The presiding officer the senator from ohio. Mr. Portman mr. President , i rise to talk about an opportunity, something good that this body could do for the American People, for the economy and for the taxpayers. Tomorrow, the Senate Budget conference that was established as part of this recent agreement that was made over reopening the government and extending the debt limit will meet. This will be the first Public Meeting of the group. We have had some other meetings, including one i just had with some of the members of that group, but this is the first opportunity for us to meet as house members, senate members, republicans and democrats in this budget conference. And it couldnt come soon enough. The opportunity we have with this group is that in the wake of what happened at the beginning of this month, which was again a Government Shutdown and then a debt limit debate and then pushing right up against the debt limit, the opportunity we have now is to finally deal with this issue of Government Shutdowns and to deal with the underlying problem of what were spending that forces us to extend the debt limit time and time again. So lets start with the Government Shutdowns. The agreement that was agreed to opened government for three months. Thats right. In january, we once again come to this cliff where the government shuts down unless we act. So Merry Christmas and happy new year, everybody. In january, we hit this again. It doesnt have to be that way. Earlier this year, i introduced with senator tester from montana Bipartisan Legislation that would have prevented the last shutdown and would prevent all shutdowns in the future. Its called, appropriately, the end Government Shutdowns act, and its really pretty simple, and it addresses several Critical Issues that we saw firsthand during this last shutdown. It would end the chaos that we saw on federal services and citizens who depend on them. It would give Government Agencies the predictability they need to plan their budgets based on these appropriations levels. It would add certainty to the economy and more certainty in the economy is certainly needed right now to try to bring back the jobs. It would also take away the pressure for these haphazard, lastminute budget deals, which inevitably have stuck in them little provisions that nobody finds out about because they are all done at the last minute to avoid a Government Shutdown. So heres how this would work. When we dont have speck bills agreed to by the time the fiscal year comes to an end and that would be october 1 then the Spending Continues just as it was the Previous Year, so the same level of spending. Except that automatically it would begin to reduce spending after 120 days and 60 days. So congress would have 120 days to come together and figure out a budget. Thats the carrot. The stick is that after 120 days, the spending would be ratcheted down 1 and then again every 60 days another 1 . So i think its become painfully obvious that Congress Needs encouragement to get its work done, and this certainly would be encouragement. By the same token, you wouldnt have these Government Shutdowns. The gradual decline in spending, by the way, would treat all spending equally, so all Discretionary Spending would be treated the same way. No exceptions for liberal Spending Priorities or conservative Spending Priorities. It would be the same for everybody. Both sides in congress would feel the pain, and both sides might be more willing to actually get the work done. Now, is this the ideal solution to end Government Shutdowns . No, its not. The ideal solution is Congress Actually does its work, which is our constitutional duty, the power of the purse, and that is to sit down and have these Appropriations Bills passed which require the oversight of the agencies and departments which are badly in need of it. It then requires prioritizing spending in 12 different areas. Thats how it should work. This legislation to end Government Shutdowns would actually encourage that would work, again because it would establish this situation where need of doing a lastminute deal where you can kind of throw in these provisions that Appropriations Committee members might want, youve actually got to go through the process. Otherwise, it just continues the spending from the Previous Year and ratchets it down over time. Sadly, congress has shown its pretty much incapable of doing Appropriations Bills without some sort of pressure. The United States congress has not completed all regular Appropriations Bills by the october 1 deadline since 1997. Here in the senate, actually, over the past four years, during the current administration, the Obama Administration and under democrat control here the last four years, we have passed all of one appropriation bill on time. Thats one out of 48 that was done on time. It was a milcon bill about 2011, as i call. Wrong is better with a deadline. Again, you see this with the debt limit and with what we just went through these last few weeks. We can do better. This legislation would keep the impetus for congress to act without including the threat of another costly and destructive shutdown. I think its a good idea. Its one that is already bipartisan, should be adopted by both sides. We had a vote on it earlier this year, it got nearly half of this chamber. I hope others will take a look at it. I think, particularly with what we have just gone through, its something that our constituents would think would make a lot of sense. I hope it gets the support that it deserves in this body. Of course, in addition to dealing with the Government Shutdown in this budget conference that we are meeting on this week, we also have a chance to address the debt limit, which is going to come up soon also because february 7 was the date that was chosen there. Now, some say well, the Treasury Department can use extraordinary measures to shift that beyond february 7. I suppose they could. But instead, why not deal with the underlying problem . Why we need to extend the debt limit, which is the overspending. Its like you have maxed out on the credit card. Its really a lot like that. You know, you can spend only at a certain level in congress and then you have to have authority, Statutory Authority to go beyond that limit. And when you max out on the credit card, you dont just go to the bank and say id like to extend it. You have to deal with the underlying problem, otherwise you cant keep your credit card and you cant keep your credit. So dealing with the debt limit is the other part that i think gives us an opportunity here, and over the past two weeks, i know that the administration has said repeatedly even though we wouldnt negotiate on a debt ceiling before, even though the president refused to talk to congress about it, which was unprecedented, by the way. No president in history has ever said that. But he said over the last couple of weeks, if you all extend the debt limit and if you reopen government, then ill talk. So now is the time to talk. And the president should talk. I have worked for two president s. President bush 41 and president bush 43. They did talk to congress about debt limits. Why . Because its a tough vote, because their constituents get it, because it is like maxing out on the credit card. They want to know were going to do something without extending it and not looking at the underlying problem. Its been four years since weve had a budget conference. Think about that. The debt has gone up 5. 9 trillion since we had the last budget conference around here. Almost 6 trillion later, were sitting down again. And things are only going to get worse if we dont do something to deal with the underlying problem. Twothirds of the budget thats on auto pilot, the mandatory spending, obviously is where not just the biggest part of the budget is but the Fastest Growing part of the budget. It includes vital programs to our seniors for those in poverty medicaid, medicare, Social Security. Vital but unsustainable. These programs cannot be sustained in their current form. By the way, thats not me saying it. That comes from data from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, the president himself has talked about this. By the way, the Congressional Budget Office says that Social Security and Health Care Entitlements alone are 100 of the longterm increase in deficits. Revenue is starting to pick up. The Discretionary Spending is now being capped. The issue is this part thats on auto pilot. By the way, 66 of spending now. Its 76 of spending in ten years. Health care entitlements alone are going to increase 100 over the next ten years, based on what the Congressional Budget Office has told us. Now, i have heard rumblings in the press that this upcoming budget conference is just going to kick the can further down the road. In other words, were not going to really deal with the issue. Lets just say lets extend the debt limit a little further and push the issue off. Well, i think its time for the can to kick back, and if the can kicks back, that means we will actually tackle some of these tough problems. After all, thats why the American People hired us. Thats why they sent us here. If were not going to do it now, i dont know when were going to do it. I think a divided government is an opportunity to do it. Its a time for leadership in the senate, the house and certainly from the president. Its time to come to the table. As i said earlier, the president has indicated he now is willing to do it, do so in good faith and try to put our country on a stable fiscal path. If we do nothing, by the way, if we allow these annual deficits to continue, they will more than quadruple. Annual deficits will more than quadruple to 3. 4 trillion within three decades. Thats based on the Congressional Budget Office. We have already got a debt thats about 140,000 per household in america. Were talking about annual deficits quadrupling. If we let mandatory spending reach that point where it becomes 100 of the deficit, which is what they project, if we allow our National Debt to reach two and a half times the entire size of our economy, its about the size of our economy now. Its going to go up to two and a half times the size of our economy, it will be the next generation that will pay and pay dearly and our legacy will be one of bankruptcy, ct skyrocketing interest rates, skyrocketing unemployment rates and the collapse of these vital programs we talked about earlier, medicaid, medicare and Social Security. And again, this is not ideology. This is math. Its fact. Its fact that has been reiterated by the Congressional Budget Office, the trustees of Social Security, the trustees of medicare, their trust funds time and time again. So this is our opportunity, mr. President , to do something about it. At least take the first steps, both in terms of ending Government Shutdowns as i have talked about but also this underlying problem that everybody acknowledges and that has to be dealt with if we arent going to have for future generations these issues of bankruptcy, hire interest rates, lower value of the dollar, higher unemployment. The single greatest act of bipartisanship in this congress over the past few decades has been overpromising and overspending. We created this mess together and we can only get out of it working together. Ive suggested where we can start, 600 billion in the president s own budget. In his own budget, he has 600 billionplus in savings on mandatory spending over the next decade. But whatever we do, i think we can all agree that were tired of the gridlock, were teared of the stalemates, were tired of getting nothing done. Its time to make some progress and this is an opportunity to do it. These past few weeks have been trying. They have been tough on the American People as they have looked at us and said wow, are these guys going to figure it out . And we just kicked the can down the road but we also set up this process and this structure. Lets take advantage of it. Lets use this opportunity to do something important for the future of our country and for the good of the people we represent. Lets seize it. Thank you, mr. President. I yield back my time. A senator mr. President . The presiding officer the senator from delaware. Mr. Carper mr. President , the former governor, i want to follow on the comments we just heard from senator portman, who as he said served in two administrations. In one of them as o. M. B. Director, the other as trade representative. Before that a distinguished career in the u. S. House of representatives, somebody i am fortunate to serve with on the finance committee. I have a lot of respect for his intellect and for his intellectual honesty. I just want to before i talk about the real reason i came to the floor, i just feel compelled to say something. As former governors, mr. President , i had made tough decisions on spending, i had to make tough decisions on revenues, and not always well received by people, not always well received by people in our own party. I like to say there are three or four things we need to do to get our deficit heading continue to make sure it continues to head in the right direction. I dont worship at the altar of a balanced budget every single year, but what i do believe is when the economy strengthens, is goes stronger, we ought to have the deficit heading down, and when were in a war or when were in an economic doll drum, then i think its appropriate to in some cases deficit spend. All right. Four things we need to do if were serious about deficit reduction. Number one, we need, in the president s words, entitlement reform that saves money, saves these programs for our children and our grandchildren, does not savage old people or poor people. Thats number one. Number two, we need tax reform, in my view, tax reform that brings down the top corporate rates to something more closely aligned with every other developed nation in the world, and at the same time that were doing that to generate some revenues for deficit reduction, to match what were doing on the spending side. If you think about it, as the senator from ohio knows, the senator from West Virginia knows, tax expenditures, tax breaks, tax credits, tax deductions, tax loopholes, tax gap adds up over the next ten years to anywhere from 10 trillion to 15 trillion. Were going to spend more money out of the treasury for tax expenditures than were going to spend in all our Appropriations Bills combined. If we could capture 5 of 12 trillion over ten years for deficit reduction, thats 600 billion. If we could match that in like a bowlessimpson number, we could do about another 2 billion on deficit reduction on top of what weve already done. Is that a grand compromise that i want and i think the senator from ohio wants and i know the senator from West Virginia wants, its not a grand compromise but i call it a baby grand. A baby grand and its certainly better than kicking that can down the road. The last time we kicked the can down the road the beginning of this year i remember saying on this floor we kicked a rather large can down the road not very far. Im tired of doing that. I dont want us to do that. We may have maybe our last best chance here in this budget conference to do the kind of things i just talked about. Democrats dont want to give on entitlements, im willing to do that but im only willing to do that if palestinians give on tax reform that generates some revenues. There the third thing is to look in every nook and cranny of the federal government, the senator from ohio is a member of the Homeland Security and Government Affairs committee, he knows that we focus, we have large, broad investigative powers, oversight powers, authority over the whole federal government and all kinds of ways to save money in this government of ours. Like way there are ways to save money in big businesses. Everything we do to look at that and say how do we get a better result for less money in everything we do. I dont know if my friends from ohio and West Virginia hear this from their constituents but i hear from delaware constituents and folks outside of my state, i dont mind paying taxes, i just dont want you to waste my money. I dont want to pay for taxes but if i do, i dont want you to waste my money. I dont want to waste their money, either or mine. The fourth thing about moving the economy and getting out of this rut were in right now is to be able to make sure we have some money around that we can invest in the things we know will strengthen our economy. Foremost is a strong work force, capable work force. Second thing is infrastructure broadly