Political Quotes

“In response, the gentleman mentioned people want to announce town halls and whatnot. That is a tiny, tiny fraction of what occurs in the money being spent, taxpayer money, through franking on the Internet. It's things like this, and I'll just read a few. This is from a Member: ``Like'' my Facebook page to find out what I'm doing to create jobs, to reduce spending, and to put our economy back on track. How is that necessary for the taxpayer to fund? Come on. Let's get real here. Another one: I want to know, do you support a balanced budget amendment to the United States Constitution? I don't really want to know that. Members just want to get traffic, name IDs to their Web pages. Now, I'm not a Luddite here. I have my own Web page. I have a Facebook account. I do all of that, but I do it where it's appropriate--with campaign funds, not with official funds to campaign. The gentleman mentioned that we ought to just kind of trust the Member--there is a Franking Commission--and let everybody do it. I should mention that, in 1997, when this bill came to the floor, Members thought there was some abuse going on with the franking of mail, so a requirement was put in to add the ``printed at taxpayer expense.'' That was done by amendment on this bill on this floor in 1997. Also, there was abuse with franking too close to an election. So, with an amendment in this bill on this floor in 1997, there was put in a requirement that there is a 90-day blackout period in which you can't do it.…”