House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan says the 2012 budget plan to be released Tuesday “pays off our national debt,” and prevents the social safety net from “tearing apart at the seams.” Ryan also said Tuesday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” that he is willing to compromise on the spending proposal, but first “you put ideas on the table.”
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| Paul Ryan |
“I can’t look my kids in the eye — my constituents in the eye — with a clear conscience and not try to fix this country’s problems,” Ryan said. “Look, we have a huge debt problem, we got a big spending problem, we need the economy to grow, so we are trying to tackle those problems here.
“Look, I’m hoping that by putting this out there, we can get this adult conversation going, have a fact-based conversation on the budget, to get America’s problems under control,” Ryan said. “I worry that this is nothing but politics up here these days, but we got to get through that — we can’t have a bunch of politicians up here yelling at each other, pointing fingers — we need some leaders, we need leaders to come up and tackle this country’s challenges.
“This is a plan that pays off our national debt; this is a plan that creates millions of new jobs,” he continued. “This is a plan that saves Medicare and Medicaid. This saves the social safety net — the social safety net is tearing apart at the seams.”
Ryan reiterated that if action on entitlement programs is taken now, “no one 55 or above sees a change.”
“We need government to reorganize its policies, so Americans don’t need to reorganize their lives,” he said. “As far as compromise: Of course I am willing to compromise — naturally you compromise up here — but you can’t start talking about compromise until you put ideas on the table.
“Let’s see if they even put a counter offer out there.”
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