Political Quotes

“Whether serving as a staff member on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee years ago or as chairman of the Board of Supervisors in Fairfax County or now, as a Member of Congress, a constant principle of my own public service career has been a deep suspicion of political legislation that employs arbitrary across-the-board mechanisms that make for good talking points but terrible policy. Such messaging bills make a mockery of the legislative process, and, unfortunately, H.R. 4078 is just such a bill. To understand the absurdity of this bill, consider the proposal to ban any new regulations based on the Nation's unemployment rate. Actually with the typo in the bill, it's the ``employment'' rate. But for starters, there is little or no evidence correlating regulation to private sector hiring. However, there is considerable evidence showing that blocking important health and safety regulations will have a negative effect on all seniors, children, veterans, consumers--not to mention the private sector itself. As written, the legislation prohibits any new regulatory actions until the ``employment'' rate falls to 6 percent, meaning unemployment would have to reach 94 percent before agencies could issue new regulations.…”