Political Quotes

“I think this is a sad day for our country. We are taking a big step in the wrong direction. I would say in the direction of Soviet style agricultural policy. It is hard to know where to begin with this bill, but let me start with the cost. Here we are, a Nation at war, running a wartime budget, substantial deficits this year. We have got a budget baseline that already commits us to spending $100 billion in farm subsidies over the next 10 years, and this bill commits us to add to that considerably more than the advertised additional $75 billion. I say more because this bill knowingly uses dated commodity price assumptions that lowball the total cost. It also uses gimmicks such as creating a whole new $100-million-a-year program and then pretending that that will only be funded for 1 year. The truth is, the American taxpayer cannot afford this bill, but it is, in particular, a sad day for Republicans because we know better than to do this. This is a massive government subsidy of crops that is going to cause overproduction, that is going to cause further decline in crop prices and make a bad situation worse, especially for small farmers such as those in Pennsylvania.”