[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 68 (Wednesday, May 15, 1996)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5025-S5044]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                  CONCURRENT RESOLUTION ON THE BUDGET

  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Inhofe). Under the previous order, the 
Senate will now proceed to consideration of Senate Concurrent 
Resolution 57, which the clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       A concurrent resolution (S. Con. Res. 57) setting forth the 
     congressional budget for the United States Government for 
     fiscal years 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, and 2002.

  The Senate proceeded to consider the concurrent resolution.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico.


                         Privilege Of The Floor

  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I send to the desk a list of majority 
and minority staff members and ask unanimous consent they be granted 
the privilege of the floor at various times at the option of the 
manager and the ranking member.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The list is as follows:

                             Majority Staff

       Brian Benczkowski, Jim Capretta, Amy Call, Lisa Cieplak, 
     Christy Dunn, Beth Felder, Alice Grant, Jim Hearn, Keith 
     Hennessey, William Hoagland.
       Carol McGuire, Anne Miller, Mieko Nakabayashi, Denise G. 
     Ramonas, Cheri Reidy, Ricardo Rel, Karen Ricoy, J. Brian 
     Riley, Mike Ruffner.
       Melissa Sampson, Andrea Shank, Amy Smith, Austin Smythe, 
     Bob Stevenson, Beth Wallis, Winslow Wheeler (detailee).

                             Minority Staff

       Amy Abraham, Kenneth Colling (fellow), Bill Dauster, Tony 
     Dresden, Jodi Grant, Matt Greenwald, Joan Huffer, Phil 
     Karsting, Jim Klumpner, Soo Jin Kwon.
       Daniela Mays, Sue Nelson, Jon Rosenwasser (fellow), Jerry 
     Slominski, Barry Strumpf.

  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, again in behalf of the majority leader, 
I ask unanimous consent that the presence of small electronic 
calculators be permitted on the floor of the Senate during 
consideration of the 1997 concurrent resolution.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Now, Mr. President, as I understand it, there are 50 
hours of debate on this resolution. Unless it is agreed to add 
additional time, each amendment is given 1 hour for the amendment, 1 
hour in opposition to the amendment. Amendments to the amendments have 
one-half hour, and one-half hour in opposition.
  The Budget Act prescribes that opening statements will utilize 4 
hours on economics, and that will be the opening of the budget debate. 
I am not so sure we are going to use all that time, but I would like to 
engage in a dialog with the ranking member, if he would, at this point.
  Senator Exon, I note, and I think you would concur, this is a rather 
exceptional year in that there are three full budgets that will be 
offered to the Senate: There is the Republican budget that is pending, 
encapsulated in the

[[Page S5026]]

resolution; there is a bipartisan proposal, led by Senators Chafee and 
Breaux, which is a full substitute for the Republican proposal; and 
then there is a third proposal, which I assume you or someone on your 
side will offer, which is the President's budget, which, again, is a 
full substitute for the Republican plan. Also, obviously, there are 
many amendments that Members on your side and our side would like to 
offer, either to the Republican budget resolution or to one or the 
other of the other full budgets that I have just briefly described.
  It had been my hope, and I share this with you to see what your 
thoughts are, that we could use the 4 hours allowed for economic 
discussion, 2 on each side, and then proceed with amendments to the 
Republican budget for the remainder of the day--we ought to get a lot 
of them in if we can do that--and that we then, late this evening, take 
an accounting for ourselves and see where we are, and that at a later 
time in this debate we take the full budgets that are offered as full 
substitutes to the Domenici mark. So at some point you would offer the 
President's and, some time thereafter, Senators Chafee and Breaux, or 
Breaux and Chafee, would offer theirs.
  I think we had a very good spirit of cooperation in the committee. I 
am just hoping that between us we can get our Members to start sending 
their amendments to us so we will know where we are going. I can say 
unequivocally--I heard from the leader yesterday and I read a statement 
this morning--we are going to finish this this week. I see no reason to 
go into Friday night and Saturday if we can work together to kind of 
organize, as best we can, our colleagues in their presentations.
  I yield at this point for your thoughts or observations, if you would 
share them with me.
  Mr. EXON. I thank my friend, the chairman of the committee, for his 
remarks and outline. Generally speaking, I do not know that I have any 
serious reservations. I think the chairman of the committee has 
basically stated what should be the procedure. I have a caveat to that 
that I will mention in just a moment. I simply say that I agree that 
even though we have 25 hours on each side--and while you have not said 
that, I understand the intent is the 25 hours on your side would be 
controlled by the majority leader or his designee, which would normally 
be you, and the same thing would be true on our side with the minority 
leader and myself as the ranking Democrat on the Budget Committee. Is 
that the way? Would we follow usual procedures in that regard?
  Mr. DOMENICI. Yes.
  Mr. EXON. I see no reason why we should not head for, and very likely 
can, finish this by Friday late, if not sooner. I say to my friend, in 
the 4 hours set aside for economic discussions, I do not anticipate we 
would use all of our 2 hours on this side, although no one ever knows 
what happens for sure in the U.S. Senate.
  I simply say, as I listened to the opening remarks from the chairman 
of the committee, if he felt we would likely only have amendments to 
the Republican measure today, I had intended at a very early time to 
offer the President's budget, which we offered very early in the 
procedure in the committee, as you will remember, and we would not 
agree in advance to any extensive delay in our desire to offer the 
President's budget, which very likely would be the first action on this 
side. And so I would like to advise the leader of that.

  Mr. DOMENICI. First of all, let me indicate, the leader has already 
indicated that I am his designee to manage this bill and allocate the 
time. From time to time, as you will, I will give that to some other 
Senator who will manage in my stead.
  Mr. EXON. We will follow the same procedure here.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Let me tell you one thing I failed to mention by way of 
trying to reach some accord. It is my commitment and desire, and I hope 
you will cooperate--I think there is no reason why we should not do 
this. Senator Grassley has requested and I have agreed that his 
amendment with reference to defense will be the first amendment 
offered, and it addresses the pending resolution.
  So sometime after our opening remarks and some discussions on the 
economics, I will clearly ask that he be the first one, and I think you 
will not have any objection.
  Mr. EXON. I think it should be a foregone conclusion that whatever 
the procedure, that you on that side and myself on this side will make 
the final determination of what will be the order of filing amendments. 
Certainly you have every right to recognize Senator Grassley for the 
first remarks on that side.
  What I have indicated is when our time comes, it is very likely that 
the first action on this side will be the offering of the President's 
budget as a substitute. I just want to alert you to that.
  Mr. DOMENICI. You do not intend to have other amendments that address 
themselves either to our budget or other things before you offer the 
full budget?
  Mr. EXON. That is my present plan, although we have not locked in 
anything.
  Mr. DOMENICI. I just thought it might be interesting, from the 
standpoint of understanding, if we got some of the amendments out of 
the way and we were looking at three full budgets and debating them in 
a sequence which would permit us to see them all kind of one, two, 
three. But you have every right to do that. So why do we not proceed.
  Parliamentary inquiry, Mr. President: Is it correct, under the Budget 
Act, that there are now 4 hours equally divided, minus the time we have 
used, I guess, after the opening statements?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Yes, that is correct.
  Mr. EXON. May I inquire further along those lines. If, after the 
opening statements by the managers, and we are into the 4-hour period 
that has just been referenced by the leader of the committee, we 
jointly agree or should jointly agree to yield back any remaining 
time--in other words, suppose we have an hour on each side or an hour 
on that side and half an hour on this side, whatever it is, we can 
hopefully work to expedite the procedures----
  Mr. DOMENICI. Absolutely.
  Mr. EXON. And I am sure you would agree.
  Mr. DOMENICI. I agree.
  Mr. EXON. If we can take that 4 hours and get it down to 1 or 1\1/2\, 
that is our goal.
  Mr. DOMENICI. We are going to try to make it less than the 4 hours. 
We have a few Senators who want to speak on this subject, and they are 
going to be given that opportunity. And then we will get off that as 
soon as we can.
  I thank Senator Exon for his cooperative spirit this morning. I hope 
we can do that all the way through the next 3 days.
  Mr. President, we begin again today a debate that some might think 
has not yet ended and others might think never ends. To my friend, the 
ranking member of the Budget Committee, I know this is the last budget 
resolution he will manage on the Senate floor. I will have more to say 
about Senator Exon at the end of these remarks, but he knows the work 
we are about today and probably for the rest of this week. It is very 
serious work. It is work that will directly affect our country's 
future.
  In many ways, the work we are about today is a continuation of our 
efforts of the last year to find a way to balance our Federal budget 
early in the next century and, in doing that, to look through the 
budget of the United States and find some areas where we are going to 
have real trouble down the line if we do not make some reforms and 
changes now.

  In other ways, the work we are about here today builds on the 
successful efforts last year to reduce spending and put us on a path to 
a balanced budget. I think the fact has been lost in the heated debates 
last winter that we did reduce spending on appropriated accounts to the 
levels assumed in last year's budget resolution.
  Largely because of those successes in the appropriated accounts, we 
are able to continue our goal of reaching balance in 2002 as originally 
planned. Obviously, our work is to achieve that goal, that goal which 
would have been made easier had the President signed the Balanced 
Budget Act of 1995 instead of vetoing it last December. But because the 
President vetoed that legislation, which we worked so hard to

[[Page S5027]]

enact last year, we find ourselves back here today. A little 
discouraged perhaps, but not daunted at all in our effort and our 
endeavor, because this issue is not going to go away and the American 
public demands that we balance spending and revenues at the earliest 
possible time.
  While some things will surely seem not to have changed from last year 
as the debate progresses, in other ways things will have changed 
significantly since 1 year ago.
  First, one big change is that the President, after nine attempts, has 
now, at least on paper, with some major gimmicks, figured out a way to 
present what he claims to be a balanced budget plan. We will have a lot 
more to say about the President's so-called balanced budget plan, and I 
sincerely look forward to debating it.
  But let me say at the outset, however, that I have known smoke-and-
mirrors budgets and I have known real budget plans, and I do not 
hesitate to award the President, the President's so-called balanced 
budget plan this year with an Oscar for the best acting in fiction.
  Second, another big change this year, we will have a third budget 
plan to debate. I think that is exciting. The bipartisan budget plan to 
be offered by Senators Chafee and Breaux is a real budget plan. Again, 
I look forward to debating that plan.
  Unlike the President's, which is a hoax of a budget, I want to 
compliment the group of Senators who have worked hard this last year to 
put together a real budget, certainly not a smoke-and-mirrors budget 
like the President's plan. Unfortunately, the bipartisan plan does not 
achieve balance in 2002, and I have some concerns about elements of 
that plan that we will debate later. But this is a welcome change from 
a year ago when Republicans stood here on the floor alone and offered 
the only real balanced plan for the American people, the only one to be 
on the floor of the Senate in almost four decades.
  Mr. President, the Senate-reported budget resolution, the one before 
us today, Senate Concurrent Resolution 57, offers America hope. It is 
real--no smoke and mirrors. It recognizes the need to set priorities, 
it makes tough decisions, or at least says to those who will follow 
after it with legislation that they are compelled to make some tough 
decisions, and it is realistic. It can be done. It needs to be done. 
This is a budget designed to help working American families, to make 
them more secure, secure in their homes, in their communities, and in 
their jobs.

  It offers them a more efficient Government, one dedicated to economic 
growth and security, support for our children and lower taxes on 
American families.
  The resolution before us today recognizes the very simple notion that 
our Government cannot simply go on spending our children's money. It is 
good medicine for our Nation and it is designed to prevent America's 
children from having to swallow a poison pill of mounting Federal debt. 
It is designed to prevent our Medicare system from going bankrupt in 
just 5 years. It is designed to prevent a future of a crushing tax 
burden on those just starting out in life.
  The resolution before us, Mr. President, will strengthen America, it 
will continue to build on our successes of last year, and change the 
way our Government works, to make it more efficient, more responsive, 
and less expensive.
  Most importantly, it is a budget plan that will ensure a better 
future for our children and our Nation. I said that last year; I 
believed it then; I continue to believe it now. True leadership cannot 
simply postpone this difficult work because it is an election year. The 
problem will not go away simply because there is an election this fall.
  The second balanced budget plan the Republicans have proposed in this 
Congress is designed to return our Nation to fiscal reality and 
preserve America as the land of opportunity, not only for now but for 
future generations. In short, it reflects our commitment to fiscal 
responsibility, generating economic growth, creating family wage jobs 
and protecting the American dream for all our citizens young and old.
  This budget will restore America's fiscal equilibrium. It will 
balance the budget by the year 2002 without touching Social Security, 
by ratcheting down the deficit by slowing the growth of Government 
spending. But let me emphasize, Government spending will continue to 
grow over the next 6 years. It is a budget which will reverse the tide 
of 50 years of power that flowed from the rest of the country to 
Washington.
  We want to provide more freedom and opportunity to people at the 
local level so they might have more control over the decisions on the 
programs that affect their lives, affect their children, and affect 
their communities.
  Key changes are proposed to shrink the Federal bureaucracy to 
terminate duplication in Government, to consolidate programs to improve 
efficiency, and prioritize the limited resources we have. But at the 
same time, we continue to support programs which provide needed 
services to our citizens. We have been careful to preserve a safety net 
for those truly in need.

  We support programs aimed at keeping America safe, safe in their 
homes, their schools, and their neighborhoods, by funding needed crime 
programs and funding those parts of the U.S. Government that are 
engaged day by day in fighting crime across America, such as the FBI, 
the DEA, Border Patrol and the like.
  The budget before us today provides $6.5 billion for environmental 
protection, including increases of nearly $1 billion in the safe 
drinking, Superfund and the environmental enforcement programs of EPA. 
So in 1997 it cannot be said that this budget cuts environmental 
spending. It does not. It increases environmental spending.
  This budget moves toward protecting America's senior citizens. It 
makes the Medicare trust fund solvent for 10 years, 1 decade. I regret 
that I cannot stand here and say to the senior citizens of the United 
States, we are going to make the trust fund solvent for 50 years. The 
truth of the matter is, it is difficult to make it solvent for 10. And 
we must at least do that.
  I mention that the President's stated goal in his budget is solvency 
of the trust fund through 2006, 10 years, the same goal as we have in 
this budget resolution. The way we have solved it--that is, the budget 
before us and the President's--is very different. We will have more to 
say about this issue, a lot more during the debate.
  But the Congressional Budget Office tells us very simply--question: 
How much must we save in the trust fund to keep it solvent for 10 
years? Their answer is: You need $123 billion of savings in the trust 
funded portion of Medicare to meet the President's goal of 10 years. 
That is what we have done. We have said, Medicare will be changed, 
reformed, but there for every senior that wants it just like it is, but 
the providers in that system, and through changing the program to offer 
options, we must save $123 billion.
  The President's budget, I regret to say, does not meet his goal. He 
only extends the life of the trust fund for 1 additional year. This is 
the President's first big gimmick, an unbelievable cruel hoax on senior 
citizens, particularly those who depend upon home health care as part 
of this system.
  We protect, preserve and keep Medicare solvent for one decade. For 
Medicare part B--all should know that when you speak of Medicare, there 
are two pieces. One is a trust fund. Every working American puts money 
in that trust fund. That is essentially the part that is an 
encapsulated trust fund for the protection of senior citizens and their 
health programs related to hospitalization and long-term home health 
care. That is the part that is going bankrupt, and we will be there in 
5 years unless we fix it. We have been told, to fix that part you must 
reform it to save $123 billion.

  The other part, frequently called part B, is an insurance program for 
the rest of health care that is not provided in the trust fund. This 
program is funded by general tax dollars, and there is no trust fund. 
Seniors pay a portion of the insurance premium, and essentially it is 
an insurance policy.
  I want to make it absolutely clear, for part B we have taken the 
President's proposed savings, $44 billion--we have heard all we can 
take about Republicans and Medicare--and this year it is clear that we 
are responding with 44 billion dollar's worth of savings in part B, 
exactly the same number as the

[[Page S5028]]

President. But we are making the trust fund solvent in a real way with 
no gimmicks and absolute integrity.
  In our budget, so that everyone will understand the dimension of this 
issue, we provide $1.46 trillion of Medicare spending over the next 6 
years--$1.46 trillion. We propose to increase on each Medicare 
beneficiary the amount of money spent from $5,300 per person today to 
$7,000 per person in 2002. How can that be called a cut? You do the 
arithmetic and it is a huge increase. If we were to provide these kinds 
of increases anywhere else in any budget it would be impossible to 
sustain it. In the case of seniors, we have a commitment. We want to 
save the fund and maximize their coverage.
  Our budget throws the Medicare trust fund a life preserver. The 
President's budget throws Medicare overboard. We will have more to say 
about how the President gets to his statement of 10 years of solvency 
in part A of the trust fund as we move along.
  Medicaid: Now, so everybody will understand, Medicare is for seniors; 
Medicaid is a program of the U.S. Government, or I should say, a 
composite of 23 programs that are put together to help poor people by 
giving them health care, by paying their health care bills with certain 
limitations and certain exceptions. This budget assumes we will spend 
$731 billion on Medicaid over the next 6 years. This budget assumes the 
implementation of the Medicaid reform plan as recommended unanimously 
by a bipartisan group of Governors--that is, 48 Governors. We have 
added back $54 billion in Medicaid spending compared with last year's 
resolution. Mr. President, that is $36 billion of Medicaid spending, 
compared with the Balanced Budget Act vetoed by the President. We are 
anxious to get this Medicaid reform done. With the support of Democrat 
and Republican Governors it can be done. The amount proposed for 
savings is truly achievable.
  Medicaid spending, Mr. President, will increase under this budget 46 
percent over the next 6 years. How can that be called a cut? Medicaid 
spending in this budget will increase by 46 percent over the next 6 
years. This budget recognizes the need to overhaul America's 
deteriorated welfare system. Funding levels in this resolution allow 
Congress to send power back to the States as requested by the National 
Governors' Association, by converting a failed AFDC Program, Aid for 
Dependent Children Program, sometimes called the welfare program, into 
a block grant with certain guarantees.
  The resolution before the Senate assumes reforms in the food stamp 
and child nutrition programs to slow the growth rate of spending in 
those programs but maintains the entitlement to preserve a nutrition 
safety net for children. It assumes funding targets on the severely 
disabled in Supplemental Security Income Program.

  This budget assumes funding from reforms to child enforcement 
programs, to make deadbeat dads support their children instead of 
making the Government, the taxpayer, hard-working families trying to 
make a living, instead of asking them to do the supporting with tax 
dollars. This assumes we will change the law, truly make deadbeat dads 
pay their legally responsible child care and support.
  This resolution assumes savings from restricting immigrants the 
access to Government assistance programs to ensure that sponsors live 
up to their promise not to allow immigrants to become a public charge. 
Actually, very few Americans, and until lately, very few Senators, knew 
that under our generous policy of family unification, for the last 15 
years or so, American citizens have been busy bringing their relatives, 
most of them elderly mothers, fathers and grandparents, to our country, 
under our policy of unification, sign a certificate of support, for we 
do not invite the unification so that the taxpayers can pay for the 
support of these people that are brought to America to join in our 
society and be part of their family.
  It is incredible how that approach has degenerated into a program 
where billions of American tax dollars are going to legal immigrants 
who are brought here purposefully to avoid the certificate of support 
and become wards of the Government. It is American history from our 
inception. We have held a policy that we are not bringing aliens to 
America to become wards of the public. That has fallen apart. We put it 
back together in our assumptions here. Many of the assumptions were 
realized in the votes on the immigration bill, Mr. President, as we 
voted numerous times last week and the week before.
  Finally, this budget provides $122 billion in tax relief for American 
families through a $500 per child family tax credit. This will aid 52 
million American children in 28 million families. I want to repeat, in 
this budget resolution, the resolution itself says we will reduce the 
amount of tax we take into the Treasury by $122 billion because we are 
going to give 28 million American families, 52 million American 
children, a chance to keep more of their money and spend it on their 
needs. If ever the Tax Code of America went amiss and became 
antifamily, it was when we lost our way and let the deduction for a 
dependent child wither away from where it was in my day to where it is 
today. What can be deducted as an expense of rearing a child is a mere 
shadow of what it was in years past. Yet, we wonder why there is so 
much strain and stress in families. We will not even be returning it to 
its more wholesome day of profamily taxes, but we will make a giant 
step when we say every parent with children under 18 will get a tax 
deduction of $500. Their taxes will be reduced by $500 for each child. 
What is wrong with that?
  For those who want to stand on the floor of the Senate and talk about 
this budget cutting something so we can pay for tax cuts, let me just 
say I am very, very proud that we have made room in this budget for 
this $500 child tax credit. For those who accuse us, let them stand up 
and say they do not want to give the $500 tax credit. Under our plan, I 
repeat, a family with two children under age 18 would receive $1,000 of 
permanent tax relief.

  In summary, on the $122 billion tax proposal in this resolution, we 
have reduced Government spending from what it would be by $712 billion. 
In doing that, we feel very positive about being able to say $122 
billion is given back to the people rather than spent on more 
Government.
  In closing, let me say that I hope we can move, during the next 2\1/
2\ days, to enact this resolution, and then move toward implementing it 
in the months of June and July. I believe this can be done. But if, for 
some reason, we fail again to get the job done, I can only say that I 
think the tide is turning, and we will be back again and, clearly, 
sooner rather than later, we will do what is right.
  Finally, I wish it were possible to have my friend and ranking 
member, Senator Exon, join me in support of this last budget resolution 
and his last budget resolution on the floor of the Senate. That is not 
possible. But he will be convinced, maybe, on its merits, and as we 
move through this debate, I just want to say that he has been a very 
good ranking member and has spoken his party's case extremely well. I 
believe it is fair to say that the two of us have done that, with 
little rancor and, in my case, with great respect and admiration, 
regardless of how it turns out in terms of where Senator Exon ends up 
2\1/2\ days from now. I know that he feels very strongly about the need 
to find a balance in Federal spending. He has been a long-time 
supporter of the constitutional amendment for a balanced budget. He 
supported the line-item veto legislation that was enacted recently. He 
supported the unfunded mandates legislation voted out of our Budget 
Committee earlier this year.
  Obviously, in the years to come, if it is my privilege to be here on 
the floor, I will miss him and I wish him well. We will have more to 
say about that soon.
  At this time, I yield the floor.
  Mr. EXON addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Campbell). The Chair recognizes the 
ranking minority member, the Senator from Nebraska [Mr. Exon].
  Mr. EXON. I thank the Chair. I thank my friend and colleague from New 
Mexico for his most kind remarks. I appreciate them more than he knows.
  When I came here 18 years ago, I sought a seat on the Budget 
Committee and was granted one. I have served on the Budget Committee 
the entire time I have been here. One of the stalwarts on that 
committee on the other side of the aisle, whom I got to know initially 
very well that first year on the Budget

[[Page S5029]]

Committee, was Pete Domenici. What he has just said means a great deal, 
and I thank Senator Domenici for that. I have the highest respect for 
his ability and his integrity, and I appreciate what he said about my 
support.
  I feel the same way about the Senator from New Mexico. We do not 
always agree, and we cannot in this body. Sometimes it may be difficult 
for people who do not understand the U.S. Senate to recognize and 
realize that we can disagree on policy, we can disagree on numbers, and 
we can speak very forcefully about that. That is the process. But as 
far as personal esteem is concerned, there is no one in the U.S. Senate 
whom I hold in more high personal esteem than I do my chairman, the 
Republican Member, and the excellent floor manager of the measure 
before us.
  So in spite of what is said after that, I certainly want Senator 
Domenici to know, as he already knows, that we are good friends, who 
have high regard for each other personally. And in the difficult tasks 
that face the Nation, here is where we come to some disagreement as to 
how to reach the proper end that we both are seeking.
  As Senator Domenici has said, Mr. President, this is the last budget 
resolution that I shall manage on the floor of the U.S. Senate. I 
remember well my first budget resolution 18 years ago. It was in the 
spring of 1979, and our dear and late colleague, Senator Ed Muskie of 
Maine, was the chairman of the Budget Committee, and the distinguished 
Senator from Oklahoma, Henry Bellmon, was the ranking minority member. 
The projected deficit for fiscal year 1980 was less than $20 billion. 
It does not seem possible, but that is what it was. I had high hopes, 
as a freshman Senator, that we would see the end of deficit spending. I 
said so in my first speech. But those hopes were dashed, Mr. President, 
during the Reagan-Bush years when deficits were piled upon deficits. 
President Reagan's Office of Management and Budget Director, David 
Stockman--in case he has been forgotten--later described that period of 
time under Reagan-Bush as ``fiscal carnage.'' The fiscal carnage that 
took place at that time is what we are attempting to deal with here 
today, as we were last year. Four years ago, President Clinton began 
the arduous task of drawing a narrowing circle on the deficit, and he 
succeeded beyond all expectations, with no help, Mr. President, from 
those on that side of the aisle.
  I will simply cite the difficulties that we are in and how we are 
going to get out of them, and the significant contribution that 
President Clinton has made to the possibility of balancing the budget 
by the year 2002.
  The graph that I have behind me here is entitled ``Budget Deficits, 
CBO Estimates.'' These are Congressional Budget Office estimates of 
where they were going. You will see the year 1980 to the year 2000 
across the bottom of the chart, and the billions of dollars in deficits 
on the left side. If you will notice, halfway up the chart, before the 
dotted lines start, is where President Bill Clinton came into office. 
At that time, you will notice that the annual deficits were about $300 
billion a year. I would like to make a point here that I think all too 
many Americans do not fully appreciate or grasp. They hear 
``deficits,'' they hear ``national debt,'' and all too often I think 
the difference between the two becomes blurred. So, once again, for the 
Record, let me state that the deficits we talk about are the annual 
shortfalls where we spend in Government more than we take in. The 
annual deficits were running wild.
  I just stated in my opening remarks that when I was here in my first 
year, we were facing an annual deficit of $20 billion. When Bill 
Clinton became President of the United States, we were facing annual 
deficits not of $20 billion but of $300 billion.
  I hear attacks again and again that are not factual, indicating that 
the President of the United States is not sincere, that he is trying to 
use smoke and mirrors. The smoke and mirrors in this chart shows what 
has happened. This bottom line is that President Bill Clinton--without 
help from or even one vote on that side of the aisle in the U.S. Senate 
or over in the House of Representatives--has driven that $300 billion 
deficit down. That is the annual deficit as opposed to the trillion-
dollar, multitrillion-dollar debt of the United States of America. That 
is something that I think people overlook.
  At the end of each year when the deficit is $20 billion, as it was 
when I came here, or up to $300 billion when Bill Clinton came here as 
President of the United States, those deficits at the end of each and 
every year are piled upon, and we start all over at the end of each 
year. Those deficits magically go away, I guess. What we do is pile 
them onto the national debt, which has risen since I came here--before 
the Reagan-Bush years from under $1 trillion; today, to over $5 
trillion--and are going up even under the projections of the 
Republicans to at least $6 trillion, before we balance the budget, 
hopefully by the year 2002.
  The point I want to make again, Mr. President, is that when Bill 
Clinton became President of the United States we were running deficits 
of $300 billion. Notice the lower line where they have come down now to 
where the Congressional Budget Office projects they will be under $150 
billion next year. Bill Clinton, therefore, is not even given credit by 
those on that side of the aisle for more than cutting in half the 
annual deficits of the United States of America. That is a remarkable 
achievement. But you do not hear much about it from that side of the 
aisle.
  The lower part of this President's budget takes the budget down to 
balance by the year 2002 as opposed to what the Congressional Budget 
Office projections said they would be on that up line before Bill 
Clinton--BBC, Before Bill Clinton. I submit for the Record that I do 
not think anyone can refute it, that unless we had followed the fiscal 
responsibility of Bill Clinton when he became President of the United 
States that has more than cut the annual deficits in half, we would not 
be standing here today pretending, or hoping, that we could balance the 
budget by the year 2002 because we would have been way up here on the 
upper part of this chart. And had we continued to follow the policies 
that those on the other side of the aisle, evidently by their votes, 
wanted to follow we would not be standing here today talking about 
reaching balance in 2002.
  Before Bill Clinton, BBC, we were in deep trouble, and we are still 
in very deep trouble. But unless Bill Clinton had taken a stand and 
unless the Democrats, by a tie, or one vote, had the courage to stand 
up and say, ``We have to stop it,'' we would not be in a position 
today, even under the Republican proposal to balance the budget by the 
year 2002. So let us give Bill Clinton at least some credit.
  We thought, Mr. President, that we had a chance last year to build on 
the President's success. Under his leadership, we would have reduced 
our Federal deficit to use some other figure by a projected $846 
billion through fiscal year 1998. We had a rare opportunity to balance 
the budget last year, but that opportunity was squandered by the 
radical right. Here we are yet with another year and with yet another 
Republican budget that does not fairly do what this Senator and most on 
this side of the aisle and most of the American people want to do: 
balance the budget in a fair and equitable manner.
  During the opening remarks by my friend and colleague from New 
Mexico, and I think I can quote the manager of the bill correctly, he 
said the President claims that he will balance the budget. But he 
indicated in his remarks that it was fictional. Let me say, Mr. 
President, that all during that debate that followed the budget last 
year and the failure of the Republicans even to meet with the President 
to work out a proposition, it is clear to see where the responsibility 
lies.

  Despite the claims, despite the statements, June O'Neill, the 
Republican-appointed head of the Congressional Budget Office, testified 
in front of the Budget Committee, and I quote June O'Neill: ``The 
President's budget proposals and policies, as estimated by the 
Congressional Budget Office, would balance the budget by the year 
2002.''
  Let me repeat that again. Contrary to what you have heard, contrary 
to what you are going to hear, the Republican-appointed head of the 
Congressional Budget Office says the President's budget policies will 
balance the budget by the year 2002.
  Mr. President, we also heard a great deal so far today--and I am sure 
that

[[Page S5030]]

we will hear more about it in the future--that the President of the 
United States is not being honest with regard to the Medicare trust 
fund. Mr. President, I cite a letter, and hereby request it be printed 
in the Record of May 9, 1996, from June O'Neill, the Republican-
appointed head of the Congressional Budget Office, to me, the Honorable 
James Exon, ranking member, Committee on the Budget:

       Dear Senator: At your request, the Congressional Budget 
     Office has examined the effects of the administration's 
     budgetary proposals on the hospital insurance trust fund. 
     Under current law, the hospital insurance trust fund is 
     projected to become insolvent by the year 2001. CBO estimates 
     that the administration's proposal would postpone this date 
     to the year 2005.

  Enough is enough is enough. I do not think we accomplish a great deal 
by plotting against other people's motives when the leader of the CBO 
has certified that the President is being honest and that the President 
and his administration are being straightforward.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the letter I just 
referenced be printed in the Record at the conclusion of my remarks.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (See exhibit 1.)
  Mr. EXON. Here we are, Mr. President, with yet another Republican 
budget. But after 18 months of extremism and demagoguery, after two 
shutdowns and a threat of a dozen more, I must say that I expected 
something better. True--and I congratulate and thank my friend from New 
Mexico--true, there is some degree of dulling the knife's edge from 
last year's disastrous Republican budget proposal that was not 
appreciated by the vast majority of the people of the United States 
once they understood it.
  But I ask, is this latest Republican budget kinder? Is it a gentler 
budget than the Republicans had promised the American people? I think 
not. Yes, it is somewhat better, I would say, than last year. Primarily 
that is possible because the Congressional Budget Office in the 
estimating of what is going to happen in the future has come up with a 
healthier economic growth than they had previously. I thank Senator 
Domenici and the Republicans for wisely using that to alleviate some of 
the hit that many Americans not as fortunate as the rest of us would 
have taken.
  We hear time and time again about how the Republicans are going to 
spend more money on these programs than in the past. You have heard 
already and you will hear more about the fact that the Republicans are 
spending more money than in the past, especially with regard to 
Medicare programs. Yet the facts are that the additional money the 
Republicans are saying they are going to spend, therefore saying, 
piously, that it is not a cut, even though the rate of increase that 
the Republicans are proposing for the average Medicare recipient is 
less than the projected increased costs of health care for the public 
at large will not be sufficient for the seniors that need Medicare. So 
another way of saying it, oh, yes, they are providing more money but 
they are not providing the money that seniors need for Medicare, if you 
look at the projections of what the increased costs will be for the 
public at large.
  One need only go in this area to the materials issued on May 8 by the 
House Budget Committee and the joint House-Senate press conference that 
followed. You will see the same venomous policy and skewed priorities 
that were proposed in last year's budget included in this new 
Republican budget, although I hasten to add it is an improvement over 
last year.
  The direct student loan program would be eliminated. The Goals 2000 
Program would be terminated. That is a key educational function. The 
earned income tax credit would be slashed by $17 billion, $7 billion 
above what the bipartisan Governors found was acceptable.
  So that there will be no misunderstanding, the earned income tax 
credit was first proposed, I believe, by President Ford, and the earned 
income tax credit is designed for the very lowest of the low-paid 
people of the United States of America. It is designed to get them out 
of poverty by giving them an earned income tax credit. It was a Ford-
Republican proposal that we Democrats in a bipartisan fashion 
recognized was good, and we have taken up the mantle. They, the other 
side of the aisle, are devastating that earned income tax credit that 
goes right to the heart and throat of many people living near that 
economic edge.
  The programs that they advocate also eliminate the Department of 
Commerce, and Energy would be either eliminated or deep sixed to the 
place where they could not function. Even the slightly better off 
Senate Republican budget cuts $65 billion more in discretionary 
spending than the President's plan, and discretionary spending is 
something that we all agree now is a major concern for the future 
welfare of America. I suppose this warms the cold hearts of Speaker 
Gingrich and Mr. Armey and the Republican freshman class over on the 
other side of the Hill, but it is of little consolation to the American 
people who had expected moderation and imagination and teamwork.
  I say to my good friend, the distinguished chairman of the Budget 
Committee, I compliment his leadership on that side of the aisle in 
many areas, and I listened with great interest and had a tendency to 
stand up and applaud when Senator Domenici was talking about the need 
to make changes in the immigration policy. I happen to agree that we 
have gone way too far and allowed way too many people into the United 
States of America. Not all of the immigrants but far too many are 
coming in here to take advantage of our safety net that is already 
overcrowded, and we are not doing a very good job of maintaining it. We 
cannot have immigrants coming into this country primarily to take 
advantage of our safety net.
  I hope and think my friend from New Mexico appreciates the fact that 
during the recent debate on this measure, this particular Senator voted 
almost without exception with the distinguished Senator from Wyoming 
[Mr.  Simpson], the leader of the effort. I think we will find that we 
did not do everything we wanted to do, but I think we made some good 
strides under the excellent leadership primarily of Senator Simpson 
and, of course, on our side Senator Kennedy. Immigration is still a 
major problem and causes us great difficulty when we try to come up 
with what is the right thing to do.
  Once again, I compliment Senator Domenici for his leadership in this 
area and in many others. Yet we are faced with those in our party and 
he on his side in his party among many who feel that some kind of 
compromise is something bad.
  Compromise is the only way we have to bring 100 dedicated, strong-
willed people into some kind of coalition so that we can get things 
done.
  I must say that I look at this budget resolution, Mr. President, that 
this budget resolution, while some improvement over the last, still 
fails in many ways. Most of all, this budget fails the American people. 
I do not think putting frosting over a bad cake makes it any better. It 
still divides our great country when we should be striving to unite it. 
It still casts blight when we should be providing shade and comfort for 
the elderly, the disabled and especially our children. It still 
extracts the most from those who have the least when we should be 
asking for a fair and shared sacrifice. This is where President 
Clinton's budget succeeds. That is why I will be offering to use the 
Clinton budget, which balances the budget by the year 2002 as certified 
by the Republican appointee to the Congressional Budget Office.
  This is where the Republican budget, in my view, fails the test of 
fairness. The Republican budget promises many things. As far as I can 
see, the Republican budget may achieve balance. I agree that it would 
achieve balance, as does the President's budget, in the year that they 
claim it will. But at what cost to the American people under the 
Republican budget? What sacrifices, many of them unfair in the view of 
this Senator, are we going to make? As far as the rest of the loud 
promises are concerned, they are gusty winds of propaganda. This 
Republican budget delivers least when it promises to do most.

  The Republican majority would like Americans to believe that they are 
saving Medicare for future generations. ``Preserve and protect,'' was 
their poster-tested public relations slogan. But when $167 billion--I 
repeat, Mr. President, when $167 billion is lopped off the projected 
spending for Medicare over

[[Page S5031]]

the next 6 years, $50 billion more than in the President's budget, I am 
not so sure it will be the same first-class health care system that 
exists today. It is this first-class system--and it is a first-class 
system--more than just a trust fund that we are trying to protect and 
preserve.
  Despite the attacks from the other side, I cite back once again to 
the letter that I received from June O'Neill, the Republican-appointed 
CBO chief, that the President is right in his projections.
  The Republican budget would reduce Medicare spending growth per 
beneficiary far below--far below the projected private sector growth 
rate. I mentioned this earlier. It is right to say we are increasing 
the spending, but if we are increasing the spending for Medicare less 
than the cost of health care delivery in the private sector, then that 
is not an increase.
  I am very fearful that what the Republicans are doing here will, 
without question, diminish the quality and the access to health care 
for millions of middle-class Americans. Doctors and hospitals will be 
able to charge seniors for the entire balance of the charges above the 
Medicare payment. Hear this again. Under the proposal, the Republican 
proposal that they claim is fair and reasonable, doctors and hospitals 
would be able to charge seniors for the entire balance of the charges 
above the Medicare payment. The danger here, and Americans should 
understand it, and they will not have the wool pulled over their eyes--
is the Republican majority may assert----
  Mr. DOMENICI. Will the Senator yield?
  Mr. EXON. I will yield at conclusion of my remarks.
  The Republican majority may assert that premiums are not going up, 
but they cannot make the same claim about seniors' out-of-pocket 
expenses to pay their medical bills. The $123 billion reduction in the 
growth of the Medicare hospital insurance spending will particularly 
devastate rural and urban hospitals. The Republicans assert that it is 
necessary to preserve the solvency of the trust fund through the year 
2006. Not true, Mr. President. President Clinton's budget proposal 
extends the life of the trust fund without such deep reductions as the 
Republicans are proposing. The Republican-appointed CBO Director has 
certified, and I say this again, that the administration's proposal 
would extend the life of the Medicare hospital insurance trust fund 
until the year 2005.
  What about Medicaid? What about Medicaid reform? Reform was the 
Republican rallying cry, but instead of attempting to reform Medicaid 
in a manner that would be acceptable to mainstream America, the 
Republican majority paddled up one of their right-wing tributaries and 
came out with something new. I believe you would take the whole Nation 
by surprise if you told them that the Republican Medicaid reform might 
mean that middle-class working American families might have to pay 
thousands of dollars out of their own pockets for nursing home care for 
their loved ones, or that millions of low-income children might have 
their health care jeopardized, or that enforcement of nursing home 
standards might not be as vigilant as it is today.
  In other words, ``reform'' means ``conform,'' to their way of 
thinking, even if it means taking out a second mortgage on your home to 
pay for nursing home care for a sick or elderly parent. With a $72 
billion reduction in Medicaid from the projected spending combined with 
a block grant approach, that may well be the scenario.
  In closing, I want to talk for a moment about tax breaks. My 
colleagues know that I oppose all tax breaks until we get the deficit 
under control. But, of course, that is not going to prevail. This is 
just one conservative Senator's opinion, that we should not be talking 
about tax breaks until we get the budget finally and completely under 
control. But that is not the way it is going to be, because this is a 
political year. It is not easy to say ``no'' to tax cuts. It is a 
painful, unpopular vote. But that is what we should be doing, in the 
opinion of this conservative Democratic Senator.
  This year the Senate Republicans claim a net tax cut of $122 billion. 
This figure is going to be talked about a great deal during this 
debate. But let me repeat that. This year the Senate Republicans claim 
a net tax cut of $122 billion. But no one should be fooled into 
believing that the Republicans intend to limit their tax breaks merely 
to that. The gross cuts will be much larger. The House Budget Committee 
and its chairman boast that this budget will provide at least $180 
billion in permanent new tax relief.
  There is something amiss here. The Republicans are certifying and 
claiming that they have only $122 billion in tax cuts in the Senate 
proposal and yet those who consulted with the Republicans in the 
Senate, their counterparts over in the House of Representatives, claim 
that the same numbers will add up to $180 billion in tax cuts, and have 
said so publicly. There is something wrong. Their budget also provides 
for a list of tax cuts that could include nearly every item included in 
last year's totally failed budget that was rejected by the President 
and rejected by the American people. Just so no one has forgotten, the 
tax cuts in that bill would have gone primarily to the wealthiest 
Americans. So much for the little guy in a Republican proposed budget.
  I provide this side-by-side comparison for a good reason. I ask my 
colleagues to remember what happened last year. The Senate Republican 
budget had $170 billion in tax breaks and the House Republican budget 
lavished even more at $347 billion in tax breaks, largely for the 
wealthy. In the end, the conferees agreed to $245 billion in tax 
breaks. So experience tells us to be wary of Republican promises of how 
much or how little tax breaks will be, and who in the end will benefit 
from them.
  The Republican budget also does not call upon special interests, who 
assume few if any of the burdens of balancing our budget. While 
President Clinton has proposed that $40 billion--$40 billion be raised 
from corporate reform and loophole closing, the Republican budget lists 
no savings from these categories.
  When I mentioned that President Clinton has proposed $40 billion be 
raised from corporate tax giveaways and reforms and loophole closings, 
I only say, referring back to the chart I have in back of me that I 
referenced earlier, the President, Bill Clinton, knows what he is doing 
with regard to being a fiscal leader.
  Having said that, I must admit that I would not have stood on the 
floor of the U.S. Senate and said that a year ago in January when the 
President sent his group down here to explain to us on the Budget 
Committee his budget for last year. At the time, I said it was a bad 
budget, I did not support it, I would not support it. But through the 
influence of Senators like myself and others, we have helped Bill 
Clinton make the firm decisions that he made to accomplish the goal of 
reducing the annual deficit from $300 billion when he took office down 
to $150 billion.
  The President is now on the right course. I did not salute him when 
he came up with a budget last year that I did not think made any sense. 
I salute him for what he has done now. He is on the right course. The 
figures prove that he is on the right course. Let us get behind the 
President and support him.
  Chairman Domenici made it clear, however, that the tax increases can 
be used by and maybe increased by the Finance Committee to offset 
additional tax breaks. If the past is any guide, the Republicans will 
soon be proposing to raid the pension funds for working families to pay 
for tax breaks that will primarily benefit those earning over $100,000 
a year.
  I do not believe, Mr. President, that my friend and colleague, 
Senator Domenici, wants that. But he has to deal with some people on 
the other side of the Hill who plainly want that, and the Republicans 
in the Senate need and have to have the cooperation and the support for 
their Republican counterparts on the other side of the Hill.
  I simply say that there is an alternative. There is an alternative to 
this rehashed and repackaged Republican budget. It is the President's 
budget. In my 18 years in the Senate, this is the first Presidential 
budget of either a Republican President or a Democratic President that 
this Senator has supported, and I support it in the form that is 
submitted. Not that I agree with all of it, and I hope that if we were 
using the President's mark, the

[[Page S5032]]

President's budget, we would adopt some changes. But from the 
standpoint of starting and setting up something to amend, we would be 
far better off to work from the President's budget with some flaws than 
the Republican proposal with many, many, many more flaws.
  The President's budget reflects his values and the priorities. It 
makes difficult choices, but it makes them fairly. It balances fiscal 
responsibility with caring and compassion for our seniors, the young 
and the neediest among us.
  At the appropriate time--sometime today--I will offer the President's 
budget as a substitute for the Republican budget that is presently 
before us. There is a clear distinction between these two budgets, a 
distinction that is not lost on the American people. We should have the 
opportunity to debate and vote on these two distinct visions for the 
future of our Nation, and we will.
  Mr. President, let me conclude by saying to the chairman of the 
Budget Committee, once again, that I know he had a very difficult time 
putting this budget resolution together, and I suspect he would be the 
first to admit that there are some things in here that he is not 
enthusiastic about. But, once again, the art of being a leader in the 
U.S. Senate, regardless of which side of the aisle you are on, has to 
take into consideration what you can do, what you can accomplish, 
building a coalition. Certainly, in this case, the Senator from New 
Mexico has built a coalition of what most of the Republicans would like 
to see.
  I join with my chairman and thank him for mentioning the fact that 
Senator Breaux and Senator Chafee, and several of our comrades on both 
sides of the aisle, have come up with a budget that is worthy of some 
consideration. Likewise, there are some parts of that budget that I do 
not agree with, but at least it is something that we should take a hard 
look at and possibly, in the end, incorporate some of those concepts 
and those ideas of those thoughtful Senators, both Democrats and 
Republicans, who are trying, in my opinion, to be helpful.
  I had hoped one day in my Senate career I would be able to say to my 
good friend, for whom I have said before I have high respect and 
admiration, that I support his budget. Unfortunately, that day has not 
come. But I really enjoy working with him, and I hope that the debate 
that follows will be as factual as possible, will be as short as 
possible, and, once again, I tell him that I will try in every way I 
can to cooperate with him, as I did in the committee, not to have this 
go on and on and on.
  I thank the Chair, and I yield the floor.

                               Exhibit 1

                                                    U.S. Congress,


                                  Congressional Budget Office,

                                      Washington, DC, May 9, 1996.
     Hon. J. James Exon,
     Ranking Minority Member, Committee on the Budget, U.S. 
         Senate, Washington, DC.
       Dear Senator: At your request, the Congressional Budget 
     Office (CBO) has examined the effects of the Administration's 
     budgetary proposals on the Hospital Insurance (HI) trust 
     fund. Under current law, the HI trust fund is projected to 
     become insolvent in 2001. CBO estimates that the 
     Administration's proposals would postpone this date to 2005.
           Sincerely,
                                                  June E. O'Neill,
                                                         Director.

  Mr. DOMENICI addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico [Mr. Domenici], is 
recognized.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, shortly, I am going to yield as much 
time to Senator Mack as he desires. Senator Spencer Abraham will come 
to the floor probably during Senator Mack's discussion. On the record, 
I want to state that I am going to designate Senator Abraham in my 
stead to control the time on this side, at least until noon or 12:30.
  Mr. President, I want to make two very brief comments with reference 
to the statements of the distinguished Senator from Nebraska. First, if 
the Senator is suggesting that Republicans are for lower taxes, we are 
going to plead guilty. We are for lower taxes. If the Senator suggests 
that we are going to cut taxes for families with children, we plead 
guilty. We are going to do that.
  Second, the President of the United States entered into his office as 
President at a point in time when a number of things were happening 
and, as a matter of fact, he was very, very fortunate, as was the 
country, that these events occurred. I personally believe the 
President's budget and the President's conduct had nothing whatsoever 
to do with them. They were in play.

  Let me just put up one little chart. You see, Senator Exon says that 
this budget deficit CBO estimates--let me see if I can meander over 
there a little bit.
  Does the Senator mind if I use his chart?
  Mr. EXON. No. The Senator is welcome to.
  Mr. DOMENICI. The Senator would make a point that at this point in 
history the budget starts turning down, and it would have gone up; and, 
therefore, President Bill Clinton has done a masterful job of 
controlling the expenditures of our country and being fiscally 
responsible.
  Let us just look. This is not me. This says the Congressional Budget 
Office. It is not the Senator from New Mexico. We asked them, what did 
this? How did this happen? Lo and behold, here is what they said: Taxes 
were raised, and that made up 38.3 percent of getting this down.
  So the American people right off should know, yes, the Democrats got 
the deficit down. And 38 percent was because they increased taxes. Most 
interesting, 50 percent--50 percent--of this reduction, from this line 
to this line, had nothing whatsoever to do with any action by anyone. 
They are merely reestimates of the expenditure of Government to adjust 
them to the reality instead of the estimate, such things as the savings 
and loan fund to pay for the bailout. We overestimated the amount of 
money, and it was sitting there in the budget, a huge amount of money. 
I cannot believe that anybody is going to claim that the President did 
that or the Democrats, by voting for a tax-loaded budget-deficit 
package, did that. That is a huge amount of money.
  Others are estimates in the expenditure costs of programs. The 
estimated increases did not come out as high as the budget projected. I 
must say, in all deference, it did not matter who was elected 
President. That 50 percent occurred from no action on the part of the 
executive branch or the Congress. So that is 50 percent; plus 38 
percent of the reduction in the deficit.
  Over here we had economic changes amounting to $13 billion. We will 
just put that up there. If they want to argue about that $13 billion--
that the President deserves credit for that--then we can talk about 
that. But the thing that we must be worried about--that we must be 
worried about--is that the Congressional Budget Office told us that 
through 1995 the total cuts in spending were $1 billion, the total cuts 
in spending were $1 billion.
  Frankly, in all deference and with all of the gentleness that I can 
muster, this is not a deficit-reduction package that is calculated to 
permanently reduce the size of Government, which everyone says is the 
cause of the deficit. Nobody says we are being taxed too low--strike 
that. Somebody does. Most people do not think we have to raise taxes 
and spend more. They think we should cut the expenditures of Government 
to get to fiscal equilibrium. This is the history of those lines.

  Having said that, I want to just make one last point. Senior 
citizens, senior citizens, the President of the United States has 
pulled off in his budget a huge hoax--a huge hoax--for which, because 
of other things in his budget, as I said in my opening remarks, he 
truly deserves the Academy Award for fiction on his budget.
  Let me just tell you about Medicare. Medicare in the entrusted fund, 
the trust fund, Mr. President, has been assuring and paying seniors for 
long-term--long-term--home health care. Let me repeat, in the trust 
fund, seniors, you have been getting your long-term home health care 
paid for by this guaranteed fund.
  Second point. It is the fastest growing item in Medicare. Fact--the 
President chooses to take that program out of the trust fund. That 
program is $55 billion, home health care for seniors.
  What a hoax. You take out something you are providing them, and say,

[[Page S5033]]

``We're saving the trust fund.'' Now the question is, how does he pay 
for it, the home health care for the seniors? Interesting. He does not 
pay for it. He puts it right on the backs of the taxpayers of America. 
One might even say, you raise the taxes $55 billion, because the truth 
of the matter is, the insurance premiums that the seniors pay for, 
everything other than what is in the trust fund, other than 
hospitalization and long-term care, the insurance premiums, the 
President says we are not going to add the $55 billion to the premiums. 
So magically he has made the trust fund more solvent by taking away 
some of its responsibility and also diminishing the assuredness of that 
coverage for seniors and at the same time does not pay for it.
  He just says, add it to the expenditures of the Government. I believe 
it is at risk. I believe it was safe in that trust fund. I believe it 
is at risk when you take it out and you do not pay for it and you just 
say, the taxpayers will pay for it, and Congress will see to that.
  That is the truth of the difference in our solvency of the trust fund 
and the President's. He has this magic $55 billion solvency by saying 
what we have been giving you out of that trust fund we are not going to 
give you any longer. But we have made it solvent.

  So frankly that is the only difference between the President and the 
Republicans. That is a big difference. That is a difference that, when 
it is understood, will turn the tables on who is really worried about 
making sure the senior citizens get their care and protection.
  At this point I yield to Senator Mack.
  Mr. EXON addressed the Chair.
  Mr. MACK addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Coats). The Senator from Nebraska, as 
manager of the bill, is recognized.
  Mr. EXON. I yield myself whatever time is necessary off of my time.
  Mr. President, I listened very carefully to my friend and colleague, 
and as near as I can tell, when he uses charts to show how we are 
falsely trying to take credit for reducing the annual deficit, and 
giving that credit where I think it logically belongs, to President 
Bill Clinton, I simply say, well, it is tomfoolery.
  I also suggest, regardless of the charts and percentages that we talk 
about, one of the reasons that we are making significant progress is 
the fact that under President Bill Clinton we are having a good 
economy, a growing economy, the stock market reaching record 
proportions.
  I simply say, at least I hope my Republican colleagues would agree 
that we should give President Clinton the credit that he deserves for 
the good economic news, the growing economy without inflation that we 
are experiencing under the leadership of Bill Clinton.
  I would hate to think what the Republicans would be saying if we were 
here debating this resolution at a time when the economy was not going 
well, if the confidence of Americans was not as healthy as it is. I am 
sure that under those conditions my Republican colleagues would not be 
blaming President Clinton for those downturns. That is facetious and at 
best it is an understatement.
  One other thing on Medicare. The Republicans always seem to keep 
moving the goalposts. Last year, how many times did we hear, ``Mr. 
President, just give us a balanced budget that will be scored and 
balanced by CBO, and we can come to an agreement.'' The President did 
that at the urging of myself and others who thought that his earlier 
budget proposal last year was not sound. He made dramatic changes. He 
changed many things, all for the good.

  Finally, believe it or not, we got CBO to approve a budget plan that 
the President had offered. Then, rather than sealing the agreement that 
they had made--if you could come to a balanced budget agreement 
certified by CBO, we could get together--they started moving the goal 
post.
  On Medicare, the Republicans always seem to be moving the goal post 
once again. All last year, the Republicans called for preserving the 
Medicare hospital insurance trust fund. All year, time and time again, 
that is what they wanted. Now, Mr. President, now that the President 
has come up with a plan, certified again by the Republican appointee, 
the head of the Congressional Budget Office, they are moving the goal 
post. They said 2005 is not enough, we have to go beyond that. It is 
like they are moving the budget, and every time we meet their goal and 
reach their goal line, they move the goal post. That may be political. 
I think it is. At least, it seems to me, it is not realistic.
  I simply say, as somewhat of a football expert, Nebraska could not 
possibly have won two national championships if we moved the goal post 
every time we got close to the goal line. I reserve the remainder of my 
time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Michigan is recognized.
  Mr. ABRAHAM. How much time remains on our side?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator would be advised there are 24 
hours 15 minutes.
  Mr. ABRAHAM. Is there a limit on opening statement time?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. There is no limit.
  Mr. ABRAHAM. I yield such time as he may consume to the Senator from 
Florida.
  Mr. MACK. Thank you, Mr. President. I am going to focus my remarks 
this morning not so much on the specifics of the budget, as others will 
during the next several days, rather I will focus on the economic 
conditions that surround this debate.
  The distinguished Senator from Nebraska who a minute ago said he 
hoped that we Republicans would give President Clinton credit for good 
economic news, may be disappointed in what I have to say, because it 
certainly is not my intention to give the President high marks for what 
is happening in the economy.
  I ask people to reflect first on my very strong feelings about the 
Office of President of the United States, an office that all of us hold 
in high regard, when we think back across our history to some of the 
great leaders who have held that position. But today, as I discuss the 
economy, I find it difficult, frankly, to hold in high regard the 
comments made by the President of the United States with respect to 
what is happening with the economy, what is happening with growth, what 
is happening with opportunity.
  In his State of the Union Address this year, President Clinton said 
this is the strongest economy in three decades. Last year, fourth 
quarter to fourth quarter, the economy grew at an anemic 1.3 percent. 
Over the entire time that President Clinton has been in office, we have 
seen economic growth of only 2.4 percent a year. Compare that to the 10 
years prior to President Clinton's administration, when economic growth 
in America averaged 3.4 percent a year. I do not believe this economy 
is something that we should brag about.
  Now, some economists cite statistics and say to us, ``Well, things 
are really kind of OK, not to worry.'' Let me tell you who I pay 
attention to. It may be all right for the President to pay attention to 
those economists and maybe try to hide behind the numbers--2.8 percent 
annual real growth in the first quarter of this year--while ignoring 
the fact that in 1995 we had only 1.3 percent real growth; or to say 
the unemployment rate is at 5.4 percent, while failing to say at the 
same time that there were no net jobs created in the private sector 
last month--none, zero. What does that mean? No opportunity. No 
opportunity to find a new job, no opportunity to leave one job to 
advance to another. No jobs created.

  When I want to know about the state of the economy, I pay attention 
to the people back home, people who come up to me and tell me they are 
worried about their future. In fact, it is interesting to ask people 
these days, how many of you believe that you are better off than your 
parents were at your age? Almost every hand in every audience goes up, 
agreeing that they are better off than the previous generation. But 
when you then ask how many believe their children will be better off 
when they are your age, maybe four or five hands go up. It appears that 
for the first time in a long, long time, we have a generation of 
Americans that thinks the next generation will not do as well as they 
have done. That is what is causing the tremendous anxiety that exists 
in America today.
  Still, President Clinton wants to claim the strongest economy in 
three decades--on the basis of 1.3 percent growth. It is interesting to 
remember

[[Page S5034]]

that in 1992, when he was campaigning for the Presidency, he called the 
economy the worst in 50 years, even though the economy that year grew 
at 3.7 percent. It is a little difficult to understand the President's 
line of thinking: one day he talks about 3.7 percent growth as being a 
very weak economy, and then a few years later and he is President, and 
the economy is growing at only 1.3 percent, or even 2.4 percent, to say 
we have the strongest economy in three decades. It is very difficult 
for me, frankly, to give this administration, or this President, credit 
for a strong economy.
  I think we ought to, again, listen to what the people back home are 
saying to us. One example. I recently heard a story about a woman 
recalling that her husband had said to her on two separate occasions, 
``You better not go out today. I may have to call and tell you to come 
pick me up, because I may not have a job when this day ends.'' I think 
about the mother telling her children she would not be home in the 
evening because she had to get a second job to make ends meet.
  One piece of statistical data that has not made the headlines is 
that, since January 1994, the number of individuals holding a second 
job has increased 17 percent. Now, the economists might tell working 
people not to worry. The President may tell working people not to 
worry, that everything is fine. But I can tell you that the people back 
home do not agree. They are very anxious about their future, and their 
ability to make ends meet.
  As a matter of fact, a recent poll asked, ``How worried are you about 
your ability to make ends meet?'' The response indicated that some 20 
million American families a year say their ability to make ends meet is 
their No. 1 concern. Now there are 30 million families who are 
concerned about their ability to make ends meet. The anxiety question 
is real. Economists can say whatever they want, but the people in the 
State of Florida are concerned about the future.
  A couple of other statistics point to why people are feeling anxious. 
Real median family income has declined in 4 out of the last 5 
years. And many other indicators suggest that trend will continue. Real 
compensation--that is, wages and benefits--grew only four-tenths of a 
percent in 1995, the slowest in 14 years. Between 1982 and 1989, real 
income per person grew three times as fast as it has since 1993, when 
President Clinton took office.

  The real issue before us is, how can we help create higher levels of 
growth? Should America be satisfied with 2.4 percent real growth, or 
worse? I say the answer is absolutely not.
  From the end of World War II to the beginning of the Clinton 
administration in 1993, economic growth averaged nearly 4 percent a 
year. Today, we are told we are doing well with growth of only 1.6 
percent. Where are the jobs going to come from that will ensure 
prosperity and opportunity tomorrow?
  Not long ago, the President of the United States was in Florida, and 
there was debate over the future of the sugar industry in the 
Everglades. Protesters opposed to the administration's plan said they 
were going to lose their jobs. In essence, the President responded: 
``Don't worry, we will see that anyone who loses their job will get 
another one.'' I wonder how many times he has made that comment around 
the country. But where does he think these jobs come from? Government 
doesn't create jobs. They come from the private sector, and they come 
as a result of Government getting out of the way and allowing for 
investment to take place.
  So we must begin this discussion, Mr. President, with the 
understanding that the economy is weak, not strong, that job creation 
has slowed. While the administration wants to brag about the 8.5 
million jobs created since they came into office, they neglect to 
mention that if job formation took place at the same rate as in 
previous recoveries, there would have been 11.5 million jobs created in 
America, and we are really 3 million jobs short. Furthermore, of the 
8.5 million jobs that have been created, many are second and part-time 
jobs going to families that need second jobs just to make ends meet. 
That does not make for a growing economy.
  I think it is also important that, when we debate the budget, we must 
remember who is paying the bills. I think about the people at home who 
come up and tell me about their tax burden, what they are being asked 
to pay for Government. I think of the young couple, the husband who 
works two jobs all week long, from early in the morning until late at 
night, five days a week, and then stays at home on Saturday and Sunday 
to take care of his little ones while their mom is out on her job over 
the weekend in order to make ends meet. I think about the couple that 
gets up at the crack of dawn and commutes long distances to work, and 
does not get home at night until well after dark, who cannot spend time 
with their kids, yet are being asked to pay more and more and more to 
the Federal Government.
  Do you know what really frustrates them? It is that they are being 
asked to work longer and harder to pay more taxes to support programs 
that they know have failed and to support individuals who are not 
working. That is the central theme that runs all through the debate. 
For example, with respect to the 4.3-cent rollback of the gasoline tax. 
Every time workers pull up to the gas pump, that 4.3 cents in gasoline 
taxes goes not to build more roads or to build more bridges, but to 
fund Federal programs they know have failed, and support people who 
refuse to work. That is why support for activities here in Washington, 
DC, has been so deeply undermined in America.
  So, Mr. President, I believe our debate should not be so much 
concerned about this budget itself, but about what needs to happen in 
order to spur growth of this country, and thereby provide more hope and 
opportunity for more Americans.
  Let me make one other point about productivity growth. Prior to the 
mid-1970's, productivity in America grew approximately 2.1 percent a 
year. In the last 10 years, that rate declined to about 1.1 percent. 
And now, during the 3 years of the Clinton administration, productivity 
growth has averaged only three-tenths of a percent. If productivity 
does not increase in a meaningful way, there is no way to pass on 
higher wages to employees.
  What is causing productivity to decline? More taxes, more spending, 
more Government, and less freedom, including taking away the freedom to 
pursue greater creativity, to spur American ingenuity, and to provide 
opportunity. With higher taxes, more regulation, and more interference 
from Washington, there is less opportunity for American business to be 
more productive, more competitive, and to create jobs.
  So, Mr. President, I say that, at this point, this economy is weak. 
There is no sign that, in the long run, we are going to achieve higher 
levels economic activity or offer hope and opportunity to future 
generations of Americans unless we follow far different policies than 
the ones offered by the administration. Those politicians who believe 
that today's economic statistics indicate opportunity are making a 
grave mistake. The debate on this budget should be about America's 
future, about the ability to create jobs and opportunity through more 
investment, job creation, and business formation.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  (Mr. ABRAHAM assumed the chair.)
  Mr. COATS. Mr. President, I asked the Senator from Michigan if he 
would assume the chair so I could take the opportunity to come down to 
the floor to compliment my colleague, Senator Mack from Florida. He 
outlined for the Senate, and for those who are observing, the real 
concern and the deep anxiety that exists among many Americans today 
about their future and their family's future. A concern that I think is 
now becoming almost universally shared about the impact of the 
decisions, or lack of decisions, that Washington has made. This 
inability of Congress and the President to make decisions impact their 
future in a negative way.
  We have not faced up to some of the difficult choices that clearly 
must be made if we are going to put our economy on an upward path, and 
if we are going to offer and provide opportunity for the young people 
of the next generation of America, not to mention this current 
generation that is struggling with that economic anxiety. The Senator 
from Florida put his finger on the most immediate items that we in this 
Congress and with this President can address in answering these 
particular problems. We can provide immediate relief to Americans today 
by

[[Page S5035]]

doing what they have asked us to do, and that is examine the role, the 
function, the scope, and the size of Government. We can address what 
virtually a universe of Americans now believe--this Government tries to 
do too much, it is too big, it spends too much. Americans see the 
results of this Government and they are simply not the kind of return 
on investment that Americans are asking for. They are working harder in 
order to pay more taxes to fuel and feed a Government spending effort 
that is not addressing the basic needs of Americans in an effective 
way, and they are saying ``scale it back.'' If we could do so and make 
the appropriate decisions in doing so, we can provide them with an 
immediate increase in their wages. We can give them immediate salary or 
hourly wage increase by giving them tax relief from the excessive 
burden of taxes now being imposed.
  This whole question about the gas tax is not really to move the price 
of gasoline which I paid this morning $1.65.9 a gallon. The question 
is, and the issue is, that the Congress has not been straight and fair 
with the American people on the issue of gas taxes and on a whole range 
of other taxes. The Clinton 4.3-cent gas tax increase was not applied 
to building roads and bridges, which most motorists in Indiana and, I 
think, across the country believe. When Americans pay extra money to 
cover gasoline increases, I know they at least think it goes to build 
roads and bridges and to help ease their commute to work, or their 
travel across the country. But no. This gas tax increase went to 
general revenues in order to feed the excessive and seemingly unabated 
spending habits of Congress.
  So just in the gas tax alone we are talking about more than a 
reduction at the pump. We are talking about being honest with the 
American taxpayer in terms of how their money is being used and giving 
them some relief. The budget that we are debating today is designed to 
put us on a path toward fiscal responsibility that will allow us then 
to take the savings that occur over and above balancing the budget 
which can occur in outyears and return it to the American people in the 
form of tax relief so they do not have to work so hard and do not have 
to take that extra job simply to pay taxes to fuel Government.
  The Senator from Florida has accurately addressed the issue. And I 
wanted to take the opportunity to step down from the Chair to thank him 
for his contributions and for reminding us and keeping our eyes focused 
on the real picture.
  The second point I would make is simply that we as a Congress and the 
President of the United States must address the tough choices and the 
priority choices that we all know have to be addressed if we are going 
to get a handle on this budget.
  This idea of deferring for some future Congress the questions about 
mandatory spending and entitlements is simply postponing the inevitable 
and bringing us closer to a day of cataclysmic budget collapse. We 
cannot continue to run up the deficit as we have. We cannot continue to 
pretend that there are not problems in the mandatory spending programs 
that need to be addressed.
  It reminds me of the old commercial where the fellow picks out the 
dripping carburetor leaking with oil and says, ``You've got two 
choices. You can pay me now or you can pay me later. If you pay me now, 
we can make this a lot less expensive and a lot less painful. But, if 
you wait, the whole engine is going to fall apart.''
  If we keep postponing this decision, the whole engine is going to 
fall apart. Republicans have attempted to come forward with budget 
after budget addressing these questions in an honest way even at 
considerable political risk only to find that President Clinton ducks 
his head in the sand, or slips and slides his way through the political 
minefield, the end result of which is to do nothing.

  Mr. MACK. Will the Senator yield?
  Mr. COATS. Yes. I am happy to yield to the Senator.
  Mr. MACK. I think it would be helpful if we put this debate in terms 
that citizens around the country can associate themselves with. I 
remember last year when we were going through this debate, we talked 
about what would happen if we got a balanced budget. We said that 
interest rates would come down and that would mean lower mortgage 
payments, lower automobile payments, and more affordable student loans. 
I think it is important to look closely at what has happened since we 
did not get an agreement on a balanced budget. Long-term interest rates 
have risen by a percentage point. What does that mean to the average 
consumer, to the couple who is out there today closing on the purchase 
of their first home? For the average home in America, that higher 
interest rate means they will pay about $650 more each year in 
payments, or another $100 a year for a car.
  So there are real consequences to this debate and for failing to get 
a balanced budget proposal through the Congress and signed by the 
President of the United States.
  Real families, real individuals, hard working men and women of 
America, are paying hundreds of dollars more each year because of the 
failure to come to an agreement on a balanced budget.
  I thank the Senator for yielding.
  Mr. COATS. I thank the Senator for those comments.
  I will close by quoting what has already been quoted on the floor 
today probably, the piece written in the Washington Post by Robert 
Samuelson, who is an economist and writer that I greatly respect 
because he speaks with great candor, and I think speaks about the 
thrust that this Congress and that the President needs to address. Just 
to quote part of this. He says, ``As a moral matter, Americans deserve 
candor.''
  Americans deserve to hear the truth about the financial situation in 
which we find ourselves. We are debating in the Senate this week the 
budget for the next fiscal year and a budget which lays out a plan to 
achieve a balance in the future. We are debating about these very 
issues, the issues of how we spend taxpayer dollars, and how we 
establish priorities. And there is no better time to talk about it than 
this particular week in the Senate.
  Samuelson said, ``As a moral matter, Americans deserve candor. As we 
debate this issue, they deserve what we believe to be the truth. They 
deserve candor about the situation in which we find ourselves. When you 
look at the mandatory spending in just the Social Security and Medicare 
areas, it is an unassailable fact that longer lives, steep health 
costs, and an aging baby boom will inevitably make Social Security and 
Medicare unbearably expensive in the next century.''
  The next century sounds like a long way away. We have plenty of time 
to worry about it. This is 1996 approaching 1997. We will be at the 
next century before we know it.
  He uses the word ``unbearably expensive.'' ``We are facing a crisis 
of fiscal proportions that this Nation has never faced in its history. 
It will be unbearably expensive, if we do not address it, and address 
it now.''
  He goes on to say, ``At some point, spending and benefits will be cut 
to avoid costs that seem politically intolerable. But the trouble is 
that the longer changes are delayed the more abrupt and unfair those 
changes will be, and that's why silence is irresponsible.''
  We are today hearing silence on this issue from the White House. We 
are seeing gimmicks, budgetary gimmicks, as the Senator from New Mexico 
just outlined, to fool, or attempt to fool the American people about 
the status of the Medicare trust fund by shifting $55 billion out of 
that trust fund to the general revenues to either put the benefit 
program at risk, or to add additional costs to the taxpayer, or to 
drive us deeper into debt.
  Samuelson says ``This is a relevant character issue about the 
President. Question: Does he have the moral fiber to help America make 
difficult choices?''
  We are trying to make difficult choices. This budget requires 
difficult choices. But it is time that we stood up and began to tell 
the American people the truth about those difficult choices and not 
postpone the inevitable. At great risk to this economy, at great risk 
to the future of this generation, and an extraordinarily unbearable 
risk to the future generation.
  So I hope we will use this time to make these discussions relevant, 
to talk about them in an honest way, and to quit the posturing and the 
pretending and to end the practice of saying,

[[Page S5036]]

 ``Well, we cannot do it now because there is an election just months 
away.'' I have served in this body for some time, and every 2 years the 
excuse is ``we will do it after the next election.'' The time to do it 
after is running out. The risk is extraordinary; the results are 
unbearable; and I hope we could face up to these decisions and honestly 
put it before the American people.
  Frankly, I think they are ready for the truth. Frankly, I think they 
will reward truth and reward candor, and I hope this can be a major 
part of this debate in the Presidential election and in the Senate and 
congressional elections, and I hope we can initiate the debate this 
week.
  Mr. President, I thank you for your patience. I 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. ABRAHAM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Coats). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. ABRAHAM. I yield myself such time as I may need.
  Mr. President, once again, we have before the Senate the budget 
resolution that was passed by the Budget Committee under the leadership 
of Senator Domenici. This budget resolution achieves balance in the 
year 2002. It accomplishes this feat by reducing the size of Government 
and slowing the growth of various governmental programs. At the same 
time, it preserves and protects Medicare, provides full funding for 
education and environmental programs, and increases funding for Federal 
crime programs over previous levels.
  Mr. President, let me begin by saying I am happy that this year we 
are dealing with a belief that we should balance the budget. One year 
ago in this budget process the President was talking about $200 billion 
a year deficits as far as the eye could see. This year the President is 
talking about balancing the budget and attempting, we would argue not 
successfully but at least attempting, to present a budget that does 
bring us into balance.
  The differences though are considerable. The accomplishments of the 
Republican budget contrast strongly with the President's budget 
submitted earlier this year. Where we rely on tough economics and tough 
choices, the President's budget relies on rosy scenarios, gimmicks and 
deferred savings. Where we employ new ideas to help curb the growth of 
our entitlement programs, ideas like choice in Medicare and returning 
our welfare programs back to the States where they belong, the 
President relies on tried and, I believe, failed policies that 
guarantee our entitlement programs will continue to spiral out of 
control. Where we put our faith in individuals and families by 
encouraging economic growth so they can earn more, reduce the size and 
scope of government so they can keep more, and in the process do more 
for themselves and their families, the President's budget simply puts 
his faith in more government.
  The differences are these. We are offering a budget that gets to 
balance and achieves it by making some tough choices, choices that have 
to be made if we are to truly have a balanced budget.
  The President's budget, on the other hand, in effect says we can 
achieve a balanced budget painlessly, without anybody really having to 
suffer. That is, in my judgment, impossible. Obviously, we have to 
constrain the growth of government. We have to do it in a way that is 
fair and equitable. To say that we can accomplish this where tough 
choices are not needed is wrong.
  Other Members have already addressed the important details of the 
Republican budget. How it reduces overall growth in Federal spending by 
over $440 billion through the year 2002 while increasing funding for 
education, the environment and crime fighting programs. How it protects 
veterans' health care and homeless programs from the devastating cuts 
included in the President's budget. And how it protects Medicare home 
health care programs by keeping the program within the part A portion 
of Medicare where it belongs.
  Today, I would like just to focus on one difference between the two 
budgets. That is the area of tax cuts and how the Republican approach 
contrasts with that of the President.
  First, let me put the tax picture in perspective. According to the 
Tax Foundation, more than one-third of the average American worker's 
wages go to taxes. For working parents that meant they had to work 
until May 7 just to pay their taxes this year. The Tax Foundation calls 
this tax freedom day, and May 7 is the latest it has ever been 
recognized.
  Other indicators are just as ominous. Columnist Bruce Bartlett 
pointed out recently that State, local and Federal revenues now consume 
more of our national income than ever--31.3 percent of everything 
Americans earned last year. At the Federal level, taxes are also at 
near record levels. Last year, they consumed 20.4 percent of our 
national income. This marks only the second period in which the Federal 
tax burden has exceeded 20 percent of the gross domestic product of the 
United States. The last period was at the end of President Carter's 
administration, just prior to President Reagan's tax cut proposals of 
1981.

  President Clinton has played a very active role in helping achieve 
this record tax burden. As a candidate, he campaigned on a platform of 
middle-class tax cuts. At that time he stated, ``We will lower the tax 
burden on middle-class Americans.'' He even argued against raising 
gasoline taxes, telling voters, ``I oppose Federal excise gas tax 
increases.'' Why? Because a gas tax ``sticks it to lower income and 
middle-income retired people in the country, and it's wrong.''
  That is the campaign rhetoric of 1992, but it is not consistent with 
his performance thereafter. As we all know, President Clinton pushed 
through the Congress in 1993 the largest tax increase in history: $265 
billion over 5 years. Gas taxes were raised during that budget battle. 
The President also raised taxes on senior citizens. He raised taxes on 
the largest corporations, and he raised taxes on thousands of the 
smallest businesses. He raised taxes on the living and he even raised 
taxes on the dead. Then he turned around and told a Houston audience, 
``You might be surprised to find * * * I think I raised your taxes too 
much.''
  That is true. The fact is, the tax burden has been raised higher than 
it has ever been before, except for one point in American history. More 
significantly, by ranking tax burdens according to Presidents, you can 
see that this President has presided over the highest average tax 
burden of any President in the history of the country, 19.933 percent 
of national income.
  In a nutshell, the President has succeeded in completely reversing 
the progress made during previous administrations in moving us toward a 
simpler, fairer, flatter Tax Code. The Tax Code now is more burdensome, 
it is more complex, and it is more costly as well.
  What does that mean to average Americans? We can talk about numbers 
and percentages, as we often do on the floor here, to the point where 
we lose sight of its impact on real people. But what it means is this. 
Last year Americans paid to Uncle Sam $87.2 billion more than they 
would have under previous policies. For the average American family, 
that's over $800 taken out of their pocket each year and handed over to 
the Federal Government.
  The Balanced Budget Act which President Clinton vetoed last year 
would have provided partial relief from these record tax burdens. The 
bill would have reduced the tax burden on Americans by a modest amount, 
on average about $36 billion a year. In other words, the tax relief 
vetoed by President Clinton last fall was less than half the increased 
tax burdens that Americans have experienced since he took office in 
1993. President Clinton vetoed the Balanced Budget Act and deprived 
Americans of middle-class tax relief, like the $500-per-child family 
tax credit, marriage penalty relief, expand IRA's, spousal IRA's, and 
estate tax reforms that would have given small business and family farm 
owners the opportunity to pass on their enterprises to their families 
in a way that is not feasible right now because of the high inheritance 
taxes.
  Which brings us to this year. In the President's State of the Union 
Address, Mr. Clinton announced that ``the era of big Government was 
over.'' He then

[[Page S5037]]

sent to Congress a budget which would ensure that Government spending 
and income taxes remains at record levels.
  Once again, however, we have to look beyond the rhetoric. When the 
President released his budget in March, he claimed he was providing 
Americans with $99 billion in tax relief, enough to pay for a watered-
down child tax credit.
  On closer inspection, however, the President also included $62 
billion in tax loophole closing and other increased revenues, which 
means the net tax relief is only $36 billion.
  Finally, in an attempt to make the budget reach balance in the year 
2002, President Clinton has to terminate his tax cuts in the year 2000, 
which reduces the total tax relief provided in the Clinton budget 
between 1996 and 2002 to something around $6 billion.

  Think about that. We are talking about net tax relief over 6 years of 
about $1 billion per year. There are 250 million-plus Americans. That 
means the President's tax cut, spread over six years, averages out to 
about $4 per American per year. This amount is hardly consistent with 
the promise that was made during Clinton's election campaign for 
significant middle-class tax relief. In fact, Mr. President, as I think 
about it, it probably means one extra trip to McDonald's per year for 
the average American family.
  But that is not the worst part. The worst part is that, while 
President Clinton terminates his tax cuts, his tax increases are 
permanent. They go on forever. The net effect is another tax increase 
on Americans. Between 1996 and 2006, President Clinton's budget would 
raise taxes on Americans by $50 billion. Add this new tax increase to 
the previous tax increases, and this Presidency will have cost 
Americans 465 billion additional dollars through the year 2002.
  Contrast this tax increase with the Republican budget. Our budget 
includes funding for the full-sized, permanent, $500-per-child family 
tax credit. Our goal is to reduce the tax burden for those taxpayers 
who need it the most--parents attempting to raise young children. For a 
family earning $30,000 per year in my home State, Michigan, with two 
children, the child tax credit would reduce their 1996 Federal income 
tax burden 51 percent. That is real relief from what, under President 
Clinton, has become the highest tax burden on families in the history 
of this country.
  That is the difference between the direction that we perceive 
Americans wanting to go and the direction they would have under the 
President's proposals. Our goal is to let American families earn more 
and keep more. Our goal is to give American families a chance to keep 
more of the dollars that they earn and to be able to use those dollars 
to help their families, particularly those families in the middle class 
who are struggling to make ends meet, working hard and playing by the 
rules.
  I think the choice before the Senate is clear. On the one hand, you 
have a resolution that is responsive to the American voters and 
taxpayers in their desire to see a smaller, more effective Government 
with its books balanced, and, on the other hand, you have the 
President's budget which is responsive to the status quo and inside-
the-beltway interests.
  I would like to just close by thanking Senator Domenici for his 
leadership on this issue. This is my second opportunity to vote for a 
budget resolution. Thanks to Chairman Domenici's resolve and guidance, 
I am once again proud to support and back a document that brings this 
Government's budget into balance. It has been 25-plus years since the 
Congress was able to do that, and it is under the leadership of Senator 
Domenici and the Republican majority that we accomplished this goal.
  Last year we took this goal as close as we could to the finish line 
by making sure that Congress ultimately passed a budget that was in 
balance. Unfortunately, the President chose to veto that budget. He 
chose to veto tax cuts for working families. He chose to veto reform of 
the Medicare Program to help ensure the solvency of the Medicare trust 
fund. And, he choose to veto a budget that will give Americans relief 
from the high interest rates that result from uninterrupted Federal 
budget deficits. years.
  Hopefully this year, when a balanced budget is presented to the 
President, we will have a different result. I hope he will sign that 
budget, and I hope he will agree with us that it is time to truly put 
the era of Big Government to rest and move in a different direction.
  The President's budget does not really accomplish that. The budget 
which the Senate Budget Committee passed last week does. I look forward 
to working to see its adoption here on the floor of the Senate.
  I yield the floor.
  Mrs. BOXER addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Ashcroft). The Senator from California.
  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I am pleased to be here today as a member 
of the Budget Committee to talk about the differences between President 
Clinton's budget, which I voted for in the Budget Committee, and the 
Republican budget that passed on a partisan vote.
  First, I wanted to point out that the Senator from Michigan complains 
about the size of Government as a share of the economy, but he only 
tells half the story, if that. What he did not know is that President 
Clinton has reduced the size of Government. There are fewer people 
working for the Government now than at any time since John Kennedy was 
President.
  Let me repeat that: There are fewer people working for the Government 
now than at any time since John Kennedy.
  Spending by the Federal Government now is 22 percent of the economy. 
But what the Senator did not know is that this is the lowest percentage 
since the 1970's--lower than it was when we had Republican Presidents. 
As a matter of fact, the record level was set during the Reagan 
administration.
  So I think when we talk about this budget and the situation today, we 
ought to put it into the context of where we have come from. We have 
come from a time when there were hardly any new jobs created to a point 
where President Clinton has fulfilled his commitment to create more 
than 8 million new jobs. We have come from a time where we talked about 
deficit reduction but ran up more debt during George Bush and Ronald 
Reagan than all the years since George Washington through Jimmy 
Carter. Now we have seen deficit reduction 4 years in a row.

  There are many other facts about this economy that are important. The 
misery index is at the lowest point. That is a combination of 
unemployment and inflation. It is at a very low point. As I said, we 
have fewer Government employees than at any time since John Kennedy.
  Does that mean everything is perfect? No, it does not mean everything 
is perfect. We have a long way to go. We should have started yesterday 
by passing an increase in the minimum wage. That is what we should be 
doing. We should be reaching across the aisle to make life better for 
millions and millions of working people who have seen that minimum wage 
go to a 40-year low in terms of its purchasing power. Seventy percent 
of the American people think it is an issue of fairness, and we have a 
Republican leader over in the House who says he really does not believe 
there ought to be any minimum wage--there ought to be no minimum wage. 
Can you believe it?
  The thinking that has taken over this Congress since 1994 never fails 
to amaze me. Yesterday, I said the passion that is being expressed on 
the other side about reducing 4 cents on the gas tax should be matched 
by a passion to increase the minimum wage for our people.
  We already know from the experts that the oil refiners will probably 
get that 4 cents a gallon. When that issue comes before us, we are 
going to work hard on the Democratic side to make sure that money does 
go into the pockets of consumers, but even with that, we cannot ensure 
it. Let us say they got every penny, that is $27 a year, and the 
deficit will go up. If it is made a permanent repeal, it will go up by 
$30 billion.
  So how do the people view this Republican Congress when deficit 
reduction is supposed to be No. 1 and then we repeal a gas tax, which 
will probably go into the pockets of the oil companies, and then we are 
going to have to find out how we are going to make up that money? The 
latest plan is to do a one-time fee on banks. But the fact is, that fee 
on banks is supposed to be put aside in case there are bank or savings 
and

[[Page S5038]]

loan failures, not to be used up on a gas tax repeal.
  What does that all have to do with the budget? I think in many ways 
it is symbolic of the kind of budgets we are going to see presented. 
One, in my view--and that is President Clinton's budget--really does 
put people first, and the other, the Republican budget, I do not think 
puts people first. Of course, it is up to the American people to 
decide.
  I am going to just show the differences in the budget, as I see them. 
I will use a chart to do that, because I think it is one thing to talk 
about how we feel about the budget, which we all will do, it is another 
thing to put the numbers behind our statements.

  So I have tried to highlight from my perspective as a Budget 
Committee member some of the most important differences in the two 
budgets. I want to talk about education and job training.
  If people from another country were to ask me what makes our country 
great, I would say it is because we have a great middle class and 
everyone has a chance at the American dream.
  And then if they asked, ``Why do people have a chance at the American 
dream,'' I would say, ``If I had to say one thing, it would be 
education.''
  I happen to be a product of public schools, all the way from 
kindergarten through college. I was very fortunate to have a good 
education in public schools. In college, I went to the State 
university. It cost me $12 a semester. It was amazingly affordable. Of 
course, as I go around my State, the people who like me say, ``Look at 
that Senator, she's a product of public schools.'' Of course, the ones 
who do not say, ``See what public schools can do; look at that 
Senator.''
  The fact of the matter is, it is education that is the key to the 
American dream, and today it is more than education, it is education 
and job training. As our President has said, many of us will have seven 
and eight jobs in a lifetime, and we need the constant retraining, the 
reeducation. I know people of my generation have had to learn how to 
use the computer. It is not that easy, but it can be done.
  The fact is, if you look at the two budgets, the President's budget 
and the Republican budget, the President adds $56 billion more to 
education and training than does the Republican budget. That is a fact. 
Both budgets balance in the timeframe of 6 years. Both budgets balance. 
So we do not have to argue about that. That is resolved. The question 
is, what are your priorities? What do you want to invest in? And I 
think that this Democratic President is correct in saying we must 
invest in education.
  What the Republicans do is actually, compared to 1996 levels, 
decrease by $3.2 billion over the next 6 years what is spent on 
education. I just have to say, if there were no other differences in 
this budget, no other differences than this first point, $56 billion 
more to education and job training in President Clinton's budget than 
in the Republican budget, if there was not one iota of difference other 
than that, I would say vote for President Clinton's budget, which is, 
of course, what I intend to do.

  There are more important things as well--Environmental Protection 
Agency enforcement. I see the Senator from Arkansas is on the floor, 
and yesterday I thought he made a spectacular statement about the 
importance of clean air and clean water and an environment we can hand 
down to our children that is at least as beautiful as the one we 
inherited. You cannot do that without enforcement.
  We had this argument in the 1970's when, under President Nixon, we 
set up the Environmental Protection Agency. That was bipartisan. What 
has happened to the environmental issue? We cannot find support for 
environmental protection on the Republican side of the aisle.
  It takes inspectors to enforce the laws, to make sure that companies 
are not polluting and that when they do, they pay to clean it up. It 
takes dollars to clean up Superfund sites, most of which are very close 
to our populated cities.
  I visited one of them in San Bernardino, CA. The cleanup was stopped 
because of the Government shutdown. We could not get the money to clean 
it up, and the pollution and the toxic waste was about to penetrate 
into the water table. Thank goodness we were able to get those funds 
after the Government reopened to begin cleaning up that site. That is 
just one small example of the problems that we have.
  Years ago we did not know that some of these chemicals were very 
dangerous, that they could sink down into the water table. But we know 
it now, and if we do not pay the price now, we will pay it later. How 
wise it is to clean up those pollutants now before they get into the 
water table and people cannot drink the water, and if they do, they get 
sick. I just read a recent report that they have traced chemical 
pollution in the water supply to childhood leukemia.
  The fact of the matter is, it is shortsighted to shortchange the 
Environmental Protection Agency, and that is a difference in our 
budget.
  Let us get to the issue of Medicare. I thought we had the fight over 
Medicare in the sixties, and we decided it was shameful and morally 
reprehensible that half of our senior citizens had no health insurance.
  We passed a good law, the Medicare law. It has worked. Do we have to 
make sure that the Medicare system is sound? Do we have to make 
corrections and reforms? We do. And the President does in his budget. 
He makes that fund safe until at least 2005.
  But what does the Republican budget do? It cuts $50 billion more out 
of Medicare than does President Clinton's budget--$50 billion more. It 
is hard to imagine what $50 billion would look like. But taking $50 
billion out of Medicare more than the President--more than the 
President--and saying that system can survive is simply not so. As I 
understand it, all of the costs would be put on to the hospitals in 
this particular plan, and hospitals will start closing; we will lose 
emergency rooms and we will be in big trouble. I think our senior 
citizens deserve better.
  Republicans cut $18 billion more than the President out of Medicaid. 
I hope to have an amendment to talk about the Medicaid issue. Who is on 
Medicaid? The poor children, the poor families, and two-thirds of our 
senior citizens in nursing homes are on Medicaid, our grandmothers and 
our grandfathers.
  What do you suppose is going to happen when you take $18 billion more 
than the President did out of Medicaid? Nothing good will happen, I can 
assure you. We have already had the scandals in the nursing homes in 
the 1980's. I do not want to live through that again. We cannot take 
these kinds of dollars out of Medicare and Medicaid and have a system 
that functions and a system that works. Then if you do the medical 
savings accounts on top of that, which is also, as I understand, 
assumed in this budget, the healthiest and the wealthiest will leave a 
lot of our plans, including Medicare, and it is going to make matters 
far worse when the healthiest and the wealthiest leave the big 
insurance pool.
  The earned income tax credit. Republicans cut $12 billion more than 
the President in the earned income tax credit. What is the earned 
income tax credit? It is a credit given to those in our community who 
work very, very hard for very low wages. And the purpose of it is to 
ensure that they do not have to go on welfare. And it is really a very 
important, very important tax credit for those at the bottom of the 
scale who work so hard and do not want to be on welfare. Yet, the 
earned income tax credit, which was really praised highly by President 
Reagan, President Bush, bipartisan, is hurt deeply in the Republican 
budget.
  However, there is one area where the Republicans spend more. Guess 
what it is? It is the Pentagon. They spend $11 billion more than the 
Department of Defense asked for. Let me repeat that. In this budget, if 
you vote for it, you are voting for $11 billion more than the 
Department of Defense, the admirals and the generals, asked for. I do 
not get it. I do not get it.

  We have the strongest military in the world, and we should keep it 
that way. We spend more than any other nation. I am going to tell you 
exactly what we spend compared to other countries.
  Here is a chart that shows that the U.S. military budget spends more 
than the next five countries combined. I want to thank Senator Simon 
for sharing this chart with me. He had used it

[[Page S5039]]

in the Budget Committee. So here we see the United States, $264 
billion; Russia, $98 billion; Japan, $54 billion; France, $41 billion; 
the United Kingdom, $35 billion; and Germany, $34 billion.
  Let me make a point. Let us just say for purposes of this that Russia 
is not our friend. Of course, the cold war is over and she would like 
to join NATO. But for the purposes of this conversation, let us say 
Russia was not our friend, because there are elections coming up and we 
are nervous about it, I understand. All the other countries--Japan, 
France, the United Kingdom, and Germany--are our very close allies. So 
if you take what America spends, and you add what our best friends 
spend, I mean, we are up there in the stratosphere. We do not have to 
lose sleep at night about the size of our military budget.
  And the fact of the matter is, the kinds of threats we now face are 
very different than the threats that we faced in the height of the cold 
war, when we worried about intercontinental ballistic missiles and we 
worried about nuclear weapons. Thank goodness times have changed. Are 
they risky times? Yes. Are they dangerous times? Yes. We can never not 
be vigilant. But the threats are different. And the costs should 
reflect the different types of threat.
  We are far more threatened by terrorism, for example, than we are 
from an intercontinental ballistic missile. And you need different 
things to prepare for that than you do that type of a star wars threat 
that we used to feel in the cold war days. So with all of this 
information, the Republican budget adds yet another $11 billion.
  I want to hearken back to what Dwight Eisenhower said, general and 
President, a Republican. He said, it is very important to educate our 
children; that the defense of our Nation is not only in the size of its 
arsenal, but how educated our children are. He is the one who brought 
to the Congress in the 1950's the National Defense Education Act. He 
called it the National Defense Education Act because he knew, if we are 
going to be strong, if we are to defend America and its principles and 
its democracy, it takes an intelligent country and it takes young 
people who are ready to learn.

  I will tie that into a conversation I had with the entrepreneurs in 
the Silicon Valley. I am so proud to represent them here in the U.S. 
Senate. When I went to see them when I was running for the Senate back 
in 1992, I said, ``Tell me the one thing I could do for you if I become 
your Senator.'' I fully expected them to say something like, ``Well, 
cut our taxes.'' They did not say that. They said, ``If you become our 
Senator, get us an educated work force. Get us an educated work 
force.'' Today they are hiring foreign workers because they are not 
getting the skills here that they need. The answer lies in this budget.
  That is why this debate is so exciting and so important. It can sound 
a little boring when you talk about technical terms such as ``real 
freezes'' and ``hard freezes'' and all the rest and technical 
assumptions, ``CBO'' and ``OMB,'' and all the things we talk about in 
our budget meetings.
  But behind all those words is reality. The reality is, what do we 
believe in? What do we believe will make us great? If we can, in our 
budget, invest in those things that will make us great, in the context 
of a balanced budget, because we need to do that--we need to do that. 
We are wasting so much on interest payments on the debt. We have to get 
a handle on that. And we do in both of the budgets before us. The 
debate can now focus on these differences, these things.
  So, Mr. President, it is indeed an honor for me to partake in the 
debate. I want to thank Senator Exon, our Democratic ranking member, 
for all the hard work that he has done and the staff has done. I want 
to thank the President of the United States for giving us a budget that 
I think we can be very proud to vote for. It is fiscally responsible. 
It makes the tough and hard choices. It comes to balance, but it does 
it in a way that makes the right investments: Education, environment, 
Medicare, Medicaid, the earned income tax credit, and a sensible number 
for defense.
  You put that altogether, and I think you have a pretty good roadmap 
into the next century, one in which America will truly be the economic 
leader of the world, and also the moral leader of the world.
  Thank you very much, Mr. President. I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.
  Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I rise today as a member of the Budget 
Committee in strong support of the 1997 balanced budget resolution. I 
want to commend the diligent work of our chairman on that committee in 
moving this legislation to the floor of the U.S. Senate.
  As we begin our debate, I hope we will keep our Federal debt in 
perspective. As of today, the Federal Government is $5 trillion in 
debt, more than $19,000 for every man, woman, and child in America. The 
whole concept of $1 trillion is so difficult to understand. An analogy 
I use to explain how much a trillion is, I go back to a very simple way 
of thinking about it. That is, if you started a business on the day 
that Jesus Christ was born, almost 2,000 years ago, and on the day he 
was born you lost $1 million and you lost $1 million every day since 
the day he was born--$1 million every day--you still would not have 
lost $1 trillion.
  We in this country have a $5 trillion debt. Looking at this problem 
from another angle, a child born today owes $187,000 just on interest 
on the debt over his or her lifetime. We clearly cannot sustain this 
course of unrestricted, unrestrained Federal spending. That is why we 
are here today to introduce a balanced budget which will protect those 
children and that opportunity for an American dream for those children.
  It really boils down to the whole concept of long-term thinking. We, 
in this town, too often think in terms of 1 year or 2 years. It is time 
for all of us to come together and think in terms of that long term. In 
my own career of medicine, before coming to this body, you do an 
operation to possibly get through a short-term, acute problem, but you 
do it for the long-term quality of life for that individual. It is this 
long-term thinking that all of us need to engage, bring to the table in 
this budget debate.
  Long-term thinking clearly means reducing spending and reforming 
entitlements, something that is tough to do--and this is a political 
year--really any year. All of us are dependent on reaching out to the 
public. Telling the public, broadly, that entitlements, or benefits 
established by law and paid to any eligible beneficiary--and we define 
that the eligibility requirements, regardless of cost, are what are 
driving this country to higher and higher debt and larger deficits over 
time --it is the result of the automatic-pilot spending that causes 
entitlements to be the largest and fastest growing portion of our 
Federal budget.
  On this chart--and it is a familiar chart to many of us on the budget 
committee, but it is one that is worth imprinting in our minds because 
it shows the problem that we have, not just in 1996 and 1997, but on 
into the next century. The chart is very simple. It shows Federal 
spending; that is the height of each of the bars. It starts in 1970 and 
comes to where we are right now, 1990, then to the year 2000, and on 
into the next century, the year 2030.
  The green line is the revenue that comes in to Washington, DC, the 
taxpayer dollars, the amount of money that is coming in. We can see, 
over time, as a percent of GDP--gross domestic product--that is 
constant. It has been constant for decades and will be for decades, 
right at 19 or 20 percent of GDP. We can see, of interest, that the 
income coming in, the revenues, matched in 1970--the last time it 
matched--Federal spending. Why? We have not had a balanced budget in 
almost three decades in this country.
  We can see through the 1980's and the 1990's that the Federal 
spending outpaced the revenues. That is why we have the deficit each 
time. We add up each of the deficits, and we get the $5 trillion debt. 
In red are the entitlements. There are basically five entitlements--
there are really more than that: Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, 
pensions, and welfare spending.
  Look at the dramatic increase, historically, over time, to where we 
are today, in the red, in entitlements. They are on autopilot. The 
interest is the amount of money, the interest on

[[Page S5040]]

the Federal debt. It is the amount of money that we are paying each 
year we have to pay on the $5 trillion debt that is out there. As the 
debts increase, the amount of increase over time has increased.
  In the blue, looking at 1970, we have discretionary spending. 
Discretionary spending is that spending that is for the sorts of things 
that we just talked a little bit about earlier. That is our national 
parks, defense of this country, education, roads and infrastructure. 
Notice how, over time, the blue is getting smaller as the red gets 
larger on autopilot.
  What is frightening--and the reason why I want to show this chart--is 
what happens in 4 years, 10 years, in the year 2000, 2010, and 2020. 
Revenues stay the same and there is a huge growth in overall Federal 
spending. Unless we do something, this is inevitable. This is agreed to 
in a bipartisan way. These are data that are generated by a number of 
sources that, again, both sides of the aisle accept. It is inevitable. 
The reason it is inevitable in some part is because of our aging 
population, because we had a baby boom back 30 years ago now which will 
be traveling through, which at the year 2010 will hit.

  Now, 2010 sounds a long way away, but in truth it is 14 years away. 
You can see in the year 2010, 14 years away, that entitlements, in the 
red, and on the debt, in the yellow, consume all Federal revenues in 14 
years unless we do something. The last year and a half we have not done 
anything. Unless we do something, we will have no money left over for 
the discretionary spending. This is education, national parks, 
research, science, and defense of this country. That is why we must 
come together and act in a reasonable way.
  The growth of mandatory spending we can look at differently to drive 
home the problems that we have. That is really in this second chart. 
Mandatory spending--what we spend if we do nothing--on entitlements and 
interest on the debt are consuming an increasing portion of our Federal 
budget pie. This chart, I think, describes that and explains that very 
well. We have mandatory spending in 1965, overall spending in 1965; 
overall spending in 1995 is shown by the middle pie; and then looking 
on into the future. This is our overall budget. The red is 
entitlements; the yellow is interest on the debt; and the discretionary 
spending is in the light blue.
  Look what happens between 1965 and 1995: Entitlements and interest on 
the debt in 1965 consumed about one-third of our overall budget; by 
1995, the discretionary spending and the mandatory spending have 
flipped. We can see entitlements and interest on the debt now consume 
almost two-thirds of the overall budget, with the discretionary 
spending having consumed before two-thirds, now only one-third. We must 
act.
  Again, why do we need to act today for the long term and not just the 
short term? Because if we look out again in 14 or 15 years, in the year 
2012, the entire Federal budget will be spent for entitlements and 
interest on the debt, with absolutely no money left over for defense, 
medical research, roads, national park, and infrastructure. This is 
what happens if we do not act, if we do not act in this body, in a 
bipartisan coming-together, in a reasonable way.
  Clearly, we face a monumental fiscal crisis if we do nothing. This 
1997 balanced budget resolution, which came out of the Budget 
Committee, begins to solve this long-term problem by reducing spending 
growth and reforming entitlements. Over the next 6 years, our 
resolution will slow spending by $441 billion. More importantly, 85 
percent of these spending reductions target mandatory programs, those 
automatic pilot entitlements that are driving us deeper and deeper into 
debt.
  Our budget, unlike the President's budget, addresses this problem of 
growth in entitlements and interest over time, which ultimately 
eliminates discretionary spending. Now, long-term thinking also means 
strengthening and improving programs that are critical to the health 
care of our Nation.
  Of the 400 entitlement programs in the budget, I want to briefly 
comment on two--Medicare and Medicaid. It is the long-term decisions 
that we make about these programs that are crucial because it is they 
that are the fastest growing entitlements, and it is they that provide 
the critical health care services that over 37 million senior citizens 
depend upon and over 30 million people below the poverty level. It is a 
little disappointing because I have been in this body about a year and 
a half to 2 years, and we have made absolutely no headway in saving, 
strengthening, and simplifying Medicare. Yet, the problem has been laid 
out for us now almost 2 years ago.
  Politicians all too often have been negligent in telling people the 
truth about Medicare's really precarious financial situation. Let me 
say at the outset that, as a physician, I have taken care of thousands 
of Medicare patients personally, day in and day out. It is the world's 
largest insurance program. It is hugely popular among 37 million 
participating Americans. It is giving seniors and individuals with 
disabilities unprecedented access to the great health care system that 
we have today. It has prolonged and improved the lives of millions and 
millions of Americans. Thus, we must work together to strengthen and 
save this program.
  The truth is depicted again in this chart, though. This is the 
Medicare hospital trust fund, the so-called part A trust fund. It 
started going broke last year. If I were to come into any small 
business and say, ``You are going broke right now,'' what would they 
do? They would react, go back and develop a strategic plan. They would 
react on that day. Yet, we sit in this body and have not yet done one 
thing to reverse Medicare going broke in a few short years.
  This chart shows overall assets of the trust fund in billions of 
dollars. You can see that we were spending more than we were taking in 
beginning last year. This is 1994. In 1995, we went into the red in the 
Medicare trust fund spending, the actual cash flow going in and out. 
That deficit spending has increased this year, will increase this year, 
the year after that, and the year after that. Meanwhile, this trust 
fund is going down, down, and down, where in 4 to 5 years the trust 
fund will be bankrupt.

  I should add that these projections have gotten worse over the last 
year. Last year, we said it is not going to start going bankrupt for a 
year and will not really go bankrupt until 2002. Well, over the last 14 
months of doing nothing in the U.S. Congress, Medicare is going 
bankrupt more quickly.
  This chart shows this whole concept. We sort of looked at cash flow 
in the last part, how much is coming in and going out. If we look at 
actual bankruptcy--I took a chart that we used last year, based on the 
Medicare trustees' report of last April, and updated that chart. This 
chart looks at, in billions of dollars, how much the trust fund has in 
assets. When it gets down to this line, Medicare is actually going 
bankrupt. This is 1985 to 1995. It projects out to the year 2004. The 
line that I used last year, which was in the Medicare trustees' report, 
was the blue line. From 1985 to 1995, as you can see, the Medicare part 
A trust fund looked better and better and better. However, we saw, 
beginning last year--not this year, and we saw it on the previous 
chart--we started deficit spending. This is what we projected last 
year. This is 1995. That is, Medicare would be bankrupt in the year 
2002. I should add, when Medicare goes bankrupt, by law, no hospitals 
can be paid. So when it goes bankrupt, that means that care will 
actually be denied. That is inevitable, unless we act. Well, last year, 
we presented a plan to the President of the United States that would 
save Medicare, would change the course of this line on out into the 
future. Yet, it was vetoed by the President. Now we have yet another 
opportunity to salvage, to save and strengthen Medicare.
  Look what has happened in the course of the last year and a half of 
doing nothing. That is where I have updated this chart. That is where 
the red line comes in. Based on the predictions by the Congressional 
Budget Office, we see that Medicare is not going to go bankrupt in the 
year 2002. But now it is going to be going bankrupt in the year 2000--
and nothing else has changed--unless we act. In this balanced budget 
resolution, I will show you, shortly, how we will extend these lines 
out and preserve Medicare.
  Surely, we must save and strengthen and simplify this program. We 
have to lay aside the politics and focus on protecting those Americans. 
I think of

[[Page S5041]]

those thousands of patients who I have taken care of myself, and who 
were treated for heart disease, lung disease, emphysema, and had lung 
cancers taken out, and who have gone through coronary bypass surgery. 
Those are the people I have seen and the people we have to be 
responsible to in preserving this program.
  This chart shows the Medicare hospital insurance trust fund with what 
we have before us today in this balanced budget resolution, with what 
the President has proposed and will be talking about later today, and 
what we will discuss on this floor today and tomorrow. Under current 
law, again, this shows that Medicare will be going bankrupt in the year 
2000 if we do nothing. That is the red line. Well, the President, in 
his proposal--once you get rid of the gimmicks of moving home health 
care and part A of the trust fund elsewhere, which is a gimmick--if you 
put that aside, you can see that under the President's proposal, in 
green on the chart, the hospital trust fund is extended for 1 year.
  We have to get away from this short-term thinking and look on into 
the next century. The baby boom does not even hit until 2008. We have 
to be prepared for the year 2008 and extend solvency for 10 years. That 
is what our balanced budget proposal does. The balanced budget 
proposal--the one we will be debating and discussing--extends the life 
of the part A trust fund, which is the heart of Medicare, out for 10 
years. That is an objective that the President said he would like to 
see out there. It is something I feel strongly about. Remember, out in 
the year 2006, we are going to have a whole new set of problems we have 
to address. In the proposal before us, we extend for 10 years the 
solvency. The President extends it only for 1 year. If we do nothing, 
it will be going bankrupt in the year 2000.
  With regard to Medicaid, which is the second area I want to discuss, 
I think we have a historic opportunity to work together to preserve 
what has become and needs to be a real safety net for women, children, 
senior citizens, and our disabled population.
  Let me, again, say that about 35 percent of the people who I have 
transplanted hearts into are below the poverty level and benefited by 
having Medicaid. So, again, my experience with this whole health care 
issue is pretty real in that 35 percent of all the people I have 
transplanted benefited by having Medicaid, which served them very well. 
The problem is that Medicaid, today, takes up 6 percent of total 
Federal spending and about one-fifth of State spending. Unless we act, 
we will see about a 155-percent increase in just 10 years.
  This increase in Medicaid spending, if you look at it just from last 
year to this year, is more than we spent in whole on mass transit, on 
all criminal investigations, on pollution control and abatement, and on 
the National Science Foundation. That is just how much the increase has 
been. Unfortunately, Medicaid, with this inexorable growth, is 
bankrupting our State budgets, who have Medicaid being the largest 
single entity in the States' budgets, driving out spending on other 
very useful causes, like police, crime, and education.
  Let me say at the outset that nothing in our balanced budget 
resolution constitutes a cut in Medicaid--absolutely nothing.
  President Clinton and Republicans both attempted to rein in growth 
and spending and protect the eligible population. The differences are 
going to be hammered out in the committee. But let me just say what we 
started with.
  We started with the bipartisan cooperation in working with the 
Nation's Governors, 48 of whom got together and passed out unanimously 
a proposal that we agree with. Their plan was designed to protect all 
current law eligibles and included in the umbrella a fund for 
emergencies.
  To preserve the important safety net which must be there, Medicaid 
spending under our plan, our proposal, will increase 25 percent over 
the next 6 years. There are $54 billion more in our bill than in last 
year's budget resolution. It is not a cut. The program will continue to 
grow at a rate of about 6.5 percent under our proposal, which is 
important--two times the rate of inflation--and it will grow a total of 
46 percent from 1996 to the year 2002.
  Let me also add that as we strengthen Medicare, improve Medicare, and 
save Medicare for the future, and as we improve, simplify, and 
strengthen the Medicaid programs, we must also recognize that 
biomedical research must and will remain a priority for our Nation's 
long-term health care needs, again going back to the importance of 
thinking long term and not just short term. In this field of biomedical 
research, shortsightedness would only yield some quick remedies that 
would really, I think personally and based on my experience, 
potentially endanger lifesaving breakthroughs from continuing research.
  The 1997 budget resolution allows us to maintain funding for the NIH, 
the National Institutes of Health, at the level of funding secured last 
year and an increase of 8.8 percent, or almost $1 billion, more per 
year than in last year's budget resolution. Their commitment will help 
to preserve our position as a world leader in biomedical research.
  Finally, Mr. President, long-term thinking means avoiding budget 
gimmicks. Earlier I spoke very quickly about a gimmick that I find very 
troubling in the administration's budget of transferring home health 
care, which is growing at about 17 percent a year, from one part of 
Medicare to another to make us feel better about part A. Medicare is 
part A, the hospital trust fund we have talked about, and part B, which 
is physician services, we focused on a lot over the last year and a 
half.
  Part A, the hospital trust fund, and the data that we just talked 
about, is the hospital part A trust fund. We cannot solve that problem 
without some fundamental reform. What the President has done, 
unfortunately, is take assets out of the part A trust fund, move them 
elsewhere and say, now the trust fund is going to be solved long term. 
It is just not right. It is just not true. That is a gimmick. We have 
to have fundamental structural reform if we are going to look at the 
long-term solvency of that part A trust fund.
  I guess I want to comment lastly on the President's ``spend now, save 
later,'' proposals for discretionary spending. This chart looks just to 
the nondefense discretionary outlays, the spending that is out there. 
The red is the President's plan. The green is the Senate-reported plan 
that we have on the table now. It is $270 billion in overall spending, 
fiscal year 1996, where we are today, going out to the year 2002 over 
the next 6 years. The difference in this plan is very clear--increased 
spending in these early years by the President's plan in nondefense 
discretionary spending where we have real numbers coming in addressing 
the problem today, not focusing on just the first 2 years, but the long 
term.
  The President has certain trigger proposals which will come into play 
these last few years, and I think they really defy common sense. The 
American people need to recognize these proposals as gimmicks that are 
antithetical to our efforts to balance the budget. No American family 
or individual would conduct their financial affairs in this manner, and 
their Government should not either. The problem is now. Let us address 
the problem now, not increase spending hoping, hoping, that it will be 
addressed in the future.
  I look forward to offering a sense-of-the-Senate amendment on the 
floor that will oppose these discretionary triggers and support 
commonsense budgeting.
  Our constituents deserve nothing less than a courageous forward 
thinking leadership here in Washington. All of us know that today they 
want us to balance the budget. Today they want us to save Medicare from 
bankruptcy, which is inevitable if we do not act. They want us to 
reform Medicaid to return welfare to workfare, to provide tax relief 
without resorting to budgetary gimmicks. We do need to transform 
Washington from that 2-year town that looks to the next election to a 
20-year town that looks to the next generation.
  We can start that today as we get this whole budget discussion 
underway this morning and in the afternoon, over the next 50 hours, by 
eventually passing this 1997 balanced budget resolution.
  I would like to briefly yield time, if I might, out of my time to 
Senator Grams, my friend from Minnesota.
  Mr. EXON addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nebraska is recognized.

[[Page S5042]]

  Mr. EXON. Mr. President, I would like to briefly respond to the 
remarks and comments of my friend and colleague from Tennessee.
  Could I see that chart that he just had there about the trust fund 
going broke?
  Mr. President, here is one of the things that I am most concerned 
about. I think we all recognize that we have a problem, and we all are 
trying to work together to solve it. I do not think it is particularly 
helpful for us to show on television charts that scare the devil out of 
the senior citizens of America.
  The Medicare fund is not going to go broke. Everybody knows it is not 
going to go broke because the Congress, whatever it has to do, is going 
to step in and stop it. The fact of the matter is that while we keep 
criticizing what the President of the United States has done, as I 
demonstrated by charts earlier on today--listening to people on the 
floor of the U.S. Senate that have recently come into the Congress, you 
would think they are the only ones who have any expertise or knowledge 
on how to balance the Federal budget--as I showed vividly with charts 
this morning, it was the President of the United States, Bill Clinton, 
who has come on board and at the urging of some of us who have been 
fiscal conservatives for a long, long time and very much concerned 
about the skyrocketing budget deficits annualized at about $300 
billion, Bill Clinton is the one who has reversed that course. For the 
first time since man's mind runneth to the contrary, we have seen a 
dramatic turnaround in the annual deficits of the United States of 
America.
  I only say, once again, that all of these things that are being 
thrown around by those on that side of the aisle who fought without a 
single Republican vote against the deficit reduction proposal advanced 
by the President of the United States and supported by Democrats was 
the only time in 30 years that we have had a turnaround in the annual 
deficits.
  When I see people talking about the trust fund going broke, 
unfortunately, I feel it is a means of scaring senior citizens. I tell 
the senior citizens that the fund is not going to go broke. Of all the 
criticisms that have been made about how bad and how gimmickry the 
President of the United States is with his proposal, I cite once again, 
and, if necessary, I will read it once again.
  Let me repeat what June O'Neill said on May 9, 1996, in a letter to 
me after I made a request for her, June O'Neill, the Republican 
appointee as head of the Congressional Budget Office that we all look 
to as a guiding light today and the umpire, if you will, on disputes 
between the political parties. She said, ``Under the law, the trust 
fund is projected to become insolvent by 2002.''
  So we agree with that part. But when we talk about going busted, that 
is something else--going bankrupt, projected to go bankrupt.

  June O'Neill goes on to say that the Congressional Budget Office, 
which, I say again, is run by the Republicans--it has a director who 
makes these decisions after listening to staff that are Republicans--
June O'Neill says in that May 9 letter to me, ``The Congressional 
Budget Office estimates that the administration's proposal would 
postpone this date,'' or the date when it could be in some trouble, 
``to the year 2005.''
  I simply say, Mr. President, it is not necessary for us to talk about 
this going broke and indicate that the Democrats and the President of 
the United States are doing nothing about it when that is not the case.
  The Senator complains about backloading, about backloading in the 
President's budget. Take a look at the Republican budget. It is like 
the kettle calling the teapot black. There is little difference with 
regard to the backloading in either the Democratic plan or the 
Republican plan, and we should be honest about it and not mislead the 
American people. It seems to me you would have to agree that under my 
calculations, both budgets, both the Democratic budget of the President 
and the Republican budget, achieve exactly the same amount of deficit 
reduction--82 percent of it in the last 3 years.
  Let me repeat that. You hear this talk about backloading. Backloading 
means that you do not make the cuts upfront now. You wait until the 6th 
and 7th year of the budget. So that is after Bill Clinton will have 
finished his second 4-year term as President of the United States or 
that is after our good friend, Senator Bob Dole, would finish his first 
4 years as President of the United States. But both are guilty of the 
same thing. And I wish to lay down the marker now, that when you hear 
about backloading, it is a plague on both of our houses.
  Mr. President, 82 percent of the deficit reduction or savings in both 
the President's plan and the Republican plan is in the last 3 years. So 
I simply say that there is probably little to be gained if you want to 
talk honestly about who is the worst backloader.
  I reserve the remainder of my time and yield the floor.
  Mr. FRIST addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.
  Mr. FRIST. Let me just very briefly respond because I know we have a 
number of colleagues here. I guess the one element that I would like to 
respond to is the scare tactics, because it has been a fascinating year 
for me. I have only been here for a year and a half, and I do not have 
all the answers to the budgetary problems that we have today, but if we 
look at the issue of scare tactics, the numbers that I showed you in 
terms of the chart and Medicare going bankrupt were given to us, given 
to this body, by the Medicare trustees, a bipartisan group, three 
members of President Clinton's Cabinet, and that is the chart that 
comes directly out of their numbers. They tell us that it is an urgent 
problem; it is going bankrupt--again, bipartisan.

  The numbers that have been released recently are that things are 
getting worse, that part A--40 percent of the overall Medicare Program 
is part A--is going to be insolvent. We were told in 7 years. Now we 
know it is going to be 6 years, which, since it has been a year, is 
only 5 years from now. That is scary. That is scary.
  But contrast that with the number of things you see on television. 
Every time I go back to Tennessee they say, ``What are you people 
trying to do with our budget and Medicare, trying to slow the growth 
from 7 percent to 6 percent,'' which is what we were trying to do last 
year and that is what we are trying to do this year.
  That scares seniors. That scares seniors. If we do not do anything, 
that program is going broke. It is gone. The 70-year-old people who 
need heart surgery, who I operate on, are not going to get it.
  I have not been around that long, but maybe by the year 2000 they 
will come in with some huge tax increase or strip back benefits in the 
year 2000, but that is the only thing that will save the program. 
Nothing else will do it because it is inevitable; it is going bankrupt, 
part A, the hospital part of the trust fund.
  So we have seen a lot of scare tactics out there over the past year 
and a half. Those scare tactics have been on television, paid 
advertising. They scare every senior citizen. Every person over the age 
of 50 will come up, because they are scared, and say, ``Don't touch 
anything, because what we can see on the television ads, if you reform 
the system, we are not going to have a health care system at all.''
  Those are the scare tactics I am afraid of. I have just presented the 
facts in terms of bankruptcy. I agree with Senator Exon. We need to 
work together. Clearly, both budgets have their real problems. These 
numbers came from CBO scoring, that right now, if you look at the 
hospital trust fund--these are CBO numbers, Congressional Budget Office 
numbers, that came from June O'Neill's staff to our staff that have 
been released and part of the record we talked about in the 
Budget Committee--it is going bankrupt in 5 years--the red line--if we 
do nothing.

  Under the President's plan, if you remove the gimmickry of the $55 
billion in home health care--it is just moved to the side--CBO said it 
extends the life of the trust fund for 1 year.
  Our proposal, according to CBO, June O'Neill's group, says we have 10 
years in our report. This, again, comes from the Congressional Budget 
Office.
  I thank the Chair. I yield the floor.
  Mr. GRAMS addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota.


                      Unanimous-Consent Agreement

  Mr. GRAMS. Mr. President, first, in business to come before the 
Senate, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate stand in recess today 
from the hours of 1:30 to 3:30 and that the time

[[Page S5043]]

during recess then be charged equally from the budget resolution. By 
the way, this does have the approval of the minority side as well.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Mr. EXON. There is no objection on this side, Mr. President.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. GRAMS. Thank you very much, Mr. President.
  I rise today with great pride in supporting the budget resolution for 
fiscal year 1997, and I commend the distinguished chairman of the 
Senate Budget Committee, Senator Domenici, and my colleagues on the 
committee for drafting a piece of legislation of which every American 
can be proud.
  This bill, more than anything else, is about promises, making 
promises and keeping them. The American people have every reason to be 
cynical about political promises. They hear so many of them, and they 
hear them repeated so often that it is easy to begin to tune them out. 
Yet, something resonated with the voters when we went to the people 
back in November of 1994 and we promised that we would take this 
country in a better direction if they elected a new majority to 
Congress.
  Last year we redefined the role of the Federal Government when we 
laid out a plan for the Nation's future unlike anything that the people 
have seen over the last 40 years. Up until then, they had always been 
told that big Government was good Government; that we could keep 
spending as much as we wanted and never get stuck with the bill; that 
Washington knew best.
  That was nothing more than a fairy tale. Our budget pointed toward a 
more realistic, more responsible path, and we passed that into law only 
to have it vetoed by a ``pie crust'' President whose promises are 
easily made and easily broken.

  Now the second installment of our balanced budget promise is before 
us and we have a second opportunity to take our case to the people. Our 
budget recognizes that we do have a responsibility to guarantee our 
children a debt-free future and that balancing the budget without 
raising taxes must be a priority of this Congress.
  Mr. President, it is ironic that we begin debate on the budget 
resolution today, May 15. Each year, the nonpartisan Tax Foundation 
calculates its tax freedom day, and that is the day on which Americans 
stop working just to pay their State, Federal, and local taxes and 
actually begin keeping their earnings for themselves.
  Now let us go back to 1925. Tax freedom day arrived on February 6. 
But this year, Americans had to wait until May 7 before they were 
allowed to keep the first dime of their own money. Mr. President, 1996 
marked the latest arrival ever for tax freedom day. In fact, tax 
freedom day has just jumped ahead an entire week since President 
Clinton took office because under Bill Clinton's watch the Government 
is taking more from the paychecks of middle-class Americans than ever 
before.
  Let me repeat that. Despite all the claims you hear about Bill 
Clinton doing well with the budget and the deficit, tax freedom day is 
a week later under Bill Clinton than ever before because, under the 
watch of President Bill Clinton, he is taking more money out of the 
pockets of American taxpayers than ever before.
  I also want to make a couple of notes on some of the charges or 
responses we have heard today from some of our Democratic colleagues, 
and I will just go back to Senator Exon and some of the comments he 
made, that Congress will step in to save Medicare. Senator Frist of 
Tennessee is more of an expert on this than I am, and he has done a 
good job of laying it out and trying to explain what happens, but we 
know the President is using smoke and mirrors when he says he is going 
to take $55 billion out of Medicare and move it into the general fund 
so it will make it look like it is solvent. And when Mr. Exon says 
Government or Congress will step in to save it, what does he mean? The 
President has ignored the issue. How they would step in and save it 
would be to raise your taxes.
  Let us not talk about it today, but if we get the opportunity we will 
come in and we will raise our taxes. Also, about the claims that they 
passed the 1993 budget plan without a single Republican vote, we are 
very proud of that, that we were not part of raising taxes in 1993.
  My colleague from California, a few minutes ago, was talking about a 
smaller Government today under President Clinton than ever before, and 
a higher Government level under President Reagan in the 1980's. But I 
think that is when you take into consideration all military personnel 
as well. The truth is, under this administration we have more 
bureaucrats and more people working in Government outside of the 
military than at any time in history. So they have not shrunk the size 
of the Federal Government. They have shrunk the size of the military in 
order to come up with those numbers.
  Then lower deficits, the reason we have lower deficits today is 
because of higher taxes. They are taking more money from the average 
taxpayer to offset the increase in spending. Also, we have enjoyed some 
lower interest rates over the last couple of years. But when we are 
talking about spending, it continues to grow out of control, so we have 
not reduced the size of the Government, we have not eased the spending 
burden on Americans, especially when you look again at the fact that 
tax freedom day comes 1 week later today than it did 3 years ago.
  And then the gas tax. I tell you, some just cannot stand to let go of 
a tax no matter how small they try to make it look. They are saying the 
4.3 cents is going to go into the pockets of oil companies. That is 
doubtful. When they reduced the excise tax on air fares, when the 
Government tax went off, that was immediately passed on to the consumer 
in a rebate. But no matter what that question might be, we do know one 
thing, the $5 billion in that increased gas taxes come out of the 
pockets of taxpayers and it has gone into the pockets of bigger 
Government.
  When we talk about cutting and backloading our budgets, and we are 
charged we do not do any better than what the President has proposed in 
his budget--there are some very stark differences. Our budget, over the 
life of 7 years, begins to trim the size and scope of the Federal 
Government and we will enjoy compounded savings in the fourth, fifth, 
sixth, and seventh year of our budget. But the President's plan takes 
100 percent of its backloading reductions in the last 2 years, and it 
takes it directly out of discretionary spending. I do not think there 
is one Member of this Congress who could stand up and tell the mayors 
and Governors of this country and others they are going to make that 
deep of a cut in the last 2 years. That will not happen.
  So we do have some differences in how we achieve the balanced budget. 
It seems they always try to find some good out of a bad situation. On 
the farm you would call that trying to make a silk purse out of a sow's 
ear. But the news is more discouraging for taxpayers of Minnesota 
because national tax freedom day came and went 8 days ago, but 
Minnesotans do not keep their own dollars until today. That is, 136 
days into 1996, because of higher State and local taxes, and the 
differences in the Federal tax burden, Minnesota is tied with Wisconsin 
in having the fourth latest tax freedom day in the Nation. Only the 
residents of Connecticut, New York, and New Jersey pay higher taxes 
than we do in Minnesota. That is nearly 20 weeks, over 800 hours on the 
job, just to pay Uncle Sam.
  By imposing his record-breaking $255 billion tax increase in 1993, 
again, President Clinton bears the responsibility for ever-increasing 
tax burdens from singles to families to seniors to job providers. Every 
segment of society has felt the pinch. Motorists were hit especially 
hard by the President's gas tax increase, which again boosted the cost 
of gasoline by nearly $5 billion every year.
  So, whatever you call it, the Clinton crunch or the middle-class 
squeeze, as long as taxes keep rising, the dollars Americans have left 
over to provide for their families will keep falling. It must be the 
goal of Congress to help Americans earn more money and keep more money 
so they can do more for themselves, their kids, their communities, and 
their churches.
  The budget resolution we begin debating today will go a long way 
toward ensuring tax freedom day arrives earlier next year for all 
Americans. Mr. President, its cutting taxes provisions

[[Page S5044]]

could not come at a better time. Government has become a looming 
presence in the lives of the American people. Each year the people are 
asked to turn more responsibilities over to the Federal Government for 
Government regulation, for Government support. From the time they get 
up in the morning until they go to bed at night, there are very few 
aspects of American daily life that are not touched now by the hand of 
government.
  So government has been forced to grow just to keep up. Consider that 
government spending at the Federal, State, and local level has jumped 
from 12 percent of the national income in 1930 to 42 percent today, and 
the burden for keeping these ever-ballooning bureaucracies in operation 
has fallen on the taxpayers, of course, through more and higher taxes.
  The increase has been dramatic. Between 1934 and 1995, individual 
Federal income taxes as a percentage of gross domestic product rose 
1,114 percent.
  Today, the typical American family faces a tax burden from all levels 
of government of 38 percent, and most middle-class American families 
are turning more money over to the government than they are spending 
for their family's food, clothing, shelter, and transportation 
combined. Families with children are now the lowest after-tax income 
group in America, below elderly households, single persons and families 
without children.
  A significant number of families are relying on a second job just to 
pull themselves above the poverty line and to meet their annual tax 
obligations. The majority of families who have reached a middle-class 
standard of living are families with two incomes. They are still trying 
to pursue the American dream, but the ever-increasing tax burden keeps 
pushing it out of reach.
  According to the Gallup organization, 67 percent of the people say 
they are handing over too much of their own money to the Federal 
Government. They might feel differently if they were getting a fair 
return on the investment, but Americans see their hard-earned dollars 
being wasted by the Federal Government. They look at the services they 
are getting in return and they feel like they have been taken to the 
cleaners.
  It has always been easy for past Congresses to be generous with 
somebody else's money. This Congress, however, is no longer willing to 
let the Government gamble away the taxpayers' hard-earned dollars. In 
fact, we are going to keep those dollars out of the Government's hands 
in the first place. The centerpiece of our balanced budget plan is the 
$500 per child tax credit, and I am proud this desperately needed 
provision remains at the heart of our legislation. The tax credit alone 
will allow 28 million taxpaying households to keep $23 billion of their 
own money each year.
  In my home State of Minnesota, the tax credit would return $477 
million every year to families who work hard, pay their bills, and 
struggle every day to care for their children without relying on the 
Government.
  In addition another 3.5 million households nationwide will find the 
$500-per-child tax credit tax liability has eliminated their tax 
liability entirely; 3.5 million households. President Clinton has 
promised a middle-class tax cut of his own, but, again, it is virtually 
nonexistent in his 1997 budget. Let us look at what he calls for.
  To qualify for the President's version of the child tax credit your 
child has to be under the age of 13--meaning that just about the time 
you need that tax relief the most, it would dry up. In addition, it 
would only be $300 per child for 3 of its 5 years, and then it would be 
abruptly terminated 2 years early. The $122 billion in tax relief 
Congress is offering in our budget resolution is real tax relief. It is 
not a paper gimmick.

  The second plank of the legislation before us is the promise to 
balance the budget by the year 2002. Every year the Federal Government 
is spending billions and billions more than it takes in. Because of 4 
decades of fiscal insanity, the national debt has today eclipsed $5 
trillion and continues to rise. Just the interest alone on a debt that 
massive is accumulating at the rate of $4 million an hour. If our 
national debt were shared equally among all Americans, each of us would 
have to pay up $19,000 for every man, woman, and child in this country. 
Every child born today in the United States of America comes into the 
world already saddled with a debt of more than $19,000. The share for 
an average family is $75,000.
  So the first, most important result of a balanced budget would be to 
free our children and grandchildren from the economic burden they will 
inherit from this generation, a burden they did not ask for and one 
they certainly do not deserve. Because we have been able to begin 
reining in spending over the past year, our budget reaches balance in 6 
years, not 7 as we first proposed a year ago. By contrast, the 
President's 1997 budget plan never achieves balance. It achieves an 
annual budget deficit of $84 billion by the year 2002. Our plan 
achieves its goals without dramatic cuts of any kind--except in the 
deficit.
  Spending on Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, welfare programs, 
and the earned income tax credit will all continue to grow to meet this 
Nation's needs over the 6-year life of our budget.
  Keeping promises may be considered out of style here in the Nation's 
Capital City, where promises are a dime a dozen among the professional 
politicians, but back in Minnesota a promise is something a person does 
not back down on, even if it was made by a politician.
  With our budget resolution and its meaningful tax relief, its 
protections to ensure the solvency of the Medicare Program, its reform 
of the welfare system, its commitment to a balanced budget by the year 
2002, this Congress is keeping the promises that we made to the 
American taxpayers.
  Thank you very much, Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. If the Senator from Michigan will withhold.

                          ____________________