Kent Conrad: “I salute the Secretary for saying, Hey, we have to take money out of the baseline plan.”

I do, and I made that argument to the commission, and others on the commission made some of the points that you are making now.

We admire that, and I can say on both sides of the aisle, people recognize the job he did as Budget Committee Chairman.

All the talk in the world doesn't matter if you don't actually get something done in the real world.

We also increase the payroll tax very modestly, from the current combined rate of 12.4 percent to 13.4 percent over 10 years.