Ted Cruz

Mr. CRUZ

Mr. CRUZ. I thank the Senator from Alabama, and I thank him for his perseverance, his leadership, and his courage. I will say there have been more than a few legislative fights, and even a few while I have served in this body, on which Jeff Sessions and I have been fighting side by side, and I appreciate his friendship and wisdom, and it matters in this body. Let's hear from the American people some of the tweets that were sent this afternoon during this discussion: Already got a second job again because taxes are squeezing me dry. Make D.C. listen. Congress passes laws that they don't follow, lives large off our money, and has contempt for those they represent. Make D.C. listen. 2700 pages when it was passed, over 20,000 pages now to implement. Make D.C. listen. Vote no on cloture. A vote for cloture is a vote to fund ObamaCare. Defund ObamaCare. Make D.C. listen. We will not go quietly into this disaster called ObamaCare. Make it cover everyone or no one. Make D.C. listen. What a great point. If ObamaCare is such a terrific thing, as its defenders say, then all of us should be subject to it--big businesses, Members of Congress, our staffs, President Obama, every political appointee in the government, every Federal employee. If that is a burden--and I believe it would be a huge burden--I would not be eager about that personally, but if that is a burden, then it shouldn't cover anyone. If there is some reason why that would be unacceptable--I actually think, of all of those, our friends on the Democratic side of the aisle would probably get the most pushback from having it apply to all Federal employees because Federal employees would push back mightily for good reason. But the right thing to take from that is not, well, all these guys should be exempt. It is, why would they push back? If Members of Congress and their staff, Federal employees, the President, and the executive branch employees all found themselves subject to the same exchanges, the same rules that hard-working Americans find themselves subject to and they would be really, really dismayed, that should motivate every one of us to say: Hey, I am a lot more worried about the single mom working in a diner than I am about the IRS tax agent making $125,000 a year who is dismayed about being subject to the same rules as that single mom. And if we wouldn't be willing to make it apply to everyone, then it shouldn't apply to anyone. Make D.C. listen. Do the right thing and defund this abomination of an unfair tax. Listen up, America. This is your wake-up call. Make D.C. listen. Defund ObamaCare now. We do not need this injurious legislation to be enacted. Make D.C. listen. Stay strong. Vote no on cloture. ObamaCare must be stopped. The will of the majority of Americans is to defund ObamaCare. Make D.C. listen. Sick of our employees deluding themselves into believing they are our bosses. Make D.C. listen. For those who didn't follow it, we are the employees, the elected representatives who work for the American people, and yet an awful lot of people in this body think we are the bosses. That is exactly backward. We don't want ObamaCare. We never did. Defund it. Make D.C. listen. Just finished college. Can't get a full-time job. Thanks, ObamaCare. Make D.C. listen. There should be no law that exempts a few and burdens the citizens. We, the people, do NOT want ObamaCare. Make D.C. listen. D.C. a leader out of touch. IRS has no business being involved with health care. Make D.C. listen. Make D.C. listen, because ObamaCare and its tax will damage the opportunity of Americans to choose the course of their own lives. My insurance premiums went from $450 in 2010 to $880 in 2013 with $1500 deductible. Make D.C. listen. ObamaCare is a job killer, will ruin health care. Let's look at those numbers again. Two thousand ten was just a few years ago, and $450 was that individual's health insurance premium. Now it is $880 in 2013. That is the impact ObamaCare is having. Here is a nice one: Thank you for reading tweets so the American people can be heard. Make D.C. listen. You are welcome. It is a privilege to have a chance to in some small way help provide a voice for the American people. IRS bureaucrats don't want ObamaCare, either, but they are happy to force everyone else to conform to it. Make D.C. listen. ObamaCare has turned America into a part-time nation. People are losing their homes. They can't feed their children properly. Make D.C. listen. I wish to think about that last tweet for a second. ObamaCare has turned America into a part-time nation, and people are losing their homes. They can't feed their children properly. If any Member of this body was forced to work part-time, was losing his or her home, couldn't feed his or her children properly, it would be a crisis. Talk about getting our attention--it would be a crisis. If it was a family member, if it was our parents, if our kids were facing that, we would move Heaven and Earth to address it. Yet here it is our boss, the American people who are experiencing that, and most Members of this Senate are doing something else other than being here. I will note that we have Congressman Louie Gohmert, Congressman Paul Broun, and Congressman Richard Hudson was here earlier. But where is the Senate? We don't feel the pain of the American people like it is ours, like it is us. It is not surprising because President Obama has exempted Congress from ObamaCare, so we are not feeling the pain. That is the problem. ObamaCare has turned America into a part-time nation and people are losing their homes. They can't feed their children properly. Make D.C. listen. Three years and they still can't get it going. Make D.C. listen. Make D.C. listen, because D.C. is not listening to the American people. HELP US. Defund ACA. It is job killing and not affordable and we won't get care, and our politicians act like it is good for us. Well, that is true. A lot of politicians do act as though this is really good for you. Mind you, we don't want to be subject to it, but trust us, it is good for you. Different rules apply to the Washington, DC, ruling class than apply to the American people. That is the problem. Help revive the economy. Make D.C. listen and defund ObamaCare. Fight for real reform. ObamaCare is a disaster. Make D.C. listen. Letters saying your plan is cancelled due to the ACA ruins the ``like it, keep it'' narrative. Make D.C. listen. By the way, that is from an individual who is @demcalal. Makes me wonder if that is a Democrat in California named Al. I don't know if it is, but it would be interesting if it were. What is interesting about this is that if you get outside of Washington, it is not just Republicans who understand ObamaCare isn't working; it is Democrats, Independents, libertarians. I feel quite confident that James Hoffa, the president of the Teamsters, is not a Republican. I really have no doubts on that. Yet Mr. Hoffa in a public letter has said that ObamaCare is destroying the 40 hour workweek that is the backbone of the American middle class. Those are just the facts. That is what is happening. If we were listening to the American people, every one of us would be here doing everything we could to turn it around now. We wouldn't be happy to wait until the end of the week. We would say: Now, let's stop this job killer. Defund ObamaCare, because I know what is best for my health care, not some bureaucrat. Make D.C. listen. Defund ObamaCare. The majority of America is against this intrusion into our private relationship with our doctor. Make D.C. listen. Make D.C. listen because ObamaCare is killing full-time jobs. Make D.C. listen. Defund ObamaCare because it takes our freedom away. If you love your country, value freedom and choice, oppose tyranny-style government laws, then make D.C. listen to you. Tired of Senators who won't listen. Make D.C. listen. Make D.C. listen. Please stop ObamaCare. It is killing this country. We need the government to listen to the people and do what is best for the country. I support defunding ObamaCare 100 percent. Make D.C. listen. Make D.C. listen. We don't want government intrusion into our health care. D.C. isn't listening. Everyone in America understands that ObamaCare isn't working. Make D.C. listen. The health care reform that the President sold America isn't the health care reform that America is getting. Make D.C. listen. ObamaCare. AIN'T NOBODY GOT TIME FOR THAT!!! Make D.C. listen. Way to go. Make D.C. listen to our voices calling for individual liberty. Make D.C. listen. We don't get an exception, so you shouldn't either. I agree. I think all of us should get an exception. Every American should get an exception. And there is no world in which Congress should be treated better than hard-working American families. I don't want more government. Make D.C. listen. I wish the Senate would listen to us. Please listen to the people. We don't want this bill. We want freedom. Make D.C. listen. Make D.C. listen. ObamaCare is turning us into a part-time economy. Government is designed to go by the will of the people, not the other way around. Make D.C. listen. We don't want it, don't need it, can't afford it. Please tell them to listen to its citizens. Make D.C. listen. Ronald Reagan warned us about government-run health care. Bad. Bad. Bad. Make D.C. listen. Make D.C. listen. Analysts, experts, and business people agree that the ACA will hurt our economy. Americans are fed up with our elected officials not listening. WE don't want ObamaCare. Make D.C. listen. Let the free market make health care more affordable by allowing sales across state lines. Make D.C. listen. Let me say, by the way, that is a terrific proposal. Once we defund ObamaCare, there will be a lot we will need to do on health insurance. There is a lot we need to do on health care reform to make it more affordable, to make policies personal and portable so they go with you regardless of what job you are in. One of the best things we can do is allow interstate competition. Right now it is illegal to purchase health insurance across State lines. Why does that matter? Well, the biggest barrier to access for people who don't have health insurance is the cost. You get government regulators who drive the cost up and up because they mandate this bell and this whistle, and you have to cover everything they want. It is a great thing for politicians because if you mandate that every health insurance policy has to cover this procedure, it lets politicians come to the people and say: I am giving you free what-have-yous. But one of the simplest principles of government is that there ain't no such thing as a free lunch. Every time you mandate that a health insurance plan must include whatever benefit it is that politicians want to give away to the people, it drives the cost up. Every time the cost goes up, there are more and more people who can't afford it. So you can have a lot of politicians giving away free stuff, and when you do that, it will mean there will be a whole bunch of people who get no coverage at all because they can't afford it. If we were to allow purchases across State lines, we would see a true 50-State national marketplace, true competition. There would be real choice. By the way, the people who may be the biggest losers of all under ObamaCare are the young. It is difficult to design a bill to do more damage to young people. The ``lost generation'' is what economists are now dubbing young people, in significant part because of the consequences of ObamaCare. If you are a young healthy person, it may well make sense to purchase catastrophic health insurance--health insurance that if, God forbid, you get hit by a truck tomorrow or you get diagnosed with some horrible life-threatening disease. The odds are relatively small that is going to happen to any of us, but if it does, it is very bad, and that is when we want health insurance. If you could purchase insurance across State lines, there would be a 50-State market and you could get low-cost, inexpensive catastrophic health insurance. If you think about health insurance right now, it doesn't work like insurance. I wish to compare it to an insurance market that works. Most of us are familiar with car insurance. Most of us who have cars have car insurance. With car insurance, if you need to change the oil in your car, you do not call Allstate and say: Change the oil in my car. If you get a flat tire, you typically do not call Allstate and say: Hey, I have a flat tire, change the tire on my car. God forbid, if you get hit by an 18-wheeler and your car gets totaled, then you call your insurance company and say this catastrophic event happened; that is why I have insurance. A lot of people when it comes to health insurance though, right now the system is treated as just a third-party payer instead of dealing with catastrophic, unlikely events. That is a reform that would make a real difference. If you want access to low-cost health insurance, allowing people to purchase it across State lines after we defund ObamaCare would make a real difference, and if we added to that reforms that expanded health savings accounts so you could save in a tax-advantaged way to meet routine prevention and maintenance, to take care of the equivalent, in the auto context, of changing the tire, that would go even further; and if we changed the tax law right now--most people do not know that employer-provided health care is an historical anomaly. It actually arose during World War II. Shortly thereafter, when wage and price controls were in effect, employers had a challenge. They wanted to recruit employees, but they could not raise wages. It was against the law. So they began offering health insurance as a way to attract people, to say come work for my company, we will give you health insurance. Right now the Federal tax laws heavily favor employer health insurance. The problem is, we don't live in 1950s America now. There was a time when people would get a job in a big company and work 30, 40, 50 years, retire, get a gold watch, and that would be it. We don't live in that kind of world anymore. Most people will work for one company, then another company, then another company--relatively unlikely that American workers are going to stay with one company their entire life. They are going to switch jobs, possibly a lot, sometimes voluntarily and sometimes not voluntarily. When you and I were in the private sector, Mr. President, if we lost our jobs and got fired, you didn't lose your life insurance. You didn't lose your car insurance. You didn't lose your house insurance. The only insurance you would lose if you lost your job was your health insurance. That doesn't make any sense. Of all of them it is the worst one to lose. The Senator from Illinois asked about preexisting conditions. If we could change the law so health insurance plans were personal and portable, just like your car insurance, regardless of where you happen to work it goes with you, it travels with you, that goes a long way to solving the problem of preexisting conditions, because where preexisting conditions have such a big impact is when somebody loses one job and is trying to get coverage for the next job. If you could take your personal portable plan with you, that goes a long way to mitigating it. Let me point out all of those reforms have a fundamentally different philosophy than ObamaCare. ObamaCare has a philosophy empower government over your life, put a government bureaucrat between you and your doctor. The reforms I laid out are all about empowering you, the American people, empowering you, the patient, to make a choice, empowering you to make decisions about your health care with your doctor, with no government bureaucrat anywhere near you. I am going to suggest the difference is those plans come from listening to the people. ObamaCare is the opposite of listening to the people.

Mr. CRUZ. I am happy to yield for a question. I would note my friend from Alabama seems bound and determined to stop the tweets. God bless him.

Mr. CRUZ. I think Senator Sessions is absolutely right. The Senate isn't trying to fix this bill. The Senate isn't trying to respond to the needs of the American people. It isn't trying to respond to the jobs that have been lost, to the people who have been forced into part- time work, to the people who have lost their health insurance. Instead, it is responding to political power. I will note that any Republican--on Friday or Saturday when we have the cloture vote--who votes to cut off debate is voting to give majority leader Harry Reid the ability to force funding for ObamaCare with no changes--no amendments, shutting off amendments. The Senator from Alabama can't offer amendments, I can't offer amendments, and we can't do anything. It is a pure exercise of political power on a straight party-line vote. That will make many Republicans happy because they will get to symbolically vote against it, and then we will be certain to lose if it is a 51-vote threshold. Part of the reason, I would suggest--and one can understand why the majority leader wants to do that. Listen, if you are defending a law such as ObamaCare, that is a train wreck, in the words of the Democrat who wrote the bill, you don't want to debate the substance of it. When the esteemed Senator from Illinois was down on the floor--and I appreciate his coming--he sure didn't want to debate why there is a congressional exemption, why Members of Congress are treated better than average Americans, why President Obama has said Members of Congress are going to be exempted from ObamaCare but hard-working American families are not. Look, I understand. If I were the Democratic majority leader and I were defending that position, I wouldn't want to defend it either. Because I have to tell you there is not a State in the Union where our constituents wouldn't just about tar and feather us if we stood in front of them and defended that, yes, there should be a special exemption for Members of Congress but not for you. And for big business. President Obama granted a special exemption for big business, but not for you, not for hard-working Americans. Look, what a perfect example of the broken system, of the disconnect between DC and the American people. It is indefensible on the merits, and so this whole process is designed not to debate on the merits. It is designed never to have that debate because, as I observed earlier, the old adage in the courtroom--and my friend Senator Lee will recognize this from his days as a litigator, as will the Chair--if you have the facts, pound the facts; if you have the law, pound the law; and if you don't have either, pound the table. So if you are defending ObamaCare, if you are defending exemptions for giant corporations and Members of Congress that don't go to the average American family, you don't want to talk about the facts and you don't want to talk about the law, so you want to pound the table. You want to talk about shutting down the government. You want to scare people. You want to threaten cutting off the funding of the men and women in the military, which is grossly irresponsible. I think Congress should never ever imperil the salaries of the men and women who risk their lives to protect us. This body should immediately take up the Defense authorization bill the House passed so that we can make sure the men and women in the military are always paid. And, by the way, even without that--if there were a partial shutdown--the President has all the authority he needs in existing law to pay the men and women in the military. But if you don't want to debate the merits, you have to distract people. So it is a game. If you talk to a professional magician, magicians are good at banter and they are good at smoke and mirrors and distraction. Sometimes when they raise their hand and they have a shiny object over here and they want everyone to look over here, it is because they are pulling a card out of the deck with this hand. There are a lot of professional magicians in this Senate. There is a purpose to all of the discussion about shutdown and, for that matter, all of the personal politics--all of the attacks, more than a few of which have occurred within the Republican conference, more than a few of which have been directed at Senator Lee, more than a few of which have been directed at myself, and more than a few have been directed at the courageous House conservatives who led the fight in the House to get the House of Representatives to do the right thing and defund ObamaCare. It is not even the purpose that appears on the face of it. One would think the purpose is as it appears on the face. One would think the purpose for leaking nasty quotes, trying to beat up people, sending congressional staffers to get anonymous quotes--a little bit of profanity, a sort of mean, wicked sense of humor is because they are trying to pound somebody. It is not that, although that is an added side benefit. It is all about distraction. Make it about the personalities, make it about the people, make it about anything, anything, anything other than ObamaCare. If we were actually talking about ObamaCare, if we were listening to the people--listen, if we were listening to the people, the people don't give a flip about any of the hundred of us. They don't care about politicians. And for good reason. There are very few people in America who say, when asked what do you want to do on the Fourth of July, they want to pal around with a bunch of elected politicians. Most people want to be in their backyard grilling burgers with their kids. God bless them. That is why America is the greatest country on Earth, because we have families and it is not about government. You know, in a totalitarian regime, everyone thinks about government almost all the time. Because when you have a jackboot on the back of your neck, it is hard to think about anything else. The game in Washington is smoke and mirrors. The game in Washington is distract from anything, anything, anything, except the thing the American people care about--fixing the jobs and the American economy. That is not what is happening. All right, let me read some tweets.

Mr. CRUZ. I am happy to yield for a question without yielding the floor.

Mr. CRUZ. I thank Senator Sessions for that very important question. The payer would be the U.S. Government, which means the payer would be the U.S. taxpayer, which means the payer would be hard-working Americans, once the Federal Government starts paying for all health care in all of America, which has been the stated position of the far left for a long, long time. The Senator from Alabama made reference to Senator Bernie Sanders. I agree. I respect Senator Sanders's commitment to his principles. As you know, he previously ran as a socialist. That is correct. I respect that degree of candor. Quite frankly, I would be very happy if this body had 10 more Bernie Sanders and 10 more Mike Lees, because I think there would be far more truth in advertising and then we could have real debate about what the role of government should be in our lives. Should we have socialized medicine? That is a very good debate to have, especially because--and I know the Senator from Alabama agrees with me on this--the facts are on our side. In every country on Earth where socialized medicine has been implemented it hasn't worked. We know what the results are. If you implement socialized medicine, you inevitably see poor quality. You see rationing, you see scarcity. You see the government getting between you and your doctor, the government deciding you want a health treatment, your mother wants a health treatment, your child needs a health treatment. And you have a government bureaucrat deciding whether you get one. Maybe the bureaucrat tells you: Well, you can get that hip replacement you want in 6 months, in 1 year. But they may turn to Senator Lee and say: You know what. Your mom can't get that treatment. We have determined in our tables it doesn't make sense to give her that treatment. I guess she is at the end of her road. That is what happens. It is the government that decides who gets health care and who doesn't. And you know what. Americans overwhelmingly don't want that. This is another point that is critical. It is not just that Majority Leader Reid said he likes single-payer socialized health care; it is that he says, and a number of others have, that ObamaCare is designed to lead to that. I think it is very important to ask the question: Why? How does it lead to that? Because that goes to both sides of the aisle. There are many Republicans who have said: We shouldn't fight this fight. It is risky. We will get political blame. All of the DC pundits say we shouldn't do this. Let's sit quietly and let ObamaCare collapse. It is collapsing of its own weight, it is not working. If we sit quietly, it will collapse and the Democrats will take the blame. I am suggesting there is far too much worry about blame and credit. Who cares? I don't care if Democrats take the blame. I would prefer to avoid the collapse and spare the Democrats the blame. Who cares? But if it collapses, why is it that Majority Leader Reid says ObamaCare will lead to single payer? Because in the process of the collapse, it will take our private health insurance system with it. Yes, it will collapse, but it will leave a wreckage. It will leave millions of people losing their health insurance, being pushed more and more into the exchanges, with one insurer after the other pushed out of the market. So when it collapses, there is no private health insurance market to go back to. That is why Majority Leader Reid can tell the American people: Hey, I want the single-payer socialized medicine. And relax, ObamaCare will take us to that. But that is also a real message to all the Republicans who right now have not yet announced they are going to oppose cloture on this bill. Because if we wait for ObamaCare to collapse--yes, it will collapse-- with it will go the private health insurance system, and we may find ourselves in single payer. I think instead of worrying about blame, instead of trying to play the politics and think through it--and, listen, I am not nearly smart enough to play through all the political angles and everything else--it is a lot simpler to stand and do the right thing. One of the easiest ways to do the right thing is to listen to the American people. You want to know what the American people are worried about. Go home and listen to your constituents. Their concerns are: I am trying to get a job and I can't get a job. I am trying to grow my small business and ObamaCare is driving us out of business. I am afraid of losing my health insurance and ObamaCare is taking away health insurance. Look, we have read, and I have stack after stack that I am going to keep reading, from individual constituents--constituents in Texas and Virginia and Utah and Alabama and all over the country--who are losing their health insurance because of ObamaCare, who are losing their jobs and being forced into part-time work. We need to listen to the people. I told the men and women who are watching tonight if they were to tweet the hashtag ``MakeDCListen,'' which has been, over the course of this, trending No. 1, that I would share some of the tweets they sent. So with your indulgence, I would like to do so to help give them a voice. Many of these folks right now presumably cannot walk on to the Senate Floor and give a speech. Maybe in a few years some of them might. Maybe in a few years, if enough politicians in this body don't listen to the American people we may get quite a few of these tweeters who show up as new Senators committed to listening to the American people. But in the meantime--

Mr. CRUZ. I yield for a question without yielding the floor.

Mr. CRUZ. I think the Senator from Alabama is exactly right. We are seeing Americans all over this country hurt by ObamaCare. I want to suggest that the problem we are debating today is bigger than this continuing resolution, it is bigger than ObamaCare, and it is bigger even than the Federal budget. The problem is that the men and women of DC are not listening. They are not listening to the millions of Americans who are asking for more accountability, more responsibility, and more truth from their elected officials. It is time to make DC listen. I would observe that during the course of this afternoon, the hashtag ``MakeDCListen'' has been trending No. 1 because the American people are frustrated. They are frustrated that the Democratic Senate is not listening to them. They are frustrated that the Republican Senators are not listening to them. The whole debate we are having right now is not about strategy, it is not about process, it is not about procedures, and it is not about all of the pundits and pollsters and consultants. The problem is that DC is not listening. Everyone in America knows that ObamaCare is destroying jobs. What the Senator from Alabama so eloquently talked about, the econometric predictions--you have to get outside the beltway to any of the 50 States and actually talk to people who are trying to find jobs and talk to small business owners who are struggling under the 20,000 pages of regulations. Everyone in America knows ObamaCare is destroying jobs and driving up health care costs. Let me encourage right now everyone in America--President Obama 3\1/ 2\ years ago promised the average American that by the end of his first term, by the end of last year, the average American family's premiums would drop $2,500. Let me encourage everyone in America whose premiums dropped $2,500 to go online and tweet ``ObamaCare cut my premium.'' You know what. I am willing to venture that in every one of these States, if all of the Democratic Senators who support ObamaCare are willing to say ``I will take only the votes of those of you whose premiums have gone down,'' I can tell you right now on the Republican side that I will happily take the votes of everybody else because I am going to predict that is not going to be a 50/50 election, it is not even going to be a 60/40 election. Everyone knows this thing is not working, and Washington is pretending it does not know. This process is rigged. That is why we have to make DC listen. In traveling across Texas, just like the Senator traveling across Alabama, I hear the stories everywhere I go. It does not matter what town I am in, it does not matter whom I am talking about, I hear the stories. I see people with disabilities saying: Please stop ObamaCare before I lose my health insurance. I see young people who would like to be working toward a career saying: Please, I would like a job. I met with a whole bunch of service men and women who had just come back from Afghanistan at a military base in Texas. I asked them, as I try do in any gathering that is a small enough group that I can do this: Go around, share an issue that is weighing on your heart, that you pray about, that you are concerned about. I remember one young soldier said: I am most worried about jobs. When I come out of the military, am I going to have a job? All of my buddies, when they come out, they cannot find jobs. Everyone nodded and said: That is exactly right. The American people want to stop this madness. So do I. Here in Washington we pass million-dollar bills and billion-dollar bills no one has ever read, without even voting on them. We call it unanimous consent. It is only unanimous because we do not let the American people know. It would be very interesting to bring 100 of our constituents in on any unanimous consent that is spending $1 billion here, $1 billion there, and see what our constituents think about that. The system is designed deliberately to hide what we are doing. In this debate right now there are many Members of this body who are happy that the debate is covered with obscurity over pressure, obscurity over a motion for cloture on a motion to proceed. Nobody knows what that is. You know what. That benefits Members of this body because it lets all 100 go back to their citizens and say: What were you for? Yeah, yeah, I was for that because I was for the motion to whatchamacallit. No one understands what that is. You know, one of the things we see is our leaders demand approval for bills before they are amended. So we are being asked this Friday or Saturday to vote to shut off debate on this bill before we know what the bill will be. We do not know what amendment Harry Reid is going to file, but we are asked to cut off debate nonetheless. It is like former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi when she said: Pass it to find out what is in it. You wonder why the American people are disgusted with what happens in Washington. That is business as usual in this town. Listen, the way this is planning to unfold is very simple. Majority Leader Reid has said that if he succeeds in cloture, if he succeeds in shutting off debate on Friday or Saturday, that he is going to introduce one amendment--and by all appearances only one amendment--to fund ObamaCare in its entirety. That will be subject to a straight 51- vote threshold. There are a couple of dynamics going on. No. 1, Republicans are actively debating among ourselves: Should Republicans vote with Harry Reid and Senate Democrats to allow Harry Reid and Senate Democrats to fund ObamaCare with a straight 51-vote partisan majority? I do not find that a difficult question. I think that should unify all 46 Republicans to say no. We should not enable ObamaCare to be funded, and a vote for cloture on Friday or Saturday is a vote to fund ObamaCare. They are one in the same. They are identical. If you vote to give that power to Harry Reid to fund ObamaCare, then you are responsible for it being funded--and, by the way, for it being funded in the same broken process where there are no amendments, there is no opportunity to change it, there is no opportunity to offer anything. The Presiding Officer will not have an opportunity to offer an amendment, and I will not have an opportunity to offer an amendment. Instead, it is brute political force. But I will tell of an upside--an upside, frankly, from some Members of the Republican caucus. If debate is cut off, they can tell their constituents: I voted for the House bill. That is not true, but they can tell them that. But even better, a 51-vote threshold--here is the dirty little secret people do not want to admit: There are more than a few Republicans on this side who affirmatively want a 51-vote threshold on funding ObamaCare. Why? Because they want two outcomes. No. 1, if we have a 51-vote threshold on funding ObamaCare, I promise you all 46 Republicans will vote against it. It will be a straight party-line vote, which means every Republican can go back to their district and say: Mr. and Mrs. America, when I had the opportunity to vote against ObamaCare, I did it. I did what you wanted. I did what you want. The rest of it is kind of hidden in the procedural mumbo jumbo. But the beautiful outcome--and the reason why some Republicans want a 51-vote threshold--is if it is 51 votes we will lose. The President is well aware there are more than 51 Democrats in this body. It will be a partisan party-line Democratic vote, exactly how ObamaCare got passed into law. I am going to suggest that Republicans going along and saying we want a symbolic vote is not listening to the people. Look, the dysfunction is on both sides. The Democratic Members of this Chamber--I understand, look, ObamaCare is a Democratic law passed and signed into law by a Democratic President, passed into law with only Democratic votes. It is hard, if you are a political party, to admit, gosh, this thing that we put a lot of political capital in, it ain't working. That is a difficult, risky thing for anyone to say. I am going to encourage--and my hope is that by the end of this process we will see some Democrats, Senate Democrats, listen to their voters and say: Listen, I thought this thing would work, I hoped it would work, but it hasn't. That is what the unions have said. The labor unions that publicly, vocally supported ObamaCare--and many of them were active proponents of getting it passed--have looked at it and said: Do you know what, we thought it would work and it hasn't. There is no shame in admitting you tried something and it didn't work. I very much hope over the course of this debate we will see some Democratic Senators doing so. I would note that the fact that Senate Democrats are not participating, are not here, makes it less likely. But on the Republican side, the game is the same. Washington, DC, is a strange place in many regards, one of which is symbolic votes are treated as tremendously important. I am told of a conversation that Senator Lee had with a Member of the House when early on the House had not yet voted to defund ObamaCare, but there was discussion about casting a symbolic vote to do so. The American people were quite unhappy with that and expressed that view. Both Senator Lee and I expressed the view that we shouldn't be engaging in procedural games; we should actually be defunding ObamaCare. One particular House Member who will remain unnamed called Senator Lee and made a comment that I thought was particularly revealing. He said: You guys should be grateful. We gave you your vote. I remember thinking what a curious turn of phrase, ``grateful.'' What an odd, Washington view of things. Why should we feel gratitude for getting a vote that is 100 percent destined to lose because it is offered in such a way that Harry Reid, on a party-line vote, can fund ObamaCare, and yet we can all have a symbolic vote. The reason, frankly, is that this is a town where for a long time neither side has listened to the team. This is the town where for a long time there have been elected politicians who want symbolic votes. Let me be very clear. I don't want any symbolic votes on anything. I think everyone--our constituents should know what we believe. Whether or not we get a vote on it to demonstrate it shouldn't matter, because if we are standing and fighting, and if we are walking the walk, our beliefs should be self-evident. DC responds, the DC establishment responds, if anybody tries to tell the truth--look, I promise you, my observations right now that there are some Republicans that would like a symbolic vote and then would like to lose so that they don't have any risk of it actually being defunded, I promise you those comments are not getting me invited to any cocktail parties in Washington anytime soon. That is perfectly fine. I don't particularly enjoy cocktail parties anyway. This town needs a lot more truth telling. It is absolutely true. Everyone here knows it, but we are not supposed to say it out loud. There is a custom where we kind of wink at each other and say, listen, you are telling your constituents one thing, I am telling my constituents one thing. Let's not bother to give them the opportunity to know the truth. If we got 100 of your constituents or mine, if we got 100 citizens from any of the 50 States and we put them in this room instead of 100 Senators, I promise you, No. 1, our constituents would not care about a symbolic vote. If you got 100 people, why would you want a symbolic vote? What is the point of that? It is only the politicians who make a living staying in office that want symbolic votes. Symbolic votes are useful for getting reelected. They don't actually change the country. They don't make the lives of people better. But they do help politicians who want to get reelected and want to run a campaign ad saying, here is what I voted to do. If you have 100 citizens in the Commonwealth of Virginia, the great State of Texas, the great State of Alabama, what they would say on ObamaCare is, we have to fix this. We have to get people back to work. We have to deal with all the young people that are stuck in dead-end jobs because they can't get a job coming out of school. We have to deal with all the people, all single moms working in diners who are finding themselves working 29 hours a week because of ObamaCare. We have to deal with all of the people who are struggling because their health insurance premiums are skyrocketing under ObamaCare. We have to deal with all of the people who are losing their health insurance under ObamaCare. This is why I am speaking out today and why so many others have come here speaking out because we have to make DC listen. That is what this fight is about, to make DC listen to the American people. I very much hope that the debate over the course of this week has a real effect changing the culture. That is why this body has held 10, 12, 14 percent approval ratings. I remember a few months ago when all of us were in the Old Senate Chamber, all 100 Senators. It was a bipartisan meeting, and it was actually a very interesting, productive conversation. I remember a number of Senators commenting about the low approval ratings that Congress has and saying something to the effect that it is because we are not more efficient, that we don't pass more laws. I have to say I think that gets it exactly backwards. I have never once found any constituent in the State of Texas--and I suspect there are not many in your State, in my State, or in anyone else's State--who says the problem is you guys aren't passing enough laws. That is not what I hear from people. It is what you hear from politicians in Washington who would like to pass as many laws as possible so they can take credit for them. But it is not what you hear from people. The people at home say: You guys have done enough damage already. I will tell you why I think we are held in such low esteem. It is because we don't listen to the American people. In every poll that has been done for years of the American people, in any State, whether your State, my State, any State, even bright blue States, Democratic States, if you ask the American people what is their top priority, jobs and the economy is the overwhelming answer. This is true if you ask Republicans, even if you ask only Democrats. If you ask only Democrats in bright blue States, jobs and the economy are still the top priority--or independents, Libertarians, anyone in the United States. Yet the Presiding Officer and I have both served in this body 9 months. I would note the 9 months we have been here the Senate has spent virtually zero time talking about jobs and the economy. It is not on the agenda. We don't talk about it. We spent 6 weeks talking about guns, talking about taking away people's Second Amendment right, and no time talking about fundamental tax reform, fundamental regulatory reform. Today we are talking about defunding ObamaCare, the biggest job killer in the country. If you want to get jobs and the economy going, there is nothing we could do that is more important than defunding ObamaCare. What is the case? There are right now three Members of the Senate on the floor of the Senate and two Members of the House of Representatives. Ask the American people, how many Senators should be here in the debate over defunding ObamaCare, the biggest job killer in this country? Because the American people's top priority is jobs and the economy, the people would say to all 100 Senators, what possibly do you have that is more important to do? I expect some of my colleagues are at a fundraising dinner. Some of our colleagues are at home with their families. Do you want to know why Congress is held in such low esteem? It is not that we don't pass enough laws; it is that the priorities of the men and women in this body are not the priorities of the men and women in America. We are not listening to America. The most important objective, what I hope will come of this week, more important than the continuing resolution and the budget, more important than ObamaCare, is that we make some real progress to changing the culture of this place so that both Democrats and Republicans start listening to the people. That is the way our democratic republic is supposed to work. Right now, unfortunately, it is not how it is working.

Mr. CRUZ. I am going to yield to the Senator from Alabama. I am happy to return to the Senator from Illinois if he would like to remain, but I want to be fair because the Senator from Alabama has been waiting for some time. So I am happy to yield for a question without yielding the floor.

Mr. CRUZ. I thank the Senator from Illinois for his certainly genuine political advice and counsel. I would note that the experience Democratic Senators found under ObamaCare of suddenly facing the prospect of losing their health insurance, of being forced into the exchanges, health insurance that had been employer provided--being forced into the exchanges with no employer subsidy, is a disconcerting experience. It is an experience nobody liked. It is an experience that is lousy. There is a reason why Democratic Senators were so upset. There is a reason why congressional staff were so upset. What my friend from Illinois is not focusing on is that right now there are Americans all over this country who are experiencing that same exact sentiment because of ObamaCare. Just a few weeks ago UPS sent a letter to some 15,000 employees saying: We are dropping spousal health insurance because of ObamaCare. That is 15,000 UPS employees who had insurance for their husbands and wives, and suddenly those husbands and wives are left without health insurance and being told: Go on an exchange with no employer subsidy. Senator Durbin just made a passionate case for why that is a terrible thing to tell people. I agree. Listen, my preferred outcome is not to subject Members of Congress, congressional staff, political appointees of the administration, and Federal employees to the exchanges and ObamaCare. My preference is to subject nobody to that. But the reason Senator Grassley inserted that amendment is because we have a problem of a ruling class in Washington--in both parties; this is a bipartisan affliction--that believes the rules that govern working Americans do not govern us. So if we are going to set up a system, if ObamaCare is going to force Americans all over this country to lose their employer-provided health insurance, to be forced into the exchanges with no subsidies, then the men and women who serve in this body should feel that pain exactly the same. So when we go on television and say ``this is great,'' we should know of which we speak because we got skin in the game and we are not being treated better. I think under no circumstance should Members of Congress be treated better than hard-working Americans. That is what President Obama did. He did so, by all reports, at the request of Democratic Senators in this body.

Mr. CRUZ. I am happy to yield for a question without yielding the floor.

Mr. CRUZ. I thank the Senator from Illinois for that question. Let me answer it in two different ways. Let me talk generally about what the Senator talked about, about his health insurance and my health insurance as a Member of the Senate and let me talk about preexisting conditions separately. The first point I will make is that the Senator from Illinois is passionate and has been quite eloquent describing what he perceives to be the benefits from ObamaCare. Yet I think it speaks volumes that the Senator from Illinois and I and every other Member of Congress have been exempted by President Obama from the plain text of the statute. The statute provided--and it was inserted quite deliberately--if we are going to impose rules on the American people, we should be subject to the same rules, we should be put in the exchanges similar to millions of other Americans. The Senator just talked about the wonderful exchange. The text of ObamaCare provides that he and I should be in those exchanges. It also provides that, just like the other people in the exchange, our employers cannot subsidize it once we get in that exchange. Once it passed into law, the Democratic caucus met with President Obama. Obviously, I was not in that meeting. But I read the public reports of what occurred there. I read the press accounts. The press accounts all indicated that the majority leader and the Democratic Members of the Senate asked President Obama: Please get us out from under this. We do not want to be in the exchanges. I see my friend from Illinois is shaking his head. I was not in the room. The press reports all say that is what occurred. But regardless, that is what happened. So that message was heard by the President because shortly thereafter the administration issued a ruling that exempted Members of Congress and exempted our staff. I am curious, if the Senator from Illinois is such a fan of the exchanges, is such a fan of the health care that has been provided to Judy, would the Senator from Illinois then support Senator Vitter's amendment to provide that every Member of Congress, every one of our staffs, every political appointee in the Obama administration--and, frankly, I would like to see every Federal employee all put under the exchanges--so if we are going to make the rules for the American people, that we be subject to those same rules, those same plans, so that when we go on television and say the exchanges are very good, we are not talking about something someone else is experiencing, we are talking about our own health care.

Mr. CRUZ. I am happy to yield for a question without yielding the floor.

Mr. CRUZ. But I will say this. The Senator tells the story of Judy. The best way for Judy or anyone to have health insurance is to have an economy that is booming where people can get jobs and have opportunities. Indeed, let me respond with two things. No. 1, before the Senator from Illinois came to the floor of the Senate, I read a number of letters that have come from people all over the country. Let me just read the next one in my stack because it happens to actually be a counterpart to his story about Judy. This is a constituent from Brackettville, TX, who wrote earlier this year: Since the passage of what is known as Obama Care, my insurance premiums have gone up three times. That doesn't count the increases in my Medicare Part A and B that have also risen. I was also informed prior to passage that certain retirees from one group would see their company support terminated after 2013 and my support will terminate after 2018. In the meantime, I've lost two family doctors who have left the practice . . . and must settle for nurse practitioners and physician assistants. I am fortunate to have good coverage, for which I pay dearly, that is accepted everywhere; but I fear the day I can no longer afford it. I am paying for Obama's train wreck ever since the bill was passed. Surely, there must be some way to defund or repeal the bill. . . . Please help. I would note for the Senator from Illinois, these pleas for help are coming from all across the country.

Mr. CRUZ. I thank the Senator from Illinois for that question. I will say, I respect his sincerity and passion in believing that government solutions from Washington can fix this problem. I do not know if the Senator from Illinois shares the views that Majority Leader Reid expressed on television. I do not know if his objective is as Majority Leader Reid said his was: to move to single-payer, government-provided, socialized health care. But it may be. I do not want to put words in the Senator's mouth. Certainly, I do not know one way or the other what his view would be.

Mr. CRUZ. Sure.

Mr. CRUZ. I would like to finish answering the Senator's last question, and I am happy to yield for another. But let me finish answering the Senator's question. The third step is where we are now as the Senate. In the Senate, we are going to have to do two things. The first thing we are going to have to do in order to successfully defund ObamaCare is to unify Republicans, to bring together all 46 Republicans, opposing cloture, opposing Harry Reid being able to fund ObamaCare on a straight 51-vote partisan vote. I believe every Republican should be unified in that. Right now we are not. Right now there are divisions in the Republican caucus. I am hopeful Republicans will listen to our constituents. I cannot convince my colleagues. The only people who can convince my colleagues on this side of the aisle or that side of the aisle are the people all of us work for, the American people. If we are able to unify Republicans, the next step--the Senator asked me: How do we ultimately get to 60? I assume the predicate of that question is that the first thing we would have to do is to get to 51-- so if we got 46 Republicans and we initially got five Democrats. How would we get five Democrats? As the Senator from Illinois is well aware, there are quite a few Democrats who are up for election in red States, States where their citizens understand ObamaCare is a train wreck. It is not working. I believe if those Democratic Senators, particularly in red States, begin hearing from their constituents in overwhelming numbers, that will change their calculus. Let me readily admit, as long as Republicans are divided, as long as we are shooting at each other, there is not a lot of incentive for Democrats to come join us. But if we can unify Republicans, then I believe we will start with red State Democrats who will potentially lose their jobs if they continue not listening to their people.

Mr. CRUZ. I thank the Senator for that question, and I thank the Senator for the comment he has made in public, noting that having attended the schools I have that perhaps I had not learned to count to 60. I will note that I am quite familiar with what is necessary to defund ObamaCare. What I have said for months is this is a long process. I am not remotely Pollyannaish. I am not remotely under the illusion that this is going to be a short, quick process, that suddenly ObamaCare will be defunded. I am getting to the answer to the Senator's question, but it is a detailed answer, so if he will forgive me, I will take a few moments to lay it out. In my view, the first step to this process was unifying and motivating the American people. This process was never going to work unless the American people became engaged in historic numbers. So I spent much of the month of August and September during our recess traveling the State of Texas, traveling the country, doing everything I could to go directly to the American people, to go around the lobbyists, to go around the entrenched interests in Washington, and go straight to the American people. I will tell the Senator, the response was incredible. Everywhere I would go, I would see 1,000, 2,000 people show up. We have seen over 1.6 million Americans sign a national petition to defund ObamaCare. That was the first step. That was not going to be enough, but it was a critical first step. The second step was what happened last week. It was the House of Representatives voting to defund ObamaCare. I would note, as the Senator from Illinois is well aware, that as recently as a couple weeks ago, every learned observer, every pundit, everyone in Washington said: It is impossible that the House is going to pass a continuing resolution that defunds ObamaCare. It is not going to happen. Yet on Friday it did. Why did it pass it? Because the House of Representatives listened to the American people, because the Speaker of the House and House conservatives stood and did the right thing and made a courageous vote. I will note, two Democrats joined the House Republicans in that vote.

Mr. CRUZ. I am happy to yield for a question without yielding the floor.

Mr. CRUZ. I thank the Senator from Illinois for that question. That most assuredly is not my position, so I thank the Senator for the opportunity to clarify it. Let me be very clear. I do not believe we should shut down the Federal Government. The only reason we might shut down the Federal Government is if President Obama and Majority Leader Reid decide they want to force a government shutdown. What I believe we should do is the same thing the House of Representatives did, the same thing the House courageously did, which was last Friday the House of Representatives voted to fund every aspect of the Federal Government--every bit of it, including parts they disagree with--except for ObamaCare. I would note to my friend from Illinois, they did so in response to the American people because the American people are hurting under ObamaCare.

Mr. CRUZ. I am happy to yield for a question without yielding the floor.

Mr. CRUZ. I thank my friend from Oklahoma for his very kind remarks of support and encouragement and for his friendship from day one since I arrived in the Senate. I do hope other colleagues in this body don't listen to all of the remarks of the Senator from Oklahoma and suddenly discover that hanging for treason is an option because that may not work out terribly well for me. I hope that becomes purely fictional. I will know that at the end of the day--listen, the Senator from Oklahoma and I, and all 100 of us, are incredibly fortunate. We have lived lives in this country of relative privilege. We, everyone in the Senate, enjoys a good home, has a soft bed, I suspect, has air- conditioning, has food on the table. I feel blessed to have a wife who is my best friend in the world and whom I love with all my heart, to have two precious little girls who are the joy of my life. To be able to come to work every day, to walk on this Senate floor, there is not a day when that doesn't take my breath away. The idea that the son of a Cuban immigrant with nothing, who finds himself suddenly elected to the Senate, to have the opportunity to come in every day, it is truly awesome, in the real sense of the word. There was a time when the word ``awesome'' was a Valley girl phrase for everything, but awesome, in its real sense of inspiring awe--I will tell my colleague I find it awesome every day to walk into this Capitol and to have the amazing privilege to serve, as the Senator from Oklahoma and I do, as do all 100 of us. The slings and arrows one deals with serving in public office, to be perfectly candid, are all chickenfeed. The old phrase about sticks and stones--listen, someone saying something mean about another is nothing compared to the suffering that so many people across this country are experiencing. I sat down with one single mom who is working her heart out to provide for her kids because she wants her kids to have a good home, she wants her kids to have an education, she wants her kids to have a future. Her hours have been reduced to 29 hours a week and she doesn't know what is coming next. That is hard work. That is suffering. This ain't nothing. The Senator from Oklahoma speaks with disabled veterans, as I know he has done many times, and he is worried about the impact of ObamaCare on our economy, of jobs drying up. He is worried about his grandson who is just coming out of school right now but who can't get a job. That is a lot more important than the political bickering back and forth. That was my point about all of the press coverage dealing with--it is not about any personality here; it is about listening to the American people. The American people do not give a flying flip about any Member of the Senate--none of the 100 of us. What the American people are interested in is what we have always been interested in, which is freedom, our families, providing for our kids, being a good example to our kids, working for a better world and working so our kids and their kids have an even better future and opportunity than we have had. If we go back centuries, we see that every generation of Americans has been able to give to the next generation a brighter future, greater prosperity, greater opportunity. We are on the verge of being the first generation of Americans not to do so. If we want to put our fingers on the discontent so many Americans feel, that goes right to the heart of it: What we are doing in Washington isn't working. The economic malaise. I refer to the last 5 years as the ``great stagnation'' because for 4 consecutive years our economy has grown on average 0.9 percent a year. It is not working. Intelligent, rational people looking at a set of policies that aren't working would do the intelligent, rational thing. We would correct course. We would say, OK, this isn't working. What has worked? But that is not happening. It is not happening because even though it is not working, the failures aren't visited on Congress. The failures are visited on the American people. Congress exempts itself from ObamaCare. It doesn't even do it in the law. The law says we are covered by it, but, instead, Democratic Senators go to the President and say: We want a special exemption for us that doesn't apply to the American people. So the fundamental problem is that elected officials are not listening to the people. Earlier, I was reading the article about the lost generation of young people from the Wall Street Journal that ran on September 19. I made it about halfway through. Let me finish that article because I think it raises some very important issues. The last thing I read was about the young man, 23 years old, working a job where he says his job at the grocery store--he doesn't have a college degree, but he is seeing more and more college degrees getting in, and he is saying: Gosh, I thought this was a job that helped me pay my way through school. If this is the end job after you get a degree, what does it say about opportunity? The last quote I read was: I think a lot about whether I am ahead or behind. I really hope I'm not ahead. The article continues: Americans aren't the only ones asking such questions. The financial crisis that began in the U.S. quickly rippled across the Atlantic, bursting similar credit and property bubbles in countries such as the U.K., Ireland and Spain, and crippling a European banking sector that had dense links with the U.S. financial system. Much of Europe's economy was plunged into its worst postwar slump and has struggled even more in the U.S. to regain its precrisis levels of growth and jobs. In Europe, the banking crisis also triggered a second-wave crisis--massive capital flights from Southern European countries that relied on foreign borrowing--that came close to unraveling the euro. Let me move forward beyond the Europeans, back to where it discusses American young people again: But there are signs that the weak economy is leading to deep societal changes. An entire generation is putting off the rituals of early adulthood: Moving away, getting married, buying a home and having children. The marriage rate among young people, long in decline, fell even faster during the recession, and the birth rate for women in their early 20s fell to an all-time low in 2012. Why do we think it is that young people are putting off marriage and putting off kids? According to a recent Pew Research Study, 56 percent of 18- to 24-year-olds lived with their parents in 2012, up from 51 percent in 2007-- Fifty-six percent of 18- to 24-year-olds lived with their parents in 2012-- an increase that looks particularly dramatic because the share had changed little in the previous four decades. Moreover, many young people are losing hopes of matching the prosperity of their parents' generation. I talked a minute ago about the hope of all of us that our kids have greater opportunity. What does it say that young people are losing hope of even matching where we are, much less having greater prosperity? Just 11 percent of employed young people in a recent Pew survey said they had a career as opposed to ``just a job''; fewer than half said they were even on track for one. John Connelly thought he was on the right track in life. The son of a New Jersey auto mechanic, he was the first in his family to go to college when he enrolled in Rutgers in 2009. I will note as an aside, my uncle went to Rutgers. I went to college, to Princeton in New Jersey, and my uncle was often fond of reminding me that the very first collegiate football game that ever was played in the United States was played between Rutgers and Princeton. At every Thanksgiving, my uncle would then remind me who won and it was Rutgers who won. Princeton got whipped in that Princeton game. I am sure John Connelly is quite aware that Rutgers won the first collegiate football game in the United States. Four years later, the 22-year-old found himself $21,000 in debt, without a permanent job and sleeping on friends' couches in New Jersey and Brooklyn. ``I hear a lot of stuff that people in my generation aren't buying cars or houses, and I'm a step beyond that--I can't even pay rent on time,'' Mr. Connelly says. ``I have a hard time planning 10 years in the future when I can hardly plan three months in the future.'' At Rutgers, Mr. Connelly was an honors student and president of the student assembly. But wary of taking on more debt, he ended up withdrawing from school with three credits to go until graduation. After a summer spent living with friends while working a temporary job at a Brooklyn nonprofit, he found a grant that allowed him to reenroll in school this fall, but he still doesn't know what he will do when he graduates at the end of the semester. ``I kind of did everything I was quote-unquote ``supposed'' to be doing,'' he says. I am still reading from the Wall Street Journal: The costs of a ``lost generation'' go beyond the impact on young people themselves. A 2012 analysis commissioned by the Corporation for National and Community Service, a federal agency, estimated that the 6.7 million American youth who are disconnected from both school and work could ultimately cost taxpayers $1.6 trillion in lost tax receipts, increased reliance on government benefits and other expenses. Look at broader economic and social effects such as lost earnings and increased criminal activity and the impact tops $4.7 trillion, the researchers estimated.

Mr. CRUZ. I am yielding for a question but not yielding the floor.

Mr. CRUZ. I thank my friend from Oklahoma for that question. I have to say I am not surprised. There is an old adage among courtroom lawyers: If you have the facts, pound the facts. If you have the law, pound the law. If you don't have either, pound the table. To be honest, the approach by ObamaCare defenders is an awful lot of table pounding. It is an awful lot of ``let's discuss anything other than what, in fact, happened.'' Pick up any newspaper and it is talking about this issue. What will the reporters, the political reporters in Washington, DC, write about? I think some may be frustrated because they wanted to be Hollywood gossip reporters because they covered these issues as a battle of personalities. If you want to get a story on the front page of the paper, find some anonymous congressional staffer to say something scurrilous, ideally include profanity in it, and the political reporters eat it up, because, apparently, the only thing that matters is the personalities bickering back and forth. In many ways, that is not surprising, because if one is trying to defend a law that the lead author calls a train wreck, that the unions who supported it are desperately trying to get out from under, that you and your Democratic Senate colleagues are desperately asking for yourselves to be exempted from it, then you sure as heck don't want to talk about how the law is operating. You sure as heck don't want to talk about all of the people who are losing their jobs because of ObamaCare. You sure as heck don't want to talk about all the people who can't get jobs, all the small businesses that aren't growing because of ObamaCare. You certainly don't want to talk about all of the people forced into part- time work, 29-hours-a-week work. You don't want to talk about the insurance premiums that are going up, pricing people out of the insurance market, and you especially don't want to talk about all the people losing their health insurance. My colleague read the stories from East Texas of citizens there losing their health insurance. That is happening all over the country. So it doesn't surprise me that the Senator from Oklahoma is seeing robocalls in the State of Oklahoma because they don't want to debate on the merits of ObamaCare because it is indefensible. So the only strategy is smoke and mirrors. The only strategy is, if we can't talk about the law, let's convince them about something else. Let's distract them. Let's figure out anything to take people's minds off of the underlying issue. I would note to my friend from Oklahoma, the only way that strategy works is if the American people don't believe Washington will listen to them. Look, there are a lot of reasons for the American people to believe Washington is not going to listen to them because Washington hasn't been listening to us for a long time. Politicians on both sides of this aisle have lost touch with their constituents. They don't go home, don't go to townhall meetings, and view the desires of their constituents as simply uninformed and not relevant to doing our jobs.

Mr. CRUZ. I do indeed. I remember in particular at the time the press and all of the graybeards in Washington at the time saying that Hillary Care was unstoppable. It can't stop it. Republicans need to get together. If the Senator from Oklahoma will recall, initially the response was described as like Hillary care lite. Back then in the midst of the Hillary care fight there were a few courageous leaders in the House who stood up against Hillary Care. What changed that battle was the American people rising. At the end of the day, it is the only thing that can win any fights.

Mr. CRUZ. I thank my friend from Oklahoma for his excellent question. Let me say from the outset that I am grateful for Senator Inhofe's leadership and his courage. From the outset Senator Inhofe has been with me on this fight, fighting to defund ObamaCare. I want to also note that Senator Inhofe, like some of the other Senators who have come to the floor of the Senate this afternoon-- including Senator Roberts, Senator Sessions, and Senator Enzi--are respected veterans of this institution. They are leaders who have earned the respect of their colleagues. I am grateful for Senator Inhofe being willing to stand up and be a leader in this fight. That courage is contagious. I hope it will continue to be even more contagious in the Republican Congress. I hope by the time we come to the cloture vote on Saturday that we see all 46 Republicans united in voting against shutting off the debate and against allowing majority leader Harry Reid the ability to fund ObamaCare with a straight 51 party vote.