[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 34 (Wednesday, March 13, 1996)]
[House]
[Pages H2214-H2220]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            THE NEW POPULISM

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Florida [Mr.

[[Page H2215]]

Scarborough] is recognized for 60 minutes.
  Mr. SCARBOROUGH. Mr. Speaker, I certainly enjoyed listening to the 
last speaker that came to this floor, and I think there are a few 
things that, despite the differences in opinion on many things, I think 
there are a few things that we can agree on. I think we can agree on 
the fact that more Americans do need to get involved in the political 
system, and I do believe that a lot of people have tuned it out, and 
that has been unfortunate, but that we have to do what we can to help 
middle-class families expand that middle class and to contribute.
  But I have got to say that is about where the similarities end, 
because unlike the previous speaker, I do not believe the answers lie 
in Washington, DC. In fact, I think most of the problems that afflict 
middle-class Americans come from Washington, DC. Now that is not 
demagoguery, it is not simple-mindedness. It is just reality.
  He spoke for some time about what I would call class warfare, talking 
about, oh, the big business men and women that make all that money, 
that steal from the middle class, that steal from the working class. 
And we have heard that type of class warfare come out of the White 
House for the past few years, we have heard it on the floor of the 
House here, and I just--it strikes me as being very interesting because 
I look back over my background, look back over my history, and I 
remember growing up in a very middle-class family. We certainly were 
never wealthy by any stretch of the imagination growing up, and I 
remember, in fact, my father, being one of the first people in his 
family to graduate from college, and to go off and get a good job and 
work for the first 7, 8 years of my life. But then, when there was a 
recession, he lost his job, and I remember him driving around across 
the southeast, small towns throughout Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi 
looking for a job, and I was with him. We spent, in fact, a summer 
doing that in the car, driving across the southeast looking for gainful 
employment for my father.
  But you know during that entire time, when we went through the 
difficult times that we went through, I cannot remember one single time 
when my parents said to me, ``Joey, look at that doctor's house over 
there,'' or ``Look at that lawyer's house,'' or ``Look at that person 
that started their own business. We should resent them. How dare they 
actually go out and make money?''

  I mean I just do not understand where this idea comes from that we 
are somehow going to build up the middle class and working class and 
blue-collar Americans by tearing down those who actually get up early 
in the morning, like many of our blue-collar workers and working-class 
families do that go to work all day, that have invested their time, and 
their money, and their effort over 10, 20, 30 years, and built up a 
business and have become successful. That to me is the American dream. 
That is not something we should discourage. That is something we should 
encourage and something that we should be excited about.
  But let me tell you something, and let me just say, if the previous 
speaker has been in Congress for the past 4 years, I will guarantee you 
that he made more money over the past 4 years than I made and my family 
made.
  Now I understand what it is like to be in the working class, to 
barely make enough money to get by every 2 weeks, to not have enough 
money to put aside for health care, to not have enough money to put 
aside for your children's college programs. I understand what that is 
like, and it is extremely difficult and excruciating. But at the same 
time I am not going to run around and try to whip up class warfare 
simply for my own political purposes or agenda. It just does not make 
good sense.
  But if you want to talk about what Americans are really angry about 
out there today, it is not the populism of old, it is not the populism 
of William Jennings Bryant when he stormed across the country almost a 
hundred years ago talking out against rich people, and people who dared 
to be successful, and corporations. Now we have a new populism, and it 
is a populism that helped elect me and others, and it is a populism 
that focuses on big government more than big business, because for an 
American family earning $30,000 or less, or $40,000 or less, that is 
having trouble getting by week after week after week, and paying those 
bills, and being able to afford health care, being able to afford to 
take their children to the doctor, or to the hospital, or to get the 
prescriptions filled, or to afford to put aside a few dollars for their 
children's education fund, it is not big business that is taking away 
all their money. It is big government.
  And look at the historical trends. Back in the 1950's, the average 
family spent 4 percent of their revenue, their take-home pay, on 
Federal taxes, 4 percent.

                              {time}  2100

  Four percent. Today the average family spends at least, on average, 
26 percent to pay taxes to the Federal Government. Now, if you add up 
the impact of taxes, fees, and regulations that the Federal Government 
throws on the average American family, they work 50 percent of their 
year paying off taxes, fees, and regulations placed on them by the 
Government. They see it every 2 weeks in their paycheck. Look and see 
how much the Federal Government takes out.
  Yet, we still have people standing on the floor of the House of 
Representatives in 1996 wondering why Americans are angry with the 
Federal Government, wondering why a revolution that started in 1994 is 
going to sweep through the turn of the this century and into the 21st 
century, and why the American people are standing up and saying enough 
of big government, enough of government telling me how to spend my 
money, enough of government telling me how to educate my children, 
enough of government telling me how to protect my family, how to 
protect my streets.
  Americans have had enough of big Government. We have failed. The 
Congress of the United States, over the past 40 years under liberal 
rule, has failed to achieve its mandate. Back in 1965 LBJ started the 
Great Society, the war on poverty. But it is a war not on poverty but 
on families, on hard work, on discipline, on personal responsibility, 
and a war against those very people that LBJ thought he was going to 
help.
  All you have to do is drive through the torn-out ghettoes in South 
Central L.A., or in the South Bronx, or in Gary, IN, or in 
Philadelphia, and ask yourself a basic question: Are those people today 
better off than they were 30 years ago, before the Federal Government 
started tampering with their lives and trying to micromanage every 
social ill that was out there? The clear answer is no.
  The Federal Government is ill-equipped. Our Founding Fathers knew 
that. Thomas Jefferson knew that, when he said, ``The government that 
governs least governs best.'' Jefferson did not say that because he was 
anti-government, he said that because he was pro-freedom, and because 
he believed in the goodness of the American people, because he believed 
in the greatness of the American character, because he knew from his 
experience with King George III in Great Britain that the answer did 
not lie with a highly centralized monarchy, the answer was out in the 
community, was out in the country, was out on the farms with the 
goodness of the American people.
  There was a debate earlier this evening on education. We had people 
that have supported the liberal view for the past 40 years, the 
centralization view for the past 40 years, come to the floor and say 
what was causing the problems in this country was simple, that we were 
not spending enough money on our Federal education bureaucracy; that 
these bureaucratic programs needed to expand, that we needed to raise 
taxes, send more education dollars to Washington, drain more education 
dollars out of the community, drain more education dollars out of 
schools, drain more education dollars out of teachers' paychecks, drain 
more education dollars out of computers, send them to Washington, DC, 
so Big Brother, a Federal bureaucracy, could decide what to do with 
those education dollars.
  Mr. Speaker, some of the people that were on the floor today were 
condemning what we are trying to do, but what we are going to do is 
empower the teacher, empower the parent, empower the local school 
system. However, they

[[Page H2216]]

said that we ``* * * wanted to destroy public schools.''
  Mr. Speaker, that is very disturbing to me. Of course, I have to 
recognize who the source is, because these were the same people that 
called us Nazis for wanting to balance the budget, for trying to only 
spend as much money as we take in. They called us Nazis because we did 
not want to rob from future generations, we did not want to rob from 
our children or from our grandchildren. They called us Fascists because 
we believe that Americans deserve to be able to control their destiny 
more than a Federal bureaucracy in Washington does. But anyway, let us 
fast forward it to tonight, they said that we wanted to destroy the 
American public education system.
  Let me tell the Members something, Mr. Speaker, I can give two good 
reasons why we do not want to destroy the public school system in this 
country, why I do not personally, two very personal reasons. One is 
Joey, age 8, and another is Andrew, age 5, who are my two children, my 
two boys who are in Pensacola, FL, this evening, and who tomorrow 
morning will go to public school.
  I have a vested interest in education. I have a vested interest in 
public schools. I have a vested interest in trying to end the insanity 
that this Federal Government has been pursuing for the past 15, 20 
years on education. It is my two boys.

  Mr. Speaker, there was a study from a report called ``Nation at 
Risk.'' In that study, this was the conclusion that they came to on 
what the Federal Government has been doing in education. It was this. 
They said ``What has been done to America's educational system, had it 
been done by a foreign power, would have constituted an act of war.'' 
Yet, this bizarre bureaucratic experiment with education that started 
in 1979 continues, continues today unabated.
  Back in 1979, when we started our Federal education bureaucracy, we 
were spending $14 billion on education in the Federal bureaucracy, $14 
billion. Fast forward to 1996. We are now spending $36 billion, and 
soon it will explode to $50 billion, just on our education bureaucracy. 
That is taking $50 billion out of the communities, out of the 
educational budgets of the local school boards, out of teachers' 
salaries, out of school upkeep, and bringing it to the Federal 
education bureaucracy.
  Of course, what has happened? The same thing that has happened when 
we tried to micromanage these other social ills: We have fallen behind. 
Our children have suffered, because we have people in Washington, DC, 
today that still believe, despite the failures over the past 30 years, 
that Washington has all the answers, and that Americans are either too 
stupid or too lazy to teach their own children without Washington's 
intervening.
  Mr. Speaker, I am going to give the Members some basic facts to show 
that is not true. We have spent all this money coming up to Washington, 
DC, and yet, if you go through the State budgets for education 
departments, the average State only receives 6 percent of their money 
on education from Washington, DC. Yet, an Ohio study showed that they 
get over 55 percent of their paperwork and their bureaucratic redtape 
from Washington, DC, so they are not getting a return for their 
investment.
  The money is sucked up to Washington, DC, out of the schools and the 
communities, and as it comes up here, what do we get for it? What do 
they send back out? All you have to do is look at last year's budget to 
find some pretty strong anecdotal evidence on what the Department of 
Education is doing with my money and your money. They have cut $100 
million in upkeep to keep schools safe, to keep infrastructure safe, to 
keep ceilings from falling down on children, cut $100 million out of 
school upkeep budgets. Yet, last year they increased funding for their 
own bureaucracy's upkeep, for their own single building down the 
street, by $25 million. Basically, they take $100 million away from our 
children and their schools and their safety to make their building a 
little more plush, a little more inhabitable. Again, it is a classic 
example of how we are not even robbing Peter to pay Paul, we are 
robbing our children to pay off bureaucrat salaries. I think it has to 
stop.
  Compare what has happened since 1980, when we started this colossal 
mistake with what is going on today. We have fallen behind on test 
scores with industrialized Western nations. Dropout rates have gone up, 
test scores continue to fall down, violence in schools continue to 
rise. We are spinning rapidly out of control with our educational 
system. All some people want to do is what we have been doing for the 
past 25 years on education, spend more money on a bureaucracy and less 
money on schools. To me, that is morally indefensible.
  Mr. Speaker, I heard somebody talk also, talking about anecdotal 
evidence, talking about the fact that one of the programs that the 
Department of Education spends our money on is closed captioning. That 
sounds great, right, closed captioning for the hearing-impaired. But it 
is closed captioning for the hearing-impaired for the TV show Baywatch. 
I do not know what Federal education dollars are doing for closed 
captioning for Baywatch.
  It seems to me we could spend our money better. We could spend our 
money in our local communities better than in Washington, DC. We could 
spend our money better on teachers' salaries and on improving students' 
living conditions than on spending it on bureaucracies in Washington, 
DC.
  That is what this fight is about. We are trying to send power back to 
the communities, back to the States, back to local governments, so we 
can have what I called before, and what even Alice Rivlin has called, 
``legislative laboratories,'' where we allow 50 States and hundreds of 
communities and thousands of school boards to experiment with education 
and to decide how they want to educate their children, instead of 
having this cookie cutter approach.
  Mr. Speaker, if you tell people that you want to do this, they throw 
up their arms and they say what would we do without a Federal education 
bureaucracy? What would we do without the Federal Department of 
Education? We would do the same thing that we did for the first 204 
years in this constitutional Republic. We would keep it out of 
Washington, and we would empower the communities and the teachers and 
the parents and the students. That makes good sense.

  Our Founding Fathers knew that made good sense. James Madison said:

       We have staked the entire future of the American 
     civilization not upon the power of government, but upon the 
     capacity of the individual to govern themselves, control 
     themselves, and sustain themselves according to the Ten 
     Commandments of God.

The 10th amendment to our Constitution that Madison helped draft said 
``All powers not specifically given to the Federal Government are 
reserved to the States and to the citizens.''
  There is nothing in our Federal Constitution, the United States 
Constitution, that Madison helped draft about an education bureaucracy 
in Washington, DC., but if we look at all 50 State Constitutions, we 
will see in all 50 State Constitutions mentioning of education, because 
that is the way our Founding Fathers and those that wrote our State 
Constitutions envisioned the American educational system being, an 
educational system that would be a bottom-up system, where teachers and 
parents and principals and school board members and community leaders 
would get together and decide how they were going to educate their 
children, instead of having an education bureaucracy in Washington, 
DC., or to go back to what our Founding Fathers looked at it as, 
instead of having King George III tell everybody how they were going to 
teach their children.
  It just makes good sense. We have to empower our schools once again. 
We have to do that by getting it out of Washington, DC. That may be a 
radical concept, I suppose as radical as James Madison was considered 
to be radical or Thomas Jefferson was considered to be radical all 
those years ago when they started what continue to be the greatest 
living experiment in the history of government, and that is, the United 
States experiment.
  Last year there were 72, 73 freshmen that were elected who said 
``Enough is enough. We are going to stop draining all the power out of 
the communities, stop taking it all up to Washington, DC., stop 
consolidating money and power and authority and prestige in Washington, 
and start sending it back out to the States, back out to the 
communities, back out to the parents, back out to the teachers.''

[[Page H2217]]

  One of those people who is here tonight is the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania, Jon Fox. Jon has been an instrumental player not only in 
these education issues, but in other issues on fighting to take our 
country back and reclaim our heritage, and return this constitutional 
Republic to what it was meant to be.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Fox].
  Mr. FOX of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for 
yielding to me. The gentleman has been a leader, and I would like to 
extend my gratitude to you on behalf of the others in the Congress for 
your leadership in speaking out on important issues.
  Frankly, we are looking to the point that the status quo does not 
live here anymore; how can we make the Congress more responsive, how 
can we make sure that we in fact look forward to some substantive and 
important changes.
  That is why, from my perspective, and I think as well, from yours, we 
need to look and make sure that the local school boards are making the 
decisions. Yes, we want the Federal funds for textbooks and school 
lunch and for transportation to go to our school districts, but we do 
not need national policy to tell our local school districts how to in 
fact make sure we are giving educational policy that our students need 
and our parents want. Frankly, I think the teachers want that, too. We 
want minimum standards, of course, but we can get maximum results by 
empowering local governments.
  Mr. SCARBOROUGH. Mr. Speaker, I agree with the gentleman 100 percent. 
I have to tell him, though, if we do go through a process where we 
block grant some of these programs back to the States, I think the 
important thing is that we do empower them and allow them to make the 
decision, just like you said.

                              {time}  2115

  Because Pennsylvania's issues on education, on transportation, on 
school lunch programs are different, I can guarantee they are different 
from Pensacola, FL.
  Mr. FOX of Pennsylvania. No question.
  Mr. SCARBOROUGH. We come from different parties. I lived in upstate 
New York for a few years. I recognize that. Our society and our country 
is huge. So I do not think Bill Clinton or any President should say 
this is what our education agenda is going to be and we have got to 
stick to it.
  Mr. FOX of Pennsylvania. Would the gentleman yield?
  Mr. SCARBOROUGH. Sure.
  Mr. FOX of Pennsylvania. On the school lunch program, what I think is 
exciting about the new Congress is that in the 104th Congress, in a 
bipartisan fashion, we have seen the school lunch and the WIC programs, 
how we have expanded the amount of money for those programs, and we 
said in a block grant, we are going to make sure it meets National 
Science Foundation standards for quality of the food.
  Instead of spending 15 percent on administrative costs, as the 
Federal Government has for many, many years, we told the States and the 
governors who want the programs, ``You can only spend 5 percent on the 
administrative costs. With the extra 10 percent we are giving you, you 
have got to feed more kids more meals.''
  That is a better way of doing it. Less bureaucracy, more direct 
services. That is what I think is the kind of reform that is positive.
  Mr. SCARBOROUGH. That is right.
  It is very interesting, you were talking about the school lunch 
program, and we saw and actually I talked about how we had been 
attacked as being extremist and Nazis and all these other things. Just 
absolutely ridiculous attacks on our character, and it showed just how 
desperate they were.
  They even paraded little children around here in a shameless display. 
Everybody was wearing their ties with children on them, and all they 
talked, children, children, children, that is all they talked about. I 
have got two children. I do not need anybody to tell me that I am more 
or less compassionate than they are simply because they have more faith 
in the Federal bureaucracy than in local communities.
  I think what we need to do is, while the school lunch programs went 
up, I think we need to reexamine if this is something that the Federal 
Government should in the end, in the perfect world, even be involved 
in. Because let us say, for instance, in my area, and we are talking 
about getting to the ideal situation on school lunch programs, to make 
sure that we feed the most disadvantaged and those students that need 
to be fed.
  In my area, let us say that you take, and I, of course, because I am 
a working class type of guy, I probably do not even have a dollar so I 
cannot even hold it up. But let us say you take a dollar and you pay 
taxes coming up on April 15 in my area. Well, that dollar for school 
lunch programs, for instance, that dollar first goes to Atlanta, GA, to 
the regional IRS office, which is our regional southeastern IRS office.

  That dollar that was for school lunch programs first gets channeled 
through the IRS office in Atlanta. Of course they have got copying 
machines. They have got to pay their people to work. They have got to 
pay rent. They have got to do all these other things, so a little bit 
of that dollar is gone, sort of a brokerage fee.
  Then where does it go next? It comes up to Washington, DC, goes to 
the IRS office in Washington, DC, and the Treasury Department. They 
take off their little bit.
  Then of course if gets funneled over to the next agency, I suppose 
the Department of HHS. They take off their part of the dollar, and then 
of course it goes to the subdivisions within the Department of HHS, and 
then over to the Department of Education.
  Everybody got their brokerage fee on it, so that dollar that started 
out for school lunch programs continues to get cut up more and more. 
The does it come back to the students and get put on the table in 
Pensacola, FL? No. Then it goes to Tallahassee, FL, and they start 
figuring out how they are going to cut up the money. Then it comes on 
over to Escambia County and they have to cut it up.
  Finally, by the time that dollar that got out of my pocket on April 
15 and went through this maze of bureaucracy up to Washington, DC, and 
back down to Tallahassee and back to Pensacola, and finally to pay to 
put a lunch or a breakfast on the table for that disadvantaged child, 
we have blown most of our money, instead of keeping the money in the 
community and having the communities raise the revenue and pay for the 
school lunch program. That is where we need to be. Not only does it 
make sense, not only is it constitutionally correct, but it just makes 
good basic sense.
  Mr. FOX of Pennsylvania. Will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. SCARBOROUGH. I certainly will yield.
  Mr. FOX of Pennsylvania. The point is well taken. The fact is that 
our local communities, local officials, schools, parents, teachers, 
they know best what they need in their community. If it goes through 
all the layers the gentleman from Florida described, what happens is, 
as he well knows, all the pieces that are taken out is less for the 
child.
  After all, what it is about, we want to help more children, we want 
to help more of our constituents get the services they need that cannot 
be provided by the private sector. Where the private sector can handle 
it best, they should. Where State government and local government can 
handle it best, they should.
  But if it cannot be handled in the local government, then the Federal 
Government has to get involved, obviously in national defense and in 
other areas like Medicare and Medicaid. Those things that cannot be 
handled in the local government, certainly of course the Federal 
Government needs to take care of it.
  Under this new Congress, the new vision I like is we are trying to 
eliminate the fraud, abuse and waste in the system, and that is where 
the big differences are coming. For instance, if we want to save 
Medicare for our seniors and make sure they get all the services they 
need with the appropriate increases, so they are always covered for 
health care, there is $30 billion a year right now in fraud, abuse and 
waste just in Medicare, $14 billion in Medicaid.

  Under the new legislation we passed, the new Health Care Fraud Act is 
going to make sure we go after that fraud,

[[Page H2218]]

abuse and waste and the savings go back to health care for our people. 
That is the difference in the new Congress, direct services, more for 
the people, less waste, fraud and abuse. By going after these kinds of 
problems in our Government, we are going to make sure we get some real 
reform.
  Mr. SCARBOROUGH. I go through the panhandle, hold town hall meetings 
all the time. As I hold town hall meetings, I hold Medicare town hall 
meetings, and I ask people what they think the problem is with 
Medicare.
  I cannot tell you how many people cite waste, fraud and abuse inside 
the system. They will tell me that a medical provider will overcharge 
them and that they will call up, they will say, ``You have overcharged 
me here. You need to correct my bill.'' And the provider will say, 
``Don't worry about it, it's not your money.''
  The sad fact is, it is their money. I will tell you what, if I added 
up all of the waste, fraud and abuse cases I heard in those town hall 
meetings, I think it would be enough to take care of the Federal debt.
  We cannot close our eyes to the fact that there is waste, fraud and 
abuse in the system, and we also cannot close our eyes to the fact that 
this system continues to lose money. I was shocked, like I know the 
gentleman was, and quite frankly worried for my parents and for my 93-
year-old grandmother, shocked to find out that the Clinton 
administration actually had knowledge that Medicare was losing money 
this past fall and that, unlike what the President had told us in the 
Medicare trustees' report back in April of 1995, that Medicare was 
going to go broke much faster than the 7 years they had originally told 
us. It was actually going to go broke a lot earlier.
  That is what excites me about this problem, despite all the sound and 
all the fury and all the demagoguery, and I can say demagoguery. That 
is not coming from me. That is coming from the Washington Post. The 
Post accused Bill Clinton and the Democrats of shamelessly demagoguing 
on the issue.
  Robert Samuelson, who wrote a Washington Post editorial, called the 
President a liar, said he lied on Medicare and said he did not like 
using that term, but that the President had so twisted the facts on 
Medicare that he really felt like there was no other term that fit him.
  I guess my last example of how the media has caught on to the 
President, and they have already told us what they are going to do 
there this fall, they are going to continue this shameless parade of 
lies, trying to scare senior citizens, but my favorite was Nightline.
  They had a program they called ``Medicare.'' The first clip, and I am 
sure you know about this, Jon, but the first clip they showed in the 
introduction of Nightline, they go, ``this is Nightline.'' The first 
clip they show is Hillary Clinton testifying before Congress a few 
years ago, a few short years ago, to Democrats in Congress, talking 
about how to save Medicare. She said we must slow down the rate of 
growth in Medicare to twice that of inflation, twice the rate of 
inflation. I suggest 6.9 percent.
  The next clip they showed was Speaker Gingrich saying we must slow 
down the rate of growth in Medicare to twice that of inflation. I 
suggest 7.2 percent. So already in these first two clips in 10 seconds 
you see that we are actually suggesting a higher increase of growth in 
Medicare than the President and Hillary did in 1993, the First Lady.

  Then the next clip was Bill Clinton saying, ``I will not allow the 
Republicans to destroy Medicare,'' when we were doing the exact thing 
or even a little bit better than they were suggesting just 2 short 
years ago.
  I cannot tell you how many senior citizens have said, ``My gosh, am I 
going to have Medicare next year? Are you guys abolishing Medicare?'' I 
sit there and I go through the numbers. After I go through the numbers, 
and I explain to my 93-year-old grandmother and to others that they are 
going to go from getting $4,600 this year in benefits to an average of 
$7,200 in benefits 7 years from now, I apologize to them. I apologize 
to them because of the shameless demagoguery that we have heard from 
this side by people who have admitted they are using this for political 
leverage to try to scare senior citizens, to maintain power, to try to 
get reelected.
  Now, if that is not a signal of the end of a party, and if that does 
not signal intellectual dishonesty and bankruptcy of the lowest order, 
I do not know what does.
  We are doing what we have to do, what the Washington Post recognizes 
we have to do, what the New Republic has recognized in a cover story 
that we have to do, what a lot of liberal publications even have 
realized that we have had to do to save Medicare for senior citizens 
and for those that are in the baby boom generation.
  I yield to the gentleman.
  Mr. FOX of Pennsylvania. The fact is the gentleman is absolutely 
correct. It was we Republicans who led in this Congress for several 
issues before we even got to Medicare. We are the ones that said we 
want to roll back the 1993 unfair tax on Social Security when we passed 
that bill in the House.
  We are the ones that said that seniors under 70 should earn more than 
$12,800 without having deductions from their Social Security. In fact, 
that legislation will allow them to make up to $30,000 a year without 
any deductions for Social Security.
  Third, we are the ones who said we read the report from the 
President's trustees saying that Medicare was going to run out of funds 
in 7 years. So we came up with a proposal, which we hope the Congress 
will eventually adopt and the President sign, which does several things 
that you outlined:

  No. 1, eliminate the $30 billion in fraud, abuse and waste by going 
through the Attorney General's office and working with the HHS 
Inspector General to make sure we root out that waste; give a 10-year 
penalty for those who violate the law. No longer can you be a provider. 
And put those savings back into health care for seniors.
  No. 2, make sure that the minimum education for the indirect and 
direct costs for interns and residents which is now part of Medicare be 
a separate line item, fully funded but not part of taking dollars away 
from seniors.
  No. 3, let us reduce the cost of the paper work, 12 percent cost now 
in Medicare, just on paper work. I want to see that down to 2 percent, 
like you do, and use electronic billing, and give an extra 10 percent 
back for seniors for health care.
  We also have a provision in there for managed care for Medicare, as 
well as Medisave accounts, which lets a senior determine how much money 
they want to spend each year on their health care and they can pocket 
the savings or roll it over the following year.
  The fact is we are trying to be innovative and we are trying to make 
sure that Medicare will be there for next year, the year after, and the 
year after. Whatever it takes to make sure seniors have health care, we 
are going to do it, because we are the ones who have been leading the 
way to help make sure that seniors live longer, live better, live 
independently and really can make sure that they have the quality of 
life that we want for your grandmother, for my grandmother, for our and 
for your parents.
  Mr. SCARBOROUGH. The gentleman brought up a good point, reclaiming my 
time for a second here. I remember back to 1993, the largest tax 
increase in this country, in fact in the history of mankind. I think 
back to that night when the vote was taken that increased taxes on 
Social Security up to 85 percent, where you had the Federal Government 
reaching in and taking more money out of senior citizen's pockets.
  I think back to that night. I think back to how they lowered the 
earnings limit that you talked about from $34,000 to $14,000 and 
basically told our senior citizens, ``Do not dare to be productive, my 
friends, because if you do, we are going to take your money away from 
you.''

                              {time}  2130

  You know, I think back to that night when they raised taxes, estate 
taxes. I think back to that night when they raised taxes that affected 
seniors' incomes a million different other ways. And, you know, the 
thing that is striking is that night it was this side of the aisle, the 
Republican side of the aisle, that unanimously voted for the rights of 
senior citizens. Not one single Republican cast a vote to raise taxes 
on senior citizens and their social security benefits. Not one single 
Republican

[[Page H2219]]

cast a vote under Bill Clinton's tax plan to lower the earnings limit, 
to punish seniors for being productive. Not one single Republican 
signed off on the largest tax increase in the history of this country.
  It was an initiative that was rammed through the House, through the 
Committee on Ways and Means, by liberal Democrats, signed on by 
President Bill Clinton, the same man who had promised a middle-class 
tax cut only a few months earlier when he was campaigning for 
President.
  Yet these people, a lot of these people, have the nerve to actually 
stand up now and act as though they are the protectors of senior 
citizens, when, in fact, when they were in power, they were the ones 
that were taxing senior citizens, making it harder for them to get by 
from Social Security check to Social Security check and who are now 
pretending to be friends of senior citizens. All they are doing is 
fiddling while Rome burns.
  They know the system is going bankrupt. The Medicare trustees told 
them the system is going bankrupt. The headlines this past month have 
shown it is going bankrupt even faster than we were led to believe by 
the President and by the liberal Democrats. And yet it is like they are 
a doctor that opens up a patient, sees cancer in that patient, and 
instead of operating, closes the patient back up, pats them on the head 
and says, ``Go in peace. You are fine.''
  We cannot turn a blind eye to the waste, fraud and abuse that is in 
the system. We cannot turn a blind eye to the fact that the system is 
going bankrupt. We have got to protect it and preserve it and make it 
stronger, and I ask you who cares for senior citizens more: those that 
actually dare to make a difference and save Medicare or those who want 
to be elected this coming November and that is all they care about? So 
they are willing to just sort of let it go on for another 6 months or a 
year or 2 years until we wake up one morning and Medicare is gone.

  Mr. FOX of Pennsylvania. I will be glad to answer your question, if 
you will yield. The fact is the Republican majority has led the way to 
protect seniors, not only having in that legislation all the things we 
discussed previously, but also a clause to return in case there has to 
be a further increase if we have not been able to save as much as we 
hoped to through the fraud, abuse and waste.
  We will not let seniors go without the proper Medicare and senior 
health care services they deserve and need, but we are not going to 
tolerate a system that will lose money and have the waste go out the 
door when the services those dollars could have brought the seniors 
should go to our people. We are going to be vigilant that way.
  What is also important is to note, and the people, our colleagues 
should also know, Social Security is off the table. That is not part of 
our budget. We are not going to let that be touched by anybody, not 
anybody anyhow.
  The fact is Social Security deserves to have funds brought back to it 
prior Congress borrowed from the Social Security. The Social Security 
trust fund is owed about $358 billion. Hopefully, through things like 
the line item veto, other savings we are going to have reducing 
agencies, the sunset review legislation I have, other ways to reduce 
the cost of programs that have outlived usefulness, we can restore 
those funds to the Social Security fund, the Social Security trust 
fund.
  The Social Security trust fund is solvent, doing well. We want to 
make sure it is going to be solvent for many years to come. Many on the 
other side of the aisle try to take things from it to balance the 
budget for seniors and those who have given their whole life to train 
us, to give us the right to be here. We have to protect them.
  Mr. SCARBOROUGH. I agree. Exactly.
  I want to try to bring this together, in closing, and just say this, 
that we have been talking about Medicare, we have been talking about 
education, but you know, the Democrats, some of the leadership, some of 
the liberals have tried to say, tried to tie some things together for a 
campaign slogan. And I guess it sounds great as a campaign slogan. 
Unfortunately, it is just not true.
  What have they said time and time again, the Republicans are cutting 
taxes for the rich to pay for Medicare and have said that we are 
actually cutting Medicare to pay for tax cuts for the rich. And we 
cannot talk about Medicare until--
  Mr. FOX of Pennsylvania. First of all, nothing could be further from 
the truth.
  Mr. SCARBOROUGH. Exactly. Exactly. We cannot end this discussion on 
Medicare without discussing these tax cuts, I think, just to totally 
blow it out of the water, because nothing could be further from the 
truth. Not only are we strengthening and preserving Medicare, not only 
are we allowing Medicare to grow at a rate that is sustainable, not 
only are we going to be giving senior citizens more options than they 
have ever had and going to be allowing the Medicare benefits to 
continue to increase, and that shows that we are telling the truth on 
Medicare.
  On the tax cuts for the rich, you and I both know those are not tax 
cuts for the rich. You take the $500 per child tax credit, let me tell 
you something, that is a tax credit to help the struggling middle-class 
family that is having trouble getting by from paycheck to paycheck.
  And here is an interesting fact for you on it: They call it tax cut 
for the rich; the fact is 89 percent of those tax cuts, 89 percent of 
that tax relief goes to working families earning less than $75,000. So 
what does that tell us? It tells us one or two things about the 
liberals calling them tax cuts for the rich. It tells us that, first of 
all, either they are not telling the truth on tax cuts either, on tax 
relief for working-class Americans, it tells us that. Or the second 
thing it tells us is that they truly believe that a working-class 
family of four earning $35,000, $40,000, is rich in their book.
  Now, whether they are lying about it or whether they truly believe 
that working-class Americans making $40,000, a family of four is now 
rich in America, either way, I do not think they are fit to govern this 
country anymore.
  I think it is a sad commentary when people would actually stand up 
and say those are tax cuts for the rich and try to scare senior 
citizens. This is about empowering senior citizens if we are talking 
about Medicare. it is about empowering working class Americans if we 
are talking about working-class family tax relief. And it is about 
empowering parents, teachers, principals, and school boards if we talk 
about educating our children in the classroom and not in a bureaucracy 
in Washington, DC. And that is what this whole, they have called it, a 
revolution, we have barely taken the first step.

  That is what this whole movement is about, getting power out of 
Washington, DC, and once again relying on the goodness of the American 
people and the greatness of the American civilization, which I believe 
today truly is the last great hope.
  Mr. FOX of Pennsylvania. I agree with you. You are absolutely right. 
The fact is that when it comes to the tax reform, it is going to help 
most Americans. And we have done it after we have already taken the 
spending cuts, $190 billion, deficit reduction of $90 billion. It is 
only when we start looking to the tax reform to help us create jobs, 
over 300,000 a year, to help encourage savings to help encourage 
investment, and that is what America is all about. If we can create 
more jobs, not Government jobs per se, but real private sector jobs, we 
will have more people paying taxes and more, a more stable tax 
structure for everybody. Everybody can pay less toward the Government 
and get more in their pocket so they can help this economy drive 
forward.
  We have the elder care tax credit, the new IRA's are part of that 
program. We have the new adoption tax credit. All of those tax reform 
packages will help seniors, help working families, will help children.
  So, frankly, when you talk about it here in this Congress, we have 
had bipartisan support for that program, but the President 
unfortunately vetoed the bill, and I am hopeful the next time when 
welfare reform comes before the President, tax reform comes before the 
President, and a balanced budget, we can make a difference, because 
with that balanced budget we are going to reduce the costs for working 
families, college education interest expense, car expense, and on the 
mortgage expense.

[[Page H2220]]

And that is basic to the country. And by doing that, we are going to 
have a stronger country. The last time we balanced the budget was 1969.
  Mr. SCARBOROUGH. That is right. For the first time in a generation, 
this Congress actually dared to say enough is enough, we are going to 
balance the budget, we are going to only spend as much money as we take 
in.
  A lot of people do not realize how much $5 trillion is. I heard 
somebody on this floor say one time, in explaining how much $5 trillion 
debt is, if you earned a million dollars every day from the day Jesus 
was born, Jesus Christ was born, to today, you would not make enough 
money, making a million dollars a day, you would not make enough money 
to pay off that debt. And yet we still have people telling us we do not 
have to do it in 7 years.

  Mr. FOX of Pennsylvania. What is interesting is we can still balance 
the budget and still have the safety net for those who are in need. 
This is a compassionate country, and this Congress does care but it 
does not mean we need to spend money on every program. Frankly, we have 
a private sector doing a great job, whether Habitat for Humanity, 
community service block grant where we take existing Federal funds and 
raise three times as much in the private sector to serve the community, 
we can do it all. We do not have to bankrupt the country or the next 
generation in doing that.
  Mr. SCARBOROUGH. I will tell you what we have done in Pensacola, FL. 
What we have started up, we started a community service network. I got 
together 3 or 4 months ago with community leaders. One is a doctor, 
Reed Bell, who has just been instrumental. He has cared. He is a 
pediatrician. He has done great work in the community for years, caring 
for disadvantaged children, caring for those in need. I talked to Dr. 
Bell, and he had come up with an idea, a private sector welfare reform, 
where when people come off of welfare, we create a community service 
network of all of these different community service organizations that 
would work together, that would draw in churches and synagogues, and 
get these people when they come off of welfare and help them get on 
their feet and do everything they can to empower those people without 
going back on the welfare rolls a month or two later.
  You know, at the time I came up with the idea, Dr. Bell had already 
come up with the idea, had been doing it for some time before me. I 
thought, hey, I have got a great idea. He had already been thinking 
about it, and we got together, and, with Dr. Bell's leadership, we have 
launched this community service network. And it is going to make a big 
difference. But that is something that is spreading throughout this 
country.
  I saw on the front page of the New York Times a few Sundays ago that 
there has been an explosive growth of these groups, that people are no 
longer waiting for the Federal Government to come in and help them out. 
Communities are now sort of digging in and doing their part and saying, 
``Forget the Federal Government, we have got this American can-do 
spirit. We are going to do it ourselves.'' That is what we are doing in 
Pensacola. That is what Dr. Bell is doing. That is what the New York 
Times is talking about.

  Again, this is not a political revolution that is sweeping the 
country. It is a revolution of thought, again, that Americans are once 
again reclaiming their country and saying we are not going to just 
depend on the Federal Government for everything.
  Mr. FOX of Pennsylvania. I will say, in summation, the spirit of 
voluntarism also is alive and well in Montgomery County, PA, where we 
have hundreds of organizations working to help with shelters for the 
homeless, food cupboards, you name it, health care. They are involved. 
But with our welfare reform legislation, in the Congress, I think that 
is also very sensitive. We are going to have a safety net for those in 
need, when they are taking care of children at home, those who are 
able-bodied, in 5 years we are looking to help them get a job, job 
counseling, job placement, day care, if they need it. We want to make 
sure it is those who are able-bodied get in the world of work if that 
is what they are able to do and we can train them for it.
  Mr. SCARBOROUGH. Of course, that debate will continue. I personally 
think our welfare bill that ended the Federal Government's oppressive 
mandates on States for the first time in 62 years is a great bill. 
Obviously, 88 Senators out of 100 Republican and Democrat alike thought 
it was a great idea.
  The President unfortunately vetoed that bill. Obviously, the 50 
Governors, when they came to town, all 50 endorsed our welfare reform 
bill, thought we had a pretty good idea. Again they thought we had a 
good idea, because it keeps going back to the ideals of Jefferson and 
Madison and our Founding Fathers that we are in the end a Nation of 
communities and not a Nation of bureaucracies.
  We have got to rely on the goodness of Americans as we go into the 
21st century, because we have seen the Federal Government only goes so 
far.
  Mr. FOX of Pennsylvania. I want to thank you for taking this hour so 
we have a chance to discuss some of the basic achievements we have had 
in the 104th Congress, so we can continue the enthusiasm to make sure 
we continue our reform goals. I thank you for your leadership.
  Mr. SCARBOROUGH. I thank you for your leadership.

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