Republican Leader Press Office

Opposing view: ‘We learned our lesson’

Republicans offer better solutions and a path to fiscal sanity.

By John Boehner

Wednesday, October 21, 2009

As I've stated before, Republicans lost our way on fiscal responsibility when we held the majority in Congress. Since then, we have held firm to our commitment to show the American people we learned our lesson by offering better solutions to hold the line on spending, rein in red ink and get the nation's fiscal house in order.

We offered an alternative economic recovery plan that, according to a formula used by one of President Obama's senior economic advisers, would have created twice the jobs at half the cost of the Democrats' trillion dollar "stimulus." We developed a budget that keeps spending under control without raising taxes by instituting a spending freeze for five years, exempting defense and veterans' benefits.

In stark contrast, the Obama administration and the Democrats in Congress have gone on a spending spree the likes of which our nation has never seen.

In fact, the federal government ran up a budget deficit of $1.4 trillion during the past fiscal year, more than triple the size of the previous record high. This level of reckless spending is unfathomable to out-of-work families struggling to make ends meet, but it has become the status quo for out-of-touch Washington Democrats.

What's worse, this spending binge hasn't produced the jobs this administration promised. The "stimulus" has failed to keep unemployment from rising to near 10%, and roughly 3 million private sector jobs have been lost since it became law. Families are rightfully asking: "Where are the jobs?"

Now, even while operating on a budget that doubles the debt in five years and triples it in 10, Democrats are proposing a new round of spending — and borrowing — to make up for the "stimulus" that isn't working. This is on top of a trillion dollar government takeover of health care, a cap-and-trade national energy tax and other costly initiatives passed this year.

By continuing to spend money we don't have, Democrats are making matters worse for our economy, not better. It's time to start working together to ensure the American people have a government that lives within its means.

Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio, is the House minority leader.