SBIR/STTR Reauthorization Act of 2011 - Continued

Floor Speech

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Mr. PAUL. I ask unanimous consent to set aside the pending amendment and call up my amendment No. 199.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?

Ms. LANDRIEU. I object to making it pending but not for discussion.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.

Mr. PAUL. This amendment, No. 199, would save taxpayers $200 billion. Recently you have seen some discussion, but I think the American taxpayers are actually baffled that there is not more discussion up here.

We have proposals of a deficit from the other side of $1.65 trillion and yet we are not down here discussing this. We have not passed a budget. We have not passed any appropriations bills this year. The American people wonder what we are doing. You wonder why the American people say Congress has about a 13-percent approval rate? Why are we not today talking about a budget? Why are we not talking about appropriations bills? Why do they not come out of committee?

Then when we get to the proposals, look at the proposals. In the red we have the deficit, $1.5 trillion, maybe $1.6 trillion. Here we have the proposals. The other side, you cannot even see without a magnifying glass, $6 billion. We borrow $4 billion in 1 day. We spend $10 billion in 1 day. And the best they can do is $6 billion for a whole year.

Our proposal is a little bit better but still does not touch the problem, $61 billion in cuts. It sounds like a lot of money. You know what, we increased spending by $700 billion, and now we are going to nibble away at $61 billion. But put it in perspective. Saving $61 billion on $1.5 trillion means that either proposal, Republican or Democrat, is going to add trillions of dollars to the deficit.

I am proposing something a little more bold. I am proposing $200 billion in cuts. I think it is the very least we can do. Two hundred billion dollars in cuts can be gotten rather easily. The Government Accountability Office said there is $100 billion in waste, duplicate programs. Why do we not cut that? What are we doing?

If you look at the chart of what is going on here, and you say, what has happened to spending, the yellow line, around 2008 when we got the current administration, is going up exponentially. That is the spending that is going up. The spending is driving the deficit.

You look at the two lines over here. You cannot even see the difference. This is the Republican proposal to cut $61 billion in proposed increases. Spending is still going up. The deficit is going up. We need to do more. The danger is if we do nothing that we may well face a debt crisis in our country. We need to do more. My amendment will cut $200 billion in spending.

When I go home and I talk to the grassroots voters, they say, that is not even enough, we need more. But at the very least, let's have a significant cut in spending and do something to get the deficit under control before it is too late.

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