Political Quotes

“I have got to approach this issue from the standpoint of somebody who was in business for 35 years. This is a bill whose time has come. International commerce is always a balancing act, a balancing act between expanding markets overseas and protecting our job base. We did not ask for this fight. Europe did, and a man called Pascal Lamy forced it. The concept in our tax situation, whether it was DSC or FSC or whatever, my colleagues want to call it, ETI, was to neutralize the differences in the tax system, the regional value-added tax versus our income tax, and it was accepted. We did a good job, and we flourished under this. Then there were grumbles, and then, all of a sudden, Europe came back and challenged our position. We should have challenged theirs, but we did not, but then we tried to make an accommodation with the World Trade Organization, not once, not twice, but three times. It did not work. So this is the only way it seems to me that we can accommodate the European community. It is a good bill. It is not perfect. It does not shift jobs abroad. It allows American companies to produce abroad as it allows people abroad to produce here in this country, but basically, it firms up our economy, and that means it firms up our job base. I think it is something we ought to encourage, we ought to support, and we ought to defeat the motion to instruct.”