[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 17]
[House]
[Page 23787]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                 DEFENDING CRITICISM AGAINST DEMOCRATS

  (Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts asked and was given permission to address 
the House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Mr. Speaker, I do not want the gentleman 
from Georgia to wonder all day about some of these things, so I have 
one answer and one correction.
  Our response to 9/11, the gentleman's memory seems to be failing him, 
was to vote virtually unanimously with only one dissent to invade 
Afghanistan and put an end to that regime. I am sorry we were not able 
to catch Osama bin Laden. But I have heard few distortions as great as 
to say that our response to 9/11 was whatever he said. In fact, we all 
but one on this side voted to go to war in Afghanistan. Now, that may 
seem a triviality to him, but it seems to me that that was a very 
useful response.
  Secondly, the gentleman wants to know what is our answer to Social 
Security. It is very simple: put the money back. If Social Security 
receives every dollar which has been paid into Social Security and the 
interest that it is legally entitled to receive on that, it is fully 
funded until sometime in the 2040s.
  Now, having spent some of the Social Security surplus for the war in 
Iraq, for tax cuts for the very wealthy, the President now says, Well, 
those are just IOUs. We do not have the money.
  But here is my answer: put the money back. If you just put the money 
back into Social Security, we will be okay.

                          ____________________