David Obey: “In my view, our responsibilities are to provide a budget which has a balanced set of budget reductions so that the pain…”

“In my view, our responsibilities are to provide a budget which has a balanced set of budget reductions so that the pain is shared evenly and so that major portions of the appropriations are not exempted from the squeeze that is being applied to everybody else. This bill does not meet that test. It does not even allow us over time to stay within the Republican budget that was passed with overwhelming Republican unity in this House just a few months ago. Because with all of the weapons systems piled into this bill, they will be forcing spending far in excess of the Kasich budget. We also have a responsibility to see to it that the Congress of the United States does not embarrass itself by giveaways to corporations in the process of providing a defense bill. This bill also does not meet that test, and so the bill ought to go down until those two items are corrected.”