[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 158 (2012), Part 13]
[Senate]
[Pages 18481-18486]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                            THE FISCAL CLIFF

  Mr. CORKER. Madam President, I just listened to the President, and my 
heart is still pounding. I was very disappointed to hear what the 
President just had to say in front of a pep rally--something very 
unbecoming of where we are at this moment.
  It is my understanding that most of the tax issues have been worked 
out--should have been worked out on the floor in regular order. I think 
most of the Senate is very distressed that we are in a situation where 
the negotiations are taking place all of this time and it is not being 
done through regular order, but that is the way things are today in the 
Senate.
  But I just heard the President say that in dealing with the sequester 
that was put in place to reduce spending--it was part of a $2.1 
trillion package to reduce spending so that we could raise the debt 
ceiling back in August of 2011. No one ever thought we would end up in 
this place where the sequester would be enacted, but it was done so 
that we would reduce spending.
  I notice my friend from Arizona is here. He has been one of the best 
there is to focus on defense spending and how it should be done, and I 
know he would like to see things happen in a very different way in that 
regard.
  But I just heard the President say that the way we are going to deal 
with this sequester is in a balanced way, through revenues and through 
reduced spending. I just want to go on record here on the Senate 
floor--I know there are negotiations that are taking place, but the 
sequester was to be dealt with and substituted with other spending 
reductions, not through revenues. I hope all those who are involved in 
bringing this together understand that even on the Democratic side, 
that was the understanding. Not only was it to be dealt with through 
spending reductions if these were considered to be ham-handed--and they 
are, and we should deal with them in a different way--but they were to 
be dealt with in the same time period. In other words, we weren't going 
to reduce $100 billion of the sequester and pay for it over 10 years; 
it was to be done during the same amount of time.
  So I know the President has fun heckling Congress. I think he lost 
probably numbers of votes with what he did. He didn't lose mine; I am 
not that way; I am going to look at the substance. But it is 
unfortunate that he doesn't spend as much time working on solving 
problems as he does on campaigns and pep rallies.
  But I just want to say that I am very disappointed in what the 
President had to say, and I am one Senator. I just want to go on record 
that it is absolutely unacceptable to pay for the sequester with 
revenues.
  Yesterday we had a meeting that broke down because all the money was 
being spent. The President campaigned for a year on raising taxes on 
the upper income. We have acquiesced to that. We know it is going to 
happen. But yesterday the deal was that all the money was going to be 
spent. There was going to be no deficit reduction. It is unbelievable--
unbelievable that all of the money was going to be out the door as soon 
as it came in. As a matter of fact, before it came in, it was going to 
be spent.

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  I just want to say that I know the President enjoys heckling and 
having pep rallies to try to get Congress to act instead of sitting 
down and actually negotiating, but I hope that is what is going to 
happen, is we will end up following through on the reductions in 
spending that need to take place to replace the sequester.
  I will also add just for what it is worth that the last time we 
extended unemployment insurance, we paid for it. The last time we did 
not cause the doc fix, the SGR, to go into place, we paid for it. And I 
hope that as this negotiation goes forward, we keep the same principles 
in place that we have had.
  This country is over $16 trillion in debt. The sequester was put in 
place because we couldn't reach an agreement on reductions, but we knew 
they had to take place. Mr. President, I hope we will continue to honor 
the fact that the sequester--the $1.2 trillion that we don't like the 
way it is being implemented--will only be adjusted through other 
reductions. If that is not the case, count me out. I think most people 
in this body consider me to be a semireasonable person, but if that is 
not what we do, count me out.
  This country has a spending problem and a revenue problem, I agree 
with that. I am willing to support revenues to deal with this problem, 
the overall problem. But what I will not agree to is using revenues to 
replace spending reductions that were part of the Budget Control Act; 
that, candidly, we need further reductions in place to totally get this 
country where it needs to be.
  With that, I know we have other Senators on the floor. I don't know 
what their response is to what just happened at the White House.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President I ask unanimous consent that I be allowed 
to follow Senator Mikulski.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Coons). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  The Senator from Maryland.
  Ms. MIKULSKI. Mr. President, I rise to speak as to what is going on 
here today as the new chair of the Senate full Committee on 
Appropriations. That means we are the committee that actually puts 
money in the Federal checkbook. I would like to talk about that 
because, you see, today here we are on New Year's Eve doing what we 
should have done right after Labor Day.
  We are behind the clock, and actually we are behind the thinking of 
the American people. They want us to come together and have sensible 
fiscal policies that promote growth and at the same time balance it 
with a new sense of frugality. The fact that we have come to this point 
with this culture of delay in this institution I think is really 
unacceptable. But I don't want to go into the culture of the 
institution, I want to go into actual discussions of something called 
sequester and spending.
  The words of Washington are a foreign language. We use words that 
nobody understands, and we use numbers that nobody believes. I am 
telling you that with me, there is going to be a new day and a new 
way--plain talk, straight talk about what we are doing here.
  So let's talk about the word ``sequester.'' Sequester literally means 
that you are going to--sequester stands for an arcane government word 
that means you are going to have automatic, across-the-board government 
spending cuts. These are supposed to be triggered if we don't resolve 
the issues today and will happen on January 2.
  What is being proposed is that we would cut $110 billion in 2013--$55 
billion in defense and $55 billion in nondefense. This means every 
single program--not programs that are dated, not programs that are 
bloated, not programs that might be for another era or only benefited a 
small group of people in a distant past, it means every single program. 
Yes, there will be certain exemptions to that in terms of Social 
Security benefits, veterans' benefits, and certain things related to 
the military.
  Since we are already 3 months into the fiscal year, the impact of 
these cuts will even be worse. So when you hear that we are cutting 
deals on the sequester, we are actually talking about government 
spending.
  Now let's talk about cuts. This is not the first time either party 
has talked about cuts, nor is it the first time either party has 
started to talk about a sense of frugality. One party, however, wants 
to also understand that we need to be able to meet the compelling needs 
that are in the mission of our government, and we have already given at 
the office.
  So let's talk about, oh, this could be new spending, and I don't want 
this. The fact is that since 2010, not 2001--let's get our zeroes 
straight for a change--since 2010 we have already cut domestic spending 
by $43 billion. We have already cut $43 billion. That is nearly 10 
percent of domestic spending in just 3 years. That $43 billion was in 
nondefense programs.
  Then there is talk about, oh, why don't we have a budget? On August 
2, 2011, we passed something called the Budget Control Act. That was 
deemed to be the budget of the United States of America. In that Budget 
Control Act, they instructed those of us on the Appropriations 
Committee to cut discretionary spending $1 trillion over the next 10 
years. The Appropriations Committee will honor the instructions of the 
Budget Committee, as approved by the Congress of the United States. We 
are on the program. We are on the same page. We are on the same 
glidepath. We don't have to have showdowns here.
  So we have already cut actual dollars--an actual checkbook--of $43 
billion. That is a lot of money. Also, in the Budget Control Act, we 
are to cut $1 trillion over the next 10 years. That would meet what was 
being discussed in Simpson-Bowles and so on, so we need to understand 
that.
  Now let's go to this across-the-board cut. I see on the Senate floor 
the distinguished Senator from Arizona, a well-known advocate for our 
national security, well versed over the years in the compelling needs 
our military must have to protect the Nation. I am sure he will speak 
to those needs, and I will also.
  But I also want to speak about another dynamic, which is the impact 
of $55 billion across the board in discretionary spending. What I want 
to say is that if, in fact, we go ahead with this, we are going to cut 
defense, there is no doubt about it, $55 billion, and it is going to be 
a meat ax. That is not the way to go, that is not the way to treat our 
military, and that is not the way to focus on our national security.
  Secretary Panetta, along with the generals, General Dempsey, the head 
of the Joint Chiefs, has gone through his own budget. He has 
recommendations where, out of the $66 billion of defense, how we could 
begin to have a prudent way where we could begin to have modest 
reductions in the DOD account without jeopardizing national security.
  I serve on the Intelligence Committee. I served with the Senator from 
Arizona and other distinguished people. We are going to make sure we 
can do this in our own way, but sequestration could really affect a 
variety of things related to operations and maintenance.
  Let me tell you what else there is. There are many other people who 
defend the United States of America, and I am proud of them all. These 
are things such as our Federal law enforcement. With our Federal law 
enforcement, if we go into this meat ax approach, over 7,500 
positions--because it will come out of personnel--will be affected. 
This could affect as many as 3,000 Federal agents--3,000 Federal agents 
of the FBI, DEA, and ATF. They might not be laid off, but they are 
going to be furloughed. They are going to have short-term furloughs. 
This is going to have a direct impact on morale, a direct impact on 
mission, and it will have a direct impact on protecting the American 
people, whether it is from cyber threats, border control threats--all 
these things they do. The Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Drug 
Enforcement Agency are absolutely important.
  Then the other area is in homeland security. We could reduce the 
mission hours at the Coast Guard by as much as 50 percent. Now, the 
Coast Guard is absolutely crucial when it comes to

[[Page 18483]]

drug interdiction and also protecting our borders from our waterways.
  You know, a lot of people love the Weather Channel. I love the 
Weather Channel too. If you watch what they do in Alaska, down in 
Florida, wherever they are, they are doing search and rescue and making 
sure drug dealers aren't using our waterways and byways to bring drugs 
into the country and just standing sentry and protecting the United 
States of America.
  Again, we could talk about the border control, but then there is this 
whole issue of the center for health and human services. Whatever you 
feel about ObamaCare, that doesn't affect what goes on at the Centers 
for Disease Control. Right now, the Centers for Disease Control and the 
FDA are trying to make sure we have food safety and drug safety and are 
watching out to make sure there are no big outbreaks that spread.
  All of us were horrified at the meningitis outbreak. We had a 
situation with a medical technician who went State to State--he was 
kind of a technician by hire--who spread terrible meningitis by 
injecting dirty needles into people who needed steroid injections 
because of their back.
  So we need the FDA. We need the Centers for Disease Control. They are 
out there working to protect our American people. Remember, they are 
the ones who discovered Legionnaires' disease.
  Mr. President, how much time have I consumed?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
  Ms. MIKULSKI. I have a commitment to the gentleman from Arizona, and 
I will honor that commitment both in speaking here and in dealing with 
these issues.
  Mr. President, the point I am making is this across-the-board meat 
axe approach has very serious consequences. Let's use prudence and 
delay them, I would hope, for at least 1 year or 2 years and not a 
matter of weeks. But I am saying, and I promise, we do have methods for 
getting our spending under serious discipline.
  I yield the floor, and I look forward to working with my colleagues.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arizona.
  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Maryland as 
always for her usual courtesy, and I think she had a very important 
message. I appreciate not only the words themselves but her eloquence 
and passion.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senator from South 
Carolina be included in a colloquy during my remarks.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I, as I believe all of us have, just 
finished watching the President's remarks at--I guess it was the 
Executive Office Building. I am not sure yet, as I sort out my 
impressions of the President's remarks, whether to be angry or to be 
saddened.
  I have been around this town for a number of years, and as is well 
known, I had more than an academic interest in the Presidency. I have 
watched a lot of Presidents, going back to President Reagan, from the 
standpoint of being a Member of Congress, and I have seen these other 
crises as we have gone through them--whether it was the potential 
shutdown of the government when Newt Gingrich was Speaker of the House, 
or the crisis of the debt limit expiring, and a number of others. It is 
sometimes, unfortunately, the way we do business here.
  But I must say, at a time of crisis, on New Year's Eve, when at 
midnight, at least, certain actions will take place or have to be 
planned to take place, today we had the President of the United States 
having a cheerleading, ridiculing-of-Republicans exercise in speaking 
to the people of the United States of America. As I have watched other 
Presidents address crises, the way they were able to address them and 
resolve them--with Presidential leadership, and that is why we elect 
Presidents, to lead--was by calling the leaders of both parties to the 
White House to sit around the table and do the negotiations and the 
discussions.
  Sometimes concessions have to be made; compromises have to be made. 
But what did the President of the United States just do? He kind of 
made funny--he made a couple of jokes, laughed about how people are 
going to be here for New Year's Eve, and then sent a message of 
confrontation to the Republicans. I believe he said: If they think they 
are going to do that, then they have another thought coming.
  I guess I have to wonder--and I think the American people have to 
wonder--whether the President wants this issue resolved or is it to his 
short-term political benefit for us to go over the cliff. I can assure 
the President of the United States that historians judge Presidents by 
their achievements.
  Now, we all read the polls. We, Republicans, know what is in the 
polls; that is, the majority of the American people--50-some percent--
support and approve of this President. We also see the approval ratings 
of Congress--10, 11, 12, 9, 15 percent, whatever it is. I haven't seen 
one that high lately. But historians judge Presidents by what happens 
on their watch, and this President just made comments which clearly--
clearly--will antagonize Members of the House. We are a bicameral 
government. His comments will clearly antagonize them, and once we get 
an agreement--and I appreciate that negotiations have been going on in 
the Senate between the majority leader and the Republican leader--
whatever is done and whatever is agreed to has to be ratified by the 
House of Representatives, men and women who were elected on promising 
their constituents they wouldn't raise taxes.
  Now, whether they should have made that commitment or not, whether 
that was the right thing to do, the fact is that is what they said. So 
the President basically, in his talk to whatever group of people he was 
talking to--who were laughing and cheering and applauding as we are on 
the brink of this collapse, of the incredible problem this creates for 
men and women all over, all of our citizens--said to the Republicans on 
both sides of the aisle, but particularly the House of Representatives: 
Take it or leave it. That is not the way Presidents should lead. These 
are draconian effects.
  Now, whether we should be at this cliff is a discussion for scholars 
in years to come, but we are where we are. Frantic discussions are 
going on. They went on into the middle of the night last night. So what 
is the President of the United States doing? In the middle of this, as, 
hopefully, they were reaching an agreement--and I understand there was 
only one major issue remaining--he comes out and calls people together 
and has a group standing behind him while he laughs and jokes and 
ridicules Republicans. Why? Why would the President of the United 
States want to do that?
  I want to say a word about sequestration. Now, sequestration is about 
to kick in. The Pentagon and our Defense Department are like a giant 
oil tanker. We have to turn it around in a very difficult and slow 
manner because they have to make plans, and they have to have 
contingencies. They have to have procurement of weapons, and we have to 
do all the things that are necessary to make sure our men and women who 
are serving in the military are the best trained, the best equipped, 
and most professional in the world--and they are. But when we look at 
sequestration, the Secretary of Defense says it will decimate our 
ability to defend this Nation.
  Shouldn't the President be concerned about that, about what his own 
Secretary of Defense is saying and what his own selection of Chairman 
of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is saying? Instead, he kind of jokes 
around and tells people they are going to be here for New Year's Eve. 
That is not the way to lead this Nation.
  So I come to the floor and say to my colleagues, we need to get this 
done. We all know we need to get this done. If we go over the cliff, we 
are going to disappoint the people we are elected to represent, and we 
will disappoint them mightily, as we already have. But I also say it is 
the time for Presidential leadership. It is time to stop the 
cheerleading; it is time to stop the campaigning. The President won. We

[[Page 18484]]

all know that. He won fair and square. Isn't it now time to govern? 
Isn't the best way to govern to sit down with people from the other 
party and from both Houses and say this is an issue we must resolve for 
the good of the American people?
  So I hope, again, the President will spend some time with the leaders 
of both parties in the Oval Office sitting down and ironing this out 
before the people of this country pay a very heavy price.
  Now, my friend from South Carolina was around when we almost went 
over the cliff the last time, as we were about to shut down the 
government, and there were all kinds of consequences. But we pulled 
back from the brink, after almost going over it, and it was the most 
serious of all these that I have seen. I guess I would ask him, is it 
not true, in our experience, that Presidents, whether they be 
Republican or Democrat, no matter what party or affiliation, going back 
to the famous Ronald Reagan and Tip O'Neill relationship, where they 
sat down together and they saved Social Security for about 25 years--
and it was tough medicine, but they did it together. The President of 
the United States basically dismissed Social Security and Medicare from 
his list of priorities.
  As my friend from Tennessee pointed out, we have a $16 trillion debt. 
For us to say we are not going to do anything about spending when we 
all know that spending is the biggest problem we have in this 
agreement--again, that is throwing kerosene on the fire that is on the 
other side of the Capitol, and that is my Republican colleagues on the 
other side of the aisle who have committed and pledged to their 
constituents that we will end this hemorrhaging that we call spending 
which has given us the greatest debt in the history of this country.
  So I guess I would ask my colleague from South Carolina, who is 
usually very modest and reticent in explaining his views, particularly 
in various media outlets, what is his view on this situation.
  Mr. GRAHAM. Well, I thank Senator McCain. My first view is it is 
better not to go over the cliff than to go over the cliff. But it is 
also important, as my colleague just said, to understand what we have 
accomplished.
  Let's assume for a moment--let's hope this is a good assumption--that 
we are reaching an agreement by the end of the day that raises tax 
rates on people who make over $400,000. I don't think that is a good 
idea because I think it hurts job creation. The better way to get 
revenue is to eliminate deductions and exemptions for businesses and 
wealthy individuals and take that money back into the treasury, lower 
tax rates to create jobs and pay down some debt. That is what Bowles-
Simpson did.
  Not one bipartisan group, I say to the Senator, that has tried to 
solve our debt problem and our spending problem and our revenue problem 
has suggested raising tax rates. Bowles-Simpson, a bipartisan group, 
actually lowered tax rates, and they did that by eliminating deductions 
and exemptions, and they put a lot of money on the debt. They had a 25-
percent corporate rate, and the top personal rate was 30 percent. They 
took this $1.2 trillion we give out every year in exemptions and 
deductions to the favored few and brought it back into the treasury. 
They paid down the debt and they lowered tax rates to help create jobs.
  This President's approach is the opposite of Simpson-Bowles and the 
Gang of 6. We had six Senators, three Democrats and three Republicans. 
How did they try to solve our long-term problems? They reformed the Tax 
Code by eliminating virtually all deductions. They took that money back 
into the treasury, they paid down debt, and they lowered tax rates, 
just as Simpson-Bowles.
  Now, this President has taken another path. He wants to raise tax 
rates to generate revenue. My concern is the higher the tax burdens in 
America, the less likely to create a job in America. There are better 
ways to generate revenues. But he has gotten his way and he is going to 
win.
  Hats off to the President for having the courage of your convictions. 
You said during the campaign you were going to raise tax rates on 
everybody making above $250,000. Well, you probably are not going to 
get that, but you are going to be somewhere around $400,000.
  The money to be generated, you say you want it to go on the deficit. 
Well, that is good. Yesterday, the proposal by our Democratic 
colleagues was to take that increased revenue from raising tax rates 
and spend $600 billion on the government. That is why they don't have a 
deal.
  I am willing to swallow my pride and vote for a tax rate increase--
even though I don't think it is good policy--just to save the country 
from going into the abyss and destroying the military. I am willing to 
do that, and I will take some heat. But that is the way democracies 
are. You win some, you lose some.
  What I am not going to do is raise tax rates on anybody and take that 
additional money to grow the government when we all know we need to get 
out of debt. That is what was going to happen yesterday.
  By 2037, the amount of debt we have in the Nation will be twice the 
size of our economy. Every child born in America owes $51,000 of debt 
on the day of their birth. When we look at Medicare, Social Security, 
and Medicaid, the three big spending programs, called entitlements, in 
about 25 years the cost of those programs is going to consume all the 
revenue coming into the government, and there will be no money for the 
Defense Department.
  So when the President said today that round 2 will be the debt 
ceiling, he is right. He won round 1. But we have done nothing, as 
Senator McCain indicated, to lower the deficit in any real way.
  If we took every penny of the money we are generating from raising 
tax rates for people above $400,000, that is 6 percent of the national 
deficit. That doesn't even begin to solve the problem.
  So this is a hollow victory--a victory of revenue with no change in 
the Nation's march toward becoming like Greece, no real reduction in 
our deficit or our debt. The good news is that we are one big deal away 
from dominating the 21st century because America's problems are less 
than most other places. The bad news is that deal is elusive. It 
requires Presidential leadership, and I haven't seen much of it. If we 
stay on the course we are on today, we are going to lose the American 
dream because our grandchildren and your children cannot pay off the 
debt we are about to pass on to them.
  So in about 2 months round 2 begins, and we will be asked to raise 
the debt ceiling. Trust me, I don't want to default on our obligations. 
But in August of 2011, we borrowed $2.1 trillion because we ran out of 
money, and 42 cents of every dollar we spend is borrowed money. If we 
don't keep borrowing, we have to cut the government by 42 percent. 
Nobody suggests that is a good idea overnight.
  But here is what I will not do. I will not continue borrowing money 
unless we address in the process what got us into debt to begin with. 
So when we have to raise the debt ceiling again, I want to make a 
simple request: Let's come up with a plan bipartisan in nature to save 
Social Security and Medicare from bankruptcy because they are going to 
run out of money and become insolvent in the next 20 years. Let's also 
create a spending reduction plan that will allow us not to become like 
Greece.
  If you want to raise more revenue by capping deductions, count me in 
because we will need more revenue. But in 17 months, ladies and 
gentlemen, we spent $2.1 trillion. We are burning through money like 
crazy. It took us 200 years to borrow the first $2 trillion. We spent 
$2.1 trillion of borrowed money in 17 months. That has to stop.
  So to President Obama: Congratulations on your tax rate increase. You 
fought hard and you won. I hope I have the courage of my convictions 
not to raise the debt ceiling until you and others will work with me to 
find a plan to begin to get us out of debt. You mentioned Medicare 
today in your speech, and I am glad you did.

[[Page 18485]]

  In 2024, it completely becomes insolvent. Think of how many people in 
this country need Medicare and will need it 20 years from now. If we 
don't do something, it is going to run out of money. The age of 
eligibility for Medicare recipients is 65. It hasn't changed one day 
since 1965 when it first started. We are all living longer. I propose 
we adjust the retirement age to 67 over a 10-year or 20-year period. 
That will save the program in many ways.
  People at my income level shouldn't get any money from the government 
to help buy prescription drugs. I should pay the full cost because I 
can afford to. That is called means testing. This CPI thing you hear a 
lot about, that is how you evaluate benefits. That needs to be 
reevaluated based on real inflation. We are overestimating the cost and 
adding burdens to these programs.
  That is kind of technical stuff, but here is what I am telling you. I 
am not going to vote to raise the debt ceiling until we do something to 
save Social Security and Medicare from bankruptcy, and I am not going 
to borrow a bunch more money that our grandkids are going to have to 
pay off without a plan to get out of debt. If that is too much to ask, 
so be it. But it is not too much to ask of you at home because if you 
spend a lot more money than you make, you go to jail. We call it good 
governance. That has to stop.
  So round 2 is coming, and we are going to have one hell of a contest 
about the direction and the vision of this country.
  The President we need 2 months from now is going to be the one who 
will come down here and talk with us and work with us and not have a 
press conference. Because, Mr. President, I want to make you a historic 
President. I want, on your 4-year watch, for us to change the course of 
the country. I want to save Medicare and Social Security from 
insolvency, and I will give you full credit as the Presidential leader 
if you will help us as a nation find a way to save these programs from 
bankruptcy. I want to turn around the spending problem we have and 
prevent us from becoming Greece. And if you will lead I will follow. 
Yes, I will raise more revenue in a responsible way. But without you, 
it is going to be hard for us to get there.
  So the next time we meet, it is going to be a round of debt ceiling, 
and the image I want is not a bunch of people behind the President who 
are clapping for him, but Members of Congress--Republicans and 
Democrats--behind the President, clapping for the President because he 
signed a bill that will save all of us from a certain fate. And our 
fate is being sealed as I talk unless we make changes.
  We cannot survive on the course we are taking today. The good news 
is, with some bipartisanship and Presidential leadership, we still have 
time to turn around this country and actually dominate the 21st 
century. It is going to take some pain and it is going to take some 
sacrifice.
  One final story. When I was 21 my mom died. When I was 22 my dad 
died, 15 months later. My family owned a liquor store, a restaurant, 
and a pool room. Everything I know about politics I learned in the pool 
room. My sister was 13. My uncle took over the businesses. He left the 
textile industry to run the businesses. We moved in with my aunt and 
uncle. They never made over $25,000 or $30,000 their entire life. And 
if it weren't for Social Security survivor's benefits for my sister, we 
would have had a hard time making it. She went to college on a Pell 
grant.
  I am 57. I am not married. I don't have any kids. I am part of the 
problem. That is what is happening all over America. But when I was 22, 
we needed every penny we could get in Social Security benefits. Today, 
I could easily give up $500 when I retire and not feel it at all, and I 
could pay more for Medicare--and I would, and I am going to ask people 
in my situation to do that. We just have to have the courage to ask. I 
think most Americans would say yes.
  So Medicare and Social Security are not programs to me. I know what 
they do for real people, and if we do nothing, in 2032--which seems 
forever but it is not--Social Security becomes insolvent, and we have 
to cut benefits 25 percent for everybody, whether they can afford it or 
not or raise taxes by 38 percent, whether businesses can afford it or 
not. And the way you solve that is to reform the programs like Ronald 
Reagan and Tip O'Neill.
  Mr. President, I am willing to play, along with my other Republican 
colleagues, the role of Tip O'Neill. You just need to play the role of 
Ronald Reagan.
  So the next time we talk about fiscal problems in America, I want a 
news conference where the President is center stage, not surrounded by 
political activists but surrounded by Republicans and Democrats who can 
celebrate accomplishing something that we should all be proud of.
  They tell me this is the least productive Congress in the history of 
the Nation. If it is not, I would hate to be in the one that was. We 
haven't done a whole lot up here.
  I know Senator McCain has been here a few years now. I ask the 
Senator, what is his opinion of where we are going as a nation and how 
we get along with each other?
  Mr. McCAIN. I would say to my friend, first of all, we have had some 
meetings of a bipartisan fashion to try and improve the process so that 
we can move legislation forward.
  I believe the issue before us right now--at nearly 3 p.m., 9 hours 
from midnight and we still have not reached an agreement--and the 
longer it takes for us to reach agreement, the less time we will have 
examining it and the less time we will have before voting on it. As the 
Senator from South Carolina said: We can't keep doing business like 
this. And we can't.
  But on this particular issue, I want to express, as I began, my 
disappointment in the President in having a cheerleading rally when we 
should be sitting down together and resolving this issue. That is what 
I have seen other Presidents, Republican and Democrat, do.
  I hope, now that the President has made his statement with his 
cheering section, that now he would sit down--as Presidents have and 
should--and work to hammer out this agreement and agreements in the 
future.
  The Presidential campaign is over. He won. Congratulations. Now let's 
get down to the serious business of governing this country in a 
bipartisan fashion.
  Mr. ISAKSON. Mr. President, would the Senator from Arizona yield?
  Mr. McCAIN. I yield to the Senator from Georgia.
  Mr. ISAKSON. I rise for a moment to associate myself with the Senator 
from Tennessee, the Senator from Arizona, and the Senator from South 
Carolina. I want to tell a personal story somewhat like the Senator 
from South Carolina.
  I made my living my entire life before I got here for 33 years 
selling houses, causing two people to come together and agree on price, 
agree on terms, sign and shake on a deal, and walk away from a closing 
table feeling like both of them won.
  I have also been elected to every legislative body I could be elected 
to in my State, and I have served in legislatures for 34 years. I have 
negotiated deals and been on conference committees, and I never once 
found myself making a deal by intimidating or insulting the other side.
  What the President did this afternoon set us back in civility and in 
leadership and in dealmaking, and I am a big enough guy to know I am 
not going to take it personally. If the desire was to offend me, the 
speech did. But if the desire was to deter me, it did not.
  It is time we all found ways to come together as Americans and solve 
our problems, not just in the short run but in the long run; not fill 
our room with partisan supporters, but, instead, cause everybody to sit 
together around the table and find a way to make a deal.
  This is the greatest country on the face of this Earth, and it will 
continue to be unless we forget what got us here. What got us here are 
the American people, not the American politicians. The American 
businessman, the American entrepreneur, the American worker, the 
American laborer, and the American leaders--people who, through their 
sweat, their blood, and their toil

[[Page 18486]]

built businesses, built factories, built companies, and made this great 
enterprise known as the United States of America work.
  If we want to raise our revenue--sure, you can raise by percentage 
your revenue by raising your assessment, but if you lower your base 
your revenue goes down. What we need to do is empower our base by 
raising the prosperity of the American businessman, the American 
employee, and the American worker. As their prosperity rises, taxes 
will go up not because we are charging them more by rate, but because 
they are making more. The rate and what they pay goes up because they 
are more prosperous.
  You will never raise the revenue you need by insulting the American 
people or taking away the incentives to work, make a living, maybe take 
a risk and be an entrepreneur. So while we had a speech today--the 
intention of which I don't know, but it probably protracted and delayed 
what we are trying to do here today, and that is find a way to come 
back and fight another day.
  I agree with Senator Graham. The big battle is yet to come, and it is 
over the debt ceiling. It is going to be a big battle, and I share 
every comment and every sentiment that Senator Graham said because that 
is the one where we have to find a way to make a deal. The President is 
not going to make a deal by poking us in the eye and by charging one 
side against the other to try and have a win-win proposition. I never 
made a deal if it wasn't a win-win proposition. I always lost a deal 
when I made it a win-lose proposition.
  I am at the table. I will continue to negotiate. I want to make this 
country work, but let's work together. Let's find common ground. In the 
eleventh hour and in the twelfth hour, let's do what is right for the 
American people.
  I want to thank Senator Graham, Senator Corker, and Senator McCain 
for their remarks. I associate myself with them, and I yield the floor.
  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I yield the floor for the Senator from 
Tennessee.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.
  Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, I thank the Senators from Arizona, South 
Carolina, and Georgia for the comments they have made. I already 
addressed the issue of the speech. I agree with the comments made by my 
colleagues here.
  I want to address the substance of this. We get caught up in 
terminology around here and sometimes talk beyond each other. I don't 
know what most people are doing today, but the country almost came to a 
halt in August of 2011 as we negotiated some reductions in spending--
$2.1 trillion worth. Most people believed that was not enough. I know 
everybody in this body has been contacted by the Fix the Deck folks and 
others who think we need to have a $4.5 trillion to $5 trillion deal, 
and I agree with that 100 percent. I thought that was what we were 
going to be doing.
  As the Senator from South Carolina said, had we done that, we could 
focus on the tremendous potential this country has. We are not going to 
do that.
  Let me go back to August 2011 when we agreed to reduce spending by 
$2.1 trillion. We implemented some things and we put some things off to 
what we call the sequester, which is what I am talking about now. The 
sequester was supposed to kick in on January 1 if we didn't reach an 
agreement on other spending reductions. I had hoped we would come up 
with other spending reductions. I know my friend, the Presiding 
Officer, felt the same way. But we have not done that.
  Here is the substance of what the President just said in his speech; 
that is, since we did not come up with an agreement on spending 
reductions, we are going to deal with the sequester that kicks in 
tomorrow--the $1.2 trillion.

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