Saxby Chambliss: “Looking at what debt reduction has meant to this country and can mean to this country in very simple terms is this, you…”

“Looking at what debt reduction has meant to this country and can mean to this country in very simple terms is this, you know, here we are in the midst of a political campaign, and we just heard a lot of demagogue and rhetoric from the folks on the other side about a prescription drug plan. We are going to pay this year in interest payments alone in excess of some $230 billion to $235 billion in American tax dollars just for that interest payment. What in the world could we do with $240 billion? We could be fighting over just how that money ought to be spent if we were not paying that interest payment. What has balancing the budget done for the dynamics in this House that we are looking at today? What it has done is we are now arguing over a prescription drug benefit program and what is the best way to approach that program and what is in the best interests of our seniors. Do we think for 1 minute that if the budget submitted by the Clinton-Gore administration in 1995 that calls for a $194 billion deficit this year had come to pass that we would be here today arguing over how to go further and further into debt? No, we simply would not be.”