Political Quotes

“I thank the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Westerman) for yielding to me and for setting up this special session. It is the most important economic issue of our times. I have taught economics for 20 years or so, and I went to seminary before that. I ran on bringing economics and ethics to Congress, and that was usually kind of a joke in the stump speech, but most people catch it. It matters, linking economics and ethics together. There is no better issue from which to view this challenge as the issue before us today dealing with the monumental increase in mandatory spending. Congress has been monumentally irresponsible. Promises were made that can't be kept. Politicians sold out the future in favor of immediate gratification, and that future is now. We see headlines every day in the newspapers about promising more and making promises and not keeping them, but today the evidence is overwhelming. The major promise that has been made that has not been kept is balancing our budget. We promise program after program after program that we cannot pay for, and we have not kept our word. As we will show, the folks who will pay for this are the only folks who don't have a lobbyist in this city, and that is our kids and the next generation. The U.S. Government has $19 trillion right now in total public debt outstanding. Debt per citizen currently stands at $60,000. That is separate from the chart here. We will get to that in a minute.…”