On the recordMay 9, 2013
I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from California (Mr. LaMalfa). Mr. LaMALFA I appreciate my colleague from Michigan allowing me to speak here today. My colleague from California, I'm glad to be a cosponsor of this very important measure. ``Full faith and credit,'' what does that mean? What does it mean to the American people? When we ask for them to send us to Washington, to send us to this august place, we're asking for their faith in what we do with their money, with their tax dollars. And so when we report back to them, what does that look like to them? Have we upheld their faith? Have we done everything we can in this Nation to keep the credit rating of America on line? This measure is a giant step towards keeping that faith, to paying our bills on time, to paying the types of things that keep our credit rating in a best possible fashion for our country. We default on that, we put our whole economic system in peril. We drive up the cost of doing business for our government, and more tax dollars it costs to run our government when we do that. We hear talk about pay China first. Well, that's kind of funny, because if we wouldn't do that kind of business with China, if we'd pay attention to our own level of spending and growing the economy of this country instead of having to do things that cause debt to go up higher, we wouldn't be having to contract with them for more debt. So that comes back to this place here, reforming the way we do business.…
