Bill Nelson

It certainly is--the same system that has been in place in Florida for years, the system over which the senior Senator from Florida presided as Governor, and therefore the chairman of the State Board of Administration that oversaw the…

I wish to talk about one of those plans and talk about the reason why it is so important for us to modernize Medicare. If we were designing a health insurance system for senior citizens today, would we design it to include prescription…

After what went on with Enron last summer, while Enron executives were selling their shares for hundreds of millions of dollars and protecting their portfolios, their retirees and employees lost more than a billion dollars in retirement…

I doubt that it would surprise the Senator that one of those executives, by the way, was putting the finishing touches on a $15 million mansion, derived from that money from WorldCom. Would it surprise the Senator that late last year…

I voted today for passage of the Dodd-Schumer terrorism insurance bill. While it is not perfect, it provides temporary backstop to allow the private insurance marketplace to adjust to the new threat of terrorist attacks. Because I had…

Yes, I do. Is the Senator aware as a matter of practice insurance commissioners of the States basically do not set rates for commercial policies?

Would the Senator concede under that complicated mathematical formula, often it is a fraction of a percentage of the total annual premium of a company that they will actually pay in an individual company in any one year?

The question is, since we have the Federal Government involved big time under your bill, 80, 90 percent of the risk is going to be borne by the Federal Government----

The Senator has made much of the fact that this would suddenly be the Federal Government getting into ratemaking. Of course, the Senator would concede, would he not, that this is the first time the Federal Government would be getting into…

It seems to me that it makes common sense that since the Federal Government is getting into the business of terrorism insurance in such a big-time way, that we ought to separate out the premiums in a separate account, purely from an…

Therefore, we are not talking about this Senator's amendment having any kind of permanent regulation of rates at the Federal level. Rather, we are looking at a process to affect this specific bill having to do with terrorism rates of which…

The Senator raised a very legitimate question. I think that ought to be hashed out. However, the Senator's bill does self-destruct at the end of year 2002, unless it is extended by the Secretary for 1 more year.

I understand the Senator wants to limit my roll, and I do not want you to limit my roll.

And comprehensive health care reform has to deal with the 40-plus million who don't have health insurance by creating a system whereby they are covered. That then allows the principle of insurance to work for you because the principle of…

It is amazing to me where they come up with the ideas from the administration to get savings out of Medicare, particularly when they start talking about making senior citizens pay copays on home health care, which is an activity that is…

Reverend Sam Green of St. Mark AME Church in Orlando is a rather extraordinary minister of the gospel. He comes from a family that has four brothers who are all ministers, in Orlando, Tallahassee, Gainesville, and Miami. Reverend Green's…

Hearing this debate, it reminds me a little bit about the debate on miles per gallon, whether or not that would be etched into law that would have to be met. If we do not set such a standard, we will never get to it. If we do not set a…

I understand the Senator's discomfiture. It just seems to me it is common sense to assure a person's right to have their ballot counted given the awful experience we had in the State of Florida on ballots not being counted. I just do not…

Given the experience we had in Florida, what could any of the three Senators have as an objection to notifying someone that they had overvoted on a punchcard ballot? What is the objection?

We must allow the market to figure out how to price this new risk.

We cannot let that happen.

Neither can we allow the insurance industry to use the September attacks as an excuse to shirk its rightful role and responsibilities.

We cannot ask the taxpayer to pick up the entire bill.

The good news is that the insurance industry is clearly capable of taking care of the losses that occurred on September 11.

Well, that is a consideration--we cannot do no solution. I do not think we can do that. So let us find the delicate balance.