Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, this conference report on H.R. 3019 wraps up all the appropriations matters for fiscal year 1996. I hope that this is lucky No. 14, because that is the number of temporary funding bills that we have had to get to this final measure. It is well past time to closeout all matters and move on to fiscal year 1997. Its budget debate will begin next week. In fact, it is 6 months past time. This conference agreement honors the commitment of the Committee on Appropriations to reduce discretionary spending and put this country on a path to a balanced budget. It contains $163.7 billion in gross spending, lest anybody says there is not enough money in this bill, with $4.34 billion in offsets, for a net spending total of $159.37 billion in total spending. This amount will cause overall appropriations to be $30 billion below the President's request and $23 billion below last year. When we add the $11 billion net savings from our rescission bill last year, actually $20 billion aggregate savings, we have cut discretionary spending by a net total of roughly $34 billion in 16 months. In the aggregate, it is about $43 billion. These numbers represent the termination of more than 200, two-zero- zero, 200 wasteful programs and bureaucracies.”