Political Quotes

“I support the Pelosi amendment very strongly and I do not support this bill. It is the wrong bill from a diplomatic standpoint, from an economic standpoint and perhaps most importantly from a moral standpoint. In many ways it is like walking down the street seeing a starving kid with his hand out in front of a store front, putting your hand on a couple of bucks and then decide, no, and walking in the store and buying yourself a cigar instead. Why are we doing this? Why are we so dramatically cutting debt relief, family planning, the assistance that starving people in Asia and particularly in Africa need, the health care, the educational assistance? We are doing it to give ourselves a trillion dollar tax cut. That is the only reason we got such stringent allocations to our appropriations subcommittees, so we can afford a trillion dollar tax cut. We are the wealthiest nation in the history of the world. In fact, one-earner families making $40,000 are paying 5 percent on average in Federal income taxes. Two-earner families making $70,000 on average pay 10 percent. We have never been better off. We have never had more capacity to do what is right for the rest of the world. And so here when we are confronted with the opportunity to do what is right, to change the lives of millions of people, one-quarter of the population in many of these African countries are dying of AIDS. Think of the suffering.…”