Chuck Hagel: “I ran for the Senate because I wanted to help strengthen America's future. I, like my colleagues here, want to help…”

“I ran for the Senate because I wanted to help strengthen America's future. I, like my colleagues here, want to help solve problems. America is reaching out for leadership to put our fiscal house in order. When we debate the budget, we are debating America's future, the future we leave for our children and our grandchildren--the opportunities they will have, the burdens in debt they will inherit, the America they will know. Balancing the budget must be our top priority, not because we have some abstract fascination with accounting but because the future of every man, woman, and child hangs in the balance. The future of our very liberty is at stake. That is why I strongly supported the proposed balanced budget amendment to the Constitution, an amendment that would have forced Congress to make the hard choices and set priorities, priorities that we have for too long avoided. Despite the support of all my Republican and 11 of my Democratic colleagues, the Senate last week defeated the balanced budget amendment. We lost by one vote. President Kennedy told us three decades ago that real leaders 'are not here to curse the darkness but to light a candle.' Without the balanced budget amendment, we are still looking for a candle to guide us to a balanced budget. Now more than ever we need leadership for America's future. However, when I read the President's budget, I do not like the future I see.”