[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 10]
[House]
[Page 14620]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                            AT A CROSSROADS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Florida (Mr. Mica) for 2\1/2\ minutes.
  Mr. MICA. Mr. Speaker, it's Saturday morning and we're here in the 
House of Representatives in an unusual session. I'm glad some people 
had the opportunity to go home last night and come back this morning.
  Some people say, Oh, this is unusual duty, you're working hard, and 
all of that. And I say to them that I represent the millions of people 
across the United States who are going to work, sometimes at midnight, 
work all night, and get up in the morning and go to work at 6 o'clock. 
They're struggling to put food on the table. They're struggling to 
educate their children. They're struggling to pay their mortgage and 
keep their home and their family together.
  So I believe that it's Congress' responsibility, and there's no 
question about it that we work--we work on Saturday, we work on Sunday, 
we work on Monday, and we'll work until we get this situation resolved.
  Now where are we? We're at a crossroads. Rarely, in the history of 
our Nation, have we come to a crossroads like this. We have the biggest 
government program probably since World War II in ObamaCare and the 
President's health care plan going into effect in a few days. We have 
the government running out of money in a few days, on October 1. And 
then we have the country facing a financial deficit in less than 2 
weeks.
  So this is an important crossroads. We need to get it right because 
there are a lot of hardworking Americans counting on us.
  We must avoid the biggest government takeover of health care or any 
segment of our economy in history. We must avoid forcing people into 
part-time employment and the government making decisions about our 
health care. Even the unions are walking away from this plan now. We 
have a short time to accomplish that.
  The deficit is $17 trillion, and they want to extend it almost 
another trillion--$900 billion--for 1 year. Since the beginning of the 
Obama administration, in 5 years, we've gone from $9 trillion to $17 
trillion in debt--almost doubling it.
  Finally, funding the government. We must keep the government open. We 
must be responsible stewards for the public. But the spending spree in 
Washington has to stop. Republicans have held the line. We need to hold 
the line responsibly. We can cut waste, we can cut inefficiencies, and 
we can make government accountable to the people.

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