[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 152 (2006), Part 9]
[House]
[Page 11875]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                 BRING BACK PAY-AS-YOU-GO BUDGET RULES

  (Mr. MILLER of North Carolina asked and was given permission to 
address the House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. MILLER of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, when President Bush took 
office, our Nation had a $5.6 trillion surplus. President Bush said 
that the surplus proved taxes were too high and called for cutting 
taxes on the richest Americans.
  Then he said because the economy was doing badly, we had to stimulate 
the economy by cutting taxes on the richest Americans. The richest 
Americans, President Bush said, would sleep in and spend the afternoon 
watching soap operas instead of creating jobs for other Americans, 
unless they got a generous tax cut.
  Now President Bush and Congressional Republicans say that the same 
tax rates on the richest Americans in effect when we had a surplus 
would now cause the deficit to worsen.
  Mr. Speaker, the Republican fondness for cutting taxes on the richest 
Americans has nothing to do with job creation or stimulating the 
economy or reducing the deficit. The tax cuts on the richest Americans 
has resulted in turning a $5.6 trillion surplus into a $4 trillion 
deficit, pushing interest rates up, stagnating savings rates, and 
dragging the economy down.
  My colleagues, Mr. Hensarling and Mr. McHenry, were correct in their 
remarks a few minutes ago: this Republican Congress has absolutely no 
discipline on the spending side. But neither do they have any 
discipline on the tax side.
  Mr. Speaker, pay-as-you-go budget rules worked in the 1990s to 
control the deficit and kept Congress from working on economic 
fantasies. It is time to bring those rules back.
  Mr. Speaker, congratulations Hurricanes.

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