One thing I see as I travel the district is that the resolve of our people to work, create, innovate and succeed is as strong as ever. Folks are telling me they want Washington to stop all the grandstanding and bickering and start doing something now that will help people and businesses in their fight to regain our national economic strength.

There is one thing Congress can do right away to help out:  return to Washington immediately and extend the two-percent Social Security payroll tax rollback.  At a time when working families are already struggling to get by, two percent more in each pay check can make a difference. Since this payroll tax is only applied to the first $106,000 dollars a person earns in a year, it is those who make less than that who pay the highest percentage of their income to this tax.

Estimates are that the average American family would have an extra $1,000 dollars a year in take home pay through a reduction of this tax. What some people in Washington don’t seem to understand is that for so many working families just hanging on by the thinnest of financial threads, $1,000 a year is real money. In addition to buoying the income of workers, the rollback would also help businesses as families would continue to spend that extra $1,000 a year on gas, groceries, clothes and the other necessities of life.

At a time when government provides massive subsidies to multi-billion dollar, multi-national corporations and allows tax loopholes that keep some billionaires’ effective tax rates lower than those of middle class wage earners, it doesn’t seem right to re-institute a tax that hits hardest on school teachers, nurses, store clerks and minimum wage workers. Critics say this rollback will hurt Social Security by allowing less money to come into the trust fund during the time of the rollback. No one is a stronger advocate for Social Security than I am, and I would not support any measure that I believed placed it at risk. Families need the money now. Our economy needs the activity now.

Those in Washington who are genuinely concerned about the solvency of Social Security should stop the government from borrowing against the Trust Fund, to which the government now owes $3.5 Trillion. It is a decade of out of control spending and borrowing that has jeopardized the Social Security system. I say rather than allow the government to continue to raid the Trust Fund, we simply continue to give two percent of that money back to the people who’ve earned it during this time of economic hardship. I say the solvency of the American working family should be a higher priority than the ability of the government to continue to siphon money out of the Social Security Trust Fund. When the government stops bleeding the Trust Fund dry, then its solvency will no longer be an issue. In the meantime, we must begin to address the economic crisis that many working families in America face every day.

Be it bailouts, TARP, tax loopholes or monetary policy, our system always seems tilted to the big, the powerful and the well connected. How often have we heard “Too Big to Fail” as an excuse to use taxpayers’ dollars to bailout or prop up the reckless or poorly managed? Well I have another option. I say the American family and the working class are “Too Important to Fail.” And maybe the government should acknowledge that fact by extending the period of time over which the middle class and the working poor can take home that extra two percent of their pay check that just might mean paying the rent or mortgage for another month or two, or being able to keep fresh, healthy food in the house for their children.

Washington has done much over the years to diminish the value of American labor and to make it ever more difficult to earn a decent living, save a little money and provide opportunities for the next generation. I say that, while times are hard and families are struggling to make ends meet, the government should allow them to keep the two percent payroll tax and I am ready to go back to Washington, end this recess and get that done for the American people. We don’t have another moment to waste.

As the district work period continues on and I talk with people about their concerns, I have been telling them I have a plan to get America back to work, shore up our economy, and keep us secure. I know I sound like a broken record, but it is simple—we have to make things here at home in America.

One thing we can do immediately is kill the three pending trade deals that are coming down the bureaucratic pipeline as we speak. The last thing our economy needs is another series of unfair trade agreements with Korea, Panama and Colombia—putting our workers at a disadvantage and stifling growth of our small businesses. Our region has seen and heard it all before. The fact remains that well intentioned trade deals like CAFTA and NAFTA brought nothing more to our district than pink slips and shuttered mills. I believe we can trace our current economic ills in our district back to the passage of NAFTA. I’ll do every single thing I can to block these pending new trade deals and keep opportunity alive for our businesses.

If we want to create jobs here in America, we need to give our companies a fair shot in the global markets. If trade deals like the flawed Korea agreement go through, we’ll only help usher in boatloads of Chinese goods to our shores and stores—suffocating our domestic manufacturers. I’m sick and tired of seeing “Made in China” printed on items I remember once buying that were made locally by proud, hard-working Americans. I bet you share this sentiment, too.

We need to make it here, and make it now. We need a domestic manufacturing strategy that works for our nation, not the economies of the rest of the world. I’m fighting to extend Buy American provisions to cover more of our Department of Homeland Security, knowing that if we truly want to secure our country, we must also secure our economy along the way. Just as the Berry Amendment originally intended, the Department of Defense should be purchasing domestic items made right here by our fellow countrymen. We must outfit and equip those who protect us with the very best uniforms and equipment we can—ones that proudly display the Made in America label. We must take care of our soldiers at every turn, from our active duty and reserves to our retirees and veterans. Just as we respect those before us who helped build this nation, we must also fight for those who protect it and keep it great. I find it amazing that we have to fight to equip the Americans protecting us with American-made goods. Isn't it just common sense? Apparently not.

I fight to protect these troops, our seniors, and the working families and small businesses that call our district home. All they want is a chance to find success and help move our nation forward. We should all work together to make sure that we leave our country better off than we found it. I’ll continue to do all I can to help keep the American Dream alive.

In order to do this, the gridlock holding up solutions to the real issues at hand must stop. We need folks in Washington to get back to work on the job they were elected to do—represent the people of their districts and act in the best interest of our nation. Our founding fathers created this democracy to promote the very real discussions our lawmakers should be having—but they must be constructive. I’ll continue my fight to end this “recess” period, bring Congress back into session and hopefully all will see that we have a clear and fair path to repairing our economy—we must defeat these unfair trade deals and reinvigorate domestic manufacturing and America will get back to work.

With all of the fighting going on in Washington, it can sometimes be lost upon us all that the real fight is for our future. Our children are our most precious resource. As I've been home this week talking with folks, I've noticed that the anger we all have towards the debacle in Washington is matched by worry that our children are going to be the first to face a future where they’re no better off than the generation before them.  This is unbelievable to me—it means the American Dream is in peril.

I'm your Congressman, but I'm also a father and a former teacher.  I worry about our children's future.  There are times I think this generation coming up has it too easy. They don't remember a time without cell phones, bottled water, or air conditioning.  But we need to remember that young people also have pressures that our generation never had.  Too many of them don't get enough exercise because they sit in front of televisions and computers.  Too many rarely have meals as a family, often because their parents are working multiple jobs just trying to make ends meet and are exhausted when they get home.

Too many of our young people are exposed to drugs and alcohol at younger and younger ages.  They face high stakes standardized tests and are told that they and their schools are failures if all don't do well.  They live in a post 9/11 world with no real memory of what life was like before that horrific event, and see nothing but political bickering and name calling if they watch the news at all. Some of these things we can try to improve as a country, some we must leave to families, and some are part of our world now and cannot be changed.

I was glad to see a blow to the much-flawed No Child Left Behind law this week. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announced that states can apply for a waiver to be exempted from the NCLB standards, setting up their own system that works. I'm looking forward to seeing North Carolina file for a waiver and use our own guidelines to assess student success and not have it all be tied to teaching to tests, which do nothing to truly educate our children. I know there are folks out there who think standardized tests are the way to create accountability, but I strongly disagree.

Kids these days may have many advantages and opportunities with all the new technology, but that same technology also brings new challenges for parents and grandparents whose first concern is keeping our kids safe. Not only do we have to worry about sending children outside to play and how to keep them safe, we also have to worry about ways in which to protect them from Internet predators too. We are fortunate that here in North Carolina we have an Attorney General in Roy Cooper who has made it a top priority to protect our children from those who would use the Internet to prey upon them. Not all states have such proactive leadership as we do to keep our children safe.

No matter what we all disagree upon, there is one thing that I think can bring both sides of the aisle together—children should be protected. I hear from you and your neighbors each week by the thousands.  I was struck by the number of people who were writing in and calling on behalf of the little girl in Florida, Caylee Anthony, who would have been six years old this week if she had not died so tragically in 2008.  As a father of two daughters myself, I couldn't help but be torn up by the testimony we all heard on the news during that trial. I heard from so many folks that were upset that it wasn't a crime to fail to report a child missing.  We all know that a child should be reported missing immediately, and that the first three hours that a child is missing are the most critical in terms of getting them home safely.  It is hard to even believe such a law is needed, but clearly it is.

I wanted to support a bill that would make it a federal offense to not report a child missing.  I assumed someone had introduced a Caylee's Law bill by now and found that no one had, so I took it upon myself to write it and introduce it.  My bill makes it a felony to fail to report a child under age twelve missing within 24 hours, and would also make it a felony to not report within an hour upon discovering that a child that has died in one's care.  I am hopeful that Speaker Boehner will allow it to move forward for quick passage this Congress.

From Caylee's Law, to finding a solution to our budget woes and stopping the bad trade deals that take our jobs away—there are important issues before our nation that Congress should be working on right now.  As I've said before and I'll say again, America isn't getting a recess and neither should Congress.  There is important work to be done in making sure our next generation succeeds beyond this one, and it cannot wait.  I hope my colleagues will join in my efforts to get us to stop the fighting, get back to work and take care of the people's business.

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Washington is broken and everyone knows it. While admitting the problem certainly makes for a proper first step to finding a solution, that alone will not fix the many issues we still face. We must change the way we approach our problems. Partisan bickering and last minute gamesmanship do nothing for the average American.

While the past week brought a temporary end to the debt ceiling crisis, the agreement that was reached was anything but good. In true Washington fashion, an 11th hour deal was struck with the intent of averting crisis—but the bad deal that was presented and passed has only prolonged and postponed the potential for even more bad days to come. I completely understand the great risk of default, but I simply could not support a deal that violates the commitment our nation has made to senior citizens. I did support a compromise bill on July 30^th that would’ve protected our seniors, reined in Washington’s out-of-control spending, and honored the full faith and credit of our nation, but unfortunately it failed.

When you look into the actual numbers behind our National Debt, you find some surprising statistics. The largest sole owner of the U.S. debt is not China. America’s largest debt is owed to our own Social Security Trust Fund. The U.S. Treasury has raided the coffers of the Social Security Trust Fund, borrowing from it over 2.6 trillion dollars. That money belongs to those who have paid it in over the years. So the next time someone says to you “Social Security is broke,” remind them of the nearly three trillion dollars it is owed by the rest of the United States government. We cannot continue to allow our government to steal from retirees.

I’ve cosponsored legislation to instruct the federal government to keep its hands out of the Social Security and Medicare trust funds, as constantly raiding those accounts does nothing to ensure solvency or benefits for our seniors for years to come. By removing this added drain on programs that we must preserve, we can help end the growing uncertainty that seniors have faced in the ongoing talk of spending cuts in Washington. Sadly, many of my colleagues continue to use our seniors, veterans and small businesses as bargaining chips in the political debates surrounding spending. We can cut out our wasteful ways while preserving our promises and prosperity, continuing to be the best country in the world.

In 2010, I voted to extend tax cuts for small business owners and working families, because I understand that we’re in tough times. I know small businesses are doing all they can to help create jobs to get our economy back on track, and I wanted to do all I could to help small business owners be successful. I believe we simply cannot call on our average working families and small businesses to pay more taxes during a recession. Big corporations are another matter. Sadly, we’ve seen big business take advantage of tax loopholes or relocate their headquarters overseas to avoid paying their fair share of taxes. Too many have enjoyed the gray areas of a dangerously complex and confusing tax structure, offering no domestic job creation or any benefit for our country—just payouts and bonuses for company executives.

Here at home, we remember all too well how our once vibrant manufacturing sectors have fallen victim to the awful trade deals crafted by Congress over the last two decades. As Washington leaders continue their work on even more upcoming deals with Korea, Panama and Colombia—I’m working to do all I can to stop them from hurting folks in our part of the world. This week, I introduced the Textile Enforcement and Security Act of 2011 to help crack down on the lax enforcement of the deals of our past, and help protect our nation from fraudulent and job killing products entering our borders from China and other nations. If we intend to compete in global markets, we cannot continue to hinder the American worker and American business owner by allowing others to break the rules while we pile on more restrictions for our own businesses.

I was angry that Congress adjourned before resolving funding for the Federal Aviation Administration. I was ready to stay and get work done. This standstill had halted the work of over 4,000 FAA employees, and affected an additional 70,000 jobs nationwide—halting over $2.5 billion in construction projects. The construction industry has served as such a vital part to our recovery, and investments in infrastructure and business expansion should not be stopped. Tens of thousands of workers and working families have suffered at the hands of Washington’s continued dysfunction. The eventual resolution of this did not change the fact that the situation could have been prevented all together.

We have all had enough of empty promises. Clearly our economy is not improved by rhetoric. We have to take a real stand against these job killing trade deals, enforce our laws on the books, and stop playing the blame game. There is enough blame to go around on both sides of aisle. What we must have now is action. I, for one, am ready to go back to Washington and do what the American people need us to do—get our economy back on track and our people back to work. There is no recess for families out of work and struggling, and there should be no recess for Congress.