[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 100 (Monday, June 19, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8598-S8599]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          BALANCING THE BUDGET

  Mr. THOMAS. Mr. President, I would like to take an opportunity as we 
wait to go on the highway bill to talk a bit more about the budget. It 
seems to me there will be nothing this year that we will deal with more 
important than the budget. One aspect of it, of course, is the ``why'' 
of balancing the budget. Certainly I do not think anyone would suggest 
that continuing to spend more than we take in is a responsible fiscal 
or moral position. This Congress has not balanced the budget for 25 
years.
  When there is discussion of a balanced budget amendment, we always 
hear people say: I am for a balanced budget; I sure want a balanced 
budget, but we do not need an amendment; all we have to do is do it.
  Well, we have a chance to come to the snubbing post this time and 
figure out if we can do it. And we have before us from the Senate as 
well as the House potential outlines that do balance the budget.
  Not only is balancing the budget important, Mr. President, but I 
think also, of course, the budget and spending and taxes help to shape 
the form of Government. I think they respond to what I believe was a 
very clear statement of the voters in 1994 that Government is too big 
and spends too much. And certainly the test of good Government is 
whether or not the Government responds when voters have sent that sort 
of a message. So nothing will be more important than the budget 
discussions this year and the result of those deliberations.
  I am pleased to welcome the President of the United States to the 
budget debate. I am disappointed that it took this long for him to 
participate in it. He sort of falls into the follow-the-leader type of 
concept.
  I am disappointed that the budget recommended by the administration 
does not, in fact, balance the budget, even though it is extended to a 
period of 10 years. I am also disappointed that it appears to yield to 
the political notion of endloading, where almost all of the pain is 
somewhere in the future, somewhere 10 years from now, which puts 
balancing the budget at great risk. It's likely that in the next 10 
years there will be another budget and all the benefits will come early 
and the price we have to pay for it as taxpayers will not show up until 
later and the budget ends up never being balanced.
  So, Mr. President, I am glad we are launched. I am glad the President 
of the United States has come into the discussion. However, the 
Congress has already done most of the heavy lifting by passing a 
balanced budget weeks ago. I am very proud of what the Senate did. I am 
not on the Budget Committee, but I think Senator Domenici and others 
came face up to the task, and their cuts start soon; they start to do 
what has to be done without putting it off the way the President does--
the political way of tough talk, the political way of giving the 
benefits and doing the tax adjustments early on and letting the hard 
work, the heavy lifting go until later, make it until even after the 
turn of the century, which is only 5 years from now, maybe until after 
the next Presidential election, not this one in 1996 but the next one 
in the year 2000. Most of the heavy lifting in the President's budget 
comes after that--coincidence, I am sure.
  We are told that the President's budget cuts discretionary programs 
except defense and education by $200 billion in 7 years.
  What we are not told is in the last 3 years the discretionary budget 
is cut by $178 billion, so basically almost all of the cuts come in the 
last 3 years, not in the early years.
  We are told there are no cuts in defense, but after the year 2005, 
there are an additional $65 billion in defense cuts. Most of the 
discussion this year has been that this is not a peaceful world, and it 
is not a time to continue to reduce defense expenditures.
  In addition, what was not said in the President's budget was in the 
last 3 years Medicare is cut by $167 billion, more than all of the 
proposed cuts in the first 7 years.
  So I think it is fair to say that this budget proposal is endloaded. 
Even the Washington Post, which is not exactly a pillar of 
conservatism, indicates that given more time, it is always easier to do 
the budget reduction.
  A full 85 percent of the President's promised reductions would occur 
in the next century. I would argue that chances are pretty good before 
we come to actually paying for the changes we ask for, there will be 
other changes. In the next 7 years, as a matter of fact, the promises 
made in the President's budget for cuts are slightly smaller than the 
budget he submitted in February.
  So Martha Phillips, who is the executive director of the Concord 
Coalition, said, ``It is a funny thing about those elusive outyears; 
they never seem to arrive.''
  I think one of the difficulties, Mr. President, in recent years--
perhaps always, but it seems particularly ironic now--is that in an era 
in which we have the greatest, quickest communications system the world 
has ever known, it is very, very difficult to get facts to you and me 
as voters in Casper, WY;
 that the information is usually put forth by advocates on either side 
and spun whichever way they choose to spin it to where it is extremely 
difficult for people to really get a handle on what is happening.

  I noticed in just the last couple of months that the folks who come 
to our office who belong to nationwide organizations usually get a 
briefing. Frankly, when they come to the office and explain their point 
of view from the basis of the briefing, you hardly recognize it from 
what you have seen in the budget.
  What we need more than anything, of course, is really straight talk, 
some real facts. The idea that we are going to balance the budget with 
no pain is an illusion. Of course, there is going to be some pain. Of 
course, there are going to be some changes.
  The idea that we accomplished great things in 1993, for example, when 
most of the deficit reduction came from bookkeeping changes. We changed 
what was anticipated in losses in the RTC. We changed what was 
anticipated in losses in Medicaid. About 18 percent of the change was a 
policy change, and that was a tax increase. [[Page S 8599]] 
  Spending in 1993, when we talk about the deficit reduction, went up 
and continues to go up at 5 percent. When you are talking about $1.5 
trillion, 5 percent of that is a very large amount of money.
  But I am encouraged now that the President has endorsed the idea of 
balancing the budget that we should get there as quickly as possible. 
It is a little hard to imagine that in a $7 trillion economy that a $60 
billion change in Government spending is going to hurt our prosperity. 
I think George Will said that it was very hard to figure out how that 
can discombobulate a $7 trillion economy.
  So we should move boldly. We have the chance to move boldly. We have 
the chance to do the things that we talked about for a very long time, 
that almost everyone talks about on the campaign trail--balance the 
budget, reduce Government, reduce spending. But when we get here, there 
are arguments about who does it, where it ought to be, and we end up 
not doing the things that you and I know need to be done.
  We can balance the budget. Very likely we will find 6.1 million more 
jobs, we will lower interest rates on student loans, and on mortgages.
  Mr. President, I think that we are going to hold the administration's 
feet to the fire. His track record does not indicate a great deal of 
confidence. His actions do not match the rhetoric that we have been 
hearing. The President promised a 5-year balanced budget plan as a 
candidate, then rejected a 7-year budget plan, and now proposes a 10-
year budget plan. The budget deficit reduction in 1993 he talks so much 
about was a matter of increasing taxes.
  So we have a history of more taxes, more spending--spending has never 
been reduced--and more Government. As a matter of fact, in the 1993 
deficit reduction bill, domestic discretionary spending actually 
accelerated rather than decreased.
  In addition, this administration last year made an effort to have the 
Government take over health care. We have to do something about 
Medicare. Americans rejected the idea of a Federal Health Care Program. 
We have now an opportunity to save Medicare. If we do not do something, 
according to the trustees--some of whom are Cabinet members--in 2 years 
we will be into the reserves and in 5 more years it will be broke. So 
it is not a question of whether we do something, it is a question of 
what we do and how we do it. If we want to have Medicare, if we want to 
have health care for the elderly, we have to change the program. Yet 
the administration only keeps Medicare solvent for 3 more years, until 
2005.
  So I certainly hope that the President of the United States joining 
the debate will cause us to move toward a balanced budget. I am 
decidedly pleased he has moved away from the February budget proposal 
which was rejected 99 to zip in this body.
  We need to use the Congressional Budget Office's [CBO] numbers. The 
President suggested 2 years ago that those were the better numbers. Now 
we find he chooses to use other numbers which actually reduce the need 
by about $200 billion per year, and according to most people's 
accounting, would come up at the end of the 10 years still hundreds of 
billions in arrears. We have the best chance in memory to take a real 
bona fide look at doing something about overspending, about doing 
something with the size of Government, and we can do it this year, Mr. 
President.
  So I welcome the President's entry, his recognition that we do need 
to balance the budget, and some of the ideas that he has, but I suggest 
to you we have to be honest and fair about it. We cannot wait until the 
next century to have the pain come. We have to start now and do the 
things that most people agree need to be done.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. WARNER. 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. WARNER. Mr. President, we have just had an opportunity for the 
chairman of the committee, the Senator from Rhode Island [Mr. Chafee] 
myself, and the distinguished Senator from New York [Mr. Moynihan] to 
meet with Mr. Rodney Slater, the Administrator of the Federal Highway 
Administration, and he will soon be forthcoming with some 
clarifications of the positions of the administration on a series of 
amendments.
  The Secretary of Transportation did forward to all Senators today a 
letter respecting a special interest in the safety provisions in the 
pending bill, and at an appropriate time, I will introduce that letter 
into the Record.
  But I encourage all Senators who have a particular interest in this 
legislation to come forward today when we have the opportunity to work 
out a number of amendments and to, hopefully, have arguments on others 
and hold over until tomorrow, pursuant to the decision of the majority 
leader and Democratic leader on the time for the votes.
  So, at any time, this Senator and, I am sure, my distinguished 
colleague would be pleased to interrupt our remarks to allow a Senator 
or Senators to pursue their individual interests with respect to 
amendments.

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