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Posted: 6:11 a.m. Monday, Nov. 5, 2012

Senator Tom Coburn on the election: 'The best thing that could happen is all of us lose'

Oklahoma Senator says too many tax dollars wasted

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U.S. Senator Tom Coburn
U.S. Senator Tom Coburn

By Rick Couri

Doctor and Senator Tom Coburn doesn’t care who likes him in Washington.

That was apparent during a 60 Minutes interview on Sunday night when he said, “The best thing that could happen is all of us lose and send some people up here who care more about the country than they do their political party or their position in politics.”

Coburn didn’t stop there.

The man they call Dr. No pointed out how tax money is wasted on redundancy.

“Let’s not spend money we don’t have on things we don’t need,” an exasperated Coburn began. “Let’s not create another program when we already have six over here we’re doing that nobody has done an oversight hearing on, nobody’s looked at.”

Click here to listen to part of Senator Coburns remarks.

Coburn added some specifics to back up his claim, “We have 47 job training programs we spend 19 billion dollars on a year and there’s not a metric on any of them, GAO says all but three overlap one another.”

The Senator explained what he meant by not having metrics.

“No measure or not on if it works. No reporting to say, oh, we created X jobs with this job training program or this person got a job and we gave him a life skill, there’s no measurement."

Coburn told the 60 Minutes crew that this version of the Senate has been completely inactive.

“This is the first time in 51 years the Senate has not passed a defense authorization bill which directs where the defense spending is going to go and in terms of the priorities.”

Coburn leaned forward and added, “Our commanders need that.”  

See Coburn's interview here.

Coburn emphasized what he thinks is the ridiculous nature of the government today is by bringing his point to a personal level.

“Nobody would run their life that way, nobody would run their business that way, nobody who is successful in life works that way.”

Coburn himself isn’t up for election until 2016, but has already promised to term limit himself and not run.

The others up for election tomorrow hope the American people don’t heed the Senators word and send them all home, looking for work.

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