[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 2]
[House]
[Page 1666]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                             SEQUESTER CUTS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Tennessee (Mr. Duncan) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. DUNCAN of Tennessee. Mr. Speaker, before I speak about the 
sequester, I want to salute my colleague, the gentleman from North 
Carolina (Mr. Jones) for his earlier remarks about Afghanistan. I agree 
with him that we need to stop trying to rebuild the world and start 
putting our own country and our own people first once again. We have 
spent several trillion dollars over the past decade on very unnecessary 
wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and we should have brought our troops 
home many years ago.
  Mr. Speaker, I would like to speak about the sequester. WMAL radio 
reported this morning that the administration had put out in a list of 
cuts which the sequestration would require that the National Drug 
Intelligence Center in Pennsylvania would be cut by $2 million. The 
only problem is that this center no longer even exists. It was closed 
in June of last year.
  The scare tactics about the sequester seem to grow more ridiculous, 
more exaggerated every day. The Washington Examiner wrote, in its lead 
editorial yesterday, that:

       It is known as the Washington Monument Strategy. Turf-
     protecting government executives and bureaucrats go out of 
     their way to make spending cuts as painful as possible for as 
     many people as possible. By applying any cuts to the very 
     things the public benefits from most, bureaucratic infighters 
     believe they can convince the public that every penny that 
     goes into government is necessary.

  In other words, the administration has apparently told all the 
Departments and Agencies to say that their most popular programs will 
be drastically cut, instead of reducing spending on their least 
popular, least necessary, most wasteful programs.

                              {time}  1030

  The sequester has already been reduced from $109 billion to $85 
billion. This sequester is a cut of slightly over 2 percent from our 
almost $4 trillion budget. Many people seem to have already forgotten 
that the fiscal cliff deal raised taxes by $620 billion over the next 
10 years on upper-income people. Then there is also the $93 billion in 
higher payroll taxes on all workers this year. That hike is already in 
effect. Then there are the taxes already coming in to pay for 
ObamaCare.
  Columnist Mark Tapscott wrote yesterday:

       The sequestration scares are the ultimate example of 
     Washington wink-wink. Politicos from both parties warn of 
     imminent disaster if the Federal budget is ``cut,'' even 
     though they know government spending will be higher in 2013 
     even if the sequestration ``cuts'' are implemented. Put 
     another way, the sequestration scares are lies, pure and 
     simple. Not just bunk, not just distortions or misstatements, 
     but lies. And every professional politician in town--
     Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, Socialist, Independent--
     knows it.

  Our national debt is now at a mind-boggling $16.5 trillion. It will 
go to over $25 trillion in the next 10 years under optimistic 
scenarios. The Congressional Budget Office a few days ago put out a 
report that said the interest on our national debt--just the interest--
was going to go from $224 billion this fiscal year to an astounding 
$857 billion in 10 years. If we allow that to happen, Mr. Speaker, we 
will then not be able to pay for anything other than Social Security, 
Medicare, Medicaid, and interest on the debt.
  The sequester we are talking about now is minuscule when compared to 
our present debt and our future pension liabilities. Our choice is 
simple: we can cut now or crash in the very near future.

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