John Spratt: “last week I came to the well of this House to express my concern along with the concern of others in the Committee on…”

“last week I came to the well of this House to express my concern along with the concern of others in the Committee on the Budget who joined us that night about the direction that a process we call reconciliation was taking. This week my concerns have not been allayed. They have been aggravated because I see the course that reconciliation has taken, and it is coming home closer and closer to programs that matter to those that can least afford to take the hits that they are about to receive. As we speak, our colleagues, our Republican colleagues from across the aisle, are debating and considering and moving toward big cuts in Medicaid, student loans, child support enforcement, child foster care, and supplemental security income, farm conservation, the list goes on. About $50 billion in spending cuts spread over about a 5-year period of time. They have offered up these spending cuts as a way to offset, partially at least, the spending increases that the responses to hurricanes Katrina and Rita will require; but in actuality, these spending cuts will not go to offset the costs of Hurricane Katrina because the Republican budget calls for $106 billion in additional tax cuts. And when these additional tax cuts are passed, the spending cuts that are also being proposed will simply go to make up for the revenue losses to some extent caused by the tax cuts they are proposing.…”