Political Quotes

“Mr. President, I want to address the same subject and I certainly share the views of the Senator from Florida that we have got to solve this so-called sequester problem because, as the Secretary of Defense has said, it would be disastrous for the Defense Department to take another $\1/2\ trillion hit to its budget after already committing to do so. We have required under our Budget Act that the Defense Department reduce spending by about $487 billion over the next 10 years. To add another \1/2\ trillion to that would, in fact, as Secretary Panetta said, be disastrous. So I appreciate the comments of my colleague. Let me speak to the President's proposal specifically that was made at the beginning of the so-called negotiations here. His offer would increase taxes by more than $1.6 trillion on individuals, on investment income, small businesses, under the estate tax, farms and estates, and American energy producers. As President Reagan said many years ago, if you tax something, you get less of it. When you have to pay more taxes to engage in certain activities, you tend not to engage in those activities. What is happening now in the market is a perfect example. A lot of people are of the view that capital gains taxes are going to go up, so they are selling their shares of stock or property now in order to pay the tax on the gain at the lower rate this year rather than the higher rate next year. Tax rates should not be a factor in business decisions that are made.…”