The New York Times
July 8, 2003
Plans Improve Federal Workers’ Drug Benefits
By Robert Pear
The House is expected this week to pass legislation ensuring that federal employees, including members of Congress, will have prescription drug benefits better than those available through Medicare when they retire.
The new House bill says drug benefits for civilian federal retirees, who already have drug coverage, cannot be reduced to the level proposed for Medicare. An identical bill has been introduced in the Senate.
The Washington Post July 6, 2003 Medicare Bills Don’t Mimic Model Coverage Not as Comprehensive as Federal Employees’ By Ceci Connolly
In the recent debate over Medicare drug coverage, Sen. Mark Dayton (D-Minn.) challenged senators to match their words with deeds. He offered an amendment requiring lawmakers to lower their drug coverage to the level provided in the final Medicare legislation.
“I would rather bring everyone else up,” he said, “but what is fair for them is fair for us.”
The Senate approved his amendment 93 to 3. But within a day, several senators told the newspaper Roll Call it was a symbolic vote that would be overturned in negotiations with the House.
Explained Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pa.): “Most members saw this as demagoguery. And we weren’t going to condone it publicly by taking it seriously. So we all voted for it.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A13558-2003Jul5.html
Comment: Sometimes it is embarrassing to see how obscene democracy-in-action can be. Shouldn’t we seriously consider replacing many of our current politicians with true advocates of democracy?