Political Quotes

“Obviously, we could debate a bill we just passed, a bill that has been debated on this floor for 3 days, a bill that was chairmanned and supported by somebody equally, if not more, bipartisan in terms of his work over the years on this matter of defense, Adam Smith, period. It is a good bill, Mr. Speaker. It takes care of the men and women. It provides them the necessary resources. And, yes, it says we ought to have a new AUMF that is now 18 years old. With respect to the pay raise that was going to happen anyway, I presume that the gentleman refers to the recommendation of the President of the United States, a Republican. We took the recommendations of the President of the United States and put it in our bill. It is higher than any figure that was put in for our men and women in uniform during the previous 10 years that the Republicans controlled the House and controlled this bill. There were poison pills, from my perspective, in the defense bills in years past. I now note that I voted against those bills when they passed the House. I voted for the conference committee when it came back. I am hopeful that the Republicans will decide that the rhetoric they used, ``If you vote against this bill,'' meaning the defense bill, to our side, ``you vote against the men and women in the Armed Forces, the men and women in uniform, the men and women at the point of the spear,'' I hope you will remember that language, Mr. Speaker.…”