Meg Greenfield Quotes

It's a shame that the president doesn't embrace the effort to reduce spending. None of us like using situations like the sequester or the debt ceiling or the operation of government to try to engage the president to deal with this.

We're going to have to control the spending of government.

I always think a debt ceiling is a good tool to carry something.

After a decade of profligacy, the American people are tired of politicians who talk the talk but don't walk the walk when it comes to fiscal responsibility. It's easy to get up in front of the cameras and rant against exploding deficits. What's hard is actually getting deficits under control. But that's what we must do. Like families across the country, we have to take responsibility for every dollar we spend.

If we don't get a grip on government spending, there will be no growth.

As I have traveled throughout my Congressional district, the one thing I heard loud and clear was simply please stop spending money you do not have, rein in spending, live within a budget.

You got to have a courageous president to stand up and says, listen, if - if you send a bill to me that spends more money than what we've coming in, I'll veto it. I mean, I'm going to try to work with you the best I can, but I'm going to veto it.

Government does not have a revenue problem; government has a spending problem. Government does not have a revenue problem; government has a priority problem. It is time that we begin to fine tune our focus and decide what the priority of government ought to be.

The real goal should be reduced government spending, rather than balanced budgets achieved by ever rising tax rates to cover ever rising spending.

Sequestration was not designed to be anyone's ideal method for getting our hands around government spending, and it certainly isn't mine.

Federal spending is atrocious.

Like working families all across the state, we must find a way to make government live within its means.

When you're the president of the United States and you know that the biggest issue facing you is this cliff that we're about ready to head over if we don't get this spending and debt situation under control, it's very irresponsible not to take the action that is necessary to fix the problem.

We are beginning a new era in our government. I cannot too strongly urge the necessity of a rigid economy and an inflexible determination not to enlarge the income beyond the real necessities of the government.

The President has a short time to let people know that he is serious about getting spending under control.

The debt ceiling serves no useful purpose.

We need to focus on issues where we all agree, which is spending discipline and control and making sure that government, both in Springfield and in Washington, doesn't take more from your family budget.

You know government needs a haircut. If we keep their spending down, that's more money in your pocket.

We don't have a revenue problem in Annapolis. We have a spending problem we need to control.

My parents taught us to live within our means. It's time to force Washington to do the same.

The budget caps were busted, mightily so. And we are reviewing with people like Judd Gregg from New Hampshire and others some budgetary reform measures that will reinstate - you know, possibly reinstate budgetary discipline. But the caps no longer - the caps, I guess they're there. But they didn't mean much.

I think we all know the budgetary environment we live in. We all know the troubling future for federal deficits. They should pay for everything. This shouldn't be special on this bill or another one. The Congress has to get serious about controlling spending.

How do you hold down government spending?

Coolidge cut the budget, and even better, cut it during peace and prosperity. He left a federal budget lower than the one that greeted him when he arrived in office. He managed to freeze or cut the budget over more than five years in office. If you look at charts of presidents - Nixon, Ike, and Reagan - you see them failing on this score.

The Appropriations Committee in the Senate is out of control, out of control on spending.