John Spratt: “Roughly that. Even the CBO tells us that another substantial increase in the debt ceiling will be necessary by at least…”

This bill fully funds national security activities in the Departments of Defense and Energy, including top-line funding increases for DOD as well as fully funding Iraq and Afghanistan operations. This is the fourth consecutive year that…

I think it is a widely held view that all of those actions have had positive effects on the economy.

We are the Budget Committee, not the Energy Committee, and it is not our job to draft energy bills.

Can we conclude from what you have just said and from what you are seeing that the favorable factors in our economy today may be glimmers of hope, may be harbingers of an economy that is recovering?