Political Quotes

“I wanted to bring it closer to home for some of my constituents, and this is what they can expect out of this budget in Pennsylvania. We talked about Social Security and the fact that the President inexplicably once again moves toward his privatization scheme. Well, in Pennsylvania we have 1.7 million Social Security beneficiaries, many of whom could see retirement savings cut if we moved in that privatization direction. More egregiously, the Medicare program, as we have talked about sees dramatic cuts, $300 billion of cuts to Medicare and Medicaid. In the State of Pennsylvania, I want to talk about what this does. Pennsylvania's Medicare beneficiaries would have to pay higher premiums for coverage of prescription drugs and doctors' services. Reimbursement cuts are going to take effect to home health agencies, to hospitals and to nursing homes. That is what the President's budget does not only around the Nation but in Pennsylvania. This administration's budget, which we talked about assumes, an eight percentage point cut in reimbursement for Medicare physicians. I do not think anybody thinks the cost of health care is going to go down over the next several years.”