Don Nickles: “I wish to compliment my colleagues, Senator Hutchison, Senator Gramm, and Senator Domenici, for their statements in…”

“I wish to compliment my colleagues, Senator Hutchison, Senator Gramm, and Senator Domenici, for their statements in support of this alternative. I think this is a positive alternative. It is important to note for the Record, though, that neither one of these budgets cuts spending. Neither one of the budget alternatives we have before us cuts spending. I think we get so tied up in rhetoric and the use of current services baselines and projected CBO numbers that we forget the real facts and figures. The real facts are, under the Democrats' budget, spending is going to rise from $1.5 trillion to $1.8 trillion over the next 5 years. In the Republican alternative, we slow that growth down significantly; but spending still grows from $1.5 trillion to $1.7 trillion. So spending goes up under our plan too, just not as fast. I heard my colleague from Tennessee talking about the Republican substitute, that it gutted all of these social programs, and how catastrophic it would be to health programs. I looked at our health numbers, and this includes Medicaid. In 1995, we are going to spend $118 billion on health programs. Under the Republican substitute, which supposedly guts Medicaid, health spending grows to $150 billion--from $118 billion, in 5 years. I heard my colleague from Tennessee say Republicans are gutting Medicare, and we are going to close hospitals. Under our plan, Medicare grows from $154 billion in 1995 to $210 billion in 1999.”