Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, the fact that we were able to take this bill after it had been vetoed by the President and run it back through a limited conference and get it back on the floor and, hopefully, get it back to the President's desk for signature, is a tribute to our chairman, the gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. Spence]. I also want to thank the ranking member, the gentleman from California [Mr. Dellums]. When we put this abbreviated conference together to get the bill back through, the gentleman from California worked equally hard to see to it that we had a Defense authorization bill. It is important that we have this bill. This bill is about $8 billion more than the President's initial suggestion. On the other hand, the President's own vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Admiral Owens, has said that we need to spend $20 billion more per year on procurement. In this bill we not only have the pay raise and the increased housing allowance for the troops, but we have modernization. We have increased airlift, increased sealift, more ammunition, more precision guided munitions, and such very basic things as trucks and other transportation equipment, so we are giving the troops the equipment that they need to do the job. Mr. Speaker, let me just conclude by saying we did strip out missile defense from this bill.”