Political Quotes

“Mr. President, the Democrats talked this morning about the Affordable Care Act and what the reform efforts are trying to do and what they are not trying to do. I want to associate myself with the comments made by my colleague, the Senator from Nebraska, earlier today. A lot of talk has been thrown around about how the new effort would cut Medicaid spending. As my colleague from Nebraska mentioned, here in Washington a cut is not a cut anywhere else. But if you deal with the rate of growth, if you raise spending only by the Consumer Price Index rather than the medical Consumer Price Index--5 percent rather than 6 percent, for example--then you are somehow cutting the program. We know that the program as it currently stands is unsustainable. I think we all recognize that. So any efforts to deal with and to allow Governors and others at the local level to have more of a say on how these funds are spent and to gain efficiencies that way are frowned upon. It is said that we simply can't do that because it would be cutting Medicaid. That simply isn't the case. Arizona, for example, has a version of Medicaid called AHCCCS. It is done far more efficiently than some of the other States do it. That is because at the local level they have been able to do what local governments do best. The government that is closer to the people generally spends money more wisely and finds efficiencies that the Federal Government simply can't find.…”