Jerry Nadler: “this resolution is a joke. I have been a Member of Congress for almost 10 years, and I cannot remember any resolution…”

“this resolution is a joke. I have been a Member of Congress for almost 10 years, and I cannot remember any resolution that simply supports current law. To not repeal or roll back tax cuts, we do not need this resolution. Nothing is coming to the floor. Nothing is threatened. We do not have to do anything. The fact of the matter is that it was the Clinton budget's deficit reduction package, which the Republicans called the greatest tax increase in history in 1993, which they predicted, and I remember the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Armey) on the floor saying this will lead to a depression, this will lead to hair-curling depression, instead led to the greatest economic boom in the history of this country, led to the lowest unemployment, lowest inflation, greatest job growth. It led to reversing the $5 trillion in debt that we incurred during the Reagan, Bush Senior, years. Instead, we got what we predicted a year ago after 8 years of the Clinton economics was going to be $5.5 trillion of surplus, and 1 year with this tax cut and with the economic recession partially brought about by this tax cut, we now have $4 trillion of that wiped out. Now they say we should not have a tax increase in a recession. Of course we should not. No one is proposing that unless they think the recession is going to last another 4 or 5 years, but the real point here is that with a $4 trillion in surplus wiped out, this country is going to face choices a couple of years down the road.”