Lincoln Chafee: “there is an organization set up to report to the Congress every year on the status of Social Security and the status of…”

“there is an organization set up to report to the Congress every year on the status of Social Security and the status of Medicare. This group is a very distinguished group. It consists of the Secretary of the Treasury; the Secretary of Health and Human Services; the Secretary of Labor, or Acting Secretary of Labor; and the Commissioner of Social Security, or the Acting Commissioner of Social Security. These are the people, plus two members of the public. I might say, of the first four--and there are six in all--four of these are Democrats. They are not Republicans; they are Democrats. They submitted a report to us in the Congress in April of this year. What did they say? As we have reported for the last several years, one of the Medicare trust funds, the Hospital Insurance-- The HI, the so called part A. will be exhausted in 4 years without legislation that addresses its fiscal imbalance. This isn't a bunch of right wing Republicans saying there is trouble ahead. These are the very prestigious, qualified Cabinet Members of the President of the United States--every single one of them a Democrat. It goes on to say: We are urging the earliest possible enactment of legislation to further control Hospital Insurance program costs because of the nearness of the Hospital Insurance Trust Fund exhaustion date. Mr. President, these are serious matters. They go on to explain why this is happening. On page 6 of its report it says: Why do costs rise faster than income?…”