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Van Hollen: GOP Agenda is Bush Economic Policies on Steroids
“Are we much better off than where we were under the Bush economic policies that, over an eight-year period, resulted in over 670,000 lost private-sector jobs after that eight-year period? Yes, we are.”

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Washington, Aug 15, 2010 -

Today, Maryland Congressman Chris Van Hollen, Assistant to the Speaker, was on CNN’s State of the Union with Congressman Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) and emphasized key differences between Washington Republicans and Democrats on creating jobs, strengthening the economy, and protecting Social Security.  Watch clips of it here and here.  Read the full transcript here.

Here are some key highlights:
  
  • “Well, Candy, it's interesting to listen to my colleague, Kevin McCarthy – a little bit of revisionist history there. And he and his colleagues are counting on the fact that the American people are somehow going to have a bout of collective amnesia come these elections, because we all know that George Bush's last day in office, we saw this country losing 700,000 jobs a month. And it takes time to turn things around.  Are we where we want to be? Of course not. Are we much better off than where we were under the Bush economic policies that, over an eight-year period, resulted in over 670,000 lost private-sector jobs after that eight-year period? Yes, we are...”
  • “Elections are about the future. And our point here is not to talk about all the things that created the problems, but to point out that Kevin and his Republican colleagues, when you ask them what their plan for the future is, it is no different than the Bush economic policies. In fact, it's the Bush economic plan on steroids. And people do not want to go back to that.”
  • “And you have proposed blowing a $700 billion hole in the deficit over the next 10 years because while we want to make sure that we extend tax relief to middle class taxpayers, 98 percent of the American people, you are holding that hostage until you get a break for the folks at the very top, even though it was proven during the eight years of the Bush administration, which ended with net job loss, that that was not a big creator.”
  • “And we know that the Republican John Boehner was very vocal in support of the Bush plan to privatize Social Security, which, as you know, would have resulted in millions of senior citizens in this country losing a whole lot of their retirement savings during this economic meltdown. And the fact of the matter is, they would like to send more of the Social Security money to Wall Street. That’s been a position the Republicans have held for a long time. And their -- their leader, the guy who wants to become Speaker...” 

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