Political Quotes

“Well, we have a fundamental disagreement because the gentleman continues to want to focus on spending. I think that's right that we focus on spending. But again, debt is not caused by spending; it is caused by buying things that you don't pay for, or it's caused by cutting revenues that you don't offset either by cuts in spending, by cutting revenues. That's what causes debt. It's not buying things that causes debt. It's not paying for things. The discipline, I will tell my friend, in the system for the American public is, if they want things, for us having the honesty to say, okay, if you want a tax cut or you want a strong defense, it costs money, both of them cost money. And if you're willing to pay for it, we will do that. If you're not willing to pay for it, we ought not to do it. That's not been our practice, unfortunately, and we dropped the PAYGO requirement, as the gentleman knows, in 2001, actually 2003 legally. De facto, we dropped it in 2001, because we had substantial tax cuts without paying for them. We waived that requirement, and I think that, frankly, got us into the problem we have on either side of the aisle, whether it's spending or revenue reductions. I don't think the President's changed his position. I think the positions have changed. Mr. Bowles indicated that. Others have indicated that. The situation has changed its dynamic in the sense that it's not the situation we were confronting in 2011.…”