2006 Minnesota Senate Debate: on Budget & Economy

Amy Klobuchar: Budget & Economy

I was ready for that line. During the campaign, I had laid out a plan to reduce the debt that included both spending cuts and a proposal to roll back the Bush tax cuts for the top 1 percent of the nation's earners. Kennedy would not agree to any changes in the tax rates, even for the very wealthy.

I hit back. Noting that I had just visited the State Fair's beer garden, where I'd heard one student tell another that the beer they'd been drinking was "all foam and no beer," I turned to Kennedy and said, "That's your economic plan, Congressman. It's all foam and no beer."

That got the crowd going, and the line played almost constantly on radio and TV for the next 24 hours.

Amy Klobuchar: Cut discretionary spending like “bridge to nowhere”

KLOBUCHAR: We have had a 50% increase in discretionary spending. The Cato Institute identified that.

Q: What specifically?

KLOBUCHAR: Let’s start with the Rep. Kennedy voted for, the bridges to nowhere, the rain forest in Iowa, the waterless urinals in Michigan.

Q: Will you go after Medicare and pensions?

KLOBUCHAR: I believe that if we can shore up this deficit and balance the budget, that we can then start shoring up Social Security.

Mark Kennedy: Authored the line-item veto, to take out bills’ silly stuff

Q: But you voted for both those proposals.

KENNEDY: I voted for every single amendment to take out these crazy line items.

Q: But in final passage, those proposals were legislation you voted for.

KENNEDY: They were, because I support roads and key programs. But you ought not to hold a whole bill hostage because there’s silly stuff in it. We ought to have a line-item veto for the president to cut that junk out of there, hold Congress accountable, keep spending under control.

Q: But you have a Republican president, a Republican House, a Republican Senate, and you have an $8 trillion debt.

KENNEDY: I would like the president to take a little bit more leadership on spending. We do need to push forward and make sure that we have strong fiscal measures to keep spending under control.