Fritz Hollings

Mr. HOLLINGS

Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, so many Senators have spoken so eloquently about the loss of Senator Moynihan; but no one has been listened to in their speeches like they listened to our friend in the bow tie with the staccato delivery. Standing in this Chamber, he would overwhelm with his original thoughts, including overwhelming this Senator who had the good fortune to listen to his ideas for all 24 of his years here. The saddest part about losing our friend is we lose him when we need him most. He was the authority on Social Security, just when we need someone to stand up and expose the numbers that these voodoo tax cuts are taking out of the Social Security trust funds. He was the United Nations Ambassador who spoke bluntly, just when we need a guy with an opinion to straighten out those people up in New York. He was the architect who turned Pennsylvania Avenue into a grand boulevard, just when we need someone to figure out how to protect against terrorism and not undo the beauty he brought to this city. Right to the point: he was from the world of intellect, not from the nonsense poll watchers. This Senator will miss the gregarious big man with the biggest of the big ideas, who nevertheless got things done in this Chamber. My wife Peatsy joins me in extending our deepest sympathy to his wonderful wife Elizabeth and their family.

Mr. HOLLINGS

Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, for the fourth time in as many years, the Gospel Choir of Benedict College in Columbia, SC, has won first place in the National Collegiate Choir Competition. This year the choir performed the ``Hallelujah Chorus'' and gospel tunes such as ``We Are At War'' in the competition held in New York City under the sponsorship of the Black Music Caucus of New York. The singers are not only fine musicians, but they are outstanding members of the community--many of them are preparing for some form of service to the church. Although this Senator cannot always carry a tune, having the best choir in the land is a source of great pride to me and my State, and I wish to congratulate all the singers and the choir's director, Mr. Darryl Izzard.

Mr. HOLLINGS

Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, Jean Hoefer Toal, Chief Justice of the South Carolina Supreme Court, has just been recognized by Government Technology Magazine as one of the top 25 leaders from across the Nation who has done the most to bring technology to the public sector. I rise today to congratulate her. We are a small State, much of it rural, and she has been the guiding force for linking the judicial courts in all 46 counties. She is making the county courts, all with their own cases and business, into a truly unified court system so that cases can be managed all across the jurisdictions. After September 11, the Nation saw the importance of a well-connected criminal justice system, and I am proud that my State is leading the way with automation. I know everyone in this body joins me in thanking Chief Justice Toal for bringing this about.

Mr. HOLLINGS

Mr. HOLLINGS. Will the distinguished Senator yield? We had not gotten up to $726 billion. We had it paid for until you-- --

Mr. HOLLINGS

Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, many children face illnesses requiring a hospital visit. This can be a frightening experience and underscores the need to provide quality pediatric health services, while easing the stress children and their families feel. To do just that, the Greenville Hospital System Children's Hospital in South Carolina is celebrating Children and Healthcare Week the week of March 24th with a number of valuable activities. Among the scheduled events are: continuing education classes for medical residents and support staff, an awards ceremony to honor local individuals who have dedicated their lives to pediatric care, a special tribute service to honor children, and special staff appreciation activities conducted by community volunteers. Lack of quality health care should never be an impediment to the long-term success of our children, and I commend Greenville's dedication to this.

Mr. HOLLINGS

Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that further reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, if you turn to page 6 of the budget, you will see that for the fiscal year we are projecting going into the red $484 billion; for 2004, $582 billion; for 2005, $556 billion. So for the 3-year period, that is $1.5 trillion going into the red. That is $1.5 trillion of stimulus. If anybody wants to talk growth, you know dividends and the estate tax are not going to stimulate anything. This is $l.5 trillion of stimulus. The only thing that grows in this budget is the debt. So for those who are responding to the needs of the country, trying to get us to sober up and get back on track and get ahold of ourselves and quit running these horrendous deficits and spending Social Security, vote aye; for those responding to the needs of the campaign, vote no.

Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, the amendment is at the desk as modified.

Mr. HOLLINGS. I ask unanimous consent reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. HOLLINGS. On behalf of Senators Graham of Florida and South Carolina, Senators Byrd, Lieberman, Corzine, Schumer, Murray, Biden, and others, this amendment is to fund the port security provisions that we passed unanimously through the Senate. We had funding at that time. The House would not agree and the law is there. The responsibility and the unfunded mandate is there upon the States. Now they have no emergency dollars and it is an emergency situation. We have to have $1 billion this year and $1 billion next year. I wanted to first take the money from the tax cuts. That was not going to work, and then I was going to remove the caps and I retreated to the 920 offset. We are in a desperate situation. We have to have the money. Last Congress, we passed the Maritime Transportation Security Act of 2002. This landmark bill reflects the first time that the federal government has imposed security requirements on U.S. ports since World War II. People do not ordinarily think about what happens at our ports. They take for granted that goods from all over the world are transported through our ports at minimal cost. However, this system is in jeopardy because security has never been part of the equation, and for the first time, we are requiring shipments to not only be efficient, but efficient and secure. The current situation leaves us in jeopardy, because Al Qaeda could use one of the millions of marine containers that are shipped into the U.S. to carry a dirty bomb, they could also take over an oil tanker and use it as a weapon to attack our coastal cities. The bill we passed last year, the Maritime Transportation Security Act, sets the stage for protecting our nation, and for protecting our homeland. Last year, when we were considering this measure, Senate conferees insisted that we needed a commitment to fund the important requirements and mandates of this act. But until now we have not agreed on how to fund this measure. We implored the administration to come up with their own plan to help us address the vital need to secure our ports and points inland from maritime attack, but they sat on the sidelines. Faced with that inaction, we pushed our colleagues in the House to require user fees on cargo shippers, and on ships, in order to provide funds for security equipment and programs, and to help our first responders plan how they might counteract any attacks. But our friends in the House, primarily those at the Ways and Means Committee, said that it was not a user fee. When we convinced them that it was, they then said that revenues had to originate in the House. After that we said okay, you pass the bill on the House side, and then we will pass your bill in the Senate. Yet the goal post moved further away once again, when the house said that they couldn't agree on any user fee at all, and that the federal government should pay for port security in the budget. In the end, it was more important to pass the maritime security bill, and to impose the security mandates, so we required the Administration to submit their plans for funding port security to Congress within 6 months. Well, this years' budget proposes not one penny for port security! As required by the MTSA, the Coast Guard has begun to survey security at U.S. ports, and preliminary estimates are that we will need 4.8 billion dollars to comply with the mandates. According to a ``Maritime Security Notice'' in the Federal Register of December 30, 2002, the total costs of implementing security in our seaports will reach $6 billion over the next ten years. The first year cost will be $1.4 billion. The costs are broken down by USCG as follows: Vessel security: $1.1 billion over ten years, Facility security: $4.4 billion over ten years, Port Security Plans and Committees: $477 million over ten years. This funding is crucial to the security of our homeland. A recent port security terrorism simulation was conducted by federal, state, and private sector experts to examine the consequences of a seaport attack. Their conclusions were stunning. The simulation indicated that within twenty days of an attack through U.S. seaports, the New York Stock Exchange would halt trading on the Exchange because of restated earnings estimates and shareholder panic. Retailers and manufacturers would be crippled by our inability to reopen U.S. ports so that their inventories could be replenished. Last year, U.S. ports on the west coast were temporarily closed because of labor strikes, economists estimate that this closure cost our economy over two billion dollars a day. And, while we are spending billions of dollars each year to figure out how to shoot missiles out of the sky, we are spending practically nothing to protect against a weapon simply being put into a marine container, and shipped to the United States at a cost of less than three thousand dollars. The economic impact of the closure of just the west coast ports pales in comparison to the economic devastation that would be the reaction to a dirty bomb imported in a container through the Port of Charleston or Philadelphia, or an intentional ship collision with an oil facility along the Houston ship channel, or the scuttling of a vessel blocking the Mississippi River maritime highway. Many Members are from States that would be directly impacted by a maritime terrorist event, and all will be effected by the economic fallout. As demonstrated by the port security simulation, a terrorist event will force the closure of every port in the country, potentially causing the destruction of our economic system before the ports could be cleared and reopened. Currently, we are only inspecting two percent of containers entering the U.S. We need to do better. The consequences are just to great to not provide the badly needed funds to upgrade port security. For example, Tuesday, with the existing military situation and homeland security threat level at ``high,'' the State of South Carolina has been forced to supplement the existing security at the Port of Charleston, and at nuclear power plants, by deputizing and reassigning 400 probation and parole officers. This extra security should be available from security professionals trained in transportation security, but these professionals are not available because we are not doing what is needed to secure our ports. A failure in securing our ports from attack, will result in a catastrophic attack on our economy, and ultimately on the strength of our nation. We currently do not have an adequate security system at our ports, and there has not been any sign from the Administration that they will secure our seaports in the future. The Coast Guard, Customs and Transportation Security Administration are doing their best, but unless they are given the tools and the funding to help our ports and cities employ the security that we need, we will be defenseless from a catastrophic attack. In order to provide this critical funding I am proposing an amendment to the Senate budget resolution. The amendment would add $1 billion annually, for seaport security needs, over the next two years. In order to pay for the amendment, the tax cut would be reduced by $2 billion. The one billion, per year, could be spent consistent with the Maritime Transportation Security Act of 2002, as follows: Maritime Administration, $610 million; $450 million, for grants to ports and waterfront facilities to help ensure compliance with federally approved security plans; $150 million; for grants to states, local municipalities and other entities to help comply with federal area security plans and to provide grants to responders for port security contingency response; $10 million, to be used in conjunction with the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center to help develop a seaport security training curriculum to provide training to federal and state law enforcement personnel, and to certify private security personnel working at seaports. Coast Guard, $160 million; $50 million, for port security assessments; $50 million, for the establishment and operation of multi- agency task force to coordinate and evaluate maritime information in order to identify and respond to security threats; $40 million, to help implement the Automated Identification System, AIS, and other tracking systems designed to actively track and monitor vessels operating in U.S. waters; $20 million, for additional Coast Guard port security vessels. The Border and Transportation Security Directorate, $230 million, $100 million, to Customs for the installation of screening equipment, and to be used to help develop new technologies to help develop and prototype screening and detection equipment at U.S. ports; $100 million, to TSA and Customs; $50 million each, to evaluate and implement cargo security programs; $30 million, for the Transportation Security Administration, TSA, to develop and implement the Transportation Worker ID Card, and to conduct criminal background checks of transportation workers who work in secure areas or who work with sensitive cargo or information. I thank the distinguished chairman for his agreement. We could voice- vote to save time.

Mr. HOLLINGS. I move to reconsider the vote.

Mr. HOLLINGS

Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, I thank the leader from North Dakota. He has led our Budget Committee and done an outstanding job. The kudos belong to him for fiscal responsibility, and the responsibility in the position he has as the ranking member, to try to get the group together on a consensus, which is next to impossible, but he does the job. I have three amendments at the desk, and I understand we are not introducing amendments, so I will address hastily comments on all three. The first, of course, is the port security amendment for $1 billion a year for 2 years. It is focused, not Pepto-Bismol homeland security of $80 billion over 10-some years. I have talked to Senators on both sides of the aisle. They want to finance what we passed unanimously--all 100 Senators--earlier last year for port security. Right to the point, Osama owns several vessels. His teams landed and blew up the Embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam. His crews were on planes flown into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. He could just as easily have two or three crews get on an Exxon tanker going up the Delaware River to deliver a tankerful of oil, throw the captain overboard and that tanker aground, and that would close down the eastern seaboard for at least 1 year. I could go into it, but the amendment is worked out and in detail. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the details of the amendment.

Mr. HOLLINGS. I thank the distinguish Chair. The second concerns paying for the war. At the very beginning of this session, the first week of January, I introduced a bill to pay for the war in Iraq. I read a book about the fiscal dilemmas we faced each time there was a war, and I say to my distinguished colleague from Wyoming, each time our leaders paid for the war. During the Civil War they put a tax on dividends. The party of Lincoln did that. In World War I, they went up to a 77 percent marginal tax rate to pay for that war; in World War II, a 94 percent rate; in the Korean war, 91 percent. In Vietnam-- that is when President Johnson, who has been abused in history but he is the one who wanted to pay for guns and butter--he balanced the budget, paying for both guns and butter, in 1968 to 1969. That was the last time in the history of this Congress we balanced the budget. We paid for the war in Vietnam. Now, of course, we come to the war on Iraq. Unlike the Civil War where we had put taxes on dividends, here, there is no tomorrow; like drunken sailors, we come up to this chamber and say we are not going to pay for the war. My particular measure on the desk is a reserve fund of $100 billion. Larry Lindsey, the President's former chief economic advisor, said the war will cost between $100 and $200 billion, but that is up to the Finance Committee to figure out. You have to put your money where your mouth is. I think a better way to pay is with new money. We cannot just forgo this program or that program. We need a value-added tax of 2 percent dedicated to paying just for that war in Iraq. It would take the IRS a solid year until they fashioned the tax and we could start collecting it. But it is a very enforceable tax. Every industrialized country has had one. We had hearings before the Finance Committee back in the 1980s about a value-added tax. We almost adopted it then. We ought to get serious and get off the deficit bandwagon we are on now. That is what disturbs me. The Commander in Chief, the President of the United States, says in time of war we run deficits. Then, just the other day, in a speech to the nation, he said that ``Americans understand the costs of conflict because we have paid them in the past. War has no certainty except the certainty of sacrifice.'' The point is, we must have sacrifice; yet that is not being followed through, by any manner or means, with respect to paying for the war. Now is the time for this body to sober up and realize we are running horrendous deficits. What we have right now is the certainty of sacrifice, for everyone except the Commander in Chief and us in Congress. What we are saying to that GI going into Iraq tonight is: We hope you don't get hurt. We hope you don't get killed because we want you to hurry back. Why? Because we are going to give you the bill. We are not going to pay for the war. The fellow who fights the war is going to have to pay for the war because we need a tax cut. We are going to Disney World. We are not going to have any sacrifice. They are all running around here with flags on their lapels. So I put section 6 into my bill when I introduced it, which says that if members vote against it, they will be prohibited from wearing the flags in their lapels. Now when the President leads you to deficits by saying, in time of war we can run deficits, we are playing a game. He says that so in the election next year, you can say, ``I voted for tax cuts.'' That is our dilemma. The other side talks about the need for tax cuts so we can see economic growth and growth and growth; but my third amendment is to stop the tax cuts. You can see in this budget before the Senate, the only growth we have is in the national debt. It goes from $6.687 trillion in fiscal year 2003, to $11.919 trillion in fiscal year 2013. It goes up, up, and away by $5.2 trillion. I was here when we did not even have a $1 trillion deficit. President Reagan started this tax cut nonsense with voodoo I, and we immediately had a recession. Dave Stockman wrote in his book ``The Triumph of Politics,'' we should have canceled the tax cut in November 1981, and we did not. He said the President did not do what he should have done. Then we had voodoo II, the year before last, with President Bush's tax cut. On June 1, 2001, we had surpluses. Then we passed the tax cut, voodoo II, on June 8, and by July 1 we had a deficit. By September 10, 2001--one day before September 11 we had a deficit. We were in the red by $99 billion, so don't blame the deficits on September 11. We were already in deficits, and voodoo II caused it. Now we seem to get no education in the third kick of a mule, so to speak. We are on course just for the pollsters and buying the election next year with more tax cuts. That is why I resist what some members are trying to do by cutting the tax cut down to $350 billion. Do you know what that means to this particular Senator? I was with Phil Gramm and Warren Rudman on Gramm-Rudman-Hollings, and our particular initiative called for the reduction of the deficit each year by $35 billion. Here they want me to vote to increase the deficit each year by $35 billion for 10 years, or $350 billion. What will happen is we will pass it in the Senate, it will get over to the conference, they will fix it, it will be back up to $700 billion-and-something. You will have the votes. You have the majority. I ask unanimous consent to have ``budget realities'' printed in the Record.

Mr. HOLLINGS. If you take the years from 1945, from President Truman down through President Ford, 30 years, to 1975, you will find the aggregate total of all deficits at $358 billion. That is for 30 years, six Presidents, the cost of World War II, the cost of Korea, the cost of Vietnam. All throughout that and all the deficits, it was only $358 billion. Last year the deficit was, in 1 year, $428 billion. Here in my hand is the President's budget. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the last page in here, page 332.

Mr. HOLLINGS. On page 332, the President projects we will have a deficit next year of $569 billion. He says this year we will end up with a $554 billion deficit. That $554 billion doesn't include the $100 billion for Iraq. So you can see we are up around $600 or $700 billion. I used to say Strom Thurmond and I are home free. But I think my newest distinguished colleague from South Carolina will have to pay for it. I will not have to pay for it. I am not worried about it, and everything else like that. We can retire, get our pension, go on home and be quiet. But you cannot do it in good conscience when you come to Government to do the job of the people, and they trust you, they want you to look out for the needs of the country, not the needs of the campaign. That is what we are all engaged in here. People are giving up their lives for us, for what we believe in, for what we legislate, and for the command we give them to go to war. We ought at least to pay for the war on the one hand. And we ought to ensure the peace economically for our children and grandchildren, not by tax cuts, but somehow, somewhere, to pay for these budgets. I would like to get Government on a pay-as-you-go basis. I remember when Alan Greenspan went down with a team to President Clinton and he said you are going to have to raise taxes. In 1993 we raised taxes. We cut the spending and we raised taxes on Social Security, we raised taxes on gasoline, we raised taxes on the highest bracket. And we had 8 years of the finest and strongest economy. Now we come here and want to sell the idea of tax cuts are going to give growth. We know that with $428 billion and $554 billion in deficits, that's really almost a trillion dollars in stimulus, and that is without the cost of the war. What gives here? We have to sober up and get off this deficit barleycorn we are drinking like drunken sailors around here, like there is no tomorrow, like we don't have to pay for the war. There is no sacrifice for us. We go to the schoolchildren in America and we say there is one thing certain about war, it is sacrifice. But then we come up with the pollsters and say we have to get reelected so we want to go ahead next year to say we cut taxes. So there we are. I am not for that $350 billion compromise or whatever it is. I admire the people who are trying to work out the compromise, but that is totally misleading to the American people, that somehow the burden is too great on estate taxes. We have had people come here, George Soros, Bill Gates, and the others come who are paying the estate taxes. They come and say don't worry about it. That is not really too big a burden. With respect to dividends, in the market in New York there is a dichotomy, a difference up there with respect to whether or not we ought to lift the taxes on dividends. But if they would talk about seniors, they would say senior are double taxed on their Social Security. I pay the tax on Social Security and when I receive the benefit, I pay the tax on that Social Security benefit. That is double taxation. Eighty percent of seniors in America depend for the major part of their income on Social Security. So if it's seniors we have in mind we want to look out for, then look out for, not the rich seniors, but the poor seniors, 80 percent of the seniors, because they are not in that top bracket that is worried about estate taxes and everything else of that kind. I really appreciate the distinguished Senator from North Dakota yielding me this time. I wanted to be able, in a deliberate fashion talk about these amendments, because when we get to that 1 minute a side rule I will not be able to. I have a very judicious amendment on port security, where we would just fund it for 2 years. We voted 100 to nothing, all Republicans and all Democrats, with respect to port security. I think we ought to pay for the war. We are not raising the taxes here and we are not telling them how to do it in the Finance Committee. The Budget Committee can't do that. But we can do the amount. And I think we ought not to have any more tax cuts. I yield the remainder of my time to the distinguished Senator from North Dakota, with my gratitude. I appreciate it very much.

Mr. HOLLINGS. My friend.

Mr. HOLLINGS. If the distinguished Senator will yield, I really am grateful to him. The truth is, more than a balanced budget, we need balanced Senators. The distinguished Senator from North Dakota is just that. He has that even temper in how he approached it, and therefore has been far more effective because I have been wailing and crying without effect for years. But I will continue on, trying my best, thank you very much.

Mr. HOLLINGS

Mr. HOLLINGS. Is it controlled time?

Mr. HOLLINGS. Ten minutes.

Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, I have a very high regard for my distinguished junior colleague, but anybody who puts up this particular sense-of-the-Senate resolution relative to Social Security could not possibly be voting for the tax cuts. I know a majority of our Republican-controlled Budget Committee has voted for the tax cuts. The President is for the tax cuts. Right to the point, we are about to pass a tax cut in this budget resolution. I want to bring into focus the sham of the so-called resolution of the distinguished junior Senator from South Carolina because he worries about the year 2042 hours before we are going to war and totally disregards the law. I will propose an amendment to strike all after the enacting clause and inserting in lieu thereof the Budget Act, section 13301. Section 13301 was a very deliberate and discussed matter that we had not only in the Budget Committee, but I had help on both sides of the aisle, and we voted on it 98 to 2. It was signed into law on November 5, 1990, by President George Herbert Walker Bush. It signed into law the Greenspan commission. With this particular Graham of South Carolina resolution, one would think there was no President Bush commission. President Bush's commission was chaired, I think, by one of our distinguished former Members, the Senator from New York, Mr. Moynihan, who is under the weather and we all pray for his speedy recovery, but we have that commission report on what to do. This resolution says we really are concerned about Social Security at this particular point but, by passing this resolution, we want everybody to disregard the fact that this day, this week, this year, this budget, we will be spending Social Security trust funds in order to afford a tax cut. That is all it is. It is an absolute sham. They know it, and I know it. Section 21 of the Greenspan commission said, put this money in a trust off budget. If we had adhered to it, I think we would have about a $1.3 trillion trust fund. The distinguished chairman of the Budget Committee, Senator Nickles, said we have always taken from the general fund in order to pay for Social Security, but that is not right. I have two pages of the 2003 annual report of the Social Security Commission, page 4 and page 5. I ask unanimous consent that those two pages be printed in the Record.

Mr. HOLLINGS. We can see from the table: Assets of the trust funds provide a reserve to pay benefits whenever expenditures exceed income. Assets increased by $165.4 billion in 2002 because income to each fund exceeded expenditures--as shown in the table II.B1. Unlike what Senator Nickles says at the end of 2002, the combined assets of the OASI and the DI Trust Funds were 288 percent of estimated expenditures for 2003. This resolution of Senator Graham of South Carolina is just cover for the looting of the Social Security trust fund. As the distinguished Presiding Officer knows, all that is needed to secure the Social Security trust fund is quit spending it on any and every other thing other than Social Security. Is my time up?

Mr. HOLLINGS. Yes, I would like additional time, if I can have additional time.

Mr. HOLLINGS. The reason I would like additional time is to amend this resolution, and insert section 13301. That is the budget law. How can we bring into sharp focus that is the law? I have tried by putting different penalties in, but I cannot get the Senate to pass them. We have to quit worrying about the year 2042 and start worrying about today and getting by. Our soldiers in the front lines are ready to go into Iraq, and they are worried about being around this time tomorrow, not 2042. It is a shame for the Senate to engage in this charade at this hour. We are looting the Social Security trust fund. We are running, this fiscal year, according to the President, $554 billion in the red. That is without the costs of the war, without a supplemental. We ran a deficit last year of $428 billion. That right there is $1 trillion of stimulus into this economy. They should be ashamed to come here asking for tax reform under the cover of stimulus. No one believes the relief of taxes on dividends will stimulate the economy or the estate tax will stimulate the economy. Those with estates and those with dividends, Bill Gates and several other witnesses, have said that is the wrong course to take. They know it. I know it. You know it. I had to speak on the initial amendment of my distinguished colleague from South Carolina for whom I have the greatest respect, but we are not going to be able to join in these charades. We have to start paying the bills, including paying for the war, and not engage in tax cuts. Yesterday, I sent a Dear Colleague letter to everyone in this body about paying for the war. It is very simple. Here we are saying: GI, we want you to go into Iraq and we hope you do not get killed. Then we want you to come back. The reason we want you to come back is because my generation, this Congress, isn't going to pay for it. You are going to have to pay for it. You are not only going to have to fight the war but pay for it. What do we need in this Congress right now--a tax cut so we can go to Disney World? That is the charade going on here, a few hours before we commit our troops to freedom in Iraq. We ought to sober up. I am informed by the staff that we have to wait until the end of the consideration to put up the amendment. Everyone is on notice, I would like to strike all of the ``whereases'' because that is poppycock. We do not all have to be worried about 2042, today, as we go into Iraq. We ought to cut out the playing of games and get serious around here that we are running the economy into the ground. I yield back the remainder of my time and I ask that I be able to call the amendment at the proper time.

Mr. HOLLINGS. Yes.