[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 48 (Thursday, March 25, 1999)]
[House]
[Pages H1790-H1791]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           DO NOT BUY THE LIE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from South Dakota (Mr. Thune) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. THUNE. Madam Speaker, for the past three months I have listened 
as our friends on the other side have extolled the virtues of the 
President's budget. Today we had an opportunity to vote on a series of 
alternative budgets, one of which was the President's budget, and I 
just have one question:
  Where did all the President's men and all the President's women go 
when it came time to vote on that budget? The President's budget, today 
when it was voted on in the House, got two, two votes out of 435, and 
when it was voted on in the Senate the other day, it got two votes in 
the Senate.

[[Page H1791]]

  Now we have to ask ourselves, why is that? Why did the President's 
budget only get two votes in the House and two votes in the Senate? I 
think that once the smoke had cleared and the dust had settled, it 
became clear that the charade was over.
  Maybe it is because the President spends the Social Security surplus 
in his budget, maybe it is because the President's budget raises taxes 
by $172 billion. Maybe it is because in the President's budget there 
was no funding for priorities that he mentioned in his State of the 
Union address, priorities that rolled out like they were never going to 
end, like agriculture, and he did not put any money in his budget for 
important priorities like reforming the crop insurance program.

  Maybe there were only two votes in the House today on the President's 
budget because the President cuts Medicare. In spite of all the 
rhetoric about saving Medicare and putting aside 15 percent, the 
President's budget cut Medicare by about $10 million.
  Maybe it was because the President's budget busted the budget caps. I 
mean it could be any of those reasons, but the fact of the matter is 
that when all the posturing was done in this Chamber and all the lofty 
rhetoric was put aside, it came time to vote, nobody was there to vote 
in favor of the President's budget.
  So we rolled out an alternative, the Republican budget plan, today, 
and already for weeks our friends on the other side, the Democrats, 
have been assailing that budget. But then, as my colleagues know, the 
rhetoric started to tone down a little bit because they looked at it, 
and they said: ``Well, you know we want to attack the Republican budget 
for Social Security,'' and then they realized that we were locking up, 
walling off the Social Security Trust Fund, making sure that all the 
payroll tax was actually going into the trust fund where it should. And 
then they thought, well maybe we can attack the Republicans again on 
Medicare because they did not fall for the President's percentages game 
and say, well, we are going to do 15 percent here and 62 percent here, 
and 20 percent here, 10 percent here. But then they realized that by 
locking up the payroll tax the Republican budget puts aside more money 
for Social Security and Medicare than the President's budget.
  So, that issue is off the table, and the fact of the matter is they 
could not attack, they want to attack for the veterans budget, but the 
Republican budget actually funded veterans at $1 billion more than the 
President's budget. It funded agriculture at $6 billion more than the 
President's budget.
  So then it was the old traditional line about it is tax cuts for the 
rich. Well, as my colleagues know, if we look at the budget, there are 
not any tax cuts specified in there. Yes, we believe that we ought to 
have a debate. Once we have walled off Social Security and taken care 
of that program and Medicare, and there is $800 billion projected over 
the next 10 years that comes in over and above that, then we believe we 
ought to engage in debate in this city about whether or not to give 
that back to the American people or whether to spend it here in 
Washington. But we will have that debate when and if the time comes. 
But in the meantime we need to do the responsible thing and the honest 
thing, and that is to wall off Social Security and make sure that it is 
there for the next generation of Americans.
  In fact, I want to read something here that AARP, Mr. Horace Deets, 
the Executive Director of AARP, said about the Republican budget plan. 
It says: ``AARP believes it is important to protect Social Security's 
growing reserves and is pleased that the House budget resolution 
provides that protection. Over the next 10 years, Social Security is 
projected to contribute $1.8 trillion of the unified surplus. 
Preserving Social Security's reserves not only allows our country to 
better prepare for the impending retirement of the baby boom 
generation, but also gives us greater financial flexibility to enact 
long-term reform in both Social Security and Medicare once the options 
have been carefully considered and their impact understood.''
  That is from the AARP, and what I would simply say to the American 
people here this evening is:
  ``When you listen to all this rhetoric over the course of the next 
few months, who are you going to trust to solve these problems, Social 
Security and Medicare? Are you going to trust the people who are going 
to be honest with you and say that we are going to put the payroll tax, 
Social Security and Medicare, aside where it should be walled off to be 
used for those purposes, or are you going to trust the people who want 
to keep raiding it like we have in the past?''
  I think the American people are wise, I think the Americans in this 
country who are currently benefiting from Social Security and Medicare 
have figured this out, and I have one simple message for them this 
evening, and that is:
  Do not buy the lie. We have heard it before, we are going to hear it 
again. Work with us in a constructive way to build a better future for 
the 21st century.
  Madam Speaker, I look forward to the opportunity, when we get past 
all the posturing and all the rhetoric, to work with my colleagues on 
the other side to come up with a budget that takes care of these 
important priorities.

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