Bill Clinton: “Let me make it clear. What I said was that, obviously, we would be working together on all the appropriations issues and…”

“Let me make it clear. What I said was that, obviously, we would be working together on all the appropriations issues and expenditure of money if we did first things first. But I think that it's quite important that the Republicans say how they're going to pay for all these things. You know, they say they want even larger increases for defense than I do, and I've proposed substantial increases. Then they want huge increases in tax cuts. Do they propose to keep us in debt? Do they propose to basically eviscerate the education and health and environment budgets of the country? What is their proposal? Of course, we will negotiate, but we ought to think about first things first. Let me just say this: I think we proved in '93, when we didn't have a single Republican vote and the Vice President had to break the tie in the Senate, that we were right and they were not right about what would be the best economics for their constituents. That is, when we passed that '93 economic plan, there is no question that it sparked a huge drop in interest rates, a huge increase in investment, and an explosion in economic activity. And it had a lot more positive impact on the markets and on business investment and on job creation than a tax cut, which perpetuated a deficit, would have had. Now, in 1997, we reached agreement on a bipartisan balanced budget deal which kept that philosophy going. We continued to invest in education and technology and research. We provided tax cuts to families and for college education. We did it in a balanced way, and what's happened? Now we've got this surplus. I will say this: The most important thing we can do for the long- term health of the economy is to say to the whole world, we're going to make America debt-free in 15 years. If we did that, what does that mean? Much lower interest rates, higher business investment, lower credit card, lower consumer, low homeownership rates, higher wages. So will we negotiate? Will there be a negotiation? Of course there will be. But let's do the first things first. Let's keep America economically strong. We've got 6\1/2\ years of evidence now about what works. Why in the world would we take a U-turn and run this deficit back up or just pull out of the education business? Mr. Insana. Let me ask the question more simply than the way maybe an individual might, which is, if I overpay my taxes every year, I get a refund; if I overpay for 15 years, why can't I get a really big refund and get that money back in the way of a tax cut?”