Gil Gutknecht

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. I am delighted to have the gentleman. As the gentleman was talking I was thinking about growing up in the 1950s, baby boomers. I tell the story often that when I graduated from college, the speaker at our commencement address was the director of the United States Census. Most people do not remember who spoke at their college commencement ceremonies, but I remember and I remember what he talked about. At the time I was 22 years old. He said, ``Most of the people in this audience are 22 years old and most of you were born in 1951. There were more babies born in 1951 than any other single year. You are the peak of the baby boomers.'' In many respects when the gentleman and I came here as baby boomers and as members of the new Republican majority, I think we came here understanding that we had a special place in history and we had a special responsibility. As baby boomers, I look at this and I look at welfare reform, I look at Medicare reform and saving Social Security and balancing the budget for our kids, I really see those issues in some respects as generational fairness and generational responsibility. Because both of my parents are living, I want to make certain that they are taken care of, I do not want to pull the rug out from under them in terms of Medicare or Social Security. On the other hand, I have 3 kids and I look at them and I say what kind of a country are we going to leave them? Is it going to be a country that is filled with debt, dependency, despair? Is it going to be a country where all the decisions are made for people in Washington? I say, we have an opportunity to make a real difference. I think that is the reason that I ran, I think that is the reason the gentleman ran for the Congress, because I think the American people in many respects have been way out in front of us for a long time. The gentleman talked about polls. It is always nice to talk about polls we like, and sometimes we ignore the polls we do not. But I think we all instinctively know deep down in our bones that the American people have been asking for, indeed demanding, that Congress live within its means, that they begin to return more of the power, more of the responsibility, more of the resources back to the local communities, because they know that Washington does not do it best. They read stories every day, whether it is a $400 toilet seat or whether it is money wasted in Bosnia or whether it is money wasted on other things, and they look at the welfare system and say, ``This is just a big waste. All you're really doing is encouraging people to be increasingly more irresponsible.'' We look at all the statistics and the evidence and Washington has failed. I am not saying that. The American people are saying that. In the end, though, as the gentleman was talking, especially thinking about my parents and the gentleman's parents and that generation, in the end a lot of this debate is really about values. I think that in many respects, what really makes this whole country work, I have had a lot of discussions and I have thought a lot about this, that a value is something that you believe in strongly enough that it will get you to take action. Because if you say you believe in something and you do not do something about it, you really do not believe in it. There are certain values that I think have made this country work. Literally from that day at Valley Forge to today, there are certain values that make this society work and that are the glue that holds us together. I think if I were to reduce it to about 5, I would say it is faith, family, work, thrift, and personal responsibility. The unfortunate thing about the liberal welfare state, in my opinion, is they tended to undermine some of those values. In other words, if you pay people not to work, you undermine the work ethic. If you tell people that you cannot receive benefits through a faith-based system, you undermine faith. And if you undermine the family, if you give people their own apartment and encourage them to leave home and have babies out of wedlock, you undermine the real cornerstone, the real glue that holds this society together, and that is the American family. And so I think the American people sort of knew and they still know that there is something wrong with this system that eats away at the very fiber, the very values, the glue that holds a society together, and they wanted something done about it. In that respect, I do not think they look at us and say, well, we want you to have all the answers. What they really say is give us more of the power and the decisionmaking back. That is what this tax plan is about. I will tell a quick story. Going home last weekend, I am on the Committee on the Budget, I am proud to be a part of this Congress and I was proud to be a part of the 104th Congress as well, because I think we are beginning to turn this giant battleship around and we are beginning to sail it in the right direction. We have still got problems and we still make mistakes. I told some people the other day that we recruit from the human face and we are subject to human frailties and we make mistakes. We have made plenty and we will make more. But I think on balance we are doing the right things and we are heading in the right direction. We are beginning to reinforce values, encourage Government accountability and encourage personal responsibility. We are starting to say, maybe there is a place for faith-based systems, whether we are talking about education, about welfare delivery, about something else. Again, we do not have all the answers, but I think we are moving in the right direction. I am proud to be a part of this Congress, I was proud to be a part of the Committee on the Budget that put this package together. If I could, I would like to share a story. When I was going home this weekend, the Committee on the Budget met until about 7:30 Friday night, so I could not catch the last plane to go back to Rochester, MN. I flew back on Saturday morning. I did something that I do not do very much anymore, and I used to like to do this. Just look out the window. You are flying in an airplane, sometimes it is just nice to look out the window and daydream and think a bit. So I did that on the flight home. As I was flying, I looked down at this great country, and I began to think about all the great people who live here. This is a great country. It is filled with great people, and people with great dreams and people who were willing to take risks and risk their fortunes and perhaps build a business. When I got home and my wife picked me up at the airport, we were driving home, we got to our neighborhood, about a block and a half from our house and one of our neighbors down there was having a garage sale. There was a family, they were getting out of their car and going up to this garage sale. They had used clothing and everything that goes on at garage sales. This family had four children. There were three older kids and there was one, one of those little chubbers, if the gentleman knows what I mean, that is sort of permanently attached to mom's hip. Mom was carrying the littlest one up to the garage sale. The others were running up. As we drove by, I thought, in this budget, we talk about numbers, $139 billion and 2.7 percent and all the other numbers, but in the end this budget and this tax bill is about real people. It is about real families. I thought about that family. To them, this tax bill means a lot. First of all to their kids it means a brighter future. It means that those kids have a better chance at the American dream. It means that we are not going to saddle them with debt that they will never be able to pay. But to that family itself, four kids, that is $2,000. I know, some of the people who are here in Washington, $2,000 does not seem like a lot of money, but to that family driving that car, going to that garage sale, $2,000 is a lot of money. That is money they can spend on their family, that they can save for their future. Then we think about the tax advantages as it relates to their education, for those kids' higher education. This is a very important tax bill for them. When we get involved in these debates here in Washington and we are talking percentages and billions of dollars, we sometimes forget all those people who live in this great country, all those people who take risks, all those people who invest, all those people who have families. Forty-one million children will benefit from this tax plan. I am proud of that. I think it is going to make a difference. I think it is going to mean a brighter future for those kids and for our country in general.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, perhaps I will not take the entire hour. There may be some colleagues coming down to join me in this special order tonight. I want to talk a little bit about where we have been as a country; in other words, where we were, where we are and where we are going. Mr. Speaker, it is my observation that for 40 years Washington had it wrong. For 40 years Congress thought that Washington knew best, that big bureaucracies could solve social problems. And so for 40 years, spending increased at double the inflation rate, taxes went up faster than the family's income, the debt ballooned and social problems got worse. Washington had it wrong. Washington waged a war on poverty. We spent over $5 trillion on a war on poverty. But, Mr. Speaker, I encourage you to take a walk through any burned-out inner city, and you will see the victims of that war on poverty. I ask you to ask yourself, who won the war on poverty? No, I think Washington had it wrong. Washington overtaxed those who worked hard and, as some say, played by the rules. They squandered much of it on top-heavy programs that did little but breed more dependency. When I was a child growing up and my parents raised three boys, I was the oldest of the three, my father was the sole breadwinner in our family. He worked in a factory. I am a blue collar kid. When I was growing up in the 1950's, the largest payment that the average family made was the house payment. In fact, families back then could afford to raise their kids on one paycheck, because the largest payment they made was the house payment. In fact, taxes back then averaged something like, Federal taxes, less than 4 percent of the family's income. But today, according to the National Taxpayers Union, the average family in America today spends more for taxes than they do for food, clothing, and shelter combined. No, I think Washington had it wrong. They thought if we took more money from families who were doing the right things and gave it to people who perhaps were doing the wrong things, we could solve those problems. And Washington was just wrong. We encouraged more irresponsibility, and we discouraged personal responsibility. I want to show a chart here, because I had my staff do a little research. And it is something that I had suspected for a long time and I think this chart confirms it. What it shows is that since 1975, for every dollar that the Congress took in, and these red lines are really how much more the Congress was spending than it took in, for every dollar that they took in, for example, I think in the year 1976, for every dollar that Washington took in it spent $1.23. The following year they got a little more frugal and dropped to $1.15. But if you take the averages from 1975 until 1994, for every dollar that Washington took in, it spent $1.21. The good news is that since the Republicans took control of Congress, and these are the blue lines over here, that number has dropped to $1.08. And when we enact the budget that we voted on today here in the House and when that budget is finalized, we, in fact, will be spending 99 cents for every dollar that we take in. And we are laying the foundations for actually paying off the national debt. So things are changing here in Washington. As my colleague, the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Neumann], who put this chart together with the help of the House Committee on the Budget and the Congressional Budget Office, what it shows is that we have come a long way. Since the days when we consistently spent $1.20 for every dollar that we took in, right now we are actually ahead of budget, ahead of our goal and under budget. And what we see in the red lines, this was our 1995 budget plan, the 7-year plan that we put in effect 2 years ago when those of us came here in the 104th Congress and decided to change the way Washington does business. What we said was, in fiscal year 1997 we would have a deficit of $174 billion. Now that is a lot of money. But when I first came to Washington, some people were saying that we could actually be seeing deficits of something like $274 billion. Well, there is a lot of good news. Because what has really happened, because we have had a stronger economy and because we eliminated about $50 billion worth of wasteful Washington spending, because we have begun to limit the growth in entitlements, because we are actually doing what the American people had wanted Congress to do for 40 years, we are ahead of schedule and under goal. As a matter of fact, in our budget resolution of 1995 we said that the Congress would spend no more than $1,624 billion. That is still a lot of money. But we said that is the most we would spend in fiscal year 1997. Well, the good news is that we are actually going to spend only $1,622 billion. In other words, this Congress is actually going to spend less money than we said we would spend in this fiscal year 2 years ago. Now that is the good news. And that news gets even better. Because the economy has been stronger than we expected, we have actually taken in over $100 billion more than we expected to take in; and, as a result, rather than having a $174 billion deficit this year, it is actually going to be less than $70 billion. If we stay on that path and we have that kind of fiscal discipline, I believe that this Congress will balance the budget not by the year 2002 but actually by the year 2000. I think there are good economic reasons to believe that that is going to happen. The best news is that we are balancing the budget while saving Medicare and providing significant tax relief for working families here in the United States. As I mentioned earlier, we are also laying the foundations for actually paying off that debt, making Social Security truly secure, and leaving our kids a debt-free future. Now I would like to talk a little bit about some of the things, and there is going to be a real heated debate, and already there is a heated debate about what actually is in the tax relief package. I think the more the American people begin to understand what we are really talking about in terms of tax relief for working families and what it will do in terms of spurring more economic growth and growing the economic pie even more, I think the American people are going to overwhelmingly support this tax relief package. First of all, the cornerstone of this tax relief package includes a $500-per-child tax credit. Now that is a credit, and I think a lot of the people do not understand the difference between a credit and a deduction. In other words, if you have three children under the age of 18, you are going to get $1,500 more to spend. That is take-home pay that you get to keep and spend on your family as you see fit, not as some Washington bureaucracy dictates or decides for you. There is $35 billion in post-secondary education incentives. I can say this: As a baby boomer and a father who has one in college right now and two teenagers that I hope will go on to post-secondary education of some kind, that is real relief. That means real things to real families, $35 billion to encourage families, to make it easier for families to send their kids to post-secondary education options. I think that is a great component in this plan. There is also a broad-based capital gains tax relief. Now some of our friends on the left talk about capital gains and they say that is tax cuts for the rich. Well, in some respects, maybe they are right. In fact, back in my southern Minnesota district I have a lot of farmers and small business people, and they understand capital gains tax relief more than anybody else. They do understand that many people who pay a capital gains tax are rich for 1 day: the day they sell their farm, the day they sell their business, or the day that they sell an asset or some investment that they have held for a long period of time, and in most cases they have been paying taxes on that farm or that business or that investment all along the way. So capital gains taxes are about encouraging families to save and invest for their own future. I think it was Abraham Lincoln that said that ``You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.'' If we make it more and more difficult for people to invest and save, it means that we are going to reduce the amount of capital in our economy, and that means ultimately fewer jobs. So capital gains tax relief is about encouraging people to invest and save for their own future, and it is about growing this economy so we have more jobs for the people who really need them. We also expand the individual retirement accounts and make it easier for people to save for their future that way. We have significant reduction in the death taxes. Now some people are saying, well, this is not as good as it should be; and I guess we would have to agree. But it is a giant step forward in saying that just because you die does not mean the Federal Government has a right to step in and take up to 55 percent of your estate. So those are the basic components of the tax relief package that we are talking about. This package is aimed directly at America's middle- income wage earners. There is going to be an awful lot of rhetoric and misinformation spread about what is in this tax bill. But the best information that we have, according to the House Committee on Ways and Means, and I think it is backed up by the Congressional Budget Office, is that those who are earning under $20,000 will get about $5.5 billion worth of tax relief under our plan. Families between $20,000 and $75,000 worth of income are going to get 83.5 percent. Families that make between $75,000 and $100,000 will get about $19.3 billion, and those making over $200,000 will get $1.4 billion. If you divide that up, just simple arithmetic, take a calculator to it, you can work this out back in your office or do it in your home, but what it really means is that over 75 percent of the tax relief that is in this tax relief package that we will vote on tomorrow on the floor of this House will go to families earning less than $75,000. Now I know there are some people who say those folks are rich. But those who may be watching at home do not consider themselves to be rich. It is targeted at middle-class people. Let us talk about saving the Medicare system from bankruptcy. One of the other problems we realized when we came here, when I came here in 1994, was that Medicare was in trouble and that if we did not take some serious action, according to the trustees of the Medicare trust fund, they said that the Medicare trust Fund was going to go bankrupt in only a few years. So we said, well, what can we do? Well, one person once said that insanity is doing more of what you have always done and expecting a different result. What Washington always used to do when they had a problem with health care or anything else, they would figure out a way to crank down on fees. If price controls had worked, well, I think Richard Nixon would have solved inflation back in the 1970's with his price control program, but price controls do not work. What does work is the magic of the marketplace. We said, let us try to figure out ways to take some of the ideas that are working so well in the free market system, out where we are seeing inflation in the health care delivery system dropping to 2 and 3 percent, why can we not take some of those ideas, use competitive forces, give people more choices and actually use the miracle of the marketplace to help control cost? That is exactly what we have done. But inside of that we are still allowing total Medicare expenditures under our plan to go from $5,480 per recipient, in other words, per senior citizen spending will be from $5,400 per senior citizen to almost $7,000 per senior citizen in the year 2002, in other words, in less than five years. What we are really assuming, though, we are not cutting Medicare but we are slowing the rate of growth. We are slowing the rate of growth, and that ultimately will yield savings of about $115 billion. But most importantly, we are going to provide more choices to more seniors. In fact, what I like to say to some of my folks is, we want to give seniors wherever they live the same kinds of choices that Members of Congress and Federal employees receive. If we structure this thing correctly, we think we are going to see lots of choices for these seniors. One other important thing we have done, and I worked very hard on this and a lot of folks from other parts the United States have worked on it, we tried to change what is called the AAPCC formula and we made tremendous progress there. What that really means is, for those people who live in rural parts of the country, they are going to get closer to the same kind of payments for their managed care system if they decide to join managed care operations as those people that live in the big cities. After all, that is only basic fairness, because those people that live in Mankato, Minnesota pay exactly the same taxes as someone who lives in Miami, Florida. So there is real fairness in this Medicare reform plan that we are putting forward, as well as reform which ultimately we believe will yield big savings while offering seniors more choices and actually more benefits. This is another chart about Medicare, where we were, where we are going; and what it demonstrates is, what we are still doing is allowing the growth in spending in Medicare to go up, but at a much slower rate. This Congress recognizes that doing more of the same will only get us in the same soup, so we are talking about real reforms. We are talking about reforms not only of Medicare but of welfare. Last year this Congress passed perhaps the most important welfare reform package that this country has seen, and it was about sending more of the power, the authority, the responsibility and the resources back to the States. As I said earlier, for too long we thought that Washington had all the solutions, that Washington had it right, that Washington knew best, and that somehow Washington could make decisions to try and help people who were trapped in welfare, and all we really did was create more dependency. But as we evolved more of that back to the States, what we have seen is tremendous changes in what is happening in welfare across the country. Let me just give a couple of statistics. My colleague, the gentleman from Florida [Mr. Weldon], is joining me, but I want to give a couple of statistics about what has happened with welfare and the case load since we came to Congress. Nationwide, welfare rolls have dropped by 20 percent. Now, in real numbers that is 1,029,000 fewer families are on welfare today than when we came to Congress. And some of my colleagues and some of our conservative friends out in the audience say, well, that is wonderful because it saves money. Well, the real goal of welfare reform is not saving money; it is about saving people, it is about saving families, and it is about saving children from one more generation of dependency on the welfare system. In Minnesota, for example, 13,000 fewer families are on welfare today than when I came to Congress, and I am proud of that. In Wisconsin, where they have done an even better job, case loads have dropped by 97,000 people. In Oklahoma, case loads have dropped by 45,000. And that story is across every State, where we are seeing that States know best how to reform the system and encourage more personal responsibility. I do have some other things, and I am joined now by the gentleman from Florida [Mr. Weldon], my good friend, the doctor, who came here with me in 1994, in the class of 1994, the 104th Congress. I yield some time to the gentleman.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, we had our Committee on the Budget meeting that went late Friday afternoon, in fact it went well into the evening, and so I missed my flight and I flew home on Saturday. I did something on that flight back to Minnesota that I do not do very often. I looked out the window. I realized what a beautiful country this is, full of hardworking people, as the President says, who play by the rules, who pay their taxes, lots of good Americans. When I got home, we drove back from the airport, there was a garage sale in my neighborhood. There was a family that was piling out of their kind of beat-up car. They had four kids. The youngest one was sort of permanently attached to mom's hip, and I think some of my colleagues know what I am talking about, one of those little chubbers. I thought about our budget agreement, about our tax bill and I said, ``It's for families like that that we did this.'' Because they are going to get $2,000 more to spend themselves, to invest themselves, to do what they want to do. And they are going to get help in terms of educating those kids. When we talk about this tax bill and about this budget plan, it is about preserving the American dream for those kids and it is about allowing those families to keep more, to spend more and save more of their own money.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that when the House adjourns on Saturday, June 21, 1997, it adjourn to meet at 10:30 a.m. on Monday, June 23, 1997, for morning hour debates.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the business in order under the Calendar Wednesday rule be dispensed with on Wednesday next.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. If the gentleman will yield, I think it is interesting to see how much the rhetoric around this building has changed since we first came here. If my colleagues will recall, when we first started talking about balancing the budget in 7 years, there were a lot of people that said we could not balance the budget in 7 years; that it will take at least 8 years, maybe 9, maybe 10. In fact some of us recall seeing the President on several different occasions say, well, maybe we could do it in 9, maybe we could do it in 10. And then there were an awful lot of people here in the body who said, well, maybe we can balance the budget, we might be able to do it in 7 years, but we cannot do it and provide tax relief for American families. That just cannot be done. I think we are demonstrating not only can we balance the budget in less than 7 years, as we first stated, but we can do it while we provide tax relief for American families. I want to point out one other argument we have had here in Congress over the last several years, and that is about saving and securing Medicare, not only for our parents but hopefully into the next generation. All of us are baby boomers, and we want to make certain our fellow baby boomers are not left out completely in the cold as it relates to Medicare. But the debate last year was that we could not offer seniors the kinds of choices that Members of Congress get as it relates to Medicare, and save the system and do all these other things. My colleagues will remember some of the ads run against people like my colleagues and I. I think all three of us were the recipients of some of the advertising and all the negative nay saying about what we were doing to Medicare. But it is interesting that the Medicare plan that we are going to vote on in the Committee on the Budget, hopefully in a few minutes, is essentially the same in both policy and in price tag that, A, was vetoed just a year and a half ago but, more importantly, was demagogued in the last election. So it is really interesting for me to see how much the debate has changed from, A, we cannot balance the budget; B, we cannot balance in 7 years; C, we cannot balance it and give tax relief; and, D, we certainly cannot save Medicare along the way. Well, the beauty of all of that is, as we begin to work on this reconciliation package and this budget agreement between the White House and the Congress and the Republicans and the Democrats, the interesting thing is that virtually everything we talked about 2 years ago is now coming to fruition. We are balancing the budget, we are saving Medicare and, more importantly, we are going to start to lay the groundwork of actually paying off the debt. If I can say one more point, because I have to leave, I know there were an awful lot of children here and there were some on the floor earlier. Sometimes we forget. We start talking about numbers and balancing the budget, and 2.3 and 3.8, and $1624 billion, and all these big numbers. We lose track of what this debate really is about, and what the debate really is all about is preserving the American dream for our kids. Because what was happening in Congress for so many years is that we were mortgaging their future so that we could have more and more Washington spending. And the American people in 1994 said enough is enough, because they understand who can spend the money better. So we are making tremendous progress. We are keeping our promise. We are going to balance the budget no later than 2002. We will provide honest tax relief. And I think in terms of seniors and baby boomers, the other good news is, we are going to save and secure Medicare.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, we heard a lot about it in the last campaign about these draconian cuts. The truth of matter is, we have made some reductions. We eliminated 279 programs here. We replaced the welfare state with the opportunity society. We have had serious, real welfare reform. There have been some serious changes but there have not been the draconian cuts that some of our colleagues on the left have said. Some of the Members who ultimately believe that Washington knows best, their end of that debate is losing. The American people no longer believe that. They believe that the decisions are best left to families and to communities and to States, and that is what we are trying to do, is to send more of the authority, the responsibility and the resources back so they will have more accountability for that money. And as a result we have a stronger economy. There is more consumer confidence. They understand that Washington is limiting the growth of entitlements, that we are cutting some of those duplicative programs, that we are trying to streamline Government and as a result there is more confidence. They see the deficit coming down because revenues to the Federal Government are going up. I hate to steal your numbers here but I love this number so much. If we compare what happened in the past when Congress would take in a dollar, it would spend $1.22. But I think the numbers that we have come up with about what has happened over the last 2 years when we passed our budget resolution in 1995, this Congress, this House said that in fiscal year 1997, we were going to spend $1,624 billion on Government programs. That is still a lot of money. But what has really happened is because of the fiscal discipline, because the demands for welfare and so forth are less, we are actually only going to spend in fiscal year 1997, $1,622 billion. This Congress is actually going to spend less money in this fiscal year than we said we were going to spend just 2 years ago. That is good news. But the news gets even better when we apply what is happening on the revenue side. Because of the growing economy, because we have offered more opportunity to more people, we have actually taken in over $100 billion more than we expected. That is incredibly good news. I guess good news does not always make the national news, but hopefully the American people, without this being a major headline story, are beginning to figure out that this Congress is actually doing what it said it was going to do: It is limiting the growth of Federal spending, it is allowing taxpayers to keep more of their own money. We have a stronger economy, and we are going to apply these additional revenues, rather than to new Federal programs that waste so much, we are going to give a big chunk of that back to the American people and apply some of it to the debt.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I think there is another point that needs to be made. We are working on a chart in my office that demonstrates what a big part of the problem has been. The history has been for about a 20-year period for every dollar that Congress would take in, it would spend about $1.22. In fact many people made the point, I think it is a good one, that the problem was not that the Government was not taking in enough money. In fact one farmer in my district said it so well. He said the problem is not that we are not sending enough money into Washington. The problem is that Washington spends it faster than we can send it in. And that has been the problem, the problem has always been on the spending side because many of those fixed programs involve some kind of, quote, revenue enhancement or tax increase; and for every dollar that tax revenues were supposed to go up, Congress just spent another $1.22, $1.23 of that. And that is the history of this place. I think we want to talk about what is happening now.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I would echo virtually everything that my colleague from Minnesota has just said. I would add that we have had meetings this morning both with the Speaker of the House as well as the chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means, and we have had assurances from both that the ethanol program, as we have known it, will survive, at least through the end of the century. Obviously, we still have our work cut out for us, to continue to resell the benefits of the program, but I think by the time this bill ultimately is settled on in the House, the ethanol program will be saved. I happen to agree. I think ethanol is a great product. I think it is good for the farmer. But more importantly, it is good for our economy, good for our balance of trade and, more importantly, I think, perhaps than anything else, it is good for the environment. I have had assurances from both the Speaker and the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Archer]. I met with him personally not more than an hour and a half ago. He assured me that by the time this bill ultimately is finalized, that the ethanol program will be protected as it is today, at least through the end of the century. We are making progress and our voices are being heard.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize a high school senior in my district in Minnesota for simply telling the truth, even when it hurt. Recently the Elgin-Millville Watchmen provided the Dover-Eyota Eagles in a sectional tournament baseball game. In the fifth inning, Watchmen left fielder Jason Livingston missed a fly ball and saw it barely clear the fence for a home run. The umpire, however, ruled the hit a ground- rule double, thinking it had bounced over the fence. Jason was the only one in position to know exactly what had happened. Without hesitating, he indicated to the umpire that the ball had cleared the fence for a home run. The umpire reversed his call, the Watchmen ended up losing the game, and Jason's baseball career ended that afternoon. Mark Twain once said, ``When in doubt, tell the truth.'' Well, Jason Livingston never had a doubt. He said it was no big deal, he just did what was right. A week after the game, Jason graduated from high school without a baseball trophy. But some things are just more important.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, this afternoon the Subcommittee on Technology will conduct a hearing to review the President's National Bioethics Advisory Commission Report on Cloning. When the President accepted the Commission's report and announced legislation to ban the use of cloning technology to create human beings last Monday, he stated the following, and I quote: Our scientific explorations must be guided by our commitment to human values, to the good of society, to our basic sense of right and wrong. Nothing makes the necessity of that moral obligation more clear than the troubling possibility that these new animal-cloning techniques could be used to create a child. Attempting to create a human being is unacceptably dangerous to the child and morally unacceptable to our society. Creating a child through this new method calls into question our most fundamental beliefs. It has the potential to threaten the sacred family bonds at the very core of our ideals and our society. Mr. Speaker, I commend the President on his remarks, and I intend to support the Cloning Prohibition Act. But how is it, Mr. Speaker, that our President can ban a technique to create a human life but veto legislation banning the grisly procedure known as partial birth abortion?

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me the time. Several weeks ago, myself and the gentleman from Minnesota [Mr. Ramstad] and the gentleman from Minnesota [Mr. Peterson] and the gentleman from North Dakota [Mr. Pomeroy] went to the Red River Valley. It was quite an experience. We got a chance to look into the eyes of those people. And I know this is true all over the United States, but it is especially true in the upper Midwest that if a farmer is hurt, for example, the next day there will be six tractors there to help them do whatever needs to be done. I think that is the spirit of America. We went there and we saw what was happening. And actually, as a result of that visit, there are special provisions in this disaster relief bill that, as far as I know, have never been done; and I think that is good. But in many respects, I was thinking about this earlier today, and this has been perhaps the most frustrating 2 or 3 weeks that I have had since I have been in this Congress. In the Tale of Two Cities, they talk about the best of times and the worst of times, and in many respects, this bill and the way it was put together represents the best and worst of this city. Because I think we all want to help our neighbor, but it is so frustrating when you take three ideas, which I think enjoy overwhelming support, the idea of helping our neighbors when they need the help, I think everyone agrees with that. And I think the notion of having something to make certain that the Government does not shut down, I think that has overwhelming support. And the notion that a census ought to be conducted by real counts rather than guesstimates, again, I think that is a good idea that has overwhelming support. Only in Washington can we take three good ideas that have overwhelming support, put them together, and have gridlock for 3 weeks. So it is the best of times. It is the worst of times. But I am delighted on behalf of the people of Red River Valley, Minnesota, and the Dakotas that this fight is now over and the relief will be on its way. So I thank the Speaker, thank the chairman, and thank the President. Let us get on with the business of the House.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I rise out of frustration today about what is happening with the flood relief money for northwestern Minnesota and the Dakotas. But I am mostly frustrated with some of the rhetoric, and I am very disappointed with the some of my colleagues for trying to turn this into a partisan political issue. Some people say, ``Well, this bill is not perfect.'' Absolutely it is not perfect. There is money in there for the troops in Bosnia. I do not support that. There are a lot of other things in this bill that I do not support. But if I wait for the bill that is perfect, that has only in the bill what I absolutely agree with, we are never going to get a bill. I think the President is being absolutely unreasonable on this because there is money, as I say, in there for Bosnia, there is money in there for parking ramps, there is a lot more money in there, and incidentally, there is money in there that the President did not request. It is money for relocation, and that is very important money for the folks up in the Red River Valley. So if we wait for all the lights to turn green, we are never going to leave the house. Now why is the President holding up this flood relief money? Because he does not like the anti-Government shutdown provision in it. Is there any Member in this body that will stand on this floor and say they want to make certain that we have the chance to close down the Government come October 1? If they believe that, they ought to come to the floor and say that.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I think all of us in business know that good news does not necessarily make news and bad news is always on the front page. But I think there is some good news, especially with respect to the budget, and the interesting thing is not only do most Americans not know this, frankly, I do not think most Members of Congress know this. Back in June 1995, when this House passed its budget resolution, we said that we would spend in fiscal year 1997 $1624 billion and that we would take in, in revenue, about $1,451 billion. Well, that is what we said in June 1995. Let us talk about what really has happened. In fiscal year 1997 we are going to spend $1,622 billion. In other words, Mr. Speaker, this Congress is going to spend less money in fiscal year 1997 than we said we were going to spend just 2 years ago. And the even better news is, because the economy has been stronger and interest rates have been lower, we have taken in an additional $100 billion. Now, when is the last time that Congress took in an extra $100 billion and actually spent less than they said they were going to spend? I think that is great news for the economy, I think it is great news for the American people but, most important, I think it is great news for our children.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I must say, I get a little irritated when the folks on the other side resort to the only card in their deck: class envy. Yes, America, the land of class envy. In the liberal vision, America is not a land of unlimited opportunity, a land where all Americans are encouraged to become as prosperous as their God-given talents and hard work will take them. No; in the liberal vision we do not encourage people to become rich. We must tear them down. No; in the liberal vision of success, it must not be considered the just rewards of hard work; success must be attacked. No; in the liberal vision, instead of serving as a spur to your own success, government must expropriate wealth that others have produced. Mr. Speaker, we reject that liberal vision. Pitting one class against another is destructive, counterproductive and just plain wrong. Cutting taxes on Americans, rich or poor, is nothing more than the belief that Americans should get to keep more of the wealth that they produce.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, next week we celebrate Memorial Day. I rise to commend the residents of Faribault, MN, for their traditional observance of this most sacred holiday. The first observance of Memorial Day by the residents of Faribault, MN, was on May 30, 1869. Under the leadership of the local Grand Army of the Republic post, Capt. J.C. Turner, the post commander, took command and led the soldiers and citizens of Faribault, MN, on the first Memorial Day march. With colors and banners unfurled they marched to three local cemeteries where flags and flowers were placed on the graves of fallen comrades. A ceremony was held with a scripture reading and prayer led by Reverend Dubois. This year the citizens of Faribault and the Rice County Veterans Association will once again participate in community activities, and proudly display the stars and stripes in honor of Faribault's fallen heroes and departed loved ones. The people of Faribault serve as shining examples for their longstanding patriotism and commitment to civic duty.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from Connecticut [Mr. Shays] for yielding me the time. Mr. Chairman, in his immortal poem, ``The People, Yes,'' Carl Sandberg said essentially, ``The will of the people will prevail.'' For many years, and I remember when I was in the State legislature, we would send petitions to the Congress asking them to balance the budget. Finally, we are reaching a point where it is within our grasp, and I think it is a historic and important night. I was interested, in listening to this debate, some of our more liberal friends on this side continue to talk about winners and losers. But I am intrigued because there was a President from Massachusetts a few years ago, and he said that a rising tide lifts all boats. That is what this budget is about. It is not about winners and losers. It is about everybody winning. Under a balanced budget, we will see lower interest rates, we will see stronger economic growth. It is about rising tides for all boats. We talked about projections earlier, and the CBO was wrong. Frankly, they have been wrong more often than they have been right. But the most important thing is, we are ahead of our goal, we are under budget, we are moving in the right direction, and the American people are happy about it. Why? Because they are the biggest winners. The American people understand that. They understand who the winners are; they are, because the size and scope of the Federal Government is going to shrink. I do not know why some of my colleagues on the right, and I have got some more friends over here who say, well, they do not know if they can support it because it does not do enough. Well, ladies and gentlemen, it does a lot. Maybe it is not perfect. This is not a perfect solution. I know some of my colleagues think we should not do this or we should not do that. But this is a compromise, and that is what makes this place work. That is the other reason the American people are happy, because for the first time in a long time we have the Congress and the President working together to balance the budget, to give them permanent tax relief. And they understand this, and our chairman talked about that earlier, that family with three kids that is going to church and they have got the Billy Graham bumper sticker on the back of their car, they are going to be better off under this, and they can figure that out. That family that has got two kids in college or one in college and one about ready to go to college, they are big winners under this. Real entitlement reform. Anyone who has studied the budget for the last 5 years understands that you cannot balance the Federal budget unless you get control of entitlements like welfare and Medicare and Medicaid. With the passage of this budget, we are well down that road. Finally and most importantly, and I think this is a generational equity budget, we save Medicare from bankruptcy for at least 10 years. So, is this budget perfect? No. Is it a giant step in the right direction? Absolutely yes. And the big winners are the American people, American families, but most importantly, American children. Because we begin to lay the foundations in this budget of not only balancing the budget, in my opinion, before the year 2002, but absolutely beginning to pay down the national debt as we go into the next generation. The real winners are the American people, because Government spending as a percentage of the gross domestic product drops from 22\1/2\ percent to 18.9 percent. What does that mean? It means there is going to be more money in the private economy, it means a stronger economy, it means a rising tide. If the American people continue to apply pressure to this Congress, we will stay the course, we will balance the budget, we will allow families to keep more of their money, and most important, we will lay the foundations for actually paying off the national debt. No, this is not the end of the great debate about balancing the budget. It is, however, a historic and very important beginning.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, what if Americans were to ask this question: ``What are the politicians in Washington up to these days?'' If you were to say, ``Oh, they are doing exactly what we told them to do, balancing the budget, cutting our taxes, putting our fiscal house in order,'' if you were to say that, who would believe you? It is time to believe. After 28 years of budget deficits, this Congress has an agreement with the President to balance the budget by 2002, if not later. Four years after the largest tax increase in our history, this Congress has an agreement with the President to change direction and cut taxes. A lot of folks on the other side cried hysterically that we could not balance the budget and cut taxes at the same time. But this agreement does just that. This agreement is the first step in a new direction, government living within its means and tax relief for working families. Let us take this first step and pass this historic balanced budget agreement. Let us do it for our kids.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. We are certainly in a wonderful position. We are given a golden opportunity. We are at relative peace and relative prosperity here in this country. If we cannot balance the budget and save Social Security now, I do not know when we will.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding. I just came from a meeting with our Governor and the rest of the Minnesota delegation to talk about what has been happening in our State. I think we all, from both sides of the aisle, and whether we calls ourselves liberal or conservatives, recognize that there is a need, as the gentleman from Florida a few years ago can attest, when the hurricane came through southern Florida. In some respects, my district has been spared all but just the edges of the serious flooding, but the folks up in northwest Minnesota, it is a devastating thing to have entire cities literally under water. And it is the kind of situation where who would have ever predicted that a relatively small river like the Red River would be 25 feet above flood stage. So I think that we are going to do what we can to make certain we get the aid that we can to those people to begin to rebuild the infrastructure in those areas, but I think there is also a new ethic in this Congress, that we should figure out a way to help pay for that as well out of this budget. That is going to be tough. I know that the gentleman is doing what he can on that front, because I think there is a different ethic, and we will have to say that some projects will have to be delayed because this is a much higher priority project. I also want to, if I could quickly, talk about, and it is not just the people in my area, but I think this is an ethic of Americans all across our country. My wife told me that about 36 hours ago now one of the radio stations in my district announced a program to try to raise some money for the folks up in the Red River Valley and they set a goal of raising $10,000. I think my numbers are correct, that within 24 hours they already had pledges and cash totaling over $21,000. I think that is going to happen all over the upper Midwest. And we are demonstrating that charity begins at home and that we will find people willing to help out. I think that is a great thing. In the bigger picture, I do not think we should say, well, this is a new program, we will just have to add more debt to our grandchildren. There are certainly projects still in the Federal budget that are going to be delayed, that should be delayed in order to pay for this, and we hope that we can figure out ways to offset that spending as well. And I thank your son for being one of those who are volunteering on the sandbag lines. Literally there are thousands of volunteers from Wisconsin and Minnesota, the Dakotas, and all over the upper Midwest helping those people save their homes.

Mr. GUTKNECHT. If the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Neumann] would yield, I think that there are plenty of examples. The gentleman from Wisconsin has illustrated one. But I think perhaps even to the point, we are paying to rebuild villages and countries all over the world; and I think this is one example where we probably have got to rebuild some of our villages and our cities first. It really is a matter of priorities. I applaud the Committee on Appropriations for what it is doing, but I do not think we should get away from the basic goal of balancing the people's books. Partly, as the gentleman says, it is a moral issue. It is not just an accounting exercise, it is about preserving the American dream for our kids. Every time something comes along where we say we want to balance the budget but, we would balance the budget but, we have just got to eliminate those ``yes, buts.''

Mr. GUTKNECHT. To change the subject slightly, there was a Pepsi commercial that used to say life is a series of choices. And really Congress is about making choices. We may have to have some different priorities. It may mean that we will have to delay the purchase of some of the B-2 bombers. It may mean that we are going to have to pull our troops out of Bosnia sooner because we simply cannot afford $2.5 billion a year to keep troops in a country that may or may not ever be at peace with itself. There are a lot of choices that we are going to have to make in this Congress, and they are not easy choices, but I hope that we will not say to people, whether it be in Grand Forks, ND, or East Grand Forks or some of those people who really are suffering that we are not going to help you. I really do think we have to help those people, but then we have got to make the tough choices. And as I think what you are saying is, Congress has got to lead by example as well. We are going to have in the next several weeks a number of tough choices. I would hope that within 2 weeks, this House will have on the floor a budget resolution which will be the blueprint. Hopefully, it will be an agreement between the White House and the Congress. And there are negotiations going on, and we hear rumors that one day they feel like they are close, the next day they are far apart. We really don't know, and they have been very tight-lipped about what exactly the terms and conditions are that are on the table. But we hope there will be an agreement between the White House and the Congress on a budget resolution. But even if there is not, this House is going to have to pass a budget resolution very soon and it is going to mean some tough choices. We are not going to turn our backs on people, and particularly Americans who are desperately in need and then say to other countries and other people around the world, well, sure, Uncle Sam will be there to bail you out. So we are not going to turn our backs on those people who are suffering in the United States and continue to provide unlimited foreign aid to some of these other nations.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that when the House adjourns today, it adjourn to meet at 2 p.m. on Monday next.

Mr. GUTKNECHT

Mr. GUTKNECHT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that when the House adjourns on Monday, April 28, 1997, it adjourn to meet at 12:30 p.m. on Tuesday, April 29, 1997, for morning hour debates.