Tom Coburn Quotes

Sometimes less is better with government.

One could argue the GOP made no progress on limiting government in their four years of total control from 2002 to 2006. If anything, government expanded like never before.

My goal is to cut government in half in twenty-five years, to get it down to the size where we can drown it in the bathtub.

Americans want government that is leaner, more efficient, and less intrusive into their personal lives.

I believe that government should confine itself to the public realm and that it should be as stripped down as possible, within reason. It should not be burdened by excess bureaucracy.

Less government, less regulation, lower taxes.

Big government doesn't work! It just doesn't work!

I think that if we get back to some basic fundamental principles, we can make sure that we resolve the issues. And I think that that's what the Tea Party was all about. It's getting back to a constitutional conservative government. And that is limited, but it's also effective and efficient. I think that that's what we'll be able to do.

We don't need bigger government. We need to shrink the size of government.

I would bring the government back to what it was intended to be - a plain economical government.

I will support vigorously whoever commits to reduce the size of government the most.

The way I look at it is this, as Republicans, we look for less government interference in our lives.

Our goal is to shrink government to the size where we can drown it in a bathtub.

Trust free people and free enterprise as opposed to meddling, burdensome government.

I continue to vote against such spending increases, but sometimes I think some of my Republican colleagues forgot that we were sent here to shrink the federal government, not to grow it.

The media has brainwashed the electorate to expect the government to do something. The best economic policy of any government is to do nothing but reduce the size of the government, reduce the size of the laws, and reduce the size of regulations.

I'm not really conservative. I'm conservative on certain things. I believe in less government. I believe in fiscal responsibility and all those things that maybe Republicans used to believe in but don't any more.

While we may argue about the size of government, the Republican Party has not been a party that says, 'I want to destroy government.'

I believe that smaller government is better government. But I also believe that in the areas where government does play a legitimate role, we should demand that it is done better.

The thought about Republicans is, we're supposed to be Jeffersonian. That government governs the best that governs the least.

In my view, as a country we need to rediscover some of that skepticism about government and revisit that libertarian agenda.

Libertarians understand a very simple fact of life: Government doesn't work. It can't deliver the mail on time, it doesn't keep our cities safe, it doesn't educate our children properly.

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

The Tea Party is simply a loose description of local activism driven by Americans who want smaller government and more self-reliance. That sounds like what the Founding Fathers had in mind, does it not?

Someone has to stay on the line and say, no, we can do this by cutting spending and reducing the size of government. That's what I was committed to doing.