Political Quotes

“at a White House news conference last week President Bush, called on this Congress to pass the Central American Free Trade Agreement this summer. This morning in this Chamber, next to me, the most powerful Republican in the House, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay), once again promised a vote, this time by July 4. Actually, a month or so ago the gentleman from Texas (Mr. DeLay) promised that there would be a vote in May, but this time he says he actually means it. Mr. Speaker, those of us who have been speaking out against the Central American Free Trade Agreement have a message in return. Let us scrap this agreement. Clearly, this Congress does not support it. And let us renegotiate a better Central American Free Trade Agreement. President Bush signed this agreement fully 1 year and 2 weeks ago. Every trade agreement negotiated by this administration, Morocco, Singapore, Chile, Australia, all trade agreements negotiated by this administration have been ratified by Congress within 65 days of the President affixing his signature to them. CAFTA has languished in Congress now for 54 weeks without a vote because this wrong-headed trade agreement offends Republicans and Democrats alike. Just look at what has happened with our trade policy in the last decade. 1992, the year I ran for Congress, we had a trade deficit in this country of $38 billion. Today, a dozen years later, last year actually, in 2004, our trade deficit was $618 billion.…”