Year in Quotes: White House and Congress

(LIN) – In 2011, the American people held their breath as members of Congress and the White House exchanged sometimes heated rhetoric over budgets, spending, wars and almost everything else.

Here are 10 quotes that helped define 2011.

"It’s like lighting the match that could burn down the house.”--Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., describing a scenario in which a debt ceiling agreement was not met by May. April, 2011

"It's not going to get easier, it's going to get harder. So we might as well do it now. Pull off the Band-Aid. Eat our peas."--President Obama, in a press conference urging House and Senate leadership to come together to pass a debt ceiling bill. July, 2011

"Get your ass in line. I can't do this job unless you're behind me."--House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, to fellow Republicans who were holding out against his debt ceiling deal for one with more spending cuts. July, 2011

"I strongly believe that crossing the aisle for the good of the American people is more important than party politics. I had to be here for this vote. I could not take the chance that my absence could crash our economy." --Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz., after returning to the House chamber to cast her vote for the debt ceiling bill. It was her first appearance to Congress since she was shot in the head in Jan. 8, 2011. August, 2011

"At a time when spending is out of control, giving the federal government more money would be like giving a cocaine addict more cocaine." --Speaker Boehner, in response to the president’s proposed deficit reduction plan. September, 2011

"After months of hard work and intense deliberations, we have come to the conclusion today that it will not be possible to make any bipartisan agreement available to the public before the committee’s deadline.”--Rep. Jeb Hensarling, R-Texas, and Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., co-chairs of the debt “supercommittee,” a congressional group tasked with identifying $1.2 trillion in deficit reduction. November, 2011

"The world is safer. It is a better place because of the death of Osama bin Laden."--President Barack Obama, hours after U.S. forces killed the al-Qaida leader in the middle-of-the-night raid on his compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. May, 2011

"All I will say is that for three years the president has been harvesting the successes of the very strategy that he consistently dismissed as a failure. I imagine that this irony was not lost on a few of our troops at Fort Bragg today, most of whom deployed and fought as part of the surge."--Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., after President Obama marked the end of the Iraq War at Fort Bragg, N.C. December, 2011

"I'm not sure I want to put national, federal resources into trying to figure out who posted a picture on Weiner's website, uh, whatever. I'm not really sure it rises, no pun intended, to that level."--Rep. Anthony Weiner, D-N.Y., as a media storm continued to swirl surrounding a lewd photo sent from his Twitter account to a female college student in Seattle. June, 2011

"There isn't anything that I can imagine doing after this that would be as demanding, as challenging or rewarding."--Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, after indicating she would step down in 2012. March, 2011