Political Quotes

“Mr. President, the Senate just rejected the previous Coburn amendment by a vote of 51 to 46. The Senate, I might say, rejected an attempt by the Senator from Oklahoma to give the Director of the Office of Management and Budget sweeping powers to cut unobligated balances by billions of dollars. The Senator from Hawaii, Mr. Inouye, chairman of the Appropriations Committee, explained why that would be unwise. Essentially, there are many contracts which take more than 1 year to be fulfilled--building ships, for example, aircraft carriers, and so on. It takes a good number of years to build them, and it would make no sense to rescind all those unobligated balances. The Senator from Oklahoma has two more amendments. One in particular is virtually the same amendment. It gives the Director of OMB powers to cut unobligated balances by billions of dollars, so the arguments of the Senator from Hawaii would apply there as well. So the same reasons given for opposing the Coburn amendment just a short while ago--and the one that was defeated--should be the same reasons that would apply with respect to this next Coburn amendment that we will be voting on in the not-too- distant future. The Senator from Oklahoma has another amendment which would reverse decisions of the Congress through the appropriations process, and it also would, I might say, affect some tax provisions that would be inappropriate if we were to pass them now.…”