Political Quotes

“I commend the gentleman from California for his and his colleagues' work on this bill. Madam Chair, my amendment would eliminate funding for the Diesel Emissions Reduction Act grant program, saving taxpayers $100 million. Funds from this program have gone to a number of questionable items, including $750,000 for cherry pickers in Utah, $1 million for electrified parking spaces at a truck stop in Delaware, and $1.2 for a new engine and generators for a 1950s locomotive in Pennsylvania. This program was intended to be a short-term effort to assist States and local governments in meeting diesel emissions standards, but has joined a long list of temporary government programs for which there is no end in sight. As Ronald Reagan famously said that, ``The nearest thing to eternal life we will ever see on this Earth is a government program.'' One of the things I have learned as a freshman Member of Congress is that we have an office tasked with holding Federal agencies accountable and reporting on their programs. That office is the Government Accountability Office. One of the things that has surprised me is how rarely we act on their recommendations. I hope that won't be the case with this program. The GAO has noted that funding to reduce diesel emissions is fragmented across 14 programs at the Department of Energy, the Department of Transportation, and the Environmental Protection Agency. Surely we can make do with one less.…”