[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 10 (Wednesday, February 11, 1998)]
[Senate]
[Pages S620-S622]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         THE PRESIDENT'S BUDGET

  Mr. GRAMS. Mr. President, I rise today to make a few, brief 
observations about the President's budget.
  Let me say I welcome the fact that President Clinton has come up with 
a budget that may finally be balanced in the next fiscal year, although 
I do not agree with the outlines of his plan. The good news is that if 
the economy stays as strong as expected, we may soon enjoy a unified 
budget surplus for the first time since 1969.
  However, Mr. President, again, after a thorough examination of 
President Clinton's budget, I must say this is not at all a responsible 
and honest proposal. Here is why:
  First, President Clinton claims it is his fiscal policies that have 
reduced the federal deficit and brought the budget to the edge of 
balance. That would be stretching the truth. The productivity of the 
American people has brought us to this point, in spite of what Congress 
has done or the President's tax-and-spend habits. The truth is, the 
President has only been willing to balance the budget, if he is allowed

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to use all increases in revenues, plus even higher taxes, to match his 
appetite for spending on expanded programs, new programs, and new 
entitlements.
  In 1992, candidate Bill Clinton promised he would balance the budget 
if he were elected. When President Clinton arrived at the White House 
in 1993, he abandoned that promise at the front door. The first budget 
he proposed called for the largest tax increase in history and 
increased federal spending of more than a trillion dollars in just five 
years, a jump of 20 percent.
  In 1995, the President again promised America he could balance the 
budget, first in ten years, then nine, then eight, and finally, seven. 
He made a similar balanced-budget promise in 1996. Finally, after 
spending all of the $225 billion revenue windfall ``miraculously'' 
discovered by the CBO, President Clinton and the Congressional 
leadership agreed last year to achieve a balanced budget in six years.
  Mr. President, it is the American economy that produced this 
unprecedented revenue windfall for the federal government, and the 
unexpected dollars have come directly from working Americans--taxes 
paid by corporations, individuals, consumers, and investors. Washington 
did not do any heavy lifting: the people did. Yet, Washington takes all 
the credit.

  Second, the Clinton Administration claims that this budget will 
produce surpluses ``as far as the eye can see.'' Sure, as long as you 
are looking through rose-colored glasses. Such claims are explicitly 
intended to mislead the American people. Mr. President, this projected 
surplus is only a surplus under a unified budget. Without borrowing 
from the Social Security trust funds, the real federal deficit could 
reach $600 billion over five years. The total deficit will reach a 
trillion in the next decade. This means we will see deficits, not 
surpluses, as far as the eye can see.
  In fact, the CBO estimates the possible budget surplus could easily 
turn into a $100 billion deficit. I asked Dr. O'Neill last week what 
the odds were we would achieve a budget surplus versus ending up with a 
deficit, and she said it was 50/50. This uncertainty requires us to 
exercise fiscal discipline, not to run off and approve another $123 
billion in spending as the President has proposed--money from a surplus 
we have not seen yet and a tobacco settlement that is only a proposal.
  I need to stress that a unified balanced budget is an unacceptable 
prospect if it is achieved at the expense of responsible governing. The 
truth is that the President's budget continues the tax-and-spend 
policies that have been the hallmark of this Administration. Again, 
after setting spending limits that in 1997 grew the government three 
times faster than inflation, or the incomes of working Americans, the 
President wants to blow those spending caps with another $123 billion 
increase in federal spending. The ink is barely dry on last year's 
budget agreement, which gave working Americans, or at least a few of 
them, $90 billion in tax relief, and now the President proposes wiping 
out that tax cut with $115 billion in new taxes--or increases in 
existing taxes, permits, or fees.
  The most untruthful thing about this budget is President Clinton's 
rhetoric that the era of big government is over. OMB director Raines 
testified in the Senate Budget Committee last week that by any 
standard, big government was indeed over. A $100 billion government 35 
years ago is now 18 times larger, at $1.8 trillion. Who is kidding who?
  If he does not get those new taxes through Congress, the President 
wants to borrow from the Social Security Trust Fund. Mr. President, the 
Congress must not permit the President to finance his spending 
programs, his big-government solutions, by borrowing from Social 
Security.
  If you count what Senator Gramm calls ``hidden spending'' of $42 
billion, actual spending under the President's budget would reach 
$1.775 trillion, a 6.4 percent increase, and a Washington record. And 
it continues to grow from there. In 2003, the President is asking for 
$1.945 trillion in federal spending. Total federal spending for the 
next five years would reach $9.2 trillion. Annual government spending 
was $1.4 trillion when Mr. Clinton became president.
  In five years, the President has already increased government 
spending by 27 percent. Is there any sign of leaner government? No. The 
truth is that the government is growing bigger and bigger and bigger.
  Nor does this budget do anything to eliminate wasteful and 
unnecessary Federal programs. It does nothing to make the government 
more accountable and efficient. It actually increases civilian 
nondefense employment by 9,200. This is big, central government by any 
standard.
  Mr. President, as I said on the floor the other day, if this is a 
race to prove who can be the most ``compassionate'' with the taxpayers' 
dollars, it is a race nobody is going to win, and one the taxpayers 
most certainly will lose. The truth is simple: you cannot buy 
compassion.
  Third, the President claims that he will not bust the spending caps 
set up by last year's budget agreement. Again, this is not true. 
President Clinton has not only violated the spirit of the budget deal, 
he has also in effect broken the statutory spending caps established 
under the Balanced Budget Act of 1997.
  Secretary Rubin assured us last week that the President would be 
bound by the budget agreement we reached last year. But by the 
President's own estimates, his budget does not meet the statutory caps 
on discretionary spending by actually reducing that spending.
  The offsets proposed in the budget are highly questionable. To stay 
within the caps called for by last year's Balanced Budget Act, the 
President anticipates the use of $60 billion in tax increases to offset 
discretionary spending.
  By doing so, without amending the law, the budget in effect violates 
the two separate enforcement measures set up by the 1990 Budget 
Enforcement Act, and it violates the spirit of last year's budget deal.
  Mr. President, we broke the 1993 statutory spending caps last year, 
and we must never repeat that mistake. The current spending caps must 
stay in place.
  Fourth, President Clinton claims that his budget will save Social 
Security. Again, the President is not being truthful to the American 
people. On the contrary, his budget does nothing to address our long-
term financial imbalances.
  And his call for increased spending would use all of any surplus, 
leaving nothing for Social Security. In fact, under the unified budget, 
the President will borrow another trillion dollars from the Social 
Security Trust Fund by the year 2012.
  The President's Medicare proposal in this budget does more harm than 
good. Although the President has proposed putting the projected budget 
surplus into the Social Security trust funds, he has no specific plan 
of how to save Social Security.
  Simply throwing money into the system without real reform will not 
preserve it. President Clinton's own Social Security Commissioner, 
Kenneth Apfel, recently said the President's proposal to bail out 
Social Security could not alone come close to solving the system's 
impending deficit. It may only extend the fund for two to five years.
  Mr. President, I am deeply disappointed with this budget and troubled 
by its untruthfulness to the American people.
  Although our short-term fiscal condition has improved in recent 
years, thanks to what Chairman Greenspan called an ``exceptionally 
healthy'' economy, our long-term fiscal imbalances still impose a 
threat to our future.
  Washington's bills remain astronomic. We have a $5.5 trillion 
national debt, at least $14 trillion in unfunded liabilities for Social 
Security and Medicare, and more than $5 trillion worth of government 
contingencies. These risks will shatter our economy if we fail to take 
action now.
  If the President will not step up and take the lead in ensuring 
fiscal responsibility, then Congress must. We must continue to cut 
government spending, shrink the size of the government, and reform 
Social Security and Medicare to save them.
  Mr. President, in the next few months, I intend to work with my 
colleagues and the Administration to exercise the fiscal discipline 
necessary to ensure the federal budget will be balanced--and stay 
balanced--without

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new taxes, without new spending, and without borrowing from the Social 
Security Trust Fund.
  That is the responsible thing to do. That is the honest thing to do. 
And, Mr. President, that is the right thing to do.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I have two different items that I want 
to visit with my colleagues about. No. 1 is on international trade, and 
the second one will be on the Massiah-Jackson nomination that is before 
the Senate.
  (The remarks of Mr. Grassley pertaining to the submission of S. Con. 
Res. 74 are located in today's Record under ``Submission of Concurrent 
and Senate Resolutions.'')

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