I want to welcome everyone to the Senate Budget Committee today.

We cannot simply tax our way out of this problem.

I just want to make a correction.

Revenue as a share of our national income is the lowest it has been in 60 years.

I believe history will condemn us all if we do not do substantially more for the decade than is in this budget.

Mr. Buffett is often up here talking about tax reform and he has admitted that his taxes are too low.

We have seen some progress made--in fact, important progress made.

If you have a flat tax that generates the same amount of revenue, it is a mathematical certainty that people at the top pay less and people at the bottom are going to pay more.

But it is happening. I mean, I have had people come to me who are in very large multinational accounting firms who have had clients who were doing precisely this.

I begged Chairman Greenspan not to take that position because it is, yes, it is psychological, but it matters around here.

Make no mistake. We are at a critical juncture.

we do not just have a spending problem, although we do have a spending problem, we also have a revenue problem.

We are on an unsustainable course, and we have an obligation, we have a very serious and somber obligation to come up with a plan and to do it sooner rather than later.

It is horizontal inequality.

Our country is in serious trouble.

Let's get real. Yes, we have to do spending and yes, we have to do revenue.

I think that demonstrates that we can reach across the aisle to do things that are critically important for the country.

What we need, I believe, is an entire package with everything on the table that deals with fundamental reform of our tax system.