Political Quotes

“No. Actually what Federal Prison Industries does and what they did with office furniture was they took a growth industry in America and decided to piggyback on it. And now that that industry is facing some difficult times, the industry is down, there is more foreign competition coming in, and then they are looking over here and they are competing with their own government. I just get absolutely enraged when I am back home in my district because these are my neighbors. It was just a week ago and I am speaking to a local group and a friend of mine that I would like to think of as still a young man, but somebody I worked with, somebody that I graduated with. He said, maybe you did not hear, but I got laid off last week. He had been with the company for 28 years. This is as the industry is going down 18 percent. Federal Prison Industries is growing by 24 percent. What does that mean? It means they grew from $174 million in the office furniture industry to a $217 million company in one year, as the industry in the private sector was going down and they deliver poorer quality products as at a higher price. These people come up to me and say, how come I am out of a job? I pay taxes. The company paid taxes. We have got shuttered plants. Hathaway is now a shuttered plant. I am sure the folks up in Maine, they are not getting any State income taxes. You cannot explain to them and say, well, we have got to put these prisoners to work.…”