Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, all across America, Americans are speaking out loudly. In fact, there's a degree of dismay for those of us in Washington when we go home to see the outrage that is coming out from the average taxpayer in this country. I think we are just now really realizing that there is a justification for the outrage and the strong feelings. Basically, as we tell the American people that they must give more and that we are going to take more, they are saying, No way. You have not earned the right to be trusted with our tax money. Mr. Murphy and I have been able to identify one of those items that the American people have been calling for for a long time. How do we explain to our constituents that we are giving away inappropriately twice as much money as we spend to defend their neighborhoods from terrorism when it comes to homeland security? How do we have the gall to ask them to trust us with more money when we have this kind of mismanagement of public funds--not just recently, but historically. And I think this is one place we can, in a bipartisan effort, admit that Washington needs to be more responsible, needs to do more and, frankly, demand more from Washington and the bureaucracy and less from the American people when it comes to accountability.”