Kay Bailey Hutchison: “I have heard the most amazing rhetoric on the other side. I am told by my colleague from Minnesota we have cut all the…”

“I have heard the most amazing rhetoric on the other side. I am told by my colleague from Minnesota we have cut all the increases the Senate put in this bill. What is wrong is the facts. We haven't cut the increases. In fact, we haven't cut them out at all. We have increased in the areas where we have prioritized. Education: $2 billion more than in last year's budget. What does a 1-percent cut across-the-board mean? It means $1.8 billion more than we spent last year. NIH: We are committed to giving NIH double the funding for medical research in this country. We are keeping our promise. We are increasing NIH $1.8 billion over last year. Head Start: We increased it $600 million. A 1-percent cut means we are increasing it $594 million. We are keeping a promise. We have said the most important thing we are going to do in this Congress is keep our Social Security surplus intact. We are doing it by making sure we do not go into that surplus. We are making a 1-percent across-the-board cut in increases because we have given so much more than we did last year.”