[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 17]
[House]
[Page 24292]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                       REPUBLICAN ACCOMPLISHMENTS

  (Mr. BRADY of Texas asked and was given permission to address the 
House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. BRADY of Texas. Mr. Speaker, this is the time of year when 
history gets rewritten in politics; when people like President Clinton 
take credit for welfare reform that he vetoed repeatedly. Who was 
actually responsible for getting the compass going in the right 
direction can be quite confusing. For that reason, I would like to set 
the record straight.
  I think the American people can be proud of the progress the 
Republican Congress has shown. Just a few years before we got here, 
this administration forecast budget deficits of $200 billion or more as 
far as the eye could see, and they said that the deficit is not a 
problem; that it is not an issue for us.
  Well, Republicans reversed that. In 1998, we balanced the budget for 
the first time in decades. The next year we stopped a 40-year raid on 
Social Security, where our Social Security surplus was being diverted 
to other programs instead of being saved for retirement. And this year, 
because of that fiscal responsibility, we have a budget surplus. That 
only means we have to work harder to be fiscally responsible and not 
allow the White House to go on another spending spree.
  We think the best responsibility is paying down the debt.

                          ____________________

                              {time}  1015