Political Quotes

“when it comes to doing oversight, I think I have a reputation of doing just as vigorous oversight when we have Republican Presidents as when we have Democratic Presidents, and what I am speaking to the Senate about today has no partisanship in it because I could have said the same thing--and did say it--when there was a President Bush or a President Clinton or a President Reagan. I speak today about watchdogging the watchdogs, as I have done many times in the past. I first started watchdogging the Pentagon back in the early 1980s when President Reagan was ramping up defense spending. Then a group of Defense reformers were examining the pricing of spare parts of the Defense Department, and we uncovered some real horror stories, such as $750 toilet seats and $695 ashtrays, all going into military aircraft. That is ridiculous, of course. As news reports of these horror stories were hitting the streets, Offices of Inspectors General--OIGs--were sprouting up in every Federal agency as a result of a recently passed act of Congress in 1978. The Defense Department OIG officially opened for business March 20, 1983. Today, thanks to the Inspector General Act of 1978, and the taxpayers, we now have a real army of watchdogs. The question is, To what extent are they doing their business? This mushrooming IG bureaucracy is very expensive. It costs over $2 billion a year.…”