Political Quotes

“I am delighted that we have shown a unanimous vote of confidence--we did in the Finance Committee this morning--in Bob Rubin to be Secretary of the Treasury. He is an eminently qualified man. I have had occasion to talk with him over the last 2 years from time to time, but one of my best memories of him was when he and I were speaking at a conference in Williamsburg, a conference by and large of business leaders and chief executive officers and boards of directors of the larger corporations in America. I though he handled with great aplomb a particular question. One questioner got up and said, ``Mr. Rubin, you asked us to come to the aid of the administration last year and to lobby hard on behalf of the North American Free-Trade Agreement. You asked us to spend a lot of money and effort and manpower to support the administration in that effort, isn't that correct?'' And he said, ``Yes, sir'' And then the questioner said, ``Why is it then you won't let us deduct the expenses for that lobbying on behalf of the administration?'' To Mr. Rubin's credit he said, ``Sir, I cannot give you a good answer to that question.''”