Ron Kind: “I think my good friend and colleague from California is raising a very important point, and it is a point that all of us…”

“I think my good friend and colleague from California is raising a very important point, and it is a point that all of us here this evening on the Ways and Means Committee, with the leadership of Mr. Neal from Massachusetts, have been raising for some time. Doing tax reform right is tough. There are a lot of moving pieces to it, and there are a lot of traps and unintended consequences if you do it the wrong way. Not having one hearing, not having proper vetting, not taking the time to listen to people back home in our respective States and districts about the consequences of something that is going to affect every American life in this country is legislative malpractice, and that is what we are on the verge of committing leading up to tomorrow's vote. My friend from California mentioned the $2.3 trillion in additional debt over the next 10 years by the time you add in the interest payments and how devastating that will be, and it is happening at the wrong time. I mean, we might have gotten away with that with the 1981 tax cuts that weren't paid for back then because there was a little bit of time to recover from a big fiscal mistake, and from 2001, 2003. We have run out of time as a nation, with 70 million baby boomers beginning their massive retirement, 10,000 a day joining Social Security and Medicare.…”