Ted Cruz Quotes

There are two important things to remember about 'entitlements': They are hugely popular programs for a very good reason, and actual sensible 'reform' would mean improving them, not sacrificing them at the altar of 'fiscal responsibility.'

People like entitlements. That's why we spend so much on them.

The mortal enemies of Social Security and Medicare are those who, in contempt of the plain arithmetic, continue to mislead Americans that we should change nothing.

You cannot tackle Britain's debts without tackling the unreformed welfare system.

No one was elected to Congress because he or she promised to cut Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid.

The Democrats generally recoil from the subject of entitlements.

The Missourians I hear from just don't buy the idea that the only way to tackle the national debt is to drastically alter Medicare and Social Security.

When you talk about entitlement programs, it's not just about - it's not about cutting those programs. It is about saving those programs. Those programs are on a path of fiscal unsustainability.

If you throw a welfare state into the middle of a democracy, it’s very hard to get rid of the beast.

A mature welfare state is always broke.

The Democrats want to save more on defense so they can spend more money to buy votes through the welfare state.

To deal with entitlements we must either raise taxes, cut benefits, or borrow inordinate amounts of money.

Our pandering politicians compete to add names to the dependency of entitlement rolls instead of evaluating the success of these programs by how many people leave the dole and are restored to an independence. And these bulging entitlements are saddling our offspring with unsustainable generational debt.

Americans never would alter the way entitlement programs are funded or education administered without serious study and widespread debate.

The true enemies of Social Security and Medicare are those who defend an imploding status quo.

I wrote my thesis on welfare policy.

People ask me about if, being a Republican, you guys want to cut everything and stop everything and not help people. I find that patently false.

You know, I think that the Republicans have made it really clear that they want to end the so-called social safety net from cradle to grave.

I don't think you expand entitlements when so many people are dependent on government and when the money the federal government is offering is going to be taken away from you after just a couple of years.

I don't like a lot of social programs either because it makes you non-productive.

Social Security has not contributed to the deficit problem.

In the current law we're seeing Social Security dwindle. And so what we're saying is if we're going to reduce taxes we just want to make sure that there are things within the law that pay for it.

Social Security's not the hard one to solve. Medicare, that is the gorilla in the room, and you've got to put all of it on the table.

When public spending in the form of transfer payments makes various services and benefits free of charge, work is discouraged. Yet it is precisely Social Security that legislators fear to cut.

It's not easy cutting welfare bills. It's not easy cutting the deficit.