government will not move you out, will not force you into another plan. what he didn't complete that sentence with is the next clause, which is, but the government may institute rules, in fact will institute rules that will force you out of your plan. that's the crowdout that happens when the government gets involved in the area of health care, whether it's medicare or schip or anything else. if you like your current coverage, it is very likely you will not be able to keep it under the president's proposal. >> senator and congress, cbo did a mark-up on one version of the bill, which came out at over a trillion dollars. can you talk a little bit about where your colleagues in the house and senate intend to find that money and what it is

amongst you colleagues with finding a whole new round of taxes to pay for this? >> as you know now, the federal government is spending and borrowing in unprecedented levels. i think the interest we pay on our debt is about $150 billion this year. by the time we get to the end of obama's 10-year budget, the interest alone is over $800 billion. other countries are starting to lose faith in our ability to pay this back. and the value of our currency. a multitrillion-dollar health care takeover is an extraordinary proposal in light of where we are. we don't have the money. we've doubled our money supply. the federal reserve appears out of control. we're in very dangerous waters as a country. we don't need to be expanding government any further and borrowing more money. we can recapture money that's already on the table in this tarp money, get over $20

million americans insured in half the time the obama administration is talking about, and not spend any new money. so we have got to look at proposals like this that don't put us further in debt. we don't have the money. they're going to pay for it with either new taxes or more borrowing, which would make america a more expensive place to do business, which means more jobs will go overseas. >> this notion that you have to introduce a whole new government program to solve the challenges that we have, that aren't real in health care, is just folly. it simply isn't true. there are wonderful ways to improve the system and utilize the money that we currently spend on health care to have a much more efficient system. if you think about the cost drivers in health care, they're no different than the cost drivers in any other industry. they're taxation, litigation, they're regulation, primarily. if we truly have appropriate and robust liability reform, we could save hundreds of billions of dollars currently in the

practice of defensive medicine. if we had appropriate regulatory reform, we could save hundreds of billions of dollars just in how patients are cared for in the marketplace. and if we had real tax reform, we could also hundreds of billions of dollars and allow individuals to have the kind of health care they they desire, patients and their families desire, not the kind of health care that speaker pelosi and harry reid and president obama desire. >> question in the back? >> can you talk a little bit about what it would cost over 10 years? >> about $700 billion, which is the same amount that tarp has invested in the legislative language. it suggests the tarp money should all be back in within five years. if we don't capture it and spent it on something like this, it will be spent on some new governmero