Pete Domenici

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. In fact, I am prepared to make a guess, if they want us to settle for $300 billion--and $792 billion, rounded to $800 billion, is almost 25 percent--they would like to give the American taxpayers back less than a dime, it looks to me. So if they have a chart up that explains their position and want to use an American dollar, put it up and clip it off at 10 percent and say: That is what we would like to give you back because we need all the rest of it because we want to increase spending. I do not think this applies to the distinguished Senator who is making the argument in behalf of the Democrats. I do not think he would want to spend all that money. But I do believe the President has snookered us all. He has us believing we are really going to harm the American people by not paying for every new program he has in mind and more. And, frankly, that is just not true. In fact, tomorrow, if I can, I will put up about five of the President's new programs, I say to Senator Abraham. I will get them on a chart here, and I will ask the American people: Which do you prefer? These five new programs? Or would you prefer to make it easier to pay off student loans? Would you prefer to make it easier to take care of an elderly parent? Would you prefer to stop penalizing marriage? Or would you prefer a new program? It does not matter what new program. New programs are new programs, if they are added to the expenditure of the Federal Government and are making it grow. We believe it is a pretty good size right now. We believe there is a need for some growth. We believe there is a need in some instances to increase dramatically what we have been spending, and we voted for that in our budget resolution. We said education is one of them, if you will reform the way we give it to the States. Let's put more money in, not less. We said that. We argued it here on the floor. We propose to stick with that. But the truth of the matter is that our lockbox will make our tax cut reasonable and plausible and will make sure the Social Security people are safe. I close tonight by suggesting to everybody who is listening to this debate the President continues to raise the issue and Democrats are following him almost in rote marching, and that is, they get cranked up and they say: We want to save Social Security; we want to save Medicare, which simply means you should not have tax cuts. Here is $1.9 trillion waiting for you to tell us how to fix Social Security. Is it so complicated? No, it is not complicated. He prefers the issue to a solution. That is why we are on the floor. He does not want to submit a Social Security reform program. He wants to continue to hoodwink us into thinking if you give the people a tax cut, you cannot fix Social Security. I will bet the President would not submit a Social Security program that would cost so much that it would not leave money for a tax cut out of this surplus. That is absolutely incredible that he would do that. I do not believe he would submit a Medicare reform program that would be so big and so costly that there would not be money for a tax cut. As a matter of fact, he kind of shocked me. He submitted a reform Medicare plan that only costs $48 billion, if he was right in his numbers. It turns out he is not right, but had he been right, he would have been submitting one that cost $48 billion. I submit there is plenty of money left over to do that. My last argument, and it will take a minute, is there are some suggesting we should not do this now. If we do not do this now, we will never do it because, as a matter of fact, as we proceed through, we will obligate all this money one way or another for some American program, and then we will say there is not any money left for tax cuts. For those who are so frightened about us having a negative impact on the American economy, let me suggest, for the next 3 years, our impact is insignificant, almost negative. It begins to grow a little bit in the outyears, but even the great doctor--as Phil Gramm said today--he is like the Bible, everybody quotes him but nobody reads him. That is what Phil Gramm said today on the floor. Even he said if you are going to spend it, have a tax cut. He also said the Republican plan is not significant enough in size over a 10-year period or annually to have a negative impact in terms of the American economy. I think we are on the right track. Will the Senator yield me 1 additional minute?

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I ask the distinguished chairman of the Finance Committee if he will yield up to 20 minutes.

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, before my friend, Senator Roth, leaves the floor, let me say to the Senate that Senator Roth has come through again for the Senate and for the people of this country. His tax bill is clearly one that recognizes fairness, that puts the money where it ought to be put, gives back to the American people some of their money, and it does it in a way that clearly is prudent and responsible. It will be very difficult when we are finally finished explaining this bill for the President of the United States to veto this bill. We are going to talk about that a little later in the day. Since he has challenged us, we will tell the American people loud and clear what he is going to be doing when he vetoes this bill. Mr. President, I rise today to discuss the budget blueprint that Congress has passed for the first decade of the 21st century. It embodies three major things: Social Security, first and foremost. Much will be said about it. But nobody can deny that with this refund to the American taxpayers, we have left intact every single penny of surplus that belongs to the Social Security trust fund, and we will even debate on the floor locking it up so it is very hard to spend. The budget before us and that we adopted demanded that 100 percent of all the funding that Social Security recipients will need will be exclusively set aside for that purpose. Second, it sets aside enough money to meet the demands of Medicare for the next 10 years. Medicare is fully funded under the budget that was adopted by the Congress this year. That means there are no cuts. The program is fully funded for the decade. As a matter of fact, the President cut Medicare in the first 5 years of his budget. We did not do that. Then we would have a rainy day fund to implement any Medicare reform that Congress might enact. I will allude to that soon. Third, after all the bills of the decade have been paid, after Social Security recipients have their money set aside, after we have funded every penny anticipated for Medicare, and have an ample rainy day fund available, if we want to do something on prescription drugs, then we would send back the excess to the American taxpayers--to the working families--and those in middle- and low-income brackets will get a very substantial tax reduction. The budget resolution recognized economic conditions now, and the projected economics including the planning for an inevitable recession that might occur in the future. It outlined a decade-long, phased-in tax cut. Only a very small tax cut was envisioned in the first 2 years of this budget timeframe because the economy is already operating above optimum capacity. We want to keep inflation subdued and interest rates low. The budget expected Congress to pass a tax bill that was very small in the first 2 years and grew as the decade wound its way through into the next millennium. I congratulate again the chairman of the Finance Committee and the members of that committee for producing the kind of tax cut for our budget for the 21st century. I think it is appropriate, prudent, and fair. Chairman Roth has produced a tax cut that starts small and ends up larger, reflecting economic conditions. He has produced a tax cut that targets help to those who really need it--those with children in school, those with elderly and ill parents who need long-term care, those who are trying to save for their own retirement instead of Government reliance, and many more items of that nature and of that significance. Yes. The same old class warfare arguments like tired, defeated soldiers of past wars have begun to stagger across the Senate debate again--and they will be here before us again--that we are only helping the rich. We are told we must spend the surplus. That is essentially the argument against our tax refunds--we must spend the surplus. We must grow Government. It is the same old debate. One party wants to give money to programs. And we want to give money to the people. That is exactly the way it has been, and that is exactly the way it is on this floor. I believe there is a degree of arrogance in those who argue against tax cuts. They say to working families: I know what to do with your money better than you do. Give it to me so I can spend it. Can you imagine the arrogance of that position? They have grand schemes now with the surpluses. Republicans, through their dedicated efforts, and Dr. Greenspan and his fantastic ability to manage the money supply in our country, and to control interest rates, have given the Nation this enormous surplus. The President of the United States thinks they have the money to implement new, grand schemes and to grow government. That is the issue. A government big enough to give you everything is a government that takes everything away in the form of high taxes. I didn't originate that quote. I can't imagine and I can't fathom anything more frightening to the average taxpayer than the sight of a grand government schemer rushing toward a $1 trillion pile of extra taxpayer dollars. Republicans say it is the best of times for tax cuts. Democrats say it is the worst of times. Everyone quotes Dr. Alan Greenspan. The Taxpayers Refund Act before the Senate is the best of plans. It lowers rates. It encourages savings. It eliminates the worst of a bad Tax Code. It eliminates the marriage penalty for many Americans. It begins the death of a death tax. It ends the alternative minimum tax, to rescue the full benefit of child care, foster care, education, and other needed tax credits for families who otherwise unavoidably would end up in the alternative minimum tax brackets. They are sick of this. They are worried about it. You will get more mail on this issue because it is grossly unfair to give credits and then take them away--to run across the land saying: We are delighted to have given you a credit for your children's education only to find that middle-income Americans by the hundreds of thousands are falling into this alternative minimum tax trap. I say: Tax cuts, if not now, when? The Democrats say not now. I say: If not tax cuts now, then what? The President's answer is: Spend it all. It does not matter what he says he wants to spend it for; he wants to spend it all. Can you imagine if we did not have this surplus? What will the President be doing--asking for tax increases to pay for these programs he thinks we need? I doubt that. I doubt that very much. I support prudent tax relief, and I must say this is prudent tax relief. It is synchronized to our business cycle and the condition of the economy. It improves our tax policy and moves us toward a system that taxes income that is consumed instead of income that is earned. It moves America toward a tax system that allows business to deduct investments in the year they are made. It encourages investment in retirement, education, and health care. Congress' budget allocates 75 percent of the projected surplus over the next 10 years for paying down the debt and long-term priorities. If the surplus were a dollar, two quarters would go for Social Security, one quarter for high-priority spending--education, research, and defense--and the remaining quarter for tax cuts. Without tax cuts, who would spend the surplus? Not the American people. The Government in Washington would spend it. Without tax cuts, we will ``grow'' Government. There can be no denial of that. The President plans to grow Government substantially rather than give back anything to the American people. He now says he would veto a $500 billion tax cut. What about $200, Mr. President? That means giving the American people back about 6 cents of the surplus, at $200. Can we afford that? I believe we can afford 25 cents out of every $1 of surplus. Democrats say the question is: tax cuts versus Social Security. Tax cuts or Medicare. Tax cuts or domestic spending. Tax cut versus debt reduction. The right answer: It is not ``this'' versus ``that.'' The correct answer is, we can do all of the above. The size of the surplus lets us do it all. That is the reality. Save Social Security, reform Medicare, provide adequate funding for domestic and defense spending, pay down the debt, and give the American people who earned the money a decent tax cut. Do that in a manner that phases in, which will probably be very complimentary to the American economy. Even with the tax cuts and refunds we are talking about, our surplus will steadily climb as a share of GDP and our national debt will ultimately be paid off, falling dramatically from 40 percent of GDP this year to only 12 percent in 2009. Under the proposal we make, the external debt--the debt to the public--will go from 40 percent of the gross domestic product to only 12 percent by the end of the decade. I am amazed the President's political advisers allege this budget is reckless. Nothing is reckless about steadily rising surpluses and paying down our debt by more than 50 percent over the next decade. In fact, our plan lowers the level of debt more than the President's plan. Some may wonder why. That is because the President spends heavily in the first 5 years. We have tiny tax cuts. Thus, he incurs more debt than we do at that time, and he cannot make it up in a decade. I have been amazed by the administration and other opponents who claim our tax cut will lead to higher interest rates because the economy will overheat. That is just not true. The Fed is most concerned not with the economy as it is today but what it will be in 18 months and thereafter. Our tax cut is slow, a total of $28 billion over the years 2000 and 2001. I repeat, if they are worried about stimulus, it is $28 billion in tax cuts. It is almost unrecognizable in terms of impact one way or the other on the American economy. It saves 92 percent of the projected surplus during these first 2 years. As a result, our budget surpluses will rise sharply from 1.4 percent of the gross domestic product to 2 percent by 2001. It is clear that the budget plan is not expansionary, which some people now talk about. It truly is not. Ask any economist to look at it in its true sense, phased in as it is, and ask if it is an expansionary budget. I cannot imagine this tax bill would be defeated on such a preposterous economic observation. In House testimony last week, Chairman Greenspan cautioned against expecting any rapid stimulus as a result of this tax relief package. I can assure the American people that Congress' tax plan will not overheat the economy. As a matter of fact, Chairman Greenspan cautioned against expecting a rapid stimulus as a result of this package, given the long phase-in of the tax cuts. I can anticipate the response of my Democratic colleagues who are likely to say: If your plan is so ideally suited for the economy, why did Alan Greenspan argue we should let surpluses run for a while before cutting taxes? Listen carefully. I have two responses. First, I believe the Congress is doing exactly what the Chairman advised. Our budget plan delivers only $28 billion in tax cuts over the next 2 years. Most of that relief is scheduled to arrive only after surpluses have mounted on a consistent basis. Second and more important, Chairman Greenspan is advising what policies would be best in an ideal world. However, he is fully aware that ideal may not be politically feasible. Let me read a quote he made last week which I think was insightful: There is nothing that I can see that would be lost by allowing the process to delay unless, as I have indicated many times, it appears that the surplus is going to become a lightning rod for major increases in outlays. That's the worst of all possible worlds from a fiscal policy point of view. That, under all conditions, should be avoided. I have great sympathy for those who wish to cut taxes now, to preempt the process. And indeed if it turns out they are right, I would say moving on the tax front makes a good deal of sense to me. The worst of all fiscal policies will materialize if the President gets his way. The President proposes to increase spending by more than $1 trillion over the next 10 years. Most of this new spending would go to create 80 new, often repetitious, often local-government- prerogative-infringing Government programs, with services already being handled at the local or private sector. The President's spending proposals are the worst of all proposals from the standpoint of what is good for America during the next 2 years. That time horizon must concern the Federal Reserve. The President proposes to use $53 billion of the surplus for new spending. It is nearly twice as large as our tax cut in the next 2 years. Thus, the President's plan would be far more stimulative than the Congress' measured tax cut. I ask my colleagues on the other side of the aisle if they are worried about interest rates rising because the economy is overheating, why support the President's Government-growing agenda over tax cuts? The money is there. We have a surplus. The last question is the $792 billion question: Who is going to spend it? When faced with the President, who wants to spend the surplus, Congress has no choice but to cut taxes. However, we have to be careful. While we are still saving the majority of the surplus for shoring up our long-term fiscal health, we must be careful in that regard. To sum up, I leave two messages today. Our budget is prudent, and it is synchronized for where we are in the business cycle. Be skeptical of the administration's criticism of our tax plan. They want to grow Government well in excess of Congress' tax cut. Most of the spending has nothing to do with Social Security or Medicare. This is what should most concern the American people when faced with the surplus, excluding Social Security funds, and I have already indicated what will happen to them. The Republicans want to give it back to the people who earned it and worked so hard. The big question then is, Who is going to spend the surplus? With tax cuts, the answer is you; without tax cuts, the answer is big government. I yield the floor. Several Senators addressed the Chair.

Mr. DOMENICI. We are on the right track, and I think the Democrats have missed the boat. They are mixing apples and oranges when they try to confuse us on another lockbox for Medicare. I think tonight we have just about disposed of that as being a ridiculous approach which I call anything but a tax cut approach. Frankly, with that size surplus accumulated over this period of time, I say if you cannot give back a little bit of it to the American people, then what do they elect us for? I yield the floor.

Mr. DOMENICI. I ask the Presiding Officer to tell me when I have used 10 minutes. I heard the distinguished Senator from Montana, Mr. Baucus, say there is not one nickel for Medicare in this Republican budget. That is absolutely wrong. Perhaps the Senator forgot to include the fact that there is $3.1 trillion in this budget for Medicare, fully funded. What the Senator should have said was: Shame on the President. He is accusing Republicans, and he underfunded Medicare $31.5 billion on purpose. He did such things in his budget as freezing hospital costs for rural America. Senators, including the distinguished Senator from Montana, are worried about that. The President's proposal is that it be frozen for another year. That is where he picked up $31.5 billion. Guess what he did with it. He spent it on other domestic programs. That is the stark reality, unequivocal truth. Having said that, let me start with a quote from the CBO on July 23 of 1999. It has some real application to the so-called Medicare lockbox that is being proposed today to confuse the issue. The issue is putting a lockbox around Social Security. The other side doesn't want to vote for that for some reason, so they say: Let's do another lockbox, let's do Medicare, and we will get credit for reducing the debt. Here is what they say about it. The chief criticism that the President--that is, OMB--has of CBO is that, . . . we did not give them credit for $328 billion in transfers from the general fund to the Medicare trust fund. Then they say, That's right, we didn't, and that's because transfers from one part of government to another do not reduce the public debt. The whole argument the President is taking to the American people is that he reduces the debt more than we do. But one of his big-ticket items is this one right here. The Congressional Budget Office says that $328 billion that he wanted to move out of the general fund, so it could not be used for tax cuts, he puts in the Medicare trust fund and wants credit for reducing the debt. What does the Congressional Budget Office say? Fundamentally the most simple of all propositions: We did not give them credit for that because transfers from one part of Government to another do not reduce public debt. That is an interesting one. Then, in addition, we had a very good Senator who does not agree with the Democrats on everything and say--this is Bob Kerrey: The President also has a great deal of pain in his plan--a hidden pain in the form of income tax increases that will be borne by future generations of Americans. He is alluding to the $328 billion which are IOUs, and he says: I strongly disapprove of a plan that provides a false sense of complacency that Social Security has been saved by this nebulous and vague idea of ``saving the surplus''-- The very same thing applies to Medicare-- while failing to disclose the real pain that will be imposed on future generations. When they will have to pay for it, is what he is saying. Their income taxes are going to go up by the amount of $328 billion or whatever amount the Democrats allegedly want to secure for Medicare by putting it in some kind of lockbox in an on-budget trust fund. I also ask an interesting question: Is there anybody who can stand on the floor of the Senate and suggest that by taking this money away from the taxpayers and shuffling it over into a trust fund extends the date by which we run out of money to pay the Medicare people what they are entitled to? Does it increase any? Not at all. You have to change the payment plan to do that. That is what Medicare reform is all about. Having said that, I could even quote the President's own OMB budget about it. Suffice it to say, anybody who wants to read this can. But even they say, ``only in a bookkeeping sense'' does this carry out any real purpose--in a bookkeeping sense, nothing else. We don't need bookkeeping; we need to decide what we are going to do with this surplus. I believe I understand the nature of this surplus. I am working very hard to convince people that we all ought to agree on one set of facts and then see where we are. So I would like to suggest to the Senate, if they find fault with this, they can do their own. But I submit that we have, if you start with a freeze on domestic spending for the next 10 years--Do not jump up and say we cannot do that. I know we cannot do that. But if we start with that, we have an accumulated surplus of $3.3 trillion. We ought to then talk about how the Republicans plan to use that. Very simply, we take every penny that belongs to Social Security and we say put it in a lockbox. That is the debate tonight. But put it in a real lockbox, don't put it in a lockbox such as the one that is offered here on the floor tonight. It is unbelievable that the other side would even claim to have a lockbox. They create another budget point of order on top of at least four that already exist, against a budget resolution that has an on-budget deficit. That is exactly the issue. You can call it Social Security or whatever. There are already four points of order on that. You do not need this new lockbox on Social Security. But let me suggest, let's continue on. If this is the way you look at a surplus, then set all the Social Security money aside. Then go and say, What do we do with the rest of it? We submitted the proposal that was put in this budget resolution when we designed it and voted on it for a tax cut over a 10-year period. People are acting as if we are cutting $792 billion worth of taxes next year. Do you know how much we are cutting taxes next year? Four billion dollars. They are worried about whether we have a tax plan that will overstimulate the American economy. That is so small that it is in the range of rounding errors in terms of the tax take of America. In the next year it is maybe twice that--$8 or $10 or $12 billion. It does not do anything to inflate this economy because we are planning it right. We are planning it to come in piecemeal, as a booming American economy can absorb it. That is $792 billion. If you want to know the number, that is 23.4 percent of this total surplus. I have been using a dollar bill. It caught on. The Democrats have used dollar bills, and they got us all confused. They have two different dollar bills, one cut in thirds, one cut some other way. Ours is simple. We have not cut it any way. We say one-quarter of it, 23.4 percent, should go back to the American people. It is tough for Democrats to believe this, but plain old arithmetic says there is $505 billion left over. The other side says there is not a nickel in this for Medicare. Before they came to the floor, before this idea that we were not doing anything for Medicare became a political issue, the budget resolution had $90 billion in it for Medicare--the one you voted on, Republicans. It had $90 billion in. Now, look here, there is $505 billion worth of domestic priorities. We submit it is up to the Congress and the President to decide how to use it. But would anybody believe we are not going to use part of it for prescription drugs? Of course we are. And, incidentally, is that enough money? Do you know how much the President said we need for prescription drugs? And he would have sold this to the American people, except it is impossible. He said $48 billion of that is what you need to fix, reform, and pay for prescription drugs. It turns out he totally underestimated it. It is more like $111 billion--$118 billion. But the truth of the matter is, take $90 billion out of it, take $100 billion out of it; that leaves $405 billion to add to discretionary. Just in rough numbers, you could add about $50 billion a year. If you do $100 billion worth of Medicare, you can add $40 billion a year. Is that enough? Tomorrow I will put up a chart showing how much discretionary spending has gone up in the last decade. I would be surprised if it went up $40 billion, net increase, in very many of the years. So essentially we have only one issue here: Do we lock up, in an irretrievable manner, as suggested in the Abraham-Ashcroft-Domenici lockbox, which is really a lockbox--such a lockbox that the Secretary of Treasury was even worried that it did not give Government enough flexibility, so we changed it to give them some flexibility. We provide, in the case of a war, in the case of great emergencies, you are not bound by it. We provide some other flexibility. But the truth of the matter is that this is a prudent way, if you decide you do not want to use the surplus to grow big, big, big, big Government. If you want to grow it, then do it the way the President recommends: Do not have this tax cut in; have a little piece of one.

Mr. DOMENICI. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. DOMENICI. Good words.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, section 211 of H. Con. Res. 68 (the FY 2000 Budget Resolution) permits the Chairman of the Senate Budget Committee to make adjustments to specific figures in the budget resolution and on the Senate pay-as-you-go scorecard, provided the CBO estimates an on-budget surplus for FY2000 in its July 1, 1999 update report to Congress. Pursuant to section 211, I hereby submit the following revisions to H. Con. Res. 68: [In millions of dollars] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Current Aggregate/Instructions: FY 2000 revenue aggregate................................ $1,408,082 FY 2000 revenue reduction reconciliation instruction..... 0 FY 2000-2004 revenue reduction reconciliation instruction 142,315 FY 2000-2009 revenue reduction reconciliation instruction 777,868 Adjustements: FY 2000 revenue aggregate................................ -14,398 FY 2000 revenue reduction reconciliation instruction..... 14,398 FY 2000-2004 revenue reduction reconciliation instruction 14,398 FY 2000-2009 revenue reduction reconciliation instruction 14,398 Revised Aggregate/Instruction: FY 2000 revenue aggregate................................ 1,393,684 FY 2000 revenue reduction reconciliation instruction..... 14,398 FY 2000-2004 revenue reduction reconciliation instruction 156,713 FY 2000-2009 revenue reduction reconciliation instruction 792,266 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Fiscal years, in millions of dollars] -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Total Deficit Impact Senate Pay-As-You-Go Scorecard ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2000-2004 2005-2009 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Current scorecard............................................ 49 -8,524 -54,950 -33,312 -52,107 -148,844 -729,920 Adjustments.................................................. -14,398 0 0 0 0 -14,398 0 Revised scorecard............................................ -14,349 -8,524 -54,950 -33,312 -52,107 -163,242 -729,920 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I am so very pleased that the Senate has passed H.R. 66, and taken an historic step in preserving one of America's cultural treasures--Route 66. I have long championed preservation of Route 66, the ``Mother Road,'' which changed and shaped America in the twentieth century. This body had already passed my legislation earlier this year, S. 292, the Route 66 Corridor Preservation Act. Congresswoman Heather Wilson of Albuquerque, New Mexico, reintroduced a companion bill (H.R. 66) in the House of Representatives, and after a few amendments, we have finally got legislation which will preserve the unique cultural resources along the famous Route and authorize the Interior Secretary to provide assistance through the Park Service. I have been working for this day for nine years. This legislation almost became law at the end of the 105th Congress, but failed to pass in the House of Representatives due to last minute political wrangling. However, no one has ever questioned the merit of this legislation. I introduced the ``Route 66 Study Act of 1990,'' which directed the National Park Service to determine the best ways to preserve, commemorate, and interpret Route 66. As a result of that study, I introduced legislation last Congress authorizing the National Park Service to join with Federal, State, and private efforts to preserve aspects of historic Route 66, the Nation's most important thoroughfare for East-West migration in the twentieth century. H.R. 66 authorizes a funding level over 10 years and stresses that we want the Federal Government to support grassroots efforts to preserve aspects of this historic highway. The Secretary of the Interior can now support State, local, tribal, and private organizations' efforts to preserve these resources. Designated in 1926, the 2,200-mile Route 66 stretched from Chicago to Santa Monica, CA. It rolled through eight American States and three time zones. In New Mexico, it went through the communities of Tucumcari, Santa Rosa, Albuquerque, Grants, and Gallup. New Mexico added to the aura of Route 66, giving new generations of Americans their first experience of our colorful culture and heritage. Route 66 allowed generations of vacationers to travel to previously remote areas and experience the natural beauty and cultures of the Southwest and Far West. While mobility of Americans has increased, few have forgotten the impact of this two-lane roadway of our youth. The ``Grapes of Wrath'' illustrates how depression-era families utilized this ``Mother Road'' to escape the dust bowl and start new lives in the West. The western U.S. was later opened to tourism, and many people learned the beauties of this entire country, Midwest to West. And I think a few folks discovered that New Mexico really is the Land of Enchantment. The bill is designed to assist private efforts to preserve structures and other cultural resources of the historic Route 66 corridor. I am pleased that as we reach the turn of the century, we have recognized this historic landmark, and the impact it had on this Nation in this century. I thank my colleagues for once again recognizing the importance of this legislation. I also want to thank the many New Mexicans and the National Historic Route 66 Federation for their support and help in this effort. Finally we will have a law recognizing the twentieth century equivalent to the Santa Fe Trail.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. I did not make it a question. But if you think it is a question----

Mr. DOMENICI. But I will be glad to have your answer.

Mr. DOMENICI. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. DOMENICI. I was here, as was the Senator from Texas, when the distinguished Senator from West Virginia, Senator Byrd, spoke. What kept coming to my mind was: When are Senators from authorizing committees expected to bring their bills to the floor and have votes? I came up with a very simple conclusion, with which my friend, Senator Byrd, will not agree, but I want to state it anyway. The problem we find ourselves in where Senators must offer authorizing legislation time and time again on appropriations bills comes about because this institution, this beloved Senate, insists on doing every single appropriations bill every single year. There is no time for anything else. That is the real problem. Then we do a budget resolution every single year. I believe there is a number around that we use up about 67 to 70 percent of the available time of the Senate on just those two functions. I hope, as we consider trying for 2-year appropriations and 2-year budgets, my good friend from West Virginia will be participating. We would like to hear his views. But I hope we can make the case that for the betterment of this institution, which he expressed my views on today when he spoke of how important it is to America, I have learned, as he has learned--when I came to the Senate, I was not steeped like him, so I did not know about it--it is to be a revered institution, and I want to keep it that way. My last observation is, I think I might have been able to get up--not under your majority leadership, but sometime during my 28 years here, most of which was as a minority Member--and make the same speech you just made as to the leadership on that side of the aisle when your side was in the majority, because when you have what we are having take place here with fair regularity, as we try to pass 13 appropriations bills, and we hear the other side--not you, Senator--the other side say: You will not pass them until we get to take up our agenda--and their agenda is not appropriations; it is a list of eight or nine items that are their agenda; and in this body they are probably minority views, but they want to get them up--then I say that is a challenge to the majority leader. That is hard stuff, because how do you then get the appropriations bills done and not have six of them wrapped up into one, which you just talked about, and put everything else in it but the kitchen sink? So, frankly, I appreciate your discussion today. Clearly, it is intended to help your side of the aisle in a debate on whether or not the appropriations bills should have more authorizing amendments on them that Senators on your side want to offer. In joining them, I commend you. It is pretty obvious to this Senator you have joined them so that you can make their case that they ought to be permitted. But I also say, if you were in Senator Lott's shoes, or if I were, and you were being told on every one of these bills this is another one we are going to get something that is the minority agenda, and you will have to vote on it or else, I would be looking for ways to get the appropriations bills done.

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, first, I did not understand what the Senator from Texas said when he talked about 20 minutes and he and I being on the floor. Did he intend to share that?

Mr. DOMENICI. I wonder if the Senator will permit me to make an observation on my time.

Mr. DOMENICI. I ask unanimous consent that when the Senator from Texas is finished, I be allowed to proceed for up to 20 minutes thereafter.

Mr. DOMENICI. I ended with a period; it wasn't a question mark.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. I ask for the yeas and nays on the pending amendment.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I want to wrap this up, and I intend to do this everywhere I can, anyplace I am asked, on any TV show I can get on. In summary, plain and simple, it is the following: The man who is most responsible for a good American economy is probably Dr. Alan Greenspan of the Federal Reserve Board. He has said: I would prefer that we keep the surplus in place and reduce the public debt. If that proves politically infeasible, cutting taxes is far superior to spending it. Here is the Republican budget: Debt reduction in Social Security, in literal numbers. I used in the summary 50 percent; it is actually 56 percent. Literally, the tax cut is less than a quarter; it is 23 percent. The money left over for Medicare and other programs is 20.1 percent. Frankly, that is a good plan. That is balanced, and it is not risky. Here it is encapsulated in another manner. Here is the President's plan: Of the $3.3 trillion accumulated over the next decade, $1.901 trillion goes into Social Security and debt service. He contends he has done more in debt service than we have. Frankly, who do you believe? We believe the Congressional Budget Office. They say we are putting more on the debt than the President is. So when his emissaries get on television and say ``we want to reduce the debt,'' the implication is that Republicans don't. But we are doing the same amount, or more, than the President. It is right there. The President then says that they don't want to do any tax cuts because, if you look at his budget, according to the Congressional Budget Office, including a tax cut--which is not a tax cut--he spends every nickel of it. If you want to talk about a risky policy, that is a risky policy. From what I can tell, that is what Dr. Alan Greenspan said would be the worst thing to do--to spend all the surplus. Last, our plan: Debt reduction and Social Security trust fund encapsulated, so they can't be spent, in a lockbox. Tax cuts, $794 billion, and for expenditure items that are very necessary, such as Medicare, education, defense, and others, there is $434 billion left over. Now, it is very difficult when the Secretary of the Treasury--the new one--gets on talk shows and says what a risky policy this is. He talks about the fact that they want to preserve or do more on the debt than we do. We are bound by the Congressional Budget Office in the Congress, and they tell us we are doing as much, or more, than the President in that regard. They tell us the President is spending every dime of the surplus on one program or another, or for a tax cut that is not a tax cut. And they maintain that a Republican plan that says, use 75 cents on a dollar for Social Security, debt reduction, Medicare, and domestic priorities, and give 25 percent back to the public, is risky. What is risky about it? Is it risky to give 25 cents out of a dollar back to the public to spend and less risky to keep it here and let the Federal Government spend it? I don't believe anyone would agree it is more risky to give some of it back to Americans and let them spend it, as compared with keeping it here and spending the entire 100 percent of the surplus on Federal Government-controlled programs and projects. Whatever time I have remaining, I yield back, and I yield the floor. Mr. CRAPO addressed the Chair.

Mr. DOMENICI. Yes.

Mr. DOMENICI. I am using everything. This represents everything. Here is what the President says. The President says: Spend it all. Is that true? Does he say spend it all? Well, look here. Here is a chart showing the entire $3.71 trillion. He says, and we say, put $1.9 trillion of it on the debt by putting it in a lockbox for Social Security. Then the Congressional Budget Office evaluates the rest of the President's proposal. Here it is in yellow. It is $1.27 trillion, and every bit of that is literally spent, according to the Congressional Budget Office. The President will argue about that because he even says he has a tax cut. We have looked at the tax cut he proposed. Not Pete Domenici, not Phil Gramm, but the Joint Tax Commission evaluated it. They said it is not even a tax cut. It is an expenditure. It is in this spending, because the President is saying, collect taxes, give some of it back to some people so they can save it, but you are giving them tax dollars; you are not cutting their taxes. That is an expenditure of tax money. Believe it or not, when you do that, the President increases taxes in his budget by $95 billion. Let me use the same dollar and let me share it with the Senator. Here is the entire accumulated surplus. Republicans say very simply, here are two quarters. We are going to put those two quarters into the Social Security trust fund, 50 percent. The number that is available for spending is bigger than the Senator said. It is $434 billion for Medicare and other highly critical Federal programs, if there are any. So I am going to say one quarter for spending. And, lo and behold, what is the other quarter for? Tax cuts. I ask the American people, out of $1, is 25 cents given back to the American people for overtaxation too big a tax cut? Is it something we should become worried about, that we are going to destroy our Government? I believe the truth of the matter is that you can't have any tax cuts if you propose what the President has proposed, because I will show you again what he proposes. On Social Security, he finally came our way, as the Senator said, and said put it all in a trust fund. All of the rest is spent. Let me ask, if we spend it all, is there any left for tax cuts? I mean, by definition, he is spending it all so there is nothing left for tax cuts. A lot has been said about the distinguished economic stalwart of America, Dr. Alan Greenspan, in the last few days. What has he said about it? I want to tell my colleagues that regardless of what was said in the last few days, Alan Greenspan has essentially made two statements about a surplus. I will give verbatim one of them from January 29 before our committee. Here is what he said: I would prefer that we keep the surplus in place; that is, reduce the debt. ``If that proves politically infeasible,'' he said, ``cutting taxes is far superior to spending, as far as the long-term stability of the fiscal system and the economy is concerned.'' In the last speech he made, and I quote: ``Only if Congress believes that the surplus will be spent rather than saved is a tax cut wise.'' Now, we don't have to guess about that. Why do we not have to guess about that? Because the President has already told us he is going to spend it. So Dr. Greenspan said, if you are going to spend it, it is far better for America's economic future to cut taxes. Essentially it seems to this Senator that we are being sold a bill of goods. We are being told that to spend one quarter of the surplus, that giving back the American people some of their overtaxation is risky to the economy. Dr. Alan Greenspan said the riskiest thing to do with the surplus is to spend it. That is what he just said. We are saying that we agree with him. We think it is too risky to do what the President is recommending. He will, by the time he is finished, have spent every cent of it, and he will call some of it ``saving Medicare.'' I want everybody to know this. Let's look at this chart again. I don't know how much it is going to cost for the Finance Committee and the House Members to fix Medicare. They are working on it. They have all worked terribly hard on a bipartisan commission, and the President shot it down. Senator Breaux was involved in that, and he believed that we had one going. What we are saying--and this is very, very important--when we have completed our tax cut, there is $434 billion left for a Medicare fix, Medicare reform, and prescription drugs, if you want it, and for other highly important programs, such as education, defense, and others. In fact, we might, as the debate goes on, put together a budget and come to the floor and show how this $434 billion might be used so that everyone will know there is money for education, if that is what you want, and there is money for Medicare reform, if that is what you want, and there is money for defense, because we have been told that that is what is left over as a surplus item, and it doesn't belong to Social Security. So it is either used for tax cuts or it is spent. We are saying: Save a quarter of it, give it back in tax dollars, and put a quarter of it in a rainy day fund, so to speak--a quarter of the dollar I showed you. I want to close with a few more comments.

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I am very pleased that the distinguished Senator from Texas has joined me on the floor and that I am permitted to join him in the beginning of a debate. I know the Senator has to leave, and I will try to make my most succinct points in the next 5 minutes. First, I will share with the American people, and in particular with my friend, how I see giving back some money to the taxpayers versus what else we are going to do with the surplus. I choose today, even though I looked around for a different dollar, an American dollar. This one is not signed by the new Secretary of the Treasury. I looked for one. I am not sure he signed any yet. This is one signed by his predecessor. I want everybody to look at that. It represents, in my analogy today, the entire surplus that is going to be generated. According to the Congressional Budget Office and the Office of Management and Budget, using moderate economics, even assuming we are going to have a couple of downturns or recessions in the next 10 years, the total surplus we are going to accumulate is this number, if you will all just look at this chart. It is a little bigger than the Senator has been using, and the numbers are a little bigger in terms of how much we have left over to be spent, but it is $3.37 trillion in the next decade.

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. As the Chairman may know, an additional $2 million in funding this year would be critical to the effort to allow existing centers to re-compete for federal assistance. Without this additional funding, many existing centers will be forced to close their doors. Assuming that S. 791 passes both houses of Congress and is signed by the President later this year, I hope that the Chairman will be willing to find a way to provide this additional $2 million for the program once this bill gets to conference.

Mr. DOMENICI. I thank the distinguished Chairman, and I yield the floor. shoreline mapping

Mr. DOMENICI

Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I rise in support of S. 1217, the Commerce, Justice, State, and the Judiciary Appropriations Bill for 2000. This bill provides new budget authority of $34 billion and new outlays of $23.1 billion to finance the programs of the Departments of Commerce, Justice, and State, and the federal judiciary. I congratulate the Chairman and Ranking Member for producing a bill that complies with the Subcommittee's 302(b) allocation. This is one of the most difficult bills to manage with its varied programs and challenging allocation, but I think the bill meets most of the demands made of it while not exceeding its budget. So I commend my friend, the chairman, for his efforts and leadership. When outlays from prior-year BA and other adjustments are taken into account, the bill totals $34.1 billion in BA and $34 billion in outlays. For general purpose activities as well as crime funding, the bill is at the Senate subcommittee's 302(b) allocation for both budget authority and outlays. I ask members of the Senate to refrain from offering amendments which would cause the subcommittee to exceed its budget allocation and urge the speedy adoption of this bill. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that a table displaying the Budget Committee scoring of the bill be printed in the Record.