Political Quotes

“in the Budget Committee yesterday, on which I am the ranking Republican, Director Elmendorf of the Congressional Budget Office gave us the report and his projections for next year and what the consequences and financial situation will be for our country as he projects it. When I asked him about his projections for economic growth, he acknowledged they have been way too high over the last several years, and that has been disappointing. Our growth has not reached the level we want to it reach. He projects now a lower growth rate than he had been projecting for the next 10 years. Let me share with my colleagues, as we vote on these matters on which we want to help veterans and we want to help the unemployed--and we can do that but we have to remember who we are, what we are doing, and how we got here. We virtually doubled the deficit in the last 10 years in the United States of America--added to the total debt of the United States of America. Deficits are going down over the last couple of years, and will for 1 more year, according to Mr. Elmendorf, but then will begin an inexorable rise to nearly a $1 trillion deficit at the end of 10 years from today. The interest we paid--and he testified to this; it is in his report--the interest we paid last year on the total debt of the United States, even with the extraordinarily low interest rates, was $230 billion--an amazing amount of money. We have a group testifying right now about the highway bill.…”