Political Quotes

“I would like to engage in a colloquy with my colleague the chairman of the Budget Committee, Senator Conrad, who worked with me as we drafted the joint committee language in this bill. The compromise we are voting on today on the debt limit establishes the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction to build on the more than $900 billion in up-front deficit reduction in the bill. The joint committee would work to achieve another $1.5 trillion in deficit reduction, for a total of $2.4 trillion. This important joint committee will be bicameral and bipartisan, with three members selected by each of the four congressional leaders, for a total of 12 members, evenly split between Democrats and Republicans. Importantly, their recommendations will be guaranteed an up-or-down vote on the floor of both the Senate and the House. For this historic process to work, we felt it important that the joint committee be given maximum flexibility, with everything on the table--discretionary spending, entitlements and other mandatory spending, and tax reform. To accomplish this goal, the joint committee should similarly be given maximum flexibility in how it analyzes its work and how it determines that it has met the target of $1.5 trillion in deficit reduction. Mr. President, over the past year, we have had three distinguished bipartisan groups provide us with comprehensive deficit reduction packages.…”