(00:00:00) Four minutes now past twelve o'clock. Midday continues here on Minnesota Public Radio. We're standing by waiting to hear from President Bill Clinton. The president is speaking to a big rally that's been scheduled today at the Crystal Court and the IDS Center in downtown Minneapolis. Dan. Olson is standing by and of course, he'll be hosting our live coverage Dan any side of the president yet? Hi Gary know the band just broke into an unidentified Rouser. I just survey the car. What did you say? What's around (00:00:25) you? Oh, is that (00:00:27) right? The White House pool feed staff thinks. They know the name of a trouser that was just played but I don't trust their judgment on that. They gave me a tune doesn't sound familiar. No, sorry. The simple answer is we haven't seen him just yet. We thought the high sign had been given for him to come down the escalator here at the IDS Crystal Court. We are sitting at a broadcast table here my fuel producer and I Brian tonnison and we're ready to bring you the speech from the podium in the Crystal Court ground floor area just in back of the podium is the gallery of people all holding give them Health Bill signs little yellow signs with blue lettering and then down in front of me. Are in the gallery no seats no chairs for this event are about 500 folks waiting to applaud. These are all Gary by and large the guests of the Minnesota Nurses Association their members. And of course a lot of dfl ours, Tom Foley is about oh 10 yards ahead of me here Don Mo former State lawmakers upon the railing close to the door where the president is going to come out of apparently he wants to get one of those first handshake. So that's about where things are at. I'm sure it'll be another 078 who knows 10 minutes before things get rolling here invitation only right Dan. I mean you couldn't just walk in off the street and well, that's true Gary, you know, the Minnesota Nurses Association got the call on April 1st. Hey, would you like to have the president come speak? Well sure the answer was and then they opened this closed event to people who were issued tickets. I guess they had about oh 300 400 tickets that were issued to all kinds of folks including the Press. I might add and so what has happened is that the Crystal Court has literally been transformed into a television Studio blue bunting. All around red white and blue balloons Gary. This is a major media event. So there's no mistaking what the White House is up to here. This is clearly a very carefully choreographed event. And of course the media are cooperating like crazy. We're just here in droves Dan what gear we're going to keep a line open that just just hop on as soon as soon as the president is cited will do Meanwhile. We're joined here in the studios by our political commentators Bob meek and Tom Horner. Mr. Mica is the dfl ER and mr. Horner is the Republican. Are these are these good these public rallies good ways to Rally support for Health Care Program. Well, I think right now for Bill Clinton these rallies are good ways to get out of Washington and get away from White Water and and the other problems that have been pursuing him and and that right now actually might be the most important priority for the president what these rallies do is bring Focus to a particular issue such as Healthcare and and yes, I mean Answer to your question Gary. I think they do help Define the issue and they do help the president take control again up the agenda that he seems to have been losing over the last several months about Mica. There's a lot of support in Minnesota or seems to be any way for the single-payer system. Is this the kind of thing that would turn it around? No, I think that what Clinton is doing here is just trying to be friendly with the party people but he has wellstones vote. This isn't going to get him during Burgers vote it I think it's just designed to sort of reassure the faithful and and as Tom said to try to change the subject and it's too bad we reserved this Gorbachev whether president, you know, the president always keeps running up against it stone wall of how is he going to pay for health care and I think you can come to a rally like this and build on a lot of support that already exists out there for reforming the system. I think almost everybody agrees that there have to be some changes to the system. Them, I think almost everybody agrees that Healthcare ought to be deemed a right that access to healthcare ought to be deemed a right and then it ought to be brought into to cover every person. But after you get past a couple of those principles you run up against the wall of how do you pay for it? The frustration that a lot of minnesotans have myself included is that the president is coming here to look at what he calls a Minnesota model that he defines as Government intervention in the the HealthCare Marketplace. The Minnesota model really is all the marketplace reforms that have occurred over the last three decades that have given Minnesota an uninsured rate that is half. The national average health care costs are rising at 20 percent below the national average and by all accounts the finest Quality Healthcare in the world minnesotacare the legislation that has been passed may or may not contribute to that progress may or may not contribute to the leadership, but it's really too early to tell Minnesota care for Intents and purposes hasn't been implemented. What were reaping right now is what has been sown by the private Marketplace in a whole variety of Cooperative reforms. That's what the president ought to be looking at. Minnesota was talking to Senator durenberger all week or two ago. And he said that despite all the the arguing going on in Washington about various approaches to healthcare. He's and despite Whitewater investigations and all that. He's absolutely convinced that in fact a health care plan will pass this year. It'll all of this will resolve itself four to six weeks. Do you guys agree with it? The incrementalist vision in the world is going to Prevail it's going to Prevail because in the 94 elections the incumbent party and it happens to be Clinton's is going to lose seats probably lose control of the Senate and very likely lose a working majority of it is logically in the house. So It gets down to the last cards here. This year is the time that a Clinton program has to go through and that program isn't going to be the one that he announced but it'll be one that actually moves the Healthcare System somewhat forward. Let's hear Dan Olsen in the background. They're not ready yet. That's right. Gary is still not ready. What you're hearing now is Congressman Martin Olaf Sabo pretty important men in Congress committee chair of a big committee. Here are some of his comments from the podium. (00:06:32) It is indeed a pleasure and an honor to have President Bill Clinton with us today in Minneapolis. As the president crisscrosses the country. I don't believe he will find and other community more informed and actively involved in healthcare matters than in, Minnesota. Mr. President, we minnesotans have been in the Forefront of reform for many years. And right now the state is working to expand coverage to more minnesotans and to lower our healthcare costs your efforts. Mr. President to provide Health Care coverage to all Americans and to control costs is vitally important to us and our people and we applaud the work you are doing it is because it is because of the president's leadership that we have as chance of success in this session of Congress and I look forward to continuing to work with the president so we can succeed at the goals. He's put before us ladies and gentlemen now, I would like to introduce to you by dynamic. quiet smoking senator from Minnesota my colleague Paul wellstone Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thanks everybody. Thank you. Thank you. Mayor Sales Belton and Congressman, Sabo. every five seconds a child drops out of school in the United States of America every two minutes a child is born severely underweight healthcare issue. Every two minutes a child is born to a mother who receive no prenatal care Health Care issue. Every five minutes child arrested alcohol-related arrests healthcare issue, every seven minutes child arrested drug-related arrests healthcare issue every two hours. Child is murdered in our country public health issue. Every four hours child commits suicide public health issue every nine hours a child and young person dies of HIV infection. We can do better in our country. I hear the voices of minnesotans in our cafes and the state fair senator. senator I can't afford care for my mother who has Alzheimer's will go under Senator. I lost my job and I don't have any insurance Senator. We live in a rural community. We can't find a doctor we can do much better. We have an opportunity of a generation now is the time to move forward and let us shout it from the mountain top today in Minnesota that whether it be single-payer all payer or whatever. We agree on one thing Universal coverage comprehensive benefits Healthcare in the communities where people live in the United States of America. (00:10:33) Well, Gary pretty familiar rhetoric from the podium here at the Crystal Court little bit of hubbub in the background as apparently some folks. Saw the president on down the (00:10:41) Skyway over past the Crystal Court. (00:10:44) Skyways have been closed off but he's probably making his way (00:10:48) along and Senator (00:10:50) wellstone at the podium now and before him Congressman Sabo addressing the audience and the president who has a derived will go back to the (00:10:57) podium people but leadership that calls on people to be their own Bell selves. We have a president that's travels from one part of our country to the other. He will Galvanize the public he represents the best of that leadership and it is in this spirit that I introduce Mary Ellen mdec president of the Minnesota knows Association and President Clinton. Thank you everybody. (00:11:21) So the yellow signs are fluttering out ahead of us. Give them Health Bill a huge fight Banner with blue letters on it, Minnesota Nurses Association welcomes President Clinton. And now over in the corner of the University of Minnesota pep band has speeded up hit a tune looks like there's a little activity on the Skyway level Gary. Yeah, I would be fairly secure in saying that the advance guard if you will to starting to make its way along the railing now getting in some of the handshaking that is going to bring President Clinton there. He is Dan and I are putting his arm around the president of the Minnesota Nurses Association Mary Ellen M dick. She's at the top of the escalator with Bill Clinton he motions to her to go ahead go down. They turned off the escalator by the way, it's not running. They're walking down much safer as President Clinton waving to the 500 or so people here who are waving back there. Give them Health Bill signs little yellow signs with blue lettering and he's down at the bottom of the escalator. Making his way now through some supporters right in front of the pep band. I hope he has some device that will reduce hearing loss in front of those great big brass horns. He's making his way up to the podium and I think he's shaking a few hands were about 75 yards in back. There's a chant now going up from the audience one of the posters right in front of us as Hey Dad. How about arranging a pizza party with Chelsea? Another poster says Minnesota is Hog Wild for Bill and so it goes this is a pretty friendly crowd. Obviously Dan. I understand. The reason that the Nurses Association was picked as the sponsor was because they were the first major healthcare provider grouped is to endorsed Clinton plan is not right. This is what Mary Ellen indic told me this morning when I spoke to her about nine o'clock. She's getting a big hug now from senator Paul wellstone President Clinton is shaking hands with the mayor of Minneapolis Sharon Sales Belton as right Gary. She will say in her introduction here, which you'll hear in just a moment that the Nurses Association. Associations across the country about 2.2 million nurses were early on supporters of Health Care reform. They're about a half a dozen different kinds of Health reform bills in Congress. Here's Mary Ellen M. Dick (00:13:31) now, my name is Mary Ellen am dick. I'm a registered nurse and I'm president of the Minnesota Nurses Association. I would like to thank some special minnesotans who have joined us for this exciting occasion Welcome to our Congressional representatives and to our state could gush constitutional officers, but I especially want to agree to welcome the nurses who are here today, including my mother and my sister. (00:14:16) There's a gallery right in back of the podium, which is leading the cheering. (00:14:20) Any nurse will tell you everyone who has a question about Healthcare asks a nurse. Your brother your aunt next door neighbor the cab driver the person sitting next to you on the bus. They all want to know what you the nurse think about their own particular health problem. And what do you think about the state of health care in general? A nurses usually have a good answer and we're willing to share it. Today Nurses have enthusiastically come to say what they think about the state of health care in the United States. We're here to say loud and clear. The healthcare system is badly damaged and we support President Clinton in his efforts to fix it (00:15:19) Gallery people around the Skyway level to probably another 300 around the railing of the Crystal Court here in Downtown (00:15:26) Minneapolis Health Care reform became a household term nurses knew that things weren't right. They saw women who had ignored lumps in their breasts being treated for Advanced Breast Cancer because they didn't have insurance to go to the doctor when they found the lump. They took care of young men in intensive care units who had ignored persistent chest pain because they didn't have health insurance. registered nurses working in emergency rooms saw people coming to the ER for treatment of everyday illnesses because they couldn't find a family doctor who would accept Medicaid OB nurses took care of mothers and premature infants who hadn't had any prenatal care and psychiatric nurses like me saw patients using lots and lots of inpatient and emergency care because their health plans didn't pay for the medication and outpatient care that would have allowed them to function in their daily lives without such expensive care. Here in Minnesota nurses decided to do something. More than 10 years ago the elected delegates of the Minnesota Nurses Association passed resolutions supporting the right of children to Quality Healthcare and pointing out the need for cost-effective ways to deliver Healthcare. Starting in 1988. We began passing resolutions on the need for universal health coverage. Nurses around the country were taking similar stands. In 1992 nurses finally found a presidential candidate who was willing to tackle the health care crisis in this country. Bill Clinton promised the very things nurses have been calling for Quality Health Care Universal coverage for all Americans and containment of the uncontrollably rising cost of care. president President Bill Clinton has kept that promise and the 2.2 million registered nurses in the United States will help him get there. I am proud to introduce to you this Advocates of Quality Healthcare for all the president of the United States Bill Clinton (00:18:43) introduction by Minnesota Nurses Association president. Mary Ellen indict shaking hands. Now with President Clinton has just turned to grief the gallery that has been leading the cheers now stepping up to the podium with the presidential seal. The yellow signs. Give them Health bill being waived by the five hundred or so people on the floor here with the Stafford and the idea Center in downtown Minneapolis another 300 or so folks around the railing there's (00:19:08) Bill Clinton, thank you. Wow, what a crowd. Thank you for coming this morning. Thank you for supporting Health Care. I want to thank Mary Ellen for that wonderful speech. She really left nothing for me to say. But she and the nurses of Minnesota have my undying gratitude for this wonderful rally and for their commitment to your health care and to the future of American Healthcare. I want to thank senator wellstone. And Congressman Sabo who has done a wonderful job in his new leadership position helping us to get a budget through that will drive down the deficit and still increase investment in the things that helped America to grow and prosper. I thank you mayor sales for being here and I want to thank the others in the audience who are good friends and supporters of mine. Especially Congressman Bruce vento who is also a strong supporter of healthcare reform your secretary of state John grow. Your State's treasure Mike McGrath my good friend. Skip Humphrey your attorney general and the mayor of st. Paul Norman element. Thank you all for being here. I also couldn't come to Minneapolis today without saying a special word of gratitude. For the extraordinary service being rendered to the United States of America under it what you now know are difficult circumstances by our ambassador to Japan vice president Fritz Mondale. I am honored to be here today under the sponsorship of the nurses of Minnesota. I thank them for doing this. I also want to say that I'm very grateful for the people from heitmann properties who made it possible for us to meet inside instead of outside today. At least for me. It's not spring time yet. The remarks that Mary Ellen made and introducing me speak more eloquently than I ever could to what the millions of American nurses know are The Facts of Life and Health Care in this country. I ran for president because I thought that Washington had become a place where there was too much rhetoric and to little reality where every statement that every person made was automatically pushed to its ultimate extreme. The government can do nothing you're on your own. Are the government can do everything there's nothing for you to do but real people and real life want us to come together as a people and figure out how to deal with our problems and sees our opportunities and we have done our best there. In other words to give the care to America's public life that the nurses of Minnesota give to their patients every day. If you look at what's happened in the last year there has been a pretty big change in the way things work in Washington for a Dozen Years people talked about the deficit and the national debt triple. Well last year this Congress working with me adopted a budget that brought the deficits down interest rates down has helped to create 2.5 million new jobs in this economy. More than were created in the previous four years. The Congress is on a Could place to adopt a new budget which if it is adopted will eliminate a hundred government programs cut 200 others, but increased spending in education in Head Start in defense conversion in the new technologies for the 21st century and educating and training our people and give us the first three years of declining government deficits since Harry S. Truman was the president of the United States of America. Already this year the Congress has passed an education bill called goals 2000 which for the very first time in the history of this country establishes national standards for a world-class education and promotes the kind of Grassroots reforms that minnesotans have been experimenting with for a decade to see that we meet those standards everywhere in the country for all of our children. When the Congress comes back they will take up a build designed to help all the young people who don't go to college to at least get a year or two of further training After High School. So they too can have good jobs and good skills in the global economy. And they will take up a bill that will completely reorder the unemployment system to make it a Reemployment system because people don't often get the job. They lose back anymore. They have to find new jobs. And now from the first day an American is unemployed, he or she should be eligible from day one for new training and new job search and New Opportunities. We're going to change that unemployment system this year. The Congress will take up a crime Bill designed. To make us not only tough but smart for a change with crime. It puts another hundred thousand police officers on the street in community policing in models that have proven proven effective at lowering the crime rate. It takes 28 kinds of assault weapons off the streets and out of the hands of gangs. And if we do it the right way instead of the wrong way the Congress will pass a bill increasing penalties for violent offenders so that we recognize that a relatively small number of our fellow citizens create a very high percentage of the seriously violent crimes. We have more people behind bars as a percentage of our population than any country in the world and yet we continue to let the wrong people out from time to time. It's time we found alternatives to imprisonment for young people and kept the people behind bars who should stay there. We can do that if we do it intelligently. Now why is this happening? It's happening partly because people like Paul wellstone and Martin Sabo and Bruce vento last year were willing to risk their political next to make tough decisions to stop talking about problems and start doing something about them. But it's happening also because the American people say look we are tired of gridlock. We are tired of paralysis. We're tired of rhetoric over reality. We want you all in Washington to conduct your business the way we conduct our business at home identify the problems identify the opportunities seize the opportunities and beat back the problems show up for work every day. It's pretty simple what our strategy is get people together get things done move the country forward give people a chance to live up to their potential. and now we are being called upon to face one of the greatest challenges of this age. For decades and decades the American people have been denied something that every other Advanced country provides to its citizens the security of knowing that they have good health care that is always there every other country with which we compete with an advanced economy has solved this problem only the United States Time After Time After Time After Time has found it impossible to do for 60 years. Whenever we came to the point when it looked like we could deal with the health care problem at times when it was much simpler than it is today when the money at stake was much lower than is at stake today always always fear overcame. Hope entrenched interests overcame the public interest today. I can tell you that we are going to make 1994 different we can provide Health security for all Americans this year and I believe that we will my fellow Americans In Washington, this may look like a partisan issue but out here on Main Street. It isn't Democrats and Republicans and independents all get sick. They all lose their jobs. They all lose their health insurance. There are 39 million Americans who don't have any health insurance now for a whole year in any given year. There are 58 million Americans at some time during the year more than one in five of us who will be without health insurance. There are 81 million of us more than one in four who are in families where we've had someone with what the insurance company is called a pre-existing condition. A child with diabetes a mother with breast cancer a father who had a premature heart attack people who have to continue working, but who either can't get insurance pay more than they should or can never change the job they're in because someone in their family has been sick. There are a hundred and thirty three million Americans. Who have lifetime limits on their insurance policies? So if God forbid they should give birth to a child with a serious illness. They could run out of Health Care at the very time. They need it the most there are people who change jobs in a narrow and look at all these young people in this audience today the average 18 year old will change work seven or eight times in a lifetime and yet it is usual in America for people have to wait months and months and months to get health insurance coverage. The good people of Minnesota know we can do better. You know that if there is a Mayo Clinic which can provide world-class Health Care at lower cost and many Americans pay for something which at least you could say is not better and they wish for is good. We can do better. You know that there is no reason in the wide world to permit Americans to be in this condition to permit most Americans those who don't work for secure big companies or for the government. I don't care who they are are just an illness or an economic failure away from losing their health care. And we now have an economy. And which we are desperately trying to preserve life in rural America and more and more and more. There are no doctors in Rural America. I was in rural North Carolina the other day and I met a woman physician who told me she had worked for months on end over 100 hours a week and she was now in her slow season where she was down to 80 hours a week because there are no doctors. We know we can do better than that. We know we can. So the question is why haven't we done it? Well, there are a lot of people who don't trust the government in America to do anything. They think we'd mess up a one-car parade. And frankly from time to time. I've been in that crowd. And so if you we do not propose, there's not a single solitary proposal in the Congress. That would have the government take over the healthcare providers of this country. Don't you believe that? We've got the best doctors the best nurses the best Healthcare Providers of s medical research the best medical technology in the world. What we also have is the absolutely worst financing system for healthcare in the world. It is the way it is financing that is killing me. For all the people who tell you that if we reform Healthcare it will make it more bureaucratic. Let me just ask you go talk to One doctor and ask a doctor how much time the people in his or her Clinic spin on the telephone to insurance companies talking to employees who don't know a lick about Healthcare trying to get approval for a procedure which is obvious and clear. I asked a nurse. ask any trained nurse who works in a clinic or a hospital how much time he or she spends filling out paper instead of taking care of patients because of the system we have it is conservatively estimated that we spend at least a dime on a dollar more on the administrative cost of Health Care than any other nation in the world. That is 90 billion dollars. We spend because we have 1500 separate companies doing Insurance Plus the government doing Medicare for the elderly and Medicaid for the poor writing thousands and thousands of different policies ensuring zillions of small groups of people finding out. With all these hundreds of thousands of paper workers and insurance companies and Hospitals and Clinics who's not qualified who's not covered what you can and can't reimburse for nobody else. Does this So we can't figure out how to cover all of our people how to give people jobs security through Health Care security when we know they're going to have to change jobs, but we can figure out how to spend 90 billion dollars to hire people to the very frustrating work of second-guessing every decision that doctor and nurse makes and pushing paper around all day long. It is wrong and we can do better. You heard Senator wellstone say so eloquently that what we have to do is provide coverage for all Americans. He favors a single-payer system. I favor guaranteed Insurance. You can argue it flat or round depending on the experience of the two main models. We have Canada and Germany, but I'll tell you one thing. Both of them have lower administrative costs less paperwork more freedom to practice medicine more efficiency and people have health care. People should have insurance that they can never lose not when they change jobs not when they get sick not when they're self-employed and not when they get older and they should have insurance that provides the right to choose their healthcare providers. I get tickled when these people attack all of us who are trying to change the Health Care System. They say oh they're going to ration Health Care. Oh, they're going to take your choices away. My fellow Americans more than half the people in America today who are insured in the workplace don't have a choice about their health care plan or their Doctrine ninety percent of the businesses that are providing health insurance who have 25 employees or less have no choice and be fair to them and to the insurance companies, they can't afford it under the present system. They're doing the very best they can under the present system. It is not a bunch of evildoers out there trying to keep people sick and insecure it is a badly broken system that is what is wrong and we can do better. under our proposal Every American family every year every year would have access to at least three choices you could have access to an HMO of your choice or a professional provider organization of your choice are the right to choose your own doctor and continue free for service medicine are the right to have a guaranteed Health manage plan and still have the right to opt out when you wanted for a specialist of your choice or your own doctor. Everybody would have those choices and they would all be more affordable for most Americans than what they're stuck with. Now we can do that if we had a system that was rational choice is important, but you can't get there unless you change the rules of healthcare Finance. If you want to have a system that works you can't have people denied coverage or charge more because of pre-existing conditions. What difference does it make I have a stake as an American citizen and seeing you as an accessible effective worker able to change jobs able to grow in your job. Even if God forbid your spouse should get cancer or your should kid should have a serious illness that is my interest in your future. We all share that insurance used to be that way everybody through in everybody paid the risk was broadly spread. We can't have waiting periods anymore before there's coverage. We shouldn't have lifetime limits. We shouldn't deny coverage to people who need it most and we shouldn't deny coverage by charging more for older people rather than younger people. Let me tell you we live in a world today where people are going to be losing their jobs. Well into their 50s and 60s and still have to find new jobs. I'm at a 59 year old man the other day who work for over 30 years in a defense industry and because of the To the Cold War and the reduction of defense spending which virtually all of us support and thank God for the opportunity to have a more peaceful world this good man lost his job. He had to find a new job. He needed retraining. He was thankfully hired by a hospital for a rewarding job, but there are lots of people like him who will not be hired because the small businesses who could hire them who know they're reliable workers because they're older they're settled their experience also know that they will drive up their health insurance premiums because of their age we do not need that we cannot afford that We have a bizarre system in this country when because of certain training and other problems a lot of young people are discriminated against in the job market their told. Well, you got to have experienced before we hire you. How do you ever get experience if you don't get a job and then you have a lot of older people who can't get hired because even though they got worlds of experience their insurance is too high. We can overcome both of those things. Another big problem for insurance. Is that small businesses and self-employed people pay on average 35% more than larger businesses and governments do because they have no bargaining power. So we have to reform that to we have to go back to what is called Community rating old-fashioned Insurance put people in big pools spread the risk broadly. Let us all share that and then small businesses and self-employed people have to have the right to ban together in buying coops so that they can get the same deal that those of us who work for the federal government. Do I want for you what I've got and what we take for granted in, Washington. Now there are a lot of people who say it's not fair to require all employers and employees to contribute to their own health care. If they don't do it now, they say they can't afford it. But let me just remind you of this when people in this country get real sick, they do get health care. It's too late. It's too expensive they show up at the emergency room. Then they pass the cost along to all the rest of us and our health care bills go up. What about the small businesses all over this country who are in competition with other small businesses, they cover their employees and their competitors don't Nine out of 10 Americans who have health insurance that is private get it at work 8 in 10 Americans who don't have any health insurance at all are in Working Families. I think everybody should do their part and I know we can do it without hurting small business. Our plan has discounts for small businesses recognizing that not all can afford to pay as much as others. We know that that happens our plan gives a hundred percent deductibility for self-employed people that you know that if you're self-employed in this country today, you can't deduct the entire cost of your health policy, but if you work for somebody else you can that's crazy. We fix that we are not going to hurt small business. We're going to help small business by controlling the exploding cost of Health Care and giving people a chance to get affordable health insurance. finally, let me say I saw this up here on the one of the wonderful signs our plan protects and preserves Medicare but it also provides a prescription drug benefit and long-term care benefits to elderly people and that is also very important Let Me Tell You Folks the fastest growing group of Americans are people over 80 the fastest growing group of Americans are people over 80 many of them are bright active and vigorous. They don't want to be forced into a nursing home just because they may not be able to get along all on their own. We ought to reward their children who are willing to care for them at home and help them to get some respite care help to deal with these prices. We ought to reward the community providers who are willing to help elderly people stay in their communities. And there is ample evidence that providing help for prescription medicine will save money immediately in the Health Care system by reducing hospitalization, especially for elderly people but also for the non-elderly and strong evidence based on population trends that over the long run. We are going to have to do something to help people deal with this long-term care crisis within the family and within the community we cannot afford only to have nursing homes as an option, even though we need them where they're appropriate. We have to think of other things as well. I have been in the last week in North Carolina doing health care forum in which I talk to people about health care and crime and other issues in Virginia and Tennessee and in Texas then yesterday I was down in Kansas City and we talk to people and Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma and I'm here tonight to do one of these. Let me tell you what I find. I find that people really would like to know more about all these programs. They like to know honestly what the problems are. They know that there are tough decisions to be made If This Were an easy issue. Somebody would have done it already and said, hey vote for me. I saw this problem. This is a hard problem. That's why it's been pushed to the back. But I think you hired me to deal with the hard problem. So we're trying to deal with them and what I want to ask you today. But I want to ask you today all of you here. These Fine nurses who have endorsed what we're trying to do and all the rest of you tell the members of your Congressional Delegation to tone down the rhetoric. And open their hearts and their eyes and their ears and listen and talk and explain this thing and work through the problems and don't use this as yet another opportunity to take a proposal and push it to the ideological extremes forgetting all about the reality of the tens of millions of people's lives that are at stake here. I played with you. You're a wonderful state has been very good to me from the time. I came here in the primary when I just had a handful of friends all the way through the general election. You've been wonderful to my wife when she's been out here on her healthcare Crusade. You have been good to us. And I thank you for that. But I asked you. Tell the members of your Congressional Delegation without regard to their party that you want this dealt with and you want it done. Now, we know enough we know as much as we're ever going to know and the longer we put it off the worse. It's going to be it's going to be like an ingrown toenail. It will not get better. This is a part of our growing and maturing as a nation deal with the problems while we can deal with them. Don't just let him get worse and worse and worse. This is an opportunity for us to come together across Regional and racial and income and party lines to do something that is good for America are all of our jobs are at stake. All of our Healthcare at stake. Our children are at stake. Our parents are at stake. This need not be an issue that divides us but we are going to have to have a clear message from the American people that it will not be tolerated to do nothing to walk away to be divided to have hot air to turn it into a political issue. Tell the American people. He'll the Congress you want us to act and act now. Thank you and God bless you all. Thank you (00:45:31) president of the United States Bill Clinton has finished his speech here at the Crystal Clark The Idea Center in downtown Minneapolis. He's shaking a few hands in the podium. Over to this mirror Sharon Sales Belton senator Paul wellstone Congressman Martin Olaf stable and the proud of 500 people on the floor waving their signs. Give them Health Bill the people around the Skyway level Gallery another two or three hundred or so clapping University of Minnesota pep band striking up another browser in the background the gallery and the podium now bathed in television lights very much a media event huge Tower Theater and television lights and three corners of the ideas Center here to make sure that this would be properly lighted for the media. The president will be in Minneapolis now for the remainder of the day and then in st. Paul tonight or the televised town meeting Jill here in Minnesota Public Radio. So Gary eichten and everyone back at the Minnesota Public Radio studio in Saint Paul that concludes the event here. The people are drifting off of The Crystal Cork floor. They're waiting around just a few minutes up front in the hopes that the president who's just gone off to the side of the Mallory might shake a few hands a couple of those long stem microphone poles are reaching over there and they're trying to catch up a few of the remarks as he shakes hand. Very diverse crowd here Gary Tom and Bob in terms of age wide range of Ages. And of course in terms of the people here to men and women of all classes all colors represented and to some school students a couple of school students having a picnic about 25 yards away before the president arrives. So somebody got out of class today and obviously as you heard a very enthusiastic reception, so with field producer Brian tonnison Gary, I'm happy we could bring this to you. Thanks Dan. Good job. Dan Olson reporting live from the Crystal Court at the IDS Center in downtown Minneapolis. And is Dan noted. The president has that televised health care forum scheduled for 7:00 o'clock tonight, and we're going to be broadcasting that live on Minnesota Public Radio. You'll be able to hear that from 7:00 to 8:30 tonight president talking with some citizens who have some questions about health care and other Objects joining us here in the studios are political commentators Bob Meek and Tom Horner and we don't have a lot of time gentlemen, but very briefly. Do you think Congress is in fact in a mood for a reasoned a political debate on Health Care Tom Horner Republican. I think it is although despite what the president said that there's no more to learn about health care. In fact, there's a lot to learn about health care. It is an issue that is enormously complicated. It is one-seventh of our economy. And I think that is exactly the problem in Congress is that there is a sense that we don't know enough about the delivery of healthcare the financing of healthcare and in the end, we'll all the talk right now is what's the most we can do this year to reform Healthcare? I think when Congress comes to its final vote in September October, it will be what's the least we can do and still get out of here and run for re-election. I do also just couple other quick comments that part of the problem. In that Congress is going to have to deal with is that this idea that as the president is proposing we can cover everybody give them whatever they want. We can put a cap on premiums but we don't have to to have more government involvement. We don't have to have more tax subsidies. In fact, that doesn't add up the only way you arrive at what the president wants to do is to nationalize health care and what we ought to be looking at is that it's not that that other countries have solved the problem as the president said in fact, the the second most expensive Health Care system in the world is Canada with costs Rising just as fast as those in the United States and they ration care. I think those are the kinds of issues that Congress will have to deal with make do you think Congress can engage in a reasoned a political debate on this issue? Absolutely not. There's no indication of it the Special interests on health are better organized than any you will find the Dollars are in the hundreds of millions, whether you're talking the ARP to the insurance companies and by and large the conclusion of most of those special interests that they would rather just obstruct as much as they can this year and deal in an incrementalist fashion and hopefully with a Congress that is much more attuned to Republicans. Next year. The difficulty for Clinton is his program took so long to get out of the Starting Gate and then when it did it scared the pants off people to hear all about these, you know, space-age alliances and managed competition and drgs and all of these silly words when the real question was always, you know, Tom says, yeah, let's learn more everybody's for learning more lowest qualms Linda Bergland all these people who are having us learn more in Minnesota, but the truth is that there could have been a Reagan or a bush health Warm act during the 12 years of those administration's to have got us the first step. So we had learned something too moved on Clinton is trying to take a first step and and the Approach at this point I think has to be we are never going to have a more democratic Congress and a better opportunity to make a down payment on Health Care to the American people then this Congress and if you can't do it, you're not going to get a chance to do it next year well, but in response to that, I mean the first ten steps the first 20 steps were taken 30 years ago in Minnesota. What we ought to be looking at is what has worked in Minnesota what has given this state an uninsured rate. That's half the national rate what has kept our cost below the nation's average what has maintained the highest quality of Health Care in the world. It's not government government has come a long in in the 11th hour and minnesotacare may work minnesotacare may take us to the next step but what has gotten us to this point is the cooperation of providers. Doctors to hospitals with employers with insurers and with state government it is that cooperation what we ought to be looking at in Congress is how do we get the Minnesota Marketplace model out to Washington so they can see where the first steps are to be taken. Okay. Give us an Insider's report here very briefly. Now the president has this meeting this afternoon private meeting with a hundred and fifty politico's the call that grip and grin glad everybody gets their photos. Nothing. There's no substance being done here. Just saw a chance to get your picture taken with the president. Is that what's happening here? Yeah. This is his little substance as possible. And the emphasis is on thanking people or lining up the folks for the future. This is about money and dollars in campaigns. And if the wrong people well if some people aren't invited who should have been invited then you then you pay for that later. I suppose getting a ride on Air Force One. There's no such thing as the wrong person getting in to see the president. All right. Thanks guys. We're out of time here. Our commentators Tom Horner who is an independent Republican and Bob Miku is a dfl ER and we're going to continue our coverage of the president's visit. Of course throughout the day. We'll have reports throughout the afternoon extensive report on all things considered this afternoon. And then at seven o'clock tonight live coverage of his televised town hall meeting will be talking about health care and other subjects that he's asked about and you can hear our live coverage beginning at seven o'clock tonight on our news and information stations like to thank you for tuning in today. We had a chance to hear from the president and then our two wise men here. Mr. Mica and mr. Horner. Hope you can join us. Let's see ten nine o'clock tonight after the president gets done, you know, of course, normally we rebroadcast our noon our program. But since we're going to hear from the president for an hour and a half this evening, we're not going to rebroadcast this hour-long program instead. We're going to talk baseball program that got passed over through the week Donald fehr who's the head of the baseball players union. Be able to hear a speech that he gave this week at the national Press Club is speech which baseball lovers will be happy to hear included thoughts that well. They're probably be a strike to interrupt the season just about the time we get to the playoffs. Anyway, you can hear that at nine o'clock tonight producers lots of producers for Midday this week Sarah Mayer Mike McCaul pangur and Sasha aslanian. We had production help from Susan a Randy Perry finale Marianne Combs, John oral Todd mole their Engineers, Randy Johnson, Danny Hansen and Brian tonnison, of course working the field recording today. I'm Gary eichten. Thanks so much for tuning in today. any music any time one phone call the public radio music Source One 875 music This is KRW 91.1 FM and KRW 1330 A Minneapolis Saint Paul the Twin Cities news and information station.