David Obey: “What this simply is is a very strange and goofy way to provide an opportunity for Members of Congress to get out of town…”

“What this simply is is a very strange and goofy way to provide an opportunity for Members of Congress to get out of town for the next 2 weeks, put Government people back on the payroll, but limit what they can do. It solves the problems of Government workers who are not getting paid, but it leaves an awful lot of problems for taxpayers who are still not getting served. That is a fundamental problem. If that is as far as the majority party will go, then we have no choice but to support it because it is a partial opening up of the Government. I wanted to point out another interesting bit of strangeness. The Prompt Payment Act requires that the Government pay its bills within 30 days. If no payments are made, the Government is required by law to pay interest on those outstanding obligations at a rate of 6 percent. That means that, because these obligations are piling up, we are going to have to pay added interest, added interest at a time of such a large debt, because of the stubbornness of Members in this House who insist on putting their ideology ahead of our obligation to serve all of the taxpayers whether they be Republican, Democrat, Independent, or anything else.”