[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 5]
[Senate]
[Pages 7131-7133]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                            FINANCIAL HEALTH

  Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, I want to share a few thoughts on a 
very important matter, the financial health of the United States. We 
had a nice meeting with the President earlier today. The Republican 
Senators virtually all were there, shared their thoughts, and the 
President responded. All in all it was a good exchange. Those are the 
kinds of meetings where I do not talk about what is said in detail and 
quote anyone.
  I was asked by a number of reporters what happened and what did you 
say about it. I guess my conclusion is that not much happened. No 
commitments were made that I could see, that indicated the President 
had made any change in the budget he had submitted or the speech he 
gave somewhat amending his budget a few weeks ago.
  He did not make any changes in the plan I am seeing out there. He was 
open, discussed it, maybe something will happen. What is the status of 
the Senate's business? This is the Senate. The Senate has serious 
responsibilities. The Budget Act was designed to ensure that Congress 
passes a budget, because it was learned over the years--it goes back to 
the 1970s--that a budget is important for a country. Families have 
them, businesses have them. You need a budget.
  Congress was having trouble passing a budget. So they passed the 
Budget Act that allowed a budget to become law without 60 votes in the 
Senate, but they could be passed with 50 votes. As we know, there are 
54 Democrats in the Senate--and more, I guess, than that with 
Independents who caucus with the Democrats. So this is the situation we 
are in.
  The President complied with the Budget Act, a week late, by 
submitting his budget, and his budget failed to meet the requirements 
of our time to a very significant degree. Every witness we have had in 
our budget committee--I am the ranking Republican on it--has indicated 
and told us, many in great detail and with passion, we are on an 
unsustainable course; you cannot continue to borrow 40 cents of every 
dollar and try to fund a government borrowing that kind of money.
  We will hit a budget deficit this year of $1.5 trillion, the largest 
in the history of America. In 4 years, the President will have doubled 
the entire debt of the United States based on the trillion-dollar 
deficits he has had each year. So this is not an acceptable path for us 
to be on.
  We had hearings in the Budget Committee about the critical issues we 
face. We considered and had testimony from the fiscal commission that 
President Obama appointed--Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson, we had 
Rivlin-Pete Domenici. Senator Domenici, retired now, was Budget 
chairman at one point in time in the Senate. Alice Rivlin, OMB Director 
for President Clinton, is a wizard herself with numbers. They proposed 
some real changes in the debt trajectory we are on. I thought after 
that, and based on the comments of Senator Conrad, our chairman, and 
the strong witnesses we heard who called on us to make significant 
changes in what we were doing that we would move forward with a budget 
that would be a good bit stronger than the one President Obama 
submitted.
  Indeed, President Obama's budget was not serious. President Obama's 
budget took the current spending line for 10 years, that the 
Congressional Budget Office said we are on, and it made it worse. It 
made the deficit worse, $2 trillion worse than the current plan we were 
on--totally unacceptable.
  He proposed in his budget increasing the Department of Education 
funding by 10.5 percent; increasing the Energy Department funding 9.5 
percent; increasing State Department funding 10.5 percent; proposed 
increasing the Transportation Department 62 percent.
  In a time when inflation is 2 percent, we are having those kinds of 
increases and we say we are submitting a budget

[[Page 7132]]

that recognizes we are on an unsustainable course and we have got to 
change. Well, it was unacceptable. I was very disappointed about it. I 
think even the man he appointed to head the debt commission, Erskine 
Bowles, said they have come nowhere close to what is necessary to avoid 
our fiscal nightmare.
  We were told by our Budget chairman, Senator Conrad, whom it has been 
a pleasure to work with, that we would have a budget markup beginning 
this Monday. He told us that last week. Well, it did not happen on 
Monday. Then maybe it was going to be Tuesday. Maybe it was going to be 
Wednesday. Then all of a sudden the President invited the Democrats 
over Wednesday and the Republicans to the White House Thursday and 
everything is off.
  I asked my staff, have we received a notice that we are going to have 
a Budget Committee hearing next week? The answer is no. So what do we 
say about that?
  The Budget Act says the Senate and the House should commence budget 
action April 1. We have not done that. It says a budget should be 
passed by April 15. The Senate has not done that. The Republican House 
has. The Republican House has proposed a historic budget. They have 
passed it. They passed it on time. It will reduce spending by about $6 
trillion. That would actually reduce taxes also and get the rates down 
to help encourage more economic growth, and put us on a path to fiscal 
sanity, not only this decade, but in the decades to come, because it 
dealt with some of the exploding entitlement programs such as Medicare.
  What resulted from that? Well, Mr. Ryan, a brilliant young 
Congressman who has worked on budget issues for many years, is the most 
knowledgeable person probably in America about the details and the 
financial condition of America. They attacked him as though he did 
something wrong. The Democratic Senators and the President are spending 
their time attacking the one person who stood up and produced a budget 
that can be defended. He is prepared to defend it anywhere, anytime. He 
goes to townhall meetings. He has stood before the press. He has issued 
statements. He has explained what his budget is. It may not be perfect, 
but it is a change. It would put us on a path to financial stability. 
And what has the Senate done? Complained about his budget. Well, it is 
time this Senate produces a budget.
  Let me say this: Today, 743 days have passed since the Senate has 
passed a budget. Now, let me ask, if we took a poll of the American 
people, how many of the American people would say the Senate shouldn't 
pass a budget? We have a whole act that requires one to be passed and 
brought up and voted on. What happened last year? The Budget Committee 
did produce a budget. It came to the floor, and the Democratic leader, 
Senator Reid, just didn't have time to bring it up. Why? Well, you 
know, there is a vote-arama. We don't like vote-aramas. What is a vote-
arama? Everybody gets to file an amendment, and Senators are supposed 
to vote. It has to be brought up and passed. It is passed by a simple 
majority. Why? Because we want to accelerate the debate and make sure a 
budget is passed because a nation that intends to be serious about its 
financial stability needs a budget, does it not? This began in the 
1970s.
  So we are now beginning to wonder, will the committee even pass a 
budget? Is Senator Conrad not even going to have a committee markup and 
produce a budget? Is the Democratic Senate not even going to move one 
out of committee? At least it moved one out of committee last year. And 
if the committee does meet and does move a budget, is Senator Reid 
prepared to stand up, like Congressman Ryan, lay his budget down before 
the American people, and defend it before the world? Oh, well, we need 
to have talks. We have talks going on. The Vice President is having a 
meeting. The President is inviting everybody over.
  Why don't we move forward with our budget process, I ask? Why don't 
we? Well, why not? We read in one of our local newspapers that cover 
the Senate--I think it was The Hill--Senator Conrad had a hard time 
with his Democratic colleagues. His budget, which I very much was 
afraid wouldn't contain spending enough, but certainly I felt it would 
be better than the budget President Obama had submitted, was discussed 
with his Democratic colleagues last week in their conference, and it 
didn't go well, we are told. So this week he came back again, 
apparently, and produced another budget.
  According to the report, Senator Sanders--probably the most 
aggressive and articulate advocate for greater government spending and 
activism in the Senate--seemed to be very happy that he changed the 
budget, and it had $2 trillion in tax increases, they said, and $2 
trillion in spending reductions. That is supposed to be balanced. But 
that is not what the debt commission said. The debt commission--which I 
didn't agree with, really--said we should have at least $3 worth of 
spending reduction for every $1 in tax increases.
  Then we have another report. I think it was in the CQ publication 
that does work around here and digs up information. They said it looks 
as if there are going to be fewer spending reductions. It looks as 
though it is going to be about $2 trillion in tax increases and only 
$1.5 trillion in reduced spending. So it is less than even 1-to-1.
  Well, I think if I were the majority leader, I wouldn't really feel 
comfortable about bringing such a budget as that before the American 
people and standing right down here and defending such a weak response 
to the fiscal crisis we are now in. Of course, that budget is 
irresponsible if that is so. I don't think the American people will be 
happy with it. I certainly will oppose it with all the strength in my 
body if that is the nature of it.
  Well, why don't you know, Sessions?
  Well, I haven't been told. We asked. The Republican members of the 
committee wrote the chairman and asked that any budget numbers that are 
produced be produced 72 hours in advance of the hearing so we can study 
it, offer amendments, or substitute as we choose to do. We have been 
basically told we will get the budget resolution the chairman intends 
to file the morning it starts. When we commence the hearing to mark up 
the budget, we will be getting the copy of what they propose to bring 
forward. We really think that is not a healthy way to do business on a 
matter this important.
  This period in history represents the most significant long-term 
threat to American financial stability that we have seen maybe ever. 
Sure, we had a tough time during World War II and the debt went up, but 
we could see, when the war was over, the strength of our workforce, and 
the economy grew. We came right out of that and got that situation 
under control quickly. But now we are in a situation in which our 
Nation is aging. The number of people working is down. The number of 
recipients of Medicare and Social Security is up. We have to figure out 
a way to honestly deal with that without in any way placing our seniors 
at risk and other people who benefit from government programs.
  It is going to take some change. It is first going to take change in 
wasteful Washington spending. All our discretionary spending needs to 
be looked at, and we also are going to have to look at the long-term 
prospects for our financial future, as our creditors--those who are 
loaning us this money we are borrowing--are getting uneasy. They are 
not too comfortable with what we are doing.
  I believe any President of any party who desires the mantle of a 
leader, desires to demonstrate a commitment to a firm footing for our 
financial future, should come forth with a plan as part of the budget 
process and lay it out so the American people can see it.
  I am becoming very concerned, once again, even though 743 days have 
passed since a budget has cleared this Senate, that we may not get one 
this year. What an event. That, to me, is unthinkable. How 
irresponsible could we be to go another year under these circumstances? 
For example, the Congressional Budget Office has analyzed the 
President's proposal for the future, and that scoring of the 
President's budget concludes a couple of things.

[[Page 7133]]

Last year, the interest we paid on the money this Nation has borrowed 
was $200 billion. In 10 years, under the President's plan, the 
Congressional Budget Office said the amount of interest that would be 
paid in 1 year is $940 billion. That is bigger than the Defense 
Department. That is bigger than Medicare. It will be the largest single 
item in the entire budget. It is unthinkable. We get no benefit from 
that whatsoever except the money we borrowed to live off of.
  We are passing huge debts off to our grandchildren. The expert 
economists and financiers who testified before the Budget Committee 
said: Don't think you can just assume the problem falls on your 
grandchildren. They said we could have a crisis much sooner than that.
  Mr. Bowles and Mr. Simpson issued a statement to us when they 
testified that said we are facing the most predictable debt crisis in 
American history. We asked: Could we have an idea of when such a crisis 
could hit us? And Mr. Bowles, chosen by President Obama to head the 
commission, said 2 years, maybe a little earlier, maybe a little later. 
Alan Simpson said: I think it could be 1 year.
  Well, we hope we don't have some new debt crisis. We hope the people 
who have been loaning us money don't get so nervous, as they have done 
in Greece, that our interest rate surge puts this economy in a 
dangerous condition and damages our country. I hope that is not 
happening within 2 years or 1 year. Wouldn't that be a disaster for us? 
How do we prevent it? We take action now that changes the debt 
trajectory of our country and sends a message to the whole world: We 
get it. We know we can't continue on this path, and we are changing. 
And the way our Congress and government is set up, the way that change 
occurs is through the adoption of a budget.
  I remain very disappointed that while the House has produced a 
historic budget on time--by April 15--we have not even begun to mark up 
a budget in the Senate. That is irresponsible. And we need to know and 
the American people need to know that the majority leader, if a budget 
is passed out of committee--and certainly it should be--will move it to 
the floor and bring it up for vote and amendment and debate, and then 
it goes to the House and conference, they hammer out the differences, 
and we adopt a budget that can help put this country on a sound 
financial path and avoid the kind of crisis so many experts have warned 
us could occur.
  I thank the Chair. I see my fabulous colleague, Senator Hatch, the 
ranking Republican member of the Finance Committee and my former 
chairman of the Judiciary Committee. I was honored to serve with him.
  I thank the Chair and yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Utah.
  Mr. HATCH. Madam President, I thank my dear colleague for his kind 
remarks. I appreciate them.

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