Political Quotes

“what we are going to discuss this evening is one of the most expensive, and perhaps one of the most important, elements in our Nation's national defense. We are going to discuss the national missile defense system. The reason for its importance, I guess, could be summarized in several ways. First, it is an extraordinary expenditure of money. It is anticipated that if we are going to meet our first goal by 2005, we will spend up to $60 billion. That is an exceptional expenditure, even by Federal standards, even by the standards of the Department of Defense. Second, those who support this system are telling us that our goal is to basically protect America from attack by rogue missiles, by those enemies of the United States who might launch a missile at us and threaten our cities and population. So the importance of the system we are talking about cannot be overstated. Third, we know that if we go forward with this, we run the risk of complicating our negotiations with other countries in the world-- particularly Russia and China--about the reduction in their nuclear arsenals. So this is high-stakes poker. We are talking about a decision, in terms of our national defense, which may be one of the most important in history.”