[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 31 (Wednesday, February 26, 2003)]
[House]
[Pages H1370-H1377]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           THE FEDERAL BUDGET

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 7, 2003, the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Price) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I and a number of 
colleagues wish to address this body and the American people this 
evening on our country's fiscal situation and the decisions facing 
Congress as we propose a budget for the 2004 fiscal year. We speak with 
some urgency, and I think colleagues will sense that, because our 
situation has worsened drastically, and we are convinced that the 
President's 2004 budget would move our country dramatically in the 
wrong direction. In the minutes to follow, we will elaborate on our 
concerns and explain on the alternative course that we should be 
taking.
  Mr. Speaker, just 3 years ago, the Federal budget achieved its first 
surplus that did not rely on either the Social Security trust fund 
surplus or the Medicare surplus in many, many years. In fact, in the 
last years of the Clinton administration, we actually paid down $400 
billion of the publicly held debt. This first chart tells the story: 
the deepening deficits in the 1980s, the climb out of deficit spending 
that occurred after the historic 1993 budget vote, and then, in the 
last years of the Clinton administration, a surplus, almost unheard of 
in this postwar period. This surplus enabled us to pay down a portion 
of the publicly held debt and to look forward to being able to meet the 
obligations of Social Security and Medicare as the baby boomers retire.
  This situation, unfortunately, has now drastically reversed. As this 
chart indicates, we have in this second Bush administration a plunge 
into deficit spending that breaks the record set in the first Bush 
administration and promises red ink as far as the eye can see. After 
just 2 years in office, the Bush administration would spend the entire 
Medicare surplus, the entire Social Security surplus, and would pile up 
trillions in the debt we once set out to retire. Never in our country's 
history have we had a fiscal reversal of this magnitude. The next 
charts will make that especially clear.
  We had, at the start of this administration, a projected $5.6 
trillion surplus over the next 10 years. That surplus now is not only 
gone--and you see here the successive projections as our fiscal 
situation worsened. Now we are looking at no surplus and, in fact, at a 
$2.1 trillion deficit for that same 10-year period. That is a fiscal 
reversal of almost $8 trillion, unprecedented in our country's history. 
The deficit for 2003 is projected to be over $300 billion and for 2004 
around $307 billion. The next chart shows those same figures with the 
Social Security and Medicare surpluses removed. Of course, that makes 
the situation even more alarming, because when you remove the cushion 
of the Social Security and Medicare surpluses which the Bush budgets 
would spend in their entirety over the next 10 years, the hole is even 
deeper. Where we were formerly looking at a $3 trillion on-budget 
surplus over the next 10 years, we are now looking at a $4.4 trillion 
deficit.
  This chart indicates what happens to trust fund revenues. The red 
bars are the Social Security surplus. The yellow bars are the Medicare 
surplus. The olive bars are the deficit beyond these surpluses. The 
Bush budget plans to spend those surpluses entirely and to borrow 
considerably beyond that. All this is going to add to the national 
debt. We are going to add some $2 trillion to the national debt in the 
next 5 years.
  Some Members will recall that at the end of the Clinton 
administration, we were talking about actually retiring the publicly 
held debt by 2008. There was even some debate about whether we could 
fully pay it down. Well, you can forget about that debate, because now 
we have a $5 trillion publicly held debt predicted for 2008. As many 
speakers have already said this evening, that will not only be a huge 
burden on future generations but it will also sap our annual budgets, 
because we are going to have to pay an additional $1.5 trillion in 
money down the rat hole in interest on that publicly held debt.

                              {time}  1830

  This will amount to a debt tax, 
d-e-b-t tax of more than $200 billion a year for the forseeable future. 
That comes to about $4,500 per year for the average family, and it is 
rising. This chart indicates how that debt tax, the accumulated debt 
taxes, will grow by $1.5 trillion by virtue of these projected Federal 
deficits and the piling up of debt.
  Unfortunately, in the face of the worst fiscal reversal in the 
Nation's history, what is the response of the Bush administration? The 
response is actually to propose more of the same failed policies. The 
budget proposes $1.5 trillion in new tax cuts, every penny of which is 
funded by increased government debt, and when we add the interest 
costs, those new tax proposals, on top of the old ones, come to almost 
$2 trillion. These tax cuts mainly benefit the wealthiest taxpayers in 
this country. They will not only increase the deficit, but they will 
restrict the money available for education, for the environment, and 
for transportation, health care, and law enforcement.
  In fact, Mr. Speaker, this Bush budget gives us the worst of both 
worlds. It take us over the cliff fiscally, but then it actually 
underfunds critical domestic priorities.
  We know, for example, that our States are flat on their back 
fiscally. Our next speaker will elaborate on that.
  The No Child Left Behind Act passed with great bipartisan enthusiasm. 
But it is not funded in the President's budget proposal, leaving the 
states to their own devices. Homeland Security has been underfunded in 
the 2003 budget. The President promised $3.5 billion in additional 
funding for first responders, but then taking the money away from 
conventional law enforcement grants, leaving the states with less than 
a billion dollars in new money.
  The most obvious way to help the States from the federal level would 
be to increase the cost sharing percentage temporarily on Medicaid. But 
just this week the President reiterated that he has no intention of 
doing that. So the States can forget it when it comes to any relief 
from their fiscal distress. We may be faced with a situation of cutting 
taxes here at the Federal level and

[[Page H1371]]

having like amounts reimposed by the States to meet their obligations, 
and that of course would mean that the net stimulative effect was zero.
  So, Mr. Speaker, by proposing a budget that mandates enormous 
deficits into the indefinite future while cutting important domestic 
priorities, this administration utterly fails to meet the fiscal 
challenges facing our Nation, and I and my colleagues participating in 
this special order wish to elaborate on where the Bush budget would 
take us.
  First we will hear from a new Member of this body who has significant 
experience in politics and in government and is already making his 
mark, the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Emanuel).
  Mr. EMANUEL. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from North Carolina 
for yielding.
  Mr. Speaker, President Kennedy once said, ``To govern is to choose.'' 
I think it is very interesting, in the very week that the President was 
telling the Governors that we had no more money for their health care, 
Medicaid plans, their education, college, every State is raising 
tuition on middle-class families who are affording college and higher 
ed, the Leave No Child Behind. The very week that the President of the 
United States said to our Governors, I am sorry, there is not another 
penny for them, is the very week that we upped and sweetened our bid to 
Turkey; so we have now given Turkey $24 billion.
  I want to meet the person that was negotiating for Turkey. They have 
done themselves a wonderful job. We finally got ourselves a job plan 
and economic growth package. The problem is it is for Turkey, not for 
the United States. And we have done ourselves, I think, a world of 
damage here. And I believe personally that we need a northern front in 
our fight if we are going to war in Iraq and I do not think we should 
spare anything to save our lives; so clearly having a northern front in 
this war is going to be important. But I want my colleagues to think 
about the fact that in the very week that we told our Governors and, 
most importantly, the citizens of our States that there would not be 
another penny for higher ed, there would not be another penny in 
assistance on health care, that we could not fully fund the Leave No 
Child Behind on the education program, is the very week that we 
sweetened our offer to the nation of Turkey.

  To all the police departments that need money for fire, for all the 
cities that need assistance for police departments and fire for 
training on terrorism, I want them to now know Istanbul has their 
money. So I have come to the conclusion that maybe our States need to 
apply to Turkey for foreign aid. They have our money.
  When it comes to making sure that all our police departments and fire 
departments are fully trained for dealing with terrorism, they do not 
have the resources to deal with that. We do not have all the money that 
they need. They are not going to get all the training they need to deal 
with terrorism. And when we have an act here at home, which everybody 
knows that this war will instigate as further terrorism here in the 
United States, our police and fire departments do not have all the 
resources they need to act on that.
  I want my colleagues to think about the choices here, because as I 
have said early on, that President Kennedy once said there are choices. 
The amount of money that we have now guaranteed for Turkey, $24 
billion, is twice the money we spend on Pell grants. We spend $11 to 
$12 billion a year. It is twice the money for Pell grants. The loan 
guarantees for Turkey, the same amount of money that we have now given 
Turkey, we could make two thirds of the existing tuition free at public 
universities.
  These are choices we are making. So as we make this assistance, as we 
tell our Governors we do not have money for them and there is not 
another penny for them and yet we tell Turkey here is another $2 
billion, the same week we did that, I would like the left hand of the 
administration to meet the right hand of the administration, because 
somebody has not got a clear plan; and we are giving money away to 
Turkey while we are telling our own people here at home we do not have 
enough money for them.
  How did we get there? I have a chart here that shows the last 50 
years of fiscal and economic management by Presidents. It goes back to 
the second term under Truman, and it goes through all the Presidents 
and tells how they did in managing the economy. And our present 
President, our President, has the most anemic economic growth of any 
President in the last 50 years. And since we are in the mood of quoting 
former Presidents, Ronald Reagan once said, ``Facts are a stubborn 
thing.'' And since the 2000 election, we have lost 2\1/2\ million jobs 
in this economy; 925,000 manufacturing jobs in the years 2001, 2002; 4 
more million Americans are without health insurance; nearly a trillion 
dollars' worth of corporate assets have been foreclosed on, and 2 
million more Americans have left the middle class for poverty.
  Facts are a stubborn thing. That is the record of this present 
President and the economic management at this time. And what has he 
chosen to do and what has the administration chosen to do? Having 
argued for a tax cut 14 months ago to get the economy moving, the net 
result has been the worst anemic growth of any President in 50 years: 
More people unemployed, more people without health insurance, more 
businesses closed, and more people joining the ranks of poverty. He has 
decided to put his foot on the accelerator and pushed further for more 
tax cuts. He is the only President in history, in a time of war, who 
has decided to have tax cuts. So we will ask our men and women to 
sacrifice, that those in the wealthiest corridors of our country will 
not be sacrificing and joining the rest of us as we do sacrifice.
  This is the wrong way to economic management. We can have a 
bipartisan approach that puts our fiscal house in order, invests in our 
future, and defends our interests overseas. As a person and individual 
Member of this Chamber who does support in some capacity military 
action, I think the notion of the last 2 weeks in Turkey where it was 
let us make a deal, unfortunately Turkey has walked away with the 
resources that our kids need, our police departments need, and our 
doctors and nurses need to provide health care.
  Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I especially appreciate the 
gentleman's pointing out the plight of the States and the tongue-in-
cheek advice to how the States might improve their situation. Of course 
we had the Governors here in Washington this week, the Governors from 
both parties. Is there any indication they got any satisfaction at all 
from the President?

  Mr. EMANUEL. Mr. Speaker, no. But I am thinking of recommending to 
the Governors Association that they hire the person who was negotiating 
for Turkey and maybe he could do them a good job. So there is no 
indication of that. In fact, what has happened is if the gentleman will 
read the Wall Street Journal report out of the meeting that the 
President had with the Governors, in fact he told them there will be no 
more assistance in that area. And mind you, this is not a partisan 
issue. It is the worst fiscal condition of all 50 States since World 
War II.
  Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I ask the gentleman, is it 
not true that a number of the items under discussion were things that 
the Federal Government has mandated?
  Mr. EMANUEL. Correct.
  Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, for example, the education 
reforms under No Child Left Behind.
  Mr. EMANUEL. Right.
  Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, of course there has been a 
good deal of help promised in the homeland security area, particularly 
for upfitting and getting better equipment, better communications 
capacity for first responders, for fire and emergency medical and 
police. The Republican Governors went to the White House and apparently 
came away empty-handed. It seemed even they had a hard time putting a 
good face on this.
  Mr. EMANUEL. Mr. Speaker, what we have decided is we just do not have 
the same sense of urgency. And let me add one other point that I lost 
in here is that today there was a story, I think in the Wall Street 
Journal again, that States have borrowed more money this year than at 
any time in the last 50 years for the States, greater I think in times 
by a magnitude of 3 in borrowing

[[Page H1372]]

more money, and again they are making cuts again at the same time, the 
most severe cuts in the areas of health care and education; and we are 
basically mandating they have to meet certain obligations, not giving 
them the assistance and resources they need to meet those obligations.
  What are those obligations? They are in the area of health care where 
we have a health care crisis; 42 million Americans who work full time 
without healthcare. We do not have an agenda or plan to help them meet 
that obligation.
  We have not had a raise in the Federal level in the Pell grant to 
help people go to college. In over 4 years, the tuitions on average are 
going up 9, 10 percent this year. So we have put not only a burden on 
our States and our Governors, our State legislatures, to fund 
requirements that we pass here, most importantly we are putting demands 
and further burdens on middle-class, hard-working families who are 
trying to raise their kids right, with the right sense of values and 
get on to college so that they can succeed in life, and yet we are not 
giving them the resources they need.
  And that is why I brought up this point about both the Pell grant or 
public universities and the choices we make. We make choices. We have 
said that Turkey in that effort over there is more important. We have 
given Turkey now, in one year, twice the money we have given in Pell 
grants in this country to help middle-class and lower-middle-class 
children go to college. If we took the same type of resources, we could 
make free two thirds of public university education to kids. These are 
American children. We have a commitment to do right when we win this 
war, if we are going to go to war. I want our troops to succeed, but we 
have an obligation over here, and the truth is if we had a balanced 
deal we would not have to make a choice. These are not either/or 
choices.
  Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman.
  Now I am happy to recognize the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott), 
a Member who has long studied Federal budgets and understands very well 
the dire situation that we are facing.
  Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for 
yielding. I think it is helpful just to use the charts because the 
charts tell the story better than anything else. I mean, we have all 
this rhetoric about how good the economy is, how good this is, and 
whether or not there is going to be a deficit. But one does not produce 
numbers and charts like this by accident.
  If we look at when President Reagan came in, my colleagues will 
remember that his budget passed pretty much as he introduced it. He had 
enough support in Congress to get his budget passed. And we see what 
happened to the deficit after Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter, what 
happened to the deficit under Reagan and Bush. It was essentially their 
budgets that passed.
  When President Clinton came in, it was his budget that passed. Very 
narrowly without a single Republican vote in the House or the Senate, 
his budget passed, and we saw the deficit declining year after year. 
When the Republicans took over, it was still President Clinton's 
budget, because he vetoed the budgets passed by Congress several times. 
My colleagues will remember that the Republicans shut down the 
government because they would not accept President Clinton's budget. 
They sent him a budget. He vetoed it. They closed the government down, 
he kept vetoing the bills. Finally, the budget kept going with 
continuing resolutions and otherwise, but essentially it was President 
Clinton in charge of the budget.

                              {time}  1845

  He had enough support in Congress to sustain his vetoes, and it was 
essentially his budget that created the situation where there were 
smaller and smaller deficits, up to the point where there was, in fact, 
a surplus. This is the nontrust fund, so this is the surplus after you 
secure Social Security and Medicare, save them for Social Security and 
Medicare; and we still had a surplus.
  President Bush comes in, and it is his budget that is adopted; and we 
see what happens to the deficit this first year. September 11 is within 
3 weeks of the end of the fiscal year, so most of this happened before 
September 11, and we see as far as the eye can see what is happening to 
the budget.
  When we look at the President's proposal, we see that, according to 
his budget, we started out 2000 with the surplus; the first year, 2001, 
we spent all of Medicare and some of Social Security; 2002, all of 
Medicare, all of Social Security, and about $160 billion more in debt. 
The budget year we are in now looks to be worse than that. The budget 
projection for as far as the President's budget goes, according to his 
budget, he is recommending all of these deficits.
  Now, I think you have to put those numbers in some kind of context. 
This is the President's budget out to 2008. The on-budget deficit for 
this year is going to be $468 billion. In the 2004 budget, the one he 
is recommending, it is going to be $482 billion. It is offset somewhat 
by Social Security, so it is not quite as bad as it looks. But the on-
budget, after you have taken just the on-budget part, before you offset 
it by spending the Social Security and Medicare, it is $468 billion and 
$482 billion.
  Now, the President says if we just would not spend as much, maybe the 
budget would go into balance. It has already been pointed out that the 
entire non-Social Security/Medicare/defense part of the budget, 
nondefense discretionary budget, is about $425 billion. In other words, 
we would have to eliminate all of education, all of transportation and 
roads, all of the Department of Justice, FBI, prisons, all of NASA, all 
of foreign aid, all the veterans benefits, eliminate all of government 
outside of Social Security, Medicare and defense, and we still would 
not have the budget in balance. So when he says just cut a little 
spending, look at the numbers.
  The next chart is when you run up deficits, it is not free. This 
bottom line is what the Federal payment on the national debt would be 
and what it was supposed to be when the President came in. We would 
have paid off almost the entire national debt by 2011 to 2015. Instead, 
we are running up debt. So we have to pay more in the debt tax.
  Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. If the gentleman will yield, the debt 
tax was on the way down because the interest payments on the national 
debt naturally go down as the debt itself is paid off. We had begun 
paying the debt off. But as that chart seems to indicate, those are on 
the way right back up, over $200 billion a year in money that I think 
all of us could think of more productive ways to spend than paying 
interest on the debt.
  Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. We were about to pay off the entire national 
debt, so there would have been no interest on the national debt. Even 
if you do not pay off any of the debt, you still have to pay the 
interest. These are big numbers. Let us divide it and see what it means 
to a family of four.
  For a family of four, dividing the population into the interest on 
the national debt, we have gotten it down to $4,500. As you saw, it 
would have gone down to virtually zero. It was $4,500 for a family of 
four, headed toward zero. But instead, it is going to be $6,500 by 
2008, and going up at a rate of about $500 a year as far as you can 
see. By 2008 it will be $6,500 just interest on the debt before you 
have got any government at all.
  Now, as it gets worse and worse and the debt tax gets worse and 
worse, we are trying to prepare for the baby boomers and Social 
Security. This is the chart of the Social Security surplus. Social 
Security, we are bringing in more than we are sending out; and we have 
a surplus, temporarily. In 2017 it will be about even, and then it gets 
worse and worse, and we will have almost $1 trillion in deficit out 
here in 2037.
  Now, if we had banked all this money and invested it, we would be 
able to pay this. In fact, we could have covered all of the Social 
Security deficit out 75 years with one-half of the tax cut that has 
already been implemented. In other words, if they had cut taxes only in 
half and allocated the other half to the Social Security problem, we 
would have had a solvent Social Security system for 75 years. But 
instead, they spent all of the Social Security surplus.
  Now, people ask, what is our plan? They have ruined the budget. What 
is our plan? I remind them that our plan is right here in green. When 
Democrats

[[Page H1373]]

controlled the budget, the deficit was less and less, into surplus, 
going towards the end of the national debt. That was our plan.

  This is President Bush's plan. Now, when we were leading, this is how 
we led. I do not think you can escape this chart. You do not create a 
chart like this by accident.
  Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for a 
very convincing demonstration of where we have been and where, 
unfortunately, it appears we are going, unless we take corrective 
action.
  The gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Van Hollen) is one of our new 
Members, who is already actively participating in the work of this 
body. We are happy to have him as part of this Special Order here 
tonight.
  I yield to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Van Hollen).
  Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from North 
Carolina for yielding.
  Mr. Speaker, this is actually the first time I have made remarks on 
this floor; and I deliberated, as I am sure many new Members do, over 
what subject I should address first, and I can think of no more 
important matter facing this Congress than the future economic health 
of our Nation and what investments we decide to make for the common 
good.
  The actions we take here this session will affect the well-being of 
Americans for generations to come. We need to adopt an economic plan 
that will put America back to work and a budget that reflects the 
priorities of the American people.
  The budget plan submitted by the President a few weeks ago, it is a 
long document filled with thousands of numbers. Like most budgets, it 
is not exciting reading unless you like to put on the green eye shades. 
But it is probably the most important document we will work with this 
year as Members of Congress, because just as each family has to make 
many tough decisions about their household budgets, so must we make the 
tough decisions for our entire American family. And how we decide to 
invest our collective resources should tell us a lot about what we care 
about as a people and who we are as a people. The budgets and economic 
plans we adopt here this session I hope will reflect the priorities of 
the American people.
  Mr. Speaker, I have listened carefully to the people in my district, 
and I think that their priorities are the same as priorities of 
Americans around this country. They want a country where every child 
has the opportunity to get a great start in life with a first-rate 
education. They want a country where every American has access to 
quality health care. They want an America where every American and 
every individual who is ready to roll up his or her sleeves and go to 
work can find a job. And they want to know that their government is 
taking all reasonable steps to protect our homeland and be prepared to 
respond to national emergencies.
  These are simple things that we all want for our families. We want 
them for our neighbors; we want them for our fellow Americans. We are a 
great Nation, and we can do these things. But to do so we are going to 
have to work with the President to change the course that he has 
charted with the economic plan he has submitted and the budget that he 
has proposed to Congress.
  Just a few weeks ago I had the privilege to attend and sit in this 
Chamber when the President delivered his State of the Union address. I 
was sitting right over there. I was very eager to hear what he had to 
say.
  Very early in his speech, he made the following statement: ``We will 
not deny, we will not ignore, we will not pass along our problems to 
other Congresses, to other Presidents, to other generations.''
  I must say, when I heard that statement I nearly fell out of my 
chair, because the budget and the economic plan proposed by the 
President does exactly what he says he does not want to do. It does 
ignore our problems; and, if we do not fix those problems, we will 
simply be passing the buck to future Congresses, to future Presidents, 
and to future generations.
  Let us look at education. Last year with great fanfare the President 
signed the Leave No Child Behind Act. But the ink was barely dry before 
the administration submitted a budget that fell well short of the 
promised funding. When you leave the funding behind, you also leave 
millions of children behind, and leave them with nothing but broken 
promises. The President's budget for the coming fiscal year promise 
falls $9 billion short of what had been authorized, and it is a 
terrible message to send to our school children and to our teachers.
  Let us look at health care. The President has made no meaningful 
proposal to address the problem of the 41 million Americans who have no 
health insurance. Apparently, the Bush administration proposes to leave 
this problem to future Congresses, to future Presidents and future 
generations.
  And how about domestic security? The President's proposed budget 
ignores the needs outlined by the heads of his own agencies. The U.S. 
Customs Service, the Coast Guard, the Department of Energy, they have 
all said that they need more resources to meet the threat than the 
President has proposed in his budget.
  So what has the President proposed? What is the President's top 
domestic priority? We have heard tonight, another huge tax cut that 
overwhelmingly benefits the superwealthy. Apparently the administration 
has decided that the most pressing domestic problem, the one issue that 
cannot wait, is that the superwealthy are paying too much in taxes. And 
this comes on the heels of the $1.4 trillion tax cut in 2001 that 
disproportionately benefits already the very wealthy.
  And don't be fooled by averages. Sure, when you combine the estimated 
tax break of $325,000 that Bloomberg News says Vice President Cheney 
will receive, and others with very high incomes with the small tax 
breaks that most will receive, you get an average refund of over 
$1,000. That's like saying if Bill Gates were elected to the House of 
Representatives, on average, all 435 members in this chamber would be 
multi-millionaires. It's a great statistic, but nobody is really any 
better off.
  What is the result? What is the result of the President's tax plan? 
Even the administration officials have conceded it will do virtually 
nothing to help get the economy going right now, to help stimulate our 
economy, to get people back to work; and the real result, as we have 
seen, will be rivers of red ink and rising interest rates.
  The President's plan would result in a $304 billion deficit this 
year, and his plans will lead to the sharpest reversal in America's 
fiscal fortunes in history. We have gone from a projected $5.6 trillion 
surplus over 10 years to a projected $2.1 trillion deficit, and that 
does not even include the cost of war in Iraq and the aftermath.
  As our colleague from Illinois stated, just this week we have 
promised Turkey $24 billion, and that before the conflict has even 
begun. This administration has not begun to come clean on the costs of 
war.
  So who is going to pick up this mountain of debt? In the end, it is 
the American people who will always be left holding the bag. And there 
are only two ways to deal with the debt in the long term. We all know 
that. Either you raise taxes on our children in the next generation, or 
you deeply cut expenditures. And as our colleague from Virginia just 
pointed out, where you have to go to cut expenditures to make up these 
deficits are Medicare and Social Security. There is no other way to do 
it.
  The President is already using the funds from the Social Security 
trust funds to pay for his tax cuts. The lockbox we all heard so much 
about, well, it was picked so long ago, and the raid is on. The 
President's plan is a guided missile aimed at Social Security and 
Medicare, and it is not just the money in the trust fund that will be 
lost; we are also going to lose the trust of the American people.
  So, Mr. Speaker, I am very concerned with the reckless economic 
course that the President has set. It does exactly what he said he did 
not want to do. It ignores our very real needs and passes on the 
burdens of tax cuts to Social Security, Medicare, future congresses and 
future generations.
  I believe his plan is out of touch with the true hopes and 
aspirations of the American people. We have an obligation to confront 
these issues squarely, as we are talking about tonight. We need to talk 
straight to the American

[[Page H1374]]

people; and I hope this Congress, before we get out, will adopt an 
economic plan and a budget that reflects the true priorities of the 
American people and does not pass the buck to future generations.

                              {time}  1900

  Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the 
recollection of the President's quote about not passing along problems 
to future generations. We had a little more candid quote from the 
director of OMB the other day, Mr. Daniels, who said, ``We have 
returned to an era of deficits, but we ought not hyperventilate about 
this issue.''
  Well, I do not see anybody hyperventilating here tonight, but what I 
have heard tonight from the gentleman from Maryland is a passionate and 
persuasive case for confronting this budget issue and getting our 
fiscal house in order, getting back on the right track, so I appreciate 
very much his contribution to our discussion.
  I am happy to yield to the gentlewoman from Santa Barbara, California 
(Mrs. Capps), a treasured colleague, for her remarks on this situation 
that we are facing.
  Mrs. CAPPS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from North Carolina, 
and it is a pleasure to be here with my colleagues. I could be no place 
else. We are really at a crossroads in this country, facing a budget 
such as we have received from the President to deal with.
  I want to echo what my esteemed colleagues are talking about with 
respect to the budget, and I have asked that this chart be left here. 
It has been referred to already, but it points out clearly the huge 
deficits, as far as the eye can see is the way we phrase it, and this, 
after we finally did bring our Federal budget into line in the late 
1990s.
  Maybe this is a good time to mention a quote by the Fed Chairman, 
Alan Greenspan, last fall. ``History suggests that an abandonment of 
fiscal discipline will eventually push up interest rates, crowd out 
capital spending, lower productivity growth, and force harder choices 
upon us in the future.''
  The administration has no plans to address this budget deficit and, 
in fact, in this latest budget is proposing to make it much worse. The 
reckless tax cut that we cannot afford that will not help to restart 
the economy and, for the most part, goes to precisely the people who do 
not need it, is what they are proposing.
  I must be up front and admit that a couple of years ago I did vote 
for the tax cut, the big one. I believed then and I continue to believe 
now that it had some good provisions: increasing the child care tax 
credit, getting rid of the marriage penalty, dealing with estate taxes. 
At that time we were told we had a $5.6 trillion surplus and that we 
could afford a tax cut. Clearly, things have changed. Everything, that 
is, except the administration's approach.
  I believe it is so irresponsible to propose these kinds of tax cuts 
to a Nation at war. We are at war in Afghanistan and in other parts of 
the world against terrorism. We are asking all Americans to sacrifice, 
and yet this tax cut will fatten the wallets of a few. This is not 
shared sacrifice. The tax cut that the President is proposing will 
cripple our ability to deal with an important part of the war on 
terrorism: our homeland security. We are facing a possible war with 
Iraq for which there is no mention in the President's budget, and we 
have ongoing needs such as some I will address in my time today: health 
care needs of our senior citizens, and others. These are some real 
problems that we are facing of economic security in our land, of health 
security, environmental security.
  I want to talk about just one small example, and I brought it up 
today with our Secretary of Health and Human Services, Tommy Thompson. 
Our country has a huge shortage of nurses, all kinds of nurses. They 
are the backbone of our health care system. They are critical to our 
efforts to provide everyday health care to millions of Americans, and 
they are on the front lines of our efforts to fight bioterrorism. They 
will be the ones to identify victims, to vaccinate the healthy, to 
assist doctors in treatment. We have 19,000 nurses in Armed Forces 
Reserves. We are going to face a continued crisis as they are called 
up.
  So last year, Congress passed my Nurse Reinvestment Act. It was a 
bipartisan effort by my committee chairman, the gentleman from 
Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin), the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell), the 
gentleman from Florida (Mr. Bilirakis), and lots of Members worked hard 
on it, the President signed it into law, Tommy Thompson raved about it 
and was glowing about it. I want to just read two sentences from his 
``Budget in Brief: Fiscal Year 2004'' from the Department of Health and 
Human Services addressing the national nursing shortage:
  ``The Nation continues to face a nursing shortage. In 2000, the 
estimated national demand for registered nurses was over 100,000, 6 
percent more than the supply. Demand for nurses is rapidly increasing 
as a result of a growing and aging population that needs more health 
care as well as continued medical advances that heighten the need for 
nurses. The nursing supply is not keeping pace with demand due to a 
decline in nursing school graduates and an aging of the work force.''
  At the time that the bill was signed into law, the omnibus bill of 
last year, the amount of the budget was increased to a nice size; but 
then, in this year's budget, it is again reduced. So these are empty 
words, empty rhetoric, that have come from the administration, just one 
piece of our complex but very important health care delivery system.
  This budget request that we are facing this year has a 13 percent cut 
in the nurses' education and training fund. It slashes funding for 
advanced practice nursing in half, and it defunds programs to train 
nurse faculty and geriatric nurses. I talked with Secretary Thompson 
about this today. I like him; I think he is an innovative thinker and 
committed to the issues. I asked him about these cuts and his response 
was, ``Well, yes. We will be sticking with this proposal to cut funding 
for these programs,'' despite their assessment that the nurse supply is 
not keeping pace with the demand. They are just not going to do 
anything about it.
  I believe, I say to my colleagues, that this is plainly 
irresponsible. We need to provide the funds to train new nurses, which 
we desperately need both for our ongoing medical needs and health 
needs, but also in the event of a bioterrorist attack. We should not be 
cutting this important program. I urge my colleagues who worked with me 
to get this Nurse Reinvestment Act to step up where the administration 
has not.
  I told Secretary Thompson that we were going to adjust the budget to 
include sufficient funds for the nurse program. I apologize for making 
this sidebar. It is part of an overall budget that is way out of 
kilter, but I think it speaks in a precise way to a matter of great 
concern to the health and security, really, of our Nation at this time 
in our history.
  Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, there is no Member better 
qualified than the gentlewoman from California to speak to the nursing 
shortage and to the deficiencies in this budget with respect to nursing 
education. So she has done all of us a service in pointing this out, 
and we appreciate very much her contribution.
  It is now my pleasure to yield to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. 
Moran), a member of the Committee on Appropriations and the Committee 
on the Budget.
  Mr. MORAN of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, there are so many reasons why 
these tax cuts that have been proposed in the President's budget are 
irresponsible. One of them, obviously, is the fact that just as the 
budget deficits and the public debt balloons in 2008 and thereafter is 
when the baby boom generation, our generation, starts to retire. So we 
are no longer making money, helping to solve the problem; we become the 
problem. When I say ``we,'' I refer to the fact that most of the 
Members of Congress are members of the baby boom generation. We are 
going to double the retirement numbers, and yet what we would be doing 
with this tax cut is to use every last dime of the Social Security and 
Medicare Trust Funds to pay for these tax cuts. Mr. Speaker, $4.4 
trillion over the next decade. That is the first element of 
irresponsibility.
  Second, of course, is that we do not know what the costs are really 
going to be from other parts of the budget. We had an analysis in The 
New York Times yesterday. They consulted the

[[Page H1375]]

Congressional Budget Office, any number of distinguished economists, 
all of the best sources, to figure out what might be the cost of war in 
Iraq and of fulfilling the responsibilities that the President said 
that he would make us responsible for once we go in. They estimated the 
costs would be between $100 billion and roughly $569 billion. The point 
is, we do not know what the cost is, yet we are going to go ahead with 
these tax cuts when we do not know how much money we are going to have 
available. So we have no idea how much we are going to be borrowing 
from the next generation.
  The third that has been aptly discussed is the fact that the money is 
going to the very wealthiest people in this country, the people who 
needed the tax cut the least and who are the least likely to spend it 
immediately to stimulate the economy. So it does not make a whole lot 
of economic sense when what we are really trying to do is to pull this 
country out of a lingering recession.
  The last issue that I would like to address is some of the foregone 
alternatives that are caused as a result of the tax cut. Today we heard 
from the Secretary of Health and Human Services. The administration has 
a prescription drug plan. They are touting it. They should be ashamed 
of it, because the fact is that it is woefully inadequate. Medicare 
beneficiaries are going to spend more than $1.8 trillion on 
prescription drugs over the next 10 years, and even if every dollar of 
the President's proposal went to our prescription drug coverage, which 
it will not, there is really only about $300 billion that actually goes 
to covering prescription drugs, the plan would only cover 22 percent of 
beneficiaries' medication needs. Seniors who spend more than $5,500 of 
their own money would get only 20 percent reimbursement for their drug 
costs.

  But it seems to me that when we look at a plan like this, we really 
ought to consider what we get as Members of Congress, and there is 
where the deficiency is most pronounced. The President wants seniors to 
pay a $275 deductible each year. Most Members of Congress pay no 
deductible. The President wants seniors to pay 50 percent coinsurance 
for the first $3,000. Members of Congress only pay 25 percent. The 
President wants seniors to have a gap in coverage where they pay 100 
percent of the cost when their need is between $3,000 and roughly 
$7,000. Most Members of Congress have no gaps in prescription drug 
coverage, and yet the administration says that they want it modeled 
after the Federal Employees Health Benefits Plan.
  Mr. Speaker, it is not just the prescription drug coverage that is 
going to be necessarily inadequate. The Medicaid program is going to be 
capped with block grants. We look at programs like housing programs, 
HOPE 6 that the President has touted and, in fact, HOPE 6 is eliminated 
in this budget. This budget cuts education, it cuts 36,000 seniors from 
Meals-on-Wheels, not to mention No Child Left Behind which was the 
President's principal domestic initiative, and it is $619 million less 
than what is needed just to offset inflation. I could go down a long 
list. I am not going to do that.
  Mr. Speaker, the fact is that the President's budget and the 
President's economic plan does the American people an injustice. It 
needs to be defeated.
  Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from 
Virginia for a very useful look at a number of critical items in the 
President's 2004 budget.
  I yield to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Tierney), our 
esteemed colleague.
  Mr. TIERNEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his hard work in 
putting this time together.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise today to discuss President Bush's 2004 budget 
which, unfortunately, and I think disturbingly, at a time of continued 
economic insecurity and global instability, fails to put America's 
priorities ahead of politics and idealogy. The President continues to 
pursue an irresponsible economic policy that focuses solely on 
multiyear tax cuts for our wealthiest citizens, while offering little 
assistance to countless working individuals and families that need it 
the most. One of my colleagues said it best earlier today: This is the 
most irresponsible fiscal situation of an administration since the days 
of Nero.

                              {time}  1915

  All this is going on while the same wealthy individuals and 
corporations that have already pocketed the lion's share, the 
disproportionate share of $1.6 trillion in tax cuts for 2001 and 2002, 
are out there, while the number of unemployed workers, white-collar and 
blue-collar, are higher than they have ever been in decades.
  Further, although the President says he supports education, homeland 
security, prescription drugs for seniors, and a myriad of other 
responsible needs, his budget reflects otherwise. There is a clear 
disconnect between what the President promises and what he produces. 
His rhetorical support for many critical domestic processes is simply 
not reflected in the budget's numbers and figures. The reality is that 
children will be left behind. Our first responders, those that protect 
our borders and ports, will not be adequately funded; and our senior 
citizens will be short-changed.
  On top of all of this, we are having the biggest defense buildup in 
the past 20 years. The costs of disarmament or a potential war with 
Iraq are not even included within the President's budget or within 
those Department of Defense numbers. While the White House speaks of 
little else besides Iraq these days, the one place they are 
conspicuously silent is in the budget.
  Today's report in the Washington Post says the President is going to 
request a supplemental spending bill of as much as $95 billion to pay 
for any military action in Iraq. Why is that not in the 2004 budget? 
Why is it not being talked about with the American people today as the 
cost of what we are looking at here?
  They have already offered $26 billion to Turkey for the use of our 
bases on their northern front against Iraq. All of this, the $95 
billion, the $26 billion to Turkey, God knows how much else to other 
countries whose silence or participation is being bought with respect 
to the invasion of Iraq, is in addition to the $400 billion in the 
fiscal year 2004 budget already proposed for the Department of Defense 
for our military, and there is no end in sight.
  Estimates for the cost of war, even if it is successful in military 
terms, and Iraq's reconstruction are between $50 billion to $200 
billion. At the same time, we are continuing to spend 650 to $750 
million a month in Afghanistan to try to rebuild that country. We are 
going to continue to do that for the foreseeable future.
  We have to put this budget in perspective. When we add all of that 
up, without the cost of Iraq, this $5.6 trillion budget surplus we 
looked at at the beginning of this Presidential term has already been 
replaced by a $2.1 trillion deficit. This is close to an $8 trillion 
turnaround in just 2 years, and the numbers are staggering.
  At the same time, there are record job losses and poor economic 
growth. Two million jobs have been lost since January of 2001. The 
stock market has gone down while the unemployment rate has gone up. 
Consumer confidence is at its lowest level in nearly 10 years.
  Meanwhile, in response to all of this, all this administration can do 
is to continue to promote and advance the narrow economic plan of tax 
cuts for the few without regard to the plight of the many.
  There are consequences for this flawed fiscal policy, and our vital 
domestic programs on which many people depend are what are going to 
suffer. They were underfunded even before we started talking about what 
is going to happen in Iraq, and they are going to be even more severely 
underfunded after that.
  No Child Left Behind will leave many children behind. It is $9 
billion beneath the amount that the President promised.
  After-school programs, a cut. Two million children will be left 
without the benefit of those programs. In April of 2002, the President 
went to New Mexico and told us all about his support for Even Start, 
but he cuts that program; and he cuts the Head Start program, as well.
  The President cuts vocational and technical funding. Even though 34 
percent of our children are all that go on to higher education for 4 
years, he is cutting money from vocational and

[[Page H1376]]

technical programs that might give other children the chance to go on 
and have a well-prepared background for a life that gets them ready for 
the future.
  I could go on and on, but I know other Members want to speak. I would 
simply say this budget is totally irresponsible, and it has yet to put 
in the amount of money we are going to be spending in Iraq and in 
occupying Iraq.
  I think the President owes the American people an explanation of just 
what that amount is and what are the costs, not only in terms of human 
life of Iraqis and United States individuals, and others, but what is 
the cost in treasure, and what are we giving up for his decision not to 
go ahead and contain this country, and not to go through the United 
States Security Council to bring that matter to a resolution, but 
rather to go in unilaterally and peremptorily invade at a significant 
cost. That is what the American people have to know and debate.
  Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield to my 
colleague, the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Etheridge), who 
served as our superintendent for instruction and therefore knows our 
education budget very, very well, but also has been a very strong 
spokesman in this body for fiscal responsibility.
  Mr. ETHERIDGE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding to me, 
and I thank him and the gentleman from South Carolina for pulling this 
Special Order together.
  Mr. Speaker, I have been working hard to get Federal support for our 
schools. Although this White House talks a good game about education, 
when it comes to the budget, the devil is always in the details; and 
the details of the Bush budget certainly provide tremendous cuts to 
vital education aid in my military communities.
  I want to talk about just one area tonight: those communities. Mr. 
Speaker, President Truman established Federal support known as Impact 
Aid for school districts that are impacted by heavy Federal presence 
because they do not pay property taxes. In my district, Forts Bragg and 
Pope are two major bases; and other people can talk about theirs, where 
thousands of soldiers, airmen, and their families are based. Because 
these Federal entities do not pay taxes, we provide for something 
called Impact Aid to help with books, teachers' salaries, buildings and 
the like. Impact Aid was designed to compensate for the revenue losses.
  Well, in these areas across the country, they have seen devastating 
cuts this year because of State budgets being put in trouble because of 
this administration's policies. In this budget they are proposing to 
cut $173 million from Impact Aid, a 14.5 percent cut, at the very time 
when we are asking our men and women to deploy and go overseas, and 
leave their children back home for an education. This is just terrible.
  By not allowing federally connected school districts to count 
children where parents reside off base, this is what they said in 
Cumberland County, the President is ignoring 240,000 children who 
attend the schools in the areas around these bases. Abandoning these 
children is not only a mistake; it is absolutely immoral.
  Last week the Fayetteville Observer reported that under the Bush 
budget, funding for 14,600 children living off the post there would be 
eliminated for funding. Mr. Speaker, my State's economy is hurting 
because of this administration's economic policies. Other States are 
seeing the same. State budgets are being slashed.
  We cannot allow, in one of the largest deployments, at a time when 
impending war is here, allow these men and women to be concerned about 
their children being educated at home. Rather than being compassionate, 
these cuts in Impact Aid are absolutely cold cruelty, and I urge my 
colleagues to restore these devastating cuts.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight to join my colleague from South Carolina, 
Mr. Spratt, and Mr. Price of North Carolina to talk about the serious 
consequences of President Bush's misguided budget proposals. I want to 
thank my friend for his unsurpassed leadership in this vital area.
  As the former Superintendent of North Carolina's public schools, I 
have made federal support for education my top legislative priority as 
a member of the U.S. House. Although this White House talks a good game 
about education, when it comes to budgets the devil's in the details. 
And the details of the Bush budget contain an inexcusable cut to vital 
education aid for our military communities.
  Mr. Speaker, President Truman established federal support known as 
``Impact Aid'' for school districts that are impacted by a heavy 
federal presence. For example, in my Congressional District, we have 
Fort Bragg and Pope Air Force Base where thousands of soldiers, airmen 
and their families are based. Because these federal entities do not pay 
local property taxes, the school districts are deprived on their normal 
source of revenue for books, teacher salaries, school buildings and the 
like.
  Impact Aid was designed to compensate for some of that revenue loss. 
In areas like Cumberland County, NC, Impact Aid is a crucial component 
of the annual budget, and if it's not there, that community will face 
massive property tax increases, devastating cuts to schools, police and 
fire and other vital services.
  Under its proposed budget for next year, the Bush Administration has 
proposed cutting $173 million for Impact Aid. That's a 14.5 percent 
cut.
  In addition, the Administration proposes to end Impact Aid for 
children of military families who live off base. Earlier this month, 
the head of the National Association of Federally Impacted Schools 
said, ``By not allowing federally connected school districts to count 
children whose parents reside off-base . . ., the President is totally 
ignoring over 240,000 children who must attend these schools.'' 
Abandoning these children is not only a mistake, it's immoral.
  Last week, the Fayetteville Observer reported that under the Bush 
budget, funding for 14,600 children living off the post would be 
eliminated.
  Mr. Speaker, my state's economy is hurting because of this 
Administration's terrible economic policies. The state government has 
been forced to slash funding. At the same time, military families are 
dealing with large-scale deployments for the looming was against Saddam 
Hussein. And the communities that support these military facilities 
already face devastating losses of commerce and tax base.
  Rather than being compassionate, these cuts in Impact Aid are cold 
cruelty. I urge my colleagues to restore these devastating cuts, and I 
thank my colleague Mr. Price for his leadership on budget issues and 
for organizing this Special Order.
  Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for 
his contribution with respect to Impact Aid, a subject we have heard 
about tonight. That certainly is a deficiency in the President's 
budget.
  I am happy to yield the remainder of our time to the gentleman from 
South Carolina (Mr. Spratt), the chairman of our Committee on the 
Budget, for whom I am substituting tonight. He has been tied up in a 
meeting. We are glad to have him here on the floor to wrap up this 
Special Order with his own insights.
  Mr. SPRATT. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend and colleague, the 
gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Price), for taking charge of this 
Special Order and making this information available. It is awfully 
difficult to get all of this detail and all of its complexity out so 
that everybody can understand why we are so concerned. This is not just 
political rhetoric we are going through tonight.
  I have one chart here which runs the risk of being a little complex, 
but it tells a great deal about where we are. First of all, it shows 
the surplus that we thought we had that OMB estimated in January of 
2001 as $5.637 trillion. A few weeks ago, OMB came back to us, the 
Office of Management and Budget, and says, whoops, we were wrong. We 
have to make economic adjustments to that surplus of $3.174 trillion. 
What that means is that the adjusted surplus, the real surplus in 
economic reality now is $2.463, not $5.63 trillion.
  Then if we look at these enacted policies, and these are things done 
today, legislated, which have committed the available surplus, we will 
find they add up to mostly the tax cuts, $2.6 trillion. As a 
consequence, we have already committed all of the available surplus 
still remaining after economic adjustments from the $5.6 trillion 
surplus last January. In fact, we are $19 billion over and above that 
surplus if we do not do another thing, just sit still and do not 
increase any policies.
  However, the administration, knowing that, is proposing nearly $2 
trillion in additional action, the lion's share of which goes to 
additional tax cuts, two tax cuts that come to about $1.4 trillion. As 
a consequence, they are adding

[[Page H1377]]

$2.1 trillion to the national debt, which, with cumulative deficits 
between 2002 and 2011, will come to $2.1 trillion.
  Here in one chart, very graphic, is why we are concerned. Now we are 
living in this sweet spot. Those are the peak years of the baby boomers 
when they are doing better and paying into the Social Security and 
building up a surplus, for now. As this chart shows graphically with 
these red bars here below the line, in 2017 that gravy train comes to a 
halt. Social Security goes cash negative, and it is that that we should 
be getting ready for right now. We are doing just the contrary of what 
we should be doing to prepare for those years when the baby boomers 
will be retiring.
  Mr. PRICE of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for 
contributing to the Special Order.

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