Time to Get the Budget Straight

TIME TO GET THE BUDGET STRAIGHT -- (House of Representatives - March 08, 2006)

(Mr. SCOTT of Virginia asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Madam Speaker, in a couple of days we will be taking up the budget, and as people talk about fiscal responsibility, this chart is the chart they are talking about.

This chart shows the deficit over the years, how President Clinton took a $290 billion deficit and converted it into a $238 billion surplus, and as soon as this President came in, there has been a complete collapse.

As you talk about the budget, remember this chart. When President Clinton left office, we had a projected surplus of over $5.5 trillion. Now we have for those same 10 years a projected deficit of $3.3 trillion. The war, $300 billion, that is .3. Katrina, $200 billion, that is .2. An almost $9 trillion deterioration in the deficit.

And we didn't create any jobs. When they talk about economic improvement, this is the number of jobs created since Herbert Hoover, by administration. This administration, the worst since Herbert Hoover.

We need to get our economy straight. We need to get our budget straight, and we can do it if we take the same kind of initiatives we took in the 1990s.

http://thomas.loc.gov