Political Quotes

“Mr. Chairman, President Bush started with a balanced budget and budget surpluses as far as the eye could see, but today the GOP budget plan has squandered that surplus, and we will have to borrow $1 trillion from Social Security over the next 5 years and $2 trillion from Social Security and Medicare over the next 10 years just to pay their bills. The lockbox that we all talked about a year ago has been smashed and the contents have been looted. This budget does, indeed, represent a generational mugging. The majority is demanding spending programs and tax cuts for themselves, paid for by borrowing Social Security and Medicare dollars from seniors and leaving the bill for our children. This budget is putting money in the form of spending programs and tax cuts into the left-hand pocket of the taxpayer, but taking out money from their right-hand pocket where the trust funds are located. The Social Security trust fund surplus is estimated to be $2 trillion over the next 10 years. This budget spends $1.5 trillion of those dollars by borrowing that money, plus all of the surplus, $556 billion of the Medicare trust fund, in order to pay these bills.”