[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 9]
[Senate]
[Pages 11995-11996]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                            THE DEBT CRISIS

  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I will be brief. I have been asked by a 
number of people how I feel about the efforts made to get the United 
States out of the quandary in which it now finds itself over the debt 
limit. Let me be very clear. I applaud President Obama and Majority 
Leader Reid for real leadership and persistence over many months in 
trying to find a bipartisan solution to the debt crisis.
  Senator Reid has put forward a solution that would end the current 
crisis and reduce our unsustainable national debt. This is a solution 
that has the potential to draw support from lawmakers from both parties 
who are willing to put common sense and the national interests above 
partisanship and ideology, those who would say rather than party first 
let's go country first now we have a framework for a solution.
  By repeatedly walking away from the table and insisting on their way 
or no

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way, those who are holding the American people and our economy hostage 
are playing ideological games with serious consequences for everyone 
else. Through their tactics they threaten great risk to the well-being 
of ordinary Americans. The longer this goes on, the greater the danger 
of lasting damage below the waterline of our democracy. Right now 
Leader Reid's $2.7 trillion debt reduction package is the best chance--
really is the best chance this country has--to avoid a default and a 
credit rating downgrade that would damage our fragile economy. It would 
also impose a credit tax hike on every American family. If we downgrade 
our credit rating, we are going to be sending hundreds of billions of 
dollars in interest to other countries, money they can spend on medical 
research, on schools, on transportation, and alternative energy. They 
can spend it in their country--we will be paying the bills--and all 
because the Congress did not come together on a solution on this issue.
  Most people looking at this wonder why have we not moved. Senator 
Reid has a plan that can move. It says we will spend this money--the 
money we have--not shipping it overseas to other countries but spend it 
on the needs of our own country. The plan consolidates terms agreed to 
in the ongoing negotiations. It proposes a solution that ends the 
current crisis. It accomplishes wide-ranging savings, and has enough 
bipartisan support to pass.
  It would end the roller coaster of unpredictability that shackles our 
economy by instead offering financial stability through 2012. Social 
Security, Medicare, and Medicaid beneficiaries will be spared a loss of 
benefits. The American people will begin to recognize these savings 
from withdrawing from Iraq and Afghanistan. Essential education, job 
creation, housing, and environmental investments for America's economic 
recovery and for a strong economic future would be protected from the 
slashing cuts proposed by House Republicans.
  The irony is Republican leaders previously had backed all of the 
spending reductions called for in Leader Reid's plan. I do not agree--I 
suspect all of us do not agree--with all aspects of this proposed 
solution. But we are not going to have 100 solutions on this floor, we 
are going to have 1 we can vote on. I wish this would have included new 
revenue, especially by ending such costly and outdated tax benefits as 
those still enjoyed by the biggest oil companies to help us pay off our 
debt even more quickly.
  I want to help pay for the debt incurred by the inexcusable earlier 
decisions to enter two wars without paying for them. I continue to 
believe that a surcharge for the wealthiest would mean they would pay 
more of their fair share after so many years of tax cuts that tilted 
far more toward the wealthiest of Americans rather than to the middle 
class.
  I find it interesting when I hear lectures from those who voted for 
an unnecessary war in Iraq--Iraq, a country that had nothing whatsoever 
to do with 9/11, a country that before we invaded it had no al-Qaida 
but has plenty now--say we will vote for this war, and for the first 
time in our history we will not pay for it, we will borrow the money. 
We will cut taxes. And to pay for it we will borrow the money. Look 
where we are now. We will eventually owe $3.5 trillion for that war.
  You know, it is far easier--and I say this to everybody like myself--
they may see every single thing they want here--it is far easier to 
walk away from the negotiating table than to make the hard choices 
needed on behalf of the American people. We need serious statesmanship 
on both sides for this to work, both sides to get a solution, and both 
sides to do it before it is too late.
  The economic health of our country, the jobs of thousands of hard-
working Americans, should not be mired in politics. It is well past the 
time--and I realize there is a House faction that is driving much of 
the decisions there. It is well past time for that faction in the House 
of Representatives to put politics aside and accept a long-term deficit 
reduction plan that does not force America's most vulnerable to 
shoulder the burden.
  Just as many Vermont families are forced to make difficult financial 
decisions, Congress has to be open to considering all available 
options. We do this in my State of Vermont without gimmicks. We do not 
have any constitutional amendment on balanced budgets or anything such 
as that. We just balance the budget.
  In that regard, I recall a Member who said: Let's have a 
constitutional amendment to balance the budget, knowing it would be 
years from now. But we actually had a balanced budget during the 
Clinton-Gore administration. Not a single Republican voted for it. 
Democrats voted for it, and we balanced the budget. We created a 
surplus. We started paying down the national debt, and created 24 
million new jobs. Let's go back to those days. Forget the sloganeering. 
Forget the bumper sticker solutions. If things were that easy, it would 
have been done long before now. Start going back to doing what we are 
elected to do, what we are paid to do, and also what we are expected to 
do. Seek a solution, not a gimmick; not a deal, a solution that 
benefits all Americans.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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