Paul Tonko

When women succeed, America succeeds.

Government spending clearly needs some adjusting. But a budget is a statement of our priorities, and balancing our spending on the backs of our nation's seniors is not the right approach.

Taxpayer dollars should not be used as a reward for contractor executives, especially when other segments of society are hurting.

Surely there are common-sense reforms that we should, and must, take in order to keep our children and our communities safe. I take these recommendations very seriously, and will listen to the voices of my constituents to ensure I do everything I can to help prevent gun violence.

Let's restore sanity and fairness to the tax cut conversation. We simply cannot afford to hand over the bank vault to our nation's millionaires and billionaires while the middle class picks up spare change.

Many climate change deniers would have you believe that addressing climate change is all pain and no gain. This is simply not true. We can tackle this challenge while improving our personal health and the health of our economy. These are not competing interests; they go hand in hand.

On Medicare, I would suggest ridding the system of fraud and bulk purchasing of prescription drugs, to begin with.

Plain and simple, Congress must act to meet the needs of our constituents. We can do that by strengthening families, increasing the minimum wage, and ensuring equal pay for equal work.

Americans are falling out of the middle class, not into it. And they deserve relief. I absolute support extending the Bush tax cuts for those who work the hardest and invest the most in our economy - the real drivers of American growth, the middle class.

We must reign in overspending by ridding government of outmoded programs, making Big Oil pay their fair share, repealing massive tax breaks for corporations that ship jobs overseas, and enacting a tax code that no longer favors millionaires and billionaires.

As the U.S. did during the Space Race, we must invest in our businesses and intellect to ensure America leads the clean energy economy of the future. As we all know, the best way to reduce our deficit and bring down our debt is by putting Americans back to work.

We cannot get serious about helping the private sector create quality jobs without focusing first on the main drivers of our economy - the American middle class and those struggling to enter it.