Tim Ryan

Mr. RYAN of Ohio

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I realize you are racking up credit card debt. I realize you can't afford to put gas in your tank.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. And it is a tough argument to make to say, when someone's struggling to say, no, no, you are really doing okay. Wait, no I am not. I have got to tell you it is kind of hard right now. No, I am telling you, you are really doing fine.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Exactly. I yield for Number 8.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. And I would suggest that the President's approval rating wouldn't be at 31 or 32 percent if the economy was going great.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Just to make a point. We heard a lot today, and I know I heard on the floor today a lot about how, as you said, the economy was doing great and how incomes were up. I think we have some facts that say otherwise.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Right. The money we pay in interest every year, $230 billion a year, we pay in interest on the debt. That is interest on the debt. Compared to education and homeland security and veterans, this is the number we are paying on interest. This is reckless spending. This is a Congress that has run away with the checkbook. They are taking the country off a cliff financially without any regard for what this is costing future generations. This group started to talk about optimism and what the future was going to look like.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. And so if you are sitting in a community in Ohio or in the industrial Midwest or in New England or somewhere across this country where the jobs you have are being lost to China, and then you know that your government at the same time is borrowing money from China, and the Chinese government is using that money to undermine American business in the United States of America and we continue to borrow it, and that is just in the past year or so, another $5 billion has been borrowed from the Chinese. This is going on again and again. The reason I bring this up is today we expanded this. We increased this even more. The $42,000 that we are going to give a millionaire, we do not have it.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. And who actually needs the tax cut is that person who is a home health care aide, driving around, and the gas prices are high and everything else. Mr. Delahunt talked about borrowing the money to do this and who we are borrowing it from. This is from 2001 to 2005, of the $1.18 trillion in debt that the Bush presidency, the Bush House and Bush Senate racked up, $1.16 trillion of the $1.18 trillion came from foreign nations. We are not even borrowing the money from National Citibank or some bank in our own country, we are borrowing this money from the Chinese government or the Japanese government. That at the end of the day makes us weak. I want to show one more chart here. This is the public debt held by China. It has quadrupled under Bush. It was $62 billion in 2000, and it is $257 billion in 2005.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I agree with the gentleman and I agree with former Congressman Toomey. As you made the point about the wealthiest, the millionaires getting $42,000 back and the missed priorities and the schoolteacher in Ohio who is making $35,000 or $40,000 and getting just a few dollars back, we are not saying that the wealthy person does not make a certain contribution to society because they do. Make profits and make money, we want you to. But there is just as much value to our society by the teacher.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Let us do better.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Let us do better. Let us implement some of these ideas that we have. Let us implement some of this innovation agenda where we are going to have broadband in every household, Mr. Delahunt. That will create a whole new class of people that will understand how to benefit from the Internet. Let's have the research and development tax credit that the Democrats have in our innovation agenda. Let's make sure we get the real security going so we can make sure that we have the proper energy process, the proper energy plan for the United States of America. Why is it still going to be energy independent and the United States of America still gambling in this game that we have in the Middle East? It's a big game that we are losing. Everybody is losing. It leads to the war on terrorism. It leads to these tremendous profits at the cost of average people, Mr. Delahunt. It is polluting the environment. We have all kinds of problems because we refuse to say, we want to be a leader in alternative energies in the world. Brazil is doing it, why can't we? Why is there a magnetic levitation train in Shanghai that goes 270 miles an hour and not in the United States, Mr. Delahunt? Quite frankly, I think this President and this Congress has given our generation, the 30-something generation, a pretty raw deal. You know, you think about it, we are going to have more debt. We are going to have a dirtier environment. We have got higher tuition costs. We have got more debt, higher credit card rates, higher interest rates, less control, because we borrowed so much money from all of these foreign countries. What legacy are you leaving to the next generation, which is what we originally started coming to this floor for? It is terrible. That is poor leadership. I don't care if you are a Democrat or you are a Republican. That is poor leadership. You left the country worse off than you found it. That is not the American way. That is not the American dream. Give us a chance, Mr. Speaker. Put us in coach. I mean, God, we couldn't do any worse. We have ideas to unleash the potential of this country and move the country forward. Mr. Meek.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. It doesn't work.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. You can do whatever you want.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. And I would like to make a point, because as the oil companies reap these profits, and again I am not saying for you not to make profits, but not at the expense of everyone else in society. So I want to make this point: The oil companies benefit a great deal from the public, from what the taxpayers support, A, point number one, the $16.3 billion in corporate welfare that they are getting from the public tax dollars that is going to them. So they can't say they don't benefit from the public. But their product is sold on roads that are funded by the taxpayer. Those roads are protected by the taxpayer, paved by the taxpayer, secured by the taxpayer. The ports in which the oil comes in and out of our country, all funded by the taxpayers. The Coast Guard, by the taxpayers. The military, the over $400 billion budget that we have here that we spend on our military that goes to protect the transportation lines and the oceans, and as the ships start distributing this all over the world, that is protected by the taxpayer. So all we are arguing here, Mr. Speaker, is that the taxpayer has an interest; and when this company and this certain industry benefits so much from the public tax dollars, they should be responsive to the public in these instances. I would be happy to yield to any one of you to wrap up this brilliant discussion. I am going to yield to Debbie.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, as we go through this tonight, the 30 Something's two key third-party validators are the former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich and former Congressman Pat Toomey, now president of the Club for Growth, both saying that there is out-of- control spending, out-of-control government, dysfunctional, and the American people know that. Any Members who would like to come to our Web site, www.housedemocrats.gov/30Something, www.housedemocrats.gov/30Something.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Is that in addition to the $113 billion in profit, and three times, triple what it was 4 years ago? The American taxpayers, those that would be overhearing our conversation tonight, are subsidizing those same oil companies to the tune of about $16.3 billion. So let us be clear. Out of the 100, not only is this outfit here, these oil companies getting $113 billion, our friend is saying, corporate welfare from this Republican-led institution, gave these guys $16.3 billion of taxpayer money.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. 1991?

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. That is an insult. The more I think about it, that is a real insult.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. This is exactly right. This is a consequence of some faulty leadership in the Nation's capital. Oil companies profits in 2002, $34 billion. This is BP, Shell, Chevron, the whole bit. It gradually went up, in 2005, $113 billion in profits. Now, something is wrong with the structure of our society when the oil companies are reaping $113 billion in profits and we have 5.4 million people slipping into poverty. We have college tuition costs doubling all over the country, Mr. Delahunt. We have a structure here that is just not working for the people any more.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I think this is very important when you ask why people are slipping into poverty.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. The king. And I want this President to come hold the hand of somebody in my district. Go hold the hand of one of the 5.4 million people that just slipped into poverty. This man doesn't need his hand held. But we have got a lot of people in the country that need a little help, and not a handout, a hand up, an opportunity to succeed. I yield for Number 6.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. He just articulated exactly what I was going to say, much more eloquently than I ever could. So maybe I will just point to this picture again, but I think Mr. Delahunt did make the point. If I could, the strength of our democracy over the years in a bicameral legislature is the debate of the minority party and the majority party in the House and coming to some reasonable solutions that have been debated through the committee process and vetted and studied and looked at, and then over to the Senate, and let that happen and then come together with the administration and make something happen. When you try to govern in secrecy, you are incapable, FEMA, energy, you know, education costs, all this stuff, there is no debate. It is just rule with an iron fist.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. The end result is that chart you have right there behind Ms. Wasserman Schultz. It is the $3 a gallon in gas. It is the no vision for energy down the line. It is high tuition costs. It is health care costs spiraling out of control for how many years. That is the end result of the back-room deals that you are talking about.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Right.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I think the overall point, as you stated, is exactly correct. But when the time came, Mr. Delahunt, Mr. Meek, when the time came for the Republican Party to muster up enough votes to make sure a person making $10 million----