[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 34 (Wednesday, March 23, 1994)]
[Senate]
[Page S]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[Congressional Record: March 23, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET CONCURRENT RESOLUTION
The Senate continued with the consideration of the concurrent
resolution.
Mr. DOMENICI. Madam President, I yield the remainder of our time on
the Boxer amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico has yielded back
the remainder of his time on the Boxer amendment.
Mr. SASSER. Madam President, Is there any time remaining?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. There is 1 minute remaining prior to the vote.
Mr. SASSER. Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum to run
off that 1 minute.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. SASSER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
vote on amendment no. 1561
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the question is on
amendment No. 1561.
The yeas and nays have been ordered.
The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk called the roll.
Mr. FORD. I announce that the Senator from Ohio [Mr. Metzenbaum] and
the Senator from Michigan [Mr. Riegle] are necessarily absent.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber
desiring to vote?
The result was announced--yeas 33, nays 65, as follows:
[Rollcall Vote No. 67 Leg.]
YEAS--33
Akaka
Boxer
Bumpers
Byrd
Chafee
Daschle
Dodd
Ford
Gorton
Gregg
Harkin
Hatfield
Hollings
Jeffords
Kennedy
Leahy
Levin
Lott
Mathews
Mikulski
Mitchell
Moseley-Braun
Moynihan
Murray
Pell
Pryor
Reid
Rockefeller
Sarbanes
Sasser
Specter
Wellstone
Wofford
NAYS--65
Baucus
Bennett
Biden
Bingaman
Bond
Boren
Bradley
Breaux
Brown
Bryan
Burns
Campbell
Coats
Cochran
Cohen
Conrad
Coverdell
Craig
D'Amato
Danforth
DeConcini
Dole
Domenici
Dorgan
Durenberger
Exon
Faircloth
Feingold
Feinstein
Glenn
Graham
Gramm
Grassley
Hatch
Heflin
Helms
Hutchison
Inouye
Johnston
Kassebaum
Kempthorne
Kerrey
Kerry
Kohl
Lautenberg
Lieberman
Lugar
Mack
McCain
McConnell
Murkowski
Nickles
Nunn
Packwood
Pressler
Robb
Roth
Shelby
Simon
Simpson
Smith
Stevens
Thurmond
Wallop
Warner
NOT VOTING--2
Metzenbaum
Riegle
So the amendment (No. 1561) was rejected.
Mr. SASSER. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote by which the
amendment was rejected.
Mr. EXON. I move to lay that motion on the table.
The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
vote on amendment no. 1562
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the question is on
agreeing to amendment No. 1562. The yeas and nays have been ordered.
The clerk will call the roll.
The bill clerk called the roll.
Mr. FORD. I announce that the Senator from Ohio [Mr. Metzenbaum] and
the Senator from Michigan [Mr. Riegle] are absent on official business.
The result was announced--yeas 93, nays 5, as follows:
[Rollcall Vote No. 68 Leg.]
YEAS--93
Akaka
Baucus
Bennett
Biden
Bingaman
Bond
Boren
Boxer
Bradley
Breaux
Brown
Bryan
Burns
Byrd
Campbell
Chafee
Coats
Cochran
Cohen
Conrad
Coverdell
Craig
D'Amato
Danforth
Daschle
DeConcini
Dodd
Dole
Domenici
Dorgan
Durenberger
Exon
Feingold
Feinstein
Ford
Glenn
Gorton
Graham
Gramm
Grassley
Gregg
Harkin
Hatch
Hatfield
Heflin
Hollings
Hutchison
Inouye
Jeffords
Johnston
Kempthorne
Kennedy
Kerrey
Kerry
Kohl
Lautenberg
Leahy
Levin
Lieberman
Lott
Lugar
Mack
Mathews
McCain
McConnell
Mikulski
Mitchell
Moseley-Braun
Moynihan
Murkowski
Murray
Nickles
Nunn
Packwood
Pell
Pressler
Pryor
Reid
Robb
Rockefeller
Roth
Sarbanes
Sasser
Shelby
Simon
Simpson
Smith
Specter
Stevens
Thurmond
Warner
Wellstone
Wofford
NAYS--5
Bumpers
Faircloth
Helms
Kassebaum
Wallop
NOT VOTING--2
Metzenbaum
Riegle
So the amendment (No. 1562) was agreed to.
Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, I move to reconsider the vote by which
the amendment was agreed to.
Mr. SASSER. I move to lay that motion on the table.
The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senator from
Mississippi, Senator Lott, is recognized.
Amendment No. 1563
(Purpose: To improve the resolution)
Mr. LOTT. Madam President, I have an amendment which I send to the
desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the amendment.
The bill clerk read as follows:
The Senator from Mississippi [Mr. Lott] proposes an
amendment numbered 1563.
Mr. LOTT. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of
the amendment be dispensed with.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
(The text of the amendment is located in today's Record under
``Amendments Submitted.'')
Mr. LOTT. Madam President, a summary of this amendment is this: It
maintains the $26 billion in discretionary outlay cuts contained in the
Exon-Grassley amendment that was added to the budget resolution in the
Senate Budget Committee last week. But it specifies that all of these
discretionary spending cuts would come from nondefense accounts.
In addition, it adds $20 billion in mandatory spending cuts for
deficit reduction. The amendment assumes that a number of the mandatory
spending cuts contained in the 1993 Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act,
OBRA, which are currently scheduled to expire in the next 5 years, will
be extended.
Let me emphasize, it accepts the Exon-Grassley amendment but with the
language specifying that it would come out of nondefense accounts, and
then it takes the language that has been developed by the Senator from
New Mexico, Senator Domenici, that would call for an additional $20
billion in entitlement cuts. The assumption is it would be the
extension of the 1993 OBRA agreed-to spending cuts.
Here is my purpose. First of all, I have no doubt that the Senator
from Nebraska, Senator Exon, and the Senator from Iowa, Senator
Grassley, were certainly well-intentioned and were trying to be helpful
in trying to find a way to reduce the deficit further in this year's
bill. I think there were some surprises and, obviously, some
consternation in the Budget Committee that the amendment was adopted.
It was adopted on a bipartisan vote. I think it received nine
Republican votes and four Democratic votes. It was adopted and there
was no effort to reconsider it.
Why was it adopted? I think because the members of the Budget
Committee just felt as if there was insufficient deficit reduction
effort in the President's budget request. Yes, he made some cuts in
some programs. But he came around and added back some of those cuts in
other areas of higher priority to him.
In addition to that, the majority members of the Budget Committee
added back money for some of the cuts which he had proposed. The money
that the President had recommended be cut in urban mass transit
operating assistance was put back in by the majority members of the
Budget Committee. In LIHEAP, the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance
Program, the President recommended just controlling the rate of growth.
The committee, members of his own party, said, ``No, we don't want
that. We are going to put that back in.''
So the net result is there is very little spending reduction and
deficit reduction in this year's budget resolution. As a matter of
fact, over a 5-year period, there is about $127 billion in new spending
initiatives in this budget resolution.
So Senator Exon and Senator Grassley just felt as though we could do
more. They came up with this amendment.
Obviously, they are willing to take whatever cuts might come out of
this. They understand the budget resolution is not binding on the
appropriators who are going to make the decision of where the cuts
would come from. But I do think that there have been a lot of questions
raised concerning how much this will impact on defense.
They would prefer that most of the cuts not come out of the defense
area. They would prefer half of these cuts not come out of the defense
area, but they recognize some of the cuts would come out of the defense
area.
There are a lot of Senators on both sides of the aisle who feel we
have already cut too much in the defense area and it is having an
impact. Talk to members of the Armed Services Committee on both sides
of the aisle, and they will tell you from what we are hearing now from
our uniformed personnel as well as our new service chiefs, that we are
getting into real problems in a number of areas.
For instance, General Sullivan, Chief of the Army, testified just a
couple of weeks ago that the 1995 budget is our 10th consecutive budget
representing negative real growth. We cannot continue in that direction
forever or we will not be ready for tomorrow at any level.
It is affecting defense across the board. It is affecting the
National Guard and Reserve units. Most of us just experienced
reductions of numbers in National Guard and Reserve forces in our
States, and some of the armories are going to be lost or some of the
new armories that are needed are not going to be funded. We find that
we probably do not have the airlift and sealift capabilities to do
again today what we did in Desert Storm just 3 years ago. The C-141's
that we used in the first place to take off, headed for the Persian
Gulf with equipment that had problems--with cracks in their wings; all
of them were grounded. Then we got that fixed and now a number of them
are being grounded by engine flameouts. We have not made a decision
about what to do with the C-5's.
We do not know what the future is going to be with airlift. We have
not made the decision of what to do and what is going to be our major
airlift aircraft.
We face the same thing with long-range bombers. For years we have
been arguing over B-1 and B-2. It seems as long as I have been in
Washington that argument has occurred. But now we have a problem
because this year the budget will cut one-half of the B-52 force that
we have and retire it. We have not made the decision to upgrade the B-1
in the way it would take to make it an effective B-1 bomber, and we
have limited the B-2. So, again, we do not know what we will need
there. But we have not made the decision on what we are going to have
in the future regardless of how many would be required. And the list
goes on.
Now, ships: We are only going to be building four surface ships this
year, I believe, and one more submarine. We talked about maintaining a
Navy of 346 ships. When we got the budget, we found out it was 330. And
at the rate we are funding ships, we are going to be down to 150.
Now, if the world is utopia, great. We do not need bombers or airlift
capability or sealift capability or ships or National Guard. But the
world is not utopia. As I have talked to my constituents in Mississippi
just the last few days, the first question out of their mouths has not
been health care reform. It has not even been crime. It has not been
welfare reform. The question has been, the last couple days: What is
going on in North Korea? How dangerous is that situation? What is going
to happen? Are we on the brink of war again? All of a sudden, people
are beginning to say: Now, what was it you were saying about the
defense budget just a few years ago or over the last 3 years? People
are worried that maybe we have gone too far already with the defense
cuts.
Let me just give you this quote. The President stated in his State of
the Union Address:
As long as I am President, our military forces will remain
the best equipped, the best trained, and the best prepared
fighting force on the face of the Earth. We must not cut
defense further.
And yet the President's budget that was submitted calls for a 5.2
percent additional cut in outlays for defense, down to $271 billion in
outlays in this budget.
Then if that is taken even further, if the Exon-Grassley amendment
remains in the budget resolution and that is used as an excuse to cut
defense even more, instead of being a 5.2 percent defense cut, it may
actually get up to as much as 10 percent.
The President said do not do that. And I believe the majority of
Congress, and I know the majority of the American people, say do not do
that. We are about to lose control of this. We are losing our
readiness, our strength for the future of the military. In fact, just
in the last couple of months, for the first time in many years at
least, one branch of the services did not meet its recruitment goals.
This is having an impact on morale, on the lifestyle of our families
that have to tolerate a tough life in the military.
So to use the Exon-Grassley amendment as a smokescreen or as an
excuse or in fact an obligation to cut defense further, I believe, is
very dangerous. I feel very strongly that should not happen. And that
is why I included in this amendment the language which specifies that
all of the discretionary spending cuts would come from nondefense
accounts.
Now, is that going to absolutely guarantee the appropriators do not
do that? I guess they could say, well, we are not going to take any
more than the $26 billion out of defense, but we are going to take more
out of other areas of the mix. The net result would be that there would
be an effort to cut defense even more. Such is not the intent of the
Senate, in my opinion, and I know it is not the intent of Senator Exon
or Senator Grassley.
If the Senate votes for this amendment it will express itself very
strongly that it supports further efforts for deficit reduction, but
that it does not want defense to be get reduced further after a 37-
percent cut over the past 3 years.
Now, I will address the next part of this amendment. Senator
Domenici, a long-time member of the Budget Committee, is a very capable
man when it comes to understanding the intricacies of the budget. This
is not an easy thing to do and very few of us really do understand it.
Senator Domenici realized there was this feeling that perhaps the Exon-
Grassley amendment would go further than Members wanted it to in a
number of areas but particularly defense. He started working on an idea
to have additional savings in the entitlement area.
In fact, he has always said one of the mistakes we made in the past,
and we are making this year as a matter of fact with this budget
resolution, is we are trying to do all the cuts on the domestic
discretionary side and keep ignoring the problem of the exploding
increases on the entitlements. And there have been efforts by Senator
Domenici and Senator Nunn and others to try to deal with that in a
fairer way.
In the Republican budget alternative that was voted on earlier today
and received 42 votes, 60 percent of the cuts I believe came out of
discretionary and 40 percent out of entitlements--or the reverse, 60
percent out of entitlements, 40 percent out of discretionary, but it
was an effort to get some of the savings out of both sides and not just
let the entitlements continue to explode and increase year after year--
to try to get some balance there.
So what Senator Domenici did in this case is he said we can get this
additional $20 billion in spending cuts to be used for deficit
reduction out of the entitlement category by simply continuing the
existing restraints in the mandatory area of the 1993 Omnibus
Reconciliation Act. And we have a list of the programs that that would
actually involve. They are very small amounts of money in several
categories. Again, it is not mandated nor can we require that this is
the way the Finance Committee in this case would get the savings. But
that is the intent. And it is a logical and an easy way to get
additional spending savings.
So what I thought we should do, instead of arguing over whether we
should have just the discretionary spending savings or have some of it
come out of the entitlement category, is to take them both because
neither one of them are deep additional cuts.
When I go home to my State, I have a lot of people who come up to me
and say: When are you going to get serious about dealing with the
deficits? Do you ever discuss the problems of a $4.7 trillion national
debt and the tremendous amount of money that is going into the interest
on the national debt each year? When are you going to do something
about that?
Well, as a matter of fact, over a 5-year period, this budget
resolution would allow the national debt to go up another $2 trillion.
So obviously we did not do enough. So instead of saying one or the
other, what I am suggesting in this amendment is let us take them both.
Take the $26 billion in the Exon-Grassley amendment and add to that the
$20 billion in mandatory spending cuts out of the entitlement area, and
then you would have a total savings of $46 billion, and it has the
intended protection against the defense cuts.
So I want to say again I think that really good work has been done by
Senator Exon and Senator Grassley, and I am sure they are going to
defend their language as it goes forward. I presume there will be an
effort to knock their amendment out later on. But I think we should not
question their motives, and I think we should listen to what their
intent was.
The same is true with Senator Domenici in his effort to find an
alternative. He has done good work. He has come up with a good idea.
So my suggestion here is that we take both ideas. It will not be
devastating in either category, and it will provide ways to get
additional savings.
I urge my colleagues to look seriously at what I am proposing and
pass this, and I think we would have a much more credible budget
resolution when we complete our work.
At this point I will reserve the remainder of my time and yield the
floor so that others may speak.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Lieberman). Who yields time?
If neither side yields time, time will be charged equally against
both sides under the pending amendment.
Mr. SASSER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
UNANIMOUS-CONSENT AGREEMENT
Mr. SASSER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that on
disposition of the Lott amendment, Senator Dorgan be recognized to
offer an amendment stating the sense of the Congress regarding foreign
producer taxes; that there be no second-degree amendment in order to
the Dorgan amendment; and that upon disposition of the Dorgan
amendment, Senator Domenici be recognized to offer an amendment
regarding discretionary and mandatory spending.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. SASSER. Mr. President, I request the yeas and nays on the Lott
amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There is a sufficient second.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
Mr. SASSER. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum and ask
unanimous consent that it be charged equally against both sides.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. SASSER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
UNANIMOUS-CONSENT AGREEMENT
Mr. SASSER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that there be no
second-degree amendments on the Lott amendment.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. SASSER. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum and ask
unanimous consent that the time be charged equally against both sides.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. SASSER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. SASSER. Mr. President, we are awaiting Senators coming to the
floor. While we are waiting, I ask unanimous consent that the Senator
from Minnesota be allowed to speak for 20 minutes as if in morning
business and that this time be charged against the resolution, equally
divided.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection? Hearing none, that will be
the order.
The Senator from Minnesota is recognized.
Mr. WELLSTONE. I thank you, Mr. President, and I thank the Senator
from Tennessee.
____________________