Dan Coats: “I want to express, however, the reason I am voting against this budget agreement. When the budget resolution came before…”

“I want to express, however, the reason I am voting against this budget agreement. When the budget resolution came before the floor of the Senate initially, I voted against it because it did not contain the entitlement reforms--the structural reforms that I felt were absolutely necessary if we are ever going to have a sustained, consistent effort at balancing our budget. Clearly, we all know that the entitlements-- the mandatory spending--have not been structurally reformed for a long, long time, and we are on a collision course with their ability to meet the demands on those funds in the future. Some changes were made in this bill. I want to talk about those in a minute. But they were not the structural reforms. Then when the budget reconciliation bill came before the Senate, I supported the budget reconciliation bill because the Senate had the courage to stand up to the plate and address the need for entitlement reforms. I doubt that there is a Member of this Congress, House or Senate, or anyone else who has paid attention to this issue, that doesn't recognize that this is something that we have to do. We are on a collision course with bankruptcy for Medicare.”