William M. ``Mac'' Thornberry: “Mr. Chairman, anytime we have to try to put together a Federal budget, we have a number of priorities and demands, and…”

“Mr. Chairman, anytime we have to try to put together a Federal budget, we have a number of priorities and demands, and we have to try to find the appropriate balance among those different demands and priorities. I think that the budget which the Committee on the Budget has recommended is a far superior budget to the substitute now being offered. It starts out by making sure that we set aside 100 percent of the money we take from people in social security taxes and not let that money be spent for any other government program. It then goes on to strengthen Medicare and trying to set aside $40 billion so that we can modernize and improve Medicare to include a prescription drug benefit. I think all of us recognize that a system born in the 1960s needs to try to keep up with the changes of health care and this will allow us to do that. It goes further to retire a billion dollars of debt over the next 5 years, and it will strengthen and increase support for education and science, including vital medical research. It then has two other important priorities, I think, that are missing from the substitute now before us. The budget recommended by the Committee on the Budget has important provisions to have tax relief for American taxpayers. And I think it is very easy for those of us in Washington to forget whose money it is that we are talking about.”