Joe Barton: “In my town meetings, and I am sure as the gentleman begins to do his town meetings, his constituents are going to come…”

“In my town meetings, and I am sure as the gentleman begins to do his town meetings, his constituents are going to come and demand that he cut out that waste, fraud, and abuse and cut out pork-barrel spending. The gentleman would say that he will do it and he is going to be a bulldog to do it. The problem is there is no line in the Federal Government's budget that says waste, fraud, and abuse. When you get to a specific program and you say, ``Mr. Director, can you tell me where the waste, fraud, and abuse is, in your particular program?'' And the director is going to say, ``Congressman, there is no waste, fraud, and abuse in my program.'' Now, I was a White House Fellow at the Department of Energy in 1981, part of 1982, and was a staff liaison to the Grace Commission that President Reagan empowered to look for waste, fraud, and abuse in the executive branch of the Federal Government.”