Tax Extenders Act Of 2009

Floor Speech

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Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, most Americans breathed a sigh of relief in January when it looked like the Democrats' partisan plan for health care was done for. Most people saw the outcome of the Massachusetts Senate race as an opportunity to start over on what they wanted, which is a step-by-step plan that would target costs without raising taxes or insurance premiums, without cutting Medicare, and without using taxpayer dollars to cover the cost of abortions.

Unfortunately, the proponents of this plan are still determined to force this distorted vision of health care reform on a public who is already overwhelmingly opposed to it. So this afternoon the President will outline yet another version of the Democratic health care plan we have been hearing about all year long. The sales pitch may be new, but the bill is not.

We got a preview of the administration's new sales pitch yesterday in a letter from the President, in which he said he is now willing to incorporate a few Republican ideas into the Democratic bill. But this is not what the American people are asking for.

Americans do not want us to tack a few good ideas onto a bill that reshapes one-sixth of the economy, vastly expands the role of government, and which raises taxes and cuts Medicare to pay for all of it. They want us to scrap the underlying bill--scrap it altogether--and start over with step-by-step reforms that target cost and expand access.

This whole exercise is unfortunate and completely unnecessary. It is also a disservice to the American people. The fact is, the longer the Democrats cling to their own flawed vision of reform, the longer Americans will have to wait for the reforms they want.

Last week's health care summit could have served as the basis for a series of step-by-step reforms that both parties could support and which the general public would embrace. Unfortunately, Democrats in Washington have decided to press ahead on the same kind of massive bill they were pushing before the summit. Even worse, they now seem willing to go to any length necessary--any length necessary--to force the bill through Congress.

Well, Americans do not know how else to say it: They do not want the massive bill. It is perfectly clear. They want commonsense, bipartisan reforms that lower costs, and they want us to refocus our energy on creating jobs and the economy. They have had enough of this year-long effort to get a win for the Democratic Party at any price to the American people. Americans have paid a big enough price already in the time we have lost focusing on this bill.

They do not want it, and they will not tolerate any more backroom deals or legislative schemes to force it through Congress on a partisan basis. History is clear: Big legislation always requires big majorities. This latest scheme to lure Democrats into switching their votes in the House by agreeing to use reconciliation in the Senate will be met with outrage.

So we respectfully encourage the administration to consider a new approach to reform, one that does not cut Medicare to fund a trillion-dollar takeover of the health care system or impose job-killing taxes in the middle of a recession, and one that will win the support of broad majorities in both parties. We encourage the administration to join Republicans and Democrats in Congress in listening to what the American people have been telling us for more than a year now.

At the risk of being redundant, here is what they are saying: Americans are telling us to scrap the bills they have already rejected and start over with commonsense, step-by-step reforms we can all agree on. Now is not the time to repeat the same mistakes that brought us here. It is time to listen to the people and to start over.

I yield the floor.

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