Bill Clinton: “Well, let me say I'm still not sure how it's all going to come out. And let me try to answer this very carefully.…”

“Well, let me say I'm still not sure how it's all going to come out. And let me try to answer this very carefully. Secretary Bentsen did not so much announce as to grudgingly acknowledge--[laughter]--the state of play in the Senate. And it's quite interesting, because he's from an energy State, and he came to this Btu tax after going through a lot of other issues. Let me tell you what the state of play in the Senate is, first of all. You've got essentially a Senate Finance Committee where no Republicans will vote for this bill because they are not going to be for any taxes. And the Boren substitute is a massive shift of the burden to elderly people and the working people just above the poverty line. And if it got on the floor of the Senate, I bet it wouldn't get 20 votes. So there is no other viable alternative out there. But with an 11-to-9 majority, the Democrats cannot lose any votes on the Senate Finance Committee and get any bill out. Now, Secretary Bentsen had what I thought was a great suggestion for modifying the Btu tax which would essentially have drastically alleviated, all but eliminated, the burden on production, whether industrial or agricultural, but would have otherwise left the tax in shape, so that it applied to all forms of energy and, therefore, was less burdensome to any region of the country but got out of the whole business of whether we were being uncompetitive with people from--when we exported our products or whether imports would acquire a competitive advantage, and whether we were putting too much of a burden on energy-intensive forms of industry which had led the House to make too many exceptions to it. So if you just essentially had a blanket alleviation of the production sector, which is what Secretary Bentsen was talking with them about, it looked to us like that was the best thing. There had been so much said about the wording of the Btu tax--and, I must say, some legitimate concern about the whole administrative difficulty of starting a new one--the Senate seems disinclined to go forward. That does not mean that the House will give up on a modified Btu tax. I don't know what's going to happen from here on in. And we have not agreed to anything or disagreed with anything. We have been in consultation with the Senate and would go to any meeting they asked us to. But they're going to have to come up with their own program. And they know what the principles I have outlined are. And I just gave them to you. So I don't know what's going to happen now. Senator Breaux has some ideas that he wants to float, and some others have some ideas. I think you'll have plenty of time to react to them. A lot of them want to rely more on a broad-based transportation tax, but that also has some economic difficulties even if you raise less money. The number one thing: 100 percent of us agreed and the House Members agreed that we would lower the dollar volume of the energy tax, the total money raised, and make it up in various kinds of cuts. And I think that's where everybody is now. Everybody is there. And let me just run a few other things out here. There is also a discussion about whether or not there should be a delay in the effective date of the taxes, the income taxes. That's being discussed, the economic grounds for that. And there are all kinds of discussions about that. I want to red-flag one issue for all of you who provide comprehensive health policies for your employees, though, again, because sometimes things are not what they seem. We cut about $60 billion in Medicare expenditures over and above the red line I showed you. That is, that was a big part of our deficit reduction. There are those who say, ``Well, we ought to cut a lot more, and we can freeze provider fees and we can do all this kind of stuff with Medicare.'' I would urge all of you as employers to look at that very closely because, again, it's a sleight of hand. You know, yes, we can cut the fool out of Medicare. But if we don't have some sort of comprehensive resolution to the health care crisis, what will happen? The same thing that's been happening the last 12 years: All those people will send you the bill. There will be massive cost-shifting with certain kinds of Medicare cuts unless it is part of an overall health care strategy, which just means a hidden tax on employers and their employees, which is the very thing I'm trying to get away from, anything hidden. And it contradicts one of the essential goals of our long-term strategy, which is to bring health costs in line with inflation and fairly apportion the burden throughout society, which it's not now. Most of you are paying too much and your employees are because of the way the thing is. So I'm not trying to avoid your question, I'm just trying to tell you I do not know what the Senate will do. My position has been to try to tell them what my principles are; make Secretary Bentsen and Mr. Panetta available to them to discuss everything; ask them to be faithful to the House by involving the House Members in the discussions, because a lot of House Members passed this budget on the understanding there would be some less tax and some more spending cuts and that they would be a part of it. And I don't know what's going to come out of there yet. Deficit Reduction”