Charles Rangel: “It is amazing how any bill that reaches the House, all you have to do is put a title on it and then not read it, and you…”

“It is amazing how any bill that reaches the House, all you have to do is put a title on it and then not read it, and you think you have got something going. Listen to the way this bill, H.R. 3393, is described. It sounds like the committee that put it together was well on the way to reform, that they have taken a whole lot of complex provisions and combined them into one to make it easier for the applicant to understand what is going on. The problem with that is when you do all of that and make it simple, and then put a trillion-dollar bill on top of it and make it permanent and cut off benefits for other people, it just shows that when people use the word ``reform,'' it doesn't necessarily mean that you are doing better. I admired the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee when he put together a tax bill and had the courage to eliminate a lot of the tax credits that were not paid for, a lot of loopholes that were in the law, and I think it was supposed to be revenue neutral, as difficult as that sounded. But no one ever thought, certainly not Paul Ryan, when he said: The people deserve a government that works for them, not one that buries them in more debt. Well, this is exactly what this bill does. It is permanent. There are no provisions to pay for it, and it buries us in more debt.…”