[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 54 (Tuesday, March 31, 2009)]
[House]
[Page H4132]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                               THE BUDGET

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BLUMENAUER. Madam Speaker, the budget is the most important 
challenge that every Congress faces year in and year out. It reflects 
our priorities, it shows how we deal with war and peace, the economy, 
education, and the environment, who pays, and who benefits.
  Under the Constitution, this is a uniquely congressional 
responsibility. The power of the purse is reserved to the United States 
Congress.
  I have been disturbed lately to find one political party being AWOL. 
In fact, Republican Leader Boehner famously announced earlier this 
month that he wanted the people that he leads in the Republican 
Conference not to be legislators but just communicators, not be 
involved in the give and take of the legislative process. And as if to 
drive the point home, the Republicans last week released a budget 
proposal that the Associated Press summarized as, and I quote, ``a 
glossy pamphlet, short on details, and long on campaign-style talking 
points.''
  There wasn't any substance there. There were no hard numbers talking 
about what they would do to reduce the deficits and what the deficit 
would be, what programs they were going to cut. Very, very 
disappointing to see a pamphlet that basically recycled the policies of 
the last 8 years of the Bush administration and Republican leadership 
that drove us into the economic ditch. They proposed their same old tax 
cuts for people who need them least, and offered an alternative that 
would provide 25 percent less in tax reduction for lower income 
Americans than is proposed by President Obama and would run up the 
deficit even higher than it already is.
  We are going to have a week that is dominated by budget discussion. 
We Democrats are going to bring our budget to the floor on Thursday 
that builds on the President's challenge: Health care for all 
Americans; education reform, investing in the needs of education for 
our children and for people that have lost their jobs or need to change 
their career track; investing in reducing carbon pollution, climate 
change, and energy independence to create green-collar jobs that will 
be sustainable and provide value to the economy while we protect the 
planet. Our budget is serious about deficit reduction, after President 
Obama inherited from the Bush administration the largest deficit in 
United States history.
  It is ironic, because when the Bush administration took office, they 
were facing a projected $5.2 trillion budget surplus, and Republicans 
had control of all of the levers of power here in Washington, D.C. 
Their control created economic problems, the budget deficit exploded, 
and taxes were cut for people who needed it the very least.
  Ours is, I must emphasize, a budget outline that will enable 
Congress, at least those who want to be legislators and not merely talk 
about it, to roll up their sleeves and deliver on the challenges that 
the President made in health care, education, climate, deficit 
reduction, and tax reform.
  There are no specific policy decisions made in the budget outline. 
That is not what a budget is for. Rather, it is to provide the 
framework. Budget decisions will be made by the people here who decide 
to be legislators over the next 6 months. There is still time for 
people on the other side of the aisle to reject their leadership, roll 
up their sleeves, and work with us to deal with specifics on carbon 
pollution, on health care, on education.
  It was a little disorienting to hear at the Budget Committee late 
into the night last Wednesday Republicans talking about objecting to 
the President's proposal to reform student loans because they were 
afraid it would cost some bankers some jobs. I did the math. According 
to their figures, those jobs were at the expense of $133,000 each, 
money that the Democrats and the President think ought to be loaned to 
students, not to subsidize bankers.
  We look forward to a spirited debate this week.

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