Political Quotes

“I just sort of handed out this sheet to both sides as a reminder to us that we have not given clean debt ceiling increases. So it seems like tonight, with this clean increase in borrowing authority for the Federal Government to make sure that we get by the rest of this month and into toward mid-March, that we should pass it and say, ``Look, it is a good first step, let us move on.'' Mr. Speaker, to the gentleman from Michigan, I would still like to point out that the last couple debt limit bills that we had represented a huge tax increase of $137 billion over the 5-year period in 1990 when there was pressure on President Bush. Again, there was a large $252 billion tax increase in 1993. Some of these put pressure on an administration. So the debt ceiling is not very wholesome, not being used as leverage. As we researched the records, Treasury does not have the right to withhold Social Security payments. The trouble is they have not managed cash flow, so they are out of money right now. They have no legal authority to withhold payments for Social Security or any other trust fund when there are surpluses coming into those trust funds. This action tonight is to give money back to Treasury because they have not had the kind of cash flow management that allows them to pay Social Security benefits and the other retirement benefits.”