Political Quotes

“I want to state that I share the Speaker's admiration for Mr. Rangel and Mr. McDermott. I consider Mr. Rangel very intelligent, and I enjoy working with Mr. McDermott as well, but I do disagree with the distinguished Speaker on a point that she made. You know, she was talking about 5.5 percent unemployment, which in my view is too high, but I would note that it seems sometimes the definition of a bad economy is who's in the White House. In 1996, President Clinton stood before us at the State of the Union in January 1996. Unemployment was at 5.6 percent, higher than it is today. President Clinton said the economy was the healthiest it has been in three decades. Well, today unemployment is lower than it was when President Clinton made that statement. So, we all agree the economy needs to be improved, but President Clinton would say it's the healthiest in decades, if he were standing again before us based on his definition of a healthy economy. I would also note, as my good friend from Washington has made the point, that why are we talking about energy. When I talk to the folks back home in Illinois at the local grocery store, at the gas station, and people are commenting about food prices and energy prices, they say that when you have over $4 gasoline, that's bad for the economy. There's people losing jobs because energy costs are so high.”