Unemployment Compensation

Floor Speech

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Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I was not on the floor after the vote last night, but I did get a chance to read some of the transcript of the back-and-forth between Senator Bunning and Senator Durbin and others. I understand that Senator Durbin retained the floor for the most part and yielded for questions, but basically the procedure denied Senator Bunning and Senator Corker, who I know also weighed in, an opportunity to explain precisely what was going on.

I have seen some news reports this morning that have suggested that because of the objection to more deficit spending in order to pay for this temporary extension of benefits--that this was an unreasonable thing to do, to actually insist that Congress pay for benefits it is providing.

I would like to put it in a little bit of context. I think if there are two things that are causing the lack of approval of the American people of Congress these days it boils down to two things. One is a lack of fiscal discipline, and the second is a complete lack of credibility whatsoever when it comes to fiscal matters.

Let me give one example. Pay-go, the so-called pay-as-you-go requirement that was passed about 2 weeks ago, in the jobs bill that was passed earlier this week, $15 billion, the Senate voted to waive those pay-as-you-go rules that it passed 2 weeks ago and the President signed into law with great fanfare.

But the problem goes further than that. It is not just the Senate being unwilling to live by the very law that it passed 2 weeks earlier and was signed by the President. It is the illusion of fiscal responsibility.

Let me tell you what I mean by that. For example, within the pay-go requirement itself, I think most Americans would be surprised to learn that discretionary spending, which is about a third of the Federal budget, is exempted completely. In other words, the senior Senator from New Hampshire frequently calls this the Swiss cheese pay-go because it is so full of holes, it is not what it would otherwise appear to be, and you can see why, if it exempts discretionary spending. Nor does pay-go apply to current entitlement spending--baseline. For example, many of us talked about the $38 trillion in unfunded liabilities for Medicare itself which is not fixed, which was actually made worse by the health care proposals which have been made by the President most recently and which passed the Senate on Christmas Eve. The pay-go rules don't even apply to current entitlement spending. So under the rules that give the illusion of fiscal responsibility but not the reality, entitlement spending can continue to grow 6 percent annually.

Suffice it to say as well that the problem the majority leader just got through talking about, which is the inability to pass these benefits because they are not paid for, is really a product of his own creation. You recall a couple of weeks ago Senator Baucus and Senator Grassley were working on a large jobs bill, which was a bipartisan bill, which was rejected in its entirety by the majority leader in favor of a partisan bill. He did not allow any amendments, did not allow any other suggestions. That was the very jobs bill that was passed by waiving the pay-go requirement.

All the Senator from Kentucky has asked for is that we do what every American family has to do and what every small business has to do; that is, be honest in our accounting of the public's money and to not continue a sham, which is to pretend as if we are being fiscally responsible when, in fact, we are not--by waiving the requirements, by creating the perception or patina of fiscal responsibility with these pay-go rules but which are so fraught with exceptions that they really do not mean what they are sometimes represented to be.

We know there is broad bipartisan support for the legislation that is pending before this body. All the Senator from Kentucky has asked for is that it be paid for, that we not add $10 billion more to the Federal deficit. That is on top of the roughly $1.6 trillion that already exists. That is just the deficit. That is not dealing with the unfunded liabilities of the Federal Government.

I am advised that there is about $100 billion left in discretionary spending from the stimulus bill that was passed the first part of last year--$100 billion. Using those funds, using $10 billion of that to pay for this extension of jobless and other benefits does not seem like an unreasonable request at all. It does raise the question, again, of whether Congress is continuing to say one thing and do another.

I remember when we talked about the stimulus funds that it was advertised as being targeted, timely, and temporary. We know it was none of those things because now there is still $100 billion left in discretionary spending here a year later, along with the TARP which is used as sort of a revolving charge account by Congress--again, more deficit spending. This has been anything but fiscal responsibility when it comes to doing the people's business here in the Congress.

If there is one message I hear from my constituents in Texas and other people around the country it is this: Stop the spending and be responsible when it comes to these unmet liabilities, whether they be annual deficits or when it comes to unfunded Federal liabilities.

But while Congress purports to be fiscally responsible on a number of fronts, you see small bills such as this benefits extension, not paid for, $10 billion a clip, which continue to add up, and pass the burden of paying for that on to our children and grandchildren, because that is what they are going to inherit, huge deficits, huge unfunded Federal liabilities, that they are going to pay for, not the present generation. That is not right.

I want to say I admire the courage of the junior Senator from Kentucky, Mr. Bunning. It is not fun to be accused of having no compassion for the people who are out of work, the people for whom these benefits should be forthcoming, and I believe will be forthcoming.

But somebody has to stand up finally and say enough is enough: No more intergenerational theft from our children and grandchildren by not meeting our responsibilities today. That is what I interpret him to have done. If the majority leader and the majority wanted to have this taken care of, they could have had it done in the Baucus-Grassley bipartisan bill that the majority leader shelved in favor of his partisan jobs bill.

I anticipate that next week when we do take up further legislation, we will take care of these requirements that are now being objected to because of deficit spending. That is appropriate. But I hope, unlike this current proposal, we will do the right thing by the American people and by our children and grandchildren and not borrow or, probably more correctly stated, steal from future generations. We will meet our responsibilities by making sure that any legislation we pass is paid for by an offset, unlike the current bill that has been objected to.

I yield the floor and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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