Political Quotes

“Mr. President, for the last hour my friends on the Republican side of the aisle have had the floor, and they have presented their point of view. I would like to--and I am joined by the Senator from Vermont--I would like to spend a few moments, if I can, reflecting on what they said and perhaps making some observations that disagree with some of their conclusions. There are some points on which we agree. The deficit is a serious national problem. Right now we are borrowing 40 cents for every dollar we spend. Whether we are spending that dollar on education, student loans, food stamps, missiles, or the paychecks for our soldiers, we borrow 40 cents for every dollar we spend. No company, no family could survive borrowing 40 percent of everything they spend. That is a fact. So we need to be serious about reducing this deficit. We are confronted, however, with a reality in terms of our economy. Since 2008 we have had a weak economy. We have had a recession that has killed off a lot of jobs. We are coming back but slowly. If we are not careful in the way we reduce the deficit, we can make it worse. I think everybody agrees with that premise on both sides of the aisle. So we have a massive deficit, and we have a weak economy. We have to be careful how we reduce spending and raise revenue in a way that doesn't kill off the recovery. Ultimately, we cannot have a strong American economy unless we start putting people back to work in larger numbers.…”