GOP Response: Voters Want Real Results From Obama Admin.

"We want results, not rhetoric," McDonnell said. "We want cooperation, not partisanship."
Gov. Bob McDonnell (R-Va)

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GOP Response: Nation Can’t Afford Democrats’ Policies


The nation cannot afford the spending Democrats have enacted or the tax increases they propose, Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell said Wednesday in the Republican response to the State of the Union address.

McDonnell, in a transcript of his speech released in advance, said Democratic policies are resulting in an unsustainable level of debt. He said Americans want affordable health care, but they don't want the government to run it.

"Today, the federal government is simply trying to do too much," McDonnell said in prepared remarks. "In the past year, over 3 million Americans have lost their jobs, yet the Democratic Congress continues deficit spending, adding to the bureaucracy, and increasing the national debt on our children and grandchildren."

McDonnell said that all Americans want affordable, high-quality health care. But, he added, "Most Americans do not want to turn over the best medical care system in the world to the federal government."

McDonnell is to deliver the Republican response after President Barack Obama's speech Wednesday evening. National GOP leaders picked McDonnell after he was elected in a rout last fall in a state Obama and the Democrats swept in 2008.


String of GOP Victories

Republicans are feeling emboldened following a string of GOP victories at the polls, including a stunning win by Republican Scott Brown last week in a special Senate election in Massachusetts. Since then, Obama has amped up his populist rhetoric and promised a renewed focus on job creation.

Republicans said they want Obama to change more than his rhetoric. They complain that a $787 billion economic stimulus package enacted last year did not do enough to increase employment. And they oppose Obama's plan to let income tax cuts expire next year for families making more than $250,000 a year.

"We want results, not rhetoric," McDonnell said. "We want cooperation, not partisanship."

House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, said, "This isn't about a pivot in terms of his message. I think that most Americans know that actions speak louder than words."

McDonnell will speak live from the Virginia House of Delegates before an audience of about 300 friends, family, supporters and members of his administration.

In his remarks, McDonnell cites several areas of agreement with the president. On education, he said he agrees with Obama's proposal to increase the number of charter schools.

On national defense, he said he agrees with Obama's plan send an additional 30,0000 troops to Afghanistan. McDonnell said his oldest daughter, Jeanine, was an Army platoon leader in Iraq.

However, McDonnell said, Republicans have "serious concerns" about the administration's treatment of suspected terrorists. McDonnell complained that a Nigerian man accused of trying to blow up a plane as it approached Detroit on Christmas "was given the same legal rights as a U.S. citizen, and immediately stopped providing critical intelligence."

Some Republicans want suspected terrorists tried in military courts rather than civilian ones.

In a new twist for Republicans, Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart, R-Fla., will tape a Spanish-language version of the Republican response. Diaz-Balart's speech will be carried by Spanish-language media.






Mitch McConnell: Drop The "Big-Government" Agenda

When the president took office last January, he vowed to tackle the economic crisis head on. Yet over the past year, Americans have seen their economic situation deteriorate even further.

For the nearly 3.5 million Americans who lost their jobs, the nearly 3 million people who lost their homes, and many millions more, 2009 was another very painful year. This is why most Americans hope the White House will change direction in 2010 -- and that's exactly what most of them will be listening for signs of in the president's first State of the Union address Wednesday night.

Many Americans were surprised by the way the administration approached its first year in office. Americans wanted the administration and Democrat leaders in Congress to implement policies to create jobs, spur the expansion of small businesses, and help middle class families make ends meet.

What they got instead were trillion-dollar spending bills, a misguided government experiment to upend our health care system, and trillions of dollars in debt that our children and grandchildren will be saddled with for decades.

The recent elections in New Jersey, Virginia and Massachusetts were proof that Americans have run out of patience with the policies of the administration and Democrat leaders in Congress.

So it's my hope that the White House will use the State of the Union address to announce that it will put aside the big-government, big-spending agenda of the past year, move to the center, and embrace the sensible, step-by-step approach to our problems that Americans are asking for. Along these lines, here are some things the Administration could do:

• Put the 2,700-page Democrat health care plan on the shelf, and leave it there. The best first step we could take in righting our economic ship is to take this job-killing and tax-increasing monstrosity off the table once and for all and move toward the kind of step-by-step approach Americans really want.

• Prevent tax hikes: Declare that taxes will not go up at the end of the year, as they're scheduled to, for millions of American families and businesses. Even some Democrats are calling on the administration to do this. Struggling small businesses are asking themselves whether they can hire new workers; the prospect of a massive tax hike makes it far less likely they will.

• Return TARP to taxpayers: Return unused TARP money and put it toward paying down the deficit. Taxpayers who bailed out the banks last year are wondering why their money is still lying around unspent; money that's come back to the Treasury should be used to pay down the deficit, not used on new spending programs.

• Stop spending borrowed stimulus funds: The stimulus was sold to the public on the promise that it would hold unemployment at 8 percent. A year later, unemployment is at 10 percent, its highest level in a quarter century. At a time of trillion-dollar deficits, the administration should direct unspent stimulus funds to pay down our debts right now, rather than have money spent out on questionable projects nine years down the road.

• No more debt: Later this week, the administration, with an assist from Democrats in Congress, plans to increase the amount of money available on the federal credit card by nearly $2 trillion. In other words, they want to increase the amount of money we can borrow by an amount equivalent to what it cost to pay for the entire federal budget 10 years ago.

• Get out of the auto and insurance businesses: Explain to the American people how the federal government will end its ownership of auto companies, insurance companies, and banks. Americans don't think the U.S. government should be one of the largest shareholders of GM, Chrysler, and AIG.

• Expand domestic energy: Nuclear power is one of the cleanest, most efficient sources of energy. The administration should commit to expanding nuclear power as well as clean coal. And until these clean, green sites are up and running, it should allow the states to drill for oil and natural gas off their shores, if they want to.

These are just some things the White House could do to demonstrate that it has heard the concerns of the American people -- and the voters of Massachusetts, Virginia, and New Jersey -- and that it is willing to work closely and in the light of day with both parties to improve our economy and to get Americans back to work. It isn't too late to work together.

Sen. Mitch McConnell, a Republican from Kentucky, is minority leader of the U.S. Senate.


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