I think the points that the gentleman is making are absolutely correct. Ostensibly we live in a democracy, and ostensibly it is the President of the United States and the House and the Senate that represent the American people, and…

Thus, if it costs States more money to enforce the same occupational safety standard, there is arguably a new unfunded mandate that can be banned. I am seriously concerned that current minimum labor standards are in serious jeopardy. I…

I know something about unfunded mandates and municipal government. I was the mayor of the largest city in the State of Vermont for 8 years. But I also know something about the responsibility of the Federal Government and the responsibility…

I will just say to the American taxpayers that if you think that the best use of your money now is to guarantee loans to Mexico, money that is going to be made by large investment houses and big banks, why, then, you should call the…

You are absolutely right. And I think the point that has to be made over and over again is that at a time when America, for working people, is becoming a poorer and poorer country, at a time when the gap between the rich and the poor is…

The gentlewoman is not suggesting that the patriotic billionaires in Mexico are not going to themselves reinvest in their own country? She is not suggesting that they might take their own money out of their own country and put that money…

I think that they might, given the fact that they are putting $40 billion on the line. I think what people throughout this country should appreciate is that very often when the President, any President, when the leaders of Congress want to…

But what I get a kick out of is in this era of personal responsibility it is not enough that you may very well, and probably likely, will earn a 20-percent rate of return on your investment, but we are saying to these very brave investors…

I can remember on the floor of this House, in my first term 3 years ago, sometime around 2 o'clock in the morning, some $2 billion that some of us had managed to put in the budget in order to feed hungry children and take care of the needs…

The absurdities pile on top of the absurdities. Not only is everything that you are saying true in my opinion, but on top of that, we are spending tens and tens of billions of dollars to defend Asis against whom I am not exactly sure. Some…

That was the Johnson Control factory in Bennington, VT, and that was a very painful situation, very serious loss to our community and to the hundreds of workers who were affected. The only word I want to add to what you are saying, I say…

We have a moral obligation to make certain that no American goes hungry, no American sleeps out on the street.

It is an absolute disgrace that in the wealthiest nation on earth, we have the highest rate of childhood poverty of any major country.

The function of a good government is to represent and protect the needs of the most vulnerable people in our society.

There is something fundamentally wrong when the top 1 percent of the population owns more wealth than the bottom 90 percent.

The time is long overdue for the United States to join the rest of the industrialized world and provide healthcare to every man, woman, and child as a right.

What we need is a progressive agenda which speaks to the needs of working families.

I believe that in a democratic, civilized society, healthcare is a right, not a privilege.

On February 4, BST, a bovine growth hormone produced by the Monsanto chemical company through genetic engineering, was allowed on the market by the FDA. On that very same day some of the largest dairy retailers and grocery store chains in…

The United States must help lead the world in reversing the arms race, not in escalating it.

I think that anyone who has studied economics and has some kind of a conscience understands that you cannot continue to have a nation in which a few people have so much and so many people have so little.

We must not let the wealthiest people in this country, who have so much influence over our political process, make the rules for everyone else.

We must stand up to the big money interests who not only want tax breaks for themselves but want to cut back on the needs of working families and the elderly.

We must make the banks serve the needs of the people, not the needs of the banks.

I think the major political problem in this country is that you have a two-party system, which is essentially a one-party system.