Walter B. Jones: “I am a freshman, and I campaigned with a promise to the people of my district and the people of America that I would…”

“I am a freshman, and I campaigned with a promise to the people of my district and the people of America that I would work with my colleagues to balance the budget. I had to come to the floor when I hear some of these scare tactics of not meeting our obligations as a government and letting this Government default. That is such an outrageous statement, and the people in my district do not believe that. I am a little bit tired, from Medicare to default, that we are going to let the Government default, we are not going to take care of our senior citizens. I want to make just a couple of comments. My father served in the U.S. Congress for 26 years. He was a Member of the other side, a Democrat, and many times we would talk about in the late 1980's why the Congress did not balance the budget. And several times he would make the statement to me, ``Well, Walter, you know, we could have chaos if we do. Programs would be cut. People would feel threatened.'' I would say to my father, ``Father, I don't understand if we don't balance the budget, we also are going to have economic chaos,'' and that is what this debate is all about.”