Barney Frank Quotes
No solution can be more elegant than the problem at which it is aimed allows.
Barney Frank, U.S. Congressman (Democrat, MA), Statement July 25, 2008
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
He was discussing “Stand Your Ground Laws” which were enacted to solve one problem, but then effected many other things negatively. The law, once passed, is the law regardless of whether it has adverse consequences that the legislators never anticipated. This is one of the reasons that drafting legislation is such a difficult skill.
The reason that this quote is important is that during the time that Graham served in the Senate, most of his Republican colleagues had evolved a political style where they just criticized everything the Democrats did or advocated. They would outdo each other to characterize problems more dramatically. They would even vote against legislation that they had supported earlier and in some cases, that they had even sponsored. They generally never made any specific suggestions or offered specific legislative options as once they did, there would be something that some might criticize them for. The tactic was reasonably effective in the short run, but a few Republicans, like Graham, felt that it was their duty to try and legislate solutions to national problems and not just uncover, describe or harp on what is a problem and attack Democrats.
Barnett Frank is a former American politician. He served as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Massachusetts from 1981 to 2013. A Democrat, Frank served as chairman of the House Financial Services Committee from 2007 to 2011 and was a leading co-sponsor of the 2010 Dodd–Frank Act. Frank, a resident of Newton, Massachusetts, was considered the most prominent gay politician in the United States during his time in Congress.
