Stimulus - Day 3

Floor Speech

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, briefly, I didn't see the article the majority leader is referring to, but I will say again publicly today what I said publicly yesterday and privately to him as well. We are pleased with the way the amendment process is being handled. We have many additional amendments to be offered today.

The majority leader said earlier in the week, and I certainly agree, that we know that the final vote will meet the 60-vote threshold. But regardless of what the article may have said, my view is we proceed as we did yesterday, get as many votes as we can in, and later in the day we can discuss what the endgame might be.

Now, the effects of the economic crisis are inescapable. Every day we hear about some of America's most venerable companies slashing jobs. The longer we wait, the worse this crisis could become. But action simply for the sake of action is always unwise. What is needed is the right action. The stimulus plan that Democrats in the House and Senate have proposed is not the right action.

First, it is too costly. Including interest, the proposal before us comes to a staggering $1.3 trillion, a figure that makes most people's head spin. It includes billions in wasteful spending and it increases permanent Federal spending. Let me say that again: This bill, which is supposed to be temporary, timely, and targeted, increases permanent Federal spending by nearly $300 billion, locking in bigger and bigger deficits every year.

Apparently, the authors of this bill couldn't resist inserting scores of long-cherished pet projects. That is how you end up with $70 million for climate research, tens of millions to spruce up Government office buildings here in Washington, and $20 million for the removal of fish passage barriers in a stimulus package, as I indicated earlier, that was supposed to be timely, temporary, and targeted.

The President said Sunday night we need to ``trim out things that are not relevant to putting people back to work right now.'' It seems some in Congress haven't been listening. The bill's remaining defenders say it contains a number of projects essential to our long-term economic health. But with millions of struggling Americans learning to live with less, Congress needs to resist the temptation to load this bill with unnecessary spending that doesn't create jobs or which only touch on the problems that demand long-term planning and serious thought.

Yes, now is the time to act. But it is not the time to act foolishly. This week, Republicans have tried to improve this bill in a number of ways. One goal was to cut out the waste and bring down the total cost. So far, Democrats have rejected these efforts. Yesterday, they said no to cutting $25 billion from the bill. That used to sound like a lot of money, but in the context of this bill, it was a relatively paltry amount. They said no to turning off spending on newly created programs, and they said no to turning off spending once the economy recovers.

In fact, throughout this entire debate, the two parties seem to have been guided by two different philosophies. The Democrats, it seems, decided on a random dollar amount of about $900 billion and have spent most of their time either defending it or adding to it. Republicans, on the other hand, have thought all along that what we needed to do was to identify the core problem first and then see how much money it would cost to fix it.

In our view, and in the view of most economists, the root problem of the current crisis is housing--housing. It just so happens that fixing that problem would cost a lot less than $1 trillion. In his op-ed in this morning's Washington Post, the President wrote that in this debate we can ``place good ideas ahead of old ideological battles, and a sense of purpose above the same narrow partisanship.'' I couldn't agree more. But this bill doesn't do either one of those things.

Republicans remain committed to working with the President and with our friends on the other side to address this crisis. We agree something must be done, but it will require a lot more work. Today, Republicans will present in greater detail our ideas for making this stimulus work. Our friend and colleague, Senator McCain, is here now to explain his proposal.

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