Thursday, January 28, 2010

State of the Union responses

Republicans lining for Rep. Roy Blunt’s seat in Congress shared their thoughts on Wednesday night’s State of the Union Address:

State Sen. Jack Goodman

"Southwest Missourians are looking for real solutions to our very real problems like job-loss and out of control government spending.  Tonight, we did not hear any solutions; just more rhetoric. Sadly, President Obama and those that run Washington D.C. are not listening to the American people.

Americans are putting politicians on notice that they will no longer stand by while Congress recklessly spends their tax dollars on bailouts, stimulus bills and federal healthcare takeovers.  While I commend the president for proposing a spending freeze for next year, we need to pass a balanced budget amendment, implement a moratorium on all earmarks and an immediate across the board spending freeze on non-essential services to return America to a sound financial foundation.

Until we see this administration actually leading on things like deficit and debt reduction, healthcare solutions with patients driving the marketplace, job creation and getting back to the free market principles that have made our nation great, America will be prevented from achieving its greatest potential and putting families back to work."

 

Billy Long

Tonight, President Obama outlined his plans to revive his failed health care proposal and curtail government spending, but his speech fell far short of offering real solutions to the nation's rapidly-growing problems.

"The solution to the high cost of health care is not a big-government takeover," Billy Long explained. "What we need instead is the proven success of free market competition and fair business practices. Congress should make insurance companies compete across state lines, which would reduce prices and encourage better service. Insurance companies should be required to fulfill their obligations to premium payers by covering pre-existing conditions. We should also allow more flexibility in how insurance plans are structured so that people are not forced to buy insurance for conditions that they don't want to have covered."

"The problem with the President's health care bill is the same problem you see with all of his proposals," Billy continued. "The President seems to have an unshakable faith in the power of big government when he should be placing his trust in the strength of the American people. I welcome the President’s call for a spending freeze to help curb the enormous deficits we have had – according to Fox News, the 2009 deficit of $1.4 trillion was 9.9% of our GDP and the 2010 deficit looks to be of a similar size. Unfortunately, the President is not serious about his ‘spending freeze’ – it would still have the government borrowing over one trillion dollars per year and would save only 250 billion dollars over the course of a decade, far less than what is needed to balance the budget.    Borrowed government money won't fix the economy. Only individual Americans and small business owners can create jobs and grow our economy. Every dollar the President borrows for pork barrel spending and political favors just makes the task before American entrepreneurs that much harder."

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