Kent Conrad

Mr. CONRAD

Mr. CONRAD. I am happy to yield.

Mr. CONRAD. What they should say is they have become the party of borrow and spend--because they spent the money. They increased spending more than 40 percent, but they didn't pay for their spending. Instead, they put it on the charge card, and they have run up the debt in a way that is unprecedented in American history. They will have doubled the debt of the country and doubled foreign holdings of our debt. I have another chart that shows it took 224 years and 42 Presidents to run up $1 trillion of U.S. debt held abroad. This President has more than doubled that amount in 6 years. That is the record. They can't run away from it because they own it. When they say there is this huge tax increase--please. This is what the President said he was going to raise in taxes, $14.826 trillion. Here is what we raise, $14.828 trillion--virtually no difference. That is what the President said his budget would raise. CBO has a little different take on it, the Congressional Budget Office. They show a difference, over the 5 years, of 2 percent; that we have 2 percent more money than they are proposing. The important thing about this budget--we all know we are going to write another budget next year--is what is the difference for revenue this year between our budget and the President's budget. Do you know what it is? Zero--nothing. No difference. Where is this big world-class tax increase they are talking about? You certainly can't find it in the budget. When he talks about spending, here is what has happened to the spending under our budget. They are the ones who ran up the spending, increased it 40 percent. We are talking about spending as a share of gross domestic product, down each and every year under this budget; from 20.5 percent of GDP in 2008 down to 18.9 percent of GDP in 2012. We are turning the corner on debt. They have had it explode on their watch. We are turning the corner and starting to take debt down as a share of GDP. I heard a lot of talk about this big increase in spending. Where are the increases that are in our budget? First of all, we increase the funding for veterans health care by $6.7 billion over last year. I am proud of it because we are going to keep the promise that was made to our Nation's veterans that they were going to receive quality health care. We have seen the scandal of the veterans being mistreated at Walter Reed under this administration, on their watch, when they were in charge. We are going to fix the problems in veterans health care by putting money where the speeches are. On education and training, we increase by $3.6 billion because we understand that investment in our kids' education ought to be a top priority. On justice and law enforcement, we add $3 billion because we are not going to cut the COPS program 94 percent and take police off the street when those additional 100,000 cops all across America have helped us reduce rates of crime. The President inexplicably says cut the COPS program 94 percent. We have rejected that proposal. We say keep the police on the street. Let's keep our streets safe. On health care, we can begin to ensure the children of America, provide them with health insurance. When we look at the reasons for the increases in spending under the budget resolution, 34 percent is because of defense and war cost; 25 percent is because of Social Security and Medicare. That is no change that we have made. It is simply the increased cost of those programs. We also have a 7-percent increase in veterans' benefits and services, to take care of veterans health care. Net interest up 10 percent. That is nothing we did. That is the debt that this President has run up. We have to pay the bill. When they talk about this big increase in spending, do you know what it is? It is 2.6 percent. We have added 2.6 percent over the baseline to address veterans health care, to address the Nation's needs in education and health care of our kids. That is exactly what the American people expect and want us to do. He says the tax cut will never come about. We have the middle-class tax cuts and estate tax reform in this proposal. He says none of it will ever happen because of the trigger. The way the trigger works, the Office of Management and Budget, controlled by the President, tells us what they expect the surplus to be in 2012. We can only use 80 percent of it for tax cuts. That is the way the trigger works. Under the current scoring by OMB, there is sufficient room, as this chart shows, to fund all the tax cuts that are in this budget, all the middle-class tax cuts and the estate tax reform. Under current Office of Management and Budget scoring, if you take 80 percent of their projected surplus in 2012, their projected surplus, or 80 percent of it, in 2012 is $232 billion. The cost of the tax cuts is $180 billion. We can fund the tax cuts that are provided here, that go to hard-working, middle-class families, exactly where they ought to go. He says we are raiding Social Security. He forgot how we got into this position. We got into this position because this President chose to provide tax cuts to the wealthiest among us instead of protecting Social Security. Under the President's plan, he is going to take, from 2008 to 2017, $2.5 trillion of Social Security funds to use it to pay other bills. Let me say this. If anybody tried this in the private sector, what the President is doing, they would be on their way to a Federal institution, but it would not be the Congress of the United States, it would not be the White House, they would be on their way to the ``big house.'' That is a violation of Federal law. But, unfortunately, they have dug the hole so deep it is going to take us time to dig out of it. That is exactly what we have done under this budget because, unlike them, we have balanced the budget by 2012. Unlike the President, who even now has not balanced the budget by 2012--under his proposal, we would still be $30 billion in the red by 2012. We balance the budget by 2012 and have a $41 billion surplus. That is a real American value, paying your bills. When they say their tax relief has somehow magically benefitted the middle class at the expense of the most wealthy among us--whoa, there is a whopper. Here is what happened. The millionaires of our society-- and I have respect for those who have succeeded. I applaud them. I am delighted at their success. I hope everybody is financially successful. But when they somehow say the middle class has been the ones who have gained by their tax policy and not those at the highest end of the income ladder, come on. I don't know whom they think they are fooling with that one. Here are the facts. This is according to the Urban- Brookings Tax Policy Center. Those earning more than $1 million in 2006--this is not a projection, this is what happened in 2006--those earning over $1 million a year got, on average, a tax cut of $118,000. Those earning between $100,000 to $200,000 got $3,700 dollars. Those earning less than $100,000 got less than $700. Please. There is no question who are the primary beneficiaries of these tax cuts. It has overwhelmingly gone to the wealthiest among us. I am not being critical of the wealthy. I absolutely applaud their success. One of the great things about America is if you work hard and you are inventive and entrepreneurial, you can succeed. That is a great thing about America. We want to preserve it. One of the ways we preserve it is to pay our bills and quit running up the debt and quit running these massive deficits. That is why we worked hard to balance this budget by 2012. The President, even now, has not presented a plan that balances by 2012. I have already talked about the things that are done within the long term. We have these reserve funds that were in our budget. But let's reflect--our friends on the other side, they criticize reserve funds. Here are all the reserve funds they had in their budget, reserve fund after reserve fund, and they criticize the ones that are in our budget? Please. That is the pot calling the kettle black. Finally, with respect to the long term, I have said repeatedly, this is one place where Senator Gregg and I entirely agree. We have to tackle the long-term entitlement challenges--absolutely. The only way that is going to happen is bipartisan agreement. Neither party can tackle the long-term challenges on their own. This is a 5-year budget resolution. Our long-term entitlement plan problems are 10- and 15-year problems. The sooner we deal with it the better. But the budget resolution is not going to be the place because only one party is carrying the burden there. It has got to be a joint agreement between the two parties. That is why, along with Senator Gregg, he and I have proposed a plan to give, to empower, 16 Members--8 Democrats, 8 Republicans--the responsibility to come up with a long-term plan that would be dealt with separate from a budget resolution. With that, Mr. President, I notice the Senator from Washington is here. I do not know whether the Senator----

Mr. CONRAD. How much time would the Senator require?

Mr. CONRAD. We can then go to two people on that side.

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I thank Senator Murray for the extraordinary contributions she has made to this budget resolution. There is no more valuable member of the Senate Budget Committee than Senator Murray. She was a conferee. She has participated throughout the committee's deliberations on this budget. Again, there is no one who played a more constructive role than Senator Murray. She has been a fierce advocate for education, for expansion of children's health care coverage, and for the transportation needs of the United States. So I thank Senator Murray for her very thoughtful participation in the deliberations of the Budget Committee. I also want to take this moment to thank my colleague, Senator Allard, again for his courtesy. I yield the floor.

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, the Senator has a vivid imagination. I don't know what these charts refer to, but they certainly don't refer to the conference report that is before the body now. He has mixed up so many different proposals that have been before various bodies, but he has not referenced the matter that is before this body. What is before the body is the conference report on the budget. The conference report on the budget does not increase spending; the conference report on the budget takes spending down as a share of gross domestic product, which all the economists say is the right way to measure because it takes out the effect of inflation. We are taking spending down from 20.5 percent, which is where they took it when they had control; they ran up the spending when they ran everything here. They controlled the House. They controlled the Senate. They controlled the White House. On their watch, they ran up the spending. We are taking it down, from 20.5 percent of GDP down to 18.9 percent of GDP. That is one of the key reasons we are able to actually balance the budget--something they have never done and something they still have no proposal to do. That is the fact. This is not increasing spending; this is taking spending down as a share of the gross domestic product. Now, the Senator puts up charts that are people's tax returns and talks about this rate going up and that rate going up. There are no rate increases here. There just aren't. I know the Republicans have given this speech so many times, it is habit. So it doesn't really matter what the budget is; they just trot out the same speech they gave 5 years ago. The problem is it doesn't fit the facts. The President said in his budget, by his own estimate, that he would raise $14,826 billion over the 5-year life of the budget. Our budget raises $14,828 billion--virtually no difference. Now, this is using his own agency's estimates, the Office of Management and Budget. We use the Congressional Budget Office on ours because they are the official scorekeeper for the Congress. If you put them on the same basis, the Congressional Budget Office basis, we do have 2 percent more revenue than the President's, but our revenue doesn't show up until beyond 2010. We are going to write another budget before then. This budget controls next year. There is no difference in revenue next year. There is no difference in revenue. I don't know what speech you are going to give next year when there has been no tax increase. I know you will be terribly disappointed, because you believe that there has to be a tax increase. We are going to be here next year, and then we are going to have to trot out all of these speeches that have been given here. I am afraid some of those who have given these speeches are going to be terribly embarrassed.

Mr. CONRAD. I would be happy to yield.

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I would say in response to the Senator that it does. This conference report includes the amendment that was offered by the Senator to increase funding for community health centers. As the Senator knows, this is one area of spending the President has supported. More than that, this is an area I think almost all of us believe has had remarkable success. I have visited community health centers in my own State, and I have seen the remarkable work they are doing. In Fargo, ND, we have a community health center that is serving thousands of people and doing it in an extraordinarily cost-effective way. It is getting very good health care results for its clients. So I was pleased to support the amendment of the Senator from Vermont. I think this is one of the most cost-effective things we can do to expand health care coverage for the people of our country and the people of our individual States, and I salute the Senator for offering that amendment. We vigorously defended that approach in the conference committee, and the conference agreed to support that level of funding.

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I thank very much the Senator from Vermont, who is an extremely constructive member of the Senate Budget Committee and a fierce advocate for those things he believes in. He is somebody who has done his homework, and we appreciate that very much on the Senate Budget Committee. I thank the Senator from Vermont.

Mr. CONRAD. I am happy to yield.

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, let me just say that the spending in this budget, as I have said over and over--and I will be happy to put up the chart again--spending as a share of gross domestic product goes down under this budget each and every year. It goes down from 20.5 percent of GDP to 18.9 percent of GDP. The Senator will recall it was on their watch that, not only did the spending go up dramatically, but the revenue stagnated. The result was to explode the debt of the country. That is the record of the other party. Unfortunately, it falls on our watch to begin to clean it up, and this budget does so. Mr. President, is the Senator from Texas prepared?

Mr. CONRAD. No.

Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I yield 15 minutes to the Senator from Michigan, who, by the way, is an extremely valuable member of the Budget Committee and has played a very constructive role in this process. I thank the Senator for her assistance at every step in the budget process.

Mr. CONRAD. Madam President, how much time remains on both sides?

Mr. CONRAD. Madam President, I wish to take 2 minutes to respond to Senator Cornyn, and then is it the intention on the other side to go to Senator Vitter?

Mr. CONRAD. Why don't we lock that in right now? Senator Vitter has been waiting here patiently. I will consume such time as I might use, and then we will go to Senator Vitter for 5 minutes.

Mr. CONRAD. Madam President, Senator Cornyn of Texas raised a concern about an amendment he offered that was adopted both in committee and on the floor with respect to creating a 60-vote hurdle for any increase in rates. He raised a concern about that being dropped in conference. I advised the Senator it was going to have to be dropped in conference because the Parliamentarian advised us that if it came back from conference, the whole privileged nature of a budget resolution would be eliminated. That is the reason it was dropped. It is a simple procedural matter that we could not include it. Why couldn't we? The Budget Committee does not have the authority to tell the committees of jurisdiction how to raise money or how to spend it. I know that seems odd, but the reality is the Budget Committee is able to tell the Finance Committee how much money it can raise and the Appropriations Committee how much money it can spend. We do not have the authority to tell the Finance Committee how to raise it. We do not have the authority to tell the Appropriations Committee how to spend it. If we exceed our authority, then the whole privileged nature of the budget resolution-- that is, that a budget resolution comes to the floor under special rules; there are 50 hours dedicated to the budget resolution and other special rules that apply--all of those would be out the window if we had allowed the amendment of the Senator from Texas to be included in the conference report. That is just a simple fact. We could not do that. Nobody would want to eliminate the whole budget process. That is what would have happened because the Budget Committee would have exceeded its authority. On the question of spending, the Senator from Texas raised that issue. This is spending as a percentage of GDP under this administration. When they came in, spending was 18.4 percent of GDP. They have raised it to 20.3 percent of GDP. That is their record. Under this budget, we are taking spending down--20.5 percent GDP in 2008, and we are taking it down each and every year until we get to 18.9 percent of GDP in 2012. Again, the Senator said we got a big tax increase here. There is no tax increase here. There just isn't. The President, in his budget, said he was going to raise $14.826 trillion over the next 5 years. Our budget, according to the Congressional Budget Office, which is nonpartisan and professional, says our budget raises $14.828 trillion. There is virtually no difference. That is what they said their budget would raise. I see the Senator from New Mexico is in the Chamber. We have an order that the Senator from Louisiana would have the next 5 minutes. Then we are supposed to go back to our side to Senator Wyden. It is Senator Vitter's time.

Mr. CONRAD. Madam President, I don't see Senator Domenici on the floor. How much time does the Senator require? Here is Senator Domenici. We had previously thought that he might go next, if that is acceptable to the Senator from Oregon.

Mr. CONRAD. How much time does the Senator require?

Mr. CONRAD. I thank the Senator from Oregon. Not only is he an extremely important member of the Budget Committee, he is one of the conferees. He is somebody who has been incredibly important for these deliberations. I thank him for his cooperation and leadership.

Mr. CONRAD. The Senator is correct, Madam President, but might I ask the Senator to yield for just a moment?

Mr. CONRAD. Madam President, I want to just say this--and I fully anticipate the Senator may be critical of this budget, so I certainly respect his views. But I just want to say, after going through this budget process, that the Senator from New Mexico has been involved in the writing of 20 budgets, more than 20 budgets here, and my respect for him has grown geometrically after going through this one. I really do want to commend the Senator for what is truly an extraordinary thing, to be involved in more than 20 budgets for the United States. Madam President, I yield the floor.

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

Mr. CONRAD. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the debate time with respect to the conference report to accompany S. Con. Res. 21 be extended until 3:30, and that time be equally divided and controlled between the Chair and the ranking member, and all other provisions of the previous order remain in effect.

Mr. CONRAD. Madam President, how much time now remains?