[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 29 (Tuesday, March 9, 2004)]
[House]
[Page H907]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         ALL HAT AND NO CATTLE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, ``This economy of ours is 
strengthening, and that's positive,'' is what President Bush has said.
  ``Outsourcing is just a new way of doing international trade, and 
that is a good thing.''
  The President says the economy is strengthening, that we are creating 
the jobs. This is the newspaper headline today from the Youngstown 
Vindicator. In the City of Youngstown Ohio, the unemployment rate is 
16.6 percent. In the City of Warren, the unemployment rate is 14 
percent.
  This President's economic policies are not working, yet we get 
rhetoric from this President. The economy is actually getting worse, 
not better, it is not strengthening, it is struggling.
  Just yesterday, we had a field hearing for the No Child Left Behind 
funding issue. A recent study came out and said the State of Ohio needs 
an additional $1.5 billion a year in order to get every single child in 
our State across the finish line and proficient in all the needed 
areas; $1.5 billion a year to do this.
  The President goes on about tax cuts and how these tax cuts are 
stimulating the economy, which they are not. He is cutting necessary 
funds for education, Pell Grants, public health, worker retraining, all 
of the areas that we need funded in order for us to move our economy 
forward and make the proper investments. Instead of economic politics, 
we get election year politics.
  One of the issues one finds mind-boggling, quite frankly, in a recent 
article that says ``Bush all hat and no cattle when it comes to small 
business,'' this President has told us that he is for small business 
and that these tax cuts are going to help small business. We already 
talked about how that is not true.
  I want to share with the American people some of the cuts that this 
administration is making in small business assistance. The President's 
budget entirely eliminates the Micro Loan Program funded within the 
SBA; reduces government guarantees from 75 percent to 50 percent on the 
SBA 7(a) loan program; reduces funding for Small Business Development 
Centers; and slashes the Manufacturing Extension Partnership from $106 
million to a paltry $39 million.
  Where is this manufacturing czar that we have been promised from 
Labor Day? I have shared that before. On Labor Day, the President of 
the United States came to the State of Ohio, and he goes to Richfield, 
Ohio, one of the wealthiest suburbs in the State. He passes up 
Cleveland, he passes up Youngstown, he passes up Akron, Steubenville, 
Toledo, Lima, all the areas that have suffered a complete erosion of 
manufacturing jobs, where the unemployment rate is 14 to 17 percent.
  We are getting no money or very little money for our No Child Left 
Behind program. And all these investments the President said he wants 
to make, we are getting a bunch of hot air from this administration.
  Quite frankly, something needs to be done, because we get the 
rhetoric that says his economic policies are working. We are trying to 
get talked into an economic recovery that is jobless.
  All you have to do, Mr. President, is come to Youngstown, Ohio and 
you will find out your economic policies are not working.

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