S. Con. Res. 41, H. Con. Res. 112, S. Con. Res. 37, S. Con. Res. 42, S. Con. Res. 44 En Bloc--Motions to Proceed

Floor Speech

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Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, one thing we know is that a budget isn't just a collection of numbers, it is an expression of principles and priorities and direction.

While I have the floor, I will take a moment to say to our friend and colleague from North Dakota that he has been one of the strongest chiefs of the Budget Committee. I sat on the Budget Committee for a long time. I think it is fair to say, Republican or Democrat, the Senator from North Dakota deserves the thanks and respect from everybody here for the detail and for the arduous task he took on to make sure our budgets were clear. No matter how often the challenges came, Senator Conrad would stand and give the background and give the details that got him to a point of view, and we are grateful, and we will certainly miss his presence here.

The budgets the Republicans have put forward today confirm their true priorities.

I had a good business career before coming to the Senate, and I remember that during the Second World War we raised taxes on high incomes and on excess profits because the country needed the revenues. We needed to make investments.

Again, the budgets the Republicans have put forward today confirm their true priorities. What are they? They really are pushing, working hard to make sure people who make millions can get tax breaks. It is a little hard to understand, with the shortages we have and needing to invest in more programs, that they are worried about those who make more than $1 million a year. I have had a good business career, and I want to make sure our country is strong, and I want to make sure my contribution is included among those

who should be paying.

What Republicans do not seem to care about in their budgeting is seniors, children, and middle-class Americans. At a time when our economy is
fighting against strong headwinds and too many Americans are out of work, the Republicans are offering the same old prescriptions: tax cuts for the rich and austerity for everyone else.

Now, I have seen this country of ours through adversity many times, and I have seen it come out stronger on the other side. But our recoveries have never been spurred by starving the middle class while giving tax breaks to the wealthy. Prosperity has never trickled down from the wealthy few. Prosperity has always grown up from a broad middle class. We can't build a building starting with a chimney, and we can't build a society's strength by starting from the top. It has to have a foundation at the bottom that is strong and has the ability to support the needs of our total society.

But a strong middle class depends on a first-rate educational system--and forgive the personal annotation here for a moment more. When I got out of the Army--I was a high school graduate. I enlisted when I was 18, and I was lucky. I was able to get an education paid for by the government. I was one of 8 million soldiers--service people--who got our education paid for virtually because of the fact that we had served in the military. As a result, half of those who were in uniform--8 million out of 16 million--got a college education.

I can tell my colleagues that it enabled me, working with two colleagues, to start a company that the three of us founded, a company that took years and years to build. Slowly and energetically it began to develop. Today that company produces the labor statistics every month for the worldwide knowledge of what is happening with working people, what their wages are, what employment is like. The name of the company is ADP. We have 50,000 employees now. We were three poor boys with nothing going for us except the willingness to work hard, and that is the value. What did we get? It was determined that was the greatest generation. Why? Because an education was given to so many who could learn but didn't have the ability to get to college.

What we need is a society with affordable and accessible health care and a tax system where everyone pays their fair share.

The Republican budgets include vicious cuts to the middle class. Just look at what they do to education. They slash funding for education by $19 billion. They want to do that now when we desperately need the skills and the knowledge that education brings and the opportunity for invention and creation. They want to take away $19 billion. That is not going to help us get out of the hole we are in.

The Ryan budget coming from the House of Representatives would cut education, as I pointed out, by $19 billion. They don't want us to see the specific programs they cut, but let's look at the devastating consequences if their cuts were distributed evenly.

I don't know whether Head Start is a familiar operation in our country, but it is one of the most valuable. I believe there are about a million children who participate in the program. Look at the face of this child, looking through a narrow prism. There are 200,000 of these children who will be told: Stay home. There is no room for you. We can't afford to pay for you.

I recently went to a Head Start school in New Jersey and I met the children. I am such a professional grandfather that all little kids look beautiful to me. I met the children. What they were learning was that learning is fun. Words mean something. Pictures mean something. They were prepared, when they got to kindergarten or first grade, to say that learning is good.

I met a child there. The children lined up to greet me. This is a school that is bilingual.

I said: What is your name?

The little boy standing in front of me said: My name is Julio.

So I put my hand out to shake his hand, and he pushed it aside and instead he wrapped his arms around my legs and gave me a hug. All the little kids who followed thought he was the leader, so they all gave me hugs. It was one of the best days I have had, to see what happens when we treat these little kids to an opportunity to learn. Imagine slashing funding for a program that will help children learn how to learn.

These cuts are shortsighted. They are cruel. Ten million college students could see their Pell grants cut by more than $1,000 in 2014--very painful.

With less support and rising costs for higher education, young people would be forced to take on more debt in order to attend college because we see college tuition is going up rapidly across the country.

The Republican budgets address student debt too. They would let the interest rate on the new student loans double, increase by twice. It is an outrage. Why are Republicans putting obstacles in front of young people seeking an education? I never would have been able to attend, as I said, Columbia University without that government help for me and the services that ADP provides. It enabled me to cofound one of America's most successful companies. The investment this country made when we came home from World War II helped to create the momentum and direction of this country with decades of prosperity.

But instead of offering a helping hand to this generation of students, the Republican proposals close the door in their faces. Government investments in science, technology, and medical research are cut by more than $100 billion over the next 10 years. Medical research funding alone could take a hit of nearly $6 billion by 2014.

What does that do? It delays research on new treatments for diseases such as cancer, childhood asthma, and juvenile diabetes. Imagine telling a parent of a sick child that we could not help find the money to help him get back with his friends out in the play yard or the schoolroom or going to school on a regular basis. Is that where America wants to be? Right now we are finding across the country that there is a greater likelihood that autism will enter into a family's difficulties with a child being born with autism. How can we say no when we see, in my State alone, that 1 in 29 male babies has autism? That is a plague. That is a terrible statistic.

Then we want to talk about cutting back on health research? In their budgets, instead of helping seniors retire with dignity, Republicans have proposed to end Medicare as we know it, giving seniors a voucher instead of guaranteed care. If that voucher cannot cover the cost of needed medical services, Republicans say: Hey, too bad; you are on your own. We have heard comments from them saying: Well, so what if you are poor. It does not matter.

I look at this chart that says: ``Ends Medicare As We Know It To Provide Tax Cuts For The Wealthy.'' They want to say that to people who need the care, who are fortunate enough now under present conditions to be able to have long-term care with a disease that is terminal.

The Republican plan would also cut Medicaid. Medicaid is a program for those less able to provide for themselves because of low income or no income. The Republican plans also want to cut that by more than $800 billion over 10 years. Medicaid provides vital resources such as pregnancy services for expectant mothers and nursing home care for seniors.

We created Medicare and Medicaid because it was decided in this country as a society that we have to be there for seniors and the poor when they get sick. But now the Republicans are proposing to break that promise. They seem to do it without shame.

Republicans are not even exempting the hungry from their cuts. They would eliminate food stamps for up to 10 million Americans over the next decade.

In their obsession with austerity, they cut through far more than the fat in the budget. They cut into the bone.

Many on the other side--and I do not say all; a lot of people on the other side are good people concerned about their constituents, concerned about what happens--but many on that side say balancing the budget is the mission, the only mission. And in order to do it, they want to make sure that includes a high priority for tax breaks for the millionaires.

We could reduce our deficit if we required the wealthiest among us to pay at least the same tax rate as middle-class Americans on all of their income. But, instead, a Republican budget would give millionaires an average tax cut of almost $400,000 a year. Their plan shreds the safety net for seniors and the poor while padding the mattress for the rich.

I ask my colleagues, please get your priorities straight. America needs your help across the board. Your families, your neighbors, your State, all need your help. Millionaires do not need more tax cuts, and they certainly should not get them at the expense of seniors, children, and the middle class.

With that, I yield the floor.

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