Fritz Hollings

Mr. HOLLINGS

Mr. HOLLINGS. Will the distinguished Senator yield for a question?

Mr. HOLLINGS. I will give it to my colleague from New Hampshire, and he can get everything, the Congressional Budget Office figures. And the main point to be made, Madam President, is just that. Where you see an actual surplus down here in 1998 that they project of $63 billion, in order to do that they had to use trust funds of $168.3 billion. They used not only Social Security but all the rest. And then where they project for next year an $80 billion surplus, they had to use $199 billion in trust funds from Social Security and the retirement funds. That is how they talk that language. And I am trying to stop the doubletalk and talk sense to the American people. I retain the remainder of my time.

Mr. HOLLINGS. Madam President, these are all deficits. I have asked the other side that sponsors this resolution to, for heaven's sake, show that dumb Senator from South Carolina where the surplus is. Show me the surplus, and I will hush and vote for your resolution. But you can't show me a surplus. There is nothing but deficits in these reports. And mislead the public so that we can use Social Security as a slush fund to reelect ourselves--that is what we are doing. It is the greatest campaign finance abuse that I know of to continually have the word ``surplus'' come out of the mouth of that side of the aisle. There ought to be ashes in their mouths. They oppose--in fact, still are. Down in South Carolina, I have a young Republican colleague running around hollering ``the biggest tax increase in history.'' Of course, we know it was under President Reagan and Senator Dole. That has been analyzed in every newspaper. But I plead guilty, I voted for that tax increase. It is not the biggest. What happened was, we cut spending $250 billion. Yes, we increased taxes $250 billion. We downsized the Government by over 300,000 Federal employees. That is what has the economy good--lowest unemployment, lowest inflation rate, biggest business investment, stock market through the ceiling, more home ownership, more young children getting help in receiving health care. We are in good shape. If we can't talk the truth to each other now about where we stand fiscally, we never will. This is one grand fraud. That is what has occurred. For those who fought us on down the line, instead of $250 billion-- yes, the revenues went up. Where is the amendment that says do away with the Social Security increase that we put in that they are now blaming me for? Where is the amendment that says we reduce the gas tax increase that they are blaming me for? I go home and they are blaming me. Yet, they want to come up here and holler, ``Oh, the economy is so good; man, we got surpluses everywhere; now what is in order is, let's all now have a bunch of tax cuts.'' I want to expose that fraud. Don't go along with this Republic resolution to fuzz it, using the word ``surpluses.'' As my sister used to say, ``Saying it so doesn't make it so.'' There is no surplus. If they can find one in the Federal Government, God bless them. I will join me. But these are all deficits. I ask unanimous consent, once again, to have this chart of the budget realities printed in the Record.

Mr. HOLLINGS. Madam President, let me go right to the point made by the distinguished Senator from Texas. He said, ``We believe the tax burden is too high.'' We all agree on that. But what is increasing that tax burden rather than decreasing it is this profligate spending, increasing the deficit, and increasing the debt. If you look on page 11 of the Congressional Budget Office report, you find out that we increase spending over what we bring in for the next 10 years, and there is nothing but deficits. There are not any surpluses. There are not any surpluses. Go right to the point of, yes, the President did submit a budget, and he increased spending $70 billion. You look on page 10 where the total went up to $1.721 trillion. The budget that passed the Senate with the vote of the distinguished Senator from Texas increased spending $70 billion. The President is guilty. The Congress is guilty. This Senator tried a budget freeze. We had a vote on it last year, tried it again in the Budget Committee, and couldn't get any support. They call it the ``Fritz freeze.'' But the whole point is, return all moneys or surpluses to the taxpayers. Common sense would indicate that there must be some surpluses after Social Security. I ask unanimous consent to have this chart printed in the Record.

Mr. HOLLINGS. They are telling the baby boomers they are the problem when we are charging them. They are not the problem; it is us adults on the floor of the Congress. The baby boomers are not the problem. We provided in the Greenspan Commission and in the law passed and signed by President George Bush on November 5, 1990, to take care of the baby boomers. Instead of taking care of them, we are continuing to charge them and, at the same time, telling them there is going to be a problem in the next generation when we are causing the problem. I yield to the Senator from New Jersey.

Mr. HOLLINGS. That would be lovely. Reelect me, I am for all the tax cuts. Whoopee.

Mr. HOLLINGS. My dear colleague, they understand the language. They know exactly what they are doing. I can tell you here and now as a Governor who went before Standard & Poor's, went before Moody and got a triple A credit rating, we wouldn't have any rating at all, the U.S. Government on its bonds, this very minute with these kinds of deficits. You couldn't doubletalk Wall Street about surpluses. Wall Street goes along with the unified because it is business for them. That is why I pointed out the difference between corporate and the country's economy.

Mr. HOLLINGS. Exactly. That is what they intend to do. But they think the politician makes his own little laws and sits attentive to his own applause--Plato's famous words. The language, the image--it is a scandal. It really is a scandal. We are going broke, and we are talking about surpluses when we have nothing but deficit all around us.

Mr. HOLLINGS. Then I go to the real point with respect to surpluses, as if there were plenty of them around. There are not. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the trust funds looted to balance the budget.

Mr. HOLLINGS. Now, we find out with this, Social Security is only one-half of the problem. The truth of the matter is that this year we will owe--these are CBO figures--$732 billion. We will owe Medicare, $113 billion; and the hospital and SMI, $34 billion; military retirement, $133 billion; a deficit in civilian retirement of $460 billion; a deficit in the unemployment compensation of $72 billion; a deficit in the highway trust fund of $23 billion; a deficit in the airport trust fund of $10 billion; a deficit in the railroad retirement trust fund of $20 billion; and others, like Federal Financing Bank of $55 billion. I only limited it to 1 year, trying to get their attention to what is going on this particular year. We can extend it out. There is no difference there. But don't go along with this continued fraud. Don't go along with this continued trickery. There is $1.652 trillion overall. Social Security is less than half; almost $1 trillion from the military retirement and civilian retirees and unemployment fund. So the Government, us politicians, have been running around and gabbing about everyone. I thought I could get the seniors to pay attention to Social Security, but they are only paying attention to Medicare and Medicaid. I have been trying my best to get them in that particular movement. The military retirees don't understand it, and civilian retirees don't understand it at all. So what is really wrong is not only that CBO has estimated the unified budget surplus will reach nearly $1.5 trillion when there is no surplus, they act like they are trying to give dignity and credibility to unified budgets. There is no surplus. Look on page 11 of the CBO report, and for the next 10 years there is listed a deficit, gross deficit. It is listed there in the column like I emphasized--otherwise, returning all remaining surpluses. At this point, tell me, where is a surplus in the Government accounts? None--N-O-N-E. In fact, deficits--they mislead and say once we make a plan for Social Security, we can continue to spend the Medicare trust funds, the military retirement, the civilian retirement, the unemployment, the railroad retirement, the highway trust fund, the Federal Financing Bank. All of these are deficits--not surpluses. So they say I hope we can get together and fuzz it all up, and there is really no difference here. This is a cancer, I emphasize again, a fiscal cancer because unless and until it shows instead of surpluses over the next 5 years--and that is what we are talking about, this year's deficit, $557 billion spent more than we take in. Deficits, deficits, deficits--not surpluses. And we add that to the national debt, the interest costs go up. According to June O'Neill, it doesn't, but I can tell you right now it will go up. You can see Mr. Greenspan hedging his bet right now. When we do that, we will go back to the interest rates we had 10 years ago, and we are going to be eaten alive. So we have fiscal cancer. Nobody wants to talk about it, and we want to come up on the floor of the U.S. Senate with this nebulous language ``return all remaining surpluses to the American taxpayer.'' If you have them, Brother Hollings would be for that. But I don't want to mislead the American public. I haven't been nearly 50 years in public office to come here with this kind of fraud and doubletalk to the American people. There are no surpluses. I challenge them to point out the surplus in the highway fund, point out the surplus in Medicare, point out the surplus in military retirement, point out the surplus in civilian retirees, in unemployment, railroad retirement, Federal Financing Bank, all of the rest of them. All of them are in deficit. That is why the debt has gone through the ceiling, and that is why we are increasing spending faster than we can cut it. It is $1 billion a day we are increasing spending on the interest costs on the national debt. Who in his right mind is going to cut spending $365 billion? That is our problem. The best way to ignore it is to put it under the rug, come in here and ``return all remaining surpluses.'' They still want to use that language to give in to Speaker Gingrich over on the House side; that is what they are trying to do. That is why we are raising this all-important point right now. If I can get their attention, just this 1 year we will have accomplished our intent here. I retain the balance of our time.

Mr. HOLLINGS. Let me tell you why you miss the point and how you danced around it. Now, here is the difference. It says, ``The CBO has estimated''--this is the Domenici-Lott resolution; sense of the Senate--``The CBO has estimated that the unified budget surplus will reach nearly $1.5 trillion over the next 10 years.'' Absolutely false and in violation of section 13301, Madam President. Without reading the whole thing--``Exclusion of Social Security from all budgets.'' Now, how do you get $1.5 trillion without using $1.621 trillion, $1.621 trillion of Social Security money? That is the first mislead here. They first say that they are not going to use Social Security, but then they talk about a budget surplus. And the only way they can really mislead and continue the fraud and continue the campaign finance fund for all of us politicians to get reelected is to talk about tax cuts and surpluses when there are not any. There are not any, Madam President--absolutely none. But they use $1.621 trillion in order to get to the $1.5 trillion. Now, Madam President, there is a further point to be made. Here is the entire--I ask unanimous consent the trust fund surpluses from Social Security alone for the next 10 years--rather than a $1.5 trillion surplus, there is a $1.621 trillion deficit--I ask unanimous consent that it be printed in the Record.

Mr. HOLLINGS. I say to the distinguished Senator from New Mexico, I hope I can get to Heaven. But if I ever get to Heaven and have to make an accounting to the Lord of all my sins, I hope I have you as my lawyer, because you are really very persuasive.

Mr. HOLLINGS. I am trying to clear that now and find out--that is agreeable, except for the fact that we have how many Senators seeking time? Four Senators. We have 50 minutes. I will be the fifth one.

Mr. HOLLINGS. Yes.

Mr. HOLLINGS. It is absolutely the case. The only place you can find this kind of money for tax cuts is here in the Social Security trust fund, which is a violation in and of itself of section 13301 of the statutory laws of the Budget Act of the United States of America. President Bush signed it, 98 Senators over here voted for it, almost unanimous over in the House of Representatives. We voted for it. But it is not hit-and-run driving. Let's stop right there. Let me emphasize, in 1994 we were really distraught with respect to the takeover artists. Individuals were coming in, the corporations, and literally taking the pension funds, paying off the corporate debt, and taking the remaining money and running. The employees were left high and dry. So we passed the Pension Reform Act of 1994. Now, our good friend, the former pitcher up there from Detroit, Denny McLain, became the head of a corporation. As the head of the corporation, last year he had paid off the company debt with the pension fund. That was made a felony. He got an 8-year jail term. If you can find what jail he is in, tell him, next time, instead of running a corporation, run for the U.S. Senate; instead of a jail term, you get the good government award up here for looting the pension funds to pay your debt. That is exactly what we are doing. We go against the formal law that we passed ourselves. We go again the policy set for corporate America. But when it comes to us, we have to get reelected. The worst campaign finance violation and abuse is using Social Security trust funds to reelect ourselves, telling them we are trying to protect Social Security.

Mr. HOLLINGS. I am delighted to yield.

Mr. HOLLINGS. I thank the distinguished Chair. This takes us from President Truman, in 1945, down to President Clinton's 1999 budget and the one we passed in the U.S. Senate. You will see when President Bush left town that the actual deficit was $403.6 billion. That was how much we were spending. In 1993, we passed the budget act I mentioned earlier, and we brought the actual deficit down to $349.3 billion. Then, in 1994, to $292.3 billion. In 1995, to $277.3 billion. In 1996, we reduced the deficit down to $260.9 billion. In 1997, to $187.8 billion. In 1998, it is down to $105.3 billion. You can see in 6 years, we have gone down, down, down, down. The Congress and the President should be credited. We have a wonderful economy, the lowest interest rates, lowest unemployment rate, the highest business investment, more home ownership in America, consumer confidence at its highest, stock market going through the roof. We acknowledge that and take credit for it. We participated in it. Just when we ought to stay the course and continue to reduce the actual deficit, we have an election coming up in November. Oh, boy, they see that cookie jar, and they are breaking ranks now. They voted for this particular amendment unanimously in the Budget Committee. They might want a second-degree amendment. I just want to get an actual vote, because colleagues on this side want an actual vote so we find out where they all stand. I think they can outmaneuver us, there is no question about that, if they don't want to vote. But they can't change this record. We have a situation where instead of reducing the deficit, they want to go back and start to increase deficits, as I related, again and again for each year for 5 years running. They are all talking about surpluses as far as the eye can see. Mr. President, the surpluses as far as the eye can see are the Social Security surpluses. These are the moneys that belong, under the law-- Greenspan said put it off budget. We put it off budget. We continue to spend the money. I keep raising the points of order, and they just ignore it and go on. Right now the word is, ``Wait a minute. If we vote for this, you can't get your tax cuts.'' Well, come, you can't get your tax cuts, because the only way you can get your tax cuts is to loot the moneys out of Social Security. That is how you get tax cuts. That is how you get all of these programs that increase spending. In order to do it, they want to use $105 billion of Social Security in 1998. In order to get the tax cuts, how do they justify that list the distinguished speaker put out? He had capital gains, he had estate tax elimination, he had the marriage penalty, he had tuition tax credits for private education--he just got it all in and said, ``Just watch them vote against that, and we'll go after them and say, `Tax- and-spend, tax-and-spend, tax-and-spend.' '' The truth of the matter is, he is the one increasing taxes, because as you do this, as you loot the Social Security fund, the debt increases, as we see by the CBO record; and as the debt increases, spending for interest goes up. It cannot be avoided. It is going to be spent. That is exactly what is going on. It is fiscal cancer. Let me say a word about that. I was on the Grace Commission, Mr. President, and worked with Peter Grace. We were against waste, fraud and abuse. At the very time we put out this magnificent volume, which was 2 inches thick, of our wonderful work of eliminating waste, fraud and abuse, we were creating the biggest waste in the history of Government; namely, deficits and the national debt. We cut revenues, we increased spending, we didn't pay for it, and the debt went up, up, and away. Whereby it was a little less than a trillion dollars when we first started with President Reagan--it was $903 billion at that particular time--it has gone up now with 12 years of Reagan-Bush to over $5 trillion. Of course, it has gradually gone up even though we have been reducing the deficit each year. At this minute, we will spend, if we approve the budget that has been approved in the Senate and what they confirmed over on the House side, over $100 billion more than we take in. On April 15, we are supposed to complete the budget work. I have been on the Budget Committee since we instituted it. Modestly, I say I used to be the chairman, and we did reduce spending at one time. Now it is July, and we haven't even had a conference. They appointed everybody in the conference committee from both budget groups, but they can't confirm because they can't face up to each other and say, ``Wait a minute. Somebody is going to tell the secret that the only way there are any surpluses around here is the budget trust fund surplus that we have to loot in order to get all of these tax cuts, children's programs, Medicare costs,'' and everything else of that kind. The media doesn't even report it. It is a scandal. There it is. We started the biggest waste at that particular time. You have to understand why this is given sanction even in the business community. I have argued with Alan Greenspan about this one. He loves the unified budget. That business crowd doesn't want the sharp elbows of Government crowding in to the bond market running up interest costs, running up inflation. They don't serve in public office. They don't have to face the statutes, laws and policies that we enact as Members of the Congress. They say, ``Oh, it will be taken care sooner or later.'' They go ahead with the unified budget pointing, if you please, Mr. President, to the difference between the corporate economy and the country's economy. The corporate economy, of course, is higher profits. The country's economy is for the good of society. And they don't necessarily meld. Or it is good for the corporate economy for NAFTA to go like gangbusters down in Mexico. That is where General Motors is headed with that strike. Actually, Honda exports more cars than General Motors this minute in the United States of America. We are going out of business. I have lost 24,000 textile and apparel jobs since NAFTA. Those are good jobs. It is an industry that under President Kennedy we found out is necessary to the national security. After steel, it was the second most important. It was a finding in the sense you couldn't send the soldiers to war in a Japanese uniform. You had to have clothing. Seventy-five percent of the clothing within the view of us in the U.S. Senate is imported. We are at the water's edge of whether or not we are going to have that industry. The other industry is going down, because in the corporate culture, if you can save--it is shown that you can save a good 20 percent of your labor costs, 20 percent of volume, by moving to a low-wage, offshore country. So if you have $500 million in sales, you can move offshore. Just keep your corporate office, your sales folks, but move your manufacturing offshore and you make $100 million. Or you can continue to stay here and work your own employees--they call them associates now--and go broke because your competition is gone. The multinationals could care less. They are in the business of making money. We are in the business of making a good and strong economy. And America's strength is like a three-legged stool. You have on the one leg your values. That is strong. We sacrificed to go to Somalia. We are now out in Bosnia. No one questions the values of the United States of America. We have the second leg, of course, which is the military. That is strong. But the third leg, the economic leg, is fractured, and intentionally. That is the corporate culture, corporate economy--move on down to Mexico. And they promised at the time, of course, that we were going to increase the balance of trade that we had of $5 billion. Now it is $15 billion negative. They said we are going to create 200,000 jobs. We lost 400,000. They said it was going to solve the immigration problem. It has gotten worse. They said it was going to solve the drug problem. It has gotten worse. The actual Mexican worker is taking home 20 percent less pay. So they have suffered. The $12 billion that we paid in there to keep it from going totally under has gone back to Wall Street. It should have gone into a common market approach where we could have developed in Mexico--and I would vote for it this afternoon--the institutions of a free economy, a revered judiciary, the right of labor to strike, the corporate interests of owning property, the right of appeal, and those kinds of things. Over in Europe, the European countries in the common market approach taxed themselves for 4 years, $5 billion before they allowed Greece and Portugal. So what happens? We use the free market approach, which is good for the corporate economy, but not the country's economy. And therein is where we are really headed with the fiscal cancer that is eating us alive here, because you have $1 billion a day. We are going to meet tomorrow, and we are going to spend another $1 billion for nothing. We are going to meet on Friday, and we are going to spend another billion in this Nation's Capital for nothing. We can meet on Saturday, and we are going to spend another $1 billion for nothing. We can meet on Sunday, and we are going to spend, like it or not, another $1 billion for nothing--total waste. Here we were trying to stop waste, fraud, and abuse, yet under the Grace Commission we instituted the biggest waste. I thought finally-- finally--we had gotten on it. We not only were bringing down the deficit, but in his message to the Congress, the President of the United States said, ``Save Social Security first.'' And every Congressman and every Senator said, ``Amen, brother. That's what we want to do.'' Everybody went off the floor and had their little interviews. ``We've got to save Social Security.'' So we go into the Budget Committee, and we get a vote and unanimously vote for it. But now conferences are ongoing with respect to the parliamentary maneuvers to make sure that you do not vote. They can have a second-degree amendment. We will come back later on with other bills. We will have our chance. Oh, we will just nag them and never get to a vote, but we will point it out from now until October: ``Save Social Security first.'' There is no surplus. This country has fiscal cancer. If you keep spending up, up and away, interest costs on the national debt will mount, with the debt increasing each year for 10 years running. These are not surpluses as far as the eye can see, but rather deficits as far as the eye can see. And this particular report of the Congressional Budget Office--if that is the case, Mr. President, you can see at a glance that Congresses that are going to be meeting in the next century--for the millennium and for the next century--we will meet, we will put a little bit in Social Security, we will put a little bit in defense, and a big bit in interest costs on the national debt, and we will not have any Government. Now, judging by their Contract with America, that is what they want: to abolish the Department of Education, the Department of Commerce, the Department of Energy, the Department of Housing, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Just get rid of highways--they do not even want the highway system. They objected around here and said it busted the budget when we used highway moneys for highways. Very interesting. We passed a highway bill, and all we used was the gas taxes for highways. But, oh, no, they wanted to rob the highway fund for foreign aid or any other particular project that they had in mind. Because of the distinguished Senator from Rhode Island, Senator Chafee, we changed that. I commend him for doing it. We finally agreed that after this year we are going to spend highway gas taxes, highway money on highways. Boy, I am telling you, just to get something normal, decent and understandable here in the U.S. Congress is next to impossible. But there it is. We have a resolution that says, ``Save Social Security first.'' Now, they can get into parliamentary maneuvers. I guess one thing is: Move to commit the bill, like they did earlier. They can do another one to commit the bill with instructions and hide behind it. But I can tell you, whatever the maneuver is, the issue is clear; it is almost undebatable. I want them to say, ``I am wrong on the figures I have given.'' I want them to say the CBO is wrong on the figures or whatever. I want them to get up here and debate it and say, ``No. It is necessary to spend the Social Security trust fund.'' That is all I want to hear them say. But I do not believe you are going to hear a Senator in the Senate say that. They all are going to hide behind the maneuvering here and second degrees and third degrees, and move to recommit, and everything else possible; and we will get a rollcall on that. And that will be the call on whether or not you want to continue to loot Social Security. I know my distinguished friend from New Hampshire does not want to do it. There is Senator Feingold there. Under the unanimous consent, of course, we agreed that the distinguished leader of this particular bill, our chairman, is to regain the floor, but I hope the other Senators here who, of course, are cosponsoring--and I put this up so we can actually get a vote on a sense of the Senate. And don't tell me that this is not relevant to State-Justice- Commerce. It is relevant to the fiscal state of the United States. I can tell you that now. We do have fiscal cancer. The media is not paying any attention to it. They are all hiding under the unified, unified, unified. It is against the law. I have given you the law. It is against policies. It is against the vote of the Budget Committee. But there is a quiet discussion. I listened on the weekend shows, and again and again they were talking about surpluses here, surpluses there, including, of course, the Administrator here of the Congressional Budget Office. If we have that report--I would like to refer just one second to that particular report so you can see even she disobeys the law. You cannot get even the Congressional Budget Office-- the conclusion, on page 13: An unexpected increase in revenues in 1998 has virtually ensured the total Federal budget will be balanced for the first time in almost 30 years. False, according to her own records, her own figures. The previous pages showed that is not the case. On page 11, all she has to do is read her own document. An unexpected increase in revenues in 1998 has virtually ensured that the total Federal budget will be balanced for the first time in almost 30 years and nothing currently visible on the horizon seems to threaten a return to deficits in the near term if policies remain unchanged. I know I wouldn't use her to do my income tax return. I would be in jail, I would be gone, with that kind of doubletalk. There is no surplus. But when the Director of the Congressional Budget Office, Madam June O'Neill, comes and says there is nothing on the horizon, when she shows that in order to say that you have to spend $1.621 trillion of the Social Security trust fund, Social Security by the year 2008, supposedly, if this weren't occurring, would have a surplus of $2.252 trillion. Look at that, on page 11 of this particular report--$2.252 trillion. Yet everybody is going around with solutions to Social Security. The only solution, and the first solution, is to quit looting the fund. There won't be any $2.252 trillion. That is why you have all of the bills in to solve the Social Security crisis, the Social Security shortfall, the baby boomer problem. All nonsense, all out of the whole cloth. She is talking again and again, ``However, if any other number of assumptions that CBO has made turn out to be off the mark, budget outcomes could be quite different than projected, even if there are no changes in policy. For instance, if CBO's economic projections prove to be just a little too optimistic, surpluses could be much lower than anticipated.'' Surpluses--there isn't any surplus in the report. There is a surplus, supposedly, in Social Security. That is where the surplus is. Section 13301 of the Budget Act says don't spend Social Security surpluses, don't count on them in reporting a budget; don't count on them, Congressional Budget Office, when you analyze a budget. But she willy- nilly talks about surpluses. It is just amazing to me, until you see her projections, of course, of the interest costs. Again, on page 11, she finds that interest costs on the national debt are just going down, down, down. It has been increasing each year anywhere from $10 to $20 billion. The debt has been going up. The interest costs--even with that increased debt, even though interest rates are down, the interest costs have been going up. If you want to see the pressure brought by the Speaker on the Director of the Congressional Budget Office, look at that series of figures straight across the board. She finds that from 1958 to the year 2008 the actual interest costs decrease $11 billion. Totally out of the whole cloth, this is made. They kept nagging her and they held up the Budget Committees. The Budget Committees don't meet; they don't sit down and confer over the budget. They go on the weekend talk shows and put out all the documents about tax cuts, spending programs, and put in here these optimistic figures. The Director of the Congressional Budget Office has responded to the pressure of the Speaker of the House; there isn't any question in this Senator's mind. We know what is going on. I wish the media--whether print media, TV media, or any other media-- would please, please, please, report truth in budgeting. That is what we had when we had Gramm-Rudman-Hollings--truth in budgeting. We sold it over on this side of the aisle, 14 votes up and down. Our Democratic colleagues, majority, voted to cut spending over the objection, at that time, of the leader, over the objection of the chairman of the Budget Committee. But there was a conscience back in 1985. Now, in 1998, it has become the game of the day: Just look over and find whatever you want in the $100-some billion Social Security surplus, and it grows each year. It is only $105 billion this year; 10 years out, it is $186 billion. So we have plenty of money to spend for plenty of programs until we run right up against the wall, run right up against the wall, and the interest costs eat us alive. We have fiscal cancer. We won't acknowledge it. I am glad and proud, on behalf of my colleagues on this side of the aisle, to bring up this sense of the Senate. It is more important than the entire State-Justice-Commerce bill or any appropriations bill. Unless we get ahold of our senses and vote a sense of the Senate that we save Social Security first, we are gone.

Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, ``Exclusion of Social Security from all budgets''--this is the formative statutory law. We have been talking about criminals, while many members of this body commit a crime every time they discuss budget surpluses. They are not obeying their own-- Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the receipts and disbursements of the Federal Old Age Survivors Insurance Trust Fund and the Federal Disability Insurance Trust Fund shall not be counted as new budget authority, outlays, receipts or deficit or surplus for the purposes of-- (1) the budget of the U.S. Government as submitted by the President, (2) the Congressional budget, (3) or the Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985. That was Gramm-Rudman-Hollings. We have been struggling a long time, but we cannot get the truth out. We cannot get the truth out. One of the deterrents to the truth is the common belief that every President since Lyndon Johnson has used Social Security trust funds for the general budget. This is not true, Mr. President. It was not so. No, sir. President Lyndon Johnson did not use Social Security in order to balance the budget in 1968-69. I was there. In fact, over on the House side we had the conference. George Mahon was the chairman of the Appropriations Committee. We called over and asked Marvin Watson and said, ``Ask the President if we can cut another $5 billion.'' President Johnson said, ``Cut it,'' and we balanced the budget. President Lyndon Baines Johnson was very conscientious about guns and butter. He was leaving office, and he did not want to leave a heritage of busted budgets and the charge that he had the Great Society and the war in Vietnam and he could not afford them. Mr. President, do you know what the budget was then? It was $178 billion for all purposes of Government, defense and domestic. Do you know what the interest cost on the national debt is? The interest cost on the national debt now is going to be $363 billion, according to this recent report here--a billion dollars a day. Do you know what the interest cost on the national debt was when President Johnson balanced the budget back then? The interest cost was $16 billion. That was interest costs for 200 years of history and the cost of all the wars, up from the Revolution right on through World War I, World War II, Korea, and Vietnam. And it was only a debt that required taxes, interest costs, to be paid of $16 billion. Now we are up there to almost $5.7 trillion without the cost of a war. It has gone right on through the ceiling, a billion a day, $363 billion in interest costs. That is $350 billion more than what we had. And we are spending the money. This is pure waste. Many say government is too big. I agree, it is too big. But the biggest thing in the budget is the interest costs on the national debt. It is bigger than Social Security, bigger than defense, bigger than the domestic budget. We keep spending for nothing. If we had the extra $350 billion since President Johnson's balanced budget--the defense budget is only $250 billion--we could double the defense budget: Instead of 13 aircraft carriers, we will give you 26 aircraft carriers; instead of 16 divisions, we will give you 32 divisions. Double it, and still have $100 billion for research for cancer, NIH, for education, for the environment, for anything--for cleanups, for agriculture. We have the money, because we are spending it on interest payments. Why? Because Congress is not minding the store. It has a wonderful cookie jar it takes from by the billions every year. And over the next 10 years, Congress will continue to steal from it. Over the 5-year period, we are going to have deficits of $557 billion--$557 billion, and we are talking about balancing the budget. Each year, every year, instead of a surplus, there is going to be a balance, and we keep going, going to it. In order to verify this, I ask unanimous consent that this chart of the budget realities be printed in the Record.

Mr. HOLLINGS. The majority of the members of this commission--I am just paraphrasing--stated that the Social Security trust funds should be removed from the unified budget. You will see that in report there. When they submitted the Greenspan report, the Commission said to remove Social Security from the unified budget. I struggled, as a member of the Budget Committee, for almost 7 years to get it done. But I kept moving. I kept trying different ways. I tried on Gramm-Rudman- Hollings and that particular budget approach. But in the summer of 1990--that is why I can remember November 5--before the Budget Committee, by a vote of 20 to 1, we removed it from the unified budget. We got it on the floor of the Senate in October, and 98 Senators--if any Senator who was here in October is still here, any Senator who was here in October of 1990--they voted just that way, to remove it from the unified budget. I will get, later, the vote record and we will put that in the Record. I am not trying to embarrass or account for any Senators, but I am trying to emphasize that this body has pledged time and time again to save Social Security first and to stop looting the fund. So we had 98 Senators vote for that, and President George Bush signed it into law. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that we have printed in the Record just that 1-page law, right here, subtitle (c) of the Budget Act on Social Security, 13301. I ask unanimous consent to have it printed in the Record. Subtitle C--Social Security

Mr. HOLLINGS. Yes, an hour-and-a-half equally divided.

Mr. HOLLINGS. These are the updated figures: In 1998, the trust fund surplus is $105 billion in Social Security; in 1999, $117 billion; in the year 2000, $126 billion; in the year 2001, $130 billion; in 2002, $138 billion; in the year 2003, $146 billion; in the year 2004, $154 billion; in 2005, $165 billion; in 2006, $173 billion; in 2007, $181 billion; and in 2008, $186 billion. So what you see in the projection here with respect to so-called surpluses that are now being quoted by the President, distinguished Members of the House of Representatives, distinguished Members of this particular body, on page 11 of the Congressional Budget Office report, you will find that what we actually are spending over the 10 years in order to get down to a deficit in the year 2008--they finally reduce the deficit down according to these magnificent projections over a 10- year period--the deficit is down to $1 billion by using $1.621 trillion of Social Security trust funds. Last evening--let me compliment the distinguished Senator from Minnesota--Mr. Grams talked at length about the various countries and how they approach the Social Security problem. He referred in several instances to the Social Security problem--this is just late last evening--to the ``looming crisis,'' the ``coming crisis,'' the ``fiscal crisis.'' And most of what he says, by the way, I agree with, but there is no real crisis in Social Security if we only stop spending the money. The problem is that the politicians, both Republican and Democrat, see the Social Security trust fund as a cookie jar they can stick their hands in to get their favorite programs. Look here, they think, I can get my children's program; oh, no, I get my marriage penalty tax reform; I get the corporate taxes here; I get the estate taxes over here; I get another capital gains tax there; oh, no, I want to spend it for Medicare. This is just the biggest scandal I have ever seen, because that crowd up there in the gallery--namely, the media--will not report the truth. I hope they look right at the Congressional Budget Office report from the 15th of this month, just a week ago. These are the supposedly nonpartisan figures. On page 11 you will see that the deficit goes up, in 1998, to $105 billion; and then, in 1999, to $119 billion; in the year 2000, $127 billion; and the year 2001, $124 billion. I remember back in 1993, when we on this side of the aisle passed the Budget Act, the Republicans claimed that if we passed that particular 1993 budget plan, the economy would go into a nose dive; there would be a depression. My friend on the Republican side of the aisle, the chairman of the Finance subcommittee, Senator Packwood of Oregon, said he would give us his house if this thing worked. Our distinguished friend in the House, the chairman of the Budget Committee, Congressman John Kasich, said he would change parties and become a Democrat if that thing worked. It has worked. It has worked, Mr. President, until now. That is why I, the Senator from Wisconsin, and other Senators here wanted to be heard on this. Because what is really occurring is, everybody is dealing out the Social Security trust fund to various programs in an illegal fashion--certainly in an immoral fashion. They are running around telling everybody, you can count on Social Security, except for the baby boomers. It is not the baby boomers in the next generation, it is the Members of Congress on the Senate floor and on the floor of the House. We, willy-nilly, are savaging, ravaging, looting Social Security. And there is not any question that the law disallows this. I appreciate my distinguished chairman from New Hampshire allowing me this moment. I ask unanimous consent the Greenspan Commission report of 1983, which I worked on, be printed in the Record.

Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, I understand what the distinguished chairman is saying, and I agree with him. But I want to answer that question and then do as we agreed, because I only have the floor under the courtesy of Chairman Gregg.

Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished chairman. With respect to this particular sense-of-the-Senate amendment, it really goes right to the heart of the expression ``Saving Social Security first.'' The fact is, as we talk about campaign finance reform, the abuses and the scandals of campaign finance reform are not corporate money, labor money, soft money, hard money, Buddhist temple money, Lincoln bedroom money. The scandal of campaign finance is the looting of the Social Security fund by politicians who want to get reelected, whereby they determine every year that they have a big surplus. The reason for this amendment, of course, is the constant chatter, particularly on the other side of the Capitol, about Social Security, surpluses, and taxes. In order to get a surplus, here is exactly the moneys necessary to be used and even allow you to talk the language. Under the law, we are not allowed to talk the language, under section 13301. But in violation of Section 13301, a statute signed into law November 5, 1990, the CBO report uses numbers of the so-called unified budget. This is not a long report, Mr. President. I ask unanimous consent that excerpts of the CBO report of July 15 be printed in the Record. I understand the Government Printing Office estimates the cost of printing this report in the Record to be $2,222.

Mr. HOLLINGS. Yes. We all voted for it. It is the same thing we voted for. Where do you need to ask unanimous consent for an amendment?

Mr. HOLLINGS. This is a sense-of-the-Senate amendment on Social Security.