“I’ve never understood exactly why we [we have a debt ceiling], or why anyone can think it’s ‘fiscally responsible’ to vote against raising the debt ceiling when we’ve already incurred the responsibilities. It’s like not paying your bills. It’s silly to go through the posturing that you’re saving money by not voting to increase the national debt.”

--Rep. Tom Foley on raising the debt ceiling, in The New Yorker: April 1979