[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 32 (Tuesday, March 19, 2002)]
[House]
[Pages H941-H942]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




           PRESIDENT'S BUDGET CANNOT BE RESPONSIBLY APPROVED

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the order of the House of 
January 23, 2002, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran) is recognized 
during morning hour debates for 5 minutes.
  Mr. MORAN of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, today the House budget resolution 
goes before the Committee on Rules, and it comes to the House floor 
tomorrow. This is a budget that we are not familiar with in terms of 
the underlying assumptions because up until now we have been using 
numbers from the Congressional Budget Office. Maybe some people that 
watched the machinations of the budget process in earlier years will 
recall that our Republican colleagues shut down the Congress, shut down 
the government twice, insisting on Congressional Budget Office numbers 
instead of OMB numbers. Well, now they have reversed course and decided 
that they want OMB numbers because they are more optimistic, and they 
do not want the Congressional Budget Office numbers which are more 
conservative.
  We think this is a time to be cautious and conservative about our 
projections. Last year we used a 10-year projection because if we went 
out over 10 years, there was a $5.6 trillion surplus, and that enabled 
our colleagues on the Republican side to justify a $1.7 trillion tax 
cut.
  But now they do not want that 10-year projection, they only want a 5-
year budget because of that $5.6 trillion surplus; $5 trillion has 
disappeared. Where has it gone? Well, the biggest single component of 
that loss is attributable to the tax cuts; 43 percent of it. The lost 
surplus is due to the tax cuts. About 23 to 25 percent is attributable 
to the economy. The rest is attributable to additional legislation, 
particularly increases in defense and homeland security.
  So we are spending more, we are keeping the tax cuts, and yet we do 
not have the money to pay for it. What does that mean? That means that 
this budget that will be on the floor tomorrow assumes that we will 
take $2.2 trillion out of Social Security and Medicare trust funds. We 
are going to have a deficit of $224 billion just in this budget year, 
$830 billion over 5 years. But when we go out 10 years, then it really 
starts to count.
  The problem is that over this next decade, we have a fiscal crisis 
facing us because that is when the baby boom generation retires. Mr. 
Speaker, 77 million people in that baby boom generation will retire and 
double the number

[[Page H942]]

of people depending upon Social Security and Medicare. That is why this 
budget just takes us to the cusp of that point when they retire. These 
are people born right after World War II in 1945 and 1946. We can do 
the calculations. They start retiring in 2007 and 2008. We will not 
have provided for their retirement costs. I say we, to emphasize the 
fact that, I am a member of that baby boom generation. My parents' 
generation fought the ``isms,'' Nazism, communism, fascism, and gave us 
so much better a life than they had inherited from their parents. And 
what are we going to do? We are going to leave to our children the 
responsibility to pay for our retirement costs, our health care costs 
through Medicare, and to pay off a debt of over $3 trillion. That is 
what this budget does that our children will have to face tomorrow.
  It makes a number of other cuts that do not seem to be particularly 
justified. We are in a recessionary period, and to cut $14 million out 
of housing for the homeless doesn't seem right. To take $80 million out 
of the Leave No Child Behind education legislation the President has 
gone around the country touting and taking credit for, and we agree, it 
is bipartisan legislation, and now we are going to take $80 million out 
of that program? To take $338 million out of low-income heating 
assistance, the LIHEAP program? No that's not right.
  No, Mr. Speaker, this is not a budget that this Congress can 
responsibly approve.

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