Political Quotes

“I thank the Chair. Mr. President, this morning we saw yet another replay of a dialog between some of my friends on the other side and some on my side of the aisle. It kind of goes like this. Republicans make a proposal to make a pending Democratic leadership proposal such as the extenders bill deficit neutral. The Democratic leadership marshals the votes and defeats the deficit-neutral proposal on a largely party-line basis. After the vote, debate ensues. My friends on the other side define the proposal that they defeat in an incorrect way. They define it as a proposal to carry out the policy of a fiscally responsible manner as opposition to the underlying policy in the proposal. Republicans counter that the Republican deficit-neutral proposal carries most, if not all, of the policy contained in the Democratic leadership's proposal. When the smoke clears, the true differences between the two sides' approaches become very clear. My friends on the other side want to add to the deficit to carry out the underlying initiative--be it an extension of unemployment benefits or a lot of other things in the bill. On this side, we want deficit neutrality at a minimum by rolling back future bloated spending. The Democratic leadership wants to keep in place the future bloated spending. Tax increases are OK, if they are offset. Bring on hundreds of billions of dollars of tax increase, whether they hit individuals, small businesses, or what have you.”