John Spratt: “The gentleman mentioned what they told us about repayment of the debt. If the gentleman recalls, they said if you pass…”

“The gentleman mentioned what they told us about repayment of the debt. If the gentleman recalls, they said if you pass our budget, including these tax cuts, $1.5 trillion, $1.6 trillion in tax cuts, with interest even more, we will not be back until 2008, if you implement our budget, to ask you for an increase in the debt ceiling. We will not need to come back because we will have ample room beneath that ceiling. In the Clinton administration the last 3 years we paid off over $300 billion of national debt. That is the first time that has happened for a long time. So they said that trend is going to extend and we will not need to come back and ask for an increase in the debt ceiling in 2008. History shows in 2002 they were back, hat in hand, saying we need $450 billion. The next year, 2003, they needed 984. As the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Cooper) pointed out, that was equal to the entire debt of the United States in 1980. And then only 16 months later, they were back asking for another $800 billion which was provided in November of last year; and as a consequence, the total increase in the debt ceiling of the United States to accommodate the Bush budget from 2001 through 2005 is $2 trillion 234 billion. That is simple arithmetic, back-of-the-envelope analysis, but it is truly astounding to me, given the fact that they told us we would not need to raise the debt ceiling until 2008.”