Paul Ryan asks Blue Dogs to stop fiscal train wreck, restore American ideals March 25,
2009
Congressman Paul Ryan, Ranking Member of House Budget Committee, makes plea to colleagues at markup of FY2010 Budget Resolution:
"I believe America is an exceptional nation. It is exceptional. It is the greatest nation on earth. It has done more to bring prosperity, wealth, and growth, and lift people out of poverty than any other nation in the history of this planet. We are a very strong nation in so many ways. We are not the kind of a nation that is going to be defeated by outside forces. We are not the kind of a nation that is going to be defeated by some other
country's military. But we are the kind of a nation that if we don't watch it we could defeat ourselves from within. That is exactly is what this budget proposes to do in my opinion.
"This budget proposes to increase our national debt by more than all prior 43 presidents combined. We are going to double the national debt within five-and-a-half years and triple it in ten years. We are going to impose a nearly two trillion dollar tax increase on our economy on everyone in the middle of a recession. And we are going to do this because we think that government has all of the answers. We think that industrial policy bureaucrats, health care bureaucrats, education bureaucrats, energy bureaucrats can better organize these affairs in our lives than we ourselves can. We disagree. We think the strength of this economy the strength of this country is its people, not its government.
"We are a people with a government, not the other way around. We believe this budget makes it the other way around. We believe the genius of this country is the entrepreneur the person who gets up, works hard, takes risks, creates and innovates.
That's the spirit of entrepreneurship that has brought the greatest display of prosperity ever in the history of mankind, and this budget puts us on the wrong track.
"Were asking our friends on the other side of the aisle those who claim fiscal conservatism; those who based their campaigns on controlling spending and controlling debt were asking you to help us defeat this unprecedented taxing, borrowing, and spending spree, and lets get back together and fix these fiscal problems in this country, which this budget exacerbates and makes much, much worse.
"We know both parties
don't corner the market on virtue on fiscal conservatism. Yes Republicans clearly made mistakes in that area. Lets accept that, and lets not make them worse, lets not compound these problems lets fix them."
