Dianne Feinstein: “I echo the comments of Senator Byrd, the ranking member of the Appropriations Committee. While I do not have the…”

“I echo the comments of Senator Byrd, the ranking member of the Appropriations Committee. While I do not have the perspective of his years of service in the Senate and on the Appropriations Committee, I share his concern about the breakdown we are seeing in this year's appropriations process. There are only 2 days left before the Senate leaves for an extended August recess. Yet the Appropriations Committee has reported out only 4 of the 13 appropriations bills we must pass this year. The Senate has passed only one Appropriations bill--the Defense Appropriations bill. This is a dereliction of our primary duty in the Senate, funding the functions of Government. The blame for this situation does not go, in my view, to the Appropriations Committee. In the limited work the committee has done this year, it has operated in an efficient, bipartisan manner. But we all know that the committee has been hampered by the failure to enact a budget resolution. A budget is a clear articulation of priorities. We are having these problems because of a failure to prioritize, or because of skewed priorities. As we all know, the Congressional Budget Office is projecting a $477 billion deficit in fiscal year 2004. But some in the Congress continue to believe that more tax cuts should be the priority in this Congress. And they refuse to subject these tax cuts to the discipline of pay-as-you-go rules, which would require offsetting revenue increases, or spending cuts.”