Political Quotes

“Mr. Chairman, earlier this evening in this debate, one of the proponents of the Space Station described the benefits of the Space Station as indescribable. I could not agree more. And the reason they are indescribable is because they do not exist. We have listened now for 14 years about the benefits of the Space Station, about the potential, and that same speaker made reference to the potential of the Space Station several times during his speech. But the time comes, Mr. Chairman, when we have to move from the potential to the reality. We have heard so much about waiting for the Space Station, waiting for the Space Station, and all the benefits that are going to come from it. It reminds me of the play 'Waiting for Godot,' where we keep waiting and waiting and waiting and it never comes. The Space Station never comes and the benefits never come. We have heard time and time again how the Space Station is going to help our international relationship with Russia. That this is going to improve our relations with Russia. Of course, it started out a decade and a half ago we were going to build the Space Station to ward off Russia. Things have changed, and now we are going to cement our relationship with Russia. Have we seen that happen? No, we have seen more problems with Russia and their inability to finance their share and that has basically set back our relationship more than improved it.”