Ask Your Congressman – Over the Telephone

With “the Sequester” kicking in, and the Obama Administration’s warnings about how devastating its effects would be, I thought it would be a good idea to check in with the people I have the honor of representing in Congress.  Therefore, over the last two evenings, I held two telephone town hall meetings.  We called quite a few of the people living in our congressional district – maybe you received a call.

In case you weren’t able to participate, I thought you might find it interesting to hear a sampling of the questions I was asked, and the answers I gave.  Here goes.

Question:  Why couldn’t President Obama and the Congress reach an agreement to stop the Sequester from going into effect?
Answer:  Because President Obama insisted on raising taxes, again, as part of any deal.  Republicans said – no way.

Question: Why do we need more gun controls when we don’t enforce the laws already on the books?
Answer: We don’t.  We should enforce existing laws.  In my opinion, new gun control laws would only inconvenience law abiding citizens.  Criminals would ignore them – that’s why we call them criminals.

Question: Why should we continue to send our money to foreign countries when we could use that money here in the United States?
Answer: Far too much of our foreign aid ends up in the hands of people who do not share our principles, and in fact are rivals or even enemies of the United States (North Korea.)  This must stop.

Question: I heard that 46 cents of every dollar that the federal government spends has to be borrowed.  Is this true?
Answer: Unfortunately, yes.  And the country we borrow the most from, is China, which doesn’t necessarily have our best interests at heart.  We owe China approximately a trillion dollars.  We must get the out-of-control spending under control, work towards a balanced budget, and start paying down our $16.5 trillion National Debt.  This would, in my opinion, go a long way towards turning the economy around and getting Americans back to work.

Question: Is there anything we can do to stop Obamacare from going into effect?
Answer: After last November’s election, it’s much tougher to do.  Obamacare was passed when Democrats controlled the House, the Senate and the Presidency.  The Republican-controlled House has voted a number of times over the last two years to repeal Obamacare.  However, since Democrats still control the Senate and the Presidency, we can’t legislatively repeal Obamacare in the next few years.  But since the regulations carrying out the various aspects of Obamacare are still being written by the federal bureaucracy (principally by the Department of Health and Human Services), the House can still exercise vigorous oversight at upcoming hearings which will be held.  And even though it’s a ways down the road, repeal is still possible depending on how future elections go.

Question: What happened to all those jobs the Stimulus was supposed to create?
Answer: The Stimulus, in my opinion, was a waste of money, which put us another trillion dollars in debt.  It was shoveling money out the door on wasteful programs, like Solyndra.  I would much rather have seen private citizens keep their money and spend it as they saw fit, rather than the government spend it less efficiently.  People spend their money far more carefully and wisely than the government does.

Question: How will Sequestration affect Wright Patterson Air Force Base?
Answer: The Defense Department just sent a letter to Governor Kasich indicating that there could be some furloughs of civilian employees at Wright Patterson Air Force Base.  Republicans in the House are attempting to pass legislation, which would give our military leaders more flexibility than is currently contained in the Sequester, to shift money to more important priorities and away from less critical areas of spending.  This will hopefully reduce any negative impacts to Wright Pat.

Question: Is Congress making any cuts in its own budget?
Answer: Yes.  Congress cut spending on its own staff, office space, supplies, etc. by 11% last year and by 8.2% this year.  And over and above that, in my Washington and Cincinnati Congressional offices, even though we are permitted to employ 18 staff positions, we have cut our staff down to 14, in order to do our part.  (Our goal is to do more with less.)

Question: Why hasn’t President Obama submitted a Budget for 1400 days now?
Answer: Actually he has.  Unfortunately, each year his budget has been so unrealistic that not only did he not receive a single Republican vote in either the House or the Senate, but he didn’t receive a single Democrat vote in either house either.  It’s the Democrat-controlled Senate which hasn’t passed a budget in almost four years now (1407 days to be exact), despite the fact that they’re supposed to pass a budget EVERY year (as the Republican-controlled House has done each year.)

Question: I am a small business owner and our employees are required to be drug tested.  Why shouldn’t people who receive welfare or public housing be drug tested too?
Answer: Good question.  I’ll look into the feasibility of that.  It does seem that if our tax dollars are going to welfare recipients, they shouldn’t be using that public assistance to buy illegal drugs.

Question: If you’re going to test welfare recipients, shouldn’t Members of Congress be tested too?
Answer: Good point.  When I was a Member of Cincinnati City Council back in the 1980’s, we had a rash of accidents involving city employees who turned out to be under the influence of alcohol or drugs.  It was costing the city a bundle in medical bills, lawsuits, settlements, etc.  I proposed drug testing city employees whom we had reasonable cause to believe were under the influence of alcohol and/or drugs.  To show that Members of City Council should set an example, I underwent a drug test myself.  (I was clean!)

Question: I’ve heard President Obama is trying to make the Sequester hurt as much as possible.  Is this true?
Answer: I certainly hope not.  However, after what just happened yesterday, you sure have to wonder.  The White House just announced yesterday that they are shutting down all White House tours to the public.  Many families and school groups come to Washington and this can be one of the highlights of their trip.  The cost of such tours, especially when one considers that volunteers are used, has to be miniscule, especially when compared to the disappointment so many people will experience.  The Obama Administration should be ashamed.

Well, that’s a smattering of the questions I received and the answers I gave over the last two evenings during my telephone town halls.  Maybe I’ll get a question from you in the near future.  Thanks in advance for your interest.

See you next week.

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