Eric Cantor

Look, we know we screwed up when we were in the majority. We fell in love with power. We spent way too much money - especially on earmarks. There was too much corruption when we ran this place. We were guilty. And that's why we lost.

In a perfect world we would bring corporate tax rates down to 25% or less so we can get competitive in the world economy. Ultimately, I would love to see a flat tax.

It's all about the fungibility and money. If Planned Parenthood accesses hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayer money and they use that for other purposes, then they can use other dollars to fund abortion.

But, as we've seen over the last several months, the people in this country are very dissatisfied with the direction that this administration is taking this country. And what we heard last night was absolutely the ignoring of that fact. It was: We're going to continue with this agenda. In fact, we're going to double down on healthcare.

The American people elected us here to cut spending so we can create an environment for jobs in America. The House has acted. We have demonstrated that we want to see spending, discretionary spending, brought down to levels of 2008. We've seen no counteraction. We have seen no position that has been expressed by the other side at all.

And basically, the sense of the 'Pledge to America' is this: Republicans understand when we were in charge, we got fired in '06. We spent too much money. We defied the trust that the people had put in us. And we know that there is a better way.

If the President says, oh, Washington's got to change, and people are doubting whether my change can really happen, I think instead what the public's begun to see is the change they're seeing is not the change they voted for.

It is time for us to insist that we are accountable for the money that we are spending.

People have to take responsibility for themselves. We need to get the housing industry going again. We don't need government intervening in every step.