Kendrick Meek: “But he is basically just talking about the debt ceiling, that it will be reached in 2006; at this time, unless the debt…”

“But he is basically just talking about the debt ceiling, that it will be reached in 2006; at this time, unless the debt ceiling is raised, we will no longer be able to continue financing government operations. This is on the 29th of December. On February the 16th he writes another letter, Secretary Snow. We talk about him. We have his portrait here. He is a nice guy. He is just trying to figure out how to run this thing because the Republican Congress is handing him a fixed deck. He writes John Spratt, who is the ranking minority member on the Budget Committee here in the House, an honorable man, and he says, on December 29th I wrote the Congress regarding the need to increase the statutory debt limit. Because the debt limit has not been raised, I must inform the Congress that pursuant to 5 U.S.C. 8438(h)(2) that it is my determination that by reason of the fact the public debt limit has not been raised, I can no longer pay into the retirement system. That is the retirement system that we call the G Fund, which basically puts forth the dollars for us to be able to invest in the retirement system of the Federal employees. He can no longer do it. He goes on, to relieve the Federal employees, that when the debt ceiling is raised that he would be able to continue the investment there. Now, if you can just bear with me for 1 second, because I have to go through this and make sure everyone is clear.…”