Political Quotes

“I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to my friend from North Carolina (Mr. McHenry). Mr. McHENRY. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Florida for yielding this time to me. This is a very important bill offered by my colleague from Wisconsin (Mr. Ryan). The legislative line item veto is something that is necessary for us to get our fiscal house in order. What this will do is enable Congress to work with the executive branch to root out special- interest projects. Case in point. We just passed an emergency spending bill not 2, 3 weeks ago on this House floor. It included $38 million for funding for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to fund ``activities involving oysters.'' This is an emergency spending bill. Certainly something that is not reasonable. I like oysters, I like them baked, I like them fried, I like them raw. They all really taste great, but does that mean that we should spend $38 million for this? That is a great case in point for the President to be able to use a legislative line item veto and for us to act to root out this wasteful spending. Washington big government has an infinite appetite for more, more programs, more spending, more taxes. We have to take a principled stand to reform this, to fix this problem, to root out that waste, and this will put us on a diet if we pass this legislative line item veto. I encourage the House to approve the rule today and to vote for the underlying bill.”