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[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 122 (Wednesday, September 12, 2012)]
[House]
[Pages H5867-H5868]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

                 WE FIDDLE WHILE THE FISCAL FIRES BURN

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Maryland (Mr. Hoyer) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. HOYER. Madam Speaker, first I want to, of course, associate 
myself with the remarks from Mr. Dreier and Mr. Price, who have done 
such terrific work on the spread of democracy, but also to lament the 
tragic loss of life and the courage displayed by our men and women in 
our Foreign Service who are deployed abroad to represent the United 
States, its democracy, and its principles.
  Madam Speaker, I regretfully rise, however, to talk about another 
unhappy subject. Our fiscal house is burning, and in Washington we 
continue to play and fiddle. We have another 8, perhaps 13, days left, 
or less than that. I don't know whether we're going to be here in 
October, but I do know that we're going to be here for a very short 
time--this week, frankly, doing message bills.
  The middle class tax cut which passed the Senate lays fallow 
somewhere, not brought to this floor, to assure that our middle class 
citizens would understand that they weren't going to get a tax increase 
on January 1, give them confidence, give our economy confidence, to 
help grow our economy.
  We have not assured our doctors that the payments for Medicare 
services to patients will in fact be available. We have not taken 
substantive action to set aside the sequester with a balanced plan.
  There will be a bill on sequester. That will be largely opposed on 
our side of the aisle because it does not provide for balance. It 
simply says set aside the sequester, which is the direct result of 
Republican policies. In fact, the Republicans have offered two bills on 
the floor which say that sequester is the option of choice if you don't 
meet certain numbers. They did that in their Cut, Cap and Balance bill, 
which was enforced how? Through sequestration.
  We understand that sequestration is an irrational act. Why is it an 
irrational act? Because it is as if you have a food budget and a movie 
budget at home and you have tight finances that week, that month, that 
year. You don't cut your food budget exactly the same as you cut your 
movie budget. You say, We're going to forego a movie and make sure we 
have healthy food on the table. That's what we ought to do.
  We ought to have a strategic way and a balanced way to get this 
deficit that is out of control and needs to be handled under control, 
and the best way to turn off the sequester is a balanced plan. But what 
we will see offered on this floor is not a balanced plan, but a plan 
which says, Do it our way or no way.
  Now, very frankly, that's been the history of this Congress. I've 
served in 16 Congresses. This is the least productive Congress in which 
I've served. Now, that view is shared by two scholars, Thomas Mann and 
Norman Ornstein, who wrote in a book and wrote in an op-ed:

       We've been studying Washington politics in Congress for 
     more than 40 years and never have we seen them--meaning the 
     Congress of the United States--as dysfunctional.

  The American public share that view, of course, and our poll numbers 
reflect it; properly so.
  Mr. Mann and Mr. Ornstein go on:

       In our past writings, we have criticized both parties when 
     we believed it was warranted. Today, however, we have no 
     choice but to acknowledge that the core of the problem lies 
     with the Republican Party.

  They went on to say:

       The GOP has become an insurgent outlier in American 
     politics. It is ideologically extreme, scornful of 
     compromise, unmoved by conventional understanding of facts, 
     evidence, and science, and dismissive of the legitimacy of 
     the political opposition and, therefore, unwilling to 
     compromise.

  That's what our gridlock is caused by, an unwillingness to 
compromise.
  The Senate has passed a farm bill. The Senate has passed a farm bill 
which would help farmers threatened by drought. As a matter of fact, 
their own committee has reported out a farm bill, but that farm bill 
has not been brought to the floor because, apparently, the majority of 
Republicans aren't for a farm bill. So even their own bill is not 
brought to the floor, much less a bipartisan-passed farm bill in the 
United States Senate which could be passed and would get a significant 
number of Democratic votes--not because we believe it's exactly what we 
want, but because we believe it is a compromise that will work for 
America and America's farmers.

                              {time}  1040

  Ladies and gentlemen, Madam Speaker, the American public ought to 
know that in the next few days we're not going to be doing much of 
anything; not on jobs for Americans, not on the fiscal cliff that 
confronts us, not on farm bills, not on the Violence Against Women Act, 
which also passed the United States Senate in a bipartisan, 
overwhelming fashion. No, we fiddle. We fiddle while the fiscal fires 
burn.
  I would urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle, my Democratic 
colleagues and my Republican colleagues--I don't think we're going to 
get anything done before November 6. I think it's going to be politics, 
politics as usual. The American public and America will suffer for 
that. But I think that's what's going to happen.
  But I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle, and Madam 
Speaker, I would urge the American people to demand of us that we not 
perceive the lame duck session as simply a time to further fiddle. It 
ought to be a time, my colleagues, when we act, we come together, we 
adopt a balanced, fair plan to get the fiscal house of America in 
order, to put ourselves on a fiscally sustainable path that is 
credible, that people believe in, so that the rating agencies, which 
are now talking about perhaps downgrading the United States of America, 
the most creditworthy Nation on Earth--why? Not because we don't have 
the resources to solve our fiscal problems but because they do not 
perceive that we have the political will and willingness to do so or 
the courage.
  My colleagues, Americans expect more of us. We ought to expect more 
of ourselves. We have an obligation, a responsibility. We swore an oath 
to protect and defend not only the Constitution but the welfare of this 
country.
  Putting our country on a fiscally sustainable path is absolutely 
essential. I don't think we're going to do it before November 6, but I 
would hope every one of us, every one of us who comes back here the 
second week in November, or the end of the second week of November, 
will pledge ourselves to work together, as Americans, not as Democrats, 
not as Republicans, not as conservatives, not as liberals or moderates, 
but as Americans, understanding that the only way every commission 
that's reported has said we're going to get our house in order is to 
come together and do so in a balanced way.
  And yes, ladies and gentlemen, that means making sure that we deal 
with revenues. We pay for what we buy. That's what revenues are about. 
We pay for what we buy. And then we deal with the spiraling cost of 
health care. Everybody's talked about that. We have to do it. President 
Clinton talked about that. Paul Ryan talks about that. We have to do 
it.
  But we can keep the guarantee of Medicare, we can keep the guarantee 
of Social Security in the process, while getting our fiscal house in 
order on the entitlement side.
  Ladies and gentlemen of this House, we owe it to the American people. 
The American people expect us to act responsibly. We are fiddling while 
the fiscal house of America burns.
  Let us summon the courage, the judgment, and the personal 
responsibility each one of us has, that when we return here after the 
election and, hopefully, the politics are behind us, those 30-second, 
60-second ads which misinterpret, misinform, and dissemble are behind 
us, and we say to all of our citizens who we represent, we are prepared 
to exercise the courage and judgment to put our country on a fiscally 
sustainable path that is credible. Not only will rating agencies 
believe in it, our citizens will believe in it, our businesses will 
believe in it, and the international community will as well.

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