[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 164 (Monday, December 13, 2010)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8849-S8850]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       UNSUSTAINABLE FISCAL PATH

  Mr. VOINOVICH. Madam President, since I joined the Senate almost 12 
years ago, I have worked to ensure that Congress deals with our 
country's unsustainable national debt and budgets that are not balanced 
as far as the eye can see; to do this, we must undertake tax, 
entitlement and spending reform. As most of my colleagues know, since 
2006, I worked conscientiously to create a commission that would 
undertake this task. My partner in the House was Congressman Frank 
Wolf, and we introduced legislation we called Saving America's Future 
Economy, SAFE, which got 118 House co-sponsors. In the 111th Congress, 
Joe Lieberman and I introduced the Senate bill and were gathering co-
sponsors, then later combined our efforts with Senators Conrad and 
Gregg, chair and ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee, to 
introduce a similar debt and deficit commission bill, which eventually 
did receive a vote in the Senate.
  The Conrad-Gregg bill stipulated that if its commission's 
recommendations were supported by 14 of its 18 members, it would be 
fast-tracked for an up-or-down vote in both the House and Senate. One 
of my biggest disappointments in the Senate is that the Conrad-Gregg 
bill failed. I believe the reasons for that failure are already known 
by my colleagues, so I won't revisit that vote. And in any event, as I 
look back, even if it had passed the Senate, I am not so sure it would 
have passed the House because many in the Democratic leadership opposed 
it. Thankfully, sometimes there is good that blows in an ill-wind, and 
the President created his own debt commission by Executive Order with 
promises from Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Reid that they would 
allow a vote in Congress if 14 of the 18 commissioners supported this 
commission's recommendations.
  As you know, the President's commission, chaired by Alan Simpson and 
Erskine Bowles, recently released its final report. I am supportive of 
the commission's proposal, understanding that there would have been a 
tremendous amount of negotiation if the report they released had been 
adopted and sent to Congress.
  I am encouraged by the fact that 11 of 18 panelists endorsed the 
report, including my Senate colleagues Tom Coburn, Mike Crapo, Judd 
Gregg, Kent Conrad and Dick Durbin. As far as I am concerned, they and 
the other commission members who voted in favor of the proposal are 
true patriots who had the courage to do what is right for our country, 
and for the future of our children and grandchildren.
  As my colleague Tom Coburn said just before the commission's vote, 
``The time for action is now. We can't afford to wait until the next 
election to begin this process. Long before the skyrocketing cost of 
entitlements cause our national debt to triple and tax rates to double, 
our economy may collapse under the weight of this burden. We are 
already near a precipice. In the near future, we could experience a 
collapse in the value of the dollar, hyperinflation or other 
consequences that would force Congress to face a set of choices far 
more painful than those proposed in this plan.'' Fast-tracking the 
commission's proposal for a vote during this lame-duck session would 
have shown Americans and the world that the Federal Government is, in 
fact, deeply concerned about the direction we are headed and is not 
oblivious.
  The thing that is of grave concern to me is that in spite of the 
commission's hard work, it may be for naught. I think back to the Mack-
Breaux Tax Overhaul Commission that President Bush created at my 
urging. I was pleased to see that many of their recommendations were 
incorporated by the President's current commission, and I urge my 
colleagues to look at the executive summary of the Mack-Breaux 
commission that was given to President Bush in 2005.
  Frankly, I thought President Bush would review, tweak, and then send 
the Mack-Breaux recommendations to Congress. Unfortunately--and I have 
a great deal of respect for our former President--Congress never 
received a Presidential tax reform package for its consideration. I am 
anxious to read his book to see if he explains why he didn't do so. It 
was a missed opportunity for his administration, but more importantly 
it was a missed opportunity for the country. In my opinion, we would 
not be in the predicament we find ourselves in now had we addressed 
these issues in 2005 or 2006.
  And so, here we are in a situation where we are on an unsustainable 
fiscal course caused by explosive and unchecked growth in spending and 
entitlement obligations without adequate funding. We have got an 
outdated tax code that does not sufficiently encourage saving and 
economic growth, and a skyrocketing national debt that puts our credit-
rating in serious jeopardy and should give all of us great pause.
  I believe that the American people get it. They recognize that our 
fiscal situation is in the intensive care unit--on life support.
  When speaking, I always ask the audience two questions: First, ``Is 
your standard of living better than that of your parents?'' They answer 
yes. The second is, ``Do you believe your children's standard of living 
will be better than yours?'' The overwhelming answer is no. Sometimes, 
I also ask whether they think they will see their Social Security when 
they retire. Almost no one raises their hand, unless they have grey 
hair like me.
  In all of my 74 years I have never seen such fear, uncertainty, and 
concern about the future. I would also point out that it is not only 
the American people who think we are oblivious to the looming fiscal 
crisis; just ask the Europeans, the Chinese, and others

[[Page S8850]]

around the globe who fund our spending addiction. Many Americans don't 
realize that foreign governments hold nearly 50 percent of our public 
debt, and we are going to ask them to keep on purchasing more. 
Moreover, many have failed to realize just how bad this spending 
addiction has gotten. I remember speaking at the Brussels Forum last 
year, and the Europeans were asking us for more money for NATO. When I 
pointed out to them that we were borrowing 41 cents for every dollar we 
spend, a hush fell over the room.
  It is time for us to do what needs to be done to fix our country's 
looming fiscal crisis. So I would like to say to my colleagues that 
when we vote on the Obama bipartisan tax fix, my vote will be NO. I'm 
not for any of the compromises. I am not for borrowing another $800 
billion dollars from China, Saudi Arabia, and other countries. To the 
contrary, I agree with David Walker, former Comptroller of the GAO and 
former President and CEO of the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, who said, 
``This `deal' is not reasonable from an economic, fiscal and social 
equity perspective. The compromise evidently was `you give me my tax-
cut extensions and more tax cuts, and I'll give you your spending 
increases.' The result is a bigger bill for our kids, grandkids and 
future generations of Americans. It's time for Washington to wake up 
and start dealing with our structural deficits.'' Maya MacGuineas, 
president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, had even 
stronger words: ``This feels more than a bit surreal. On the heels of 
the work of the White House Fiscal Commission last week on how to get 
control of the national debt, the White House and Members of Congress 
choose to engage in a negotiation that involves adding increasingly 
larger amounts to the debt? It's utterly exasperating.''
  Madam President, I feel the exact same way. It's time to stop kicking 
the can down the road and let these tax provisions expire and, as a 
result, force Congress and the President to make the tough choices 
about not only these taxes, but the entire tax and entitlement crisis 
facing our country. Perhaps then we would have enough anger from our 
constituents that we would act to reform a tax system that is far too 
complicated and does not encourage the growth we need. I would like to 
remind my colleagues that since 1986, there have been over 15,000 
changes to the Internal Revenue Code and it costs all of us $240 
billion each year to prepare our tax returns. Think of it. If we could 
simplify the code and make it cheaper to comply even by 50 percent each 
year, we would save the American taxpayers $120 billion.
  If these expiring cuts are not extended, you can count on it that 
everyone will take an interest in seeing that we finally deal with a 
broken tax and entitlement system. Then, perhaps, we will finally get 
the reforms that will get the floundering ship that is our country back 
on even keel. It will restore people's faith in the future of America 
as well as give comfort to the rest of the world--especially our 
creditors--that we are on the path to fiscal responsibility. It's time 
for us to face up to what needs to be done.
  I will not, after working my butt off from the day I got here to 
address a broken tax and entitlement system, have one of my final votes 
as a U.S. Senator be to kick the can down the road by extending these 
tax provisions and assuming that our fiscal ills will be taken care of 
next year. Because, you know what, if the history of our recent 
Congress is any indication of what will happen, nothing will get done.
  Just a few weeks ago, when the President's commission released its 
report, we started to gain momentum towards these long-overdue reforms. 
We need to take advantage of that momentum. I feel like we are coming 
to the last mile in a marathon, and rather than push through to the 
end, we are about to turn around and go back.
  My 45-year experience in government has been that in the absence of a 
crisis, the tough, but necessary, measures that need to be taken are 
not taken. If the tax cuts and other provisions expire, you can count 
on it that everyone will take an interest in seeing that we finally all 
come to the table to work to address these fundamental issues. It will 
restore people's faith in the future of America as well as give comfort 
that we, our country's leaders, understand the need to put our country 
on a path to fiscal responsibility.
  I have a modest proposal. The President should reconvene the same 
group of individuals that worked on the Bowles-Simpson commission and 
insist that they continue their dialogue and put a package together 
that the President can submit to the 112th Congress as soon as 
possible.
  By the way, where is the President's leadership? The New York Times 
reported that the Obama administration is considering comprehensive 
reforms, but other reports indicate that, once again, it's more talk 
without action because no working groups are in the works, no 
Executive-Congressional meetings have been scheduled. The President 
needs to get his key folks back to the table with Congress to see if 
they can't come up with some sort of compromise based on the best 
commonsense, reasonable, and fiscally responsible proposals that we've 
heard from his Commission.
  And so, to my friends that will remain in the Senate for the 112th 
Congress, and to those that will be new to this body, God bless you. 
You have the future of our Nation and the future of my children and 
grandchildren in your hands.
  During my time in office, I have tried my best. I have tried my very 
best. I am pleased with some of the progress that we've made, but 
believe-you-me, for someone who's been in government service for 45 
years, as I have already said, nothing happens unless you have a 
crisis. So that's what we need. A crisis that says now is the time to 
deal with tax and entitlement reform; now is the time to deal with 
budget reform; now is the time to curb our spending addiction and 
growing national debt; now is the time to balance our budgets.
  Madam President, I pray that the Holy Spirit will inspire my 
colleagues to make the right decisions for our country's future. I pray 
that the results between now and the end of the year will not be 
another ``kick the can down the road-we'll take care of it later,'' 
scenario. Madam President, my time in public office has run out, and 
from my perspective, so has the country's. Our national debt is one of 
the most important problems we face. Our failure to begin to address 
this fiscal crisis now will damage our economy, our national and 
domestic security, and the kind of future we leave to our children and 
grandchildren.

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