Disapproval Resolution Relating to Debt Limit Increase

Floor Speech

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Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Madam Speaker, according to a new poll by The Washington Post and ABC News, 84 percent of Americans disapprove of the way Congress is doing its job. I don't know that the other 16 percent are paying attention, because we're not doing our job well. And this certainly is not doing our job well. The reason it is not doing our job well is because it is a pretense, a sham. This legislation is to pay bills that we've already incurred. Whether, as the gentleman said, it was incurred with your votes or whether it was incurred with our votes, we have incurred those expenses. This is about whether America is going to pay its bills. Nothing more, nothing less.

Now, the previous gentleman said nobody had done anything about the debt. In point of fact, we did do something about the debt. We put revenue at levels commensurate with our spending. As a result, in 1997, 1998, 1999, and 2000 and 2001--in 1997 we brought the deficit down to $25 billion, and for the next 4 years, we had a surplus. Now a couple of those years were not real surpluses because we counted on Social Security revenue. But two of those years were real surpluses.

This is about whether we pay our bills that we have incurred. Not doing this would be irresponsible, and would lead, I think, to further disrespect by the public, and properly so. One of the reasons for this feeling by the public is that Americans are tired of political games. This is a political game. This is a game that will say, see, I voted against debt.

Now, let me tell you how you can vote against debt. When you cut taxes in 2001 and 2003--and I agree with my friend, it's not about blame. It is about learning, however. When we cut taxes in 2001 and 2003 under George Bush, we didn't pay for them. We pretended they would pay for themselves. They didn't. Alan Greenspan says they won't. We ought to learn from that.

Learning from that, we ought to say yes, we'll pay our debts. The President doesn't want this money. It's not for the President; it's for bills that we incurred in fighting two wars, in giving tax cuts primarily to the wealthiest in America, to passing a prescription drug program that frankly all of us now support, but we didn't pay for it. And as a result, we got deeply into debt. And we have to get out of that debt, and we have to show courage, wisdom, and hopefully intellectual honesty in getting to that.

The American public is tired of seeing Republicans spending time on votes simply because of electoral positioning. And, frankly, they'd be tired of us doing the same thing. But that's all this is. It's so we can say: Look what we voted for. This is not our debt, we voted against it. But that's not responsible, and it's not honest. And I think most of you know that.

The resolution before us today is simply another waste of time. More than that, it undermines confidence here and around the world. Some of that debt, of course, we owe to people around the world. It is the essence of political gamesmanship, and does nothing to reduce the debt or create jobs. And we spend a whole day on it. As a matter of fact, this is the only full day we are going to spend in January debating any issue.

Americans know that we ought to pay our bills. They know we reached a deal in August that said both parties will work together to address our deficits in a way that will provide certainty to our businesses, markets, and families around the dinner table.

Agreeing to this resolution would only provide more uncertainty at a time when our people need to see us working together on a big, balanced deal to meet our fiscal challenges. My friend and I are both for that effort. I am very much for that effort. But I don't pretend that not paying the bills that we have incurred is going to solve that problem. The only thing that's going to solve that problem is we're going to ask everybody to contribute their fair share. Yes, we're going to have to make some cuts. And we're going to have to make some cuts that neither side will like, and we're going to have to raise revenues that neither side will like.

But I will tell my friend who is waiting for his grandchildren, I have three grandchildren now, and I have two great grandchildren, and he's right; they are the ones who are going to have to pay this bill.

And I saw my young friend, a new Member from South Carolina, and I can't recall his name right this second.

The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentleman has expired.

Mr. LEVIN. I yield the gentleman an additional 3 minutes.

Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for yielding.

I saw my young friend passionate about not passing these bills along to his children. I thought to myself, I could give that speech. But, very frankly, I voted against cutting taxes without paying for them. I voted against the AMT without paying for it. We paid for it when we set the AMT. I think it needs to be fixed, and we paid for it.

I will vote ``no'' on this resolution, which comes as no surprise after you've heard me talk, and I strongly encourage my colleagues to do the same. Why? America is disheartened because they do not believe we are honest in dealing with them. They believe we play political games. They believe that we are not addressing the issues they know are of importance and they know do not have easy, simplistic answers.

I hope Democrats who vote ``no'' are joined by a large number of Republicans, not because you like debt, not because any of us like debt. And, very frankly, I voted for the Clinton revenue increases in 1993, and the prediction on your side of the aisle was that it would destroy the economy, unemployment would spike, and the deficit would explode. None of that happened. You were wrong. All of us are wrong from time to time. Dead wrong.

As a matter of fact, we enjoyed the best economy I have seen in my adult life in the 1990s. And we have seen the worst recession in my life after pursuing the Bush policies for 8 years. Yes, we were in charge for the last 2, but we couldn't change policies because the President had the veto and a majority of the votes to sustain that veto on this floor.

So ladies and gentlemen, let's be honest with the American people. We've all incurred a debt. We all spent the money. We drove on the roads, we were defended abroad, we invested in health care, research. We all incurred these debts. We know we need to solve it. We know that medicine will be tough. But honesty will make it easier, honesty between ourselves, honesty with the American people, and honesty, integrity and courage.

I hear around this country talk about Greece has a real problem. They are 128 percent, I think, in debt; we're only at about 100 percent. If you count our internal debt, it's less than that. But the problem that Greece has is they don't have the resources to solve their problem. America, the good news for us is we have the resources to solve our problems if we have the courage and political will to do so. This vote is a small token of showing that we have the courage, the wisdom and the political will to do so.

We need to pay our bills. Vote ``no'' on this resolution. Show the American people that we have courage, that we have wisdom, and we can have the political will to make America the continuing strongest country on the face of the Earth.

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Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for his comments. And I want to thank him for his participation in addressing this issue. And frankly, in my opinion, he was one of the 100 signatories that we had saying let's get a big deal, we have to get a handle on this debt. I want to thank him. But I want to assure him as well, I've been here just a little longer than he has, this debate has been going on for some period of time. This is not a new debate. With all due respect, it's been on this floor--I've been raising this issue for some 20 years, very frankly, others have as well on both sides of the aisle. The debate has been going on, but as I said, we need to summon the courage and political will to not just debate it, but to address it and address it effectively. And I thank the gentleman for yielding.

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