Famous quotes by Public Servants

"The Department of Defense took 40 years to get where it got"

"I think the idea that you can go this alone is - was a huge mistake. And unfortunately, there was a price paid in terms of suffering and pain for people in New Orleans"

"And I have to say, I agree with some of the criticisms that some have made about that state program which allocates the grant money on a very rigid formula all across the country, with a certain percentage to each state"

"In this job, you're going to make decisions. You'll say things that some people are going to love them, some people are going to hate them. It's just part of the job"

"Jim, I'm not aware of any formal requests from the Senate Judiciary Committee for these kinds of documents"

"The economy is too weak right now. We need to jump-start it. The American Jobs Act will provide that jump-start, to help us into next year and the year after that"

"I think what should be celebrated about our campaign is we have over 3 million people who have contributed to our campaign - teachers, firefighters, nurses, retirees. They're making up the backbone of this field organization in the country"

"I think that's unjustified criticism. We have had a number of measures in place in this country for several years to mitigate the possibility of mad cow spreading in this country. We have found a single case"

"My point is cutting spending shouldn't be reliant on the debt limit though. It's something we have to do. The good news for America is, leaders in both parties, the president, believe that we have to have significant deficit reduction. So the intent is there. And I think what America is going to demand is that our leaders come together"

"This was a dairy cow, and dairy cows have IDs on them. The ID was traced back to the farm in Washington. It's a dairy farm. And that farm now has been quarantined, and the owners have been very cooperative in doing that"

"The demand for beef in Canada remains strong because I think people in America, in North America, know that we have a very strong food safety system and that our food is safe to eat"

"But the fact of the matter is that all scientific evidence would show, based upon what we know about this disease, that muscle cuts - that is, the meat of the animal itself - should not cause any risk to human health"

"Nobody leaves a hotel without getting a full measure of three months of rental assistance. So no one has been evicted - no one who's eligible has been evicted from a hotel without getting a significant amount of money to find - to pay for their rent"

"What we've tried to do is have neighbors, colleagues, friends and family talking"

"It's really a question of fairness and what kind of country we're going to live in. There are 22,000 people making over $1 million. They're paying an effective tax rate in the teens. As Warren Buffett said, he pays less in taxes effectively than his secretary does. That's not right"

"This is a basic function of Congress to keep the government running. And so, what we ought not to do is play politics with those who have been affected by disasters"

"The American people know the economy is too weak. Too many of them are suffering. So the question for Washington is, are we going to continue to play political games and - and - or are we going to say, we can do something right now to create jobs, to put money in the pockets of the middle-class, hire construction workers, teachers, veterans?"

"But the debt limit obviously is something that needs to and will be passed. That is not inconsistent with a process and a belief that we have to get significant deficit reduction"

"We had a single find of BSE in this country. And we believe that what we're doing is appropriate action taken in an abundance of caution under the circumstances. And I believe it's the right thing to do"

"Now, the impact on export markets - we export about 10 percent of what we produce, so obviously that will probably have some impact on the market. At this point it's too early to determine how much"

"Actually, in this instance we do have probably a better tracking system than was the instance in Canada. Because this is a dairy cow, they're all individually tagged"

"I'm confident that we have measures in place. And the additional measures that we announced yesterday will be even more protective of our food supply in this country"

"Second, there are two problems with respect to mobile homes in particular. One is we obviously don't want to put them in a flood plain, because if there's another flood, you're going to lose the mobile home"

"But I think the bottom line right now is to take the constructive criticism and use that to build toward, as I say, the hurricane season that is 100 days away. And we don't have a lot of time to waste before we start to address that next set of challenges"

"I think it's a little early to tell what the economic impact will be. This year our cattle prices have been particularly high. The demand for beef has remained strong in this country, even though there was the single find in Canada earlier this year"

"We are doing everything we can to protect the food supply. And I can tell you that we're making decisions based upon sound science and good public policy, given the circumstances that we are now in"

"It's been studied to the point where we know that the impact on humans would be from consuming the most infected parts of the cow; that is, the brain and the spinal cord"

"I have to say that in this particular cow that we're dealing with, those parts of the cow were removed, and so we don't think there's any risk or very negligible risk to human health with this particular incident"

"We've done it in intelligence sharing and certain elements of security. There were parts of the department, in fact, that worked very well in Katrina, like the Coast Guard and TSA"

"We may have to force people to get together in terms of picking a particular type of technology and starting to build to that technology, as opposed to everybody exercising their right to buy their own system, you know, at will"