Barbara Boxer: “one of the virtues of traveling back home is to hear what the people are saying about us. And it isn't good. The people…”

“one of the virtues of traveling back home is to hear what the people are saying about us. And it isn't good. The people are on anxiety overload. The purpose of my remarks is not to increase anyone's anxiety but just to tell it the way it is. How did we get to a place where we are having mindless, across-the- board cuts in spending with absolutely no thought? It came about because the Republicans refused to increase the debt ceiling. We were about to default on our obligations, after raising the debt ceiling many times--18 times under Ronald Reagan. And Ronald Reagan warned us in those times never to play games with the debt ceiling. Well, the Republicans did. They played games with the debt ceiling, and they did it because, if you follow what the Republican leader said, his highest priority was defeating President Obama. I am sure they thought that kind of chaos would lead the way. It didn't happen, clearly. Our President was reelected, and he was reelected with the big vote. We got into this situation with the sequester because there were games being played with the debt ceiling, and as a way to get out of it, we did something we thought would never come to pass. We said: OK, give us this ability to raise the debt ceiling so we can pay our bills and not become a third-world nation and not lose our credit rating even more than we have already lost it, and then we will look at deficit reduction.…”