Sen. Hutchison: The American people deserve to know more about this bill."
WASHINGTON D.C. U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) Texas senior Senator today spoke on the floor of the United States Senate against the FY2009 Omnibus Appropriations Bill. Below are excerpts of Sen. Hutchisons remarks on the Senate floor:
I think the American people deserve to know more about this bill and why there are so many objections to it…
Passage of this bill will mark the first time in United States history that our regular appropriations process just funding government in the routine and regular order will surpass $1 trillion…
Last week I offered an amendment…My amendment was 2008 levels with the rate of inflation. So instead of an 8 increase in spending in a one-year period double the rate of inflation it would have been a 3.8 increase from 2008 which I thought was quite reasonable.
Furthermore I said lets decide that we will only take it from the accounts in the bill before us that duplicate what we just passed in the stimulus bill weeks ago so that we would say to the American people we are going to fund government at 2008 levels plus the rate of inflation. And the way were going to cut it back is to let the Appropriations Committee decide which of the duplicated accounts that were just passed in the stimulus bill two weeks ago would be taken out of either the stimulus bill or the bill before us. That was my amendment and it too failed.
I hear from my constituents all the time and a lot of common sense is coming out of my constituents. I just wish that we could export the good old Texas common sense to the United States Congress… What theyre saying is why dont we look at the big picture here? Instead of spending a $1 trillion stimulus spending package on top of $1 trillion to fund government for the next nine months and furthermore we havent even dealt with the financial institutions yet why dont we step back?
Why dont we step back and look at the problem we have which is our financial institutions arent working our small businesses are not getting credit so theyre not able to borrow to stay in business and the housing market is in the tank…
We havent addressed those issues yet and here we are spending as if there is no restraint adding to the debt because we dont have the money in the bank. I cannot think of anything more irresponsible than what were doing in these last couple of months in the United States Congress…
The cumulative debt of America today is $10.6 trillion. The proposed budget plan recently suggests a doubling of this debt over the long term. Twenty-five percent of the national debt that we have that we are accumulating is owned by foreigners. The Chinese government owns almost $700 million in debt our debt…
In addition to the concerns about whether the borrowers are going to buy our debt what if they say …maybe well buy your debt but the risk is too great and well just have to jack up the interest rate. What is that going to do to an economy that is teetering so badly?
I dont think we can turn a blind eye to the long-term consequences of this debt burden. It is not only irresponsible but it borders on being reckless."
