Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I think what I would like to offer to the chairman at this moment is to pose the following question: Are you going to surrender this morning, or are you going to surrender in November? Because, really, those are the two options that are before us today. Let me retrace where we have been on tax reform. The chairman gets credit for a valiant effort at tax reform. Mr. Levin has acknowledged it; Mr. Van Hollen has acknowledged it. For 3 years, we studiously and aggressively undertook a genuine effort to do tax reform. Now, what is interesting about it is the Democratic response to the chairman's draft was fairly tepid. Let's continue the conversation. Republicans released letters to the media, the Speaker poured cold water on the initiative, and a pretty good effort was cast aside. So we are back here this morning. Let me offer a couple of, I think, economic facts that might defy consideration around here because, sometimes, they don't square with opinion. There has been little wage growth for the average American worker since 2002. Downward pressure on wages is what we should be discussing. In addition, a company located not far from where I live submitted a tax form last year of 19,000 pages. They have 11 full-time Internal Revenue agents on site daily. If this isn't a reason to go back to the table and negotiate tax reform, I don't know what is.…”