Lamar Alexander

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, there is a way to do this if we want to head in a different direction. I yield the floor. Exhibit 1 [From the Washington Post, Aug. 5, 2009] How We Can Achieve Bipartisan Health Reform (By Ron Wyden and Robert F. Bennett) We refuse to let partisanship kill health reform--and we are proof that it doesn't have to. As 12 U.S. senators from both sides of the aisle who have widely varying philosophies, we offer a concrete demonstration that it is possible to find common ground and pass real health reform this year. The process has been rocky, and slower than many had hoped. But the reports of the death of bipartisan health reform have been greatly exaggerated. Now is the time to resuscitate it, before the best opportunity in years is wasted. Democratic activists have long campaigned for universal coverage and quality benefits. Republican activists zero in on empowering individuals and bringing market forces to the health-care system. Our approach does both. In our discussions on the Healthy Americans Act, each side gave a bit on some of its visions of perfect health reform to achieve bipartisanship. The Democrats among us accepted an end to the tax-free treatment of employer-sponsored health insurance; instead, everyone--not just those who currently get insurance through their employer--would get a generous standard deduction that they would use to buy insurance--and keep the excess if they buy a less expensive policy. The Republicans agreed to require all individuals to have coverage and to provide subsidies where necessary to ensure that everyone can afford it. Most have agreed to require employers to contribute to the system and to pay workers wages equal to the amount the employer now contributes for health care. The Congressional Budget Office has reported that this framework is the only one thus far that bends the health-care cost curve down and makes it possible for the new system to pay for itself. It does this by creating a competitive market for health insurance in which individuals are empowered to choose the best values for their money and by cutting administrative costs and spreading risk across large groups of Americans. First, we allow all Americans to have the same kind of choices available to us as members of Congress. Today, more than half of American workers who are lucky enough to have employer-provided insurance have no choice of coverage. Members of Congress who enroll their families in the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program often have more than 10 options. This means that if members of Congress aren't happy with their family's insurance plan in 2009 or insurers raise their rates, they can pick a better plan in 2010. Our plan would give the consumer the same leverage in the health-care marketplace by creating state-run insurance exchanges through which they can select plans, including their existing employer-sponsored plan. Beyond giving Americans choices, our approach also ensures that all Americans will be able to keep that choice. We believe that at a time when millions of Americans are losing their jobs, members of Congress must be able to promise their constituents that ``when you leave your job or your job leaves you, you can take your health care with you.'' Our approach ensures seamless portability. Our point is not that our framework is the only way to reform the system or to reach consensus. But our effort has shown that it is possible to put politics aside and reach agreement on reforms that would improve the lives of all Americans. Insisting on any particular fix is the enemy of good legislating. A package that will entirely please neither side, but on which both can agree, stands not only the strongest chance of passage but also the best chance of gaining acceptance from the American people. We didn't undertake this effort because we thought it would be easy; in fact, we started working together because we knew it would be hard. Passing health reform is going to require that we take a stand against the status quo and be willing to challenge every interest group that is jealously guarding the advantages it has under the current system, because health reform isn't about protecting the current system or preserving the advantages of a few. We can't forget that we are working on life-and-death issues facing our constituents, our families, our friends and our neighbors. It's time to stop trying to figure out what pollsters say the country wants to hear from us and focus on what the country needs from us. The American people can't afford for Congress to fail again. Exhibit 2 [From the Wall Street Journal, Aug. 5, 2009] How To Fix the Health-Care ``Wedge'' (By Arthur B. Laffer) President Barack Obama is correct when he says that ``soaring health-care costs make our current course unsustainable.'' Many Americans agree: 55% of respondents to a recent CNN poll think the U.S. health-care system needs a great deal of reform. Yet 70% of Americans are satisfied with their current health-care arrangements, and for good reason-- they work. Consumers are receiving quality medical care at little direct cost to themselves. This creates runaway costs that have to be addressed. But ill-advised reforms can make things much worse. An effective cure begins with an accurate diagnosis, which is sorely lacking in most policy circles. The proposals currently on offer fail to address the fundamental driver of health-care costs: the health-care wedge. The health-care wedge is an economic term that reflects the difference between what health-care costs the specific provider and what the patient actually pays. When health care is subsidized, no one should be surprised that people demand more of it and that the costs to produce it increase. Mr. Obama's health-care plan does nothing to address the gap between the price paid and the price received. Instead, it's like a negative tax: Costs rise and people demand more than they need. To pay for the subsidy that the administration and Congress propose, revenues have to come from somewhere. The Obama team has come to the conclusion that we should tax small businesses, large employers and the rich. That won't work because the health-care recipients will lose their jobs as businesses can no longer afford their employees and the wealthy flee. The bottom line is that when the government spends money on health care, the patient does not. The patient is then separated from the transaction in the sense that costs are no longer his concern. And when the patient doesn't care about costs, only those who want higher costs--like doctors and drug companies--care. Thus, health-care reform should be based on policies that diminish the health-care wedge rather than increase it. Mr. Obama's reform principles--a public health-insurance option, mandated minimum coverage, mandated coverage of pre-existing conditions, and required purchase of health insurance--only increase the size of the wedge and thus health-care costs. According to research I performed for the Texas Public Policy Foundation, a $1 trillion increase in federal government health subsidies will accelerate health-care inflation, lead to continued growth in health-care expenditures, and diminish our economic growth even further. Despite these costs, some 3o million people will remain uninsured. Implementing Mr. Obama's reforms would literally be worse than doing nothing. The president's camp is quick to claim that his critics have not offered a viable alternative and would prefer to do nothing. But that argument couldn't be further from the truth. Rather than expanding the role of government in the health- care market, Congress should implement a patient-centered approach to health-care reform. A patient-centered approach focuses on the patient-doctor relationship and empowers the patient and the doctor to make effective and economical choices. A patient-centered health-care reform begins with individual ownership of insurance policies and leverages Health Savings Accounts, a low-premium, high-deductible alternative to traditional insurance that includes a tax- advantaged savings account. It allows people to purchase insurance policies across state lines and reduces the number of mandated benefits insurers are required to cover. It reallocates the majority of Medicaid spending into a simple voucher for low-income individuals to purchase their own insurance. And it reduces the cost of medical procedures by reforming tort liability laws. By empowering patients and doctors to manage health-care decisions, a patient-centered health-care reform will control costs, improve health outcomes, and improve the overall efficiency of the health-care system. Congress needs to focus on reform that promotes what Americans want most: immediate, measurable ways to make health care more accessible and affordable without jeopardizing quality, individual choice, or personalized care. Because Mr. Obama has incorrectly diagnosed the problems with our health-care system, any reform based on his priorities would worsen the current inefficiencies. Americans would pay even more for lower quality and less access to care. This doesn't sound like reform we can believe in.

Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, I also ask unanimous consent that an article by Art Laffer in Wednesday's Wall Street Journal, which provides yet another reasonable option for providing health care opportunities for Americans without adding to the deficit, be printed in the Record following my remarks.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, will the Chair let me know when I have 30 seconds remaining?

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I agree with the Senator. His point is a valid one. It is not a matter or are they going to propose middle- income tax increases. In the health care plans, we already see that happening. For example, in the proposed payroll tax or jobs tax on employers to pay for the proposed health care plan coming out of the House of Representatives, there is a very large tax. It could be up to 8 percent of payroll. Quoting from the Wall Street Journal editorial of July 30: So who bears the burden of this tax? The economic research is close to unanimous that a payroll tax is tax on labor and is thus shouldered mostly if not entirely by workers. This is a middle-income tax increase already proposed. Then there is another issue that bothers me, especially as a former Governor. Our current Governor of Tennessee called it the ``mother of all unfunded mandates.'' If we add, as is proposed by both bills, another 20 million people to Medicaid--which is for low-income people, and the States help pay for that--that is more than 300,000 new people for Tennessee. The estimates we have gotten from Tennessee's department of Medicaid, TennCare, is that would cost enough money to equal the amount raised by a 5-percent new State income tax. If we actually pay doctors a sufficient amount to cause them to see these people who are dumped into Medicaid, then Tennessee would need a total of a 10-percent new State income tax. That is another middle-income tax increase.

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, a few minutes ago, I was waiting to give a television interview with MSNBC. The White House press secretary, Robert Gibbs, was on. He said a most astonishing thing. He was there, obviously, for the purpose of an impromptu press conference to correct what I thought was a truthful impression left yesterday by two members of the Obama administration. Both Mr. Summers and Mr. Geithner yesterday did not rule out the possibility of a middle-income tax increase. That was widely reported all over the country today. Apparently, they were taken to the woodshed this morning, and Mr. Gibbs was sent out to say: Oh, no, we are not going to raise taxes on middle income Americans. But that is misleading, at best, to the American people. Most people know that. An article in the New York Times on August 1, was titled: ``Obama's Pledge to Tax Only the Rich Can't Pay for Everything, Analysts Say.'' Among those quoted is Leonard Burman, ``a veteran of the Clinton administration Treasury and director of the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center.'' ``This idea,'' he says, ``that everything new that government provides ought to be paid for by the top 5 percent, that's a basically unstable way of governing.'' I am sure the Senator from Arizona remembers Isabel Sawhill's distinguished service. She had some comments on tax increases as well. ``There is no way we can pay for health care and the rest of the Obama agenda, plus get our long-term deficits under control, simply by raising taxes on the wealthy,'' said Isabel V. Sawhill, a former Clinton administration budget official. ``The middle class is going to have to contribute as well.'' I wonder if the Senator from Arizona, who is a veteran member of the Finance Committee, is surprised to see, first, the two top finance people for the Obama administration say we are not going to rule out a middle-class tax increase, and then all of a sudden today, the Obama administration says no, nope, we are going to rule that out again. What is going on?

Mr. ALEXANDER. As the Senator knows, we have heard about limited taxes before. We actually have a millionaire tax on the books, passed in 1969, 40 years ago, where 155 high-income Americans were avoiding paying Federal income tax. There was the cry: So let's tax them. And so we did. Well, today that is called the alternative minimum tax. Every year we have to change it because this year it was going to affect 28 million Americans. People who are making $46,000 or $47,000 as individuals or $70,000 filing jointly were suddenly affected by the millionaires tax. So beware of the millionaires tax because it soon catches us all. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Arizona for his time. I see Senator McCain, and I yield the remainder of my time to him. But before doing so, Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to include the August 1 New York Times article and the July 30 editorial from the Wall Street Journal, to which I referred.

Mr. ALEXANDER. The Senator makes a good point. If you are young and in America and you are forced into the health plan that is passing the House, your costs are going to go up, and that is a mandate or a tax that absolutely will go up. So the Senator is exactly right. For every young person in America who is in this plan, their health care costs are, by definition, going to go up. Their health care costs are going to go up to help pay for older Americans whose benefits, I might add, are going to go down because half of the health care plan is going to be paid for by Medicare cuts. These Medicare cuts will not make Medicare solvent, but grandma's Medicare benefits are going to be cut to help pay for this new health program. Whether it is a benefit cut or a tax increase, there are a lot of middle-income Americans who are already looking at a very big change in their economic circumstances.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Senator Kyl and I be permitted to engage in a colloquy during our time.

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, how much time is remaining?

Mr. ALEXANDER. Will the Chair please let me know when 10 minutes remain?

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, of course, all of us extend our sympathies to Congressman Young and his family. The remarks of the Senators from Alaska spoke for all of us.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, I have a statement to make about the President's nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to be Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. Even though Judge Sotomayor's political and judicial philosophy may be different from mine, especially regarding second amendment rights, I will vote to confirm her because she is well qualified by experience, temperament, character, and intellect to serve as an Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. In 2005, I said on this floor that it was wrong for then-Senator Obama and half the Democratic Senators to vote against John Roberts--a superbly qualified nominee--solely because they disagreed with what Senator Obama described as Roberts' ``overarching political philosophy'' and ``his work in the White House and the Solicitor General's Office'' that ``consistently sided'' with ``the strong in opposition to the weak.'' Today, it would be equally wrong for me to vote against Judge Sotomayor solely because she is not ``on my side'' on some issues. Courts were never intended to be political bodies composed of judges ``on your side'' who would reliably tilt your way in controversial cases. Courts are supposed to do just the opposite: decide difficult cases with impartiality. The oath Judge Sotomayor has taken twice and will take again when she is sworn in as Associate Justice of the Supreme Court says it best: . . . I will administer justice without respect to persons, and do equal right to the poor and to the rich and . . . I will faithfully and impartially discharge and perform all the duties incumbent upon me . . . under the Constitution and laws of the United States. During her confirmation hearings, Judge Sotomayor expressly rejected then-Senator Obama's view that in a certain percentage of judicial decisions, ``the critical ingredient is supplied by what is in a judge's heart . . . and [in] the depth and breadth of one's empathy.'' In answer to a question from Senator Kyl, she said in her confirmation hearing: I can only explain what I think judges should do, which is judges can't rely on what's in their heart. They don't determine the law. Congress makes the laws. The job of a judge is to apply the law. And so it's not the heart that compels conclusions in cases. It's the law. The judge applies the law to the facts before that judge. Giving broad Senate approval to obviously well-qualified nominees helps to increase the prestige of the Supreme Court and to confirm its impartiality. For that reason, until the last few years, Republican and Democratic Senators, after rigorous inquiries into the fitness of nominees, usually have given those well-qualified nominees an overwhelming vote of approval. For example, no Justice on the Supreme Court that John Roberts joined in 2005 had received more than nine negative votes. Four were confirmed unanimously. All but three Republican Senators voted for Justice Ginsburg, a former general counsel of the American Civil Liberties Union. Every single Democratic Senator voted to confirm Justice Scalia. In truly extraordinary cases, Senators, of course, reserve the prerogative, as I do, to vote no or even to vote to deny an up-or-down vote. During the 8 years I was Governor of Tennessee, I appointed about 50 judges. In doing so, I looked for the same qualities Justice Roberts and Judge Sotomayor have demonstrated: intelligence, good character, restraint, respect for law, and respect for those who came before the court. I did not ask one applicant how he or she would rule on abortion or immigration or taxation. I appointed the first female circuit judge in our State and the first African-American court chancellor and the first African-American State supreme court justice. I appointed both Democrats and Republicans. That process served our State well and helped to build respect for the independence and fairness of our judiciary. In the same way, it is my hope that my vote now will not only help to confirm a well-qualified nominee but will help to return the Senate to the practice only recently lost of inquiring diligently into qualifications of a nominee and then accepting that elections have consequences, one of which is to confer upon the President of the United States the constitutional right to nominate Justices of the Supreme Court. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record my floor remarks in support of Judge John Roberts on September 27, 2005.

Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I move to waive the applicable section of the Budget Act with respect to my amendment and ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, we have the time equally divided between now and 11:25; is that correct?

Mr. ALEXANDER. I would like to reserve the last minute of my time, if I may, for use before the vote. But I will go ahead now. I thank the managers of the bill for creating the opportunity for this vote. The American people want the government, the Federal Government, out of the auto business. I believe Democrats and Republicans in the Senate would like to have the government out of the auto business. President Obama has said he would like to have the government out of the auto business. Yet we are in the auto business in a big way for the foreseeable future unless we take some action. The taxpayers have paid almost $70 billion for 60 percent of the stock in General Motors and about 8 percent of the stock in Chrysler. My amendment is identical to legislation which is cosponsored by the distinguished Senator from Utah, Mr. Bennett, and Senator McConnell, Senator Kyl, and others. What this amendment would do, most importantly, is have the Treasury, within a year, to declare a stock dividend, which means to give the stock the government owns in General Motors and Chrysler to the 120 million Americans who pay taxes on April 15. They paid for it. They should own it. Why is that a good idea? Polls show that 95 percent of Americans disagreed ``that the government is a good overseer of corporations such as General Motors and Chrysler.'' We know that. We have seen the incestuous relationship that develops. We own the company, so we call up the managers and say: Change your dealer contracts. Don't close a warehouse in my district. Put your plant in my State. Why are you buying a battery from South Korea when you could be buying one from my congressional district? We can, and are, summoning the executives of General Motors and Chrysler to the more than 60 committees and subcommittees in Congress that have some say-so over these companies we own, one of which we own a big majority of. So the executives have to drive in their congressionally approved methods of transportation to Washington, DC, and spend time talking to us, who know nothing about building cars, but that doesn't stop us from giving them a lot of advice. Then these executives go back. During that day they have talked to us, they haven't designed or built or sold a car. We need to get the stock out of the hands of the government and into the hands of the taxpayers. Several Senators have suggested a way to do that. The simplest way is the corporate spinoff or spinout. A spinoff is a new organization or entity formed by a split from a larger one. It typically happens when we have a corporation that has a subsidiary which increasingly doesn't have any relevance to the major corporation's business, so we simply give the ownership to the owners of the major corporation. That is what Procter & Gamble did with Clorox in 1969. Procter & Gamble decided Clorox didn't have anything to do with Procter & Gamble anymore, so they gave all the stock in Clorox to the owners of Procter & Gamble. In March 2009, Time Warner gave all the stock in Time Warner Cable to the people who paid for the stock in Time Warner. In 1997, PepsiCo gave all the stock in KFC and Pizza Hut and Taco Bell to the people who own stock in PepsiCo. Why should we not do that with General Motors and Chrysler? The taxpayers paid for it. They own it. We should give the stock back to all the taxpayers who paid for it on April 15. We should stop this incestuous political meddling with major American corporations. The only alternative, other than this, is to slowly sell down the stock over a period of years. Over that time, we will meddle so much, General Motors will never survive. This is the best thing for General Motors. It is the best thing for the country. If we want to reverse this trend of Washington takeovers of banks, insurance companies, and car companies, this is the simplest thing to do. I urge colleagues to vote yes on the motion to waive the budget point of order. I yield the floor.

Mr. ALEXANDER. The Senator from Illinois made an eloquent argument about why he believes it is better for the government to run the auto companies. I believe it is better to put it in the hands of the stockholders. Those are the people who pay taxes on April 15.

Mr. ALEXANDER. If I may have an additional minute?

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I am surprised by this. I thought we all wanted to get the stock out of the government and into the hands of the taxpayers. The argument I am hearing is that the government is wiser than the marketplace, that it is dangerous to give the stock to the 120 million taxpayers who paid for it. It is their taxpayer money. They should own it. General Motors had 610 million shares before it went bankrupt and 51 percent of American families own stock. This is a classic difference of opinion. Do we want the government to run companies? Do we trust the government or do we trust the shareholders? I trust the shareholders. I urge colleagues to vote aye.

Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I want to express my disappointment that the Energy-Water appropriations bill before us today does not fully fund the administration's request for its energy innovation hubs. As my colleagues know, I have a long history of support of federal investments in science and research, and in energy research in particular. I have called for a series of ``mini-Manhattan projects'' on seven clean energy grand challenges: improving batteries for plug-in vehicles, making solar power cost competitive, making carbon capture a reality, safely recycling used nuclear fuel, perfecting advanced biofuels, designing green buildings, and providing energy from nuclear fusion. It should come as no surprise, therefore, that I am a strong supporter of the administration's proposed energy innovation hubs. In testimony earlier this year, Energy Secretary Chu has indicated that these hubs are one of his top priorities and will focus on overcoming the most significant barriers to achieving national energy and climate goals. The challenges the Secretary has asked these hubs to address are very similar to the grand challenges I outlined last year. I believe Congress and the Federal Government should tackle these seven grand scientific challenges during the next 5 years in order to put the United States firmly on the path toward clean energy independence within a generation. If we are to end our energy dependence and make renewable energy cost-competitive then we must double our investment in energy research and development. I believe the administration's hubs are a firm commitment to put us on this path to energy independence. I know the energy research community is eager to compete for this funding and to meet the challenges before our Nation. The passion and commitment of our researchers is palatable both at home in Tennessee and across the country. In fact, my home State boasts some of the finest energy researchers in the country at Oak Ridge National Laboratory as well as research institutions such as Vanderbilt and the University of Tennessee. At these institutions and similar institutions across the country, researchers are eager to make progress on these pressing issues to improve the lives of their fellow citizens and solve some of our greatest energy challenges. It is our obligation to ensure that they have the full backing and support of the U.S. Government, which means funding these energy innovation hubs. These multidisciplinary research hubs will harness the best and brightest researchers at our universities and national labs as well as in industry. Each one could very well become a world-class research facility in its given program of focus. They are conceived as highly collaborative, integrated centers of innovative thinking that will focus teams of researchers from multiple institutions on developing novel ideas to overcome major scientific and technological barriers. Their efforts will complement--not duplicate--other DOE programs such as the Energy Frontier Research Centers, EFRCs and the Advanced Projects Agency for Energy, ARPA-E, differing from these programs in their larger scale, their duration, and their breadth spanning basic and applied science as well as limited technological development efforts. Moreover, the hubs are designed so as to permit flexibility and to allow for the quick reallocation of funding within each topic area to pursue new research opportunities or alternatives quickly, as they emerge--without the delays that may impede other government programs. I recognize that the Department may not have had all the details fleshed out when they initially presented the hubs to the Congress. Despite its best efforts, the Department is not yet operating with a full staff--although I hope this situation is improving daily. But my colleagues are right to ask for a fuller explanation of this concept and its role in the greater Federal research enterprise. The funding level requested is not insignificant and deserves careful scrutiny. So I am pleased to report that additional details have now been submitted which address many of the very valid questions and concerns my colleagues have raised. I hope that this additional information will permit us to move forward with full funding for all eight hubs.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for up to 10 minutes as in morning business.

Mr. ALEXANDER. Would the Chair please let me know when I have 1 minute remaining.

Mr. ALEXANDER

Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, some friendly person is exercising his or her constitutional first amendment rights in Memphis these days running television ads urging me to vote for the health care proposal that is currently pending before Congress. That person may be wasting their money, because we are getting a fair number of calls in my Memphis office congratulating me for suggesting that we ought to slow it down and come up with a better plan. We should start over in terms of what we are doing to try to find the right way to provide health care for the American people at a cost they can afford and, at the same time, provide a government they can afford. We are going in the wrong direction. I know a lot of good effort has been put into the plan that came out of the Senate HELP Committee, and to the plans that have come out of two of the House committees and currently are being discussed in the third. But the most charitable thing I can say about it is, very well- intentioned people are working hard to try to find the best way to go in the wrong direction. When you are going in the wrong direction, is it not the best course to start over, especially when we are dealing with something as big and complex and as personal and as important as the health care of every one of 300 million of us? We all know we will only have one opportunity to get it right. And that opportunity is before us. So if we are headed in the wrong direction, let us start over and let us get it right. Who says we are headed in the wrong direction besides one Senator from Tennessee or maybe several members of the Republican Caucus? The Mayo Clinic said that in an opinion it released about 10 days ago. The Mayo Clinic is often cited as an example of what we ought to be doing more of--good results, lower costs. But it said, we are headed in the wrong direction. It did release an addenda after someone obviously called, probably from the White House, and said, what is going on here? So the Mayo Clinic said one thing the White House said did seem to be helpful, but fundamentally it said we are going in the wrong direction with the idea of a public option. A public option, as the President has said, is to help keep the insurance companies honest. That is like the President saying he is going to buy the rest of General Motors to keep Ford Motor Company honest, or to buy a drugstore to keep Walgreen's honest, or to have a government restaurant to keep O'Charley's honest. That is not the way our country works. Who else says we are headed in the wrong direction? Democratic Governors as well as Republican Governors as I mentioned here on the floor last week--the Governors of Colorado, Montana. My State Governor said, this is the mother of all unfunded mandates. These Governors are looking at the idea of dumping--I use that word carefully--another 20 million low-income Americans into a failing government-run program called Medicaid, when 40 percent of the doctors will not see Medicaid patients. The proponents of these proposals call it health reform, and then they are going to shift the cost to the States after about 5 years. The Governors are appalled by this plan. The Congressional Budget Office says we are going in the wrong direction. Senator McConnell, the Republican leader, has said that the only bipartisanship thing about the health care debate is the opposition to it. So let me take each of those points one by one. There are seven big problems with the two health care plans, one in the Senate, one in the House, that are before us. One is it flunks the first test which is reducing cost. Two, it cuts grandma's Medicare and spends it on another program. Three, it would pass big, new Medicaid costs on to the States, causing big increases in State taxes. Four, despite what the President has said--or because the President said it, there is another reason to step back and take a different direction--millions would lose their employer-provided insurance. No. 5, millions more Americans would find themselves in government- run health programs. No. 6, during a recession, we would impose new taxes and new fines on employers in order to encourage more health care. And, No. 7, with those government programs, you are more likely to wait in line and you are more likely to have your health care rationed. Let's take them one by one. Flunking the first test, reducing costs. We should start with the 250 million Americans who already have health care and make it more affordable. We know there are 47 million Americans who do not, but 5 million are college students, 10 million are noncitizens, 11 million are people making $75,000 a year or more who can probably afford it, 11 million are eligible for an existing program. Those are important things to do, but the idea here is to try to reduce the growing costs of Medicaid so you can afford your health care, and so that you can afford your government. The Congressional Budget Office said on the 17th of this month that the legislation before us significantly expands Federal responsibility for health care costs. Over the weekend, in looking at the next 10 years, the Congressional Budget Office--that is our Congressional Budget Office--said: The proposal would probably generate substantial increases in Federal budget deficits during the decade beyond the current 10-year budget window. No. 2, it cuts grandma's Medicare. The New York Times yesterday, in describing the proposal in an editorial, said: Reformers are planning to finance universal coverage in large part saving money in the traditional Medicare Program, raising the question of whether all beneficiaries will face a reduction in benefits. If we are going to cut grandma's Medicare, we ought to spend it on grandma and grandpa. We ought not to take that money from that program, which the Medicare Trustees have told us may be broke by 2017, and spend it on a new program. Then there is the third issue, expanding Medicaid and increasing State taxes. As a former Governor, I am concerned that Congress hasn't got a real sense of how this will affect States--this plan to expand one government program, a failing, embarrassing program called Medicaid, into which we dump low-income Americans, and where we are going to dump another 20 million more. This is the reason the Democratic and Republican Governors, at their meeting in Biloxi a couple weeks ago, were up in arms about this. And after 5 years, we will shift the cost of that to the States. To expand it that much, to 133 percent of the Federal poverty level, would cost our State about $423 million a year for the State share. If we really want to give people a bus ticket to a bus line that actually has buses, we will have to pay doctors more because today doctors, 40 percent of the time, don't see Medicaid patients. As a result, that adds another $600 million. That equals a 10-percent new State income tax. It is inhumane to dump low-income Americans into a failing government program. Then there are the employer taxes and fines. I have talked to a number of businesspeople. If given the choice between paying $750 per person, which the Senate plan does, or providing every single full-time and part-time employee health care, they will take the $750 a person. And where are the employees going to be? They will be out of employer health care. That is not what the President said he wanted. Where are they likely to be? A lot of them will be in these government programs, one of which is being extended and one of which is being created. Then there is the problem of waiting in line and rationing. If we create government programs with government people in between ourselves and doctors, there is more of a chance that we will be waiting in line and that we will have our health care rationed. Republicans have offered a number of plans that make more sense. A number of us have joined with Senator Wyden in a bipartisan plan that makes common sense. That plan, to be specific, would take the subsidies which we now spend on health care and spend them in a fairer way, giving low-income Americans a chance to buy health care like the rest of us have. It wouldn't create any new government programs. According to the Congressional Budget Office, it wouldn't add to the debt. If we are starting over, that framework would be a good place to start. People at home in Tennessee, the Mayo Clinic, 1,000 local chambers of commerce that have made their announcement today, the Congressional Budget Office, and the Democratic Governors all say: Whoa, let's get it right. This has too many problems. Let's start over with something that Americans can afford in terms of their own health care plan and a government they can afford. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record an article by Martin Feldstein, President Reagan's former Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, from the Washington Post of today.