MSNBC "Hardball With Chris Matthews" - Transcript
Interview
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Let"s start with the health care debate. Senator Bob Menendez, a New Jersey Democrat, and Senator John Barrasso"s a Wyoming Republican.
Gentlemen, I want to listen to something from the old days. This isn"t a million years ago, this is two years ago, Ted Kennedy debating the children"s health care bill. Let"s listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. TED KENNEDY (D), MASSACHUSETTS: Your taxpayers" money is paying for 72 percent of our health care coverage costs! Do we understand that? Now, for those that are saying, Well, I"m not going to support this because it costs too much, I"m not going to support this because it may be 300 percent of poverty--we get paid $160,000. We are well above the 200, the 300, the 400 percent of poverty level. And yet we"re going to have members on the floor of the Senate this afternoon who are going to turn thumbs down to American families that are watching the debate and discussion, and knowing that our premiums, our health insurance, is being paid for by the American taxpayers.
I wonder how people do that, myself. I wonder how they do it. You"d think if they"re so offended about federal government spending, or a federal government program, that they wouldn"t use it themselves. But no, they do. They"ll take it!
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MATTHEWS: Senator Menendez, you know, when you watch this debate on television, as we do every night, it"s very hard to keep track of the main passions here, the main reasons why Democrats disagree with Republicans. Democrats want a national health program with government involvement. Republicans are averse to any major government involvement. You don"t hear Ted Kennedy"s voice, you hear a lot of Mickey Mouse between Lieberman and McCain and the outliers who are just causing trouble here. Where are the passions going to be heard from so we know why we want this bill again, Senator Menendez?
SEN. BOB MENENDEZ (D), NEW JERSEY: Well, first of all, Ted Kennedy was not only passionate but a lion in the Senate and a conscience of the Senate. And so we certainly miss his voice in this debate. But there"s a lot of--there"s a lot of passion going on in our caucus in support of the reform because we know what it is to bring millions of people who have health insurance and make that health insurance stop double-digit premium increases. We know what it is to bring millions of people who go to sleep every night worried that they have no health insurance and now will have health insurance. We understand what it means to change from a system that"s based on disease to a system that"s preventive, that we can get to people earlier and improve the quality of their lives and ultimately save money, as well.
So that"s why we"re in this struggle, and we"d only wish our Republican colleagues would join us in that passion, as well.
MATTHEWS: Dr. Barrasso, Senator Barrasso, what do you make of this debate? Has this been a philosophical debate or has this been Mickey Mouse, with people like Lieberman causing all the trouble and just basically screwing up the works? That"s what it sounds like to the person watching this, Lieberman waiting until the last second to say, Oh, no, I"m going to do that. I may have said that two, three months ago about a Medicare buy-in, but I"ve changed my mind.
SEN. JOHN BARRASSO ®, WYOMING: To the people who are watching this and who"ve taken part in the NBC poll, they are furious. Only 32 percent, less than one in three Americans, support what the Democrats are trying to cram through before Christmas. The American people said, Wait a second, you"re going to cut $500 billion from Medicare, raise taxes by $50 billion and cause my health insurance premiums to go up? And for what purpose? To put more people on Medicaid and unfunded mandates to the states, where it"s like giving people a bus ticket when a bus never comes? It"s very hard for people on Medicaid to get to see doctors in this country.
So you look at this whole plan, this is Rahm Emanuel, do it in secrecy and do it with speed, and it"s not what the American people want. And certainly, on a bill that none of us have seen--you"ve worked on the Hill, Chris. You know what it is. People here, at least the Republicans, are interested in reading the bill before we vote on it. Maybe the Democrats don"t care about knowing what"s in the bill that has changed up and down, in and out. I want to know what"s in the bill, and so do the American people, because even Dick Durbin said he doesn"t know what"s in the final version of the bill.
MATTHEWS: You know...
MENENDEZ: This bill"s been...
MATTHEWS: ... I"ve watched...
MENENDEZ: You know, this bill"s been out there for weeks. We have been debating it on the floor of the House--of the United States Senate for weeks. We have been debating it in committee, both in the Health Committee and the Finance Committee, for weeks before that. Overwhelmingly, people know what"s in this bill. And you know, with all due respect to my colleague, I think he must be looking at a different piece of legislation than I do.
BARRASSO: I"m just looking at Dick Durbin...
(CROSSTALK)
MENENDEZ: I"m looking at the reality that you all know what"s in it because you keep talking about your version of it. The reality is, is that what we have here is a bill that lowers costs, covers millions of people, and at the same time, does it in a way that reduces the debt, according to the Congressional Budget Office, and is fully paid for, not by the taxes that John keeps talking about and that other of our colleagues keep talking about, but primarily through industry-driven resources, as well as through savings that John McCain and others have talked about and heralded in their last presidential campaign.
(CROSSTALK)
BARRASSO: ... the budget office says the price of the cost of care is going to go up, the quality is not going to improve. People across America say, Hey, the quality I get right now is better if we don"t change anything. And they all believe, and I think rightfully so, that what they"re personally going to have to pay in taxes and in insurance premiums is going to be higher now than--if this bill passes than it would be if we did nothing, Chris.
MENENDEZ: The rates will continue to rise, double-digit premium growth. If we do nothing, it will double in eight years. That"s unsustainable for businesses, unsustainable for families who have to pay for it, unsustainable for the federal government in terms of its debt. And certainly, for millions of Americans...
MATTHEWS: OK...
MENENDEZ: ... who go to sleep every night and don"t have anything, this has got to be a hell of a lot better than what they have right now.
BARRASSO: And this is a job killer...
MATTHEWS: Senator Barrasso...
BARRASSO: ... that"s going to kill 1.6 million jobs in America over the next four years if this goes through, Chris.
MATTHEWS: You know, Senator Barrasso, the Republicans are very good at playing defense, and they wait for the Democrats to come out with a health care bill every once in a while. But it seems like they"re the party that really tries to insure the country, the whole country, really trying to go for universal coverage. Since Roosevelt, the Democrats have wanted something where all Americans would have a chance to be covered for health insurance and not have to end up in the emergency room.
Your party"s very good at finding mistakes on the Democratic side, but every time the Democrats don"t come up with a plan, you don"t either.
BARRASSO: I told you what we need to do...
MATTHEWS: The Republicans never have a plan for universal college, have you? Have you ever come out...
BARRASSO: The last time...
(CROSSTALK)
BARRASSO: ... we need health care reform. I told you last time I was on...
MATTHEWS: When are you going to come out with a proposal?
BARRASSO: ... we need 12 million people who can get insurance if they can just buy across state lines.
MATTHEWS: All right. OK.
BARRASSO: Why are they preventing that? They would buy insurance today, 12 million more Americans would be covered, if we just allowed them to buy insurance across state lines. Can"t do it.
MATTHEWS: You know, you don"t have a plan for universal coverage, do you?
BARRASSO: Not for universal coverage.
MATTHEWS: OK.
BARRASSO: But we have plans to help keep the cost of control under--for health care--and that was how this all started. That"s what the president said.
MATTHEWS: OK.
BARRASSO: We need to get the costs...
MATTHEWS: OK, well the American people...
BARRASSO: ... under control. This bill explodes...
MATTHEWS: ... want universal coverage.
(CROSSTALK)
MATTHEWS: Gentlemen, I"m sorry to keep this going too fast here, but you"re both pretty clear in what you"re saying. But let"s look at the exchange on the Senate floor yesterday between Senator Lieberman of Connecticut and Senator Franken, who was in the chair. He"s from Minnesota.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. JOE LIEBERMAN (I), CONNECTICUT: ... will provide an opportunity for broad savings in health care and health insurance for pretty much everybody in our country...
SEN. AL FRANKEN (D), MINNESOTA: Senator? The senator has spoken for
I"m sorry. The senator has spoken for 10 minutes.
LIEBERMAN: I wonder if I could ask unanimous consent for just an additional moment.
FRANKEN: In my capacity as senator from Minnesota, I object.
LIEBERMAN: Really? Oh, OK. I don"t take it personally.
FRANKEN: Good.
LIEBERMAN: I will ask--I will ask unanimous consent that the remainder of my remarks be included in the record as if read.
FRANKEN: Without objection.
LIEBERMAN: I thank the chair.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MATTHEWS: Well, one senator did take that personally. Here"s John McCain, the senator from Arizona, reacting to what we just saw today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. JOHN MCCAIN ®, ARIZONA: I"ve been around here for more than 20 years. Yesterday, on the floor of the Senate, the senator from Connecticut was finishing up his remarks, and as we always do, ever since I"ve been here, as we always do, he said, I"d like an extra minute to finish my remarks. And it was objected to by the newest member of the United States Senate in the most brusque way. That"s how the comedy in this body has deteriorated. We"ve got to stop--we"ve got to stop this kind of behavior. I"ve never seen anything like that. And I hope that I don"t see it again.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MATTHEWS: Well, Senator Barrasso, what do you make of what we saw there?
BARRASSO: Well, I"ve only been here for two years, but last night, when we came back in at midnight, Senator Franken was in the chair and he introduced me as the guest chaplain to give the prayer. So hopefully, we can have some bipartisanship here.
MATTHEWS: Well, really?
BARRASSO: I want to work with others. I want to work to find solutions for health care. But this bill that we"re--are still waiting to see doesn"t do it. I worked in the Wyoming state Senate, where we worked together and came to solutions. If you"re going to change one sixth of the economy of this country, Chris, and you"re going to affect every American personally, which is what health care does, you need a program that is bipartisan and supported by many, many members. That"s the way you get a program to succeed in a way to also help keep costs under control. And this is not the way to do it. It"s a lot easier to get 60 percent of 100 votes...
MATTHEWS: OK...
BARRASSO: ... than have to be forced into...
MATTHEWS: Let me...
(CROSSTALK)
MATTHEWS: Senator Menendez, what"s going on here with McCain, with John McCain?
MENENDEZ: Oh, well, first of all, as it relates to that--well, with John McCain, I don"t know because I was on the floor the other day and he made comments impugning the purpose of why I was going to debate a certain amendment. So I"m not quite sure, when he talks about comedy, what we"re talking about.
But the bottom line is, what"s going on here--we are on the 98th filibuster of this year, a historical record. That record was broken months ago. And all that is, is to--the Republicans have made a decision that their road to electoral victory next year in 2010, and positioning themselves for 2012, is for this president and this Congress to fail.
Now, as a political tactic, one might look at it and say, Well, I understand it. But the problem is, it"s not about the president or Democrats in Congress failing, it"s about the country failing. And you can"t talk about bipartisanship when even for the defense appropriation bill, which is to take care of the men and women in the field today in terms of their pay and their health care and the equipment that they need, we have to go through filibusters, including a 1:00 AM vote earlier this morning, a 7:00 AM vote tomorrow, simply because they want to slow the whole process as it relates to health care.
You don"t hold our men and women hostage to health care debate when they, in fact, are in the field defending us. And it"s really not acceptable, but this is their political tactic.
MATTHEWS: OK.
BARRASSO: And I met with the men and women in the field in Kuwait on Thanksgiving Day, held a town hall meeting, and they said, I want to make sure there"s a job available for me from our National Guard...
MATTHEWS: OK...
BARRASSO: ... when I get home. Why aren"t you focused on the economy and the debt and the spending? Why aren"t you focused on jobs instead of spending your time on a health care bill that we can wait on. Focus today on the economy. That"s what the American people are concerned about.
MATTHEWS: You know, Senator Barrasso...
(CROSSTALK)
MATTHEWS: ... and Senator Menendez being honest in saying that you guys are using dilatory practices to slow down consideration of a final vote on health care? Is your party leadership or is it not using dilatory practices to slow down this so that the Democrats can"t reach the pre-Christmas deadline they"ve set for themselves?
(CROSSTALK)
BARRASSO: Why would you set an arbitrary deadline for something that"s going to affect every person in the United States personally and one sixth of the economy? Arbitrary deadlines are foolish. What we need to do is get this right. I want to see the bill. The Republicans want to see the bill. I"m surprised the Democrats aren"t asking to see the bill. Evan Bayh said, Hey, they"re asking me to vote something...
MATTHEWS: OK...
BARRASSO: ... I haven"t seen it yet. When are we--when are the people of America going to get to see what we"re being asked to vote upon and then have a chance to visit with their elected representatives and give some input?
MENENDEZ: This bill has been...
BARRASSO: When is that going to--when"s that going to happen?
MENENDEZ: ... out on the Internet since the day it was presented...
(CROSSTALK)
MENENDEZ: ... when, in fact, the amendment is offered to add onto the bill, that will be posted on the Internet. Everybody will be able to read it. The Senate will debate it and we will move forward. But this is not about health insurance, for the Republicans. This is not about covering millions who don"t have health insurance. This is not about bending the cost curve. This is about protecting the special interests and it is also about having this president and this Congress...
MATTHEWS: OK, thank you...
MENENDEZ: ... fail at any cost.
BARRASSO: The 2,074-page bill bends the cost curve up.
MATTHEWS: OK...
BARRASSO: Costs are going to be up.
MATTHEWS: OK...
BARRASSO: It"s going to be much more expensive, Chris.
MATTHEWS: The Republicans--thank you, Senator Menendez, and thank you, Senator Barrasso.
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