On the recordFebruary 18, 2011
I rise because the debt and the deficit problem facing our Nation are greater than I think most people in this room understand, and certainly most people back home understand. The circumstances demand that we go just a little bit further than we have and that's what this amendment does. It takes non-defense discretionary spending back to 2006 levels instead of 2008. That represents an additional 3 percent savings, which on the one hand doesn't sound like that much, but on the other hand actually saves $134 billion of the $900 billion worth of deficits that we will incur between tomorrow and the rest of this year. I am doing it because I feel that most of the folks don't grasp the size of the difficulty. I know that most of the folks in my district don't grasp it yet. And I have been struggling with how to explain to people exactly what a $1,600 billion deficit means and a $14,000 billion debt.
