Gilbert Gutknecht: “I was going to say, whether you are talking about tax reform, health care reform, Medicare reform, welfare reform…”

“I was going to say, whether you are talking about tax reform, health care reform, Medicare reform, welfare reform, reforming the way Congress does business, opening up the process, really what this debate is about is whose country is it, and whose government is it, and who is in charge, and whose money is it? And for too long we have sort of taken, or our predecessors have taken the attitude in Washington that it is Washington's money and Washington's government. One of my favorite Presidents once observed we are a people with a government, and not the other way around. And really all of these reforms are about opening up the process. The beauty of this Congress is for the first time we are having honest and healthy debates about what kind of a Medicare system we are going to have, what kind of welfare system should we have? We have agreed that the problem with our welfare system is not that it costs so much money. The problem with our welfare system in America today is that it costs too much in human potential. We have created dependency. When Representative Tauzin talks about our tax system, it is a system riddled with perverse incentives. Throughout all of our programs, it is a system of perverse incentives. No good deed goes unpunished. Frankly, it is wrong, and the America people know it is wrong.”