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W A S H I N G T O N, Nov. 4 ? It?s an open secret on
Capitol Hill: The GOP leadership in Congress
has quietly killed spending restrictions that
helped create the historic budget surplus and is
planning to bury them without a funeral.
The time of death came Tuesday, when the Senate
sent its final appropriations bill to President Clinton to
veto, marking congressional Republicans? official
abandonment of spending restraints they imposed upon
themselves in the Balanced Budget Act of 1997.
That?s right, the same limits that GOP leaders fought to
include in that historic 1997 budget deal, an agreement
largely responsible for the $1 trillion surplus projections
that have made it more comfortable for Congress to
spend a few extra millions here and there.
Tipping His Cap
Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., on Tuesday
became the first leader to bid farewell to the caps, which
until recently leaders were still pledging to uphold. As he
acknowledged the limits would be ignored, Lott at least
credited them with helping to balance the budget and
eliminating the deficit.
?While the caps have been hard to meet, and while
they haven?t been met,? Lott said, ?to be perfectly candid,
they have provided some pressure and some resistance to
just out-of-control spending.?
According to the non-partisan Congressional Budget
Office, the caps would have required $31 billion less in
spending than Republicans have proposed this year, limits
that proved too severe for a Congress struggling to find
cash for a war in Kosovo, aid for farmers hit by falling
agriculture prices, emergency assistance for disaster
victims and, of course, a few pork projects in their home
states.
Lawmakers found they couldn?t fund the government
under the caps last year either. In fiscal year 1999,
Republicans buckled to pressure from President Clinton
and increased government spending by $21 billion. And
that capitulation came with a price: Conservatives blasted
the GOP?s majority and former House Speaker Newt
Gingrich, R-Ga., was forced to resign after disastrous
mid-term elections.
Changing the Subject
Smarting from that budget battle, congressional leaders
pledged this year to stay loyal to spending limits. But after
passing a $792 billion tax cut that Clinton vetoed in
September, the GOP majority in Congress decided to
switch tack. Talk of the caps disappeared and
Republicans launched a daily chorus on the need to
protect Social Security.
?Nobody west of Rockville, Md., knows what the
budget caps are,? said a senior GOP leadership aide
familiar with the strategy. ?But everyone knows what
raiding the Social Security trust fund is about.?
Through spending gimmicks, lawmakers have been
able to draft spending plans that go beyond the statutory
limits by declaring ?emergencies,? as well as delaying
funding until the following fiscal year ? something known
as ?forward funding.?
Robert Reischauer, former CBO director and now a
senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, said declaring
emergencies to fund the Census and cover day-to-day
military operations stretched credibility.
?There is a laugh test and one could argue that they
breached that test,? he said. ?They have transformed the
$14 billion surplus into a $17 billion deficit and the game
isn?t over at this point.?
But now in their fifth budget fight with President
Clinton, Republicans feel their crusade to protect the
Social Security trust fund will help them prevail.
Republicans have ratcheted up the rhetoric at news
events, on the House floor and in a series of TV ads that
accuse Democrats of trying to raid the trust fund.
Social Security Mantra
On Thursday, Oct. 21, as they prepared to break the
deadline on their second continuing resolution to fund the
government, Republicans used the words ?Social
Security? 119 times in one day. Democrats cited the
program 91 times that day. One week later, on Oct. 28th,
Republicans had nearly doubled their references to 220 a
day. Democrats, eager to fight back, made 196
references.
Rep. David Obey, D-Wis., ranking Democrat on the
House Appropriations Committee, accused the GOP of
engaging in ?a cheap, phony and manipulated debate.?
?It is a joke for our Republican friends to cry crocodile
tears about protecting Social Security,? said Obey. ?This
is the party that tried to kill Social Security when it was
born.?
Underlying the debate is the fact that the Social
Security Trust Fund, which had a $140 billion surplus this
year, is essentially unaffected when Congress some cash.
Anytime the federal government borrows money from
Social Security, that cash is immediately repaid in
Treasury bills ? leaving the trust fund?s solvency intact.
Experts don?t expect this to prove troublesome until the
Baby Boom generation starts to retire a decade from
now, drawing more from the trust fund than they paid
during their careers.
?It?s purely rhetorical because it really doesn?t matter
whether we spend the Social Security surplus,? said Ellen
Taylor, policy analyst at OMB Watch, a non-profit
research and advocacy group. ?They are not doing
anything to protect the Social Security trust fund by
preserving the surplus. Republicans are trying to use it to
hold back spending and gain the high ground.?
And Republicans, who say they are determined to
keep their promise, claim they are already securing that
ground.
According to internal GOP polls, their drumbeat on the
issue is resonating. In one question about borrowing from
the trust fund, 71 percent of those polled said Social
Security should never be used for any reason except to
pay retirement benefits.
So as this year?s budget battle ends, the battle to take
credit for protecting Social Security begins, leaving little
chance that anyone will mourn the death of the 1997
spending caps. |
