Country has serious challenges

Area residents and business owners gathered for a side of politics with their breakfast Friday morning.

Over 100 people joined U.S. Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., to ask questions on health care, energy and other topics during a breakfast in the banquet room at Williston’s El Rancho.

Before the floor opened to questions, Dorgan spoke briefly on the challenges facing the country right now. He said there are a lot of serious domestic, economic and international concerns to address.

“We have always had challenges, some far worse than today, but we have always persevered,” said Dorgan.

Dorgan said the most prominent and intensely debated issue recently is the Obama administration and his party’s proposed overhaul of health care. He said there has been a bit of a rush into trying to overhaul the system.

He believes the issue should be addressed step by step. Several times Friday, Dorgan stated one of the first and most critical steps in fixing the health care system is to bring down the extremely high prices of prescription drugs and insurance premiums.

“Our first responsibility is to address the rising costs. We spend more than any other country on health care, yet we’re 41st in the world in life expectancy. We need fair prices from these pharmaceuticals; no more sweetheart deals,” said Dorgan.

Dorgan said if the price of medicine and premiums can be lowered, it would be easier to provide coverage for more people. Simply trying to cover more people with the current rate of increases, he said, would price more people out of coverage.

Another thing Dorgan said needs to be addressed is the misinformation circulating on the health care proposal in Congress.

“I would not support health care legislation that provides coverage to illegal aliens, allows for ‘death panels’ or makes coverage mandatory. There is nothing in there on any of these things, yet the commentary programs are claiming that every day,” said Dorgan.

Dorgan also said the nation’s energy policy is a concern, but most news on energy and oil in North Dakota is overwhelmingly positive. He said the ultimate goal is to wean America off of foreign oil. The oil in the Bakken is a key source to achieving that goal.

“For the next 30 or 40 years, we’ll see a consistent amount of exploration and production of oil here that will effect everyone in this room,” said Dorgan.

Other important aspects of energy policy, said Dorgan, are increasing diversity in sources such as wind, solar and alternative sources, as well as not damaging the environment.

“We have to protect the Earth. I think we need to take some no-regrets steps to address that. But I’m not in favor of doing that in a way that upends our way of life,” said Dorgan.

The first question of the morning asked what would happen to health care for veterans under the new plan in Congress.

“We’re not going to do anything with veteran’s health care. When these veterans come home, their injuries tend to be quite different and need more long-term attention. Veterans health care will be the same thing,” replied Dorgan.

Dorgan was then asked what will Congress do to ensure that employers may maintain coverage due to increases in premiums. Dorgan said the main way to expand coverage is for Congress to demonstrate it can tackle the high prices of drugs.

If it can handle that and find ways to get insurers to stop having large premium increases, Congress could eventually fix the rest of the system.

Other questions asked included Dorgan’s thoughts on medicare and off-shore drilling.