Export-Import Bank Reauthorization Act of 2012--Motion to Proceed
Floor Speech
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Mr. BARRASSO. Well, I would tell my colleague from Texas, who has been a leader in this fight asking for a budget, demanding a budget, as of today it has been 1,111 days since the Senate passed a budget, in spite of the law that says they must do so by April 15 of each year. So April 15 came and went this year, as it did last year and the year before, and yet there is no budget.
So I look to the leadership of the Senator from Texas, who knows how the hard-working families in her State and the hard-working families of my State resent the fact that Washington refuses to be accountable. The Democrats in this body refuse to be accountable to the American people.
All the American people are asking for, in my view, is value for their money. They want to make sure the money they send to Washington is being spent effectively and efficiently, and they are actually getting value for their money.
I assume that is what my colleague is hearing from Texas as well.
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Mr. BARRASSO. I would tell my colleague and friend from Texas, who is a wonderful student of this as well, this health care law is bad for patients, it is bad for providers--the doctors and nurses who take care of those patients--and it is terrible for taxpayers, who are going do get stuck footing the bill. So it is not a surprise this administration doesn't want to come to the Senate, is embarrassed to come to the Senate with a budget, because they know the American people would be so offended by the irresponsibility and the nature of such a budget.
That is the situation we find ourselves in now. As both my colleagues have said, they took $500 billion from Medicare--and not to save Medicare, not to strengthen Medicare--to start a whole new government program for someone else. That is why when I travel the State of Wyoming and I talk to seniors, they say they don't like this health care law. It is why the health care law is even more unpopular today than it was the day it was passed.
But I do notice our colleague from Wisconsin has a new chart I am trying to read from here, and so I will ask if he could share with us what is on that chart so that everyone gets a chance to see it and hear the explanation.
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Mr. BARRASSO. I just want to thank my colleagues who are here today sharing their time and their insight. They have a lot of insight because they have run businesses, they have worked to actually meet a budget and live within a budget, have dealt with government regulations. And the Senator from Texas was talking about these regulations. They are burdensome, they are expensive, and they are time-consuming. It is hard to budget when you don't know what to expect. That is what the American people who create jobs and who work jobs need--some predictability and some certainty so they can make wise decisions. And when you have a Congress led by the Democrats in the Senate who do not pass a budget, the predictability isn't there, the certainty isn't there. There is so much confusion and uncertainty that people have a hard time making the longer term decisions.
To my colleague from Wisconsin, I know that is what I saw in my medical office, and as I talk to my colleague, I know they have the same situation in Wisconsin.
I thank my colleague from Wisconsin as well as my colleagues from Texas and Tennessee for their leadership and their continued efforts to try to get the Democrats in this body and this administration to pass a budget, which by law they are mandated to do. Yet, even today, now we are at 1,111 days without a budget. To me, that is inexcusable.
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