[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 87 (Friday, June 13, 2003)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1257]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 THOMAS FRIEDMAN COLUMN ON SERVICE CUTS

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                        HON. NICK J. RAHALL, II

                            of west virginia

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, June 12, 2003

  Mr. RAHALL. Mr. Speaker, as the Republican majority shortchanges 
working families on the child tax credit; as our veterans' benefits are 
cut; as the majority approaches cuts in transportation funding; as we 
experience a lack of funding for education and homeland security 
initiatives, and as the President is cutting services for the many in 
his incessant thirst to help the wealthy few, Thomas Friedman offers a 
view in his column ``Read My Lips'' in the June 11, 2003 edition of the 
New York Times, which I recommend to all my colleagues, Democrats and 
Republicans alike. It is as follows:

                [From the New York Times, June 11, 2003]

                              Read My Lips

                        (By Thomas L. Friedman)

       Democrats have been groping for a way to counter George 
     Bush's maniacal tax cuts, which are designed to shrink 
     government and shift as many things as possible to the 
     market. May I make a suggestion? When you shrink government, 
     what you do, over time, is shrink the services provided by 
     federal, state and local governments to the vast American 
     middle class. I would suggest that henceforth Democrats 
     simply ask voters to substitute the word ``services'' for the 
     word ``taxes'' every time they hear President Bush speak.
       That is, when the president says he wants yet another round 
     of reckless ``tax cuts,'' which will shift huge burdens to 
     our children, Democrats should simply refer to them as 
     ``service cuts,'' because that is the only way these tax cuts 
     will be paid for--by cuts in services. Indeed, the Democrats' 
     bumper sticker in 2004 should be: ``Read my lips, no new 
     services. Thank you, President Bush.''
       Say it with me now: ``Read my lips, no new services--or old 
     ones.''
       Whenever Mr. Bush says, ``It's not the government's money, 
     it's your money,'' Democrats should point out that what he is 
     really saying is, ``It's not the government's services, it's 
     your services''--and thanks to the Bush tax cuts, soon you'll 
     be paying for many of them yourself.
       As the former Nixon-era commerce secretary Peter Peterson 
     just observed in this newspaper, when Mr. Bush took office 
     the 10-year budget projection showed a $5.6 trillion 
     surplus--something that would easily prefinance the cost of 
     Social Security. The first Bush tax cut, coupled with 
     continued spending growth and the post-9/11 costs, brought 
     the projected surplus down to $1 trillion. ``Unfazed by this 
     turnaround,'' notes Mr. Peterson, ``the Bush administration 
     proposed a second tax-cut package in 2003 in the face of huge 
     new fiscal demands, including a war in Iraq and an urgent 
     `homeland security' agenda.'' Result: now the 10-year fiscal 
     projection is for a $4 trillion deficit.
       This in turn will shrink the federal government's ability 
     to help out the already strapped states. Since most states 
     have to run balanced budgets, that will mean less health care 
     and kindergarten for children and the poor, higher state 
     college tuition, smaller local school budgets and fewer state 
     service workers. And Lord only knows how we'll finance Social 
     Security.
       Everyone wants taxes to be cut, but no one wants services 
     to be cut, which is why Democrats have to reframe the 
     debate--and show President Bush for what he really is: a man 
     who is not putting money into your pocket, but who is 
     removing government services and safety nets from your life.
       Ditto on foreign policy. As we and our government continue 
     to spend and invest more than we save, we will become even 
     more dependent on the outside world to finance the gap. 
     Foreigners will have to buy even more of our T-bills and 
     other assets. And do you know on whom we'll be most 
     dependent: for that? China and Japan. Yes, that China--the 
     one the Bush team says is our biggest geopolitical rival.
       ``In the 1990's, Japan's and China's excess savings were 
     financing our private sector investment, because the 
     government was in surplus,'' says Robert Hormats, vice 
     chairman of Goldman Sachs International. ``Now, with these 
     looming deficits, China and Japan are being asked to finance 
     our government's actual operations.'' That makes us very 
     dependent on their willingness to continue sending us 
     hundreds of billions of dollars of their savings. Should 
     China and Japan not want to play along, your services will 
     very likely be cut even sooner (unless you believe in 
     ``voodoo economics''). Which is why Democrats should rename 
     this tax bill the China-Japan Economic Dependency Act.
       I don't think Democrats can win the presidency with a 
     single issue. You win the presidency by connecting with the 
     American people's gut insecurities and aspirations. You win 
     with a concept. The concept I'd argue for is 
     ``neoliberalism.'' More Americans today are natural neolibs, 
     than neocons. Neoliberals believe in a muscular foreign 
     policy and a credible defense budget, but also a prudent 
     fiscal policy that balances taxes, deficit reduction and 
     government services.
       To name something is to own it. And the Democrats, for too 
     long, have allowed the Bush team to name its radical 
     reduction in services, and the huge dependence it is creating 
     on foreign capital, as an innocuous ``tax cut.'' Balderdash. 
     This new tax cut is a dangerous foray into wretched excess 
     and it will ultimately make our government, ourselves and our 
     children less secure.

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