Political Quotes

“I rise in support of the Cummings-Owens-Kucinich-Lee substitute. The Republican budget contains no specific Medicare or Medicaid cuts, but the fact is it mandates a 1 percent cut in all mandatory spending, which translates to approximately 10-year cuts in Medicare and Medicaid of $215 billion and $93 billion respectively. For Illinois, this means 10-year Medicare cuts of approximately $10 billion and Medicaid cuts of more than $3 billion for the same period. Estimated cuts for my district alone are at least $1.4 billion; cuts in public housing, cuts in education, cuts in veterans' health care, cuts in Justice Department programs. With the Republican budget, I am afraid that all of the bloodshed we shall see will not be in Iraq. All I am hearing about this budget is cut, cut, cut. I am afraid that when all you do is cut, cut, cut, all that you are going to get is blood, blood, blood. The blood of the American people will be on the hands of those who held the knife. There are more than 2 million people in jails and prisons throughout the United States. More than 600,000 of them are being released each year. This poses a real threat and a real problem to many communities, especially low-income areas where they come from and return. The Justice Department reports that the cost of crime to victims is $450 billion annually.”