[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 149 (2003), Part 8]
[House]
[Pages 11117-11118]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




            SETTING THE RECORD STRAIGHT ON ECONOMIC HISTORY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from California (Mr. Cunningham) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. CUNNINGHAM. Mr. Speaker, if Patrick Henry could come back today, 
he would be appalled at what taxation with representation gives us 
today.
  There was not time to speak during the debate, so I would like to set 
the record straight, and these are facts, undisputable facts.
  First of all, I would like to address the issue that George W. Bush 
lost jobs and the surplus. Fact: In history, in the year 2000, we were 
starting into a recession. Alan Greenspan. We had tax relief 2 years 
ago. Alan Greenspan and the majority of economists say that that tax 
relief shallowed that recession.

[[Page 11118]]

  Then, Mr. Speaker, we had 9/11. I cannot tell you the effects of 
this. To New York it was $283 billion, including the $83 billion in 
lost revenue, and it did hurt this country.
  I would like to respond to the ranking minority leader, the 
gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi). She stated that only 
Democrats voted for the 1993 tax increase. Let me tell you why 
Republicans did not vote for the 1993 tax bill. I would say in 
fairness, not all the Democrats were here during that 1993 period and 
they should not be held accountable, but the Democrat leadership 
should.
  First of all, they gave us the largest tax increase in history in 
1993, and this is when the White House, the House and the Senate was 
controlled by the Democrats. I heard the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. 
Gephardt) stand up here and plead for a middle-class tax cut in that 
1993 bill. It was the largest tax on the middle class we have ever had 
in U.S. history. There was a $360 billion deficit, forever, no light at 
the end of the tunnel. No, we were not going to vote for that.
  There was a $320 billion increase. Did they increase the spending on 
veterans? No. Did they increase it on the military or Social Security 
or the Social Security Trust Fund? No. They did it at that time on the 
then First Lady Hillary Clinton's health care government control plan 
and welfare.
  Well, what did they do? They cut the veterans' COLA in the 1993 bill. 
Things they demagogue every single day, they cut the entire COLA for 
veterans. They cut the entire COLA for military. When Republicans took 
the majority, we passed and rescinded that and we restored those COLAs 
for our veterans and our military.
  They demagogue every day about Social Security and our seniors. They 
increased the tax on Social Security. They cut every dime out of the 
Social Security Trust Fund for their tax increase, and that is wrong as 
well.
  Did they cut spending? No, they did not. They even had an increase in 
the gas tax that went into the general fund. When we took the majority 
in 1994 we changed that also. We did not eliminate it, what we did was 
put it into the transportation fund so that liberals could not spend it 
on social programs.
  In 2000, as I said, there was a recession. Under Bill Clinton we had 
147 military deployments, in Haiti, Somalia, Iraq five times, Sudan, 
Bosnia, Kosovo. In Bosnia and Kosovo, we flew 86 percent of the 
missions, we paid for 90 percent. The U.S., not ``Butros-Butros By-
Golly'' in the UN, but we paid for 90 percent of those wars.
  Then the next fallacy is the Clinton surplus. Not a single Clinton 
budget after the 1993 bill passed this floor. Republicans even brought 
two of his budgets to the floor to have Democrats vote on them. They 
were so ridiculous, they got the same amount of votes as the Hillary 
Clinton health care plan, three votes. Why? Because it was so 
outrageous and demagogued. But yet they would not vote for it. Not one 
substitute, even the Blue Dog budget, ever passed this floor.
  So we restored the veterans and military COLAs, we took 
transportation dollars and put them into the Transportation Trust Fund, 
we balanced the budget, and yet they claim that it was a Clinton 
Democrat surplus.
  It just is not true.

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