[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 52 (Thursday, March 26, 2009)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3818-S3821]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                               THE BUDGET

  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I understand the Senator from North 
Dakota, the chairman of the Budget Committee, may come to the floor. If 
he does and wants to speak, I will defer to him.
  In the meantime, I will address the President's budget, which the 
Senate will begin to consider this morning at 10 o'clock. Those of us 
who have spent a lot of time around schools, children, and education 
know there is a very good way to get a picture of the future and that 
is to walk into a first-grade class in Arkansas, Tennessee or anywhere 
else in America and take a photograph of the first graders. If you do 
that, you have a picture of that town, that neighborhood, that 
community, and our country 10, 15, 20 years out.
  The President's budget plan for the next 10 years gives us that kind 
of photograph of the future of our country. I commend the President for 
his candor, but I don't like the picture I see. I think, increasingly, 
our friends around the world and people in this country feel the same 
way. The Budget Committee chairman, Senator Conrad, has developed a 
different budget--somewhat different. He says it is about 98 percent 
similar to the President's budget. What the chairman, Senator Conrad, 
does is say let's look 5 years out, not 10 years, as the President has 
suggested. Senator Conrad has moved a few ``children'' out of the 
picture--the alternative minimum tax ``child'' is over here during the 
class photograph, so we will not be seeing that person. I think the 
``doc fix'' to avoid cuts in physician payments, which we are going to 
spend money on, is over here, so we will not see that ``child'' during 
the class picture. The money for the banks--I think we all hope 
Secretary Geithner's plan to begin to get toxic assets out of the banks 
will work. If it doesn't, we may have to go to plan B, and we should 
have the money in reserve if that is necessary. That ``child'' is also 
out of the class photograph.
  With all respect, the attempt of the chairman of the committee to 
present a 5-year budget, leaving out items that we know we will be 
spending money on, doesn't come nearly as close to giving us an 
accurate picture of what the country would be like 10 years from now 
with the budget we are acting upon.
  The President's photograph of the future is a more accurate picture, 
one we should pay attention to. But it is a blueprint for America that 
is a very different kind of America--an America with less freedom, with 
more Government, with more taxes, with more spending, with more 
borrowing, and an America that our children and our grandchildren will 
have difficulty affording. This blueprint that President Obama has laid 
out for us includes a trillion dollars more in spending for health care 
on top of the trillion dollars in so-called stimulus money that was 
spent. It includes more than a trillion dollars in taxes, including a 
national sales tax on energy in the middle of a recession. It would 
double the debt in 5 years and nearly triple the national debt in 10 
years.
  There is nothing in the President's budget that would seriously get 
to work on something he said he wants to work on, which is out-of-
control entitlement spending, which accounts for more than 60 percent 
of the spending in this budget.
  It is important for the American people to know this budget that we 
begin working on at 10 a.m. this morning is a budget of which 60 
percent is out of Congress' hands. It is on automatic pilot. It is 
spending for Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and it is going up--
everyone agrees--at an unsustainable rate, which means we cannot earn 
enough money to pay at that rate 10, 15, 20 years out; and there is 
nothing in the budget that would begin to take charge of that problem, 
such as the commission that Senator Gregg and Senator Conrad have 
proposed; whereby, we would, as a Congress, come up with a plan and 
present the plan for controlling entitlement spending, and we would 
vote it up or down--much in the same way that we deal with the 
difficult problem of closing defense bases.
  This 10-year picture of America's future is causing concern around 
the world. In China, where the savings rate is as high as 50 percent, 
compared to ours of about 1 percent--although it is up temporarily in 
the recession to about 5 percent. In China, a country that buys many of 
our dollars, leaders there express extraordinary concern about the 
value of the dollar and whether they should continue to buy our 
dollars.
  Of course, if people overseas do not find buying our dollar as 
attractive,

[[Page S3819]]

the price of our dollar goes down and the cash we are paid when we work 
is worth less and we can buy less and our standard of living will be 
less.
  We are a very lucky country. Here we are in the middle of this 
recession where people are hurting, where people are having difficulty 
finding jobs, and still in this year, we will be producing nearly a 
quarter of all the money in the world to be distributed among just 5 
percent of the people in the world. One way we keep that high standard 
of living compared with the rest of the world is to make sure the 
dollars we produce and earn and spend are valuable dollars. If we spend 
too much and tax too much and borrow too much, they become worth less 
and China and other countries will not buy those dollars.
  Not only is it causing concern in China, we have our European friends 
expressing concern about the U.S. financial condition. This is a turn 
of affairs. I have heard a lot of comment on this floor and over in the 
House of Representatives about: Oh, my goodness, we don't want to be 
like France, we don't want to be like some European country. We are 
already worse than that in some ways. In order to be admitted to the 
European Union, a country's annual deficit has to be less than 3 
percent of its gross domestic product. We are already exceeding that. 
The President's 10-year budget plan would have us settle in, after the 
recession is over, at about 4 percent. So we would be permanently 
disqualified from joining the European Union, according to the plan 
that is laid out before us.
  The plan also shows that every year of the 10 years of this budget, 
our total gross debt, which is all of the public debt we have--that is, 
debt that we individuals have when we loan money to our own Government 
or that we owe to the Chinese when they buy our dollars, or other 
countries around the world--that debt every year exceeds 90 percent of 
our gross domestic product, 90 percent of everything we work and earn 
and produce every year in this country that produces 25 percent of the 
world's income. We would be at that level for each of the 10 years. 
That is an alarming number. That is the highest amount of debt compared 
to our gross domestic product that we have had since the end of World 
War II. And, of course, during World War II we were just paying no 
attention to what we spent, what we borrowed, what we taxed because we 
had to win the war. Still we find ourselves today with that level of 
debt.
  Polls show this not only is causing concern around the world, it is 
causing concern at home. I normally do not think it is wise for elected 
officials to rely on public opinion polls when they vote. We are sent 
here, of course, to respect the views of the people who elected us but 
also to make some independent judgments.
  The Peter G. Peterson Foundation--which is headed by with David 
Walker, the former Comptroller General of the United States--has done 
some very important work over the last few years to try to bring to the 
American people the seriousness of the problem of our debt. Earlier 
this month, the Peter G. Peterson Foundation released a public opinion 
survey that was done jointly by Democratic and Republican pollsters. It 
showed the following: that voters rank the need to address our budget 
challenges as a top priority for the Obama administration second only 
to the need to get the economy back on track and get Americans back to 
work; that Americans see the threat to our future posed by our growing 
deficit and debt as more grave and more significant than global 
warming, more grave and more significant than declines in education, 
more grave and more significant than manufacturing, and more grave and 
more significant than the prospect of a rogue nation developing a 
nuclear weapon.
  In other words, the American people, like people in the rest of the 
world, look at our fiscal condition, look at this budget discussion we 
are beginning at 10 a.m. today--in just a few minutes--and they are 
concerned about this issue. We are the world leaders. Our dollar is the 
world's currency by choice. People who buy and people who follow our 
leadership are concerned.
  Another way to think about the importance of the debt is this way: In 
the 10th year of the President's budget, we will be spending $800 
billion on interest alone. Our credit card will have that big a monthly 
payment just for interest. That means we will be spending more on 
interest in the 10th year than we will on national defense, which is 
$700 billion. We will be spending eight times as much on interest as we 
will be spending on education, eight times as much on interest as we 
will be spending on transportation. Every dollar we spend on interest 
is a dollar we will not be spending on investments to protect our 
nation's competitive edge in the future, it is a dollar we will not 
have in our pocket to spend for our families, it is a dollar the small 
businessperson will not have in his or her pocket to create a job, and 
it is a dollar that makes us a little less wealthy.
  No one is suggesting that President Obama single-handedly caused 
these large deficits this year or that he is responsible for the 
economic mess in which we find ourselves. Our friends on the other 
side, the Democrats, always like to begin their speeches by blaming 
whatever they can on President Bush. But I think the American people 
are ready for a talk about where do we go from here.
  President Bush did not cause Hurricane Katrina, but he got in some 
trouble for how he dealt with the cleanup after Hurricane Katrina. In 
the same way, President Obama had nothing to do with the economic mess 
in which we find ourselves today, but he will be judged and his 
administration will be correctly judged based upon how well they lead 
us in responding to the economic mess in which we find ourselves today. 
We would suggest that spending this much, taxing this much, and 
borrowing this much will not help get us out of our economic mess.
  The right way to deal with this is not to increase our debt levels to 
levels that have not been seen since World War II. The right way to 
deal with it is not to spend another trillion dollars on health care at 
a time when we are already spending 17 percent of the gross domestic 
product, which is that much more than every other industrialized 
country in the world is spending. The right way to do it is not to put 
a national energy tax on the American people in the middle of a 
recession.
  There is a better way, and I will be offering an amendment in a few 
minutes in the Budget Committee to show how we can deal with climate 
change and clean air without new taxes.
  We can do it by starting with conservation, with construction of 100 
new nuclear powerplants. That is 70 percent of our carbon-free energy 
today. We can do it by electrifying half our cars and trucks and 
plugging them into nuclear plants and to coal plants at night when they 
have plenty of extra electricity. We do not have to build one new 
powerplant in the next 20 years for the purpose of charging plug-in 
electric cars unless we wish to. We need to have aggressive research to 
make solar power cost competitive, to find a way to capture the carbon 
produced by coal plants, to have the safe processing of nuclear waste. 
We need to be very aggressive on conservation and efficiency, which is 
the easiest way for us to deal with clean energy.
  We need to develop our oil and gas offshore. We can do it 10 miles 
offshore so we cannot see it, but we need to do it because the natural 
gas is important for home heating and, to some extent, for electricity. 
We are going to be using oil even if we do electrify half our cars and 
trucks, and we should be using our own oil instead of sending billions 
of dollars overseas and making us hostage to countries that are not 
always friendly to us.
  This is an important day in the Senate. This is a day when we begin 
to talk about the budget. We Republicans appreciate the fact that the 
President has given us a photograph of the future, in the same way we 
would take a photograph of first graders, and imagine what the country 
would look like in 10 years. We admire and appreciate his honesty in 
doing that, but we do not like the picture we see--too much spending, 
too much debt, too much borrowing, levels that concern the world and 
levels that concern the American people. It is not necessary to do 
that. It is not a wise way to create jobs in this country and to begin 
to get us out of this economic mess--but it will give us in that 
picture of our future a very different kind of country with more 
Government, more debt, less freedom, and a country that our children 
and

[[Page S3820]]

grandchildren will have a difficult time affording.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. JOHANNS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. JOHANNS. Mr. President, I rise today to discuss the coming debate 
on the budget resolution. I am very concerned about the use of the 
budget process to pass very complex climate legislation.
  When you think about it, cap-and-trade bills are enormous bills. They 
are complex, they require discussion, thought, debate, and a very 
careful weighing of the costs and the economic impacts of the 
legislation. Such a thoughtful, careful approach is simply not possible 
if we were to choose to move ahead with a cap-and-trade bill through a 
budget reconciliation process.
  I am not alone in believing this. At least 32 of my colleagues agree 
with me, and I suspect there are more. But these 32 colleagues cosigned 
a letter which I circulated together with a man I admire and respect a 
great deal--the senior Senator from West Virginia--to the Budget 
Committee. The letter plainly stated that we oppose the use of the 
budget reconciliation process to consider complex cap-and-trade 
legislation. Thereafter, the junior Senator from North Dakota, another 
man I admire and respect, also from the other side of the aisle, sent a 
letter to the Senate Budget Committee expressing similar concerns.
  Some of the cosigners support cap and trade. Yet they also oppose 
using budget reconciliation to enact it, to make it the law of the 
land. A group of Democrats in the House recently expressed identical 
concerns.
  Despite this very bipartisan, bicameral expression of clear 
disapproval, there are some who continue to push the use of the budget 
reconciliation process for cap and trade. Press reports indicate that 
the leadership in the Senate and in the House continue to discuss 
passing cap and trade through the budget reconciliation process. Just 
this last weekend, administration officials indicated ``all options 
remained on the table.''
  Even more troubling to me, yesterday we learned that the House 
included reconciliation instructions for the Energy and Commerce 
Committee, directing it to reduce the deficit by $1 billion by 
2014. But don't be deceived by the stated goal of reducing the deficit. 
The House language, in my opinion, is a Trojan horse.

  The fact is, this language opens the door to cap-and-trade 
legislation at some point in the budget process. It could be set up to 
bring in $900 billion in fees and spend only $899 billion, for example. 
Authors could claim to have reduced the deficit by $1 billion, but in 
reality every American family will have to pay thousands of dollars per 
year in increased energy costs. The use of such language would clearly 
serve one purpose: to slip through a piece of legislation that could 
literally change the economic landscape of this country under the cloak 
of the budget process.
  To be very clear, my comments today are not meant to address the 
general merits of climate change. I am simply saying no to 
shortchanging the legislative process and supporting instead a very 
careful, deliberate, and meaningful review of the legislation. It is 
troubling that leadership would even consider trying to put it in under 
the mask of another bill.
  When the Senate considered climate legislation last year, the bill 
set caps on U.S. greenhouse gas emissions through the year 2050. That 
is 40 years. The cost of such a cap is estimated to be $900 billion, 
according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. It would 
reportedly require 400 additional staff at the Environmental Protection 
Agency just to set up the program and write the rules. What does that 
mean? It means requiring almost $1 trillion in permits for the first 10 
years, and according to the President's budget director, of course, 
this will cost consumers.
  In Senate testimony last year, the CBO Director at the time noted:

       Firms would not ultimately bear most of the cost of the 
     allowances, but instead would pass them along to customers in 
     the form of higher prices.

  Under the President's proposal, an average American family would pay 
$3,000 a year in increased energy bills. In this day and age, that is a 
very heavy burden. It simply is not right to contemplate imposing a tax 
of $3,000 per family in legislation that is passed under the cloak of 
another bill.
  To summarize, Mr. President, cap and trade is complex. It is as 
difficult a piece of legislation as we will face this year. It will set 
limits on economic growth for the next 40 years, it will require a 
small army of additional Federal employees, and it will require every 
American family to pay a price. So I urge my colleagues to support a 
thoughtful, deliberate, transparent effort to address this country's 
energy challenges. I urge them to oppose the use of the budget to pass 
cap and trade in any form or fashion.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record 
the text of the two letters I referenced earlier in my remarks.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                                  U.S. Senate,

                                   Washington, DC, March 12, 2009.
     Hon. Kent Conrad,
     Chairman, Committee on the Budget, U.S. Senate, Washington, 
         DC.
     Hon. Judd Gregg,
     Ranking Member, Committee on the Budget, U.S. Senate, 
         Washington, DC.
       Dear Chairman Conrad and Ranking Member Gregg: We oppose 
     using the budget reconciliation process to expedite passage 
     of climate legislation.
       Enactment of a cap-and-trade regime is likely to influence 
     nearly every feature of the U.S. economy. Legislation so far-
     reaching should be fully vetted and given appropriate time 
     for debate, something the budget reconciliation process does 
     not allow. Using this procedure would circumvent normal 
     Senate practice and would be inconsistent with the 
     Administration's stated goals of bipartisanship, cooperation, 
     and openness.
       We commend you for holding the recent hearing, entitled 
     ``Procedures for Consideration of the Budget Resolution/
     Reconciliation,'' which discussed important recommendations 
     for the upcoming budget debate. Maintaining integrity in the 
     budget process is critical to safeguarding the fiscal health 
     of the United States in these challenging times.
           Sincerely,
         Mike Johanns; Robert C. Byrd; David Vitter; Blanche L. 
           Lincoln; George V. Voinovich; Carl Levin; Johnny 
           Isakson; Evan Bayh; Christopher S. Bond; Mary Landrieu; 
           James E. Risch; E. Benjamin Nelson; Lamar Alexander; 
           Robert P. Casey, Jr.; Michael B. Enzi; John McCain; Tom 
           Coburn; Jim Bunning; John Barrasso; John Ensign; Bob 
           Corker; James M. Inhofe; Chuck Grassley; Roger F. 
           Wicker; Mike Crapo; Susan M. Collins; Thad Cochran; Kay 
           Bailey Hutchison; Mark L. Pryor; Lisa Murkowski; Pat 
           Roberts; Saxby Chambliss; Sam Brownback.
                                  ____



                                                  U.S. Senate,

                                   Washington, DC, March 13, 2009.
     Hon. Kent Conrad,
     Chairman, Senate Budget Committee, Washington, DC.
     Hon. Judd Gregg,
     Ranking Member, Senate Budget Committee, Washington, DC.
       Dear Chairman Conrad and Ranking Member Gregg: Global 
     climate change is a serious problem that demands the full 
     attention of the Congress and the President. However, I 
     believe that the budget reconciliation process is not an 
     appropriate mechanism to expedite passage of climate change 
     legislation. It unnecessarily short circuits Congress's 
     ability to more fully debate this complex and multifaceted 
     public policy issue.
       I fully expect that the U.S. will enact mandatory 
     legislation that will reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the 
     near future, and we must do so in a way that balances our 
     energy security, economic development and environmental 
     integrity goals. The far reaching implications of this 
     legislation affect all sectors of the economy and require 
     appropriate time for debate in a number of key standing 
     committees.
       I look forward to working with you to review and respond to 
     the Administration's budget request in a way that will allow 
     us to enact innovative policy measures for the future of our 
     nation.
           Sincerely,
                                                  Byron L. Dorgan,
                                                     U.S. Senator.

  Mr. JOHANNS. Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the 
absence of a quorum.

[[Page S3821]]

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. CASEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.

                          ____________________