ustxtxb_obs_1985_11_08_50_00004-00000_000.pdf

How They Voted The Gramm-Rudman-Hollings deficit reduction amendment to the bill raising the national debt limit passed the Senate, 75-24, on October 10, 1985. \(Sen. Charles Mathias, budget by 1991. Democrats voting for the plan were: Baucus,. Mont. ,; Bentsen, Tex.; Biden, Del.; Boren, Okla.; Bumpers, Ark.; Burdick, N.D.; DeConcini, Ariz.; Dixon, Ill.; Dodd, Conn.; Ford, Ky.; Gore, Tenn.; Heflin, Ala.; Hollings, S.C.; Kennedy, Mass. \(Will a future Doggett run campaign ads about Gramm and Kennedy voting together? Or, perhaps, in Massachusetts they’ll say, “Texas doesn’t need Leahy, Vt.; Levin, Mich.; Long, La.; Melcher, Mont.; Nunn, Ga.; Proxmire, Wis.; Pryor, Ark.; Rockefeller, W. Va.; Sasser, Tenn.; Simon, Ill.; Stennis, Miss.; and Zorinsky, Neb. The four Republicans voting against Gramm-Rudman were: Hatfield, Ore.; Kassebaum, Kan.; Stafford, Vt.; and Lowell Weicker, Conn. , who told the New York Times that Democrats and Republicans who would normally have voted against the bill “are up for re-election, and they feel this is an easy thing to have on their resumes.” The 20 Democrats voting against the bill were: Bingaman, N.M.; Bradley, N.J.; Byrd, W. Va.; Chiles, Fla.; Cranston, Cal.; Eagleton, Mo.; Exon, Neb.; Glenn, Ohio; Harkin, Iowa; Hart, Colo.; Inouye, Hawaii; Johnston, La.; Lautenberg, N.J.; Matsunaga, Hawaii; Metzenbaum, Ohio; Mitchell, Me.; Moynihan, N.Y.; Pell, R.I. ; Riegle, Mich.; Sarbanes, Md. a formula by which to turn this country into Pinochet’s Chile, wherein austerity is imposed on all social programs in order to repay the national debt while the only major government subsidies go to the military-industrial complex. The independence of the middle class is mortgaged for years to come, while military spending not only protects the established order but, more important, becomes the only game in town. It is no accident that higher education and high technology in this state are so intimately tied to the military. Gramm’s economics require that the U.S. economy become dependent upon military spending. Already some community organizations in South Texas believe that a military base is the only kind of economic aid their region will receive. This is also closely tied to the increasing belligerence of Reagan foreign policy. There needs to be periodic justification for the military build-up. That ignoble experiment in Chile by the Chicago school of economics is being brought home by Phil Gramm and his ilk. The austerity imposed by international lending institutions on other debtor nations is being imposed on us, only without being so named. If everything goes Gramm’s way, we will one day be a nation with no corporate taxes, cheap labor, no worker rights, a large underemployed labor force desperate for work, and Phil Gramm will proclaim that, finally, the great day has come for U.S. industry to return to the United States. He may be lacing up his jackboots at this very moment in eager anticipation. Phil. Gramm is a major architect of our current despair. His deficit reduction bill is not a corrective for his 1981 budget bill but an escalation. Those voting with him do this country a grave disservice. G.R. The `Mama’ Defense IS THERE anything that can stop Kent Hance’s slide into the abyss? First he said he’d never turn Republican, then did. Then he kissed the ring of the leader of Texas anti abortion forces, begging forgiveness for having voted for several pro-choice measures in the House. Now, in an interview run on October 27 by Sam Attlesey of the Dallas Morning News, Hance grovels for Republican support by proclaiming his adherence to the “King’s X” school of politics. Hance tells Attlesey that he “voted for Reagan in 1984 because I knew him, and I voted for Reagan in 1980 because I knew his opponent.” He says that, while he’d pledged to “support the Democratic ticket” in 1984, that didn’t mean he was going to vote for its candidates. Curious, since it was hard to find any other kind of support coming from Hance. Trying to make a virtue out of what, at best, can be called disingenuous activity, Hance drags his mother into it, saying, she “voted for Phil too. She was going to write me in, but she was worried it might be a tie. Then if Doggett won, she 4 NOVEMBER 8, 1985 was afraid when she got to Heaven, the Lord wouldn’t forgive her.” It sounds like Hance’s mother has been hanging around with Phil Gramm’s much-touted “mama.” Don’t these women get tired of serving as the last defense whenever their boys find themselves backed up against the moral and ethical wall? It’s the old “mama” defense, whereby Gramm saves himself from charges of hard-heartedness and the suspicion that he wants to cut Social Security by pleading that his mama depends on that Social Security check. Apparently Kent Hance is trying to show that he couldn’t have been lying to us about his 1984 vote. Instead, he must have been doing the right thing, seeing as how his mama did it, too. And just for good measure, Hance throws in the Lord and Heaven, too. How could anyone flout that kind of authority? Or is this an indication that worms are eating at Kent’s subconscious? The question for Republicans: can you believe Hance now or is this a “Double-King’s X” with a path already cleared for hiding behind mama’s skirts? G.R.