us pray eternal god source of light and consolation we need to you every hour our strength is inadequate to meet the challenges of our time so we place our hope in you strengthen our senators give them knowledge and wisdom to solve the riddle that is that open their minds to think your thoughts make them quick to listen slow to speak and slow to anger may they place themselves under your control so that you can use them for your glory lead them through life storms with hope in their hearts help them to commit to you everything they think say and do today washington d c march eleventh two thousand and eight to the senate on the provisions of rule one paragraph three of the standing rules of the senate i heard by point honorable john tester a senator from the state of montana to perform the duties of the chair by robert  byrd president pro tempore is rising majority leader following my remarks those of the republican leader there will be a period morning business for our centers will be allowed to speak for ten minutes each with the time equally divided control between the two leaders or the designate republicans will control the first half majority controls the final house following morning business the senate will resume consideration of ask congress seventy concurrent resolution on the budget for debate only until the twelve thirty recess for the c luncheons is present i understand there are two bills dust due for a second reading clerk will report at twenty seven thirty eight a bill to identify and remove criminal aliens incarcerated in correction facilities in the united states and for other purposes as twenty seven ninety three a bill to authorize certain programs and activities in the department of interior and so forth and for other purposes mr president i would object any further proceedings respect to these on block objection is heard the bills are will be placed on the calendar the budget proposed by the other side of the aisle one thing is clear the people who wrote it were more interested in growing the size and scope of watches pending that in growing america's family budget but americans expect more from government that a one point two trillion dollar tax hike and billions of dollars in new spending especially in these difficult economic times but even with the giant tax hike the new spending and this budget isn't really accounted for democrats say they want to quote pay for a quote massive spending by among other gimmicks closing what they like to refer to as the tax gap this is the gap that exists between what people actually owe in taxes and what they pay well we need to only look back at last year to see that congress hasn't been very successful in attempting to close the so called tax gap in two thousand and seven congress passed a democratic budget resolution which promised to reduce the a gap about three hundred billion dollars over five years unfortunately this promise was never followed up all with actual legislation to make it law and no progress was made in other words democrats are counting on a direct deposit from a job they never completed that doesn't work in the family budget and it won't work in the federal budget while congress did act a few a few of the tax gap proposals included in the president's two thousand and eight budget those amounted to only a tiny tiny fraction of the tax gap hardly enough to rely on for offsetting the billions of dollars in new spending that our friends on the other side are proposing as the ranking member of the finance committee reminded the senate yesterday the promises didn't come close not close to matching reality during the first year of this democratic majority they enacted tax gap provisions amounted to two ten two tenths of one percent of the tax gap two tenths of one percent that's ninety nine point eight percent short of the promised revenues that's hundreds of billions of dollars short of the revenue they projected to pay for their new washington spending that's not even close not even in the same ballpark and these are serious disagreements between the parties on taxes the other side supports higher taxes we want to keep the tax rates low but we should all agree that people have a responsible did a pay what they lawfully owe over and over again the democratic majority has failed to enact any sort of serious and substantial strategy for closing the tax gap and as a result their jobs it's about green collar jobs jobs rebuilding america jobs really education and job training the one thing that my friends never talk about on the other side of the aisle is where we are now they want more of the same we don't want more of the same we've had enough the american people have had enough the economy is in a downturn spiraling down housing markets in a state of tremendous distress the stock market is dropping as we speak boilers now at one hundred nine dollars a barrel everything you hear from republicans is a buzzword for status quo keep things the way the are way things are just fine let's just let things work out we don't believe in that and we have a recipe for changing this is it something that's never been done before no look at the clinton years where we were taking in x number of dollars we brought in ten dollars we only spend eight of those dollars that's the way it was during the clinton years we paid down the national debt so the budget that we have led by senator conrad who i've been chairman that budget committee for many years has it has a program that creates jobs jobs jobs and that's what's important to american people republicans controlling the first half of the majority controlling the final half of the press center from new hampshire president i want to rise to speak about the budget first i want to express my respect for people who've worked on this budget my staff especially but also the democratic staff and the chairman of the budget committee senator conrad we are however in an extraordinarily difficult time as a nation we confront major issues we confronted our national issues of course involving the threat of islamic terrorism we confront domestic issues of even more or equal significance not more significance nothing is more significant than the threat of a terrorist attack in the us with some sort of weapon of mass destruction and we confront huge domestic issues such as the projected bankruptcy of the nation that's a pretty big issue and that's an undeniable fact it's going to occur unless we take some action because of the fact that the baby boom generation is beginning to retire and the that they are going to put on the federal government and therefore on our children to support them through taxes is going to be extraordinary we also confront the extremely difficult issue of energy policy and the cost of gasoline barrel gasoline went over a dollar one hundred seven dollars has not protected to come down and the effect on the economy is devastating we confront the fact we have a federal government which is spending and continues to spend significantly more than it's taking in and as a result is spending the social security surplus and is adding to the debt of the nation significantly adding to the designation so you would hope these very large issues which we confront as a nation the threat of terrorism the issue of the retirement of baby boom generation in the physical devastation that's going to bring to our children's ability to have an affordable lifestyle the issue of the cost of energy the issue of the size of the federal government and its growth at a pace which you cannot sustain the tax on the american people which gasoline is now represents which is undermining the economy and the general tax policy of the proposed budget which will undermine it even further you would hope that the democratic leadership of the congress would have come forward with a budget that showed some imagination some creativity some initiative in the area of addressing some of these crucial problems regrettably what we got was the same old same old a budget filled with taxes a budget filled with spending on this special interest program in that special interest program a budget which underfunded the national defense a budget which dramatically increases the taxes on working americans a budget which dramatically increases the death of the federal government and therefore the debt passed on to our children a budget which rage the social security trust fund a budget which has no creativity in the area trying to address entitlements reform a budget which uses gimmick after gimmick after gimmick and even gimmicks its own gimmicks in the area of pay go in the area of discipline in the area of revenues it is to say the least it should be an embarrassment because it is such a mediocre mediocre presentation it passes the problems on to the next generation doesn't confront them doesn't even try to confront them is simply aggravates those problems for the next generation and that's unfortunate because now we're running out of time here we're the generation of leadership baby boom generation we have some obligation to fix the problems which we're going to pass on to our children i believe we have a significant obligation to do that but this budget doesn't accomplish anything in that area this budget has one thought in mind it's not jobs jobs jobs as the majority leader said it's reelect reelect reelect win the next election r try to solve the problems which are passing on to the next generation the horizon of this budget is somewhere this july this august as we move into the full scale election cycle when they can go to this interest group and say we e given you this money we go to those interest group and say we've given you this money and then deny that they're taxing people because the taxes for those costs won't hit people until after the election and did that they're fudging this numbers through using gimmicks because those events one of her till after the election is truly a budget that it fails on all counts to take on what is the real issues that face our nation our we fight terrorism how we support our troops in the field how we deal with this looming massive unfunded liability of the retirement the baby boom generation which will point to unsustainable costs on our children and make their lives a sense only less viable in the way of affluence than ours has been a budget that dramatically increases taxes on working americans in the name of raising taxes on high income americans a budget that dramatically grows the debt and raised the social security funds this list here is what it does i think i've pretty much outlined it raises taxes by one point two trillion dramatically increases spending get in that little bit dramatically grows the debt gimmicks its own enforcing mechanisms paygo and all the other add force mechanisms that allegedly has in place and then does nothing to address the sixty six trillion dollars of unfunded liability which is such a huge number nobody can understand it so try to put it in context means i think that every american today has one hundred twenty thousand dollar debt and this budget adds twenty four thousand dollars to that debt and this budget does nothing to try to improve that situation the chairman the committee said we need to be tough on spending numbers spending cuts and democratic budget zero the number of spending increases twenty two billion dollars over this baseline this year stated on the discretionary side on the entire human side four hundred sixty six billion dollars increases  eighteen billion but they play another one of their games another one of their budget fudge it games they take four billion dollars in what's known as advanced appropriation that means they take it out next year and spend it this year four billion additional dollars doing that to spend on in the past i've opposed in the past but this time they just bust out the number a little bit so their numbers can work and so that they can say to their different situation is we're going to spend money on you you can have this money we got it for you we're just going about it for next year's budget or billion dollars twenty two billion dollars in new spending that's not that that's a pretty big number twenty two billion dollars i mean that would literally run the state of new hampshire for three years or four years but that's not the whole number because you got to put it in a five year context it's actually over two hundred billion dollars of new discretionary spending because once you spend that twenty two billion dollars this year it doesn't come out of the budget next year it goes into what's known as the baseline it just becomes the floor and we build on that last year they want to spend twenty two billion dollars more to do so over two years they bump things up or tried to bomb things up forty four billion dollars plus last year they put in a supplemental for another twenty one billion dollars now i know these numbers are starting to be thrown around like crazy here but the simple fact is it's big money big money being spent on constituencies that vote for them chairman the budget committee said i have prepared i am prepared to get savings out of long term entitlement programs any savings on long term entitlement programs in this budget zero net savings zero while the deficit in the long term accounts goes up dramatically sixty six trillion dollars is owed to those accounts that we can't pay for this budget as orne sixty six billion dollars into those accounts staggering amount of money no attempt to adjust that at all now it's interesting we will hear from our colleagues on the other side of the aisle let me go to this one first of all get in that national debt goes up over two trillion dollars under this budget two trillion dollars add to the national debt my colleagues in the us i believe we are i really believe increasing the debt is the threat that's that's that's one of my senator senator conrad's great phrase is the is a threat i agree with problem is he's aggravating the threat with this budget now you don't have too much choice because he's spending so much money that we don't have but he is aggravating the debt and as a result the wall of debt chart the famous wall of debt it goes up and it goes up dramatically under this budget now we will hear from the outside but the president's budget does the same thing or it's even worse you know that is a canard that's a straw dog the president does not sign the budget the president is not part of the budget process and then he has an obligation to send a budget up here for the purposes of our review which is depending on the president uniformly rejected by the party in power  since the budget up now is what his priorities are but uniquely the budget instrument and this is an important point is a child of the congress it's a child of the congress like the congress produces the budget the senate produces a budget the house produces a budget it goes to conference committee it comes back to the senate comes back to the house but you know what it doesn't do as with most laws it does not go to the president to be signed he cannot veto a budget he cannot sign a budget he simply gets a budget in a form the congress wants it's a resolution it's not a bill and why is that why is that because the founding fathers in their wisdom and the people put together the budget act some of whom are still here in the burton sentiment she being two of the key players in that one hundred seventy four seventy six i think knew that the power of the purse which is what the budget is all about relies with the congress and so the congress has the first and primary responsibility on the budget and so when you throw out well but the president did this in the president you're just trying to hide no we the congress has a responsibility for the budget it is the congress which passes the laws that create the budget or the resolution to create budget and the president doesn't sign it at all so it is the congress that you should turn to and say you are the responsible party here are you being responsible and that's the issue are you being responsible as a congress and this congress is not being responsible because the big issues that we face as a nation are either being financed gamed ignored or aggravated under this budget as i said before this budget adds twenty seven thousand dollars twenty seven thousand dollars to the debt that each child born today has to pay if you're having a child or you just had a child i just had a at a nice this year she's a wonderful little girl she came in the world she just got a twenty seven thousand dollar bill from the from the democratic leadership of this congress very stiff built a sticker with to stick any american way was just getting started really not there at all so let's get into some specifics about this budget first the allegation that there's some sort of disciplining mechanisms around here take this on for us because it is a fraud that has to be taken on for this idea i have heard more senators on the other side the us and we're going to use pay go to discipline the budget darn it when we use pay go we limit spending around here they go is a motherhood term regretably it's a title that's been put on a s'posed procedure which requires you to pay for new spending and to pay when you cut taxes well time and time again our colleagues on the other side of the aisle when they were confronted with the choice of actually having to use pay go which would have caused them to have to cut spending somewhere in order to increase spending somewhere else game the system ga system they moved a year here for a year there they wouldn't be paygo subject they cut programs from reasonable funding levels like guest yep by eighty five percent in one year so that they wouldn't be confronted knowing it's never going to happen so he wouldn't be confronted with paygo unfortunate mechanisms they took the milk program and put in a supplemental bill so that they could build a base and not have to be subject to the pay go program time after time after time fifteen different times they game pay go to the tune of one hundred forty three billion dollars i call it swished he's go i think that's a much more truth and labeling act there's no reason we should ever call this thing to go again let's just call it was cheese go because that's what it is whenever they're whenever it's inconvenient for the democratic leadership to have to subject themselves to their own discipline rules they weigh them they gave them or they ignore him now the first obligation of a national government is national defen the most important thing about national defense is to make sure your soldiers who are in the field have the resources they need to do the job we've asked them to do whether you agree with what they're doing or not you should never send a soldier into the field and not support that soldier with everything that he or she needs now understand there's a huge debate on specially in the other side of the aisle as to whether or not we should sit cut the legs out from underneath our troops in iraq we all understand that we voted on here forty three times in this congress but there should be no question that those soldiers need the support as long as they are in the field is totally inappropriate the total abrogation of the responsibility of the congress not to support those soldiers in the field now in this exercise the white house does not come clean hands and i was fairly aggressive in complaining about their decision to send up a request for only seventy billion dollars which is a lot of money but that's nowhere near what it's going to cost to keep our soldiers in the field over the next year and to their credit at least the people at the pentagon secretary gates when confronted with that number said no that's wrong even though and b may have sent it up here in the president's  presentation is wrong we're going to need something like one hundred fifty to one hundred seventy billion dollars somewhere between eighty and one hundred billion dollars more than what they've got in the budget the chairman of the budget committee agreed he said and we know i think with great certainty seventy billion dollars is not the right answer for two thousand and nine zero is not the right answer for two thousand and ten those are the two numbers that the white house a and secretary gates said no it's not the right answer when he was asked he said it's going to be a higher number so the documentation is pretty clear even as the white house didn't send out the right number by the time that we acted and remember once again it is the congress that does the budget not the white house by the time we acted we should have put a number in here that adequately reflects what our soldiers are going to need to mainstays now even if you oppose this war vehemently as some do on the other side of the aisle to the point where they're willing to take the soldiers out next week which you can't physically do i mean we all know that it will take six months to a year to get the soldiers o of the of there when this number you can't get the soldier back with seventy billion dollars literally this number does not allow you to get the soldiers back what happens with this number is that you're going to have our soldiers in the field without immunisation without resupply without the without the facilities they need without the equipment they need as number assumes the we're going to leave our soldiers in the field unprotected unprotected it's inexcusable irresponsible number to put in the budget simply to make your budget look better this number should have been at least seventy two hundred billion dollars higher than accurate budget then the budget moves on we have heard more about how there's uncollected taxes and if we just collect the un collected taxes will solve all our problems i call it the wizard of oz approach to budgeting budgeting there's somebody behind a curtain somewhere in all of us a lot of money we're going to find that person we're going to get the money that's going to take care of everything well i'll be happy last year they suggested we do this to the tune of three hundred billion dollars last year they were given the benefit of doubt they had never done a budget before so you got to give him some benefit of the doubt ok let's see how much they get again if we just collect if hundred percent of the tax gap that's what your firm do that would be over three hundred billion dollars and that alone would come close to meeting the revenues needed under our budget resolution this was last year you know how much they collected last in fact they cut in their budget the collection capabilities of the i r s so not only was the iris not able to go out and collect more money that was owed they're having trouble collecting what they did get that was owed because their collection process has been  and so you would think after such a pathetic performance that they would presume not to do this again that it would take to get credible i don't know verve to do claim one more time that you're going to generate these types of revenues but they do they do three hundred million dollars they're going to get it from out there and in the virtual land of tax policy what they really got was zero zero this budget in it's at its essence is a massive tax increase that's essentially what it is it's a massive tax increase the purpose of which is to expand the size the federal government grow the federal in my own bill opinion as a result make it much more difficult for us as a government to produce a positive and strong economy and to give people an opportunity to live lives that  as affluent and as hopefully successful as prior generations the amount of tax increase in this bill is one point two trillion dollars the largest tax increase in history one point two trillion dollars under the assumptions of this budget every tax goes up to rates which were fairly high and which the congress agreed were too high back in the early two thousand marriage penalty goes up child tax credit goes up rates go up cap gains goes up dividends goes up the estate tax goes up they're all assumed to go up a m t is assumed to be continued in place every year but this year we should have a new chart called the wall of taxes because that's what this budget does it generates a lot of tax increases climbing every year as president of g d p it's important to know that is historically been the case that we have presumed that the federal government would take something like eighteen point two percent of gross national product in tax revenues that's been the case since the end of world war two this budget blows through that number but equally important it should be noted that in blowing through that number an adding a one point two trillion dollars in new taxes it doesn't address you know it doesn't address the outyear issues which is going to cause taxes to even go up higher the failure to do anything on entitlement reform and then use up all the revenues to fund this group and that group that you happen to be happy about giving money to for the next election put you in an even worse position when hopefully the congress gets around some day t addressing the biggest this go policy issue which is entitlement reform in addition in addition it needs to be noted that this tax increase of one point two trillion dollars is just the beginning just the beginning of the democratic proposals because if you listen to their to the actual candidates for president in the case of one they have already offered and put in place over three hundred billion dollars three hundred billion dollars of new programs just in one year that adds up to something like one point two trillion dollars of additional programs over five years that's on top of this on top of this number now when senator obama makes that representation going to add three hundred billion dollars of new program every year the fractal effect is he's got to pay for it somehow his claim is that he's going to pay for by taxing the rich is not tax the rich and pay for his one he actually ironically has a saying i'm here one point two trillion dollars of additional spending over that five year period well if you tax the rich which would mean you raise the top bracket from thirty five percent up to thirty nine point six percent which was the practice under just under president clinton you generate how much income to the federal government twenty five billion dollars twenty five billion dollars multiply that by five years which is what this number is the one point two trillion dollars that mr obama has that senator obama suggested we spend a new program he got two hundred twenty five billion dollars so he's about a trillion dollars short in order to pay for what he's suggesting a new program but there's another irony here this tax number already assumes that two hundred twenty five billion dollars is tax number assumes that the rates have been increased to thirty nine point six percent for the top income brackets with the practical effect of that being that it's already been spent this budget already spends the money and the tax revenues that candidate senator obama has suggested he's going to spend on his new program so he doesn't have any money available to him so now we have a democratic budget which increases taxes by one point two trillion increases spending dramatically as i've gone through already and then you have layered on top of that a national candidate to national senator clinton's not far behind senator obama in suggesting new programs there's going to add another one point two trillion on top of this i mean the numbers become staggering but what does it all translate into huge tax increases on working american huge absolutely staggering to try to put this in context without the obama tax increases or the clinton tax increases twenty seven million small businesses in this country under the democratic budget will see their taxes go up one hundred dollars each per year now you can double that if senator obama were to put in all his programs eighteen million seniors will see their taxes jump twenty two hundred dollars each because of this budget twenty two hundred dollars each that's that's a lot of money trying to put that in context that basically buys groceries for most americans for i think it's half a year certainly by a fair amount of gas not as much as we'd like because the present gas is so outrageous certainly helps with a mortgage payment maybe a child going to school or helping a grandchild go to school in the case of a senior but serious money twenty two hundred dollars that's what this budget in new taxes is going to cost average seniors in this country and something else should be pointed out here this budget assumes th cap gains and dividend rates are going to go up and the primary benefit of cap gains and dividend rates flows to senior citizens they take as a percentage seniors take more advantage of  cap gains than any other demographic group so it's directly targeted on them tax increases all this works out to with the average american family there is a twenty three hundred dollar tax increase in this bill and that doesn't include how much you would be increased if you were to put the obama clinton programatic initiatives on top of that it would almost double this number i mean there's almost the appetite to raise your taxes from the other side of the aisle is unquestionably questionable that's correct nancy ation is huge let's put it that way and unstoppable it appears when this budget passes john q public is going to have to write uncle sam a check for twenty three hundred dollars that's a pretty expensive experience where the american people and what do they get for it when they get for let's come back to what they get for not lot do they get the troops were properly supported when they're fighting for us overseas no no one hundred billion dollars short on that do they get in thailand reform that helps us down the road with that question with the pressure is going to be put on our children by the cost of the expansion of thailand programs due to the retirement days when generation is no i don't get that they get health care reform you know health care reform and here they get tax reform no there's no there's no tax reform in here do they get which make sense in are presented in a coherent an orderly manner are there programs eliminated that it may be gotten around been around too long in exchange for adding programs we've got study after study that tells us about programs you could eliminate  no one program is eliminated and this this budget just an expansion just add to the base bumping up another two hundred billion dollars over the next five years and pass that bill on to our children passing the problem on that's what this budget is courageous creative imaginative addressing the core issues which we confront as a nation and which really do threaten us whether it's terrorism the cost of energy cost the government the retirement of a them generation these issues are not going away but you wouldn't know that even existed if you looked at this budget it is a regrettable missed opportunity in a very difficult time and it's unfortunate that all it's really become is your classic liberal tax and spend an issue president  senator from north dakota i want to welcome back the ranking member of the budget committee i've listened with great interest to his presentation here this morning and the highly imaginative presentation highly imaginative the presentation is made that purportedly is about the budget that we have offered as virtually nothing to do with the budget that is before us it's largely a concoction although i must say when he talks about creativity i give him high marks for creativity because this is complete make believe what we've heard from the other side in terms of description that is on this floor you know last year maybe one good place to start is let's think of what the senator said last year about our budget because it's almost identical to what he's just said about this year's budget he said last year we were going to have a trillion dollars of tax increases if our budget passed well our budget passed and now we can go check the record i don't have to have a bunch of projections or suggestions about what might happen we cannot i look back and see what actually did happen and last year the senator from new hampshire the ranking member of the budget committee by the way for whom i have high regard we work together very closely we have substantive differences this will become more clear as these days wear on but i have high regard for the senator from new hampshire but let's check the record did we increase taxes as he asserted what happened last year by a trillion dollars no did we increase taxes at all no did we cut taxes yes how much did the democratic congress cut taxes well here it is it's not a projection this is not make believe this is  fact the democratic congress has cut taxes one hundred ninety four billion dollars with seven billion dollars of revenue raisers so that is the factual record with respect to tax cuts the democratic congress cut taxes by a hundred ninety four billion dollars most of this in the stimulus package just passed to give lift to the economy now the senator talks about where we're headed under this budget that perhaps the best way to anticipate where we're headed is to look back and see where we've come from when they controlled everything they controlled the house they controlled the white house they controlled the senate and here's their record here's what they did they started with budget surpluses and they ran up deficits you can see this is the record of the bush administration four hundred thirteen billion was the biggest deficit in the history of the united states in fact they've got five of the biggest debt that's in the history of the united states that's their record revenue was flat they increased spending about fifty percent and the result was they have exploded the debt of the united states again this is not a projection this is  forecast this is their record our friends controlled it all they control the white house they controlled the senate of the united states they controlled the house and here's what happened to the debt they have built a wall of debt that's unprecedented they took us from a debt at the end of the president's first year five point eight trillion dollars they've run it up to over nine billion dollars last year and by the end of two thousand and nine that will be the  years this president's responsible for they will almost have doubled the debt of the country in just eight years it is a stunning stunning record and i don't mean stunning in a good way now the senator says we have this massive increase in spending massive increase in spending well it's not in this budget that's just not the case here is here is a chart that shows the president's spending is the red line the green line is the spending under this resolution this is over the five years of this budget you'll see that they are very very close to each other in fact the difference in spending over the five years between our budget and the president's budget is two point two percent we have two point two percent more spending than the president's budget and why because we have resort cuts that he made in things like the cops program that has put one hundred thousand police officers on the  the president's budget eliminates the cops program the president's budget eliminates the weather zation program program in this country to go back and weatherize homes so they're more energy efficient he says no we don't want to do that anymore the president's budget cuts the grants to first responders our emergency medical personnel our ambulance crews and other first responders our firefighters cuts those by seventy eight percent we didn't think that was a good idea and so yes we do spend some more we also spend some more to reduce our dependence on foreign energy because we think that's a smart investment we do spend some more and education because we think that is critical for the future strength of the country and we do spend some more money on infrastructure because we don't want any more bridges collapsing like we saw happen last year in minnesota where the bridge over thirty five w collapse with people on so yes we spend two percent more over the five years for this year if you take the total spending in the president's budget it's three trillion three point zero four trillion dollars in our budget it is three point zero eight trillion dollars that is a difference of one percent one percent of all this great spending that the senator just described the problem is the facts for his recitation the thing that gets in the way of it are the facts and the facts are we spend one percent more than the president in two thousand nine the senator said that we have not been responsible with the troops well let me just indicate if we have not been responsible then the present hasn't been responsible either because we have the identical amount in our budget for defense in the war as the president had in his budget identical not a dime of difference so if we have been irresponsible then the senator is saying the president has been irresponsible because we match him dollar for dollar the senator said something that is really quite to remember what he said about the president's role in the budget he said the president doesn't have any to do with the budget really the president of the united states has nothing to do with the budget of the united states i don't think so the president sends us a budget if you look at the historic record what you find is that congress gives a president in a budget very close to what he asked for that's the that's the record going back forty or fifty years now he added to that by saying the president can't veto or sign a budget that is true the way the process works is the president sends us his budget then a budget is developed by congress that does not go to the president for his signature or his veto that is true but does it yes the president really doesn't have anything to do with the budget that's not true because the president sends us his blueprint and then he has the power of the veto to inforce all of the provisions that flow from a budget he can veto any appropriations bill those are the bills that spend money he can veto any revenue bill those are the bills that raise money so to suggest that president doesn't having to do with the budget that is really misleading to people in the n f l i think if you just think of it in a commonsense way of course the pres the united states would have a lot to do with the budget policy of the country should have does h it is true that on the budget resolution he does not sign it he cannot veto it but he does have the capability to inforce its spending and its revenue because he has the power of veto let's look at the question of revenue again the president the our colleagues said we're going to raise taxes a trillion dollars that's exactly what he said last year democrats they're here they're going to raise taxes a trillion dollars i think he just likes that number doesn't matter what budget we present he says we're going to raise taxes trillion dollars i've already showed that what democrats have done once we've controlled the house in the senate was actually reduced taxes by a hundred ninety four billion dollars that's our record so far that's a fact there is additional revenue in our proposal over the five years and you can see the difference our revenue line is the green line the president's revenue line is the red line again you see they're very close in fact if you look at the numbers over the five years of this budget the president has fifteen point two trillion dollars in revenue that's the proposal he sent to us we have fifteen point six trillion in revenue that is a difference of two point six percent i don't know where he comes up with this trillion dollars because that's not our proposal our proposal when the baucus amendment is adopted is to raise fifteen point six trillion in comparison to the president fifteen point two the other day the sender put up a sign that said that i had and he quoted me in a sixty minutes interview saying the first thing we need is more revenue that is true i did say that they didn't include the whole quote here's the whole quote here's the transcript steve kroft is talking to me and he is asking me about the head of the general accounting office who is warning the country we're on an unsustainable course because of the long term commitments that have been made he says what do you think about david walker and what he's doing senator conrad i think david walker is providing an enormous public service mr kroft do you agree with his figures and projections i do you know we could always question the precise nature of this projection or that projection but that misses the point the larger story is telling is exactly correct or most people in washington aware of how bad it is mr kroft asked me i said yes they know in large measure here republicans and democrats that we're on a course that doesn't add up this is one place where senator gregg and i are in complete agreement we're on an unsustainable course mr kroft why doesn't somebody do something about it my answer because it's always easier not to because it's always easier to defer to kick the can down the road mr cropped question to me do you think taxes ought to be raised my response i believe first of all we need more revenue but then he didn't include the next sentence we need to be tough on spending and we need to retool reform the entitlement programs we need to do all of it that was my answer and i believe it is the truth not only have i said that but senator gregg has said we need more revenue senator gregg himself said we also know revenues are going to have to go up if you're going to maintain a stable economy in a productive economy because of the simple fact that you're going to have you're going to have this huge generation that has to be paid for is talking about the baby boom generation so we're going to be honest with the american people we do need to be tough on spending we do need to have more revenue and i have said repeatedly before we ask for a tax increase from anyone we ought to go after the tax gap the difference between what's owed and paid the revenue service says back in two thousand and one that gap was over three hundred billion dollars in a year now i think that's unfair to the vast majority of us who pay what we owe to allow others to escape but it doesn't end there we also have tax havens offshore tax havens are permanent subcommittee on investigations as indicated we're losing one hundred billion dollars a year to these offshore tax havens and now we've had just additional reports in the last two weeks of more of these tax havens proliferating if you go on the internet and you push in offshore tax havens you'll get a million hits a million because there are a lot of con is going on and we ought to shut them down before we ask for a tax increase from anyone in addition there are these abusive tax shelters companies that are actually buying european sewer systems european systems writing them off on their books in the united states to lower their taxes and then leasing the sewer systems back to the european cities that built it mr president the senator also went after the pay go rule call it cause it swiss cheese go which is numerous and i always preached at the humor but let's give both sides of the story the senate paygo rule says if you're going to add new mandatory spending or new tax cuts they must be offset or get a super majority vote this is a means of disciplining the budget process that's worked well in the past we've reinstituted that senator gregg when he was in charge of the budget committee said this about paygo this is when he supported it he said the second budget discipline which is paygo essentially says if you're going to add a new entitlement program or you're going to cut taxes during  period especially of deficits you must offset that event so that it becomes a budget neutral event that also lapses if we do not do this if we do not put back in place caps and paygo mechanisms we'll have no budget discipline in this congress and as a result will dramatically aggravate the deficit which of course impacts a lot of important issues but especially impacts social security he had it exactly right when he was an advocate for pay go let's look at the record of pay go here's what we see we had a strong pay go rule from one thousand nine hundred one to two thousand and we climbed out of the deficit debt we produced surpluses then our friends came into power and in two thousand they dramatically weakened paygo and look what happened right back to an ocean of red ink we have now put pay go back into effect in two thousand since the two thousand and four elections and let's look at the record this is the number of times pay go i was raised thirteen the number of times paygo was waived zero pay go raise thirteen times pay go waived zero pay go is working excluding the alternative minimum tax legislation that passed last year the pay go score card has a positive balance of one point three billion over eleven years every bill sent to the president other than a m t in the stimulus package just passed has been paid for or more than paid for taiko as also significantly produced a deterrent  effect and anybody that doubts that should sit in my seat for one week and see the number of times colleagues decide not to offer a spending proposal because of the pay go rule now on the other side they've said that there this hundred forty three billion dollars that they claim pay go has been violated let's look at each one of their claims and i only have two minutes left before senator stabenow i'll be taking over immigration reform they claim thirty billion dollars loophole in fact zero zero immigration reform never passed the senate remember the test is what goes to the president of the united states the bill never went to the president of the united states energy bill final bill that was sent to the president was more than paid for they claim a four point two billion dollar short shortfall in fact it was more than paid for and had a surplus of fifty two million mental health parity that bill has not yet gone to the president they're claiming a two point eight billion dollars shortfall bill hasn't gone to the president it's still in conference and the promise has been made by the conferees that it will comply with paygo the prescription drug user fee amendments the final bill sent to the president was more than paid for their claiming two hundred million dollars shortfall in fact it was four million dollars to the good the minimum wage increase fully paid for on a unified basis they claim a fifty million dollars shortfall in fact zero the water resources development act final bill sent to the president more than paid for passed the senate by the way on a vote of eighty one to twelve other items that they have mentioned the children's health insurance reauthorization more than paid for over six in eleven years they claim a forty five billion dollars shortfall in fact a savings of two hundred seven million dollars the fire bill more than paid for over six and eleven years and by the way that bill has not yet gone to the president they're claiming a twenty seven million dollars shortfall in fact there are savings higher ed reconciliation more than paid for over six in eleven years they show a twenty six billion dollar shortfall in fact the savings will continue to grow and decades beyond the budget will window and over six in eleven years that bill is completely paid for the two thousand and seven supplemental county payments payment lieu of taxes and milk they claim six point five billion dollars shortfall in fact the pay go rule applies to mandatory spending and revenues only not to appropriated accounts discretionary spending is controlled by separate caps the two thousand and eight budget resolution established a new sixty vote point of order to limit changes in mandatory spending on appropriations bills and to strengthen pay go even further mr president they call paygo swished years ago their pay go was easy cheese easy cheese because what they allowed under their pay go was for the debt to explode no forecast no projection just the facts just the record they've increased the debt from five point eight trillion to over nine trillion today and under the president's proposal it's going to go to over ten trillion dollars that is the record mr president we have now reached the eleven o'clock hour senator stabenow is going to take the chair and there are other senators awaiting recognition we have a meeting to try to determine where we go with the rest of the day but i hope we have a good substantive debate i look forward to it i thank the chair and y americans have important expectations for the public servants they expect us to act in the common good they expect us to advance our common values but first and foremost they expect us to have common sense last week's department of defense tanker procurement decision raises serious questions of common sense as some of my colleagues have already discussed the best bargain last week word a forty billion dollar contract for a new generation of air force tanker aircraft the european defense of space company or eads the parent company of airbus receiving this major contract is an enormous victory for the european company a victory for thousands of french german and spanish airbus workers this contract will employ is also a victory for u s contractors who will work on the project yet i have serious questions about whether this is a do not question the merits of one tanker plane over another i'll leave that to my colleagues on the armed services committee but i certainly am concerned and have serious questions about this deal from the perspective of international trade this responsibility falls to me as chairman of the senate finance committee united states values competition and acknowledges the right of foreign companies buy feeds subsidiary airbus to pursue american markets  customers american consumers including the federal government should have the right to buy the product that best suits their needs that's only fair but airbus is not just another company competing in open markets on the merits of its products it is not just a commercial venture rather is a product of four decades of explicit government industrial policies to create european aircraft industry and industry designed not just to compete with american companies but to defeat them with massive government funding don't take my word for it former french prime lionel just found himself publicly pledged quote we will give air bus the means to win the battle against boeing and quote true to mr just bands promise decade after decade project after project european governments have injected massive amounts of subsidies in their bus including fifteen billion dollars and launch aid these subsidies  between one hundred percent and sixty percent of air buses commercial aircraft development costs including the a three thirty aircraft on which this tanker aircraft is based these subsidies allow air bus to develop aircraft under terms unavailable to unsubsidized market participants or as a farmer british trade and industry secretary boasted quote we are not standing to one side and leaving everything to the market quote in fact european subsidization of air plus was so extreme and so at a competitive that three years ago that i had stage trade representative initiated a dispute settlement case the world trade organization does not file these cases frivolously they do so when the damage is real the case solid and all other means of resolution have failed this case is still ongoing it cio panel is currently weighed the facts of the case the effect of these subsidies on our aerospace aerospace industry and the compatibility of these subsidies with international trade laws what defies common sense to me is that one arm of the administration united states trade representative argues that subsidies to airbus hurt our companies skew global markets and violate the rules of the game yet another arm of administration the defense department rewards a subsidized company with a forty billion dollar contract to purchase illegally subsidized aircraft that's the kind of government decision making that just doesn't add up it's not common sense and it raises serious and fundamental questions about how this administration goes about its business does the right hand of the government know what the left hand is doing does one agency respect international rules and their effect while the other one does not what was us t r s role in this procurement decision and why the defense department appeared to have disregarded it there's no other questions need answers i look forward to pursuing these answers with my colleagues until we hear a full accounting of this issue i'm left with is the feeling that last week decision by the defense department does little for the common good or common sense this afternoon along with a number of other senators i tend to offer an amendment that would take the surplus in the budget resolution and give it back to hardworking american families earn it first i remember it makes the ten percent tax bracket permanent that's a tax cut for all taxpayers second or making permanent changes to the child tax credit that's a one thousand one thousand dollars tax credit for a child this tax credit recognizes that a family's ability to pay taxes decreases as their family size increases unless we act it's actually the child tax credit will fall to five hundred dollars per child in two thousand and ten making permanent the marriage penalty relief married couples should not pay more taxes just because they're married is to least make sure that a married couple filing a joint return has the same deductions in tax brackets as they would if they filed as individuals were making permanent the changes to the dependent care credit this credit is important to working families it recognizes the increased cost of child care for thousands of americans especially child care for households where both parents work outside the home are making permanent the changes to the adoption credit most adoptions cost more than twenty thousand dollars this provision offers a credit of ten thousand dollars for those willing to give a child a home and this is a member it's also important because in it we also believe that important to positive effect of the sacrifices that our men and women in uniform make for us every day nearly one in one half million american servicemen and women have served in iraq ever and afghanistan or both firsthand what a heavy burden our troops bear for all of us they face hardships they face danger they keep at it every day today one small way to support them is to make the tax code a little more troops friendly you can extend  special tax rules that make sense for a military expire in two thousand and seven and two thousand and eight we can also limit the roadblocks in the current tax laws that present difficulties to veterans and service members one problem that this member would address is how the tax code treat survivors of our fallen heroes the families of soldiers killed in the line of duty death gratuity benefit of one hundred thousand dollars by the tax code restricts the survivors and putting this benefit into a roth ira today we can make sure that the family members of fallen soldiers can take advantage of these tax counts now the hazard in the tax laws at peet's our disabled veterans and taking the time limit for filing for a tax refund most a disability claims filed by veterans are quickly resolved but many disability awards are delayed due to a lot of paperwork or the appeals or rejected claims once a disabled vet finally gets a favorable toward the good news is that the disability award is tax free but the bad news is that many of these disabled veterans get ambushed by a statute that bars them from filing a tax refund claim today give disabled veterans an extra year to claim their tax refunds most troops doing the heavy lifting in combat situations are the lower ranking lower income soldiers their income needs to count towards computing earned income tax credit or see under current law however any camera and buy a soldier income tax is actually hurts low income military personnel under the i t c the i t c combat takes action allows combat zone page account as earn income for the purposes of determining a credit that way or a soldier qualify for the i t c but as the combat pay exception expires at the end of two thousand and seven if the i t c is a beneficial tax provision for working americans makes no sense to deny it to our troops today we could help to plan to offer a second amendment that would dedicate enough additional funds to estate tax reform so we could achieve a five million dollars at a thirty five percent rate to these efforts congress will show that we support america's small businesses ranchers and reform we're holding hearings so that we're ready but today remember that we will offer it shows our commitment to american families american families earn their wages with the sweat of their brows as a member takes the surplus and gives tax relief to those hard working families is no less than what they have earned  thank the senator from michigan president i do try to talk about the senate but budget resolution this is going to be considered for an entire week it does provide the american people with congress's blueprint for spending and fiscal policies and priorities and will not binding it does establish the direction for later consideration of our appropriations bills i like many of my colleagues have been reviewing the the mark that came out of committee and the results from last week's markup i am impressed with parts of this budget there are some priorities in here that i share with the chairman and the committee it's fully fund the defense budget is fully fund nasa including the additional one billion dollars that senator last year to reimburse the agency for the columbia disaster because we know that nasa has been pulling from operating funds to repair the damage done from the columbia disaster and this has kept it from keeping its research commitments and we can't have a an agency that is supposed to be doing the state of the art research and pushing the envelope not only in but in science and medicine and yet we have a billion dollar shortfall in that which is taken from the research that could fuel scientists for years to come it fun competes act which is such an important priority in education for us to remain competitive we need for more of our young people to go into science and engineering the physical sciences the hard sciences we're losing our edge in this global marketplace congress in a bipartisan way did pass the america competes act and there is funding for much of that in this bill and we must extend the sales tax deduction which is a provision that's close to my heart because my state and seven others have a sales tax but no state income tax so we believe that it is a matter of equity that sales deductible if that is the choice of the taxpayer rather than just the state income taxes which is available to all of the other states but not available to the seven states that do not choose to fund their government with an income tax a position with which i also strongly strongly agree these deserve our attention and support however mr president this budget has a major flaw well before the budget had increased twenty two billion dollars above the president's request we have now found that over over the period of time that it has languished in the senate committee we are now looking at what appears to be a balloon ing of that increase in spending and yet the budget projects a surplus of one hundred seventy seven billion dollars in two thousand and twelve one hundred sixty billion in two thousand and thirteen and yet the budget has increased by two hundred  billion over five years now how can we have this increase in spending and yet still have surpluses so my economic one zero one tells me there has to be a catch because we know there is no free lunch so in addition to the largest spending increases the budget includes the largest tax increase in the history of america one point two trillion dollars the budget allows the incredibly beneficial tax cuts from two thousand and one and two thousand and three to expire and these are the tax cuts that spurred our economy that solidified the stock market and created thousands of new jobs in our country is it spurred the growth in our economy when these tax provisions expire forty three million families with children will have to pay an average of twenty three hundred dollars more each year and eighteen million senior citizens will owe twenty two hundred dollars more on average twenty seven million small businesses the engine of economic growth and america will owe forty one hundred dollars more in taxes on average almost eight million low income workers will lose their jobs especially during this time of economic uncertainty why would we ask our fellow citizens that i have just a numerated to pay more and rob the jobs that have been created with the tax cuts of two thousand and one and two thousand and three the first thing we did when we saw the slowing economy was on a bipartisan basis have a stimulus package and what was the crux of the stimulus package it was to give money back to the people who have paid taxes in rebates to help spur the economy so why would we turn around in this budget and increase taxes and ask the people that we just gave rebates to that will be in the mail in the next six weeks to pay more considered what a twenty three hundred dollar tax burden would pay if the average american family could keep the money they heard in that amount groceries for about a month health care expenses for eight or nine months electricity and home heating oil for almost a year and gasoline for the car that we know is now rising as we speak how can we consider taking money away from families when we are seeing the strains of this economy a burden on those same families this budget makes great promises for american families but it also calls the rug out from under them by saying here is the burden there we're going to give you to pay for this big government spending budget so i hope as we consider the budget this week that we will take a serious look at keeping some of the major priorities but having the good sense to cut in other places or to remain static in other places where there isn't the essential need right now we do need a budget that looks out and says for the long term competitiveness and vitality of our country and our society and our workers and our workforce we do need to spur investment we need to spur research we need to have more engineers and scientists graduating from our universities and we can do that by funding nasa fully by funding the america competes act and we must do that for the long term but why not do what every family in america does when we have essential needs for long term planning but we're on a limited budget and we want to bring down that deficit and that is make choices can't we come together and make choices just as we came together for the stimulus package the last thing we want to do since we did pass a bipartisan stimulus package which the president supported is to wipe it all out and say well we're going to give you back a little bit but we're going to take more we're go take more at a time when we know america is a little jittery about the economic conditions and looking to the future of the economy in our country so mr president i hope that we will do what we can do in a bipartisan basis and hash out what the priorities are and that we can have the poor york even spending without the ballooning budget and the tax increases that they propose to pay for this ballooning budget we don't need tax increases we need to make the tax cuts permanent that have helped so many people get back to work get on their feet small businesses make investments and keep our economy going when this home mortgage for crisis is trying to sort itself out so mr president unless we can make some major changes in this budget i can't imagine supporting it but we do have time we do have time to do the right thing and mr president i'm hoping that as we go through the amendment process that we can make the choices that will take the taxes out we'll put the priorities in and we'll get our our ten year plan started that will create jobs that will create more opportunities for engineers to graduate from our colleges and universities and have good careers solid careers because we have made the right investment in two thousand and eight thank you mr president and i yield the floor as the president senator from michigan in a moment i'm going to yield to senator whitehouse but i do want to respond for a moment because what my friend from texas is talking about frankly in terms of focusing on middle class families is exactly what this budget does and it will be enhanced by the baucus amendment that takes that surplus dollars that are in the budget and targets them right back to middle class families putting dollars into their pockets in terms of extending the middle class tax cuts that we all support but we also more than that we focus on jobs we focus on health care investing in education and opportunity for the future we are not more of the same this budget resolution is not more of the same of what has been occurring since two thousand and one in the last eight years particularly six years of that when we have seen our colleagues on the other side of the aisle in the white house basically controlling all of the agenda in terms of the priorities in the budget and spending and so on we create a budget that offers a change a set of priorities based on the values that are important to the american people american families american jobs here investing here and let me first say that just overall we have a situation where basically we have seen under this president more debt more tax cuts for the wealthy more spending interact less investments in america mr president that's what we have seen and in listening to the outline of what i understand will be a public and budget alternative that will be presented this week it is more the same it is more of this saying we want to reserve reduce that down the budget by two thousand and twelve focus tax cuts on middle to income workers hardworking americans that have not seen tax relief or investments in their future in their children's future we want to refocus instead of just talking about that spending in iraq we want to be focused on spending at home we have somewhere of twelve billion to fifteen billion dollars a month being spent right now in iraq even though the iraqi government we know is receiving dollars from oil revenues we continue to be the ones investing in rebuilding their communities and their jobs their infrastructure president our budget invests in america american jobs american families american communities and i'm very hopeful that we will see a strong  first of all i'd like to salute the leadership in the energy of the senator from michigan in this area the senator is clearly passionate about the economic issues that we see across the country but the particularly affect her state and there isn't a person in this body who is not aware of how deeply she cares and how hard she fights for the people of michigan so i'm very pleased to join her on the floor last month mr president we received the president's budget request for f y two thousand and nine i'm a member like senator stabenow of the senate budget committee this is the last budget we will receive from president bush and i think it's an opportune time to look at how this administration's policies have affected our economic circumstances and how average americans will suffer as a result the bush policies have generated what deserves to be known as and what i will call today the bush debt a legacy of indebtedness that will burden our children and grandchildren for generations to come and cost us the opportunity to help millions of americans all over this country lead lives of promise prosperity and happiness as i've traveled across my state rhode islanders have told me over and over their stories about struggling to make ends meet from seniors scratching fixed incomes to pay for prescription drugs and housing to working families trying to heat their homes and send their children to college yet president bush and his budget for f y two thousand and nine have proposed deep cuts to medicare deep cuts to home heating assistance for low income families and deep cuts to federal student aid weakening access to our citizens basic needs instead the administration cites the need for fiscal discipline the president said discipline is necessary to address our nation's growing budget deficits but the president does not say and probably never will say is that his own ill advised misguided policies created those record deficits it did not have to end up this way but it did and the president must bear the responsibility seven years ago this january george bush stood on the western steps of this hallowed building and took his oath of office as president of the united states in his first address to the nation george bush pledged to call for responsibility and try to live it as well after a divisive election many americans found comfort and hope in those words and on the budgetary front there was good reason for optimism on that cold january morning after decades  deficit spending bipartisan cooperation between president clinton and a republican congress had set the nation on its healthiest fiscal path in generations after twenty eight straight years of multibillion dollar budget deficits our nation's saw surpluses beginning in one thousand nine hundred eighty eight in president clinton's last full year in office we saw the largest budget surplus in our nation's history two hundred and thirty six billion dollars and the good budgetary news wasn't behind us the month the george bush moved into six hundred pennsylvania avenue the congressional budget office the nonpartisan accounting arm of congress projected that we would see surpluses straight through the decade these budget surpluses the product of responsible governing some might even say fiscally conservative governing were projected to be enough to completely wipe out our national debt by two thousand and nine we say that again to completely wipe out our national debt by two thousand and nine in other words mr president the hard work had been done if president bush had just stayed the course of fiscal responsibility he could have been the first president of the united states since andrew jackson in one thousand nine hundred thirty six to govern a debt free united states of america an america with the power and the freedom to support its people as they sought new opportunities and new frontiers imagine that this president's f y two thousand  budget instead of including debt service payments could have requested significant funds for pell grants for a lie he the badly needed overhaul of our health care system bridge construction investment in small and environmentally friendly business and countless other valuable programs for ordinary americans when president bush took office leading economists were debating the consequences of this great nation debt free standing tall in the world with no claim on it by foreign powers but this president made a different choice instead of keeping our nation on the path to economic security and prosperity to new investments in our health care system our students our seniors and our veterans the president who called for a man's ability squandered away the surpluses he inherited mortgaged our children and grandchildren compromised the quality of working americans lives how can we measure the magnitude of the harm done to our economy and our people by this administration's decision to deviate from the responsible policies of president clinton the first chart shows the budget plans of president clinton as he left office and the budget formulated by president bush as you can see the clinton line represented in blue based on his levels of taxation and spending has budget surpluses for every single year of this decade in contrast the bush budget line represented in red has deep record setting deficit  every year after two thousand and one this next chart illustrates the value of the differences between the budget landscape planned by president clinton in the one created by president bush as you can see the difference between the two with a staggering seven point seven trillion dollars this number represents the fiscal harm that president bush has inflicted on our nation this number is the bush debt it consists of a decade of foregone surpluses and new borrowing much of it from foreign nations like china japan and saudi arabia we've even become a de nation to mexico seven point seven trillion dollars is more than double the amount of public debt when president bush took office like most concepts of enormous size this amount takes some thought to comprehend seven point seven trillion dollars is twenty five thousand dollars owed by every adult or child in the united states squandered surpluses and new debt created by this president how do we move from a path of surpluses away from the promise of wiping out our national debt to trillions of dollars in new national liabilities one would hope that this administration could at least justify the bush debt by pointing to borrowing policies that improve the average americans lives unfortunately nothing could be further from the truth rather this dramatic change of course stems largely from two of this president's many poor decisions over the past seven years first tax cuts that overwhelmingly benefit the wealthy at the expense of the less fortunate and second the president's endless misguided unpaid war in historical editor national standards the irony of course is the president bush's tax cuts of two thousand and one and two thousand and three were the height of irresponsibility because these massive tax cuts were predominantly directed at high income families rather than low income families many americans most in need of assistance were short changed these extravagant tax cuts are weighted heavily towards the wealthiest americans in fact seventy one percent of the value of the tax cuts in two thousand and nine will go to the wealthiest fifth of americans with a staggering twenty eight percent of the value of the tax cuts going to the top one percent and almost nothing at all going to the lowest earning fifty families who earn fifteen thousand dollars a year or less this is george bush's idea of fair tax cuts and bush's insistence on forcing through these cuts without making up for the lost revenue to defer that pain to later administrations and later years was not only cowardly leadership but it left our budget in precarious straits the bush tax cuts cost a staggering one point nine trillion dollars and account for twenty five percent of the seven point seven trillion dollar bush debt measured from the start of the bush presidency through two thousand and ten when the tax cuts are set to expire every american knows the importance of balancing his or her own household budget every american knows the struggle of keeping spending in line with income making sure there's enough money to pay for clothing food home heating college tuition and maybe a little for a vacation or going out to the movies most americans do a good job at balancing budgets but not president bush rather than living by his inaugural pledge of responsibility president bush preferred to score political points by delivering massive tax cuts to his wealthiest supporters he chose not to remain on a responsible fiscal path and instead put this country under the crushing burden of a multi trillion dollar debt the bush debt these tax cuts while a large slice of the bush debt pie are unfortunately not the whole story there's also a large spending component to the bush debt driven principally by the war in iraq by the end of this year the price tag for the war in iraq will have exceeded six hundred billion dollars and even if we're successful in pressuring this president or the next president to begin redeploying our troops american taxpayers will still have spent at least seven hundred forty billion dollars on this misguided war by two thousand  even if the next president gets us quickly out of iraq as i hope she or he will we will be paying costs related to this war for years to come we must care for our veterans and for the families of fallen soldiers the congressional budget office estimates that the cost of medical care disability payments and compensation for the families of fallen soldiers will cost between ten billion and thirteen billion dollars in the next ten years alone we have a moral obligation to take care of the brave men and women who sacrificed their youth their health their limbs and sometimes their lives to serve their nation these are costs however that we need never have had to bear while they pale in comparison to the personal cost incurred by service members and their families these monetary costs are nonetheless significant and they will affect america's security for decades to come like all debt the bush debt requires interest payments everyday americans make interest payments on mortgages car loans student loans or credit cards according to president bush's proposed budget for f y two thousand nine next year alone america will go two hundred and sixty billion dollars in interest on the bush debt two hundred sixty billion dollars in interest payments equates to eight hundred fifty thousand dollars to our creditors in japan and china and saudi arabia for every man woman and child in the united states next year and the year after that long into the future to make matters worse if you can believe this hold on your hat the bush administration is borrowing the money to make the interest payments further adding to the debt imagine if we could take the seven point seven trillion dollar bush debt debt off budget and set up a separate revenue system to make the interest payments to feed the beast then every taxpayer would see we are doing something about this on present and debt we should consider forming a commission a bush debt repayment of thor eighty to study the possibility of bringing the bush debt off the budget to show the american people just how much this president has cost them to pay the bush debt down responsibly over time the way government often steps in to pay down a disaster debt responsibly over time and to show our children and our grandchildren that we were not all cowards pushing our costs on to them this enormous interest payment isn't just an abstract idea dreamed up by economists this two hundred sixty billion dollars is precious cash flow that could otherwise be spent improving our health care system building new schools repairing our roads and bridges or helping our businesses compete against foreign competition individual americans may not be writing eight hundred fifty seven dollar checks to japan or china or saudi arabia but each one of us pay a steep price for the bush debt a price that is already evident in the president's budget for this year the budget request that included two hundred sixty billion dollars for interest payments also included tough talk about belt tightening the president proposes the whole discretionary spending growth to one percent effectively a cut since the consumer price index grew four point one percent last year his budget plan slashed funds for low income heating assistance the cops program which keeps police officers on the beat to protect local communities federal student aid programs which help young people afford a college education and community development grants which provide badly needed assistance for low income families and small businesses the president's budget also calls for tremendous cuts in medicare and medicaid over the next five years cuts that would surely affect medical care for american families president bush is asking for more money to continue his misguided war in iraq more money to service the debt he created and more money to pay for tax cuts for the wealthiest americans but less money to help the millions of people all across this country who need health insurance or food for their families or better schools for their children or a home they can afford those are not the correct priorities for america president bush what if president bush had never cut rich americans taxes or taken us to war in iraq what if the fiscally responsible policies of the clinton administration had continued to the present day what if our public debt had been paid entirely by the end of next year leaving us free to invest in our people and our future what if there were no seven point seven trillion dollar bush debt and no two hundred sixty billion dollars in interest payments next year what could this country the land of opportunity and possibility be doing with an extra two hundred sixty billion dollars a year well for just five billion dollars or two percent of the interest cost of the bush debt in two thousand and nine we could provide health insurance to three point eight million more children through the children's health insurance program the very initiative that president bush vetoed last year actually according to the kaiser family foundation we could provide health insurance to every uninsured american adult and child for one hundred seventy three billion dollars so well within the amount we will need to spend next year to service the bush debt we could completely cover every american for health insurance with quality health care there are many other worthy programs that we could fund with the remainder of the two hundred sixty billion interest our head start program which helps their preschool age children from low income families to succeed in kindergarten and beyond currently has barely enough resources to cover half of the two million children who are eligible the remaining million children could be covered for an additional seven billion dollars pell grants named after my distinguished senator from rhode island claiborne pell help college students afford the steep cost of their education we made progress last year in increasing funding for the pell grant program but pell grants only fund a small fraction of tuitions for many students used to fund about half of the tuition it slipped to less than a third today we could double every single pell grant next year raising the maximum grant to over eighty four hundred dollars for eighteen billion dollars with the remaining sixty two billion dollars in our world without bush we could bring up to code ninety five percent of the structurally deficient and functionally obsolete bridges in the country with all the work and jobs that would entail my home state of rhode island and the unhappy distinction of having the highest percentage of structurally deficient bridges in the country but following the tragic bridge collapse in minneapolis last year there is renewed awareness of the urgency of updating our national transportation infrastructure that's sixty two billion covers ninety five percent of our nation's deficient bridges and fund those repairs in f y two thousand and nine what about the other five percent well we have another two hundred eighty billion dollars in bush debt interest payments coming up in two thousand and ten we can spend it if we could to fix those bridges another year of tragic lost opportunities we will make annual interest payments of this magnitude until a future president takes on the daunting challenge of paying down the principle of the national debt left for us by president bush well that's quite a list cover every insured american with health insurance fully fund the head start program double each and every pell grant and repair our deficient bridges sadly we do none of that we use that money to pay the interest on the bush debt and we will be making payments for the bush debt for decades into the future and often ignored yet critical aspect of the bush debt is the effect interest payments have on our national security the very interesting administration purports to be advancing through its misguided war in iraq this chart illustrates the point to service the bush debt we have borrowed more money from foreigners more money from other nations such as china japan and saudi arabia under george bush than under all forty two of his predecessors combined the result of this foreign borrowing is that a large portion of the interest payments we make get sent overseas supplementing the income of foreigners and allowing foreign nations to invest in their economies and infrastructures if not for the bush debt that money would be invested here at home helping to grow american businesses and generate income and strength for our own future generations instead the bush debt has helped and will continue to help boost the chinese economy at the cost of our own the bush debt will send trillions of dollars to foreign nations over the coming years giving them even more dollars to buy up our american businesses president when the presidency of george w bush comes to its long anticipated and on january twentieth two thousand and nine it will leave in its destructive wake trillions of dollars in debt owed to other nations many of whom do not have a marriage those best interests at heart this administration will leave behind in america whose standing in the world and whose regard among its fellow nations has been weakened and degraded by a war that seems to have no end a fiscally we en nation a borrower with a falling a con a me struggling under the bush debt and worst of all this president will leave behind millions of americans who had this administration merely stayed the course of fiscal responsibility charted by president clinton would be far better off than they are today they would be starting in two thousand and nine in a debt free united states that could afford to assist working families with the cost of college education to overhaul our health care system to repair our crumbling infrastructure to invest in small and green businesses and to improve the lives of average americans and countless other ways we cannot ignore wish debt while george bush starts packing for his retirement on his texas ranch those of us who care about the future of our nation the future of our children must work toward and doing the damage that this president has done mr president i submit that we need to see the bush debt as a serious national problem a fiscal economic and national security threat and engage in a solemn and serious way as the trustees of our national welfare to confront the bush debt the president  president senator colorado misprint i believe about now i have scheduled to give a speech for about ten min sir so so without objection yes mr president i spoke last week in the budget committee of which i'm a member about the differences between this year's consideration of the budget resolution and last year's last year we were obligated to accept the assurance from the majority that under their new regime they go would be respected spending would be curbed entirely a crisis would be addressed and the debt would be attacked and i do want to take just a moment to respond to my colleague's attempt who just left the floor from rhode island about trying to say that this is all president bush's problem it's not it's all of our problems for example the budget that we have before says over two trillion dollars that it adds to the national debt and there's some basic reforms that we have to do if we're going to correct the debt problem that's been accruing over the years we have to reform entitlements especially we now however have results from  we now have or have results in this budget not predictions and when all was said and done last year there was an eighty three billion dollar increase in discretionary spending there was one hundred forty three piggle violations we didn't close the tax gap we added to the debt we did nothing for entitlement reform reconciliation was used to add spending reduce it and reconciliation was originally put in for that sole purpose to reduce spending so we assumed tax increases so we began consideration of the fiscal year two thousand nine a budget resolution i hope that everyone is aware of what was promised last year and what transpired i hope they'll use that knowledge when considering this budget document i'd like to talk about the items that concern me in this budget now that our economy is trending in the wrong direction and when we really need the benefits of a reasonable and pro growth tax policy we're going to depress our economic growth by adding to the debt and increasing taxes in this budget we're not addressing the entitlement crisis in this budget everyone knows it is there is a huge avalanche of debt waiting to burry our for our future the sooner we add this to the better the longer we wait the more drastic it will be and more expensive but we do nothing we're not even doing something as productive as fiddling we're just talking year after year and perhaps wishing that our national debt will go away in this budget we are raising taxes on the middle class this budget can't be paid for by closing the tax gap it can't be paid for by closing loopholes it can't be paid for by shifting dates around on revenues or outlays example you should surely can't be paid for by increasing the taxes paid by the super rich the rich or just the very well to do it will only be paid for by reaching down into the average earners and raising their taxes as well under this budget the average family children will pay two thousand three hundred dollars more each year seniors will pay two thousand two hundred dollars more each year small businesses will pay for that thousand one hundred dollars more each year and we consider these tax increases let's remember last year we were assured that we would see tax relief the first vote we were presented on the budget last year was to budget for an alleged middle class tax cut but this never materialized what has materialized this spending increases this budget adds two hundred ten billion dollars over five years the gross  will expand by two trillion dollars by two thousand and thirteen this year we're spending three quarters of a billion dollars of the social security surplus this year we're increasing spending by twenty two billion dollars without fully funding the war now about that i know there will be those who say that they're just following the president but the budget is a congressional document say what you want about the ideas in this document but it was written and prepared on the sixth floor of the dirksen not in the white house that they did it first argument is not one i except for my children and i'm not going to accept it here we know the war is expected to cost one hundred seventy billion dollars this year we have an obligation to budget for that amount it's on its budget i will be introducing them to do just that we're going to pay for this war this war fiscal discipline and legitimate budging requirements demand that we include those comments there are those who do not want to fund our campaign in iraq and there are those who in the war as soon as who  war as soon as possible regardless of the damage that it might do they're entitled to those views but there is no legitimate reason to fail to include the known estimates the war to our budget they are to do so is pure gimmickry and devalues the budget exercise we're engaged in hiding the war cost from you when every parent that member knows we will be spending more is ridiculous on that topic my second great concern with this budget is that the budget continues the erosion of fiscally responsible process we're seeing increases in reserve funds there are thirty seven this year up from twenty four last year they contain up to three hundred billion dollars in spending that hangs over our treasury and taxpayers as a threat i've heard them referred to as harms but any device that serves to weaken the tortie and legitimate ness of our budget is simply not harms many feel that these reserve funds have become an over complicated type of sense of the senate but they weave weakness into what should be a rigid and honest budget document another rosena fiscal discipline is the use of reconciliation a process that originated to cut government spending for spending increases we saw that last year we've heard rumors and intentions of it being done again this year and fortunately there was this one this will be something we're not sure of until it's too late and that's when the conference report is before shifted the timing of tax payments and spending cause to me that nickel definitions that have no basis in reality we haven't acted wildly unrealistic program cuts and sense that to hide comes pay go has been promised praise but the last one hundred forty through billion dollars in deficit spending to occur and i noticed when we started the session this year senator gregg our ranking top republican on the budget committee was pointing to his swiss cheese example of how the pay go rules have been moved how they've been able to get around the pay go rules i believe congress and especially the budget committee should be committed to a rigid budget this discipline not politically expedient gamesmanship i would urge a return to a tighter and more credible budget document i plan to offer several members to shore up the priorities in terms of this budget resolution there are number of things that we are doing here that are very important restoring the investments of the tax that the president made overall in health care and is the fact that you want to eliminate the cops program that puts thousands of police officers in our communities on the streets we stored those dollars are there essential dollars for homeland security firefighters and so on but we also have picked three priorities as we have done last year to focus on in terms of new investments and given what's happening to families to middle class families across the country given the fact paper in michigan the chances that gas prices will hit four dollars a gallon this summer growing with every uptick in the price of oil and we go on to hear all about what is happening to families in terms of price  of health care the price of college on and on and on people saying squeeze on all sides we also know that the best economic stimulus is a good paying american jobs and so to address that we have focused on three priorities in this budget and it's very simple mr president jobs jobs jobs and what i mean by that we are focusing on three areas one that also addresses our dependence on foreign oil addresses a critical issue of global warming where we need to go into as we look at the future and for our families but it also creates jobs and that's a green collar jobs  to invest in those new technologies new energy efficiency jobs whether ization jobs innovation in the future green collar jobs we know we can create thousands and thousands of jobs by focusing in this area and we do that the second our jobs rebuilding america we know for every one billion dollars that we put into rebuilding our roads and bridges and and schools and water and sewer we create forty seven thousand five hundred new good paying american jobs you can't outsource those jobs mr president those are jobs here in america and that's what we need today and then finally a focus on education and job training we know there for the future for ourselves our children our grandchildren it's opportunity it's education it's fully funding the law that was passed called leave no child behind and creating job training opportunities people in my state who've lost their jobs because of trade we have something called trade adjustment assistance that has been consistently underfunded and yet we have individuals who through no fault of their own have seen their jobs go overseas they are middle class families trying to care for their families trying to pay that mortgage they were all talking about right now in the housing crisis and trying to have the american dream for their families and yet  which was set up to help them go back to school get training and help cover their health care costs for two years while they're doing the training that has been consistently underfunded and we have legislation to fully fun and expand the support for families ended so we want to make sure that job training and education are also a part of this this is jobs jobs jobs and i want to focus for just a moment on one of those areas because it directly directly relates to what i said a moment ago as it relates to gas prices inching up towards four dollars a gallon we've gotta change the scenario and i know that our presiding officer understands  has spoken of this we have got to get off of foreign oil invest in the new alternative energies that create jobs that create alternatives in terms of being  independent of foreign oil and addressing gas prices directly which are hitting people are right between the eyes right now in terms of what is happening our green collar jobs initiative focuses on energy efficiency and conservation investments in battery technologies retooling older plants so we're keeping our jobs here in america biofuel production and access got to have the pump available you can grow the fuel you can make the vehicle but the pumps if they're not available we're not going to achieve the goal and then finally a green collar jobs initiative these are five areas that we have focused on in terms of investing in the future of our country mr president that's what we're all about this is for us this is all about focusing on america about focusing on folks that every day get up play by the rules work hard every day and just want to know that america is going to work for them and that they're going to be able to keep their home and be able to send the kids to college and have the health care that they need and have that job that's going to allow them in america to be able to keep their standard of living and in fact live the american dream that's what our budget resolution is all about jobs jobs jobs and i am very pleased that we have in fact put together something that makes sense for american families and i now see my tally here from maryland who is  distinguished member of the budget committee was a distinguished a leader in the house of representatives before coming to us and so i will yield now to the senator from maryland for whatever time he would  room friend from michigan of thank her for her friendship but more importantly thank her for work on this budget resolution we have before us she has been a very articulate and effective leader on the budget committee to make sure that our budget resolution focuses on job growth here in america that invests in the people of this country so that we can compete internationally and keep jobs here in america and i thank you very much for your earlier ship on the committee and for what you have gone to really help the people of our country this budget resolute as you point out is really our blueprint is what we believe are the priorities of america what we need to him to do as far as moving this nation forward it's interesting i think we can perhaps judge how important this resolution can be based on what happened last year i heard a lot of my friends comment about last year's budget resolution whether we make a difference in the lives of people in our country and when you look at the budget resolution that we enacted last year based upon the president's submission i think we have a right to be proud of how important this debate really is for american people let me just point out if we didn't pass that budget resolution last year you know that higher education bill that passed signed into law supported by almost all my colleagues ear is going to make a major difference in the ability of families to afford higher education largest single increase in financial aid since the g i bill after world war two that still could have happened but for the ability of the budget resolution to allow it to be considered so i think we should be very proud that we are able to accomplish that and my colleagues seem to support that although some seem to have questions about this budget resolution the president's budget will not allow us to have had that mr president i've heard most of my colleagues talk in glowing terms about what we did last year to help our veterans and veterans health care let me remind you it was our budget resolution not the president's that made that a reality it's important what we include in a budget resolution it speaks to the priorities of our country and we had a significant bipartisan support two thirds of our members who supported the children's health insurance program we made room for that in the budget i regret that the president vetoed it the president was wrong we're going to come back to that but we members of the senate spoke a set of priorities to take care of our children's healthcare needs that was in last year's budget and what we did last year is go on a glide path that's going to bring us to a balanced budget faster than president so not only are we investing in america's future we're doing it in a more fiscally responsible way so i also  might just talk proclaim for one second for the people of maryland you know the cuts to the chesapeake bay program would have been very severe the president's budget were passed fortunately we had our budget resolution that allowed our committees to come in with resources so the federal government could continue to be a partner in the chesapeake bay so mr president i think this debate is very important and i think the budget resolution that is before us my friend from michigan pointed out speaks to investing in the people in this country speaks to job growth here in america now how's that done with this budget resolution compared to the president's allows us to invest in education last year we did in higher education this year we can invest in teacher quality and in schools here in our community so that every child can get a quality education that should be our goal our budget moves us for a federal partnership to achieve those goals whereas the president's budget would not let us move forward in energy you all talk about how we're going to become energy independent how we're going to become friendlier towards the environment well our budget resolution allows us to move in that direction once again compared to the president's budget it wouldn't happen in health care our budget provides for the expansion of the of the children's health insurance program i know we have a difference with the president on it we're going to win this battle this is not in two thousand and eight when in two thousand and nine we're right on this issue tell you how many children in my state over one hundred thousand who have no health insurance the children's health insurance program needs to be expanded we need to make sure that every child in america quite frankly mr president i think that every family in america should have access to affordable quality health care for infrastructure needs investing so we can create jobs very important i just came from a meeting with biotech leaders in my state where we talked about what we need to do as a federal partner to help in regards to the biotech industry and new creative innovations in america and we talked about the and i h budget and how the bush administration's budget would level fund which is really a reduction in the number of projects that and i could participate in well the budget resolution we have before us today would allow us to invest in research in america to help keep jobs here in america to develop the type of technology that we know americans are capable of doing but the federal government should be a partner and then i always enjoyed bipartisan support in our budget last and i a to expand to cover more of the very worthy requests that they receive every year the budget provides for dealing with the housing crisis but the president we have a continuing housing crisis in all parts of our nation in my own state of maryland we have record numbers of foreclosures people who just can't afford their mortgages because of the adjustable rates coming in or there are some prime mortgages but we could do a better than that we've already heard bipartisan support for giving the government more authority to deal with refinancing loans of getting better counseling to people who who are in the market to buy a home and take out a mortgage and i hope to provide additional incentives so people can stay in their homes and that they can buy homes and the home owners can sell their homes we need to do that for the sake of the individuals involved need to do it to preserve communities and property tax revenues for local government and we need it in order to help spur economic growth this budget allows for those types of programs to reach the floor of this body for consideration the president's budget would not allow us to do it this budget provides for middle income tax relief you've heard the chairman of budget committee talk about it the alternative minimum tax very important mr president that we extend that relief otherwise literally hundreds of thousands of marylanders will fall within the alternative minimum tax and millions of americans will fall into a tax that we never intended and have to pay our budget resolution provides for that type of relief and that mr president one more thing about this budget resolution that's on the floor and that is that this budget resolution actually moves us towards a balanced budget faster than the president's budget now i could go back and talk about seven years ago as to how we had all these surpluses and how the bush policies have led to these huge deficits and i could talk very with a lot of credibility on a because i didn't support the president's economic plans i said it was wrong for us to spend the surplus before it was fully there i said it was wrong for us to do this war funding without paying for it as it was wrong for us to get out additional tax cuts when we were in a deficit basically wealthy people i thought that was immoral i thought we owed it to our children and grandchildren to pay for our bills the day i was a have voted and we did it and now we have these bush deficits that we have to deal with but we have to deal with it you can't rewrite history it's our responsibility to balance the federal budget the budget resolution that you have before you offered by the budget committee puts us on our glide path the balance the budget at a faster rate than the president's budget would do so we are acting fiscally responsible investing in america's future investing in jobs and doing it providing the appropriate tax relief for middle income families i want to thank chairman conrad for his cooperation and his leadership in bringing as all together on the budget committee i particularly want to thank him for help on an amendment that i was able to get into the budget resolution that will help in providing dental care particularly to our children i mention that whenever i can mr president because low over a year ago a twelve year old from maryland lives about six miles from here the monte driver had to think his mom tried to get him to a dentist social workers may numerous phone calls to try to find a dentist who would take care of his needs this was in two thousand and seven in the united states of america in my own state of maryland couldn't find a dentist who would take care of them  only needed an eighty dollars to fix traction instead he suffered abscessed one through two brain surgeries costing a quarter of a million dollars and he lost his life because we would not invest in access to affordable dental care for our children but i want to thank chairman conrad for allowing an amendment to  to this budget bill that will allow the senate finance committee to bring a bill to this floor and make sure that we will have no war to monte driver tragedies in america to make sure that our children have access to dental care it's the number one leading disease affecting children the number of children who have untreated tooth decay is alarm being particularly in our minority communities and our rural areas we can do much better in this budget resolution will allow us to move in that direction i want to thank chairman conrad for allowing us to move forward with an i h research so we could do much better you know the one nine hundred ninety s we were committed to doubling the amount of money in an i  a great day for this nation but the bush budgets would have us fall back and lose our competitive advantage the budget we have before us will allow us to continue to make progress in the federal government on an i s research on amtrak funding i want to then thank again the chairman conrad in the committee for allowing us to move forward i know that senator lott burgers but particularly effective in bringing this issue to our attention we need to have an efficient rail system in this country we just read recently about how we have to monitor our clean water more effectively well the budget before you gives us a much better chance of achieving those objectives than the president's budget bottom line mr president this budget is a good investment for america's future and that's what it is an investment for america's future so that we can become more competitive and we can pay down our debt that we can provide the appropriate relief to middle income famil about choices and we make tough choices we could do everything we wanted to do so i just would like to make this point considering the legacy of the bush deficits that we have to deal with considering the economic problems that this nation is confronting can can considering the political realities that we have to work with where there are serious differences between the majority in congress and president bush considering all those issues considering the bush budget and how that would lead us into reading five providing tax relief i tell you is to present to to individuals why don't believe made it particularly when risking our children and grandchildren to pick up those costs considering all that considering that this budget puts a priority on job growth and competitiveness of our nation i urge my colleagues to support this resolution i think it's worthy of strong support and in this body and i'm certain that when we pass this resolution and reconcile it with the how many of the implementing bills are going to enjoy large bipartisan support the budget resolution deserves that support and i'm proud to endorse it and urge my colleagues to support it and with that mr president i would