Kent Conrad: “this is the most amusing chart that has been presented in the Senate this year. The biggest block of the Senator's chart…”

“this is the most amusing chart that has been presented in the Senate this year. The biggest block of the Senator's chart is about alternative minimum tax relief. He is talking about the Gregg amendment. Read the Gregg amendment. There is no mention of alternative minimum tax relief. That chart--I am glad he is taking it down because it is a complete concoction. It has no relevance to anything that is being suggested here. The Senator says the biggest tax increase in history--not true. There is no tax increase in the proposal before us. Here are the facts. The President, when he produced his budget, said, through his agency of Office of Management and Budget, an agency he completely controls, that his budget would produce $14.826 trillion of revenue over the next 5 years. That is what the President said his budget would do. What does the budget I have presented do, according to the Congressional Budget Office? It produces $14.827 trillion of revenue. That is $1 billion of difference on an almost $15 trillion base. And they are talking about the biggest tax increase ever? Come on. It is a great speech. It is the same speech the Republicans have delivered for 20 years. They are so used to it, they keep giving it. It doesn't matter what the facts are or what the budget is before us. There is no big tax increase that is in this budget. In fact, there is no tax increase that is contained in this budget.”