Boehner on NBC’s Meet the Press: Republicans Are Standing on Principle and Offering Better Solutions
GOP Leader Discusses the Economy and Creating Jobs, Wasteful Washington Spending, Health Care and Republicans’ Better Solutions
Washington
(Jan 31)
In an appearance this morning on NBC’s Meet the Press, House Republican Leader John Boehner (R-OH) discussed the Better Solutions that Republicans have been offering all year long on the budget, energy, putting Americans back to work, and health care – the same alternative solutions that President Obama acknowledged on Friday, putting to rest once and for all baseless claims by members of his own Administration that Republicans are the “party of no ideas.” Boehner also discussed the economy, wasteful Washington spending, and health care, noting that Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and other Democratic leaders continue to plot ways to pass their government takeover of health care. Following are highlights of Boehner’s appearance and video of the interview:
BOEHNER ON REPUBLICANS STANDING ON PRINCIPLE AND OFFERING BETTER SOLUTIONS:
“Listen, there are parts of the President’s agenda that we’ve been supportive of. But as a political party, and in the Minority, on the Hill, we have an obligation to the American people to stand on principle. That’s why we’ve all stood and voted against the ‘stimulus’ bill, that was supposed to be about creating jobs immediately, yet three million Americans have lost their job. The President said unemployment wouldn’t exceed eight percent, now it’s over ten. Whether it’s his budget, with trillion-dollar deficits for as far as the eye can see, their National Energy Tax they call cap-and-trade, or this government takeover of health care – Republicans have an obligation to stand on principle and to fight these proposals. But, but, at the same time, to offer better solutions. We’ve offered better solutions all year long.”
BOEHNER ON THE PRESIDENT’S VISIT TO THE GOP RETREAT:
“I thought it was a very good afternoon. We invited the President to come because we wanted to have a dialogue and we’re glad that the President accepted. I thought our Members were honest and I thought the President was honest. It’s not that we’re going to agree on everything, but the American people sent us all here to Washington to do what we can to help solve the problems we have in our country. … I told the president, when we convene with you and when we agree with you we will stand tall with you. as we did on Afghanistan, as we did on Iraq, as we did on things like teacher quality and a number of areas. When it comes to health care, we could agree on some common-sense steps to make our health care system work better. But we are not going to put the government in charge of people’s health care. And it’s something that is a fundamental difference here. And most of America has already said no to this big government takeover.”
BOEHNER ON AMERICANS YELLING “STOP!” TO THE DEMOCRATS’ JOB-KILLING POLICIES:
“If you look at the policies we’ve seen over the course of this year from the Administration and his Democratic colleagues in Congress, they are all these leftist proposals. The people of Massachusetts, the people of Virginia, the people of New Jersey are sending a pretty loud signal just like the other 47 states, to Washington, saying stop. This is way more than we ever wanted Washington to do.”
BOEHNER ON SPEAKER PELOSI AND MAJORITY LEADER REID SCHEMING TO PASS THEIR GOV’T TAKEOVER OF HEALTH CARE:
“We’ve seen all week Speaker Pelosi, Majority Leader Reid continuing to scheme and plot trying to find some way to get their big government takeover of health care enacted. So, I do think they are having problems, but I think Republicans are going to continue to be vigilant. I think the American people need to stay engaged because I’m watching the movement on the Hill. They are still trying to find a way, even after Massachusetts, the election there, they are still trying to find a way, to shove this down the throats of the American people, and the American people are saying, ‘no, stop.’ And what we need to do is scrap the big government takeover bill, and let’s start over. Let’s start over on common-sense steps that we can take to make our system work better. No one in Washington thinks our current health care system is perfect and certainly not Republicans. We outlined our eight or nine ideas about how we can make it work better. But we want to preserve the best health care system in the world and we don’t want the government to take control of it.”
BOEHNER ON PRESIDENT OBAMA’S SPENDING CUT PROPOSAL: “WE CAN DO MUCH BETTER THAN THAT”:
“I think the President’s proposal on freezing non-security domestic spending is a good first step. But it’s only $15 billion for each of the next three years. I think we can do much better than that. I don’t think any agency of the Federal government should be exempt from rooting out wasteful spending or unnecessary spending. And I frankly, I would agree at the Pentagon, there’s got to be wasteful spending there, unnecessary spending there, it all ought to be eliminated. We should be going through this budget line by line and asking the question, is this spending worth having to borrow money that our kids and grandkids have to pay back. That’s the real question. If we went through the budget line by line like that, I think there’s a lot more spending we could cut.”
BOEHNER ON PRESIDENT OBAMA'S CALL TO REPEAL "DON'T ASK, DON'T TELL":
"In the middle of two wars and in the middle of this giant security threat, why would we want to get into this debate? While at a time when Americans are asking where are the jobs, why do we want to get in this debate? while we're fighting over health care and trying to find some way to come to common ground, why do we want to get into a divisive debate that will do nothing more than distract the real debate that should occur here about helping to get our economy going again and getting American people back to work."
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