Ensign calls for serious revamping of Medicare

Larry Henry

Tuesday, Dec. 17, 1996 | 11:59 a.m.

Doctors who abuse the Medicare system. Drug tests for congressmen. Term limits.

Those items are among the hot-button issues Congress will address when it convenes next month, said Rep. John Ensign, R-Nev.

Topping the list is a brewing battle between President Clinton and the Republican-controlled Ways and Means Committee over "structural reform" in Medicare, a federal program providing health care for senior citizens and the poor.

During his November re-election, Ensign was forced to defend a Republican plan to raise Medicare payments by a smaller amount than Democrats proposed. Ensign said Medicare would go bankrupt in five years without serious reform.

Ensign defeated state Sen. Bob Coffin, D-Las Vegas, and will begin his second two-year term on the Ways and Means Committee. The committee decides where federal money is spent and initiates all changes in federal taxes and entitlement programs, such as Medicare and Social Security.

In an interview with the SUN Monday, Ensign said the committee will be reluctant to pass Clinton's balanced budget proposal unless it includes more than a "Band-Aid" approach to Medicare reform.

Bringing an end to doctor abuse is an important factor in reforming Medicare, he said.

Ensign said doctors are abusing the system by ordering needless surgeries, such as hip replacements for "dying" patients.

One solution is to allow Medicare recipients to tailor health-care plans based on real needs, he said. That would prevent doctors from performing expensive organ or hip transplants on patients whose age could be a factor when determining costly procedures.

Ensign also discussed other issues he thinks will take center stage next year. Those include term limits and random drug testing for congressmen. He said he will support both issues but not become an outspoken advocate.

Drug testing is important because congressmen should submit to the same demands they place on workers in other professions, he said.

"If you're going to require it of others, then make it part of the rule," he said.

Term limits allow women and minorities to win seats that well-financed congressmen otherwise wouldn't lose, Ensign said.

He discounted arguments that term limits prevent small-state congressmen from gaining influence that comes from longevity.

"I know a lot of new congressmen who have influence," he said.

Ensign said he has committed to supporting a limit on House members of four two-year terms. He did not say what the limit should be for senators.

Any discussion of term limits raises questions about Ensign's political future. He has said he would impose an eight-year limit on his House career even if the law doesn't require it.

That has raised speculation that Ensign will run in two years against Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev.

Ensign fueled those discussions by blaming Reid for killing legislation Ensign and Sen. Richard Bryan, D-Nev., sponsored to revamp land exchanges in Southern Nevada between developers and the Bureau of Land Management.

During the campaign, Ensign said Reid undermined the bill to hurt Ensign's re-election. Reid denied that, saying he objected to a portion of the bill that allocated money to Utah to protect desert tortoise habitat.

The desert tortoise provision has been removed from the version to be introduced next year.

When pressed this week, Ensign would not say whether he will run for the Senate, but he said that he and his staff have a good relationship with Bryan but not with Reid.

"My staff works well (with Bryan's)," he said. "I like him a lot."