Political Quotes

“Mr. President, it is one of Congress's main duties-- arguably, its single most important duty--to provide for the common defense of our great country. That sometimes means and necessarily entails providing additional funds for unforeseen costs and emergencies in times of war. Troops might run out of equipment or munitions or might need to be transported through war zones, and it is of the utmost importance that they have what they need and that they can get where they need to go to fight for our country and to protect us against our most pressing and dangerous threats. In the past, Congress provided emergency supplemental funding to take care of precisely these costs. If it didn't appropriate enough to begin with or if some of these unforeseen costs arose, perhaps in excess of what Congress had already planned for, Congress would fill the gap and would make adjustments to the following year's base budget to account for them. In other words, Congress was doing its job, and it was doing its job in a thoughtful manner--one that was fiscally responsible and one that acknowledged Congress's constitutional role as a lawmaking body and the body responsible for funding war operations and declaring war. But after the September 11 attacks, something seemed to change. In 2001, the Bush administration created a fund called the Global War on Terrorism account, sometimes known operatively as GWOT, separate from the base budget.…”