[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 7]
[House]
[Pages 9722-9723]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                  PRINCIPLES FOR ANY BUDGET AGREEMENT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
California (Mr. Honda) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. HONDA. I rise today to urge the President and this Congress to 
listen to the American people when negotiating a budget agreement. As 
much as the politicians argue, they don't seem to hear the good sense 
of the American people. The many closed-door meetings in Washington to 
decide America's future are filled instead with esoteric and magical 
formulas purporting to close the deficit. One group wants budget caps. 
Another wants trigger clauses. A third wants simplistic rules.
  None of these will work. These are gimmicks, not governing. Governing 
is about making choices, setting priorities, and following through. 
Governing is also about ensuring that the interests and values of the 
American people are at the negotiating table. If not, any new deal will 
benefit only the rich and powerful or simply postpone any real 
decisions until after 2012. Either way, America will lose.
  A budget deal needs to be publicly debated and needs to reflect the 
true values and the views of the American people. One group in Congress 
gets this. The Congressional Progressive Caucus

[[Page 9723]]

has heard the message of the American people who want to cut the 
deficit without cutting into America's future and without destroying 
America's sense of fairness. Ask the public what they want and they 
will tell you.
  Let us defend our health programs for the elderly and the poor, 
Medicare and Medicaid. Let us hold to our intergenerational promise of 
Social Security. Let us invest in education, research and development, 
and fix our crumbling infrastructure. Let us bring our men and women 
home from Iraq and Afghanistan and save at least $150 billion a year, 
not to mention the lives saved as well. Let us rebuild America.
  Any budget agreement must not hurt the economy. America is making 
economic progress, but many families are still struggling. And we must 
do more to create jobs. Any budget agreement must raise revenue. 
Americans know it. It would be irresponsible, unwise, and unfair to 
reduce the deficit and debt while leaving tax breaks for big 
corporations and millionaires in place. A fair budget will not emerge 
from behind closed doors. We need an open budget process, one that 
keeps the interests and the bottom majority of the American people 
front and center.
  The Congressional Progressive Caucus wants to bring the people's 
budget to the forefront of publicly held negotiations as well as a 
budget plan that would truly put the American Dream back within the 
reach for the majority of the Americans.

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