Political Quotes

“only in Washington, DC, and the Federal Government would we say that we want to do something, but we can't do something. My hope is that we will do something. Long-term, we all see it. I agree that it is the same thing that we always deal with. It is always down to the time and to the moment. This is one of these dialogues we have had for a long time, asking how we can deal with deferred maintenance that is $16 billion and growing and with no plan to shrink it. In fact, we are adding lands in this bill that, when we pass the bill, will increase the amount immediately, and there is no plan to take care of that. The simple request is that we should actually take care of deferred maintenance when we buy it so that we are not adding property with deferred maintenance on day one, and we should have a plan to deal with deferred maintenance that we have--the $16 billion. Without that plan to actually deal with it and without a plan to deal with it the first day with products that we buy, we are adding to the deficit immediately. This is an issue we have to resolve long-term, and it will not get better. My concern, as I have expressed, is that this is a permanent reauthorization. We don't ever have to come back to it. I hope we do, but we don't ever have to come back to it, and this Congress is notorious for only doing things we have to do. So we will see how things go in the future with this. With that, I yield back. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alaska.…”