Political Quotes

“today I am introducing the ``Keep the Promise of Medicare Act'' of 2005, and am pleased to be joined by my colleagues Senators Kennedy, Boxer, Lautenberg, Rockefeller, Dayton, and Corzine. Our Medicare beneficiaries were greeted in the New Year by the largest premium increase in Medicare's history--17.5 percent. At the same time, the Social Security COLA increased by only 2.7 percent. What are the implications of such a discrepancy? More than 2 million beneficiaries nationwide have lost their entire COLA to the Medicare premium increase, and almost 13 million seniors and disabled Americans will have over 50 percent of their COLA consumed by the Medicare premium increase. This dramatic increase could have been avoided--CMS Administrator McClellan has acknowledged that provisions included in the 2003 Medicare law designed to privatize the program directly contributed to the premium increase. Therefore, my legislation will limit, retroactively, the 2005 Part B premium increase to the same level as the Social Security COLA. The result will be nearly a $10 monthly savings for our seniors--the Bush Administration has given seniors a monthly $78.20 premium; under our legislation the premium would be $68.40. Older Americans have been struggling under the relentless increases in the cost of their health care and prescription drugs. Rather than alleviating the challenges they are facing, the 2005 premium increase has made their situation even direr.”