Folks, take a few minutes from your
day to look at this one closely...Coburn is considered an "honest
spokesman" on both sides of the aisle. His statement is sobering at
best. To me it was incredibly chilling. If you are a homeowner, and
especially if you bought within the last 10 years or so or have a mortgage you
are paying, the info coming later in the statement is scary...but also a call
to a reasonable solution which could be implemented if only DC would do
it. I'm forwarding a copy to both my senators...
IF THIS DOESN'T MAKE
YOU UPSET AND ANGRY NOTHING WILL!!
__________________________________________________________________________________________________
Sen. Tom Coburn
A MUST READ REGARDLESS OF YOUR
POLITICAL TIES, YOU SHOULD READ THIS!
Sen. Tom Coburn is an MD
(general practitioner)
and GOP Sen. from Oklahoma and recognized as 'the conscience' of the US Senate.
He is well respected on both 'sides of the aisle' & probably one of the few
senators to actually read these 'bail-out' bills. (Goggle him for his background.)
This takes a couple of minutes. It's
from his speech in the Senate and if this doesn't raise your blood pressure,
you'd better check to see if your heart's beating!
"We are going in exactly the wrong direction. We ought to be standing on
the principles that made this country great. There ought to be a review of
every program in the Federal Government that is not effective, that is not
efficient, that is wasteful or fraudulent, and we ought to get rid of it right
now. We ought to say, you're gone, to be able to pay for a real stimulus plan
that might, in fact, have some impact. I would be remiss if I didn't
remind everybody that next week we are going to hear from the Obama
administration wanting another $500 billion. Outside of this, they are going to
want another $500 billion to handle the banking system. Still not fixing
the real disease-the pneumonia-we are going to treat the fever or treat the
cough, but we are not going to treat the real disease. Until we treat the
real disease, this is pure waste. It is worse than pure waste. It is morally
reprehensible, because it steals the future of the next two generations.
I am going to wind up here and finish, but I wanted to spend some time to make
sure the American people know what is in this bill. I think once they know what
is in this bill, they would reject it out of hand.
Let me read for my colleagues some
of the things that are in this bill..
The biggest earmark in history is in
this bill. There is $2 billion in this bill to build a coal plant with zero
emissions. That would be great, maybe, if we had the technology, but the
greatest brains in the world sitting at MIT say we don't have the technology
yet to do that. Why would we build a $2 billion power plant we don't have the technology
for that we know will come back and ask for another $2 billion and another $2
billion and another $2 billion when we could build a demonstration project that
might cost $150 million or $200 million? There is nothing wrong with
having coal-fired plants that don't produce pollution; I am not against that.
Even the Washington Post said the technology isn't there. It is a boondoggle.
Why would we do that?
We eliminated tonight a $246 million
payback for the large movie studios in Hollywood .
We are going to spend 88 Million to
study whether we ought to buy a new ice breaker for the Coast Guard. You
know what. The Coast Guard needs a new ice breaker. Why do we need to spend $88
million? They have two ice breakers now that they could retrofit and fix and
come up with equivalent to what they needed to and not spend the $1 billion
they are going to come back and ask for, for another ice breaker, so why would
we spend $88 million doing that?
We are going to spend $448 million
to build the Department of Homeland Security a new building. We have $1.3
trillion worth of empty buildings right now, and because it has been blocked in
Congress we can't sell them, we can't raze them, we can't do anything, but we
are going to spend money on a new building here in Washington .
We are going to spend another $248
million for new furniture for that building; a quarter of a billion dollars for
new furniture. What about the furniture the Department of Homeland Security has
now? These are tough times. Should we be buying new furniture? How about using
what we have? That is what a family would do. They would use what they have.
They wouldn't go out and spend $248 million on furniture.
How about buying $600 million worth
of hybrid vehicles? Do you know what I would say? Right now times are tough; I
would rather Americans have new cars than Federal employees have new cars. What
is wrong with the cars we have? Dumping $600 million worth of used vehicles on
the used vehicle market right now is one of the worst things we could do.
Instead, we are going to spend $600 million buying new cars for Federal
employees..
There is $400 million in here to
prevent STDs .. I have a lot of experience on that. I have delivered 4,000
babies. We don't need to spend $400 million on STDs. What we need to do is
properly educate about the infection rates and the effectiveness of methods of
prevention. That doesn't take a penny more. You can write that on one piece of
paper and teach every kid in this country, but we don't need to spend $400
million on it. It is not a priority.
How about $1.4 billion for rural
waste disposal programs? That might even be somewhat stimulative. New
sewers. That might create jobs.
How about $150 million for a
Smithsonian museum? Tell me how that helps get us out of a recession. Tell me
how that is a priority. Would the average American think that is a priority
that we ought to be mortgaging our kids' future to spend another $150 million
at the Smithsonian?
How about $1 billion for the 2010
census? So everybody knows, the census is so poorly managed that the census
this year is going to cost twice-in 2010 is going to cost twice what it cost 10
years ago, and we wasted $800 million on a contract because it was no-bid that
didn't perform. Nobody got fired, no competitive bidding, and we blew $800
million.
We have $75 million for smoking
cessation activities, which probably is a great idea, but we just passed a
bill-the SCHIP bill-that we need to get 21 million more Americans smoking to be
able to pay for that bill. That doesn't make sense.
How about $200 million for public
computer centers at community colleges? Since when is a community college in my
State a recipient of Federal largesse? Is that our responsibility? I mean, did
we talk with Dell and Hewlett-Packard and say, How do we make you all do
better? Is there not a market force that could make that better? Will we
actually buy on a true competitive bid? No, because there is nothing that
requires competitive bidding in anything in this bill. There is nothing that
requires it. It is one of the things President Obama said he was going to
mandate the Federal Government, but there is no competitive bidding in this bill
at all.
We have $10 million to inspect
canals in urban areas. Well, that will put 10 or 15 people to work. Is that a
priority for us right now?
There is $6 billion to turn Federal
buildings into green buildings. That is a priority, versus somebody getting a
job outside of Washington , a job that actually produces something, that
actually increases wealth?
How about $500 million for State and
local fire stations? Where do you find in the Constitution us paying for local
fire stations within our realm of prerogatives? None of it is competitively bid
- not a grant program.
Next is $1.2 billion for youth
activities. Who does that employ? What does that mean?
How about $88 million for renovating
the public health service building? You know, if we could sell half of the $1.3
trillion worth of properties we have, we could take care of every Federal
building requirement and backlog we have.
Then there's $412 million for CDC
buildings and property. We spent billions on a new center and headquarters for
CDC. Is that a priority? Building another Government building instead of - if
we are going to spend $412 million on building buildings, let's build one that
will produce something, one that will give us something.
How about $850 million for that most
"efficient'' Amtrak that hasn't made any money since 1976 and continues to
have $2 billion or $3 billion a year in subsidies?
Here is one of my favorites: $75
million to construct a new "security training'' facility for State
Department security officers, and we have four other facilities already
available to train them. But it is not theirs. They want theirs. By the way, it
is going to be in West Virginia .. I wonder how that got there? So we are going
to build a new training facility that duplicates four others that we already
have that could easily do what we need to do. But because we have a stimulus
package, we are going to add in oink pork.
How about $200 million in funding
for a lease-not buying, but a lease of alternative energy vehicles on military
installations?
We are going to bail out the States
on Medicaid. Total all of the health programs in this, and we are going to
transfer $150 billion out of the private sector and we are going to move it to
the Federal Government. You talk about back dooring national health care. Henry
Waxman has to be smiling big today. He wants a single-payer Government-run
health care system..
We are going to move another $150
billion to the Federal Government from the private sector. We are going
to eliminate fees on loans from the Small Business Administration. You know
what that does? That pushes productive capital to unproductive projects. It is
exactly the wrong thing to do.
Then there is $160 million to the
Job Corps Program-but not for 20 jobs and not to put more people in the Job
Corps but to construct or repair buildings.
We are going to spend $524 million
for information technology upgrades that the Appropriations Committee claims
will create 388 jobs. If you do the math on that, that is $1.5 million a job.
Don't you love the efficiency of Washington thinking?
We are going to create $79 billion
in additional money for the States, a "slush fund,'' to bail out States
and provide millions of dollars for education costs. How many of you think that
will ever go away? Once the State education programs get $79 billion over
2 years, do you think that will ever go away? The cry and hue of taking our
money away - even though it was a stimulus and supposed to be limited, it will
never go away. So we will continue putting that forward until our kids have
grandkids of their own.
There is about $47 billion for a
variety of energy programs that are primarily focused on renewable energy. I am
fine with spending that. But we ought to get something for it. There
ought to be metrics. There are no metrics. It is pie in the sky, saying we will
throw some money at it.
Let me conclude by saying we are at
a seminal moment in our country. We will either start living within the
confines of realism and responsibility or we will blow it and we will create
the downfall of the greatest Nation that ever lived. This bill is the start of
that downfall. To abandon a market-oriented society and transfer it to a
Soviet-style, government-centered, bureaucratic-run and mandated program, that
is the thing that will put the stake in the heart of freedom in this country.
I hope the American people know what
is in this bill. I am doing everything I can to make sure they know. But more
important, I hope somebody is listening who will treat the pneumonia we are
faced with today, which is the housing and mortgage markets. It doesn't matter
how much money we spend in this bill. It is doomed to failure unless we fix
that problem first. Failing that, we will go down in history as the Congress
that undermined the future and vitality of this country. Let it not be
so."
"The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the
people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government-lest it
comes to dominate our lives and interests." -Patrick Henry
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Sam Adams said,
"'When the people fear the government they have tyranny, when the
government fears the people they have freedom
LIBERALISM IS A MENTAL DISORDER!