Heidi Alexander: “tomorrow we will be voting on the Energy and Water Development appropriations bill. I come to the floor to make two…”

“tomorrow we will be voting on the Energy and Water Development appropriations bill. I come to the floor to make two points about that very important legislation. No. 1: if our Democratic friends would allow us to vote on it, allow us to debate it, amend it, pass it, send it to the President, and do the same with the other 11 appropriations bills that our Appropriations Committee has reported, we could easily say that this year in the Senate is one of the most productive years in a long, long time. No. 2: the other point I wish to make is the importance of this bill. Ben Bernanke, the retired Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board wrote an article in the Wall Street Journal this week in which he said that you cannot rely on the Federal Reserve Board to create jobs in a growth economy in the United States, and that what you need to do is have better educational opportunities, more research, and you need supercomputing. I would add to this that you need to have infrastructure. This bill, the Energy and Water bill, has all of those things. It is a pro-growth bill for the United States of America. Let me take the first point first. This is the first time in 6 years that the Appropriations Committee has reported all 12 appropriations bills. You might find that unusual because that is the Appropriations Committee's basic job. As much as it is for the Grand Ole Opry to sing, our job is to pass appropriations bills. That is article I of the Constitution.…”