Paul Ryan

Borrowing and spending is not the way to prosperity.

What I’m concerned about is endless borrowing, which is going to compromise our economy not only today but in the future. Because we know the decisions we make right now really dramatically impact us in the future, and the debt is literally getting out of our control.

Our debt is out of control. What was a fiscal challenge is now a fiscal crisis. We cannot deny it; instead we must, as Americans, confront it responsibly. And that is exactly what Republicans pledge to do.

Since taking office, President Obama has signed into law spending increases of nearly 25 percent for domestic government agencies – an 84 percent increase when you include the failed stimulus. All of this new government spending was sold as ‘investment.’

We believe that the government has an important role to create the conditions that promote entrepreneurship, upward mobility, and individual responsibility.

The rate of return on Social Security for people nearing retirement is about 1.5 percent. By the time young children like mine are ready to retire, that rate of return will be a negative percentage.

Look, I am not worried about Washington cutting too much spending too fast. I mean, the kinds of spending cuts we’re talking about just right now are $100 billion out of a $3.7 trillion budget.

What matters to me is that I do what I think is right and I see, I’m a numbers guy, that’s my attitude. I know we have a debt tsunami coming, we are bankrupting this country and I’m in a position where I can actually advance ideas to prevent that from happening. That’s exactly what I should be doing.

That’s the real secret to job creation – not borrowing and spending more money in Washington.

We do not have a functioning market in the true sense of the word in health care. That’s a layer of transparency that’s sorely needed in America.

When you take a look at the problems our country is facing, debt is No. 1. The math is downright scary and the credit markets aren’t going to keep on giving us cheap rates.

Look, only in Washington is not raising taxes considered a tax cut. Nobody’s getting a tax cut here. We’re not cutting taxes. We’re preventing tax increases from occurring.

Look, the president is elected to lead and to face the country’s biggest challenges. The country’s biggest challenge domestically speaking, no doubt about it, is a debt crisis, and I’m really hoping that he is going to give us a budget that tackles this debt crisis.

The reason I got involved in public service, by and large, if I had to credit one thinker, one person, it would be Ayn Rand.

We’re saying no changes for Medicare for people above the age of 55. And in order to keep the promise to current seniors who’ve already retired and organized their lives around this program, you have to reform it for the next generation.

Are we interested in treating the symptoms of poverty and economic stagnation through income redistribution and class warfare, or do we want to go at the root causes of poverty and economic stagnation by promoting pro-growth policies that promote prosperity?

Exploiting people’s emotions of fear, envy and anxiety is not hope, it’s not change, it’s partisanship. We don’t need partisanship. We don’t need demagoguery, we need solutions.

We believe a renewed commitment to limited government will unshackle our economy and create millions of new jobs and opportunities for all people, of every background, to succeed and prosper. Under this approach, the spirit of initiative – not political clout – determines who succeeds.

We are looking for bipartisan solutions not partisan rhetoric.

If borrowing and spending all this money led to more jobs than we would be at full employment already.

By failing seriously to confront the most predicable economic crisis in our nation’s history, the President’s policies are committing us and our children to a diminished future.

If you’re running for president, you’ve got to do a lot of things to line up a candidacy. I’ve not done any of those things. It’s not my plan. My plan is to be a good chairman of the House Budget Committee and fight for the fiscal sanity of this nation.

We believe, as our founders did, that ‘the pursuit of happiness’ depends upon individual liberty; and individual liberty requires limited government.

I don’t consult polls to tell me what my principles are or what our policies should be.

What we heard today was not fiscal leadership from our Commander-in-Chief, what we heard today was a political broadside from our Campaigner-in-Chief.

Hiding spending does not reduce spending.

If we don’t make tough decisions today our children are going to have to make much, much tougher decisions tomorrow.

The debt and the deficit is just getting out of control, and the administration is still pumping through billions upon trillions of new spending. That does not grow the economy.

We need to reclaim our American system of limited government, low taxes, reasonable regulations, and sound money, which has blessed us with unprecedented prosperity. And it has done more to help the poor than any other economic system ever designed.

Look, of course people are scared of entitlement reform because every time you put entitlement reform out there, the other party uses it as a political weapon against you.

I don’t want to get into the ‘who’s a hostage-taker’ discussion here, but what is the estate tax? It’s a double tax on death. Economists will tell you that it’s really not a tax that soaks the rich, but it’s a tax on capital that deprives business investment and therefore job creation.

Republicans have offered dozens of comprehensive healthcare plans many of which achieve comprehensive healthcare reform without breaking what’s working in healthcare. We want to fix what’s broken in healthcare.

Do we believe that the goal of government is to promote equal opportunity for all Americans to make the most of their lives? Or, do we now believe that government’s role is to equalize the results of peoples lives?

This debt crisis coming to our country. The wall and tidal wave of debt that is befalling our nation. Medicare and Social Security go bankrupt within ten years, we have a debt that is looming so high that in the last year of President Obama’s budget just the interest payments on our debt is $916 billion dollars.

We need leadership. We don’t need a doubling down on the failed politics of the past.

Here’s the problem if you keep raising tax rates: You slow down economic growth.

This is a government takeover of our healthcare system. It is the government basically running the entire healthcare system, turning large insurers into de facto public utilities, depriving people of choice, depriving people of options, raising people’s prices, raising taxes when we need new jobs.

Our founders got it right when they wrote in the Declaration of Independence that our rights come from nature and nature’s God, not from government.

If we didn’t propose these reforms, we would not have proposed a budget that got the debt under control.

We are all representatives of the American people. We all do town hall meetings. We all talk to our constituents. And I’ve got to tell you, the American people are engaged. And if you think they want a government takeover of health care, I would respectfully submit you’re not listening to them.