I have made terrible mistakes that have hurt the people that I cared about the most, and I am terribly sorry. I am deeply ashamed of my terrible judgment and my actions.
I am here today to again apologize for the personal mistakes I have made and the embarrassment I have caused. I make this apology to my neighbors and my constituents, but I make it particularly to my wife, Huma.
Pictures get manipulated, pictures get dropped into accounts. We've asked an internet security firm and a law firm to take a hard look at this to come up with a conclusion about what happened and to make sure it doesn't happen again.
More and more Americans are asking about the price that we have to pay when Wal-Mart comes into a community, treats workers poorly, violates immigration laws and squashes small businesses.
Every dollar that we send in State Department aid or humanitarian aid that saves us from having to get involved with very expensive military actions is a good investment. And frankly, helping Israel fight terrorism in the Middle East is much cheaper than us fighting it here on our shores.
We always make the mistake in the United States of America in Democratic or Republican administrations alike is we tend to embrace the despot that's least troublesome to us. That should not be the way we view things.
Here we have been sitting down for a brief moment and you are already asking me if there are pictures of me in my drawers.
I am announcing my resignation from Congress so my colleagues can get back to work, my neighbors can choose a new representative and most importantly that my wife and I can continue to heal from the damage I have caused.
New York lost a classic. Carmine was an old school New Yorker.
There's no doubt about it that Mubarak has been indeed a partner with Israel, but there's also no doubt about something else. Conditions in Egypt were getting worse and worse, and it was almost just a matter of time before the popular uprising started.
Sooner or later they are going to live in a New York City where gay marriage is not only legal, but it's common and they don't even notice.
Listen, if the mayor wants to have a debate about education in this city, I got three words: bring it on.
For the fifth year in a row, the Bush budget cuts city core services to pay for wealthy tax breaks. And once again, the mayor's requests were not funded.
It's a nice neighborhood, like the one I left. My home borough is Brooklyn and Queens.
All those predictions about how much economic growth will be created by this, all of those new jobs, would be created by the things we wanted - the extension of unemployment insurance and middle class tax cuts. An estate tax for millionaires adds exactly zero jobs. A tax cut for billionaires - virtually none.
I see a trend here where the President seems to think his job is to count votes and then try to make a deal That's what we in legislatures do. Mr. Obama's job is to travel the country, fight for the values that he cares about.
Do you know what the overhead is of the Medicare system? One-point-zero-five percent. Do you know what - private insurance is 30 percent in overhead and profits? Given a choice how I'm going to improve health care, I'm going to take it away from private insurance profits and overhead. Wouldn't you?
What I am saying is, all health care has a problem with costs. Medicare is growing slower than the private insurance plans. Why? Because of their efficiency. They don't have to give money to shareholders. Why should be defending shareholders?
Is Medicare socialism? You want to get rid of Medicare. And a lot of the people against health care do. I want to preserve it and grow it.
It's also very important in Latin America. If we can deal with the drug problem there, some of their strife there, it's less likely we have immigration problems here.
