Political Quotes

“Mr. President, I rise to make a few remarks and to make a motion. Everyone in this body knows one of the issues, the issue I believe is most holding back our economic recovery and most holding back our ability to sort through so many issues our country faces, is the issue of our debt and deficit. We are like $17 trillion in debt. The debt goes up over $4 billion every night when we go to sleep. This problem is structural in nature. Time alone will not solve this issue. In the last 4 years, my time in the Senate, there has been no issue on which I have spent more time, spent more effort trying to reach out. I understand many of my colleagues actually try to avoid me in the hallways now because they fear they are going to get a Mark Warner harangue on the debt and deficit. I also know the only way we are going to get this issue resolved is if both sides are willing to meet each other in the middle. This is a problem that cannot be solved by continuing to cut back on discretionary spending. It will require, yes, more revenues, and it will require entitlement reform. Those are issues where, unfortunately, in many ways our parties have not found agreement. We have all agreed as well at least that, while we do not have to solve this problem overnight, we need at least $4 trillion in debt reduction over the next 10 years. The good thing is, while we have been lurching from budget crisis to budget crisis, we have gotten halfway to our goal.…”