[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 148 (2002), Part 1]
[House]
[Page 108]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




     EFFECTS OF BUDGET DEFICITS ON GOVERNMENT PROGRAMS AND PROMISES

  (Mr. DOGGETT asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, the lead story in today's Wall Street 
Journal really tells it all: ``Seeing Red: As Budget Deficits Loom, 
Many Promises, Programs Could Suffer. Social Security Is Vulnerable as 
Huge 10-year Surplus Contracts by $4 Trillion.''
  Yes, an unprecedented 70 percent of the estimated surplus has 
evaporated in less than a year. It is true that the two Republican 
budget offices, one here in the House and one at the White House, 
cannot agree on exactly how deep a hole Republicans have dug.
  But I can tell you, even using Arthur Andersen accounting, this hole 
is a whopper. Our Republican colleagues have ``stimulated'' little more 
than red ink with their huge tax breaks designed for certain 
priviledged corporations and the wealthy few.
  What a difference those huge tax breaks have made. They have not 
stimulated anything except red ink. Now when they have dug such a deep 
budgetary hole, it is time to stop digging, instead of offering more 
and more corporate tax breaks, as our Republican friends persist in 
doing this year.
  Let us at least stop that digging downward, embrace some fiscal 
restraint and begin climbing out of this budgetary hole before Social 
Security is wrecked and we reach the point of economic ``no return.''

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