[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 42 (Wednesday, April 5, 2006)]
[House]
[Pages H1543-H1549]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           THE FEDERAL BUDGET

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 4, 2005, the gentlewoman from Tennessee (Mrs. Blackburn) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
  Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, it is budget week here in the U.S. House 
of Representatives, and sometimes we hear people say, Oh, no, I just 
dread it when we get around to talking about this budget. And then we 
will hear others say, I love to just really tackle this budget issue. I 
love looking at where we spend our money. And I kind of appreciate that 
attitude because we are the stewards of the taxpayers' money and it is 
our responsibility to be a good steward and to be diligent in the work 
we are going to do as we work on this budget and decide what should the 
priorities of our government be? What should be our concerns? Where 
should we be looking for ways to achieve a savings?
  And over the past several months, actually over the past 3 years, we 
have come to the floor regularly to talk about waste, fraud, and abuse 
and find ways and point out ways and to continue to seek ways that we 
can achieve a savings for the American people.
  And from time to time over the past few years, we have talked about 
lots of different reports. Many different reports from different 
government agencies, from the General Accounting Office, from some of 
our friends who are in the media that have pointed out programs that 
maybe have outlived their usefulness, programs that are wasting money, 
programs that cannot achieve a clean audit. And some of our colleagues, 
we have worked on ways that we can go in and investigate and highlight 
and look at what this drain is on our tax dollars. And we have House 
committees, certainly the Government Reform Committee, that continue to 
hold hearings. Oversight and investigations from our Energy and 
Commerce Committee are certainly looking at ways to achieve a savings 
and find ways to review how our agencies are spending their money.
  We have clear data showing places where the Federal Government is 
bleeding funds. And the President's budget this year has included more 
than 100 programs that could and should be targeted, Mr. Speaker. So 
the target for spending reductions is clearly enormous. We have got 100 
programs, 100, that we can look at through so many different agencies 
and so many different spots in the Federal Government. Now, certainly, 
out of 100 programs, we are going to be able to find a way to achieve a 
savings.
  One of the interesting things is no matter what part of this country 
that you are in and no matter whose district that you are in, whether 
it is a Democrat or a Republican, there is consensus among the American 
people that we have a problem. Government does not have a revenue 
problem; government has a spending problem. Government does not have a 
revenue problem; government has a priority problem. It is time that we 
begin to fine tune our focus and decide what the priority of government 
ought to be.
  The taxpayers pay far too much of their paycheck in taxes. They are 
tired of every time somebody comes up with a good idea, they say well 
let us just go raise the taxes. And, Mr. Speaker, I tell you what, if 
it were not for the leadership in this House, we would see those taxes 
going up. If our friends across the aisle had their way, they would be 
raising taxes, not cutting programs. That is not where we want to go. 
We know it is tough to eliminate waste.
  I often quote Ronald Reagan, who is pretty close to my favorite 
President ever, I will have to say that, but one of my favorite 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 to get rid of 
it. It is so tough to get rid of it, Mr. Speaker.
  Sometimes in my townhall meetings in Tennessee, I will have 
constituents say, Why is it so tough to get rid of these programs? We 
see 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 programs?
  And to that, Mr. Speaker, I will have to say if you listen to our 
colleagues from across the aisle this morning when they gave their 1 
minute speeches, then you can see why it is so very difficult for us to 
downsize 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 our efforts to make reductions in 
Federal spending.
  Mr. Speaker, we spend trillions of dollars to support all sorts of 
social spending programs; yet any reduction or even holding the line on 
spending, 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 do not get a massive salary increase every year. But 
we have colleagues that think if they are not giving every agency an 
increase every year, then they are getting a cut. It is the most 
incredible, most incredible, program that you have ever seen. If you do 
not get an increase, then you are getting a cut.

                              {time}  2015

  It does not work that way in real life, only in the bureaucracy. We 
have to look at this and see that it happens year after year after 
year.
  You know, I don't think that asking the Federal Government to reduce 
its spending, I don't think asking bureaucrats to be accountable, I 
don't think asking agencies to be accountable and get clean audits and 
know where they are spending their money is evil. I don't think it is 
uncaring. But many of our colleagues across the aisle will come down 
here and demonize those of us who simply want the spending increases to 
stop.
  I have talked a lot about the Great Society government that was 
created over 40 years of Democratic control of Congress, and I will 
have to tell you, yes, 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

[[Page H1544]]

took care of every problem by spending more money.
  Mr. Speaker, you and I know that 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 at them. Many times all you do is mask 
the problem. In the long run, you make it worse, because you are not 
addressing the causes of the problem.
  The moveon.orgs of the world, the Democratic leadership, they 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 with it. They want us to break 
it apart; to 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 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, of why the Democratic leadership wants to keep, 
why the liberal leadership wants to keep, a big, big, big bureaucracy 
in this town. But it is their party's creation. It is their legacy.
  I am joined by some colleagues tonight who are going to share some of 
their thoughts on the great ideas that we can bring to the table to 
look at how we are spending the Federal Government's money. This party 
and this leadership is the one that is keeping the attention on 
spending less and reducing the size of the Federal Government.
  Mr. Hensarling is joining us tonight. He is a member of the Budget 
Committee, and he has had the Family Budget Protection Act. 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, the process reforms that we are beginning to look at and 
move forward, and add to the discussion that we are going to have this 
week as we continue to work on our plan to yield savings for the 
American people and to reduce the size of the Federal Government.
  With that, I yield to the gentleman from Texas.
  Mr. HENSARLING. Well, I thank the gentlelady for yielding, and I 
especially appreciate her leadership in this body on issues of 
spending, on issues of budget and trying to protect the family budget 
from the Federal budget. Certainly she is one of the most powerful 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. To some people, this 
is about kind of green eyeshade accounting. It is about numbers. 
Frankly, it is a lot more than that. It is about numbers. But, more 
important, Mr. Speaker, it is about values.
  There are 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 
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 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 
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 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 
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 put a roof over 
their head.
  Now, many people will say this is the debate about how much we are 
going to spend on health care and how much are we going to spend on 
nutrition programs and how much are we going to spend on education 
programs. To some extent, it is a debate about those subjects.
  But the Democrats only value government spending, only government 
spending. We, Mr. Speaker, value family spending. We want families to 
do the spending, not government, and we know the difference. So, there 
will be two very different sets of values that are present presented in 
this budget debate.
  You are going to hear a lot of things in this budget debate. You are 
going to hear about which budget is the more compassionate of the two. 
Well, Mr. Speaker, 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 Medicare and 
Medicaid and Social Security are growing way beyond our ability to pay 
for them.
  The Democrats will present their vision, and they will claim they 
want to balance the budget, but yet all they want to do is increase 
spending.
  Mr. Speaker, if that is true, if they want to balance the budget, if 
they want to increase spending, if they refuse to reform any programs, 
and, Mr. Speaker, we know, we know, we can get better health care, we 
can get better retirement security at a lower cost. That is a different 
debate for a different night. If they want to increase government 
spending, if they refuse any reforms, if they want to balance the 
budget, well, Mr. Speaker, the General Accounting Office, the Office of 
Management and Budget, the Congressional Budget Office, the liberal 
Brookings Institution, 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. 
Double taxes in one generation.
  So that is something, Mr. Speaker, as the American people follow this 
debate, they have to look at quite carefully.
  Now, you will also hear a lot about budget cuts. Well, recently I 
went to Webster's dictionary and looked up the word ``cut.'' It 
actually means to reduce. That is what it means everywhere in America 
except Washington, D.C. In Washington, D.C., when we listen to the 
Democrats, it seems to mean something else. In Washington, D.C., what 
it means is some program is not growing quite as fast as a big 
government bureaucrat liberal wants it to grow.
  Mr. Speaker, I know you are 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 the Office of Management and 
Budget. What you will discover is over the last decade, international 
affairs has grown by 89.1 percent; science, space and technology 
spending at the Federal level has grown 49.5 percent; natural resources 
and environmental spending at the Federal level has grown 43.8 percent; 
Federal agricultural spending has grown 118.1 percent; Federal 
transportation spending has grown 83.5 percent. The list goes on and on 
and on.
  Mr. Speaker, over this same time period, guess what? Median family 
income grew by 33 percent and inflation grew by 25 percent. In other 
words, government, just over the last decade, just over the last 
decade, government has been growing far faster than family income.
  We are growing the Federal budget way beyond the ability of the 
family budget to pay for it, and if all we wanted to do was keep 
government that we had 10 years ago, we would have grown it by 
inflation. We are growing it at twice the rate of inflation.
  So, Mr. Speaker, when we start hearing all these accusations about 
cuts, we have to remember how America defines that term and how liberal 
big government Democrats define that term, and those are two very, very 
different things.
  Mr. Speaker, something else you are going to hear as this debate 
ensues is nowhere in a $2.8 trillion Federal budget can we find any 
savings whatsoever for the American people. Well, 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 looking at a massive tax increase.

[[Page H1545]]

  Recently, Mr. Speaker, the Federal Government could not account for 
$24.5 billion that it spent just a couple of years ago. It just kind of 
disappeared into thin air. Federal auditors who are currently examining 
all Federal programs have reported that 38 percent of them examined 
have failed to show any positive impact on the populations they serve. 
Thirty-eight percent are not meeting the stated goals of when Congress 
published them.
  It wasn't that long ago that the Department of Defense wasted $100 
million on unused flight tickets and never bothered to collect the 
refunds, even though the tickets were refundable. Mr. Speaker, if it is 
your money or it is my money, my best guess is we are going to go out 
and get that refund. But, you know, there is a truism, and that is we 
are never as careful with other people's money as we are with our own.

  The Federal Government spends almost $25 billion annually on what is 
known as earmarks, pork projects, including the infamous bridge to 
nowhere, grants to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. Hey, I love rock & 
roll, but, you know what? The last I looked, it was a fairly profitable 
industry and probably didn't need subsidies from the Federal 
Government. We had the infamous $800,000 outhouse, the rain forest in 
Iowa, and the list goes on and on and on.
  In the last year of the Clinton administration, the Department of 
Housing and Urban Development couldn't account for $3.3 billion in 
overpayments. Ten percent of their entire budget just disappeared, 10 
percent of their budget. There is no family in America, there is no 
small business in America, that could just watch 10 percent of their 
revenues disappear and expect to survive.
  We have the Conservation Reserve Program paying farmers $2 billion 
annually not to farm their land. We spend over $60 billion on corporate 
welfare versus a smaller amount on homeland security.
  Mr. Speaker, I could go on all evening, but I have given you this 
list just to illustrate a handful of items where we could go out and we 
could find savings.
  Again, Mr. Speaker, what is at stake here? What is at stake here is 
really the kind of America we are going to 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 
are not going to go the debt route? Are we going to increase taxes on 
our children, double taxes?
  The average American family is paying $20,000 a year combined in 
their Federal taxes. That is what we are paying. Are we going to expect 
our children to pay $40,000? How are they going to buy a first home or 
send a kid to college or buy that second car to get that parent to 
work? Is this the kind of America we want to leave our children?
  Mr. Speaker, this is what this debate is all about. You are going to 
hear a lot about compassion, but, Mr. Speaker, I don't see any 
compassion in doubling taxes on our children. I see no compassion there 
whatsoever.
  You are going to hear a lot again from the Democrats about how we 
have to increase this Federal program and that Federal program. I want 
to remind you, these are the people who voted against any tax relief 
whatsoever for American families and small businesses.
  When we back in 2003 enacted tax relief for small businesses and 
families, guess what, Mr. Speaker? Five million new jobs were created. 
Yet the Democrats in their budget, what they want to do is, they 
believe that somehow paychecks are not about compassion, and yet 
welfare checks are. The compassion of our society should be defined by 
how many paychecks we create, how many opportunities there are for men 
and women to use their God-given talents and to go out and find good 
productive careers. That is how our budget is going to define 
compassion.
  Their budget is going to define compassion by how much dependency 
they can create, what kind of labyrinth, what kind of tangled labyrinth 
of welfare can they make people more dependent upon. We want to empower 
people. We want to get people off of welfare and on to work so that 
they can have careers, so they can have opportunities, so they can have 
freedoms that previously they haven't been able to dream of.

                              {time}  2030

  And those are the two different values that are going to be 
represented in this debate, Mr. Speaker.
  Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Texas is so right 
when he talks about the 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 to turn this ship around 
and turn that corner so that we look at how we handled the Federal 
purse, how we handle the priorities of the Federal Government, how we 
shift that focus and move it away from saying, let us give government 
the money, and then task government to go solve all the ills to say, we 
believe this is government of the people, by the people, and for the 
people, and we believe the people can solve these problems. They can do 
it.
  We know that most people feel when they see their taxes increase, 
when they see more of their money going to feed that bureaucracy, they 
know that their freedom has been cut.
  Mr. Speaker, I am joined this evening by Dr. Gingrey, who is a member 
of the Rules Committee and is going to have a few comments on the 
budget. Certainly, he is a gentleman who knows of compassion and how we 
should be working with and for our Federal man.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Georgia.
  Mr. GINGREY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from Tennessee. 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 on the Republican Study Committee, that you just heard from 
the gentleman from Texas, you will be hearing from others, the 
gentleman from New Jersey, the gentleman from North Carolina, the 
gentlewoman from Ohio. These 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 as distinct from just wanting more, more, more.
  Mr. Speaker, my dad told me one time when I was just a teenager, he 
said, ``Somebody asked a very rich person one time, what would it take 
to make him happy?'' And the answer was, ``Just a little bit more.'' 
That is a problem that we have in trying to satisfy all of the wants 
and not necessarily just the real needs.
  Mr. Speaker, my colleagues here tonight and on this side of the aisle 
are committed to restoring some fiscal sanity to this place, and I 
commend Mr. Hensarling in particular. I have told him in private that 
he is our modern day William Proxmire of the 109th, and indeed, the 
108th Congress as we came in together in regarding to ferreting out 
waste, fraud, and abuse in this Federal Government. In fact, that was 
our class project that the gentlewoman from Tennessee and myself and 
others in the 108th class were determined to do, and that is what we 
are doing.
  Mr. Speaker, we have talked about the other side and what they want 
to do and their plans. The tax cuts of 2001 and 2003 is an example of 
what they did not do. They voted no for those tax cuts. They said we 
cannot do that. That is going to, according to the Congressional Budget 
Office, when you do this static scoring, we are going to cut taxes, we 
are going to cut rates for everybody that pay taxes. We are going to 
lower capital gains, we are going to lower the tax on dividends, which 
indeed is a double taxation.
  We are going to get rid of the marriage tax penalty. We are going to 
increase child tax credit from $600 to $1,000 per child. We are going 
to finally stomp dead the death tax. As Steve Forbes once said, there 
should be no taxation without respiration.
  We did these things, and the opposition said, well, that is going to 
cost $1.3 trillion over 10 years. Mr. Speaker, you know, I know, my 
colleagues know, I hope the American people know that it did not cost 
us any money. We gained revenue, something like $250 billion over 10 
years. That is what happened in 1960 under Democratic President 
Kennedy; it happened in 1980 under my colleague's favorite,

[[Page H1546]]

maybe all-time favorite President Reagan. We cut taxes, we raised 
revenue, and it works. The opposition, they not only oppose that, but 
they also opposed health care reform, Medicare modernization, 
Prescription Drug Act. They said that is going to cost $750 billion 
over 10 years. But of course, actually, their plan, if we had done what 
they wanted us to do, would have probably cost $3 trillion over 10 
years.
  Mr. Speaker, the fact is, it was only going to cost that money if it 
did not work. And what we are finding today, as we are getting closer 
and closer to that deadline of May 15, the 6-month opportunity for 
seniors to take that option and sign up for prescription drug benefit, 
we are reaching our goal. We are beyond our goal. Seniors are saying, 
members of my own family, my mom, my brother, constituents in my 
district saying, ``Thank you, Congressman. We are saving money.'' I 
have had people spending $900 a month who found out they qualified for 
the low income supplement and now are spending $27 a month, they are 
saving $900 a month.
  We wanted to do Social Security reform to give individuals an 
opportunity to have an individual personal account. What does the other 
side do? They fight that. They are the party of no, of negative.
  But these are the things that this majority and particularly the 
Members here tonight, Mr. Speaker, are determined to do for the 
American people: To reform government, to save money, to let people put 
that money back into the family budget, as Mr. Hensarling has pushed so 
hard for.
  This budget that we are going to vote on, this 2007 budget is a very 
fiscally sound, responsible budget. It virtually freezes nondefense 
discretionary spending at the 2006 level. Again, the other side will 
say, well, you are taking money away from the school children, you are 
taking money away from Head Start, you are taking money away from 
social welfare programs. Not at all, Mr. Speaker. All we are doing is 
putting a cap on discretionary spending, and then we are saying to the 
appropriators: You decide where that money needs to be spent. You 
decide whether cuts really need to be made and whether plus-ups need to 
be made. And that is the responsible way to do it.
  In conclusion I want to say, too, to the chairman of the Budget 
Committee, the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Nussle) and the great job that 
he has done and his willingness to include in this 2007 budget a rainy 
day fund. This is something that all of the Members here tonight who 
are speaking during this hour have been calling for and for a number of 
years saying, look, we know every year that we are going to have a 
hurricane, we are going to have a natural disaster.
  It may not be every year, but all of a sudden you go a couple of 
years and then you have a Katrina. So we need to fund this based on a 
10-year average of how much we spend on a natural disaster and 
emergency. So this is in the budget, $4 billion for each of the next 5 
years. I think that is absolutely responsible.
  In addition to that, we are going to come forward with a line item 
veto. The President needs it, the Congress wants it, and we are going 
to get that done. We are also going to have the earmark reforms that 
Congressman Flake has called for shine the light of day on those 
earmarks, some of which are very good and should be included in the 
budget; and last but not least, of course, a sunset commission.
  Mr. Speaker, as I say, it is an honor. I know we want to hear from 
our other colleagues on this issue. But I commend the gentlewoman from 
Tennessee for her continued work on fiscal responsibility and putting 
together this hour tonight and giving us a chance to weigh in on it.
  Mrs. BLACKBURN. I thank the gentleman from Georgia, and I appreciate 
so much that he calls our attention to some of the issues that are at 
hand.
  Mr. Speaker, for any of our colleagues who are looking for more 
information on the House budget, they can go to the Web site gop.gov, 
and pull down the House Budget Resolution fact sheet.
  Here is some interesting information on it, and it goes back to what 
Mr. Hensarling was talking about on the budget. It is a $2.7 trillion 
budget authority. One of the things that is so important in this is 
when you look at the discretionary, it is a 3.6 percent increase over 
what we had in fiscal year 2006. We did some interesting things here, 
and Chairman Nussle is to be commended for this. We have a $50 billion 
placeholder in here for our war effort cost.
  We have money for Katrina or for emergencies such as Katrina. Then we 
go in and we look at our discretionary spending, a near freeze in 
nonsecurity discretionary spending. A near freeze. Quite amazing, is 
not it, when you think about the growth that year after year after year 
took place. And I would encourage the individuals that are listening to 
this over TV tonight to call their legislators. Call us. Let us know 
what we think. We love to hear from you.

  We have another Budget Committee member, and leader who is with us 
tonight, the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Garrett), who is going to 
have a few things to say, and then we are going to invite some of our 
other colleagues in.
  Mr. GARRETT of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlelady for 
this opportunity. I applaud her for being here not only tonight, but on 
so many nights when you bring these important issues to the American 
public. I will be brief, and I just want to go back to one of your very 
first comments that you made as you began this night's program.
  You started out by saying, ``I do not know whether people who are 
listening here tonight are going to be interested on this debate on the 
budget or whether they are not. Some people are going to be interested, 
other people are not.''
  I think the debate that we have here in Congress when it comes down 
to the Federal budget in reality is absolutely no different than the 
debate that goes around the kitchen table in the families across 
America, once, twice, three times a month with regard to the family 
budget. That is really all we are doing here, is we are just one large 
family, the American family and the American family budget.
  You know, back at home right now, as I say, once or twice a month, 
people probably sit down as I do with the household checkbook, and you 
sit there with a stack of bills on the one side and you write out the 
checks to pay for them, whether it is the electric bill or the gas bill 
or other utility bills, the rent or the mortgage or other expenses that 
you have, maybe some more luxurious items, going out to eat or buying 
videos or other luxuries, a new car or what have you. And, at the end 
of it, at the end of that evening as you write out that check, you hope 
that you are able to write out that last check and that there was money 
in your checking account to pay for all those necessary and extra 
bills. But if there was not, if at the end of it you look at it and you 
say, ``Gee, there just is not enough money going around this month,'' 
what does the American family have to do with their budget? What they 
have to do is set priorities, set boundaries, set parameters, set a 
limit as to what they are able to do next month in their budget.
  This is nothing different than what the Founding Fathers of this 
country said. Madison said in Federalist Number 45 that: The powers of 
the Federal Government are few and limited, but the powers of the 
States and the people are numerous and indefinite.
  For that reason, we come to the Budget Committee and the budget 
process here in the Federal level realizing that those are limits on us 
and what we have to do so that we can protect the American family 
budget.
  So I applaud you for doing what needs to be done here, and we can 
discuss later today and at other times, what are those priorities, and 
what are those waste, fraud, and abuse, as Mr. Hensarling has addressed 
in the past, that we must do to cut out so we put more priorities back 
into the family budget.
  Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New Jersey 
for his thoughts. He is such a thoughtful member of our Republican 
Conference, and a thoughtful and studious member of the Budget 
Committee, and the ideas that he brings forth are very important to us, 
because that is what we bring, ideas. How are we going to work through 
this process of reducing what the Federal Government spends?

[[Page H1547]]

How are we going to work through the process of being certain that 
Federal agencies are called into accountability for how they spend your 
money?

                              {time}  2045

  This is not the government's money. It is the taxpayers' money, and 
we need to remember that every single day.
  A gentleman who does a great job of reminding us that it is the 
taxpayers' money is the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. McHenry), 
and at this time I yield to Mr. McHenry.
  Mr. McHENRY. Mr. Speaker, thank you. I certainly appreciate your 
leadership and support on these budget issue. They are so important to 
every working family in America and so vital to the debate we are going 
to have tomorrow and on Friday on the Federal budget here in 
Washington, D.C.
  I also want to commend my colleagues Mr. Gingrey, Mr. Garrett and Mr. 
Hensarling, who I have worked extensively with on budget issues, and I 
am so happy that Congresswoman Schmidt joined us as well.
  I think it is important that we let the American people know how we 
are spending their money and what this debate here in Washington, D.C., 
on our Federal budget means to average Americans.
  The Democrats in the left wing represented here often times in loud 
ways, but represented here in this body, will scream that Republicans 
are cutting too much, they are hurting people. They scream, they yell 
and it is just all about emotion with them, and when you get down to 
what we are doing as Republicans, as conservatives, as the majority in 
this House, you see that we are just trying to reform government so it 
more efficiently provides services for people.
  I know the American people would understand, Mr. Speaker, and see 
that there are programs out there that are no longer fulfilling their 
purpose or their mission. There are government bureaucrats who are not 
working as we need them to work. We have useless bureaucracies here in 
Washington, D.C., that in the name of big government continue to grow 
and prosper, all the while siphoning off money from every American, 
every American family.
  What we are saying is conservatives have to look at those programs, 
and if they are not providing a service, if we have empty buildings, 
that perhaps we need to sell those empty buildings and gain revenue for 
the Treasury so we do not have to raid the American taxpayers' 
treasuries and the working families' treasuries.
  As conservatives, we understand that this is the American people's 
money, that it is not, as some in the left would say, the government's 
money. No, it is the American taxpayers' money, and we need to be 
diligent on how we spend our tax money, your tax money, my tax money 
here in Washington, D.C.
  I am so happy that we are going to begin this debate because I think 
the American people will see the more fiscal party is the Republican 
Party, and I think they will understand the leadership we are trying to 
provide to change the direction of the ship of state, and in order to 
change the direction of a ship, you cannot turn on a dime. We are 
talking about a $2.7 trillion budget, so enormous, but if we can just 
change the direction ever so slightly, it will have an impact over 
time, and that is what we are trying to begin now, Mr. Speaker.
  I want to commend my colleague Congresswoman Blackburn from Tennessee 
for leading this debate, this colloquy here on the floor, and I think 
she, of everyone here in the House, has been so outspoken in talking 
about what this means to the taxpayers.
  When she goes back to Tennessee, they do not know Marsha Blackburn as 
the Congresswoman. They know Marsha Blackburn as the leader of fighting 
taxes in Tennessee, of stopping that income tax that they wanted to put 
in place in Tennessee just a few years ago, and she is bringing that 
same leadership here to say, wait a second, let us look at our fiscal 
house because if we spend recklessly, they are going to tax recklessly, 
and that means that every American, instead of paying for their 
children's books, paying for their children's college, providing for 
their families, their perhaps retired parents or their children coming 
up, buying a new car or actually owning a home, that they will have to 
only pay their tax bill instead of doing those things.
  So we need to look at how we spend money because that is directly 
tied to how we take money from the taxpayers. I appreciate your 
leadership.
  Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from North 
Carolina, and as he said, it is so important that we keep the attention 
on both sides of this ledger, that we hone that focus and just target 
it, what we are taking in and what we are spending.
  When we go back and we look at the 2003 tax cuts, we know that 91 
million Americans saw a tax reduction of about $1,100. That is real 
money. We also know that when government takes more of that paycheck, 
that the individuals are not making choices, that the government is 
making choices, and that is where we see a decrease in our freedom.
  The gentleman is so correct. It is the debate of ideas and putting 
new ideas on the table that is so very important, and we are joined, as 
you mentioned, by the gentlewoman from Ohio (Mrs. Schmidt), who has a 
few thoughts to offer on the line item veto and some of the ideas that 
are being offered for our budget process, and I yield to the 
gentlewoman.
  Mrs. SCHMIDT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from Tennessee. I 
appreciate the opportunity to talk tonight, Mr. Speaker, about an 
important tool that would I believe help eliminate wasteful spending.
  When I was first elected to Congress last August, I pledged to be a 
fiscal conservative for the residents of the 2nd District of Ohio. 
Taking a fiscally disciplined approach to government has always been 
one of my top priorities as an elected official. I am committed, as my 
colleagues on this side of the aisle are, to seeking out and supporting 
common-sense measures that promote fiscal responsibility and curb 
government spending.
  That is why I cosponsored and strongly support the Line Item Veto Act 
of 2006, which the President recently sent to Congress. The line item 
veto would be a useful tool designed to reduce the budget deficit, 
improve accountability and ensure that taxpayer dollars are spent 
wisely.
  Many people are surprised to learn that the President currently has 
no power to remove wasteful or unnecessary spending in appropriations 
bills or other pieces of legislation that are presented to him. 
Oftentimes, provisions are slipped into a larger spending bill that 
never gets discussed or debated. The result is more spending in the 
Federal budget.
  The Legislative Line Item Veto Act would allow the President the 
authority to line out unjustified spending items, eliminate new 
entitlement spending from larger legislation, and return the bill to 
Congress for consideration. The Congress, us, would then have 10 days 
to vote on each and every proposed cut.
  I am proud to say this is a bipartisan issue. Leaders and Members of 
the Republican and Democratic side of this aisle, in both the House and 
the Senate, have supported this approach in the past. They have. In 
fact, in 1996, the Congress gave the President a line-item veto but the 
Supreme Court struck down that version of the law in 1998 because the 
Court felt that the act gave the President too much power to change the 
text of enacted statutes.
  But this Line Item Veto Act does not raise those constitutional 
issues because the President's rescission proposals must be approved by 
a majority in Congress and signed into law. So we do have congressional 
oversight.
  Forty-three governments, including my own in Ohio, have the line-item 
veto to reduce spending, and I believe now is the time to give the 
President of the United States a similar tool to help control spending 
in the Federal budget.
  The line Item Veto Act is not about giving the President more power 
or taking power away from Members of Congress. This legislation is 
about ensuring that hard-earned taxpayer dollars are spent more wisely, 
and that is our mission, is it not, to spend the taxpayer dollars more 
wisely, more efficiently, more prudently.
  While I do believe that this legislation will go a long way toward 
identifying and eliminating waste in government, I caution this body to 
realize this is not the only solution. This is one of many, and I am 
committed to

[[Page H1548]]

working with my colleagues in Congress on both sides of the aisle to 
seek out other ways to promote fiscal responsibility and curb spending.
  Thank you, and I commend my good colleague from Tennessee for taking 
on this issue and all the Members that are here.
  Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman, and it is so 
true. We are to spend wisely, and this week, as we look at this year's 
budget, there are some things that you will hear us talking, some 
themes that will bear themselves out as we talk about this budget this 
week. As I said, you can go to the Budget Committee Web site, through 
house.gov or go to gop.gov, our colleagues can, and get more 
information on the budget.
  We are going to talk about strength and how we look at strength and 
security in this budget. We look at defense, homeland security, 
national security. We are going to talk about spending control, the 
issue that we have talked about tonight, how we work on waste, fraud 
and abuse, how we seek that savings and continue to seek that savings 
for the American people and how we continue to push for reform, so that 
government avails itself of every possible efficiency, every possible 
efficiency that is out there to be certain that the taxpayer is 
receiving the best buy for their dollar.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Garrett).
  Mr. GARRETT of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for 
yielding.
  When we talk about the Federal budget, sometimes the numbers are just 
so large that it goes out of our sphere of understanding, as I was 
referencing before our conversation with regard to the family budget 
and the dollars that they spend there, but at the end of the day the 
issue has really come down to the exact same thing, and that is, are 
you taking in as much money, income, your paycheck, what have you, 
through Federal tax revenues as you are paying out at the end of the 
day? Do you have a balanced budget? Do you have a paycheck?
  That is a problem for the American family. This is a problem for the 
States, as well as the gentlewoman knows I come from the great State of 
New Jersey, and people from New Jersey know right now our State is 
having a difficult time with the State budget. Other people are looking 
in and they realize we are having a difficult time with the State 
budget. We have a new Governor who is trying to deal with this issue. 
As a matter of fact, in the State of New Jersey, we are looking at a $6 
billion shortfall in revenue coming in. What that means is that we have 
less money coming in than is going out at the end of the day for the 
State treasurer when he writes out his checkbook at the end of each 
day.
  But what the State of New Jersey has to do now, of course, is the 
same thing as the family budget. That is, they have to set priorities, 
boundaries or limits, but so, too, does the Federal Government.
  The Federal Government is basically on some of the items that you 
have already raised. We have to decide what are the priorities of the 
Federal Government.
  I think one major word that you described for almost all of them is 
security: homeland security, economic security.
  In the area of homeland security, if you look at the budget that came 
out of the Budget Committee that I serve on, we are planning to spend a 
3.8 percent increase in homeland security to make sure that Americans 
at home feel more secure, that our borders are secure, that the 
Department of Homeland Security and the people that work for them have 
adequate money in order to get the job done.
  Another area, of course, for us in the area of security is defense. 
We want to make sure that we are able to protect our Nation, protect 
the freedoms and the liberties that our Fore Fathers have fought and 
other generations have fought since that time. For that reason, in this 
budget, we will be seeing a 7 percent increase in defense.
  Veterans, of course, is another area that this budget does not skimp 
on at all, and I think the gentleman from Texas gave some of the 
numbers before as far as the policy and the goals of this 
administration and of this Republican Congress to make sure that our 
veterans are adequately taken care of and protected.
  So this budget does continue what this Republican Congress has done 
in the past. It sets out what the appropriate priorities have got to be 
for this Congress and for this Nation, and once we establish those 
priorities, we can establish our spending.
  Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman talked about priorities 
and where the priorities are in this budget. I think that is one of 
things that our colleagues will want to watch over the next couple of 
the days because over the past decade, we saw discretionary spending 
increase by an average of 7 percent each year. What we have done in 
last year's budget and this budget is to come to a near freeze in 
nonsecurity discretionary spending.

                              {time}  2100

  And that is so important, because that points to the priorities that 
you have mentioned and the gentleman from Texas has mentioned and the 
gentleman from North Carolina has mentioned.
  Mr. GARRETT of New Jersey. And if the gentlewoman will yield. After 
anyone, a State or a family or the Federal Government sets its 
priorities, the second half of the equation then must be what are the 
items that don't rise to that level of a significant priority? Where 
are those areas, again as Mr. Hensarling referred to that we can begin 
to say maybe we should not be spending all the money that we have been 
in the past. And I would humbly suggest a couple that I would at least 
suggest that may not be the top priorities.
  Some of the areas where we could see some savings, for example, the 
Great Ape Conservation program, the Rhinoceros and Tiger Conservation 
program, the African Elephant Conservation program. Certain areas and 
important issues, I am sure, but when you compare them against making 
sure our veterans have the TRICARE services they need, I would say they 
pale in comparison.
  How about the exchanges with Historic Whaling and Trading Partners 
program, or the Native Hawaiian Vocational Educational program, or the 
Native Hawaii Health Care program, for that matter.
  Mrs. BLACKBURN. If the gentleman will yield, earlier we talked about 
our colleagues across the aisle and this morning how they were 
bemoaning the fact that we were going to freeze spending or reduce 
spending, or if they weren't going to get everything they wanted, then 
it is considered a cut. Now that is government speak, as the gentleman 
from Texas said. That is government speak. It is not really a cut.
  But we have to realize that every single time, every single time we 
start to make reductions in what the Federal Government spends, there 
are some who try to keep us from doing that. And their answer is 
always, we need more money. Government can't afford that cut. 
Government can't afford that tax reduction.
  And as you said, it is so important that we differentiate between 
this.
  Mr. McHENRY. If the gentlewoman will yield, and I thank Congresswoman 
Blackburn.
  This is one of the things they always say on the other side, if you 
cut taxes, you are going to cut revenue to the government. Now, that is 
absolutely misunderstood. Because as we know, the Bush tax cuts have 
fueled the economy and government returns, tax returns, the money sent 
to government because people are working, those things have gone 
through the roof. And I will yield to the gentleman if he has something 
to add to that.
  Mr. GARRETT of New Jersey. If the gentleman has yielded.
  Mr. McHENRY. Absolutely.
  Mr. GARRETT of New Jersey. Normally, the press and the media would 
say that if you had unemployment under 6 percent that you are doing 
good. We have seen because of the actions of this Republican Congress 
in cutting the taxes and returning the money to the family budget, as 
opposed to keeping it here in Washington for the Federal budget, we now 
see unemployment in this Nation around 4.7 percent.
  Normally, the press and the national media would say if you have 
growth in the economy of around 2 percent that

[[Page H1549]]

you would be doing good. Well, we, of course, know that because of 
those tax cuts that you referenced just a moment ago, we have seen the 
growth in the economy of over 3 percent for the last 11 straight 
quarters. So it is because of this pro-growth economic policy you just 
set forth that we are seeing the economy grow.
  And by having a strong national economy, obviously it is helping the 
revenue stream on this side and obviously it also affects the family 
budget.
  Mr. McHENRY. If the gentleman will yield.
  Mr. GARRETT of New Jersey. I yield back.
  Mr. McHENRY. This is one of the great discussions of the day. If you 
cut taxes does government get less in income or taxation? What we have 
seen through the tax cuts is it is a pro-growth policy. We allow people 
to keep more of what they earn, therefore they can actually provide for 
their child. They can go out this time of year and buy shorts and T-
shirts and tennis shoes for the kids.
  Mrs. BLACKBURN. If the gentleman can yield for just a second.
  Mr. McHENRY. Absolutely.
  Mrs. BLACKBURN. I want to yield to the gentleman from Texas, because 
I think it is important for us to bring the deficit back into this. We 
are allowing the taxpayer to keep more of their paycheck, and the tax 
reductions in 2001 and 2003 certainly have done that. The gentleman 
from Texas can talk for a moment about the deficit and how we are 
speeding along and reducing that deficit faster than we had originally 
thought that we were because of the growth in taxes and because of the 
changes we have made in budgeting.
  Mr. HENSARLING. Again, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. It is a 
very important point that we are going to have in this debate. Number 
one, there is no doubt that our colleagues on the other side of the 
aisle will be talking about tax cuts are bad; we can't have any more 
tax cuts.
  Well, first, Mr. Speaker, nobody is talking today about any more tax 
cuts. Unfortunately, in this very odd budget process we have in 
Washington, tax relief is temporary and spending is forever. The only 
thing we are trying to do, Mr. Speaker, is make sure that the American 
people don't have a huge automatic tax increase brought about by the 
Democrats.
  They will tell you, my Lord, if we allow the American people, if we 
allow small businesses to keep more of what they earn, that is going to 
cost government. Well, number one, Mr. Speaker, it is not the 
government's money, it is the people's money.
  Second of all, we have given tax relief to American families and 
small businesses. And, guess what? The deficit starts to come down. 
Revenues are up. Again, don't take my word for it, go to the United 
States Treasury and here is what they will tell you. We cut marginal 
rates in 2003. We helped small businesses. We helped families. We cut 
tax rates. And guess what? We ended up with more tax revenue. More tax 
revenue.
  Individual tax receipts were up 14.6 percent. Corporate tax receipts 
were up 47 percent. A huge boon of revenue. That brings the deficit 
down because people are going out and they are saving and they are 
working and they are rolling up their sleeves and they are building new 
businesses. In just this year, in the first few months of this fiscal 
year, corporate tax receipts are up 29.6 percent. Again, don't take my 
word for it, go to the U.S. Treasury.
  Mr. GARRETT of New Jersey. Will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. HENSARLING. I would be glad to yield to my friend from New 
Jersey.
  Mr. GARRETT of New Jersey. Just for a quick point. I don't normally 
do this, but I would reference you to The New York Times and today's 
edition, because they verify that too. You can't go by what their 
headlines say, because their headline is a little misleading. But they 
did an article in the business section in The New York Times today 
saying who benefitted from the tax cuts that this Republican-led GOP 
Congress and this administration passed. And if you get beyond the 
headlines and you dig down into the weeds, even The New York Times 
admits that the benefits to them are to the middle class and the lower 
class, as opposed to the higher incomes, as the other side would argue.
  Mrs. BLACKBURN. If the gentlemen will yield. As we wrap up our hour, 
I want to bring it right back to where we started, talking about the 
compassionate thing to do is to let the American taxpayer keep their 
paycheck, be certain that they have first right of refusal on that 
paycheck and not the Federal Government.
  I also want to encourage our constituents to talk to us and our 
colleagues, to talk to our constituents so that we are certain that 
everyone understands our goal as the majority party here in this House 
is to be certain that we preserve individual freedom, that we preserve 
hope and opportunity, and that we allow the American taxpayer to keep 
control of their paycheck. And that as stewards of the taxpayers' 
money, that we are good and accountable stewards.

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