Rehberg visits Lake County

POLSON - Montana Republican Denny Rehberg, running for his sixth term in the U.S. House of Representatives, visited Polson last Wednesday as part of "America Speaking Out" town hall forums.

The series is in an ongoing Republican effort to "engage the American people and give them a voice in setting Washington's agenda."

"This is your opportunity, your chance to tell me what's on your mind, and an opportunity for me to listen," Rehberg said to a packed room at the Lake County Courthouse.

Fielding questions about job creation, social security and health care, as well as Senator Tester's Forest Land Bill 1470 and the Japanese Abduction Act, Rehberg focused his answers on getting control of what he called a failed stimulus plan and out-of-control federal spending.

"The problem is scale," he said. "A lot of people have a problem wrapping their arms around that: a million million is a trillion. With the stimulus package, 88 cents on the dollar went to spending. That is an expense, not an asset, and you can't build an economy based on spending. Our biggest fear in congress is, slow down, for God sakes. We were afraid that Nancy Pelosi was going to find the next word after a trillion. They think we are an endless pit."

When asked about his prediction on job creation in the next 12 months, Rehberg gave the example of the State Department's foreign operations committee, which increased employment by 2,285 people. According to Rehberg, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently asked for an additional 600 employees.

"Government grows, but the private sector does not," Rehberg said. "There are two views. Either you think that they can spend their way into prosperity, which is their view. Or my view, which is that government is in the way."

One woman wanted to know, "why aren't we drilling more in Montana?"

"At times, we create an unfortunate disadvantage," Rehberg said, citing poor infrastructure and the 30 percent coal tax in Montana versus the 15 percent tax in Wyoming.

"We over-regulate and over-tax in America, so companies go overseas," he said.

When a community member expressed concern that people on social security have gone two years without any cost of living increase, Rehberg said, "the baby boom is going to create a problem with social security. It used to be 33 people working for one retiree. Now, there are three."

What does he think about President Obama's health care reform?

"It was a trillion dollar program that was paid for with waste, fraud and abuse," Rehberg said. "It got more people on the system without decreasing the cost of health care. They have no way to pay for it right now. They misled you."

When asked about making Congress' reading of a new bill public, he ended the town hall discussion by urging Americans to educate themselves through information readily available on the Internet.

"I know there were abuses when the Republicans were in power in congress," Rehberg said. "You know more about government than anybody has ever because of the Internet. You have the ability to be as much a part of it as you want to be. Organize, educate and activate. The activate is always the hardest part, but you have access to information that people in the past never have. It gives you an opportunity to hold our feet to the fire and now you're mad about it. I thank you for being mad, ‘cus some of us have been mad for years."