Political Quotes

“Mr. President, I am actually glad to have come to the floor after my colleague from Illinois has just spoken. I was in Illinois this week talking with a number of people there in the business community as part of what I do on the Banking Committee. I wish to say that in talking to many of the great civic and business leaders who exist in Illinois, one of the biggest concerns they have is, in fact, this debt ceiling issue and the reduction of debt. I appreciate the work of the Senator from Illinois in trying to reach a compromise. As a matter of fact, I salute anybody who is trying to work to solve this problem. I wish to say, from my standpoint, I know the debt ceiling is a major issue, and for me to be able to support it, we need to have dramatic changes in the way spending is taking place in this country. I think there are numbers of people on both sides of the aisle who feel that way. I have offered the only, to my knowledge, concrete proposal that has bipartisan support in both the Senate and in the House. I wish to mention there are a number of discussions about the Medicare proposal Paul Ryan has put forth, and certainly it is not perfect. I would love to see a proposal made from the other side since everyone knows Medicare is going to be insolvent in the year 2024. The worst thing we can do, of course, is not pay attention. I hope at some point in the near future we will actually hear a concrete proposal from the other side of the aisle regarding Medicare.…”