Russ Feingold: “This is the pay-as-you-go amendment. We extend the pay-as-you-go system that has been in place since 1990 as adjusted…”

“This is the pay-as-you-go amendment. We extend the pay-as-you-go system that has been in place since 1990 as adjusted for the reconciled levels just adopted in the Breaux amendment. This amendment says tax cuts or entitlement spending increases, if they are beyond the $350 billion for which the Senate just voted, do have to be deficit neutral. This is a system that has worked well since 1990. It has helped keep deficits in check. It was suspended in times of surplus, and we got ourselves into the current deficit jam. The budget resolution before the Senate, however, creates a giant exception to pay-as-you-go for everything the budget assumes. Basically, it says pay-as-you-go, but for the first $900 billion they are free, they are on the house. They are not free. We should not take money from Social Security revenues. We should not just bill our children's generation, robbing them of their choices. We need to return to the ethic that we will pay for what we get. I urge my colleagues to support the amendment.”