John Spratt Quotes

Each generation should be made to bear the burden of its own wars, instead of carrying them on, at the expense of other generations.

Those who say we can continue to indefinitely borrow from our children and grandchildren and generations to come in fact are eroding our ability to do what we ought to do in education, in health care and in other things.

Well, where is the money? Show me the money? Our allies have put up a few billion dollars, but the American taxpayer has been required to shoulder the burden of this war.

We cannot allow anything that's called 'national defense' to justify any and all spending. We need to be very, very careful that we don't overspend and say, 'Oh, that's defense,' when perhaps it isn't.

We pay for the navy, and we have no commerce for the navy to protect; we pay for the army, and we loathe and execrate the work upon which it has been engaged.

What we are effectively doing, I say this to the young people of America whom my colleagues represent, is leaving our children and grandchildren the tab for fighting a war, letting them pay for the lion's share of it by simply adding it to the national debt.

Well, no American wants to in any way hurt our capabilities to national defense, but that doesn't mean an unlimited amount of money, and a blank check for anything they want at any time, for any purpose. Not at all.

We have been maintaining a standard of living by putting things on the debt of the next generation.

We need to stop spending money on those weapons systems that do not advance national security.

For the first time in history, we declared war without financing it. Americans have not been asked to pay for it through taxes.

Fighting terrorists does not require half a trillion dollars worth of conventional and nuclear forces.

Wars cost money.

To suppose this expensive War can be carried on without joint and strenuous efforts is beneath the wisdom of those who are called to the high Offices of Legislation.

… war is a matter not so much of arms as of money

The Pentagon has expended stupendous sums. Yet when it comes to promised results—–disorder curbed, democracy promoted, human rights advanced, terrorism suppressed—–the United States has precious little to show.

The repose of nations cannot be secure without arms, armies cannot be maintained without pay, nor can the pay be produced without taxes

This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children.

Beginning to dismantle the Pentagon would save $1 trillion a year - a small government proposal if ever there was one.

Just put down 9/11... I think, on most things I'm liberal, except on defending ourselves and keeping half the money. Those things I'm kind of conservative on.

When terrorists blew up the Marine barracks in Lebanon, Reagan was frustrated and furious, as Bush was after 9/11. But he didn't stick us in a war in the Middle East with no exit.

I'm finding myself really angry over spending and the deficit. I'm finding myself really angry over what's happening in the Middle East, the decision to stay in Afghanistan indefinitely. I'm angry about cap and trade. And I've been on record for a long time on the failed war on drugs.

I have three adult children, and I have four grandchildren. I want to stop the deficits. I want to make sure that we're not passing on to my children and my grandchildren deficits and that we cannot repay and that they will have to repay and maybe they won't be able to repay them.

Now we are raising the debt limit 3 times, up to $8 trillion, so that our children and our grandchildren will have to pay for the cost of our expenditures.

At Concerned Veterans for America, we've made the case that the defense budget could be targeted for spending reform, but in a targeted fashion that genuinely changes unsustainable spending trajectories while preserving U.S. defense capacity.

There's a financial cost, but the only costs that are ever real are the costs of our soldiers.