[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 13]
[House]
[Page 19182]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



  REPUBLICAN BUDGET PROPOSAL BEING MISREPRESENTED AND MISCHARACTERIZED

  (Mr. BALLENGER asked and was given permission to address the House 
for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. BALLENGER. Madam Speaker, if you take a look at this chart here, 
you will notice that the Republican budget proposal will reduce the 
debt held by the public by approximately $2 trillion. You will also 
notice that the Republican debt reduction proposal bears absolutely no 
relation whatsoever to the rhetoric we are hearing on the other side of 
the aisle.
  Democrat after Democrat, over the past several weeks, has come down 
to the House floor and railed against the Republican tax cut proposal, 
claiming that it would do nothing for debt reduction, do nothing for 
Social Security, blah, blah, blah. But our proposal reduces the debt by 
$2 trillion. The Congressional Budget Office confirms this. Not only 
that, but the Congressional Budget Office scores our budget proposal as 
$200 billion better on debt reduction than the Democrat plan. In other 
words, our plan reduces the debt more than the Democrats do.
  How are we to take their rhetoric seriously? How can we possibly have 
an honest debate, when our budget proposal is routinely 
mischaracterized and misrepresented beyond any recognition?
  All I can say is thank God for C-SPAN.

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