RUSH: Ladies and gentlemen, this sound bite, this yesterday in Washington on Capitol Hill, it was a Senate Budget Committee hearing on Obama’s 2012 budget. The Treasury secretary, little Tim Geithner testified, and during the question and answer Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama said, ‘Let’s talk about our interest situation under your budget. The interest increases every year. It was $187 billion in 2009. Under your proposal, the interest increases to $844 billion. And would you not agree that that’s a stunning figure, perhaps the fastest growing item in the budget? And all of that is a direct result of the debt we’re running up, and only a modest expectation of interest rate increases.’
GEITHNER: Senator, absolutely. It is an excessively high interest burden. It’s unsustainable —
SESSIONS: Well, it’s your plan! For the ten years. I mean, that’s the one the president has submitted! That’s what he’s asked us to vote on. It will result in this — and that’s your numbers, off your budget.
GEITHNER: Senator, you’re absolutely right. With the president’s plan — even if Congress were to enact it, and even if Congress were to hold to it and reduce those deficits to 3% of GDP over the next five years — we would still be left with a very large interest burden and unsustainable obligations over time. That’s why we’re having the debate. I completely agree with you. But the question, though, is — just to be direct about it — what’s the alternative plan?
SESSIONS: Well, what your plan is is that plan. It’s the one you’re required by law to submit, and that’s what you called for, and it’s not acceptable. I’m sorry, it’s a plan not for ‘winning the future,’ but losing the future.
RUSH: Jeff Sessions, Alabama. But the interesting thing here, let’s go back on Monday, or whenever it was. I think it was Monday Obama said, ‘It’s time to live within our means. Okay, here’s a budget, this is responsible, we’re gonna live within our means. We’re gonna get serious about cutting the deficit. In fact, my budget’s gonna cut the deficit $1.1 trillion over ten years,’ blah, blah, blah, blah, and here’s the Treasury secretary admitting that Obama’s budget is unsustainable! It’s almost like a threat. He agrees with Sessions, ‘Yeah, it’s unsustainable,’ what are you gonna do about it?
‘You’re absolutely right, Senator. Even if Congress were to enact this, we’d still be left with a very large interest burden. That’s why we’re having the debate. I completely agree with you, but the question is, just to be direct about it: What’s the alternative?’ What are you guys gonna do? In other words, ‘Yeah, we got a budget here that’s gonna bust this government. What’s your plan?’ So clearly Geithner and Obama think the public is clearly on the side of spend, spend, spend; benefit, benefit, benefit. You guys tell senior citizens they’re not gonna get what they expect. You guys tell Medicare and Medicaid people are not going to get what they expect. This is a threat. They’re throwing down the gauntlet. You guys make the tough decisions.
And Sessions says, ‘Well, this is your plan. It’s not acceptable. It’s a plan not for ‘winning the future,’ but losing the future.’ So if they’re gonna go up there and admit… You know, Geithner, they’re submitting an unsustainable budget tantamount to dereliction of duty!