Federal Quotations

State constitutions typically provide that the state first has to service its debt, then make it pension payments, and then pay for services. What we don't know is whether that order will be enforced. And ultimately, the busted state is going to be looking to the federal government for a bailout. Think Greece, but on a much bigger scale.

It's easy: if you want to grow the economy, encourage job creation, and increase federal revenue, you support making bonus depreciation permanent. Permanency gives job creators the certainty they need to plan and invest in their businesses, including hiring employees.

The bailout of Fannie Mae is completely off the books. It's going to cost us hundreds of billions of dollars. Yet nobody is placing this in any type of column in accounting for federal debt.

Government is inevitably going to play a very significant role in infrastructure, and in a country with a federal system where vibrancy and economic health depend on interstate commerce, it's not going to be private enterprise or state governments that will give you things like an interstate highway system.

Eastern Washington families and businesses should be able to deduct every penny of state and local sales tax they pay throughout the year from their federal tax bill, especially when people in most states are deducting their state income taxes.

If Congress is unable to do its job and pass a federal budget, then I do not believe we should receive a salary.

Marriage equality - I think that it's a constitutionally guaranteed right. Let's end the drug wars. Let's balance the federal budget, and that means reforming the entitlements - Medicaid, Medicare.

Like many of his fellow skyjackers, 49-year-old Arthur Gates Barkley was motivated by a complicated grievance against the federal government. In 1963, the World War II veteran had been fired as a truck driver for a bakery, after one of his supervisors accused him of harassment.

During my time as a state legislator, I've pushed for significant investment in public school districts. In Congress, I would look forward to increasing federal public investment in education through initiatives like Race to the Top.

We can adhere to the Henry Hyde amendment by saying that no federal funds will be used for abortions. And that's the bottom line for me.

It's definitely longer than the buzz cut you see most of the time in the federal government. I would pale in comparison to rock and rollers with my haircut. I would be a lightweight.

Nonetheless, the research budgets of the Department of Defense are under enormous stress-and they are extremely important because they support more than 40 percent of all federal funding for engineering schools across the country. So the threat was and is real.

Federal funding for biomedical sciences plays a critical role in training the next generation of scientists.

We're facing a natural disaster in the middle of an economic disaster. The federal government has to balance its budget the way our families do.

My politics are of a practical kind - the integrity of the country, the supremacy of the Federal government, an honorable peace, or none at all.

So the idea that you could put Kurds, Shiite Arabs, and Sunni Arabs in a nice, liberal, federal system in Iraq in a short amount of time, six months or a year, boggles the mind.

Throughout American history many of our social gains and much of our progress toward democracy were made possible by the active intervention of the federal government.

The Supreme Court, in 2005, emphasized and contrasted the great power of Congress under the Commerce Clause to regulate interstate commerce versus much more limited federal power under the discarded Articles of Confederation.

Safe Routes to School is one with great potential to get children walking and biking to school again. The program uses federal grants to make road and sidewalk repairs aimed at getting kids to school safely on foot or bicycle. The money also supports efforts to get the community, school officials and others involved.

After four centuries of Spanish rule, Puerto Rico was ceded to the United States in 1898. Residents were granted U.S. citizenship in 1917, and the federal government has allowed Puerto Rico to exercise authority over its local affairs in a manner similar to the 50 states.

The steel workers have now buried their dead, while the widows weep and watch their orphaned children become objects of public charity. The murder of these unarmed men has never been publicly rebuked by any authoritative officer of the state or federal government.

We must continue to work hard on the federal level, to make sure that our local law enforcement and communities have the tools and resources they need to fight this war against methamphetamine, and keep our kids safe.

I believe that the federal government, like a raging river, has expanded upon the barriers and the boundaries of its banks, and unfortunately, it is flooding all of America with its encroachment.

I can recall back in 1998, in August of that year, when we had a horrible disaster along the Mexican border in the town of Del Rio. At the time, FEMA was the shining star of the federal government. It's now perceived as many to be the dullest knife in the drawer. Right or wrong, that's the perception.

I learned a couple things. The government can do to you whatever they want. They can break the laws, federal laws, as they see fit... You can't turn laws on and off as you deem fit.

The fundamental challenge is that people like me simply do not trust the federal government any longer.

Working for a federal agency was like trying to dislodge a prune skin from the roof of the mouth. More enterprise went into the job than could be justified by the results.

Besides the healthcare bill being unconstitutional and a great expansion of federal government, I think if it does not respect people's individual religious views and makes groups or individuals do things that are contrary to their deeply held beliefs, there is going to be a visceral negative reaction.

They're the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, and they will not do that. They will not pull the trigger.

Today, the Federal minimum wage purchases less than it has at any point in the last 50 years. Let me repeat: The Federal minimum wage purchases less than it has at any point in the last 50 years.

When I was first elected I was puzzled why they were holding events in my honor as a mere freshman. I asked myself, why is a federal entity so involved in political activity?

I can only hope the federal aid made available today will be sufficient in our recovery efforts, and pray that our citizens continue to be safe from the fallout of this dangerous natural disaster.

After almost 50 years in which federal spending averaged about 20 percent of GDP, Joe Sestak and Nancy Pelosi took federal spending to 25 percent. You know, that's a 25 percent increase in the size of the government overnight. That's what we - that's what we've got to rein in.

Towards four o'clock, the rebels felt strong enough to take the offensive. A brigade with a battery under Earle managed to strike the Federal right on the flank and rear and throw it into utter confusion, which spread rapidly along the whole front. Now came the disastrous end.

We don't want the efficiency of the federal government and the compassion of the IRS to run our health care.

Patient autonomy is paramount to the oath that we take when we enter the profession of medicine. That is why I am appalled when the federal government gets between my patients and their right to the full range of medical information and complete access to health care.

I made a commitment and a promise to Ms. McSpadden, Michael Brown's mother, that I will pursue justice with the family at every avenue, be it on the federal level or at the state level.

Health care providers, saving lives daily in our emergency rooms, live with federal mandates.

If somebody had said to me in June or July of 1987, 'We'd like you to become chairman of the Federal Reserve, but you're never allowed to discuss any economics after you leave,' I'd have said, 'Forget it.' What do they want me to do? Become an anthropologist?'

Gerald R. Ford was a decent and honorable man. Under his steady hand, the nation began the process of recovering from the terrible trauma of Watergate - the lies, distortions, cover-ups, misuses of federal agencies to exact political revenge, illegal wiretapping, burglaries.

When the state or federal government control the education of all of our children, they have the dangerous and illegitimate monopoly to control and influence the thought process of our citizens.

The Obama administration's attempted short-term fixes, even with unprecedented monetary easing by the Federal Reserve, produced average GDP growth of just 2.2% over the past three years, and the consensus outlook appears no better for the year ahead.

I think the motive is to establish in federal law the personhood from conception forward and try and alter the Constitution through statute.

Election Day 2010 saw the culmination of years of aggravation and resentment toward a federal government that became disconnected and disdainful of the values and priorities of Americans.

Elections do have consequences, and those we elect and far too often re-elect have forgotten how government works and for whom they work for, and that an ever growing, power hungry state and federal government are not the answer to the problem, but 80% of the time are the problem.

The founders had a strong distrust for centralized power in a federal government. So they created a government with checks and balances. This was to prevent any branch of the government from becoming too powerful.

Specifically, the reservation of sovereignty to the people of the states in matters not governed by federal law is constitutionally defined and permanently enshrined in the 10th Amendment.

I made a promise to Michael Brown's parents that I would do everything to bring all of the resources of the federal government to this investigation so that it is transparent; so that it is a viable investigation, and we get to the truth.

The federal government should only be providing services for emergencies. You and I, taxpayers, shouldn't be paying for cell phones so someone can have a social life. I just don't think it's appropriate.

The higher amount you put into higher education, at the federal level particularly, the more the price of higher education rises. It's the dog that never catches its tail. You increase student loans, you increase grants, you increase Pell grants, Stafford loans, and what happens? They raise the price.

At the federal level, we must help, not hinder, local school boards, parents, teachers and administrators as they make decisions about educating our children.

I've loved being in legislative office on a state level, and I think on a federal level there are so many more opportunities. I'm so excited to accomplish more.

Of course, Mississippi participates in federal matching programs for everything from preserving the post-Civil War home of Jefferson Davis to beaver control.

After 2003, we lowered taxes across the board. And by 2004, revenue to the federal government grew. In the 1980s, Ronald Reagan cut taxes dramatically. And by the end of the decade, revenue coming in the federal government had doubled.

Our political machine, composed of thirteen independent sovereignties, have been perpetually operating against each other and against the federal head ever since the peace.

Medicaid is essentially bankrupt, Medicare is essentially bankrupt, why the heck would we give the federal government another entitlement program to manage?

I have represented farmers in federal court during the Iowa farm crisis. A farmer from Butler County. I don't think Sen. Grassley had that life experience. It's just a simple difference of who we are and where we've come from.

On the other hand, it is not fair to say that changes in federal policy have caused our tuition to rise faster. Every economic argument imaginable would indicate that we should raise tuition at a faster rate than we do.

The President forgot to mention the Moon, Mars, and the federal deficit - all of which are sky-high.

Man, I'm a conspiracy theorist by nature. You can't experience the federal penal system and not be somewhat skeptical.

It is important that Congress works to promote home ownership in Indian Country. These federal housing funds and programs will help young Native American families to stay on tribal lands in order to live, work and raise a family.

The Federal government does not have any information about extraterrestrial life to conceal, and there are no secret projects for me to investigate.

We need sensible gun safety measures. The federal government could do something about this; they could show up.

It's not, 'We have a city to bid, now let's go check in with the federal government'.

Conservatism is about the basic rights of individuals. God created us. As far as the government goes, the Founding Fathers based the Constitution off of Christian values. It goes hand-in-hand. As far as the Republican Party? I felt connected to it because individual freedom should not be legislated by the federal government.

As for my state of Mississippi, our governor, Phil Bryant, said the state could not afford the matching funds required to trigger the federal match for Medicaid expansion. We won't do it even though in 2014, the federal government would pay over $50 for every one dollar Mississippi chips in.

Embryonic stem cell research is legal in America, and nothing in the administration's current policy affects that legality; 400 lines are currently being used to conduct embryonic stem cell research, both in the private sector and by the Federal Government.

As a fiscal conservative, I believe one of the most important roles the federal government can play in assuring that our economy remains strong is to keep our fiscal house in order.

The central question is whether Medicare and Medicaid should remain entitlement programs guaranteeing a certain amount of care, as Democrats believe, or become defined contribution programs in which federal spending is capped, as Republicans suggest.

We have got to protect privacy rights. We have got to protect our God-given, constitutionally protected civil liberties, and we are not doing that in the federal government. The Department of Homeland Security, as well as the TSA, is a great culprit in being a Gestapo-type organization.

President Obama has ignored or dismissed proposals that would address our anti-competitive tax code and unsustainable trajectory of federal debt - including his own bipartisan National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform - and submitted no plan for entitlement reform.

We need to prioritize those expenditures of the federal government in A, B and C priorities... And I believe that on the C priority list are things like the Departments of Education and Energy, and those are the places where we should begin those defunding.

You can look at that by comparing Medicare's growth rates to the private insurance world, to the other Federal programs that we run, by looking at the billions of dollars, not millions but billions of dollars, we waste every year.

Laying the groundwork for smaller, smarter government, especially at the federal level, is going to be tough. But it is essential for getting us back on the path to long-term prosperity.

Funnily enough, the Federal Reserve produced comics about monetary policy, and there is a good comic book guide to microeconomics and macroeconomics out there. But it is not really appropriate for younger readers; it is really aimed at economics students.

Meanwhile, people have to join us and fight back against the federal government that has dropped the ball, that is in bed with these energy companies, that wants them to make more money than they've made before.

Our challenge in this regard will be to broaden the scope of our federal funds in terms of international diplomacy, development aid, and international assistance. Many Latinos in the United States look at Latin America and see trouble brewing.

I think the federal government should be doing only what the Constitution says it should be. We don't have authority under the federal Constitution to have a big federal criminal justice system.

It's not easy for the average family to ensure that their child receives a quality education. And the federal government is not making it any easier.

The federal government neither has the power to site transmission lines, nor do we build them. That's done, as people know, in their own communities. The siting decisions and the permitting is done at the local level, or by state governments if it's interstate in nature. And federal government - this is one area we have no authority.

If you have a federal government that's not enforcing the law and does not preserve the integrity of its own borders, then naturally, states are going to take matters into their own hands.

The federal government does not trample in jackboots those with whom it does business. It wraps them in cotton batting and, when they express ingratitude, apologizes profusely.

But he said Blanket Hill should be a national monument. And so we came out of his chambers feeling, though while we had lost to the powers of darkness, we had at least shown one Federal Judge what the right path would have been.

Not only is it possible to do lean startup in federal government, but it's the most effective way to drive change in the federal government.

The cell phone companies add to the problem. Every one they give out, they get money for from the federal government. So they have an incentive to give as many away as possible. And that's exactly what they're doing, and they're making a killing.

Especially today, given the tight fiscal situation that many States and localities face, the use of transportation facilities that pay for themselves without additional Federal funding is essential.

Market forces will one day crush the Federal Reserve. One day, the market forces will reverse.

I was born in 1966, at the beginning of the Biafran-Nigerian Civil War, and the war ended after three years. And I was growing up in school, and the federal government didn't want us taught about the history of the war, because they thought it probably would make us generate a new generation of rebels.

Literally from the moment I came in the door of MIT, it was very clear that a highly productive 40-year partnership between U.S. research universities and the federal government was badly eroding.

Criminal conduct by police officers, federal agents, and their confederates cannot be tolerated and will be met with the full force of the law.

I think that the press has a duty and an obligation to report on local government, state government, federal government - to be aggressive, to do its job. And its job is to report on whatever it's covering.

Many civil rights came about, not when they were passed into law, but because the federal government did what it should and saw them enforced.

It's absolutely critical that we audit the Fed so the American people can see what's going on over there. Do it from top to bottom so that we can have transparency in this entity called the Federal Reserve. Hopefully, the American people will see that we need to go back to the gold standard, which I've introduced, and get rid of the Fed.

We worship an awesome God in the Blue States, and we don't like federal agents poking around our libraries in the Red States. We coach Little League in the Blue States and have gay friends in the Red States.

The American people say, 'Don't touch Social Security, don't touch Medicare, don't cut defense.' That's 84 percent of the federal budget.

I think it's a fundamental responsibility of the federal government to enforce our nation's borders.

The frame of mind in the local legislatures seems to be exerted to prevent the federal constitution from having any good effect.

One day between takes on the 'Oz' set, I went into one of the cells and laid down and dozed off. When I woke up, I thought I was back in a federal pen. But I did my time, and today no one is more of a free man than Chuck Zito.

We can't have - we can't have a patchwork of 50 states developing their own immigration policy. I understand the frustration of people in Arizona. They want the federal government to step up and deal with this problem once and for all, and that's what we want to do.

Every generation has an obligation to leave its children in a better position than it inherited. Our representatives in Washington are breaking faith with that covenant. America must reduce its federal spending and accumulation of debt for the sake of generations to come.