On the recordFebruary 4, 2022
We all get behind these microphones on occasion and we want to share something. And tonight, I am going to try to stay on a theme. I am going to try to walk through one of my intense frustrations around here that we keep making public policy. Let's be honest. We just passed--the Democrats, I don't think a single Republican voted for it--a $350 billion bill that originally was labeled as America COMPETES Act. But if you look at the math in it and the spending in it, it is functionally, hey, let's give lots of money to our special interests who actually support them politically. So here's the theme. If I came to any Member of Congress, any one of our staff, anyone out there listening in the public and said, What makes people poor? Seriously. What makes our brothers and sisters who are working poor poor? And you get these discussions, Oh, we don't tax rich people enough and transfer their wealth, or we don't do this, or we don't do that. And it turns out, when you actually look at the math, almost none of those things are actually true. It is complicated. So we have been doing a project for almost a year in our office, of trying to understand what is different. So we held a hearing recently, on health disparities. Guess what? There really are health disparities between certain urban minority populations, my Tribal communities in the Southwest. But why? Also, take a look. There is crime, crime differential.…
