Joe Cunningham: “In 30 years, Mr. Speaker, our national security is the worst and the lowest I have ever seen it. We have gotten there…”

“In 30 years, Mr. Speaker, our national security is the worst and the lowest I have ever seen it. We have gotten there because Somalia, Haiti and Bosnia policies set forward were not paid for. They have cost $16 billion out of an already low defense budget. Those dollars come out of operation and maintenance of a 1950s budget. The other problems that we have in emergency spending, we have got to find some offsets for those. It is going to be difficult in the upcoming weeks to find those offsets so we do not break the budget. Alan Greenspan has said if we break the budget caps, then the economy we have, the interest rates and everything else is going to go down. We need to work together to find those offsets, Mr. Speaker.”