Political Quotes

“I rise and thank the distinguished chairman of our full committee and the ranking member, two fine gentlemen who have worked together with us to achieve this piece of legislation. While we may disagree in certain elements, we certainly come together and respect each other's views. In the end, hopefully we will have a bill that all of us can support. In terms of the Subcommittee on Research and Development, Mr. Chairman, I would like to thank the ranking member, the gentleman from South Carolina [Mr. Spratt] for his cooperation and support. The request by the administration was $34.7 billion, $1.5 billion less than the fiscal year 1996 request. Because of the request by the service chiefs, which amounted to $20 billion of additional funding in the R&D area alone, we increase slightly the R&D account to a level of $35.5 billion. As I said, Mr. Chairman, the service chiefs asked us for an additional $20 billion that we just could not provide. It is somewhat discouraging, Mr. Chairman, that we were criticized very heavily last year by both the White House and the Secretary of Defense's office for plusing up the defense budget, but then in this year's hearings, the Secretary came in and showed us charts taking credit for flattening out the acquisition downturn; in effect, taking credit for funds that we were criticized for putting in last year.”