July 19, 2011

Jeb Hensarling

“If we want jobs, hope, and opportunity, we must cut, cap and balance”

WASHINGTON – House Republican Conference Chairman Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas) made the following remarks today on the floor of the House of Representatives before his vote in support of the Cut, Cap and Balance Act to avoid a default on our debt, to restore confidence in our economy and job creators, and to commit to a permanent solution to controlling spending. 

“Mr. Speaker, our nation suffers from a surplus of deficits. 

“First, our seniors have a health care deficit because in the last Congress Democrats cut Medicare by half a trillion dollars, hastening its bankruptcy, and then created a new board called the IPAB in order to ration the access to the quality of their health care. 

“Next, they have brought us a jobs deficit. Millions are unemployed and they remain unemployed—the highest duration of long-term unemployment since the Great Depression. 

“Next, Mr. Speaker, we have the financial deficit. After the president’s trillion-dollar stimulus program which has failed miserably, after the trillion-dollar takeover of our health care system, after an increase in base government spending—24 percent in two years—and three trillion-dollar-plus deficits in a row, we now have a debt crisis. 

“The president says we need a balanced plan: ‘I want you Republicans to raise taxes to pay for my spending.’ Well, Mr. President, one of the greatest impediments we have to job creation today is the threat of taxes to pay for your spending. Every day I hear from small business people in my Congressional District. I heard from Christine Tanzillo from Canton, Texas: 

‘Washington seems to think it can tax its way out of our economic problem, which is not possible. We are not hiring or planning to grow for the next several years. We are concerned that our government will raise taxes and put other burdensome restrictions on us, that we will not be profitable. 

“The financial deficit is tied to our jobs deficit. The American people have a message for their government. It is: ‘Time to quit to spending money we do not have. It is time to stop borrowing 42 cents on the dollar, much of it from the Chinese, and then sending the bill to our children and grandchildren.’ It is why today House Republicans bring to the floor the Cut, Cap and Balance program. 

“Cut spending to at least the ’08 levels. Who thought that government was too small before President Obama came into town? Cap: Since World War II, spending has averaged 20 percent of our economy and under this president it’s 25 percent and growing to 40. Let’s keep it at 20 percent. Balance: Every family in America has to balance their budget around the kitchen table. Every small business has to balance their budget. 49 of the 50 states but no—our Democrat colleagues said it is ‘radical,’ it is ‘radical’ to balance the budget. “What I say is: if we want jobs, hope, and opportunity, we must cut, cap and balance.”

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