Lois Frankel: “Thank you, Congressman, and thank you for inviting me to join you today. I don't want to go through all the statistics.…”

“Thank you, Congressman, and thank you for inviting me to join you today. I don't want to go through all the statistics. I guess I could because sometimes we forget that we're talking about real people. Let me just keep it very, very simple. First of all, in the State of Florida, the beautiful State of Florida--I tell people I live in paradise--we're finally turning the corner with the economy. Over the last several years, we literally lost millions of jobs. Our construction industry went bust. Of course, the whole country was hurting, so tourism got hurt. And now we're starting to turn things around. The value of our homes is going up, the tourists are coming back, and people are finding work. The worst thing that could happen right now--the worst thing that we could do here in Congress to our economy back home--is to remove so much money in such a quick time from our economy that it would put our job market in a tailspin. Outside analysts say that just in the State of Florida, over the next year, we could lose 80,000 jobs. Now, we're not talking about 80,000 government jobs. We're talking about the removal of government spending--that horrible government spending--from our economy. It will mean 80,000 Floridians, mom and pops are not going to be able to pay their mortgage or send their kids to college. And they could be a teacher, or they could be a bus driver, or they could be a manager in a hotel. It's going to affect all walks of life.…”