[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 29 (Tuesday, March 1, 2011)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1024-S1028]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           ECONOMIC RECOVERY

  Mrs. BOXER. Thank you very much. Senator Reid has told me I have 30 
minutes, so I will start that at this time.
  We are in a very difficult time right now because we are getting out 
of the deepest recession since the Great Depression. If we go back and 
look at the headlines when our President was inaugurated, we see the 
pace of job loss and we see what happened to credit and we see what 
happened to the auto industry and we see what happened to the stock 
market--we eventually lost about 50 percent from its highs. We are now 
in a situation where we have this economic recovery starting, but the 
jobs are not coming as fast as we want.
  We don't want to do anything which threatens that economic recovery, 
which threatens our families and threatens the middle class. This is 
not the time to hurt the middle class. What we see in Wisconsin is the 
middle class finally saying to the Governor there: Look, be fair to us. 
We are willing to give up pay, we are willing to pay more for our 
benefits, but don't destroy our ability to have a say in our lives.
  So as this economic recovery plays out, we have to deal with deficits 
that have come about because of this terrible recession, fewer revenues 
coming in to the Federal Government, more people calling on programs to 
help them with unemployment insurance and food stamps and things they 
need to stay alive. We have to deal with our deficit, there is no 
question about that. We have to do it like grownups. We

[[Page S1025]]

have to do it with common sense. We don't want to take a meat ax to 
this recovery and wind up losing jobs, jobs, jobs.
  This last election was all about jobs. I was out there, so I can tell 
you. My Republican opponent, every day, said: Senator Boxer, where are 
the jobs? Where are the jobs? That was a legitimate question. I 
answered it this way: It is taking too long to get these jobs back 
where they should be, but I am going to fight every day for jobs. When 
I see a proposal that will threaten jobs, I am going to talk about it.
  I am going to get to the Republican proposal for the rest of this 
year, the 2011 budget proposal, which experts such as Mark Zandi, a 
Republican expert who advised Republican candidates--he advised John 
McCain. He said, as well as Goldman Sachs, that if you pass the 
Republican budget plan, you endanger 700,000 jobs. So what do we do? We 
have to cut spending, yes. We have to do it wisely. We have to sit 
together and discuss it, not say: My way or the highway; here is the 
bill, don't talk to me.
  I think it is important, as we hear the majority leader address his 
comments to the Democratic side, to address some comments to the 
Republican side. When George Bush was elected President, President Bill 
Clinton handed him a $236 billion budget surplus. I am proud to say I 
served at that time, and I voted for the Democratic budget, the Clinton 
budget. What did it accomplish? Quite a bit. Not only a balanced budget 
but a surplus. There were those on the other side calling for an 
amendment to the Constitution for a balanced budget. We said: We don't 
need an amendment; we just need to balance the budget in a wise way, 
and we did it. We cut out unnecessary spending, but we invested where 
it created jobs. Guess what. We said to the upper income people of $1 
million or more: You have to pay your fair share. They were willing and 
able to do it, and we created not only surpluses in the Federal 
Government but 23 million new jobs.
  Let me say that again. We created a surplus--not only a balanced 
budget surplus but 23 million new jobs. Now the Republicans take over, 
and when George Bush leaves office, he created 1 million jobs in 8 
years, compared to 23 million. Guess what. He left us a $1.3 trillion 
deficit. I say to my friends here, he left the wars off budget, so it 
was even way higher than that. He didn't put the two wars on the 
budget.
  President Obama, last year, created more jobs than George Bush did. 
President Obama created, in 2010, 1.1 million new jobs. So the new jobs 
under President Obama in 2010 equal the net jobs of George Bush after 8 
years. President Obama inherited a $1.3 trillion deficit from George 
Bush, who created that from a surplus. It is important we follow this. 
George Bush created 1 million jobs net compared to 23 million jobs 
under Bill Clinton, and President Obama inherited the worst recession 
since the Great Depression--700,000 jobs a month lost, panic on Wall 
Street, you name it, the auto industry going out. We would have been 
the only leader in the industrialized world not to have an auto 
industry.
  It is fair to say things have stabilized. The auto industry had the 
best year in a long time. The money we loaned to the banks has been 
paid back. But we have more to do. The deficit is up to $1.6 trillion 
now because the wars are now on the budget, because we still haven't 
made up for the revenues we lost, and the jobs are coming back too 
slowly.
  This is where we stand. We have to pass a budget for the remainder of 
this year, and Democrats are saying let's do it wisely. We will cut, 
cut, cut, and we have a list of cuts we can go over. We cut $40 billion 
from the President's 2011 budget. The Republicans cut $100 billion from 
the President's budget. So, surely, between the 40 we cut and the $100 
billion they cut, we can meet and solve this problem. I would like us 
to do it right now--sit down in good faith and get it done and scratch 
any of the cuts that hurt our children, scratch the cuts that hurt our 
women's health, scratch the cuts that are essentially political--I will 
go into those later--and come up with the cuts that don't threaten 
hundreds of thousands of jobs.
  Here is the deal. There is still talk and fear about a government 
shutdown. Every time we think we have passed the point, there comes 
another article. Today in the Washington Post there is this article. I 
ask unanimous consent to have this printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                [From the Washington Post, Mar. 1, 2011]

     With Government Shutdown Looming, Freshmen Are the Wild Cards

              (By David A. Fahrenthold and Philip Rucker)

       In just two months, a freshman class of Republicans has 
     found a way to run the House.
       These 87 new members--who otherwise might have become foot 
     soldiers for party bosses, or jittery pawns of their home-
     town tea party groups--have instead coalesced into a bloc 
     with its own ideas and a headstrong sense of its muscle.
       As Republicans and Democrats try to cut a short-term budget 
     deal this week--and a more permanent one in coming weeks--the 
     freshmen are the wild card. They have the power to derail the 
     whole process. Again.
       But even their own leaders don't know if they will.
       The freshmen's willingness to do things their way stems 
     from their hyper-confident vision of themselves, revealed in 
     interviews in recent days with more than 30 members of the 
     group. Many described their job as a ``calling,'' a sense 
     that their grandchildren, their country or their God needed 
     them to make hard decisions to right the government's 
     finances.
       ``We may be the last opportunity,'' said Rep. Michael G. 
     Grimm (N.Y.), a former FBI agent.
       But now, the difficult part.
       In the escalating budget fight--and other battles to come--
     the freshmen will face the capital's hardest kind of 
     decision: how to compromise on the issue they care about the 
     most.
       How much ground will the freshmen give before they defy the 
     Senate and risk a government shutdown?
       ``I don't know,'' Rep. Joe Walsh (Ill.) said when asked how 
     the newcomers would react if the Democratic-controlled Senate 
     offered a spending bill with fewer cuts than theirs. '1 don't 
     know. I don't know. And I think most freshmen don't know.''
       This class of Republican freshmen--the largest for either 
     party in at least six decades--includes nine women and 78 
     men. Their views are not all the same: Some have called for a 
     more nuanced approach to spending cuts, while others have 
     insisted that the House's bare-bones budget was not bare 
     enough.
       Many can recount the moment they realized they were mad 
     enough to run for Congress.
       Rep. Alan Nunnelee (Miss.) said that he was happy as a 
     state legislator, and that he had resisted previous efforts 
     to draft him as a candidate. Then, on March 27, 2009, he 
     learned he was going to be a grandfather.
       ``What I saw happening in Washington really was endangering 
     the freedom'' his new grandson would have,Nunnelee said. ``I 
     had a moral obligation to do something about it.''
       Rep. Blake Farenthold (Tex.) was a talk-radio host, one of 
     more than three dozen freshmen who had never held an elected 
     office.
       ``I really feel like I was called to run for office at this 
     time,'' he said. ``A whole bunch of things all came together 
     at once. . . . I can't credit that to anything but divine 
     intervention.''
       With that kind of back story, the freshmen said they 
     wouldn't play the role of Congress's rookies. Instead of 
     being taught by longtime lawmakers, many said, they wanted to 
     teach.
       ``When you say, `We need to listen to the American people,' 
     that's us,'' said Rep. Kevin Yoder (Kan.), a former state 
     legislator.
       This group--which represents about one-third of the 
     Republicans in the House--showed its muscle last month, in a 
     series of private meetings with House Speaker John A. Boehner 
     (Ohio) and other GOP leaders.
       At issue was how deep to cut spending in a ``continuing 
     resolution'' to fund the government for the remaining seven 
     months of this fiscal year. During the midterm campaign, 
     Republicans had pledged to cut $100 billion over a year.
       But the leadership presented a number equal to seven-
     twelfths of $100 billion.
       The math worked. But, freshmen say, the politics didn't.
       ``We felt like we told the people that we would do $100 
     billion,'' said Rep. Trey Gowdy (S.C.), a former prosecutor. 
     ``And when you start using the words `pro-rata' or `There's 
     seven months left in the budget'--as a prosecutor, when 
     you're explaining, you're losing.''
       The leadership agreed, without much of a fight, and went 
     back to make additional reductions. In Congress's world of 
     tradition and seniority, the tail had officially wagged the 
     dog.
       But from here on out, it will be harder to be Congress's 
     heroes.
       Many of the freshmen say they want to consider changes to 
     Medicare, Social Security and other entitlement programs, 
     which have been political land mines in the past. And Senate 
     Democrats and the White House probably will stop many of 
     their proposals cold.
       ``We may not make it. Honestly. It may blow up in our face 
     as well,'' said Rep. James

[[Page S1026]]

     Lankford (Okla.), who previously directed a Christian youth 
     camp. ``At some point, somebody's going to stand up and say, 
     `We cannot keep doing this.' ''
       This is a key part of the story the freshmen tell about 
     themselves: that they don't mind turning some people off, or 
     even losing reelection.
       ``I cannot tell you how liberating it is,'' Gowdy said. 
     ``The job just doesn't mean that much to me. I'm loyal to my 
     word, and in the end I think that's what I'll be judged on.''
       But the election is still 21 months away. In that time, 
     historians say, the freshmen will find it more and more 
     difficult to hold on to their sense of exceptionalism--that 
     they can be in Washington, but not of it.
       ``Their principal vulnerability is that--having been 
     elected--they will be seen as politicians. No matter what. By 
     definition, they are politicians,'' said Ross K. Baker of 
     Rutgers University. Baker said that means making complicated 
     decisions that are hard to explain to voters.
       ``The alternative, of course, is to be voices in the 
     wilderness,'' Baker said--uncompromised, but also irrelevant.
       But the fallout from their hard decisions will not come 
     just at the election.
       Last week, as freshmen went home to their districts for 
     town hall meetings, Rep. Robert T. Schilling (Ill.) could 
     already feel it in the pit of his stomach.
       ``He who turns a blind eye will get many a curse,'' said an 
     angry Clara Caldwell, 81, quoting Proverbs at Schilling's 
     town hall meeting in Moline, Ill. She was criticizing him for 
     voting to cut funding for Head Start programs.
       Last year, Schilling was making pies at Saint Giuseppe's 
     Heavenly Pizza, the restaurant he owns just a few blocks 
     away. On this night, he received applause and criticism from 
     a standing-room crowd. Schilling tried reasoning with the 
     critics: ``Lots of people say, `We need cuts.' But everybody 
     in the room says, `Don't cut my stuff.' ''
       He tried conciliation, on the subject of an Amtrak project 
     in the district, which he'd voted to cut. ``The Amtrak will 
     probably end up happening someday,'' Schilling said.
       And he tried, in a quiet way, to ask for sympathy. ``The 
     stress that's out there is just unbelievable,'' he said, 
     meaning in Washington.
       It isn't just in Washington. ``Your stomach kind of knots. 
     Your mouth's dry. I went through a whole bottle of water in 
     there,'' Schilling said after the town hall meeting, walking 
     to his car. Good to get used to it, he said. ``It's not going 
     to get any better. We're on a mission.''

  Mrs. BOXER. It says this on the front page: ``With shutdown looming, 
GOP freshmen are wild cards.'' When you ask the Republican Members of 
the House where this is going, they say they don't know. The government 
could shut down; we don't know. Later, I will go into what happened the 
last time the government shut down. I will not do that at this moment.
  I talked to Senator Casey, my good colleague and a great leader in 
the Senate, about an anomaly in the law that protects Members of 
Congress from getting their pay shut down in the case of a government 
shutdown, when the vast majority of Federal workers will not get paid. 
He and I agree there is something wrong with this system. It is not 
fair. If we fail to keep this government operating, which is our basic 
responsibility, to keep the checks flowing to Social Security 
recipients, to veterans with disabilities, to make sure we don't harm 
the private sector contractors and workers--if we don't do that, we 
don't deserve to get our pay.
  We put together a bill that says, in the case of a government 
shutdown, Members of Congress and the President must be treated the 
same way as other Federal employees--and, by the way, not get back our 
pay retroactively. It touched a chord with several colleagues. We have 
the bill written, and we have sent it to the Republican side and the 
Democratic side. My understanding is, it has passed the Democratic side 
via hotline, and the Republicans are looking at it now. The cosponsors 
are Senators Boxer, Casey, Manchin, Tester, Nelson of Nebraska, Bennet, 
Warner, Wyden, Coons, Harkin, Hagan, Menendez, Stabenow, Merkley, and 
Rockefeller.
  We feel we have the support of the people. We are hopeful we will 
avert a government shutdown because it is bad for our country, bad for 
our families, bad for our States, and there is no need to have one. But 
if we do have one, we don't want to have Members of Congress go home, 
get their pay, and not even have to pay a price or sacrifice or 
anything else while other families are sacrificing. We hope our 
Republican friends will agree with us and, if they do, we are going to 
send it over tonight. We are not asking unanimous consent now, but we 
will at 4 o'clock. If they can go forward, we will send this over to 
Speaker Boehner in the hopes it will breeze through the House.
  In case of a government shutdown, which we hope will be averted, we 
hope we are treated the same as Federal employees and that we are not 
getting our paychecks when others are not.
  With that, I will yield the floor to Senator Casey for as long as he 
would like.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Pennsylvania is 
recognized.
  Mr. CASEY. Madam President, I wish to take a couple moments to 
express my gratitude, and I think people across the country--if we can 
get this done--will express their gratitude as well. At a time when the 
economy is still recovering--and there is good news that the recovery 
is moving at a faster rate than it was 1 year ago or certainly than 6 
months ago. I wish to talk about that for a moment.
  I express my gratitude to Senator Boxer for her leadership on this 
issue. All we are saying together--as she did in the mid-1990s, when 
this came up at the time of that shutdown--is, Members of Congress have 
to play by the same rules as everyone else who depends upon the Federal 
Government for a program or their pay; that we will play by the same 
rules. I commend Senator Boxer for her leadership, as she demonstrated 
all those years ago, when at the time it passed, but it was taken out 
in a conference committee. I believe, if Members of Congress are going 
to be deciding whether the government continues to operate or whether 
it shuts down, they have to play by the same set of rules.
  I mentioned the economy because this has a direct connection to why 
we are discussing this today. We have, as I said, a recovering economy. 
In Pennsylvania, there is data to show that. I know in California the 
unemployment rate has been high. It was high for a long period of time 
in Pennsylvania. It is still high but, in a relative sense, lower than 
a lot of places. We are at 8.5 percent in our State. That translates 
into 538,000 people out of work, which is an incredibly high number. I 
will say this. That number was higher this past summer. We were 
approaching 600,000 people out of work. We were below 540,000 at last 
count. I hope we are still moving in that direction when we see the 
monthly numbers again.
  We have a recovering economy. We also have very high deficits and 
debt. The American people are worried about that, justifiably. I have 
no doubt that when we continue to work together in the Senate--and I 
hope it happens in the House as well--we can come to a consensus about 
the 2011 budget, which is where most of the attention is now, and the 
2012 budget but also, longer term, about how we pay for essential 
services, create jobs, and reduce deficit and debt.
  Along the way, if Members of Congress are going to vote for a 
shutdown, they should not be paid their salary while that shutdown is 
in effect. It is about basic values such as accountability, not having 
one set of rules for Members of Congress and another set of rules for 
the American people. It is also about playing by the rules. We have to 
play by the same rules that we vote to attach to what happens in the 
Federal Government. Finally, I think it is about restoring or beginning 
to restore some of the basic trust we hope the American people will 
have in their government. That trust, that faith that keeps our 
democracy together, can be badly broken if we have Members of Congress 
who vote for a shutdown but are still getting their pay after the 
shutdown is in effect.
  Finally, it is about a basic value called fairness. People expect us 
to be fair. We cannot say to the American people that a Member of 
Congress is voting to shut down the government, with all the 
implications of that and the instability that would create, but then in 
the same breath say we still want to get the pay we have as Federal 
employees. So it is good accountability, trust, and fairness.
  I commend Senator Boxer for, once again, showing the leadership she 
demonstrated in the mid-1990s on this issue and again making it very 
clear we are going to do everything we can to live by the same rules. 
If there is a shutdown, our pay should be shut down.
  With that, I yield the floor.
  Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, how much time remains?

[[Page S1027]]

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Twelve minutes 45 seconds remain.
  Mrs. BOXER. I thank the Senator from Pennsylvania for working hard on 
this piece of legislation. It is very simple.
  No budget, no pay. That is it. We cannot have no function of 
government more important than passing a budget and keeping us going. 
The people have a right to expect that we will do our work.
  Social Security checks, if there is a shutdown, may not arrive on 
time. Veterans may not receive the benefits they have earned. Passports 
may not be issued. Superfund sites will not be cleaned up, and those 
are dangerous. Oil wells should be inspected. We see what happens when 
we do not do the functions of government; we pay, our people pay. 
Export licenses must be granted. Troops must be paid. Failing to keep 
the government open because of politics or because no one wants to 
listen to the other side and meet in the middle is a failure. All we 
are saying is treat Members of Congress and the President the same as 
other Federal employees. And no retroactive, back pay either.
  The bigger issue is the one I touched on; that is, what is the right 
way to approach this deficit problem. Clearly, we have to do it 
responsibly. Clearly, the American people want us to reduce this 
deficit. I want to reduce it. I have to say very proudly, not only did 
we reduce it under Bill Clinton but we had surpluses. This is the only 
time we ever had a surplus--a Democratic administration. OK? That is 
it. I do not need lectures from the other side of the aisle. Show me a 
time when they balanced the budget. They do not have one to show me.
  They can show me the record under George W. Bush and George Herbert 
Walker Bush: deficits, deficits, deficits, deficits. And under George 
Bush, job losses. Over the entire 8 years, there were 1 million net new 
jobs compared to 23 million under Bill Clinton. What a record.
  Let's do this the way we know it should be done, which is a balanced 
approach. Cut spending where it is wasteful, where it is useless, where 
it is dumb to spend money. Spend it where it makes sense--on our kids.
  The things my colleagues in the House did without one Democratic vote 
are shocking. The experts tell us we could lose between 700,000 and 1 
million jobs--between 700,000 and 1 million jobs--if we go with their 
package. They need to sit and talk with us. Let's reason together.
  They cut $100 billion off the President's budget. We have already cut 
$40 billion. Let's meet in the middle. But let's not threaten as many 
as 1 million jobs.
  Moody's estimates their budget would destroy 700,000 jobs. Goldman 
Sachs says their plan would cut economic growth by as much as 2 percent 
by the end of the year. It is inconceivable, after they ran around in 
this last election saying: Where are the jobs? Where are the jobs?--
that is all I heard. And it was a good point. But it is inconceivable 
they would turn their backs on jobs and now focus on the deficit as if 
that is the only issue we have to worry about.
  Again, when President Obama took office, the economy was heading off 
a cliff. I will never forget the Republican Secretary of the Treasury, 
Hank Paulson, looking straight in my eyes--and that was hard because he 
is 7 feet tall and I am a little under 5 feet; he is not 7 feet tall, 
but to me he looks like 7 feet tall--and saying: Senator, capitalism is 
on the brink of collapse. We may see the collapse of capitalism.
  I remember back to the debates when one of my Republican colleagues 
suggested nationalizing the banks. President Obama said: No, we are not 
going there. We are going to have to figure out a way. Yes, we did lend 
them money and it was an awful vote and I hated every minute of it. The 
banks paid back every penny.
  The auto industry--oh, my colleagues said, we cannot help the auto 
industry. Oh, yes, we did. We did not want to be the only Western Power 
that did not have an automobile industry. It is important to our 
national defense. We stabilized the auto industry, we have stabilized 
the financial industry, we approved tax cuts for the middle class, and 
we made investments in infrastructure.
  Yes, it is true, George Bush took a big surplus and turned it into a 
$1.3 trillion deficit. The deficit now is $1.6 trillion as we struggle 
out of this economic mire and put the wars on the budget.
  By the way, ending the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq over 10 years 
could get us $1.1 trillion. I have not heard any of my Republican 
friends go there at all with that. We need to do that. They are just 
looking at one small part of the budget.
  I have to tell you from my heart what I think they did over there. 
They cut $100 billion off the President's budget. We cut $41 billion 
off the President's budget. This is what they did: I believe they used 
deficit reduction as an excuse to carry out political vendettas against 
the Environmental Protection Agency. They not only took a meat axe to 
that budget, but they ordered the EPA--they said they cannot protect 
families from pollution from cement plants. They cannot do that. That 
means our people will be exposed to mercury. They said they cannot 
enforce the Clean Air Act when it comes to carbon pollution. Imagine, 
they do not dare just come here and say: Let's repeal the Clean Air 
Act. They go around the back door using the budget as a political 
vendetta tool.
  They said: Let's stop our improvements in food safety. I have to say, 
not one person in my home State ever came up to me--I do not care if 
they are Republican, Independent, or Democrat--and said: Senator, the 
two things I want when you get back is to give me dirty air and give me 
poisoned food. I need more contamination in my food.
  I cannot believe this. We just did a great bill, and they slashed the 
money for food safety. Tell me how that makes America stronger. Tell 
me, when we know how many people die of illness from contaminated food.
  They did a political vendetta against family planning, which is going 
to lead to more abortions if it goes through. It is not going to go 
through because we are not going to let them stop ensuring that 
American women in this day and age--they are not going to tell my 
people in California they cannot have access to contraception. Yet they 
cut every penny from Planned Parenthood in a clear, I believe, 
unconstitutional political vendetta.
  Madam President, 5 million men and women get the services of Planned 
Parenthood. They get tested for STDs, AIDS, cancer screenings--all of 
that. And a lot of women use Planned Parenthood clinics as their first 
line of health care. This is 2011. We are not going back to the dark 
days when women died because they did not have health care. We cannot. 
We cannot do it.
  Drop the political vendettas. Come to the table and let's find the 
cuts that make sense. Put a little more faith in your Democratic 
colleagues since we are the only ones who balanced the budget and 
created a surplus and 23 million jobs. I do not need to hear lectures 
about that. They can talk all they want. The last balanced budget was 
under Bill Clinton. The last surplus was under Bill Clinton. The last 
great economic growth was under Bill Clinton.
  Our President gets it. That is why he tackles this deficit over a 
period of time and gets it down to $600 billion by 2015. Maybe we can 
do more. I am ready to do more, and we will do more if we have an 
economic recovery. We will not if we lose another 1 million jobs and 
have another 1 million people getting help from us rather than having 
jobs and keeping their homes.
  What other vendettas? This one, the Corporation for Public 
Broadcasting. Somebody said that 4 hours of the war in Afghanistan 
would be equal to the cut they made to public broadcasting--4 hours of 
the war in Afghanistan. America should be proud of the Corporation for 
Public Broadcasting. We go toe to toe with the BBC. Great Britain funds 
100 percent of the BBC. We fund 15 percent of public broadcasting. But 
now they want to zero it out. A vendetta against Elmo.
  They have a vendetta against health reform. The President is right. 
In our bill we say the States can do another plan. Let's push that up 
to 2014. Do not go back to the days when 62 percent of all bankruptcies 
were linked to a health care crisis.
  Madam President, how much time do I have remaining?

[[Page S1028]]

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. There is 1 minute 45 seconds 
remaining.
  Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, they have a vendetta against clean 
energy. I guess they want to keep dependence on foreign oil. I do not 
and my people do not. We do not enjoy $5-a-gallon gas, which is where 
it is heading maybe because of the unrest in the Middle East. We need 
alternatives--clean cars, cars that go 50, 60 miles a gallon or do not 
need any gas at all. Oh, they cut that.

  They cut Head Start. Our little kids will not have Head Start. What 
are they doing? It makes no sense. Every dollar we put into early 
childhood education saves $10. What are they doing? And Pell grants.
  There are so many other ways to proceed. Do you know, if we just 
looked at the tax loopholes given to corporations who ship jobs 
overseas, it is over $140 billion over 10 years? Let's take a look at 
that. Let's take a look at the billionaires. Why do we have to ask 
little kids to give up a slot in Head Start and get that Head Start 
they need? Why do we have to ask our teenagers to give up on going to 
college? That is what their budget does for no reason at all.
  Let's avert a government shutdown by coming together. I am willing to 
move in their direction. They have to be willing to move to mine. 
Again, they cut $100 billion off the President's budget. We cut $40 
billion. Let's meet in the middle.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator's time has expired.
  Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent for 30 more 
seconds, and then I will yield to my friend.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, in conclusion, let's meet in the middle. 
Let's put this 2011 budget issue behind us quickly. Let's move on to 
long-term deficit reduction and job creation. If we fail, let's not get 
paid for our work here.
  This afternoon I will be back to ask unanimous consent: No budget, no 
pay.
  Madam President, I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Tennessee.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, I appreciate the comments of my 
friend, the Senator from California. We have to be serious about the 
country's debt. Admiral Mullen, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of 
Staff, says the debt is our biggest national security threat.
  Anyone in my State who looks at what we are spending in Washington is 
astonished. We are spending, this year, $3.7 trillion. We are 
collecting $2.2 trillion. The House of Representatives has said: Let's 
take a step--a serious step--toward dealing with that debt. I applaud 
them for that. That number is a number that we on the Republican side 
try to support in the Senate. We might have our own priorities within 
that reduced number, but we need to get serious about the entire 
problem of America's debt.
  It also goes directly to the problem of jobs we have in our country 
today. The last Democratic Congress and the President's policies have 
thrown a big wet blanket on private sector job creation in America. One 
of the biggest parts of the wet blanket is the big debt. According to 
economists, it costs us 1 million jobs a year. The big debt creates the 
potential for higher interest rates. That makes it harder to create 
jobs. It soaks up capital. It could be used to create jobs. It creates 
uncertainty. It creates a lack of confidence.
  There is a lot of spirit in this Senate to find a consensus on how to 
deal with the debt. I want to be one who does that. I look forward to a 
serious discussion of those efforts.

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