On the recordDecember 2, 2010
I support the comments from my colleague from Iowa on the importance of ethanol and the tax incentives and the ability to try to make us less dependent on foreign oil and produce more renewable energy in our country. So I appreciate the statement he has just made. I want to talk about the START treaty and the importance of it. But I cannot help but respond, at least a bit, to some of the discussion that occurred as I walked on the Senate floor about the so-called tax cuts or the extension of the tax cuts. You know, what is going to confound a lot of people who look back on history, perhaps historians who, in a rearview mirror, look back 100 or 50 years--what is going to confound them about this time, this place, and these people, all of us, is what we did that seemed so irrational because, particularly economic models, if you are talking about economic historians, economic models are based on rational expectations. Then they create a model based on what would you do rationally. Now here is what they are going to see at this moment. They will see a country that is at war halfway around the world. They will see a country with a $13 trillion national debt and a $1.3 trillion annual deficit. And what is the debate? Tax cuts that existed in 2001, through legislation I voted against, tax cuts that were extended and were set to expire this year would cost $4 trillion in the coming 10 years to extend.
