Steve Kagen: “Being a songwriter and a singer yourself, I understand, you remember the song, ``There's a Hole in the Bucket.'' Well…”

“Being a songwriter and a singer yourself, I understand, you remember the song, ``There's a Hole in the Bucket.'' Well, when we came to Congress, we discovered there is a hole in the bucket. We feel, and I will just speak on behalf of myself, I feel just as frustrated as everyone back home that change can't happen fast enough, that we can't plug the leaks as fast as humanly possible. We have not got the ability. I wasn't elected President; I was elected to be one of the 435 Members of Congress who express the people's view. We are not the administrators. Our job is to do oversight, to legislate, and to fund those things and place our values on the table and put our money where we believe the people best want it spent. And people watching have to ask themselves: Whose side are we on? Are we on the side of large insurance companies? Are we on the side of no-bid contractors? I am a Democrat. I am not on their side. I don't sit in the boardrooms. I sit and stand with you on the House floor speaking their voice. All these issues come together. You cannot solve our situation in Iraq and health care and education and our environment and the safety and security of this Nation without talking about how we are going to spend our hard-earned money. It always requires money, and that's obvious. It is simple. Money is a problem solver. If you have a problem, you throw money at it and the problem should go away. Well, we are throwing money into Iraq and the problem isn't going away.”