Medicare

MEDICARE -- (House of Representatives - September 28, 2004)

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

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. I yield to the gentleman from Ohio.

Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, what I think I heard the gentleman say sounds almost unbelievable.

Mr. EMANUEL. Mr. Speaker, does the gentleman want me to repeat it?

Mr. STRICKLAND. If he would, Mr. Speaker, but what I think I heard him say was that the pharmaceutical companies are offering a senior citizen $4,000 if they will be willing to say something positive about this benefit?

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

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. I yield to the gentleman from Ohio.

Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, so if a senior is on a fixed income and the Social Security premium goes up less than 3 percent and yet the Medicare premium goes up 17.4 percent, what is that senior on a fixed income to do when they are already living on the edge, they are already having a struggle to buy food and get their medicines, pay their bills, heat their homes? What are they to do? What does this President say to an 80-year-old man or woman who is living at the edge in terms of their income? What does this President say? What do the leaders in this House have to say to those folks?

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Mr. STRICKLAND. Madam Speaker, if the gentleman will yield further, I was just standing here thinking if you are a working person, if you are a senior citizen, if you are a veteran in this country, you had better look out, because this administration is out to get you. They are cutting veterans' health care funding. They certainly are not doing anything for the working people, who are seeing the tax burden of this Nation shifted more and more from the very wealthy on to the backs of the working folks. And then when it comes to the older people in this country, when it comes to our senior citizens, they are really getting the shaft.

The fact is that since George Bush became President, Medicare part B premiums have increased 56 percent. In less than 4 years they have increased 56 percent. But back home in Ohio, in Southeastern Ohio, we have an old saying about the chickens coming home to roost. I think the chickens are coming home to roost for the Republicans, because the senior citizens are starting to understand what is happening to them.

A story in the Columbus Dispatch, September 12, it says: "Medicare expense becoming a big issue in the election fight." If I can just share the opening paragraph, it says: "Medicare has emerged as a volatile issue in this year's elections as Democrats vow to roll back a sharp increase in premiums announced this month."

Those premiums are increasing, as has been said here, 17.4 percent. That means that beginning in January, and that is after the election, but beginning in January a senior citizen will be required to pay for part B, their Medicare part B premium, $78.20. That amounts to $938.40 a year.

I repeat to my friend, the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone), the question I asked him a little earlier: If you are a senior citizen and you have health problems that require medication to keep you healthy or to keep you alive, in many cases, and you are on a fixed income, as many of our seniors are, and this President decides to increase your premium 17.4 percent, and your Social Security cost of living increase is less than 3 percent, what can you do? Where can you go to get what you need to buy your medicine, to pay for your food, to heat your home, to pay your rent?

That question is facing hundreds of thousands of American senior citizens tonight, and this President has an obligation to speak to that question, because he is the one who is responsible for putting this additional burden on the backs of our senior citizens.

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Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, listening to this discussion and listening to the things the gentleman said about this bill and how it came into being, I would say that for a senior citizen to continue to vote for those in power would be not unlike a chicken voting for Colonel Sanders. Now, we all know down in Kentucky and Ohio and around there that Colonel Sanders sells Kentucky Fried Chicken. It is pretty good stuff. But quite frankly, Colonel Sanders is no friend of the chicken, and I believe that this administration is no friend to America's senior citizens.

When we think about what is being discussed here, it is outrageous. It is absolutely outrageous. What we are talking about is not theoretical. We are talking about real people, older Americans. We are talking about tax dollars that are being given to pharmaceutical companies and insurance companies. We are talking about decisions being made that are almost irrational, if we consider them in a serious manner.

This administration pushed through a law that says, we cannot negotiate discounts. I mean, Sam's Club negotiates discounts. As the gentleman said, the gentleman from Ohio, the Veterans Administration negotiates discounts for pharmaceutical medications. Yet, this President and the leadership in this House said oh, no, no, no. Medicare cannot negotiate discounts for our senior citizens. Why? Because the pharmaceutical companies wanted that provision in the law. It is outrageous.

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Mr. STRICKLAND. So it is fair to say that President Bush believes that America's senior citizens should pay more for their drugs than Canadian senior citizens. He believes that American senior citizens should pay more for their drugs than English senior citizens or German senior citizens or Belgium senior citizens or Swedish or French senior citizens. That is what we have. America's senior citizens are paying more, senior citizens in other countries are paying less; and this President says that is the way it ought to be. He is standing in the way, with the leadership in this House, of those of us who feel that this is wrong, having the ability to change it.

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Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, we have talked about the problems with this bill. What is the solution?

Well, I think these problems could be solved if the President would pick up the phone and call the gentleman from Illinois (Speaker Hastert) and say, Speaker Hastert, I want a bill that allows the importation of cheaper drugs from Canada into this country. And if the President said to the gentleman from Illinois (Speaker Hastert), Mr. Speaker, I want a bill that allows our government to negotiate cheaper prices for our senior citizens with the pharmaceutical industry, the President could do that, and I believe the Speaker would accommodate him. A bill could be brought to this floor; and with the President's support, it would pass overwhelmingly.

So what is the problem? The problem is the President is on the wrong side of these two issues. He is on the wrong side of other issues as well regarding this bill, but especially on the issue of importing cheaper drugs from Canada, something that most Americans want. Americans cannot understand, they just simply cannot understand why a drug can be sold in Canada at a profit, at a profit. The drug companies are not losing money when they sell these drugs in Canada. So the American people ask, how can a drug company sell a drug in Canada and make a profit and then sell that same drug in this country for two or three or four times as much as they are charging in Canada? What is right about that, when we have older people on fixed incomes who are desperate?

I do not know if the President, as he is out and about the country campaigning, encounters the same kind of people that I do, but every time I go back to my southeastern and southern Ohio district, I encounter older people who are desperate. They simply do not know how they are going to make it.

It would be so simple. We could accomplish this in a few hours' time if the President would simply take the leadership and do it, but thus far, he is leading in the opposite direction. I think the American people need to know that, that if they are concerned about high drug costs and they are concerned about Canada and France and all these other countries getting the drugs more cheaply, they need to know that the President is one of the reasons for that, because he refuses to speak up and speak out and to provide the leadership.