Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the privilege to address you here on the floor of the House of Representatives and also the times that I've had to be here on the floor and listen to the dialogue and the debate that's delivered by Members of both sides, the Republican and the Democrat side of the aisle. I listened with interest as my friend and colleague on the Agriculture Committee, Mr. McGovern, talked about the SNAP program and the necessity to maintain the dollars that were there. I was a little surprised that he didn't ask for more dollars going into the SNAP program as opposed to opposing any reduction in the programmed increase in the SNAP program. We have about $78 billion a year that are going into food stamps now--$78 billion, a little more than that. And by next year it will be $80 billion. Now, we do calculate our budgets and spending in a 10-year budget window, so that means $800 billion is the universe of money that he's talking about, and he's pleading with us not to reduce that growth from a little bit more than $78 billion a year up over $80 billion a year. So of that $2 billion a year that's programmed between this year and next year over the period of time of 10 years there would be $20 billion trimmed off of $800 billion, which comes to about a 2\1/2\ percent decrease in the overall projected expenditures of the food stamp program known as SNAP.…”