Austin Scott: “first, I want to respond to something my distinguished colleague from the other side said. Now you talk about smoke and…”

“first, I want to respond to something my distinguished colleague from the other side said. Now you talk about smoke and mirrors. For him to say on our side that we are talking about raising taxes is so disingenuous. Nobody is talking about raising taxes. We are talking about fiscal responsibility and pay-as- you-go responsibilities. We are saying that we do not want to cut vital services to the American people and then go borrow more money that we have to pay interest on. That, in effect, when you put it altogether, if anybody is talking about raising taxes, it is the Republicans. Somebody has to pay for this. You know who is going to pay for it, our grandchildren and our children based on their proposals. No, sir, you are not going to be able to depend on Democrats this night that we are talking about raising taxes. Democrats are talking about keeping our taxes low and bringing fiscal responsibility back to this House. You talk about responsibility. When Democrats were in control, when President Clinton was there, he left a several trillion dollar surplus. In just 5 years, this President and this Republican-led Congress has squandered that surplus. So when you talk about who is more responsible for the taxpayers' money, it is Democrats, not Republicans. And the American people are not going to be fooled by this smoke and mirrors of consistently trying to paint the Democrats as being for raising taxes and they for not.…”