Alan Simpson: “Let me first say that I compliment the gentlewoman for her consistency. She is a true budget hawk in trying to make sure…”

“Let me first say that I compliment the gentlewoman for her consistency. She is a true budget hawk in trying to make sure that we ultimately balance this budget. It is tough work to do that. We have actually, as she mentioned, reduced spending in this bill over last year. Could we reduce it another 1 percent across the board? The problem is we have to choose some priority in the bill. The highest priority we had was our Nation's defense, the nuclear weapons program. Even though the overall bill is down $206 million, the defense activities are actually up nearly a billion dollars. We then have to look at the infrastructure of this Nation and the fact that we have deteriorating infrastructure, and Congress has told us that each year we have to meet what is called the WRDA target. We have to spend with the Army Corps of Engineers to meet the infrastructure of our harbors, dams, and inland waterways and restore those things, because it is very important to our commerce and something the Congress supports greatly. So when we have had to increase the Army Corps of Engineers funding over what was spent last year and then we have had to increase weapons activity, that means the Department of Energy has been significantly reduced over what they were last year. We have had to make some very hard choices. We have cut the EERE, Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, program in half from $2 billion to $1 billion, roughly.…”