MSNBC "The Rachel Maddow Show" - Transcript

Interview

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Joining us now is Democratic Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota.

Senator Klobuchar, thank you very much for joining us tonight.

SEN. AMY KLOBUCHAR (D), MINNESOTA: Well, thank you. Some holiday cheer to you with that lead-in, Rachel.

MADDOW: Let me ask you if you feel like everything is still on schedule? If you think the vote really will happen at 7:00 a.m.?

KLOBUCHAR: I think it will be. I"m putting on my mukluks, my Viking cap and getting there at 7:00 a.m. I think that we will have a vote. And this is, of course, historic moment to be there when we had the 1:00 a.m. vote a few days ago and had Vicki Kennedy sitting there watching--as she said in the piece she wrote in "The Washington Post," when this is finally done, the American people will wonder why did this take so long.

And, of course, we"re going to se these last-minute attacks, you always see them, you"re going to see them through the first few months. I kind of liken them in the Christmas spirit to reindeer games where they"re getting their all antlers tied up.

But, in fact, you know and I know that saving Medicare is a major piece of this bill. If we do nothing, if we just put our head in the snow bank, Medicare will go in the red by 2017. And my mom who"s 82 wants to live well into her 90s and beyond. People who are 55 want to get Medicare when they"re 65. And if we do nothing, and we just go down this path, we will be in trouble.

And that"s why--I guess, I come from Minnesota and I look at some of the independent studies that show you can get Mayo Clinic-type care in other parts of the country for cheaper, and it"s just counterintuitive, but some of the highest cost part of the country, highest cost Medicare, has some of the lowest quality care. In fact, one study showed that if you just use the protocol Mayo uses for chronically ill-patients, you"d save $50 billion just for that every five years, if other hospitals use that protocol.

So, I"m actually excited about the possibility that we can have that kind of higher quality care in other parts of the country, save Medicare, and fill the doughnut hole so our seniors aren"t having to foot the bill for expensive prescription drugs.

MADDOW: In terms of the conservative strategy and the Republican strategy against this, I think we"re seeing health--death panels come back and this other sort of conspiratorial stuff come back, I"m guessing because Republicans and conservatives are really hoping that what happened in August, in terms of people being really riled up and scared about health reform, opposing it almost to the point of violence during those town hall meetings that happened in so many parts of the country over August, I think they"re hoping that"s going to happen over the holiday break as well.

Do you think that that"s likely to be true?

KLOBUCHAR: You know, there has been so much misinformation out there, and there still is and so much in misinformation. But I still think that the American people do agree that they know we need to reduce costs and we need to be smart about it. We need to make sure that that stable care is in place.

Look at the benefits people can see from this bill, and a lot of them have been moved up. Immediately after the bill is signed, if your kid gets sick, they"re not going to be kicked off your health insurance. You can keep kids on your health insurance until they"re 26 years old.

As I mentioned, the doughnut hole would be filled so seniors can get some help with paying for their prescription drugs.

There won"t be lifetime caps on benefits.

All of these things will happen in the first year or so of this bill. That is a major change and something that the American people have wanted for a listening time.

So, the misinformation will continue and when we think about this whole notion they"ve cooked up with the death panels, to me what this is about is really people being able to have control over their own care, putting the patients in the drivers seat, being able to talk to my doctor and say, "Well, what are my options?" You can have this surgery, or you can have this kind of treatment and patient should be able to decide. And that"s what this bill is all about.

MADDOW: As you say, some of those insurance reforms are going to go into effect right away. But the big reform, of course, is the creation of the exchanges and the subsidies for people to be able to purchase insurance, subsidies from the government. That"s not going to happen for quite a long time. And as the Senate bill gets merged with the House bill, the House actually proposes that it happens a year earlier than it does in the Senate.

Do you think that it"s possible that the House timeline might be adopted?

KLOBUCHAR: I really hope so. I think there"s some good things in the Senate bill. There"s more cost reforms that I really want to see, and things that are in the House bill that move up some of these benefits are also very good.

And you also have to remember that these exchanges, some of the small business tax credits that we added in the Senate that really help to defray 35 percent of employee health care costs for small businesses, those start right in 2011.

So, by melding these two bills, I think we could get a very good final product. But there are still a lot of work that needs to be done.

MADDOW: One Minnesota question for you. As a senator, your constituents include all of the constituents of Michele Bachmann, and Michele Bachmann has been one of the members of Congress who"s been most responsible for advancing some of the most conspiratorial and in many cases, totally untrue things about health reform, including death panel idea--as you just heard in the introduction.

What do you--what do you think is going on with her in terms of her politics on health reform? And how do you reach across the Michele Bachmann divide to reach those constituents who are also yours?

KLOBUCHAR: Well, you"d have to talk to her. Hopefully, she"ll come on your show sometime, Rachel.

MADDOW: Yes, sure.

KLOBUCHAR: You never know. You can dream.

MADDOW: I dream.

KLOBUCHAR: Put a little wish in your stocking.

OK. But what I do think, I will talk about her constituents. They are very cost-conscious. They"re very focused on making sure that we"re not adding to the deficit. And one of the good things about this bill, $132 billion saved in the first 10 years, $1.3 trillion on the next 10 years saved on the deficit.

I wouldn"t be for this bill if it added to the deficit. We can"t afford to do that. And so, health reform is one of the main ways that we can go toward reducing some of the costs in our country that have been really dragging us down.

Sixty billion dollars a year wasted on Medicare fraud. Checks that should be going to help our seniors have been going to conman that set up store and shops and storefronts that say, you know, "doctor" and there"s no doctor there. They"re stealing the money.

This bill has increased criminal penalties for Medicare fraud. It actually allows for giving out of this antiquated system and do direct deposit. And the people in Minnesota and in her district, and really, throughout our state, are very focused on bringing down the cost of government, looking at smarter ways to do things, and there are many things in this bill that lead us in that direction and begin us--to begin the path of more affordable health care and reducing some of these unnecessary costs.

MADDOW: Democratic Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, who we"ll be watching for in mukluks and a Viking hat tomorrow at 7:00 a.m.

KLOBUCHAR: That"s right.

MADDOW: Good luck tomorrow morning.

KLOBUCHAR: OK. Thank you, Rachel. Have a very Merry Christmas.

MADDOW: You, too. Cheers!

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