Jack Kingston: “I am often amused when I hear Democrats say this is a do-nothing Congress. What they mean is we have done nothing…”

“I am often amused when I hear Democrats say this is a do-nothing Congress. What they mean is we have done nothing towards increasing the taxes, we have done nothing towards increasing the size of government, and then nothing to further destroy the American dream which they seem to be so intent on. What we have done though is pass the first tax cut in 16 years, we have balanced the budget for the first time since 1969 when Woodstock was at Max Yasgur's farm, and Mod Squad was on TV, and Neil Armstrong was on the moon. We have reformed Medicare on a bipartisan basis. We have reformed welfare, and almost 40 percent of the people on welfare have gotten off it in the last 3 years. What have we done in this budget agreement? Strong drug interdiction, strong prevention and rehabilitation programs. What have we done for education? We have returned more dollars and more power and more flexibility to the local level where the teacher in the classroom gets most of the money, where the teacher in the classroom can make most of the decisions, where the teacher in the classroom can call the shots on how to teach Johnnie to read and how to teach Susie to read because they might be a little bit different in Georgia then they are in California or New York. These are important steps. This is not a do-nothing Congress.”