Free enterprise has done more to lift people out of poverty to help build a strong middle class to help educate our kids and to make our lives better than all the programs of government combined.

No government ever voluntarily reduces itself in size. Government programs once launched never disappear. Actually a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we'll ever see on this earth!

The debt-ceiling vote isn't about what will be done in the future it is about the integrity of America's commitment to support the bonds we issue. Elected officials have an obligation to maintain that integrity regardless of whether they voted for the programs that required the borrowing in the first place.

I launched The Emeril Lagasse Foundation to provide culinary training and developmental and educational programs to children in the cities where my restaurants operate. I think everyone has a responsibility to give back to the community if they can and to help future generations learn new skills.

We must oppose programs that would take food from the mouths of younger generations to buy prescription drugs for old people and we must do it... for the children.

Our budget works to reduce and eliminate the risk of attacks at our ports rails in the skies our food supply and roads by allowing for increases in many of the programs and agencies to help protect these important areas of commerce and travel.

We need a grassroots movement and government policies and programs to change the food landscape and the built environment to give our children a chance to have happy healthy successful lives.

There's the issue of hunger and there's an issue of if you're going to cut out food programs. We should be focusing on healthy food. Right now fruits and vegetables are very expensive. So what can we do on the policy side to bring the cost of fruits and vegetables down?

My priority is to turn people - especially kids - on to sports and being active so they don't even have to think about it being good for their health. If people participate for the fun of it and believe me - it is fun then fitness programs will be much more successful.

Similarly another famous little quantum fluctuation that programs you is the exact configuration of your DNA.

I'm very very concerned about the Bush presidency. I'm worried about the kinds of cuts in domestic programs that mean something to a lot of people including members of my family who depend on certain things from the government.

My family and our neighbors and friends thought of Africa and its Africans as extensions of the stereotyped characters that we saw in movies and on television in films such as 'Tarzan' and in programs such as 'Ramar of the Jungle' and 'Sheena Queen of the Jungle.'

The steady expansion of welfare programs can be taken as a measure of the steady disintegration of the Negro family structure over the past generation in the United States.

The measure of a man is not how great his faith is but how great his love is. We must not let government programs disconnect our souls from each other.

Before this learning experience I had assumed that with regard to programs that sought to help people out of poverty the political world was essentially divided into two camps: conservatives who opposed these for a variety of reasons and liberals who supported them.

Vocational education programs have made a real difference in the lives of countless young people nationwide they build self-confidence and leadership skills by allowing students to utilize their unique gifts and talents.

What the mayors care about is 'How can I get money to invest in the infrastructure in my city? How do we put people back to work lower the unemployment rate provide for job training programs? How do we make class sizes smaller and make investments in our children from an education standpoint?'

Unfortunately the elimination of incentives such as parole good time credits and funding for college courses means that fewer inmates participate in and excel in literacy education treatment and other development programs.

Studies have shown that inmate participation in education vocational and job training prison work skills development drug abuse mental health and other treatment programs all reduce recidivism significantly.

By cutting critical domestic programs such as education health environmental protection and veterans' services this budget reveals misplaced priorities.

My mom was on welfare and the occasional food stamp but I have never participated in any of those governmental programs even the ones that kind of work like education scholarships and whatever and I managed to do just fine.

My hope was that organizations would start including this range of skills in their training programs - in other words offer an adult education in social and emotional intelligence.

Research has shown time and time again that infants who receive the high-quality child care and early education programs do better in school have more developed social skills and display fewer behavior problems.

We must promote upward mobility starting with solutions that speak to our broken education system broken immigration policy and broken safety-net programs that foster dependency instead of helping people get back on their feet.