Tom Coburn: “First of all, the $81-billion supplemental that this body passed, I had an amendment to cut $19 billion out of that…”

“First of all, the $81-billion supplemental that this body passed, I had an amendment to cut $19 billion out of that because it is not going to be spent for the next 3 years. So there is no way you can call that an emergency. One amendment on limiting the expenditures on the embassy, we got 44 votes. Fifty-five people thought it was OK. The fact is, we are at war. We seem to forget that. In every war this country has ever had, the Congress trimmed discretionary spending massively to fund the war. We have decided we will not do that. We have decided we can continue. There is no question good work was done to cut a half-billion dollars out of this bill. The question the American people ought to be asking is, is everything that is in this bill necessary now in light of the fact that any money we spend we are going to charge to our grandchildren? We are going to charge the unpaid interest over the next 30 years because we have no history of paying back our debts. So by the time you compound the interest costs of this $540 billion, now with some $40 billion on top of it $588 billion is the number it will become--what is the real cost? The real cost is no college education for the generation 2 years from now, no homeownership 2 years from now, decreased investment in capital goods for productivity and scientific advancement, decreased investment in education and competition in the world. That is the cost.…”