Angie Craig: “the debate today on the floor on S. 557 is not a fraud; it is a real shakeup with reality that a lot of our Senators and…”

“the debate today on the floor on S. 557 is not a fraud; it is a real shakeup with reality that a lot of our Senators and some Members of this Congress don't want to face, because for years we have had the tremendous flexibility in this country of borrowing money from the Social Security trust fund and spending, and spending, and spending. I think the American public is suggesting to us that that time ought to come to an end. There is no question that, in 1994, it began to come to an end. Some Senators can't face the reality of the changes that occurred then. But the American economy did, and it responded robustly when Government curbed its appetite to progressively spend a greater amount of the gross domestic product of this country. And it is now with a balanced budget and a surplus, generated by Social Security payroll taxes, that we have an opportunity to turn to the American people and, for the first time in a long while, say to the American people that we can not only ensure your Social Security without a new tax increase, but we can modernize it for future generations so that it will be a reliable and an earning annuity of the kind that most people would like their retirement account to be. At the end of this fiscal year, the Social Security trust fund will hold an estimated $853 billion. This year alone, it is projected to run a $127 billion surplus.”