Political Quotes

“We only have 11 days left until Congress by law must pass a budget plan. But here we are today debating a rule and debating a resolution that says, Mr. President, send us your second budget, and yet we do not even have our first here from Congress. While the President and Democrats have fielded criticism for weeks now from the Republicans on the President's budget plan, we have not yet seen their alternative. The Republicans need to respond with their own budget before they can ask the President for a second budget. That is what is called give and take, and that is what this process is about. This resolution calls for the President to submit another budget because of the claims that the CBO found that the current budget proposal from the President would not be balanced in the year 2002. I happen to see a letter from March 4 that the director of CBO analyzed the President's budget and showed that it would indeed be balanced by the year 2002. As Democrats, we are not opposed to criticism if it is accompanied by concrete and realistic proposals.”