If we want to truly regain the public's trust, we can provide greater accountability and transparency with a simple step. Let's start by communicating to our constituents about the votes we take.

My Eighth District, like others, counts on these family businesses and their teams working hard to support their families and aid their communities. As retailers, these teams often bring different or unique products to the marketplace.

In fact, 80 percent of our domestic job growth comes from the small- and medium-sized business community.

And yet, if we don't, first and foremost, act responsibly with the national tax dollars that we have, we can't properly address those regional priorities that we would like to.

If we want to truly regain the public's trust, we can provide greater accountability and transparency with a simple step. Let's start by communicating to our constituents about the votes we take.

Even the best data security systems can't protect private taxpayer information from entrepreneurial foreign businesses than can make huge profits selling U.S. taxpayer information.

During a trip to Iraq last fall, I visited our theater hospital at Balad Air Force Base and witnessed these skilled medical professionals in action and met the brave soldiers whose lives they saved.

As a member of the House Committee on Small Business and because of my own experience as a small business owner, I am appreciative of the impact these small businesses have on our local economies.

Taxpayers should not be coerced into giving up their privacy rights just to file their taxes.

Small businesses are the economic drivers of our country, providing the stimulus our communities need.

And I also serve on a caucus that addresses financial literacy for young people in this country. And it is so hypocritical that we want to talk to these kids about how to better manage their money when we are not doing a good job with our Nation's resources.

Identity theft is one of the fastest-growing crimes in the nation - especially in the suburbs.

By overhauling current rules and speeding the entry of competitors in the market, we encourage competition and provide our constituents with new choices and cheaper bills.

The budget enforcement rules of the 1990s were an important part of getting the budget back into balance. It was done on a bipartisan basis. Those pay-as-you-go rules were tested and they worked. We are now in a one-party system, and we have thrown them out.

I am excited to rise today to support National Mom and Pop Business Owners Day. This celebration honors the husband and wife business owner teams whose work helps drive the economy and fuel job growth.

The American people expect more from Congress. They expect fiscal responsibility and common sense. They expect us to return to the pay-as-you-go budget rules that we had enacted in the past that helped us establish a surplus, however briefly.

We're all proud of the communities that we've built and are a part of, but we shouldn't accept lost time and unnecessary stress when traveling in them.

When I came to Congress, I came to bring what I thought was a real-world business perspective to government because, in the business world, I spent over 20 years in the high-tech industry, but it certainly was not unique.

For the last 4 years, our Federal Government has produced the four biggest deficits in history, and the estimated 2006 deficit of $423 billion is projected to be the largest of all.

But in this Congress, accountability is just a catch phrase, usually directed elsewhere. Demands to personal responsibility or corporate accountability abound, but rarely congressional accountability or fiscal responsibility.

I am the parent of teenagers, my daughters are 13 and 15, so the issue of Internet safety has been an important issue. I have been visiting middle schools to talk about some of the challenges that they face.

Reports also suggest that Ernst and Young and other large tax preparation firms are sending tax returns overseas for processing. But the IRS has no control over tax information once it's been sent to India or another country.

Married couples who work together to build and maintain a business assume broad responsibilities. Not only is their work important to our local and national economies, but their success is central to the well-being of their families.

Many seventh graders I know in Illinois, as well as around the Nation, are studying the Constitution. I was pretty impressed with the quality of education our children are receiving because they had not expected me to ask them about it.

Mr. Speaker, democracy works best when the American electorate is engaged and informed.

As part of my efforts to fight identity theft, I worked with my colleagues on the Financial Services Committee to strengthen consumer protection with a reasonable notification requirement.

Oftentimes, small business owners are unable to obtain reasonably priced financing and instead turn to higher priced forms of capital, such as credit cards.

Social security, bank account, and credit card numbers aren't just data. In the wrong hands they can wipe out someone's life savings, wreck their credit and cause financial ruin.

Many of our constituents have one option for cable TV and one price. Our constituents desire choice.

The IRS is currently considering a rule that would make it easier for tax preparers to disclose the private information contained in tax returns - including name, address, Social Security number, employer, income, and charitable donations.

Under the Environmental Protection Agency's Energy Star Program, homes are independently verified to be measurably more energy efficient than average houses.

Small businesses are the economic drivers of our country, providing the stimulus our communities need

Roosevelt's magic lay in one facet of his personality: He knew how to take the risk. No other man in public life I knew could so readily take the challenge of the new.

When producers want to know what the public wants, they graph it as curves. When they want to tell the public what to get, they say it in curves.

Public discussions are part of what it takes to make changes in the trillions of graphics published each year.

I can assure you, public service is a stimulating, proud and lively enterprise. It is not just a way of life, it is a way to live fully.

I give everything I have to give on the screen. I feel I don't owe the public anything else.

Public opinion polls are rather like children in a garden, digging things up all the time to see how they're growing.

My art became very public.

Depending on what day of the week it is and what time of the month it is, I'm a good friend or not a good friend. I'm more or less a good mom or not a good mom, more or less a good mate or not a good mate. That's just life, whether or not you're public.

Well, I think that those of us in public life that are trying to do a good job, and that are faced with this popular new game that the media has of being critical of everything that anybody in public office does probably are thin-skinned.

The greatest public health threat for many American women is the men they live with.

Like religion, politics, and family planning, cereal is not a topic to be brought up in public. It's too controversial.

Yesterday in this country we had people die of hunger and malnutrition. In some parts of this country, the infant mortality rate rivals that of sub-Saharan Africa. We have a public education system that ranks below that of almost any other Western nation.

Don't try to be somebody you're not because it doesn't work. If you try to be this perfect person or perfect persona of what you think that somebody should be when they're involved in public office, it's just not going to work. Just be yourself, stay true to your core values, and really just stay abreast of the issues.

Alabama citizens, like the vast majority of Americans, respect and value the meaning of decency, and appreciate public institutions that reflect the common values of our society.

It was he who impressed, time and again, the necessity of singing as nature intended, and - I remember - he constantly warned, don't let the public know that you work. So I went slowly. I never forced the voice.

In the coming days, I know there will be some reflecting on my time as mayor. Many of you will search to find what's behind my decision. It's simple. I have always believed that every person, especially public officials, must understand when it is time to move on. For me, that time is now.

All of us who are convinced that our military needs all the support the government and public will provide are pleased that he will have his chance to do just that.