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Republicans Don't Understand What People at the Bottom Really Have to Deal With
House of Representatives - December 19, 2005

Mr. Speaker, the week before Christmas and here we are gathered, most of the children are in their bed, even in my district by now and the elves have been working and here we are.

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The Republican Party since the days of Reagan have lived by the motto of Mrs. Thatcher, that "There is no society, there is only individuals." Now, that is contrary, as you heard from the gentleman from Missouri, to what the Bible says

In Isaiah, we all start the story of the Bible of the Christian story starts in Isaiah. In Isaiah the prophet is categorizing what is going on in Jerusalem and why it is failing as the injustice and the materialism and the wealth accumulated. Here is what Isaiah said, verse 23 first chapter, right off the bat, "Everyone loves a bribe and runs after gifts. They do not defend fatherless. The widow's cause does not come before them."

For us to be here in the middle of the night taking whatever it is, $50 billion $60 billion, nobody on the floor knows what is in this budget, let's admit upfront, except about people six wrote it. We all taking it we are going to take about 60 billion dollars. We are going to tell the poor people, "You are so lucky to live in America. We are going to throw you a little something."

Our history every one of us has been raised with the story, the Biblical Christmas story or the Dickens Christmas story of the coal and Grinch, and you think about the stories we have at Christmastime and you have the nerve to come out here with a budget at this time of year where you cut child support, you cut food stamps, you cut Medicaid and then you say to people, "Merry Christmas and a happy new year." that takes the height of gall or else no feeling whatsoever.

There is no way you could stand up and talk about these issues if you understood what people at the bottom really have to deal with.

Most of make $150,000 as a minimum. The average income in the country is about 1/5 of it and those people are scraping along and we are doing everything we can to make it impossible for them live a decent life because of our own, as the prophet says, "Our own greed and materialism."