Jon Kyl

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I am pleased to be an original cosponsor of the families first legislation that our colleague, Senator Rod Grams, is introducing today. This important legislation would provide badly needed tax relief for American families. It would repeal the Social Security earnings limitation. It would cut capital gains taxes and provide other pro-growth economic incentives, while still putting the budget on track to balance by the year 2002. It does so by cutting spending. Balancing the budget does not mean that taxes have to be increased. Nor does it preclude consideration of tax cuts. The problem is not that the Federal Government is collecting too little in tax revenue. The Government is simply spending too much. As a result of the tax increase Congress approved in 1990, Americans paid over $20 billion in new taxes. They paid another $35 billion as a result of President Clinton's tax increase in 1993. Taxes increased, but so did Federal spending. It climbed from $1.2 trillion in 1990 to about $1.5 trillion this year, and it will rise to $1.6 trillion next year. That is a 33 percent increase in spending in just 6 years. Taxes--which are already too high--will never be high enough to satisfy Congress' appetite for spending. Since 1948, the average American family with children has seen its Federal tax bill rise from about 3 percent of income to about 24.5 percent today. Combined with State and local taxes, that burden rises to a staggering 37.6 percent. Senior citizens have been hit hard by tax increases as well. The earnings limitation is bad enough, but combined with the 1993 Clinton tax increase on Social Security benefits, the marginal rate now experienced by some seniors amounts to 88 percent, twice the rate paid by millionaires. That is not taxation. It is confiscation. Mr. President, the American people know what it means to balance a budget--to struggle to make ends meet--and they know better than the Government how to provide for themselves and their children. Parents just want a chance to keep more of what they earn to put food on the table, a roof over their heads, and their kids through school. The $500 per child tax credit in the families first bill is no panacea, but it is an important step in the right direction. In fact, about 35 million families across the nation would be eligible for the bill's $500 per child tax credit. Among those who would benefit the most are 4.7 million low-income families who would see their entire Federal tax burden eliminated--4.7 million families. As pointed out in a Heritage Foundation report last year, ``a $500 per child tax credit would give a family of four earning $18,000 per year a 33-percent tax cut, and a family earning $40,000 per year a 10- percent tax cut, while giving a family earning $200,000 per year a cut of only 1.5 percent.'' So the families first credit is fair. It targets relief to those who need it most--low- and middle-income families across the Nation. The bill also repeals the Social Security earnings limitation which is inherently unfair to people who need and deserve their full Social Security benefits and who also want to work. Not only should the earnings test be repealed, the Clinton tax increase on Social Security should be repealed as well. I know there are those who will say that deficit reduction is more important than tax relief, and they may oppose the bill. I disagree. I have never understood how taking more money out of the pockets of the American people can make them better off. Taxing people too much makes them worse off, and it slows down the economy. If the goal is to maximize tax revenues, as opposed to tax rates, then tax relief is not inconsistent with the goal of deficit reduction. It is integral to the goal of reducing the deficit. As my colleagues have heard me point out on a number of occasions, revenues to the Treasury have fluctuated around a relatively narrow band of 18 to 20 percent of gross national product for the last 40 years. That is despite tax increases and tax cuts, recessions and expansions, and economic policies pursued by Presidents of both parties. Since revenue as a share of the gross domestic product is virtually constant, the only way to raise revenue is to enact policies that foster economic growth and opportunity. In other words, 18 to 20 percent of a larger GDP represents more revenue to the Treasury than 18 to 20 percent of a smaller GDP. That is the basis for these Federal spending limits that I proposed in other legislation. It is the reason the tax cuts in the families first bill make good economic sense. Empower American families and they can do more for themselves and depend less on Government. Cut taxes and stimulate the economy and more people can go to work. There will actually be more economic activity to tax, more revenue to the Treasury, despite the lower tax rates. Last fall, the American people sent a loud and clear message to Congress: It is time to end business as usual. They want less Government, not more. They want tax relief and lower Government spending. Let Congress help President Clinton keep the promise he made in putting people first, to grant additional tax relief to families and children. Let Congress pass the families first bill.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, today the Senate is considering H.R. 889, the Defense emergency supplemental appropriations. This bill provides $1.96 billion to the Department of Defense for readiness by rescinding funds from other DOD programs. I will support H.R. 889 because it replenishes defense funds which were depleted to support unbudgeted operations in Haiti, Somalia, Rwanda, Bosnia, Korea, and refugee support in the Caribbean. Without these reimbursements, defense readiness will certainly suffer. The Chief of Staff of the Army, Gen. Gordon Sullivan, testified before the House National Security Committee that ``readiness will drop off the table'' if the supplemental appropriations is not passed. He further stated that all Army training will cease May 31 if the funds are not provided. The Navy reports that 4 carrier airwings would be forced to stand down and 500 aircraft would be grounded. The Air Force has indicated that its flight time would be cut in half if the supplemental fails. The readiness crisis faced by the Armed Forces is not, unfortunately, a recent phenomenon. Defense Secretary William Perry admitted last year that in 1994, 3 of the Army's 12 divisions were far below peak readiness standards, and that 2 of the Army's main quick-reaction units would have been unable to fulfill some of their missions if they were ordered into combat. It was further revealed that, due to funding shortfalls, some platoon leaders had never taken their soldiers into the completed their drill evaluations, and platoons had not been evaluated with live fire exercise. The Armed Forces have found themselves in a readiness crisis for a variety of reasons, such as the new, unplanned deployments mentioned above. But, increased spending on nondefense items in the defense bill is another reason that funds are being syphoned off readiness accounts. For example, nondefense expenditures imposed by Congress in last year's bill include funding for community roads, ponds, sewers, and a plethora of other development projects. The Department of Defense, for instance, is paying for security at the World Cup Games and the Olympics. DOD is even paying for the roundup of wild horses in New Mexico. Nondefense programs are growing, gobbling up larger portions of the defense budget. The Congressional Research Service estimates that nondefense spending by DOD has nearly quadrupled from $3.5 billion in fiscal year 1990 to $13 billion in fiscal year 1994. This is not to say that all R&D programs are unjustifiable. Some technology reinvestment programs [TRP], for example, are properly funded through the Department of Defense, because the program demonstrates a direct linkage back to defense. Other programs, such as some of the projects identified above, have no linkage to defense. This Nation simply cannot afford to allow the defense budget to become the cash cow for nondefense-related programs. In my view the general rescission identified by the Appropriations Committee is justifiable provided the funds come from the nondefense programs. I do disagree with the committee on one notable program recommended for rescission--the $77 million for the Apache AH64 attack helicopter. Last year, the Congress provided $77.6 million to procure 6 AH-64A aircraft because, as I recall, we were concerned that a break in production between the AH-64A and AH-64D could cause the program to escalate the costs of the low-rate procurement. At the same time, the Army requested $117.7 for advance procurement of Longbow radar, a key modernization feature, but only received $80 million. Faced with a difficult choice, the Army elected to submit a reprogramming request in order to proceed with full funding of the Longbow radar at the expense of the procurement of the six helicopters. The committee rejected the reprogramming request and rescinded the $77 million. I believe this action is a mistake since the Longbow program is clearly an essential Army helicopter modernization effort and certainly a justifiable defense program. For this reason, I intend to work with the chairmen of the House and Senate Appropriations Committees to restore the funds for the Apache-Longbow procurement.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, just before the Senator mentioned our children and grandchildren, I was going to make that precise point. I just got through with a statewide campaign. We conducted what we call back yard and living room meetings. In every one of these meetings, the question of the balanced budget amendment came up. Many of them were attended by seniors. I would ask these seniors--frankly, it was a way, Mr. President, of bragging about my two grandchildren. I would say, ``How many of you have children or grandchildren,'' and most of the hands would go up. ``Well, so do I, I have two beautiful grandchildren,'' and promised not to talk about them. But the point I am making is that these seniors love their children and grandchildren more than anything else in the world. And when they talked about the balanced budget amendment and they talked about their needs for Medicare and other expenses that they would have to bear in their remaining years, they always came back to the point that they wanted to leave a better future for their children and grandchildren, and the last thing that they wanted to do was to leave a mountain of debt for these young kids to have to pay, because they instinctively knew that the future for these children and grandchildren will be a lower standard of living than we have enjoyed unless we get the Federal fiscal house in order. And so these senior citizens, consistent with the statistics that the Senator from Idaho has just quoted, to a person, were very much in favor of the Federal Government getting its fiscal house in order. They understood it was not only good for them but it was essential for the people they love most, their children and grandchildren.

Mr. KYL. I thank you. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Idaho. He and I served in the House of Representatives together when he was a leader in the fight for the balanced budget amendment there. He carried that fight right over here to the Senate, and was one of our leaders in attempting to obtain passage of the balanced budget amendment this year. I predict that he will be one of the key figures in securing its passage sooner or later. It has been a pleasure for me to be of assistance to him and to bring with me from the House of Representatives an idea actually which I brought from my own home State of Arizona to achieve a balanced budget by spending limits rather than by raising taxes. That is what I wish to talk about today. Mr. President, if I could call time out for a second, the Senator from Idaho mistakenly referred to me as the junior Senator from Colorado for a moment, and I know exactly why. In the background, there was a deafening noise just a moment ago of loud applause for the junior Senator from Colorado, Ben Nighthorse Campbell, for his declaration that as of today, he is a proud member of the Republican Party, and will be a Member of the Republican Senate cadre. We are looking for a place to put his new desk on this side of this Chamber.

Mr. KYL. And I suspect any others who may wish to join Richard Shelby and Ben Nighthorse Campbell in joining us on the Republican side. Mr. President, we welcome these friends--former Democrats who are now Republicans--not only because they are friends and we need their help, but because their decision to join the Republican Party in both cases, as they said, was, as in Ronald Reagan's old phrase, a decision not to leave the Democratic Party, but because the Democratic Party had really left them. We have many friends here who proudly serve in the Democratic Party and uphold its traditions. From our point of view, one of those traditions is being willing to spend too much of the taxpayers' money. People like Ben Nighthorse Campbell and Richard Shelby and Paul Simon from Illinois and others who remain in the Democratic Party have finally said, ``We do not want to do that anymore. We have to balance the Federal budget.'' It has not been comfortable for a Democrat to support us in that effort. The President of the United States was very much in opposition to the balanced budget amendment, and as the Senator from Georgia said a short while ago, we can probably attribute the defeat of the balanced budget amendment yesterday to the lobbying of the President of the United States. Five or six Democrats who had previously cosponsored and voted for the balanced budget amendment--Democrats--decided this time not to support it. I think that handful of Democrats in support of the President, obviously, are the ones who will have to answer to the American people when the questions are asked, who defeated the balanced budget amendment. But today is another day. We have to move on. We are going to move forward as if the balanced budget amendment had passed and as if we are going to balance the budget by the year 2002. We will do it with or without the balanced budget amendment. It will be harder without that constitutional limitation. Yesterday's defeat of the balanced budget amendment, I suggest, is a call to arms. The ballot was lost, but the war rages on. The balanced budget amendment will ultimately pass--maybe later this year, maybe next year, or perhaps the year after. But it will pass because the American people demand that it pass. Last fall, a political revolution swept Capitol Hill, a revolution fueled by the American people's anger with the Federal Government out of control, a Federal Government overregulating, overtaxing, and overspending. Although the American people swept new leadership into the Senate and the House of Representatives, yesterday's vote demonstrated that the vestiges of business as usual remain and that another round of housecleaning is yet to come. I will predict that those who stood in the way of a balanced budget amendment yesterday will not be around when it is brought to a vote in future Congresses. The American people will, as I said, hold them accountable. Our mission today, with or without the balanced budget amendment, is to immediately begin making the tough choices about what spending to cut and what programs to terminate in order to get the budget to balance by the year 2002. Our responsibility is to put an effective enforcement mechanism into place to force the Congress to begin to prioritize, to separate wants from needs, just like families all across America must do every day. Mr. President, I thank the Chair. (The remarks of Mr. Kyl pertaining to the introduction of S. 494 are located in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Idaho for yielding this time and, again, for taking a strong leadership role in the effort to get the balanced budget amendment passed and predict that through his leadership eventually we will pass it. (Mr. GORTON assumed the chair.)

Mr. KYL. Will the Senator yield on that?

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I rise today with my colleagues, Rod Grams, Spencer Abraham, and Larry Craig to introduce the Balanced Budget/ Spending Limitation Act of 1995, a bill designed to balance the budget by fiscal year 2002, through the establishment of Federal spending limits and sequestration. An identical bill is being introduced in the House of Representatives by Representatives Jim McCrery and Mel Hancock. The Balanced Budget/Spending Limitation Act establishes a mechanism to limit spending and enforce limits. It establishes a Federal spending limit as 21.5 percent of the gross domestic product in fiscal year 1996, declining one-half percent of GDP per year to 19 percent in fiscal year 2001. In subsequent years, Federal spending would have to balance with revenue but could not exceed 19 percent of the gross domestic product. Any excess of spending over receipts or the Federal spending limits would be eliminated by sequesters, including a new fiscal year start sequester designed to hold a fiscal year's spending accountable for any actual deficit in the prior year. The Federal spending limits in the Balanced Budget/Spending Limit Act are established in recognition of the fact, as the Senator from Idaho said a moment ago, that revenues have fluctuated only within the narrow bands of 18 to 20 percent of the gross domestic product for the last 40 years, despite tax increases, tax cuts, economic contractions, and expansions and fiscal policies pursued by Presidents of both parties. In effect, the economy has already imposed an effective limit on how much revenue the Federal Government can raise--19 percent of the gross domestic product, exactly the level of today. While tax rate increases and tax cuts may produce temporary surges and declines in revenue, revenues always adjust at about 19 percent of GDP, and that is because changes in the Tax Code affect people's behavior. Higher taxes discourage work, production, savings, and investment, slowing economic growth. And with less economic activity to tax, of course, revenues to the Treasury are never as great as the tax writers expect. On the other hand, lower tax rates stimulate work, production, savings, and investment so revenues to the Treasury increase even at lower tax rates. With that in mind, the only way that Congress really can ever balance the budget is to ratchet spending as a share of GDP down to the level of revenues the economy has historically been willing to bear--19 percent of GDP. Limit spending, and there is no need for Congress to consider tax rate increases. It would not be allowed to spend any additional revenue that it raised. Besides, as reflected in historical trends, tax rate increases are more likely to slow economic growth than produce additional revenue relative to the gross domestic product. Link spending to economic growth, as measured in terms of GDP, and a positive incentive is created for Congress to support pro-growth economic policies. The more the economy grows, the more Congress is allowed to spend, although always proportionate to the size of the Nation's economy. In other words, 19 percent of a larger GDP represents more revenue to the Treasury and, thus, more than Congress is allowed to spend, than 19 percent of a smaller GDP. The advantages of the Federal spending limits are thus threefold. First, it will get us to a balanced budget by limiting spending, not increasing tax rates; second, it will shrink Government relative to the size of the economy; and third, it gives Congress a strong incentive to support policies that will keep the economy healthy and strong, policies of less taxation, less regulation and less spending that the American people are demanding anyway. For those Members of the Senate who voted against the balanced budget amendment saying Congress could do the job if it only had the courage and the will, well, here is your chance. For those who express concern about Social funds that we promised during the debate on the balanced budget amendment. The balanced budget amendment will never be a threat to Social Security. Mr. President, with or without a balanced budget amendment, deficit spending must stop. We know that. The economic security of the Nation is at stake. The future of our children and our grandchildren is at stake as a result of the mountain of debt Congress is leaving behind. This bill we are introducing today defines the glidepath and includes the enforcement mechanism to get the budget to balance, and I am going to urge its prompt consideration by this body so that we can immediately demonstrate to the State legislatures, to the people of this country and, frankly, to many of our colleagues who did not support the balanced budget amendment yesterday that we mean business, that we mean to balance this budget by the year 2002 and that we are prepared to begin the steps to achieve that goal. One of the first steps should be the adoption of legislation such as this to establish the framework for achieving our goal.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, outside the Senate Chamber on the Capitol grounds, the debt clock is ticking: an additional $9,600 every second, $576,000 every minute, $35 million every hour, and $829 million every day. That is nearly $1 billion in additional debt the Federal Government is accumulating each and every day. It is a catastrophe waiting to happen. The choice before the Senate today is clear. We can defuse that time bomb of debt by passing the balanced budget amendment and begin to make the tough decisions necessary to put our Nation's fiscal house in order, or we can bury our collective heads in the sand and pretend that spending $1 billion a day beyond our means will not have devastating economic consequences. But we ought to be honest with the American people: Without the balanced budget amendment, there is no plan to balance the budget--not in 5 years, not in 10 years, or ever. The budget that President Clinton submitted to the Congress earlier this month proposes $200 billion deficits as far as the eye can see. The President has no plan to balance the budget. Although the new Congress is poised to make significant cuts in spending, there is no assurance that when the pain begins to be felt in a few years, it will not opt to mitigate pain by resuming Federal borrowing as Congresses in the past have done. That is why Gramm-Rudman failed several years ago. It is why nothing less than the balanced budget amendment will succeed in the future. Mr. President, this is a debate about the future, about preserving what is best in America. It is about protecting senior citizens on Social Security. It is about letting our families keep what they earn. It is about protecting our children's future. I am hopeful today when this day ends the U.S. Senate will have passed the balanced budget amendment.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that immediately following the disposition of the Wellstone motion dealing with homeless children, Senator Wellstone be recognized to call up his filed motion No. 2, and that time prior to a motion to table be limited to the following: 45 minutes under the control of Senator Wellstone, 15 minutes under the control of Senator Hatch, and that following the conclusion or yielding back of time the majority leader or his designee be recognized to make a motion to table the Wellstone motion, and that vote occur in the stacked sequence to begin at 3 p.m. today.

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Senator Wellstone be recognized to call up his motion dealing with homeless children; and that time prior to a motion to table be limited to the following: 45 minutes under the control of Senator Wellstone; 15 minutes under the control of Senator Hatch; and that following the conclusion or yielding back of time, the majority leader, or his designee, be recognized to table the Wellstone motion; and that that vote occur at 3 p.m. today.

Mr. KYL. Reserving the right to object, Mr. President, if I might, it is my understanding that there are two unanimous consent requests which deal with two amendments of the Senator from Minnesota. I wonder if I might make those requests and see if they are suitable to the Senator from Minnesota, and we can proceed in that manner.

Mr. KYL

Mr. KYL. In the amendment, we have to have 51 Senators to exceed the balanced budget requirement in situations in support of an ongoing military conflict.

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, we are prepared to yield the remainder of time on this side. Mr. President, at this time, I move to table the amendment of the Senator from West Virginia and I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. KYL. The answer, as I understand it, is the requirement would be 218 irrespective, but I do think it is a mischaracterization to say not infrequently there are 3, 4, or 5 vacant seats in the House. In my 8 years there, the most ever at one time was three, and very rarely were there any. I think if I could get back and conclude my part of the debate on my time, then I will be happy to hear from the Senators from West Virginia and Maryland. I think we have to put this back in context. We have a very important issue before our country right now. It is the runaway Federal budget deficit and the accumulating debt that we are consigning to our children and our grandchildren. All of us understand the importance of dealing with that. We have some disagreement about precisely how to deal with it. But those of us who support the balanced budget amendment believe that one thing we should do is to say that if we are going to exceed that balanced budget limit, even in a time of military conflict, it should require a constitutional majority, meaning 51 Senators, 218 Representatives. That is hardly too much of a burden in that situation. Why? Because in that situation, we have already put young American men and women in harm's way by definition. Therefore, the seriousness of that commitment should require an equally serious commitment on the part of the House and Senate in providing for the funding for those operations. We provided, in a case of declaration of war, of course, which, as the Senator from Maryland correctly pointed out, only requires a majority vote, you should only require a majority vote to fund that operation beyond the requirement of the balanced budget amendment. But in those cases where you have not made a declaration of war, such as the situation in Haiti, just to cite one example, if the funding cannot occur any other way than by breaking the budget, then we suggest that a mere 51 votes in the Senate and 218 in the House is not too much to ask for. The amendment of the Senator from West Virginia would change that to a simple majority of those here and voting, however many decide to vote. We think that that is not a substantial enough requirement to break the balance of the budget that we are trying to achieve by the passage of the balanced budget amendment. Mr. BYRD addressed the Chair.

Mr. KYL. The Senator is correct.

Mr. KYL. I want to yield to the Senator from Idaho, but I will make a point first. The Senator is correct, I am assuming that in important matters where funding was necessary, 51 Senators would be willing to do that. But the Senator from Maryland is assuming that that is the right thing to do, as am I in this situation. If 51 Senators said, ``No, we're not going to break the budget; we're not going to unbalance the budget to fund your operation in Haiti,'' or wherever it might be, I cannot assume that that is a wrong decision, if 51 Senators have made that decision. I yield to the Senator from Idaho.

Mr. KYL. It most certainly could. If I could finish. Only in the event that we did not find the money to fund the war effort and all of the other obligations of Government, would we have to exceed this balanced-budget-requirement limitation. Obviously, in a case of a World War II we would be spending a lot more money. We probably would go into deficit. One would assume the votes would be there. But, for example, the conflict of Haiti, which is not a declared war and obviously would not necessarily require that we break the bank in order to support the operation in Haiti, it does not seem to me to be an unreasonable requirement to require 51 Senators.

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, yes, the Nation could.

Mr. KYL. In this situation, the Vice President--just as in any other situation where we do not have a tie--the Vice President is not casting a tie vote. It is very rare that the Vice President has to cast a tie vote, but we are aware of the fact he has on occasion. No one will suggest that there are not occasions where we have a tie vote. What we are saying is, if we are talking about supporting an ongoing military conflict involving a U.S. interest, we have American men and women sacrificing or at least risk their lives in support of this operation, if we cannot muster 51 votes in support of those young men and women, then presumably the Senate has said we do not want them over there taking whatever risks they are taking. If we cannot trust the U.S. Senate, 51 Senators, to make that kind of decision, it seems to me there are not very many other judgments we could make.

Mr. KYL. It all depends on whether or not the expenditure--first, whether this was an expenditure of funds, whether it would put Members over the balanced-budget-limit requirement, and whether it was done in furtherance of support for our activities in an ongoing military conflict.

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I yield.

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, if I could reclaim my time. I am not aware of a situation. There may very well be one. I have not heard of any one situation in which fewer than a constitutional majority but a majority, a simple majority, voted to fund an important military operation of the United States, ongoing military operation. I think it is important to put this in context. Throughout the entire year the Congress can fund operations of the Government, including the Defense Department or the State Department, where we are involved in military conflict. We are involved in military situations around the globe today, some of which can involve conflict. As a matter of fact, if something occurs in Haiti or one of the other countries in which we have troops today, that is a military conflict. We are funding those operations. We are not voting on that. We do not take a vote every time we send another ship or more jeeps or tanks to one of these places of military conflict. This question of funding only arises in a few situations. It may arise with regard to a supplemental appropriation where we will, in effect, refund the money to the Defense Department, or it may arise in connection with a defense authorization bill, which we do once a year, or a defense appropriation bill. So we can deal with these issues throughout the year. The only thing we are talking about in the constitutional amendment is the question at the end of the year when we have to either be in balance or vote to exceed that balanced budget requirement. At that one critical moment in the year when we decide to let an ongoing military operation continue with the funding it has rather than to override or to exceed the balanced budget requirement, in that case we have to have a constitutional majority rather than a simple majority, meaning 51 Senators out of 100, 218 Representatives out of 435. Mr. President, I just suggest in closing the debate on this amendment from our side that while the seriousness of the Senator from West Virginia is always apparent and issues of national security are known to all Members to be of utmost importance, I suggest that this is much ado about nothing. A constitutional amendment that says we should have 51 Senators out of 100 or 218 Representatives out of 435, a mere majority, is not too high a requirement. It is not too much to ask. If we are going to be putting our young men and women in harm's way we better have the support of half of the Senate and half of the House of Representatives. That is all that the balanced budget amendment requires with respect to the requirements for funding. certainly is not something that would suggest the appropriateness of an amendment to our proposed constitutional amendment here.

Mr. KYL. Mr. President, if I may interrupt, the Senator from Maryland said this has happened in the past. I am not aware of a situation where the Congress has refused to fund an ongoing military operation of the United States of America.

Mr. KYL. If I may just finish this thought. By definition, if it is an important vote, they are there doing their duty. It does not seem to me to be an unreasonable requirement that, for a matter of this magnitude, one would require a majority of both the House and the Senate to approve exceeding the requirement for a balanced budget. And especially on matters as important as those suggested by the Senator from Maryland and the Senator from West Virginia, Members will be present, will reflect on the matter seriously, and therefore will vote. I am happy to yield further to the Senator.