Date: 2012-12-11
Speaker: AUSTIN SCOTT (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Georgia

Mr. Speaker. ladies and gentlemen of America. every day that Im on the floor. I cant help but be reminded that facts are a stubborn thing. and I simply want to talk to you about the facts today. You see. the President and the Democratic leadership spent the last 4 years blaming George Bush for driving our economy into the ditch. Now. as President Obama drives our economy towards the fiscal cliff. Id like to share with you some remarks. remind you. remarks that he made during his Fiscal Responsibility Summit held on February 23. 2009. at the White House. The President said: We cannot and will not sustain deficits like these without end. Contrary to the prevailing wisdom in Washington these past few years. we cannot simply spend as we please and defer the consequences to the next budget. the next administration. or the next generation. Were paying the price for this budget right now. He continued: In 2008 alone. we paid $250 billion in interest on our debt 1 in every 10 taxpayer dollars. That is more than three times what we spent on education that year. more than seven times what we spent on VA health care. So if we confront this crisis without also confronting the deficits that helped cause it. we risk sinking into another crisis down the road as our interest payments rise and our obligations come due. Confidence in our economy erodes. and our children and grandchildren are unable to pursue their dreams because theyre saddled with our debts. Thats why today. Im pledging to cut the deficit we inherited by half by the end of my first term in office. Now. this will not be easy. It will require us to make difficult decisions and face challenges weve long neglected. But I refuse to leave our children with a debt they cannot repay. That means taking responsibility for it right now. in this administration. for getting our spending under control. Now. lets do the math. Mr. Speaker. The deficit that the President is talking about is this 1.4. the $1.4 trillion deficit that hes talking about. Now. according to his own proposal. if he gets all of the tax increases that he has asked for. and I want to make this clear. his revenue estimate right here assumes that he gets the tax increases that theyre asking for. You still have a $900 billion deficit. ladies and gentlemen. He promised it wouldnt be any bigger than $700 billion. That means that the President owes the American taxpayer $200 billion in cuts. not over the course of 10 years. but over this year right now. the fiscal year 2013 that were in. Mr. Speaker. the President made a pledge to cut spending not to the Republican Members of Congress. He doesnt even speak to us. if you want to know the truth of the matter. He made a pledge to cut spending to the citizens of the United States of America so that our children and grandchildren would be able to pursue their dreams instead of being saddled with our debts. Mr. Speaker. a pledge from the President of the United States to the citizens of this country should mean something. Instead. his plan in his budget. assuming his tax increases. leaves our children and grandchildren with a debt of more than $21 trillion. That. ladies and gentlemen. is something that we simply cannot allow him to do to our country and to our children.