Remarks as prepared for delivery.
M. President,
I rise today to speak about the tough fiscal choices this body, this government, and our President, now face.
But before I say anything, I would like to start off with a profound apology.
I want to apologize to every West Virginian and all Americans for the terrible process they have been made to endure and witness.
With five days before an August 2nd deadline to raise the debt ceiling, this government faces yet another crisis of its own making, and yet it is not we who pay the price for our failures to govern - it is the American people.
To the tens of millions of American families who work hard to take care of their families, I can only imagine the anger and disgust they have at witnessing a broken government and a President and Members of Congress who can’t seem to even agree sometimes on what day it is – let alone how to solve our nation’s debt crisis.
M. President, the American people deserve better.
Now, some will say that Washington is broken and this is the best we can do - but I do not believe that for one moment.
Washington may be broken, but it will not break me.
And you should not let it break you, either.
I came here to fix things, not to make things worse.
I came to solve problems, not to ignore them.
I came here to worry about the next generation, not worry my next election.
I, for one, am willing to make the tough and painful decisions that will improve the lives of every West Virginian and all Americans for generations to come – regardless of what it means for my party or the next election.
And I know I am not alone.
……………..
M. President, after our beloved Senator Byrd passed, I chose to run for the U.S. Senate for one simple reason: I saw the great challenges that our nation faced – exploding debts and deficits, our nation’s energy dependence, costly wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and a painful jobs and economic crisis - and I wanted to help make things better by bringing a little commonsense to Washington.
I knew we had to focus on rebuilding America, and doing so meant making hard, politically difficult, choices.
Now, some of my colleagues often remind me that fixing problems as complex as our debt crisis isn’t easy – but with all due respect – it seems like we make it harder than it really needs to be.
My friends, it doesn’t need to be this way.
I did not come to Washington with the illusion that I could reinvent the wheel. But I did come so that I could help balance the wheels, so that the car could run a little smoother.
…Months ago, when I said that I would not vote to raise the debt ceiling without a long-term fix, I thought this Congress and the President would tackle the issue head-on.
As I made clear on that day, the choices we make to address our debt now will determine whether the vital programs we all deeply care about – Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, veterans programs, education for our children, Head Start – are there for those in need and for decades to come.
However, instead of coming together months ago to focus and deal with the gravity of our debt, we delayed and we continued to delegate.
While I will never question someone’s motivations or their heart, we all have a right to question the strategies of our leaders and colleagues – whether they’re Democrats or Republicans – because these strategies have once again led us to a crisis and the brink of a disaster.
At a minimum, this entire process has once again fed a growing public cynicism that is corrosive to the very fabric of our government – and we all bear the responsibility for that.
M. President, I truly believe that we can do better.
I know this to be true, because we proved it West Virginia.
When I first became Governor of the great state of West Virginia, our state faced similar fiscal concerns.
After facing dismal credit ratings for far too long and a dark fiscal future, some thought our state’s best days were behind us. But after confronting our fiscal challenges head on, in West Virginia – even during the deepest recession in our lifetimes – we are one of the few states in the nation that has had its credit rating upgraded the last three years in a row. We had surpluses for the last six years in a row.
We did this in West Virginia by cutting spending, but not cutting vital programs or services. We did this NOT by raising tax rates, but by ensuring everyone paid their fair share in our state. We did this tackling waste, fraud, and abuse so as to as to ensure we took care of those most in need, not those bent on greed. And by doing this, we helped to restore confidence to the economy of our state – that is a factor that we can’t overestimate.
West Virginia may be a small state, but these are commonsense solutions that I strongly believe can apply right here.
Now, I did not blame these fiscal challenges that we had in our state on the mistakes made by past Governors or legislators – whether they be Republicans or Democrats.
I reached out to all members of the legislature, whether they were on the front row or the so-called back row, and I met with them and anyone who had an idea on how to best solve our fiscal problems.
It required sacrifice. It required patience. It required trust and respect.
Now, can anyone honestly say that is what has happened here?
In fact, if we turn on cable news right now, we’ll see exactly where this broken process stands. Democrats rush out to attack Republicans and Republicans rush out to attack us Democrats.
M. President, we are better than this, and for the sake of this nation’s future, we must do better.
I owe it to West Virginians and we all owe it to this great nation to do much better than we have.
And, from time to time, we should remind ourselves that we took an oath to do just that.
As idealistic as it may sound, I implore this great body, each member, the leaders of both bodies, the President, the two parties and especially the political committees, to put away their political knives and swords, and let us do something that has become rare in Washington: put aside the political attacks for a few months and actually work together, openly, honestly, with respect for our profound differences, and build a trust that will fix the big problems that we face as a nation.
M. President, the stakes are too high to do anything else.
Our nation faces not only a threat of default, but of a downgrade.
The credit rating agencies, like Standard & Poor’s, have made it clear that the United States needs to cut nearly $4 trillion over the next decade, or they will lose confidence in our long-term ability to pay our bills.
Yet, in my estimation, neither of the two plans – neither one – that are currently proposed by Republican or Democratic leadership comes close to preventing our nation from being downgraded or actually solving the debt crisis we face.
Each falls far short – whether it’s in time or dollars.
The truth is, both of the plans being discussed and that the Senate may consider – one offered by the leader of the Republican party, Speaker John Boehner; the other offered by the leader of this Chamber and my party, Senator Reid – do not really solve the nation’s long term fiscal problems as presented.
Make no mistake, I have the utmost respect for both of these fine public servants.
Both find themselves in difficult positions, and I know they are trying their best to do what is right.
And I understand their desire to prevent our nation’s default, but what we have before us are effectively a short-term fix and a shorter-term fix. Either one might prevent a default – which is a good thing – but neither may prevent a credit downgrade – which is a terrible thing.
To me, it doesn’t matter if it’s a Republican proposal or a Democratic proposal, but including $1.2 trillion in savings from the wars that we should not be fighting as savings just doesn’t make sense.
Saying that we will save money we haven’t even budgeted or spent is like saying that because your family bought a $20,000 car instead of a $50,000 car – you saved $30,000. It’s even worse when you consider we couldn’t afford to buy any car in the first place.
Most of the American people understand that, and I know the people of West Virginia do.
As for Speaker Boehner’s plan, his was supposed to save $1.2 trillion, but the Congressional Budget Office just took a look and determined it would save only $917 billion. So instead of fixing our problem, it kicks the can down the road to 2012 – which will be an election year…and if you think this process is ugly now, you ain’t seen anything yet.
As these two proposals currently stand, I cannot in good conscience support either one of them unless they include a pathway for a long-term debt fix.
While it is true that our nation will suffer if we only enact a short-term deal, we will suffer much more if we fail to fix our greatest fiscal problems.
We must solve our nation’s problems now – not in 2012 and certainly not in 2013.
This is not just my opinion. As many rating agencies have warned and economists have predicted, every year that goes by, the options on how to fix our looming debt crisis will become worse and worse.
If we are being honest, neither of these proposals, as they stand today, can prevent a credit rating agency downgrade – an event that would be just as catastrophic, or maybe even worse, than default.
Because I personally know…a government’s climb back from a low credit rating is extremely long and painful.
To be clear, a downgrade in our credit worthiness could lead to a sell-off of stocks, Treasury securities, and U.S dollars. Gold prices could rise even higher, and interest rates could increase across the board – which would not only have a devastating impact on consumers, small businesses, and local governments, but would make the price of financing our nation’s debt even more costly.
At a minimum, the shock to our nation’s confidence from our first-ever downgrade could prove more costly than we can even fathom.
M. President, we can’t let this happen.
For the sake of our nation’s future, we must come to a compromise that acknowledges that a long-term debt fix is needed and that our spending is out of control and that raising tax rates – whether it’s the rich, the middle class, and even the poor – won’t cure our spending problems.
But we must also come to a compromise that acknowledges that tax reform is not the same as raising taxes and that there is something morally wrong when a large corporation, like GE, pays zero in federal taxes while a small business or a middle class family pays more.
We must also come to a compromise that finally acknowledges that we simply can’t fight three wars for years to come while we cut services here at home and choose to keep taxes low.
I have said this before, but it is so important: If I have to choose between rebuilding America and rebuilding Afghanistan, I choose America.
So with the clock ticking toward default, what can we do.
M. President, as part of any deal to raise the debt ceiling, I would respectfully encourage leaders in the Senate and the House, and the President, to find common ground by committing to a guaranteed vote on a long-term fix – otherwise, as I said months ago, I simply cannot support a short-term deal that is just a little better than the shorter-term deal.
With all due respect to my colleagues, I will not look West Virginians in the eye and say: don’t worry, all is good, I saved myself for the 2012 election – but you’re on your own.
A vote on such a long-term debt fix, I would hope, could come within the next 90 days or a reasonable period of time so as to prevent what I fear the most – a downgrade of our nation’s credit rating.
I believe such a vote on a long-term fix is possible because many good people have already worked hard to put together the framework and pieces of what such a long-term fix could look like.
Already we have seen two promising commonsense proposals from bipartisan groups: the Bowles-Simpson Debt Commission, which presented its report nearly nine months ago, and a similar framework that was presented last week by the bipartisan Gang of Six.
In fact, the day the Gang of Six announced their proposed framework was one of my better and prouder days as a Senator. For the first time since I have been in the Senate, I saw Democratic and Republican Senators – almost equally divided – come together to put politics aside and agree to the principles of a commonsense solution that recognizes the urgency of fixing our long-term problems now.
No plan is perfect, no plan will be. No plan will please all, no plan can.
But within these two plans, I believe, lies the path our nation can take if we are to get our fiscal house in order. Of course, some will have other ideas, whether from the right or left, and we should listen to them all.
But I would ask each of us, and all the groups who will undoubtedly be mobilized to stop any fix, to think hard about what will happen to our great nation if we fail to act.
What will happen to the programs we cherish like Social Security and Medicare? What will happen to our nation’s defense and to tax rates? What will happen to the people who are truly in need? What will happen to our seniors, our veterans, and our children, if we choose to do too little, or nothing at all?
Finally, as the negotiations for this long-term fix proceed, I would hope that we can all remember that if we are to negotiate in good faith, we must have faith in each other. We cannot turn a fair compromise into the enemy. And we can’t tear each other apart with attacks if we are to come together to solve our nation’s great problems. We can respectfully disagree as long as we never lose respect for each other.
M. President, as difficult as the next few days, weeks, and months will be, I believe we – the President and this esteemed Congress – have the opportunity to make this one of our finest hours.
We have within our hands an opportunity where we can prove to the naysayers and doubters that the Government of the people is as great as the people which it serves.
I, for one, am willing to whatever I possibly can and whatever is asked of me; I will work hard every day, across the aisle, until we have a long-term solution to our debt crisis.
I know that no Senator or Member of Congress can do this alone. But together, putting our politics aside, we can do this – and, for the sake of this great nation, our children, and the state I love, I truly hope we do.
Thank you, M. President, I yield the floor.
