Political Quotes

“It is hard to answer that presentation because, in my view, it conflates two issues. I have been on this floor willing to deal with the other side on a regular basis to bring down our debt and to apply discipline. Part of applying discipline is paying for what you buy. And the gentleman is right; we had PAYGO. But when the Republican side of the aisle took over, they negated that; and they negated it specifically for tax cuts because, I suppose, they believe they will pay for themselves. {time} 1230 I have been here for a longer time than Mr. McCarthy, Mr. Speaker. In 1981, they did that, and we increased the deficit under Mr. Reagan by 189 percent. We could have dealt with it then. Then we had a commission that was called Simpson-Bowles, which tried to deal with what the gentleman is talking about, and all three Republican Members from the House of Representatives voted ``no'' on it. Why? Because it asked us to pay for what we bought. So, Mr. Speaker, talking about A when you need to do B is a way of not dealing with B. Do we need to deal with the debt? We absolutely do, and the bills that are supposed to do that, as I just indicated, have not been brought to the floor. They represented sequester. The gentleman, apparently, is for sequester. I am not for sequester, although the gentleman would say, ``Oh. Well, it is your party which instituted sequester,'' which is not right. Mr.…”