Ernest Istook: “the public is demanding that the Congress reduce Federal spending. The message from the elections was clear, the…”

“the public is demanding that the Congress reduce Federal spending. The message from the elections was clear, the constant messages we receive from our constituents are clear; they are demanding that we do so. They realize that we have built a gigantic Government bureaucracy of social programs and Government handouts that are cruel. They are cruel because they are killers of initiative, killers of self-reliance, and destroyers of the family. Do the American people lack compassion because they want to bring down the size of Government? Of course not. Do Members of Congress, whether they be on this side of the aisle or on that side of the aisle, lack compassion because they see the necessity to reduce Government spending and to do it in social programs? Of course not. Mr. Chairman, we all prove our individual compassion by what we do with our own time, our own efforts and our individual dollars. We do not prove we have compassion by reaching into the wallets of the American taxpayers and extracting, under force of law through the tax system, more and more money. That proves that we believe in taking from other people, not that we have personal compassion.”