As Congress prepares to consider President Bush’s budget for the coming year, I believe it is important that we start by locking away the Medicare trust fund so that the money from this fund is used only for Medicare.  In fact, the first legislation I sponsored as a member of Congress was a Social Security and Medicare lockbox bill to protect both of these funds by taking them out of the budget process.

Unfortunately, President Bush’s tax cut plan invades the Social Security surplus to pay down the national debt, and takes all of the Medicare surplus for his so-called “contingency” fund.  I believe we can do better by our seniors.  I want to support the President’s tax plan, but I cannot do that until I am sure that we will be able to pay down our $5.7 trillion national debt—costing us as taxpayers $1 billion a day in interest, protect Social Security, and truly modernize Medicare to include prescription drug coverage for all seniors.