Senate Proceeding on Sep 23rd, 2009 :: 7:48:10 to 7:54:55
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7:48:06 to 7:48:26( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: speak, could and i the floor open for him to speak for the remaining time. mr. ensign: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from mr. ensign: mr. president, tomorrow, from what i understand, i will have a motion to recommit this bill with instructions that hopefully will be agreement.

7:48:10 to 7:54:55( Edit History Discussion )
Speech By: John Ensign

7:48:27 to 7:48:49( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: let me describe exactly what my motion to recommit is going to say. i did this last week on the appropriations bill that we had before us because last week's appropriation bill dramatically increased and this week's appropriations interi has another huge increase.

7:48:50 to 7:49:11( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: 2008 was 4%. this year the increase is 16.28%. every local government, government, probably, at least almost everyone in the united states right now is cutting their budget.

7:49:12 to 7:49:36( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: almost every business is cutting its budget. most households in america are cutting their budgets because of these difficult economic times. here in washington, d.c., what do we do? we print money and we dramatically increase spending. the national taxpayers union agreed with me and they are

7:49:37 to 7:49:58( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: asking the senate to vote yes on my motion to recommit, which i will be offering tomorrow. and they're saying we need have fiscal discipline at this time. we need to say, we just can't keep running up spending around that's what we're doing.

7:49:59 to 7:50:19( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: if you look at each one of the appropriations bills so far this year, the legislative branch last year was at this year it's about a 5% increase. homeland security, almost 10% this year, it's gone up by 7% this year. energy and water had the smallest ag had about a 13% increase last

7:50:20 to 7:50:40( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: year and about the same percentage increase this "thud" or transportation, housing and urban developmenting had a 23% increase this year. and the bill that's before us now, which is interior, 4% increase last

7:50:41 to 7:51:02( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: increase this year. last year was a negative inflation. this year there's almost no inflation. yet around here we keep running up our deficits. this year alone w have so far this yea

7:51:03 to 7:51:23( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: year $1.56 trillion in deficit. this says it pretty well. 43% of every dollar that we're spending this year is deficit spending. we are borrowing from future generations so we can give us what we want. so we can be reelected. goodies. that's what a lot of these

7:51:24 to 7:51:46( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: appropriatio passing out the goodies. they're increasing spending. when aree going to get serious in this body about fiscal restraint? the other side criticized us during theast seven or eight years for spending too much money. in some regards they were right. but compared to what they're

7:51:47 to 7:52:07( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: doing right now, we -- i mean, we were fiscal conservatives by a large degree. what they are doing is dramatically raising federal spending. and the increase that we have before today in this spending bill, over 16%, if you keep this kind of spending increases up, it

7:52:08 to 7:52:28( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: will double the five to six years, doubl because what happens is this year we spend more money. that gets put in the baseline budget for next year. so any increase next year is on top of the increase this year and each increased and increased. we never seem to go backward in

7:52:29 to 7:52:49( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: this body. we only go higher and higher as far as spending levels are?? concerned. it seems that there are no -- there is no limit to our appetite for spending around here. the american up. and i'm actually the most encouraged i have been in my entire political career,

7:52:50 to 7:53:10( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: involved, hearing from them from all ove seeing them all over the country getting involved in time tt we think about the greater good in america. that we don't think about pet projects or pet or any of this just massive spending it's time

7:53:11 to 7:53:32( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: responsibility. we start getting back to what the framers of our constitution envisioned when they saw a limited federal government. not at this expansive federal government. so, mr. president, i would urge tomorrow when we vote on this that this chamber would say: now

7:53:33 to 7:53:53( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: is the time that we' going start showing some fiscal restraint. that we're going to say, yeah, we'll tighten our belts. we'll snug it up a little bit. 'llay no to some of the come every year to lobby our offices for more and more money. we'll make priorities. let's look at some things that

7:53:54 to 7:54:17( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: ar aren't. let's take the money away from the ones that aren't. and let's reduce the deficit. that's what we need to be thinking aboutn this body. op you know, that -- that my don't fall on deaf ears. i hope that people will actually in this body start thinking

7:54:18 to 7:54:42( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: about future generations instead of just thinking about, you know, their favorite projects that they want to fund and special interest groups that they want to pay attention to. so, mr. president, i remarks, yield the floor, and note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk

7:54:43 to 7:54:48( Edit History Discussion )

John Ensign: will call the roll.