[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 34 (Wednesday, March 17, 2004)]
[House]
[Page H1205]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       WASHINGTON WASTE WATCHERS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Bradley of New Hampshire). Under a 
previous order of the House, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hensarling) 
is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. HENSARLING. Mr. Speaker, I rise today, along with several of my 
colleagues from the Washington Waste Watchers, a Republican working 
group dedicated to rooting out the rampant waste, fraud, and abuse in 
the Federal Government.
  Over the last 3 weeks, my colleagues on the Committee on the Budget 
have been discussing the Federal budget and debating the growth of 
government spending. With a historically large deficit and with Federal 
spending now exceeding $20,000 per American household for only the 
fourth time in American history and for the first time since World War 
II, many Democrats say, it is time to raise taxes yet again on the 
American people. Democrats are demanding that we roll back the tax 
relief that is responsible for the unparalleled growth that we have had 
in our economy, the tax relief that is bringing down our unemployment, 
the tax relief that amounts to only 1 percent, 1 percent of the $13.1 
trillion 5-year spending plan the Committee on the Budget approved 
today. In other words, 99 percent of our budget woes lay on the 
spending side.
  Clearly, Mr. Speaker, we have a spending problem, not a taxing 
problem in this town. And I, for one, say it is time to take the trash 
out of Washington. It is time to go after the costly waste, fraud, and 
abuse that permeate every nook and cranny in our Federal Government.
  Albert Einstein once said that the definition of insanity was doing 
the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. 
Well, Mr. Speaker, each and every year, we pour more money into the 
Federal Government with scant accountability; and we continue to throw 
billions of dollars of American taxpayers' money away in waste, fraud, 
and abuse.
  Let me discuss just a few examples. The Office of National Drug 
Control Policy awarded one advertising agency a $150 million grant to 
craft ads keeping American youth away from drugs, even though this 
company had a history of overbilling the Federal Government. In 2002 
the firm had to repay the government $1.8 million for overstating its 
labor costs, and some representatives of the company are currently 
under indictment for filing false claims. Now, the ads are part of a 5-
year, $1 billion campaign whose effectiveness has been greatly 
scrutinized. A private research firm concluded that teenagers viewing 
the ads were no less likely to use drugs than if they had not viewed 
them and that some were even more likely to use drugs. False claims and 
ineffective ads, yet Democrats want to raise our taxes to pay for more 
of this.
  The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services, CMS, is currently 
undertaking a major crackdown on phoney claims for power wheelchairs 
and has recovered $52.5 million thus far. One 89-year-old from Florida 
said that she and her husband were approached by a salesperson who 
pressured them into an unnecessary order. Medicare was then billed 
$15,500 for two scooters, a hospital bed, and a pressure mattress, none 
of which was needed. Another senior citizen testified in court that a 
claim had been submitted without her approval. She then demonstrated 
her lack of a need for a wheelchair by walking before the jurors. Mr. 
Speaker, $52 million in fraud, yet Democrats want to raise our taxes to 
pay for even more of this.
  The Drug Enforcement Agency contracts with the private sector to get 
translators and transcribers in many of its field divisions. However, 
the Inspector General's Office found such loose controls were in place 
that $2.8 million of the $9.4 million paid was going to unauthorized 
and unallowable expenses. Yet Democrats want to raise taxes to pay for 
more of this.
  In the year 2000, an investigation discovered that the Department of 
Energy spent more than $38 million developing information systems that 
it already had. They already had the systems in place. Yet Democrats 
want to raise taxes to pay for more of this.
  Mr. Speaker, these are just a few examples of the rampant waste in 
our Federal Government. After we begin to look closely, we see that so 
many Federal programs routinely lose 10, 20, even 30 percent of their 
taxpayer-funded budgets to waste, fraud, and abuse and have for years.
  There are so many different ways that we can save money in Washington 
without cutting any needed services or without raising taxes as our 
Democrat colleagues seek to do. Because when it comes to Federal 
programs, it is not how much money we spend that counts, it is how 
Washington spends the money that counts.

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