Gilbert Gutknecht

It is lead, follow or get out of the way. For too long the Federal Government has been in the way.

I think the real excitement, like welfare reform, the real reform that is happening in the United States today is not happening at the Federal level; it is happening at the State and local level, and it is happening primarily where we…

You do not have to teach the Bible to teach the principles that have made not only this society successful, but every successful society in some form or another has subscribed to the basic principles and values we are talking about. But it…

I tell some of my friends it is not right because it is in the Bible, it is in the Bible because it is right and it works. The time-tested principles and values that we talk about, work, thrift, personal responsibility, respect for your…

I represent an awful lot of farmers, and some of the greatest wisdom I have ever heard has come from some of my farm families. Back in farm country they know one of the great parts of the American dream is to pay off the mortgage and leave…

I think those are legitimate questions. But I think Benjamin Franklin may have said it best when he said, ``I know no lamp by which to see the future than that of the past.'' I would like to remind Members of what we said just 2 years ago…

What a difference 4 years has made. If we look back just 4 years ago, this Congress, under the leadership of the other team, was debating the largest tax increase in American history. They were attempting to dismantle the greatest health…

what a difference 4 years can make. Four years ago, with the other team in charge, they were about to vote on the largest tax increase in American history, while the other problems of welfare and Medicare reform were being ignored. The…

The real tragedy of that tale is they know that that is not true. As a matter of fact, the Treasury now has updated numbers that shows by reducing capital gains at the levels that we are talking about in this tax bill, you actually…

It underscores the real danger of playing this class warfare game. Abraham Lincoln warned many, many years ago that you cannot help the poor by hurting the rich. In other words, we are all in the same boat. You cannot sink half of them…

That is what the President promised, and that is what we have delivered. Perhaps we can flip to the next chart because this is another chart that was put together by the Joint Economic Committee on Taxation, again the people who actually…

That is money that they get to keep, and sometimes people misunderstand. They confuse credits with deductions. We are talking about $1,500 more that this family will have in their checkbooks to spend as they see fit rather than having that…

This typical American family, and this is not all that different from the family I grew up in during the 1950's. In fact, when I was growing up in the 1950's, the average family, the largest single payment that they made was for their…

In fact, while the gentleman is bringing a chart down, I think he has made an excellent point and sometimes we forget because we get so bogged down in $1,624 billion and 2.3 percent and $100 billion and $200 million and all of these…

I will hold this picture up of this family, but I think if he flips to the next chart, let us talk a little bit about that. He is absolutely right that the President promised when he ran for office the first time a middle-class tax cut. He…

David Gergen writing in this week's U.S. News & World Report says, and I quote, and David Gergen is a former Clinton administration adviser, he says it is time for the left to stop twisting the truth about tax relief. Why is that important…

let us talk about class warfare. According to the Census Bureau, the median family income in the United States today for a family of four is $47,000 a year. Let me be clear, that is $47,000 American dollars, not Euro-dollars, not imputed…

I would like to quote from a famous news anchor: ``Finally, a few words about Federal taxes and what some of the great minds in the U.S. Treasury are thinking about. ``The Treasury likes to calculate American people's income on the ability…

I think our time has about expired. I think you have summarized very well where we were, where we are and where we are going. The negative naysayers said you cannot balance the budget, you cannot provide tax relief, you cannot reform…

The IRS does not use that. Frankly, in all of this discussion, and the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Neumann] and I were talking, earlier, frankly, what we need to do is get, and I think the Senate Finance Committee already has an…

Show that chart. I think people are astonished when people see the numbers, the average Federal revenue growth over the last 17 years.

Not even the IRS says this. Only the Treasury Department uses this convoluted system called imputed income. Frankly, I have to say, and I think I am a fairly well educated person, I was in politics before I came here, I had never heard the…

We actually had some Members of this Congress come before the House not too long ago and say, in effect, with those numbers, that our tax cut was targeted at the rich.

And frankly that is what many of our colleagues were talking about for a number of years before we came here. They were talking about moving away from the welfare state and to an opportunity society, and we are making real progress in that…

I was home over the Fourth of July break. We were in about six parades, at a lot of community festivals, including Spam Jam, had a wonderful time in Austin, MN, on Saturday, but in talking to a lot of folks, there is a good deal of…