Relating to Consideration of S. 1932, Deficit Reduction Act of 2005
RELATING TO CONSIDERATION OF S. 1932, DEFICIT REDUCTION ACT OF 2005 -- (House of Representatives - February 01, 2006)
02/01/06
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Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me this time.
This is kind of funny. It keeps happening. Any time we are having this debate, we hear words or phrases like ``fiscal integrity'' and how we are making these cuts because we are going to ``balance the budget.'' No one is balancing any budget here. Who are we kidding? We are borrowing the money, billion upon billion upon billion, from the Chinese to fund tax cuts that are going primarily to the top 1 percent of the people.
You are making cuts that are hurting middle-class and poor kids. That is the fact. I am not making this up. But if we try to talk about cutting the energy subsidies or cutting the subsidies to the HMOs or asking simple things like having the Secretary of Health and Human Services negotiate the drug prices on behalf of the Medicare recipients, or asking for reimportation for drugs coming in from Canada to help lower the price, we cannot even hear a word from the Republican majority on these issues.
I had a meeting the other day with a school board member from Youngstown city schools. And I asked him, I said, how many kids live in poverty in this school district? He said, 90 percent. Ninety percent of the kids that go to school in Youngstown city schools live in poverty. And I asked him how many qualify for free and reduced lunch, to maybe get another number. He said, we don't even hand out the form any more because it costs us more to administer the form and the program than to just give it to everybody.
Ninety percent of the kids in Youngstown and you are cutting $12 billion from giving these kids an opportunity to go to college? No Child Left Behind is underfunded in Ohio $1.5 billion a year, just in Ohio alone, while some of these other countries are graduating much higher percentages of kids in math and science.
Let us wake up. We need these kids on the field competing in a global economy, and you will not get them there by cutting education and cutting health care. You want to compete with China? You want to compete with India? Fund these programs.
We are not saying you don't need to change some things, and we are willing to work with you to do it, but for God's sake don't cut programs to kids living in poverty and middle-class kids. You are cutting their health care, you are cutting their education, and you are giving tax breaks to rich people. Period, dot.
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