Political Quotes

“I thank the chairman. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak very well about H.R. 641, the Conservation Easement Incentive legislation. I get confused sometimes by the discussion on the floor. If I understand it, if you do it for a year or 2 years and you don't pay for it, that is good policy, that is good legislation, that is good for America, but if you go beyond that time, it is not good. This is a piece of legislation that came up in 2006. In fact, my colleague Mr. Thompson brought it up. He and Chairman Camp did it. He and Mr. Gerlach, who retired last year, did it. This just makes good sense. I can tell you something about this. It is not only bipartisan, it is bicameral. It is in the President's budget. If you are talking about trying to work together to get somewhere, isn't this it? Isn't this it? Sometimes, we always try to bend the rules for something else, but this is about conservation. This is about allowing a landowner to set property aside. So I don't care if you are a farmer or a rancher, I don't care if you are a hunter or a hiker, I don't care if you like to look at birds or hunt birds, there are over 65 associations around the country that say, Please do more of this, set this ground apart. Now, if you are a farmer or a rancher, you can still work that ground. All you are saying is this is a set-aside, this ground can't be developed, we can't lose this ground. This is so basic who we are as Americans. We are saying, Let's preserve what we have.…”