Debt Ceiling Negotiations

Floor Speech

Mr. GARAMENDI. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

I was just kind of curious about which one of those EPA regulations that my colleague was talking about. Perhaps it's the one that would prevent the emission of mercury into the air, or arsenic into the water. Maybe they want to poison the air and the water. Maybe that's what they're looking at. Or the SEC regulation that would bring to heel Wall Street and all of its excesses which just about terminated the economies of the world. Maybe those are the regulations they don't want to see. In any case, what I would really like to talk about here is the negotiations that are under way to deal with the looming crisis of the debt.

The President of the United States has said, okay, let's not kick the can down the road any further, let's deal with this issue, and has proposed a $4 trillion solution. No sooner did he make that proposal than our Republican colleagues said, oh, no, we can't do that because that will include finally creating in America a fair Tax Code, one in which the superwealthy are actually going to get to pay for their share of the burden. For example, the hedge fund managers who pay a 15 percent rate on their earnings, their ordinary income, while the rest of us get to pay the full freight, whatever that might be, 35 percent for those at the top brackets. But, no, no, we can't deal with that problem, so we can't have a $4 trillion solution.

The President also says, We're not going to kick the can down the road. We want to extend the debt limit to at least 2013, to put this issue off. But the Republicans don't want to do that. They want to do a short term.

I wonder what's going on here. Talking about cuts, the only cut that I've seen thus far defined by our Republican colleagues is to cut Medicare. In fact, not just cut it, terminate Medicare, to somehow take all of those Americans who are 55 years or younger, and say to them, no, when you become 65, you will not have Medicare. We'll give you a voucher and you can go out and take your best shot with the private insurance sector.

Good luck. I was an insurance commissioner. I know what those private insurance companies will do. They'll deny you benefits, deny you coverage, and they will tell the doctor exactly what you might actually receive in terms of health care. It doesn't make much sense to me.

I think we need to support the President in this matter. I think we need a balanced approach here, one in which the wealthy finally get to pay their fair share, in which the oil companies no longer receive our hard-earned tax dollars so that they can have their $4 billion subsidy. I think it's time, as we heard earlier from our colleagues, to end the wars. If we end the war in Afghanistan, we could over the next 4 or 5 years have a third of a trillion dollar reduction in our deficit.

There are many things that can be done, but one thing we will not do is to attack Social Security. Social Security and Medicare are the foundation of support for all Americans. When they become old, 65 and older, they know that they have that benefit available to them.

Medicare works. Medicare is actually far more efficient than any private health insurance system. It has provided seniors across this Nation with an opportunity to not be impoverished when they become 65, that their health care will be provided to them. It has allowed for the extension of their lives. It has reduced the poverty rate. Together with Social Security, these are two of the foundations that we have promised every American. When they become 65, they will not face poverty. They will have a foundation. Not enough to provide all that they might want but at least a foundation.

And so as we go through this whole issue of whether we're going to raise the debt limit or not, let us be mindful that we will not do it on the backs of the seniors, and we will do it in a balanced way as the President has said. We will provide for a fair Tax Code in which the superwealthy pay their fair share, in which corporations are no longer able to evade taxes, in which the oil companies no longer will receive our hard-earned tax dollars so that they can have even greater profits, and let us be mindful that the oil industry itself over the last 10 years, the top five oil companies have had over a trillion dollars of profits. It's time to bring back those subsidies and to balance our budget. We can do these things.

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