Will Rogers on Congress

This country has come to feel the same when Congress is in session as when the baby gets hold of a hammer.

~ Will Rogers

Ben Bernanke on the consequences of a US debt default

It would be a calamitous outcome. It would create a very severe financial shock that would have effects not only on the U.S. economy, but the global economy.

~Ben S. Bernanke, chairman, Federal Reserve, Congressional testimony to the Senate Banking Committee, July 14, 2011

Bernanke on the effect of budget cuts on the US recovery

I only ask ... as Congress looks at the timing and composition of its changes to the budget, that it does take into account that in the very near term the recovery is still rather fragile, and that sharp and excessive cuts in the very short term would be potentially damaging to that recovery.

~Ben S. Bernanke, chairman, Federal Reserve, Congressional testimony to the Senate Banking Committee, July 14, 2011

Ben Bernanke on the realities of monetary policy

Monetary policy can't add one bushel of corn to the world.

~Ben Bernanke, chairman, Federal Reserve, testimony in House Budget Committee hearings discussing the effect of Federal Reserve policies on world food prices, February 9, 2011

Nancy Pelosi on the entrepreneurial spirit of the healthcare reform bill of 2010

We see it as an entrepreneurial bill, a bill that says to someone, if you want to be creative and be a musician or whatever, you can leave your work, focus on your talent, your skill, your passion, your aspirations because you will have health care.

~Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House, 110th US Congress, remarks from a speech given to the Asian American and Pacific Islanders Summit, May 14th, 2010

Mark Twain on Congress

There is no distinctly native American criminal class except Congress.

Malancton Smith on Congress and taxes

Congress will ever exercise their powers to levy as much money as the people can pay. They will not be restrained from direct taxes by the consideration that necessity does not require them.

~ Malancton Smith