Political Quotes

“Mr. President, Mr. Speaker, there is not time to debate in the time I have available how we determine Federal pay. I was a sponsor of the Federal Employee Pay Comparability Act which George Bush signed back in 1990. I know a little bit about this. America is confronting a sequestration that will have a devastating impact on our economy, on every individual in America, and on international confidence in America's ability to manage itself. And what have we spent 2 days on? A quarter percent cap on cost-of-living adjustment for Federal employees. A quarter of a percent. Some of us in this body earn that in about 10 minutes. Not all of us, but some of us. Uh-huh. Yet we fiddle while America faces a sequester burn. And sequester is Republican policy. July 19, 2011, Cut, Cap and Balance brought to this floor; 98 percent of Republicans, 229, voted for it. What was the fallback position? Sequester, an irrational policy that cuts across the board irrespective of the priority. And so what does the majority in this Congress do? It has now wasted 2 weeks on debate of nickel-diming the people we rely on to protect our domestic safety, our international security, our food and drugs, our health care, our borders. I join in the remarks of my good friend, Frank Wolf. He and I have been here 32 years. We have some understanding of what is proper and not proper in terms of managing the government.…”