Phil Gramm

“Misery sells newspapers.”

“I have to tell you that the innovation and the technology and the entrepreneurship of the world still lies in the United States of America.”

“It's not fair to say that people who work with their head or with their hands ought to pay taxes, but people who earn their living with capital ought not to.”

“There are a lot of things you can say about the Bush tax cuts, but you can't say they didn't work.”

“Government is not the generator of economic growth; working people are.”

“The Democrats want government to do the spending. Senator McCain wants families to do the spending.”

“I said we are in a mental recession. We keep getting the steady drumbeat of bad news... it's become a mental recession. We don't have measured negative growth. That's a fact, that's not a commentary.”

“Every technological advance we've made in the 21st century and throughout the 20th has come from the United States of America.”

“I have the most reliable friend you can have in American politics, and that is ready money.”

“Quite frankly, I think nothing could do more to immediately bolster national security then enabling us to produce more oil and gas here at home at a price consumers could afford.”

“I believe I am more conservative than Bob Dole; I believe I am more committed to fundamentally changing American government than Bob Dole.”

“The cap-and-trade plan is more market driven than anything else. If you want to discourage carbon use, you have to make it more expensive, but what is crucial is that this be a worldwide program that includes China and India.”

“Half the world does not know the joys of wearing cotton underwear.”

“I'm carrying so much pork, I'm beginning to get trichinosis.”

“The genius of the American system is that through freedom we have created extraordinary results from plain old ordinary people.”

“I'd rather go to the dentist... but I'm going.”

“We have benefited greatly from the globalization of the economy in the last 30 years.”

“The American story is a story of immigration. I would be the last person who would say immigrants are not important to America.”

“It is clear to me that Democrats want to attack me rather than debate Sen. McCain on important economic issues facing the country. That kind of distraction hurts not only Sen. McCain's ability to present concrete programs to deal with the country's problems; it hurts the country.”