Providing For Consideration Of Senate Amendment To H.J. Res. 45, Increasing The Statutory Limit On The Public Debt
Floor Speech
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Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Madam Speaker, no surprise, I rise in opposition to this closed rule. The charade of Speaker Pelosi running ``the most open, honest, and ethical Congress'' is once again confirmed today that that's not happening. That is not happening here again on the floor, and it's related to this activity that we went through in the Rules Committee upstairs just yesterday.
At a time of record deficits and record unemployment, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are simply trying to blame Republicans and George Bush rather than looking at their own responsibility of what they have done in the last year that has placed enormous, enormous financial strain on this country. Never once did they talk about that responsibility, that they led this country, saying, We must go and spend this money because it will lend itself to jobs. And we're going to have the stimulus bill. We're going to call it the stimulus bill.
The President went all over the country and Members of Congress went all over the country and sold this. It didn't work it. It didn't work. It didn't work big time. I didn't hear any offer of, Whoops. As Vice President Biden said, We guessed and it didn't work.
I think it would have been appropriate this morning for the gentleman from Massachusetts or anybody from the Democratic Party to stand up and say, You know, we did guess. I know those Republicans told us this wouldn't work, but we really guessed and we guessed wrong. The Vice President has the guts to say that. I think this body should say the same thing, rather than trying to blame this on George Bush.
Today, we're here to raise the debt limit an additional $1.9 trillion. Now, the first question is: My gosh, why so much? Because so much burden and debt has been added. The bottom line is we're only here because what our friends Speaker Pelosi and the Democratic Party have done did not work. They took out a monster loan that is not paying off. But today, there is not even a vote. It's required, but not even a vote or a debate on the issue of raising the debt limit. In fact, the majority party has used deceitful procedural games to hide the fact that they are raising the debt limit again, for the sixth time, six times since they took control of the House. Why, you ask? Well, it's to give their members political coverage and a vote on statutory PAYGO again. I guess we're going to keep blaming George Bush, President Bush, for this.
The bottom line is, Madam Speaker, as I speak to each of the Members here on the floor today, this is about raising the statutory debt limit $1.9 trillion. And my colleagues and I are going to spend the time today discussing the current economic climate, the reason why things aren't working. The majority's principles and priorities of spending and taxing and borrowing and the President's fiscal year 2011 budget--$3.6 trillion--that was just released this week tell the reason why.
Madam Speaker, we've told you over and over again, if you take the investor out of the equation, if you tax the American people, if you destroy job creators, if you go at employers and have a battle with them, they will get it. They will quit employing people.
Our President seems to have, every time I watch him, he's always after somebody. He's always got a problem; the bankers, the doctors, insurance. Every time I look up, our great President, Barack Obama, has an ax to grind with somebody, and it's generally employers. And then he wants to turn around and say, How come we don't have any jobs? Oh, we're going to get those. We'll get those. This is America. We can do anything.
But the policies are not creating jobs; they're creating debts. They're creating circumstances where this country has to again today borrow for the debt limit and pass a bill here today that says we're going to raise the debt limit $1.9 trillion so our government doesn't go belly up. Madam Speaker, that is over $46,000 per American family, just what we're doing now. Since September 2007, the year our friends the Democrats took control, over $3.8 billion, on average, has been added to the national debt every single day.
The President's budget borrows too much, taxes too much, and spends too much. But what it does is it kills the goose that lays the golden egg. Then we wonder why we don't have jobs in this country.
The $3.6 trillion budget represents nearly a 30-percent increase in total outlays since 2008. The budget includes more than $2 trillion in job-killing tax hikes, with nearly a 20-percent jump in the first year alone. I get it. I get it as an individual taxpayer, and that's why I virtually sold all my stock. I got out of the stock market because this administration and this Congress want to kill economic growth and opportunity, and I can't take that and everybody else can't take that. And so that's why you're seeing employers and others say, Enough is enough. That's what we're saying here today.
This tax includes taxes on small businesses, investors, and families earning less than $250,000 a year, also. I thought we heard the President say that he was going to give everybody a tax cut. They keep talking about it. Boy, it's a great idea to float. Sure wish you'd deliver on that one. But let's also go to the high side. We need investors to be in the game, Madam Speaker. We need investors, and this bill taxes the stuffings out of them.
Additionally, the President's budget runs up a record budget deficit again. We're going to vote on it again. Democrats, Yea, we support the President. All these great priorities. The national debt is predicted to double once again over 5 years and triple by 2019, and that's a mistake. Interest alone would set the American taxpayer back roughly $6 trillion, just the interest over the next decade.
The American people want Congress, want Washington to rein in borrowing, taxing, and spending. They don't want more of it. They want Congress to stop talking about what they will do about helping jobs and to actually make the environment better. There's still an experiment going on out there, Madam Speaker, and people are not buying it because they are concerned about Washington and what they're going to do next. Taxing, spending, and borrowing is not a way to start this new year.
During last week's State of the Union, President Obama stated, Starting in 2011, we will prepare to freeze government spending for 3 years. Great. Great, Mr. President. That was Thursday night. I went upstairs just yesterday and I offered an amendment in the Rules Committee on H.R. 4061, the Cybersecurity bill, the first bill right out of the bag, and I took the President up on that and said, Hey, I think we ought to have an amendment added to the bill, since the bill doesn't do it, that would have frozen spending just on two programs for 3 years. My amendment would have saved a paltry $47 million. That's all, just $47 million. I know it's not a lot. And you would not have believed the calls at me about how out of line I was and how this was the most important thing in the history of our country.
This body is not prepared to make tough decisions. This body is not prepared even to cut $47 million after we clapped for the President just the other day. This Democrat majority continues to pursue initiatives and policies that will lead to more unemployment and bigger and more deficits. This administration and the Democratic majority promised the American people they would aim for jobs and economic recovery, health care, cleaner energy, better education. That list goes on and on and on. And I will tell you what we've got for it: record deficits, record spending, and record unemployment.
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Madam Speaker, by the way, I like this PAYGO thing that my friends, the Democrats, are pushing. But when it comes down to it, they waive PAYGO on a regular basis.
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Madam Speaker, it's a good thing we're here on the floor of the House where we're exempt from things like deceptive practices, because this body would be guilty today. Here we are with the Statutory Pay-As-You-Go Act of 2010. Madam Speaker, 32 pages of this 56-page bill are exemptions to pay-as-you-go. So 32 pages are--Oh, we say we're going to have pay-as-you-go--but 32 of the 56 pages are, I'm sorry, but it does not apply to the following items. Madam Speaker, that's deceptive.
Madam Speaker, at this time I yield 3 minutes to the favorite son of Dallas, Texas, the gentleman Mr. Hensarling.
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Madam Speaker, once again, a hyperbole that does not match the action. Out of the 56 pages of this bill, 32 pages are exemptions to pay-as-you-go, 32 of the 56 pages that our good friends are touting as the answer and the right way to do it. But most intriguing is that we've heard that the way to do it is the way it's being done here, because it's open and honest.
There is not even a vote on the debt limit; it's self-executed in the rule. So let's go and vote for PAYGO and talk about how responsible we are. Oh, at the same time, make sure we fund what we've done, $1.9 trillion. The Rules Committee is pretty good up there, Madam Speaker. Know how to hide things. Know how to obfuscate the real facts of the case. The facts of the case are the American people know what's going on. They K-N-O-W what is going on. Over the last year, I've heard from constituents also, and they want a good economy and they want jobs. And the Democrat majority is simply not stepping up to this.
I'm going to encourage a ``no'' vote on the previous question and a ``no'' vote on the rule when it's our time to get that done. Just so our colleagues understand this, we're going to have a vote on this one here today.
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You know, I think the best evidence, and reclaiming my time, I think the best evidence that this is not working is the deficit rising from $161 billion in 2007, to $1.4 trillion last year and $1.6 trillion this year; $161 billion in '07 to last year, $1.4 trillion and this year $1.6 trillion.
I would say that the preponderance of the evidence does not support the hypothesis. Today, in this rule, we didn't really debate the debt limit about being honest about the vote; but we're going to go ahead and have an opportunity, Madam Speaker, when my colleagues vote ``no'' on the previous question, that we will be allowed to amend this rule to consider an end to the TARP Act to stop the bailouts which are a part of this problem. This act would immediately terminate the Troubled Asset Relief Program and reduce the debt ceiling by the amount of remaining authorized TARP funds, which is nearly now $200 billion.
We cannot continue what we're doing, spending taxpayer dollars and having these bailout programs. This is an ineffective program.
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Madam Speaker, spin zone. I love it. The gentleman is talking about all these Republicans want to privatize Social Security and Medicare. We're responsible. Well, what the gentleman forgot is it's the Democrats' proposal that takes $400 billion out of Medicare, $400 billion. Those are not only talking points from the 1990s that the gentleman is hung up on, it's not truthful.
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Madam Speaker, in the remaining time, I would just like to say that I think the American people are watching and they are listening, and they heard a good debate here on the floor about these corporations that Republicans try and get all of these tax breaks for. I'd like to remind the gentleman those are called employers, and employers in this country have the second highest tax rate of any country in the world.
Darn right Republicans are trying to cut taxes, because we want the American people to get employed again, and attacking employers is the key thrust of what the Democratic objective is all about. No wonder we've lost jobs. We're attacking employers, attacking employers. The President, the gentleman Mr. Hoyer, the Speaker, Mrs. Pelosi, attacking employers. No wonder we've got an unemployment problem.
But this budget is filled with reckless spending and unsustainable debt. Don't blame that on somebody else. Accept the responsibility yourself. This is the biggest budget we've ever had. And for the President to come and say, as a takeaway, Just as you know, American people, we're going to start this spending process to where we freeze spending, it's really a joke.
The bottom line is the American people know what the problem is. They've clued in on it. They even know the pages of the bills where they have seen the majority party try and take advantage of the taxpayer, rip health care out from their advantage where they could have their own health care, take dollars away from their employers and tax them.
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