Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. Mr. Speaker, it is not the most ideal situation to be in. As I reflect back on the many days I spent in my district--and I am about to go back there for the August recess, and I am going to circulate around my district and have some townhall meetings and engage in conversation. I know this subject is going to come up. I already know that most people are going to say: Look, you guys have a spending problem up there in Washington. I hear that a lot, and I would agree with that. Very few people say that we have a revenue problem, but we do have a spending problem. Mr. Speaker, you can bet your bottom dollar that I am going to be carrying this chart with me that I brought up earlier that shows the big difference between the mandatory side of Federal spending and what we are discussing here today about a $1.37 trillion discretionary budget. For all of the reasons that have been mentioned today by my colleagues, namely, national security, the ability to give our Pentagon certainty over the next 2 years as we continue to rebuild the readiness of the men and women who, on a voluntary basis, might I add, put their hand up and say, ``I will go anywhere, anytime, to defend the principles of freedom''--they make that pledge willingly. They are not conscripted into the service. They make it on a voluntary basis.…”