John McCain Quotes

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

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

It is necessary to watch people in Washington all the time to keep them from unnecessary expenditure of money.

What really gets me is this - it's very ironic that those who are most critical of extra tax are those who are most vociferous in demanding extra expenditure. What gets me even more is that having demanded that extra expenditure they are not prepared to face the consequences of their own action and stand by the necessity to get the tax to pay for it. I wish some of them had a bit more guts and courage than they have.

We've had a Congress that's spent money like John Edwards at a beauty shop.

If you were starting from scratch to invent an instrument that could impose fiscal discipline, the last one on earth you would come up with is the United States government.

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.

Congress must demonstrate fiscal responsibility.

If Washington were a factory, it would manufacture spending.

To a certain extent, I have to be the president's bad cop from time to time. I have to look people in the eye and tell them, 'No, we don't have enough money for that.' That is not a very popular thing to do in Washington.

To achieve responsible budget savings, government must be retooled with an effective spending-control system.

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

By incorporating disaster spending into the annual budget we can help Americans with disaster assistance without the process becoming a pathway for runaway spending on unrelated projects.

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

I don't think the press has done a very good job dealing with government spending.The Defense Department with the $9,500 toilet seat, that's not the problem anymore. Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security are the problem. That's us. That's our generation. There the press never says a word.

I'll fight with every breath in my body to stop the out of control spending and debt that are bankrupting our kids and grandkids.

Conservatives were brought up to hate deficits and justifiably so. We've long thought there are two things in Washington that are unbalanced - the budget and the liberals.

I have spent my career trying to get Congressmen to spend the people's money as if it were their own. But I have failed.

No honest hardworking official likes to see good money disappearing into the hands of the Treasury at the end of the financial year.

Governments don't reduce deficits by raising taxes on the people; governments reduce deficits by controlling spending and stimulating new wealth.

These guys [liberals] will never tire of spending our money and will never hold themselves accountable for their boondoggles. For them the failure of $5 trillion to eradicate poverty simply means that we haven't spent enough money. Ditto with education. The solution is always more money. No amount of empirical evidence will shake their socialist theology.

We need to balance the budget and force Washington to stop spending more than it takes in.

It is inexcusable for the White House and Congress to not even make the effort to find at least some offsets to this new spending, ... No one in America believes the federal government is operating at peak efficiency and can't tighten its belt.

For three long years I have been going up and down this country preaching that government . . . costs too much. I shall not stop that preaching.

The challenge for any government is how do you do two things at the same time. How do you put money forward for things like the payroll tax holiday, for things like getting a jump-start on infrastructure, for building schools, and make the decisions for long-term deficit reduction.