Not linked on Ron Paul’s Congressional Website.
Mr. BRADY of Texas. Madam Chairman,
I would yield 5 minutes to a member
of the Joint Economic Committee
for more than 6 years, the gentleman
from Texas, Mr. RON PAUL.
2009 Ron Paul 41:2
Madam Chairman, I rise in opposition
to this resolution.
2009 Ron Paul 41:3
You know, they say so often that
there is not enough bipartisanship
around here. We hear that complaint a
lot of time. But, you know, when I look
at it, I see that there’s been too much
bipartisanship in creating the problem
we have had. And it hasn’t been the
last – this crisis that we’re in the midst
of, this financial crisis, didn’t pop up
here in the last 60 days. It didn’t pop up
here in the last 8 years, but it’s taken
several decades to get to this point
where we are today dealing with a
budget that is just totally out of control
and a monetary and economic system
that is uncontrollable as well.
2009 Ron Paul 41:4
It is said that this budget is going to
be $3.6 trillion with a $1.1 trillion deficit.
An amazing thing is that $1.1 trillion
deficit is going to be $400 billion
less than this year. I will wait and see
if that really comes out because that
probably won’t work out that way.
Matter of fact, characteristically, the
statistics that we hear when we talk
about the budget are never reliable, especially
when you’re in a recession. In
a recession, nobody can protect the
revenues. The revenues are going to be
a lot lower than they said and the expenditures
are going to be a lot higher.
2009 Ron Paul 41:5
So I am making a prediction that the
spending will be over $4 trillion this
year and that the deficit is going to be
over $2 trillion and that the picture
that we are looking at today is much
worse than we’re willing to admit.
2009 Ron Paul 41:6
Matter of fact, I think the problem
we face today is not so much a budgetary
problem. It’s much different. I
think we talk a lot about the budget.
Just think about how many hours we
talked about it today. But the budget
and the deficit is a symptom of something
much more serious. And that is,
what have we allowed our government
to become? I think it has been the loss
of respect by us here in the Congress to
understand and take seriously article I,
section A. If we did that, we wouldn’t
be doing all of these things that we’re
doing.
2009 Ron Paul 41:7
If we understood the tenth amendment,
we wouldn’t be doing all of this.
We wouldn’t have a deficit. If we understood
monetary policy, we wouldn’t
have a monetary system that encourages
all of this that gets us off the
hook because conservatives like to
spend a lot of money, and liberals like
to spend a lot of money. And they don’t
have to worry. We raise taxes. We borrow
it. And we do it, and we’ve been
doing it for decades and getting away
with it. But it’s coming to an end because
we’ve always been dependent on
the Fed to come in and monetize the
debt.
2009 Ron Paul 41:8
Now, have they backed off in any
way? No. They are expanding it. Not
only do they buy in the market, they
are buying it directly from the Treasury.
They’re only encouraging us to do
even more of this.
2009 Ron Paul 41:9
We have endorsed, as a Congress and
as a people, a welfare/warfare State.
And that is not part of what America is
supposed to be. And it encourages the
spending and the borrowing and the
deficits and all of the inflation.
2009 Ron Paul 41:10
And we take – for instance, we were
supposed to get a lot of change with
the new administration. One thing I
was hopeful about is that they might
look at this overseas wild expanding
and expansion of the war going on in
the Middle East, but the military budget,
the war budget, is going up 9 percent.
And as long as we have the expansion
of the war, the dependency on the
spending overseas, we’re spending over
$1 trillion over a year maintaining the
world empire at the same time we have
runaway spending here on welfare here
at home. It is unsustainable.
2009 Ron Paul 41:11
We have a debt that will not be paid.
We know that when it reaches a certain
level, it cannot be paid. But it is
always liquidated.
2009 Ron Paul 41:12
Now, if an individual or a company
goes into debt, it can be liquidated in
the old-fashioned way of bankruptcies.
Countries don’t go bankrupt. What
they do is they default on a debt. That
doesn’t mean they won’t pay it. They
pay it off in bad money. And literally,
that is the purpose of the Federal Reserve
right now is to lower the real
debt. So if you destroy 50 percent of
the value of the dollar in the next year
or two, the real debt has gone down 50
percent.
2009 Ron Paul 41:13
Literally, the Federal Reserve board
is praying for, encouraging inflation to
lower the real debt because it can’t be
sustained.
2009 Ron Paul 41:14
But who does that hurt? It hurts the
people who save, the people who save
get 1 percent on their earnings, and we
tax the little bit they get, and the people
who are doing the right thing are
being punished the most.
2009 Ron Paul 41:15
So the ones who live beyond their
means get bailed out. And it’s a very
bad, bad system that we have. And we
have to decide what the role of government
ought to be.
2009 Ron Paul 41:16
You know, we do blame the banks
and we blame the business people and
everybody. But you know, I have a lot
of people that come to my office and
say, Cut his, cut his, but don’t cut my
program.
2009 Ron Paul 41:17
So we have to decide as a people what
should the role of government be. And
if we think the role of government is
going to be, and should be, the policeman
of the world and to run the welfare
State, this budgetary problem will
never be solved.
2009 Ron Paul 41:18
The Acting CHAIR. The time of the
gentleman has expired.
Mr. BRADY of Texas. Madam Chairman,
I would like to grant 30 seconds
to Mr. PAUL to conclude.
2009 Ron Paul 41:20
And let me just close by saying the
greatest danger I see right now is the
placing of the blame for the crisis that
we’re in is that we had too much freedom,
too much capitalism, not enough
regulation. And they did this in the
1930s. They are doing it even more now.
2009 Ron Paul 41:21
Instead of saying that we overspent,
overtaxed, overregulated, we have lost
our confidence. And if we don’t change
that attitude and if we accept this notion,
accept international regulation,
believe me, we’re in big trouble. We
will lose our freedom, and we will lose
our sovereignty as well.
