Orrin Hatch: “I give warning that I am prepared to close down the Senate if the Senate is prepared to be closed down. Let me just say…”

“I give warning that I am prepared to close down the Senate if the Senate is prepared to be closed down. Let me just say a few words about my friend's amendment. My friend, Senator Reid, and others seek to remove Social Security from the protections of the balanced budget amendment. I look forward to a lengthy debate tomorrow on this subject and this issue. But while I respect these critics, and I certainly do, the truth of the matter is that the Reid amendment is merely a diversion from what should be the real focus of this debate: whether the Constitution should be amended to require a balanced budget amendment except in exigent circumstances. When I say that, I again look at these 28 years of unbalanced budgets. This is the real issue. Everybody knows that if the Reid amendment passes, this is going to only get worse. The fact of the matter is, if we are going to do anything about this, we have to pass the underlying balanced budget amendment without the Reid amendment on it. Exempting Social Security from the balanced budget amendment will create an overwhelming incentive to do just what these critics fear.”