It was the labor movement that helped secure so much of what we take for granted today. The 40-hour work week, the minimum wage, family leave, health insurance, Social Security, Medicare, retirement plans. The cornerstones of the middle-class security all bear the union label.
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It is our intention, of course, to try to do all we can to improve that bill, ... We want to ensure that seniors have access to these drug benefits through Medicare itself. We want to make sure they know what it's going to cost. We want to make sure they know what they can count on with regard to the benefits themselves.
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Just like mammography, we essentially have a preventive health care test that Medicare is mandated to cover.
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And in terms of entitlement reforms, we have to save them from themselves, because if we don't reform social security and we don't reform Medicare, they're going to actually implode.
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And because of these programs like Medicare, Medicare prescription drugs, Social Security, we now have the healthiest and wealthiest group of senior citizens that the world has ever seen. This is a continuing commitment to that.
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I opposed Clinton's budget deal in 1997 because he brought in $115 billion cut in Medicare that created greater pressure for providers not to participate.
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