The Public Record
Tom Coburn is a former U.S. Senator from Oklahoma, serving from 2005 to 2015. A member of the Republican Party, Coburn was known for his fiscal conservatism and advocacy for government transparency. He was a practicing physician before entering politics, which influenced his views on healthcare and government spending. Throughout his tenure, he was a vocal critic of wasteful government expenditures and often called for reforms to improve accountability in Congress.
It is made up of how we dole money out to the States rather than looking at the best interests of the country and looking at the risk base for national security and homeland security. I am basically for a true pay-go that says the options…
Will the Senator agree that since we had a $300 billion- plus deficit last year--$200 billion-plus if we weren't in the war in Iraq--if we took that off the table, would it not make sense for us to try to get rid of the waste, fraud…
My amendment did not sunset the whole Department of Homeland Security. It was the grants process.
As a matter of fact, I did just that on the last 9/11 bill, and the Senator from Illinois voted against it. I voted to sunset it. I actually offered the amendment that said we should sunset it and look at it in 5 years, and the Senator…
Let's carry your analogy a little further. What has really happened is you give your son $200, but the mandate is--you are going to spend $100 on a broken iPod or a used iPod, and you have $100 to buy down towards a good one, but you…
This is a sense of the Senate. I would be happy for us not to borrow money. We had $200 billion a year in waste, fraud, abuse, and duplication outlined by the Federal Financial Management Subcommittee last year. Appropriators refused to…
This is a real simple amendment. The improper payments law was passed in 2002. By 2004, all Government agencies were supposed to come under it. The Homeland Security Department has never filed, under the six major agencies, an improper…
It will be a benefit but not to the extent a direct tax credit to them would be. Right now the average American, if you are in the upper income scale, gets $2,700 worth of tax benefit from our income tax code. And if you are on the lower…
They don't carry the force of law. He doesn't have to carry them out. So he said get rid of them or I'll start not carrying them out. And that's a very plain message he sent to Congress.
I make the point, if you got better reporting on 5 percent and no reporting on 95 percent, you have nothing. That is the whole point. Before the Senator from Illinois came down, I said it is not dishonorable to ask for an earmark. Most of…
The question I have is, The distinguished Senator from West Virginia asked the question: How long and at what price? But that is a false choice. Because if we leave Iraq and we walk away, we are going to be fighting this battle again. So…
I don't know. I am certainly supportive of it. I will drive it through the subcommittee.
I agree with the Senator. He knows my record. I have not voted to not pay for anything in this body. I don't believe we borrow the future of our children to take care of our present-day needs.
The overall point of all this is we can do this the easy way or we can do this the hard way. The hard way is what the American people expect us to do--and the hard way is paying for this. The easy way is not to pay for it. The easy way is…
I will repeat today what I said in person and in writing. It authorizes $1.5 billion spending with not one offset and zero consideration for prioritization of how we spend money in this country.
I would be happy to add an amendment or a caveat that says ``under this act.'' Would that satisfy the chairman?
Is there a reason, even if the money was spent from NSA or Defense Intelligence, that you wouldn't want an improper payments evaluation for that money?
Let me describe the recent assessment by the Department of Defense: For payments made within the Department of Defense for travel--for travel--as required under section 2 of the Improper Payments Information Act.
We spent some time last evening with the Parliamentarian on it. We believe we have a defense of germaneness based on what the content of the House bill is and that we would stand by the idea that this is already relating to and attached to…
Could the Chair advise the time remaining on both sides? The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The majority has 46 minutes remaining; the minority has 22\1/2\ minutes.
No. The Senator alluded to the fact that there is a gold standard of whether an embryonic stem cell is pluripotent or whether it produces a teratoma. That means it has components of the three layers of an embryo--exoderm, endoderm, and…
Let me clarify for the record. I think it is very important. There is a difference between cancer and teratoma. They use the formation of teratomas to make a differentiation of whether this is a part of the cell. That is not a cancer…
They have been published in peer-reviewed articles. I would be happy to submit them for the Record.
Politicians like Tom Coburn
