Nancy L. Johnson: “but we need to do something better than the Senate position, and we certainly need to avoid the additional 2 percent cut…”

I also want to say both to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula) and also to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) that you have brought forward for this body a very fine, balanced bill in a difficult era. The money that you have put into…

in an era when Americans' dependence on federal entitlements is increasing, when the number of Americans filing for personal bankruptcy rose an astounding 30 percent in the past year, and when our national savings rate is at its lowest…

For instance, someone said, why do not we have a prescription drug benefit that is part of traditional Medicare? That is what we should have passed. Folks, that is what we did pass. The bill we passed made prescription drugs a benefit…

I yield myself 40 seconds. Mr. Chairman, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are acting as if we had technology that, if we only had the money, we could implement. That just isn't so. Secretary Levitt and Dr. Brailer have led a…