Political Quotes

“I rise to support the freeze amendment. That is what this does. It is a freeze amendment. Now, it is interesting to me, when we voted on the balanced budget amendment there were about 300 Members of the House of Representatives who came in here and voted for a balanced budget amendment. That was the easy part, come in a vote for a balance budget amendment, go back to our districts and say, well, I voted for a balanced budget amendment; I want to balance the budget. We tried yesterday to cut corporate welfare with very little success, then we tried to cut tobacco subsidies with a little more success, but we were unable to do it. Mr. Chairman, this defense appropriations bill adds close to $11 billion more than what the President requested, $3.7 billion more than we gave the Pentagon last year. Adding $11 billion to the defense budget is the height of fiscal irresponsibility; 15 percent of the budget is the defense budget. How in the world are we going to tell the American people that we are serious about balancing the budget when we do not have the courage to make the difficult choices with defense?”