Christopher Shays

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, I am delighted to yield 3 minutes to the gracious gentlewoman from Connecticut [Mrs. Johnson].

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia [Mr. Bliley]. (Mr. BLILEY asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Fawell]. (Mr. FAWELL asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from New Jersey [Mrs. Roukema]. (Mrs. ROUKEMA asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, to begin the debate, I yield 4 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from New York [Mr. King], one Member who is strongly opposed to term limits.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Porter].

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. No, I do not ask that. I have a parliamentary inquiry before I make that decision. parliamentary inquiry

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, I have a question to ask of the Chair, a parliamentary inquiry.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume to speak in support of an amendment to restore $186 million for people with AIDS, housing for people with AIDS. Mr. Chairman, the purpose of this amendment is to restore a cut that was made in the Committee on Appropriations that basically eliminated all 1995 appropriations for HOPWA. This is the funding that enables people throughout the country who are providing those with AIDS with housing. We have Ryan White funds, and that provides services for people with AIDS, but HOPWA provides the housing for people with AIDS, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Flanagan].

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment listed in the March 13 Congressional Record as amendment No. 70.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, I want to be up front with every Member on both sides, even if I do not happen to agree with them. I want the opportunity to use my 15 minutes to state the case on this issue. If the gentleman withdraws his point of order, is he allowed to bring it up in the future?

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, based on the dialog that has taken place in this instance with the chairman, and based on the courtesy of this House for allowing me to proceed on an amendment that could have been declared out of order, I ask unanimous consent to withdraw this amendment.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the remainder of my time. Mr. Chairman, I want to conclude by making a few very basic points. I arrived in this House in 1987 at the death of Stewart McKinney. Stewart McKinney died of AIDS. There is a real hero in this country named Lucie McKinney. Lucie McKinney has devoted her life to people with AIDS. She was not a public person while her husband was a congressman. She became a very public person. She works tirelessly night and day on this issue of, not AIDS research, not AIDS services, but providing homes for people with AIDS. This has not been an easy task for her, because we have so many people who are on our streets, without homes, dying of AIDS. Occasionally and quite often they find themselves spending their last days in a hospital, at $1,000 a day. Lucie McKinney provides this housing for them for one-tenth of that cost, with the help of the State, with the help of the Federal Government, and with the help of so many volunteers and people who contribute. Mr. Chairman, this cause matters to me. It matters to many people in this Chamber. I sincerely believe cutting out the 1995 funds is a mistake, and it is a misunderstanding that this issue is continually being reviewed. It is also my understanding that I could have had a Member, any Member here, raise a point of order at any time, and they had the graciousness to allow us to continue. At this time I would just like to ask the Chairman of the Committee on Appropriations to clarify with me his request that I withdraw this amendment.

Mr. SHAYS. I thank the Chair. I appreciate the graciousness of the chairman of the Committee on Appropriations for letting us proceed, and also the majority whip. Mr. Chairman, I yield 30 seconds to my colleague, the gentleman from Kentucky [Mr. Ward], a former Peace Corps volunteer.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California [Ms. Pelosi].

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New York [Mr. Lazio].

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New York [Mr. Schumer].

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, before yielding to my colleague, the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Gunderson], and then to the gentleman from New York [Mr. Schumer], I would like to just point out that we are really talking about three issues. We are talking about AIDS research. My colleague is right in saying that we have spent a great deal of money on AIDS research, without the kind of payback we would like. We then talk about AIDS services and the Ryan White funds, to respond to that in a very sincere and serious way. Where we have a deficiency is housing for people with AIDS. We are housing people in hospitals at $1,000 a day instead of $100 or less for people with AIDS in housing for people with AIDS. This is what this amendment is attempting to address. I want to say to my colleague, the gentleman from California [Mr. Lewis], I do not know of any greater champion on this issue. He has taken a hit he does not deserve. The purpose of this amendment brought forth by many people is in no way to embarrass Mr. Lewis, because, frankly, he is not deserving of some of the criticism he has received. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Gunderson]. (Mr. GUNDERSON asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. SHAYS. I thank the Chair. My understanding is that I have 9 minutes remaining. Is that correct?

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, I have a parliamentary inquiry.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleagues for the dialogue they had. This is going to be a long process and hopefully when we are done we will find some common ground. Mr. Speaker, I am speaking tonight on an issue that to me is extraordinarily important and that is getting our financial House in order. And I think in terms of this, what I have looked at as I have served now in Congress for 7 years and have been a State legislator 13 years before, I see a society where we have 12-year-olds having babies; a society where we have 14-year-olds selling drugs and 15-year-olds killing each other; a society where our 18-year-olds who have diplomas cannot even read their diplomas. I see a society where we have 25-year- olds who have never worked and 30-year-olds who are grandparents. That is a society I see in our country, and I believe a society like that cannot long endure. I also am seeing a society where we have had for the last 20 years extraordinarily large budget deficits. We have seen the national debt go up and up and up, our annual deficits adding to the national debt each year. And I do not single out any one party. We all shared in that to the extent that we were a part of it. I would like to think that I was a force for restraint in this, but we had Republicans who did not want to cut defense and we had Democrats who did not want to control the growth of entitlements. And Gramm-Rudman only focused in on what we called discretionary spending. It never dealt with entitlements. What we had was a Republican President, and now a Democratic President, who are willing to have the status quo continue. And I have often been asked what do I think about a balanced budget amendment. I think it would be great if we did not need it. And we do not need it if we have a President who submits a balanced budget, be he a Republican or Democrat. We would not need it if we had a Congress that decided to reject unbalanced budgets. And we would not need it if we had a President, who was receiving a budget that was not balanced, that would simply decide to veto it. But that has not been the case and that is why I have become convinced that the only way we are going to see some sanity to what we have is to require a balanced budget amendment. The White House to submit a balanced budget and Congress to vote out a budget that is, in fact, balanced. I thought long and hard about how much have I, as a Member of Congress, or in the State House, been a part of the solution and a part of the problem. And when I was elected 7 years ago, I was determined that I could look my family in the eye and my constituents, go to a town meeting and say, I have voted to control the growth in spending. I have voted to get our financial house in order. I am finally going to see the opportunity to have that come to fruition in a real way. When I first started out, there were about 30 of us who were voting to control the growth in spending. That number grew to about 60. It then got to be about 80, including Republicans and some Democrats. And then there were times that we were up to about 160 during the last session. In fact, during the Penny-Kasich debate, when Republicans and Democrats, 15 Republicans, 15 Democrats, got together, led by Mr. Kasich and Mr. Penny, the Democrat, Mr. Kasich the Republican, and we put together a package of $90 billion of cuts in spending. And I went to the White House and spoke to Leon Panetta and asked him to support this proposal and I said, ``If you cannot support it, at least do not oppose it.'' I received my answer a week after my visit when the White House decided to oppose, for the very first time in Congress, a bipartisan effort to control spending. I will tell you that was probably one of the most disheartening things that has happened, because I thought you want to nurture that. You want, if you spending in Congress, no less, you want to nurture that. But it was not nurtured. It was an attempt to stamp it out. The vote failed by just four votes. So I guess I could take some real satisfaction we came so close. And how encouraging that would have been to have seen that bipartisan effort succeed. It did not succeed and our deficits continue and Congress still is wrestling with how we get our financial house in order. I often think about whether we are a caretaking society or a caring society. And I describe it this way: a caretaking society is a society that tries to take care of people, and then those who vote for the bills that take care of people feel good that they have voted for something that takes care of someone, without asking what are they actually doing. To me, the preferable one is the caring society. The caretaking society gives the food; the caring society shows someone how to grow the seed so it becomes food and feeds them until they get to that point. Now, the stereotype I have of a liberal is an individual who sees someone drowning 50 feet out and runs to the end of the pier and grabs 100 feet of rope and throws that rope out to the person who is drowning 50 feet out. The person who is drowning is trying to grab onto the rope and make it taut, ready to be pulled in. The stereotype liberal, when the line is taut, drops the line and says, ``I have done my good deed. Now on to the next good deed.'' I have just as discomforting a view of the stereotyped conservative who sees someone drowning 50 feet out, grabs 25 feet of line, throws it to the individual, it does not quite reach him, and says, ``You swim halfway, and I will do my part and I will pull you in.'' I have to feel that somewhere between that stereotype of the liberal and the stereotype of the conservative is a sensible program that tries to reach out to the person who is drowning, takes the temporary step of pulling them in, throwing them enough line to work, making sure the program works, not walking on to the next program, pulls the individual in, and then just does not part company, but teaches that person how to swim. Mr. Speaker, what I wrestle with is the fact that as I look at this budget chart, and the task that I have as a member of the Committee on the Budget, what is in the dark green is basically what we call entitlements; Social Security. Entitlement is not a bad word, it means someone is truly entitled. It has gotten to mean something that is not always positive, but someone who has paid into Social Security is entitled because they put money into a system and expect to receive it back in retirement. In the shades of different green there is Medicare, that is 10 percent of the budget; there is Medicaid, which is 5.7. Then there are other entitlements that are 121.3 percent. These entitlements add up to 50 percent of the budget. They are on automatic pilot. I have been here since 1987, and I rarely get an opportunity to vote on these, because they are in the law, and if the law is not changed, they just keep happening. The numbers keep growing, and the costs keep growing. They begin to consume more and more of our Federal budget. No one, Mr. Speaker, Republican and Democrat, has yet to truly address entitlements. We also have something else that is on automatic pilot for the most part. It is in yellow, and it is interest in the national debt. Collectively, entitlements, 49 percent of our budget; interest on the national debt, 15 percent of our budget--and by the way, interest on the national debt is $234 billion--two-thirds of our budget are on automatic pilot. What do I vote on? I get to vote on 36 percent, which is in the 3 tones of pink, domestic discretionary spending. It funds the judicial, legislative, executive branch, all the departments of the executive branch, all the grants of the executive branch, minus the Defense Department. The Defense Department is so large that we just isolate it as a similar expenditure. It is almost identical, it is 1 percent more than discretionary domestic spending. Defense is 1 percent more. Then we have what we call international, about 1.4 percent. That is the State Department and foreign aid. I vote, when I get the Committee on Appropriations expenditure bill, I vote on one-third of this entire pie. Two-thirds has been on automatic pilot, and growing. Mr. Speaker, what do we need to do? We need to take an honest look at what we can control. Democrats and Republicans, candidly, have done a pretty good job of trying to control the growth in discretionary spending, both defense and nondefense. You see a good example of it right here. You see the growth in spending for each of the next, from 1995 to the year 2000, and you see the annual growth. What was in the solid greens, the entitlements, different shades, they are growing at extraordinary rates: Social Security, 5.2; Medicare, 9.6; Medicaid, 9.1. The numbers we have from CBO, Congressional Budget Office, are higher, but I used the President's own numbers. Other entitlements are at 6.1 percent. What is happening is interest on the national debt is going up nearly 6 percent. The entitlements are growing, they are 50 percent of the budget. They are on automatic pilot. What I vote on, defense spending, will go down three-tenths, will go down less than a percent, three- tenths of 1 percent. Foreign aid and the State Department will go down about 1.9 percent during each of the next 5 years. Domestic spending is only going to go up a tenth of 1 percent. So what I vote on, what we debate, the discretionary spending out of Committee on Appropriations is basically, for the next 5 years, at a standstill. This is what we have to address. We have to address the extraordinary growth of Medicare and Medicaid. Mr. Speaker, there was discussion earlier on about the food and nutrition program. I will use this as an example of what makes the debate difficult. What makes the debate difficult is that people simply are not leveling with the American people about what is truly happening. We may disagree with the WIC Program and the School Lunch Program as proposed by the Republicans, but we know that the School Lunch Program is going to go up at 4.5 percent during each of the next 5 years. This is in the solid blue. The black is the number that it would grow without our program. It would be slightly more expensive, ever so slightly. You probably cannot even see it. The program devised by the Republicans will allow spending on the School Lunch Program to go up 4.5 percent during each of the next 5 years. The WIC Program is seen in the red. It also will continue to grow at that basic rate of over 4 percent a year. We can call it a cut in spending, yes, I guess you could call it that. It would not be accurate, but you could call it. What you can call it is a growth in spending, a significant growth in spending of 4.5 percent as it relates to the School Lunch Program. The problem we have in Washington is, and I did not have it when I was in the State House, we could never get away with it in the State House, but when I came down here I would always hear how we were cutting spending, yet I was finding that spending was continuing to grow. I could not figure out how we could call it a cut in spending if it was continuing to grow. Then I learned after just watching this process for a while that if a program cost $100 million to run this year, and $105 next year, and we appropriate $103 million, Washington, the White House, Congress, both parties, have historically, and the press, have historically called it a $2 million cut in spending. Even though it went from $100 to $103 million, they are going to call it a $2 million cut in spending, because they said it should have gone up to $105. What most people would call it is a $3 million increase in spending. We are not going to succeed in balancing our budget unless we are able to get a handle on the entitlement spending that is on automatic pilot and slow the growth. What we anticipate by the year 2002 is that spending, without our taking any action, will grow over $3 trillion of new money. We want to bring that down to a level of growth of about $1.9 trillion, almost $2 trillion. We want it The reason we want it not to grow as quickly is we want to eliminate the deficits. We want to make the interest of what we pay on the national debt smaller. I think of the generations that have preceded me in Congress, the Members that preceded and voted out these large deficits, and those that were here while I was here who continue to vote out large deficits. We now spend $234 billion on interest on the national debt. Think of what we could do with that money if it was not interest on the national debt. Think of the programs that we could do, that would be meaningful. Mr. Speaker, I do not think we are going to succeed in slowing the growth of Medicare and Medicaid unless it is bipartisan. I'm not sure how that is going to happen, because the dialog to date has not been encouraging. We have not had the President come in with a recommendation on how he would suggest we slow the growth in spending; still spend more, just not spend as much. We are having a dialog now where Republicans are saying we need to take tough stands on some of these programs, tough; we are going to allow the nutrition program to go up 4.5 percent, instead of 5.2 percent. I guess we could call it tough. I think it makes sense. I think it makes sense to block grant the program. I think it makes sense to spend more of the money on the poor children in our school districts. I had some of the school nutrition people come to my office and tell me they did not want that to happen, they want to subsidize lunch for all students. I said ``I want it to go to the students who cannot pay for it.'' They said ``We do not want two lines in our school system, the poorer kids, and the kids who can afford that.'' I said ``Do not have two lines, have one line, but give one of the students a voucher, a coin, something that enables him to have a subsidized lunch.'' So as I think about this debate, and wonder if we are going to continue the way we are going, or whether we are going to have change, I am encouraged. I think that there are a number of Republicans who are willing to take some tough votes and take responsible votes. I think there are going to be a number of Democrats who will as well. I think we are going to have an honest debate about what was discussed earlier about taxes. To me, deficit reduction comes before cutting taxes. I might have a disagreement as to what the tax cuts do. I happen to think a capital gains cut makes sense. I happen to think that what we need to worry about is what happens to the money once it is provided to that taxpayer, what do they do with it. If we can provide tax cuts where a person takes the money and invests it in new plant and equipment and increases productivity, and it means more jobs for Americans, I think it makes sense. If it means that it is not going to encourage growth, then I have a question mark. The jury is still out as to what is going to happen to the tax cuts. They will be funded. I think they will pass, but ultimately what the Senate will do for me, I am going to vote to control the growth in spending. I am going to allow my Government to spend more money on these very needed programs. I am just going to have the growth be more sensible and not so out of control. And I am going to vote to make rational controls as well to some of the discretionary spending that we see. We need to slow the growth in spending. We are going to spend more, we are just not going to spend as much as we have been spending. With that, Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank you and the staff who are here staying up late to allow us to share our views on what we think are some very important issues.

Mr. SHAYS

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

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding time to me. Mr. Chairman, 50 States, 50 different State laws affecting interstate commerce, and we have for so long allowed a tremendous ripoff. It blows my mind that we have tolerated this for so many years. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of Common Sense Product Liability and Legal Reform Act of 1995, and I rise in support of the amendment of the gentleman from California [Mr. Cox] and the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Pete Geren] the fair share amendment. It is so simple. It does not take a lot of words, a lot of legalese. The bottom line is so simple. If you are responsible, you should pay your proportionate share of whatever problem you caused, but if you are not responsible, you should not be held liable. When I hear of the outrageous awards that are given to an individual plaintiff, and then I learn of the liability that company had, which was 100 percent, when in fact they only caused 5 or 10 percent of the action, and then I think ``Who pays?'' I pay, you pay. We all pay for this outrage. This outrage needs to end. The bottom line is so simple, it is so clear and maybe it is just one has to be an attorney to find it confusing. If you are in fact responsible, you should pay. If you are 50 percent responsible, you should pay 100 percent of your 50 percent. But you should not have to pay when you are not responsible in the vast majority of the cases. I urge my colleagues to vote this amendment and vote this bill. I consider it of all the bills coming before this Chamber the most important bill that we will vote on in this entire 2 years.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Madam Speaker, I wanted to take this time to kind of just register my concern and to just discuss a little bit the commitment I think we have on this side of the aisle to get our financial house in order, and my purpose for speaking is not to take a partisan tone, but to just express a tremendous amount of concern about what is really shaping up to be a battle between the White House and Congress over something that, if we work together, would be extraordinarily helpful for our Nation. I speak of the fact that, when President Clinton was elected, he found that he had a national debt of $4.3 trillion, and he felt that he had worked out a plan to bring our annual deficits down, but we are going to see under his 5-year plan that he presented to Congress just last month that our national debt by the year 2000 will be $6.7 trillion, that it will go up $2.3 trillion, or 54 percent, during this period of time. What concerns me is the fact that there are some who are saying, well, this is a smaller percentage, but it is a smaller percentage on a larger base, and so this two trillion, 2.3 trillion, will be the largest increase ever experienced at any time in our history, and I look now and think what are we going to do to resolve this? What opportunities do we have as Republicans and Democrats to get together? One of the things that the President deserves high marks on is the fact that we have, in fact, started to get a handle on what we call discretionary spending, what we vote out of the Committee on Appropriations, and this has resulted in some hope for the fact that at least with what we spend in defense and what we spend in nondefense that we are starting to show the kind of restraint that we need. We have simply decided that we will not add to discretionary spending. We have not in the last few years, and we are destined to keep it at a freeze for the next few years, but where we see the challenge is with, in fact, entitlements which constitute half of our budget, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and what we refer to as other entitlements. The concern that I have is that the President has really taken a hard position that he is not going to touch entitlements, which is really the same old story. Republicans have not wanted to cut defense, and they did not. Democrats have not wanted to slow the growth of entitlements, and they did not. And Republicans and Democrats for 20 years got together and voted out budgets with large deficits so that we saw the national debt just continue to go up, and up, and up, and up. The challenge we have today is that the fastest part of our budget are entitlements that are growing at 10 percent annually. I am talking particularly of Medicare and Medicaid. We need to slow the growth of Medicare and Medicaid to about 5 percent annually. We are going to spend 5 percent more next year than we did the year before, and 5 percent the year after. We are going to see Medicare and Medicaid grow. But if we cannot get those numbers down, we will never ever get our financial house in order. I look at this budget, and I see that our foreign affairs expenditures are actually going down each year. I see the defense is going down each year. I see the domestic discretionary spending is basically at a hard freeze. Then I look at Medicare, and Medicaid, and other entitlements, food stamps, AFDC, and they are going up at triple the amount of inflation. What an opportunity we have to work together as Republicans and Democrats to get our financial house in order, but the kind of response we are getting when we start to try to make logical changes. I happen to think the welfare state is dead. I think that 12-year- olds having babies, I think that 14-year-olds who are out selling drugs, 15-year-olds killing each other, 18-year-olds who cannot read their diplomas, 25-year-olds who have never had a job, 30-year-olds who are grandparents, is the legacy of the welfare state. It is dead. It is not going to be allowed to continue, and what I am pledging as one Member of Congress is that I believe that we Republicans in particular are going to get our financial house in order, and I speak as someone who is a moderate Republican, and I would like to think I am extremely moderate, someone who comes more from the center than from the right or left, and I can tell you that we have absolute conviction that we are going to work together to get our financial house in order. We are going to balance the budget.

Mr. SHAYS

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Speaker, I would like to take this opportunity to extend my condolences to the Jensen family of Riverside, CT, for the loss of their son and brother. Dr. Charles W. Jensen III, 34, a doctor of dental medicine in Greenwich, CT, who died suddenly last Monday morning at his office in Greenwich. A resident of Stamford, he previously lived in Greenwich and Darien. He had been practicing dentistry for almost 8 years and had just taken over the practice from his father, who retired at the end of December. Dr. Jensen was an avid sportsman whose special interest was sports fishing. His other interests were softball and golf, and he was a member of the Innis Arden Golf Club. Born August 24, 1960, in Goldsboro, NC, he moved to Greenwich when he was a year old. He was a 1979 graduate of Greenwich High School, graduated magna cum laude from Fairleigh Dickinson University and was a 1987 graduate of the University of Connecticut Dental School. He was a member of the American Dental Association, the Connecticut State Dental Association, and the Greenwich Dental Society. In addition to his father, he is survived by his mother, Rachel Vuono Jensen of Riverside; three brothers, James S. Jensen of Silver Spring, MD, Thomas F. Jensen of San Ramon, CA, and Daniel T. Jensen of Riverside; two sisters, Mary Beth Jensen of Park City, UT, and Kathleen Bellissimo of Los Altos, CA; and his girlfriend, Rachel Gregg, of New Canaan, CT. Charlie will always be remembered as a genial, engaging person of rock solid integrity. The very mention of his name elicited a warm smile and a laugh from all those who knew him. Whether fishing off the shores of Nantucket, boating on Long Island Sound, or caring for his patients in the dental office, Charlie will always be remembered as a wonderful brother, trustworthy friend, and a dedicated professional. John W. Moffly IV, a long-time friend of the Jensen family, recently stated, ``I so much admired Charlie, not only as a professional, but as a person * * * he took such great interest in his patients that I never had a single doubt that whatever the problem, he would find the right solution * * * certain doctors rise above the norm and earn special recognition for their talent, dedication and humanity. This was Charlie.'' Mr. Speaker, Dr. Charles W. Jensen III will be very, very missed.