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The legislation before us actually does three important things. First, it eliminates an antiquated, outdated system of public financing. Second, it terminates an obsolete commission, and finally, and not incidentally, it actually saves money -- something we talk a lot about around here but seldom actually do. When the Presidential Election Campaign fund was actually created in 1973, it was during a time before things like Facebook, YouTube, Twitter. Widespread use of the internet did not exist. That's no longer the case today.
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Rep. Tom Cole (OK-04) released the following statement after the House of Representatives approved HR 3463, a bill to eliminate the Presidential Election Campaign Fund and the Election Assistance Commission. These outdated programs use taxpayer money to fund presidential campaigns and political nominating conventions. The Federal Election Commission (FEC) recently announced that the Republican and Democratic parties received $17.7 million each in taxpayer funding for their 2012 presidential nominating conventions.
President Obama is having a field day campaigning against a Congress he says is not doing enough to create jobs -- despite the fact that House Republicans have passed more than 20 jobs bills that are now languishing in the Democratic Senate. However, when presented with a golden opportunity to create 20,000 jobs and decrease America's reliance on foreign oil, President Obama punted.
The U.S. national debt reached the latest in a series of sobering milestones recently. As of November 15, our accumulated debt officially stands at more than $15 trillion. Worse still, $4.4 trillion of that debt was racked up just since President Obama took office.
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Rep. Tom Cole (OK-04) released the following statement after the House of Representatives voted on H.J. Res. 2, a Balanced Budget Amendment to the Constitution:
There are certainly members on this floor that are a lot more knowledgeable about this particular piece of legislation than I am. I don't serve on any of the relevant subcommittees on Appropriations, and so they're going to talk about it in more depth and detail than I ever could. But I tell you what -- and I certainly would be the first to say -- that we did not have a perfect process. I would have preferred individual bills, I think most of us on the Appropriations Committee would. And we didn't cut as much money as I would have liked to have cut.
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Rep. Tom Cole (OK-04) released the following statement after the House of Representatives passed H.R. 822, the National Right-to-Carry Reciprocity Act, which allows law-abiding gun owners with valid state-issued concealed firearm permits or licenses to carry a concealed firearm in any other state that also allows concealed carry.
New Defense Secretary Leon Panetta has been charged with cutting $450 billion from the Defense Department over the next 10 years. In keeping with that goal, the Air Force recently announced a realignment that will ultimately benefit Tinker Air Force Base. Tinker's Air Logistics Center will now become the new single head for Air Force sustainment and logistics, making it one of the military's leading repair and maintenance facilities. The assignment of a sustainment center and 3-star general highlights Tinker's pre-eminent role among air logistics facilities.
Bipartisan cooperation is often hard to come by in Washington, but some ideas are so bad that both Republicans and Democrats can agree to work together to oppose them. Such is the case with taxation of employee health benefits.