[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 101 (Friday, July 8, 2011)]
[House]
[Pages H4773-H4776]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          LEGISLATIVE PROGRAM

  (Mr. HOYER asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the majority leader for the 
purposes of inquiring of the schedule for the week to come.
  Mr. CANTOR. I thank the gentleman from Maryland, the Democratic whip, 
for yielding.
  Mr. Speaker, on Monday, the House will meet at noon for morning-hour 
debate and at 2 p.m. for legislative business. On Tuesday, Wednesday, 
and Thursday, the House will meet at 10 a.m. for morning-hour debate 
and at noon for legislative business. On Friday, the House will meet at 
9 a.m. for legislative business. The last votes of the week are 
expected no later than 3 p.m. on Friday.
  On Monday, the House will begin amendment debate on H.R. 2354, the 
Energy and Water appropriations bill; and consider H.R. 2417, the 
Better Use of Light Bulbs Act, under suspension of the rules.
  For the remainder of the week, the House will consider H.R. 1309, the 
Flood Insurance Reform Act of 2011; H.R. 2018, the Clean Water 
Cooperative Federalism Act of 2011; H.R. 2434, the Financial Services 
appropriations bill; and potentially legislation relating to the 
expiring authorization of the FAA.
  Finally, Mr. Speaker, as a scheduling notice, Members are advised 
that the House will now be in session during the week of July 18. I 
expect legislative business for the week to begin on Tuesday, July 19, 
at 2 p.m., with first votes postponed until 6:30 p.m. The last votes 
for the week are expected to conclude no later than 3 p.m. on Friday, 
July 22.
  And I thank the gentleman.
  Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for his scheduling information.
  I want to pursue what I presume is the reason for not having the 
district work period that was originally scheduled. My presumption is 
that we are concerned about the impending arrival of the August 2 date 
on which America would be put in the position of defaulting on its 
obligations. I presume that's the reason, that we want to make sure 
that we are here to work on that issue. Am I correct on that?
  Mr. CANTOR. The gentleman is correct.
  It is my hope that we can have some deliberative processes and open 
discussions so that we can arrive at an appropriate conclusion of the 
challenges surrounding the issue of the debt limit expiration. That is 
correct.
  Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for that observation.
  I know the gentleman has said in the past that he believes it would 
be a very bad situation for our economy and for our country if we did 
not extend the debt limit.
  Am I correct that the gentleman still shares that view?
  Mr. CANTOR. I would say to the gentleman, Mr. Speaker, that I have 
said before that America pays its bills just like the American people 
are expected to pay their bills at home and in their small and large 
businesses; but the fact is I think that the American people are 
expecting us to live up to the promise that we are not going to let 
spending get out of control again.
  So the purpose of the deliberations that are ongoing throughout this 
Capitol, at the White House, et cetera, are focused--and should be--on 
making sure we change the system, on making sure that we accomplish the 
necessary cuts which would exceed the amount that we raise the debt 
limit, as well as to signal to the American people that we have changed 
the system; that this kind of unbridled spending ceases and that we 
begin to live within our means and get the fiscal house in order so 
that we can focus on the overriding need for this country right now, 
which is to create an environment where jobs return.
  I know the gentleman has seen today's jobs report. ``Disappointing'' 
is an understatement, so I make the point again:
  As the gentleman knows, Mr. Speaker, he and I were at a meeting at 
the White House yesterday with the President in which I said, again, 
the import of our need to act and act responsibly and not--not--to 
raise taxes on the American people and the small businesses, and that 
we need so desperately to begin to create jobs again.
  Mr. HOYER. I am pleased, as the gentleman knows, to hear that you 
want to stop the spiraling deficits that confront our country. I will 
repeat again because the gentleman keeps mentioning this, and I have 
enough experience to know what has happened:
  In the 30 years that I've been here, of course we've had some few 
years of the Obama administration, but we had Mr. Reagan's 
administration, Mr. Bush I's administration, Mr. Bush II's 
administration, and we ran up--and I know the gentleman knows these 
figures--over $6 trillion of deficit during that period of time. 
However, in the 8 years that Mr. Clinton was President of the United 
States, we had a $62.9 billion surplus.
  Now, the gentleman makes the point that spending is out of control. 
The fact is, as the gentleman clearly knows, when you were in charge of 
the House and the Presidency and the Senate, you increased spending by 
more than was increased during the Clinton administration by a 
percentage on an annual basis. So I'm glad to hear that your side now, 
without fail, talks about spending being out of control. Very frankly, 
I have the feeling, if your side were spending 5 cents, you would think 
that we would need to cut an additional 5 cents in revenues so that we 
could not pay the bills, because that's why we ran up $6 trillion in 
deficits: you did not pay for what you bought.
  Now, I'm one of those who very strongly believes we ought to pay for 
what we buy, but I also believe that we ought not to put this country 
on the brink of financial chaos and bring us down in the eyes of the 
world because we don't extend our debt.
  Very frankly, I think we ought to pay for what we buy. We call that 
``taxes''--whether it's defending America, paying our FBI, paying 
people who are researching cancer, heart, lung, diabetes issues. Those 
are Federal expenditures for which the American people pay through 
taxes. If we are going to be responsible, we make a very simple 
judgment: if we want to buy it, we ought to pay for it.
  That $6 trillion of deficit was incurred during those Presidencies, 
and the President is the only person in America who can stop spending--
the only one. You can't do it and I can't do

[[Page H4774]]

it. We need 217 other votes in our House. Over there, they need at 
least 60 votes to do anything. The President can do it himself. Ronald 
Reagan never had a veto overridden of a bill that said we spent too 
much money. George Bush I never had a veto overridden in which he 
vetoed a bill saying we spent too much money, and George Bush II never 
once had a veto overridden so that we spent money that he did not 
sanction.
  So I say to my friend, we did meet at the White House, and the 
President of the United States, the leader of our party, and I and Mr. 
Reid and Mr. Durbin all said, yes, we need to get a handle on this 
spending; yes, we need to get a handle on the deficit; and, yes, we 
need to bring down the debt. We need to come to the table together with 
everything on the table, and we need to pay for what we think we ought 
to buy. Frankly, we ought to ensure that the United States of America, 
for the first time in history, doesn't fail to pay its bills.

                              {time}  1220

  I tell my friend that we've had a lot of commentary over the last few 
days, people on Wall Street, people in business--large, medium and 
small--and I will tell you that if the United States doesn't, by August 
2, agree to pay that which it owes, that which it has incurred--not 
what we're going to incur, but those debts that we've incurred in the 
past--everybody in America is going to be hurt.
  Every economist that I talk to says that interest rates are going to 
spike, the stock market is going to be at risk and, very frankly, 
millions of people who have pension funds and who have interest in 
their pensions are going to be adversely affected, the housing market, 
which is struggling, is going to be hurt, the economy that is 
struggling is going to be hurt. So I would hope that my friend and I 
will go to the White House on Sunday, we will sit with the President of 
the United States, and we will be for a large deal that is 
euphemistically referred to as a ``comprehensive solution'' so that we 
can in fact--not in the short term, not temporarily, but in the long 
term--bring fiscal discipline to the operations of our country. Our 
country needs that. I think the international community expects that of 
us. And if we don't do that, I tell my friend, I think we will not have 
fulfilled our oath of office to protect and defend the Constitution of 
the United States and serve the general welfare of our country and our 
people.
  Now, some in your party of course have suggested there is no need to 
raise the debt. Does the gentleman agree with that proposition? I'm not 
going to go through the quotes, but as you know, one of your candidates 
for President has indicated there is no need to worry about raising the 
debt. She serves in this body, as a matter of fact.
  Mr. CANTOR. Mr. Speaker, I would respond to the gentleman, as he 
knows--he and I have had plenty of discussions about this; so I assume 
we are just on for show here--that he wants me to say yes. I believe it 
would be a grave consequence if we did not reach the point at which we 
could arrive at a solution and put a bill forward that would permit an 
increase in the credit limit of this country, with an associated cut in 
spending, and move to get our fiscal house in order.
  And as the gentleman correctly pointed out, the reason why now we 
will not be in our districts on the week of the 18th is to ensure that 
we do get it right and that we recognize that the markets, the 
investors around the world are smarter than expecting us to just go and 
check the box to meet the date. At the end of the day, what the markets 
and investors, and, more importantly, the American people, are looking 
for is that we act responsibly, that we begin to manage down the debt 
and deficit. That means trillions of dollars of cuts are necessary. 
Because I think most Americans are looking at Washington in disbelief, 
that somehow we think there's not enough money coming into the Federal 
Government.
  I mean, just look at the jobs report today. I cannot fathom how 
anyone thinks right now is a good time to raise taxes. Who thinks that 
raising taxes on individuals and small businesses can help create jobs? 
We are in a crisis. People in this country need to get back to work.
  And let me just, Mr. Speaker, for the point of explanation because 
the gentleman insists on going back decades to recount the past--and as 
the gentleman knows, I'm the first one to say that we came to this 
majority with some contrition--that, no, we weren't always acting in 
the best interests of the fiscal health of this country, that's why we 
have taken the job at hand and acted responsibly and passed a budget 
that actually puts a plan in place to manage down the debt and deficit, 
unlike the other body, unlike this President. And that's why we come to 
the table right now, as we approach this debt ceiling vote, with a well 
thought out, deliberative plan to get people back to work while we get 
the fiscal house in order.
  But let's just review some of the statistics, Mr. Speaker. There have 
been 2.5 million jobs lost since this President took office. There are 
13.9 million Americans unemployed right now. A gallon of gas is 
significantly higher--well into the $3.50, $3.60 a gallon in some 
places in this country, if not higher, up from $1.85 when this 
President took office. $14.3 trillion in current national debt, up from 
$10.6 trillion when this President took office. If you work that out, 
$46,042 debt per person, up from $34,371 when this President took 
office. So you can go through line by line of how things have gotten 
worse for the American people.
  Now, we can sit here and blame and point fingers all day long, but I 
would suggest, Mr. Speaker, the American people are tired of the 
bickering. They want to see some solutions. They want to see us come 
together. That's exactly why we have altered the schedule so we can 
begin to actually deliver on the promise.
  So I agree with the gentleman from Maryland, the Democratic whip; 
we've got a serious challenge ahead of us. We on this side of the aisle 
have been consistent in our efforts to meet that challenge in a 
responsible way. But I would underscore again that now is not the time 
to raise taxes. Now is not the time to say that Washington needs more 
money because that money comes off the hard work and backs of the 
American people.
  Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman.
  Reclaiming my time, very interesting comments he makes. Of course, he 
leaves out some things. He talks about the jobs that were lost. Those 
jobs were lost of course as this administration took office. This 
administration has gained back 2 million of the 8 million jobs that 
were lost during the economic program that my friend from Virginia 
voted for, for the most part. Eight million jobs were lost. And the 
month that this administration took office in January, 780,000 jobs in 
one month were lost, the last month of the Bush administration. That's 
not very distant past.
  But let me tell you, I heard the same rhetoric--you said you've 
changed, I heard the same rhetoric in 1993, same rhetoric when we 
adopted a program that we said would balance the budget, bring the 
economy back and create jobs. The same rhetoric, oh, no, you won't do 
it. The program that you're going to adopt--none of which you voted 
for, you weren't here, I understand that--but the same rhetoric 
applied. You thought we were going to tank the economy, kill jobs, 
explode the deficit and have high unemployment. In fact, as my friend 
well knows--he didn't read those statistics because he thinks they're 
ancient history because you opposed that policy. But that policy 
created 22 million jobs. That's a 30 million job difference between the 
Bush administration that was the follow-on administration and the 
Clinton administration. Thirty million job difference, I tell my 
friend, under the policies that you adopted and you supported in the 
2000s.
  So I would hope that my friend's comments are correct, that you have 
decided to change. In point of fact, we need change. And in point of 
fact, the American public--which is divided itself, but would like us 
to come together, and I'm hopeful that we'll do that. And my friend and 
I have had the opportunity to talk about this. We do have significant 
differences. But none of us can put something on the table and say if 
you don't agree, I'm going to tank the economy, I'm going to have 
America default for the first time in its 200-plus years of history if 
you don't agree and do it my way.
  I have said, the leader has said on this side, everything is on the 
table.

[[Page H4775]]

We understand that you have to pay for what you buy, and we also 
understand we have to buy less, and we are prepared to do both.

                              {time}  1230

  In fact, we have agreed to do both in the Biden talks.
  Now, my friend talks about economists. The most successful investor 
in America, I think most people will agree, is Warren Buffett. Warren 
Buffett said we raised the debt ceiling seven times during the Bush 
administration. And now in this Congress, under the Republicans, 
they're using it as a hostage, and you really don't have any business 
playing Russian roulette to get your way in some matter. We should, he 
said, be more grown up on that. To that extent, he echoed the comments 
of our Speaker, who is trying, in my opinion, to get to a place where 
we can come together, compromise--as is critical in a democracy--pay 
our bills, and reduce our obligations and reduce spending. Buffett went 
on to say we should, as I said, be more grown up on that.
  If we don't meet the August 2 deadline, he observed, you're playing 
with fire when you don't need to play with fire. And we don't need to 
tell the rest of the world that any time people in Congress start 
throwing a tantrum, that we're not going to pay our bills. That is not 
responsible behavior. It's not adult behavior. It's not good for 
anybody in the United States of America, and it's not good for the 
international community.
  In fact, Senator Alan Simpson was referring to Tom Coburn, who has 
said, look, you've got to have everything on the table, including, yes, 
revenues; yes, taxes.
  Some bard has said that taxes are the price we pay for democracy. 
They should not be any higher than they need to be, but we ought to pay 
for what we buy. And if we don't, if people don't want to pay for it, 
we ought not to buy it.
  Unfortunately, the reason we racked up $6 trillion of deficits during 
the Reagan and both Bush administrations is because we bought things 
and didn't pay for them. As you heard me say at the White House, we, 
both parties--you weren't here--voted for some things and didn't pay 
for them. We've got to stop that. That's why we put in place statutory 
PAYGO.
  But, very frankly, you say, Well, we've changed. You passed a budget 
that doesn't balance the budget for the next 27 years. You passed the 
budget. You voted for that. I didn't vote for that budget. It doesn't 
balance the budget for 27 years, almost three decades. Very frankly, I 
don't think that does it.
  That's why we went down to the White House yesterday, and almost 
everybody in the room said we need to do a comprehensive, disciplined, 
courageous, honest, principled resolution of doing what you say you 
want to do, that your party wants to do, and what I'm telling you, my 
friend, we want to do because there is no option. We must bring this 
deficit down. We must. The debt we have confronting us is not 
sustainable.
  So I would urge my friend, and I want to congratulate Speaker 
Boehner, who at the White House said, Look, we need to do this and we 
need to have a comprehensive agreement. That's what democracy demands.
  I'm not going to agree with some of the things that are in that bill. 
You're not going to agree with some of the things that are in that 
bill, if, in fact, we pass a bill. But if we come together, if we act 
as adults, if we do what every responsible financial economist and 
adviser has told us we must do, then America will be pleased with us.
  But I tell my friend from Virginia, if we don't do that, if we 
continue to buy things that we don't pay for and we continue to ask the 
people to get it for free, then frankly your children, and my 
grandchildren and children and great-grandchildren, will not be happy 
with us.
  So I urge my friend--he and I will be going to the White House on 
Sunday. I urge him to come to the table, as I will come to the table. I 
tell him, with the understanding that compromise is essential, that the 
crisis that confronts us is real and that America expects us to act in 
their best interest and have the courage--not the politics, not the 
ego, not the view of the next election--but the view of the long term, 
as we come together and try to confront this issue for which all of us 
are responsible. No one party, no one member. All of us are 
responsible. But then again, if that is the case, we are all 
responsible for its resolution.
  I yield to the gentleman.
  Mr. CANTOR. I thank the gentleman.
  I would just try to keep my remarks short, and that is to say, 
listen, it's about jobs right now. The gentleman correctly points out 
we have a real spending problem here. And the question is, how do we 
address the first priority to get Americans back to work and address 
that spending problem we've got?
  Now, if the gentleman says we have to pay for what we buy, I 
certainly agree with that. We ought to just be buying less as a 
government because the money doesn't belong to the government, it 
belongs to the people. And if we want more people to get back to work, 
we should allow them to keep more of their money so that they can 
create jobs.
  And that's really where the fundamental disagreement has been over 
the last couple of weeks. It certainly was what put the Biden talks 
into abeyance because there was a lot of good work that was done by 
both sides of the aisle in those talks. And I still believe that the 
product of those talks will prove to be the basis upon which we can 
arrive at an appropriate resolution of the challenge before us around 
the debt ceiling.
  But why these talks ended was that your side insisted that we raise 
taxes. And I would say to the gentleman, raising taxes is, as he would 
put it, paying for what we buy. And I'm saying let's stop buying so 
much and let the people decide what it is they want to do with their 
money.
  Mr. HOYER. Reclaiming my time, if I can----
  Mr. CANTOR. If I could finish.
  Mr. HOYER. I will continue to yield to the gentleman.
  Mr. CANTOR. I would say to the gentleman, I know he likes to engage 
in a lot of the decades of history before. And I don't like to go 
finger-pointing and engage in that. But every time the gentleman raises 
the issue about jobs lost here, jobs lost there, what it does is 
require me to posit again, there have been 1.4 million jobs lost since 
the stimulus bill.
  But that makes my point. We didn't need to do the stimulus bill. We 
didn't need to do the stimulus bill because now we are stuck with over 
$800 billion in additional debt with now unemployment today at 9.2 
percent.
  So, again, question whether we're on the right policies here and 
we're spending the dollars we need to be spending. Maybe we shouldn't 
spend it. Maybe we should let it be invested in the private sector.
  I would end by saying, again, the deficit is a real problem. We've 
got a $1.6 trillion deficit this year, the largest in history and the 
third consecutive year of trillion dollars of deficits.
  I would say to the gentleman, Mr. Speaker, we can't tolerate that. 
The President shouldn't tolerate that. The American people have no 
patience any more. That's why we need to get to work, try and lower the 
hyperbole and get the job done.
  I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for his comment.
  The gentleman, I understand, does not like me to look back. But the 
problem with being around for some time, you hear people say that this 
isn't going to work or that's going to work, and you know what? 
Hopefully that ought to be instructive as to whether it did work or 
didn't work.
  And the problem I have, which, apparently, I know you don't 
appreciate, is that I've heard the rhetoric before that you've just 
used today, and I heard it in 1993 when a program which had revenues in 
it, or, as you like to say, taxes--obviously those are revenues--and it 
was going to destroy the economy. Who said so? Phil Gramm, an economist 
on your side. He said we would devastate the economy. He was dead, flat 
wrong, 180 degrees wrong. We had the best economy in your lifetime.
  Furthermore, let me instruct the gentleman, I don't know what you're 
reading from, but your figures are wrong. Over the last 20 months we 
have gained 2 million jobs.

                              {time}  1240

  Now, did we lose a lot of jobs in the first 6 months? We did. Now, 
there is no

[[Page H4776]]

doubt in my mind for 1 second that if it were a Republican President 
and it had been a Democratic administration, there is no administration 
in history that wouldn't have blamed those first 6 months on their 
predecessor because they couldn't turn the economy around. So, since 
the stimulus took effect, we have gained 2 million jobs. Have we gained 
enough? No. We lost 8 million jobs under the Bush administration. So we 
have only filled 25 percent of the hole. Again, I don't know what paper 
you are looking at, but you check the figures.
  Now, unfortunately this month, he is absolutely correct. It was 
disappointing, and the month before was disappointing. In fact, of 
course, some people are doing pretty well in America. The stock market 
closed at about 12,700-plus on the Dow yesterday, some $2 trillion on 
hand.
  One of the things I think that people are worried about is making 
sure that we act as adults, we act responsibly, we pay our bills, and 
we ensure that America does not default. All I am going to say, and 
then I will close, is that I hope the gentleman and I can join together 
on Sunday and on every day thereafter between now and when we can 
resolve this issue so that we can pay our bills, stabilize our economy, 
and give what the gentleman talked a lot about in our colloquies when 
our positions were reversed--I remember those days--talked a lot about, 
and that was confidence, that was stability.
  The failure for us to act, as we acted seven times in the Bush 
administration to raise the debt limit, and I don't have the specific 
number, but more than that in the Reagan administration--and by the 
way, during the last 4 years of the Clinton administration, does the 
gentleman remember how many times we raised the debt limit? Zero. Zero. 
Why? Because for every one of those 4 years we had a surplus, not a 
deficit. A surplus. And Mr. Greenspan was worried at the end of the 
Clinton administration that we were going to pay off the debt too 
quickly. And President Bush projected a $5.6 trillion surplus.
  So I tell my friend that the reason I look back is to not repeat the 
mistakes of the past. We didn't pay our bills. We paid our bills in the 
nineties. We started not paying our bills again. You jettisoned the 
statutory PAYGO. You jettisoned it again, essentially, not the 
statutory part, but the rule part.
  Again, I don't enjoy going back and forth on this, but I am very 
concerned for my country. The Speaker said he wanted to solve this 
problem by June 30. It is now July 7. We haven't resolved it. And the 
country is waiting for us. So let us hope that all of us will not say, 
can't do this, can't do that, can't do the other.
  Let us go down to the White House on Sunday with the President, with 
the Senate, with the leaders of this House, and say, yes, we can. We 
can be responsible. We can be adults. We are going to get this done for 
the people.
  I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________