[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 186 (Monday, November 20, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H13635-H13636]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         ON THE BALANCED BUDGET

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Barr). Under a previous order of the 
House, the gentleman from California [Mr. Kim] is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. KIM. Mr. Speaker, I believe today is a truly historic day. For 
the first time in 30 years, that is right, in 30 years, Congress 
finally passed a genuine balanced budget plan. For over 30 years, the 
American people have heard nothing but hot air and hollow promises 
about the balanced budget.
  This is my second term. I remember hearing all the promises to 
balance the budget at the beginning of the year. And then at the end of 
the year, they always have some excuse for running a deficit. And the 
Government was always in the red and they were always blaming someone 
else, pointing the finger at each other. I knew that if I ran my 
business like this, I would be bankrupt a long time ago, but Government 
just kept printing more money and more money and adding to our national 
debt.
  This is very dangerous for the future generation, future economic 
security of our Nation. Why? As a result of all these deficits, we now 
have a national debt of close to $5 trillion. The interest payment 
alone on this debt alone is about the same as what we spend on national 
defense.
  Let us take a look at this chart. The blue line is the train of 
national debt. It looks fine until about 1980, suddenly going up like 
crazy, totally runaway, totally out of control. This is our national 
debt climbing up.
  One might ask what is wrong with this. When our national debt, never 
mind the debt itself, but interest payment is almost 20 percent of 
entire national budget, then we know we are in serious trouble.
  If this continues, we will owe so much money to all the foreign 
countries, we will have nothing left. Somebody has to pay off this debt 
in the future. You cannot borrow something without paying back.
  What we are trying to do under this balanced budget resolution is 
trying to bring this back, a little bit flatten, and then at the year 
2002, at the end of 7th year, flatten. So we spend the exact amount we 
take in. We still have generated an additional $650 billion during this 
process. Adding this together, we also raise our debt.
  This is what they call a mean-spirited cut? I mean, gutting it. Is 
this cut to you? Still increase more money, spend more money, but 
simply a slow rate. How we are going to pay off this debt, I do not 
know. We will worry about that at the end of 7th year.
  This is what we are trying to do is let us not accumulate any more 
debt. We have a serious problem. I do not know why my friends out there 
do not recognize the seriousness. That is why I came to Congress, to 
stop this runaway spending.
  I know the choices will be difficult. I know the Big Government 
liberals would attack me and other Republicans. I know it. But we are 
willing to take the heat. We have the courage needed to do what is 
right for the country. Our job is to fix government, not make a career 
of being in it.
  Last November we Republicans asked the American people to put us in 
charge of Congress and we would deliver a balanced budget. I am proud 
to report we did just that tonight. We passed a fair, realistic plan 
that will balance the budget in 7 years.
  Some people have said 7 years is too short. We need 10 years. Some 
people said, how about 7 years too long. We should balance it within 5 
years. President Clinton has repeatedly said somewhere between 6 and 9 
years.
  We must do it as quickly as we can and CBO score the 7 years. We can 
do it without hurting vital programs.
  We all know that we cannot balance the budget without cutting some 
programs. However, there is so much waste and fraud going on, wasted 
duplication that we can almost balance the budget simply by eliminating 
waste and fraud.
  Can you believe this? Consolidating some overlapping programs and 
streamlining bureaucracies. We have more than 5,000 programs ongoing 
right now. Nobody knows what program does what. All these overlapping 
programs must be consolidated. We can eliminate waste and fraud. We can 
literally balance the budget. That is what we plan to do. All we are 
trying to do, folks, we are trying to slow down the spending rate. By 
doing it, we can balance the budget.
  At this time I would like to thank the American people. I would like 
to 

[[Page H 13636]]
thank those people in my district. They have been calling me the last 
few days telling me, hang tough. I am telling you, 85 percent of those 
people telling me, hang tough, hanging in there. I am glad I did it.
  Thank you again, American people. Thank you. God bless you.

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