Ron Kind: “I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this legislation, and perhaps for…”

“I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this legislation, and perhaps for no better reason than it is a $270 billion cost that the Congressional Budget Office showed with no pay-fors, no offsets in the Federal budget. If my Republican colleagues want to move forward on this policy proposal, at least they should show courage to the American people and tell them how they are going to pay for this $270 billion bill or to admit that it is just going to be added to the annual structural budget deficits, a completely fiscally irresponsible approach to trying to reform our Tax Code. Lord knows we need to get to work on that. But there is a larger point--and to speak to the last speaker's point that he just made on the floor--what is somewhat problematic and troublesome for me, it seems many of our Republican colleagues seem very comfortable with the idea of income inequality in this Nation, which is only growing worse. But here is the main point: this income inequality in our society, absent opportunity, absent hope, absent mobility, is just a caste system. It is just a caste system where birth determines outcome. That is why one of the richest people in the world, Warren Buffett, who opposes repealing the estate tax, says that our fate in life should not depend on whether we win the birth lottery or not.…”