Jim Matheson: “I thank my colleague, Mr. Ross. And I am always pleased to join follow Blue Dogs on the floor of the House of…”

“I thank my colleague, Mr. Ross. And I am always pleased to join follow Blue Dogs on the floor of the House of Representatives to talk about the issue of fiscal responsibility, and also about accountability, which go hand in hand. The Blue Dogs have made a point of trying to make sure that people understand the magnitude of the debt. Mr. Ross showed the slide that showed over $8 trillion of debt. If we divide that among every man, woman and child in this country, that is over $27,000 for everybody. And the accountability issue that we have talked about, let's just take that as one issue to talk about now. Because the Blue Dogs have promoted what they call their 12-point plan that will lead us back to fiscal responsibility. One of the points has to do with accountability. See the example Mr. Ross gave where you have money being wasted and you wonder what is going on, that is indicative of a broader problem within the Federal Government. So many agencies within this Government are unable to offer a clean audit of their books. It is pretty remarkable when you think about it. Businesses would be out of business if they ran this way. And so under the Blue Dog 12-point plan, we think you have to put a structure in place that will force fiscal responsibility, one of the planks of the 12-point plan says that if there is a Government agency that cannot give you a clean audit of their books, their funding is frozen at the previous year's level.…”