Political Quotes

“I am trying to remain optimistic about the institution's ability to someday control spending. But I have got to tell you that sometimes that optimism tends to fade, because I have heard just a litany of people talking about how devastating these cuts are to all of these programs of the Federal Government. Let us put it in perspective. $10 billion in cuts out of a year's worth of $500 billion in discretionary spending. Do you know what that is? Two percent. We are trying to cut discretionary spending over this fiscal year 2 percent. Do you know what the cut is out of the total budget of the United States? it is less than 1 percent. I mean, people are running around here saying, ``The sky is going to fall. We are not going to have oil. We are not going to be able to have any crops.'' Hey, folks, are you kidding me? Are you kidding me about what you are saying on the floor today? We are going to vote on a balanced-budget amendment, and you are telling me we cannot cut 1 percent? It is not a cut, a slowdown in the increase by 1 percent to pay for people who have been hit in an earthquake. Man, somebody is not getting the message about what they are saying out across this country. They want us to act like a family, make some choices. I mean, you would think we were cutting this budget by 50 percent. We are talking about less than a 1-percent reduction in the increase in Federal spending to pay for people who got hit by an earthquake.”