Kay Bailey Hutchison: “I rise to speak in favor of the plan that is before us, the Cut, Cap, and Balance Act. I also think there are some very…”

“I rise to speak in favor of the plan that is before us, the Cut, Cap, and Balance Act. I also think there are some very important achievements in the Group of 6 proposal. It is a proposal. It is not legislative language. It has many things in it that are very good. It has tax cuts, it has entitlement reform, it has spending cuts. It is a complicated outline and one that needs to be fleshed out to know exactly what is in it, and it has some areas with which I disagree. I certainly want to assure that we keep the 15- percent capital gains and dividends rate. But we also have another proposal that I think has great merit. I think the bill that has come over from the House, the Cut, Cap, and Balance Act, puts even more together on the issues that we are all trying to address. What we need are spending cuts that are real, not proposed down the road or promised. That is what the Cut, Cap, and Balance Act will do. We all know we have a $14.3 trillion debt ceiling that is getting ready to be hit sometime in the month of August. What we need to do--in this Senate, in the Congress, and, certainly, hopefully, the President--is give confidence to the markets. That means we do two things: We raise the debt ceiling. We don't default or even scare people that we are going to default, with reforms that will assure that we will not ever have to do it again.…”