Kent Conrad

Mr. CONRAD

Mr. CONRAD. I thank the Chair.

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I hope our Republican friends are not going to propose that we have a magic asterisk for a prescription drug benefit. I hope they are not going to come in with a second-degree amendment that says: We are just going to have this money come out of thin air somewhere, and we are going to provide an unspecified amount of money for a prescription drug benefit and not identify precisely from where that money is coming. On our side, we have reserved the Social Security and Medicare trust funds in total for the purposes intended. We have not permitted a raid on those funds for any other purpose. With what is left, we provided a third for a tax cut, a third for these high-priority domestic needs, including a prescription drug benefit fully funded, fully identified, and the final third to deal with long-term debt, strengthening Social Security so that when the baby boomers retire, that promise can be kept. What I am hearing is that the Republicans may propose to open up the Medicare trust fund to provide a Medicare prescription drug benefit. That, to me, would be classic double counting. That trust fund for Medicare is needed to keep the promises that have already been made. If they are now going to make a new set of promises and fund it out of that same trust fund, that is the kind of double counting that will get this country into financial trouble. That is exactly what happened in the 1980s that plunged this country into dramatic deficits and a vastly expanded debt. Let's put up the chart about what happened back in the eighties. I hope we do not forget the lesson we learned then. Let's go back to 1980 when we had the proposal for massive tax cuts combined with a big buildup in national defense. We can see what it did to the debt and deficits of the United States. The debt skyrocketed in the decade of the eighties. If now we are going to hear this same old siren song--massive tax cut--and then we are going to also have big new spending priorities that are supposed to come out of trust funds that are already committed, that is exactly the kind of fiscal folly that did such damage back then. The difference is we had time to recover in the 1980s. There is no time to recover in this decade because, at the end of this decade, the baby boomers start to retire, and then we will see the full results of fiscal missteps, of fiscal mistakes. If we have oversubscribed this projected surplus, we will pay a terrible price as a nation. I hope very much we do not go back to the bad old days of debt, deficits, and decline. That is not the way to proceed. Instead, we ought to be cautious; we ought to be prudent; we ought to reserve the trust funds for the purposes intended and not use them for any other purposes. Mr. President, if I can inquire as to the time remaining on the budget resolution.

Mr. CONRAD. I thank the Senator from Minnesota. I appreciate his contribution to the debate. Let me just say to colleagues, very soon we will be going off this amendment. The other side has announced their intention to provide an amendment in the second degree to our amendment. I wish they would not do that. I wish they would permit a straight consideration of our amendment by the body. But they have announced their intention to amend our proposal in the second degree, and then we will have a debate on the amendment that they offer. That is being drafted. So if there are colleagues who are listening, if they would like to come to the floor to give their opening remarks on the budget resolution, this would be a good time to do that. We have called a number of offices for those who are in line in terms of the informal queue we have here to speak on the resolution. But if you would notify your Members, those who are in the queue, to come, this would be a good time to speak. I yield the floor.

Mr. CONRAD. I yield the Senator from Minnesota 5 minutes off the resolution itself.

Mr. CONRAD. That is in red because we believe it would be profoundly wrong to use any of the Social Security trust fund money or any of the Medicare trust fund money for other purposes. That has been done in the past. We have just stopped doing it in the last 3 years. We believe we shouldn't go back to the bad old days of raiding the trust funds and using the money for other purposes. We have reserved all of the Social Security money and all of the Medicare trust fund money for the purposes intended. I thank the Senator from Nevada for his questions. I ask the Senator from Minnesota how much time he would like.

Mr. CONRAD. I yield an additional minute to the Senator.

Mr. CONRAD. If you do not mind, we should ask the Senator from Minnesota who is next on our list.

Mr. CONRAD. As we have said, this program provides half as much for prescription drugs. The budget proposal that they have made provides $153 billion. But everybody acknowledges that is not sufficient and that there is simply not enough money there to provide a meaningful prescription drug benefit. They are engaged in a little bit of what I would call fiscal sleight of hand. If you look at our proposal, we take this projected surplus, and we are quick to acknowledge that this is a 10-year projection. It is highly unlikely to ever come true. We believe the prudent thing to do is to be cautious in light of the basis of all we are doing being a 10-year forecast. We save all of the money for the Social Security trust fund, all of the money for the Medicare trust fund, and with what is left we talk about one-third for a tax cut, one-third for these high-priority domestic needs, including prescription drugs and infrastructure and education. Anyone who has flown or driven on a highway knows that we need additional funds for infrastructure in America. And education is the highest priority of the American people for additional resources. We also believe we need to strengthen our national defense and then provide additional resources especially for health care and disasters. Because we know we are going to have a certain number of disasters every year, we believe we ought to provide funding for it. Finally, the last one-third would be for long-term debt and to strengthen Social Security and provide a strategic reserve in case these forecasts are wrong; then, of course, the interest costs associated with all three of those. We believe we have a cautious, conservative program--one that dedicates the vast majority of the money for debt reduction. Here is why: The Social Security trust fund money is not needed for Social Security at the moment. That goes to pay down the publicly held debt. The President uses $2 trillion of that money for the same purpose--to pay down the publicly held debt. We also reserve all the Medicare trust fund money. That will go for paying down the publicly held debt. We have $2.9 trillion reserved for debt paydown. In addition to that, we have another $750 billion for our long-term debt. This is where our friends on the other side don't have a nickel for this purpose. They don't have any money to deal with the long-term debt. In our proposal, of the $36.5 trillion forecasted surplus, we are reserving $3.65 trillion for the paydown of short-term and long-term debt. That is in comparison to the President's plan that only has $2 trillion. We have nearly twice as much to pay down long-term debt and short-term debt.

Mr. CONRAD. Yes, we will. I think part of the confusion comes from the language that we use. Our friends on the other side of the aisle are talking about reducing the publicly held debt. That is not the full debt of our country. The gross Federal debt is the full debt. They talk about having the maximum amount of reduction in the publicly held debt. At the very time they are doing that, we are seeing the gross Federal debt of the country continuing to climb. Their budget does not do anything about this long-term debt expansion. That is the difference between us. We not only are dedicating more of the projected surplus to paying down the publicly held debt, which is really the short-term debt--that is the debt that is outstanding in the public--but we are also offering for the first time that anybody has had a budget proposal before this Congress to do something about this gross debt, this long-term debt, this debt that is building in Social Security and Medicare. It is a liability out there that is growing geometrically. This has already happened to the gross debt of the United States. It has skyrocketed and it will continue to grow under the proposal that our friends on the other side of the aisle have made. Their own budget document says they are going to take the gross debt of the United States, which is $5.6 trillion today, and increase it to $6.7 trillion all the while they talk about a massive tax cut. It really makes you wonder if there is not confusion about language here.

Mr. CONRAD. It goes from $5.6 trillion today--that is where this chart leaves off. And under their proposal the public debt goes up every year until it reaches $6.7 trillion.

Mr. CONRAD. I am saying what this document says. This is not my calculation. This is their calculation. This is their document. This is their amendment.

Mr. CONRAD. I think, if we have learned nothing else from the 1980s, the one thing we should have learned is that the best strategy is one that puts our fiscal house in order and keeps it there. It is eliminating deficits and beginning the process of paying down debt that has helped us trigger the longest economic expansion in our Nation's history. When I look at the proposal on the other side, I see they talk about paying down the maximum amount of publicly held debt. But if you look on page 5 of their proposal, the amendment that was offered here by the chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, the public debt, which is currently listed at $5.6 trillion, rises under that proposal to $6.7 trillion. That is under the headline of public debt. They have talked a lot about reducing the publicly held debt, but here is the chart. Here is what has happened to the gross Federal debt from 1980 where, you can see, it was $909 billion. In 1999 it has gone up to $5.6 trillion. Under their proposal on page 5, they would take this debt up to $6.7 trillion. That is the proposal they have before this body.

Mr. CONRAD. I am happy to yield 10 minutes to the Senator from Nevada.

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I yield myself 2 minutes off the resolution. I thank the Senator from West Virginia for his comments on the prescription drug benefit. There is perhaps no senior member of the Senate Finance Committee who is more knowledgeable about health care issues than the Senator from West Virginia. The Senator from West Virginia has led the fight to expand health care coverage, including a prescription drug benefit, on the Senate Finance Committee. We very much appreciate his leadership. With that, Mr. President, I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum, and I ask we charge the time equally on the resolution.

Mr. CONRAD. I yield 5 minutes off the resolution to the Senator from West Virginia.

Mr. CONRAD. I thank the Senator from Oregon for his contribution on the committee. To give the Senator from Montana a little backdrop, the Senator from Montana reserved 5 minutes off the amendment. That time is still available. It is up to the Senator from Montana whether he wishes to use that time or I am happy to give him time off the resolution. We don't have a Member on the other side of the aisle present, but hopefully there are people watching and listening. We are prepared to go to a vote on the prescription drug amendment. We hope the manager on the other side of the aisle appears in short order and tells us what the plan is on their side. We are prepared to go to a vote in very short order. I yield 5 minutes off the resolution to the Senator from Montana.

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I will comment for a moment on the role of the Senator from Oregon in the Senate Budget Committee. He has been among the most innovative Members in trying to find ways to extend a prescription drug benefit and to do it with bipartisan support. In the Senate Budget Committee last year, he worked with one of our colleagues on the other side of the aisle, the Senator from Maine, Ms. Snowe. They offered the amendment that opened the door to a prescription drug benefit last year. It is that model that again is being pursued this year in an attempt to reach across the aisle to find bipartisan consensus on a prescription drug benefit that would be meaningful for the American people. I wanted to take a moment while he was here to thank the Senator. He has spent countless hours working to come up with prescription drug proposals that would have bipartisan support. I thank and commend him publicly.

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum, and I ask that the time be charged equally to the resolution.

Mr. CONRAD. I yield 5 minutes off the resolution.

Mr. CONRAD. We will have, in fact, a series of amendments on the question of what the priorities really are for the country. We believe we should have a significant tax cut, but we do not believe we can afford one of the President's size without threatening to said us back into deficit and without threatening to raid the trust funds of Social Security and Medicare. For that reason, we will be proposing a series of amendments to further pay down this national debt. I notice that one of the Senators is here who has been very active on the question of the prescription drug benefit and somebody who has really been a leader on the Senate Budget Committee in trying to get a prescription drug benefit under the Medicare program, one that would really have the resources to provide a meaningful prescription drug benefit. That would be the Senator from Oregon. I yield the floor.

Mr. CONRAD. I think people in North Dakota have a great deal of common sense. They know that we have piled up an extraordinary Federal debt. As we visit here today, we have a $5.6 trillion gross Federal debt. Under the President's plan, that will increase to over $7 trillion. So I think we have an obligation to the taxpayers of this country, to the fiscal future of our families, to do everything we can to put pressure on this debt, to keep it from continuing to grow. And that is really the focus of the Democrat alternative.

Mr. CONRAD. I agree with the Senator from Nevada. I think it would be very useful for us to use our time in a way that is disciplined so that we have a debate and a discussion and that we are able to have votes on a series of amendments after a reasonable debate. As the Senator knows, under the rules, if we have not debated the amendments until the time runs out, we will still vote. We will do it without time for debate. So it is critically important that we be disciplined. We believe we ought to have amendments on education, on strengthening national defense, on additional paydown of debt, and, of course, we will be having an important amendment on the question of whether or not reconciliation will be used in this process. So those are just a few of the amendments that will be considered before we are done. It is very important that there be time for debate and discussion so that Members can be informed before they cast their votes.

Mr. CONRAD. We certainly are on this side. We have used virtually all time off the amendment, and we would be prepared to go to a vote very quickly. I put a call into two offices of Senators who are vitally interested in the prescription drug amendment, and I have asked them to come to the floor immediately. So we are awaiting their appearance, and then we would prepare to go to a vote.

Mr. CONRAD. I am happy to yield.