J. Exon

Mr. EXON

Mr. EXON. I would not object to yielding. I would simply say that this is a very difficult position that I am in. We have plenty of time, but we have an awful lot of Senators wanting to make a speech that I think is very, very important. Therefore, I do not believe I would be interested in yielding any significant amount of time because there have been several Senators that I have stacked up waiting now. How much time would it take to ask the question of the Senator from Massachusetts?

Mr. EXON. I will be pleased to yield whatever time is necessary equally off the 10 hours.

Mr. EXON. Mr. President, I have listened with great interest to my friend and colleague giving his opening remarks in the debate. I would simply thank him for his kind comments, and I agree that we have worked together as friends, not always agreeing on all of the issues but at least we will continue in the future to work together, and eventually that relationship might be the basis for some kind of a workable compromise that obviously is going to have to come about, hopefully sooner than later. Mr. President, since this budget was unveiled last spring--and we are just now looking at the final details of it that were presented to us for the first time last night as numbers were concerned--we happen to feel that the Republicans are asking the American people a question that was once made famous by Groucho Marx. Groucho said, ``Are you going to believe what you see or what I'm telling you?'' The American people see a budget that is unfair. They see a budget that showers tax breaks for those living on Easy Street but punishes those slogging it out on Main Street. They see a budget that bestows bucks to the wealthy but passes the buck to working Americans. They see the Republicans pledge to their Contract With America but break the promise of Medicare made to American seniors 30 years ago. They see a budget totally out of tune with the values of fairness and reasonableness that they hold so very dear. But to this day the Republicans keep trying to spin this budget, blurring its hard edges and test marketing its language as if it were a new brand of cereal. But the American people can see through it all. The American people see that the Republicans have gone too far, too fast, and the American people are right. I have spent as much time as any Senator arguing for a balanced budget and working for one. It has been an article of faith with this Senator. It has been an article of faith with this Senator and many others on this side of the aisle who are in general agreement with many Senators on the opposite side of the aisle in this regard. I must say, though, that one of my biggest disappointments has been our inability to pass a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution. But there is a way, Mr. President, there is a right way to do it and there is a wrong way to balance the budget. Regardless of where it originates, it must be fair, and it must have shared sacrifice. This Republican budget falls flat in that regard. The ugly truth about this extremist Republican budget is that it has no semblance of balance. The overwhelming majority of the mandatory reductions come from only two areas--the first are the means-tested programs that serve primarily low- and moderate-income Americans. The second is Medicare, where three-fourths of the beneficiaries have incomes under $25,000 a year. Under this budget, ordinary Americans will pay more through higher premiums in Medicare, through higher student loan fees, through higher contributions for the GI bill benefits, and through cuts of a major magnitude, through cuts of a major magnitude in the earned-income tax credit. The Republicans keep turning the screws tighter and tighter and tighter on the ordinary Americans while opening the spigot of tax breaks for the wealthy. The $270 billion in Medicare reductions are extreme. It is far more, far more than the $89 billion needed to retain solvency of the trust fund as recommended by the trustees. Obviously, when the Republicans had to make a choice between doing right for our parents and doing right for the rich, they, unfortunately, decided to soak it to our seniors to the benefit of the wealthiest of Americans. That is one of the main points that we are most concerned about with regard to this budget rescission that will be vetoed, fortunately, by the President. The same is true with approximately $165 billion in Medicare reductions. How many of our most vulnerable neighbors will lose all of their health insurance? No one knows for sure but estimates have run as high as 12 million Americans will lose. Rural America's fragile health care system could be shattered through the combined Medicare and Medicaid reductions. Yes, the fix is in for distribution of the tax breaks. If you are making under $30,000 a year, your taxes are going to go up. The events of the past week are an absolute disgrace and do not bode well, unfortunately, for the future. The extremists have obviously hijacked the Republican Party, especially in the House, where there is no semblance of reason, fairness, or proportion. The House Republicans bared their fangs and they also bared their souls. No wonder the American people believe that Republicans have gone too far and way too fast. What our Nation needed was a simple extension, just this last week, a simple extension of the continuing resolution and the debt limit, a short-term bridge, one might say. What we got from the House were two bills loaded with so much junk that they looked like a truck from the Beverly Hillbillies. So what happened? The Government, unfortunately, is shutting down and default looms. The Republican majority seemed ready to turn Uncle Sam into a deadbeat dad. What the Republicans did not tell the American public is that their very own budget reconciliation bill will require that the debt ceiling be raised from the present $4.9 to $6.7 trillion by the year 2002. And one of the biggest reasons for jacking up the national debt by $1.8 trillion is to help pay for the $245 billion break in taxes for the wealthy. Every dollar, every dollar for tax breaks, will have to be borrowed or found from some other source, and the American people will have to cover the ever-increasing cost resulting from it in the form of interest. Since the Republicans clearly need the debt ceiling to be raised to accommodate their budget, why, oh, why, then, did we have to go through this charade of the last week? The answer is an old one. Unfortunately, it is politics. The Republicans are trying to twist the arm of the President of the United States into accepting an unacceptable budget, which the President will not do. They are willing to push this country over the edge just to gain better purchase in upcoming negotiations. That is unacceptable also to this Senator. And I believe unacceptable to the American people. In spite of all this acrimony over the past month, I still am not without hope. The essayist C.S. Lewis once said that ``Our friends are not necessarily people who agree with us, they are people asking the same questions.'' I feel that way about many of my friends on the other side of the aisle, especially my friend and colleague for so many, many years, the distinguished chairman of the Budget Committee, Senator Domenici. For many years we have been asking the same questions about how to balance the budget. Our time on the Budget Committee goes way back to those days when I first came here, when Senator Muskie of Maine was here and Senator Henry Bellmon was the ranking Republican on the Budget Committee. And I must say that I think looking back to those days, we both had great respect for Senator Muskie and for Senator Bellmon. And I think by and large during our tenure as the leaders of our two parties on the Budget Committee, Senator Domenici and I, with our differences, have had to try and carry on that bipartisan spirit as best we could. For many years then, we, Senator Domenici and I, have been asking the same questions about how to balance the budget. This time we came to different answers. But in the weeks ahead we may come to an agreement because I say to all once again, when all the dust clears, and when all the rhetoric is over, then we are going to have to do the true heavy lifting by getting a budget that can pass the House and the Senate and a budget that will not be vetoed and will be happily signed by the President of the United States. That is going to be an enormous task under the obvious difficulties that face us. But in the weeks ahead, I suggest we must come to agreement. In closing, Mr. President, we should not view compromise as a weakness. I have always viewed it as a sign of leadership and a sign of maturity. And I believe that is the way the American people understand it. We know this bill will be vetoed by the President. And in spite of the bullying and in spite of the ultimatums, there is no way the President will sign it. To this Senator the first compromise is clear, and it is compelling. The need is there. We must get together and respond as quickly as we can. Both sides can continue this trench warfare as long as they want, leaving a scorched and desolate landscape. But in the end the heavy lifting, the compromise, mutual understandings are going to have to be reached, and I will be a part of that. If we do not do that, Mr. President, we are going to continue the chaos that we see in America today with the close down of the Government. Mr. President, I will do all that I can, everything in my power, to help facilitate that process. And I am standing ready once again to do whatever I can to bring a measure of understanding to this body and hopefully in the other body to get on with the budget that is not going to be perfect, but a budget that could be workable and a budget that I feel can be formulated to balance the income and the outgo of the Federal Government in 7 years, as the chairman of the committee has so often stated is a necessity. Mr. President, I yield the floor. Mr. GORTON addressed the Chair.

Mr. EXON

Mr. EXON. Mr. President, I yield 2 minutes to the Senator from Rhode Island.

Mr. EXON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a list of Byrd rule violations contained in the reconciliation conference report. This list has been prepared by the Democratic staff of the Senate Budget Committee. It is my opinion that each of these provisions violates section 313 of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974.

Mr. EXON

Mr. EXON. Mr. President, was there an objection?

Mr. EXON. Madam President, I reserve the remainder of my time.

Mr. EXON. Mr. President, I have been fascinated and horrified by the press reports about the horse trading that went on to win the support for the Republican budget. I am not speaking about wooing recalcitrant Republicans who strayed from the party line. No, I am looking at some of the sweeteners that were loaded into this bill to keep the medical establishment at bay and to pay the American Medical Association for their support of the Republican budget. This conference report is groaning with extraneous giveaways to the medical establishment. They do not only violate the Byrd rule, but they violate every sense of decency and fair play. The conference report exempts physicians' offices and laboratories from the Clinical Laboratory and Improvement Act of 1988. It is clear that this is a violation of the Budget Act. It is extraneous, in addition to being bad policy. Antitrust regulations are turned on their heads in this conference report just to boost physicians' salaries. The conference report exempts certain groups of health care providers from the most basic antitrust violations against price fixing. This is also a violation of the Budget Act and is likely to impair competition and raise costs for non-Medicare health care purchasers. It is appalling that when our seniors, our poor, our disabled, and our children are being asked to sacrifice basic health care, the Republicans are trying to enlarge special interest giveaways to the Nation's physicians. The provisions do not belong in this fast-track reconciliation bill and are a violation of the Byrd rule. I urge my colleagues to vote against the motion to waive this well-founded point of order. Madam President, at this time, I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. EXON

Mr. EXON. Was the Democratic leader aware, on the projection idea, as to what economic growth has come about? Economic growth is what the article that has been referred to by many Senators this morning with regard to the Wall Street Journal--the economic growths that were predicted both by OMB and CBO, as a result of the President's actions, came at this level. Notice they are almost parallel.

Mr. EXON. I am asking a question. I am asking a question.

Mr. EXON. I am asking if the majority leader knew that, in addition to the other chart, on this particular chart the numbers were far, far more than either CBO or OMB had estimated? [[Page S 17120]]

Mr. EXON. May I ask this question of the Democratic leader? Was the Democratic leader aware, as a response to the question asked by the Senator from Alaska, that the reason that we are questioning these projections are that this chart showed very clearly that after the President's deficit-reduction bill, which was projected by both CBO and OMB to be in the range of $275 billion, very close, actually the deficit reduced dramatically less than that, clear down to the $175 billion level? Was the Democratic leader aware of that?

Mr. EXON. One more thought that maybe the Senator from Alaska or the Democratic leader indicated----

Mr. EXON. Will the Senator from North Carolina yield for just 30 seconds while the majority leader is on the floor so we can maybe move to some kind of tentative agreement?

Mr. EXON. I thank my friend. Again, I will proceed with my remarks. I was saying, Mr. President, I was disappointed in the fact that we have delay upon delay upon delay, and we are going through charades, as we are going through today on this continuing resolution that is going to be passed, very likely, and vetoed by the President. So this is an exercise in futility, unfortunately, at a time when the Nation is wanting. I simply say, Mr. President, that in negotiations during the last few days, myself and others have been pleading, and the administration has been pleading, with the Republican majority to just give us a clean continuing resolution. By ``clean,'' I mean every extraneous measure, or thought, or condition, or concept would be thrown off, and we would just have a continuing resolution for 24 hours, or 48 hours. That was rejected. I was mystified by that because I could not understand how any reasonable group of people, regardless of their political affiliation, would not agree that it was wise to continue the normal functions of Government, at least for a short period of time, while we continued to negotiate. I now understand why we were turned down flatly on what would appear to any reasonable person as the course of action which could be taken. It was because the Speaker of the House of Representatives, and others, clearly had in their hip pocket this new, ludicrous plan that they knew it would not open up Government once again, but it might give them, on a political scale, some advantage, or an up-bump in the polls that have been quite devastating to the Speaker and others in the last few weeks. The measure before us today is a farce. It is game playing. It is not the way to do business, and it is not doing business; it is playing politics. Grown-ups know that it is a childish game to shut down the Government in order to blackmail the President into accepting extreme measures, the extreme Republican budget, and trying to make excuses for why they are doing it. The sad part is that this game has real consequences to real people. Hundreds of thousands of Federal workers do not know whether they are going to be able to pay their bills. Thousands of Americans who are entitled to sign up for Social Security are not able to do so because no one is at work to process the new legitimate claims. Thousands of veterans who should be signing up for new benefits that they have earned are not able to do so because Government is not on the job. Thousands of Federal contractors are not being paid, but the Government has agreed to pay them. According to press reports, for example, Mr. President, 39 illegal immigrants--I repeat, Mr. President, according to press reports, 39 illegal immigrants--were detained, as they should have been, and sent on their merry way, smiling and laughing on Tuesday because the Government was shut down. It left the Immigration and Naturalization Services shorthanded. Another matter, the Colorado State Police stopped a van, called INS, and was informed they would be unable to investigate because they lacked the manpower to do so because the staff had been furloughed. This is no way to run the Government. What we should do is pass a clean continuing resolution to allow the Government to serve the people, pay its bills, and do so in a timely fashion. That is our duty. The majority wants to set the terms for the coming negotiations on the deficit reduction bill. All this political posturing about how to do the big deficit reduction bill is just a transparent attempt, I suggest, to coerce the President to weakening his negotiating position before--before--negotiations even begin. The responsible thing to do, of course, would be to pass a clean continuing resolution for either a shorter or a longer number of days and allow the Republicans to get the extreme budget proposals that they are pushing out of their system, because they are not going to prevail. We should let the President go ahead and veto these bills, which is what he is going to do, and then and only then start some real serious negotiations where people of good will can sit down and say, ``We are not, any of us, going to get exactly what we want.'' Through negotiations and compromise, we can do our job as we were sent here to do. In these real negotiations, everything should be on the table. Let me repeat that, Mr. President, because that is not the mode that we are operating under now. In these real negotiations to come that I am quite prepared for at this time, and will have some recommendations to make at the proper time that I think might be an important step toward bringing us together--bringing us together--these real negotiations have to start with everything being laid on the table. Otherwise, we will not get anything done. The length of time it takes to balance should be on the table, along with everything else. The economic assumptions that we use should be on the table. What do we need to make the extreme cuts in Medicare that the Republicans advocate should be on the table, and will be on the table. At least I am pleased that the Republicans at this very late hour have taken the Medicare matter off the table temporarily. Also on the table should be whether we want to give tax breaks to the wealthiest among us. That has to be on the table. Let me tell my colleagues, I have run the numbers on this budget and I have been trying to figure out a way to get to a balanced budget. I do not agree with the White House with regard to a 7-year budget. I think we can come to agreement to balance a budget by 7 years. I believe under the proper circumstances we would be able to convince the President to sign such a measure if we can put everything on the table and if we can sit down as adults and reach a compromise. I must say, Mr. President, that if the Republicans continue to insist--I repeat this, if the Republicans continue to insist--on a $245 billion tax break for the wealthy, and if they continue to insist on using CBO assumptions only and purely, there is no way that we can get to a balance in 7 years without extreme and deep cuts in Medicare, in nursing home care, nursing homes, and in education. We hold out the hand, the offer of compromise, once again. After we get [[Page S 17106]] through with this ridiculous exercise that is going nowhere today, maybe we can get to that point tomorrow or the next day or the day after that. I am proud, and the President is right to oppose such a budget. I support him in that. Passing of the continuing resolution that has just been offered to us from the House of Representatives would tie the President's hands to such an extent that it would be almost impossible to start meaningful negotiations on a compromise. Therefore, I will strenuously oppose this continuing resolution and hope that we can move it along to a fair and honest role that can pass both Houses and receive the President's signature, and stop this charade and game playing. I yield the floor.

Mr. EXON. The Senator from Alaska's question was a very good one, and this chart answers it directly. I am confident that the Senator from Alaska did not know about this. He seems to think that the projections of both CBO and OMB are infallible. This chart indicates the opposite and indicates and answers the question of what has happened to projections. You will note on this particular chart that President Clinton delivers on deficit reduction. When we passed----

Mr. EXON. Would you kindly direct the Senator from Pennsylvania to follow the rules?

Mr. EXON. Let me further inquire of the chairman of the Appropriations Committee, with whom I have worked very long and very well over the years. I believe that the Senator from Oregon has been on the Appropriations Committee nearly all of the time he has served with great distinction in the U.S. Senate. Does the Senator from Oregon ever recall a time when we have been this far behind in passing appropriations bills, regardless of what the reason was for the delay?

Mr. EXON. I yield 30 seconds to the Senator.

Mr. EXON. Charge it to my time. I advise the Senate that as far as I am able to ascertain at this time on this side of the aisle, we have the amendment pending, offered by the minority leader. There will be a second amendment by the minority leader, and there will be an amendment offered by the Senator from South Carolina. I would simply say at this time, in order to give us some idea of where we are going, we want to move in an expeditious fashion. How much time, when we get to the amendment that will be offered by the Senator from South Carolina, how much time does he think he would need to further explain his amendment, in addition to the time he has just used?

Mr. EXON. I ask the majority leader, are there any amendments or second-degree amendments that he is aware of on his side of the aisle?

Mr. EXON. The Senator from Alaska----

Mr. EXON. Let me first respond to the remarks just made. Why it is necessary that we use realistic assumptions? That is because we are overpenalizing Medicare, we are overpenalizing students, we are overpenalizing people who receive Medicaid. If we are realistic in our assumptions, we do not have to hurt people as much. Also being overlooked by those who talk the argument we have to stay with CBO is the obvious fact that they talk about paying for this in later years. If you look at the Republican budget, you see that they delay all of the hard choices to the fifth, sixth and seventh years. Mr. President, the amendment before us is simple and direct. It will put the Government back to work. It would allow time for negotiations on the larger budget bill which is going to definitely be tough going, but we need to reduce the deficit. That is the responsible thing for us to do: Adopt the Daschle amendment. The underlying bill will be vetoed. The underlying bill tries to stack the deck against the President in negotiations to come. The underlying bill is an attempt to force the President to accept the extreme cuts in Medicare and Medicaid and education in the Republican budget bill. It is blackmail, very pure and very simple. The President will use his veto, and properly so, to prevent that from happening. The President would sign this bill as amended by the pending amendment. So the choice is clear. If Senators want to pass a bill that the President can sign to keep the Government running, then Senators should vote for this amendment. A vote against this amendment is simply a vote to continue the shutdown. If we are to act responsibly, we must adopt the pending amendment.

Mr. EXON

Mr. EXON. If I understand the amendment, then, offered by the Democratic leader, that we just talked about, it provides for balancing the budget by the year 2002; and then second and equally important it says that, if we have a tax cut, that tax cut would be limited to only American families making less than $100,000 a year? So if you made over $100,000 a year you would not get any tax cut, if we have one. If we do have a tax cut all of it goes to those making $100,000 or less, is that correct?

Mr. EXON. Then the Republican charge that I have heard over and over and over again, that the Democrats simply do not want to balance the budget in 7 years, is blown pretty much sky high with the amendment that you have offered on behalf of the minority?