Chuck Grassley: “I refer to an article on page 6 of the Washington Post this morning where there is a quote from colleagues in this body…”

“I refer to an article on page 6 of the Washington Post this morning where there is a quote from colleagues in this body and in the other body about the President's budget. I refer to this comment from the ranking Democrat on the House Budget Committee, Congressman Spratt: When it comes to waging a war on terrorism, the President has our total support, but national security and homeland security need not come at the expense of Social Security. Philosophically, that is a good argument. It is an accurate argument for us to be using, but the inference is that with the President's new budget there is some sort of a new game in town, that because we do not have a general fund surplus, because we have to spend more money because of the war on terrorism, as well as the domestic aspect of the war on terrorism, we are going to take Social Security money to finance that because there is otherwise a debt. The implication is this is some new policy. The point I make is that this kind of talk is misleading because seniors become frightened that they might not receive their Social Security payments.”