Political Quotes

“I wanted to congratulate the Senator from Connecticut for his very persuasive case on behalf of the need for child care and making workfare or welfare to work. I do not think anyone on this side of the aisle disagrees with the basic premise of his amendment, which is if we are going to have people go to work, then we are going to be in some need of child care for working women, single mothers. The question is, How much money are you willing to put up? What will be the impact? Again, we go back to the start of a lot of these programs, the welfare programs back in the 1960's when they really mushroomed, and a lot of these programs were very well intentioned, but what happened? What were the consequences of these--I am careful not to use the word entitlement because I know the Senator from Connecticut says this is not an entitlement. I agree. It is not an entitlement. But there is enough money in his bill to fill all the day-care slots that are anticipated to be needed. Well, it is not an entitlement, but it takes care of everyone who needs the service. So while you know it is sort of taking away with one hand, saying it is not an entitlement, it is giving with the other by giving all the money necessary anticipated to have the need. You can say it is not an entitlement, but it is, in fact, almost a guarantee of child care.”