[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 45 (Friday, March 30, 2001)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3227-S3230]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                               THE BUDGET

  Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, it is midway through Friday afternoon. We 
know most Americans are heading home from a busy day working and 
providing for their families. They may be looking forward over the 
weekend to some of the basketball championships that are going to be 
played on Saturday and again on Monday evening. They are looking 
forward to attending services on Sunday and then spending some time 
with their families.
  Then perhaps on Monday, when they go to work, they may hear on the 
radio or on television that the Senate is involved in what they broadly 
term ``a resolution on the budget.'' By and large, many are going to 
wonder exactly what that means and what is its relationship to their 
lives. They are going to wonder, what is it going to mean to my 
children's education, what is it going to mean to my parents' 
prescription drugs, what is it going to mean as far as investing in 
housing or in law enforcement, or any of the areas of national 
priority, or what is it going to mean in terms of the security of 
Medicare and Social Security? They are going to wonder about this.
  I heard over the last several months the President of the United 
States talk about the fact that he is going to urge the Congress to 
pass a very sizable tax cut. He talks about $1.6 trillion tax cut. We 
know the real figures are far in excess of that because they do not 
include other factors, as others have pointed out in earlier debates. 
Senator Conrad has done such a wonderful job not only in educating the 
Members of the Senate but also in helping the American people 
understand what is at stake with the President's tax reductions and the 
real economic impact it will have on the economic stability of our 
Nation.
  People are hearing our President say we can have a very sizable tax 
cut, and even with that tax cut, still be able to preserve Social 
Security and Medicare and fulfill the kinds of commitments that were 
made in the course of the campaign on prescription drugs, on education, 
on national security and defense.
  Citizens will wonder when they hear others speak in the Senate, 
principally from this side, when the Democrats say we cannot afford it 
all. They are going to hear those voices and wonder how do we really 
put all of this into some perspective. They are hard working and this 
doesn't make a great deal of sense. Maybe there is some sense that the 
budget resolution will result in an outcome that perhaps, over the 
course of this week, citizens will think, if I pay careful attention I 
will better understand.
  There are two very obvious conflicting statements we are receiving. 
One says we can afford the tax cuts. I think the American people are 
somewhat skeptical of that. They should be.
  I remember being here in 1981. I was one of 11 who voted against the 
Reagan tax cut that had similar kinds of support. As a matter of fact, 
many of those individuals who have been working on this current tax 
reduction are the same people who worked on President Reagan's tax 
reduction. At that time, we heard it all. It is the same record. I 
almost believe it's the same speech.
  I can hear it then: We can afford to have these major tax cuts. We 
can afford that and still provide billions and tens of billions in 
defense, and we are going to meet our national security, and we are 
going to be able to afford all of this and still see an expanding and 
growing economy.
  Of course, that was not the case. We saw the direct result of those 
tax cuts when this country went into a deficit of $4.6 trillion. 
People's eyes kind of glaze over when we talk about those figures. For 
the average family, it means they will pay several hundred dollars a 
year more on their student loan programs because it will be higher 
interest rates. They will pay several hundred dollars more on their car 
payments when buying a new car. They will spend several thousand 
dollars more, if fortunate enough, in purchasing a new home.
  That is what happened with the Reagan tax cut. That is the hidden 
cost that every working family and middle-income family is paying for 
every single year when we have those very sizable deficits. Those are 
the facts.
  I think they understand it. They understood over the period of the 
last 8 years that we had the longest period of economic growth and 
price stability. In my part of the country, in New England, in 1992, we 
were close to 8 percent unemployment, and we were looking at the future 
with a great sense of trepidation. There was reduction in types of 
defense, the real estate market was flat. Many of the innovative and 
creative computer companies had not worked out. We were wondering what 
the future would hold.
  Then we put in place an economic program, fiscal policy, monetary 
policy, investment incentives for the private sector, investments in 
people, and we saw economic progress.
  We shouldn't lose track of the fact that the proposal of 1981 was 
characterized by our current President's father as being voodoo 
economics. The American people were warned it was voodoo economics. 
Those are not my words, they were the characterization of President 
Bush, father of our current President.
  Now we have a very similar program. The American people are torn, 
with all these surpluses they keep reading and hearing about, 80 
percent of which are estimated to be coming 3\1/2\ to 4 years from now. 
What family would be betting their own kind of future on what may 
happen 3\1/2\ years from now in terms of their income? But here we are 
talking about the future of our nation with all of its implications in 
terms of the economic policy, with what that means, whether we will 
have jobs, can you afford a home, or student loans. That is what we 
talk about in terms of economic policy.

[[Page S3228]]

  We have to ask, as any family would, what does this really mean? We 
have on the one hand a President who says we can have all of that tax 
cut and everything is going to be fine. We will be able to invest in 
education, we can give you that prescription drug program. Don't worry, 
we will be able to meet our national security even though it is a 
changing time in national security. We will be able to meet the other 
kinds of requirements for our country. We can do all of this and 
preserve Social Security and Medicare, too.
  Take a deep breath, Mr. Citizen. I think most Americans will say: 
Yes, let's take a deep breath.
  What does all that have to do with where we are today? This proposal 
now that is being advanced by the same party, and in many ways, the 
same leadership--not the President but in the Republican leadership 
that we will have this next week--is supposedly the blueprint that 
gives the assurance to the American people that they are going to be 
able to afford the tax cut and also that they are going to have 
sufficient resources to do what this President and what the Republican 
Party have stated is their commitment to do in enhancing education, 
providing a prescription drug program, and saving Social Security and 
Medicare. That blueprint is in what we call the budget. That makes 
sense. People ought to be able to understand that. If we are going to 
have those very large surpluses and do everything else, we can draw one 
conclusion; if we are not, we ought to be somewhat more cautious about 
where we are going in terms of the sizable tax reduction.
  I am for a tax reduction, one that is affordable and fair. But that 
isn't what we are talking about now. We are talking about an excessive 
one that is unfair. Nonetheless, we are talking about a major tax 
reduction.
  So it is fair for the American people to ask their representatives, 
as has been asked by a number of our colleagues today, and particularly 
effectively by my very good friend, the Senator from West Virginia who 
is presiding, where is the meat in this package? Where are we going to 
find out what is in this proposal that should be on everybody's desk on 
a Friday afternoon, when we will be starting debate on it on Monday; 
where is the budget that will say, OK, if we do the President's tax 
program, this is what the budget is going to be in every one of these 
programs--in education, prescription drugs, and Medicare. Where is that 
piece of paper? Where is it?
  It doesn't exist, Mr. President. Therefore, this kind of debate that 
we are being asked to conduct by the Republican leaders is basically a 
sham. Do we understand? It is a sham. Why? Because we have no figures. 
We have the general comments. We have been able to learn a figure here 
and a figure there, but we have the broadest kinds of figures. Being 
able to try and understand what is being talked about, we don't have 
it. We can't represent in the debate, which is supposed to be about the 
future of the economic condition of this country, the proposal of the 
President of the United States--a proposal of billions of dollars, a 
document that we are unable to have, which is going to give the 
assurance to the American people what we will be spending to educate 
their children, or what we will be providing to preserve Social 
Security or what we will be spending for a prescription drug program. 
It doesn't exist. It doesn't exist. And, if it did exist, it would have 
been talked about and referenced by our good Republicans this afternoon 
when it was challenged by the Senator from West Virginia and a number 
of our colleagues. It does not exist, Mr. President, in spite of the 
requests.

  There is not a family who would follow these kinds of procedures. I 
mean if we were looking at an American family and a family budget, 
could we say any family would say that all we care about is the cost of 
a new car. We only have to care about that. We have sufficient money to 
buy a new car. We do not know how we will provide for the other 
necessities--education for our kids, payments on the house, food on the 
table. But what we are going to do is, since we know we have the money 
here to buy the car, that is what we are going to do.
  That is what, effectively, is being done with this phony debate on 
the budget. You are saying you have the downpayment on the tax cut. But 
you are not saying what you are going to do about your children's 
education. You are not saying what you are going to do about your 
children's health. You are not saying what you are going to do about 
food. Those are the other elements. They do not exist. What family 
would do that?
  If there is not an American family who would do it, why should we? 
Why should we? Why should we, as representatives of the American 
family, do it with the Federal budget? That is what we are asking.
  Is there an American business that would say: We have the money to 
buy the furniture. We have it right in our cash account. Let's go out 
and buy the furniture, even though we are going to have to do something 
in terms of new machinery, even though we are going to have to do 
something in terms of research in the future. We don't know what that 
is going to be, but let's go ahead and spend the money anyways. We 
don't know, we can't tell you how much of that is going to be for 
research. We can't even tell you what the rent is going to be for our 
business. We can't even tell you what advertising is going to be. But 
we have that money for the furniture. Is there an American business 
that would do that? No. There is not an American business that would do 
it. That is what we are being asked to do with this budget. That is why 
this whole process is so badly flawed.
  Members who are interested in preparing amendments are having 
difficulty drafting the amendments because we don't know how they fit, 
this is the core issue. The principal responsibilities that we have on 
budgetary matters reflect the national priorities for this country. 
That is what Members of Congress and the Senate are all about, when it 
comes to budgetary matters: allocating resources on national 
priorities, that is what it is all about.
  We have other responsibilities, as we have seen, trying to deal with 
the proliferation of money in campaign financing, or we have other 
functions in terms of educating our constituents. We have other 
important responsibilities with regard to the judiciary. Yes. But when 
we are talking about the finances, we are talking about the nation's 
priorities, and we are talking about allocating resources to reflect 
the nation's priorities.
  The fact is not that money in and of itself is going to solve our 
problems. We know that is not the case too often. But it is a 
reflection of what our national priorities are if we allocate 
resources. If we, for example, fully fund the IDEA, the program to help 
local communities educate disabled children, which is being funded now 
at 17 percent--many of us believe that ought to be up to the 40 percent 
which we represented. We didn't guarantee it to the States, but we 
represented was going to be our best effort to try to provide the 
resources to do that. We really made a commitment to the States --more 
important, to the families--that we were going to do that. And we have 
left them short.

  Is there anyone here this afternoon, anyone left of our Republican 
colleagues, who will be able to tell us what is going to be in that 
budget for the IDEA over the next 5 years? How about over the length of 
this tax cut? That would be pretty interesting, wouldn't it? So 
families could say: Do we really want to have that much of a tax break, 
or should we save some of those resources to make sure we are going to 
provide help and assistance to local communities, local school 
districts, to provide some relief when they have a particular need with 
a child who has developmental disabilities, through no fault of their 
own, and because of those needs and a community's attempt to provide 
for and mainstream these children?
  Mr. President, 15 years ago, over 4.5 million of them were tucked 
away in closets. Now they are out in the schools. We are trying to meet 
those needs. We don't know what all those needs are going to be. We 
cannot say. In some areas, they may have very severe kinds of 
challenges and have scarce resources, and in other communities they may 
have fewer challenges and lots of resources. We are trying to see if we 
cannot provide some minimum to help. Isn't that more important than the 
tax cut?
  Where in the document is it, how much we are going to expend to help

[[Page S3229]]

and assist those parents? Where is it? Someone show us, someone show 
not just Members of the Senate but someone explain it to the people of 
Massachusetts who think they have a Senator who ought to know that, 
just like every other State expects their Senators to know it.
  But, no, no, we are not going to do that. No, we are not going to. 
One, we either do not have it, or if we have it, we are not going to 
give it to you--no. No.
  What was the request that was made? What was the request that was 
made on our side of the aisle by those who are part of the Budget 
Committee and our Democratic leadership and our representatives on 
Appropriations, the committees that are going to have important 
responsibilities on this? Why don't we just wait, wait for just another 
week, wait for just another 2 weeks or another 3 weeks until we get 
that budget so the American people will understand and have a full 
picture of what is going out and what we are going to commit ourselves 
to and what is going to be left there for tax relief, tax reduction.
  What is the answer to that? What is the reason they refuse to do so?
  None of us want to be making judgments in terms of motivations. But 
it seems to me, if I was on the other side and believed deeply that 
this tax reduction of a monumental and growing size--not just as stated 
by the Senator from Massachusetts, but every publication says it who 
has been over there, watching the Ways and Means Committee. If they 
believed in it, they ought to be able to justify it and come out on the 
floor of the Senate and justify why they believe that is a fair 
program, and why providing X amount of money is sufficient for the 
IDEA. They ought to be able to come out here. We ought to be able to 
debate it.
  Will that debate take place? No. No. Why not? If they believed in the 
program as much as they indicated in their speeches, you would think 
they would relish that opportunity. Let's educate the American people. 
Let's take it to the American people and convince them we have the 
right on our side.

  But, no, they are not willing to do that. They are not willing to do 
it. Instead, we are left completely in the dark, which is not just a 
disservice to any single Member of the Senate, but is just an 
absolutely contemptible attitude to the people we represent, a 
contemptible, arrogant attitude--contemptible, arrogant attitude to the 
people we represent.
  Fairness--supposedly. We are supposed to have a new mood in 
Washington. We are going to change the rhetoric in Washington. We are 
going to change the whole parameters of debate and discussion in 
Washington. It is going to be a new time.
  This is the worst of the old times. As a member of the Senate, I 
cannot think back to a time that there has been a conscious attempt to 
keep the Members of this body in the dark on a major kind of policy 
issue that affects the nation's future in such a basic and tangible 
way, not a single incident. Maybe it comes to others, maybe it will 
come to others, but it certainly did not to me.
  This is something. I can see people saying: Why are people getting 
all worked up about this on Friday afternoon?
  Why didn't we know this earlier? We didn't know this earlier because 
we didn't know that was going to be the posture and the position of the 
Republican leadership earlier. We at least thought we might have the 
opportunity for just a few days to go through and examine it. But no. 
We are denied that. That has only become more certain and definite in 
the most recent hours.
  The American people ought to be very wary of what will be happening 
in this Senate with this debate next week because we are basically 
failing to meet our responsibilities to them in an extraordinary and 
important way. Let me give a very brief concrete example of what I am 
talking about.
  As we have seen, there have been bits and pieces of the budget which 
have been put out. The President has indicated that his budget for 
prescription drugs will be $153 billion. We have that figure. If the 
Congressional Budget Office, joint task, and OMB had taken what the 
President guaranteed in the Presidential campaign, that would be $220 
billion. This is $153 billion. With the $220 billion, they were only 
going to get to less than a third of all the seniors. What are we going 
to expect with this lesser figure?
  Let me go on to give some concrete examples with the limited 
information that we have.
  The Congressional Budget Office reports that to maintain current 
Government services--that is effectively to maintain those services 
that are in effect today--for discretionary spending primarily in 
education, NIH--it doesn't include Social Security or Medicare--but 
let's take basic education programs; there would be the prescription 
drug program--it reports that to maintain those Government services, in 
the year 2002 it would cost $665 billion. But the administration 
proposes only $660.7 billion, which falls short $4.3 billion of the 
CBO's current services figure.
  In addition, the administration's discretionary budget includes $5.6 
billion in emergency reserve and $12 billion in new defense spending. 
As a result, under the Bush budget, spending on all the nondefense 
discretionary programs would actually decrease by an average of 4 
percent next year, or $13 billion.
  Cuts to individual programs will substantially exceed the 34 percent 
next year because President Bush finds the dollars to fund proposed 
increases for some programs--education, NIH, and community health 
centers--by cutting other existing programs.
  Accounting for these proposed discretionary increases means that the 
administration proposes a 7 percent average cut to unprotected 
nondefense discretionary programs next year.
  What does that mean? Seven percent means: 12 million fewer meals 
delivered to ill and disabled seniors; 550,000 fewer babies receiving 
nutritional supplements; 300,000 fewer families assisted with heating 
costs under LIHEAP, with all of the problems we have had not only in 
the Northeast, Midwest, and the far West; LIHEAP also helps in the 
South as well; 300,000 fewer families will be assisted under LIHEAP; 
45,000 fewer job opportunities for youth at a time when we need greater 
skills for young people in order to be a part of the job market.
  When I entered the Senate, you worked down at the Quincy Shipyard. 
Your father and grandfather worked there. You had a high school 
diploma, a small house, and 3 or 4 weeks off in the summertime. You had 
a pretty good life at that time. Now everyone who enters the job market 
has eight jobs. And young people have to have continuing training and 
education to make sure they have the skills in order to be able to 
compete. And with close to 400,000 of them dropping out of high school 
every year, we are cutting back on training and job opportunities for 
youth; 45,000 fewer people treated for mental illness and substance 
abuse at a time when we are facing, for example, the kinds of 
challenges we have seen in our high schools in recent times.

  Sure, it is a complex problem and a complex issue. But all you have 
to do is read that most recent report put out by the Mental Health 
Institute, and look at the number of troubled young girls in their 
teens and the challenges they are facing with the explosion that is 
taking place with their needs; the increasing numbers of suicides by 
teenagers in our society; the challenges of mental health.
  In my own city of Boston, a third of the children who go to school 
every day come home where there is physical and substance abuse or 
violence in terms of guns. And they are dropped in the schools. We are 
trying to provide some help and assistance to them. We don't do a very 
good job. We have eight behavioral professionals in our Boston school 
system. They are new and are very good, but eight is not enough. Talk 
to our superintendent who is making a real difference trying to reach 
out to these children who are facing some extraordinary pressures.
  Just in this current proposal that we know about, there will be 
45,000 fewer people receiving help for mental illness; 30,000 fewer 
homes prepared for low-income families.
  Tell that to most of the urban areas.
  We see in my part of the country the need for help and assistance on 
home ownership; 25,000 fewer children immunized; 10,000 fewer National 
Science Foundation researchers, educators, and

[[Page S3230]]

students; 3,000 fewer Federal law enforcement officials; 1,500 fewer 
air traffic controllers; 30 fewer toxic waste sites cleaned.
  That is just a brief snapshot of a number of programs that are 
targeted to youth or children, or in terms of some of the services that 
people are expecting that could be reduced or cut under that budget 
proposal. That is one of the figures that we have.
  Because President Bush's budget fails to specify what he would cut, 
it is impossible to determine which programs would be cut less deeply 
and which would be cut more severely than this. For each program held 
harmless, the cuts in remaining programs will exceed 7 percent by that 
much more.
  Are we entitled to know the whole range? Isn't it only responsible, 
though, that we are able to say, well, we are willing to accept that, 
or how many hundreds of billions of dollars in terms of tax? Shouldn't 
that be the nature of the debate? Why do we have to scrounge around and 
try to get these kinds of figures that are being kept away from us? 
They are not in any document here. These are the extrapolations based 
on the Congressional Budget Office of programs in our particular 
committee jurisdiction, for the most part. And we see what the impact 
would be. Should or shouldn't we have that debate, whether it is in 
these areas here or the whole range of different areas of need we have 
seen in recent times in the areas of education?

  I will just take a few more minutes, Mr. President, to look again at 
the Federal share of education funding. Referring to this chart, 
funding for early and secondary education has declined since 1980 from 
11.9 percent to 8.3 percent in the year 2000. Higher education has seen 
these reductions. We are going down in terms of the participation. 
Again, it isn't just money solving all the problems, but there has been 
a partnership among the Federal, State, and local communities, and our 
primary responsibility is for those children who are economically 
disadvantaged.
  We said in the early 1960s that for children who were particularly 
economically disadvantaged, we ought to, as a nation, help local 
communities. That is basically the Federal involvement in terms of 
helping local communities. That was what we accepted as part of a 
national commitment, that we were going to try to provide some help and 
assistance. And we have seen that go down.
  Yet what is happening on the other side of this? We see that in the 
year 2000 we have 53 million children going to school, and the total 
number of children going to school is going to effectively double in 
future years. The number of children who are going to school will 
double. Are we going to have this kind of a debate on the budget in 
relation to that?
  This chart shows the flow lines, with the growth to 94 million 
children going to school as compared to the 53 million children going 
to school in 2000.
  Shouldn't we, if we are going to at least begin to recognize that 
there is this partnership, say that in those outyears perhaps we ought 
to--if we are going to have those surpluses; and certainly no one can 
guarantee it--look at not just what the needs are today, but we ought 
to be looking down the road in terms of what we are going to do in 
terms of a national priority?
  The chart I was just showing was in relation to elementary and 
secondary education. What we see with this chart is the corresponding 
escalation in terms of the total number of children who are going to 
higher education. That is enormously important in terms of acquiring 
different kinds of skills so that they are going to be able to be 
important players in a modern economy. Everyone has understood that for 
the longest period of time.
  We ought to have that debate--whether this budget that we should have 
next week is going to take into consideration the long-range interests, 
not just the problem that we have $130 billion of needs currently in 
terms of bringing our elementary and secondary schools up to par, in 
terms of safety and security, and in terms of their ventilation and 
electronics so that they will be able to have the modern computers. 
That is $130 billion and is not even talking about current needs but 
about future needs.
  Shouldn't we have that out here alongside of what is going to be 
allocated and expended in terms of this tax cut? But, oh, no, we can't 
have that. We can't have that. We can't wait 2 weeks. We can't wait 2 
weeks, 3 weeks, 4 weeks, to be able to get that information out so we 
can have that informed debate. No, we are not going to do that.
  So I join those who have expressed their concern about this process. 
I had a good opportunity of listening, with great interest, to my 
friend and colleague from West Virginia this afternoon back in my 
office. I hope other Members listened to his excellent presentation in 
outlining the challenges of this moment because he brings to this 
debate and discussion not only the sweep of history with his own 
extraordinary career in public service, but he brings to it, in 
addition, the most exhaustive understanding and awareness in the 
history of this institution and its development, and even more than all 
of that--on top of that, his own experience and his understanding of 
the history--is his love of the institution and his deep commitment to 
it.
  So, Mr. President, when he warns about the real implications for this 
institution as a servant of the people, it needs to be a warning that 
is well heeded. And it is not being well heeded. If we are to move 
ahead the way it has been outlined that we will by the majority leader 
and the Republican leadership, at the end of next week this will be a 
lesser institution in terms of representing the people of this country, 
and that I hope to be able to avoid.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Will the Senator from Massachusetts withhold 
his suggestion?
  Mr. KENNEDY. I withhold, Mr. President.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair thanks the Senator.

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