Political Quotes

“The Senator raises an important point, which is that the larger part of the budget--the 65 percent of the budget that is not being debated as part of a continuing resolution, not subject to congressional appropriations and the faster growing part of the budget--is an issue the President actually did address in his own budget. In fact, he laid out a number of proposals called mandatory spending reforms that would help to reduce some of the debt by reducing some of the cost increases on that 65 percent of the budget. By the way, 65 percent today, 10 years from now will be 76 percent of the budget. The departments and agencies that are appropriated every year are only 35 percent, soon to be reduced to 24 percent of the budget. So that is a very good point the Senator makes. The President himself has pointed out that we need to make changes. Yet he refuses to negotiate, refuses to talk, refuses to consider any of these proposals. It doesn't seem to make sense, and it is certainly not in the interests of the American people, the people from Mississippi and the people from Ohio. I thank my colleague from Mississippi for joining me. I look forward to reading the new material he has provided for the Record today. I thank him for his leadership. I yield the floor and note the absence of a quorum. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll. The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.”