Service Members Home Ownership Tax Act Of 2009--Motion To Proceed

Floor Speech

SERVICE MEMBERS HOME OWNERSHIP TAX ACT OF 2009--MOTION TO PROCEED -- (Senate - November 21, 2009)

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Mr. BENNET. Madam President, I would like to first thank the Senator from Vermont for his excellent remarks in support of what is, after all, just a vote to get us started on the debate on health care, a procedural vote to allow us to be able to amend and improve the bill in the coming weeks.

Madam President, virtually every single Member of this body in the Senate is a Member of the baby boom generation. In my view, it is a generation of Americans--I was born in the last year of that generation--given more opportunity than any generation of people in the history of this planet because our grandparents and our parents were willing to make hard choices, understanding that part of our national creed, part of our legacy is assuring that we are expanding opportunity for those who come after us.

We are having this health care debate at a moment in our country's history beset by incredible economic difficulties. This is the worst recession since the Great Depression. But we now know even during the period of economic growth before our economy fell into this terrible recession that working families were struggling.

During the last period of economic growth, median family income in the United States actually declined. As far as I know, it was the first period of recovery in the history of the United States when median family income actually went down. It was at the same time the cost of health insurance was soaring--in my State by 97 percent--with the cost of higher education in my State going up by 50 percent.

We were saying to working families: You are living in an economy with incredible weakness, where the growth is surging ahead of a mountain of debt, but you are not getting ahead.

Just this week, we learned that in the great State of California they are increasing the tuition for their universities by 30 percent. The University of California, the California system has been the envy of the world for decades, and now it is being put out of the reach of working families.

So we have much to do--much to do--to make sure we honor the legacy of our parents and our grandparents. We honor the legacy of the ``greatest
generation'' and this generation, the baby boom generation, to ensure that we leave behind us not diminished opportunity but more opportunity for our kids and our grandkids.

There is much we need to do to make sure we have a health care system that works not just for a few people but for everyone, an education system that works not just for a few kids but for everyone, and that we have an economy in the United States that values the contribution that everybody can make.

My sense in this health care debate is that the people of my State--and I know people around the country--are deeply dissatisfied with business as usual. They hate the current system. They know it is not working for them and their families. They know they are not able to make the choices they need to make to have stability for their families so they can get ahead economically.

But, on the other hand, they are deeply worried about our capacity to make it worse. It is hard to blame people when you hear the special interests' rhetoric coming out of

Washington, DC, or when you turn on your cable television set at night and watch what people have to say. You can understand why people are concerned that we have the capacity to make it worse.

But that is why I am so pleased about the piece of legislation the majority leader has brought before us. We have never been closer to reforming our health care system, so we can address runaway health care costs, enact insurance reform, construct stability and predictability in health care for families and small businesses.

The Senate legislation before us is that promising new way forward. Coloradans, as I said, have not been shy at all about letting me know about their views of the current system and what their concerns are about what we might do.

Like people across the country, they know the current system does not work for them. But they are worried, as I said a minute ago, that we are going to make it even worse.

This bill represents a substantial improvement over business as usual. I congratulate the majority leader for listening to not just a small group of people but to people across the aisle, to people all across the country in crafting this piece of legislation.

First of all, the most important principle of the bill is that it is paid for. We already had about $5 trillion of debt when the last President became President. We are now at $12 trillion. There has been an unbelievable spike between 2000 and today. We have put an enormous burden--as the father of three young girls, I feel this very personally and very keenly--an enormous burden on our kids and our grandkids.

Our debt is now $12 trillion. Our entire gross domestic product--our entire economy--is $14 trillion. Our deficit is $1.4 trillion, 12 percent of our gross domestic product. That is utterly unsustainable. We know the biggest driver of our medium-term deficits is rising Medicare and Medicaid costs, and the biggest driver of those is rising health care costs.

This bill, unlike Medicare Part D--a very worthy program passed during the last administration--this bill is paid for. That drug program for seniors was not paid for. Instead of paying for it, instead of making hard choices, what we said to our kids and our grandkids was: You pay the bill. By the way, that is what we have said about tax cuts. That is what we have said about the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. We have to put an end to this. This bill at least starts to head us in the right direction. It does not fix our fiscal crisis, but it is an important step forward.

As I mentioned a few minutes ago, for working families, the current system has been a complete disaster, as their income has remained flat or gone down, as their health care premiums have gone up by 97 percent. Even though there is a lot of conflict out there about what the way forward should be, about a specific policy choice here versus a specific policy choice there, I can tell you, one thing everyone in my State agrees with is that their health care has not improved by 97 percent over the last 10 years. They are paying more and getting less. Coverage is getting weaker, as it gets more expensive.

Small businesses are getting crippled by the system we have today. They pay 18 percent more than large businesses to cover their employees, just because they are small. Sometimes people say to me: Well, Michael, don't you know that is because the pool of employees is smaller? It is harder to spread the risk. I say: I understand that. But as a businessperson, from a business perspective, that is ridiculous--the idea that a small businessperson, trying to execute their business plan, trying to execute their vision to grow their business, is going to spend 18 percent more for something and not get 18 percent more productivity out of it, or not get 18 percent, in this case, better health care coverage out of it. In fact, the reverse is true. It is ridiculous.

By the way, one of the things that is interesting to me about this debate over a public option is that people do not seem to understand what is actually happening before our eyes. As the costs of insurance are going up every year, few and fewer people are able to get insurance through their employer, fewer and fewer employers are able to offer insurance to their employees, which is heartbreaking for many of our small business owners because these are family businesses that for years have provided health insurance to their employees. They view it as part of their pact with their employees to help them get ahead. But they cannot do it. So they are dropping them from the rolls.

Where are these folks ending up, those who are now uninsured? Well, two places: Medicaid, if they are poor enough, or in the emergency room, getting covered with uncompensated care that we, the taxpayers, are paying for.

We have a public option. It is the least intentional and most expensive public option you can imagine. When we are talking about the changes we are making here, we need to understand what is going on in the daily lives of people all across our country.

The figures we have from the Congressional Budget Office show that this bill will reduce the deficit, not add to it, will cut our deficits over the first 10 years by $130 billion, over the next 10 years by $650 billion. That is $780 billion.

One thing we know about those numbers is they are not going to turn out to be exactly accurate. But here is the goods news: The CBO is unable to score the benefit of prevention. They are unable to score the benefit of wellness. They are unable to score or focus on primary care instead of emergency room care. There is good reason for that because that comes down to execution--how well is the program implemented. Those of us who are proponents of reform carry a very heavy burden to make sure the execution is good and that we carry this through. But the good news is, if we do a good job, we will save money.

I want to say a word about Medicare because there has been a lot of discussion from people who are opposed to reform who are saying we are cutting Medicare. They are saying we are hurting seniors. But what they will not tell you is that the worst possible scenario is not taking action now on critical Medicare reform. As I said earlier, and said in many speeches, our Medicare Program, on its current path, is headed for fiscal crisis.

Policy experts on both sides of the aisle have said we need to reform our Medicare delivery system. We need to stop basing payments on every procedure and every test. Instead, we should look at successful models such as our own Denver Health, the Rocky Mountain Health System, and the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota. We know they have better quality and better outcomes, not just for seniors but for everyone.

This bill builds on what works locally. That means protecting the guaranteed Medicare benefits for every senior, and for years to come. It improves Medicare solvency. We make sure doctors will not see a 20-percent cut in their payments. It makes the entire Medicare system more affordable and will save taxpayer dollars.

Critics say no to reform. They are content with a system that pays by the test, test after test, instead of outcomes and patient-centered care. That approach will assure that Medicare is bankrupt by 2017. We need to do better than that for seniors. We need to protect Medicare.

Included in this health care reform bill is a version of a bill I introduced
based on great work being done in Colorado. It is called the Medicare Care Transitions Act. We looked at the $17 billion Medicare was spending on hospital readmissions. Currently, one out of every five patients leaves the hospital and returns within the same month. We looked at places in Denver and Grand Junction where the readmission rates are 2 percent compared to the national rate at 20 percent. What we saw was that they coordinate care. As people go from place to place, these health care systems track where they go with a system of electronic medical records, what medications they use, what doctors they see. They focus on patients--on patients--when making decisions. So when we talk about these delivery systems being unnecessary, tell that to the 12 million Medicare seniors who got readmitted to the hospital within the very first month they were let out of the hospital. We owe so much more to these seniors, and we owe a lot more to the American people.

Health care reform must stop the rising costs that are bankrupting working families, small businesses, and our economy. If you like your coverage, you should be able to keep it. We need to put an end to denials based on preexisting conditions. We need to give people more affordable options, including a public option. One thing is clear. Business as usual cannot be an option. The debate is bigger than politically charged issues. We have to keep our eye on the ball and not get distracted by the same old, tired, special interest politics that have kept us from reforming our health care system since Harry Truman was President.

Health care reform should not be about changing our laws on abortion. I think the House went astray when it adopted new language with unintended consequences for women. The Senate bill already makes sure we do not use taxpayer dollars to fund abortion. That is why I opposed the House Stupak language.

I want to end this morning on what I am for. I am for insurance reform. I am for making our small businesses more competitive by reining in skyrocketing health care costs. I am for reducing premiums for working families. I am for more consumer choice, including the ability to voluntarily choose a public option. By the way, one thing I have noticed is that as people start to understand they are going to be required to have health insurance as part of this plan, what they are saying is, I want all the options. I want a private option, a public option, a nonprofit option. I want to be in a position to make the best decision for my family.

I am for reform that squeezes our wasteful spending so we can reduce our deficits in the long term. Throughout this entire debate, my focus has been on our working families and small businesses. There is plenty in this bill for you.

The time for talking is over. We should pass this bill. But tonight what we should do is make sure we allow the Senate to debate the bill, to improve the bill. There are things in this bill I want to change and things I want to make better in the coming weeks. But I believe that if we pass this reform, we will have taken a very important step forward to saying we are here to honor the legacy of our parents and our grandparents. We are here to say as one generation to the next that we are going to carry that legacy forward and make sure we are making the hard decisions to provide more opportunity for you, not less. This is only one step of that.

I mentioned education earlier. I mentioned our economy earlier. My hope is that in this debate, what we can do is begin to learn how to set the special interests aside for the benefit of the American people. If we can do that, there is not a doubt in my mind that we will honor our grandparents' legacy.

Thank you, Madam President. I yield the floor.

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