[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 3]
[House]
[Pages 3161-3162]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                         THE PRESIDENT'S BUDGET

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Emanuel) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. EMANUEL. Mr. Speaker, yesterday the President submitted his 
budget to the United States Congress and to the country. And in that 
budget, the President made clear a number of priorities that I think 
are in direct opposition to the wishes and aspirations of the American 
people.
  Most egregious, in my view, is that the President leaves in place a 
tax increase on the middle-class families of this country. Today, about 
three million Americans are affected by the alternative minimum tax, 
meant to tax only the superwealthy. This year alone, it will reach 23 
million middle-class families across the country. And the only way the 
President accomplishes any of his goals is to leave in place a tax that 
was never intended by the Congress or the President to affect middle-
class families.
  The Democrats make a pledge to, in fact, deal with the alternative 
minimum tax this year so middle-class families do not have a tax 
increase either this year, next year or the following year. It has been 
consistently.
  But this is only one of the egregious misplaced priorities in the 
President's budget. The other highlights, in addition to increasing 
taxes on the middle class, it cuts health care for seniors $100 billion 
over 5 years, $300 billion over 10 years.
  While we are dealing with the temperatures outside that are near 
freezing in my home area of Chicago, below zero, it cuts home energy 
assistance to our seniors by 18 percent.
  It eliminates the COPS program for community policing, which has 
supported 120,000 police officers throughout the country.
  It goes forward in the President's desire to privatize Social 
Security.
  It cuts health care benefits for our returning veterans, forcing them 
to pay up to $750 a year to enter the health care for veterans, one of 
the best health care systems in the country. And I don't think that is 
a welcome-home mat that our veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan deserve.
  It also has cuts to education. It underfunds Leave No Child Behind by 
$15 billion.
  It cuts housing assistance for affordable housing. Returning again, 
in relationship to our veterans, it cuts the funding for research into 
brain trauma research, which is so significant. One of the greatest 
injuries for our veterans coming home from Iraq and Afghanistan have 
been the brain injuries that they have incurred there. And the first 
time ever we have gotten funding inside the Pentagon for that area, it 
makes a cut.
  And then it doesn't deal with what we call earmarks here, as the 
President continues his earmarks in his budget. Across the board, from 
Social Security privatization to health care cuts in Medicare and 
Medicaid, to also not cutting children from their health care, to 
raising taxes on the middle class, in time and place, from health care 
to taxes to supporting our law enforcement community, this budget makes 
the wrong priorities.
  It is time to have a new direction and a change here in the 
priorities in Washington. In addition to all that, while we have 
families not being able to get to their homes in the area of Louisiana 
and Mississippi and the Gulf Coast, the President asked for an 
additional $245 billion for Iraq and Afghanistan. In every turn that we 
can, we have to right this ship that is wrong.
  Most importantly, in the area the President's budget has relied on 
tax increases on middle class families, cuts Medicare and Medicaid, 
asked for $245 billion in increased funding for Iraq and Afghanistan, 
cuts children from their health care, cuts heating assistance from our 
elderly, also cuts benefits for veterans. Those are not the priorities 
of the American people.

                              {time}  1445

  Every President in the history of the country in a time of war has 
thought about how to invest in America. Abraham Lincoln, in the height 
of the Civil War, had the land-grant colleges. Roosevelt, in the height 
of the final 2 years of World War II, developed the GI Bill of Rights. 
During the height of the Cold War, Eisenhower saw the interstate system 
as a way to invest in America. Kennedy, a man on the moon when we were 
facing down the Soviet Union.
  At every critical juncture when America was at war, a President 
thought about how to invest in America to turn this country's efforts 
overseas here at home to make this a stronger and better country.
  This is the first Presidential budget that in time of war, rather 
than looking for increases here on how to make America stronger, it 
looks for cuts in America. It looks for the areas of education, health 
care, veterans, and law enforcement to sacrifice, while we increase our 
investments in Iraq and Afghanistan.
  If you look at the history of every time there has been a period of 
America's engagement around the world

[[Page 3162]]

militarily, every President has looked to invest here at home to make 
America stronger. This is the first budget that leaves America weaker 
in a time of military engagement.

                          ____________________