Jim Turner

Mr. TURNER

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Stenholm) for yielding to me, and I certainly want to thank him for the leadership that he has shown for so many years now on these budgetary issues. I am pleased to join with him and my fellow colleagues in the Blue Dog Democrat Coalition, our group of about 30 or so Democrats, who believe in the balanced budget, who believe in paying off the debt, who believe in a responsible tax cut plan. I think that the reason that we have come to the floor today is because of our mutual sense that the leadership of this Congress has failed in the area of budgetary policy. The Republican leadership started off this year with a big tax cut plan. Now, we all know it was based on some estimates of a future surplus that may never arrive, and so the Blue Dog Democrats put together our own budget plan. As has been said by previous speakers, it is really a pretty simple plan. It says keep your hands off the surplus and the Social Security trust fund, keep your hands off the surplus that accrues in the Medicare trust fund. And with regard to the general fund surplus, we call it the on-budget surplus, let us use 50 percent of that money to pay down the national debt, 25 percent to give reasonable and meaningful tax cuts to the American people, and let us reserve 25 percent for spending priorities. That is the plan shown on the chart to my right, the Blue Dog budget. Mr. Speaker, it provides debt reduction of $955 billion over the next 10 years from the on-budget surplus, a net tax cut of $387 billion plus the savings of $91 billion in interest costs since we are paying down the debt with $955 billion. And program priorities, things like being sure we save our rural hospitals, who are struggling today to keep the doors open, to be sure that we have money set aside so that when the baby boomers retire and the stresses and strains come on the Social Security trust fund and the Medicare trust fund, we will be able to take care of that generation; priorities like strengthening national defense. Within the Blue Dog budget, we take care of program priorities, areas where we can all agree we need to spend dollars, and yet we provide a meaningful tax cut for the American people. Our Blue Dog plan, I think, is the most fiscally responsible plan, and it is also the plan that recognizes as a priority debt reduction. On the chart that I am showing my colleagues now, we can see the comparison of the debt reduction plans that have been presented to this Congress. The first one that is mentioned is the Blue Dog plan that I have referred to which reduces the national debt $3.6 trillion over the next 10 years. That reduction, debt reduction plan, will totally eliminate the publicly held debt over the next 10 years. We went 30 years in this Congress spending more money every year than we took in. We are just now at the point where we are able to say we have a balanced Federal budget, that is because of the fiscal restraint that we have exercised, and that is because the American people have worked hard to produce a prosperous economy. And those additional tax revenues have brought us to the balanced Federal budget. While times are good, we need to take advantage of what is, I think, a historic opportunity to pay off that national debt so our children and our grandchildren will not inherit the free spending practices of the past generation. And if we can pay off the national debt, we will, in fact, give our people the best tax cut they could ever have. Even the trillion dollars tax package that the Republican leadership advocated in this House, that would only give middle-income families about a dollar a day in tax relief. If we pay down the national debt, economists tell us that it will lower interest rates across the board for everybody that has to borrow money. In fact, the economists tell us, and Alan Greenspan himself has testified before this Congress many times, that the best use of the surplus is to pay off the national debt. If we get the government out of the business of borrowing so much money every year and rolling that debt over year after year, the economists say that it will take this pressure off the credit markets, and interest rates will go down. So folks trying to borrow money to own a home, folks borrowing money to buy a car, people who borrow money to send their children to college, they will all experience lower interest rates. A 2 percent reduction in interest rates for a family that has a $100,000 home mortgage they are paying on, it would save them $2,000 a year. That is a much better tax cut than the $323 that a middle-income family would get under the trillion dollars Republican tax cut plan. Yes, we Blue Dog Democrats and all Democrats believe in tax cuts, but we believe that they must be granted within the context of reality. The reality is that, even though the surplus we are talking about is about $2 trillion over the next 10 years, it is just an estimate. If we cut taxes with about 70 to 80 percent of that number, which is Governor Bush's plan, we may very well find out that the surplus has never materialized. If the economy is not as strong as we assume it may be, that surplus may never arrive; and we, as the Federal Government, will be back into deficit spending again. Our Blue Dog plan leaves room for $77 billion of tax cuts over 10 years. That is a conservative plan. That is a realistic plan. That is a plan that will keep us on the road to economic prosperity by lowering interest rates for the American people. But let us compare the plans. The Blue Dog plan reduces the national debt $3.65 trillion over the next 10 years. That is equal to using 80 percent of what we call the unified surplus for debt reduction. The unified surplus simply means we devote all of the Social Security trust fund surplus to paying down that debt. We devote 100 percent of the Medicare trust fund to paying down debt, and we devote 50 percent of the general fund, the so-called on-budget surplus, to paying down debt. So 80 percent of the surplus that will accrue over the next 10 years goes to debt reduction. The Clinton administration budget allocates 75 percent of the unified surplus to paying down debt. Vice President Gore's proposal that he has talked about in his campaign dedicates 68.5 percent of the unified surplus to paying down the debt. If we look on the other hand at the Republican proposals, the Republican proposal in this House would dedicate 60 percent of the unified surplus to paying down debt. Governor Bush's proposal would dedicate only 58 percent of the unified surplus to paying down the national debt. The question I ask my colleagues is, who are the fiscal conservatives in the Congress? I think it is the party that advocates paying off the national debt. The Blue Dog plan would pay it off the fastest. This plan would pay it off in 10 years. Governor Bush's plan, by our calculations, would still, after 10 years, leave us owing a trillion dollars. We believe the thing that we should do for the American people is pay down the national debt over the next 10 years. It is interesting that our 50/25/25 budget plan has received bipartisan support. During the budget debates on the floor of this House, our plan was presented. As the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Stenholm) mentioned, it received over 170 votes in this 435 Member House. Thirty-three Republicans joined with Democrats in supporting that Blue Dog plan. It is the right plan for the American people. It will ensure our future prosperity. It represents what my daddy always taught me, and that is, the first thing you do if you have a little extra money is pay off what you owe. That rule applies at my colleagues' house, it applies at my house, and it should apply in the people's house here in the United States House of Representatives. So we hope that our Republican leadership will adopt our plan. Frankly, I was disappointed in the Republican leadership after they so vigorously pushed for over a trillion dollars in tax cuts, not setting the priority that we wanted to on paying down the national debt. After their plans were vetoed, as the President vetoed tax cut after tax cut, they threw in the towel and said, well, we will just forget about tax cuts. Democrats in this House believe the American people need tax relief. We just believe that we need to give that tax relief within the framework of a sound and sensible Federal budget. With $377 billion in tax cuts under our plan, we can eliminate the marriage penalty; we can reduce estate tax. For all estates of $2 million or less, that means a family, husband and wife, could be worth $4 million and pay absolutely no estate tax under our plan. It reduces all estate tax rates above that 20 percent. We believe that within our $377 billion plan, we can increase the amount that families can put in an IRA or put in their 401(k) plan, saving more for the future, and being able to deduct more on their income tax return. We believe we can provide some relief for our seniors, many of whom have to pay tax on their Social Security benefits. We believe we can provide meaningful tax relief to allow urban and rural areas some incentives to invest and do projects that would renew their communities. These are tax cuts that make sense for the American people. They are tax cuts that fit within an overall budget plan that will allow us to pay off the national debt over the next 10 years. I believe and I hope that our Republican colleagues will listen to this plan and listen to our appeal and join with us in these closing weeks of this session to put America on the right course for the next decade.

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, I think one of the points that the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Stenholm) made there deserves our further discussion. I noted, when the Republican leadership abandoned their plans for tax cuts, they came back and began to talk as we have for 2 years now about debt reduction as a priority. I think they have said for this year it would be okay with them to use a portion of that surplus for debt reduction. I believe that when we look at what they have proposed for the next year, if we could just persuade them to put that in place, that plan for the next 10 years, we could basically have the Blue Dog budget plan that we have advocated. So I think we are really at a point where we could possibly reach some accord with regard to the future Federal budget and probably do the American people a great service by letting them know now that, in 10 years, we will pay down the publicly held national debt, and we will provide some meaningful tax relief to the American people. I think it all comes down to what the gentleman said earlier, and that is it comes down to one's view of how this process is supposed to work. The Republican leadership knew before they passed their almost trillion dollar tax cut bill that the President was going to veto it. He told them that. It was passed anyway. And that is fine, that is the process working its will. But once that occurred, then it seems to me that the right thing to do was to realize that a half a loaf, from their point of view, would have been better for the American people than none at all. And if we come back to a more realistic Federal budget plan that puts a priority on the national debt and that provides about $377 billion, as we have in our plan, in tax cuts, then we can tell the American people that we have done the people's work; that we have set our Nation on a course of fiscal responsibility and we have taken the good times that we have and the projected surplus and we have allocated it in a way that is going to work for the American people and work to keep this prosperous economy going. So I hope that this hour has not been spent in vain. I hope our Republican leadership will take a look at the Blue Dog plan, which we have advocated for 2 years now, and perhaps get us back to the point where we can come together and do the job the American people expect us to do, both Democrats and Republicans, and do the right thing. Even though it might not be what everybody wants, it will at least represents a true compromise. And after all, that is what the legislative process is all about. So I really appreciate the time that we have had here to talk about this issue. And again I thank the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Stenholm) for his leadership on this issue on our side of the aisle.

Mr. TURNER

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield, I think one of the central issues that distinguishes the Democratic plan for prescription drugs for seniors and the Republican plan is that the Republican plan does not tell the senior citizens what they are going to get in terms of coverage, it does not tell them how much it is going to cost, and it certainly does not tell them how long the coverage is going to be there. I had the experience in my district just recently going around talking about the issue of prescription drug coverage for seniors under Medicare, and I was met by seniors who were quite upset. They had signed up for this Medicare+Choice plan that is sponsored by the HMOs that a lot of my seniors were lured into because the HMO option for traditional Medicare said, well, we will offer you a little prescription drug coverage. So all of my seniors that needed prescription drug coverage were very interested in those plans. A whole lot of them signed up. Now, we have 5,000 seniors in my district alone who have received notices that their HMO Medicare+Choice plan is being canceled as of December 31. So I think the history of HMO coverage for Medicare is very clear. We cannot depend on it. We do not know if it is really going to be there. Over 200,000 seniors they tell me across this country have gotten similar notices that as of December 31, they will no longer have their Medicare+Choice plan in effect, and as I said, most of them signed up because it offered them some kind of little prescription drug coverage. So what we know about the Republican approach is that the seniors today, when they look at that plan, they do not know what they are going to get, they do not know how much it is going to cost, and they do not know how long it will be there for them. The Democratic plan, on the other hand, is a plan that offers seniors the drugs they need from the pharmacist that they trust. Our plan covers all drugs; our plan tells the seniors exactly what it is going to cost. If they want to sign up, keep in mind, the Democratic plan under Medicare is optional. If a senior says I do not want this coverage, they do not have to sign up. But when they sign up, they know that initially it will cost $25 a month; those costs are projected to increase as the coverage increases up to about 40 some odd dollars and it will cover one-half of the first $5,000 in prescription drug costs. Over that, it will cover all of it. We know that low-income seniors will be able to have that premium paid for by the government. But that plan is a very clear plan that gives seniors a defined benefit at a cost that is understandable with coverage that they understand. So I say the Republican HMO plan simply offers confusion and uncertainty to seniors, and that is a big difference. Because one thing I have learned the older I get, what we look for is security, and the Democratic prescription drug plan offers security for seniors, and the Republican plan does not. So I think that when it comes right down to looking at the two plans, we clearly have the plan that seniors are going to choose. I think if we do that, we will be doing the right thing for our seniors. We will have a plan that is workable, one that seniors understand, and one they can count on. After all, Medicare, since 1965, has been a plan that seniors can count on. All of these other private insurance plans like our Republican colleagues advocate, they are here today, they are gone tomorrow. Only Medicare has been there for seniors since it was first put into law in 1965, signed by, I might say to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Doggett), a great President, Lyndon Johnson from Texas. So I think we need to stay on that course and make sure that we take care of the security that our seniors need.

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, I think the point the gentleman made is one that we need to have the people of this country understand, because in Texas, if one can go across to Mexico, and a lot of folks do, they buy their prescription drugs at about half the price that they pay in Texas. As the gentleman pointed out, one can go to the veterinarian to take care of their dogs and pay less for their medicine than they can get at their local pharmacy. The truth of the matter is, the most vulnerable people in our society today are paying the highest prices for prescription drugs of anyone, and that is just not right. I think that is another benefit of our Democratic plan for prescription drugs, because we put the power, the buying power of the senior citizens of this country together to be able to bargain with the big pharmaceutical companies. And when the buying power of all of our seniors are united rather than divided as they are today; right now, a senior citizen without prescription drug coverage is on their own when they walk into the local pharmacist. I have talked to many a one of them who tell me they went up there, they turned in their prescription, they came back a few hours later to pick it up and they had to say, no, I am sorry, I cannot afford that medicine. So we are going to put, under the Democratic plan, the buying power of all of the seniors in this country together so that they will have the necessary clout to be able to bargain with those pharmaceutical giants for fairness in prices. If we do that, I suspect we will not have to talk about, as we have done for about 2 years here on the floor of this House, about the problem of price discrimination between the price of drugs in Mexico and Canada and anywhere else in the world, and what our seniors in this country are having to pay.

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield, I think we all understand that the free market system is not working today for our senior citizens. Every country in the world has some kind of price control over prescription drugs, because they understand that the big drug manufacturers with their patent protections have a monopoly. So they have accepted the fact that we cannot have a free market if those who are providing the prescription drugs have a monopoly. Now, we have always tried, and I think rightly so, to preserve the free market, and all we are doing here is asking to allow our seniors to be able to have their position at the bargaining table as a group. We already do that for our veterans in this country. They get lower prices, those who go and get their prescription medicines through the VA, because we have that kind of arrangement for our veterans. All we are trying to do is expand it to be sure our senior citizens have the same deal. As I say, we have to make a choice in this debate. There is no question in my mind that there is a fundamental choice here. One either has to take on the pharmaceutical industry, or one has to stand to protect them, because the only impediment, the only barrier to passing a prescription drug benefit under traditional Medicare is the opposition of the pharmaceutical industry. And if we do not take on the pharmaceutical industry, if we side with them, if we try to protect their bottom line, then we are going to have a hard time supporting a plan that is going to bring prices down for our seniors and make prescription drugs affordable for them. I just think in a country where we have granted patent protection to our pharmaceutical manufacturers to encourage them to invest in research, to come up with a lot of new and wonderful medicines, that the least the pharmaceutical industry owes back to the American people is fairness in pricing.

Mr. TURNER. It is amazing to me how hard the pharmaceutical industry is fighting to preserve the status quo. The gentleman from Texas (Mr. Doggett) mentioned Citizens for Better Medicare. The first time I ran into that group I thought this must be a group of seniors trying to improve Medicare. We got to looking into it, and we found out just what the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Doggett) said, and that is it is an arm of the pharmaceutical industry. In fact, studies showed in the first 6 months of this year, the so-called Citizens for Better Medicare spent $65 million in advertising to try to persuade the Congress and the American people to preserve the status quo. They ran TV ads with a character on it, a lady named Flo, and she began to talk about how she did not want government in her medicine chest. Then we had letters mailed out to our seniors. I had a gentleman in Wal-Mart, a friend of mine, I have known him for years, John Perkins, walked up to me in the parking lot and said, ``Here Jim, I have got a letter that said to write you, and now that I have caught you, it will save me writing a letter.'' I said, ``Well, fine, John, what do you have?'' He said, ``Well, here is this letter.'' It kind of looked like a telegram. And down at the bottom it said Citizens for Better Medicare. I read it. I said, ``John, this letter is telling you to write me and tell me to vote against the very bill that I am sponsoring, trying to help our seniors have some prescription drug coverage.'' He said, ``Oh, just forget about the letter.'' Well, all of those direct-mail pieces, all of that television advertisement, they even ran ads in our major newspapers, full-page adds. I think the one they ran in the Washington Post cost something like $80,000 or $85,000 for one ad for one day. It is just amazing to me how much money the pharmaceutical industry is pouring in to try to defeat our efforts to provide a meaningful prescription drug benefit under the Medicare program. They have got a lot to protect, I know that. They are the most profitable industry in the country today. I read that they spent $148.5 million on lobbying expenses in the last Congress. The top drug manufacturers, the top 12, paid their executives $545.5 million in salaries last year, and $2.1 billion in stock options last year to those same executives. They are a very profitable industry. As the gentleman well pointed out, the truth is every other country in the world provides prescription drugs for their seniors at about half, on average, the price that our seniors in this country pay. That has just got to stop. I think it is our responsibility. When the free market system has broken down, when it is not working, and particularly when it is not working for the most vulnerable people in our society, this Congress has a responsibility to do something about it. I think our plan is the right plan to provide some security for our seniors.

Mr. TURNER. If the gentleman will yield further, I think the point the gentleman made really goes to the heart of it. Whether or not you need some help in being able to pay for prescription drugs just does not depend upon your income; it depends on how sick you are. That is one of the beautiful things about our Medicare program that was established in 1965; everybody over 65 is eligible. I think it has been a program that has received broad public support because it is available to every senior. If we go to a system where we try to take care of prescription drugs by putting together another welfare program, all we are going to do is send money out to the States. They will struggle trying to figure out how to put a program together, and I do not think they can do it nearly as quickly as we could put a prescription drug benefit under Medicare, and it would turn out to be wholly inadequate; and it will turn out to be different all across the country. One of the other fundamental issues that one has to come to grips with in this debate is whether or not you believe that as a senior citizen you should have the same benefit and the same coverage under Medicare, no matter where you live in this country. I can tell you, representing a rural district in east Texas where those 5,000 seniors just got notices a few weeks ago that their Medicare-plus Choice plans are going to be canceled, I can tell you that those seniors are no longer going to have any help with prescription drugs, because you could not count on those HMOs that came in there and offered those plans and are now turning and running away from them; and those seniors I think are all going to probably go back into regular Medicare. They have no other choice. But at least under regular Medicare we know that we get the same benefit no matter where you are in this country. I think when we look at the Republican proposal of trying to rely on the States to set up welfare programs for low-income seniors, what we are going to find is that where you live will depend on what kind of benefits are provided for you, and there will be nothing for those middle-income seniors that are the ones I am hearing from too in my district who are struggling trying to pay those ever-increasing prices of prescription drugs. So I think that traditional Medicare, if we believe in it, if we think it is important for every senior, no matter where they live in this country, to have the same coverage and the same protection and the same benefits, then I think we need to add a prescription drug benefit to traditional Medicare. That is our plan, and I think it is the only plan that provides seniors with the security that they need. Under our plan, keep in mind, you do not have to go order it by mail. You can go to your local pharmacist, and you do not have to determine whether your insurance company has it listed on the formula, because under our plan you will get the medicine that your doctor prescribes at your local pharmacy. That is the kind of security that the seniors need. They need to know what it is going to cost, they need to know what they are getting, and they need to know it is going to be there for them without any question. That is the Democratic plan, and I think it is the best plan for our seniors.

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, that sounds like a good competitive program, because they have got traditional Medicare there to keep the private HMO industry honest. What would happen to us if we did not have traditional Medicare in my rural east Texas district today? With all of those HMOs pulling out, with 15 of my 19 counties having no Medicare+Choice HMO option, my seniors would be left with nothing if they did not have traditional Medicare. I submit to my colleagues, there are those in this House who do not like traditional Medicare for one reason or another. But the truth is, if we are going to have a system of health care for seniors, if we are going to keep the HMOs honest in terms of what they offer and the prices they are demanding to offer it, we need to keep traditional Medicare in place. I will also submit to my colleagues, if we are unable to provide a prescription drug benefit under traditional Medicare, those who advocate getting rid of traditional Medicare will carry the day. Because when faced with the choice of choosing a private HMO plan with prescription drug coverage and a Medicare plan without it, many of our seniors will be forced to exercise the choice of choosing the private HMO plan. So it is essential for those who really believe in privatizing Medicare and turning it over to the insurance companies, they had better think a little bit. Because if they ever expect it to work, they had better keep a viable traditional Medicare program in place as the safety net to ensure that every senior will always have the option of having coverage for their health care and their prescription drugs.

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, I had a similar experience to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Doggett). I talked to a lady in August during my tour of the district when I was going around to 40 communities talking about this very issue, and she came up to me and she said that her HMO had just canceled her and she wanted to know from me what I could do to help her. It would almost bring tears to your eyes. She was a kidney transplant patient. From January until August, her prescription bills totaled $17,000. That had been covered by her HMO. As of December 31, she has no coverage, like 5,000 other seniors in my district. Now, most of my seniors I talk to have prescription drug bills of $300, $400, $500. Many of them are paying their entire Social Security check just to cover their prescription drugs. This lady has $17,000 just from January through August. I could not tell her what she was going to do. I had no answer for her. I told her about what we are fighting for in Congress, why we believe that we need a prescription drug benefit under traditional Medicare. I talked to a fellow at a bank down in Liberty County. He told me that he and his wife spend $1,400 a month on prescription drugs. Now, I did not have the heart to ask him how long could he keep doing that. But these stories are real stories from real people who have real problems. And I think that the reason we come here week after week talking about this problem is because we want to try to provide some help for those seniors who need it. And the way to do it is through the Democratic plan where we can provide seniors with a clear plan with a defined benefit, we can tell them what they are going to get, that is, they are going to get the prescription their doctor prescribes from the pharmacist they trust. We can tell them what the premium is and if they elect to take the coverage, how much it will cost. We can also tell them that under traditional Medicare the plan is here and it is going to be guaranteed by the United States Government and by the people who believe in traditional Medicare, not a plan that relies on the private insurance company that, by necessity we all understand, has to make a profit and, if they find out they are not making a profit, as apparently many of them did in my district, and decide to cancel their coverage for 5,000 seniors, then they are gone. That is not the kind of security seniors in this country deserve.

Mr. TURNER. The Medicare program probably never would have been passed in 1965 if the private insurance industry could have taken care of the health care needs of our seniors. That is why we passed Medicare, is because private insurance would not work. I had a letter from a lady who had been in an insurance business 19 years. In fact, I have it here with me. It was a letter that was actually handed to me at a town meeting I had in Shelby County in my district. The lady asked me if I would read this letter on the way to my next stop. This lady writes very eloquently to say she had been in the insurance business 19 years and her letter calls for us to provide a prescription drug benefit under Medicare for our seniors. She tells the story about her mother who died last November at the age of 87. As she was going through her mother's papers, she knew, of course, her mother had been on prescription medicines, I think, for about 20 years, the last 20 years of her life. She was going through all her bills, seeing what she had spent on medicine. She came across a credit card bill that had a balance owed of $6,000, and she was just shocked. She could not believe her mother, as frugal as she was, would have run up a $6,000 credit card bill and not taken care of it. So she wrote letters to Visa. She found out what were all these charges. It turned out all of them were for prescription medicines. Her mother had been spending about $300 a month on prescription medicines, and her Social Security check just was not enough for her to get by and take care of those medicines. The lady wrote me, she says, I think my mother understood that when she died, her home could be sold and I could pay off that $6,000 Visa bill for her. But she said my mother was a very proud woman. No senior in this country should have to struggle like that to pay for their prescription medicines. We have seniors who are breaking their pills in half trying to take their medicine and being able to afford it. I have seniors that told me at a meeting that they routinely just take one every other day. A pharmacist was standing there. He said, ``For some medicines, that can be extremely dangerous for you to do that.'' I had seniors come up to me and tell me that they actually have to make a choice every month of whether to buy groceries or to go fill those prescriptions. In a country as prosperous as we are today and as compassionate as we like to say we are, I believe we can do something about the problem of a prescription drug crisis for our senior citizens. We talk about this big surplus that is going to arrive here over the next 10 years. I hope it does. I am not sure it will, but I hope it does. Some as we know on the other side of the aisle have proposed that we cut taxes to the tune, I believe Governor Bush says, of $1.6 trillion when we only have an estimated, hoped-for $2 trillion budget surplus. But I think if we are as compassionate as we like to say we are that surely we could set aside 10 percent over the next 10 years of that $2 trillion surplus and provide our senior citizens with a meaningful prescription drug benefit. I know everybody wants tax cuts. I know everybody enjoys getting their taxes lower. But the truth is there is a basic need here that should not be ignored. And I think the vast majority of the American people agree with that. That is why I think on close examination of the Democratic prescription drug plan as compared to the Republican proposal that the overwhelming majority of our seniors and of all Americans would be in favor of a prescription drug benefit under traditional Medicare as the Democrats propose in this country.

Mr. TURNER

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, reserving the right to object, and I do not plan to object, but I yield to the gentleman from California (Mr. Horn) for a brief explanation of the bill.

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, further reserving the right to object, I want to rise and join with the gentleman from California (Mr. Horn) in strong support of this legislation, H.R. 4931, and urge its adoption. I want to commend the gentleman from California (Chairman Horn) and the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Burton) and the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman), ranking member, who have all focused on this bill and to be sure that it is brought before this House today and becomes law before a new administration occupies the White House. The Presidential Transition Act would amend the Presidential Transition Act of 1963 to authorize the use of transition funds for the purpose of providing orientations for individuals that the President- elect plans to nominate to top White House positions, including cabinet positions. The bill would probably affect 20 to maybe 40 political appointments in the White House. It is designed to give greater assurance that the orientation process would take place shortly after the incoming administration assumes office or preferably before they assume office. This orientation will provide a smoother transition for a new administration, eliminating mistakes, and ensuring that the Federal Government will continue to function at a high level. Our subcommittee heard testimony from distinguished witnesses who advocated the adoption of this new provision for orientation programs for incoming members of a new administration. Witnesses such as Elliot Richardson, former Attorney General to President Nixon; the Honorable Lee White, the former Assistant Counsel to President Kennedy and counsel to President Johnson, shared the unique perspective that they have regarding the critical nature of this transition period. There is no question that whoever is elected as the next President of the United States must be ready and prepared to go to work on the morning of November 8. That period between November 8 and inauguration is, indeed, a very critical period of time, not only for the new administration, but for the country as a whole. So I am pleased to join with the gentleman from California (Chairman Horn) today in urging that this bill be adopted. It is noncontroversial. It is bipartisan. We have introduced it today and move that it be adopted by unanimous consent. Even though we passed the bill on the floor of this House, we have now incorporated changes suggested by our colleagues in the Senate. I urge that we adopt it today. Mr. Speaker, I withdraw my reservation of objection.

Mr. TURNER

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding. I want to thank the gentleman in particular for his hard work that he has exhibited throughout his years in Congress to try to bring fiscal responsibility to the Federal Government. Just last year for the first time we had a surplus in the annual Federal budget. We had not had one they tell me for 30 years. I think it is very important as all of this talk is being kicked around about the surplus, the anticipated surplus, that we not waiver in our commitment to try to continue to have annual Federal surpluses so we can pay down our Federal debt. It may very well be, as the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Taylor) said, there may not really be a surplus. People talk a lot about the anticipated surplus; but it is not here yet, and it may not be here. We all have been told by the Congressional Budget Office that the non-Social Security, non-Medicare Trust Fund surplus totals about $2.2 trillion over the next 10 years. That is an estimate. It may or may not arrive. But we also are told that that estimate of the surplus is based on a lot of assumptions. It is based on the assumption that Federal spending will not increase, even though we know the population of this country keeps growing and placing increased demand on the Federal Government. We also know that if we reduce the assumption in the budget estimate of economic growth by only one half of 1 percent, that 25 percent of that surplus just disappears. A one-half of 1 percent adjustment in annual growth over 10 years means $500 billion of the estimated $2 trillion surplus disappears. So I think it is important for us to talk tonight about the importance of staying on course for fiscal responsibility, and I was very proud that Vice President Gore and Mr. Lieberman proposed a budget surplus reserve fund, to make sure that if all those rosy estimates of the surplus turn out not to be true, that we will not put this country back into deficits. A fellow in overalls probably made the point better than I will tonight at a town meeting I had in my district. After all my efforts to explain all this complicated talk about Federal budget surplus estimates and the national debt, he raised his hand and he says, Congressman, how can you folks in Washington talk about a surplus when you have a national debt of over $5 trillion? Well, that stumped me for a minute, because I guess that is true. Only in Washington can people claim to have a surplus when we have a $5 trillion debt at the same time. Back when we got the revised estimate of the anticipated surplus that is supposed to arrive over the next 10 years of $2.2 trillion from our Congressional Budget Office, that very day the national debt stood at $5.6 trillion. Yes, only in Washington can people say we have a surplus when we owe $5.6 trillion. So before we let the politicians squander our future anticipated surplus with new spending programs or irresponsible tax cuts that primarily are aimed at the wealthiest Americans, let us set up a simple and reliable budget framework that we can all play by. The Blue Dog Democrats, the conservative Democrats in this Congress, have always advocated a very simple plan for the use of any anticipated surplus that may arrive over the next 10 years. We say, let us dedicate 50 percent of us to paying down the national debt. Let us use 25 percent of it for commonsense tax cuts that are aimed at people who really need a tax break. Let us use 25 percent of any anticipated surplus to be sure that we save social security and Medicare for the next generation. That is a sensible plan, a sound plan, and any time I have had the opportunity to talk about it to the people of my district, they say it is a good plan that we ought to follow. Our national debt works a lot like our credit cards. When the United States runs up a big debt that we do not pay off, then we have to pay interest. The debt keeps growing, and so do the interest payments. The interest today is eating away at our budget. We spent last year almost as much on interest on our national debt as we spent on the entire defense budget, which is the largest category of spending in the Federal budget. If we use half of our surplus to pay down the national debt, we can pay it off entirely in 10 years. There is still room after that to afford other national priorities like commonsense tax cuts, social security reinforcement, and to save the Medicare program for the future. But it seems that here in Washington, in order to issue a good press release about how big a tax cut we are for, the majority in this Congress has insisted on applying the bulk of any anticipated surplus to tax cuts. In fact, if we total up all the tax cuts that have passed through one House or the other in this Congress, they total almost $1 trillion. President Bush has proposed $1.3 to $1.6 trillion in tax cuts over the next 10 years. It is hard for me to see how they could devote 80 to 90 percent of any anticipated surplus that may not even show up to tax cuts, and then tell the American people that they are going to pay off the national debt. The truth of the matter is that we cannot do it. Under those almost $1 trillion in tax cuts, we find that they were targeted at the wealthiest Americans. In fact, an analysis that I looked at just the other day said that 50 percent of the tax cuts in that Republican plan, that $1 trillion, almost, in tax cuts, would go to the wealthy families of our country who make over $130,000, the top 5 percent of American families, while on the other hand, middle-income families making under $40,000 would get less than 10 percent of those tax cuts. Stated another way, it means that a middle-income family earning $50,700 a year would get a tax break under the Republican plan of $323 a year, less than $1 a day, while the wealthy family earning $329,000 a year would save $6,408 in their tax obligation. That is simply not fair. Yes, all Americans need tax relief, but those who have benefited the most from the prosperity that we have enjoyed should not receive the largest percentage of income savings. We need to get our financial house in order and our debt paid off before we give Bill Gates and Ross Perot a multi-billion dollar tax break. Let me make it clear, I am a strong supporter of tax cuts for working families. The Democrats in this Congress have voted for tax cuts for American families. They have voted for a less expensive version of the estate tax repeal that would repeal the estate tax for 95 percent of the American people who currently would be obligated to pay one, and keep in mind, only 2 percent of American families even pay the estate tax today. The Democrats also advocated getting rid of the marriage penalty, and voted on the floor of this House to do so, but the Republicans wanted to be sure they had a sweeter deal and they proposed a tax cut that not only eliminated the marriage penalty, but gave tax relief to those who actually get a marriage bonus. As I say, if we look at all the tax cuts that the Republican majority has passed on either the floor of this House or the Senate totalling almost $1 trillion, what we find is that the wealthiest Americans benefit the most, leaving the crumbs to average working families. It is the hard work of every American taxpayer that is fueling our surplus. As I have heard said often in the presidential campaign, American families need tax relief, and they do. Both candidates agree. But the truth of it, to say that the surplus is not the government's money, it is the people's money, misses the point, because the people of the country also, unfortunately, owe almost $6 trillion in debt. So let us be sure that when we talk about tax cuts, that we are talking about responsible tax cuts aimed at middle-income Americans who need the tax relief, and let us also be sure that we do not make those tax cuts so big that we fail to deal with the national debt, which is approaching $6 trillion. The truth is, the best tax cut that the American people can get is to pay down the national debt. Let me say that again. The best tax cut that the American people can get is to pay down the national debt. Members may say, why is that so? Economists uniformly agree that if we pay down the national debt, it gets the government out of the business of borrowing money in the credit market. If we reduce the demand for credit, the effect across-the-board is to lower interest rates: less demand from borrowed money, lowered interest rates. So what we can do is pay down the national debt, and by doing so, give the American people something even better than tax relief. The Council of Economic Advisors reports that paying down the debt over the next 10 years will save American families $250 billion in home mortgage payments alone, $250 billion. A 2 percent reduction in interest rates would save a family paying a $100,000 mortgage $2,000 a year. Keep in mind, even the gigantic, irresponsible Republican tax cut plan saves an average working family, a middle-income family, less than $1 a day, less than $323 a year. If we can lower interest rates and that family is trying to pay off a home, and most families enjoy the opportunity to own their own home at some point in their lives, if we can reduce that interest rate 2 percent, we will not save them $323, we will save them $2,000 a year. That is the kind of sound budget plan that this Congress need to pursue. We have a responsibility in these prosperous times to take advantage of a historic opportunity to pay down the debt, a debt that was accumulated over 30 years of deficit spending. We have a responsibility not to count on the estimated $2 trillion surplus that is supposed to arrive here over the next 10 years by deciding today what we are going to do with it. It is kind of interesting, because we actually here in Congress have had tax cuts on the floor that would consume the opportunity for any Congress in the next 10 years to vote on a tax cut. It seems to me that those who claim to be fiscally prudent, who claim to be fiscal conservatives, would understand that we do not spend a surplus that is not here yet, and that we do not spend it all at one time. There are other priorities that we have to be attentive to. Medicare needs to be preserved for the next generation. Social security needs to be preserved for the next generation. We need a prescription drug benefit under Medicare for our senior citizens. We need to spend more on national defense. We need to be sure that we protect our veterans. Those are issues that have not been accounted for when people talk about a $2 trillion estimated surplus. So let us stick to a plan of fiscal responsibility. Let us be sure we protect our economy for the future. Let us be sure that our children do not have to pay off that $5.6 trillion debt that, by the way, continues to grow. I thank the gentleman for the opportunity to share these thoughts.

Mr. TURNER

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone) for yielding to me. It is good to be here and to share this hour with him and our colleagues on the Democratic side of the aisle who have worked for so long now trying to pass a prescription drug benefit for our senior citizens under the Medicare program. Mr. Speaker, 2 months ago the Republicans tried to diffuse the issue by passing a bill on the floor of this House by a very narrow margin that was simply a plan that told the insurance companies to go out there and offer insurance policies for prescription drugs to our seniors. They did it in spite of the fact that, during the hearings on the very bill, the insurance companies came in and said that it was not going to work. In fact, the president of Blue Cross and Blue Shield said the idea of a private insurance drug benefit, and I am quoting, ``provides false hope to America's seniors because it is neither workable nor affordable.'' Now we see that Governor Bush has belatedly approached the same plan. He simply says that we need to rely on private insurance companies to provide prescription drug coverage for our seniors. It is quite interesting to note that the Republicans and Governor Bush have said we can rely on private insurance companies to cover our seniors' prescription drug needs when at this very moment the private insurance companies are pulling out of providing Medicare+Choice plans for our seniors. In early August, I had the opportunity to travel around my district. I visited about 40 communities and talked to hundreds of seniors who are struggling to pay their prescription drug bills. I stopped in many pharmacies and talked to many seniors who brought in their prescription medicine bottles. In fact, I had urged them to bring in their empty medicine bottles to allow me to take them back to Washington. This is one of them from Kirbyville. I urged my seniors to use these empty prescription medicine bottles as a way to send a message to the Congress that they are ready for this Congress to do something about the high cost of prescription drugs and to provide a Medicare benefit for prescription drugs. I have got at least four full boxes of these, and it shows that the seniors that I represent are tired of waiting for this Congress to do something. We have been working on this for over 2 years now, and the truth of the matter is it is time for this Congress to act. When I talked to the seniors in my district, many of them had prescription medicine bills that run several hundreds of dollars a month. I met seniors who are trying to make do by taking their pills and breaking them in half; trying to get by and lower the cost that way. Others told me they just try to take a pill every other day instead of every day as prescribed. I met seniors who are having to make the difficult choice of whether to buy their groceries or to fill their prescription. In the community of Navasota in my district I was there at a local pharmacy that is located in a grocery store, and a lady came up to me, she did not know I was going to be there to talk about this issue, and she just overheard me so she stopped in to listen. Afterwards, she came up to me and she said, I just brought my prescription in yesterday and I had come back today to pick it up. She said I was just back at the pharmacy counter and the pharmacist told me that it would be $125. She said I told him he would just have to keep it. I asked the pharmacist later if that was a common problem and he said it was. He said many people come in and ask to have their prescriptions filled only to find that the price is too high for them to afford. In a Nation as prosperous as this Nation is, and in a Nation that is as compassionate as we like to think and say we are, I believe it is time for us to recognize that we can do something for our seniors in helping them with the cost of prescription drugs. I had a lady in a little town of Teneha come up and hand me an envelope, and she said to me, ``Would you please read this on your way to your next stop?'' When I got in the car I began to read this letter, and I want to share it with my colleagues. This lady that handed me the letter had been in the insurance business for 19 years and she relates a story about her deceased mother. She says, ``Dear Congressman Turner: I am writing this in memory of my mother, who passed away last November in Conroe at the age of 87. My mother had multiple health problems that resulted in her having to take many expensive prescription drugs for the last 20 years of her life. She was very active and able to live a full life in spite of her health problems, and was grateful for medication that could help her. She very meticulously followed her doctor's orders on medication and diet. ``Like most people her age who lived through the Great Depression and World War II, she possessed much pride in self-sufficiency. She did not ask anyone for handouts. She believed in paying her bills first and foremost and maintaining good credit. People of this era worked hard. And even though they worked hard and paid the maximum through Social Security, their retirement income is still not sufficient to meet the total cost of retirement living, especially if there is a prescription drug bill every month of $300 or more. ``My mother's only income was her Social Security retirement income with a prescription drug cost of $300 a month. After her death, I discovered that her major indebtedness was a credit card with over $6,000 on it. I inquired and determined that it was practically all for prescription drugs. She used the card when she needed medicine and had no money left in the bank. She knew that the account could be paid off when her modest home was sold. Because of her pride and self- sufficiency, I did not know this until her death.'' It is of quite a surprise, I am sure, to this lady, to know her mother had to charge her prescription drugs on her credit card and run up a $6,000 bill just to be sure she could take her medicine. These stories and many like it were repeated to me over and over again as I traveled around my district during our August work period. These people that I talked to are in desperate need of some help. We need sound policies and a meaningful prescription drug coverage plan, not empty promises, not press releases. Today, the problems of the drug crisis has reached a new crisis. This is brought about by the fact that all across our country seniors who signed up for these so-called Medicare+Choice plans, offered by the big HMOs as a substitute for regular Medicare, have been canceling their coverage of our seniors. Hundreds of seniors told me that they personally received these notices of cancellation to be effective on December 31 of this year. In the 19 counties in my district, as of the end of December, 15 of those counties will have no Medicare+Choice HMO option offered to them. All across this country seniors are receiving similar notices of cancellation. In fact, at last count there were over 900,000 seniors in this country that are receiving notices from their insurance companies saying their Medicare+Choice HMO plans are canceled as of December 31. Many of those are in my State of Texas. One would think that Governor Bush would understand that private insurance HMO coverage for prescription drugs is not the answer, particularly in light of the fact that hundreds of thousands of seniors across this country are being told no by their HMO. We have learned, I think, an important lesson, one that our Republican friends and Governor Bush also need to learn, and that is we cannot rely upon private insurance as a safety net for our seniors. Once again the Republicans propose that private insurance can solve the problem. Recently, when Governor Bush announced his new plan, he said he would begin to cover prescription drugs in year 5 of his proposal by reforming Medicare, and for the next 4 years he said he would give $12 million a year to the States to allow them to do something about the problem of prescription drugs for seniors. Now, the States tell us that they do not want to have this ball. The National Governors Association has already said, and I quote, ``If Congress decides to expand prescription drug coverage to seniors, it should not shift the responsibility or its cost to the States.'' Why should we give money to our States to subsidize insurance companies instead of just using the money to provide meaningful prescription drug coverage under the traditional Medicare program that seniors understand and trust? The insurance companies are abandoning our seniors right and left, and yet our Republican friends continue to say that insurance, private insurance, can take care of the problem. Medicare was signed into law by a great Texan, Lyndon Johnson, in 1965, in a day when prescription drug coverage was not nearly as important as it is today, because prescription drugs were a very small percentage of our total health care cost. Today it is a much larger percentage and a much more serious problem. After 35 years of protecting our seniors, we should be strengthening Medicare with a prescription drug benefit, not dissolving it in favor of private insurance companies out to earn a buck when we already know from our current experience that private insurance companies cannot be relied upon. We only need to look back to see what has happened to seniors across this country in recent months. In rural east Texas, the area of the country that I represent, 65 percent of our seniors on Medicare do not have access to any of these Medicare+Choice plans that offer prescription drug coverage. What are we going to do for those when the Republican plan goes into effect? Seniors in my district know what their Social Security check is down to the penny. They know how much rent they pay and they know their other bills almost to the penny. What they need is a specific defined prescription drug benefit. The Republican plan, the Bush plan, does not give them that. The Bush Republican plan only gives them more questions. Seniors will not know how much that plan costs them, seniors will not know what it covers, and seniors certainly will not know how long it will be there for them. The Democratic plan is very simple. We know how much it is going to cost. We have already talked about the cost of the Democratic plan. It begins about $24 a month and rises slightly over the period of increased coverage. It covers 50 percent of the first $5,000 of prescription drug cost and covers everything above that, and it is a part of Medicare, not some insurance company plan that may go away next year. That is the kind of security senior citizens want; that is the kind of security that senior citizens deserve. The private insurance industry clearly has to try to make a profit. They are not in the business of providing a safety net for our seniors. That is the appropriate role of government. We cannot afford to abandon our seniors to those same HMOs that have been dropping them all across the Nation to date. Our prescription drug benefit plan is universal, it is affordable, it is understandable, and it is voluntary. If there be any senior who chooses not to sign up for the Medicare prescription drug benefit that we propose, they simply will not have to pay the premium. So our plan, I think, is the one that seniors deserve, and I hope that we can continue to push until this goal is accomplished, hopefully in this Congress, but, if not, in the future I am confident that we will prevail. Mr. Speaker, I yield back to the gentleman from New Jersey.

Mr. TURNER. I just want to say when I heard the gentleman from Maine (Mr. Allen) talking about the issue that it is so very true that private insurance companies are not the answer, and I think our senior citizens understand that. I think they understand full well that Medicare works, it has served them well, and the seniors that I talked to in August who had received these notices of cancellation, seniors that had signed up for these Medicare+Choice plans simply because they offered them some prescription drug coverage in addition to the regular Medicare coverage, those seniors understand that you cannot count on private insurance, and it is just as the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Berry) said a minute ago, the Republican plan offered by Governor Bush does not assure any senior what it is going to cost them, does not guarantee them what it is going to cover, does not tell them what the deductibles are, and it certainly does not promise them that it is going to be there because, as we have learned, these HMOs can pull out any time they want to. Our plan is understandable. We have already laid out the cost to seniors. It is going to be available to everybody on a volunteer basis. Seniors can get the prescription drug their doctor prescribes. And they are going to know that it will be there, not just today but tomorrow as well. Now, that is what our seniors need. The choice that Governor Bush was talking about is a choice of confusion. He is saying that private insurance companies are going to be offering all kinds of plans and you can just choose the one you want. The truth is, that is a false promise. It has not worked in Medicare+Choice with over 900,000 seniors in this country receiving a notice that as of December 31 their Medicare+Choice plan is going to be canceled. Medicare is a good program. It has served us well since 1965 and there is absolutely no reason to abandon it. We need to pass the Democratic plan. It is the plan that seniors can understand and that they need.

Mr. TURNER

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, I have a special opportunity today to honor the Huntsville Item, a fine newspaper in East Texas, which will be celebrating its 150th birthday on August 18. The Huntsville Item is the second oldest continually published newspaper in the state of Texas. Over the last century and a half, it has reported the everyday challenges facing East Texans, as well as the triumphs and tragedies of our great nation. The Huntsville Item began publication in Huntsville, Texas on August 20 1850, under the editorship of George Robinson, who was born in Liverpool, England. From 1863-1864, during Robinson's enlistment in the Civil War, the Item was irregularly published due to Robinson's war duties and scarce supplies. A fire destroyed the printing house of the Item on May 4, 1878, and the paper had to be printed several blocks away. But again, six years later, fire struck down the printing house, interrupting the Item's distribution for several weeks while printing was relocated to nearby Willis. Later that year, George's youngest son, Fred, took over management of the paper, moving all its operations back into Huntsville. For several years early in the twentieth century, the Huntsville Item operated as the Huntsville Post-Item under publisher J.A. Palmer. In 1915, the paper was sold to Ross Woodall, who, along with his wife, published the paper until 1967. The Item is currently owned by Community Holdings Newspapers, Inc. The faded headlines of this newspaper tell the story of our nation's history. Through the Civil War, two World Wars, Korea, Vietnam, the Persian Gulf, and Kosovo, the Item relayed news of brave American soldiers to their parents, siblings, and loved ones. Its newsprint has captured the Great Depression, the Baby Boom, the Oil Rush, the S&L crash, and the digital revolution. Its columns have examined Nolan Ryan, Willie Nelson, LBJ and Sam Rayburn. I congratulate all the editors, photographers, and reporters who have made this newspaper last through the test of time. Even after four fires and other challenges, the paper has survived and flourished. I hope that the stories it reports in the next hundred and fifty years will mirror the same growth, progress, and success that our nation has experienced since its first copy, published in 1850.

Mr. TURNER

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of H.R. 4924, the Truth in Regulating Act of 2000. Transparency in government is essential to our democracy. Many times our Federal agencies in their zeal to carry out their mission create regulations that can be overly burdensome to the public. As a Congress, we have a responsibility to ensure that agency rules fulfill statutory requirements in an open, efficient, effective and, most importantly, in a fair manner. Agencies must be accountable to the people they serve. This legislation creates a 3-year pilot project in which at the request of the committee of jurisdiction the General Accounting Office would review proposed and final rules which have a significant impact on the public. Within 180 days, the GAO would independently evaluate the agency's analyses of costs, benefits, alternatives, regulatory impact, and any other analysis prepared by the agency. I want to commend the gentlewoman from New York (Mrs. Kelly); the gentleman from California (Mr. Condit); the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Burton); the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. McIntosh); the ranking member, the gentleman from California (Mr. Waxman); and the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Kucinich) for their leadership and willingness to work to craft a compromise on this bill. I am particularly pleased that the language was included which clarifies that this bill only requires the GAO to audit the analyses which were prepared by the agency pursuant to statutory authority as opposed to requiring the GAO to do its own cost-benefit analysis. I would hope that all parties to this compromise agree that it would be impractical and an overwhelming burden to the GAO to perform another separate, independent analysis. Mr. Speaker, this is a good government bill; and I urge its passage by the House.

Mr. TURNER

Mr. TURNER. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, I rise today in support of House Concurrent Resolution 371, which expresses the support of the goals and the ideas of the National Alcohol and Drug Recovery Month. As may be mentioned, September is National Alcohol and Drug Addiction Recovery Month, and it is certainly a powerful message to hear the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Ramstad) speak of his own recovery from addiction. I think we should join in commending him for the courage that he displays in sharing his message of recovery from addiction. It should give encouragement to all who fight to overcome addiction in a similar manner. This powerful message which we hope to send today, that substance abuse treatment is effective and that recovery reclaims lives, is a very important message to send to the American people. Providing effective treatment to those who need it is critical to breaking the cycle of addiction, violence, despair and to helping addicted individuals become productive members of society. This is an opportunity for all of us to recognize the tremendous strides taken by all individuals who have undergone successful treatment and to salute those who have worked with those individuals so tirelessly and have dedicated their lives to helping people with problems of addiction. This month celebrates the work of policymakers, Federal, State, and local government entities, business leaders, substance abuse providers and the public. This is an opportunity for all of us to recommit ourselves to the task of substance abuse treatment and recovery. Substance abuse does cost American businesses and industries millions of dollars every year, and it has a profound negative effect in the workplace. Contrary to popular opinion, most illegal substance abusers work on the job every day. In fact the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration has found that nearly 73 percent of all illegal drug users in this country are employed. Lost productivity, high employee turnover, low employee morale, mistakes and accidents, increased Workers' Compensation insurance and health insurance premiums are all the results of untreated substance abuse problems in the workplace. September, designated as recovery month, also highlights the benefits to be gained from corporate and small business workplace substance abuse referral programs. H. Con. Res 371 makes us all aware that recovery from substance abuse is possible and that supporting treatment for addicted individuals increases productivity, improves morale, is important to success in business, and most importantly, preserves and protects the quality of life for the addicted individual and their families. I join with the author of this bill and with the gentleman from California (Chairman Horn) in support of this resolution to salute those who work with the addicted in this country. Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. TURNER. Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. TURNER

Mr. TURNER. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, I rise in strong support of H.R. 4110, the legislation to reauthorize the National Historical Publications and Records Commission. This commission is the grant-making arm of the National Archives. It is charged with a very important role of preserving non- Federal records. Every year grants are made to State and local governments, universities, libraries, historical societies, and other nonprofit institutions for the purpose of preserving important historical documents for years to come. The Congress created this commission in the 1930s because it understood and recognized the importance of preserving American history, not only within the Beltway, but all across this United States. Proper and accurate historical documentation is essential to recording the history of our great democracy. This commission has had an important job, and I am pleased to join with the gentleman from California (Chairman Horn) in cosponsoring this legislation which will reauthorize this appropriation through the year 2005. The papers, the manuscripts and other artifacts preserved by grants from this commission define who we are as a people and as a Nation. I want to commend Governor John Carlin, our National Archivist, for his leadership in this area. The former Governor of Kansas has done an outstanding job leading at the National Archives, and this grant program is one of the most effective tools that we have to continue the fine tradition of those who have worked diligently at the National Archives over our many years of history to be sure that we, as a Nation, preserve those things that are important to our heritage. It is a pleasure for me to join with the gentleman from California (Chairman Horn), and I urge the House to adopt H.R. 4110. Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. TURNER

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Camp). Ron Lasch

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, I come to the floor tonight during this special order hour with my colleagues, the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Berry), the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Green), the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone) and other leading Democrats to talk about an issue that we have worked on for at least 2 years now, and that is the problem of the high price of prescription drugs being paid by our senior citizens. Mr. Speaker, I want to talk a little bit as we begin tonight about what I believe to be the coming crisis in health care for our senior citizens. Just last week, most of us were in our districts over the July 4th holiday, and we had the chance to talk to our constituents. I had numerous senior citizens coming up to me and talking about the letter they had received from their HMO, from their insurance company telling them that as of the 1st of January, their Medicare choice policy, their HMO Medicare plan was going to be discontinued by their insurance company. In fact, in East Texas, we have almost 5,000 seniors who are receiving these notices from their insurance companies, companies like Aetna, NYL Care, Humana are sending out notices to these seniors saying you are canceled, no longer can you have our Medicare choice HMO coverage. Most of these seniors signed up for this option under Medicare, because an HMO lured them to sign up with the promise of some prescription drug coverage under Medicare, and these seniors are going to be greatly disappointed and very upset come January 1 when they find out no longer do they have access to prescription drug coverage under their Medicare+Choice program. A good example of this came in a letter I received just yesterday. One constituent whose wife's name is Roxanne was dropped from NYL Care. Here is what this constituent's letter said to me, he wrote, our rights are being violated by the insurance companies and the politicians who are on the side of the insurance companies. My wife, Roxanne, he wrote, will end up in a wheelchair and possibly not able to walk again if she's denied the drug she needs. How many more Roxannes are out there, he writes, how many more Roxannes will suffer so the insurance companies and the politicians can get rich? Mr. Speaker, well, it is a hard lesson to learn. Unfortunately, our senior citizens are learning the lesson and that is you just cannot trust the insurance companies and the HMOs. Our senior citizens are out there struggling trying to pay the costs of prescription drugs. They know the insurance companies are not taking care of them, and they know that the insurance companies simply want to make money, and they are not interested in what happens to them. That is why over 5,000 seniors in my district are getting notices as we speak. When an insurance company decides to pull out of an area, a lot of people get hurt, a lot of people will be left without coverage all across this country come January 1. Some of us here in this House on the Democratic side of the aisle do care about our senior citizens, the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone), the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Green), the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Berry) and others have been working for almost 2 years trying to do something about the high cost of prescription drugs. The sad fact is we know what works, and it is not the insurance companies' HMO plans. Just 2 weeks ago on the floor of this House, the Republican leadership passed a plan purportedly to help senior citizens with their prescription drug costs. It was a plan that said to the big insurance companies, you all offer insurance plans, prescription drug plans to our senior citizens and we will subsidize the costs for those who are at 125 percent of the poverty level and below. Mr. Speaker, well, for starters we all understand that the problem of high price of prescription drugs does not just fall on those who are below the poverty level, it really depends not only what your income is, it depends on how sick you are. I have an aunt who is a medical income person. She just got a new prescription from her doctor for a heart ailment that is going to cost her $400 a month. She is very upset. She let me know about it. She wants to know when this Congress is going to act. I told her I hope it was soon. The Republican plan that was passed by this House by the narrow margin of 3 votes was an empty promise to our senior citizens. The Republican leadership let the private insurance companies control the prescription drug programs when the private insurance companies themselves were before this Congress for weeks before that vote telling us that they will not offer any prescription-only drug plans. What really happened on the floor of this House is the big pharmaceutical manufacturers carried the day. After all, they had been running ads for weeks under a front group called Citizens for a Better Medicare, advertising full page ads in the newspapers and ads on the television screens that said the answer to the problem of prescription drug coverage for our seniors is private insurance, private insurance, private insurance, and sure enough that is what the Republican leadership did, pass a plan saying that private insurance was going to solve the problem. Mr. Speaker, well, we on the Democratic side of the aisle know that it is not going to solve the problem. In fact, even the insurance company knows that it is not going to solve the problem. Listen to what the President of Blue Cross-Blue Shield had to say about the idea of prescription drug-only insurance policies for seniors. He testified it, referring to the prescription drug plan that was proposed by the Republican leadership, it provides false hope to America's seniors because it is neither workable nor affordable. That is what the insurance industry said about the plan that they are supposed to offer under the Republican bill. The truth is, the Republican plan that was passed on this House floor by a margin of three votes is no plan at all. It might have made a nice press release over the July 4th holiday, but that is all it was, a press release. It is really interesting because my senior citizens in my district have already figured it out, and they were coming up to me over the July 4th holiday saying we know that bill that passed is never going to amount to anything for us. The New York Times had an article in this weekend's paper about insurance companies rejecting the same proposal that we just passed that was passed a few months ago by the legislature in Nevada. The New York Times wrote about the insurance company spurning Nevada's invitation to provide coverage of prescription drug-only policies for their seniors. When they advertised for bids by insurance companies under the legislation they passed, not one single insurance company was interested in the plan. The idea just does not work. It is just kind of like offering insurance for haircuts. It does not work because everybody needs one. Insurance companies understand that. It is not something that one insures. Most all of our senior citizens need coverage for prescription drugs. That is why the insurance companies cannot offer one that is affordable. Frankly, it is an idea that simply will not work. Unfortunately, the Republican leadership in the House did not understand that. So what does work? What does work is what the Democrats in this House proposed and were not even given the opportunity to present it on the floor and debate it, and that is to provide a prescription drug benefit under the Medicare program, a program that seniors have trusted since 1965 to help them cover the cost of their health care. Our plan was affordable. It was voluntary. It was universal. It covered all people regardless of their income level. That is what our senior citizens deserve. I hope that when we celebrate the 35th anniversary of Medicare at the end of this month, we will be able to say that this Congress has acted responsibly and passed a real plan to help our senior citizens with their prescription drug costs. It is time that we take that long-needed action. If Medicare were created today, there is no question we would have a prescription drug coverage. Back in 1965, only about 10 percent of our health care cost was taken up by purchase of prescription drugs. Today they tell us it is about 30 percent. The truth is prescription drugs have done a lot of good things for us, but what good is the cure if one cannot afford the medicine? That is what my seniors are telling me, and they are right. Citizens For Better Medicare advocated the plan that was passed. The big pharmaceuticals carried today. But our senior citizens today were big losers. I think it is time for us to stand up for our seniors and let the folks in this Congress who were on the side of the big pharmaceutical manufacturers understand that our senior citizens want better treatment than that. After all, why should we give billions of dollars of taxpayers' money to insurance companies and big HMOs when they do not even want to offer those plans? Let us give the money back to our seniors in the form of lower drug prices, then we will have done something that helps those senior citizens. I am very pleased tonight to be joined by the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Berry). He serves along with the gentleman from Maine (Mr. Allen) and I on the Prescription Drug Task Force. We have worked for almost 2 years to try to bring some relief to senior citizens. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield to the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Berry) and allow him to share his thoughts on this very important issue.

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Berry) for his telling comments, particularly about his visit to Cuba. Even the Cubans understand that our senior citizens are getting ripped off and everybody in the world gets a better deal on prescription drugs than we do. That is really telling. I compliment the gentleman on his remarks. I also want to mention the gentleman from Arkansas has been a leader, not only in our Prescription Drug Task Force, but in his sponsorship of the legislation that would allow senior citizens of this country, and all of us, to be able to buy drugs in Mexico or Canada, and we can do that legally. Obviously that is where we would all buy them because they get them for less than half the price that we are having to pay for them. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Green). The gentleman from Texas and I served, not only here together, but in the State senate before. He is a leader on the Committee on Commerce on this issue, and he has worked long and hard to try to bring some fairness to prescription drug prices and to provide some benefit for our senior citizens of this area of great need.