[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 64 (Thursday, April 6, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5510-S5511]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                         ADDITIONAL STATEMENTS

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                 MANY OBSTACLES TO BALANCING OF BUDGET

 Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, one of the more thoughtful observers 
of the political scene through the years has been Melvin Brooks, now 
retired as a professor at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale.
  Recently, he had an op ed piece in the Southern Illinoisan, a 
newspaper published in Carbondale, IL.
  He discusses the practical obstacles to balancing the budget and why 
it is important to the future of our country.
  His concluding paragraph says it all: ``Failure to balance Federal 
budgets without such an amendment appear almost certain and dreadful 
consequences of failure to pay as we go are virtually certain. Few 
people seem to realize how many shattering consequences are almost 
inevitable.''
  Mr. President, I ask that the Melvin Brooks op ed piece be reprinted 
in the Record.
  The piece follows:

                     [From the Southern Illinoisan]

                 Many Obstacles to Balancing of Budget

                           (By Melvin Brooks)

       The obstacles to balancing the federal budget are indeed 
     formidable, some believe too formidable to overcome.
       One key obstacle is the behavior of members of Congress, 
     presidents, other politicians, and special interests seeking 
     to influence national policies. Most members of Congress want 
     to be re-elected, have good mental ability and are 
     politically knowledgeable. They know (or at least think they 
     know) how to obtain enough votes to get re-elected.
       One way is to tell voters what they like to hear regardless 
     of logical inconsistency, and by all means avoid disagreeing 
     with the favorite prejudices of their constituents. This they 
     do.
       It seems like increasing majorities of candidates for 
     Congress criticize big government and promise to make large 
     reductions in government, reduce taxes, balance the federal 
     budget, yet prevent any reductions in Social Security or in 
     military expenditures in order to keep the United States 
     strong.
       This is, of course, an impossible combination and they know 
     it. Yet they also know that if they omit some of these 
     promises, opponents who make all of them are likely to obtain 
     more votes.
       They also know that if they support the policies desired by 
     special interests, especially those strong in their districts 
     or states, they are likely to receive campaign contributions 
     which otherwise would probably be given to an 
     opponent. [[Page S5511]] 
       And the more money a candidate has the more he can spend on 
     television and thus increase his chances of winning. The 
     temptation to play along with special interest groups is 
     great, even though it will tend to increase national 
     deficits.
       The other huge obstacle to reducing federal deficits is the 
     apparently high percentage of the public that is not well-
     informed about federal financial problems and/or are easily 
     influenced by political propaganda. That includes people who 
     pay little attention to what elected officials do from day to 
     day until near election dates and then do their duty by 
     listening to an occasional campaign speech and short (but 
     expensive) political commercials.
       They do not realize that the records of politicians are a 
     far more reliable indication of what a politician will do in 
     the future than are sounding promises. And people who fail to 
     vote because ``all politicians are dishonest'' or ``my vote 
     won't make any difference'' make it easier for the candidate 
     with the most to spend to get elected.
       Of course the special interest groups which spend large 
     sums on campaign contributions (in effect a form of bribery) 
     and seek costly special privileges from the government, are a 
     very important cause of our inability to eliminate deficits. 
     As long as they can prevent passage of comprehensive campaign 
     finance reforms such as those narrowly defeated by the 
     Republicans and some moderate Democrats a year or two ago, 
     expect little change.
       Other causes of budget deficits are the failure of our 
     educational system and the mass media to educate the public 
     better concerning basic political functioning.
       Can politicians who get elected to high office really be 
     blamed for our dangerously high and still growing national 
     debt of nearly five trillion dollars? After all, every one of 
     them was elected by more votes than those who were defeated.
       My answer is yes. Either most or many of them at times put 
     their personal interests, the interests of their party and/or 
     the interests of their key supporters ahead of the long-run 
     best interests of the United States.
       Let me illustrate with the issue of the extremely narrow 
     defeat of the proposed balanced budget amendment to the 
     Constitution.
       Leading Democrats charge that Congress can balance the 
     budget any time there is the will to do it. They claim that 
     whenever the Republicans present a concrete plan showing the 
     cuts they propose to achieve a balanced budget, then the 
     Democrats will negotiate with them to achieve a balanced 
     budget.
       The Democrats know that the Republicans will not, probably 
     cannot, do this. The president is still smarting over the way 
     Republicans and Mountain State Democrats defeated his 
     proposal to charge reasonable prices for logging, mining and 
     grazing rights on federal forest land.
       Many liberal Democrats feared that if the amendment were 
     adopted, Republicans might succeed in raiding Social Security 
     funds so extensively that the system would be bankrupted when 
     the baby boom generation retired. There are very good 
     arguments against both of these extreme positions.
       A reasonable compromise would be an excellent solution but 
     was not seriously considered by either side. Apparently many 
     Republicans and Democrats alike feared that the amendment 
     could force them to make very difficult decisions which might 
     jeopardize retaining their positions in Congress.
       Right-wing Republicans favor policies which could easily 
     result in a bigger gap between the rich and the poor and even 
     larger deficits as happened between 1981 and 1994. Many 
     liberal Democrats point out the serious potential risks of 
     passage of the proposed amendment to balance federal budgets. 
     But these are only potential.
       Failure to balance federal budgets without such an 
     amendment appear almost certain and dreadful consequences of 
     failure to pay as we go are virtually certain. Few people 
     seem to realize how many shattering consequences are almost 
     inevitable.
       Melvin Brooks is a retired Southern Illinois University at 
     Carbondale professor.
     

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