Mark Souder: “this is a truly historic debate on the difference of philosophy of government. We agree on much of what's in this bill.…”

“this is a truly historic debate on the difference of philosophy of government. We agree on much of what's in this bill. In fact, my friend from Texas, Congressman Ron Paul, is a purist, capitalist, libertarian, but in fact, we've always had a blended government. And the question is, whether it's through tax incentives, direct spending or loans, we've had a blended economy from the days of building canals and from our beginning; the question is, which way are we going to tilt? Is it going to be a capitalist tilt, or is the tilt going to be government running this? I believe, and I understand that likely today I'm going to lose, I'm going to be on the losing side, but I want to go on record pointing out how in fact extreme this bill is. There is a section, a provision of this bill, however well-intentioned, that reverses the normal role of trying to balance what you purchase with your ability to repay. It's an income-based section 133 open-ended entitlement benefit, regardless of profession, that allows them to cap the maximum loan payment each year at 150 percent of discretionary income and have the remainder of the loan forgiven after 20 years. Under the bill, this means a typical entry-level Hill staffer earning $25,000 a year would never be forced to pay more than $120 a month on their student loans. This would no doubt be popular to our staff, but the American taxpayer I don't believe would approve of this.”