Political Quotes

“One of the things that is important to note, Mr. Ryan, is that, when we became the majority once again in 2006 and over the last several years, we reestablished statutory PAYGO. First, we established it in rule. Then we passed it in statute. One hundred percent of the Republicans in this body voted ``no.'' They voted against making sure that we made a commitment in the law to not spend more than we take in, to pay for the legislation other than in emergency spending, and obviously, we've been in an emergency. We've been, you know, pretty careful about what we declare as an emergency, making sure that we have covered the legislation with pay-fors. They haven't believed in pay-fors in years and years, if ever. Let's keep in mind the tax-cutting policy that they had, which was exclusively focused on the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans, which also wasn't paid for. I mean tax cuts are spending, and there is nothing wrong with tax cuts. We have to balance tax cuts with our spending policy, but when you don't collect revenue, that is less revenue that we have in the Treasury, which affects the deficit as well. So I mean their total disregard for balancing the books is not something that they're going to be able to run away from, and we are not going to let them run away from it.”