George Voinovich

One of my concerns is that you have a lot of vulnerable people out there.

How can somebody that is in this vulnerable position, that does not have a computer, or maybe like this Senator, is not computer literate--thank god that my wife is--going to get the information so they can intelligently decide which card…

But people are already calling 1-800-Medicare.

How long have you had the 1,400 people on? Are they all hired?

Do you feel confident that the people you need to bring in to CMS to do the RFPs, request for proposals, are available to be hired?

An important part of this program, and I have been through it as a governor, will be putting requests for proposals together for private contracting.

I do apologize to the witnesses for being late but the Members of the Senate were being briefed by the Secretary of Defense and the Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff about what is going on in Iraq today.

I would like to reiterate if we were able to achieve what this graph shows, it would be the greatest gift we could give to our children and grandchildren because it would mean that we have been fiscally responsible. The way we are trying…

I can't understand that because the numbers provide for the budget point of order. How can you say, if you have the number, that you have a budget point of order, that you are not going to achieve these numbers?

If we look at the practicality, I just used these numbers because it was 10 percent a year. But the fact is a budget point of order will lie against the numbers that you are projecting in the budget that came out of the Budget Committee…

I look forward to continuing to work with the Administration and my fellow Members of Congress to ensure that Fiscal Year 2005 funding levels meet our environmental objectives.

I think that because of the position you are in, you should be able to provide us some leadership in this area, even if it is controversial.

The reason why some of us have not been able to support his legislation is according to EIA.

We have been through environmental policies limiting the supply of natural gas and exacerbating the demand for it.

I do not understand the accusation that is being made by the Senator from Oregon that it is an industry-driven process.

We know that soft coal does more to pollute the air. We know the hard coal does less.

It seems to me that it ought to be done in a very common sense, logical way, rather than not really having an idea of what is coming in the future.

Clear Skies I think would be a much better solution to the problem.

I think as a government, we owe them some clarity on just what is going to be expected from them.

I would like to comment on just what Senator Jeffords said.

I am greatly concerned about this proposal, as it will disproportionately impact bituminous coal, the Midwest and my State.

It is having a terrible effect on the U.S. economy and the needs of millions of Americans to have affordable heating in their homes.

I hope to work with you in the upcoming weeks to make sure that the mercury rule does not disproportionately affect one region of the country over another.

I firmly believe the Federal Government is responsible for paying its fair share.

Clean water has been a priority of mine ever since I was elected to the Ohio General Assembly in 1967.