Political Quotes

“Mr. Chairman, I have served 38 years in a legislative body, 26 here in this House; and I have never seen a gag rule as unfair as the one imposed here today. It is not just a gag on the minority in this House, but upon the American people. I know that there are some Republicans who are embarrassed over this attempt to do by stealth what their leaders are afraid to do openly, to increase the limit on the national credit card. Everyone in this great hall is patriotic and supports our military efforts, but there is also an economic patriotism among the American people we represent. We experienced that economic patriotism in the 1990s as we, in a bipartisan way, were balancing our Federal budget and paying off our national debt. The American people felt very good about that. Today, because of the enormous tax cut of last year, we find ourselves reversing that progress and increasing the limit on our national credit card in a stealthy, unholy manner. This dips into Social Security and shatters the lockbox. We asked the majority leadership to remove the gag so that we could at least have a debate and a public vote on raising the national debt limit. Let us return this bill to its original intent: to fight the war on terrorism which we all support. We all support our troops, including my two sons who are captains in the United States Army.”