i would just like to briefly comment for you on the work this time is different by rinehart rogoff. what did you think? >> he's one of my long-term colleagues and friends. i have great respect for both him and miss rinehart. i think it's a very interesting piece of work. it's particularly instructive because it uses a lot of historical episodes, data, as opposed to purely theoretical approach to the problem. >> it's an important piece of work. you were effusive in your praise at least on amazon, i saw. i thought the title is important because every central banker, economic official says this time is different. yet th basic themes of debasing a currency, inflation, lack of spending discipline, rinehart and rogoff highlight the similarity of poor action by bankers and governments to destroy their economy through a lack of discipline. it's an important lesson for us. we have a report from the national council of state legislators that talk about financial stress now in 12 american state just recently the state of illinois borrowed another $3.7 billion, paying 50 basis points more to bo

i would just like to briefly comment for you on the work th time is different by rinehart rogoff. what did you think? >> he's one of my long-term colleagues and friends. i have great respect for both him and miss rinehart. i think it's a very interesting piece of work. it's particularly instructive because it uses a lot of historical episodes, data, as opposed to purely theoretical approach to the problem. >> it's an important piece of work. you were effusive in your praise at least on amazon, i saw. i thought the title is important because every central banker, economic official says this time is different. yet the basic themes of debasing a currency, inflation, lack of spending discipline, rinehart and rogoff highlight the similarity of poor action by bankers and governments to destroy their economy through a lack of discipline. it's an important lesson for us. we have a report from the national council of state legislators that talk about financial stress now in 12 american states. just recently the state of illinois borrowed another $3.7 billion, paying 50 basis points moreo b

one reason we're not having growth, professors row tkpwog and -- professor rogoff and reinhart told us is the debt is putting a cloud over our economy. the whole world is watching the united states. are we going to go off the cliff or will this congress rise up and put us on the path to sound fiscal policy that creates confidence in our financial situation, creates investment, growth in jobs? that's the road we need to be on. it will be a tougher road. we'll have to make some hard decisions about spending, what programs are going to get money, what's not. maybe all of them will have to take some sofrt haircut. but -- some sort of haircut. but we can do that and get the country on the right track. america's not going to fall into the ocean if we make some reductions in spending. i would just point out that it's difficult to do that when you're in a political world, according to "the new york times," where anybody that proposes to reduce spending is called an extremist. senator schumer started that -- i quote a phone call -- saying we should use the word "extremist." cut $61 billion out

when asked, did you agree with the rogoff study, is it a sound study? wre, i believe it is. and then he said this, frankly, i think it understates the risk. understates the risk. when asked about that, he said, basically, there can be systemic immediate shocks that occur that are unple unpredictable like in7 when we went from a boon to a bust. these things happened in greece, ireland, iceland. these things can happen in this modern world of electronic financial transfer very, very quickly. now, i -- i believe we can prevent this. i believe we can prevent it. but we've got to take action or we're heading in the wrong direction. well, did you notice the news yesterday? bill gross, who runs the world's biggest bond fund at pacific investment management, a tota total -- the big bond fund -- announced that they had totally eliminated u.s.-government related debt from their flagship -- ship fund. "as the united states government projected record deficits." so that's a big development, frankly. i mean, he manages more money than anybody in the world, i guess, in the history of the

it is consistent with the rogoff reinhardt study. does that apply to us? we will, we are about 95% now. our debt is surging. by the end of this fiscal year september 30, the numbers are that our debt will be 100% of g.d.p. we wilwell above the figure. what does 1% growth mean? if you're looking for growth of 1% or 2%, it is half your growth maybe. what does it mean in other terms? experts have said that a 1% reduction in your growth amounts to a million jobs lost -- a million jobs lost. so i believe we're beginning to feel a negative pull on our bounce back from this recession as a result of growing debt right now, not years down the road as some people have been saying and predicting we're going to have a debt crisis down the road. i hate to say it. all i can tell you is what i've been told at our committee. erskine bowles -- he was president clinton's chief of staff, he was appointed by president obama to cochair the debt commission with senator alan simpson; they testified before our committee last week. and that is what they said about the nature of th

rogoff. we have to get our current system in good repair. the safety program is to help get a good state of repair back into a system that has had under investment for over 30 years. that includes amtrak operating capital. it includes equipment across the system. we are focused on how we stabilize that space. at the same time, we are moving ahead a program of new network development, which is focused on $4 billion. it will include the corridor development we have begun to see across the country connecting major areas with many areas in between. we have also suggested many some -- suggested something many of you may find interesting. the focus on how you connect and use that in the system. we have also proposed a u.s. rail equipment develop a program that has slotted to launch a $45 million in 2012 that will help began to define in the long term -- a long-term rail manufacturing sector in the united states. we have to develop technical research and development to go along with this program. it is amazing to think that over two years ago none

when asked, did you agree with the rogoff study, is it a sound study? wre, i believe it is. and then he said this, frankly, i think it understates the risk. understates the risk. when asked about that, he said, basically, there can be systemic immediate shocks that occur that are unple unpredictable like in7 when we went from a boon to a bust. these things happened in greece, ireland, iceland. these things can happen in this modern world of electronic financial transfer very, very quickly. now, i -- i believe we can prevent this. i believe we can prevent it. but we've got to take action or we're heading in the wrong direction. well, did you notice the news yesterday? bill gross, who runs the world's biggest bond fund at pacific investment management, a tota total -- the big bond fund -- announced that they had totally eliminated u.s.-government related debt from their flagship -- ship fund. "as the united states government projected record deficits." so that's a big development, frankly. i mean, he manages more money than anybody in the world, i guess, in the history of the

i think him to steal a line from fda administrator peter rogoff, this is a year like no other. i know every year you, we typically say boy, it's really but it critical that you be this year. but this year we really mean it. and this you i really important. what you have on the table, this is right out of dickens, the best of times and the worst of times. what we have on the table is we have the administration has proposed a virtual doubling, better than doubling of the infrastructure transportation investment program. and on the other side you get to approaching a half of having the program. so i mean it really is the swing between those two extremes is absolutely critical. and so you could say that they are great, great difficulties, or they are great opportunities. and the real difference between difficulties and opportunities isn't in the issue themselves. it's in ourselves in how we view it. and i thought the governor this morning was particularly effective at the same there's a lot of new members in congress, they don't know as yet. and while they may have some opinion, th

i'm not certain, but i will suspect in retrospect when rogoff and reinhardt puts their next edition out or something like that, they're going to find that this one is lacking. and i think that you have to ask the question, why is that? that break down in structure occurs in finance, i think is related to the collateral decision issue i was discussing before. it's a question of how deep and prolonged it continues. and all i can say is i think i've gone a step beyond trying to ask the question, what specific decision-making process creates a sub normal rise in economic activity? why is the recovery been so tepid? now, you can draw analogies and say it's essentially because that would financial system runs into problems, it takes a longer time to pick up. i don't deny that. that is not necessarily contradicting what i'm saying. i'm just essentially saying that you need to get beneath the data by analogy in order to come up with a specific analysis. in other words, i demonstrate, for example, on the crowding out issue, not by analogy, i've got a body of data which is highly statistically si

as rogoff and reinhardt's study showed, as secretary of treasury geithner acknowledged in the committee, it's already slowing our growth, and also he added it's worse than that because it puts us at risk as mr. bowles and simpson say for some sort of debt crisis. it's unpredictable when and how it might occur. that's president obama's secretary of the treasury. the presiding officer: the member's time has expired. mr. sessions: mr. president, i would ask unanimous consent to have two additional minutes. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. sessions: so we can't keep delaying. we can't keep promising to do something tomorrow. we have to have a vote. we'll have a vote today. we need to act today. a vote for the democratic proposal is a vote to do nothing. it's a vote to stay in denial. it's a vote that says deficits don't matter. we can just keep on, but deficits do matter. they have always mattered. they always will matter, and some say you can't reduce, say, making any savings from reducing deficit spending. let me show you this chart. i think the first one, because because $61

the fact is, according to the great state of rogoff and rien hart, which secretary of treasury geithner said he agreed with, and they advised that the main finding that across both advanced countries and emerging markets high debt to g.d.p. levels, 90% or above, are associated with notably lower growth outcomes. 70 countries simply grow their way out of deep debt -- seldom do countries simply grow their way out of deep debt burdens. if you're looking for a 3% growth this year and you get 2%, that's a lot of difference. 3% would be a good growth. if you get 2%, you're now going to get 1% because we're being dragged down by our debt. and, in addition, mr. geithner said this to us, not only does he agree that it reduces growth, he -- he says that it puts us in a position where we could more readily have a debt crisis if something happened around the world. another debt crisis could spread here and we could slip back into a recession. that's why we've got to do this. to create a healthy, growing economy and get this debt burden off of it. to create jobs, empower the private sector. and, by

as rogoff and reinhardt's study showed, as secretary of treasury geithner acknowledged in the committee, it's already slowing our growth, and also he added it's worse than that because it puts us at risk as mr. bowles and simpson say for some sort of debt crisis. it's unpredictable when and how it might occur. that's president obama's secretary of the treasury. the presiding officer: the member's time has expired. mr. sessions: mr. president, i would ask unanimous consent to have two additional minutes. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. sessions: so we can't keep delaying. we can't keep promising to do something tomorrow. we have to have a vote. we'll have a vote today. we need to act today. a vote for the democratic proposal is a vote to do nothing. it's a vote to stay in denial. it's a vote that says deficits don't matter. we can just keep on, but deficits do matter. they have always mattered. they always will matter, and some say you can't reduce, say, making any savings from reducing deficit spending. let me show you this chart. i think the first one, because because $61