Charlie Stenholm

Mr. STENHOLM

Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Bishop).

Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from North Carolina (Mrs. Clayton). (Mrs. CLAYTON asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Mr. STENHOLM

Mr. STENHOLM. I take back my time from the chairman and say that these are the rules of the House. The Rules Committee said to all people who brought a rule, ``Bring a budget that is scored by CBO.'' We did. The gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Nussle) did not bring a budget to the Committee on Rules scored by CBO. You ignored your own rules in allowing the gentleman from Iowa to come forward with an OMB-scored when your rules and what you instructed me to do is come CBO-scored. You chose to ignore it, which you can do. You can waive any rule any time you want to in the majority. But let me remind the gentleman that the chickens will come home to roost. You are going to have to vote to borrow $750 billion, and it is going to be more than that with the economic game plan you folks are on. You are going to get to stand up and provide 218 votes to increase the debt ceiling when we could have been with you and we offered to be with you in a bipartisan way to the President saying, We do not have to resort to games; we can do it under the rules of the House and we can do it bipartisanly. But no thanks, you did not want any part of that. There is justice in this world, and you are going to get a chance pretty soon to borrow that money in an up and down vote and explain why you are doing it when you could have had something better.

Mr. STENHOLM. I yield to the gentleman from California, the chairman of the Committee on Rules, that denied me an opportunity to have debate.

Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me this time. I take to the floor in the strongest possible opposition to this unfair rule. I cannot believe my colleagues on this side that can stand up and say, ``Support this fair rule.'' But the first thing I want to say today is let the record clearly state, and I could not agree more, that Congress must join the President to provide for the security of our Nation, our troops, our law enforcement officials, and everyone else who is fighting the war on terrorism. We agree. However, it is cowardly, not patriotic, to use this vitally important priority for all of us as a scapegoat for abandoning all fiscal responsibility and the budget process in the pursuit of this unfair rule. As a member of the minority, I do not expect I am going to win very often on the floor. But I do expect the majority to show a modicum of respect for the democratic process, if not for Democrats. To have every single Democratic amendment, both a complete substitute as well as numerous single bullet amendments, completely shut out of the debate is outrageous. What really bothers me about this, I remember the times in the last 23 years in which I have stood up with you on this side of the aisle when you were in the minority and demanded that you have an opportunity to have your amendments on the floor and debated and usually I was with you. But yesterday the Rules Committee said ``no'' to the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Moore), the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Tanner), and myself when under the rules that you sent to us, we brought you a complete substitute and you said, ``No, we do not wish to allow you to have 1 hour of debate on a substitute.'' We offered the good hand of friendship to you and you said ``no.'' That is your privilege. That is your privilege. You can do so. But it is not just a few Blue Dogs or the Democrats who have a problem. The majority seems determined to ignore it, but they have the same problem that needs to be solved and that is a deficit.

Mr. STENHOLM

Mr. STENHOLM. Madam Speaker, I thank my friend for taking the time tonight to permit us again to discuss in what we hope are very rational, simple-to-understand terms what we are proposing. About a year ago we stood on this floor in opposition to the budget that ultimately passed. We are in the minority. When you are in the minority you usually lose. But we also stood on the floor and offered some comments and some suggestions that we thought made a little bit of common sense. That projected surplus that everybody was talking about was projected. It was a guesstimate. It was an estimate. It was not necessarily real. It was not necessarily unreal. But we thought the conservative thing to do with our economic game plan for America was simply to take half of it and pay down the national debt. We were ridiculed by some saying that we were going to pay down the debt too fast. Others suggested that it was the people's money and, therefore, we are going to give it back to them. Very popular suggestion. Some of us were also reminding people that it was the people's debt. Again, we were told do not worry about it. The national debt, the debt ceiling, is not going to have to be increased for 7 years. And we said, we hope you are right. We hope that these estimates are right. But just in case there may be an emergency, and we were not prophetic, no one could have foreseen September 11, 2001, but it happened. We did not believe necessarily the stock market was going to go up forever. We have always recognized that there are going to be ups and downs; and we had just come through 8 years, the longest single economic expansion in the history of our country doing whatever we were doing until the 1990s, which happened to be beginning to balance the Federal budget. And I give credit to my friends on the other side for being a part of that. And that is what we are here tonight saying, look at some of the things we did and said in the last 6 or 8 years and try to be a little bit consistent. What we are suggesting is that some of the same things that occurred in 1996 in which the majority party, the same folks that are in control tonight, demanded that ``The President of the United States and the Congress shall enact legislation in the first session of the 104th Congress to achieve a balanced budget not later than the fiscal year 2002 as estimated by the Congressional Budget Office.'' What an irony. Here we are, March 19, 2002, recognizing that the balanced budgets that we have achieved over the last 2 or 3 years are now out the window as far as the eye can see. The President's budget that he submitted to the Congress does not balance without using Social Security for the next 10 years. We Blue Dogs are suggesting that is irresponsible budgeting; that we, in fact, are not unreasonable to ask the leadership of this body in the budget tomorrow and in the actions coming up to submit a plan that will balance the Federal budget by 2007 without using Social Security trust funds. That is all that we ask. Some of us have been here and voted consistently for these type of budgets. That is what I hope to do again tomorrow. But tonight we are calling attention to the fact that we believe it is irresponsible to ask the Congress to borrow $750 billion without a plan of how we are going to get our budget back in balance, other than the plan that we are now under which, by their own administration, does not balance until, well, it does not. We do not go out past 10 years. In fact, this budget we will consider tomorrow is going out only 5; that is what is bothering us. We are perfectly willing to vote for a clean debt ceiling increase with certain provisos. I do not want to see us go through what we did back in 1995 and 1996 in which we had members of the other party standing on this floor threatening to impeach Secretary Rubin for doing the things that we are now being told by the majority leadership that we are going to do, borrow on our employees, our civil service, military retirement, borrow on those retirement funds and temporarily suspend paying interest in order to get by. Why do that? There are those of us in the Blue Dog coalition that are looking for a way to be bipartisan on something other than the war. I do not understand why the leadership of this House demands when it comes to fiscal policy that the only votes that will ever come on this floor are those that get 218 Republican votes, when there are some of us, we heard the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Turner), we heard the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Moore). We do not just say that we want to return to fiscal responsibility; we are prepared to act. But the budget that is submitted tomorrow by the chairman of the Committee on the Budget's own admission is not in balance. And, again, I repeat what the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Moore) said, 2003 is a different story. We are at war, an unusual war by the fact that it has not been declared by Congress and yet we are at war, and we understand that and we are perfectly willing to fund whatever it takes, both domestically and internationally, to cover that cost. But why, we ask, would we want to just arbitrarily give a blank check to borrow $750 billion without a plan of how we are going to use it? What are we going to spend it for? Why should we just arbitrarily send the bill to our children and grandchildren for $750 billion additional, following an economic game plan that has already put us into a position where we cannot balance the budget for 10 years without going into the Social Security trust fund after we voted last year five times on the lockbox, cross my heart, we are not going to touch Social Security again. And yet, here we are, the first action of this year, we are going to do it again. Not with my vote. But if we can have a little bit of cooperation, some of us submitted an alternative today that we will talk about tomorrow. But tonight we are just talking about a simple request. What is it that is so wrong about submitting a plan that will get us to balance? What is it that is so right by sending a plan up that we have got to change the manner in which we score it? We agreed back in 1995 on a massive vote, and there were 148 of my friends on this side and 48 Democrats that voted and said we want the President to submit a balanced budget. In fact, we demand that the President submit a balanced budget; and we want that budget to protect future generations, ensure Medicare solvency, reform welfare, provide adequate funding for Medicaid, education, agriculture, national defense, veterans, and the environment. Furthermore, the balanced budget shall adopt tax policies to help working families and to stimulate future economic growth. That is what we said in 1996; and we got 277 votes for it, including 48 Democrats, 229 Republicans. What happened? If that is what we required President Clinton to do, why are we not equally asking President Bush, and I do not think it will take a whole lot of encouraging. I think this President will be amenable. In fact, I am almost sure he will be amenable, but why is that some on the other side refuse to bring that kind of a resolution to the floor and instead think of ways to circumvent, to circumvent the law of the land, to circumvent how we in fact avoid increasing the debt ceiling on a clean up and down vote, when the same folks and I will read quote after quote after quote of the same folks that said so many bad things when it was Secretary Rubin doing it? We Blue Dogs pride ourselves in consistency. We are not perfect. I am sure that somebody will find something that I have done or said that is not totally consistent, but I bet I will be 90 percent consistent in saying let us submit a plan for how we balance our budget without touching Social Security and Medicare. As we Blue Dogs stood on this floor last year and argued for our budget in which we said take half of the projected surplus, pay down the debt, take the other half, divide it equally between the necessary increases in spending for defense, for education, for health care, for veterans and for agriculture, and the other 25 percent, a tax cut targeted at helping the economy and working families. Well, we lost on our plan. If we had passed our plan, we would have been in a heck of a lot better shape tonight on all accounts, but today is a new year. Tonight we stand up again in asking, submit a balanced budget plan. Show us why we need to arbitrarily borrow $750 billion. Show us what the money is going to be used for. The best way to do that is to go slow, to go slow. Do not just give us a blank check anymore than if you were a father and your son had just exceeded his credit card, and you are not going to go out and say, well, great, son, that was wonderful that you exceeded your limit, I am going to give you another $2,000 on your credit card; just keep on doing whatever you have been doing. Families, we do not operate that way. We should not operate the country that way. So tonight we are just, in fact, saying we are ready to support a plan. We will roll up our sleeves and work with my colleagues on a plan. Try us. Just try us and see what might happen, instead of the partisanship that we see time and time again on economic issues. And here I will say if my colleagues sincerely believe in their budget, if they sincerely believe that it is in our Nation's best interest to borrow on our children's and grandchildren's grand future and the next 10 years and the Social Security trust fund, then just stay with my colleagues' budget and I will respect them for that. Anybody that stands up on this floor and does what they say they believe in and stands behind it with their vote and argues for it, I will respect them; and I hope they respect those of us that have a little bit different version of this, and we will be arguing for that tomorrow, assuming we will be allowed to have our amendment on the floor tomorrow and have that amendment, which I certainly expect and hope that we will. With these comments I would now yield back to the gentleman and to other of my colleagues who have come here to discuss this issue tonight, and I thank him for yielding.

Mr. STENHOLM

Mr. STENHOLM. Madam Speaker, concerning what the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Turner) was saying a moment ago, was also characterized in my own comments, is in agreement with the gentleman's statements concerning September 11, 2001. That is the point that we are making tonight and we have been trying to make, is that things did change. Therefore, we do not necessarily believe that the budget that was put in place last year before 9-11 should be arbitrarily sent forward without adjusting not only for the expenditures, but also for the fact that we are going borrowing the Social Security trust funds in order to meet current operating expenses. We would welcome the opportunity to work together with the other side in the same spirit that the gentleman began his remarks tonight. Things have changed; and, therefore, we believe that we need to change our economic game plan to bring us back into balance, and we look forward to working with the gentleman.

Mr. STENHOLM. Madam Speaker, will the gentleman from Colorado yield?

Mr. STENHOLM

Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will continue to yield, in the gentleman's opening remarks concerning our Blue Dog Special Order just before this, the gentleman seemed to have taken the opinion that we were beating up on the administration. That certainly was not my intent, but it was to consider the administration equally with the Congress in coming up with a solution. That is what we were trying to do. In the case of Social Security, this is one Democrat who agrees with my President, what he proposed in the campaign and what I am ready to work with him on, on an individual account approach. I happen to agree with that. That is something that the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Kolbe) and I share, and the gentleman from Michigan has joined with us in cosponsoring our one area. The gentleman has some different views, and I respect those, and the gentleman has some great ideas that need to be considered in this endeavor. I think it is important for the American public to realize that we can have differences of opinion, but we do not have to be disagreeable about it. Because I do not pretend for a moment that the bill that the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Kolbe) and I put together is the solution, but we have been scored to do that which we all agree needs to be done, and that is to fix the problem, the unfunded liability of $22 trillion. We take care of $19 trillion of that, not a small amount of money in this body, but the main thing is to start a dialogue; and that is why I appreciate my colleague inviting me to be part of his dialogue tonight, and I hope we can get more of this. We seemingly cannot get it done in the committees of jurisdiction.

Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, there are other solutions to the problem, and that is why I appreciate the opportunity to join with my colleague tonight in talking about some of these other solutions. I think it is awfully important at this stage, and my colleague probably ought to do this and I am going to have to leave in a moment, but about every 10 or 15 minutes when we start talking about Social Security, we are not talking about those who are on it today. We are not talking about those about to be on it, i.e., 55 years of age and older. They are safe. We are talking about our children and grandchildren. That needs to be over and over emphasized, and we have got a plan which tonight I will not go into all of it. The gentleman is going to talk about his, and I happen to agree with most of what he is doing, particularly with addressing the problem. It has been so difficult, so seemingly impossible, for this body to address it. The Blue Dogs, a moment ago, what we said last year is, before we get into any new budget, any new tax cuts, any new anything, the first thing we should have done was sit down and fix Social Security. The gentleman from Michigan would agree with that, but that is not to be. That is water under the bridge. That is gone. Now we find ourselves here it is 2002. Now, then, we are being told, and rightfully so, this being an election year, no one is going to address Social Security this year in a meaningful way, i.e., a chance to get a bill through the House and the Senate and the President signing it. So that means we are postponing it until 2003. The next thing we are going to hear is, we cannot do it in 2003 because the next elections are in 2004. That is why I am so disappointed that we did not have an opportunity to show bipartisan support for what our President has had the courage to do in the campaign, and I am so sorry that we have not been able to take the Commission on Social Security that made recommendations, that we have not had a serious opportunity to discuss those recommendations, pluses and minuses, and pursue the legislative process of a solution. The gentleman from Michigan and I are not controlling that process.

Mr. STENHOLM. If the gentleman will yield further, I have two.

Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Michigan for yielding to me. I wish I had the answer to that question tonight. But certainly we cannot blame it on the gentleman and I, because it has been a pleasure for me to work with the gentleman, and with the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Kolbe) and with our friend, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Boyd), who has been a cosponsor of our bill, the proposal of which we believe should be seriously considered in fixing Social Security. One of the things that we know is necessary is that any proposed fix has to be bipartisan. That is why I appreciate the fact that about 4 years ago, when the gentleman and I were joined together at that time in proposing some solutions, the gentleman's opponent attacked him and my opponent attacked me. I appreciate the letter to the editor the gentleman sent to my district saying, get off his back, because he is trying to fix a problem; and I did the same for the gentleman. That is the spirit in which we have tried to operate. We hope we will get a few more folks beginning to acknowledge the fact, and this is a fact, no one disagrees that Social Security in its current form is not sustainable for our children and grandchildren. There is no problem with those on it today, but there is a problem for our children and grandchildren; and the longer we wait and the longer we wait, it makes it that much more difficult. I know when I first got here in the Congress in 1979, 2011 was so far away we did not worry about it; but tonight, 2011 is 9 years away. That is why the gentleman and I have been trying to at least get the relevant committees to begin in a bipartisan way acknowledging some proposed solutions.

Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Michigan for sharing his time, and I want to keep on plugging, because he has been a valuable resource to this body, to those who bother to stop and listen; and some of the areas he will be talking about now are something that colleagues on both sides of the aisle, and I am going to do my best to make sure that folks on my side listen; and if they are going to complain or if they are going to talk negatively about what the gentleman is talking about, my answer is, okay, what is the solution? At least the gentleman has got a solution, and for that I commend the gentleman and thank him for yielding some time to me tonight.

Mr. STENHOLM

Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, today I want to take this time to continue a discussion that we, the so-called Blue Dog Democrats, the Blue Dog Coalition, have been carrying on for the last 2 or 3 weeks talking about the urgency of this body in dealing with the debt ceiling and dealing with our economic game plan that has now pushed us once again into a position of having to borrow on the Social Security trust fund for the next 10 years. Just a little bit of a reminder or a refresher on everyone's mind tonight. It was just 1 year ago that we were on this floor advocating a budget, an economic game plan for this country that was different from what the majority and the administration wished. The thing that we said was that this $5.6 trillion was projected surpluses, and we emphasized projected. These were guesstimates. Most everyone agrees we cannot predict tomorrow, much less 10 years. But we lost. What we suggested was let us take half of that projected surplus and pay down our national debt. We were told we were in danger of paying it down too fast. That was somewhat laughable to most of us, the idea that you could pay down debt too fast, when you owed $5.6 trillion. When we have an unfunded liability in the Social Security trust fund of $22 trillion, we also proposed in our budget plan that the first thing that we should do as a body is fix Social Security and Medicare; that we should deal with those two problems first before we begin making any other decisions as to how much money we spend. Again, we lost. We have not seriously addressed Social Security as of this moment, and we will not do so until at least next year. But now we find, again contrary to what we were told a little over 1 year ago, that we were not going to need to increase our debt ceiling for at least 7 more years; that in December, the Secretary of the Treasury, Mr. O'Neill, wrote and said we must increase our debt ceiling and do it immediately by $750 billion. Now, where are we tonight? As of the close of business Friday, March 8, the debt subject to limit stood at $5.924 trillion, leaving about $26 billion of room left in our debt ceiling. Now, what does this mean to the average layperson? It is kind of like a student going to their parents with a $6,000 credit card bill. Of course the parents will pay, because they do not want the kids rating to be damaged and probably their own, because they are responsible for their child; but they will work out an arrangement with that child that includes reducing his allowance, getting a part-time job, making promises for less partying, and on and on. That is what concerns us Blue Dogs and why we are here again tonight. We are being asked to increase the debt ceiling by $750 billion without a plan, without a plan to deal with these deficits that now have, in the President's budget, a projected raiding of the Social Security trust fund for the next 10 years. We do not believe that is an acceptable game plan. We are prepared to support our President, and we are prepared to work with our friends on the other side of the aisle on a new plan. But so far nothing has come forward. One would think that the budget that we are going to be having on the floor next week would address this. Instead, we are told that we are not even going to have a budget that is in balance anytime in the future. We are being told now that this budget that is going to be presented to us will be scored by OMB. The last time we had a fight on the debt ceiling, one of the things that we agreed to was that we would use CBO. In fact, 1995, the last time we had this difference of opinion on how we raise the debt ceiling, 48 Democrats joined with the Republican majority to insist that President Clinton submit a plan that was balanced under CBO numbers. Now, I am saying to the leadership of this House, and we again would welcome someone from the other side to come and join in this discussion tonight, we hope that the 148 Republicans who voted for that legislation in 1995, who are still in the House, will stay consistent and insist that before we raise the debt ceiling that we have a plan that gets us out of it. Is that unreasonable? Does that not make sense? If so, why are we now talking about doing the same thing that Secretary Rubin did in 1995 that had the majority threatening to impeach him? Now we are talking about perhaps doing the same thing, and now it is okay. Again, all we are saying tonight is increasing the debt ceiling by $750 billion to borrow money for what? Now, let me point out very clearly, we support the President's request for additional funding for defense and are perfectly willing to include that in any debt ceiling increase. If the President proposes to borrow the money rather than to pay for it, we are behind him, and that includes the domestic defense as well as the foreign. That is not an item in dispute. What is in dispute tonight is why should we increase the debt ceiling $750 billion without putting a plan in place to deal with it, just like the father and son or father and daughter would certainly do if it was in their household budget? I find most American people agree with that rationale. We are puzzled why we are not having that bill on the floor next week. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that I be allowed to yield the balance of my time to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Boyd), and that he be allowed to control that time.

Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding. I wish my colleague from Mississippi did not have to leave the floor, but I wanted to point out that the thee of us, the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Taylor), the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Boyd), and I were the three votes against the stimulus package last week. The reason we voted no is that it was not paid for. The gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Taylor) has been one of the most consistent Members in this body over the last couple of years in doing what he showed us again tonight, and that is recognizing that our debt is going up; and this is a debt that our children and grandchildren are going to have to pay, and it should not be unreasonable to expect this body to deal with it. All we asked for in that bill last week, the three of us, and, boy, I have been ridiculed politically and otherwise as being one of the three, but I voted that way for a very, very important reason, and that is consistency in saying that we should now, the budget that we will debate next week, we should put ourselves back on track in balancing our Federal Government. Now, we got off track and, yes, part of it was the war, no question about that. No one foresaw 9-11-01. One of the reasons the Blue Dogs last year said, Let us set aside that projected surplus, was because something might happen unforeseen. We were not prophetic. We just said it was good, prudent business to set aside rather than expend it, whether it be in tax cuts or in spending. Mr. Speaker, it is interesting now, and I am puzzled by this: In 1995, one of our colleagues, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Portman), in talking about, at that time, a different President in the White House, he said, It is not okay to play games with the $30 billion in payroll taxes that workers pay each month that retirees rely on to finance their benefit checks. The gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston) stood over here day after day after day, and on this particular day he said, Mr. Speaker, it seems unbelievable to me that we are sitting here debating whether the President can tap into the Social Security trust fund and the Civil Service Retirement fund. I find that it is almost unbelievable that the Democratic Party, who has been using the senior citizens all over America as their own cheap pawn, as their shield, to ram or resist any kind of legislation that comes up, now they want to take the money out of the senior citizens' trust fund. That is exactly what is being contemplated by the majority party in this body as of tonight, doing what they condemned Secretary Rubin for doing. If it was wrong then, it is wrong now. Some of us are willing to do the right thing. The right thing would be to increase the debt ceiling and do it clean. That is the right thing to do. But just as was argued by our friends on the other side in 1995, it is inconceivable that anyone would vote to increase the debt ceiling without first putting in a plan that will get us back into balance and take us out of the Social Security trust fund. That is all we are asking, and we are willing to work in a bipartisan way to accomplish that goal. We do not want to play games. It is too important. The creditworthiness of the United States of America is on the line. It is too important to play games. But play games, we have in the past, and play games, it seems like the leadership of this House are willing to do again. They condemned us, and I was one of the 48 that stood up with you and 148 Republicans still in the House and voted to increase the debt ceiling. I was there. Where are you tonight? Where will you be next week? Why are you insisting that now, in spite of the fact that you argued, even to the point of bringing this government down, which we did for weeks, shutting down the Washington Monument, doing all of the things that you felt were so important, because you felt like the President, President Clinton, would not, did not, would refuse to bring a balanced budget plan to you. All we are saying tonight is, we are ready to join with you, but do not change the rules. The rules are that the Congressional Budget Office is the official scorer. Do not change the rules and say OMB, and reduce the deficit and the debt by $40 million because OMB scores it differently. We agreed to play by those rules. Let us stay consistent. All we are asking again is, put up a plan. One unnamed staffer was quoted this last week on the other side of the aisle and was asked, are you going to present a balanced budget? Well, we are going to say we do, but it is really not. That was an honest answer. We are so close to doing good things for this country. We were there. We squandered it. Yes, the war was unpredictable; that is a part of it. The recession now, we are being told, was not nearly as deep as anyone thought, and I hope, just like I stood in this well 1 year ago and said, when we argued against the economic game plan that was put in place and we voted that way and we sincerely believed it was wrong, and we said at that time, I said, I hope I am wrong and I hope I get to eat the biggest plate of crow in this town. And I know that had I been wrong, I would have been served up, and I should have been. But tonight we simply come back before this body with a message to our leadership: We think balancing our Federal budget, we think pay-go, paying for those new expenditures that we need, makes good economic sense; and we think that every bill that comes before this House, new and over and above that which we passed in the budget resolution that we are now operating under for this year, that we ought to give serious consideration to paying for them or voting them down. That is what the three of us did last week. Well, obviously three do not vote down anything. But here I have a real sincere, puzzling question. If we voted last week and the President signed the stimulus package that CBO has scored to increase our debt by $42 billion over 10 years and $92 billion over the next 3, and the reason for the difference is, the tax provisions make money in the outyears, projected; if we did that last week and it was signed into law, how can you possibly leave that out of next week's budget deliberations? How can you possibly say that that law that we passed that is going into effect that will increase our debt by $42 billion over the next 10 years, and the 5-year budget will increase our debt by $100 billion, how can you possibly come to this floor and just ignore it? I mean, you talk about the Enronization of the budget process. This is it. Shifting offshore. Taking it off budget. Hiding it. Well, we will be back next week to talk about that. But tonight, I appreciate the gentleman yielding to me. The gentleman is a true leader of fiscal responsibility in this body, and it is a pleasure for me to join with the gentleman day after day in proposing what we believe are some of the better solutions. When one is in the minority, one loses. But every now and then, as we showed on the farm bill, if we work with the other side, we find that you can get bipartisanship. It was not by accident that we got 290 votes for the farm bill. That is what we ought to get on the budget next week. But if they ignore us, they will not do so. If they want to increase our Nation's debt without a new plan, count me out.

Mr. STENHOLM

Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize the 317th Airlift Group as they return to Dyess Air Force Base from a three-month deployment in Southwest Asia. These folks have been supporting the war effort in Afghanistan and today they return to home to the cheers and support of their families, friends and the entire city of Abilene, Texas. I want to add my voice to this chorus of support for these brave folks who have spent the last three months working in incredibly challenging physical conditions, flying and supporting missions, in our nation's assault on terrorism. They saw firsthand how the battle in Afghanistan has cost precious American lives even as they put themselves in harm's way. Today, I join with a grateful nation to express not only thanks to members of the 317th Airlift Group and all those who wear Air Force Blue, but also to the wives and husbands and sons and daughters and family members who share in the sacrifices they make. Our ability as a nation to deploy throughout the world at a moment's notice is possible only because there are strong families and communities to provide support. Since the terrorist attacks on our nation on September 11, 2001, we have called on folks to make great sacrifices, and our nation's military has answered that call with swift, forceful action. Like all Americans, I have the highest level of confidence in those folks who volunteer to serve in defense of our nation. They have our confidence and respect because they have earned it. They earn it every day as they face hardship and danger. They serve because they believe in America, and America believes in them.

Mr. STENHOLM

Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

Mr. STENHOLM

Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, this will be another in a series of 1- hours that the so-called Blue Dog Coalition is taking to focus on the budget, to focus on the request of the administration to raise our debt ceiling by $750 billion. We want to continue to talk about this. I want to make it very, very clear that we, the Blue Dogs, are willing to support a temporary increase in the debt limit to meet the expenses of the war and to allow government to meet its obligations; but we suggest holding off on a long-term increase in the debt ceiling until we have a plan in place to return our country and our fiscal affairs to balance. I remind everyone that it was less than a year ago that we stood and debated on this floor of the House the economic game plan that we were going to follow for the next year and the next 10 years. I remind everyone just briefly that the Blue Dogs felt that we ought to be conservative with the $5.6 trillion projected surplus just in case it was not real, just in case something of an emergency nature might occur, just in case those who projected that surplus might be wrong. We suggested that we ought to take half of that $5.6 trillion projected surplus and pay down the debt. We were told by our friends on the other side of the aisle and the administration that they were concerned about paying down the debt too quickly. Well, I do not know where they got that information, but now all of a sudden the President's budget that he has submitted to the Congress this year projects deficits and the utilization of the Social Security trust fund for the next 10 years. I repeat. The President's budget proposes using Social Security trust fund dollars for the next 10 years. That is the economic game plan that we are under tonight. The Blue Dogs are suggesting that we ought to sit back, the Congress and the President, and our friends on the other side of the aisle need to sit back and roll up our sleeves and have an honest discussion about what we need to do to put our budget back in order. We need to have a serious discussion with everything on the table. The preceding speaker opened his remarks in just that vein, and there are a large number of Democrats who are willing to sit down and try to put our fiscal house back in order, but that offer has to be extended and so far it has not. The bottom line tonight is that we are being asked to increase our debt ceiling by $750 billion. That means we are going to have to borrow or it is suggested that we need to borrow that amount of money. In the conduct of the war, we are perfectly willing, if that should be the decision of the President, to borrow the money to fight the war. There are some that suggest that maybe, just maybe, we ought to consider paying for it, because when we borrow it today we are saying that this generation does not wish to pay for that which we are enjoying, but we are perfectly willing to send that obligation to our children and grandchildren. That is part of the discussion that we wish that we were having on this floor tonight. We have made it very clear we are willing to participate in a meaningful dialogue, a meaningful debate in which we can have ideas and suggestions put forward as to how we get from where we are to where we need to be. Where we are today is we are back into deficit spending. We are back into spending the Social Security trust funds when after I think last year five times, five times we voted on this floor unanimously a lockbox on the Social Security trust fund. I guess we did not mean it. The Blue Dogs when we were on the floor last year talking about the economic game plan that we suggested not only suggested that we ought to take that $5.6 trillion surplus and devote half of it to paying down the debt, 25 percent of it to cutting taxes, and 25 percent of it to be spent on the priorities of this Nation. What were those priorities? Fixing Social Security, fixing Medicare, dealing with prescription drugs, dealing with the educational problems of this country. We believe and still believe that we could do what we needed to do with that amount of revenue, and then we proposed cutting taxes with 25 percent of that proposed projected surplus. Well, we lost. We came up 14 votes short, I believe was the number. And under our system of government, when you lose, you go on to the next round. Well, here we are into the next round being asked to increase the debt ceiling by 750 billion additional dollars. We say, whoa, let us not do that much at one time. Let us not admit that this body is not capable of working with the other body and working with the President and putting our fiscal house back in order and balancing our budget at a time certain. We are perfectly willing to deal with spending caps, with pay-go so long as everything is put on the table so we might have an open and honest dialogue and then get a vote on the issues in which we are concerned. Now what does the debt ceiling mean to the average person watching us tonight? I know many times when you listen to us you get very confused. But, basically, it is a businessman going to their lender. It is a student going to their parents, having run up a $6,000 credit card bill. Of course, the parents will pay because they do not want the kid's credit damaged in the long run, but they will work out the arrangement that includes reducing the allowance, getting a part-time job, and getting promises for less partying, et cetera. The worse thing that we are doing with our accumulated Federal debt is the reverse of this scenario. Parents are going to the students with their bills and expecting the youths to pay for their elders' irresponsible consumption. A businessman that reaches his credit limit at his bank needs to go to his banker and say, I need to borrow additional money, I have this great investment potential, I have got this great idea, and you convince your banker that you have a plan that will pay him back not only what you have borrowed up to this point but also will pay back that which you are intending to borrow in upping your credit limit. That is what we are trying to focus on tonight as Blue Dogs, a plan. If Members want to increase the debt ceiling, tell us how they are going to get the budget back into balance in a time certain and in a short time. The economic plan that we are under tonight says 10 years. Ten years we will stay in the Social Security surplus; and then, remember, baby boomers begin to retire in 2008. 2008, that is not very far from tonight. In 2011, we begin to have the baby boomers retiring in earnest. That is not very long. We cannot afford to continue to go into the Social Security trust fund without coming up with a plan for how we are going to fix Social Security and Medicare for the future. That is what we are going to be talking about tonight. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Berry), another one of the true leaders of the Blue Dog Coalition. He has been focusing not only on budget but health care matters and on agricultural matters.

Mr. STENHOLM. I thank my friend from Arkansas for those remarks. I want to remind everyone now what we are all about tonight. We are saying that to increase our debt ceiling without a plan for getting us back into balance is irresponsible. We are prepared to vote to increase the debt ceiling short term. We do not want to see our country default on its debt. We do not want that; no one wants that. But we do believe it is irresponsible for us to blindly follow an economic game plan that has squandered $5 trillion of surpluses without first dealing with the problems of Social Security and Medicare. We think that is irresponsible. And we hope that as a majority of this House puts together their budget, this year we would hope that we could be a part of it. We are here tonight saying that if you participate in a budget process that gives us a plan to get us back into balance in a reasonable period of time and that keeps us in balance, we will support it. We will support it. But we will not support increasing the debt limit by $750 billion by not only continuing down the plan area that we are into tonight but actually making it worse as the budget that has been presented to Congress projects to do. That, we will not do. I yield to the other gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Ross), one of our newer Blue Dogs, to discuss this issue that we bring before you tonight.

Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Utah for those very pointed remarks. What we are talking about tonight is aimed at his child, at my two grandsons, and that is all we are asking that we take a look at. I have been in this body now for going on 24 years. I have worked with five presidents, and it matters not whether there is an R or D after the president's name. It matters not whether that is an R or D after any of my colleagues' name. If they have a good idea, I will join in attempting to pass it, or at least attempting to discuss it. Tomorrow I will join with our colleague, the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Kolbe), in which we will ask the Committee on Ways and Means to tone down the rhetoric regarding Social Security. I will be equally hard on my party, those who choose to get a little bit rambunctious with the rhetoric on Social Security, as I will be equally hard on the majority side. I am very critical of the majority for not taking up a Social Security reform plan. I think that is legitimate. I used to get blamed for a lot of things that happened when we were in the majority on the Democratic side, but now it seems I still get blamed for what is going on, even though I am in the minority. Everyone tonight has stated the absolute importance of dealing with the future of Social Security, and we are pointing out our belief that you do not deal with the future of Social Security by digging the hole deeper. When you have an unfunded liability in the Social Security system tonight of $22 trillion, we do not believe it is a solution to dig the hole to $23 trillion. You do not really back up and get a running start out of a hole. When you find yourself in a hole, the first rule is to quit digging. That was the infamous words of Garfield. That is what we are saying tonight. You do not just automatically borrow additional money unless you have got a plan. Our colleague talked about going and borrowing $100 million to finance a cogeneration plant. It was a good investment or he would not have gotten the money. Tonight we are being asked to borrow additional money so we can pay interest on that debt without doing anything to solve the problems of this Nation. That is what bugs us. A lot of people say, well, you know, are you all not being just a little inconsistent? Some might say, how is the debt limit vote different this year from the last time? Well, let me point out how it is different. We are being asked to raise the debt limit outside of a plan for balance. The last two votes that this body had to raise the debt limit came at a time when Congress and the President were engaged in bipartisan negotiations on a balanced budget plan that ultimately led to the Balanced Budget Agreement of 1997. The current situation is very different. The President has submitted a budget which projects deficits financed by borrowing the Social Security surplus for the next decade. I repeat, the plan that we have been asked to put into place borrows the Social Security trust fund for the next 10 years. That is not a plan we can support. Now, also we are going to hear, I hope we do not, but I have already heard rumblings of this, that we need to change the manner in which we determine what the numbers are. The last time this bill came up in 1997, we had a different President in the White House. The minority leader of this body said, and I quote, ``We said from the beginning of this Congress that we want to negotiate with the President, but we cannot negotiate with a President that does not want to balance the budget. We do not want to negotiate over whether to balance the budget or not. We want him to submit a budget that balances by CBO.'' Now, here we are in danger of again doing, as we have seen happen a few times over the years, we will either use OMB, that is the Office of Management and Budget, that is the administration's budget arm, or we will use the Congressional Budget Office, that is CBO, that is the bipartisan congressional budget arm. We agreed several years ago that we would use CBO; we, the Congress, agreed that CBO would be the arbiter of what the numbers are. Not saying that they are automatically right; not saying that they are any better than OMB, but since we often have different assumptions, we just agreed that we would use CBO. Now, I hope that the majority this year will stick to what we have agreed to doing. We will use CBO, whatever they say because, remember, these are projections. Let us not slip into using OMB when it works to the advantage or CBO when it works to the advantage; let us use CBO. Congress and the President need to sit down, roll up our sleeves and have an honest discussion about what we need to do to put the budget back in order with everything on the table. We need to put together an honest plan, putting the budget on a reasonable glidepath toward balance without using Social Security using CBO estimates. That is what we are trying to say tonight. In 1995, in 1995, 48 Democrats joined with the Republican majority to insist that President Clinton submit a plan that was balanced under CBO numbers. We hope that the 148 Republicans who voted for that legislation, who are still in the House, will stay consistent. Those 48 of us on our side of the aisle do intend to stay consistent. We believe that since we, over the last 8 years, got our Nation's fiscal house in order, eliminated the deficits as far as the eye could see, actually got ourselves into surplus for 1 year, that all of the pain and anguish that has been caused or was caused or was utilized in order to accomplish that goal for our country should not be squandered in 12 months. Now, is that an overly partisan statement to make? I would hope not. I listen very carefully to my colleagues on the other side of the aisle. They say, and I believe it sincerely, as we do, that that is what they want to do. But we cannot do it on this side of the aisle unless they do it. We are in the minority. When we are in the minority, we do not have 218 votes. Now, I want to repeat, we are not playing politics with this issue. We are not. We will vote for a short-term debt ceiling, provided there is a plan of how to get from where we are to where we need to be. We do not think that is too much to ask of the majority. We are willing to put our money where our mouth is. We are willing to vote on a temporary increase on the debt limit to meet the expenses of the war. We are willing to do that. What we are not willing to do is give a $750 billion blank check to continue on an economic game plan that has already squandered $5 trillion of projected surpluses in one year. We do not think that is unreasonable. But we did not think our budget last year was unreasonable either. We put forth our best effort on the floor, and we lost. And when we lose, we go on to the next battle. Well, the next battle is now. The next battle is now. Now, again, in case someone is just now joining us, on the debt limit, I used one example, and I will use another. On the debt limit, it is kind of like going into one of our best restaurants in Texas and enjoying one of our infamous Texas beef steaks, enjoying it, and then walking out and saying we are not going to pay for it. That is what the debt ceiling is all about. The other example is a businessman in trouble because of unforeseen difficulties, but has a good record. We have a lot of farmers in that condition right now out in the country that, through no fault of their own, they are finding it difficult to pay back their banker. To go back to the banker, the banker knows them, and they make adjustments. They make adjustments in their economic game plan. They make adjustments in their budgets. We cut back here; we do things a little differently. We tighten our belt. Well, that is what we are asking. We just do not believe it makes common sense to arbitrarily say to our country, we are going to borrow $750 billion on a game plan that has squandered $5 trillion of surpluses. Now, I think it was very important that the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Matheson) a moment ago acknowledged the war. I have said three times tonight, we are perfectly willing, and we are 110 percent behind our President, regarding the conduct of the war. Separate that issue from what we are talking about tonight. We will do what is necessary to make sure that our young men and women have the tools necessary, both now and in the future, to do what they are called on to do, and that is defend the freedom of this country. We will do that. That is not what we are talking about tonight. I hope that as we get closer and closer to that vote on the debt ceiling, that we will make a few changes in that economic game plan. We will be proposing how we would do it. We have already proposed how we would do it. We told our colleagues last year how we could do it, but we lost. I want to conclude my remarks tonight by going back again to the Social Security question. I want to make it very, very clear. This is one Member on this side of the aisle that has happened to agree with the President regarding his proposal for individual accounts. I have joined with the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Kolbe) on that for the last 6 years. We have introduced, reintroduced and reintroduced for the third time our suggestion of how we can, in fact, make Social Security as sound or even sounder for our children and grandchildren. I am perfectly willing to discuss and debate that issue until the cows come home, and if we could get a majority, we win; if not, somebody will beat us with a better idea. What I am deeply concerned about is on my side of the aisle critics talking about Social Security without offering their own plan. We will find no one anywhere in the United States tonight that says that Social Security will be there for our grandchildren without making some changes. No one. No one on it today should be concerned for one second about their Social Security check. But for my grandsons, 6\1/2\ and 4\1/2\ years old, we had better start getting concerned about their Social Security if Congress continues to not do what we need to do in coming up with a plan to reform it. That is why even if, even if 9-11-01 had not occurred, we still would be standing here tonight saying the economic game plan that we are under, we ought to change. I repeat: even if 9-11-01 had not occurred, we would still be having the discussion that we are having tonight, based on the estimates of CBO and OMB. That is something that people need to understand. Again, I want to make it very, very clear. The Blue Dogs have taken this hour tonight to say that we are willing to support a temporary increase to meet our expenses, but only a temporary increase. I think we need to keep this Congress's feet to the fire, and we need to make the tough decisions, hopefully starting with at least beginning a dialogue on Social Security this year, without elevating the rhetoric and attempting to win elections this November based on someone pointing a finger at the other side and suggesting that one side is going to bankrupt the system and the other side has all the answers without ever saying what their answer would be. I will join with the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Kolbe) and others, the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Smith) on the other side of the aisle, for example, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Boyd) on my side, and the gentlewoman from Missouri (Ms. McCarthy), and others who have been a part of coming up with a constructive solution; we will join. I just do not think it is too much to ask of the majority to spend a little bit of time in serious legislation on the most serious problem facing us, other than the war, and that is the future of Social Security. We are going to have a lot more to say about it in the days and weeks ahead, and I thank my colleagues for their indulgence tonight.

Mr. STENHOLM. I thank my friends from Arkansas, both of them, for making some very relevant points. One of the statements that the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Ross) just made was that we need to tone down the partisan rhetoric. That is what we are trying to do tonight. That is why I will join the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Kolbe) from the other side tomorrow going before the Committee on Ways and Means in which we will be saying to the Committee on Ways and Means, let us sit down and begin to honestly and sincerely talk about what kind of a fix we need to put in for Social Security so that it does not run into financial difficulties in 2030. Let us start reasoning together. I do not understand, and that is what the Blue Dogs said last year, we ought to have had that discussion last year; but we did not. But it is not too late. It is never too late for reasonable men and women, elected by our constituents in our respective 435 districts. All of us get here the same way. We get elected by a majority of the people in our district. All of us are well-meaning. But every now and then you vote for something that puts in place something that we think tonight we would like to turn around. When you had a $5.6 trillion surplus last year, and you squander it in 1 year, and we go back now back into the Social Security trust fund for the next 10 years under the economic game plan we are under, I would hope our friends on the other side would not say, ``there you go again.'' All we are saying is we think, before we increase the debt ceiling, we ought to make one more attempt to get a true balanced budget, to get out of the Social Security trust fund and, even in an election year, have a serious debate and discussion about how we would fix Social Security. I have got a plan that I have joined with the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Kolbe) on. Others have plans. Anyone that stands on this floor and criticizes the other person's idea without offering one of their own, I do not think too highly of. But I would welcome an honest and serious debate, and I hope at some time in the future we could use some special orders in which we would actually have a discussion about what it is that we are differing on. Tonight, for example, I would welcome someone from the other side of the aisle that would come over and say, you guys are all wet. Here is what we are doing. I would welcome that. Maybe we can get into that. Now I would like to yield to the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Matheson). The gentleman from Utah is making a real mark here in the Congress. One of the things I have appreciated is his understanding of energy, because he kind of comes from that experience. But, also, just as my two colleagues from Arkansas have been real leaders within the Blue Dog Coalition for focusing on fiscal responsibility, so has the gentleman of Utah.

Mr. STENHOLM

Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from California for yielding to me. I thank him for leading this discussion tonight. I know that perhaps there are some that are watching tonight and are saying, what is your alternative? Let me remind everyone that just a year ago, the same Blue Dogs stood in the well, stood at this mike, stood at others, and we offered an alternative budget. We at that time pointed out that the so-called surplus of $5.6 trillion was projected. We did not believe it was the conservative thing to do, to allocate all of that $5.6 trillion. We suggested paying down the debt with half of it, and then we suggested being very fiscally responsible with the spending as well as the tax cuts. We lost that vote. Our friends on the other side of the aisle said, thanks, but no thanks. We have the formula, we have the plan, and the surplus is real. We also pointed out to our friends on the other side of the aisle that, yes, we had a surplus, but many of my constituents were saying, how can we talk about a surplus when we have a debt? We owed $5.6 trillion last year at this time. That is $5.6 trillion. We also were completely ignoring the $20 trillion unfunded liability of the Social Security system. We Blue Dogs said we thought it would have been the prudent thing to do last year to deal with the future of Social Security and Medicare. We said that is what we should have done first. But no, the leadership of this House, and this is certainly within their prerogative, they said, no, the important thing for us to do is to have a tax cut; and that is what we did. Well, here we are now, and I want to show this chart here. This was a letter dated February 13, 2002, to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Rangel), the ranking member, from Secretary O'Neill. The interesting thing about this letter is, yes, he talks about the fact that the war has changed things, the economy has changed, and all of us agree to that. There is no question from any of us tonight that we must pay for the war, and there is no question that we are in a recession and that recession started considerably more than just a few months ago. But the interesting thing about this letter is that in this letter he admits that we were going to have to increase our debt ceiling in 2003. Not 9 years, not 8 years, not any of the other rhetoric that we have heard. I show this to indicate that, as we will be seeing more and more of us on the floor over the days and weeks ahead, that we really and truly, as the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Matheson) said a moment ago, we have a credit card. Most everyone has a credit card today. I have a big mock-up here we will use a little bit later showing one from the Republican National Committee. When we have a credit card, we have a debt limit, we have a borrowing limit, we have a credit limit on what we can borrow; and when we reach that limit, then we have to go to the credit company and convince them that we are worth taking a little additional risk on. We go to the bank. That is true. When you borrow to your limit, then you have to come up with a plan of how you are in fact going to convince your banker that they ought to loan you more money. That is the most upsetting thing to we Blue Dogs tonight. What we are going to continue to suggest is that raising the limit to $750 billion in one vote, without a plan, does not make sense, does not make sense to any small businessman or woman, does not make sense to any working man or woman, does not make sense to anyone that finds themselves in a credit difficulty to believe that you can go to your banker and convince them that they ought to loan you $750 billion until you come with a plan. That is the problem that we face tonight, giving a blank check to the administration without having a plan. Now, here again, many of my friends on the other side of the aisle say, well, what is your plan? We have a plan. We had a plan. We voted on it last year. We lost. We are perfectly willing, in fact, we pleaded with the other side of the aisle time and time again, where is the meaning of bipartisan? We are ready to reach out and to work with the majority party in coming up with a plan. It is their plan that we are concerned about, and for them to believe that anyone on our side of the aisle would vote for their plan that is going to use all of the Social Security surplus for the next 9 years does not make sense. It does not make sense to me, and I do not believe it makes sense to the American people. The last two votes to raise the debt limit in this body came at a time when Congress and the President were engaged in bipartisan negotiations on a balanced budget plan that ultimately led to the Balanced Budget Act of 1997. The current situation is very different. The President has submitted a budget which projects deficits financed by borrowing the Social Security surplus for the next decade and beyond, without first passing a plan as to how we are going to save Social Security for our children and grandchildren. That is to many a small item; and, yes, there are two small items in my case, and they are my grandsons. I resolved 6\1/2\ years ago when the first grandson was born that I did not want him to look back 67 years from that day and say, if only my granddad would have done what in his heart he knew he should have done, we would not be in the mess we are in today. To raise the debt ceiling and borrow another $750 billion over the next few years, and then to increase our debt over the next 10 years under the plan that we are now under by $2.75 trillion, is something I could not do, cannot do, will not do under any circumstances. We will stand here and we will suggest, and I think the gentleman a moment ago made a good suggestion, let us borrow the amount of money necessary to fight the war. Whatever it takes to make sure that we continue to fund the Federal Government fighting the war, let us do it. But let us continue to have a little discussion on the other aspects of the economic game plan that we are under today. Let us talk about it; let us discuss it. If there was some reaching out to our side, we would find there would be an agreement. I conclude just as I started: I am sick and tired of hearing my friends on the other side say, ``Well, what is your plan?'' We had a plan. We put it on the floor last year. They did not like it. They passed their plan. Now they are coming back and saying, oh, by the way, we have to borrow $750 billion more to implement that plan. That is not what they said when they stood on the floor last year. In fact, if Members remember, we were worried that we were going to pay down our national debt too quick. We actually had colleagues saying, ``Well, we cannot pay down the debt as quick as we are going to pay it down.'' Would that not have been a wonderful problem? Because last year at this time nobody foresaw 9-11-01. No one foresaw that. We are not prophetic. All we Blue Dogs said is that there just might be something that would happen, or maybe the stock market might not go up forever, just maybe something is going to happen; and it would have been the conservative thing to do to plan for that. Nobody listened to that. Well, we had a pretty good vote. If there had been 14 more votes, we would have been here defending our plan tonight. Instead, we are here saying, ``Let us rethink borrowing $750 billion. Let us go to the drawing board. Let us work out the future of Social Security. Let us work out the future of Medicare. Let us do it within a conservative budget and a conservative principle.'' Borrowing money to the rate that the other side is talking about doing is not conservative, in my book. I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I appreciate his leadership on this. I appreciate all of my Blue Dogs. Members are going to see and hear a lot more of us, and I hope very soon we will be joined by some colleagues on the other side of the aisle as we try to find an answer to this question, other than just borrowing and going further into debt.

Mr. STENHOLM

Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Shows).

Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to this amendment. I have read it. It has nothing to do with the second amendment. It has nothing to do with the first amendment. It has everything to do with creating a little mischief on the bill before us today. That is all that it does. I am reminded at this time of the infamous words of Will Rogers when he said, ``It ain't people's ignorance that bothers me so much, it is them knowing so much that ain't so that is the problem.'' As you listen to the debate and discussion on this, I would challenge anyone to find anyone in this body more strongly in favor of the second amendment and/or the first amendment, and that is why I rise in strong opposition to this amendment. The amendment before us would create a tremendous loophole that would allow the flood of soft money from wealthy individuals, corporations and union dues to continue to unfairly dominate our electoral system. There is a lot of misinformation about what the Shays-Meehan bill actually does, and it is circulating all over my district today. The Shays-Meehan bill does not prohibit political advertisement by groups prior to an election. It does not prohibit using the name of any Member of Congress or other candidate in a group's political advertisement. It does not prohibit any group from providing its Members information about the records of elected officials through mailings or other communications. The bill simply requires that independent organizations who participate in the political process do so in the sunshine so voters know who is trying to influence their decision and make their own judgment about the ads. Under the bill before us, any organization could run ads right up to election day, mentioning names of candidates and their positions as they wish, so long as they comply with the rules that apply to everyone else, including Members of Congress. I have to comply with these rules, and I do not feel they restrict my speech in any way. I strongly support free speech. I strongly support the right of anyone to say whatever they want to about me or anyone else running for office. But I do not believe that the right to free speech is about the ability of someone to spend $1 million to influence elections without disclosing who they are or where they get their money. I do not believe that the first amendment offers individuals or groups to spend unlimited amounts of money to influence an election without disclosing who they are and where their money is coming from. This bill should not be a problem for groups such as the National Rifle Association and National Right-to-Life who have a large political action committee, and they can use that to finance whatever ads they want to. The folks who will be affected by this bill are those who are not willing to be open and aboveboard in their efforts to influence elections. The current campaign finance system gives a loudspeaker to wealthy individuals who can afford to make large political donations and gives the average working man and woman little voice in the political process. Our campaign rules have been abused by smart lawyers and political consultants who have found loopholes to get around the law. We need to put teeth back into laws long on the books preventing corporate treasury money, union dues, and unlimited contributions from wealthy individuals from being used for campaign ads. We need to be closing these loopholes, not creating new loopholes that can be abused to avoid sunshine. Vote against this amendment. This amendment will create a gigantic loophole that we are trying to close, those of us who support the Shays-Meehan. Oppose this amendment. It has nothing to do with the second amendment or the first amendment. It has everything to do with whether or not we are going to clean up our political system just a little bit.

Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Andrews). (Mr. ANDREWS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)