Christopher Shays

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the business in order under the calendar Wednesday rule be dispensed with on Wednesday, October 11, 1995.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that it may be in order for the Speaker to declare recesses at any time on Wednesday, October 11, 1995, for the purpose of a joint meeting to commemorate the 50th anniversary of World War II.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that when the House adjourns on Tuesday, October 10, 1995, it adjourn to meet at 8 a.m. on Wednesday, October 11.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that when the House adjourns on Friday, October 6, 1995, it adjourn to meet at 12:30 p.m. on Tuesday, October 10, 1995, for morning hour debates.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that notwithstanding any adjournment of the House until Tuesday, October 10, 1995, the Speaker and the minority leader be authorized to accept resignations and to make appointments authorized by law or by the House.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that for the legislative day of Friday, September 29, 1995, all Members be permitted to extend their remarks and to include extraneous material in that section of the Record entitled ``Extension of Remarks''.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. The amazing thing is you got the Democrat story all in one sentence, and it is all wrong. There is a $240 billion tax cut. About half of it is going to families with children. These are children under 18, a $500 tax cut.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to address this Chamber in a special order, and to say that I am interested in talking on a very different issue than the previous speaker, and to say for those who are in staff and want to know what time we are going to end, I do not intend to use the full hour. Twenty minutes is my goal. Mr. Speaker, I have been in public life for 20 years. I have served 13 years in the statehouse and now 8 years in Congress, but I was in the statehouse and I looked at Congress, an institution that I revered as someone who in high school and college was an American history major, and wondered why Congress would not do its most basic responsibility, and that is to get its own financial house in order. I knew we had to do that at the State level, but I saw Congress continually deficit spend and wondered why it was happening. I realized it was not the fault necessarily of one party or the White House versus Congress or the Congress versus the White House. Republicans did not want to control military spending, and Democrats did not want to control the growth of what we call entitlements, Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps, other programs. By law, you were entitled to the benefit, entitlements never being voted on by Congress on automatic pilot. So Republicans did not give on defense. Democrats did not give on entitlements, and then they got together each year to vote on budgets with large deficits, Republicans and Democrats together, the White House and Congress. During these 8 years I have served in Congress, I have noticed and felt a real privilege of being part of a small group really championed by John Kasich, our Budget Committee chairman, who 8 years ago introduced budgets to get our financial house in order and only 30 Members at that time supported it. But each year I notice something very distinct. Each year I notice that more and more Members were troubled by the fact that we were increasing our national debt to such a point. It went up in the last 20 years from $800 billion to now $4.9 trillion. Each year I would notice 30 would vote for it, then 50, then 70, and during the last Congress, we had a hard core of 160 who were concerned about getting our financial house in order. In fact, at one point, there was a bipartisan effort, unique in this Chamber, comprised of Democrats and Republicans, called the Penny-Kasich proposal, which sought to make over $100 billion of cuts in Government spending. I went to the White House to encourage them to support this proposal, and if they could not support it, to at least not oppose it. They opposed it. It was defeated by only four votes, Republicans and Democrats uniting to get our financial house in order. We needed 218 votes, and we had about 213. We now as Republicans have an opportunity to lead Congress, and it is the first time in 40 years. We have, under our watch, the opportunity to get this country back in balance. We have three basic goals. One of our goals is, first, to get our financial house in order and balance our Federal budget. Our second is to preserve, protect, and strengthen our trust funds, particularly Medicare, which we will see shortly is going bankrupt in 7 years. It is starting next year to go bankrupt. The Medicare trust fund is the trust fund that working people pay into, 1.45 percent is their share; if they are self-employed then they pay double that, 2.9 percent, into a trust fund that pays for the hospital costs of Medicare. Our third effort is to transform our social and corporate welfare state into an opportunity society, where the most disadvantaged in our communities can have a better future. Mr. Speaker, as a moderate Republican I am very comfortable using an opportunity society, because that is what we need and that is what we are seeking to have. When we try to get our financial house in order, this first chart basically shows that overall, we are going to spend more money. When we talk about cuts, we are going to cut some programs. Foreign aid is going to be cut. We are going to spend less next year than we spend today. There are certain programs in what we call discretionary spending that are going to be cut. We are going to spend less in those programs than next year. We are going to eliminate some programs. We are going to consolidate some departments. There are some programs that are going to stay even. Defense spending [[Page H 8721]] under our proposal stays even. I would like it to be a reduction, but it is a hard freeze for the next 7 years. In real dollars it is a cut. In absolute dollars it is the same. In some programs, like Medicare and Medicaid, we are going to spend more dollars. We are not cutting Medicare and Medicaid, we are increasing it. It is only in Washington, when we increase spending but do not spend as much as some people say we should spend, we call it a cut. One of the ironic things that I found when I became a Member of Congress 8 years ago was that if Congress spent $100 million for a program, in the next year to run the same level of service it has to spend $105 million. If we spend $103 million, even though we were spending $3 million more, Congress, the White House, and the press would call it a $2 million cut in spending, whereas most people I know back in my district would say, ``My gosh, you spend $100 million this year, next year you are going to spend 103, so that sounds like a $3 million increase.'' In our original spending we are at $1.5 trillion. Under our proposal in the seventh year we are going to be spending $1.8 trillion. We are going to be spending more dollars in the seventh year than we spend now. We are going to change, though, the spending line, which is in red, so it automatically, in 7 years, will intersect revenues, which is in blue. That green line is our conference agreement. We are tilting down the spending level of Government, still allowing it to increase, but knowing that it will intersect revenue and therefore have a balanced budget in 7 years. The challenge for us when we balance our budget, and in this pie chart it illustrates it quite well, the purple colors are what we call entitlements: Social Security, which we are not going to change at all; Medicare, Medicaid, other entitlements. If you fit the law, you get the benefit of the program. What you see in yellow is interest on the national debt. Because of Congress' and the White House's failure to control spending, having annual deficits, at the end of each year the annual deficits are then brought over to the national debt, the national debt keeps increasing. These added deficits added to our national debt that have meant we spend $235 billion this year in interest on the national debt, 15 percent of our budget, is interest on the national debt. We cannot spend it on programs for children, we cannot spend it on programs for the middle class, we cannot spend it on programs for the elderly. We are having to spend $235 billion on interest on the national debt. Interestingly enough, now, we pay more in interest on the national debt than we have as a deficit. If we did not have to pay so much interest on the national debt, we would not have deficits. What I vote on as a Member of Congress is about a third of the budget. I vote on defense spending, which is about 17 percent; foreign aid and the State Department, about 1.4 percent of the budget; and I vote on 16 percent of the budget, domestic discretionary spending, all what we call, in the pink, discretionary spending, and what we vote on in the Committee on Appropriations every year, I just vote on the pink, it is a third of the budget. Then I am making decisions on what we spend on defense, what we spend to run the executive branch and the administration in its entirety, all the branches. I vote on what we spend for the judicial branch and what we spend for the legislative branch. In the executive branch, I am voting on all the grants that I have to make decisions on, but it is only, basically, one-third of the budget I vote on. The blue I do not vote on. It just happens. It is on automatic pilot. We refer to what is in blue and what is in yellow. Two-thirds of the budget is mandatory spending, and we have not touched it in years. When people say how come those of you who remember Gramm-Rudman, you were going to control deficits and eliminate them and not keep adding to the national debt. The reason Gramm-Rudman failed is that it only focused in on the pink, it only focused on domestic discretionary spending and defense spending, foreign aid. It ignored all the entitlements. Now what we are looking to do is to focus in on other programs, Medicare and Medicaid in particular Medicare and Medicaid are 17 percent of our budget. These areas here, 17 percent of our budget, just two programs, are equal to all domestic spending. We are not looking to slow the growth. We are looking to not have Medicare and Medicaid grow at 10 percent a year. For a few years it actually grew at 20 percent a year. As these programs become larger and larger, and they are mandatory, they are entitlements, what is in the pink, what I vote on every year, becomes smaller and smaller. The budget is just simply getting out of control. We want to improve and protect and strengthen Medicare and Medicaid. We think, and we believe with all our heart and soul, we can have a better Medicare and Medicaid Program at an increased cost, but not have a 10-percent increase each year. What is our budget doing? Our budget is having an annual decrease in domestic discretionary spending of 1.6 percent a year. We are having an annual decrease in foreign aid of 4.5 percent a year. Defense spending is not going up, and it is not going down. Some people would say, ``How can you have such a large program and not cut it at all, just keep it constant?'' I would like it reduced, but there is one serious issue that we are faced with. The Congressional Budget Office says that the defense budget in the next 7 years is over $100 billion oversubscribed. We have weapons system that if we funded all the weapons system that we have authorized, we would have $100 billion over what we are going to be allowed to spend. The Government Accounting Office, the GAO, says we are $150 billion oversubscribed. We are going to have cuts in defense spending just to stay at a constant no increase in spending. Finally, we have interest on the national debt, which under our plan is going to grow at 2.7 percent a year. That is the interest payments that we have to pay. By the way, when we pay interest, we are not reducing the national debt, we are just carrying the cost. If it was your home mortgage, you are setting some aside on interest in the national debt and you are paying off some of the principal. We are not paying off the principal, we are just paying off the interest and trying to stay harmless. Other entitlements are going to grow at 4.1 percent a year, Medicaid, and going to grow at 4.9 percent a year, basically 5 percent each year. We are not cutting Medicaid. Medicaid is health care for the poor, it is nursing care for the elderly. It is going to go up at basically 5 percent a year. Medicare, health care for the elderly, is going to grow at 6.3 percent a year. You have heard that Republicans intend to cut Medicare and Medicaid. It is not true. What we intend to do is slow their growth. In the process, we are looking to change these programs. Basically, Social Security is going to grow at 5.3 percent a year. We have not looked at Social Security. We are not going to touch Social Security. We are going to focus in on these other parts of the budget. What are we looking to do with Medicaid? We intend to have Medicaid go from $89 billion in this year, to the year 2002 when it is going to go up to $124 billion. That is a significant increase in the seventh year. It continually goes up, but what we have done is we have reduced the rate of increase. We are not cutting Medicare, we are increasing Medicare spending quite significantly. In fact, Medicaid spending in the next 7 years, we are going to spend $773 billion. In the last 7 years we spent $444 billion. We are going to spend $329 billion more in the next 7 years than we spent in the last 7. Only in Washington, when you spend $329 billion more, do they call it a cut. I know nowhere else in the country, when you spend more money do people call it a cut. We are going to spend $329 billion more. With Medicare part A, which is health care for the elderly, money that goes to hospital costs, what we know from the trustees report, five of the members were appointed by President Clinton, three of them are Cabinet officials, and one is head of Social Security, all appointed by the President, and they issued a report earlier this year. They said conservatively that Medicare will start to have more money going out of the fund, Medicare part A trust fund,than comes into the fund. Remember, what comes into the [[Page H 8722]] fund is what you pay, that 1.4 or 1.5 percent every week or every 2 weeks or every month out of your paycheck. That goes into a fund and it should be building up, but we have 136 billion this year, it is going to go down $1 billion, and by the year 2002, 7 years from today, that blue line goes to zero. There will be no money in the trust fund. Then the only way we fund Medicare would be as the money comes into the fund, it immediately gets taken out. The Medicare part A trust fund is going bankrupt. We have four ways to save this fund. We can affect the beneficiaries, those that get the service, we can affect the providers, those who give the service, we can decide to raise taxes on those who are working today. However, we must realize that if you are self-employed, 15 percent of your paycheck--before--you pay your income tax is going into Social Security and Medicare. We have intention whatsoever in increasing that tax. We are not going to increase the tax. We have one other choice. We can change and transform the system and, in the process, benefit beneficiaries and benefit providers. We are looking to transform the system. We are looking to protect it. We are looking to preserve it. We are looking to strengthen it. We are looking to allow Medicare patients to have the same kind of health care that everybody else has. What their children and their children's children have, we want for seniors. If they want to stay in traditional fee-for- service, the traditional Medicare program, what they have now, they will be able to do that, but we are going to try to encourage more Americans in Medicare to get into the private sector, where they can have a variety of new services, and we believe at less cost. Medicare part A is going bankrupt. We are looking to preserve, protect, and strengthen that program. Are we going to spend less on Medicare? We are going to slow its growth. We are going to spend more on Medicare. We are going to have it go from $178 billion to $274 billion in the seventh year. We are looking to spend 50 percent more, over 50 percent more on Medicare than we spend today in the seventh year. It is going to go up that much. In fact, in the last 7 years, we spent $926 billion on Medicare and we are looking to spend $1.6 trillion, $1,601 billion more, in the next 7 years. That represents $675 billion of new money. Only in Washington when you spend $675 billion of new money do they call it a cut. We are not cutting Medicare. We are going to spend $675 billion more, a total of $1.6 trillion, in the next 7 years. It goes up from the sum of $178 billion to the sum of $274 billion. The President had at first said that we should not, quote-unquote, cut Medicare and Medicaid. He described the efforts of Congress to slow the growth of Medicare and Medicaid as a cut. But then a few months ago he came in with what he called his 10-year budget. I want to say without any hesitation that I am very grateful, and I mean this sincerely, that the President has weighed in and said, yes, we need to balance the budget, we said 7 years, he said 10 years. But there are some of us who believe it should be 5 years, not 7, some of us stretched out into 7, but the President said we should balance the budget in 10 years. He also said that we should slow the growth of Medicare and Medicaid. So he has weighed in on admitting and acknowledging that we need to slow the growth of these two programs, and he said we are going to spend more but we cannot spend as much as we were originally intending. What was interesting, though, was when the Congressional Budget Office looked at the President's 10-year plan, they said it does not get balanced in 10 years. They said he is more optimistic on revenue than he should be, he is more optimistic that we can control other costs than he should be, and they said his budget never gets in balance in those 10 years. One of the reasons why I am here today is the President constantly is referring to his 10-year budget and that he has weighed in on the balanced budget. The Congressional Budget Office says it is not balanced. How does he say it is balanced? Because the Office of Management and Budget with their numbers, done out of the White House, have said that it is a balanced budget. They are using different economic projections. When the President was at that dais there when he spoke to us, he said that it was important for us to sing out of the same hymnal, he said it was important for us to use the same referee, the same umpire, and he said it should be the Congressional Budget Office. We have dealt with the conservative projections of the Congressional Budget Office, in part because that is our obligation, in part because the President said that is who it should be. When we look at what the Congressional Budget Office has said about what is under current law, current law is what passed last year and the year before, if you remember, there were tax increases 2 years ago, there was a lot of disharmony, there was the thought that tax increases would slow the deficits, the Congressional Budget Office has weighed in and said under current law, the national debt is $175 billion today, the deficit, excuse me, will be $175 billion. Remember, deficits are the annual difference between revenue and spending, and they say it will be $175 billion. They say the next year under current law it will go to 210, to 230, to 232, to 265, to 296, to 310, to 340, to 372, to 408, to 454. That was the President's tax plan of 2 years ago. It does not begin to head us in a balanced budget. It is the top line, it is in black, it is current law, it goes in this direction. That is the whole debate. We have got to get that line which is headed up to head down so it gets to zero and does not keep going up. The President's budget of February, which is hard to see, it is just below the current law, and it is only a 5-year projection, they say that the President's February budget, which the President asked us to act on, would have a deficit of basically $177 billion, 211, then it goes to 232, 231, 256, 276. The President's budget of February keeps going up. What do they say about the President's 10-year budget? That is in red. When CBO scored the President's budget, they said it goes from 175 to 196, 212, 199, goes down, then it goes up, 213, 220, 211, 210, 207, 209, 209. It never gets below $200 billion a year. That is the President's 10-year budget. That is the budget that he says balance in 10 years. He can say it because the Office of Management and Budget have given him numbers that allow him to say it. But when the Congressional Budget Office scores it, the organization he said should judge our budget and his budget, when we look at that budget, it never is in balance. It is in a constant deficit of over $200 billion. When the Congressional Budget Office scores what we intend to do, and what we intend to do is have cuts in discretionary spending, cuts in foreign aid, eliminating some programs, consolidating other programs, eliminating some departments and agencies, reducing others, having a freeze on defense spending, allowing Medicare to go up, allowing Medicaid to go up, they say that our budget goes from $175 billion to 170 to 152 to 116, to 100, to 81, to 33, to minus 6 in the 7th year. Obviously we are estimating. We could be off, we could reduce the deficit a little sooner, it could go out a little more. so every year we are going to have to look at it and be firm that we get to a balanced budget in the next 7 years. Some people said that when Congress voted for a balanced budget amendment and said they would vote to balance the budget that we, Congress, boxed ourselves in. We did box ourselves in. We felt that if we were in support of a balanced budget in 7 years, a balanced budget amendment, which is the easiest thing to vote for, all you have to do is vote for saying we will balance it, we said that the important thing is that we vote to balance the budget, and so we boxed ourselves in. We were much like Cortez when he left the old world for the new world and was to conquer the new world. He landed in this new world and he came with sailors and soldiers and the sailors and soldiers looked back at the old world longingly, Cortez did something quite dramatic, he burned his ships. He said there is no retreat. We have no retreat. We did box ourselves in. We have committed to balancing this budget. We are not looking back at the old world. We are looking at the new world. We are looking to get [[Page H 8723]] our financial house in order, we are looking to balance the budget, we are looking to save our trust funds, particularly Medicare which is in the most trouble, and we are looking to transform this social corporate welfare state into an opportunity society where the poor have a future, and we have boxed ourselves in eagerly so. There is no retreat. There is no going back to the old world. We are in the new world and we are out to conquer the new world and to transform our society. The worst that could happen is we would fail. What is the alternative, to go back to the old world? When the Congressional Budget Office and OMB's numbers are put together, you can learn some very interesting information. Thr red line that goes parallel horizontal is the President's budget scored by the Congressional Budget Office. The red line with black dots is the President's budget scored by the Office of Management and Budget, the President's own office. They say he balances his budget in 10 years. Now, when we look at the congressional budget, scoring our budget, they say we balance, this green line here, they say we balance the budget in 7 years. If we use the Congress's numbers using the Office of Management and Budget, in other words, have the Office of Management and Budget score our budget using the same projections, then they say we balance the budget in 6 years. My greatest fear, or one of my greatest fears is that we will have a budget disagreement and people call it a train wreck, I do not call it a train wreck, a train wreck implies tremendous destruction and it is pretty irresponsible to have a train wreck. What we have is a disagreement between the White House and the President. The President says he wants us to balance the budget in 10 years but it is never balanced according to the Congressional Budget Office. We want to balance it in 7 years. The President has opinions about our spending cuts and our changes to the growth in spending. We have opportunity to have dialog on that issue. There are things that Republicans are going to, and this majority in Congress is going to hold firm on and there are other issues that I think should be open to debate. One thing that is firm in my judgment is that we need to balance the budget in 7 years. My goodness, we should balance it in 5 years. I think another issue that clearly is one in which we will hold to strongly, we need a tax cut. When we talk about a tax cut, understand that $145 billion in the next 7 years of loss in revenue. In a spending of over $11 trillion in the next 7 years, we are going to spend over $11 trillion in the next 7 years and we are saying let us just reduce taxes by $245 billion. Half of that tax cut is going to be a $500 tax credit to families under $200,000 for every child. If you have 3 children, you will get $1,500 back from the Federal Government. Now some people might think of that as a gift. I do not. Mr. Speaker, I notice I am going over 20 minutes. I apologize. I am getting to my end here. Some people think of it as a gift. I do not think of it as a gift. I think of it as trying to direct money where it is nost needed, for families. I come from a family of 4 boys. I happen to be close to 50. In fact, my biggest shock was I got an invitation to join AARP a few months ago. I do not know if you know what that is like, to get an invitation to be a member of AARP when you are still in your 40's. But my family, my dad and mom, were able to deduct in today's dollars per child from their income tax over $7,000 per child. The laws in the 1950's and early 1960's allowed you to deduct per child over $7,000 per child. Today you are only allowed to deduct $2,450, I believe, per child. So that meant in today's dollars if you were a family of 4, you could deduct $28,000 from your income, you would subtract it, and if you made $50,000, then you had only $22,000 that was taxable. That is if we had the same system now that we had when my family was raising their 4 boys. We were far more family friendly then. People say, well, we need to be more family friendly. We need to help families. What is the best way to do it? To have a government program where the government takes off a certain amount of money before it directs it to a child? Or to allow families to decide how to spend money on their family? What we want to do with half the tax cut is to give $500 per child. If you have 5 children, you can figure out pretty clearly what you are going to be able to get from that. The other is we want a capital gains exemption. What do I think is going to basically happen in this budget disagreement? Republicans are going to hold firm to 7 years, Republicans are going to hold firm to a tax cut. The President should weigh in and say I do not like where you are making your spending cuts and tell us how he would do it differently and we can come to some agreement, he may say we are having too large a tax cut, but ultimately I think the issue should be can we make the tax cut apply to families that are not as high income. For instance, the President has advocated having the child tax credit apply to families with $75,000 income or less. That is an area that it seems to me makes sense for there to be compromise. Have the tax cuts, just have it apply to families that make less income, so we get away from any argument that he may have that it is going to wealthy people. What is going to happen with Medicaid and Medicare? We are going to spend in Medicaid in the 7th year $124 billion. He has suggested spending $150 billion. There is not much difference between us. But what the President does is he says he is saving $54 billion from Medicaid and Republicans are saving $182 billion. The problem is his $54 billion is scored by OMB and he is using our $182 billion scored by CBO. If we are going to be fair, if we use the number that we are reducing the growth in Medicaid by $54 billion, that is his number, then our number has to be $114 billion. We are not that far apart. If we use our number of $182 billion of slowing the growth of Medicaid, then CBO says his number is $122 billion. We are simply not that far apart. We have the ability to work out our differences. Finally, with Medicare, the President says he wants to slow the growth, he wants to spend $260 billion in Medicare in the 7th year and we want to spend $244 billion. There is a difference. The program if we made no change would be over $300 billion on the 7th year. He uses the number of $127 billion, OMB says he is reducing the number $127 billion, then he says Republicans in the majority want to reduce it $270 billion. In fact, if we use OMB to OMB, if he uses $127 billion scored by OMB, then our number is $205 billion. We are simply not that far apart. If we say we are slowing the growth $270 billion using CBO, his number is not $127 billion, that is scored by OMB, we have to use CBO's number. They say he is slowing the growth of Medicare by $192 billion. We are simply not that far apart. On a per beneficiary basis, we are spending $4,800 per beneficiary today to Medicare, and in our 7th year we would spend $6,734 per beneficiary. Not only did we have a 50- percent growth in Medicare, but a 40-percent growth per beneficiary. The President wants to spend $7,128 per beneficiary. We are simply not that far apart. In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, and thank you for this time, I know you have other things to do and I appreciate it. Mr. Speaker, in conclusion, we are going to get our financial house in order. We are going to balance our Federal budget and we are going to do it in 7 years and we are going to have a tax cut. I am hopeful that the President will weigh in and make that tax cut more responsive to low-income people. I am hoping he will weigh in and look at some of our spending reductions and make suggestions that we can compromise on. There is no reason for us to have ultimately a disagreement. But I do know this. As a Member of this majority party, when our debt ceiling, the amount that we are allowed to borrow based on our national debt, being at $4.9 trillion, when the President comes in and says, ``I need you to raise the debt ceiling, because we have to increase the national debt above $5 trillion,'' myself, Nick Smith, and a whole host of other Members on this side of the aisle intend to not raise the debt ceiling. We will not allow this House to increase the debt unless the White House weighs in on a 7-year budget. [[Page H 8724]] Is that a train wreck? Is that gridlock? In one sense it is gridlock. We have never had gridlock on the budget. When I started out, Republicans and Democrats agreed. Democrats did not want to control the growth of entitlements and Republicans didn't want to control the growth of defense spending. So they both agreed to pass budgets with large deficits. These budgets with large deficits have been agreed to by both Republicans and Democrats, but you have this majority Congress agreeing that we are going to get our financial house in order. It is an unprecedented thing to have Congress say it wants to spend less. Usually Congress wants to spend more. We do not intend to waste this opportunity that we have. We have been in the minority for 40 years. We are in the majority. It is under our watch, and we look forward to getting our financial house in order. We will have gridlock until the White House recognizes that we are determined not to increase the debt ceiling, we are determined to balance the budget in 7 years, we are determined to have what we consider a very fair tax credit. But that gridlock will end when the President agrees to a 7-year budget using real numbers, not numbers cooked by OMB, and then the debate will be in my judgment how we spend those dollars and how we effect the tax cut. Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank you for the opportunity to address the House.

Mr. SHAYS

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

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding time to me. Mr. Speaker, these are the kinds of debates where you wonder whether you should weigh in, because a lot of people are angry and there is a lot of partisan debate. Then you say, ``Is this something you want to be a part of, this debate?'' I do not know if I want to be a part of this debate, but I do want to say that I believe with all my heart and soul that I have waited 40 years for the opportunity to have a leading role as a majority Member. I have only been in office 8 months in the majority. I would like to give my Republicans an opportunity to do in 2 years this issue, which my colleagues on that side had an opportunity to do for 40 years. When I listen to the gentlewoman from Colorado, Pat Schroeder, saying that ``I am voting for the legislative appropriation because I want to increase or make sure that I am paid,'' in this code, by statute, Members of Congress and the President of the United States are under permanent appropriation. The Democrats voted in 1980, and Republicans as well, to make sure that we were paid under permanent appropriation, so I just do not think it carries any weight to say a Member of Congress wants to vote for the legislative appropriation to be paid. We are, for whatever reason, in this book, permanent. In terms of the issue of gift ban or lobby disclosure, I will say something I would never say if I did not mean it. I would not run again if gift ban and lobby disclosure are not passed. I would say to my colleagues, this issue is going to be taken up by Republicans. If it is not taken up, I will not run again. That is how strongly I believe in my leadership and in my fellow Republicans taking up gift ban and lobby disclosure. I happen to agree with what the Senate has done. I do not think it is monumental, but I think it gets us a long way. I do not criticize that side for bringing this issue up. If it puts it on the antenna of some of our leadership, then so be it. However, there are very important Members of this Congress who have gotten elected on this issue.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, competition, yes. Competition, yes. But now we do not have competition. Ninety-seven percent of all systems do not have competition. And this bill, unamended, allows for those companies, most of them, nearly 50 percent of them, to be deregulated. We say yes, we are going to allow the small companies to be deregulated, the small ones, under 600,000 subscribers. Six hundred thousand subscribers is small? That system is worth $1.2 billion. We do not have competition now. Deregulate when you have competition. There are 97 percent of the systems that do not have competition. The whole point here is to make sure that companies that are not competing, that have a monopoly, are not allowed to set monopolistic prices. One of the reasons why we overrode the President's veto, 70 of us on the Republican side, we recognized that consumers were paying monopolistic prices. Deregulate when you have competition. The bill in 1992 said when you had competition, there would not be regulation. The reason why we have regulation is these are monopolies. I know Members have not had a lot of sleep, but I hope the staff that is listening will tell their Members that we are going to deregulate these companies and they are going to set monopolistic prices, and they are going to come to their Congressman and say, ``Why did you vote to deregulate a monopoly?''

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, we gave away cable franchises in the early 1970s and made millionaires out of cable franchise owners. In 1984, we deregulated and made billionaires out of these organizations. The argument that since deregulation bad things have happened to cable is simply not true. Their revenues have grown from 17 billion in 1990 to 25 billion in 1995. Their subscribers have grown from 54 million to 61 million during that same time period. Cable companies are making money. They are presently without competition. We should deregulate when we have competition, not before. That is the crux of this argument.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the Greenwood amendment. Mr. Chairman, I rise today in strong support of the Greenwood amendment to restore funding for the title X program and in opposition to the Smith amendment to restore the bill's language which would block grant these funds. It is unfortunate that some Members of Congress insist on continuing their assault on a woman's right to choose to have an abortion and her right to comprehensive family planning services at the same time. Certainly these two agendas seem at odds with one another. While I support a woman's right to choose to have an abortion, like many of my colleagues, I am very troubled by the number of abortions taking place in our country. I feel it is important to concentrate more resources toward educating our young people about the consequences of sexual activity. I have consistently supported the reauthorization of the title X program, which funds family planning clinics, because I feel it offers women necessary family planning information, including methods of avoiding unwanted pregnancy. I believe withholding or reducing funding for title X programs denies poor women in particular information about the full range of available medical options. This could cause them to make uninformed decisions and deprive them of needed medical services. Current provisions in the bill that would block grant title X funds with other health programs will, in fact, reduce the amount of money that will be devoted to the vital purpose of family planning. Our party talks about the need for encouraging responsibility and taking control of one's life and that is exactly what this program aims to teach young women. We cannot abandon these women by eliminating this program at a time when this Congress has repeatedly sent the message that abortion is not an available option. If we are truly serious about eliminating the need for abortion in our country, as well as many of the related social problems caused by unintended pregnancy, we must reaffirm our commitment to the title X program and support the Greenwood amendment.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, it is a privilege to serve in Congress. I get up every morning praising the Lord that I have this opportunity. I thought when I was in the majority I would feel even more special about it, because I thought we would not do it the way Democrats did it, legislate in appropriations bills and do a number of other things that I have been critical of for so long that Democrats have done. We are doing it. We are no better. I know it because I see it here. It is one thing to say that we want clean air and we want clean water, but we just cannot say we want it, we have to have legislation that makes it happen. We cannot say in this bill it is reform. We are not reforming it, we are eliminating it. What I find particularly immoral is we have laws on the books that people have to abide by, but we are saying that EPA cannot enforce them. I have trouble with legislation that is cutting 25 percent from HUD, which we have rectified in some way, at least rescued part of it. We are cutting 34 percent from EPA. We are being gentle, in my judgment, with NASA. We are saying the veterans do not have to weigh in in any way to help get the financial house in order. We are gutting EPA and gutting environmental laws, and let us not call it any different than that. I am looking at Republicans because that is where it is at. We are doing it, and we are going to be held accountable, and it is not going to be pretty the next election on this issue.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, I have been wrestling with this bill for a long time and wrestling with what we are about as Members of Congress. I know that we have bankrupted this nation because of the kind of rhetoric of my colleague from Massachusetts who somehow thinks that if we spend more money we help people. I think that in a hearing that my subcommittee is going to have in Chicago, we are going to have a hearing in Chicago because the Federal Government had to take over public housing because it has totally failed. A 4-mile stretch, one side a throughway and the other side 4 miles of public housing, and the poverty rate is 15 percent of the official poverty rate. So I have come to the general conclusion that 12-year-old girls having babies and 14-year-olds selling drugs and 15-year-olds killing each other, 18-year-olds who cannot read their diplomas, 24-year-olds who have never had a job, 30-year-old grandparents is the legacy of this welfare state that must change. We are going to change it. But this amendment, the fine work of the gentleman from New York [Mr. Lazio], the fine work of the gentleman from California [Mr. Lewis], the fine [[Page H 7845]] work of some Members on this side who weighed in and have helped rescue a certain part of this bill to restore some funding for senior housing that works, for HOPWA that I know works, housing opportunities for people with AIDS and for helping those who are disabled to restore some money in the homeless is to me a gigantic step in the right direction. I do not have all the answers, Mr. Chairman. I just know we have failed miserably, and I know it is not going to be solved by a lot more money. Hopefully we will get beyond the kind of rhetoric that we just heard and start to interact with people to make sure the money we do appropriate actually means something and does some good. Mr. Chairman, I salute the gentleman from California [Mr. Lewis] again, and the gentleman from New York [Mr. Lazio], and Members on both sides of the aisle who recognize that we have failed miserably, and we need to put a new and complete face on housing.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, I tried to avoid participating in the debate today, because we are all tired and we all feel strongly about these issues. But I have a hard time recognizing we have annual deficits at over $200 billion a year, our national debt is close to $4.8 trillion, and I am going back to my district and telling them we are slowing the growth of Medicare, we are slowing the growth of Medicaid. We are cutting housing programs, we are cutting education programs, but we are going to subsidize tobacco, alcohol, and mink export? This, to me, is an obscenity. I join my colleague and thank the gentleman for offering this amendment.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. When I was in the Peace Corps, one experience you are talking about, we were visiting with a whole number of villagers. We were landing on the moon. And I can remember the aura that my villagers had with the fact that Americans were on the moon and the pride that I had as an American. But to be able to sit with them in their environment and to talk about what we were actually doing was quite an experience for me.

Mr. SHAYS. I notice that the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon] is here, who has been so active in support of the veterans and what they have done. In Fiji, Mr. Solomon, the impact that Americans had during World War II had such an incredible result to the people of Fiji, because this was a British colony and yet the Americans went and just comfortably lived with the Fijians where they lived and went in the same buses they did. In fact, there is a wonderful story of an American soldier being driven by an Indian in Fiji, because there are a lot of Indians around the world as we know, and when he came to this British hotel, the Indian was not allowed in. And the American soldier said the hell with that, and just brought his Indian taxicab driver in to stay with him. But this kind of interaction, this one on one on the street, living as they live, has a tremendous benefit to helping us understand their culture, but also having them appreciate Americans. So it is not just the Peace Corps, but it was our American soldiers who were there before us.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding to me.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I just would say to my colleague, I think about this experience, remembering being in a Fijian hut and seeing a picture of President Kennedy, and how much the Third World reached out to this President who was reaching out to the Third World, and thinking about a great African leader who visited President Kennedy, and President Kennedy, who was sensitive to the culture of the African community, instead of inviting him into the East Room or the Green Room or the Blue Room, invited him up into his own personal living quarters. And volunteers know the symbolism and the significance of when we were visiting a neighbor, if they would actually bring us into the most personal part of their own home, it was a great honor. That electrified the Third World, that he had shown such respect to a great African leader by inviting him into his own personal quarters. Becoming sensitive to the concerns and the ways that people live in other countries was just a definite part of this whole Peace Corps experience. Candidly, this has brought a tremendous ability for me to interact with people of all income levels and all different social economic circumstances, all educational levels, and realize that behind that income level or that education is an extraordinarily real person that I am about to interact with.

Mr. SHAYS. Reclaiming my time, it was not quite the minimum wage, but it sure met our needs. I notice our colleague from Kentucky, and we have very little time left. I would love to yield time to my colleague.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I just want to be here tonight to say that the Peace Corps changed my life in an extraordinary way, as it did my wife, but I get my greatest satisfaction in thinking about what volunteers have done through the course of the past 30 years to change the lives of so many people around the world. Joining with my colleague to just express the tremendous satisfaction I have in knowing that Peace Corps volunteers are not those fancy consultants, high priced consultants going to countries, staying for a month or two and writing a report, the thing about a Peace Corps volunteer is that they are actually living in the communities. They are riding the buses that the indigenous people ride, they are living in the same communities, in the huts that they live in, eating the food and speaking their language. While I am not here to criticize the 4-percent reduction in cuts to the Peace [[Page H 6818]] Corps, given the other cuts that are taking place throughout our budget, I am here to just caution my colleagues to make sure that we recognize that the Peace Corps is one of the most cost-effective organizations that you could possibly have. The real fact is that you cannot ask for an organization that has done more to help people in Third World countries than this organization begun by President Kennedy and continued by Presidents of both parties. At this time I would like to yield to the gentleman from California [Mr. Farr] and just thank him for his willingness to speak out on this issue.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I want to take a moment to recognize the outstanding work of a paper in Connecticut's Fourth Congressional District, the Westport News, in a series of special reports on domestic violence, ``Behind Closed Doors.'' The five part series, run by this weekly newspaper over a 2-month period, included in depth reports providing an overview of how violence occurs in families; the cycle of abuse and how it affects victims; fallout on the family and how society silences victims; whether there is any justice in our courts system; and the support offered by our social service agencies. Following this statement I am submitting the final piece in the series, a summarizing editorial entitled ``Curb Domestic Violence by Speaking Out.'' Mr. Speaker, awareness and discussion of the terrible scourge of domestic violence is the first step toward reducing it in our society. To that end, I commend the Westport News and their parent company, Brooks Newspapers, for this important contribution to improving life in our local communities. A copy of the article follows for inclusion in the Record: Curb Domestic Violence by Speaking Out Next Monday marks one year since Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman were brutally slain by a knife-wielding assailant. The state of California is trying to prove that the murderer is O.J. Simpson, one of America's most famous football players and Hollywood icons. Because O.J. Simpson had a record of abusing his wife prior to the murders, this case, perhaps more than any other domestic tragedy in recent years, has focused the spotlight on family violence. To shed some light on the extent to which domestic violence permeates the communities of Westport and Weston, this newspaper has published a five-part series, ``Behind closed doors,'' with the final installment by reporter Christina Hennessy starting on Page 3 today. ``Behind closed doors'' has evoked a groundswell of response among our readers. Many have telephoned us. Some have written about their experiences. Some said it was high time this issue was made public here. When this series was launched on May 12, the Westport News hoped the articles would serve as a catharsis for Westport and Weston to enable some families to find a way out of the cycle of violence. Some already have--simply by recognizing the patterns in their own homes and by reaching out for help. One such reader, Annie X, (a pseudonym), experienced anger, violence and abuse from her husband for many years and told of her experience in an Op Ed piece on June 2. Although her husband escaped punishment, Annie X wrote, ``I have been forced to deal with verbal, emotional, psychological and financial abuse. I am learning how to survive and preparing myself for single parenthood.'' One reader called to our attention the murder of a former Westport woman by her husband in New Hampshire, stemming from a domestic dispute. The Westport News is encouraged by the reactions of two state legislators, state Sen. Judith Freedman (R-26) and state Rep. Josephine Fuchs (R-136). Both have been active in supporting legislation that will help curb domestic violence. The current legislation has its roots in existing law, including the Family Violence Prevention and Response Act, passed in 1986. It was a substantial step forward in the effort to provide services for domestic violence victims. In 1992 and 1993, legislation that passed the General Assembly broadened the programs for children affected by domestic violence, created a Protective Order Registry for Prevention of Domestic Violence and established a ``marriage license surcharge'' with the money going to provide shelter for abuse victims. Still, a great deal more needs to be done. During interviews conducted by this newspaper's reporters for the series, many suggestions emerged. Among them: Counselors and victims of abuse want the courts to hand down harsher punishments to fit the crime. By handing out light sentences, the courts send a message that domestic violence is still a private matter not answerable to public law. Victims suggest that the courts are reluctant to jail those found guilty of domestic violence. They say that a work-to- jail program could be created that would require [[Page E 1399]] violators to return to prison instead of going home after work. Then, a portion of the money earned could go toward child support and alimony, they say. Some women say that the courts should more seriously consider domestic violence in divorce proceedings, particularly in light of custody of any children. Further, with the courts still granting visitation rights to ex-husbands who may be abusers, there continues to be the potential of violence during the visits and there are no legal restraints on them. This needs to be changed. Victims also want a change in the way the state handles the criminal records of abusers. Currently, if an abuser is charged with a family violence crime but attends and successfully completes a court-order education program, the charges are dismissed. The law needs to be changed, victims say, so that records of abusers' violations of the law are retained for a longer period of time and they cannot get off the hood so easily. Several women also suggested that the availability of legal aid needs to be increased during divorce proceedings. They said that in leaving their husbands they experienced a dramatic drop in income level and had a hard time finding attorneys who would take them on as clients. While our elected officials have made strides in domestic violence law, we are urging them to consider the suggestions, above, and work with fellow legislators to make improvements. What can each of us, as individuals, do to address the problem? The loud and clear message our team of reporters heard from victims, therapists, psychologists, marriage counselors, police and other law enforcement officials, social workers, health and court officials alike, is this: ``Listen to the victims. Listen to the abusers. Listen to the children.'' Then, reach out and offer to help. We hear a lot about ``family values'' these days. There is a recognition in the heartland of America that families are being torn apart by the harsh realities of increasing violence. What could be more cogent that confronting and eliminating domestic violence, arguably the biggest barrier to harmony in the home?

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. I thank the gentleman for yielding me the time. Mr. Speaker, for 13 years I served in the State House and I watched Congress deficit-spend, and I wondered if I would ever have the chance to be part of a movement in Congress to get our financial house in order. When I was first elected, I noticed this young man named John Kasich, who was coming in with these budgets to balance, to get our financial house in order, and only about 30 people were supporting him. He kept working at it and we are at this day today, which is very historic. I have waited 20 years and I have worked for 20 years to finally be able to vote for a budget that is balanced. The challenge we have is when I listen to my colleagues and they say we are not taking care of the sick or poor, they simply are distorting the issue when they say we are cutting Medicare or Medicaid. The fact is with Medicaid we are going to go from $89 billion to $124 billion. Only in Washington when you spend more do people call it a cut. We are going to spend $329 billion more in the next 7 years on Medicaid. Then we have the challenge of Medicare. Medicare is going bankrupt in 7 years. The White House, Congress, the minority party wanted to ignore it. We weighed in and said we need to slow the growth of Medicare. We are going to slow the growth, but it is still going to go from $178 billion to $274 billion. Only in Washington when you spend more money do people call it a cut. We are going to spend $675 billion more for Medicare in the next 7 years than we did in the last 7 years. Social Security is going to go up 5.3 percent each year for the next 7 years; Medicare, an average of 6.3 percent each year for the next 7 years; Medicaid, an average of 4.9 percent each year for the next 7 years. Other entitlements are going to go up at 4.1 percent. What we are cutting is Government. We are going to downsize Government. We are going to make it smaller. The school lunch program is going to go up. Our health care programs are going to go up, but we are going to make this Government smaller. In the process, we are going to change this caretaking society to a caring society.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I would like to correct the statement of the gentlewoman from Connecticut [Ms. DeLauro] who said we are cutting Medicare and Medicaid and not looking into consideration of increases. Medicare goes up from $4,800 per beneficiary to $6,734 per beneficiary. We are providing more per beneficiary each and every year.