[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 44 (Tuesday, April 21, 1998)]
[House]
[Pages H2080-H2088]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
THE BALANCED BUDGET
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 7, 1997, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Neumann) is
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
Mr. NEUMANN. Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight to talk about an issue that
is very much on the forefront in America. We are hearing a lot about
the fact that the budget is finally balanced. We know that in 1995 when
many of us came here there was this discussion that we were going to
balance the budget by the year 2002, and now we are hearing in America
that the budget is balanced today.
That is good news for the American people, and I would like to spend
most of the hour tonight talking about what it actually means to have a
balanced budget and how Social Security fits into this discussion. And
I guess most important of all, like I found out in my town hall
meetings back home, we had 14 of them over the last week, how it is
that Washington's idea and definition of a balanced budget, albeit the
same since 1969, is very different than what the people in Wisconsin
think and probably what most of America thinks in terms of a budget
being balanced.
I thought I would start with a chart that shows what it was like in
1995 when we first got here. In 1995 when we first got here, the
President made a budget projection and he presented us his version of
what we should be doing. This red line shows where the deficit was
headed in 1995 when we got here, if we had played golf, basketball and
tennis instead of doing our job. But we did not play golf, basketball
and tennis. We fought hard to get Washington spending under control.
Over a two-year period of time we brought the growth rate of
Washington spending down by virtually 50 percent. In two short years it
came from 5.2 percent, that is how fast it was growing when we got
here, down to 2.8 percent. That is how fast it is growing today.
This yellow line on the chart shows what happened in our first 12
months in office, and my colleagues can see the deficit projections
were coming down already after only 12 months in office.
The green line shows what we had hoped to accomplish, and that is the
plan that we laid out when we got here to get to a balanced budget by
the year 2002. And virtually all of America heard about it, but our
constituents said, ``I do not believe they are going to do it.'' That
is what they said back home.
The facts are in, and for the last 12 months running we not only got
to a balanced budget by 2002, we are actually there four years ahead of
schedule. Remember, this is the Washington definition of a balanced
budget. For the last 12 months running, the United States Government
spent less money than they had in their checkbook for the first time
since 1969.
Now, when I get into this discussion about how this relates to Social
Security, many of us are not going to like the Washington definition
very well. But this should in no way take credit away from the fact
that this has been done for the first time since 1969.
{time} 1900
In 1969, I was a sophomore in high school dating the young lady who
now happens to be my wife so I know that was a long time ago, the last
time this actually happened, and America should be cheering for this.
We have come so far in such a short period of time.
I would like to focus on what this actually means because there seems
to be a lot of disagreement, and Lord only knows, a lot of
misunderstanding on exactly what this means when we say we have a
balanced budget. I would like to start with exactly what Washington's
definition of a balanced budget is.
I come from the business world. This is the first office I have ever
held. We were a home-building business. We would not have defined it in
the same way that Washington does out there in the business world.
Washington looks at the total number of dollars coming in, at the total
amount of taxes the American people pay. They add up all of that money
coming in. Then they
[[Page H2081]]
look at their checkbook, and they figure out how many checks they wrote
out. And at the end of the year, for the first time there was actually
more money coming in than what they wrote out in checks.
Again, make no mistake, this side of the picture, the dollars coming
in, is clearly a result of a strong economy. So let us not give any
politicians credit for these dollars coming in because, in fact, that
is the hard work of the American people. That is the people that get up
in the morning, go to work every day of the week, and earn a salary,
and then send taxes to Washington. It is their money that we are
talking about. And with the economy very strong, welfare reform was
passed, able-bodied welfare recipients have returned to the work force.
Those folks started paying taxes in, and that is why the amount of
money coming in has been very strong.
But that is not the end of the picture. On the other side, the money
going out, the rate at which that money is going out, the growth rate
has been slowed by 50 percent in these 3 short years.
Together those two things have led us to a point where we have what
Washington calls a balanced budget. I would like to go further with the
definition because it is important that everyone understands exactly
what they mean by a balanced budget so we understand just how far we
have to go. And the rest of this discussion should in no way take any
credit away from the fact that this has actually happened for the first
time since 1969.
To understand what actually is happening in this budgetary process, I
would encourage my colleagues to think of a pension fund, and think of
a business running a pension fund; only in this case the pension fund
is Social Security.
What I have on this board is the total dollars coming in being
collected out of the American taxpayers' paycheck for Social Security.
We are collecting $480 billion for Social Security this year; that is,
when you look at your pay stub, if you are out there, a hard-working
American, you look at your pay stub, that money coming in for Social
Security equals $480 billion. The total amount being paid back out to
our senior citizens in benefits is $382 billion.
This is not really hard to understand. It is very much like your
checkbook if you sit down at your kitchen table. If you have $480 in
your checkbook, and you write out a 382-dollar check, your checks do
not bounce. It works fine. As a matter of fact, you have $98 billion
left in your checkbook.
What is going on in Social Security is that $98 is supposed to be put
into a savings account. We all know that people in my age group, the
baby-boom generation is rapidly heading toward retirement, and there is
lots of us. As a matter of fact, there is lots more of us than there
are seniors today.
When we get to the retirement years, since there are so many of us,
it means there will be more money going out than what there is coming
in. It is exactly the opposite of the picture that we have today. The
idea is this $98 billion goes into a savings account, and it is much
like we do in our own family. When there is more money going out than
what we have coming in, we then go to that savings account, get the
money out, and Social Security works. That is how Social Security is
supposed to work today.
Now, I would like to point out that these two numbers, they turn
around in about the year 2012. So from now through 2012, we have more
money coming into the system than what we are paying back out. As a
matter of fact, the rest is supposed to go into a savings account.
When I am in my town hall meetings back home in Wisconsin, it did not
matter if I was in Beloit, Janesville, Kenosha, Racine or Burlington,
wherever I was, I would ask the question, what do you suppose
Washington does with that $98 billion that they have extra coming in
from Social Security? They would all start laughing, and they would
say, well, obviously they spend it. The right answer; that is exactly
correct. The American people understand that, and they know that is
what is going on out here.
Let me be very specific on how it works out here. That extra $98
billion comes in. Think of this middle circle as the big government
checkbook because that is where it goes. It gets deposited directly
into the big government checkbook. Washington then writes checks out of
their big government checkbook. Remember the first picture we had up
here. When the dollars in equals the dollars out, we call that a
balanced budget.
You see, however, what is wrong with that picture. That balanced
budget, those dollars going into the big government checkbook, those
dollars going into that checkbook, include this Social Security
surplus. When they look at the dollars going out of that checkbook, it
does not include a check going down here to the Social Security Trust
Fund. So when we talk about a balanced budget in Washington, D.C.,
please do not shoot the messenger; this is the way it has been defined
for many, many years before I got here, all the way back to 1969. They
have defined this thing to be, with these extra dollars coming in, if
we can just get this checkbook so we are not writing out more checks
than what we are taking in, we are going to call that a balanced
budget. That has been the definition.
Remember, since 1969, we have not even balanced the budget even
utilizing the extra money coming from Social Security. So while it is
an important and a first step forward, I think most people in America
would understand and realize that in order to truly balance the budget,
we need to write a check out of that checkbook down here to the Social
Security Trust Fund so that there is actually real money in the Social
Security Trust Fund.
What we do today, that $98 billion goes into the big government
checkbook. They spend all the money out of the big government
checkbook. And since there is no money left to put a check down here,
we simply write an IOU to the Social Security Trust Fund. That IOU, let
me be very technical about it, that IOU is called a nonnegotiable
treasury bond.
A nonnegotiable treasury bond is very simply something that cannot be
sold. The problem with this is if you have got a bond in there that
cannot be sold, and we get to the year 2012, remember that is the year
where there is more money going out because us baby-boom generation
people are getting there so there is more money going out than what
there is coming in. If this thing is full of IOUs, nonnegotiable,
nonmarketable treasury bonds, the question that most logical thinking
people would ask is: Where are they going to get the money from in 2012
to keep Social Security going?
There is only three possible answers to that: One is they can raise
taxes on the American workers. That is a bad idea. The second one is
they can simply borrow more money, and that is a bad idea because that
makes the situation worse for our children. The third one, of course,
is to reduce spending elsewhere in Washington, and I mean I think that
is a great idea. But the problem with that idea is, what is the
probability of it actually happening as opposed to simply going out and
borrowing the money.
The real point here, what needs to be done in Washington, D.C., and
we have written the legislation to do it; I see my good friend from
Minnesota has joined me, and in spite of the tie he has on, I am going
to invite him into this conversation. But I would like to just point
out that we have written legislation that would specifically take that
$98 billion extra that is coming from Social Security and put it
directly down here into the Social Security Trust Fund.
The bill is called the Social Security Preservation Act. It is H.R.
857, and it effectively stops the government from spending money that
is supposed to be set aside for Social Security. This means when we get
to the year 2012, the government can go down here to the Social
Security Trust Fund; we will have negotiable treasury bonds; that is, a
treasury bond that anybody can go to their local bank and buy.
When I was at our town hall meetings, I asked our seniors if they
knew what a treasury bond was. I would say at every meeting we had
three or four that actually owned treasury bonds because they had
bought them at their local bank. What we are suggesting we do is put
that right down here in nonnegotiable treasury bonds, regular T bills
that you can buy at your local bank. Then, when 2012 gets here, we
simply go to the trust fund, sell the
[[Page H2082]]
treasury bond, get the money, and Social Security is solvent.
I need to be very specific on this, though, because while that solves
the problem in 2012, this works much like your home checkbook. If you
overdraw your checkbook this month, you go to your savings account and
you get the money, and you put it in your checkbook and make good,
everything is fine. But then next month, you overdraw your checkbook
again, go to the savings account, get the money, and everything is
fine. But if you keep doing that month after month after month, which
is what happens in Social Security beyond the year 2012, eventually
what would happen to your savings account, of course, is you would run
out of money.
In the Social Security system, even if all of the money is in the
trust fund that is supposed to be there, including repayment of the
money that was supposed to have been put there in the first place, even
if all of that money is there, their savings account reaches zero in
the year 2029. So that is why we are hearing all of this discussion
about Social Security today. Two thousand twelve, we are okay if there
is really money in the Social Security Trust Fund.
If H.R. 857, the Social Security Preservation Act passes, and the
trust fund is full of real money, we are okay in the year 2012. But our
savings account runs out of money, much as your personal savings
account would eventually run out of money if you kept overdrawing your
checkbook; the Social Security Trust Fund savings account also runs out
of money in the year 2029.
I yield to the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Gutknecht).
Mr. GUTKNECHT. I would like to thank the gentleman for yielding to
me, and despite the tie, I am delighted to be with you tonight. I just
want you to know my brother gave me this tie so if he is watching back
home, he will know what you had to say about it.
Mr. NEUMANN. That was a compliment.
Mr. GUTKNECHT. I want to congratulate you for all that you have done;
not so much just in balancing the budget, because I think members of
the Committee on the Budget, and you also are on the important
Committee on Appropriations. I do not know of anybody who has fought
more to balance the budget, to fight wasteful Washington spending than
you have.
I am glad you are talking a little tonight about Social Security and
Medicare and seniors issues because you are not only a cosponsor of the
Social Security Preservation Act, but you are also a very important
proponent of trying to solve the notch issue. I know that I and many of
my colleagues, I expect, I heard you mention that you had town hall
meetings during the Easter break as well. Almost everywhere I went when
I met with seniors, someone raised the issue of the notch baby problem.
And I do not know if you spent any time talking about that, but this is
really an issue, particularly now, I think, that at least we are moving
towards a surplus using the old accounting method here in Washington;
that maybe this is the time, this is the year we can finally do
something to bring about some fairness to those folks who are called
notch babies.
I have a particular interest, perhaps a parochial interest, if you
will, in this issue because my father is a notch baby. Every so often
when I am home for a family reunion or weekend, whatever, he reminds me
that notch babies have been treated unfairly by the system. And up
until this point there have not been many Members in this House, or in
this city, who have been willing to seriously deal with the issue.
I just wanted to congratulate you. I am a proud cosponsor of H.R.
3008 for the first time giving some kind of lump sum payments, and I
think the bill originally called for a $5,000 lump sum payment. I am
not certain if ultimately that will be the number, but clearly the time
has come to recognize the inequity and perhaps you want to talk a
little bit tonight about the notch-baby problem. I suspect there are
many people who are watching who have a very strong interest in it.
Mr. NEUMANN. Well, when we wrote the notch bill, we wrote it very
different this time. As a matter of fact, when I have been on the floor
of the House sometimes Members have said this has been discussed
before, and we cannot do anything about it. But we wrote the notch bill
very different this time than in the past.
In the past, when they proposed fixes to the notch problem, and let
me make it very clear, I have got the numbers in my office on this. The
notch babies are not getting an equitable monthly payment in Social
Security when compared to other people who have paid exactly the same
amount into the system. When we wrote the notch bill this time, we went
to other parts of the budget and we said, look, this is not right what
is happening to seniors here. We are going to reduce spending over here
in order to provide the money necessary to correct the notch problem
that is very real.
And the bill we wrote does two things. It gives our senior citizens
the option of one of two things: They can either correct their monthly
payment, or get to a monthly payment that is approximately equal to
other people who have paid the same amount into the system, or they can
take the $5,000 lump sum payment paid over a 4-year period of time. It
would be their choice as to which one of these two that they were to
receive.
But the gentleman is absolutely correct. The senior citizens that
were born in those years that are commonly called the notch babies,
they are certainly not receiving a fair payment back in the Social
Security system. I personally think it is high time something got done
about it. The group that came in in 1995, this is really the first time
we are starting to discuss this in depth. The problem should be fixed
and it should be fixed today.
Mr. GUTKNECHT. Just for the Members who may not know, these are
principally people born between the years 1917 and 1926. And there is
almost something cynical about this.
Most of my seniors are not particularly cynical people, but it does
almost seem as if Members of Congress in the past said, well, if we
just let this thing go eventually all of these people will die off, and
it is not a problem anymore. I hope that we are bigger than that. I
hope we are better than that. I think, hopefully, we can find the funds
this year within the budget to take care of those people.
I would also like to talk a little bit about how important and the
work that has gone, and I am not certain how many of your slides you
have shown tonight talking about the seriousness of the debt and how
far we have come. I think we need to remind ourselves once in a while
that under the old accounting standards, and going back to about 1964,
and what we call the unified budget, we have literally taken those
excess Social Security funds and used them to mask the deficit.
Now, some people say that happened because people back in the mid-
1960s wanted to hide the cost both of the Vietnam War as well as the
great society. And this was a way of being able to spend the money
without having to recognize the trust fund obligations that we had
ultimately to Social Security. So I think the time has come, because we
have come so far with balancing the budget. We have eliminated over 300
programs. We have cut the rate of growth in Federal spending in the
last 3 years by almost 50 percent. We are closer today, and probably
you have done a better job even than the Congressional Budget Office in
terms of predicting where we would be relative to the balance and
ultimately to a surplus.
{time} 1915
Mr. NEUMANN. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, if we look at what is
happening in America today and we look at the revenue growth rate and
the spending growth rate, and to most American citizens they do not
want to know about all that stuff, that is our job to know that stuff,
but when we look at what is actually happening out there today, the
surpluses, by the old definition, will exceed the amount of money that
is necessary to be put aside for Social Security in the near term.
Let me make this very, very clear. Even setting Social Security money
aside, we will be running surpluses by the year 2000, 2001 as large as
$250 billion. Take out the Social Security money and we still have got
a $150 billion surplus by the year 2001 or thereabouts. And I think it
is very important that the American people engage
[[Page H2083]]
in this debate right now as to what they would like to see done with
this surplus.
And, again, let us be real about this. If we go into a recession,
this is not going to happen. If we have a war, this is not going to
happen. But if things keep going the way they are right now today, if
we do not have a major economic downturn, we are looking at surpluses
that are large enough to set aside the Social Security money the way we
should and still have about $150 billion left over.
Mr. GUTKNECHT. If the gentleman would yield further, though, there is
one more caveat that he did not mention; and that is that we do not
return to spending normally. The pressure to spend in this town, the
propensity of Washington to spend money that is not ours, it is so easy
to spend other people's money and it is even easier to spend the money
of people who are not yet born.
We have our friend the gentleman from South Dakota (Mr. Thune)
joining us.
I want to share one more thought. All of us are no more than one
generation removed from the farm, and this is something I talked about
in some of my town hall meetings in terms of balancing the budget and
ultimately paying off some of that national debt. And my colleague and
I are cosponsors of a bill which, ultimately, if we could get the
Congress to agree to it, would actually pay off the debt. Let me share
before we yield to our friend from South Dakota.
Historically, particularly people out in the farm understand this,
that the American dream was to pay off the mortgage and leave our kids
the farm. And what Congress had been doing for the last 30 years is we
have been literally selling off the farm and leaving our kids with the
mortgage. And it is time that that change.
Mr. NEUMANN. That is what this picture really shows. This picture
shows the growing debt facing the United States of America. From 1960
to 1980, it did not grow very much. But from 1980, that is where that
huge growth rate has been. Where we go to with this discussion of
surpluses beyond the Social Security money, that is, even if we set the
Social Security money aside, is still a surplus of $150 billion. What
it does is put us in a position where we can start dealing with paying
back some of this debt. We can start dealing with putting the money
back into the Social Security Trust Fund that has been taken out
basically over the last 15 years.
It is important to note when we look at this debt picture that part
of the red that we are seeing in this debt picture is the Social
Security Trust Fund money that has been taken out over the last 15
years. So, as we start repaying the Federal debt, we can also put the
money back into the Social Security Trust Fund.
I guess if I were to look at this surplus personally, I would say we
have three major problems facing the United States of America, and my
colleagues might join me in this. I think the three problems we have
facing America, economically at least, are the debt of $5\1/2\
trillion, and we ought to be making payments on the debt, much like
people would make payments on their own home mortgage.
Taxes are too high in America. Americans pay $37 out of every $100
they earn in taxes at some form of government level today. Would it not
it be nice if we could get that back to where it was in 1955, say to
$25 out of every $100 they earn?
And the third problem is the Social Security system. Because even if
we are paying down debt, getting all the money into the trust fund that
belongs there, we still have the long-term problem out in 2029 where,
ultimately, the Social Security savings account runs out of money.
So those are three problems that need to be fixed, and the debt needs
to be repaid. Taxes are too high, and they need to be brought down, and
we need to restore the Social Security Trust Fund. And, of course, the
gentleman is a cosponsor of a bill, the National Debt Repayment Act,
that literally takes the surpluses and divides it equally amongst those
three categories for purposes of paying down debt, restoring long-term
Social Security and lowering taxes on Americans.
I yield to the gentleman from South Dakota (Mr. Thune).
Mr. THUNE. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from Wisconsin
for yielding, and I would suspect, and the gentleman from Minnesota
here, my colleague to the east, and I would guess that their
congressional districts are not very much unlike my State of South
Dakota, and I represent the entire State.
But I would like to credit the gentleman from Wisconsin for the
exemplary leadership he has taken on this issue. Because I think one of
the reasons that we are having this discussion today is that the class
that my two colleagues came in with back in 1995 got this spending
situation into control and basically injected a new discipline into the
process out here, and I think that has helped propel us to where we are
both in terms of the economy and what we are going to be able to do to
address the debt situation.
In fact, the gentleman from Minnesota made the comment earlier that
there is CBO and OMB and there is always this raging debate about whose
numbers are more accurate, and I think we ought to have the Neumann
rule. The Neumann law would be the one that works, because I think he
has proven in the past to be the most accurate predictor of what some
of these economic assumptions and what some of these budget numbers are
going to be.
But let me just say, because I think it is very important to note
what my colleagues are attempting to do here, and that is to put us on
a path to fiscal responsibility in the future so we do not end up
selling the farm out from beneath our children and grandchildren.
Many of the proposals that the gentleman from Wisconsin, I am a
cosponsor of one as our friend from Minnesota, address this issue in a
very systematic way and start working down debt, paying down debt,
lowering taxes and again in a very systematic, disciplined and
deliberate way, so that in the next 30 years we will have eliminated
this.
It is a novel concept in this town to talk about spending only 99
percent of what you take in; and, ultimately, what we are going to have
to do if we are going to get this under control is limit the amount the
Federal Government takes in the first place. Because both my colleagues
have noted that once it ends up in this town, it is going to get spent;
and the only way we can avoid that is to leave the money at home and
make the Federal budget smaller and the family budget bigger. And,
again, I think that has been the objective of many of us here in this
Congress.
It was interesting to me because, as I traveled the State of South
Dakota this last week, I heard a lot about commodity prices; and there
was a concern about wheat and corn. I am sure my colleagues all heard
that, too, some about transportation funding, because that is important
in my State, a number of issues that were brought up.
But I walked into a gas station in Aberdeen, South Dakota; and as I
was going up to pay for the gas, the lady at the checkout said, ``You
know, Congressman, working families need lower taxes.'' She went on to
explain that she and her husband both work. They are raising children.
They are trying to educate their children. They are trying to put away
a little money for retirement. And she understands full well that
the way that we liberate and help working families in this country is
not by forcing more government solutions down their throat but by
allowing them to keep more of what they earn so the decisions about
their daily lives, the things that affect them, like education, like
retirement, like health care, like child care, are decisions that they
are able to make.
That again I think is the direction in which the gentleman from
Wisconsin in his legislation moves this country, and that is a very
positive one. Because, again, I believe it shifts power and control and
authority out of this city and back home; and that is something that
the liberals have a big time with.
Mr. NEUMANN. In one of my town hall meetings, and my colleague
mentioned this, bring the taxes down, we had a person sitting there and
he was clearly not what we would call a supporter of Mark Neumann, and
he said, ``We don't need lower taxes. We don't need tax cuts. We need
higher paying jobs.'' And I am thinking to myself,
[[Page H2084]]
higher paying jobs, is that not for more money in our take-home
paycheck and is that not exactly what the tax cuts do is provide more
take-home pay for those workers? But somehow they have got this
ingrained message we need higher paying jobs.
Well, the facts are, the reason they need higher paying jobs is
because the Government overtaxes them. If the Government would let them
keep more of their own money, it effectively creates a higher paying
job by letting them keep more of their own money.
That family my colleague was talking about, did he go through the tax
cuts we just passed to them? How many kids do they have?
Mr. THUNE. Well, I should have. I did not ask specifically how many.
But I should have walked through the things that happened last year and
how she and her family are going to benefit from that.
You go across the board in my State of South Dakota, because we are
basically small businesses, farmers, ranchers, and you look at the
death tax and rolling that back and the capital gains tax and rolling
that back and the family credit and Hope scholarship, all of these
things were done with an eye toward allowing working families to have
more control over their own future.
Mr. NEUMANN. Let us be very, very specific. Let us assume that this
young lady that my colleague talked to at the gas station had three
kids. Next year, when they figure out their taxes and their family and
they get to the bottom line, they subtract off $1,200, $400 for each
one of those children under the age of 17. That was the tax cut package
that was signed into law last year. If they have some in college, they
will get to the bottom line of their taxes and for a freshman or
sophomore they subtract off $1,500 to help pay for that college
tuition.
I had a bunch of high school seniors out here in the last couple
weeks from a couple of our different high schools around and I asked
them, did you know that next year when you go to pay your college
tuition your parents are going to get a $1,500 tax credit? That is,
they figure out how much they would have sent to Washington and they
subtract $1,500 off the bottom line to help pay for their college. A
lot of them do not even know about it yet, but this is there and
available. Juniors and seniors, it is 20 percent of the first $5,000,
or $1,000.
My colleague mentioned the capital gains, rolling it back. Let us be
very specific. The amazing thing to me in our town hall meetings, and,
remember, this is not Republicans in our town hall meetings. This is
Republicans, Independents, Democrats. It is Americans, which is exactly
the way town hall meetings should be. They are open and publicized and
everybody comes.
When I asked the question, ``How many in this room own a stock, a
bond, or mutual fund or participate in a 401(k) retirement plan,'' it
is amazing. I would say it is 99 percent in those rooms. And the next
thing I say is, ``By the way, I hope if you invested in stocks or bonds
or mutual funds you made a profit, because that is what your investment
is all about and that is right.''
The capital gains tax reduction that we passed last year means that
if they make a profit, say they make $100 selling some stock they own,
instead of sending $28 out of that $100 to Washington, they send $20.
And if they are earning less than $40,000 a year, and it is amazing
again, the number of people earning less than $40,000 a year that have
also invested in stocks and bonds, if they are earning less than
$40,000 a year, instead of sending Washington $15 out of the $100 they
made, they only send them $10.
So these capital gains, I like to put it in real family perspective.
Let me bring a Janesville family in since we talked about a South
Dakota family. They have got two kids at home and a freshman in
college. This family, when they go to do their taxes next year, they
subtract off $400 for each one of the kids that are still home and
$1,500 for the college freshman. That is a total of $2,300 that they
keep in their home, in their family, instead of sending it to
Washington.
I always like to ask the next question. The next question I always
ask them is, ``So who do you suppose could spend this money better, us
out here in Washington or you in your family in your own home?'' And
there is just a chuckle around the room because we all know the answer
to that question.
Mr. GUTKNECHT. I think sometimes we have to remind ourselves, and I
know that my colleague was back in South Dakota and was probably
watching some of the debates when we first got into this fight about
balancing the budget and allowing families to keep more of their own
money while we were trying to save Medicare and a lot of the critics
and cynics on the other side said, first of all, you cannot do it. You
cannot balance the budget. You certainly cannot balance the budget and
provide tax relief. And, above all, you cannot balance the budget,
provide tax relief, and save Medicare.
Then sometimes the cynics said, well, if you give these tax cuts it
will only benefit the wealthy and particularly as it relates to capital
gains. I mean, that was the argument. I am sure my colleague heard it.
There were ads run. There was almost hysteria around this town that if
you provide capital gains tax relief, it will not do much for the
economy but it will help the wealthy.
Well, we did not pay attention to the cynics. We did not pay
attention to the critics. We had to ignore them. And, ultimately, what
happened? Well, we are balancing the budget. We have the healthiest
economy we have seen in 30 years, the lowest unemployment rate.
And perhaps the best news of all, partly because of our welfare
reform, and I know the governor in Wisconsin has probably done more
than almost any other governor, we have done a good job in Minnesota,
and I think they have done a good job in South Dakota as well. But
nationally, when we passed welfare reform and sent a lot of the
decision-making back to the States and all that we did was require
work, personal responsibility and encourage families to stay together,
that was welfare reform. We block granted it. We ended the Federal
entitlement, which existed for 60 years.
And a lot of the critics and cynics on the other side said, ``You are
going to pull the rug out from these people. People will starve. People
will be thrown out in the streets.''
Well, let us look at the facts. Let us look at what has happened. 2.2
million American families have moved off of welfare roles and onto
payrolls.
{time} 1930
I will tell the gentleman a story from my district. I was meeting
with some teachers. After school, we talked about Title 1, and we
talked about some educational programs.
Finally, one of the teachers said, you know, of all of the things you
guys have done since you went to Washington, I think the most important
is this welfare reform. I said, really. Tell me about that.
She said, well, let me tell you about one of my students. Let us call
him Johnny. All of a sudden, Johnny started to behave better. He had a
better attitude. He was a better student. He even carried himself
better. Finally, she said, I asked Johnny, is there something different
at your house? Johnny said, yeah, my dad got a job.
We forget sometimes, those of us who have had at least one job since
we were 15 years old, that a job is more than the way we earn our
living. A job helps improve and affect our entire life, and it affects
everybody in the family.
Through a stronger economy, by lowering capital gains tax rates, by
allowing families to keep more of what they earn, by encouraging work
and personal responsibility, the great news is, not only have we saved
money, but we have saved people. We have saved families. We have saved
kids from one more generation of dependency and dispair.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back to my friend from Wisconsin.
Mr. NEUMANN. Mr. Speaker, a very exciting thing. When I was in our
district and I toured one of the centers where they help people leave
the welfare and get into the workforce, they did not talk to those
families about the first job or only the first job they were going to
get. At this work center, they talked to them about the first job and
showed them how, if they were successful at the first job, they could
have a second job, and how then there was a promotion waiting. They
literally went to the fourth job for these families that were leaving
welfare.
If citizens stay on welfare, they are destined to receive only what
the government decides to give them. But if
[[Page H2085]]
they go into the workforce, they have the opportunity to receive a job
promotion and create a better life for themselves and their family.
That is what welfare reform is all about. That is the exciting thing in
welfare reform.
Mr. THUNE. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman would yield, I would also
add, and I think, again, it is something that my colleagues all were
responsible for doing when they came here back in 1995 to reform the
welfare system. But it started with a principle, and that is that the
welfare program ought not to be measured, its success ought not to be
measured by how many people we get on welfare but how many people we
get off. And that is a value. Hard work is a value and personal
responsibility. That translates into a public policy which has produced
the exact results that we thought it would.
I think that is a great tribute to the work that my colleagues did
when they got here. Of course, we in 1996 and 1997 and following, we
were able to join them and continue down that road.
I think, in many respects, if we look at the success in the economy,
and there has been a lot of talk about who should get credit for the
booming economy. The President says it was his budget. It was his 1993
budget which, of course, included $250 billion in tax increases which I
have a hard time thinking have a lot to do with an economic recovery.
Since the Republicans took control, since this majority took over in
1995 and we made some of the tough decisions on fiscal policy and
getting our fiscal house in order, the markets have recognized that. We
look at what the markets have done. But before the election in 1994,
the DOW was at about 3800 points; today, it is over 9000.
So to suggest for a moment that that was all a result of the 1993 tax
increase I think begs the question. The question is: What about all the
hard work that was done by this Congress when they came in, made those
hard fiscal choices, which the markets recognize, interest rates
started coming down? And the general attitude in this town, for a
change, was, we are going to do what we can to lower the tax burden so
people can make investments, keep more of what they earn. That
unleashed a whole new round of investment. We are seeing the
renaissance of a lot of that decision making.
I think, frankly, in fairness, we need to give credit where credit is
due. Those of us who joined this Congress back in 1995 deserve a great
deal of credit.
Mr. NEUMANN. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I think what the
gentleman talks about, and I showed this chart earlier this evening,
but when he talks about what happened, and they said the 1993 tax
increase somehow solved this problem. This is in 1995, 2 years after
the tax increase, where the deficit was going when we got here. This is
the President's budget proposal in April of 1995. This is where the
deficit was going.
It is not the tax increase that solved the problem. It was a
combination of a strong economy coupled with controlled Washington
spending, getting the growth rate of Washington spending under control.
The yellow line is our first 12 months here, the green line is what
we hope to do, and the blue line, reaching balanced budget 4 years
ahead of schedule, is what has actually happened.
Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman would yield, the truth
of the matter is the facts speak very loudly. In fact, I often quote
John Adams, one of the people who helped write our Constitution. He
said, facts are stubborn things, and the facts are overwhelming. That
is that if tax increases alone would have balanced the budget, we would
have had a huge surplus long ago.
As the gentleman indicated earlier, when Washington gets its hands on
the money, the history has always been that it spends it. Not only does
it spend it, but let me give my colleagues one more statistic that
people forget.
On the last 30 years, on average, for every dollar that Congress took
in, it spent an average of $1.22. Since we took control, since the
Republicans took control of this Congress, that number is down to a
$1.01. I think, with this budget, it will actually be about 99 cents.
If that is not a clear-cut difference, I do not know what is.
Mr. NEUMANN. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I think the other thing
that needs to be kept in mind here, from 1969 to today, we have had
other strong economies but never got a balanced budget. Lord only
knows, we have had more than enough tax increases between 1969 and
today. That is how we have got the high tax rates we have got today.
Neither the tax increases nor the strong economy, by themselves, have
led us to a balanced budget. It has been the controlling of Washington
spending coupled with that.
We talked about some solutions here like welfare and getting us to a
balanced budget. I want to drop back to Social Security for a minute
because, long term, we still have this Social Security problem that,
even if we get the money in the Social Security Trust Fund by passing
the Social Security Preservation Act, in the year 2029, they still run
out of money. The Social Security Preservation Act solves it from 2012
to 2029.
I would like to, just for a minute, focus on some of the discussion
that is going on here. I found when I was talking to the American
people and I said Democrat Senator Patrick Moynihan has a plan on the
table, everybody knew who Democratic Senator Patrick Moynihan was. They
had very little knowledge of what his plan was, other than he was a
person who usually worked with seniors.
I think it is important, and let me be very specific about this, I do
not support this plan, but I think it is important the American people
understand what it is that Democrat Senator Patrick Moynihan is
proposing, because it is the number one plan in terms of solves Social
Security. It goes back to the old ways.
Here is what it does. It first lowers the cost of living adjustments
to senior citizens by 1 percent. I found all our seniors in our town
hall meeting knew what the cost of living adjustments were. The plan
lowers cost of living adjustments by 1 percent.
It increases the retirement age from 67 to 70. It raises the taxes on
Social Security benefits. And here is how he does this in the plan. He
looks at how much is paid into Social Security over the years. Anything
we get out over and above that amount is 100 percent taxable.
So it is a monumental tax increase on our seniors. It lowers the
benefits being paid to our seniors up front by recomputing the number
of years from which we base our initial payment.
The part that he is getting a lot of support for, and even some of my
conservative friends are supporting him, because it takes the 12.4
percent Social Security tax that is being paid today and it lowers it
to 10.4. That is where the support is coming from.
A lot of people are seeing that reduction from 12.4 to 10.4 as
something that is good. His idea is that, if people get that extra 2
percent in their pocket, they can put it away and take care of
themselves in their own retirement.
That sounds very good, but we need to understand that, if that
happens, we no longer have solvency past the year 2012, and the system
is now bankrupt in the year 2012. So I do not support this plan. But I
think it is important that the American people have the opportunity to
understand what is in the plan.
I would like to give my colleagues some modern thinking. This new
Congress that has come out here and solved Medicare without raising the
taxes by looking at things like diabetes and realizing that it was much
cheaper and much better for our senior citizens to provide preventive
care than it was to wait until a senior citizen got very sick because
of diabetes, solving Medicare problems with common sense solutions that
did not just throw money at the problem.
There is a proposal out here right now, and I am not 100 percent
ready to say I support it, but let me just go through the proposal
because it is so different than anything else that has been talked
about in terms of solving the Social Security problem.
Here is what the proposal does. It says, first, we are going to set
aside the money that is coming in for Social Security today. So we take
that extra money that is coming in, we put it in a savings account. We
solve the short-term problem in Social Security immediately by putting
that money away.
We then look at surpluses over and above that amount of money for
Social
[[Page H2086]]
Security. So Social Security goes on just exactly as it is today. We
look at surpluses above that amount that is coming in. We take those
surpluses, and we take part of the surplus, and we give it to each
American over the age of 18.
Every American is getting their share of it over the age of 18,
seniors and nonseniors. The catch here is that, if they are under 65,
they get their share of the surplus in the form of a check to a 401(k)
type savings account. The only stipulation, it is their money, they
decide where they invest it, they can put it in a stock or bond or
mutual fund or CD, where they invest it is their decision, but the only
stipulation is they cannot take the money out until they reach age 65.
So we look at the surpluses over and above Social Security. We divide
a part of those surpluses amongst all Americans over the age of 18. If
citizens are under 65, they get a check. The check goes to their 401(k)
plan. The only stipulation is they cannot take the money out until they
retire.
What if they are over 65? If they are over 65, they simply get their
share of the surplus in the form of a check. Because, of course, if
they are over 65, it would not make sense to set up this 401(k).
Even though it is completely separate from Social Security, here is
how that helped solved the long-term Social Security problems. For
seniors today or for younger people when they reach 65 and start
drawing on this account, half of whatever they get counts back against
what they would have gotten in Social Security, and the other half is
simply theirs to keep.
Again, the idea here is we look at surpluses over and above the
Social Security surplus. We divide it up amongst the American people.
I talked to my brother about this, and he says, you know, Mark, my
company is doing really well. We have a pension and profit-sharing
plan. This is sort of like America is doing real well right now. If
America is doing real well, I mentioned before, that within 3 or 4
years even, setting Social Security aside, we could look at surpluses
of $150 billion.
Let me translate that. $150 billion is roughly $600 for every person
over the age of 18. So that $600 check, or part of that check,
depending on how much we allocate to Social Security, would simply go
into that 401(k) plan on behalf of everybody under the age of 16 or
directly to the senior citizens for those that are over 65.
Again, half of whatever they get, either when they start drawing it
at 65 or half of that check that they are getting today if they are
over 65, counts back to that Social Security. That is how we solve the
long-term Social Security problems.
When we look at that next to the idea of cutting the cost of living
adjustment or raising taxes on seniors, these ideas are common-sense,
straightforward, business-sector solutions to a very difficult problem.
It is done without raising taxes on the American people.
Mr. THUNE. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman would yield, I did a lot of
talking about that very proposal just to get a feedback and reaction
from the people of South Dakota as to what they thought about that.
Because, as the gentleman noted, we have to do something to address
this very serious problem in the years as we get down the road. Today,
obviously, the gentleman has laid out a plan which would protect us,
but, ultimately, we have to do something that is consistent with a
couple of principles which he mentioned.
First of all, we have to save this system. There are so many people.
In my State of South Dakota, for example, we have an elderly population
very dependent upon it. And to make the basic statement that they will
be protected, the safety net is there, they will continue to receive
Social Security benefits as they are today and then even perhaps, in
addition to that, with respect to whatever the surplus check might be,
but that we do not touch that aspect of it.
But what we allow is we say the surplus that comes into Washington,
rather than allowing Washington to spend it, because, once it comes in
here, as we mentioned earlier, somehow Washington will find a way to
spend it, that the only way that is consistent with our values, and
that is allowing more people in this country to keep more of what they
earn, to make decisions about their future, to put it in a retirement
account, a Social Security plus account that will accumulate, get the
benefit of compound interest, and, over time, we would dramatically
increase the amount of retirement income that people who are paying in
today would receive.
Again, I think, ultimately, that is something that merits serious
consideration. The gentleman said it is a poposal. It is something that
has been laid out there. But when we compare it with the alternative,
the Democrat alternative, which is a tax increase on seniors, clearly
this is something which not only protects people who are currently on
the program but allows us to harness the surplus dollars that are going
to come in and put them to work for the people of this country.
Mr. NEUMANN. Mr. Speaker, there are two other benefits that I would
like to point out in this plan.
If there is a 20-year-old today and he started putting money into
this plan and his account grew and at age 45, for whatever reason,
something happened, he is married, he has got a couple kids, and he
dies, whatever money is in that account is passed on to his spouse or
his kids. It is his money. It does not go anywhere else. It is his
money. It would literally be passed on to his spouse.
The other wonderful thing in this plan, as far as I can see, is that
it makes each and every American citizen tied into helping us control
Washington spending. Because, as both of my colleagues have mentioned,
if this spending goes back out of control like it was when we got here,
there are not going to be any surplusses.
The key here is keeping that spending under control. If every
American citizen is getting a piece of that surplus, like my brother
says, pension and profit sharing, if every American citizen is tied
into that surplus, we will quickly get their support to help us keep
Washington spending under control.
To me, that is what government should be all about. It should be all
about the American people being actively involved in the decisions we
make. They will provide the impetus necessary for us to keep this
spending under control.
{time} 1945
Mr. GUTKNECHT. I really think that for many years we labored under
some unwritten law, if you will, that no good deed goes unpunished. If
you worked you were punished, if you saved you were punished, if you
invested you were punished, if you grew a business and hired people,
you were punished.
In fact, even in the Medicare system those areas, regions of the
country, and I think we all come from areas where we have had
relatively low health care costs, as a result, in terms of the Medicare
reimbursement schedule we were punished. And that was really the
unwritten rule of Washington, and what we are trying to do is change
that and try to reverse some of those perverse incentives.
And if we do that I think that long term, and as you say, if we can
come up with a Medicare system and a Social Security system which uses
market principles and the doctrine of enlightened self-interest to get
more people to feel as if they are stakeholders in the system, in the
long run we will have a better system which provides more value to
consumers or to Social Security people, recipients of Medicare
treatments, whatever. And that is what we are really trying to do, is
reverse those age-old perverse incentives which have been created here
in Washington.
Mr. NEUMANN. I think at this point if we could, we have been talking
a lot about these economic problems and the solutions, and I think we
have hit on the three economic problems facing America.
We must restore the Social Security system. Our seniors have a right
to get up in the morning knowing their Social Security is safe.
We need to pay down the Federal debt. Our children deserve to inherit
a debt free Nation and reduce the tax burden on American workers.
I would like to jump over to the social side for just a minute, and I
would like to talk about a couple issues over on the social side and I
would like to start with education, because we recently received a
report that tells us
[[Page H2087]]
that our kids are number 21 in the world in education. And I want to
talk about a vision for our Nation's future that does not bring us back
to the top 10, I want to talk about a vision for America that brings
our kids back to number 1 in the world, and I think that should be our
target. Not back into the top 10 in the world; I want our kids to be
the best educated kids in the entire world, and that should be our
goal.
But you know where we get into conflict here, and we are hearing this
in the news today, we get into this conflict that somehow the right way
to get education problems solved is for Washington to come running into
the picture and Washington to develop new spending programs. Washington
is going to hire new teachers and Washington is going to build new
schools.
What that means is Washington is taking control of the education
system, and I think that is exactly what has led us to number 21 in the
world. If we want to turn the education system around, the right answer
is to get the parents back involved in the education process of their
kids.
Parents should be choosing where their kids are going to school, what
their kids are learning and how it is going to be taught. If we really
want to solve the education problems facing the United States of
America, we need to re-empower our parents to be actively involved in
where the kids go to school, what they are taught and how it is taught.
There is a side benefit, and this came out in a study that was
recently published out here. They looked at 12,000 teenagers across
America, this was in the Washington Times, I believe it was April 10,
but they looked at 12,000 teenagers across America. And as you might
expect, if you look at 12,000 teenagers you find some with crime, you
got drug problems, you got teen pregnancy, you got teen smoking, you
got all the social problems that we hear about Washington trying to
solve.
But when they looked at this study of 12,000 teenagers and they
looked at crime, they found the number one predictor of whether a
student or a teenager was going to be involved in crime was parental
involvement with the child. They found the number one predictor of
whether a student was going to be involved in drugs was the parental
involvement in that teenager's life. Teen pregnancy, same thing. The
number one predictor of whether or not a teenager was going to be
involved with teen pregnancy: parental involvement and the like. Teen
smoking, same thing.
So when you really look at this and when we think about these
concepts that we are talking about here tonight, getting education back
up to number one in the world, how do you do that? You get the parents
back involved in the decision-making process in education. The outcome
will solve a lot of other problems that Washington thinks the right
answer is throwing money at. The right answer is not throwing money at
it; the right answer is getting parents back involved in the lives of
the kids.
And I do not think Washington should mandate that parents have to
spend 2 hours a day with their kids, although it might not be a bad
idea. That is not what I think we should do. But what I do think we
should do is relate this to the other side of this discussion we have
had.
When the tax rate went from $25 out of every $100 that people earned
to $37 out of every $100 people earned, that meant in many cases the
parent was going to be forced to take a second and even a third job,
and when the parents are working at that second and third job, that
means that when they get home they are either too tired or there is no
time to spend with those kids. So when we talk about reducing the tax
rate on American workers, what we are really talking about here is
getting it back to a point where the families do not have to take that
second job, so at least we empower the parents to have the opportunity
to be more actively involved with their teenagers so that those
teenagers are less likely to be involved in drugs, crimes, teen
pregnancy, teen smoking, lots of the other social ills facing America.
That is how this whole vision for America ties together. If we can
get the tax rate down, empower the parents to at least have the
opportunity to make the decision to get back in their kids' lives, we
will see a lot of other solutions.
I want to give a very specific example, and this is a case I am very
familiar with. It is good friends of ours. Christmas time comes in this
family, and they are a middle income family, it is a true story. They
live from paycheck to paycheck, but they are a middle income family.
When Christmas comes, the mother in the house takes a second job. You
know why she takes a second job? Because that is how they pay for their
Christmas presents.
Now just think about a different picture for a minute. Instead of
this mother leaving her home and leaving her family at this most
important time of the year, instead of doing that, if we could bring
this tax rate down so they could just keep that extra $12 out of every
hundred they earn in their home in the first place, that mother does
not have to take that job. It is a second job in this case. She does
not have to take the second job, and when she does not take the second
job, she has more time available to spend with the kids.
More time available with the kids on the part of a parent is the
single most important factor in determining whether we will have crime
problems, drug problems, teen pregnancy, teen smoking, all of these
things that we here in Washington somehow think that we here in
Washington can solve. It is baloney. The way to solve these problems is
get the parents and empower the parents to be actively involved in
their kids' lives. It is the most important thing that we can do, and
it is how the economic discussion ties directly into the social
problems facing America today.
Mr. THUNE. If the gentleman will yield on that, you made one comment
there which I think is really very much on the mark. You know our
children need a learning environment that is safe and drug-free, and we
are losing the war on drugs in America today, and we are not seeing
leadership in trying to snuff that out. And we need to have leadership
at the presidential level, at the congressional level, at the community
level, at the schools, in the families and the churches to address what
has become a very, very serious issue.
And again a case in point in my home State of South Dakota, and we
have often thought that we are somewhat immune from a lot of these
problems that you see in bigger cities. But the fact of the matter is
that a lot of the small communities across South Dakota are having to
come to grips with the fact that drugs are not only accessible, they
are readily available, and that kids are regularly using them.
And there is a small town for which just recently the survey was done
and of the high school kids, 28 percent, almost a third, said they used
drugs more than 4 times a month. That is a staggering statistic in
South Dakota and certainly across this Nation. We have a very serious
problem that we need to eradicate.
And frankly again it is not going to be, I do not think necessarily a
bill that we pass, but it is going to take leadership that we all have
to be a part of in community antidrug coalitions and school-based
programs and really going after this in the same way that we have
common enemies in the past. Because in my view it is a very, very
serious insidious threat to the future of our country, to the future of
or young people, and something that we are not attacking head-on and we
need to, and it starts at the top.
Mr. NEUMANN. Reclaiming my time, and I would just go back to this
survey, and I would keep going back to what the survey found: The
single most important determining factor in whether or not a teenager
is going to be involved with drugs is the involvement of the parent in
the teenager's life. The right answers to these problems are empowering
our parents. That is our role. Get us out of their way so they are not
sending all their money out here in taxes, they do not have to take
that second job; get out of the way so the parents can spend more time
with their kids.
And, I mean, I am not naive enough to think that all of a sudden we
lower taxes, parents spend more time with kids and all the problems go
away. I mean, I am not that naive. But when you start looking at how
you actually go about turning around a Nation that has been headed in
the wrong direction, certainly parental involvement in the kids' lives
ought to be our top priority.
[[Page H2088]]
And one more thing on this social side that I think is very
important. Five years ago we did not even know about this topic, but we
know as a Nation about it today. It is partial-birth abortions. And if
you start looking at America and where we are today and where we are
going to, if we turn our back on this issue, I do not see how we can
solve the rest of the social issues facing our Nation.
A partial-birth abortion is a third trimester, seventh, eighth or
ninth month abortion where the baby is literally partially delivered
and then at the last second the baby is killed. I just do not
understand how we as a Nation can go on allowing this to happen now
that we know about it. Frankly, when I was elected I did not know what
it was, but I know now. And when you start looking at these social ills
facing America, I think we have to accept that that is part of the
problem facing our country, and I think we need to end it.
I have got about a minute and a half left, and I would just like to
kind of sum up this kind of vision for where we are going to. If you
like, a Republican vision for the future of this great Nation that we
live in. How are we going to go about restoring this Nation?
Let me go through on the economic side first very quickly. Restore
the Social Security system so our seniors can get up in the morning
knowing their Social Security is safe. I think every senior is entitled
to that. The debt. Our children deserve a debt-free Nation, so let us
start making payments on the debt much like you would repay a home
mortgage. Taxes are too high on our families all across America, so let
us get that tax rate back down from $37 dollars out of every $100, at
least down to $25 out of every $100 that American workers work so hard
to earn.
On the social side, let us get education, let us make that our top
priority. Let us get education back up to number one in the world, and
do this by involving the parents and giving parents the opportunity to
choose where their kids go to school, what it is they are taught and
how they are taught it. And when the parents get involved in the kids'
lives, making those decisions about education, the automatic outcome is
that extra parental involvement in the kid's life, that leads to lower
crime rates, fewer drug problems, fewer teen pregnancies and less teen
smoking.
This is the right direction to move America, and while we are done
with this, let us make sure we end partial-birth abortions. And let us
then pass this vision on to the next generation and this great Nation
we live in.
Mr. GUTKNECHT. If the gentleman will yield, finally what you are
really saying is what Vaclav Havel, the first freely elected Prime
Minister of Czechoslovakia, said shortly after he was elected. He said
in the end all politics is moral.
Balancing the budget, saving Medicare, saving Social Security and
stopping partial-birth abortions in many respects are all about
regaining some of that high moral ground, and if you ask Americans what
is really wrong in this country, they will many times say it is the
unraveling of the moral fabric of this country. And so all of the
things we have talked about tonight really, at the end of the day, are
about morality.
____________________