[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 62 (Tuesday, May 8, 2001)]
[House]
[Pages H1951-H1956]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
PROVIDING FOR RECOMMITTAL OF CONFERENCE REPORT ON HOUSE CONCURRENT
RESOLUTION 83, CONCURRENT RESOLUTION ON THE BUDGET, FISCAL YEAR 2002
Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, by the direction of the Committee on Rules, I
call up House Resolution 134 and ask for its immediate consideration.
The Clerk read the resolution, as follows:
H. Res. 134
Resolved, That upon adoption of this resolution the
conference report to accompany the concurrent resolution (H.
Con. Res. 83) establishing the congressional budget for the
United States Government for fiscal year 2002, revising the
congressional budget for the United States Government for
fiscal year 2001, and setting forth appropriate budgetary
levels for each of fiscal years 2003 through 2011 is hereby
recommitted to the committee of conference.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Florida (Mr. Goss) is
recognized for 1 hour.
Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the
customary 30 minutes to the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Slaughter),
my friend and colleague from the Committee on Rules; pending which I
yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this
resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only on this
matter.
{time} 1830
Mr. Speaker, the legislation before us grants us a rule that provides
that upon adoption of the rule the conference report to accompany H.
Con. Res. 83 shall be recommitted to the conference committee.
Simply put, and in plain English for Members, what we are doing is we
are taking care of the necessary procedure to get the budget debate on
the floor tomorrow. What is going to happen is we are going to pass
this rule, then the matter is going to go to the other body. The
Committee on Rules is going to meet a little later in the evening, put
out a rule to get the new conference report on the floor tomorrow with
an appropriate rule, and the House will go about the business of
deliberating and voting on the budget, which we are all anxious to get
to after the long opportunity we have had to review it in the past
several days.
Therefore, this is somewhat of a technical matter; but it is
important that in order to continue our progress towards getting the
budget on the floor that we adopt this rule. I do not think there is
anything unusual about it or controversial about it, and I urge all
Members' support.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Florida for
yielding me the customary 30 minutes, and I yield myself such time as I
may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the rule to recommit this flawed
document. I urge the leadership to use this opportunity to craft a real
budget with input from both Republicans and Democrats.
The infamous two missing pages are hardly the only flaws in this so-
called agreement. Other pages are missing as well. For instance,
waiting in the wings of this Congress are a number of popular tax cuts,
including between $85 billion and $115 billion in business tax breaks.
Billions more in tax cuts, with the elimination of the estate tax for
the Nation's wealthiest citizens, and the elimination of the so-called
marriage penalty tax this Congress, are moving through the legislative
process. An honest budget would have included these provisions. The
House leadership knows full well that at the end of this tax cut frenzy
we will surpass the administration's initial proposal of $1.8 trillion.
Also missing are the President's big-ticket items. For starters, we
seem to be missing the page that factors in the likely cost of a
missile defense system. Nobody knows if it will work, and nobody knows
how much it will cost; but estimates run up to $300 billion.
We also seem to be missing the page that explains how we pay for the
conventional defense buildup being planned by the administration at a
cost of $250 billion over the next decade. How is this consistent with
a budget that makes no room for increases in defense spending beyond
those already proposed by the Clinton administration?
[[Page H1952]]
Also, I have yet to find the page that explains how we will maintain
government services in the face of a growing population while
increasing spending no faster than inflation. Perhaps the leadership
can explain what unspecified drastic cuts to the tune of $400 billion
they have planned and how will these cuts not impact Social Security
and Medicare.
I urge the leadership to turn over all missing pages and expose these
numbers; and, moreover, I would caution my colleagues on the conference
committee against signing their name to a document that is patently and
shamelessly dishonest in its current form.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I intend to reserve the balance of my time
until further notice.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from
Wisconsin (Mr. Obey).
Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, over the last 5 years we have increased the
education budget, on average, 13 percent a year. This year, President
Bush has cut that rate of increase in his budget in half to 5.8
percent. The House Republican budget resolution did the same thing that
the President did. The Senate then said, that is woefully inadequate
for education; and they added $240 billion for education over 10 years
by taking it out of the jumbo-size tax cuts. This resolution not only
eliminates the entire $240 billion add-on over 10 years for education,
it also takes funding for education $25 billion below the President's
own budget over the next 10 years, and for this coming year alone takes
the education funding $1 billion below President Bush's budget. That is
no compromise. That is returning to yesteryear.
If this is the Republican idea of how we put education first, I would
hate to see their idea of how we do not. Everything, including
education, is being sacrificed to jumbo-size tax cuts for people making
over $200,000 a year. That does not represent the priority judgments of
the American people. This bill should not only be voted down, it should
be laughed down.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from
Texas (Mr. Stenholm).
Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this rule, and I
do so with a great deal of disappointment; disappointment in the
procedure that is being followed. But I understand why, and I
appreciate very much that the chairman of the Committee on the Budget
has been the lone exception of trying to seek some kind of
bipartisanship on this budget. Obviously, he has been overruled by the
leadership, the same leadership that brings this rule today that has to
have martial law to pass the budget. Martial law to pass the budget,
after we spent 16\1/2\ hours on this floor last Thursday waiting on the
majority to come up with their idea of what the budget should look
like.
Now, I can give my colleagues 10 solid reasons why they ought to vote
against the budget, but that is not what we are talking about today.
What we are talking about today is the rule. I do not know how much
longer the majority is going to be in lockstep with breaking every rule
and precedent of the House that they used to criticize us on this side
of the aisle for doing, only I do not believe we ever did as good a job
at it as they are doing tonight and as they did last week. This is
ridiculous.
As one who would like to see some semblance of bipartisanship on the
budget, I came to the conclusion that was impossible, and I understand
why. And as a member of the minority, I understand why we are not going
to win any. But at some point in time, I would hope there would be just
a tinge of conscience as to the procedures of the House and as to how
we might get a little better comity in working on things like defense
and education and health care and agriculture, other than the manner in
which this particular budget that this rule makes in order will do.
I will guarantee my colleagues there will be bipartisanship when we
start dealing with the specifics. So many of my colleagues on the
majority have chosen under their leadership to ignore that to bring
this rule to the floor. I urge a vote ``no,'' and let us go back and do
it right.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from
New Jersey (Mr. Holt).
Mr. HOLT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from New York for
yielding me this time.
A quarter of a century ago, when the budget process was established,
it was established so that we could look at all of the numbers in a
measured, considered way, the income and the outgo, and make sure the
numbers added up. It was not intended to be done in the dark of night
in a hurried manner with some numbers there and some numbers not there
and who knows what is there. Well, that is what we have ended up with
today and this is a flagrant violation of the whole spirit of the
budget process.
And in this hurry to get this tax cut through in an ill-considered
way, we end up with a terrible shortchanging of the American people.
Take education, for example. Inadequate consideration for our national
need to recruit teachers, to find ways to get the 2.2 million teachers
that we need in the next 10 years to keep up with the retirement and
attrition in the ranks of teaching. Insufficient attention to the need
for new facilities and modern classrooms, where classes of a reasonable
size can meet in good conditions.
And with insufficient attention to the other concerns. Take special
education, for example: under IDEA, if we are going to meet our
national obligation, the Federal Government's obligation for special
education, that would come to something on the order of $100 billion
over 10 years. Do we find that in this budget resolution? No, we do
not.
Education is shortchanged at every turn. And what we have got, coming
from the House-Senate conference committee, appears to be a zeroing of
the education budget, holding it at a level that does not even keep up
with inflation. This is totally inadequate; and it is the result of
this hurried, inadequate process.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from
California (Ms. Woolsey).
Ms. WOOLSEY. Mr. Speaker, it is outrageous that this week Congress
will vote on a budget that threatens the future of our Nation's most
valuable asset: our children.
No wonder the Republican leadership tried to rush the budget to the
floor last week without allowing adequate consideration. But then I
believe they thought they could pull the wool over our eyes by
misplacing two of the pages of that budget. Mr. Speaker, it is ironic
that the two missing pages contained the details of the $1.35 trillion
tax cut.
It appears that those two pages are the essence of how the Republican
leadership will pay for their massive tax break; by cutting funding for
vital services for American women and their families, including
temporary assistance for needy families, workforce training and
employment programs, community anti-violence and anti-drug programs,
and overall education for the funding of our children.
Moreover, by prioritizing tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans,
Mr. Speaker, the Republican leadership is signing away the future of
Social Security and the Medicare Trust Fund. In addition to harming
children, it appears they want to undermine the future of grandparents,
too.
This is unacceptable. I urge my colleagues to vote for the rule to
recommit; vote against this budget.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from
Texas (Mr. Sandlin).
Mr. SANDLIN. Mr. Speaker, in the words of President Reagan, there
they go again. Fresh from the missing page debacle, we are back with
more of the same. It seems that pieces of paper are not the only things
missing as we appear here today.
The administration and the leadership talk a very good game. They
tell us they want to increase education spending, they tell us they
want a prescription drug plan for seniors, they tell us they want
funding for disaster relief. But the numbers say something entirely
different, because they just do not compute; they just do not add up.
The American public will not be fooled. Because, in fact, it seems
there is a lot more missing than two pieces of paper.
Missing: there was $21 billion in education funding missing from this
budget. This budget, as filed last week, provides even less money than
the President requested in his budget; $21 billion
[[Page H1953]]
less than requested. The leadership talks a good game about a
bipartisan education bill; and that is all well and good, but having a
bipartisan bill and talking about it does not do much when a good-faith
effort is not made to fund education for our children.
{time} 1845
Missing: The explanation. The explanation of how to adequately fund a
Medicare prescription plan is missing from the budget. President Bush
has suggested that we spend about $115 billion on a program to help
seniors. Everyone else in the country seems to acknowledge that it will
take at least a minimum of $300 billion to provide anything close to a
fair and adequate benefit for senior citizens, but this budget fails to
pay for such a benefit.
Missing: Another $5 billion is missing to cover natural disasters. In
the years that I have represented my district, we have been hit by
tornadoes, floods, droughts, ice storms. My citizens depend on FEMA,
and FEMA has provided relief for the citizens of my district. However,
this budget completely X's that out. This $5 billion is important and
should not be dropped due to a procedural dispute.
Mr. Speaker, much more is missing than two pieces of paper. Much more
is missing than two pages in this budget. The priorities of America are
missing. The greatness of America is missing. I urge my colleagues to
vote for the motion to recommit.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from
Florida (Mr. Davis).
Mr. DAVIS of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the
resolution. This conference report which we are going to debate tonight
has some fundamental flaws in it which should lead us to go back to the
drawing board. I want to highlight what I think is the most egregious
problem.
We have actually shortchanged education below what the President has
proposed. Many of us applauded the President during his campaign for
talking about leaving no child behind and doing more to help our
schools reduce class size, attract qualified teachers and build safe
and clean, modern schools. He proposed an increase in education
spending which many of us thought was simply a beginning, simply a
start.
Now, here in the House of Representatives tonight, we are going to
adopt a conference report that is $21 billion less than what the
President has proposed. Nobody has had the courage to stand on the
floor of the House tonight and say why we should do less than the
President of the United States has proposed for what we all agree
should be our Nation's highest priority. In Tampa, Florida, my
district, this is our highest priority, and people I represent want us
to pay down the debt and see a fair tax cut that benefits all
Americans, but they want us to do something about education.
We ought to have the courage to stand up to where the President has
started the debate in terms of leaving no child behind. Instead, this
House is breaking from the President, is repudiating this position, is
funding education at $21 billion less than what the President has
proposed. How can we go forward debating the Elementary and Secondary
Authorization Act we were supposed to take up last week, and we are
putting all of the money into a tax cut instead.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from
California (Ms. Waters).
Ms. WATERS. Mr. Speaker, we have been waiting all year to get details
of a proposed budget, and we have been forced to vote on crucial issues
such as a tax cut without seeing the budget. Now we are being forced to
vote on a budget on which we have had no input and only have gotten
access to because of human error. This type of process is unfair and
extremely heavy-handed.
President Bush promised the American people he would be the education
President. He campaigned on a slogan of, ``Leave no child behind.''
When he gave his State of the Union address, he stated, ``Education is
my top priority, and by supporting this budget you will make it yours
as well.''
Yet this budget has no substantial new funding for education. The
President's ostensible commitment to education, like his ostensible
commitment to bipartisanship, is a hoax. He took $288 billion over the
next 10 years out of the budget for education. This amount had
bipartisan support in the Senate, yet the conference agreement
eliminates 98 percent of that increased funding. This measly 2 percent
increase amounts to a mere $13 per student per year. The balanced
budget the Democrats offered and that Republicans unanimously rejected
called for a $112 billion increase in education funding over 10 years.
This funding would have provided for class size reductions, school
renovation, teacher recruitment, increased funds for special education,
expansion of Pell grants and additional funds for Head Start.
Announcing support for education without providing funding to back it
up is no more than another empty promise from a President whose legacy
will more likely be his consistent flip-flop on crucial issues rather
than any proposed commitment to education.
Mr. Speaker, my colleagues are going to hear a lot about education
this evening. He promised, he promised. He has broken that promise in
the way that he has put this budget together. I ask for a ``yes'' vote
on the rule.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from
Maryland (Mr. Hoyer).
(Mr. HOYER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, yesterday the gentleman from New York (Mr.
Reynolds) was quoted in Roll Call as saying, ``The Democrats are
whining about the process rather than getting into debate on the
substance.''
I am going to talk about substance tomorrow, but let me talk about
process today. I ask my colleagues on the majority side of the aisle,
what do they think about 212 Americans who represent approximately 235
million Americans, not Democrats, 235 million Americans, who had no
opportunity to see the substance of your proposal on Thursday night?
Cannot we cry foul over a Republican budget process that completely
shuts out the representatives of the people, not us as individuals, but
of the people that we represent, Republicans, Democrats, Independents,
and, yes, those who are not aligned.
Our ranking member on the Committee on the Budget, the gentleman from
South Carolina (Mr. Spratt) was not allowed into the conference on this
resolution; yet we adopt a rule that today will not debate substance
but, by process alone, will recommit this bill to the Committee on the
Budget.
Mr. Speaker, I am pretty sure I detected a few Republican tears in
the wee hours of the morning that they could not get this through. As a
matter of fact, I heard the distinguished gentleman from Florida
talking about that and lamenting. After all, that is when the majority
learned the painful truth: It would have to wait 4 days. Look who is
crying now.
Mr. Speaker, the other side of the aisle has had a weekend of bad
press on these frankly heavy-handed budget tactics, and people are
starting to reexamine the substance in this budget, a budget that
provides huge tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, and let the budget
ax fall on education, contrary to the bipartisan agreement in the other
body, and seniors who need prescription drugs, and our environment.
Mr. Speaker, let us vote down this rule. Let us return this matter to
the American people and have a full and fair debate.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from
Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee).
(Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas asked and was given permission to revise
and extend her remarks.)
Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Mr. Speaker, just 4 days ago the lights
went out in the House of Representatives, although many of us were here
seeking the opportunity to have a full debate on a budget that all of
America could support; but unfortunately, it did not happen. We waited
and we waited, and all of a sudden pages were missing.
I believe the real key is whether the American people will have their
voices heard and whether or not they will know for sure that this is a
budget that actually invades the Social Security Trust Fund and the
Medicare Trust Fund because of the $1.3 trillion tax cut over a 10-year
period, and 2011 will show us an invasion in Social Security and
Medicare.
[[Page H1954]]
Mr. Speaker, today in my district there was an Older American
Seminar, and some of the major questions being raised was what is
happening to Medicare and what is happening to Social Security? What is
happening to the real drug prescription benefit that the President
promised us almost 2 and 3 years ago? I can say there is no room at the
inn, and there is no money in the House.
When we speak about educating our children, $294 billion for
education is all of a sudden missing. The President, who indicates that
education is his chief responsibility, has money for reading and Pell
grants, and I agree with that, but where is the money for the other
programs that we so sorely need. Whether it is issues like Title I,
whether it is issues for special education, whether it is school
construction, where is the commitment for the Federal Government
collaboration with local government dealing with health?
The National Institutes of Health should be supported, but if you
exclude the National Institutes of Health funding from health funding
in the budget, you will find that that money is insufficient to take
care of the needs, like uninsured children in America, 1 million in the
State of Texas. We only enroll 300,000 to 400,000, so children are
uninsured and we need the dollars to be able to assist.
If we talk about civil rights and election reform, budgets in the
Department of Justice have been cut and so we are not serious about
election reform or civil rights in this country.
Mr. Speaker, let us turn the lights on and do this in a bipartisan
way and get a real budget and oppose the resolution that is on the
floor.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from
Pennsylvania (Mr. Hoeffel).
Mr. HOEFFEL. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me
this time.
I support sending this bill back to the Committee on the Budget.
There is so much work the conference committee still has to do. I say
with respect to the gentlewoman who talked about missing pages, there
are more than just pages missing from this document. There are whole
chapters that are missing. Just look at the President's priorities that
are not funded or included.
How are we going to pay for national missile defense? The President
is talking about that. That is hundreds of billions of dollars not
recognized in this budget document.
How are we going to pay for his military build up that he is going to
ask for in 2 weeks, probably $25 billion a year? How are we going to
pay for that? It is not mentioned in this budget.
How are we going to pay for his proposal to privatize Social
Security? If that is implemented, there are probably $1 trillion in
transition costs; yet this budget document is completely silent on
those Presidential priorities.
There is an awful lot missing in this document, Mr. Speaker. The
problem is it cuts taxes too deeply, and it has far too little for debt
reduction. The American people want us to pay down the debt. The
American people I represent want debt reduction. That is a higher
priority for them than large tax cuts, and they do not want us to take
our budget process back to unbalanced budgets, deficit spending, and
years and years of debt.
Mr. Speaker, we need to return this for the missing pages, the
missing chapters to be added. I support a ``yes'' vote on recommittal.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from
Texas (Mr. Bentsen).
Mr. BENTSEN. Mr. Speaker, the hottest play on Broadway is a play
about a washed-up producer and his erstwhile accountant who try to sell
a flop to widows, and instead of selling 100 percent they sell 1,000
percent, and when it goes under, they will take the rest.
Mr. Speaker, the hottest play in Washington apparently is the budget
resolution that is before us today, and is going back to the Committee
on the Budget, and will come back tomorrow, where we claim that we are
going to have a tax cut that is contained and we are going to contain
spending at a certain amount, as if all around the Capitol and even on
the floor today and even over at the White House today when funding
issues come up, they say, Do not worry, we will put more education
money in later. Do not worry, we will put more money in for FEMA later.
Do not worry, we will fund the NSF, the National Science Foundation,
later. Do not worry, if my colleagues do not think the tax cut is big
enough, we will take care of that later.
What we have produced here is a flop where we are selling the
American people 1,000 percent of the shares. It is a total fraud that
is being committed through this budget. It is unrealistic, and at the
end of the day what is going to happen is they are going to go to the
appropriators and they are going to say, Let us waive the Budget Act
and let us go ahead. It is not going to be 4 or 5 percent, it is going
to be 6 percent, and what we are not going to do is have a strong
fiscal policy for the good of the general economy, and we will purport
a fraud on the American people in the process by eliminating and
finally eviscerating once and for all the Budget Act.
Mr. Speaker, I think it is a great shame that this House and the
Senate have decided to follow in the footsteps of Broadway as opposed
to doing the American people's business.
{time} 1900
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from
New Jersey (Mr. Andrews).
(Mr. ANDREWS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. ANDREWS. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from New York for
yielding me this time.
This budget should be sent back to the conference, and it should be
fixed. The way it ought to be fixed is that the budget plan put forth
by the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Spratt) last month ought to
be substituted for what will be before us tomorrow.
In the years from the inception of the Republic to 1980, we ran up a
public debt of about $1 trillion to fight and win World War I, World
War II, dig our way out of the Great Depression, build the interstate
highway system, do all the things America did in those years. In the
years between 1980 and 1992, we more than quadrupled that debt. By the
time 1993 rolled around, we were in excess of $5 trillion in debt.
The major difference between the plan that will be before us tomorrow
and the plan that should be before us tomorrow is this: at the end of
the 10-year period, giving the most charitable interpretation to the
majority's plan, when we compare it to the 10-year period under the
gentleman from South Carolina's plan, our children will be
approximately one-half trillion dollars greater in debt under the
majority's plan than if we adopted the gentleman from South Carolina's
plan. That is one-half trillion dollars, I think it is really closer to
a trillion if we use honest accounting, that we are choosing to saddle
our children with.
When I came here in 1990, fiscal conservatives wanted to eliminate
the deficit and pay down the debt. Well, the worm has turned and it
appears to me that those who call themselves fiscal conservatives now
stand up for fiscal irresponsibility.
Send this budget back to the conference and fix it and relieve our
children of the debt that we are imposing upon them.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from
South Carolina (Mr. Spratt).
(Mr. SPRATT asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, there are many reasons this budget ought to
be sent back to conference. It needs a total overhaul, a complete
rewrite. I would like to ask the gentleman from the Committee on Rules
if there is a possibility if we send it back if you might reconsider
concurrent receipt for veterans disability pay which was passed in the
Senate but struck in conference. Is there any chance we can redeem
that?
Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. SPRATT. I yield to the gentleman from Florida.
Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I think that one of the interesting things
that is going on here is that I am representing the Committee on Rules
and am proud to do so and we are dealing with a rule. Other speakers
have gotten a little off the track of the rule and are talking about
the budget, which is the property and province of the Committee on the
Budget and the conference committee
[[Page H1955]]
that is discussing it. It is the Committee on Rules' desire to get
this legislation back to that conference committee where the gentleman
could properly address that question.
Mr. SPRATT. I want to suggest there are many things you ought to do
and one of my biggest concerns is the way defense has been treated in
this budget. When it left the House, we provided $70 billion more than
the rate of inflation and gave the chairman of the committee the
authority, I did not agree with this, but the authority willy-nilly to
come back and plus that up by even more. You got to conference and took
$30 billion of that away in order to get the discretionary spending
number down.
Let me tell you what my big concern is. Looking at this fairly
complicated chart here, if you come to the bottom line, it is the line,
the amount of money that remains after all the puts and takes in the
conference agreement have been made. There is $12 billion in 2002, 19
in 2003, 24 in 2004; but we have read in recent weeks about the likely
defense request that Mr. Rumsfeld is going to send once he figures out
how to transform our military. And the numbers run 2, $300 billion, $25
billion a year. We have factored that into this budget. That is this
line right here, defense increase. You know it is coming. I know it is
coming. This budget explicitly anticipates it by giving the Committee
on the Budget chairman the authority to adjust this number, however it
takes.
But what you have got is a thin bottom line here that will not
sustain the kind of increase that Mr. Rumsfeld is talking about. I
would suggest if you are going to take it back to the conference
committee, you might see if you can get these numbers to mesh.
Look, for example, at the year 2003. The Rumsfeld request in that
year, if it is $25 billion, plus let us add the previous year, would be
about $33 billion. But what is left in the contingency reserve? Just
$24 billion. Every year for the next 6 years, there is too little money
left over to provide for what the likely defense increase is going to
be. So I think this budget needs a huge rework.
Let me mention one other thing. Buried in this budget without any
debate in the Committee on the Budget is a provision that prohibits the
use of advance appropriations. It so happens that there are entities
around here that can make good use of advance appropriations. The
United States Navy would like to have that authority so they can move
from full funding to incremental funding. This will prohibit them from
doing that. It was put in the budget resolution because you shut the
doors, you shut us out, there was no constructive discussion of this.
And certainly not of the education increase. The Senate provided a
nearly $300 billion plus-up in education over and above inflation, a
huge increase, as a result of three amendments on the Senate floor. A
majority of the Senate passed the budget resolution with that increase
included; and, bam, it went to conference, it disappeared. Not only did
it disappear, the President requested $21.4 billion more than the rate
of inflation for education. It is gone, too.
This was supposed to be an education budget. The President told us
from that podium right there a couple of months ago that education
would be the account in his budget increased the most. You are bringing
this budget back to vote on in the House with nothing more than
inflation. Zero inflation. You have maintained real purchasing power.
Recommit to the conference, you bet. But take it back to the
conference and put it through a real conference. Put it through an
adversarial process and bring us a budget that is worth consideration.
This has too many missing numbers, too many unreal numbers, too many
plugs and placeholders.
Mr. Speaker, I include a chart pertaining to the budget conference
for the Record.
BUDGET CONFERENCE AGREEMENT THREATENS MEDICARE AND SOCIAL SECURITY
[Billions of dollars; CBO January assumptions]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2008 2010 2011 2002-11
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Conference Agreement:
Baseline Unified Surplus.... 281 313 359 397 433 505 573 635 710 796 889 5,610
Social Security............. 156 171 188 201 221 238 257 276 294 312 331 2,488
Medicare Part A............. 29 36 39 41 40 44 41 41 39 37 34 393
Available Surplus........... 96 106 132 155 172 223 275 318 377 447 524 2,729
Permanent Tax Cut........... 0 50 76 84 97 138 141 153 166 171 191 1,269
Stimulus Tax Cut............ 85 15 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 15
Medicare Rx and Home Health. 0 0 1 11 22 29 41 46 49 54 61 314
Other Health................ 0 7 12 11 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 44
Agriculture................. 6 7 8 8 8 8 8 7 6 6 6 70
Veterans.................... 0 0 1 1 1 1 1 1 0 0 0 6
All Other................... 2 7 4 -3 -0 -3 1 1 1 1 1 10
Resulting New Interest...... 2 7 12 19 26 36 48 62 78 95 114 498
``Contingency Reserve''..... 1 12 19 24 16 13 33 46 75 118 149 504
Likely Further Action:
Average Historical ........ 2 4 5 6 6 6 6 6 7 7 55
Emergencies................
Defense Increase............ 0 13 21 27 32 37 45 48 49 49 49 370
AMT Fix..................... 0 1 4 7 13 21 37 43 49 55 63 293
Tax ``Extenders''........... 0 1 2 3 3 4 4 5 5 6 7 41
Business Tax Cuts........... 0 3 4 4 4 4 3 3 3 4 4 36
Health Tax Cuts............. 0 0 2 4 6 6 7 7 7 7 7 53
Retirement Tax Cuts......... 0 1 3 3 4 5 6 6 7 8 8 52
Resulting Net Interest...... 0 1 2 5 8 13 19 26 34 43 53 203
Resulting Surplus/Deficit... 1 -11 -22 -33 -60 -82 -94 -98 -86 -61 -50 -597
Spending of Medicare Surplus.... 0 -11 -22 -33 -40 -44 -41 -41 -39 -37 -34 -342
Spending of Social Security 0 0 0 0 -20 -38 -52 -58 -47 -24 -16 -255
Surplus........................
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
I would like to call on all of my colleagues to vote yes on this rule
because the effect will be to deliver last week's budget to the
ignominious defeat and death that it so richly deserves.
I urge a yes vote on this resolution.
Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back
the balance of my time.
Mr. GOSS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
I am, of course, very pleased that the gentlewoman is approaching
this in a bipartisan way and there is full agreement. This is a
bipartisan rule. We are both encouraging support for this rule. If you
do not like the budget, send it back to the conference committee. If
you do like the budget, send it back to the conference committee. This
is actually one of the easiest rules I have ever had to handle.
I do say the gentleman from South Carolina was very instructive. I am
going to get myself one of those charts for Rules so that I can get
people to understand what it is we are talking about better.
I am looking forward to the budget debate tomorrow when members from
the Committee on the Budget will actually be at the microphones and at
the leadership and committee tables on this side explaining the budget
that we are proposing. Tonight we are proposing a rule because we are
the Committee on Rules. The rule is designed to get the budget on the
floor because that is much more interesting and more important. That is
what we hope to accomplish. I want to thank all of those for their
forbearance as we have gone through this procedure which is not
something that we had anticipated when we started; but I appreciate the
comity, good humor, and pleasant commentary and the bipartisanship.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the
previous question on the resolution.
The previous question was ordered.
[[Page H1956]]
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Thornberry). The question is on the
resolution.
The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that
the ayes appeared to have it.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a
quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not
present.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Evidently a quorum is not present.
The Sergeant at Arms will notify absent Members.
The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--yeas 409,
nays 1, not voting 21, as follows:
[Roll No. 101]
YEAS--409
Abercrombie
Aderholt
Akin
Andrews
Armey
Baca
Bachus
Baird
Baker
Baldacci
Baldwin
Ballenger
Barcia
Barr
Barrett
Bartlett
Barton
Bass
Becerra
Bentsen
Bereuter
Berkley
Berman
Berry
Biggert
Bilirakis
Bishop
Blagojevich
Blumenauer
Blunt
Boehlert
Boehner
Bonilla
Bonior
Bono
Borski
Boswell
Boucher
Boyd
Brady (PA)
Brady (TX)
Brown (FL)
Brown (OH)
Brown (SC)
Bryant
Burr
Burton
Buyer
Callahan
Calvert
Camp
Cannon
Cantor
Capito
Capps
Cardin
Carson (IN)
Carson (OK)
Castle
Chabot
Chambliss
Clay
Clayton
Clyburn
Coble
Collins
Combest
Condit
Conyers
Cooksey
Cox
Coyne
Cramer
Crane
Crenshaw
Crowley
Culberson
Cummings
Cunningham
Davis (CA)
Davis (FL)
Davis (IL)
Davis, Jo Ann
Davis, Tom
Deal
DeFazio
Delahunt
DeLauro
DeLay
DeMint
Deutsch
Diaz-Balart
Dicks
Dingell
Doggett
Doolittle
Doyle
Dreier
Duncan
Dunn
Edwards
Ehlers
Ehrlich
Emerson
Engel
English
Eshoo
Etheridge
Evans
Everett
Farr
Ferguson
Filner
Flake
Fletcher
Foley
Ford
Fossella
Frank
Frelinghuysen
Gallegly
Ganske
Gekas
Gephardt
Gibbons
Gilchrest
Gillmor
Gilman
Gonzalez
Goode
Goodlatte
Gordon
Goss
Graham
Granger
Graves
Green (TX)
Green (WI)
Greenwood
Grucci
Gutknecht
Hall (TX)
Hansen
Harman
Hart
Hastings (FL)
Hastings (WA)
Hayes
Hayworth
Hefley
Herger
Hill
Hilleary
Hilliard
Hinchey
Hinojosa
Hobson
Hoeffel
Hoekstra
Holden
Holt
Honda
Hooley
Horn
Hostettler
Houghton
Hoyer
Hulshof
Hunter
Hutchinson
Hyde
Isakson
Israel
Istook
Jackson (IL)
Jackson-Lee (TX)
Jefferson
Jenkins
John
Johnson (CT)
Johnson (IL)
Johnson, E. B.
Johnson, Sam
Jones (NC)
Kanjorski
Kaptur
Keller
Kelly
Kennedy (MN)
Kennedy (RI)
Kerns
Kildee
Kilpatrick
Kind (WI)
King (NY)
Kingston
Kirk
Kleczka
Knollenberg
Kolbe
Kucinich
LaFalce
Lampson
Langevin
Lantos
Largent
Larsen (WA)
Larson (CT)
Latham
LaTourette
Leach
Lee
Levin
Lewis (CA)
Lewis (GA)
Lewis (KY)
Linder
Lipinski
LoBiondo
Lofgren
Lowey
Lucas (KY)
Lucas (OK)
Luther
Maloney (CT)
Maloney (NY)
Manzullo
Markey
Mascara
Matheson
Matsui
McCarthy (MO)
McCarthy (NY)
McCollum
McCrery
McGovern
McHugh
McInnis
McIntyre
McKeon
McKinney
McNulty
Meehan
Meek (FL)
Meeks (NY)
Menendez
Mica
Millender-McDonald
Miller (FL)
Miller, Gary
Miller, George
Mink
Moakley
Mollohan
Moore
Moran (KS)
Moran (VA)
Morella
Murtha
Myrick
Nadler
Napolitano
Neal
Nethercutt
Ney
Northup
Norwood
Nussle
Oberstar
Obey
Olver
Ortiz
Osborne
Ose
Otter
Owens
Oxley
Pallone
Pascrell
Pastor
Paul
Payne
Pelosi
Pence
Peterson (MN)
Peterson (PA)
Petri
Phelps
Pickering
Pitts
Platts
Pombo
Pomeroy
Portman
Price (NC)
Pryce (OH)
Putnam
Quinn
Radanovich
Rahall
Ramstad
Rangel
Regula
Rehberg
Reyes
Reynolds
Riley
Rodriguez
Roemer
Rogers (KY)
Rogers (MI)
Rohrabacher
Ros-Lehtinen
Ross
Rothman
Roukema
Roybal-Allard
Royce
Rush
Ryan (WI)
Ryun (KS)
Sabo
Sanchez
Sanders
Sandlin
Sawyer
Saxton
Scarborough
Schaffer
Schakowsky
Schiff
Schrock
Scott
Sensenbrenner
Serrano
Sessions
Shadegg
Shaw
Shays
Sherman
Sherwood
Shimkus
Shows
Simmons
Simpson
Skeen
Skelton
Slaughter
Smith (MI)
Smith (NJ)
Smith (TX)
Smith (WA)
Snyder
Solis
Souder
Spence
Spratt
Stark
Stearns
Stenholm
Strickland
Stupak
Sununu
Tancredo
Tanner
Tauscher
Tauzin
Taylor (MS)
Terry
Thomas
Thompson (CA)
Thompson (MS)
Thornberry
Thune
Thurman
Tiahrt
Tiberi
Tierney
Toomey
Towns
Traficant
Turner
Udall (CO)
Udall (NM)
Upton
Velazquez
Visclosky
Vitter
Walden
Walsh
Wamp
Waters
Watkins
Watt (NC)
Watts (OK)
Waxman
Weiner
Weldon (FL)
Weller
Wexler
Whitfield
Wicker
Wilson
Wolf
Woolsey
Wu
Wynn
Young (AK)
Young (FL)
NAYS--1
Capuano
NOT VOTING--21
Ackerman
Allen
Clement
Costello
Cubin
DeGette
Dooley
Fattah
Frost
Gutierrez
Hall (OH)
Inslee
Issa
Jones (OH)
LaHood
McDermott
Rivers
Stump
Sweeney
Taylor (NC)
Weldon (PA)
{time} 1932
Messrs. TANCREDO, WAMP, ENGEL, MANZULLO, LARGENT, UDALL of Colorado
and GREEN of Texas and Ms. HOOLEY of Oregon changed their vote from
``nay'' to ``yea.''
So the resolution was agreed to.
The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.
Stated for:
Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, on rollcall No. 10 H. Res. 134 I was
absent because of mechanical problems with the aircraft I was on. Had I
been present, I would have voted ``yea.''
____________________