Heritage Papers: Walberg dicusses federal budget, Obamacare in Editorial Board interview

Congressman Tim Walberg (R-Tipton) recently met with the editorial board of Heritage Media-West to discuss developments in Washington and issues important to his constituents.

The Budget

For the first time in several years both houses of Congress have passed a budget and President Obama has signed it. While the budget increased spending now and spread cuts over 10 years, Walberg was happy it got done at all.

"It's a budget, that's the first thing," Walberg said. "It's the responsibility of Congress to pass a budget."

The House has passed a budget three of the last six years, but those spending plans went nowhere as the Senate failed to pass anything. The Republicans control the House of Representatives, while the Democrats run the Senate.

The new budget clearly recognizes the facts as they exist in Washington, Walberg said.

"We are in divided government," he said. "One side doesn't desire to have its core values trampled upon. If that's the case for me as a Republican, then the Democrats must feel the same way."

How to proceed then becomes the battle. Maintaining the core values he espouses as a Republican: limited government and fiscal responsibility, means standing firm on certain principles.

"I wouldn't support budget with tax increases; that violates the sequester," Walberg said.

So the new budget includes no tax increases and retains 92 percent of the cuts made by sequester. The budget eased it for year and a half. As sign of compromise, some parts of the budget benefitted Democratic values and others for the Republicans.

"This gets us back to regular order," Walberg said. "This allows Congress to debate the priorities as opposed to (letting) the bureaucracy (make the decisions.)

The bottom-line dollar amount is $1.012 trillion.

"The best Paul Ryan budget we passed in 2011 was $1.019 trillion," Walberg said. "We wouldn't get there until 2017 under sequestration."

The budget calls for $23 billion in deficit reduction over 10 years, the same as sequestration, the congressman said. The upsides are no further sequestration and no threat of shutting down government in 2014 or 15.

"It's a two-year deal, but Congress cannot hold other Congresses to it," Walberg said. "We can debate the debt ceiling, but at least we have a budget."

To make the deficit reductions and further spending cuts happen, there only one way as far as Walberg is concerned and that is for the voters to give the Republicans control over the Senate.

"(Nothing will happen) until we see a change at the ballot box," he said.

The budget deal follows Ronald Reagan's principle of getting 80 percent of what you want now and going back later for the rest, Walberg said. With a new budget, the government won't have to deal with sequestration, a bad idea from the start, he said.

"We didn't want sequestration it was the president's idea," Walberg said. "...that's what we have been doing; people want to see Congress work.

"It's good to see bipartisan effort. It's not perfect, none of us are celebrating, but we are celebrating moving forward.

"Now we can begin the process in appropriations."

During the editorial board's interview with Rep. Walberg, readers were invited via Twitter and Facebook to ask him some questions. One of those decisions asked about the decision to cut pensions for retired and disabled veterans.

Walberg said he did not like the deal and blamed the cuts on Democrats who don't like defense as much as Republicans.

He said he was confident the issue would be fixed during this Congress or one in the near future.

The cuts do allow some flexibility in the budget and restores training for troops headed to Afghanistan. Troops now are receiving only about 85 percent of training they normally would and while they are still the best trained they need all of it for their mission to be successful, he said.

"For younger military people, hopefully before they reach age 62, we will get that fixed," Walberg said. "After the next election hopefully we can get a commitment of Democrats."

Obamacare and jobs

Walberg also touched on the Affordable Care Act otherwise known as Obamacare. Editors asked if there were going to be fixes coming that address glitches in the health-care reform law. Walberg scoffed at that approach.

"Do you take an unworkable plan and cobble together fixes or let the people sort it out," Walberg said. "There are elections coming up, especially in the Senate.

"If this legislation continues to roll out like it has, a number of Democratic senators who voted for it are in trouble."

Walberg recalled that his predecessor (Democratic gubernatorial candidate Mark Schauer) voted for the ACA against what the congressman called the people's wishes."

"Why repair (the ACA) when we weren't part of putting this together," he said. "We were not given a chance to offer amendments. It doesn't make sense to repair something we weren't asked to create."

Walberg has little confidence the Obama administration is up to the challenge about fixing the law. He said the security concerns about Navigators (people designated to aid others in signing up for health insurance in one of the exchanges. The concern is that these people would have access to people's personal information) were brought up to Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebellius months before October rollout.

"She did nothing about it," Walberg said

Walberg also touched on the issue of people losing their health plans and physicians, both subjects President Obama repeatedly promised would not happen.

A woman with leukemia found out that under the ACA, she would lose the private insurance that was allowing her to get liquid chemotherapy.

"She should be spending time beating her cancer not trying to find insurance," Walberg said.

The Congressman said he heard from a physician about a woman with multiple sclerosis who is faced with a choice: keep her doctor and lose prescription coverage or find another doctor within the new system. The current prescription allowed her to live as normal a life as she could.

"(She) can't keep her doctor in this case. How do you fix that?" Walberg said.

The solution is a new power arrangement in Washington or for the president to start listening to the people, Walberg said. During the shutdown last fall, the House made a number of attempts to delay the individual mandate but the president promised a veto, he said.

The challenge is getting through the next three years or change makeup of the Senate, Walberg said. If the latter happens, it will change the dynamics in Washington.

"We can present the president a bill he can veto," Walberg said. "He has not had to veto any bills so far. It's time he addresses the concerns of the people."

Walberg said the Republican reforms would restore the 40-hour week as the standard for health insurance coverage, not the 30-hour threshold now in effect.

"I introduced a bill to do that," he said. "If the president got that bill I am certain he would veto it, because he needs more people in the system to fund it."

He continued, "It's a shame to have to read these letters. We need people to change government and go back to a program that deals with costs and not take over the whole thing

Walberg said he has seen business owners wondering if they can stay open, can they keep their employees.

One businessman received notice that doubled his premiums, Walberg said. And it's likely he will see his premiums go up again next year.

Many are seeing premiums rise 30 to 60 percent and scores have lost insurance altogether, Walberg said.

As for the jobs scene, Walberg dismisses the notion, that extending unemployment benefits is the solution for the nation's idled workforce.

"The majority of people don't want unemployment, they want employment," he said.

And they want to be able to get a job that will support them, Walberg said. He relayed the story of a Jackson woman who got her hours cut, because her employer could not afford to provide health care under the ACA.

The woman had been using a part-time waitressing job to augment her salary, but now with the hours being cut, she can't afford the premiums

"She didn't want subsidy or unemployment," Walberg said.

"The nation needs to create a full-time economy and needs to create jobs the old-fashioned way," Walberg said. "That means the government not raising taxes and living within its means."

That also means, not increasing entitlement programs and not extending jobless benefits to 99 weeks.

"If that's not working, why not scale back government and ratchet up private sector," Walberg said. "Under the ACA, most new jobs will only be part time."

While some people have chosen unemployment, others are going to where the good paying jobs are, Walberg said. He cited a McDonald's in North Dakota that start people at $18 an hour and offer a $500 signing bonus.

"Of course they have to put up with minus 30 degrees for a while," Walberg said. "I don't want to see people move out of the 7th District. We have had too much of that.