Political Quotes

“President Bush spoke from the Rose Garden this morning. It is hard to comprehend his words, the President of the United States going to the Rose Garden today, saying he wanted us to use the time left in this congressional year to ``support our troops, and to protect our citizens, prevent harmful tax increases. . . .'' He also indicated, in that same brief statement, that we as a Congress had little to show for our having been in a year. We passed a budget, the first one in 3 years. It was a balanced budget we passed. We implemented--even though they were years and years overdue--the 9/11 Commission recommendations. We passed Homeland Security funding. We passed a pay raise for our troops--we have consistently equipped our troops with programs and materials that the President did not ask for but we believe the troops needed, and time has proven they were needed. We provided health care for wounded soldiers and veterans. We set benchmarks for Iraq. We focused on the neglected National Guard, and I am glad we did that. We passed ethics and lobbying reform. We passed a CR that has funded the Government and will to the end of this year. We shortly will be doing an energy bill. We passed one here, but we hope to have one that will be a bipartisan bill that we will pass here by the end of the year. We completed a minimum wage bill that was 10 years past due. We passed the American Competitiveness Act.”