Political Quotes

“I join in cosponsoring the Hollings motion to recommit the bill to the Finance Committee with instructions to defer tax reductions in order to reduce the national debt. I cosponsored the Hollings motion in lieu of calling up the Lieberman-Levin amendment because the effect of the Hollings motion, had it been adopted, would have been largely the same as the Lieberman-Levin amendment. The tax program before the Senate is unfair to middle income Americans, it is economically unwise and it's based on unrealistic assumptions. The unfairness is perhaps best shown by the fact that about two-thirds of its tax benefits go to the upper one-fifth of our people. In addition to being unfair, it is economically unwise in that jeopardizes Medicare, fails to strengthen Social Security, and risks higher interest rates. This bill takes us back to the bad old days of backloaded tax breaks whose real costs explode several years after enactment. This budgetary time bomb is set to go off at roughly the same time as the Medicare trust fund is expected to be bankrupt and the bill begins to come due for Social Security. In that decade, as the 'baby boomers' begin to retire, the Social Security Trust fund will begin to run a deficit, requiring the redemption of Treasury bonds which it holds. It is also based on unrealistic projections. Projections are always risky.”