[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 158 (2012), Part 2]
[Senate]
[Pages 1514-1516]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                               THE BUDGET

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I listened carefully to the statement made 
by the Republican minority leader about deficits, and I think it is 
worthy to note that history suggests an opposite conclusion from what 
he just said.
  Remember this: The last time the Federal Government ever balanced its 
budget and generated a surplus was in the closing years of the 
Presidency of William Jefferson Clinton, a Democrat.
  When President Clinton left office, the national debt accumulated 
over the history of the United States of America was $5 trillion. When 
Clinton left office and handed the keys to President George W. Bush and 
said: Incidentally, next year's budget--welcome to Washington--another 
surplus, a $120 billion surplus. The economy has created 23 million 
jobs in my 8 years, and I wish you the best. He left, turned the keys 
over to President George W. Bush, and gave him control for 8 years.
  Eight years later, another snapshot. The national debt was no longer 
$5 trillion; it was $11 trillion, more than doubled under President 
George W. Bush. We had dramatically lost jobs in America, unlike 
President Clinton.
  When George W. Bush handed the keys over to President Barack Obama, 
he said: Welcome to Washington. Incidentally, next year's budget is a 
deficit of $1.2 trillion.
  It is quite a different story; isn't it? We wouldn't know that from 
the speech just given. The suggestion is that Democrats just don't get 
it right when it comes to deficits but Republicans do. History tells us 
otherwise.
  President Barack Obama inherited one of the weakest economies since 
the Great Depression. In fact, we were teetering on another depression. 
The month he took the oath of office, putting his hand on Abraham 
Lincoln's Bible, we lost over 750,000 jobs in America. That is what 
President Obama inherited. We didn't hear that from the Republican 
minority leader.
  I wish to show one chart that tells the story and tells it 
graphically. It is a chart which those who follow the floor debates 
will see over and over.
  The red reflects job losses under President George W. Bush. The blue 
lines reflect employment under President Obama.
  This was the month President Obama was sworn into office. Almost 800 
thousand jobs were lost in America. That is what he saw as he came to 
the Presidency, and then look what happened.

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The job losses started reducing and finally turned the corner on the 
positive side.
  There, we have a graphic presentation of two views of the economy, 
the views of the Republicans and George W. Bush, with all this job 
loss, and the views of President Obama. That is the debate in which we 
are currently engaged. The Republicans want us to return to these 
policies, policies which call for tax breaks and cuts for the 
wealthiest in America, and basically ignore the investments we need to 
put people back to work.
  I served on the Bowles-Simpson deficit commission. I understand this 
issue a little bit, maybe more than some. I don't profess to be an 
expert. The deficits have to be brought under control. We can't borrow 
40 cents for every $1 we spend in Washington and sustain economic 
growth in America, period. But I also know this: With 10, 11 or 12 
million Americans out of work, we cannot balance this budget. We have 
to get America back to work. These workers have to start earning a good 
wage, paying their fair share of taxes, and creating growth in this 
economy and also growth in revenue which allows us to balance our 
budget.
  The President has two accelerators; he has to push them both at the 
same time: fiscal responsibility on one side and economic growth on the 
other. And we have to move forward in a straight path. That is what his 
budget does. There are those who say ignore economic growth, ignore 
creating jobs. Just cut spending, just cut the deficit. If we did that 
alone, I am afraid the result would be disastrous. The President 
understands, and we all should.
  There are three basic pillars to economic growth in America, and they 
are obvious: training and education. Is there a single Senator, 
Congressman or anyone here who doesn't understand they wouldn't be here 
without an education? We value education in America. It is the ladder 
of opportunity, and President Obama in his budget focuses on educating 
and training the next generation of skilled workers and leaders in the 
American economy. When we walk away from that commitment to education, 
we walk away from our future.
  The second thing the President's budget focuses on is innovation, 
finding those new technologies, those new discoveries which make our 
lives less burdensome and create more economic opportunity. It may be 
the next medical device, a diagnostic tool which saves a life. It may 
be the next pharmaceutical breakthrough at the National Institutes of 
Health. It may be a new process for developing clean energy in America 
that puts us back in the race to be the world leader in that field. 
Those investments by our Federal Government pay off in good businesses, 
good jobs, and a better life for all of us.
  Education, innovation, and the third piece is one that is on the 
floor today, infrastructure. It is kind of a sterile word, but what it 
gets down to is it represents the highways, the bridges, the airports, 
the mass transit, and the ports of America that are literally the 
arteries through which our economic blood will flow. When they are not 
as good as they should be or as efficient as they should be, our 
economy struggles. Let me give one example.
  I live in Illinois and am proud of it. My family came to that State, 
my mother as an immigrant to this country, my father off a farm in 
southern Illinois, to work in East St. Louis at a railroad. We almost 
equate Illinois with railroads. We are in the center of America and 
most railroads pass through the State. There are railroads in every 
direction.
  Right now, it takes as long to take a freight shipment through the 
city of Chicago as it does from the west coast to Chicago or from 
Chicago to the east coast. Why? Our railroad infrastructure hasn't kept 
up with the growing need for rail freight transportation. We need to 
invest in that. We have an opportunity to invest in it. When we do, 
when goods move more quickly, there is more profitability, businesses 
do better, and they hire more people. The same is true with our highway 
system, with mass transit, with passenger rail. Look at what the 
Republican view is, how they view this issue.
  Currently, we are considering a bill coming over from the House of 
Representatives which would be a disaster for America's infrastructure 
and for the State of Illinois, an unqualified disaster. Instead of 
investing in building the infrastructure so America's economy can grow, 
this bill, sadly, cuts the Federal investment in transportation by 15 
or 20 percent over the next 5 years. It cuts the investment in mass 
transit dramatically by eliminating the transfer of money from the 
highway trust fund to mass transit, something that has gone on for 30 
years, and it makes a 25-percent cut in Amtrak. At a time when Amtrak 
is growing and proving itself, they want to basically start shutting it 
down, closing it down, eliminating trains. That is no vision for the 
future. That is betting on failure. That is what the House Republican 
Transportation bill will do. We can do better.
  We have a bipartisan bill--a word we don't hear that often in this 
Chamber but a bipartisan bill--with Senator Barbara Boxer of California 
and Senator Inhofe of Oklahoma. They have agreed on a transportation 
bill which moves us forward for 2 years. We need to make that 
investment. The President understands that in his budget. We should 
understand it in the Senate, and we should make it happen.
  The last point I will make is this: There was a breakthrough 
yesterday. Some people will be critical perhaps of the House Speaker 
for reversing field and changing his position. It is a question of 
whether the payroll tax cut which President Obama put in place is going 
to be continued beyond the end of this month.
  Many may remember the flap that occurred in December when we were 
questioning whether to extend it for 2 additional months. I went back 
to my State and talked about it county by county as to how much it 
meant to working families. The Republicans relented in the House and 
agreed to extend it to the end of February. Unfortunately, just a short 
time ago, the Speaker said:

       If we're going to extend the payroll tax credit, 
     unemployment benefits, with reforms, and take care of the so-
     called doc fix, we're going to have to offset the spending.

  That is what the Speaker said. That was just a few days ago. 
Yesterday, there was a different announcement. The Speaker of the 
House, Mr. Boehner of Ohio, said:

       We are prepared to act to protect small businesses and our 
     economy from the consequences of Washington Democrats' 
     political games.

  In other words, now the Republicans are prepared to extend the 
payroll tax cut without paying for it.
  It would be easy to take a shot at the Speaker because he changed his 
position, but I will not. I remember this, the week of celebrating 
Abraham Lincoln's birth, the 203rd anniversary of his birth, Lincoln 
was much criticized for changing his position on an issue.
  Lincoln said: Yes, I did change my position. But I would rather be 
right some of the time than wrong all of the time. I think Speaker 
Boehner is right.
  The last point I will make is this: Let us extend the payroll tax 
cut. The extension of unemployment benefits is of equal value to the 
economy and immeasurable benefit value to those out of work who are 
struggling to find a job. Make sure, if we get this done on a payroll 
tax cut, we don't give up on extending unemployment benefits, benefits 
that will allow people to get back to work. I wish to see these blue 
lines growing. I wish to see us moving in the right direction, creating 
jobs in America.
  President Obama's payroll tax cut and the unemployment benefits which 
we have pushed for have pushed us over the line in creating jobs. Let's 
not end this record of success. Let's build on it.
  I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Colorado.
  Mr. UDALL of Colorado. Mr. President, before the Senator from 
Illinois departs the floor, I wish to associate myself with his 
remarks--the standpoint the majority leader has pointed out in order to 
build an economy, built to last, we have to invest in our people

[[Page 1516]]

and in our infrastructure and research and development. We can't cut 
our way to prosperity. Every business man and woman knows that. Every 
economist knows that. As our economy grows, then we can meet the 
challenge that is presented to us when it comes to our deficits and 
long-term debt. That is how we are going to get a handle on that 
particular problem. I wish to thank the Senator from Illinois for his 
compelling remarks.

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