Political Quotes

“I would like to bring that up because the legislation that we considered earlier today had a provision that required a constitutional amendment that is mislabeled. It is called the Balanced Budget Amendment. Well, if you look at the provisions of the bill, not just the title, the provisions, you will see that it requires a three-fifths vote to pass a budget that is not in balance. Every budget that we have considered for the last 9 years and every budget that we will consider for the foreseeable future will be unbalanced in the first year. So all you've done is increase the threshold for any budget to be balanced. The Republican Study Committee budget, which is probably the most conservative budget in terms of spending on the table, other budgets would probably cut the deficit just as much, but all of those severe deficit reduction bills would require a three-fifths vote. Now remember, when the Clinton budget passed, it passed by the thinnest of margins. We balanced the budget and were on course to paying off the national debt, created a record number of jobs. The Dow Jones Industrial Average almost quadrupled. Fifty Democrats lost their seats when they voted for that bill. When you vote for deficit reduction, a lot of people will be casting career-ending votes. Increasing the threshold to three-fifths will just make it harder or even more impossible to pass. What you can get three-fifths for, once you need three-fifths, any kind of budget can pass.…”