Gene Taylor

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Sir, as of today, I am introducing the coalition budget, H.R. 2530, to provide for deficit reduction and achieve a balanced budget by fiscal year 2002, as a privileged resolution and request its immediate consideration.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. I, along with the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm], urge that we defeat the previous question, defeat the rule, bring the coalition budget to the floor under an open rule. Folks, we have not had a President submit a balanced budget probably in my lifetime. President Reagan never came within $100 billion. President Bush never came within $200 billion. President Clinton has stayed more or less in that league, between $200 billion and $300 billion. This is nothing new, neither Democratic nor Republican. There are folks out of work. It is a week before Christmas. We are 80 days behind on our schedule to submit a budget for next year, this year. Let us cut the nonsense out. I know the President's budget is a nonstarter. You know it is a nonstarter. So many of you who have come up to me privately in different places and said let us get the coalition budget on the floor, if you have some parts of it you think are too high, offer an amendment to cut it. If there are parts you think are too low, offer an amendment to increase it. Let us just come to the floor with some ground rules where we have to be at the end of the day, so we do not end up with a $270 billion annual operating deficit next year under the Republican budget, I say to the gentleman from New York [Mr. Solomon], or an $80 billion- something budget deficit in 2002 under the President's budget. Let us fix it. We are legislators. It is a week before Christmas, and people are wondering whether or not they are going to get paid. Veterans are wondering whether or not they are going to get their checks. Let us act like human beings. Let us act like statesmen. Let us defeat the previous question. Let us bring the coalition budget to the floor under an open rule, and let us pass a budget that the people of the United States want us to do and will be proud of us for doing.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, in a number of nationwide publications the Republican National Committee ran the following ad: The Republican National Committee will present a cashier's check for $1 million to the first American who can prove the following statement is false: In November of 1995, the U.S. House and Senate passed a balanced budget bill. On December 14, the Congressional Budget Office sent my office this letter, and the last line of it says it all: ``CBO's baseline projection for the general fund deficit for the fiscal year 1996 is likely to be $270 billion.'' That includes $100 billion that will be stolen from trust funds like the Social Security trust fund. So the much ballyhooed Balanced Budget Act, so-called, of 1995 really should have been stamped like this: ``Certified $270 billion deficit by the Congressional Budget Office.'' Mr. Barbour, I am on the way to your headquarters. Break out your checkbook, make the check out to the University of Southern Mississippi development fund.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, I take this opportunity to speak to the American people tonight to point out an inaccuracy, if not an outright deception, that has been printed in a number of newspapers around the country. We will give my fellow Mississippian, Haley Barbour, an opportunity to honor the pledge that he made to pay the first American who proves his statement false $1 million. Mr. Speaker, that is this portion of the ad that was in the USA Today for a number of days. This particular ad was last Monday, December 12. It says, ``The Republican National Committee will present a cashier's check for $1 million to the first American who can prove the following statement is false.'' And then in quotations it says, ``November 1995, the U.S. House and Senate passed a balanced budget bill. It increases total spending on Medicaid by more than 50 percent from 1995 to the year 2002, pursuant to the Congressional Budget Office standards.'' While I do not doubt what Mr. Barbour had to say about Medicare and Medicaid, the spending really will go up. It is not the cut that many of my colleagues call it. It is just a limitation on growth. It is something that we as businesspeople have to do. I will, however, take issue with the first part, that in November 1995 the House and Senate did not pass a balanced budget bill. The budget that passed for fiscal year 1996, in October, contained a deficit, according to the Congressional Budget Office, of $270 billion for next year. Now, under the rules of the House, going all the way back to the earliest days of our republic, Congress can only allocate funds for 1 year at a time. So, although it was a 7-year plan, it means absolutely nothing. One Congress cannot commit another Congress to doing something or not doing something. Mr. Speaker, those who follow Congress know, there has already been a 40-percent turnover just in the past 3 years, and over a 50-percent turnover in the membership of Congress in the past 6 years. So it is totally inaccurate for Mr. Barbour to say that we are going to commit future Congresses to reduce spending. All this Congress can do is commit itself. And the budget that it has committed itself to has been certified by the Congressional Budget Office, as recently as December 14, to be $270 billion in deficit. So, the much ballyhooed Balanced Budget Act of 1995 was a fake, a farce, a fraud, an insult to the people of this great country. As a matter of fact, even after certain members of the majority party called the Congressional Budget Office and requested that the CBO take a second look at their numbers, the number went from an annual operating deficit of $296 billion to an annual operating deficit of $270 billion, which is still a $7 billion increase over the annual operating deficit of this year. Mr. Speaker, so tomorrow morning I will be walking over to the Republican National Headquarters and I will present the following information to Mr. Barbour. I will give him the opportunity to make good on his word. For those who do not know Mr. Barbour, he is a former citizen of the great city of Yazoo City, MS. Yazoo City has several distinctions. First, one of the Confederate ironclads was built there in secret in the war of Northern Aggression, or the Civil War as the gentlewoman from California [Ms. Pelosi] might refer to it. That ironclad, the Arkansas, was responsible for lifting the siege of Vicksburg. Despite incredible odds against it, it actually ran off something like 65 Union ships in the summer of 1862. More recently, the city of Yazoo City is famous for sending America's storytellers. One of the great storytellers is William Morris, a writer of renown throughout the country. More recently, a comedian by the name of Jerry Clower comes from Yazoo City. Tomorrow, we are going to give my good friend, Mr. Barbour, the opportunity to tell America whether he is a man of his word or a storyteller. Mr. Speaker, I have used the resources of this office, and my congressional office, to help get this information. Therefore, it would be most inappropriate if I asked Mr. Barbour for that money personally. I think it would be most appropriate if he made that check to the University of Southern Mississippi Development Fund. I will be over there tomorrow morning to collect.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, I hope my good friend from Arizona and others will be here this afternoon when the House gives 5- minute speeches when I will display and walk the people of America step by step through and disprove Mr. Barbour's claim. The first sentence is what I am going to disprove: ``In November 1995 the U.S. House and Senate passed a balanced budget bill.'' They did not. The law of this Nation says we can only allocate funds for 1 year. And the funds that are allocated for next year are projecting a $270 billion annual operating deficit, of which $100 billion will be stolen from the trust funds. I again want to encourage people to pay attention to this. I am not going to ask for the money for myself. But, J.D., you can fill in the University of Southern Mississippi development fund in that space there because I will prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that this statement is false and I expect my fellow Mississippian, Mr. Barbour, to be a man of his word.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this measure.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman for yielding me the time first of all. It shows what a gentleman he is, because he knows I am going to vote against his position. But I also told him that I was going to tell the truth about this proposal. The truth of the matter is, and I just got off the phone with the Congressional Budget Office, that the Republican budget for 1996 will borrow over $100 billion from the trust funds to disguise the true nature of the debt for the Republican budget for next year, which has recently been revised but as recently as just a couple of weeks ago was $296 billion. That is money we do not have. It is money that has to be borrowed. If we were not borrowing enough already, I will tell you how bad it is. In the 2 minutes that the gentleman has granted me to address this body, our Nation will spend $1 million on interest on the existing national debt. So that $296 billion is added on top of that. So the so-called Balanced Budget Act, much ballyhooed in the ad in USA Today, is all a ruse. I am going to hit the Republican Party with a demand letter for the $1 million they promised to the first person who could disprove they had a balanced budget, because the Congressional Budget Office has just told us that the annual operating deficit first is over $180 billion of regular funds, and then they are going to disguise another $100 billion by borrowing from the trust fund. The bill before us today is good policy. The problem is they have no intention of ever putting it into effect. That is a shame. It does not bode well for this body. It does not bode well for the people of the United States. But I hope that the people of the United States will insist that this is the type of behavior that should not continue and that stealing from the trust fund, which is what is going on, has to cease.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, in 1954 one of my heroes, Senator John Stennis, spoke against sending American mechanics to a little country called South Vietnam. He said that we would get drawn into a land war that we could not win, in a part of the world that people did not care about. John C. Stennis was right. We did get sucked into it. Then when that happened, he did his constitutional duty to support those troops. What I am asking this body to do tonight is to prevent us from getting sucked into another war where other brave young Americans will die, be maimed, in a part of the world that Americans just do not care about. It is not a right or wrong decision, it is what is best for the American young men and women who have sworn to defend this country. The best thing for those fine young people is not to waste their lives, and above all, do not abuse their trust. They swore to defend the Constitution of this country. They swore to defend this country. We are not even a participant on this treaty. Vote for the Dornan alternative.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, in today's USA Today on page 7 is an ad that contains the following advertisement where the National Republican Party offers a million dollars to the first citizen who can prove that the following statement is false: ``In November 1995, the U.S. House and Senate passed a balanced budget bill.'' Then it goes on to talk about the increases in spending for Medicare. In November 1995 the House and Senate passed a budget bill that increases the annual operating deficit of this country by $33 billion. You see, next year's annual operating deficit will be $296 billion, of which $118 billion will be stolen from the trust funds that you good people are paying into on your Social Security and other programs. That is not a balanced budget. Mr. Barber, you can write the check care of the University of Southern Mississippi scholarship fund. You are out $1 million.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Florida [Mr. Deutsch].

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, may I say good things about the gentleman from Virginia [Mr. Bateman] before he closes?

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, I want to encourage all of my colleagues, Democratic and Republican, to support this measure. It is, as the gentleman from Virginia [Mr. Bateman] said before the Committee on Rules last week, a modest measure, doing the best we can with what we have to maintain the U.S. merchant fleet. [[Page H 14066]] I have every confidence that the new chairman of the maritime panel can come up with a much more ambitious program for next year and, as his ranking minority member, I intend to work with him to the fullest on that. Mr. Chairman, I want to take the comments to heart of what the gentleman from Louisiana [Mr. Livingston], the chairman of the Committee on Appropriations, said about the need for the American merchant fleet. I think we ought to be on the gentleman's doorstep asking for his help to do the things that we know need to be done. Mr. Chairman, with that, I yield back the balance of my time, and encourage the passage of the bill.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, I yield to the gentleman from Hawaii [Mr. Abercrombie].

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, I am unaware of any opposition to the amendment, but I do ask unanimous consent to claim the 10 minutes on our side.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Chairman, to reinforce the statement of my good friend from Hawaii and to answer what I think will be the questions of the gentleman, the 100 million dollars that this Nation will spend to provide for the Maritime Security Fleet would build 1 cargo ship for the Navy or make 50 ships available for the next year. That is good economics. I come from shipbuilding country. I would much rather build ships than charter them, but you cannot argue with getting 50 ships for the price of 1, and incidentally our Nation is building over a dozen fast sealift ships to help fill this need, but it will never completely fulfill the need. We will have to rely on a strong American merchant marine, and that is why I support this measure. I yield to the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Smith].

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, under the terms of the bill, any national emergency. That includes hurricanes, any national emergency.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. It would.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, to the best of my knowledge, we have no more requests for time.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. Studds], the chairman of the former Committee on Merchant Marine and Fisheries.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from New Jersey [Mr. Torricelli].

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from Oregon [Ms. Furse], an active member of the former Committee on Merchant Marine and Fisheries.

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman, I yield to the gentleman from Hawaii [Mr. Abercrombie]. parliamentary inquiry

Mr. TAYLOR of Mississippi. Mr. Chairman, I know of no opposition to the amendment. We support it.