MSNBC "The Ed Show" - Transcript: Medicare Part D

Interview

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SCHULTZ: I want to bring in Congressman John Garamendi on this discussion  conversation. He wants to respond to this. Congressman your thoughts on  the numbers that are starting to show up on medicare and how Jeb Bush wants  to get rid of it and privatize it.

REP. JOHN GARAMENDI, (D) CALIFORNIA: I just heard some of the most  outstanding misinformation I`ve heard in a long, long time. Ed, we have  seen medical cost rate increases dramatically decline. They`re still  increases but they`re about half the inflation prior to the Affordable Care  Act. Medicare Part D is not a private organization. That is a government  program in which unfortunately the Republicans in the early 2000 set up  Medicare Part D and handed over billions and billions of dollars to the  drug companies because there is no competition for the price of drugs. The  federal government is simply a price taker. It cannot -- it cannot even  negotiate the price of the drugs in Medicare Part D. That is a fact.

SHEFFIELD: How can Part D came in well below budget by the magnitude of  many billions?

GARAMENDI: Wait a minute, wait a minute. OK.

SHEFFIELD: It was because of competition. Competition because of the  plans -- 

GARAMENDI: I`m sorry, but you don`t win an argument by keeping talking.  Listen carefully. Medicare Part D expenses are exploding. Most recently  in this week`s newspaper in reports this week, Medicare Part D, prices are  going through the roof. Doctors around the nation are complaining. Cancer  doctors, oncologists are saying it is unaffordable because there is no  competition. It is all whatever the drug companies want to charge. That  is a fact. And the most and the single part of...

SHEFFIELD: And doing just fine before the Affordable Care Act. The  approval rating of seniors. Medicare Part D unrolled in 2006.

GARAMENDI: Yeah.

SHEFFIELD: The approval of seniors was in the 90s and now the Affordable  Care Act has completely disrupted the entire insurance market.

GARAMENDI: No, you`re talking about.

SHEFFIELD: I lost my doctor. The president lied to me.

GARAMENDI: Madam you`re talking about two very different things.

SHEFFIELD: He said that could keep my doctor but I did not get to keep my  doctor because of this president.

GARAMENDI: Sound bites are not going to win an argument.

SHEFFIELD: Are you saying my insurance plan is sound bites.

SCHULTZ: All right, we got leave it there. We`re up against the clock. We`ll have you both back.

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