COEUR d'ALENE -U.S. Rep. Raul Labrador, R-Idaho, kicked off Monday's town hall meeting with a short slide presentation.

If current trends continue, he said, the country will be in dire straits.

"You're talking about unsustainable deficit," Labrador said, pointing to a graph that spiked dramatically upward. "Neither party has been responsible with our money. The nation will be bankrupt, and we will have no future. We're talking about serious, serious problems."

The first-term Congressman spoke to an audience of roughly 250 people at the Eagles lodge on Sherman Avenue.

"We're broke, we have no money," he said. "And we need your help."

Labrador said cutting government spending was his foremost goal this term.

As a member of the House Oversight and Government Reform committee, he said he will be taking a hard look at the federal budget.

"We're going to look at fraud, waste and abuse in every area of the federal government," he added.

Labrador also discussed his first few months in Washington, the continuing resolutions and budget debates that will occupy lawmakers over the next several months, and his impressions of the new-look House of Representatives - now firmly in Republican control.

"You have a freshman class (of legislators) that believe like I do: We have to make serious decisions about the future of America," Labrador said. "You have young Congresspeople who have young families. We're serious in our desire to bring America in the right direction."

Labrador said he voted for $100 billion in budget cuts. Other House members had wanted to cut less, he added, but he and other first-term lawmakers stood firm.

"We told them that we have to keep our promise," he said. "If we're going to be respectful stewards of people's money, we have to be able to put all those things on the table. Now it's going to go to the Senate. Unfortunately, the Senate is not going to agree with our cuts."

Answering questions from the crowd, Labrador touched on the Department of Education - lawmakers will have to "get it under control," he said - the dual wars in the Middle East, the debt ceiling, adhering to the Constitution and the controversial tenets of the Patriot Act.

"I'm very happy with (the town hall," said Shirlee Wandrocke of Coeur d'Alene, who attended the meeting with her husband, Dick. "Quite impressed with our representative. I'm so pleased to understand that other people have the same concerns we do."

President Obama's sweeping health care legislation was another meeting topic.

"We do need health care reform," Labrador said, but reform that does not increase health care costs.

The lawmaker addressed taxes as well, saying the corporate tax should be lowered and the overall tax system "completely re-arranged." Hopefully, he added, legislators could one day eliminate income tax and get rid of the IRS.

"I liked (the town hall)," said Melanie VanderFeer of Athol. "I liked his answers, and I appreciate him being here to speak with us."

Other attendees were not pleased with the event.

"It sounds to me like it's a Republican convention rather than a town hall meeting," said Rex Smith of Post Falls. "He's continually bad-mouthed Obama, he's bad-mouthed (former Speaker of the House Nancy) Pelosi. He's telling half-truths. The town hall, as far as I'm concerned - he should represent everyone. There's more than Republicans that live in this state."

Mary Foster of Coeur d'Alene also considered the event too partisan. She said Labrador did not address any of the issues she had come to hear about.

"Well, it's a bunch of tea partiers complimenting each other, basically," Foster said of the meeting.