Legislative Plunder Progressive Style, Medicaid Expasion

Here in the lands of the Wolverine, Speaker of the State House of Representatives Jase Bolger, and Chairman of the Michigan Health Competitiveness Committee Mike Shirkey are supporting the redistribution of three billion dollars of OUR private wealth to fund their favored 501(c) (3) and State owned Health Care Services Providers under the guise of “Healthy Michigan”. 

“Healthy Michigan” is Progressive double speak for enlarging the size of State government to support Obama Care’s Medicaid Expansion.

Jase Bolger and Mike Shirkey claim to be Republicans, yet we recognize them for what they truly shall be Progressive Republicans, best defined as Republican in Name Only.

One of the many health care service entitles that will become a beneficiary of OUR redistributed Private wealth if Medicaid Expansion is imposed here in the lands of the Wolverine, will be Allegiance Health systems sitting in Jackson where Mike Shirkey was the former Board Chairman. 

Allegiance Health corrals over 401 million dollars a year in gross receipts annually, which bodes the questions why are Mike, and Jase along with their 27 fellow Republican in Name Only cronies working so hard to force “Medicaid Expansion” , House Bill 4174 on Michigan Taxpayers?  Medicaid Expansion is a statutory necessity in order for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, OBAMA-CARE to stand here in the American Republic.

One of the three billion dollar reasons why the Progressive here in Michigan are working so hard to impose this Socialistic Program is simple.  Under this statutory program, known as Medicaid Expansion, upwards of three billion dollars of OUR private wealth exacted from Michiganders would be directly ladled out to these Privately operated 501(c)(3) and State owned Health Care Service providers extracted from OUR Pockets under the misnomer of “Healthy Michigan”?

More and more it is becoming very apparent that “Healthy Michigan” is about supporting the “Fiscal Health” of health care systems, not to see patients, but to redistribute our private wealth to the chosen few.  To paraphrase the words from George Orwell’s Animal Farm, here in the lands of the Wolverine, Some Health Care Service providers are more equal than others.

How is three billion dollars of our private wealth ladled out here in Michigan?  Well, there are currently 1.8 million Michiganders sitting under the State Insurance taxpayer funded program known as the Department of Community Health.

The Department of Community Health outsources it’s funding, minus its working capital, to contracted health care service providers through Medicaid Health Maintenance Organizations.  Medicaid Health Maintenance Organizations contract health care service providers to receive billions a year in Michigan not to see their taxpayer insured “patients”.

Now Mike Shirkey, and Jase Bolger want to increase the outlay by billions more, not to provide health care, but to directly redistribute billions of OUR private wealth exacted from Michiganders to directly fund health cares service provider NOT TO SEE more taxpayer funded “patients”.

This is why Mike Shirkey is using his position in the public trust, and currently as a “humble board member” of Allegiance Health, to maneuver  House Bill 4714 through OUR State Senate in Lansing.

Mike Shirkey and his fellow legislative supporters in OUR State House of Representatives in Lansing, are intent on funding one big ongoing payola before they leave public office to be ladled out ad infinitum to their favorite charities like Allegiance Health, and the other such 501(c)(3) and State government managed health cares services operations throughout Michigan.

During the Ancien Régime in France, this Progressive public policy of tax and take, was known for what it is, “Legislative Plunder”.

  

We have one choice, and that is to stop this political plundering of our Private Wealth by directly engaging OUR State Senators sitting under OUR State Capitol Dome in Lansing.

We need to stand up to inform OUR Elected Officials sitting in OUR State Senate to shut this nonsensical legislative plundering known here as House Bill 4714 down permanently by VOTING NO on Medicaid Expansion.

The Health Care Monopolies are Terminal care . . .

The solution to Health Care services is to take government completely out of the equation.  

Here in the lands of the Wolverine we need to repeal the “Certificate of Need” Part 222 of Public Act 368 of 1978, This “Certificate of Need” is Progressive double speak to empower local health care services monopolies.

Monopolies corrupt the market place, for the monopolist has no need to be concerned about either service, or price.  All the service provider needs to carry is the limited liability insurance to cover the expected errors and omissions that arise in a service arena that is not reliant upon a competitive business model.

Mike Shirkey the sitting Chair of the Michigan Competitiveness Committee is very aware that Allegiance Health’s monopolist marketplace is predicated in part on the Certificate of Need”.  So when Mike, sitting as the Chair, rammed HB 4714 first through the Committee, and then as the assistant majority floor leader in the Committee of Whole, he knew well as a sitting Board Member and past Board Chairman for “Allegiance Health” care systems, said entity would profit in a statutorily closed marketed place, defined as a “Monopoly” with the expansion of Medicaid.

Allegiance Health had 401 million dollars of gross receipts in 2011 that was annotated on its’ Internal Revenue Service Form 990 filed by this 501c (3) “non profit institution” and managed to paper document a two million dollar loss!

This expansion of Medicaid does not provide access to health care.  Expansion of Medicaid does provide the Department of Community Health the administrative ability to expand Medicaid Health Maintenance Organizations client pool that is currently under contractual hands of a select few Medical Care Service Providers and their labor pool of state regulated professional personnel.

Health Maintenance Organizations pay practitioners not to see patients, which first limits the market place for why expand services, when one is paid not to!  Then you may consider reading through the following, with the factual knowledge, that nearly 57 million Americans of all ages fall within this statutory contractually implemented Health Care Service system that is best defined as Nationalized Health Care.  Title 42 CFR Chapter IV, Subchapter B - MEDICARE PROGRAM

The end result is a specific market place regulated by the will and whim of OUR Legislative Body sitting in Lansing, that encourages by design overpriced services paid by third parties, wherein the primary party, the customer is encouraged to roll into the emergency room for a misquote bite.

Then the Monopolists, the Lobbyists, and the Progressives who sit under OUR State “Capitol Dome” in Lansing shout loudly for more regulatory expansion subsidized by our Private Wealth for the emergency rooms are overwhelmed.

The Health Care Monopoly, Medicaid

There are many reasons why the cost of health care has escalated here in Michigan, and throughout our Great Republic.

The two most dramatic elements that have turned private health care upside down, is  the Unionization of the State Administered and Private Health Care Facilities Work Force, coupled in parallel with the Nationalization of Health Care Services for a specified group of statutory beneficiaries under the Great Societies’ legislation known as Medicare.

The two most dramatic elements that have turned private health care upside down, is  the Unionization of the State Administered and Private Health Care Facilities Work Force, coupled in parallel with the Nationalization of Health Care Services for a specified group of statutory beneficiaries under the Great Societies’ legislation known as Medicare.

The advent of Medicare, and its State implemented authority known as Medicaid put Government Bureaucrats between the Patient and the Health Care Professionals.

The first overt act was Government Bureaucrats would DICTATE the remuneration for services provided patients that fall within their administrative oversight under the Medicaid program in the State, and Medicare at the Federal level.

The State Medicaid Program runs under the direct administrative oversight of the Federal Department of Health and Human Services.  This is the result of an ill informed State Legislative Assembly enacting commingling legislation that statutorily redistributes OUR Private Wealth to a specific segment of the State’s Citizenry by administrative decree.

Then there is the little known payola known as Medicare Health Maintenance Organizations.  The Federal regulated Medicare Health Maintenance Organization and Private subscription Health Maintenance Organizations pays a set fee to the Medical Servicer facilities, and Practitioners that participate in this payola scheme.  The Health Care Service Providers are PAID a flat fee not for seeing patients, but for first being paid a “retainer” to be a “contractual provider” of POTENTIAL health care services.

Have you ever wondered why Medical Practitioners schedule time out over weeks, in lieu of immediate visits?  Well, when you are paid by the Federal Regulated Health Maintenance Organization NOT SEE TO PATIENTS why bother with new patients in the private sector?  Read through Title 42 Chapter IV  Subchapter B Part 417 Subpart A Section 417.1

Then you may consider reading through the following, with the factual knowledge, that nearly 52 million Americans of all ages fall within this statutory contractually implemented Health Care Service system that is best defined as Nationalized Health Care.  Title 42 CFR Chapter IV, Subchapter B - MEDICARE PROGRAM

The problem with escalating health care cost, is not originating in the Private sector.  It is the reaction of a once Private free enterprise system being cannibalized under the false promises of Taxpayer Funded Administrative Bureaucracies whose concern is their Agency Funding, and the next taxpayer funded seminar in Las Vegas.

In 1945, the Federal Legislature moving under the color of regulating “Interstate Commerce” enacted the McCarran-Ferguson Act of 1945 currently codified in Title 15 U.S.C.A. Chapter 20.

This Federal enactment moving under the Court Dicta of Wickard v. Filburn, 317 U.S. 111 (1942),  empowered the States to statutorily limit the Number of Insurance Companies that would be permitted do to business within the exterior boundaries of the State.

This statutory limitation artificially increases the Cost of Health Care Insurance to Consumers, for WE are compelled by State Law to purchase from a LIMITED POOL of providers operating a statutory monopoly gratis of OUR Elected State Legislative Membership.  This Federal Enactment followed by local law enacted by the State Legislature in essence was the first covertly operated “Health Care Exchange”.  Read through the State Campaign Financial Reports filed by the Michigan State Legislative membership and note who receives funds from Licensed Insurance Health Care Providers.

The Health Care Exchange as proposed here in the Lands of the Wolverine is another Bureaucratic laden regulatory falsity being promoted as a solution to a governmental designed failure.

In lieu of lifting the statutory restriction on Insurance Carriers in Michigan the Legislative Leadership sitting under OUR Capitol Dome in Lansing, would rather pander to a closed market, under the Progressive Euphemism statutorily defined as the “Health Care Exchange”.

This so called Health Care Exchange is by definition a statutory application to limit by statute, the market makers for Health Care Insurance to legislatively favored providers, which will by application result in HIGHER PREMIUM COSTS and reduced access to patient services! 

This statutory scheme is best described as Funding for Failure.  Why funding for Failure?  Well, we have ill informed legislative members who have no historical understanding how their predecessors created this problem by statutory enactment whilst sitting under our State Capitol Dome in Lansing.

Go ask State Legislative members why they tolerate the statutory limitation that favors the Monopolistic marketing by  Health Care Insurance providers here in Michigan?  One would think State legislative members were cognizant to the Constitutional Rule of Law which limits the reach of State and Federal Governance.  Unfortunately far too many members in Michigan’s 96^th Legislature believe that THEY HAVE the statutory right to limit the market place by creating the legal fiction statutorily defined as the Health Care Exchange.

What Next, how about a Food Store Exchange, wherein the Legislature will pick the Food Chains that will be allowed to operate here in Michigan?

Michigan State Citizens along with millions of other American State Citizens do not comprehend that the State Legislatures created this health care cost escalation that leads directly to the degradation of Medical Services access by limiting Health Care Insurance Providers with Statutory fiat.

This is known as Monopolistic Capitalism, which is taught in academia from Grade School to the University as the “Evil Capitalist” System.

The system of Monopolistic Capitalism is empowered by statutory decree enacted by the State Legislature, which is known as Fascism.  This monopolistic system of limiting the access to the market place by statutory decrees by an operation of law, the political ideology defined as National Socialism.

When the Nine Authorized Health Insurance Providers here in Michigan are the only Health Care Underwriters in Town, they control the market place, and arbitrarily decree the remuneration paid for services inclusive of the type of medical services coverage offered.

The proposed Health Care Exchange will limit this number to less than the current nine, with the proviso that said “competitors” may be statutorily assured of a predetermined profit margin, which by application will lead directly to spiraling increases in health Care Insurance Premiums, and limitations to Health Care services provided to Patients classified as to Age, and Aliment.  This is known as the “Death Panel” scenario, which starts with the implementation of the “Health Care Exchange”.

The Political manipulation of the term “Pre existing conditions” is the result of NO COMPETITION in the Heath Care Insurance market place.  If the market place was open to all comers, rest assured there would a Health Insurance Service provider known as PRE EXIST Health Insurance.

The Constitutional solution to his health care morass is simple.  The repeal of all statutory restrictions on the market place, which will then enable a FREE UNFETTERED MARKET, historically recognized in the business model as Laissez-faire, where Health Care Services cost, and along with the cost of Health Insurance products offered will plummet as the market expands.

Tyranny of Statism Exposed

Over in the Michigan Competitiveness Committee of the House the “Gang of Four” allied with the minority caucus to force House Bill 4714 to the Committee of the Whole.  The “Gang of Four” were elected as Republicans, yet sit on the Floor of the House as opportunistic Progressives.

The “Gang of Four”, Chairman Mike Shirkey, Vice-Chairman Ken Yonker, Frank Foster, and Dave Pagel, sitting on the House Competitiveness Committee, have shown they lack Constitutional comprehension and lack principles of leadership.

These Four House Members do not stand on the Principles of Limited Government, and have shown that fact by betraying the voters in their House District that enabled them to sit in an Office of the Public Trust as Republicans.  A Public Trust they use not for the Principles of Limited Government, but quite apparently to advance the Statist Agenda.

This action of the “Gang of Four” then allowed 24 fellow Travelers all hiding their progressive agenda under their Republican Hats, to force House Bill 4714 through the Committee of the Whole by aligning with the Minority Caucus.  This was three less “Republicans” than those who supported the previous governmental expansion legislation House Bill 4111

WE now know the sitting House Republican majority Caucus has a subset Progressive majority claiming to be House Republicans, who knowingly march lockstep on behalf of Barack Hussein Obama's agenda of Statism here in the lands of the Wolverine.

When the Chair of the Michigan Competitiveness Committee was questioned on his devious political maneuvering on HB 4714, he boldly proclaimed he does not take Marching order from the “Tea Party”.  What was left unsaid by the Chairman was that he does take marching orders behind closed doors from the Majority Caucus’s Progressive majority.

These State House Republicans showed their Progressive colors when they supported first HB 4111, and subsequently the passage of HB 4714 in the Committee of the Whole.

Now we are confronted with the Progressive led support of Roger Kahn who supports, along with his known fellow travelers in the Majority Caucus of OUR State Senate the largest governmental expansion of bureaucratic reach in the History of Michigan, Obamacare under the misnomer of “Medicaid Expansion”.

Roger Kahn, who secured his seat by claiming to be a “Republican”, will not stand for reelection due to term limits, so he suffers not politically for his Progressive ideology for expanding Government no matter what the cost is to Michiganders who ultimately will foot the bill if this Medicaid Expansion reaches the desk of our Governor.

So, Roger has no political concerns for exposing his Progressive ideology, yet as a Medical Doctor, his professional  history is invested in the greater Saginaw Covenant Health System.  His personal political push for Medicaid Expansion substantiates his credential, not as a Republican standing for Limited Government, but as the Progressive knowingly moving the Statist Agenda whilst sitting in the Majority Caucus under OUR Capitol Dome in Lansing.

It is time we remind all elected members of OUR State House in Lansing, who won their seat on the Republican Ticket, that they stand on the principles of Limited Government, or we will work hard to see that they sit upon the curbs of political history come the next primary election cycle in 2014.

The Progressive Road to Communism is strewn with the bodies of the Dead!

The actions of the current occupant of the White House inclusive of the Secretary of Defense, and State as it relates to their collective and individual response to the terrorist action in Benghazi on September 11^th, 2012 has all the appearance of a directed conspiracy to obfuscate the facts of failure.

Or are these Public Actors in Federal Service attempting to mask their Machiavellian Political agenda of subverting our American Republic to establish the Communist Caliphate here in America?

When Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton was confronted in a Congressional Committee Hearing on January 23^rd, 2013, she showed her mastery of the Progressive double speak.  

The question is why did the current Occupant of the White House allow others to terminate with extreme prejudice an Ambassador who apparently was choreographing illicit political support to what appears to be terrorists across Northern Africa known as the Muslim Brotherhood, and their silent allies within the  Secularist element collectively moving under the false moniker known as Islamic Jihad.

The actions of the Ambassador Christopher Stevens to Libya during the “Arab Spring” in 2011 appears to have been choreographed backroom support for aiding and abetting the Muslim Brotherhood, inclusive of its known terrorist allies, across North Africa.  The facts of the Ambassador's clandestine political activity appears to have died with him and his three brave associates. 

The claim following the deaths of Four Americans in Benghazi by the Occupant of the White House that an obscure video was the cause of the violent attack brings back to memory another false claim of a previous administration.

This fictitious claim carried forth by the Administration is part and parcel of governmental deceit that was used previously on April 3, 1996.  That was when the then current occupant of the White House, the Maoist Slick Willie stood behind the press story that the “Storm of the Century” in Dubrovnik caused the Plane carrying Commerce Secretary Ronald Howard Brown on April 3, 1996 to crash.  There was NO STORM, nor a dark cloud in the sky! In fact it was a warm Sunny Spring Afternoon there on the western shores of the Adriatic Sea.

So this begs one of many yet to be answered questions, why did the current Maoist regime ensconced in OUR White House at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, to this very day obstruct, and obfuscate the facts of the violent attack upon our Sovereign ground wherein American Citizens were murdered in Benghazi?

The Arab Spring appears to have been covertly aided and abetted by the current Maoist who occupies OUR White House that led directly to the political success of the Muslim Brotherhood’s secularist ascendancy as a respected advocate of Islam across Northern Africa.  Glenn Beck stated it succinctly, this is the rise of the Caliphate, albeit a secularist one under the bloody hands of the Muslim Brotherhood out to perfect the Communist ideal of the omnipotent State of indentured servitude.

So another question arises, as to why the current Maoist Occupant of the White House would refuse to stand up and protect Ambassador Christopher Stevens when assets were readily and timely available.   Why did the New York Times produce press stories on September 12^th, 2013 that supported the falsehoods promoted by the White House? 

These are just a few of the many questions that surround the Machiavellian Maoist orientated administration that sits in OUR White House at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

The answer to these many questions, is that we here in American have tolerated, since the days of the Accidental Presidency of the First Progressive to sit in the White House, Theodore Roosevelt, the rise of the Secularist State of National Socialism.

The Progressive Ideology was first known as National Socialism, till the rise of George Creel, whose Big Lie hid the facts of the truth and of the objective philosophy of the perpetrators.  The Progressives had one objective that they truly intend to achieve.  The objective goal of the Progressives has always been the perfection of Communism as their form of governance here within the American Republic.

We here in Michigan, and throughout the American Republic have one choice, stand to reclaim our Liberties as endowed by God, or OUR Children and their Children will suffer the insufferable tyranny that tolerates the Communistic State Regimes to MURDER hundreds of Millions in the Name of Communism.

It is all about Control

We need to awaken from the Big Lie that is enacted as “Gun Control” here in the lands of the Wolverine.

Governmental tyranny thrives in an environment where the Citizenry is disarmed in thought and in deed.

Our American Republic was founded by a Citizenry who awakened from the administrative actions of a Legislative Body, that funded a Judiciary, and Executive authority that was reliant upon statutory impositions that stood contrary to constitutional limitations.

Within less than 87 years following the “Glorious Revolution” British Americans were under statutory siege which imposed usurious takings of property under Fiscal Enactments, and finally the tyrannical exactions imposed by the Force of Arms in the Spring of 1775.

On April 19^th, 1775, Eighty British Americans led by Captain John Parker, stood upon the Lexington Green one early afternoon to confront the King’s Agents who came out 700 strong from Boston to confiscate their private property, their Guns and ammunition.

Here 238 years later, we here in Michigan suffer the insufferable enactments of a Legislative Body sitting in Lansing that uses the colorful force of statutory law to impose inequitable restraints upon our God Given Unalienable rights to Life, Liberty and Property.

There is a pragmatic reason that Article I § 6 of OUR State Constitution is not alterable by statutory enactment.  Yet we here in Michigan have tolerated the usurpation of this Constitutional limitation imposed upon OUR Legislative Body sitting in Lansing.

This contradiction of moving statutory enactment contrary to Constitutional authority arises from within our governmentally regulated “educational” system for Constitutional propriety is not part of the “academic” program.

In fact quite the contrary, the Trade Unionists portending to be educators malign liberty by propagating the collective ideology of Progressivism, best defined as National Socialism.

The result is Michiganders willingly request permission to bear arms, which is a statutory requirement that sits openly contrary to the Michigan State Constitution as clearly written in Article I § 6.

We have one choice, toss upon the curbs of political history all those sitting within the offices of the Public Trust in Lansing, and within our Counties, who willfully violate the Law incorporated clearly in our State, and Federal Constitution.

Article I § 6 of the State Constitution, and the Second Amendment of the Federal Constitution are a limitation imposed upon the Governance not US!

We have this opportunity come the election cycle of 2014, where the 38 State Senators and the 110 House Members stand for election.  We should substantiate our Liberty by showing those malefactors sitting under our State Capitol Dome that unconstitutional actions come at a cost, the loss of public office.

Political Jesters

House Bill 4111 was passed in the State House of Representatives in Lansing on or about February 28^th, 2013 due directly to the Republican Leadership Caucus intentionally misleading ILL INFORMED House members.

OUR elected house members sitting on the both sides of the aisle, the “infamous 78” inclusive of 29 House Republicans, who voted for this political funding bill apparently failed to comprehend the nature of the Patient Protection and Health Care Affordability Act which enabled them to support the “Big Lie”.

The Big Lie was that if the State legislature failed to enact this funding provision for enabling the establishment of a State chartered computerized health care exchange was that the Federal Congress would walk across our State’s Border and put it in place.

Well first off, no Federal law, except for Direct Taxation has the ability to coerce the State polity, and Citizens to comply.

Secondly, if anyone chose to read the 955 pages of the Patient Protection and Health Care Affordability Act they would readily note the Federal statutory term of art “State Plan”.

The State Plan first appears in federal legislation as it relates to welfare in the Income Tax Act dated from August 14th, 1935, as Amended on August 10th, 1939.

Here in Michigan, the First State plan enacted under the provision of this aforementioned Federal enactment was Public Act 1 of 1936 during a “Special Session”. The premise for this state enactment was to assure  the State General Fund would secure “Federal Funds” which would create a new layer of State Bureaucratic Jobs that would directly chip away at the Liberty of Michiganders from where the newly enfranchised state employees would implement the socialistic controls over the labor market here in the lands of the Wolverine.

Then as of now, Public Act 1 of 1936 was enacted not for the good of the Michiganders, but to fund the State General Fund with Federal Tax Dollars and consequently expand the reach of the Bureaucratic State here in Michigan, best described as Socialism.

This relentless march to Socialism was given another boost in 1939, after the amendment of the Federal Enactment dated from August 14th, 1934, that enabled the State Legislature to expand their reach for Federal Tax Dollars under Public Act 280 of 1939.

These Two Public Acts over three years enabled the State Legislature to reach out for Federal bobbles which subsequently led to  the exponential growth of the Bureaucratic State which is politically defined as National Socialism.

That legacy of encroaching National Socialism is not Michigan’s alone to bear, as the “New Deal” fundamentally transformed America under the color of statutory enactments first at the Federal Level, and secondly within the State’s exterior boundaries when the Legislative Body sitting under the State Capitol Domes enacted the Federal term of art “State Plan”.

We suffer the insufferable here in Michigan, for we have tolerated the existence of the Socialistic State. The Socialistic State is a political system imposed under the color of statutory law which is totally reliant to quote Rush Limbaugh, upon those he aptly defined as the “low information voter”.

The Senate Fiscal Agency Bill Analysis submission substantiates how easily it is to manipulate the low informed elected officers who sit under our State Capitol Dome.

As we discovered here in Lansing  under our State Capitol there sits in the 97^th Legislature a willing support pool of 29 Republican house members best described as “Low Information Voters” who move in lock step without questions to support the ever expanding design of State sponsored Socialism.

This issue on House Bill 4111 NOW sits silently in the State Senate in Lansing, where the Republican leadership is reliant upon the “Two Week” rule.

The Two Week Rule is the audacious political maneuver wherein generally as a rule controversial measures are readily forgotten when the compliant print and video news media move on to more titillating story lines to such local “newsworthy” items as violent mayhem which may, as arrogantly stated according to the talking heads, will all go away when the elected polity enacts draconian “Gun Control Laws”.

Recall the “Feral Pigs” administrative enactments from last April 2012, which directly enabled the State Department of Agriculture to arbitrarily and capriciously label a private agriculture commodity as a ‘Feral Pig”. Then upon this nonsensical administrative determination, the Department happily sent out swarms of officers to eat out the sustenance of Michigander’s who happened to be raising Pigs on their Private Property!

The State Senate in Lansing did move on House Bill 4111, where in the Republican caucus Leadership quietly set it aside pending the Two Week Easter Break.

We here in the grassroots stopped this bill only temporarily in the State Senate. We need to terminate the standing of House Bill 4111 with extreme political prejudice, by reminding the State Republican Caucuses sitting in the Senate chamber that the two week rule will no longer sustain their backroom presidium that is reliant upon a Low Informed Voter sitting on the State Senate Floor.