Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to speak, and I appreciate the remarks of the gentleman from Michigan who preceded me. I think I see a great glimmer of hope here, that those of us who are in different parties can come to the floor of the House of Representatives and essentially preach the same message.

That is what I want to do here today. I want to follow up on what the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Smith) says and tell the House that I believe that it is unconscionable that we are entering this time of war, this pending war, when we are economically in the doldrums. We have higher unemployment rates than we have had for years and years. Just 2 short years ago we had a surplus in our Federal budget, and in a very short 2 years we have managed to deplete that surplus and create the biggest deficit in the history of this Nation.

I think the results of that, the consequences of that, are certainly unacceptable to me and should be unacceptable to most Americans because I think what it does for us in the long run, the long-term economic consequences of it are very serious. It will stagnate our economy. It will make it impossible to solve the long-term Social Security problem that we have that the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Smith) spoke about. It will make it almost impossible for us to put in place a prescription drug program.

Both presidential candidates on the campaign trail talked about that as one thing that this Congress should do, reform Medicare to include a prescription drug program. But sometimes as a Congress and as an administration, we seem so fixated on revenue reductions that we have to pay for the priorities that we may list as a Federal Government.

Those priorities are pretty simple. Our primary responsibility is national security. There is a new buzzword, homeland security, that has been created since 9/11, and we know that the world is changing and we have to react to that. That is the primary responsibility of the Federal Government is national security.

We have Social Security, which is a very important program to the success of this society over the last 40 or 50 years. I tell my constituents often that in 1964 about the time of the creation of the Medicare program, if an American reached the age of 65 in this Nation, there was a 58 percent chance they would be below the poverty level. In other words, 58 percent of our citizens that reached that age, retirement age, did fall below the poverty level.

That figure today is a single digit figure, less than 10 percent reach the age of 65 and fall below the poverty level. There are many reasons for that sort of success in having the retired generation of this Nation live in comfort, but the least of those reasons certainly is not that we have a great Social Security and Medicare program in place. We know those programs have long-term funding problems, and we have to find solutions for them.

I think many of us in the Blue Dogs felt we had that opportunity 2 years ago when we had a surplus to fix those programs long term so that our children and grandchildren would not be hung with the responsibility of fixing those programs because it is going to be a much, much more difficult fix 15 or 20 years down the road. The fixes are painful now, but not nearly as painful as they will be in 15 or 20 years.

The Blue Dogs have always focused on fiscal responsibility and tried to convince this Congress that the best thing we can do for this economy is to set our priorities, spending priorities, and be willing to pay for those in our own generation. That is really what our Blue Dog budget is all about, it is about getting the Federal Government back onto a glide path of fiscal responsibility.

We spent the whole decade of the 1990s trying to bring us out of the huge deficit years of the 1970s and 1980s. It was a long, difficult battle. There were spending cuts. We ratcheted down spending at every level of government. The facts, if they are spoken accurately, will bear that out. Now in just a few short years of fiscal irresponsibility, we put ourselves back into a deep, deep ditch.

Madam Speaker, we have some other folks joining us today, and I would like at this time to yield to the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Tanner), who is a very effective member of the Committee on Ways and Means, who will discuss a few details of the Blue Dog budget.

Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Tennessee. Members can tell he is truly our leader on these kinds of budget issues, and a very thoughtful member.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor Michael J. Quirk for his service to his country and as a volunteer with the United States Coast Guard Auxiliary. At a time when the President is encouraging all Americans to serve our nation in a volunteer capacity the United States Coast Guard Auxiliary will recognize Michael J. Quirk on his retirement from the Coast Guard Auxiliary with over 22 years of service. What is truly remarkable about Commodore Quirk is that prior to his involvement in the US Coast Guard Auxiliary, he had also well and faithfully served our nation in the military for over thirty years.

In World War II, Commodore Quirk was a member of the famed 56th Fighter Group of the US Army Air Corps and achieved the status of Double-Ace. On his 100th mission he was shot down and was held as a prisoner-of-war until April 1945 at Stalag Luft I, Barth, Germany. For his World War II service he received the Silver Star among other decorations and the Purple Heart for wounds received when his plane was shot down.

Following his return to the States in 1945, he entered Catholic University and, while pursuing his degree instructed Air National Guard to fly the P-47 . . . the plane he flew in Europe.

In 1947, after the service was formally established, Quirk returned to the service of his country with the US Air Force and over a thirty- year career saw service with the 4th Fighter Group flying F-80 Shooting Stars; Langley Air Force Base where flew F-86 Sabre jets; La Paz, Bolivia training Bolivian pilots to fly the P-47; the Central Air Defense Force from 1951-52; Commander of the 87th Fighter Interceptor Squadron; 453rd Tactical Fighter Training Wing; Seventh Air Force Headquarters, Tan Son Nhut Air Base, RVN; and completed his Air Force career at the Tactical Air Warfare Center, Eglin AFB, Florida, retiring as a Colonel in 1977.

Soon after his retirement from the US Air Force, he and his wife Kit joined the US Coast Guard Auxiliary, the volunteer force of the United States Coast Guard, and rose through various positions in further service to the nation and served at Commodore of the 8th Coastal Region in 1990-1991.

On his retirement from the US Coast Guard Auxiliary with over 22 years of volunteer service, the nation joins the US Coast Guard Auxiliary and the US Coast Guard in saluting this great American.