Political Quotes

“Mr. President, I was not on the floor after the vote last night, but I did get a chance to read some of the transcript of the back-and-forth between Senator Bunning and Senator Durbin and others. I understand that Senator Durbin retained the floor for the most part and yielded for questions, but basically the procedure denied Senator Bunning and Senator Corker, who I know also weighed in, an opportunity to explain precisely what was going on. I have seen some news reports this morning that have suggested that because of the objection to more deficit spending in order to pay for this temporary extension of benefits--that this was an unreasonable thing to do, to actually insist that Congress pay for benefits it is providing. I would like to put it in a little bit of context. I think if there are two things that are causing the lack of approval of the American people of Congress these days it boils down to two things. One is a lack of fiscal discipline, and the second is a complete lack of credibility whatsoever when it comes to fiscal matters. Let me give one example. Pay-go, the so-called pay-as-you-go requirement that was passed about 2 weeks ago, in the jobs bill that was passed earlier this week, $15 billion, the Senate voted to waive those pay-as-you-go rules that it passed 2 weeks ago and the President signed into law with great fanfare. But the problem goes further than that.…”