[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 82 (Wednesday, May 17, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H5180-H5186]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                     THE BUDGET VERSUS OUR SENIORS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Fox of Pennsylvania). Under the 
Speaker's announced policy of May 12, 1995, the gentleman from Michigan 
[Mr. Bonior] is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the 
minority leader.
  Mr. BONIOR. Mr. Speaker, I am delighted to be joined this evening by 
some very good friends, and we are going to talk about this budget, and 
we are going to talk about the Medicare system. I am joined by the 
gentlewoman from California [Ms. Pelosi], the gentlewoman from 
Connecticut [Ms. DeLauro], and the gentleman from Vermont [Mr. 
Sanders].
  Mr. Speaker, let me just answer--I want to answer my friends from the 
other side of the aisle when they were speaking, and I have the 
opportunity to do so now. They talked about the issue of the Medicare 
trust fund and about its bankruptcy. It should be duly noted that less 
than 2 months ago, on this very floor, every single Republican voted 
for a tax bill that took $87 billion out of that same Medicare trust 
fund in order to pay, in order to pay, for a tax break for the 
wealthiest people in our society, and that is what happened.
  Now it is rather disturbing to hear them say that they are going to 
fix this. They were not for the Medicare program in 1965. They have not 
been for fixing it or doing anything about it since. In fact, the 
gentleman from Texas [Mr. Armey] and the gentleman from Georgia [Mr. 
Gingrich], their leaders, have said repeatedly on occasions, recent 
occasions, that they wanted to change the nature of the system, and, by 
golly, they certainly are.
  Let me, if I could, switch gears a little bit and talk about the 
people who are affected here.
  Mr. Speaker, it was 50 years ago this week that America defeated Nazi 
Germany in World War II, and all over American and all over Europe we 
celebrated that day by remembering the brave men and women on both the 
battlefront and on the home front who led this country to victory.
  As my colleagues know, looking at pictures of our parents and 
grandparents taken back then, they were so young, and they were so full 
of life, it is hard to believe that they would ever grow old. But they 
have.
  The generation that beat Hitler, that built our economy, that raised 
our families, are now America's senior citizens, and today many of them 
are living on fixed incomes. Their Social Security check is the only 
thing that many older Americans have each month to pay their rent, to 
pay their heating bill, to pay for their food, and medicine and their 
doctor bills. For most of them it is not easy. They have to struggle to 
make ends meet.
  But today, instead of trying to make it a little easier for them, to 
help them through a very difficult time in their life, the Republicans 
in the Congress are trying to make living very hard for them.
  Mr. Speaker, as I said a little earlier, this comes down to one very, 
very basic and simple question: ``Do you think we should cut Medicare, 
Medicaid, and Social Security in order to pay for tax cuts for the very 
privileged few?'' In the next few days we are going to see a lot of 
charts and numbers on this floor, and we saw them today, but this 
debate is not just about numbers. It is about people, it is about 
people, people like this lady right here, Margaret Lesley, who I have a 
picture of.
  Margaret is a proud senior citizen and a dear friend of mine who 
lives in my district. Fifty-one years ago she was known to her friends 
as Maggie the Riveter, and she was young, she answered the call of this 
country. She helped build the B-29's that helped the Allies win the 
Second World War.
  Like most of her generation, Mr. Speaker, today Margaret lives on 
Social Security. After paying for her rent, and her medicine, and her 
Medicare premium,
 and her medigap premium, she is left at the end of the month with 
$130, and with that she has to pay for her food, her heat, the bills 
that she has, or perhaps some little extra that she desires, and she 
struggles mightily to make ends meet.

  But instead of trying to make Margaret's life a little easier, this 
Republican budget is going to make it a heck of a lot harder. The 
budget before us today will take $240 out of Maragaret's Social 
Security check, and over the next 7 years it will take $3,500 out of 
her pocket to pay for Medicare, and then the last year that money will 
amount to over a thousand dollars.
  Now they are not doing that to balance the budget or to cut the 
deficit. The Republicans are cutting Medicare for Margaret for one 
reason and one reason only, and that is to pay for tax breaks for the 
wealthiest people in our society and the wealthiest corporations in 
America.
  Now something they did not show you on the other side of the aisle, 
but I will. It is a piece that was in the Wall Street Journal after we 
passed the tax bill. The Wall Street Journal said, and I quote, ``The 
tax bill could mean a windfall for the well off,'' and then it goes on. 
``It could turn out to be the biggest tax savings bonanza in years for 
upper-income Americans.'' Boy, you bet it could turn out to be the 
biggest income savings because indeed that is exactly what is 
happening. And if you are a wealthy corporation, you do not have to pay 
any taxes at all.
  The last time the Republicans were in power, in the early 1980's, if 
you looked at the 250 largest corporations in America, 130 of them paid 
no taxes for at least 1 year; in the early 1980's, no taxes at all. It 
was such an outrage that the people in this Chamber, Republicans and 
Democrats, even President Reagan, decided we would change it we would 
change it so they pay at least a minimum, and it became law. And now in 
the bill that we passed less than 2 months ago the Republicans have 
repealed the law, and now major corporations all over this country, the 
largest ones, will get away without paying any taxes at all, and you 
know who is going to have to pick up the rest.
  Now did the Republicans target the 200 billion we dole out in 
corporate tax breaks ever year? We dole out over $200 billion in tax 
loopholes to the largest corporations in America. You want examples? A 
4.3 billion every year in agricultural irrigation subsidies to the 
largest corporate farmers in America; 1.2 billion a year in mining 
subsidies to the mining companies for royalties on public lands. And it 
is endless. Do they do anything about that? No, they did not touch it, 
did not touch it. The gentleman from Texas [Mr. Archer], the chairman 
of the Committee on Ways and Means, would not have anything to do with 
it.
  Now did the Republicans target the billionaires who give up their 
U.S. citizenship in order to avoid paying taxes? I know that sounds 
like who would do that? We have people who have done it, who have 
avoided paying taxes by giving up their U.S. citizenships, and they are 
very wealthy people, and the drain on the Treasury for those people 
over 10 years is about $3.6 billion I ask, ``Can you imagine giving up 
your citizenship in order to avoid paying taxes?''
  The country in which Margaret and others defended, these businesses, 
with the hard work of men and women in this country, provided for these 
millionaires and billionaires, and all of a sudden they do not want to 
make their fair share.
  The Republicans could have gotten rid of that, and they said no. They 
argued and protected these people, except for five of them. Five 
Republicans said this is outrageous. The rest, 225 of them, stood up 
and said, ``we're for you. No, indeed we will not touch your tax 
break.'' Instead they are targeting senior citizens like 
Margaret. [[Page H5181]] 
  And just do not take my word for it. The New York Times revealed the 
contents of a secret memo that the Republicans circulated, and in that 
memo, under the Republican plan Medicare deductibles will double, 
premiums will go up to 50 percent, copayments will increase, care will 
be rationed, and the choice of doctors will be limited.
  We just heard the gentleman from the Republican side of the aisle a 
few minutes ago talking about changing the Medicare system. What he was 
alluding to was this memo; what he was alluding to is, if you want to 
keep your own doctor that you have confidence in, it is going to 
probably cost you an extra $2,000 to $3,000 a year because you are 
going to have to pay an extra premium above the extra premium that they 
are going to charge you for that privilege.
  Now, Mr. Speaker, my colleagues, this is not going
   to just affect senior citizens. How is the average working family 
going to pay for the cost of caring for their parents and grandparents? 
And I would tell my colleagues, ``Don't come to the floor and tell us 
you're trying to save the Medicare system. As Margaret Lesley says, 
Republicans haven't cared about Medicare for 30 years, and we're not 
about to believe you now, and she was absolutely right, absolutely 
right.''

  I should tell Margaret the other bad news here and all the seniors in 
America. It is that there is a cut in your Social Security in their 
budget. Yes, it is going to cost Margaret hundreds, if not thousands, 
of dollars by the end of the decade because of what they will do to her 
cost of living.
  Mr. Speaker, this debate is not just about numbers. It is about basic 
dignity. People like Margaret Lesley stood by this country in time of 
peace, and they stood by it in time of war, and it is important for us 
to stand by them today. That is a sacred promise that we made to 
Medicare, and it is time that we lived up to the promise. But this 
budget has broken that promise, and at the end of the day senior 
citizens and working families throughout this country will be asking 
one basic question, one question: Why are Republicans cutting Medicare, 
and cutting Medicaid, and cutting Social Security in order to give a 
tax break to the wealthiest people in our society?
  We are talking about 1.1 million people in the United States that 
will be getting a $20,000 tax cut. These are people who make over 
$230,000 a year. That is the amount of money basically that the tax cut 
provides for these people that they are using to cut Medicare.
  That is what this is all about, this debate. It is the shifting of 
the wealth of the country away from our seniors, away from middle 
working class families and shifting it all the way up to the top.
  I say to my colleagues, people wonder why can't I make it? Since 
1979, since 1979, 98 percent of all income growth in the U.S. has gone 
to the top 20 percent of the people. Ninety-eight percent; that means 
80 percent are standing still or they are going down in their 
purchasing power. This budget assaults that proposition is a way that I 
haven't seen in my years in public life, and it seems to me that, as 
Members of this body who care about this program, and care about our 
elderly people, and care about people like Margaret who went on line 
when the country called in the 1940's, that it is time for us to stand 
up for them today.
  Mr. Speaker, I would be delighted to engage my friends and colleagues 
and get their views on this. I know the gentlewoman from California 
[Ms. Pelosi] has also a similar experience, and I would yield to her 
for any comments she might have now.
                              {time}  2215

  Ms. PELOSI. I thank the gentleman for yielding and for his very 
important statement on what this budget debate is about. I think it is 
important to return to your point about the cut in Social Security, 
because while the cuts in Medicare are clear and obvious, it is also 
important for seniors to understand that with the increased copayment 
that they are going to have to pay and other out-of-pocket expenses, 
their Social Security benefits and any cost of living adjustment in 
their Social Security benefits will be eaten up by the increase in the 
Medicare out-of-pocket they will have to pay.
  As you know, Mr. Whip, the Urban Institute projects that about 21 
percent of seniors' income is spent on health care.
  Mr. BONIOR. The highest of any group, as I understand it.
  Mr. PELOSI. In our State of California, it is even higher. That is 
hard to believe, but it is. So seniors living on fixed incomes, with 
this being a big part of their budget and the highest of any Americans, 
what they have to pay for health care, the very idea that someone can 
say we are not touching Social Security, it is just like saying I am 
not going to touch your food budget, I am just going to double your 
rent. Where do you end up at the end of the day?
  I think the point that you make about the impact on Social Security 
and the disposable income that seniors would have is a very important 
one for our seniors to know. Not only is this an attack on Medicare, 
but it is a back-door attack on Social Security.
  Mr. BONIOR. And they promised us they were not going to touch Social 
Security. They promised us that. Here they are on the floor attacking 
Social Security, attacking the COLAs of people who depend upon it. 
These are people who need medicine, who cannot get medicine because we 
do not have a prescription drug program in this country, who need long-
term care and home health care, and we cannot get a decent proposal to 
add on to the Medicare system to deal with those particular problems.
  They were successful, I regret to say, in deep-sixing some of the 
decent proposals we had for elderly with regard to providing them with 
prescription drug care, so they do not have to make the terrible choice 
between the medicine they need or the food or heat they need in their 
homes. They were responsible for making the terrible choice that these 
folks have now with regard to their long-term care and their home 
health care, that choice put before them, either that or not providing 
for their relatives, by killing basically health care last year.
  Now they are back at it again. After the election they are here. Not 
only have they taken an assault on the seniors of this country by deep-
sixing any health care reform, now they come here and they want to go 
after not only Medicare, but, as the gentlewoman from California 
states, Social Security.
  I yield to my friend from Connecticut.
  Ms. DeLAURO. I think your point at the outset of your remarks bears 
repeating, which is that these are folks who for the last several days 
have been talking about saving the Medicare system, when they have not 
really cared much about the Medicare system at all. Just a few weeks 
ago, as you pointed out, they took $87 billion out of the trust fund 
over a 10-year period of time, without blinking an eye. They did not 
want to debate it, did not talk about it.
  This was their crown jewel, their whole tax cut
   and their tax break plan. And now they are here trying to pull 
another fast one on the American public. And I think that they worked 
hard today on this floor to hoodwink the American people, and people 
that I represent, and they are here in this photograph with us tonight 
on this floor and here earlier today, Julius and Dottie, who are people 
who have served this Nation, and our Republican colleagues are trying 
to fool these folks into thinking they are not cutting their Medicare 
payments, and then back-door them with their Social Security payments.

  The fact is, the facts just speak for themselves. The article that 
you referred to, and they do not want to admit it, our Republican 
colleagues do not want to admit it, from the New York Times, which says 
they there are confidential documents from the House Committee on the 
Budget tht show that the Republicans are recommending changes that 
would increase the deductibles, that would increase premiums. The 
deductible increase would go from $100 to $150 in 1996, and more every 
single year after that, because that would rise with inflation. But 
what they do not want to do is to have the benefits rise with 
inflation. They refuse to do that, but the costs will rise with 
inflation.
  Mr. BONIOR. How about the premiums? What are the premium rates?
  Ms. DeLAURO. The premiums will go up nearly double. They will go to 
$84 in [[Page H5182]] the year 2002, and that means seniors will pay 
$456 more a year than they do today. It is really incredible. In 
Connecticut, in my state, you will see that the enrollees, Medicare 
enrollees, will pay an additional $1,167 every year, and, over 7 years, 
$3,800. They also put on, and I would just ask my colleagues to comment 
on this, a 20 percent sick tax on home health care and on laboratory 
tests. I do not know about you, but lots of the seniors that I know go 
for substantial laboratory tests. Certainly the Ruskins do. Julian and 
Dottie go for lots of laboratory tests. Imagine what that means in 
terms of having to have a 20 percent tax put on them for those tests.
  The other point that our colleagues do not want to mention is the 
whole issue of choice and choice of doctors.
  Mr. BONIOR. That is a big, big issue. I mean, how many of us here 
have relatives and parents who really depend upon a certain doctor for 
their services. And under this plan that the Republicans have, they are 
moving people into health maintenance organizations, managed care, 
HMO's, where you will not have a choice. And they may preserve a choice 
in the bill, but you are going to have to pay an extra, and I forgot 
what the memo said, but I think it is a substantial amount of money. We 
are talking an additional $1 or $2 thousand just in order to have that 
choice, I think.
  So it really stretches what in fact these folks can indeed bear.
  I yield to my friend from Vermont to join in on this, if he cares to.
  Mr. SANDERS. Thank you very much. I did not bring any photographs of 
Vermonters with me, but I can tell you that I have attended many 
meetings at senior citizen centers throughout the State of Vermont, and 
I can tell you right now, and many people who are not senior citizens 
do not understand, oh, if somebody has Medicare, they have everything 
they need. No problem. They are fully covered. But you understand that 
with Medicare, people are paying sizeable premiums. Often they have to 
take out what is called Medigap insurance in addition to that. And 
despite
 that, Medicare does not cover prescription drugs.

  So right now in the State of Vermont, many, many people say, ``I have 
to make a choice between heating my home in the wintertime, it gets 
very cold in Vermont in the wintertime, or coming up with the money to 
pay my prescription drugs.''
  Now what will happen to those people if they are forced to pay larger 
premiums or more out-of-pocket expenses? God only knows, but it will 
certainly be a very terrible day for them.
  I think the main point that I would like to make in this discussion, 
and you have already made the point, is that we all recognize that this 
country has a serious deficit and a serious national debt. Our 
Republican friends have not told us, however, how giving huge tax 
breaks to the wealthiest people in this country is going to move us 
forward toward balancing the budget.
  What we are talking about is a tax bill in which half of the tax 
breaks go to people making $100,000 a year or more. Further, 25 percent 
of the tax breaks go to people making $200,000 a year or more, and the 
wealthiest 1 percent get more in tax breaks than the bottom 60 percent.
  Mr. BONIOR. That is a staggering statistic. I think it bears 
repeating again, the last one.
  Mr. SANDERS. Let's repeat it again. At a time when the rich are 
getting richer, when the middle class is shrinking, and poverty is 
increasing, the wealthiest 1 percent get more in tax breaks than do the 
bottom 60 percent.
  There is another point that needs to be made, and I do not think it 
was covered very well this afternoon. And that is we should ask 
ourselves how did we get into the position of having a $4.7 trillion 
national debt? How did it happen? I think everybody in this room 
understands that in the 1980's the national debt took off. It went from 
$1 trillion to over $4 trillion.
  What our friends in the Republican Party forgot to mention is that 
between 1981 and 1992, the wealthiest 1 percent of the population 
received $1.5 trillion in tax breaks. Let me say it again. Between 1981 
and 1992, the wealthiest 1 percent of the population received $1.5 
trillion in tax breaks. Between those tax breaks, between increased 
military spending, the country in fact ran up a large national debt.
  It seems to me that the way you solve the problem is not to give more 
tax breaks to the people who are primarily responsible for causing the 
national debt in the first place, and it seems to me to be grossly 
unfair to be going after the working people and the low income people 
whose incomes have significantly declined over the last 18 years. So 
this continues the Robin Hood proposal in reverse. We take from working 
people and low income people and we give to the rich. I think that is 
the essence of what this proposal is about.
  Ms. PELOSI. If the gentleman will yield on that point, it is very 
interesting to hear this debate, because as you say, it is very 
familiar. Increase defense spending, give tax breaks to the wealthiest 
Americans, and the benefits will trickle down. And here we are again, 
as Yogi Berra would say, it is deja vu all over again. What is 
interesting about it, and it is a real tribute to President Clinton, is 
this is the first year, the 1995 fiscal year budget we are in now, is 
the first time since the 1960's that we have a budget that has an 
operating surplus. President Clinton has saved $50 billion.
  In other words, the revenues coming in are $50 billion more than what 
is being spent by the Federal
 Government, except we have to pay for the trickle-down economics of 
the eighties, a $240 to $250 billion interest on the national debt. So 
we consequently have a $190 to $200 billion deficit this year.

  But President Clinton is the first President since the sixties to 
have a budget that takes in more money than it spends except for that 
interest. I think that is important to note, because our colleagues on 
the other side of the aisle in the Republican majority keep saying what 
is President Clinton doing. President Clinton is moving toward reducing 
the national deficit and the national debt.
  Mr. BONIOR. When the President took office, the annual deficit was 
about $360 billion. After we passed our budget bill during the first 
term, the historic vote we had on this floor, that debt, annual debt, 
has been decreasing to the point of $165 billion. That is a $200 
billion difference. We are on a glide path to getting there. But you 
cannot give tax breaks to the wealthiest people in our society, and ask 
people like Margaret and people from Connecticut and the lovely lady 
that you have next to you there.
  Ms. PELOSI. Enola Maxwell.
  Mr. BONIOR. From San Francisco. Why do not you tell us about her.

                              {time}  2230

  Ms. PELOSI. I talked earlier about her on the floor debate. This is 
Enola Maxwell. She is 75 years old. For 20 years she has been the 
executive director of the Petrillo Hill, serving meals to senior 
citizens, meeting the needs of inner city youths and helping with 
community services in that way.
  Enola had a heart attack recently, and I read her statement earlier 
about what a comfort Medicare was in every possible way, the confidence 
that her benefits would be there.
  She asked the question: ``Why would the Republicans want to give a 
tax break to the wealthiest Americans and America's corporations, and 
have that tax break be paid for by reducing the Medicare benefits to 
America's senior citizens? That is breaking a promise to America's 
citizens.''
  Further to that point, I think it is important to focus on what it is 
they are proposing. In their restructuring options, they are talking 
about restructuring the traditional fee-for-service plan. The option 
lists 35 recommendations, which include increasing beneficiaries' out 
of pocket expenses, copayments, premiums, deductibles, and cutting 
payments to providers, hospitals, and doctors.
  It is interesting on that point, because their own Members, the 
gentleman from Kentucky, Jim Bunning on the Committee on Ways and 
Means, has said ``Of course I think everybody, if they tell the truth, 
realizes we cannot keep cutting the reimbursement for doctors and 
hospitals without destroying the quality of health care. The savings 
aren't real anyway. The costs are just shifted out of the Government's 
budget into the private sector.''
  Then, in addition to that, their other options include ``replace the 
current benefits with a voucher.'' Listen to this [[Page H5183]] one. 
``Instead of receiving approved services, as needed, seniors would 
receive a fixed voucher amount to purchase their health insurance. 
Federal costs are limited by the amount of the voucher, although a 
catastrophic cap of $10,000 per beneficiary is recommended.'' Imagine 
that.
  Mr. BONIOR. You can eat $10,000 up in a very, very short time.
  Ms. PELOSI. Anyone who has been to the hospital knows that. Then they 
say ``expand managed care options currently available. Increase 
beneficiaries' out of pocket.'' Increasing beneficiaries out of
 pocket is in every option, so people have to know that.

  ``In nonmanaged care settings, limit providers' benefits and enforce 
spending limits.'' AARP has said that seniors are being asked to: 
``Seniors are being asked to pay a 50 percent increase in Medicare part 
B.'' That was not AARP. AARP was saying that the Republican budget will 
mean an increase of $3,000 over the next 7 years for a Medicare 
beneficiary, $3,000 over the next 7 years. Where are these people going 
to get it, and why? To give a tax break to the corporations and the 
wealthiest Americans.
  Mr. BONIOR. I yield to the gentlewoman from Connecticut [Ms. 
DeLauro].
  Ms. DeLAURO. That is what I find so disingenuous about the arguments 
the Republicans have made all day today on the floor of the House. They 
talk about that there is--they talk about Medicare increasing, and that 
these out of pocket costs we are making up. Their plan does not keep up 
with inflation. It does not allow for increased enrollment in the 
program.
  It is a very similar argument, if you will recall, that they made on 
the school lunch issue, where they said that they were going up 4\1/2\ 
percent, but in fact the program increases 6\1/2\ percent, so, by just 
very basic subtraction, you have a 2-percent shortfall.
  It is their same argument here, but what in fact it is, and it is the 
height of hypocrisy, to claim that they are not making the cut. We have 
all listened to them on the floor of this House. They have argued over 
and over again, and you mentioned, my colleague, the gentlewoman from 
California, mentioned the defense budget. They have talked about the 
defense budget over and over again, that it is being cut, when you 
treat defense in the same way, in the very, very same way.
  When the defense budget goes up, but not enough to keep up with the 
cost of a weapons system, the Republicans call it ``a cut,'' over and 
over and over again. That is why they have called for an increase in 
this budget for defense. When the defense budget goes up, but not 
enough to maintain the same troop levels that we have, the Republicans 
call it a cut. Why is it that now, in this debate, when Medicare 
spending does not keep up with inflation, and it does not keep up with 
the health care costs, or the increase in enrollment, do they say this 
is not a cut? It is hypocrisy and it is disingenuous, and we have to 
keep getting this message out to the American public.
  Mr. BONIOR. Because these people are not their constituencies.
  Ms. DeLAURO. That is right.
  Mr. SANDERS. We have touched on the fact that these cuts will be 
devastating for Medicare recipients, they will be devastating for 
Medicaid recipients, they will be devastating for Social Security 
recipients.
  Let us also mention, especially those of us from the cold weather 
States, that they propose to eliminate, cut completely, the fuel 
assistance program, LIHEAP, of which 40 percent of the recipients of 
senior citizens. That means in the State of Vermont or in the State of 
Michigan, when the weather gets pretty cold and we have low-income 
senior citizens who need help to pay their fuel bills, it is gone. What 
happens to those people?
  We should also point out that such wonderful programs as RSVP are 
eliminated. The Foster Grandparent Program is eliminated. Also, we 
should understand that at a time when everybody in America
 understands that this Nation needs to be competitive in the global 
market, that we need to have the best educated work force in the world, 
major, major cuts in education.

  What a stupid approach, cutting your nose off to spite your face. 
Among other things, what this Republican proposal does is cut student 
loans by $33 billion. In the State of Vermont right now we have 
thousands of families, and I have had hearings on this, people are 
working 50 or 60 hours a week to send their kids to college. The cost 
of college is going off the wall.
  If we cut back on those student loans, there will be hundreds of 
thousands of young people all over America who will never have the 
opportunity to go to college. To do this in order to give tax breaks to 
the wealthiest people in America is very wrong.
  Mr. BONIOR. Just on the student loan point, because I do not want to 
leave that without, I think, adding my own concerns here, all of us, I 
think, the gentlewoman from California [Ms. Pelosi], the gentlewoman 
from Connecticut [Ms. DeLauro], and myself, we have had hearings and 
forums in our districts where we have brought students in to talk to 
them. You are absolutely right, they being stretched because of the 
higher cost of tuition and housing. Fewer and fewer are going to 
college today because of that.
  Along come the Republicans, and what do they want to do? They want to 
cut out student loan programs in this country. Basically, what they are 
basically doing away with is the interest subsidy program that we have, 
that if you take student loan out, you do not have to pay back until 6 
months after you graduate. You do not have to pay on the interest. They 
are saying you have to start paying from the moment you take the loan 
out, and what that does is it adds to the debt load of these people, 
and it will cost them an additional, in my State, over $4,000 a year, 
and in some States over $5,000--excuse me, not a year, $4,000 over the 
value of the loan, $4,000 extra dollars. That is going to discourage 
literally millions of kids from going on.
  Ms. PELOSI. If the gentleman will yield on that point, Ms. Maxwell 
works with inner city youth, that is just on this point, and some of us 
got together, Ms. DeLauro, the women Members of Congress, and we had a 
press conference last week right before Mother's Day on this very 
point, Medicare and student loans, saying that his was the anti-family 
Mother's Day gift of the Republicans to America's mothers, because if 
you are in your forties and fifties, and many of us in this body are, 
and many of the people in America are, you are worried about the health 
of your parents and you are worried about the education of your 
children, so these two issues are such anti-family initiatives on the 
part of Republicans, sandwiching in----
  Mr. BONIOR. Squeezing people.
  Ms. PELOSI. Squeezing middle-aged and middle-income people who 
certainly want their children to be interested, and now they cannot get 
the deferred interest, so it makes their options less desirable, and at 
the same time, being worried about trying to help their parents meet 
their health care needs. The whole thing is anti-family. That is what 
is so tragic about it all, because the Medicare issue is not about 
seniors only, it is about the whole family.
  Mr. SANDERS. If the gentleman will yield, when we are talking about 
education, we are not just talking about student loans. Let us be clear 
about that. We are talking about massive cutbacks in virtually every 
Federal educational program: Goals 2000, the trio program, Title I, 
school-to-work, student incentive
 grants, Head Start. Is there any debate that Head Start has been 
enormously successful in allowing low-income kids to do better in 
school, to stay in school, to get a shot at life?

  Mr. BONIOR. No debate at all, none at all. It has been hailed for its 
value.
  Mr. SANDERS. Major cuts there, and cuts in the safe- and drug-free 
schools. Here you have schools all over America and in the State of 
Vermont working extremely hard to keep kids off of drugs, to keep kids 
in schools. These programs are working. They are going to be cut. What 
a wonderful idea to give up on these kids, let them turn to drugs, and 
then we spend tens of thousands of dollars keeping them in jail.
  Mr. BONIOR. They are doing all of this, school-to-work, drug-free 
schools, student loans, and all the other programs that you talked 
about, Goals 2000, and they are doing that, they are cutting these 
programs, in order to give a tax cut to the wealthiest people in 
America, a tax break to those people who are making incredible amounts 
of [[Page H5184]] money. We are talking about $200,000 a year.
  Mr. SANDERS. If the gentleman will yield, here is another cut, and it 
really refers to his original statement, where he talked about a woman 
who, during World War II, worked in the assembly lines in order to 
defeat Hitler.
  During World War II we had millions of men and women who not only 
worked in the assembly lines, they were fighting all over the world 
against fascism. This budget makes significant cuts in veterans' 
programs. The bill passed by the House Committee on the Budget would, 
over a 7-year period, reduce veterans' programs by $8.3 billion. The 
Senate Committee on the Budget, in fact, would reduce veterans' 
benefits by $15.1 billion.
  Among other cuts would be an increase in the prescription drug 
copayment from $2 to $8. The House bill would also reduce the COLA on 
veterans' compensation. It would also eliminate the Veterans' 
Employment Program under the Job Partnership Training Act; the disabled 
outreach program. Boy, we are getting really tough.
  Mr. BONIOR. The real tragedy of all this is that people are probably 
saying ``We have to get control over this deficit. What are you going 
to do?'' The problem is, they are doing this in order to provide tax 
cuts for the wealthiest people in our society, and they do not touch 
any of the corporate welfare.
  There is over $225 billion worth of corporate welfare in our Federal 
budget. They leave it alone. They leave it alone. They do not touch it. 
Instead, they go after veterans, they go after education programs, they 
go after Margaret's Social Security and her Medicare.
  Ms. DeLAURO. We are talking about veterans and Medicare and veterans' 
programs, and I just want to make reference, I have talked about Julius 
and Dorothy Ruskin from West Haven, Connecticut, earlier today. I think 
what we are all doing when we talk about the people who are our 
constituents, and people who are our friends, as well, people that we 
know--these people are not just names, they are folks that we know--
that they exemplify what is at stake in the whole debate here.
  Let me just say that these are two wonderful people, Julius and 
Dottie. They have given a lifetime of service to this country. Just on 
the veterans' issue, and I say this to my colleague from Vermont, 
Julius was an antiaircraft gunner on Iwo Jima during World War II. He 
received the Bronze Star for his service.
  These two wonderful people met each other in New Haven shortly after 
he came back from the war, and then they were married 5 months later. 
Dottie worked as a bookkeeper all of her life. Julius worked for 26 
years in the Pirelli and the Armstrong Tire Company; once again, 
wherever it was needed in our Nation's service to deal with that 
industry.
  I will tell you what Julius has said, and I quote him, ``These are 
not the golden years.'' They are dealing with taking Medicare, Social 
Security, veterans' benefits from these folks. It is unfair. These 
should be the golden years for Maggie and for Enola and for the 
Ruskins, but that is not the case.
  I worry about, and I know that my colleagues here worry about that. 
Retirement today is often not golden at all. I think I remember my 
mother saying one time, she is 81 years old and relies on Social 
Security and on Medicare, that ``These are not the golden years but the 
lead years,'' and I think this is what our colleagues on the other side 
of the aisle have tried to do to folks that we represent here tonight.
  Mr. BONIOR. The argument they are making is, they are doing it for 
their kids and grandkids so we can get this budget deficit in order. 
What they do not tell you is, they are doing it for the wealthiest 
people in our society, giving them a tax break. They are doing it for 
the largest corporations and multinational corporations by making sure 
they do not pay taxes. They are doing it for large corporations by 
making sure they do not touch any of the tax loopholes or tax 
expenditures that are out there for them.
  The thing that I think drives me to despair more than anything else 
is the fact, as my friend, the gentleman from Vermont, has just said, 
they have cut out--they have cut their nose off in front of themselves 
in terms of what is good for the country. It is the investment in our 
kids and in their education. It is the best thing we have done.
  When Margaret and her peers and Julius and his peers came home from 
that war, this Congress provided them with the G.I. Bill of Rights. It 
was one of the best investments this Nation has ever seen. People got 
an education, they grew intellectually and they grew financially as the 
country grew through the fifties and sixties. Here we are in this 
budget, cutting back on that opportunity for young people in order to 
pay for tax cuts for the very wealthiest people and the largest 
multinational corporations.
                              {time}  2245

  Ms. PELOSI. If the gentleman will yield on that last point, because I 
think the arguments that our colleagues make about children and their 
futures, of course we are all interested in children, but it would ring 
a little truer if they were not putting forth a $300 billion tax break 
for the wealthiest Americans and the corporations. It is exactly the 
amount of money they have to cut out of Medicare to pay for that, and 
they had choices.
  As you know, there was a debate in their caucus about whether the tax 
break should go up to $95,000 a year or to $200,000 a year, the tax 
break, $500 tax break per child, and it went all the way up to $200,000 
a year tax break at the same time giving a tax break and cutting 
education for our children who need a boost.
  But in addition to that, and the gentleman referred to this and I 
want to emphasize it again, the Wall Street Journal the other day said:

       Estimates vary on exactly how much the government gives up 
     in revenue as a result of corporate tax breaks. But most 
     budget experts say it exceeds $200 billion over 5 years. The 
     House Budget Committee went as far as targeting a specific 
     list of $25 billion in tax breaks over 7 years, but the plan 
     collapsed last week after it was denounced by the chairman of 
     the Ways and Means committee.

  So, again they had another opportunity to make a little cut, almost a 
10- or 11-percent cut in those tax breaks, and they rejected it again, 
instead choosing to cut benefits rather than tax breaks.
  Mr. SANDERS. If the gentleman will yield, the gentlewoman from 
California points out that at a time when the wealthiest people and the 
largest corporations receive far more welfare than do the poor in terms 
of tax breaks and subsidies, when that corporate welfare is well 
documented they did not have the guts to go after those people, but 
they do have the guts to go after the children, after the homeless, 
after the elderly, after the veterans.
  There is another area that has not gotten a whole lot of discussion.
  Mr. BONIOR. There is a reason for that and I think we should talk 
about it.
  Mr. SANDERS. Let us talk about it.
  Mr. BONIOR. Because some of the people that we are talking about here 
today and some of the kids we are talking about do not have the high-
powered lawyers and the lobbyists to represent them. The corporations 
do, the wealthiest people in this country do.
  Special interests have had a dramatic impact on this debate and what 
is in this budget and if you ever doubted it, just look at the tax 
breaks and who they go to, just look at how they ignored the tax 
expenditures and loopholes for the wealthiest corporations in America 
and in the world, and just see what they did to our veterans, to our 
seniors, and to our kids.
  Ms. DeLAURO. If the gentleman will yield, I think it is worth 
repeating just how outrageous it was what happened here a month ago 
with the repealing of the alternate minimum tax. And my colleagues from 
Michigan mentioned that. That was the tax put in by Ronald Reagan 
saying to the richest corporations in this Nation you have an 
obligation to pay taxes to this Nation. No one was complaining about 
that tax. Everyone felt it was fair and equitable, and the Republicans 
repealed it.
  It is $16.9 billion over the next 5 years, which says that the 
richest corporations in this Nation have a zero tax obligation to this 
country, and it is
 wrong, and that should not happen because they do have the lobbyists 
and the special interests that represent them in this body today more 
than they have at any other time in the history of this Nation.
[[Page H5185]]

  Mr. BONIOR. And they go after a program like School to Work, and the 
gentleman mentioned it. Most of our kids do not go on to college, they 
go to high school and they elect to get out in the work world and make 
a living, as many as three-quarters of them do. This School to Work 
Program matches kids in school with the work world and matches the 
business people who are out there and looking for good employees and 
puts them in contact with the kids in school, and they develop a bond 
and a relationship and schedule and work habits and education habits to 
match what is out in the country. It is a wonderful program modeled 
after something done in Germany that works very, very well. Everybody 
is pleased with it, the community I represent is pleased with it, the 
community college systems are just enthralled with the opportunity to 
work into that system, and of course the high schools which it affects 
most are thrilled about the promise this holds. And $60 billion you 
mentioned for the alternative minimum tax, this is like a drop in the 
bucket of that amount and they wiped it out.
  Mr. SANDERS. If the gentleman will yield, let us recapitulate here: 
Huge tax breaks for the wealthiest individuals in America, doing away 
with corporate taxes for some of the largest and most profitable 
corporations in America, and savage cutbacks for the most vulnerable in 
this country.
  I think unless one is very naive, I think we can understand why these 
things happen. And they happen for reasons like an event that took 
place in this city some 3 months ago, and I know my colleagues here 
remember the event. The Republican Party held a little fund raiser, 
just a little ordinary dinner that folks came to.
  Mr. BONIOR. How much were the tickets?
  Mr. SANDERS. I think $1,000 a plate with gratuities included, and 
they provided an extra cup of coffee for free.
  Ms. DeLAURO. I believe it was $50,000 a plate.
  Mr. SANDERS. That was for another one; that was for the right-wing 
television network, but this was for poor folks, only $1,000 a plate. 
And I think at the end of that night they walked away with $11 million.
  Now why would the largest corporations in America and the wealthiest 
people in this country contribute to the party? And they doing it 
because they believe in the Democratic spirit and they just wanted to 
get involved? Maybe, but I do not think so. I think that there are very 
smart people who made an investment. They invested in the Republican 
Party, and the last several months we have seen why they invested. It 
is a very good investment to buy a ticket for a thousand bucks at a 
dinner and find out your corporation does not have to pay anything in 
taxes, or if you are making $200,000 a year your are going to pay 
$11,000 less in taxes.
  But, interestingly enough, the average working persons did not go to 
that dinner, and you know what the average working person got? Among 
many other devastating cuts, the Republican proposal cuts back, 
eliminates, not cuts back, eliminates unemployment insurance-extended 
benefits. Many areas all over this country where unemployment is very, 
very high, we have recessions, things get bad, what the Republicans 
proposal does is make it impossible for a worker to get unemployement 
after 13 weeks.
  What do you do then? Well, how come they go cut
   and the rich got tax breaks? Maybe it has something to do that tens 
of millions of dollars that are now flooding into the Republican Party 
from some of the wealthiest people in America.

  Mr. BONIOR. I thank my colleague.
  Ms. PELOSI. I would like to talk about what this means in California 
in terms of giving these tax breaks to the wealthiest, cutting Medicare 
benefits to our seniors in California $3.6 million. Medicare 
beneficiaries will lose in the year 2002 alone, in that year alone 
$11.8 billion, in that 1 year alone. And between now and then the 
figure is $37.8 billion over 7 years.
  That is devastating. That means they are paying more out of pocket 
for fewer services. This whole thing is about values. Who do we tax, 
what do we spend it on? That is the budget debate, and I do not think 
it is a statement of our country's values, and most people in the 
country's values to say we would rather give more tax breaks to people 
who have so much on the backs of our poorest folks.
  I want to say something before you yield to Congresswoman DeLauro. 
She and Congressman David Obey have been the two champions, and there 
are others who work with you on protecting LIHEAP funding. Rosa, I do 
not want to get in Rosa DeLauro's way when somebody goes after LIHEAP. 
It is important to seniors and people in her State and she has been an 
incredible champion on that issue.
  Ms. DeLAURO. We have cold winters in Connecticut; you have them in 
Michigan and in Vermont.
  Mr. BONIOR. We have a wonderful LIHEAP program in Michigan. The 
utility companies work very hard.
  Ms. DeLAURO. They do.
  Mr. BONIOR. They are pleased with it and it helps literally tens of 
thousands of low-income seniors who would have no other way to pay 
their bills.
  Ms. DeLAURO. I just wanted to make a comment, and this was in the New 
York Times on May 2, it says let's separate the facts from the 
political claims and counterclaims.

       As a practical matter the Federal budget cannot be balanced 
     the way the Republicans are talking about in 7 years as the 
     Republicans promised without deep cuts in projected spending 
     for Medicare.

  They would like to hide this fact, but it is the case.
  Cuts of this magnitude would raise the cost of health insurance to 
millions of retirees or reduce the services available to them. And a 
quote from Stanley Colender, director, Federal budget policy at Price 
Waterhouse, an accounting firm that said, ``realistically there is no 
way to come close to balancing the budget without cutting Medicare, 
Medicare benefits.'' Our Republican colleagues are trying to hide the 
fact that they are cutting benefits for tax breaks. No one has 
suggested that there are not reforms to be made in Medicare, and we can 
do that. We can deal with the fraud in the system and we can do some 
other things, but they cut first and reform second.
  I tell you, take a look at it and listen to what they are talking 
about, what has happened to our priorities in this country when the 
majority in this body is putting the whole issue of the corporate tax 
interests, those loopholes, those breaks ahead of the care and the 
health care needs of the people that we have talked about tonight and 
the people that we represent, people like Julius and Dottie Ruskin. I 
think that is the basic argument, what the Republicans have done, and 
they do not want to own up to it.
  Mr. BONIOR. Somebody on this floor, I think it
   was Dick Durbin who gave an eloquent speech this afternoon and he 
talked about a constituent who was I believe 72 years old and who gave 
so much to this country, and his work and his service to this country 
in time of war, and basically Dick was saying that this is really an 
American hero, and I think we would all agree this evening the four 
people we have talked about here specifically are really American 
heroes. They were there when their country needed them on the homefront 
as well as the battlefront. They have been pillars of their 
communities. They are wonderful people, lovely neighbors, and for us to 
treat them in their twilight years in such a shabby way in this budget 
I think speaks to what you said, Ms. Pelosi, in our values system. What 
is our values system? The budget is about our value system that 
expresses who we are, what we believe in, and what we are willing to 
stand up and fight for, and we saw today who they are willing to stand 
and fight for. They have fought for the wealthiest folks in our society 
at the expense of our veterans, at the expense of these four lovely 
people and the expense of our many young people who are trying to get 
an education to make a go of it.

  So I thank my colleagues for participating tonight and I yield to 
them.
  Ms. PELOSI. I would like to make one point, because I know the 
gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Bonior] has been a leader in fighting for 
real health care reform in this body. Congresswoman DeLauro said we do 
have to make some reforms in the Medicare system. That does not mean we 
lessen the benefits and increase the copayments on the beneficiaries. 
But we do have to make some change in the delivery and the financing of 
health [[Page H5186]] care reform. President Clinton had a proposal for 
real health care reform. We have to have that. That is the way we are 
going to stop the rising cost of health care entitlements and the 
impact on the national budget. We all want to be fiscally responsible, 
reduce the deficit, have Medicare and quality health care for all 
Americans. But we cannot do that the way the Republicans are proposing. 
And we want to keep our people healthy.
  And just in closing I want to point out one other cut they are 
making, billions of dollars in cuts in the National Institutes of 
Health, where we do the breast cancer research, all kinds of prostate 
cancer research, AIDS research, you name it, any illness that you can 
name that has gotten attention: Alzheimer's, Parkinson's disease, the 
rest of it, so in every way that you would measure the health and well-
being of a population, they have undermined and attacked in this.

                              {time}  2300

  And I hope the American people will respond appropriately.
  I thank the gentleman.
  Mr. SANDERS. If the gentleman would yield, I just very briefly say 
this: Today we heard from our Republican friends that they had a 
mandate. Let us not forget that in the November elections, 62 percent 
of the people did not vote, did not vote.
  We can turn this around. We can win this fight. We can stop these 
devastating cuts and this transfer of wealth to the upper-income 
people. We can do it, but we cannot do it with Members of Congress 
alone. We are going to need the help of millions and millions of 
American citizens who are fighting hard to maintain their standard of 
living.
  So if you do not think it is right that we give huge tax breaks to 
the rich and cut back on a zillion programs that affect the children 
and the old and working people and students, if you think that is 
wrong, we are going to need your help.
  So let us stand up together and let us fight back. Let us get a 
little justice in America.
  Ms. DeLAURO. Just one comment. I was struck today by a letter that I 
was shown by another Michigander, the gentlewoman from Michigan [Ms. 
Rivers] our colleague, and she showed me a letter that she received 
from a senior citizen in her district about the cuts, and it was a very 
poignant comment that this individual made.
  Lynn showed it to me, and she said, ``Read this.'' And the woman 
said, ``Maybe I have lived too long.'' An indictment of our values and 
what this Nation and this country is all about when this woman writes 
and says, ``Maybe I have lived too long,'' because, ``you are cutting 
my Medicare, my Social Security,'' and we are providing tax breaks for 
the richest in this country. It was a sad commentary, and I think one 
that struck me very hard, and I think says a lot about what this debate 
is about.
  Mr. BONIOR. Let me just end with a little story to follow up what 
Bernie just said about getting involved.
  I am always reminded of that story about Senator Bill Bradley, who 
was at a dinner one evening. The Senator was eating. The waiter came by 
and put a pat of butter on the bread plate. The Senator turned to the 
waiter and said, ``Can I have two pats of butter, please?'' The waiter 
said, ``Sorry, one pat per person.'' On hearing this, the MC for the 
evening gets up and walks over to the waiter, and he said, ``Maybe you 
do not know who this is. This is Senator Bill Bradley, NBA basketball 
star, Rhodes Scholar, maybe future President of the United States.'' 
The waiter turned to the MC and says, ``Well, maybe you don't know who 
I am.'' And the MC says, ``Well, in fact, I don't know who you are. Who 
are you?'' The waiter said, ``I am the guy who controls the butter.''
  Well, the point is that everybody controls a piece of the butter, a 
piece of the action, but you have got to make your voices known, and 
you have got to speak up and you have got to be clear and articulate 
and passionate about it, because when you are, then people like 
Margaret and the wonderful people we have talked about today will have 
the decent break in our society they were promised.

                          ____________________