this resolution -- can i have an ditional one minute? i thankhe gentleman. something like this. which says contrary to the constitution, if the senate doesn't act, this bill becomes law. nobody on your side sury believes that that can happen. nobody believes that that joke that we are trying to play on the american people on april fool's day will be believed by any of them. and my friends do not tell me about your concern about the deficit because the deficit during my period of time except for the last two years trng to deal wi the deep depression in which the last administration left this economy, don't try to tell me that we are responsible for the debt, the $14 trillion of debt. surely my friend knows that's not the case. if my friend doesn't know it, i would be glad to set up a time when we can debate that issue and any -- in any form he chooses because the facts belie his representation.

my friends, reject this bill, reject this bill because it is a fraud on the ameran public. reject this bill because it's an attempt to shift blame from the house of representatives passing a bill that can in fact pass not to say to the senate our way or no way an we will shut down the government because that's what this bill says. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlen's time has expired. the gentleman from virginia. from georgia. mr. woodall: i yield mself 15 seconds to say to my friend from virginia about whom i say regularly back home as a reputation -- i'm sorry, maryland. we have virginia on my mind toda pardon me, mr. hoyer. r friend from virginia. mr. hoyer: virginia's a good state. mr. woodall: i tell sfokes back home has a great reputation for fair dealings. tremendously disappointed by that characterization of the bill. i'd like to yield five minutes to the bill sponr to set the record straight on what thbill

is. mr. hoyer: i thank you f his obrvation and regret he thought it was a mischaracterization because i thought it was accurate. thank you very much. the speaker prtempore: the gentleman from arkansas is recognized for five minutes. mr. womack: thank you, mr. speaker. thanks to the gentleman for yielding. yes, there's been a lot of conversation in washington about thprospect of a government shutdown. while i realize there are some in this congress who might prefer that option, i am not one of them. let me just add our leader is not one of them. frankly, we think it's irresponsible. our constituents did not send us to washington to shut down the government. they sent us here to make it more accountable to the people. and that's precisely what house republicans have been doing. exam the facts. when the curtain came up on this

congress, we were already three months into this fiscal year. with no budget and on a temporary spending plan through early march, this house went to work crafting legislation that would fund government for the rest of this fiscal year while delivering on our pledge to cut spending. the response from the senate, not so fast. so we kept government operational with a two week continuing resolution inopes that the senate would realize the sense of urgency that accompanies our fiscal situation , and in that two-week span of time, the response, not interested. agai this house went to work crafting another temporary measure that funds government through next week. and my friends' -- and my friends, patience is wearing thin, not just mine and of my coeagues, but the patience of

americans. in our collective opinion, time's up. mr. speaker, we all ree that we have some bigger fish to fry. pressure on the statutory limit on debt and more importantly the 2012 budget loom very large right now for this country. instead of focusing on these issues critical to our struggling economy, here we are mired in partisan gamesmanship over funding the government for the remader of this year. did we come here to fish or did we come here to cut bait? this bill simply puts the clock in action on this process. i am hopeful my colleagues will agree that the time is now to move beyond 2011 so that we can turn our attention to the bigger challenges of transforming this institution and restoring fiscal sanity. that's what the people sent us here to do and every day we fail to do this work, the people

lose. we have been called extreme. h.r. 1 which passed in the early morning hours on thifloor on february 19 cuts an annual -- on an analized basis, $100 billion in federal spending. that's 1/16 of the deficit. 1/16. is that extreme? i don't think so. mr. speaker, it's unfortunate that people across america trying to find jobs, trying to pay their mortgages, and trying to have the funds to put their kids through college are victimized by this flawed political process. instead of removing the uncertainty for small business and job creators by cutting spending and shrinking the size and reach of government, we are paying games with the -- playing games with the future of our nation. if this is our best, our best

falls short of the expectation of those we represent. we can do better. we should do better. and if we can -- if all we can show for our work is a shut down of the government, we will have failed our constituency and should not be paid. the gamesmanship going on right now is gambling with america's future and it's hard to make progress when you're playing on house money. h.r. 1255 forces members to have skin in the game. and if passed by both chambers and signed by the psident, we'll have the proper motivation to setaside the rhetoric and actually accomplish something that is good for america, a climate for job creation. not a government shut down. i urge my colleagues to support this bill so we can do the people's work. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman om south carolina. mr. clyburn: than you, madam

speaker. madam speaker, i yield myself four minutes. let's do a quick review of the year. it's been 13 weeks since the republicans took over the majority. leading up to that point we heard the mantra, where are the jobs? so you might expect on day one of the 112th congress they would bring us a jobs bill to the floor. but no. when the republican majority did with great fanfare was to conduct a reading of the constitution. and as if r oath of office wasn't enough, also implemented a new house rule which required legislation to be accompanied by a statement of constitutional authority. in fact, my fellow colleague, from south carolina, joe wilson, read allowed article 1, section

7. what does it say? every bill shall have passed the house of representatives and the senate. shall before it becomes law be presented to the president of the united states if he approved, he shall sign it. but if not, he shall return it. now, ladies and gentlemen, we all learn in grade school how a bill becomes a law. we'll get back to that in a moment. so 13 weeks ago when republicans took the majority, up that point we heard from them, where are the jobs? so then what was the first bill we were asked to vote on? the first bill was to repeal the

health care law. democratic policies created more jobs in the last year than the bush administration created in eight years. since health reform became law, 1.1 million private sector jobs have been created. 1/5 of those new jobs, over 200,000, have been in theealth care industry. so repeal of the healthare law would end jobs not create jobs. but surely at some point the last 13 weeks the republican majority would have brought to this floor a jobs bill. three months and no jobs bill. in fact, we have passed three bills that will destroy more than one million job which brings us to this moment, the so-called government

shutdo prevention act of 2011, and article 1, section 1 of the united states constitution. i've read it. but i want to repeat a certain portion of it. every bill shall have passed the house of representatives and the senate shall before it become the law be presented to the president of the united states. but the bill before us today, not a jobs bill, says that if the senate doesn't act prior to the expiration of the continuing resolution, h.r. 1, a budget bill passed only by the house, will become the law of the land. it's very simple. that is unconstitutional. we do not have a unicameral legislative body.

then what do they cite the constituon authority that must accompany each bill? therare a lot of words, but only a parliamentarian expert could understand -- parliamentary expert could understand. but if you ask my daughter's eighth grade class that visited us here earlier this week, they could tell you -- i yield myself an additional minute. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. clyburn: they would tell you that's not how thgs work under our constitution. but don't listen to me. or her eighth graders at dent middle school. listen to what some of your colleagues in the other body have to say. our colleagues in the other body made it very clear, my reaction to that is ultimately the whole

body, including the executive branch, has sign on here or we'll julls -- we are just whistling in the wind. said alexander of tennessee, to be the law of the land a bill has to pass the senate and be signed by the president. one of our own, the appropriation subcommittee chair, representative mike simpson, after laughing out loud said, if we can do that, cat we just deem the budget balanced? madam speaker, i know it's april 1st, so maybe that's the point. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. mr. clyburn: i ask my colleagues on the other side to let's hit this joke and get serious. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from georgia is cognized. mr. odall: at this time i'm pleased to yield two minutes to a very serious reform minded freshman, the gentleman from

indiana, mr. rokita. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for three minutes. mr. rokita: i thank the gentleman from georgia for yielding me time. i rise as a co-spons of this bill and urge my colleagues to support it. i have worked tirelessly with my colleagues to pass a continuing resolution that saves taxpayers money and keeps the government running. while the other body as we continue to hear has done nothing but complain. are they blind? are they deaf? do they not see, do they not hear what the rest of the people in this country see and hear in terms of this cotry's financial crisis? in terms of this country's debt, in terms of what we are doing to our children and grandchildren by continuing to do nothing, madam speaker. we waited 41 days for them to send us a funding bill and we've

got nothing. at least the members who will be voting for this bill, who will be voting in favor of this bill, are showing leadership. are showing the american people that we care about the future of this country. and that we do care about jobs. show me one country on this globe that can grow its economy, that can grow jobs, while having the beat of government on the neck of its people, neck of its businesses all the time. and just like our -- the overgulation we do right now through the fedel government, that debt burden is doing the same thing to job creation. . the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from south carolina. mr. clyburn: madam speaker, i'm pleased to yield three minutes to the gentlelady from kentucky,

ms. delauro. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady from kentucky is recognized for three minutes. ms. delauro: the majority the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady is recognized for three minutes. ms. delauro: the majority is disrespectful of the u.s. constitution. and all because of their political base and to benefit their political base. this bizarre attempt to deem and pass into law their reckless budget is not only hypocritical and blatantly unconstitutional -- unconstitutional, where is the statement of the constitutionality of this legislation? i'll ask my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, read the constitution. it calls into question whether the speaker and the republican leadership understand how our representative democracy works, and that includes the author of

this legislation. the house cannot simply close their eyes, pretend that the senate and the president have passed and signed a bill into law. it does not work that way. when the bill actually pass the senate, the senate has actually passed the bill. and when the president picks up a pen and puts his name on it and not a second before, that bill has been signed into law. no matter -- no amount of magical thinking can change these simple facts. even notwithstanding the gall of the republicans' unconstitutional plan, the very attempt to pass a deem and pass act flies in the face of all of the pearl clutching we heard from the majority in 2010. tn when asimpler version of deem and pass came up during the health care debate, one that did not fly in the face of the constitution and attempt to speak for the senate and president, the current speaker called it one of the most

dangerous, outrageous things he'd seen in the congress. cantor put the republicans on record against any sort of deem and pass mechanism. a year later the story has changed. now, most of all, this is a die version from the reckless cuts the majority proposed, the slashes to head start, pell grants, meals on wheels, veterans, job training, medical research, all cuts that hurt middle class and working families. we are still waiting for the republicans to cut the special interest waste like the oil company subsidies and the tax loopholes for the richest people in the nagse. and what about those tax subsidies for those multinational corporations that takes their jobs overseas? you're not starting there to cut the deficit, but, no, it's about working families and

their children that you're going after. you are taxing the paents of the american people and you're taxing the memories of our founding fathers who educated us and children in grade schools today on how a bill becomes a law. the republican majority is playing a dangerous game. if they do not get what they want they will shut the government down. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady's time has expired. mr. clyburn: i yield the gentlelady 130ekds. ms. delauro: you are playing with the lives of the american people. their kids, their families and with american businesses. no matter what those damaging effects are because of ideological reason and political base and electoral votes, you are willing to put the united states and its people above all working famies, middle-class families

and their children and our economy at risk. please, read the constituti, understand how this democracy works and take this bill -- the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady's time has expired. ms. delauro: and do away with it. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from georgia is recognized. mr. woodall: madam speaker, at this time i'm very pleased to yield three minutes to my good friend, a freshman from mississippi, mr. dunly. -- mr. dunlly. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady is recognized. mr. nunnelee: it's been over 40 days and the democrats in the senate have failed to act on a spending plan. if our government shuts down our troops won't get paid. now, they'll still be serving this great nation but without pay. we need to ensure there are no political burdens while our

troops are at war. as the department of defense has indicated, a funding lapse does impact their military's operational readiness. the american people cannot wait. congress cannot wait. while while the democrats in the senate play politics. we've given them ample time to put forth a reasonable plan, yet, the majority leader in the senate is not serious about spending reform. while the democrats will be cheering for a government shutdown, republicans have passed the largest spending cut in american history. and our actions are having results. just this morning it was announced that the unemployment rate was at a two-year low. americans are going back to work because of our efforts. meanwhile, what's happened this week? the senate democrats have spent the week diverting attention, trying to figure out how to spin reporters, and today while

the shutdown is imminent, they've gone home. well, the cuts that th american people want, they're not extreme. they're necessary. when we're borrowing 42 cents out of every dollar what our children and grandchildren's future in jeopar, these cuts are far from extreme. it's time for the senate to act. our goal is to cut spending, not to shut down the government. back in mississippi we have a saying, lead, follow or get out of the way. mr. reid, today you're in the way. so i challenge you today to lead by passing a plan of your own, to follow by adopting the plan that we've already passed. if you can't do either of those, get out of the way and allow the senate to act. i yield back, madam speaker. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from south carolina. mr. clyburn: thank you, madam

speaker. madam speaker, i yield two minutes to the gentleman from virginia, mr. moran. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. mr. moran: thank you, madam speaker. madam speaker, several students from key elementary school came to the office. they were excited to be on capitol hill. i explained this afternoon we are debating bail, it's been introduced by what we call the freshmen, new members of the house, that says if the senate doesn't agree with a big bill that the house has passed that the senate doesn't agree next week then this bill would deem it passed. in fact, deem it enacted. they were shocked because that's not what they learned in civics class. they learned that a bill has to be passed by the house and then passed by the senate and then it goes into conference and then if the president agrees to sign it then it can become law. but not this bill. i was at a loss, of course, to

explain how it was constitutional. they were kind of surprised that this is what the house was doing. they wanted to know, well, what is the bill they want to be enacted. it is a bill i don't agree with and the senate doesn't agree with. because while we have a lot of people unemployed,his would make apparently about 700,000 more people unemployed, according to even republican economists. so they were even further amazed by that. it also would eliminate a lot regulations that have been passed by the house. it would -- through a lot of deliberation but it just says those regulations wouldn't take effect. so it's a very controversial bill. now, i was also able to tell them i did suggest to the rules committee yesterday that the majority rejected there is something we could do today and that is to say that if we put our staff out on the street

without pay who get a fraction of what we get paid and we put another million federal employees out on the street unpaid then the congress shouldn't get paid either. the senate did in fact pass that unanimously, including senator mcconnell, obviously. so if we passed that today then we could put the country on record. we're not going to -- could i have another 30 seconds? mr. clyburn: i yield 30 seconds. the speaker pro tempore: 30 seconds. mr. moran: at least today we could put ourselves on record that we're not going to put people out on the street while we continue to get paid because we get paid from a differt authorization as does the president. now, this is legislation we could get passed, that the senate agrees and could go fought president right away. i know the president would sign it. that's what we should be doing today, not something that even a 10-year-old understands is

unconstitutional. thank you, madam speaker. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from georgia. mr. woodall: madam speaker, at this time i'd like to yield two minutes to a gentleman from your home state, the gentleman from illinois, mr. kissinger. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. mr. kinzinger: madam speaker, we are in a mess. we are throwing barbs. we've been in charge for four years and had the pridency for two years and it's not our fault and we don't want to do anything to fix it. so in fact here last year when you had all of the majority, when our friends on the other side of the aisle had all the majority they failed to do the most basic thing that you ought to do when you run something, you pass a budget. no budget was passed because the november elections were coming up. you didn't want to have to make the tough choices that would

hurt you in re election and you didn't want to have to go through that route so you didn't pass a budget. you passed a continuing resolution. guess what, the american people in november spoke. they said the federal government is entirely too big and the big bloated bureaucratic government is crowding out the free market. and so what happened? wewere sent here to washington, d.c., to control the size of federal government and we're doing exactly that. and we passed a minor cut, a significant but a cut to just a small part of the budget. we're not even talking about the 2012 budget year. that's coming up, but our friends on the other side of the aisle don't even want to show us what -- where they're at. they can't cut spending. they don't want to say no to people. the american people and the children are asking us to say yes to the future. i'm a military pilot. that's what i do as a reservist. i have friends wondering if we're going to get paid. i say, ask harry reid.

i don't know. we try to make sure you continue to get paid through this. i have a friend, tim norton, who runs a company back home. and as he's sending kids to college and as he's building his small business he doesn't know if he can trust in the faith of what this government is going to be in the future because our friends on the other side of the aisle don't want to do anything to begito rein in this out-of-control government. we do. pass this bill. thank you. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from south carolina. mr. clyburn: thank y, madam speaker. madam speaker, i yield three minutes to the gentleman from new jersey, mr. andrews. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from new jersey is recognized for three minutes. mr. andrews: i ask unanimous consent to revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. andrews: thank you, madam speaker. i thank my friend from south carolina. there was some good news today finally that 214,000 americans went to work last month. that's not neay good enough. there's radio more work -- there's a lot more work to do. one of the ways is to come to an agreement on a responsible

budget. i'm hopeful there will be such an agreement next week. hat senseably reduces spending but pro-- that sensiblely reduces spending but leads to a repeal of health care. the other side believes we should. whether or not to defund planned parenthood. we believe we shouldn't. most of the other side believes that we should. leave those discussions to another day and keep the government functioning because the taxpayers will keepaying taxes even though there's a government shutdown. they pay even if they don't get the services. so what are we doing this afternoon? what we're doing this afternoon is looking at a bill that's on its face is unconstitutional. and the reason we're looking at this bill is so that members of the majority side who probably won't vote for the budget compromise next week can say they did something.

well, doing something that's unconstitutional is wrong. as mr. clyburn read article 1, section 7, says, every bill which shall pass the house of representatives and the senate shall before it become a law become presented to the president. article 1, section 5 of the constitution says, each house may determine the rules of its proceedings. each hse may determine the rules of its proceedings. what's wrong with this bill is that one house, our house, is determining the rules of the other house's, the senate's, proceedings. you can't do that. it's a pretty simple concept, and i've heard all the convoluted arguments on the other side. i've heard all the twisted rationalizations. it comes down to is. if this afternoon the senate

passed a budget that our friends on the majority side doesn't like and our friend on the majority side doesn't pass that budget in a week it becomes law they wouldn't agree to that because they would know that it's unconstitutional. this is the same thing. . it is ironic that with great fanfare on the first week of this session, after running a campaign saying they would produce jobs, what the majority produced was a reading of the constitution on this floor. i thought it was appropriate. i thought it was actually moving and the right thing to do. the wrong thing to do is to ignore what we read the first week. each house may determine the rules of its proceeding. we can't determine the rules of proceeding for the senate. they can't determine the rules of proceeding for us. this is a bad bill. vote no. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from georgia.

mr. woodall: at this time i'm pleased to yield two minutes to the gentlelady from kansas, my good friend, ms. jenkins. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady from kansas is recognized for two minutes. ms. jenkins: thank you, madam speaker. i thank the gentleman from georgia for yielding. you-all remember the story about an old man of great faith whose town was about to be flooded? the town was being evacuated and its water was already covering the roads. the old man sat on his porch calmly unafraid. car pulled up to the house, the water almost too deep to drive in. the driver yelled, get in. we'll take you to safety. the old man shk his head and said go on, i have faith a god. he'll save me. the car moved on. a short time later the water had risen so high it covered the porch. so the old man simply went upstairs. a boat floated up to the house and the people yelled get in, we'll take you to safety. the old man said again, go on, i have faith in god. he'll save me. so the boat went on. hours later the water had risen so it almost covered the ep tire house.

the old man wasow on his of when a rescue helicopter came in. they called get in, we'll take you to safety. the old man refused, saying go on i have faith in god. he'll save me. the helicopter left. the water rose so high the old man drowned. he went to heaven of course and when he arrived he asked god, i had faith in you to save me. why didn't you? god answered, i sent you a car, a boat, and a helicopter, what more do you want from me? i hope my democrat colleagues in the other chamber and this president understand that this bill is their helicopter. you had a chance to propose and pass a budget for 2011 last year when you-all had unfettered power in washington. you had ov a month now to address h.r. 1, a bill that cut a near $100 billion from our -- mere $100 billion from our budget. today we are giving you a third chance to avoid a government shut down. please grab on to this lifeline

and workith us to prevent a government shut down that could have international consequences. vote yes on h.r. 1255. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady yields back. the gentleman from south carolina. mr. clyburn: thank you, madam speaker. madam speaker, i yield two minutes to the gentleman from new york, mr. owens. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from new york is recognized for two minutes. mr. owens: thank you, madam speaker. thank you, mr.lyburn. when i heard that this bill was coming forward, i had an opportunity to reflect on the fact that i had been having conversations with my constituents. and in each case i posed to them how we are proceeding here in congress. and asked them if in fact they could accept a small across-the-board percentage decrease for f.y. 2011. invariably each and every one said yes. i have been on record for many months as suggesting that we can solve this problem, walk away

from the ideology that's dividing us, and simply reduce spending by 2%, which i think if one does the math gets us to the position that our friends on the other side of the aisle would like us to adopt. it is clear to me after practicing law for more than 30 years part of which was a j.a.g. officer in the united states air force that clearly this is an unconstitutional piecef legislation and is nothing more than spinning in the wind. i had the opportunity the other day when i saw the make up of this bill to write to the speaker, mr. boehner, along with 27 other co-signers and asked that s. 3le 88 -- s. 388 be separated from this legislation. this legislation is not moving forward, and if in fact we do see a government shutdown, we in

congress should share the pain. we have that responsibility, that obligation, and we must lead by example. thank you, madam speaker, i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from georgia. mr. woodall: madam speaker, at this timi'm very pleased to yield two minutes to one of my fellow freshmen, the gentleman from arkansas, mr. griffin. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from arkansas is recognized for t minutes. mr. griffin i thank my good friend for yielding me time. madam speaker, i commend my fellow arkansans for introducing the government shutdown prevention act and i strongly support its passage. i'd like to say real quickly what we have seen here in the last few minutes is a colossal waste of time you had a bunch of folks saying, madam speaker, that this is unconstitutional. i just want to clarify so we can move past that and if my colleagues is -- can focus this argument where it matters. we intend for this bill like all other bills to pass the house, to pass the senate, be signed by

the president. i, too, am a j.a.g. officer from the army an i think the j.a.g. officer, madam speaker, from the air forceould understand that. thiss a constitutional bill like the other bills tt we introduce here. now, why are we here today? 41 days ago this house passed a $100 billion spending cut from the president's 2011 budget that. bill kept the government operating. we did our job here. there was another house down on the other side of the capitol and we are here because they have refused to do their job, 41 days later, zero bills. we have heard some suggestions here today. and maybe we ought to do a across-the-board cut. i suggest that if they got any friends on the senate side that they go down there and see if they will propose a bill with some kind of cuts, because so far it's zero. zero bills from the senate on

this. senator harry reid thinks our plan goes, quote, too far, end quote. we have heard a lot of people using the word extreme because that's a scary word. let me tell you, the only thing around here is the national debt. you want to see extreme, that's extreme. senator harry reid believes that shutting down the government is perfectly acceptable. in fact, we have seen with the pollsters d pundits and howard dean and others that they want to shut down the government. i don'want to shut down the government. i want to cut spending. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. mr. griffin: 30 seconds? thank you. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. griffin: i don't want the government shut down. i want spending cut. i have a question of how -- what a shut down would do to our armed forces. the airmen and the soldiers in arkansas that aren my district

, senator reid has failed to come up with a credible plan of his own. they can't cut just a few billion dollars. evenhough we have a.a.o. report that indicates $100 billion to $200 billion could be saved by getting rid of duplicative programs. if the senate is unwilling to make t small cuts, how in the world are we ever going to be able to make the bold decisions -- the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman's time has expired. mr. griffin: thank you, madam speaker. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman fromouth carolina. mr. clyburn: thank you, madam speaker. madam speaker, i yield one minute to the democratic leader of california, ms. pelosi. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady from california is recognized. ms. pelosi: i thank the gentleman for yielding and thank him for his leadership in this debate this afternoon. i have been listening to it very

intently. i heard the debate on the rule this morning and then the debate this afternoon. and some questns have arisen. first, i want to state a fact. the fact is is that every single one of us in this body, as our first act, raises our right hand to protect and defend the constitution of the united states. the bill that we have on the floor before us does violence to those provisions in the constitution that describe how to pass a bill. not by one house deeming it but as our distinguished assistant leader, mr. clyburn, described, his daughter's school children and her class could tell you that you pass one house, you pass another house, it's signed by the president. but that seems to be missed by the makers of this resolution today.

again mr. cly bush talked -- clyburn talked about the constitutional authority to bring this bill to the floor. it's truly a mystery how you can take an oath of office to protect the -- and defend the constitution of the united states, bring a bill to the floor in violence of that, and justify it aually. i have heard the distinguished chairman of the rules committee, mr. dreier, say that we had some visiting parliamentarians here who were watching this debate to see ifmerica, congress can get its job done. please don't pay attention to th. what you see on the floor today is no example of democracy in action. it's silly. the republican leadership is asking its memberso make a silly vote. and it's time for us to stop that silliness and get serious about the creation of jobs. get serious about not shutting

down government. abdicating our responsibilities and shutting down government. i have heard mr. hoyer earlier today talk about how we got here in terms of this budget defit. we all know that we must reduce the deficit, that's why during the clinton years as mr. hoyer said, we reversed the first bush deaf, came out with a trajectory of fiscal responsibility, going into surplus. the last five clinton budgets were in surplus or in balance. but because of tax cuts for the rich, two unpaid-for wars, and prescription drug bill that gave away the store to the pharmaceutical industry, we came back into deficit, the biggest swing in fiscal irresponsibility in our country's history, and now we have had to deal with that. and what is the answer that the

bush administration gave us? tax cuts for the rich, that's how you create job we didn't. that's how you reduce the deficit. we grew it. i think it's important when we are talking about the deficit, which we all agree must be cut, and we are talking about jobs to note that in the first year of the obama administration more jobs were created in the private sector than in the eig years of the bush administration. tax cuts for thrich did not produce jobs. cuts in initiatives to educate our people and keep us healthy and safe, those cuts did not create jobs. so here we are today at the end of the week wasting the public's time on a notion, not even an idea, on a notion that does not rise to the level of a credible idea that one house can deem a bill the law of the land.

i also heard on the floor of the house a call for smart reid, leader in the senate, to take up h.r. 1. he did. it failed. not even the republicans all voted for it in the united states senate. three republican senators voted against h.r. 1 in the senate. perhaps you don't know the date, but it did happen. and it is -- it's stunning to hear this debate that talks about visiting parliamentarians seeing an example of good government in action. no. wrong. so what could be the explanation for this? mr. clyburn suggested it could be april fool's and at the end of this debate the gentleman will withdraw the amendment, apologize for wasting the public's time, and say this is only an april fool's joke. because that's the only thing

that it complies with. it does not comply or conform with honoring the constitution. it does not create jobs. it does not reduce the deficit, and it does have the support of the democrats in the house of representatives. with that, i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempe: the gentlelady yields back. the gentleman from georgia. mr. woodall: madam speaker, i yield myself 30 seconds just to remind the gtlelady that article 1, section 7 says all bills for raising revenue shall originate in the house of representatives. we failed to do that in the last congress and that's why the gentleman stands here today with this bill proudly. th that i yield two minutes to a very good freshman, my colleague, the gentleman from la, mr. landry. mr. landry: when i first elected, i declined my health care benefits because i don't believe we can fix a system we are not a part of.

i declined my retirement benefits because our social security system is broke. . i support this bill becse if the american people have to endure a government shutdown, which is the result of the failure of the senate democrats, then none of us, including the president, should expect the american people to continue our pay. until we fix this budget mess. the funding for the federal government is 182 days old. democrats on the senate have failed -- democrats have failed to pass a budget or 182 days. 182 case, that's an entire school year. i ask my colleagues on the other si of the aisle, what would you think if your child's teacher did nothing for the entire school year. our constitution authorizes congress to be the power of the purse. it is our job to set a responsible and affordable budget for the federal government each year. and if we can't do our job we should not be paid.

mr. speaker,, it is time for the -- mr. speaker, it is time for the democrats in the senate to do their job. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from georgia. i'm sorry, the gentleman from south carolina is recognized. mr. clyburn: thank you, madam speaker. madam speaker, i yield a minute and a half to the gentleman from florida, mr. hastings. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from florida is recognized for a minute and a half. mr. hastings: i thank my good friend from south carolina. david fishburg wrote in 1975, "i'm just a bill," and this has been utilized -- i utilized it yesterday. my friend, mr. woodall from georgia, used it today. i encourage the american public to understand that my friends know how a bill becomes the law. h.r. 1, the measure that we have been talking about, really did pass the house of representatives and it went over to the united states senate and it was rejected. the president also said that he

would veto h.r. 1 if it reached his des so what we are doing here is symbolism. and my friends on the other side are entitled easily to message anything they wish to address their base. but don't bring it to the american public under the ages of this is something serious. it is not. it is absurd. it is a complete waste of time. and even more important, as has been said by many, and i believe everybody on the other side understands, it's unconstitutional. it also has not gone unnoticed that my friends who advocated rightly that there should be transparency in addition to being transparency that measures should be allowed to be read before they're utilized. the leadership of the house of representatives held a press conference before any member of the house of representatives s mr. womack and mr. woodall's bill.

knowing this, then i guess what must be happening here is we are wasting our time on unconstitutional -- the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. mr. clyburn: i yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds. mr. hastings: we are wasting our time on pate antley unconstitutional measures. i won't go into all of the details about the need to address jobs, but i do know this, steny hoyer said earlier what all of us in america know and when we were children we celebrated a lot, a lot of us, and it was april fools' and we played jokes on people. but, listen, the american people are not fools, and they are not foolish enough to believe this absolutely foolish unconstitutional measure. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from georgia is recognized. mr. woodall: madam speaker, at this time i'm very proud to yield 30 seconds to my good friend, the gentleman from texas, mr. gohmert. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from texas is recognized for 30 seconds. mr. gohmert: thank you, madam speaker.

we're here because the democratic majority last year did not do their job, did not give us a budget, did not do prope appropriations and now the senate has had the same problem. and so i applaud anybody's efforts in trying to move the ball down the road so that we can approriate. i just wish the senate would do their job now and take care of it. but for a bill to say provisions are passed -- that pass the house or hereby acted into law violates my conscious and thconstitution. i cannot vote for it. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from south carolina. mr. clyburn: madam speaker, may i inquire as to how much time we have left? the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from south carolina has 6 1/2 minutes remaining. the gentleman from georgia has 11 minutes. mr. clay: may i reserve the balance of my time to let the

other side catch up? the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from georgia. the gentleman from georgia is recognized. mr. woodall: it's my pleasure to yield two minutes to one of my freshman colleagues, the gentleman from arizona, mr. schweikert. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. mr. schweikert: it's been funny hearing the discussion this isn't constitutional. now, let me see -- it's a piece of legislation with a trigger mechanism in it. ok, i know the other side doesn't like that trigger but it would still require the senate to pass it and the resident to sign it. if i go back to a -- and it was fun seeing something from my childhood of the 1970's "how a bill becomes a law." it's how it becomes a law. it's not the gamesmanship of oh, it's april fools' day, let

us demagogue this piece of legislation. what's important here is the american people know we're taking the job seriously, and giving the senate anotr chance, another chance to step up and do tir job. we're sitting here how many weeks after we passed resolution -- you know, h.r. 1? and we're still doing this dance. at some point the american people have to expect us to do our job. and if we don't do our job not a single one of us here, the administration and in the senate deserve a paycheck. madam chairman, i yield back my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from south carolina. mr. clyburn: madam speaker, i yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from new jersey, mr. andrews. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from new jersey is recognized for 30 seconds. mr. andrews: i ask unanimous consent to revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. andrews: thank you, madam speaker. i think we need to reiterate, we just had a very principled statement of the gentleman from texas. i think we need to rise above

partisanship. the gentleman from texas said he agrees with the proposition that the bill is unconstitutional. i would urge members, madam speaker, to listen to that example of principle. we don't agree on all things but we should all rise to honor our oath of office and vote on this based on pure cotitutional grounds. i yieldack. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from georgia. mr. woodall: madam speaker, at this time i'm pleased to yield two minutes to my good friend and mentor, the gentleman from georgia, dr. broun. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from georgia i recognized for two minutes. . broun: i thank the gentleman for yielding. madam speaker, when a patient is bleeding to death on an operating table, we as doctors do everything that we can to save that patient's life. we don't just walk away and we certainly don't call it quits. well, that's what the democrats want to do. they want to call it quits on our spending crisis, and the

worst part is they are doing it for their own political games. democrats in congress are intentionally plotting this government shutdown and they hatched their plan months ago, i believe. if they wanted to, democrats could have passed a long-term continuing resolution during the lame dug session without making any -- lame-duck session without making any spending cuts at all. but instead they passed a short-term spending bill so they could play the shutdown card right now. the democrats' political game of wedging conservatives between unexacceptable cuts and a government shutdown is an insult to the gravity of the plan. it's an insult to american families who are struggling to make ends meet. it's an insult to all of the american people who are out of work and it's an insult to us in congress, the members of congress who are serious about trying to put this country on a road to recovery, economic recovery. it's pitiful that the democrats

have wasted so much time stalling over these minimal cuts in their own self-interest. while our country is financially bleeding to death, we should be focused on trying to revive our economy rather than bickering about $61 billion when we already borrow almost $60 billion per week. madam speaker, since the democrats refuse to stop their political games and get to work, those over in the senate, in particularly, i urge my colleagues to pass the government shutdown prevention act so that we can do our jobs and start frying to heal our economy and create jobs in america. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from south carolina. mr. clyburn: madam speaker, i'd like to yield two minutes to the gentleman from vermont, mr. welch. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from vermont is recognized for two minutes. mr. welch: i thank the gentleman. dam speaker, there's no stronger supporter of h.r. 1 than mr. gohmert from texas, and he made a very simple, very eloquent statement of

principle, about adhering to the constitution. this legislation has to be interpreted by its own words, not by what people say is in it. and what it explicitly says, if the house has not received a message from the senate before april 6 stating that it has passed a measure providing for the appropriation for the partments and agencies of government for the remainder of the fiscal year, and this is the language of your legislation, the provisions of h.r. 1 as passed by law on february 19, 2011, are hereby enacted into law. that's absurd. it's a pretend bill that says that if the house acts and the senate doesn't our action becomes law. it's absurd. it says that if the house acts the senate doesn't and the president doesn't sign this piece of legislation it's law. that's the document that you presented to this body to vote

on. now, mr. gohmert took the higher road here where instead of taking out his frustration with the united states senate at the expense of the conitution he stood up for the constitution. and that's what each and every e of us have an opportunity to do. all of us have frustration with the other body bause they sit on bills. in the eyes of the beholder it's a good or bad bill du it do not entitle us to pretend that the constitution does not apply to the legislation that we have to consider. also, if we have a political impractical problem of moving ahead on a piece of legislation in the house, is it right for us in effect to mislead the people that sent us here by suggesting that we're passing a law that has any impact when we know it has absolutely no impact? is that a fair or appropriate or horable thing for a democrat or a republican to do?

i urge us to vote no on this legislation, and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman frogeorgia is recognized. mr. woodall: madam speaker, i yield myself 30 seconds to answer my friend from vermont's question which is not the appropriate thing to mislead the american people. so i'll just read one more -- one more time the -- having passed the house, having passed the senate and be signed by the president. that's the regur order. i'll say to my friend, i'm sorry we didn't have that time to finish our discussion in the rules committee. i'm sorry we were called away by votes. i yield two minutes to my very good friend, the gentleman from pennsylvania, mr. barletta. the spker pro tempore: the gentleman from pennsylvania is recognized for two minutes. mr. barletta: mr. speaker, i came here to fight for my constituents. i didn't come here to shut down the government. my state has the highest

unemployment. they look at the reckless spending in washington and they get angry. it's just this simple. they don't spend money they don't have. so whdoes washington? this bill prevents members of congress and the president from getting paid if the government shuts down. i get it, the american pople get it, why doesn't washington get it? it's something any business owner or logical individual anywhere in america can understand. if you don't work you don't get paid. maybe this just makes too much sense for washington. thank you. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the entleman from south carolina is recognized. mr. clyburn: thank you, madam speaker. madam speaker, i'm pleased to yield two minutes to the gentleman from new york, mr. weiner. the speaker prtempore: the gentleman from new york is recognized for two minutes. mr. weiner: my friends, one of the experience we had in the opening days of experience that

we read the constitution and i think one of us had the great good fortune to read article 1, section 7, every bill shall have passed the house of representatives and the senate shall before became law be presented to the president of the united states. he has how a bill becomes a law. now, this is how eric cantor on 3/30/11 said a bill becomes a law. the senate's gotta -- this is just the transdescription. i just assume it's the southern thing. the senate's gotta act prior to the expiration of the c.r. if it does not act, meaning, if the senate does not do something, h.r. 1 becomes the law of the land. that's not true. that's not constitutional. that's not fitting of this body. now, it is, however, consistent with the -- how the majority party has been govning around here. they passed rules that they've ignored. for example, on january 5 they had members of their caucus take the oath in front of a television set.

on february 9 they failed to provide constitutional authority for a bill despite that it was one of their rules. on march 13 they failed to get a 3/5 majority for passage of a bill that raise tax rates despite the fact that it was part of the rules. on march 17 they failed to make a bill available within 72 hours despite the fact that it was part of the rules. and just march 30 they failed to include an offset for new government program. the rules are not a big thing for them to follow because this is why it's hard, it's a big book. i brought you this, house mouse and senate mouse which is sold in the gift shop to teach children how to understand the constitution. it's the floor of each chamber the senate and house where each senator and evening congress moe gets to vote on a bill and if enough do, if enough do, this president signs it if he likes to. well, the senate mouse -- mice, the senate mices haven't passed

this yet. perhaps if this were the rules that the republicans had to follow, it's a much thinner book and it rhymes, maybe you'd get it right. but this is not the constitution. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from georgia. mr. woodall: madam speaker -- the speaker pro tempore: members in the gallery are reminded they are not to participate. mr. woodall: i reserve my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from georgia reserves. the gentleman from south carolina. mr. clyburn: how much time do i have? the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from georgia -- from georgia has 6 1/2 minutes. the gentleman from south carolina has two minutes. mr. clyburn: who has the right to close? the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from georgia has the right to close. mr. clyburn: how many speakers do you have left? mr. woodall: we have no more speakers. mr. clyburn: six mutes left? the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from georgia 6 1/2

minutes. you have 2 minutes remaining. mr. clyburn: i'd like to reserve. mr. woodall: if the gentleman is prepared to close. we have no more speakers. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from south carolina is recognized. mr. clyburn: thank you, madam speaker. madam speaker, i have often referred to this palatial hall as our nation's classroom. it is the reason i feel that we should not just stand here to enunciate precepts but as elected leaders we ought to lead by example. therefore, madam speaker, i think it's important for us to bring legislation to this floor that we demonstrate to those young children in classrooms all across america that we will not fly in the face of that

constitution that all of us are sworn to uphold. i believe that it's a good thing to want to move a measure, but we ought not do so while violating the constitution of the united states. and i think it's a good reason that the senate rejected h.r. 1. because all of the economists who evaluated that piece of legislation made it very clear that to them it would destroy 700,000 jobs. that bill, h.r. 1, is a job killer. it also, that bill, h.r. 1, will say to little preschool children in head sta, we are

terminating your educational experience by at least 200,000 of you. will no longer have an educational experience. madam speaker, i think it's laudatory for us to put our hands on the constitution, swear to uphold it,ut i think that what is most important is for each and very one of us to lead by example. enunciating precepts for empty gestures. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from georgia is recognized. mr. woodall: i yield myself such time as i may consume. we have had a lot of talk about children on the floor today. we have been reading children's stories and being shown children's books. have been harkened back to my own childhood in the 1970's and schoolhouse rock and for folks who have not seen the scolhouse rock entire d.v.d. now, i recommend you pick a copy up for the young people in your

life. it really is a fantastic beginning step about what it is we are all about. what it is we are all about. the preamble is in that schoolhouse rock. no more kings in that schoolhouse rock category. what ty talk about is what does it mean for us to be americans? and what it means is folks elect their representatives and they send them to washington, d.c., and say get your business done. get your business done. that's what we are trying to do with this resolution here today. get our business done. i just want to read from the bill. i'm so thrilled that so many americans watch what we do here on the house floor to hold us accountable, and i'm so saddened by all the misinformation that's circulated. i read directly from the bill. if the house has not received a message from the senate before april 6, 2011, stating it has passed a measure providing for the appropriation for the

departmentand agencies of the government for remainder of the fiscal year 2011, the provisions of h.r. 1 as passed by the house are hereby enacted into law. this bill we sent to the senate for the senate to pass, the president to sign, those prisions are hereby enacted into law. i want to study that closer. if the house has not received a message from the senate stating that the senate has passed a measure providing for the appropriations of the united states government. folks may be wondering, madam speaker, why is it that we are doing that now? wasn't that supposed to be done last september? yes, it was. it didn't get done. should that have gotten done last december? yes, it should have, but it didn't get done. so we are here today to get it done, 41 days ago we passed a bill to fund the government. this entire body worked its will on a process that was as opened as this house as seen. democrats and republicans working together. republicans winning amendments. decrats winning amendments. democrats losing amendments. republicans losing appeds.

it made me proud to be a -- amendments it made me proud to be a representative and serve in this body much it was the best wor product this house put together. we sent it to the senate 41 days ago. they defeated it. they have to act. they defeated our bill, h.r. 1, they defeated a democrat bill, and they have done nothing. i got a call earlier today, i held up a board just like this, talking about what the sete had done. well, there's nothing on this sheet of paper. you hold up the wrong sign. no, it's the right sign. nothing, nhing have we received from the united states senate. it's the same on both sides. blank. how in the world are we supposed to fund this government with nothing fromhe united states senate? this bill does two things and two things only, madam speaker. it says, senate act. you don't have to act like us. act like democrats. just act. act. do something. send us something. begin the process. make it available. act.

and number two, -- madam speaker, tell me how much time i have remaining? the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman has 3 1/2 minutes remaining. mr. woodall: i would be delighted to yield to my friend from florida. mr. hastings: do you believe what you're doing here is constitutional? mr. woodall: absolutely. having had my mtives impugned throughout the day, i know the llegial relationship you and i have in the rules committee, you know for a fact i wouldn't be here otherwise. i wouldn't be here otherwise. now, i'm no scholar of house activities. i know we have passed bills this house that have incorporated things by reference before and i'm sure we'll do it again. not in an outside the process. to suggest, to suggest, you appreciate this, i say to my friend from florida, to receive constitutional instruction fm the team that brought us obamacare is troubling at the most basic levels. mr. hastings: would the gentleman yield again for another question? do you have any precedent for

the constitutionality of this particular measure? i urge you based on what you just said, there have been measures that were deemed but that was when they were agreed upon, but there is no authority anywherefore us to pass a law frirg -- anywhere for us to pass a law. and i appreciate my colleague yielding. mr. woodall: reclaiming my time. i'll say that this is a unique procedure and these are unique times. i will just say to you that in 1999, republican congress, democratic president, enacted the foreign relations billy reference, the foreign relations authorization bill by reference in appropriations bill. that's what we are doing today. folks, if you don't like it. call your senate colleagues and get them to act. this is where we need to be. we need action from the senate. call your senate, colleagues. i have called them. i need you to call them, too. we need to move this ball forward. if the government shuts down,

our military men and women don't get paid, madam speaker. if the government shuts down our usda inspectors go home and beef and chicken leave our shelves in the grocery stores. this isn't play time going back to our children references this is serious business. folks sent us here to do serious things. i could not be happyier, madam speaker, for the second provision to say if you don't work, you don't get paid. it's a basic premise in this republic no pay for no work. i'm very proud of the work that we have done. and i implore, i implore my colleagues to contact their senators and get them to do something. something. this is what we have from the senate so far, madam speaker. we deserve better. the american people deserver. and the senate can do better. with that i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. all time for debate has expired. pursuant to house resolution 194 the bill is considered as read and the previous question is ordered. the question is on engrossment and third reading of the bill.

all those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. the ayes have it. third reading. the clerk: a bill to prevent the shut down of the government of the united states and for other purposes. the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the -- >> i have a the motion to reconsider to recommit at the desk. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from minnesota rise? is the gentleman opposed to the bill? mr. walz: i am. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman qualifies. the clerk will read the motion. the clerk: mr. walls of minnesota moves to recommit the bill h.r. 1255 to the committee on house administration with instructions to report the same back to the house forthwitwith the following amendment. strike all after the enacting clause and insert the following, section 1, prohibition of -- on pay during government shutdown, a, in general, members of congress and the president shall not receive basic pay for any period in which, one, there is more than a 24-hour lapse in appropriations for any federal agency or department as a result of a failure to enact a regular

appropriations bill or continuing resolution. or two, the federal government is unable to make payments or meet obligations because the public debt limit under section 3101 of title 31 united states code has been reached. b, retroactive pay prohibited. no pay forfeited in accordance with subsection a may be paid retroactively. amend the title to read a bill to prohibit members of congress and the president from receiving pay during government shutdowns. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from minnesota is recognized for five minutes in support of the motion. mr. walz: thank you, madam speaker. to stand here in th haloed place as a -- hallowed place as a representative, the incredible privilege and honor to represent the hardworking americans across this country, in southern minnesota the chance to see genuine folks out working hard, doing the things that built this country, and made us the grtest nation on earth.

one of those things is a very basic premise. thamerican work ethic. the idea that you should work hard and do your best and be compensated at the end of the day and feel good a sense of accomplishment in what you did. we had the opportunity, the american people did send us here, as you heard, on both sides of the aisle, to do a very simple thing. get the work done, move this country forward. the debate is, there's differences in how to do that. that's the strength of this land. it's democracy. but there is one very strong principle that we can reinforce. that work ethic that if you do not get your job done,you certainly should not be paid. no middle of the night, no if i passes and goes this way, very simply, the easiest you thing to do if this congress after being here four months, i don't care where you put the blame, can't get this done by next week, and the government shuts down, there will be no chance of a single paycheck going and no retroactive pay. that's the least we owe those

hardworking folks. that's the least we can do here. i want to be very clear. i understand the majority is having a problem. they've got a debate happening inside their caucus. if compromise is a virtue or a vice. they will work that out and decide because that's what this debate today was about. where do we compromise in the -- for the good of the american public? i come out on the side of compromise. with that being said, if we don't get our work done, and i will do everything in my power to ensure we do not shut this government down, the repercussions are catastrophic for americans. not just macroeconomically, our seniors aren't going to get their checks. we are going to se medical care slow down to our veterans. we are going to hear from and we have heard from our military commanders that it stresses the readiness of this nation. our federal workers and even the hardworking staff here will not receive a paycheck. how do you go home to georgia, to alabama, to minnesota, look somebody in the eye an say, we failed because we bickered again, but, dang, i'm going to take home that check. i telly colleagues, especially

the new members, if you're a freshman in here, you came with an optimism that should not be able to be beaten out of you. regardless if you disagree with us, with every fiber ever your being, the very simple principle that we can't get this done let's put skin in the game. no, if it goes to the senate and get passed, no if it's not constitutional. i offer you the rarest of opportunities today. the rarest, the first time you have had this chance, if you vote yes on this mion to recommit, it goes to the president today and becos law of the land and no one here will be paid. you can look your constituents in the eye and whoever you blame for it, you can say, i'm not getting a paycheck until we fix this. i want to be very clear, this is an opportunity, a rare opportunity. you can vote however you want and decide however you want to balance the budget, but do not allow to play games. it is the bright lights of day, the board is going to come up, and you are going to have the opportunity, not what's in the underlying bill, that doesn't stop from retroactive pay, and

that has to pass the senate. . every republican already voted for my motion to recommit. so you have the chance to say, all right, i disagree with the democrats on everything in this bill but i'm not going to go back to georgia and tell someone i'm picking a paycheck and then trying to explain, but i voted for it really, but it was a motion to recommit think a didn't agree with. nothing, simple, 75 words. half page. don't do your job, don't get paid. no work, no pay. it is very, very simple. at this point i want to yield a little bit of time to my colleague from virginia. >> i thank the gentleman. so the point is, the law as it stands today is, we shut the government down, a million federal employees don't get paid, our staff doesn't get paidbut we get paid. all the gentleman wants to say it -- is, treat ourselves lke we'd pay ours. if other staff is out on the street we ought to be out there with them. mr. moran: and the other point

the gentleman makes is if he vote for this recommital, the senate has already approved it, it goes right to the senate. it gets signed into law. we've done something constructive. the alternative is to send something over to the senate and the senate's going to laugh at us. you know this 1255 isn't going to get passed. this would be passed, this becomes law, it's the right thing to do. thank you. mr. walz: here's your rare opportunity. if you don't do this and say you're going to vote for the underlying bill, the gentleman said himself, mr. woodall, that it would probably not pass the senate. this is done. there's no more going anywhere, it's going to be done. i know optimism abounds on april 1. i believe today the twins are going to win the world series. i believe that in all my heart. but i wouldn't take the bat or the chance on it. if you want to go back to each of your congressional districts and say, i stand with you to do what's right on the american work ethic, if we don't get done next week, we don't get paid. i yield back my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. the chaireminds members that they should address their

remarks to the chair. or what purpose does the gentleman from georgia rise? mr. woodall: i rise in opposition, madam speaker. the speaker pro tempore: the geleman is recognized for five minutes. mr. woodall: i don't know whe to begin. i don't know where to begin. the misrepresentation after misrepresentation after misrepresentation. i don't impugn anyone's motives. i admire the passion. but if you really believe with no work, no pay, i wish we had the board up there, if you believe it, all the time we've been spending talking about the constitution, don't you think we ought to do in a in a constitutional way? don't you think we ought to do it in a constitutional way? i do. because if we say it we ought to mean it and stand by our convictions and, madam speaker, i yield such time as he may consume to speak to these constitional issues, my chairman, the gentleman from california, mr. lungren. mr. lungren: i appreciate the gentleman for yielding. i heard the eloquent plea of our friends from the other side of the aisle. let me just read to you a

message i received from the white house about this bill. with the words that the gentleman has presented on the floor. unfortunately s.b. 388 which are the words the gentleman puts in his motion to recommit, is patently unconstitutional both as applied to congress in violation of the 27th amendment and the president in violation of -- >> would the gentleman yield? mr. lungren: no, i will not yield. of the compensation clause of article 2. so if one wants to by this bill have some pressure exerted on the house, the senate and the president, it would be in the language closer to that that's contained in the underlying bill on which you can -- the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from georgia controls the time. mr. lungren: upon which you can

make an argument is constitutional because it does not vare the pay given to these -- vary the pay either given to the president -- >> will the gentleman from georgia yield time? mr. woodall: i'd like to let my chairman finish. mr. lungren: i believe the regular order is to not interrupt at the time they're making the argument. maybe because it's difficult to hear the words of the white house about the unconstitutionality of that which the gentleman brings to the floor. if anyone wants this to act in vein it is the gentleman on the other side who has presented this motion to recommit because it is under any view, any view, unconstitutional. it violates the very terms of the constitution with respect to the president and with respect to members of congress. so if you want to exert any fluence on members, if you believe this is the way to do it, would you accept the language that's in the underlying bill which does not

attack directly the words of the constitution. i find it not funny, i find it tragic that on this floor we just heard the great arguments on the other side of the aisle about observing the constitution and then they come to the floor and give us something which the white house says in its language , in its email to me, is patently unconstitutional. not maybe unconstitutional. not perhaps unconstitutional. not arguably unconstitutional. but patently unconstitutional. so the gentleman has presented us the kind of i guess shell game we talk about where it looks good when it's presented to you but by sleight of hand it makes sure that it has no impact whatsoever. the gentleman says, well, it will go right to the president. that is not true. this is not the bill sent over to us, it's the same language. so it doesn't go right to the president, number one. number two, unless the president is sending me misinformation via his messager, the president's

position is it's pattly unconstitutional. d.o.j.'s position, department of justice, patently unconstitutional. so i guess the gentleman is arguing to us, send it to the president so that he may commit a patently unconstitutional act. now, i may have disagreements with the president but i have no wheafssoffer that the president is waing with baited breath over at the white house for us to send something to him so that he can do an unconstitutional act. perhaps the gentleman believes that's t position he wants to put the president in and even though i have great disagreement with this president, frankly i don't think that's appropriate thing to do. so i would argue to my colleagues, reject this unanimously because it really is something which doesn't pass the truth in labeling act and more than that, it violates the constitution on its very words, it's almost an attempt to directly violate the constitution. you couldn't have written it better to violate the constitution. but somehow the gentleman has

achieved that high honor. i thank the gentleman. and increasing energy efficiency through new technology. >> hello, everybody. i am speaking to -- i speaking

to you from maryland. to you from maryland. the rising price of gas and will weaken due to reduce our dependence on foreign oil. this week, i released a blueprint for a secure energy future. it is to make our economy stronger at home. part of this strategy involves increasing our oil exploration right here in america. our oil production last year reached its highest levels since 2003. we want to encourage more responsible growth where we can. doing it alone is not a real strategy. that is because even though america uses 25% of the world's oil, which currently only have about 2% of the world's oil reserves. even if we use every last drop, it would not be enough to meet

our long-term energy needs. the real energy security can only come if we find ways to use less oil, if we invest in cleaner fuels and greater efficiency. for example, we secured an agreement from all the major auto companies to raise the fuel efficiency standards of their cars and trucks. if you buy a new car with better gas mileage, is going to save you about $3,000. we need to build on the progress. as we make our cars and trucks more efficient, we have to harnessed new technologies to fuel our vehicles from everything to by officials to advanced batteries. these technologies are not science fiction anymore. they exist today already. car companies are producing electric vehicles that use little or no gasoline.

innovators are testing new products that hold incredible promise, not just for new vehicles, but for countless new jobs. the federal government has doubled the number of clean energy vehicles that we have in our fleet. in the next few years, we are going to switch the entire fleet over. companies like ups, fedex, at&t, areizon, and pepsico merge switching to more fuel-efficient vehicles. through our partnership driven by business, more companies are be going to be switching to electric and hybrid vehicles, too. the goal is simple. when i was elected, americans imported 11 million barrels of oil per day. but little more than a decade from now, we will have cut that

by one-third. by doing so, we are going to make our economy less vulnerable to wild swings in energy prices. we are going to spark new products and businesses all over the country by tapping america's greatest renewable resource, our ingenuity. we know how important this is. this week, the economy added 230,000 private sector jobs last month. that is a good sign. we have to keep up the momentum in the transition into a clean energy economy. it will ensure that the united states of america is the home of the jobs and industries of tomorrow. that is how we will win the future leave our children an america that is more prosperous than before. thanks and have a great weekend. >> hello.

i am john boehner. i ran a small business back in ohio. small businesses are the engine of job creation in america. they actually create jobs. the government does not. that is why i ran for congress. despite some recent signs of life, our economy still is not creating enough jobs. one of the reasons for this is the business here going on in washington. washington's inability to get spending under control, creating uncertainty for our job creation, discouraging investment and its eroding confidence in our economy. the spending binge in washington is holding our country back and keeping our economy from creating jobs. last year, when the president try to put forward another big spending budget, americans demanded that we stopped the

spending binge and started working together to create a better environment for job creation. they put in new majority in charge of the house with clear orders. so our economy can get back to creating jobs. we have made some early progress. this year, the federal government will spend $51 billion less than it would have. because we kept the pressure on, democrats in the white house and the senate are being forced to talk about a bill that would cut tens of billions more. over the next decade and the savings will be hundreds of billions of dollars. it is a clear change in direction. democratic leaders claim an agreement has been reached. there is no agreement. republicans continue to fight for the largest spending cut possible to help and washington's spending binge.

we need to do much, much more. that is what it is important for congress to get moving and pass a final bill that results last year's budget problems while making real spending cuts so we can tackle the bigger challenges facing job creation. one of those challenges is topping the tax hike the president has called for. this tax hike will affect every family and small-business and america and it will destroy jobs. the president has asked congress to increase the national debt limit without any commitment to stop the runaway spending that got us into this mess in the first place. it would send the signal that america has no plan to deal with her spending bonus, and that is going to have the effect of destroying more american jobs. we also need to address all the red tape and regulations making it harder to create jobs and driving up the cost of health

care and energy. we need to remove the regulatory obstacles of job growth, expand its energy production, and the threat of tax hikes, and improve stalled trade agreements that would open new markets. these are the pillars of the republican plan to help get our economy back to creating jobs. this is the focus of our new majority in the house. thank you for listening and have a great weekend. >> tomorrow, ranking member of the appropriations committee, representative norman dicks. >> i think we will pass a compromise. i do not know whether we can get it done by next friday, but i hope there will be a demonstration between now and, say, wednesday or thursday, so

we can come to gather and the sub committees will work out what is to be under those allocations that they are working on right now. it still is not together, but it is getting close. there is some flexibility there. everyone said there is no deal until everybody agrees on everything. these writers are very controversial and a lot of them will have to come out if there is going to be any democratic support for any of this. >> you can see the entire interview, tomorrow at 10:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. eastern here on c-span. it is also available online at c-span.org. tonight, c-span coverage of the annual congressional correspondents dinner.

that is at 8:00 p.m. eastern here on c-span. now, a discussion on the first 100 days of the 100 calls congress. this is about an hour and 20 minutes. >> i want to welcome you to this session of the aei politics program. this morning, results were released of a periodic quiz and the reported americans control the house and not the senate, and 43% of americans could correctly identify john boehner as the speaker.

it said in its analysis that current politics in washington are a mystery to many, and i am hoping our panel this morning will solve some of the mystery about the state of washington politics. let me begin by providing a few notes. our colleague was planning to be with us this morning, but he is unable to join us. i have an announcement about our colleague, john fortier. john 12.5been at 12 years. with our 91-year-old colleague, he recently updated the indispensable volume after the people voted.

john is going to be leaving us in a few weeks for a new assignment. the democracy project is a bipartisan initiative that analyzes and advocates for improvements of democratic institutions. its main current project is strengthening civil discourse and congressional redistricting. we wish john will and we will miss him greatly. john, i will turn it over to you. >> thank you for the many kindnesses over the years. i will not be a stranger. i expect to be back. we have a great panel today. i am going to do some introductions. first, a bit of news about donald trump. donald trump has declared for president. it turns out he declared for

president for law via because his birth certificate was not correct. it turns out he was born in another place. it is april fool's and i got that out of the way. now want to turn to more serious matters. we are going to run our panel and the more informally. our panelists are become -- are among the country's leading experts and kentuck about what is going on today, but also can talk about comparisons, especially to 1995 as well as other times where the majority has changed from one party to the other. i will start with vin weber who is sitting to my right from clark & weinstock. he represented minnesota's second congressional district. he served on the science and technology, small business,

public works, transportation, budget, and appropriations committees. he was a secretary in the leadership for the republicans. vic fazio, his former partner and senior adviser at akin gump, who also served in congress from 1979 to 1999, representing california's third district. he was on the appropriations committee, ethics, and administration committees, as well as chair of the democratic caucus. janet hook, a political reporter for "the wall street journal" has been covering congress since the 1980's when she was in elementary school. she was with the los angeles * for a long time. and the winner of several

important awards in journalism. norman ornstein is not able to join us today, we are very lucky to have alex with us. all of his thoughts will be his own accept for the jokes that norm has written for him. you are on the spot. alex is a research fellow here at the american enterprise institute and was its chief economist at a house, weis, and means committee. we'll start with a round of questions. what i would like to do is not spend all of our time in the past, but think about one of

this comparison to 1995 when republicans had taken the majority, faced a democratic president, and at that time, had a budget showdown as we are facing a potential one today. i thought there might start with janet hook to start the stage, painting a big picture of what had been happening and ultimately how we got to the end of 1995 when the big budget showdown came through. give us a big picture of where we were in 1995. >> in 1995, you have to remember that the 1994 elections were not in the old handover of power from one party to another. that was like the first time in 40 years that the house had gone out of the democrats' hands, so it was a really big deal.

not only was it the entire congress, but it was the house for the very first time. so it was not just a political change that changed the agenda. it was a huge institutional wrenching experience. when republicans took control of the house, they did not just change the agenda. they try to change the way that congress worked. -- they tried to change the way the congress worked. newt gingrich changed the ways of the speakership. he really was the center of all things because he was a larger- than-life figure and had a lot of power and he used it. to be honest, when i think about -- in addition to that, he brought power, his 100-days

agenda, the contract with america and systematically tried to march through it in the first 100 days. the first 100 days were quite exhausting for those involved. and then, from there, the longer-term confrontations with the clinton white house. if i could just say -- i do not want to talk to greatly on this point, but i am more struck by the differences between 1995 and today than the similarities because john boehner is not a larger than life figure. these republicans came to power, not with a big 10-point agenda, because here we are and they have not accomplished a lot legislatively. they have transformed the debate. it really does feel different. of course, there is this problem of the senate now being under

republican control which gave newt gingrich a different set of foils. it at that? leave >> let me turn to vin. if you could tell us about the republican mood of that year and then take us into the end of the year when we reached the final budget showdown what republicans were thinking -- if i am not wrong, republicans were confident enough that public opinion might turn to their direction. talk about the year in general from the republican perspective and tell us about what was in the minds of leaders going into the end of 1995. >> janet hook has laid the framework. the most important similarities were when the republicans came to washington with a genuine sense of shock at the magnitude of their own victory.

most republicans did not think they were going to take control of the congress in 1994. newt gingrich did. most people dismissed its. most did not expect it. when they came into this power, there was a general sense of awe of what they had done. there were a lot of predictions out there about that. the magnitude surprise everybody. in both cases, i think what you have seen -- what it did was to convince republicans, not so much that they had a huge mandate, but the public was demanding change, and if they did not act on it, they were going to lose the majority that they just won by such is surprising, shocking margin. i think that drove the actions of congress back in 1995 as it is driving the actions of house republicans today.

it is not an arrogance. it is a genuine concern that they are not going to be able to keep up with the expectations of the public putting them into power. that is what it happened back in 1995. the republicans in 1995 believe that without newt gingrich, they would not have been in the majority. no one thinks that of john boehner. i think he is a pretty effective speaker but nobody believes he delivered the majority the way that newt gingrich delivered the majority. they figured they would not be in the majority without newt gingrich. when he led toward the shutdown of the government or the confrontation with the clinton administration, there was a great deal of confidence that at the end of the day newt gingrich was going to win politically in

this confrontation. by the way, he still thinks they won politically in the confrontation. that was pretty much the attitude. you cannot really overstate the difference between a newt gingrich-led congress and a john boehner-led house. >> i would like to hear the point of view from the democratic side, but also maybe you could talk about the role of president clinton at the time and if you want to make comparisons with the president today. maybe you could tell us a little bit about the democratic view of having lost out after been in power for 40 years. >> first of all, they were in its shell shock. those of us who ran a campaign committee into the ground that you saw what was happening and tried to alert the troops

without screaming the sky is falling because it would only fallen faster. many of the members were not only in this belief but they were really unable to do anything about it even in their own districts in their own campaigns, and it really was the creation of a lot of dead wood, shall we say, and some of them were my deer friends. it really was the culmination of what lbj said when he signed the civil rights bill in the 1960's. it took 30 years for it to play out. it became the republican cutting edge, winning seats in the south. i know a lot of my republican friends think of newt gingrich as purging, and then when he

could not become eisenhower, the when. they needed a persian to win. nancy pelosi was very effective in the minority, winning the majority. i think democrats lost this majority for many reasons, but much of their related to the events that they believe were beyond their control. maybe you could say they were off message by emphasizing health care in the face of all of the joblessness, etc., but there is no question they are far more prepared to be in the minority now than the democrats who came back here in 1995. many of us -- when i got 48.4% to get reelected, i never appreciated libertarianism as much as it did then. [laughter] party candidates were essential.

today, the people who survive this wave were kind of caught up in a knowing the could not do anything. they were being pulled out to sea and they could not swim hard enough to mitigate that. many of them knew what was coming toward the end. to a degree, yes, but i think they saw the trend and probably thought in many cases they would be in the minority. they are far tougher. they were not there long enough to become complacent. bill clinton was very effective seguing into the role of being the other branch of government and using it to play off the senate and house to his own advantage. this time, i think, we have a different president. i do not think he is going to

be doing that as much as his advisers would like him to be doing. at the same time, his personal relationships with people on the hill make it hard for him to set up people as a target. i think so much of his presidency has caught up in the issue of the moment, the joblessness issue, a little bit of progress this morning will be going a long way. i think he feels his presidency is pretty much on the line in relation to the job market and the economy and the public percentage thereof. i think the democrats will pick up some seats in the house. how many? i do not know. everybody is for deficit- reduction in till you get into the details. i think democrats will be better off if some of the cuts were actually implemented because

they are great in theory when they are actually -- but when they are actually imposed, they do not pan out very well. every state, whether you are a democrat in connecticut or a republican in ohio, you are in the tank because you have started to do some things -- even chris christie is losing his support in new jersey because people do not understand what is really involved in deficit-reduction or balancing a budget at the state level. >> bill clinton came back from his loss, but at the time, 100 days or so, he was still pretty far down compared to where president obama is today. were you worried about your president more than today? did you think you were going to have to part of your own ways? >> i think democrats were so it

shall shocked that they were more dependent on the white house. there was a little bit of recrimination about the effectiveness in the first two years. the things i think led to the demise on guns, you know, by jamming that into the crime bill which was otherwise on popular. you could see the aversion even today. and then failing to pass a health-care bill. i often said newt gingrich would never let two or three committees stop the health care bill from coming to the floor. it week later, there would that then a bill on the floor and it would have passed. whether it would of been inactive -- we had the worst of all worlds. we defended everybody who did

not like the health-care bill. we did a lot of things that were playing off the inexperience of the white house. i think some people blame him for that. i don't think anybody is planning obama for the policies that they worked to put through. they may be unhappy about his communication and his inability to make his case, but they are not at odds with him about what the case was pretty quick to want to move more to the present -- what the case was. >> i want to move more to the present. there is a piece in the journal about the status of the budget negotiations. where are we now? what are we likely to see in the next few days? i think the 100-day market is the day that the c.r. expires.

it is coming up. >> where we are now on the hill is there are all kinds of different budget dynamics at work. most of the focus is on the status of continuing resolutions which expire next week. it has been a very interesting week of the events surrounding that because it showed me how different things are now than they were before this election. i always thought when this budget debate in march, it was kind of obvious what was going to happen. republicans wanted spending at 2008 levels. democrats wanted 2010 levels. what we split the difference? it is the typical way when members pass it, twisting arms. that does not work these days, in part because compromise is a discredited concept.

so, what has happened is behind the scenes there has been an agreement or is not a deal because there has been no handshake on the c.r. guess where they came out? $33 billion in cuts. john boehner, ever since the vice president came out and said we are working toward this number, john boehner has denied that there has been an agreement on that number. there is this funny dance going on. there are these sort of private negotiations going on among these staff to put together some kind of compromise without the official deal because they also have all these policy writers that are even more controversial and harder to split the difference on than the numbers themselves. epa policy and so forth. there are two steps of

negotiations going on. it is this alice-in-wonderland thing. anyway, this will go on on a two-track, public-private, money policy thing for a week, and then hopefully there will not be a shutdown at the end of the week. i have to say i can usually see how things are going to go, but i am not sure how many twists or turns this is going to take. >> talk about the divisions within and the strategy for -- >> sure. thank you for having me here. i would rather be hearing norma''s jokes. i am his substitute this morning. one of the challenges in the next seven days as they try to

put together a bill -- it has to do with the fact there is a new dynamic from the new members. really, just two points. one is many of the freshmen members in the house did not come here to compromise. they came here to win. they believe there is a difference between compromising and winning. i think a lot of members who have been here for a longer time have an understanding that winning and compromise are one in the same, and without getting a deal, you have nothing. i worked on the hill for a number of years for someone who is known as a dealmaker, someone who can get a bill signed. i worked for congressman bill thomas. one of the things i learned from my experiences is that if you lose, no matter how great your

principles are, you are not moving the ball ahead. we worked on a lot of deals and that saw how many of them got put together, that ultimately got involved compromises. that is a new concept, i think, for some in the house, and something that needs to be worked through and worked through into next week. the house has not lost yet. they have not done anything yet, but they have not lost yet either. there have been a couple of bills that made it across the bench line. there have been these small spending decisions. to some extent, i think it is under appreciated halt bipartisan this bill has been. they have been bipartisan within

the house as well. the last c.r. that we had, house republicans, 54 peeled off that bill but others came on. as the work through negotiations, they are going to be thinking about the fact that the last continuing resolution, they had 53 extra votes. it is all about 218 in the house and finininin aompromise where you have enough votes. i don't know if it is a policy of there now. when i was there on staff, there was a concept of the majority. we did not bring bills to the floor even if they would've passed otherwise. i think that was not a new concept at the time either. it is one that is on people's minds at the moment. they do have a cushion coming

into this negotiation. they will be playing those margins. however they work to solve this negotiation between the house, the senate, and the white house, they are going to need to depend on not only the democratic minority, but they are going to have to rely on democrats in the house. going into this process, they got them. i think these issues of the writers -- some of these issues become non-starters. i am not surprised that the deal has not been made today and a deal is not going to be made over the weekend. i never saw a deal that could get made in the afternoon before everybody got on the plane and went home. they are going to keep negotiating before there is no

more time to negotiate and they are going to try to negotiate a little bit more. >> do you think this deal is going to happen? it may be. we might get down to the end with another continuing resolution, but it does seem like we are zeroing in on this number. a couple of other questions. how many are republicans going to lose? if john boehner put a deal through, is that going to hurt him in the process? is that a sign of his strength? . .

>> i think john but it's a skill for speaker. -- is a skillful speaker.

they are working hard with freshmen members and they have been four months, meeting with small groups to talk about keeping their eyes on the big issue, which is the fy 2012 budget. they have convinced the freshmen members that the 2012 budget is the big issue. they allow freshmen members to go home and say, i stood up for my principles and we avoided a government shutdown because we are focusing on 2012. that seems to be an acceptable political construct for the speaker. that does not lead you to a conclusion of what happens on the fiscal 2012 budget. >> i agree. i think there is a missing of

the point. this is nothing. we have a debt limit. we have the budget of the next fiscal year. why are we getting into a trot out fight over a relatively small -- into a fight over a relatively small share of the federal budget. you have to save your bullets with the real war. this is a test for john boehner, but he has several more common. he is experienced. he has been in the majority and the minority. he is maybe in the tradition of the democratic speakers who succeeded newt gingrich. he is a person who can read it -- can reach across the lines to the other party. he has kevin mccarthy negotiating with the blue dots. he understands he has to win

these fights and -- he has kevin mccarthy negotiating with the blue dogs. the question is, what are the democrats going to do? how cooperative are they going to be. enough of them will want to vote for a deal. many of them will feel that they need to be part of the solution and not just present a target as the problem. when you get to the debt limit, it becomes a problem for the democrats to put the votes up there. many here renomination or reelection or do not care. there is a little of both. they are not going to vote for what happened in the past. this is making sure there is

enough money in your checking account to cover the checks you have written. there are enough democrats to say, you are in charge now. it is your ball. you carry it to the line. i am not sure there are some who will be part of that solution. there are many who politically feel this is john boehner's job. this is this challenge. they are not going to be part of making it easier for him. it has not been the minority's role to help the majority. >> the republicans will say, we did not write the checks. you have an excuse on both sides or not cooperating on this issue, which is a lethal combination. >> i was interested in what vic was saying about trying to put this continuing resolution problem into perspective. ñrin, -- in terms of discretiony spending, even if they do $30

billion in discretionary spending cuts, it will be the biggest cut congress has ever made. if i were a republican, i would declare victory and go home. the democrats are making it their mission to cut $30 billion. paul ryan said his initial starting point -- it was a monumental armageddon. the terms of debate on discretionary spending have moved so far that that is the democrat's negotiating position. another thing on debt limit and the shutdown issue. someone said, talking about $30 billion or $60 billion, it is still a lot of money. he said, if we are going to have a shut down, we should have a shut down over something really big like entitlement reform. we should not have a shut down

over $30 billion. >> would think the republicans are already depriving themselves of their victory over the way they are operating. >> really quick on the debt limit issue. unlike being continuing resolution, there is another problem with the debt limit. we know there is a problem coming, but we do not know when. i have written that it is crucial -- it is initially constructed and it is not a real measure of our debt. this is a classic issue. this is the majority's responsibility. they all take for a debt limit 10 times. it is a voted nobody wants to take. they attach it onto something else. it is also an issue that the tea party has grabbed onto in an

incredible way. it is an issue where it is not about $30 billion. those are the kinds of things people are saying they want in exchange for a debt limit vote. we have not even begun that debate. we do not know when we are going to hit that limit. it is one that makes negotiating the dollar level a lot easier than it is -- to talk about the bigger dollar, longer-term things. that is an issue to play over the summer in a complicated way . there will be a lot of disappointed people all around as we move to the debt issue. >> to pick up on that point, it is often said john boehner is in a difficult position. in some ways, he is not in as difficult a position as some people say.

all of you have mentioned that this is one fight and there is -- there are more to come. we want to find lots of opportunities to cut spending here in the short term cr, the cr the end of the year, we are looking at next year's budget. it is going to be a continuing theme. speaker john boehner can go to his members and say, i have fought for you as well as i could. you all know these opportunities. they are coming up soon. the republicans are talking about laying out their budget next week. can they tell tea party members, we need to get this done and we will move on to the next thing. what about these next battles? where do democrats feel, we have got enough. we have been through this round and we are not giving any more? . how does it expect the current

showdown? i am >> sure we will have a lot -- >> i am sure we will have a lot to say about it. we will have a somewhat better idea of what the real playing field will be in this congress. paul has made it clear that they will say something about entitlements in their budget. we do not know how specific it will be, but they will put that into play. nancy pelosi and the democratic caucus will come down on them like a ton of bricks on the entitlement issue. they are expecting that. the question is, what does the president say demo what do the senate democratic leaders say -- what does the presence a? what do the senate democratic leaders say -- what does the

president say? i think it will eliminate the chance of entitlement reform until we have a fiscal meltdown in this country. i am not prone to overstating things, but i really believe that. i am not saying the white house and be democrats have to embrace what the republicans say, but if there is any opening to say, let's talk about how to reform health care spending and let's see about retirement policy, let's see that revenue is on the table -- whether there is an opening to make something happen that would be big in the course of this congress -- until somebody leaves and says, we want to deal with entitlements, we do not know what the playing field really is. >> it seems that where we have to focus right now is the senate, where we have 64 members

saying they want a big, comprehensive approach. we have durbin, coburn and chambliss and all of these people tried to figure out what needs to be done, which is a broader thicks. hopefully, everybody is learning about the importance of the small portion of the budget called discretionary spending and will think in terms of doing something broader. whether you take social security, it is about the burgeoning cost of medicare and medicaid. neither party is prepared to step up to that in a fundamental way. i think republicans are most effective in attacking obama's health care proposal by saying, they are cutting our medicare. that is what democrats said about republican budgets during

the 1990's. it was not cutting, it was reducing the rate of increase. this has become the third rail even more than social security. we do not really have an answer to it. that is going to flow out of something that was announced yesterday, and accountable care organization and ways of reducing the cost of health care. but we are a long way from seeing that fully implemented and affected. i hope something can come together in the senate and see what if there is a center in the house that would support something like that. the conventional wisdom is that it cannot be done before a presidential election. i think the president would get involved if he said, we are all getting in a vote at the same time so that it is not going to tip over. that is a tough thing to do. it is still something that ultimately will have to be done,

or we will be reacting to a meltdown in the bond market or something that will give everyone the imperative of acting. >> listening to these guys or thinking ahead makes me realize, we are doing the easy stuff. the cor is totally straight forward, cutting -- the cr install elite cutting spending. somebody said it is like -- -- the cr is like cutting spending. somebody said it is like algebra. i really see a climate and a receptiveness and a seriousness in the way people are talking about entitlement reform and gatt and that some reform that is easy to overlook while all this partisan sniping is going on. that does not mean anything is

going to happen anytime soon. people are laying the groundwork for a serious effort to change longer-term policy. there are many obstacles in the way. i was talking to paul ryan a couple of weeks ago. he said something that sounded resigned. he said, maybe we need another election before this stuff can really happen. it is clear that paul ryan is serious about putting something out on income at reform. the budget resolution itself does not make any specific policy changes, it just states and intention to do something. vic is right about him not being specific about what he is going to do in terms of policy. most of their discussions seem to be aiming in the direction

not up substantive changes that need to be made, but some mechanism for setting targets. the targets become the action or forcing events. that sounds like the process changes enacted in the past that have had mixed results in reducing the deficit. there are a lot of questions. if i had to bet right now, i will not back in public. [laughter] it is an interesting debate. kind of like the continuing resolution, i was not sure how they would get to april 8. who knows what is around the corner? >> i agree with vince's comment. there is no question that there are serious issues. members are seeing what is happening in other developed countries. members are truly concerned

about the fiscally on stable outlook. the rate of growth of health care spending is in excess of the rate of growth of anything else. it will eat us all if we cannot change that path. given all of that, i do not actually think there is strength in congress to make those health care changes that are necessary in the near term. people have just lived through this once and they do not want to live through it again. there is too much focus on this repeal and not enough preparation for the replacement. the issues are difficult. that might mean that if there is an opportunity to make

progress, there might be an opportunity to take a bite out of the small problem, which is the social security issue. a couple of things on that. i think that for the first time in the social security debate, there is an opportunity for people to look toward making improvements to the social security problem that we face rather than fixing it altogether. if you look at various proposals on social security reform, all of the proposals solve the problem. the problem is, congress never solves the problem. on a good day, they make the problem less bad. when they get serious about making changes to the social security system is when we start talking about incremental changes instead of wholesale changes. changes in time and age that make the problem less worse. there is an opportunity for

social security reform to come into the forefront. one, people do not want to tackle the health care issue. the president also pisco commission, which reported in december, put together a couple proposal that actually solve the problem by their metrics. members who were mentioned on the sena te side where members of the commission. there has been some work on social security, the date of 6, were members of that. maybe there is -- the gang of 6, were members of that. it would be odd to link process reform with the debt limit vote. the debt limit is a process

itself. to pass a rule on the debt limit that raises that limit, that repeals that process and imposes another process is not making progress. >> do you think we are about to roll gover norquist? [laughter] >> i think that in order to get the deals that need to be done, that is going to have to be part of the conversation. >> i just want to come back to the point that janet brought up. it is something that you hear often. i have heard it often on different panels. it is this notion that we cannot deal with the debt and spending problem until after the next election. people who have pushed that

point of view, would have come from different standpoints. one point of view is that only a reelected president obama can let -- can get this done. the other view is, only a newly elected republican president with a crash mandate can get this done. the other view is that, we need to have another election in which there is an even stronger mandate for spending reduction than the last one. i do not buy any of that. we have had the election, the best we are going to have in terms of a mandate for spending reductions. i do not remember -- remember any election where the deficit and spending work as important as in the last election. spending, debts, and deficit were the central issues in every part of the country.

if we cannot deal with this issue now, it will be much harder after the next election. , if not impossible. >> for the two party is to be charge -- in charge of every part of the electorate will put you in the wilderness. why not do it when we have divided government where the plan will be assessed across the spectrum? politically, both parties are better off in this environment than what they hope the next one will be. >> i have a couple of microphones. i have one question that i want to get in and i will throw it out there while the microphones are moving around. it is about how the house works. speaker john boehner, speaker nancy pelosi, speaker newt gingrich were shaped under the majority when they were in the minority. they wanted to open the house a bit. speaker john boehner had an open rule and powell be kept janet

there many nights as they went to the budget -- and probably kept janet there many nights as they went through the budget in detail. what do you think of how the house works now? talk about speaker boehner. he has been compared to democratic speakers. john boehner versus john gingrich -- john boehner versus newt gingrich. what has he learned to make him the speaker he is not? >> the gang of seven? is that the group? >> one of the things that distinguishes john boehner -- he was a committee chairman. that is important training. it is different from many people who move up the leadership ladder and not through the committee process. john boehner accomplish something remarkable.

he was knocked off of the leadership ladder and did what many people who get knocked off of the leadership ladder do. he went into the committee and decided to become a serious legislator. he came back into the process having been a successful committee chairman. that is not a choice assignment, usually. he did a good job. that affects the way he performs as speaker in a fairly significant way. we will see that play out as we go forward. the other thing i would say about speaker an air, newt gingrich -- about speaker boehner, there was no question in newt gingrich's mind that he was the leader of the republican party. john boehner does not think of himself that way. i think there is a genuine

humility that runs through john boehner about the position he is in. he does not view his role in politics in anywhere near the same way that speaker gingrich did in the 1990's. >> he was in leadership and he fell out of leadership. he has been in the room where the -- when the balancing had to be imposed. there was an insurgent who never served a very long. >> why don't we open it up to the audience. we will start with michael barone in the front row. >> we know who you are. >> speaker boehner, he was minority leader banner, gave a speech -- minority leader john

boehner, eight a speech -- gave a speech. we had not thought of him as a bipartisan guy. he said he would bring things forward. he did so on the ge engine question, which was of interest to his district. ge has a plant in his district. it is hard to me -- hard for me to imagine other speakers allowing something comfortable word -- speakers allowing something to come forward that would have meant something

would be defunded in their district. >> john boehner has promised to have wide open rules. he allowed that on hr 1. a lot of his roles since then have been restrained. he has violated the promise that everything would be wide open. i do not think people expected him to do that with everything. he has not got into any kind of politically sensitive question. one thing that struck me as really interesting about watching the open rule today on the continuing resolution -- there were hundreds of amendments. i do not see a lot of bipartisan bills coming out of committee. a lot of those bills had votes that were bipartisan. when there are only going to be

three amendments and the majority controls it, you know that those amendments are going to go up or down by party lines. there were a lot of interesting coalitions. you get to watch coalitions on other issues. you find out that there are a lot of republicans that do not -- you come up with this proposal to abolish the general motors second engine for the joint strike fighter. people have been going out that for years. when the speaker of the house has a local interest in it -- it was remarkable. where are the site where john boehner is twisting arms on this -- besides -- the sites where john boehner is twisting arms on this?

i did not see them. >> i think people have not really focused on -- allowing the kind of debate and argument and amend the process we saw is a pretty effective management tools for john boehner. he has a that is caucus. -- fractious caucus. the tea party sent a strong message -- do not take in to your leadership. banishing -- managing this caucus has served to be difficult. i think it has served him well to allow people to come forward and offer amendments. he did not do what tea party

activists warned us he would do, which was tried to shut us down. we will find out whether or not he can impose that. up to now, i think it has been a fairly effective tactic in allowing him to coalesce the republican conference. >> he is getting a lot of benefit from having one \ / \ / \ \ = = = won be open rule. everybody will say, remember we had an open rule on the whole budget. he dest ffangt ed the argument. they will say, he gave us a

voted. he did not try to use his power. he will learn about the challenges ahead for him. >> the latest cnn pol on the tea party movement is interesting -- cnn poll shows that they have lost their favorable ratings in the tea party movement. do you think the unfavorable ratings increase came from people earning under $50,000? qaeda comment on how this might play out as a factor in the 2012 elections? -- can you comment on how this might play out as a factor in

the 2012 elections? >> i have a hard time as a reporter and a citizen figure out who the tea party is. i actually feel guilty every time i use it in my stories. i do not know who they are. people is an interesting concept that has captured the spirit of the vote in the 2010. the interesting challenge as a reporter is to figure out, if you want the tea party point of view, who do you talk to. there are a couple of national tea party groups. but you cannot claim they are representative of the tea party. even when you get down to the level -- i was reporting a few months ago on the tea party in maine. i was interested in the question

of whether olympia snowe would get a tea party challenge. i called one guy who has tea party on his blog. i said, what about this tea party candidate? he said, he is not really a tea party person. basically, i take my cue from members of congress. if they identify themselves as a sympathizer to the tea party movement, i say, what kind of a politician is this? this is getting too metaphysical about covering politics. i do not know what to make about polls about people when i cannot figure out who they are. >> there are literally hundreds of organizations. somebody told me 1000 or more organizations that call themselves tea party organizations. the the tea party patriots, the tea party buddies.

there is an event that will be taking place in a couple of weeks. it is the tundra tea party. in the congress itself, among the 18 freshmen members, there are maybe 10 or 20 -- among the 80 freshmen members of congress, there are maybe 10 or 20 who plan to beat tea party members. everybody -- everything on pleasant happening around the country is blamed on the tea party. that is why the image of the tea party has gone downhill since the last election. >> there are tea party members who are not freshmen. >> is anybody who is tried to personify it, it is michele bachmann. she is tied to be this a amorphous group's leader.

it has been helpful to the democrats. the republican party has become rather radical in many ways. 43% of identified republicans do not believe obama was born in this country. that is going to be legitimacy of the president. there is a group of people in the party who are mad as and not taking it anymore. -- mad as hell and not taking it anymore. it affects how issues are dealt with in washington and at the state level. it is giving democrats help that they had little of three months ago. >> it is not a third party. they are operating within the republican party. i think it is an important dynamic, obviously, in the last election. these are new voices and voices that have returned.

these are republican candidates. i do not know if that will sustain itself in the future. at the moment, we are talking about a division within the caucus versus a different party. that affects the dynamic. >> i will turn this way and go here for a question. >> i would like to know whether janet or anyone else on the panel could give us an idea -- since you feel like you do not know who we really are -- can you give us an idea of what we really stand for? if so, can you inform us? >> have a good sense of the kind of issues that people who identify themselves as tea party members actually like. they are concerned about the size of government and the levels of federal spending. i do not have any confusion

about what people who identify themselves as tea party members believe in. it is the political entity. do you see the difference? >> can we go into the back? can you identify yourself? >> tea party people just elite in limited government. it is simple. last year, $5.50 trillion of federal and local spending -- $2.50 trillion went to -- we have a $14.50 trillion economy. -- 14.5 -- my question is, in

2006, the charge has been that republicans had complete control. in the senate, on average, they had just 53 cents -- 53 seats. is that complete control? why didn't the republicans ever respond to that? >> the notion of the senate ever being controlled by anybody is a little foreign to me. it is an institution that parties have a hard time controlling even when they have a majority. even when the democrats had the magic number of 60, they had a hard time controlling outcome. talk about a party controlling a senate, it means everybody votes the same way with no filibusters. in the senate, the majority party has a sense that they have a responsibility rather than they have more responsibility and the minority party.

i think the democrats have come to appreciate themselves, especially with the republicans controlling the house, that controlling the senate is far from controlling everything. >> as we speak this morning, there is a hearing on the aarp and its non-profit status -- non-profit status. if you add that to npr and defunding epa, if you are concerned that this new republican majority in the house has been branded idea out a cut -- has been branded ideological and is more interested in cutting the budget, i would like to comment on that. >> is was somewhat concerned about that. i want to clarify.

the democrats want to say we should strip spending bills of all riders. i do not go that far. from a policy standpoint, the elite policy levers the republicans have is to attack something in -- the only policy levers the republicans have is to attack something involving spending. whether it is health care, financial services reform, higher education reform, epa regulation, thinks that they really care about, they're only ability to impact -- their only impact is to attach a rider on these things.

i am concerned that we have allowed a few symbolic issues to drown out this message back -- that we have not made our case for our own success. we have cut spending, but it is a drop in the bucket. that is getting lost in the argument about these high- profile issues. >> it has been helpful to the democrats by making the defunding of th ele left the centerpiece. their base has not been energized. maybe we should give governor scott walker more credit for that. the democrats were always hard

to pinpoint where the impact would be. everybody thinks government is too big and we should reduce it in size. when you get into the specifics and start talking about truly enormous amount of money to make points politically, you are off message. the democrats are not concerned about it. they are elated. >> do you mean we cannot cut what amounts to 1/10 of the federal budget? but when you talk about zeroing out to this program, then the program becomes the issue. >> there has been some talk in the senate about raising revenue, with the millionaire's tax or reducing deductions people can make on their taxes.

what do you think will happen if that makes it to the house? >> i am encouraged on the focus on tax expenditures that came out of the bowles-simpson work. that is where the senate is going to focus. there may be some effort to increase taxes on upper income people. we need a total we form. we need to do a lot about tax expenditure. there is bipartisan support going for reducing rates on individuals and corporations. it is not going to be all give and no tape. it will have to be a zero-dsum game. >> bowles-simpson put forward the only friend work in which you can have a revenue increase. if you are a republican, it is a

net tax increase. there is no reason democrats would support it if it is not a tax increase. that is major league heartburn for republicans. if you are a progressive government, you are not imposing a millionaire's tax, you are bringing down marginal tax rates. that is the only way they will support revenue increase, in the framework of a pro-growth tax reform plan. you have a difficult sell on both sides of the aisle for that. paul ryan and the house republicans who voted against bowles-simpson made it clear that they did not do so because of the revenue issue. they did it because of the tell you to reduce health care spending on the bowles-simpson commission.

the billionaire's tax is not going to happen. that is contrary to basic republican economic philosophy. >> i want to go back to the gentleman's question about the increase in unfavorability of the tea party and vic fazio's remark about michele bachmann identifying with the tea party and see herself as elitists. is there a link -- see herself as the leader. is there a link between that

identification and the drop in the favorability side of the tea party? >> i do not think it is individuals. i think it is by its that are going on that are unpopular in the country. you see the current popularity of john kasich and scott walker. democrats have done a good job of labeling everything that is unpopular as being tea party. it is not clear to me that there is any leader of the tea party. many people would like tothemsea party. >> there is a natural factor behind some of these polls. it is difficult to sustain eager ness and happiness to support any movement. i was in -- eagerness and

happiness to support any movement. i was in to sign and a number of people remarked that it is about the ability to keep things going. whether they are, these tea partiers, they are working really hard. they are holding down full-time jobs at the same time. to some extent, it can get tiring after a while. the momentum can be lost. a lot of what happens in washington and in the political process has to do with momentum he is one of my biggest concerns with bowles-simpson -- and i worked on it -- is that i was concerned we have lost the momentum. there was an opportunity to grab ahold of the recommendations and run with them. there was a bit of a pause. a lot of things -- with age --

the excitement around them can dissipate. >> we might have time for one more question. we have a question right here. >> the night of the 2010 elections, a lot of republicans said this was the last chance to make good on their promise. they had huge losses in 2006 and 2008. do you think the republicans lost a sense of urgency? do you think they still feel that they are in a race against time toward the 2012 elections? >> i do not think the republicans have lost a sense of urgency. i think quite the opposite.

they feel a sense of urgency on every single bill that is coming up as opposed to looking at the broader picture of the budget. there is not a loss of a sense of urgency. the question is, can they come to grips with the realities of the budget as opposed to the campaign rhetoric about the budget? i said this earlier. we have never had an election where we focus more on the deficit and spending. the rhetoric out of politicians from both parties about it was not particularly helpful toward getting us to the solution we want. the democrats will have you believe it can be solved by having you -- by raising taxes on upper income people. the republicans would have you believe it could be solved by ending waste, fraud, and abuse.

>> the sense of urgency -- it takes me back to my earlier point on the debt does between now and 1995. since 1995, both parties have had this experience of gaining power and then being thrown out either because they misread their mandate or because they did not deliver on their promises. that is why they have more of a sense of urgency. they note that the electorate is pretty volatile. there is a big chunk of independent voters that have been part of the tea party movement. if they do not deliver, it is not clear that a lot of the tea party voters will go democratic. they might just stay home. >> i will give one last chance for everyone to get a wrap up or

to say something about it 112th congress that they have not said. >> i am happy to yield my time. >> i guess i have, too. [laughter] >> it has all been said. >> i would like to play off of something that has been said. we have been dancing around budget issues for so many years. tax the rich, waste, fraud, and abuse. that was ronald reagan's favorite. we have not really dealt with the problem. it has gotten bigger and bigger to resolve. that is why, whether it is bowles-simpson or any others that are out there, we have finally begun to come to some sort of bipartisan agreement that we cannot kick the can down the road much longer.

it is causing anybody to come in from their ideological perch, was so comfortable that they had become wedded to it. at least we have people out there pushing us in that direction. i really believe that politicians -- and i am certainly one of them -- have contributed to this attitude that the public has that we can do it all by cutting your pay, welfare, and foreign aid. the things that really matter and mount royal in in the federal budget are the top ones -- that really matter, and mount in the federal budget, are the tough one. s. the public does not know that. it has been easy to keep them in

the dark. people have been reluctant to give up some of that ideology. it is no longer a partisan agenda. it has got to be a bipartisan agenda or we will not get any further than we have gotten in the last 30 years. >> might it happen in this budget? is this the time? >> i think now is the only time. if it does not happen now, i am deeply pessimistic. i will use my last comment to do something i should not do, which is not to wrap up, but to bring up something we have not talked about. there is an indication we will have a national-security debate in this country that we have not seen for a long time. the reason i say that is because i am looking at what i have seen from some republicans that would have been shocking. you have the senators on the

bowles-simpson commission talking about reductions in the defense budget that secretary gates called catastrophic. to hear republicans talking about that is not something we have seen before. haley barbour has come out against libya and is questioning opposing what we are doing in afghanistan and is calling for reductions in the defense budget. michele bachmann has come out flatly against what we have done in libya. i am looking at the tea leaves in all of this and say, at some point, we are going to have a debate about national security that we have not had for a long time in this country. it will have to do with intervention and it will be heavily affected by the cops. >> \ -- buy tghehe costs.

>> join me in thanking our panel. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2011] >> tea party activists held a rally outside the capital this weekend. the rally included michele bachmann. this is one hour, 25 minutes. [applause] [cheering]

>> tha you so much, cathy. i think we have someone you're going to ejoy hearing from, congresswoman michele bachman. [cheering] >> hello everyone, good to see you. thank you for coming. [cheering] you are a sight for sore eyes. thank you. thank you for coming. you know, it is your heart tha i love. you have such a wonderful part. thank you for coming today come to the party patriots. we love you. [cheering] and harry reid thinks you're the problem. i think those cowboy poetry festival for the problem. [cheering] what do you think? i'm so glad to see your faces and it is so wonderful to see that all of you are still fighting. there are people here in

ashington, d.c. who fought after the november election that your all going to go home and go back to sleep; is that true? >> no. >> in fact what i have seen across america you are paying more attention now than ever. [cheering] because you have an investment in what is happening in washington, d.c.. you made the difference, you knock on doors, you made phone calls, you donated to campaigns, you sent your voice to washington, d.c., and you expect that your voice will be heard. and i agree with you. well, it's no surprise to me and i think you the power here in washington, d.c. specifically in the white house have been wrong about a few things. >> wrong about everything. >> wrong about everything is

that it? you can always count on the tea party to get it right. [cheering] well remember the head of commons? they promised we would see unemployment not go below 8% if we just spent a trillion dollars of your money. were they right? they were wrong. you're right. then they promised the health ca law we would create jobs and would bring down the price of your health insurance premium by $2,500 per household. were they right? nope. >> we've increased 20%, 40%, and some cases even higher. 242, they are not doing real well. then we were promised this would be the most transparent congress -- >> i think you have an opinion, is the right? and then they forgot to tell us a little fact that there was

$105 billion buried in the obamacare legislation. >> [booing] >> have they been transcript? >> no. >> okay that's three fer three. how about this promise, president obama prmised when he was running for the white house that h has he kept that promise? yes he has. he is getting his wish. we have passed at $4 per gallon. we know that his energy secretary, while the president was running or office, said, we have got to make the price for energy in the united states the same as in the united kingdom or the european countries. at that time, it was $8 per gallon. would you like that? that is their plan. let them move there.

would that be an idea ji? maybe we need to send some change to pennsylvania avenue. you have made it abundantly clear, stop spending money you do not have. president obama does not seem to get it. the big spenders do not seem to get it. we are headed for an annual deficit this year. and anything we have ever seen. we have had a couple of whoppers in the last few years. . . ion every year going forward until 2020, over a trilon dollars. is this the hope and change we were hoping for? who is ready for true hope and

change? i like you guys. [laughter] i'm with you. how many times can these big spenders and the president be wrong? every time, that's right. every time. but tht's why we are here. that's why we are fighting and that's why i know that you are not going to walk away from this fight. because i know that you are here to hold all of us accountable and you represent so many people, everyone of you here represents essentially a community that column of people who are thankful to you can be here today because all of the other people are out working today to be able to pay their taxes. i feel it's time to get serious, don't you? and cutting 61 billion in my opinion is a starting point. it is not the goal. because taking a vote to repeal

obamacare is a good start it can't just be our goal. we have to actually repeal it and actually defunded. heering] and cutting off funding to groups like planned parenthood has to be one of those issues we are just not going to back down from. [cheering] because we can't afford anything less than a fight on these important issues and if the democrats want to shut governor down, and this week we found out from harry reid, chuck schumer and howard dean that they've got their figers crossed right now that the government ll shut down. that's their plan. they want to shut the government down, and they want to turn you into their scapegoats anday that it's the tea party's fault for shutting the government down. >> [bong] >> now the cat is out of the bag. we know who had no interest in

negotiating. it's harry reid, it is the liberals over in the senate and they want to once again for two years it's been the same song second verse it's always the tea party's fault, right? what i like about you is whenever i'm with you i feel like it is a family reunion. i feel like we are going to the state fair. you don't even eave later afterwards. [cheering] you're just awesome. you are awesome people. no wonder they are so afraid of you. they are afraid of you because you are powerful. so i'm here to give you a message stay courageous, and i know you will. don't back down, and i know you won't. we will stand for cutting the size of government. we won't change our principles. we are going to say no to another debt ceiling increase. we are not going there. [cheering]

we are going to bring the government back to you, we, the people, that's the government hour founding thers gave us. stand strong, told us accountable. love you. thank you, everyone, thank you for coming. thank you, tea party patriots. [cheering] >> thank you, coresswoman bachmann. next, we have david -- >> michele? [inaudible] >> all right, next week of david smith, is that correct, from -- i just ruined his name. he's from pittsburg and he has shom something to show you so let's hear it for david?

[cheering] [applause] >> i don't know how a non-politician can follow michele bachman. ayman as grassroots as it gets. we drove from self of pittsburgh today to be here. this is and our first time down. we are coming from a very traditionally liberal area, southwestern pennsylvania, can you imagine that? i have with me, altman and karen is with one of our groups also, from a group called the patriots. we just want to let you know our founding fathers gave us the greatest country with the grace of god gave us the greatest country that the world has ever seen, and i think when ben franklin said we give you a republican keep it i think he was talking to us today. i truly believe that. and, you know, not everyone can

drive to d.c. every time the turnaround. we have a very small part, so i brought some friends with u [cheering] >> these are the conservatives d liberals from our area. everyone iupset. [cheering] the 2010 election was monumental. it was a tremendous show, but if you think was big wait until we showed in 3g in 2012. [cheering] thank you, everyone for coming, god bless. >> thank you, david. if you want to sign this

afterwards seeking add during to the list. next we have congressman louis gohmert from texas. [applause] [cheering] >> well it's great to be here with you. i'm telling you what, you bring calcium to those who need it for their backbones. [cheering] you make difference. you know, for so long in washington when somebody had some little idea that we needed to throw money at the would always add at the end it's for the children. i'm telling you what, you know this or you wouldn't be here, what you're doing, we are doing standing up against this incredibly excessive spending is truly for the children, right?

now, if you g a hole so deep that it would be ugh to get out, is it helpful to keep digging even deeper? if you pay so much in taxes that you work for months each year to pay the government, does it help to add another several months to how much you work for the government? if everything the government controls takes longer, is less efficient and less caring about the consequences do you really want the government handling your health care? if the federal government says you cannot stop it from spending more money, could you say yes we can stop it? if the federal bureaucrats say you cannot stop us from sending jobs overas because of how

much we over regulate, would you say? yes, we can! if the epa says you cannot brief out carbon dioxide without our permission, what do you say? yes, we can! with democrats in the senate and the white house say you cannot stop us from hiring 18,000 more agents to control your lives, what do you say? yes, we can! when the president says you cannot stop me from creating a new president controlled commissioned officer corps in my obamacare bill, what do you say? yes, we can! when the president stops playing golf long enough to 66 [laughter] -- we cannot say no to whatever the u.n. asks, wh do you say? yes, w can!

when the president says we cannot avoid helping those who want to destroy us, what do you say? yes, we can! when the president by action says we cannot avoid hurting israel, what do you say? >> yes, we can! when the president says we can't avoid paying our enemies billions of dollars to drill in their country, what do you say? >> yes, we can! does the united states have more natural energy resources than any country in the world but our president says you cannot use them, what do you say? >>es, we can! >> when the president says you cannot kep me from making your lectures the costs skyrocke what do you say? >> yes, we can! -- when the psident says you can't keep me from giving away your tax dollars to buy corporate buddies, what do you say?

>> yes, we can! >> when the president says will street gave me four times more money than it contributed to my republican opponent so you caot keep me from making them even richer, what do you say? >> yes, we can! >> when the democratic senators -- twice a centers? the democratic senators say that we only promised to cut spending so you would vote for us, but you can't force us to keep our promises, whato you say? >> yes, we can! >> let me read directly from the republican pledge last fall. with common sense exceptions for seniors, veterans and our troops, we will let the government spending to the pre-stimulus, pre-bailout levels, that's down about 2.4 billion or trillion, saving

at least 100 billion in the first year alone that's what the pledge says. so there's no mstake. it says we will say the least 100 billion. you rolled back to the pre-bailout, priest and nellis levels than it is more like 1.5 trillion. so let me ask you, can we keep that pledge? >> yes, we can! >> let me just tell you -- no kidding, we better because if we don't, we deserve to be thrown out of office. and let me tell you, for people who don't keep that pledge, you need to keep stores and throw us out of offi, right? [cheering] can you do that? >> yes, we can! >> i'm telling you from the

bottom of my heart, if you will do that, we can save this country for ouchildren and their chilen, and if we don't keep that pledge, it will be our fault and you get us out of here. thank you. god bless you so much. [cheering] >> thank ou, congressman. and our next speaker from virginia beach is cassidy donelson. >> i'm from virginia beach but my husband is in the military so we have been everywhere are around this country. >> thank you for coming! >> we have met a lot of people as we have travelled around this country. and as i have travelled, and

talked with tea parties across the country that people who sacrificed time, money and energy and are contributing theitalent, expertise and resources to bring this country back to what made a great, the constitution. [cheering] und financial principles and free markets. as i look out at you today, i know that you have sacrificed to be here and iant you to know your sacrifice matters and it is making a difference. thank you. patriots of the tea party movement often look back to the founding fathers of this country for guiding fundamental principles and ispiration. these are men whose names are well known, george washington, john adams, benjamin franklin, all have become symbols of strong sound government principles. before the iconic names were

people who risked everything, sometimes sacrificed everything to begin a life where they could own the fruits of their labors and live their own beliefs. ownership. you put in the work, you reap the reward, this is the american dream. there have been times in the country's history when the dream mutated during the roaring 20's pelelayed fast and loose with their credit, agreed and speculation the firm wall street. for the most part, government got out of the way and the house of cards came crashing down and we crashed. during the great depression, people were forced to live within their means oftentimes scrambling for basic necessities and competing heavily for any job. but they came out of it, self-goverent, hard-working and financially responsible. in contrast a few years ago when

i lived in michigan i spoke with a man who was very wealthy due to his high paid position at a major american car company. he was married and had two children. his goal, his american dream was that he would become so wealthy that his children would never have to work. how many of us dream we could have fortune without work? how many children do their homework and chores not because of the value of education nd work but so they can vegetate in front of a tv show or video-game? the politicians we he liked serve as a mirror for the values the citizens as house. as the people of this country have wandered away from sound financial principles we have elected leaders who spent frivolously regardless of whether the checkbook balances d or black. as the people of this country are the allies reward without work, our government has inched toward entitlement, the allowance and handouts until

now. the households of this country have tightened their belts and we expect our politicians to tighten it as well. we will not stand idly by as our politicians spend our freedom away. congress has been kicking the n down the road looking for the next payday loan from the proverbial money tree. it's time to stop shuttling up to th teller a month after month and balance the checkbook we gave them. it will take time but all sustainable progress moves gradually. and gradually we will put politicians in office to reflect our value of hard work, living within our means and respecting the constitution of this country [cheering] we will b like and support leaders who reflect the original true american dream. god bless. [cheering]

>> thank you. the next speaker is congressman joe walsh from illinois! [cheering] >> a proud freshman from the president's home state. [cheering] let me do something terrib unusual for a politician. i'm going to take 45 seconds and that's it because you know what? we have a line of honorable the speaker is and you know what? we don't have much more time than 45 seconds. i'm one of these now eve freshman who came here to get things done. i don't want to stay here my entire life, a term limit dhaka. we don't have a lot of time. i turned down my health benefits, i turned down my

pension benefits, i came here not leave because i wanted to play my role in saving this country for our kids and grandkids. i've got 15 seconds left. folks, we do not have a lot of time. our kids and grandkids are going to be indentured servants. we will never speak to them, they won't speak to us unless we turn this around right away. the president in the white house has no clue, he doesn't get it, the senate democrats are in denial your house republicans understa. your house republicans understand, the you know what? here is what most politicians never understand, the world didn't start with them.

this movement to take back this country didn't start with them, it started with you, it will grow with you and succeed with you. we don't have a lot of time. pastore house republicans on the backhen you can. tell us good job but you know what come have the bucher ready. patau us on the back, we are doing the best we can, but have ted deutch ready to put that boot somewhere the sun doesn't shine. keep us going. we don't have a lot of time. keep the pressure on knous and we will do right by you. d bless. thank you all for coming. thank you. [cheering] [applause] >> thank you, congressman walsh.

next, we have congressman tom graves from georgia. [applause] >> well on behalf of the georgia nine freedom fighters, i want to say hello to you. we welcome you here today. i tell you, being here today has taught me to think back a little bit. think back to maybe a couple of centuries ago when we had the founding fathers, these patriots. you think about one pecific account where, against all odds, you had a young man who was born into poverty who had to go to work to support his mother who was widowed and support his brother. and at the young age of 25, he found himself standing nxt to george washington outside of boston. the british have been held up for a little while and they knew they needed one of your step, one other element to get out, and so looking to this young man, henry knox, he said we need

some artillery. who's willing to stand up? and henry said i will do it. so he took his band of friends and they traveled hundreds of miles to get the canons that were necessary, and the went to the fort begot the cannons. and it took almost eight wes to get back to george washington, and they try first every kind of country that you could imagine, for this, swamps, frozen rivers, snowdrift, anytng you could imagine, all elements against them. and of course we know the rest of the story. it was the pivotal point in our great history. and there was a van when they had the artillery the country began as we move forward and had a victory in boston. why did henry knox stepp? because he believed all along with the other sons of liberty that there was a cause, there was an idea i was going to be

lled this great and glorious cause called america. he seized the moment, and i'm here to tell you to do this is our moment. it is time for us to seize this moment. so i'm here to tell you that sees it and stand together to get so, when the left wants to attack the conservatives and the tea party, we are going to stand together. when they say you can't cut any more spending that is too close to the bone or maybe it's extreme, we are going to stand together. when they say free markets to work, capitalism is false and government is the solution, we are going to stand together. so today we have a decision to make. the decision is clear, we are at a point we can either build upon our greatness as a nation or feed off in history. and i here with you today

because we are going to build upon our greatness and seize the moment. we are going to stand together and we are going to do that on behalf of the next generation. thank you. god bless you. [cheering] >> thank you. next we have andrew langer from the institute for liberty. [applause] [cheering] >> you know it's funny coming up during one of these events and coming up after steve king and meshaal bachmann and toledo word and others it's kind of like the guy that went on after the beatles on ed sullivan. it's amazing. you know, it's funny because we come to these events, and it always seems that it's raining and wet and cold, and you all are the hardiest bunch of americans that are out there so

think you all for comg out. i'm supposed to be briefed today, and i will be because you all know why can talk. we all have our crops. this $30 billion that they're talking about is not a compromise. it is an insult to each and every one of you, not just those of us in the tea party. it's an insult. i want to put it in perspective. everybody has their props. this is institute for liberty stadium here. about 91 colin 92,000 people. if this, my friends, were the federal budget, you see the black square in the bleachers in the nosebleed seats clacks that a little bit is what they are talking about cutting. that is their grand compromise >> [booing] >> is a compromise? are we going to stand for it?

are we going to fight? muskett fighting. thank you very much. [cheering] >> how was too fast. i wasn't ready. [laughter] okay, next we have from washington, d.c. ben kessler. [applause] >> welcome to the nation's capital. you know, here as a person who has been a part of the problem. i wasn't watching what my government was doing. but now i'm partf the solution. thank you all for being here. i want to tell you a little personal story. i was in a meeting a few months ago while the budget cuts were going on and some of the representatives who were here

today came to speak to us and they were -- they looked like they were ally beaten up. so i just can't imagine all of these great people what they have to do just to do the right thing, just to save the country to make cuts in a budget that is so large, so onerous, we have to do is give them help. we have to elect more people like the ones in the freshman class. [applause] we have to take back the senate and in 2012, the presidency. that's the only way we are going to save our country. so we can do it. weare only for 2-years-old we need a lot of progress and we have a long way to go but we are all resolved that we are going to do this. thank you very much.

[applause] >> thank you. next we have congressman jack duncan from south arolina. i don't know about you all but i'm hot and it's not because of this mine war march the we have, it's what i see going on in washington, d.c.. it's why i ran for office to fight the policies coming out of the nation's capital and in south carolina let me tell you we spell poor with one o bankrupting this country. we are still fighting those policies every day and i am blessed to be part of the 87 freshman class fighting for you but let me tell you, there are as joe said they are in denial about the debt, 14 print $3 trillion, they are in denial about the deficit, the third

year in a row of a trillion dollar access. $1.5 trillion deficit. we need an aa program for the spending denial their we have in washington, d.c.. [cheering] ronald riggins of a lot of good things but he said the future isn't for the faint of heart it's for the bold and we have to be bold. the bold color which made it unmistakably clear where we stand on these issues. rall regan also said we were the first revolution in the history of man that changed this government with three little words. we, the people. thank you for all that you are doing. let's send a message to the administration the we don't need to drill there and here we need to drill here american energy independence. we need to rein in this federal debt. we nd to create surpluses and cut the spending in sanity.

the we see in washington, d.c.. thank you for what you do and for your support, god bless you and america. [applause] [cheerg] >> thank you, congressman. next, we have from pennsylvania [applause] >> gough where? that's the problem. good afternoon everybody. my name is rob and i just want to let you know, we are doing out here is important. 26 months ago, i was like you getting mad every night wondering what was going on. and then i heard the rant and said that we've got to do with

how we do it? about a week or two weeks later i got this call from a lady named diana asking me to join to go to a party in west philadelphia, and i went. and i've been here ever since. i've been here through the health care fight and every other fight we have had the last three years, but i'm here to tell you what we need to do is keep fighting. [applause] we don't have a choice. i am a father, grandfather, uncle and husband. i want to give my kids, my grandkids a country they can be proud of and not one that they are ashmed of and wishing what the heck did he do. we are doing everything we can put we have to get those people out there to do it. [applause]

we have to kick the cn down the road. what we tell you what i'm going to do. i'm going to take in 2012 i'm going to kick some democrats cans down the road. [cheering] that's what we have to do. so everything we are doing, harry reid and nancy pelosi and barack obama think that this is going to die out, though we are just going togo away, we are nogoing anywhere. we can't afford to lose this fight or to stop this fight. so, everyone this year, thinking from the bottom of my heart. and diana, thank you for the phone call 26 months ago. thank you. [applause] >> speaking thinking by emi, want to let you know i didn't formally introduce diana was one of my fellow national coordinators from pennlvania, and she is helping today.

thank you. [applause] [cheering] this is totally impromptu, so next we have -- i'm sorry, thank you, rob. next we have from idaho congressman labrdor. [applause] [cheering] >> goo afternoon. im raul labrador. [laughter] and i am one of those guys that wasn't supposed to win. i am one of those guys who was outspent five africa one and it's in my primary until that he party decided to enrse me by 1.10 points. [cheering] i was outspent by a so-called blue dog democrat 7-1, and by

1.10%. [cheering] i was a republican legislature in the idaho house of representatives, and i was the tea partier before there was the tea party. i believe the republican party needs to remember why we got elected. we got elected because we made some promises to the american people. we told you we were going to cut spending. we were going to cut the deficit, and stop borrowing money, and we need toremember those things because that's why we are here. we are here because we told the american people the truth, we told the american people that we are in trouble, we re broke. i am the author of five children, and i worry about their future. just like i know you were real about their future. iame from a single-parent home.

i was an only child. i had no money growing up. but my mother taught me that if i worked hard, played by the rules, and i did everything that i was supposed to do, i would be successful in life. and that's exactly right. that's what america is all about. [applause] and we have too many people here who forget that there's people struggling. if you go to a restaurant in washington, d.c. on a tuesday night, it's full. if you go to a restaurant in idaho, there's empty seats because people are struggling. they are having a hard time putting food on the table, so it's about time that we remember what america is about. america is the greatest nation on the earth. [cheering] it is the most powerful nation on the earth, and it is powerful not because of the government. it is powerful because of its

people. [cheering] [applause] we have been told that we have to act like adults, we've been told we have to do the same thing that people have been doing for 40 years. if acting like an adult is going to lead to a 14 trillion-dollar debt, its acting like an adult is going to lead to $1 trillion of deficit spending, if acting like an adult is going to lead to $3.6 billion every single day that we are borrowing, i would raer be a child. [cheering] because it's about time that we told the american people and the people here in washington, d.c. the we cannot continue spending. we cannot continue borrowing money, we cannot continue doing the things we are doing and taxing people out of american prosperity and out of their future.

[cheering] we need your help. we need you to stand with us. we need you to go back home and elect people that are going to do the right thing. [cheering] [applause] and we need to make sure that you understand we believe in you asou believe in us and we will do everything we can to make america once again the strongest nation, the best mentioned, and may god bless you and god bless america. [cheering] ..

>> hey. [whistles blowing] [crowd cheering] >> some backbone has come to washington. [crowd cheering] suppose we need some backbone right now. thanks for showing up. i'm just so thankful for what you did in the last cycle, i didn't be standing next to senator rand paul if it weren't for the tea parties in kentucky and all over the country. we have some great reinforcements here in the senate that are changing things, as well as in the house. it wouldn't have happened without you. i want to say one thing and turn it over to senator paul. our country is in troubl 2012 could be our last chance to get it right. and we are not going to get it right unless americans rise up,

stand up, speak out on every street corner across the country as you have been doing. and we need to invite you to invite many, many others to come out, let their voices be heard, because we can win this thing. there are many good freedom solutions, this is not a doomsday scenario for america. we can solve our problem, only if we get people who understand that this country runs on principals of freedom, not on the government controlling every aspect of our lives. folks, thanks for being here. come back as often as you can. [crowd cheering] [whistles blowing] >> thank you. thank you, senator demint. they said washington would co-op the tea party. [laughter] >> two weeks before we were sworn in with the leadership of senator demint, e got rid of earmarks.

[crowd cheering] >> even the president now says he's going to veto any bill with earmarks. who's co-oping whom? [crowd cheering] >> harry reid says the tea party is over. >> he's over. [crowd booing] >> anybody ever seen harry reid at a tea party? >> planning his retirement. >> love to. >> he's right over there. i kid you not i'm walking over there to sit down in his office with him. let'shear a little noise to see if he can hear us in his office. [crowd cheering] >> 2010 was just the beginning. [crowd cheering]

the debate has changed. instead of talking about where they are going to spend, we are talking about where we are going to cut. but it's not enough. all of the proposals on the table are for cutting the rate of increase in spending. we have to really cut spending. we have to embrace constitutional, limid government. we need to send responsibilities back to the states. [crowd cheering] >> we face serious crisis. i think we have a debt crisis looming on the horizon. but i believe that we can surmount any problem. we can climb any hill. i believe as ronald reagan said that government is not the solution to the problem, government is the problem. [crowd cheering]

>> the fight is just beginning. keep their feet to their fire. call them. e-mail them. let them know that you are prepared for america to move forward, but only by balancing the budget and making government smaller. thank you very much. keep up the fight. [crowd cheering] [whistles blowing] >> thank you, senator. next we have our grassroots activist, phil rap from richmond tea party. >> good afternoon. thas for coming. phil rap with the richmond tea party. boogeyman. i've been called a lot of things. i like that.

we're in the 7th district. the 8,000 activist are in the same district as eric cantor. despite the overwhelming outcome, we handed it back to the majority. the lack of action has been entirely unacceptable. there have been no obvious comprehensive plan presented to address the physical catastrophe, excuse me, that our nation is facing. the national debt that we've heard the numbers over and over this morning of $14.1 trillion, annual deficit of $1.6 trillion. and all that's ben proposed so far is $61 billion in spending cuts. [crowd booing] >> that will reduce the debt by a meaningless and whopping .43 percent. making matters worse, an amendment offered by

representative marsha blackmon and jim jordan, we have added $20 billion to get us to the $100 billion which we were originally promised. congressman cantor, along with 90 other house republicans voted against it. what's it going to take to get the message to these folks? while we are encouraged by leader cantor's recent new position on continuing resolution, we remain concerned with one of his earlier comments, and i quote, don't expect us to balance the budget if i time in the next decade, unquote. [crowd booing] >> we need to see a clear vision for how to save our country and give us a reason to make 2012 another monumental election year. we don't need our eaders to continue playing politics at the margin and destroying the enthusiasm of the electorate.

the fact is thcountry is about to go belly up. all washiton has to offer is the status quo. very soon the national debt will become so large, it can't be refinanced, let alone ever be repaid. when this happens, the nation will default, the dollar will collapse, financial system as we know it will be in meltdown. simply just unbelievable. we are risking an economic collapse, and all we get is a proposal of $61 billion in cuts. so let's talk about what we're going to do about it. as kids, we all played music chairs. do you remember that game? >> yeah. >> the winners of the game are those who are able to find a seat and sit down when he music stops; right? the loser is the guy who is last standing. we knew up with this game. congress is still playing this game. the rules are backwards. and need to be changed.

the winners, in fact, are those who are standing hen the music stps. those who fight to grab a chair to sit down when the going gets tough are, in fact, the losrs. we need elected officials who are willing to remain standing, make the tough decisions, take the heat, and get us physically sound again. those who fight for the safety of a chair, the status quo, must be held accountable at the polls and be replaced by those who are willing to stand up for us americans. the music has stopped. too many of our elected officials in congress are sitting down and taking the safe route. our message to them? we are watchin you. [crowd cheering] >> the republic -- the republicans may not control both houses of congress, but they own the house. they can shut the government down, they can stop raising he

debt limit again. [crowd cheering] >> this is their leverage. those are the bargaining tools that they have. they should be using them. if they are not willing to do everything in their power and go to the mat for meaningful spending cuts, nothing is going to change. the financial meltdown will continue barreling forward. the 2010 elections for an edict and indictment to those elected and those who are not re-elected. stop the insane spending. we need to support those who are standing tall to make the tough decisions. and we need to hold accountable at the polls those who are choosing to sit out. my time is about up. one more comment. if you do the math, we've heard some calculations this morning, based on the $1.6 trillion deficit for this year alone, that equates o $50,000 per second, or $3 million per minute

in deficit spending. during the past three minutes, our federal government spend $9 million that it doesn't have. it's time to changethe rules of the game. the music has stopped, and the question to our elected representative is very simple: are you standing or are you sitting? it's vitally important that we stand strongly and we stand together. thank you. [crowd cheering] >> okay. thank you. nec-- next up, rita grace from virginia constitutional tea party. [crowd cheering] >> yeah, virginia! >> i'm t events chair forthe virginia tea party patriots federation. we are 40,000, approximately, members strong. we commend for you. god bless you. i'm a second generation

american. my family stood in line on ellis island, came over from ireland. my eldest brother coming from a poor irish family got the idea of jeffrey girafe, the commercials, and headed up for many years toys "r" us, and my second oldest brother is sitting in the chairman seat of petco. he wanted to sit in the white house. now i wish he was. he left politics for toys and pets. that's us,the american people. we the people as americans. i gave birth to five children, and now i have nine grandchildren. and i don't wa to put that debt on their shoulders. >> amen. >> what do we need from the debt? do we want to fight them or freedom? freedom. [crowd cheering freedom] >> okay. and i thank god for this nation. i took our children and our five children and my husband who's here today, joined hands with

people in the baltics,we joined hands in three naions. there was not one break in the hands. not a break. the people lifted their hands, they sang their national hymns, paid -- patriotic songs and they cried out to god for freedom. after 50 years of communism, they got their freedom. after seven years of communism, russian got their freedom. what i'm going to ask, join hands, find someone, and lift them up. let's sing god bles america. this is our prayer for our country, elected officials, and for us, we the people. also my brother always began every spech with never surrender and ner give up. we're going to see never surrender, remember ovember. never surrender, remember november. [crowd chanting]

>> let's sing this. lift your hand and maybe someone can join. we can reach across. and may god hear our players across the country and for our leaders. ♪ god bless america ♪ land that i love ♪ stand beside her ♪ and guide her ♪ through the night ♪ with the light from above ♪ from the mountains ♪ to the prairies ♪ to the ocean ♪ white with foam ♪ god bless america ♪ my home sweet home ♪ god blessamerica ♪ my home sweet home

>> amen. never surender, remember november. never surrender, remember november. god bless you. [crowd chanting] >> thank you, rita grace. [whistles blowing] >> thank you for being here today, george washington. and captain america, and their corts. jan with the white hat. they are always here and always here to represent us. i want to let you know we have dick morris on the way. he's not here yet. he's landed. next we have a speaker that you are going to like very much. he's a former lieutenant colonel, congressman allen webb. [crowd cheering] >> airborne all the way.

[crowd cheering] >> thank you. thank you so much. thank you. thank you. [crowd cheering] >> okay. look. look. look. they only gave me two minutes. come on. i got to tell yo something. we had a saying back in the united states army, if it ain't raing, we ain't training. from the bottom of my heart, hoowa. simple thought. anchors away. i don't know what they say in the air force, off they go. whater. but thank you o being here. because this shows your commitment to your country. this shows your commitment to the principals ad values upon which the country was established. some of the things the people continue to ask me, they continue to ask me about why won't you compromise, why won't you negotiate? let me tell you something,

abraham lincoln said plant your feet in the right place. then stand firm. so i'm going to be standing firm. [crowd cheering] >> when i was a young lieutenant, and i was going through airborne school, and the sergeant black hat said very simply, he said if you set the bar low, you jump low. >> that's right. >> you did not send us up here to set the bar low. >> no. >> you sent us up here for expectations and mandate and believing that we were here to do the things to turn around the great ship of state called the united states of america. because right now, this leaderless, rutterless ship is out in thestorm about to get tossed on the rocks. i'm sick and tired of hearing everyone talk about the great constitutional, conservative grassroots movement called the tea party. i'm sick and tired of them trying to blame you, castigate

you in a negative manner. no one says anything abut moveon.org. no one says anything about organizing for america. you are what this country was founded upon. and i am glad to be standing here with you. [crowd cheering] >> we are not here to talk about shutting down a government. but if you want to know about shutting down a overnment, go right over there and talk to chuck schumer, harry reid, go down to 1600 pennsylvania and talk to the president. we are here to talk about the incredible fiscal irresponsibility. i got to tell you something, why would i want to sit down and compromise with people who enhanced this problem that we have in america? with the three years of deficit spending, $1.42, $1.92, $1.65 trillion. the debt in the last four years has gone up $5 trillion. why do you want to listen to

people like that? because i don't think they are going to give me any good solutions. the bottom line is this: we have got to turn this ship around. >> amen. >> i am not going to lower my standards. i am not going to do anything but stand upon the values that you sent me up here for. for 22 years, you asked me to do one simple thing. you asked me to always protect your life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. you asked me to guard the great syols of this country. d in november of 2010, you gave me the privilege and the honor to take off the uniform, put on a suit and tie, and continue to serve you. i will continue to protect you, i will protect your life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. i will not let you do. god bless you all, god bless america. and thank you to the tea party. thank you so much. [crowd cheering] [crowd cheering usa]

>> thank you, congressman west. next we have phil for americans for prosperity. thank you, phil. >> all right. i'll be quick because you guys have been standing here for a long time. i know dick morris just arrived. i'm going to be quick. the left wants to pretend that we are heartless. that it's a terrible thing to cut government spending, but widows and orphans in 2008 level. i don't know about your town, we didn't have widows and orphans in the street in 2008. we can cut spending and do it in a way that doesn't hurt people, but help people. we have to. if we do not cut spending, we believe our children and grandchildren with a crushing burden of debt that they will

never dig out from. the only compassion thing to do if you care about the people of the country, cut spending now before we have a bond market crisis, like in greece, and we have to take disaster measures. we are going to have a fight next week when the budget cycle starts. and chairman ryan's budget comes out, it better be aggressive and everything they have touted it to be. and the biggest thing that we can do right now is to learn the lesson of the 1990s what we do for families with dependent children,welfare reform worked. and it worked. we cut spending and didn't throw people in the streets. we cut spending by getting people off of welfare and into work. we got people relying on themselves instead of relying on government programs. we need to do the same thing with medicaid. we're going to get people off of the medicaid rolls by getting them to work.

[crowd cheering] >> and we're going to fix state budgets and federal budget by repeating the success of welfare reform from the 1990s. thanks, everyone. cutting spending is the right thing to do. keethe heat on, keep the essure on. youguys are the future of america. if we can turn this thing around, it's going to be because of the tea party movement and because activist from the only party, -- you know, american for prosperity is a nonpartisan organization. we are. today i am partisan. i'm tea partisan. because the tea party is the only party that can fix this country. thanks, everne. [crowd cheering] >> thank you, hl. next we have bishop e.w. jackson from chesapeake, virginia. [crowd cheering] >> thank you.

thank you. patriotic friends, our nation stands at a critical cross roads. when our founding fathers bequeathed us this nation, they bequeathed it on the basi of freedom for the american people, and sovereign of the american people, not the power of the government. [crowd cheering] >> we are in a dangerous circumstances right now. and sme pay say that's an exaggeration. that's a foundation of our freedom is not at stake, but it is. and any time that you spend, you borrow 40 cents of every dollar that government spends, you are endangering our freedom. every time you tell us that you are racking up trillion-dollar deficits, you are endangering our freedom. and every time you make deals in the back room and you buy off

people in the cloak room, and against the will of the american people, you force those policies into our living room, you are endangering the american people. get out of our doctor offices, get out of our businesses. we don't want you there. [crowd cheering] [crowd chanting usa] >> now there are those in the congress that have bought into this stas arrogance, but thank god for the allen west and the michele bachmann of the world who are standing up with us and standing up to stay that our founders dd not establish this nation that it might force the people to vow to the will of the government. they established it to force the government to vow to the will of the people. [crowd cheering] >> now there are those right now

who have been meeting and conspiring to what names they will call us. what they will say about us. but while they are figuring out what names to call us and how they can benefit politically from what they do, we are determined to benefit our nation for every citizen of this country. >>[crowd cheering] >> i want to thank the black americans and hispanic americans. you belong here. this is your movement. we care about you. [crowd chants we the people] >> it is time that we said to barack obama and harry reid, and the forces that have dragged this nation io the muck of fiscal disaster, it is about time the government vow to the will of the american people and enough is enough.

[crowd cheering] [whistle blowing] now my friends, i want to encourage you, these big spenders have their plans, we also have our plans. they have decided that maybe if they call us names, mybe if they philander us we will quilt -- quit and stop. this movement is not about black and white, it is about red, white, and blue. [crowd cheering] >> they may think think -- theyy thk if they call us names, slanderous, that we will quit. but they make a grave mistake to under estimate our resove. we are not backing down, we are not backing up. in the words of the old spiritual, we don't feel no ways tired. come too far from where we

started from. nobody told us the road would be easy. but two years ago when this movement started we knew we were going to continue all the way to victory and we knew it didn't bring us this far just to leave us. [crowd cheering] >> just one final thing. the powers that be on the capitol hill need to understand this nation was not built by government. this nation was built by the people. >> we the people. >> we sacrificed, we struggled, they bled, they died, they tried, they failed, they tried again. but they heard the spirit of george washington say, fight on. you may be outnumbered, but fit on. it may look like victory is beyond you, but fighton. freedom is worth fighting for. freedom is worth fighting for.

losing is not an option. i hear george washington say we will not quit until we bring this nation back to the founding principals that made it great. [crowd cheering] >> so figt on. fight on. [crowd chanting fight on] >> fight on. fight on. [crowd cheering] >> great job. thank you. next we have another excellent speaker, it's dick morris. [crowd cheering] >> we forgive you, dick. [laughter] >> now y'all are in washington. some of you don't live here. so i got to give you some travel advice. don't drink the water.

[laughter] >> there's something in the water that makes you liberal. makes you want to spend lots of taxpayers money. >> we bring bottled water. >> makes you want to regulate. ttled water only. [laughter] >> now you know what you do when water is contaminated. >> don't drink it. >> no, you boil it. then you toss in a tea bag. [laughter] >> that's my recipe for you. [laughter] >> thank you, robert taft. okay. so the folks that work over there, can't find any way to possibility cut the budget. they are negotiating while the deficit is rising by $5 billion a day.

and they work for three weeks on trying to cut the deficit and in those three weeks it goes higher than their cut wills ever reach. but they can't figure out how to cut the budget. and we are at $61 billion, prorated is 100. they can't think of anything other than 3 well, i have some suggestions for them. we give tenya $714 million a year. >> cut it. >> we give mozambiue $450 million. we give nivia $39 million. we give 30countries in the world more than half a billion a year.

foreign aid was at $20 billion in 2000. now it is at $50 billion. so that would be a nice place to start. wouldn't it? now a lot of people are talking about a government shutdown. we don't need to shut down the government. we need to shut own the foreign aid program. we need to shut down the infrastructure stimulus package pork barrel program that obama passed. so my advice, we need to close down pbs. we need to shut down the endowment for the arts and the humanities. so that's why i think we ought to do our shutting down. because i say you shut down what you want to end. and we don't care if it stays shut down. we're for that.

don't shut down the rest of the government if the democrats want to do that to retaliate against us, that's their look out. we are going to shut down things that we want to zero fund anyway. and there's more than enough of that there. so you bet there's going to be a shut down. but it's going to be a targeted shut down at the agencies that we want to get rid of and the programs that we want to end. now that's -- that's act one. that's unfolding right now. and i think we can win that act because ithink the democrats are scared to death. [crowd cheering] >> and i have a message for any republican that is thinking of waiverring. it's spelled p-r-i-m-a-r-y. it's not primary colors either. it's primary vice. for example, i'm going up to indiana tomorrow and i'm going to speak at a rally for murdoch

who is going to get rid of the rhino lugar who hangs out in the united states senate for indiana. he's going to be goe. he hasn't isited indiana in a couple of years. he's going to get to move to washington. act two is when they want to borrow more money. when they want to raise the debt limit. and would -- and what we should say to them, before you borrow more money, we want you to get control orthe single program that is doing more to bankrupt the united states than any other program. it's not social security, it's not medicare, it's medicaid. under obama's administration, edicaid has gone up by 54% in two years. it's doubling every four years.

and the budget deficit we are running more than anything else is caused by medicaid. social security went up by 12%, medicare by 16%, it's medicaid that is going crazy. and half of obamacare is the increase in the medicaid program. and i say if you want that debt limit raied, you got to kill that program. cancel it. cancel the increase that obama passed, cancel that part of obamacare, the courts will take care of the rest of us for us. >> i hope. >> and i know. actually it's problematic, i do have pledges from all five members of the supreme court that they won't die. [laughter] >> but the point is that we tell

the democrats in congress, you got to roll medicaid back to the 2008 levels of spending, you got to give it to the states and let the states do whatevethey want with it. you don't want to spend $750,000 per state covering viagra. you don't have to. >> no wonder the budget is high. >> you don't want to cover people who make incomes of up to $80,000 a year. you don't have to. every state makes it's undecision about how to spend that money. now as we're speaking, the governors of wisconsin and ohio and indiana and pennsylvania and florida and tennessee and idaho are standing up to regain control of their own states. [crowd cheering] >> they are saying vote me out

office if you want to. but you are going to run your own schools. you are going to decide who gets hired and who gets fired. and no union contract is going to make us keep incompetence on our payroll. [crowd cheering] >> you know, in new york city, there are 80,000 school teachers. and 4,000 of them have got to be fired because of budget cuts. well coincidently, there are 4,000 teachers in new york go to every day what are called rubber rooms. those are rooms that they never see a student. they watch tv, read the paper, some of them are even literate enough to read a book. if there's large print. but they are so abusive, physically, verbally, and sexually, and so incompetent that the chancellor has judged

they can be exposed to students. but the union contract wo't let us fire them. >> waiting for superman. >> the total umber of people that have been discharged in the new york city school system with cause with 80,000 teachers is two. and they can't touch those 4,000. now layoffs are coming. which 4,000 are going to be laid off? the people who enrolled in teach america from princeton and columbia and yale? 20% of the graduating classes go to n to teach for america, motivated, articulate, brilliant young people wanting to serve the country and help our students, they are going to be the first one laid off because they don'thave the seniority. the 4,000 are still going to be inside the rubber rooms and we can't touch them. and when bloomberg asked the