Orrin Hatch: “we knew this was a foregone conclusion. I just have to say that today the liberal politicians have won again, and the…”

“we knew this was a foregone conclusion. I just have to say that today the liberal politicians have won again, and the American people have lost. We knew that was going to happen. We had no illusions about it. But it is simply amazing to me that, yesterday, some on the other side spent time attacking Senator Dole, who sincerely has brought this amendment to the floor on a number of occasions. The only time it has ever been brought to the floor with a real chance of passing is when Republicans were in the majority of the U.S. Senate. But what happened here is that some have tried to use this critical, historical debate, which will affect the future of our very children and grandchildren, for political ends and personal gain. I feel badly about that. Some have used the phony excuse of protecting Social Security. Those protectors have now left Social Security and all of our security open to the mercy of the big spenders. Look at the current problems we face with Medicare. We said, a few years back, that we had to do something to fix it. Really, there has been little or no effort by this administration to do it. We told them Medicare was going broke. They laughed. Now their people have confirmed that we were right and they were wrong. So when is the charade going to stop? When are the American people going to realize that the balanced budget amendment was defeated today because there are taxers and spenders here who do not want to be fiscally responsible?”