Political Quotes

“I rise to discuss the House continuing resolution that will be before this body over the next couple of days, and I want to begin by talking about a Senate Armed Services Committee meeting that we had yesterday morning at 9:30 a.m. So if we are all paying attention, the House acted on a continuing resolution on Tuesday night. The budget deadline is at the end of the day Friday. And it takes two Houses to do a budget, but what happened is when the House acted on their portion of it, they decided to leave town. They thought it would just be great if they just left town before the budget was even done, and they sent us a ``continuing resolution'' that would be unprecedented because it would mean that the Government of the United States would have operated not under a traditional appropriations bill but, instead, under a CR for the entire year. To those who don't do the Washington speak, what is the difference between a CR and a real appropriations budget? The way I describe it is this: If you are driving a vehicle, you want to drive by looking through the windshield, where you are going. That is what the budget does. You budget for the year ahead of you, based upon the facts on the ground, the realities in the world, the priorities that you have embraced, the challenges that you will face. That is what a budget is supposed to do. When you operate under a continuing resolution, you are driving by looking in the rearview mirror.…”