Newt Gingrich: “I thank my friend. Let me just close by building on what he just said. We came in with a contract with America in 1994.…”

“I thank my friend. Let me just close by building on what he just said. We came in with a contract with America in 1994. In 1995 and 1996 we passed balanced budget agreements which the President vetoed, we fought to balance the budget. We did get the President to sign welfare reform. In 1997 we became the first reelected Republican Congress since 1928. At that time we insisted on saving Medicare, on balancing the budget and on cutting taxes. Those are the three great achievements of 1997. This year we began with reforms such as the Internal Revenue Service reform bill, which was a very important step in the right direction that we passed in June, that was signed into law. We began to work on ideas like dollars to the classroom to eliminate Federal bureaucracy and get the money back home to local schools and local teachers. Now we have a sound, solid, bipartisan budget agreement which frankly both sides agree to, which is good for America and which has a wide range of things. Next year if we come back in the majority, we will save Social Security with a major bill using a large part of the surplus to save Social Security without cutting benefits or raising taxes, we will pass a very major tax cut, including, I hope, abolishing the death tax so that people no longer are punished if they work and save all their lives.”