Political Quotes

“Madam Chair, I rise in strong opposition to the amendment and urge my colleague to withdraw the amendment and work with us on this issue. As a former U.S. attorney, I have the greatest respect and support for loan-forgiveness programs of this nature. It is absolutely a worthwhile cause. But the Mars program was devastated by the administration's budget. This is one of the crown jewels of planetary science. In fact, the whole planetary science budget was decimated by the administration in its proposal. Thankfully, through the work of the chairman and the ranking member, the planetary science budget has been restored, and part of what has been taken out of the Mars program has been restored. Nevertheless, the Mars program was cut by hundreds of millions, and we have a long way to go to have a healthy Mars program. As we speak, one of the most difficult missions ever undertaken, the Mars Science Laboratory, is on its way to the Martian surface. This will be path-breaking in terms of its scientific return. This is an area where we are second to none in the world. No one else has the skills to enter the Martian atmosphere, descend, and land on Mars. That is an incredible talent pool that can make that possible. At a time when we have to go hat in hand to the Russians to get a ride to the space station, but we are still the unquestioned leader in planetary science, with the Mars program leading the way, we do not need to decimate the Mars program further.…”