House Proceeding 04-05-06 on Apr 5th, 2006 :: 1:25:29 to 1:45:29
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1:21:59 to 1:25:29( Edit History Discussion )
Speech By: Collin C. Peterson

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Collin C. Peterson: we know it is tough to eliminate waste. i often quote ronald reagan who i -- he's pretty close to my favorite president ever, i'll have to say that, but he is one of the things -- one of my favorite

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remarks he ever made was that when you look at federal programs there is nothing so close to eternal life on earth as a federal government program. when you get the thing, it is just the dickens

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to get rid of it. it is so tough to get rid of it, mr. speaker. sometimes in my town hall meetings in tennessee i'll have constituents say, why is it so tough to get rid of these programs? we see

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the waste. we know the waste is out there. everybody knows these programs are wasting money. why is it so difficult to call them into accountability? why is it so difficult to get rid of these

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David Dreier: programs? to that, mr. speaker, i'll have to say if you listen to our colleagues from across the aisle this morning when they gave their one-minute speeches then you can see why it is so

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Speech By: David Dreier

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David Dreier: very difficult for us to down size this government. those colleagues across the aisle, democratic members, member after member came to the floor this morning as they do on many days and they decried

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David Dreier: our efforts to make reductions in federal spending. you know, mr. speaker, we spend trillions of dollars to support all sorts of social spending programs yet any reduction or holding the

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David Dreier: line on spending, just not increasing anything, just holding the line, all of a sudden it is called a draconian cut. it is amazing how it works. most americans don't get a massive salary increase

1:27:13 to 1:27:31( Edit History Discussion )

David Dreier: every but have colleagues who think if they are not giving every agency an increase they are getting a cut. it is the most incredible program that you have ever seen. if you don't get an increase,

1:27:31 to 1:27:54( Edit History Discussion )

David Dreier: then you are getting a cut. it doesn't work that way in real life. only in the bureaucracy. we have see it happens year after year after year. i don't think that asking the federal government to

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David Dreier: reduce its spending, i don't think asking contracts to be accountable, i don't think asking agencies to not spend money is uncaring. many of colleagues will come down here and demonize those of

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David Dreier: us who simply want the spending increases stop. i talked a lot about the great society government that was created over 40 years of democratic control of congress. i'll have to tell you, yes,

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David Dreier: indeed, they built an enormous monument, a monument of spending to their party's vision of what government ought to be. a vision in which government solved society's ills and took care of every

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David Dreier: problem by spending more money. mr. speaker, you and i know that vision is a failure. we know it is an absolute failure. you don't solve problems -- you don't solve problems by throwing more money

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David Dreier: at it. many times all you do is mask the problem. and in the long run you make it worse because you're not addressing the causes of the problem. the moveon.org's of the world the democratic

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David Dreier: leadership don't want to admit this, they want to protect and expand their monumental government, this huge bureaucracy in this town, huge bureaucracy. so many of my constituents get frustrated

1:29:25 to 1:29:39( Edit History Discussion )

David Dreier: with it. they want us to break it apart. send the money, send the power back to our states and back to our local governments. they want to keep their paychecks in their pocket. they don't want

1:29:39 to 1:29:54( Edit History Discussion )

David Dreier: the federal government to have first right of refusal on it. they are a little bit confused many times and understandably so. i think all of us are. the democratic leadership wants to keep,

1:29:54 to 1:30:13( Edit History Discussion )

David Dreier: the liberal leadership wants to keep a big, big, big bureaucracy in this town. it's their party's creation, it's their legacy. i am joined by some colleagues tonight who are going to share

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David Dreier: some of their thoughts on the great ideas that we can bring to the table to look at how we're spending the federal government's money. this party and this leadership is the one that is keeping

1:30:28 to 1:30:40( Edit History Discussion )

David Dreier: the attention on spending less and this reducing the size of the federal government. mr. hensarling is joining us tonight and he's a member of the budget committee, and he has had the

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David Dreier: family budget protection act. and mr. hensarling is going to open our conversation this evening and talk a little bit about the budget, the work that they have done in the budget committee,

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David Dreier: the process reforms that we are beginning to look at and move forward, and add to the discussion that we're going to have this week as we continue to work on our plan to yield a savings for

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David Dreier: the american people and to reduce the size of the federal government. and with that i yield to the gentleman from texas. mr. hensarling: i thank the gentlelady for yielding and i especially appreciate

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David Dreier: her leadership in this body on issues of spending, on issues, on budget and trying to protect the family budget from the federal budget and certainly she is one of the most powerful

1:31:29 to 1:31:42( Edit History Discussion )

David Dreier: and articulate members that we have helping lead this charge. mr. speaker, it is that time of year again for the united states house of representatives to consider its budget. now, to some

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David Dreier: people, this is about kind of green eye shade accounting. it's about numbers. frankly, it's a lot more than that. it is about numbers but more important, mr. speaker, it's about values.

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David Dreier: there's going to be a number of budgets that are going to be introduced by different caucuses, different groups. i myself have written a budget. but at the end of the day i think as usual if

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David Dreier: history is our guide this is going to come down to two budgets. the one that was passed by the house budget committee and the democrat alternative. and this body and really the american

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David Dreier: people are going to be faced with two very different choices that represent fundamentally two very different sets of values. one budget, our budget, the budget committee, the house republican

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David Dreier: budget, is going to value the family budget over the federal budget because every time somebody grows a federal program, mr. speaker, it takes away from some family program. ours will be

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David Dreier: a budget that values more freedom. theirs will be a budget that values more government. and we know as one of our founding fathers, thomas jefferson, once said, that as government grows, liberty

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David Dreier: yields. we want a budget about opportunity that empowers people to go out and use their god-given talents in this wonderful land that we call america to be able to put food on their table, to

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David Dreier: put a roof over their head. now, many people will say this is the debate about how much we're going to spend on health care and how much are we going to spend on nutrition programs and

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David Dreier: how much are we going to spend on education programs. well, and to some extent it is a debate about those subjects. but the democrats only value government spending. only government spending. we,

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David Dreier: mr. speaker, value family spending. we want families to do the spending. not government. and we know the difference. and so there will be two very different sets of values that are presented

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David Dreier: in this budget debate now, you're going to hear a lot of things in this budget debate. you're going to hear about which knowledge budget is the more compassionate of the two. well, mr. speaker,

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David Dreier: they are going to present essentially a status quo budget, only worse. right now we are facing a fork in the road. if we don't change things, we know that the great entitlement programs of

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David Dreier: medicare and medicaid and social security are growing way beyond our ability to pay for them. now, the democrats will present their vision and they will claim they want to balance the budget,

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David Dreier: but yet all they want to do is increase spending. mr. speaker, if that's true, if they want to balance the budget, if they want to increase spending, if they refuse to reform any programs,

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David Dreier: and mr. speaker, we know, we know we can get better health care get better retirement security at a different cost. that's a different debate for a different night. if they want to increase

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David Dreier: government spending, if they refuse any reforms, if they want to balance the budget, the general accountability office, the congressional budget office, the liberal brookings institution,

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David Dreier: the conservative heritage foundation, anybody in america who has looked at this dynamic will tell you that we are on the road to double taxes on the american people if we follow their budget.

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David Dreier: double taxes in one generation. so that's something, mr. speaker, as the american people follow this debate that they have to look at quite carefully. now, you'll also hear a lot about budget cuts.

1:35:39 to 1:35:53( Edit History Discussion )

David Dreier: recently i went to webster's dictionary and looked up the word "cut." it actually means to reduce. that's what it means everywhere in america except washington, d.c. in washington, d.c., when we

1:35:53 to 1:36:06( Edit History Discussion )

David Dreier: listen to the democrats it seems to mean something else. and in washington, d.c. what it means is some program is not growing quite as fast as a big government bureaucrat liberal wants it

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David Dreier: to grow. now, mr. speaker, i know you're going to hear a lot about how somehow government spending has been cut over the last few years. well, don't believe me. go to the historic tables of

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David Dreier: the office of management and budget and what you will discover is that over the last decade international affairs has grown by 89.1%. science, space and technology spending at the federal

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David Dreier: level has grown 49.5%. natural resources and environmental spending at the federal level has grown 43.8%. federal agricultural spending has grown 118.1%. federal transportation spending, 83.5%. and

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David Dreier: the list goes on and on and on and on. mr. speaker, over this same time period, guess what -- median family income grew by 33% and inflation grew by 25%. in other words, government just over

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David Dreier: the last decade, just over the last decade, government has been growing far faster than family income. we're growing the federal budget way beyond the ability of the family budget to pay for

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David Dreier: it. and if we all we wanted to do was keep government that we had 10 years ago we would have grown it by inflation. we're growing at twice the rate of inflation. when we start hearing all these

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David Dreier: accusations about cuts, we have to remember how america defines that term and how liberal big-government democrats define that term and those are very two very, very different things. and

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David Dreier: mr. speaker, something else you're going to hear is this debate -- as this debate ensues is nowhere in a $2.8 trillion federal budget can we find any savings whatsoever for the american people.

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David Dreier: mr. speaker, that is just absurd. not only is it absurd, we have to find the savings. if we don't find the savings, again, we will either place massive debt on our children or they will be

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David Dreier: looking at a massive tax increase. recently, mr. speaker, the federal government couldn't account for $24.5 billion that it spent just a couple of years ago. just kind of disappeared into

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David Dreier: thin air. federal auditors who are currently examining all federal programs have reported that 38% of them examined have failed to show any positive impact on the populations they serve. 38% aren't

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David Dreier: meeting the stated goals of when congress published them. wasn't that long ago that the department of defense wasted $100 million on unused flight tickets and never bothered to collect the refunds

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David Dreier: even though the tickets were refundable. mr. speaker, if it's your money or it's my money, my best guess is we're going to go out and get that refund. but there is a truism and that is we're

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David Dreier: never as careful with other people's money as we are on our own. the federal government spends almost $25 billion annually on what is known as earmarks, pork projects, including the infamous

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David Dreier: bridge to nowhere, grants to the rock 'n' roll hall of fame and hey, i love rock 'n' roll, but you know what, last i looked it was a fairly profitable industry and probably didn't need subsidies

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David Dreier: from the federal government. we've had the infamous $800,000 outhouse, the $50 million indoor rain forest in iowa and the list goes on and on and. in the last year -- of the clinton administration

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David Dreier: the department of housing and urban development couldn't account for $10% of their entire budget that just disappeared. 10% of their budget. there is no family in america, there is no small

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David Dreier: business in america that could just watch 10% of their revenues disappear and expect to survive. we have the conservation reserve program paying farmers $2 billion annually not to farm their

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David Dreier: land. we spend over $60 billion on corporate welfare verse us a smaller amount on homeland security. mr. speaker, i could go on all evening. but i've given you this list just to el separate

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David Dreier: -- illustrate a handful of items where we could go out and find savings. again, mr. speaker, what's at stake here? what's at stake here is really the kind of america that we're going to

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David Dreier: leave the next generation. are we going to go with a budget that would take this nation from $8 trillion in debt to who knows, $11 trillion, $12 trillion? or if we're not going to go the debt

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David Dreier: route are we going to increase taxes on our children, double, double taxes? the average american family is paying $20,000 a year combined in their federal taxes. that's what we're paying.

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David Dreier: are we going to expect our children to pay $40,000? how are they ever going to buy a first home, send a kid to college, buy that second car to get that parent to work? is this the kind of america

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David Dreier: we want to leave our children? mr. speaker, this -- this is what this debate is all about. you're going to hear a lot about compassion. but mr. speaker, i don't see any compassion in doubling

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David Dreier: taxes on our children. i see no compassion whatsoever. you're going to hear a lot, again, from the democrats about how we have to increase in federal program and that federal program and

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David Dreier: i want to remind you, these are the people who voted against any tax relief whatsoever for american families and small businesses. and when we back in 2003 enacted tax relief, for small businesses

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David Dreier: and families, guess what, mr. speaker -- five million new jobs were created. and yet the democrats in their budget, what they want to do is they believe somehow paychecks aren't about compassion

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David Dreier: and yet welfare checks are. the compassion of our society to be defined -- should be defined by how many paychecks we create, how many opportunities there are for men and women to use their

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David Dreier: god-given talents and to go out and find good, productive careers. that's how our budget is going to define compassion. their budget is going to define compassion by how much dependency they can

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David Dreier: create, what kind of labyrinth, what kind of tangled labyrinths of welfare can they make people dependent upon? we want to empower people. we want to get people off of welfare onto work so they

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David Dreier: can have careers, they can have opportunities, they can have freedoms that previously they haven't been able to dream of. and those are the two different values that are going to be represented

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David Dreier: in this debate, mr. speaker. and with that i would be more than happy to yield back to the gentlelady and i thank her for the time. mrs. blackburn: i thank the gentleman from texas. and he

1:43:20 to 1:43:41( Edit History Discussion )

David Dreier: is so right when he talks about compassion and what is the compassionate thing to do. mr. speaker, in 1994 the republicans swept in here and took control of this body and have been working ever since

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David Dreier: to turn this ship around and turn that corner so that we look at how we handle the federal purse, how we handle the priorities of the federal government, how we shift that focus and move it

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David Dreier: away from saying let's give government the money and then task government to go solve all the ills to saying you know what, we believe this is government of the people, by the people and

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David Dreier: for the people and we believe the people can solve these problems. they can do it. and we know that most people feel when they see their taxes increase, when they see more of their money going

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David Dreier: to feed the bureaucracy, they know that their freedom has been cut. i'm joined this evening by dr. gingrey who is a member of the rules committee and is going to have a few comments on the

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Alcee L. Hastings: budget and certainly he is a gentleman who knows of compassion and how we should be working with and for our federal man. i yield to the gentleman from georgia. mr. gingrey: i thank the

1:44:38 to 1:52:18( Edit History Discussion )
Speech By: Alcee L. Hastings

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Alcee L. Hastings: gentlelady from tennessee, mr. speaker. it is really an honor to be part of this hour discussion tonight with some of the most fiscally responsible members of this body. my republican colleagues

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Alcee L. Hastings: on the republican study committee. you just heard from the gentleman from texas, you will hear from the gentleman from new jersey, the gentleman from north carolina, the gentleman from ohio. these

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Alcee L. Hastings: are members, mr. speaker, that get it. as mr. hensarling just said, this is really not green eye shade stuff. this is about people and values as he so well pointed out. it is about real needs, real