Mike Kelly

Mr. KELLY

Mr. KELLY. I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, in closing, I want to leave this body with a simple, eloquent quote from President Reagan. He once said: ``The problem is not that people are taxed too little. The problem is that government spends too much.'' This week, as we consider the 2011 spending bill and move towards funding the government for 2012, I want to urge all Members to keep that in mind on both sides of the aisle, because it is entirely fitting and proper that we honor his memory and his wishes as we go forward, and truly take this on, and do it in a bipartisan manner, and do it in a way that reflects the American people. This is not about Republicans or Democrats. This is about America and America's financial health as we go forward. I am urging all Members to please back this and support this bill.

Mr. KELLY. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. KELLY

Mr. KELLY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Madam Speaker, I'm here today because I represent those small businessmen that are trying to make a living in towns like Butler, Pennsylvania, and Erie, Pennsylvania, and Greenville, and I've got to tell you, the rhetoric is absolutely off the charts. What we really need to see now are some results. Until we get government's boot off the throat of small business people and allow them to move forward, do we want to be in the game? Heavens yes, I want to be in the game. So does everybody else want to be in the game. We need to realize that all these taxes that we create or that we're trying to take in come from businesses that are profitable and people who are working. So if we're talking about growing an economy and if we're talking about cutting spending--and I do agree that cutting spending is important--we better wake up and start to smell the coffee. We have overregulated these people to the point that they don't want to be in this game anymore. We've got to wake up. I repeat that because we are missing the boat on a very vital thing that's happening right now in this country. We need to get onboard with this. And I've got to tell you, insiders in this Beltway talk about too big to fail. For small business people, you know what we are? We're too small to survive, because we can't get the help from the people we need. All we get is a lot of talk and a lot of overregulation.

Mr. KELLY

Mr. KELLY. I thank the gentleman for yielding time. Mr. Speaker, last week Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said that the economy cannot begin to recover until small businesses prosper. Well, the overreaching and burdensome requirements of ObamaCare will hurt small businesses. And their benefits are not even certain. Small companies, which account for over half of the private sector economy, are more likely to struggle than survive under this law. If I had followed the plan prescribed for my dealership after the government takeover of General Motors, I would have lost the business that my father started 57 years ago. We need to address the years of hard work and the spirit of entrepreneurship that will be destroyed under this law. Small employers have limited autonomy under ObamaCare. The Federal Government is dictating what benefits they must offer and then punishing them for expanding their operations or paying their people more. The choices for small business under ObamaCare are: provide government-mandated health care and face ruinous costs, or drop the coverage and pay fines just to keep those folks employed. If we burden small businesses with the requirements set forth in this law, we hamper the recovery of the U.S. economy and damage the spirit of free enterprise that has made America great for over two centuries. ObamaCare should be replaced with a smaller, more commonsense program.