Deborah Koff Ross: “reclaiming my time, I know I feel confident that the Republican leadership will send down a group to follow us. They do…”

“reclaiming my time, I know I feel confident that the Republican leadership will send down a group to follow us. They do that every Tuesday evening. I am honored that they feel a need to do that. I think our message is getting through about trying to restore fiscal discipline and common sense to our Nation's government. They are going to talk about how we didn't vote for this so-called Deficit Reduction Act. What they are not going to tell you was it was $40 billion to cuts in Medicaid, student loans and the orphan program, and also it was followed by $90 billion in tax cuts for those earning over $400,000 a year. I wasn't real good in math back in high school or college, but $90 billion in new tax cuts and $40 billion in cuts to the poorest among us equals what, $50 billion of new debt. Only in Washington would they call that the Deficit Reduction Act. That was the name of it. Then they are going to say this budget we are opposing is making the hard choices and the hard cuts and eliminating important programs in the name of trying to restore some fiscal discipline and balance the budget. What they fail to tell you is it is really about priorities, because their budget includes $1.7 trillion in new tax cuts over 10 years. Look, I voted for the biggest tax cut in 20 years back in 2001, and a lot of my Democratic colleagues are still mad at me about it. We had a surplus, it was before 9/11, before Iraq and before Afghanistan.…”