Hatch, Koop and Arlen Specter.
A simple override is built into Hatch's legislation; this is merely for show.
--
Hatch pushes balanced budgets - again
Maybe the 13th time is the charm.
After attempting, and failing, a dozen times to amend the Constitution to require Congress to balance the budget every year, Sen. Orrin Hatch is drumming up support for another try.
The Utah Republican is partnering with Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, to push a balanced budget amendment that Hatch is optimistic will pass now as the country finds itself $14 trillion in debt.
“Everybody in this country knows that we have a fiscal crisis and it’s getting worse,” Hatch says. “People are getting serious about it, even Democrats are frightened. They know that this country cannot sustain the current spending binge.”
“It’s sort of desperately needed,” says Larry Hart, a lobbyist for the American Conservative Union, which backs Hatch’s bill. “What we used to look upon as bad deficits have become potentially catastrophic. It has been shown over and over again over the years that it is absolutely impossible with the shifts in congressional and White House control to keep the country in a sane fiscal path.”
If Hatch’s bill won approval of two-thirds of both the House and Senate and then 38 state legislatures, it would require Congress to pass a budget in which revenue didn’t outpace spending, unless three-fifths of each chamber voted to waive that restriction.
It would also cap the annual budget at 20 percent of the nation’s GDP.
All federal tax increases would need to be approved by two-thirds of the House and Senate, though any of these limitations could be waived during a declaration of war or if Congress deemed them a risk to national security.
---
I'm not a big fan of Orrin Hatch but both these clips are solid...
Short clip - 2 minutes - transcript is here...
---
Video: Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UTAH) with Don Imus -- May 31, 2010
- "If he keeps spending us into bankruptcy, we're going to be $20.3 trillion in debt by 2020."
- "We'll have a $1.3 trillion budget deficit in 2020 according to their own actuaries...$900 billion of it will be INTEREST ON THE DEBT!"
- "That ought to tell you that we're going in the wrong direction."
- "And I can tell you the people out there understand it, they're just sick and tired of the spending. We now have 18% of all wages are now being paid by the federal government. Now, tell me that's a good thing."
---