Political Quotes

“If in fact this logic makes sense, I don't know why we would produce an amendment that says right now we spend--I don't know the exact national budget. My friend from Virginia may know how much we spend on defense right now in the United States of America on our total defense budget. I will make up a number. Let's say it is $300 billion. Why don't we attach an amendment right now and say that we will not spend more than $300 billion on defense, period? Why don't we do that? It is the same logic. Let's tell the American taxpayers now we are limiting what they are going to spend on defense. We will do it now. We will limit it to that number, not just in Europe but all over the world. Tell them that right now. If there is an emergency, we can come back. This is the same man, whom I respect enormously, who argued strenuously, and he argued on the same issue of a constitutional amendment to balance the budget. Why not set a number? Defense spending cannot increase at all. We can pass it now, unless we come along and by a two-thirds vote in this body agree to spend more money on defense. That is what we are doing here relative to these three countries. That is what we are doing for Europe. Why don't we do it for the all of the national defense budget? If it doesn't make sense for the whole national defense budget, I respectfully suggest it makes zero sense to do it in Europe for these three countries.”