Health Care Reform

Floor Speech

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Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, this would be the perfect moment for me to say to those who are following this debate: That is the critique of the Senator from Arizona of the Democratic bill. I would like to offer a critique of the Republican plan for health care reform, but I can't do that. It is impossible because it doesn't exist.

This bill, 2,075 pages, has been worked on for a year. It is not easy. It is complex. We have prepared a bill and brought it before the Senate. The Republican side of the aisle has had the same year and has produced nothing.

I am sorry, that is not true. They have produced press releases and speeches and charts and a handful of bills which attack sections of this bill. But they have not produced a bill that has been cleared by the Congressional Budget Office, as this one has; that will reduce the deficit; that will, in fact, reduce health care premiums for the vast majority of Americans, at least the growth in premiums. They haven't produced a bill that will mean 30 million more Americans will have health insurance. They haven't produced a bill that is going to finally give consumers a fighting chance against health insurance companies. They haven't done it. They have produced speeches and press releases. That is where we are today, after 1 full year.

Obviously, the other side of the aisle is happy with the current system of health care and doesn't want to change it. If they did, they would offer a comprehensive health care reform bill. They failed to do that. They have come before us and said: We have a lot of our own bills. We call them Republican bills. Not any of those bills have been subjected to the kind of scrutiny this bill has been subjected to by the Congressional Budget Office. They may have good ideas. I can't say that they do or don't. But by and large, they are just taking potshots at this bill because they don't have a bill.

You listen to the Senator from Arizona. He talks about taxes. He fails to mention one or two critically important things.

First, this bill has $441 billion in tax cuts in the first 10 years for average people trying to pay their health insurance premiums. I don't know if the Senator from Arizona thinks that is a good idea or not. He has never spoken to that, at least that I have heard. I think it is a good idea. If you are making less than $80,000 a year, we want to make sure you have insurance, and this bill wants to make sure we give you a helping hand. It is a tax cut.

Secondly, this bill provides tax relief for small businesses with fewer than 25 employees.

Those are ``mom and pop'' small businesses, where they find it hard to buy insurance, and it is expensive when they find it. This bill gives a tax break to those businesses. So when the Senator comes up and speaks about this little tax and that little tax, he fails to step back and look at the big picture. The big picture is this bill changes health care in a positive way. It keeps the good things we have in America's health care system, but it changes some of the things that need to be changed.

This bill makes health insurance more affordable, and that is something every American wants. I have yet to hear a proposal from the other side of the aisle which does that--certainly nothing that has been subject to the scrutiny of the Congressional Budget Office.

This bill also expands health insurance to 94 percent of the American population. That is an all-time high. We have never had that many people insured in America.

The Senator from Arizona just talked about a tax on medical devices. Why would industries such as the hospital industry or the medical device industry or the pharmaceutical industry agree to pay more money to the government as part of this? For one very simple and fundamental reason: 30 million more Americans will have health insurance. They will be using more medical devices and paying for them with their insurance policies. They will be using more pharmaceuticals. More hospitals will get paid instead of relying on charity care.

So many of these providers have stepped up to us and said: If the goal is to expand the base of people insured paying into the system, our industry, which provides medical services, medical devices, and that sort of thing, is willing to participate, to come up with the money to make this work. That is the part the Senator from Arizona did not make a note of, and he should have. It is a very critical and important part of this.

So I would say that although none of us like to see taxes increased, if at the end of the day we believe our health insurance premiums will come down, that more Americans are going to have the peace of mind of health insurance; if they believe at the end of the day there will be more people insured and paying for more services, you can understand why the health care industry is participating in this conversation about this bill.

As for the tax cuts, for those making $80,000 a year or less, I think it is a good idea. It is one of the biggest tax cut packages we have had, and we pay for it.

This bill will generate a surplus in the Treasury in the first 10 years of $130 billion, in the second 10 years of another $650 billion. It is the biggest deficit-reduction bill ever considered on the floor of the Senate, according to the Congressional Budget Office, and the Republicans have nothing to offer which comes even close to that.

This is a rare Sunday session. The rest of the day will be spent with speeches like this on the Senate floor about this issue. But I can tell you, we have never considered one more important. This is an issue which touches every American, every American family, and every American business. We have worked long and hard to bring this to the floor. I know it is not perfect; no bill ever is. But it is a good-faith effort that has gone through the scrutiny of the Congressional Budget Office.

For the critics on the other side--and there are many--my first question to each and every one of them is, Where is your comprehensive health care reform plan? Where is a plan that has gone through the scrutiny and review that this plan has gone through? The answer is, it does not exist.

So I welcome their critique, but I understand it is a critique without an alternative.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

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