America has global trade with plenty of nations that provide inexpensive labor, but it's better for us when they're in our own hemisphere, rather than sending that business halfway around the world.
Ernest Istook

America's strength is not our diversity; our strength is our ability to unite people of different backgrounds around common principles. A common language is necessary to reach that goal.
Ernest Istook

Americans should be free to recognize our religious heritage; doing that is not the same as creating a government-sponsored religion.
Ernest Istook

Education begins at home and I applaud the parents who recognize that they - not someone else - must take responsibility to assure that their children are well educated.
Ernest Istook

English should be our official language. Reading and speaking English are requirements to become a citizen.
Ernest Istook

Home schooled children frequently combine for many purposes - and they interact well. The growth of the home schooling movement means that more and more children are learning together, just not in a traditional classroom.
Ernest Istook

I remind everyone: Whether you school them at home or send them to school, you as a parent have the responsibility to make sure they learn and behave. Teachers and principals may help, but parents are the ones who must accept responsibility.
Ernest Istook

I think it's awful that the state of Oklahoma a couple of years ago passed this law to give the same tuition to illegals as they do to people who are residents of Oklahoma. I think it's wrong.
Ernest Istook

Instead of this confusion, we need the unifying force of an official language, English, which is the language of success in America.
Ernest Istook

It's good that the first half of the speech emphasized freedom, because George W. Bush has been the global champion for freedom. As he said, if we don't fight tyranny it will not leave us alone in peace.
Ernest Istook

My father was the son of immigrants, and he grew up bilingual, but English is what my father taught me and what he spoke to me. America's strength is not our diversity; it is our ability to unite around common principles even when we come from different backgrounds.
Ernest Istook

Our economic freedom is founded on individual property rights; government should never be permitted to take those away.
Ernest Istook

Out of control judicial activism threatens traditional marriage in America.
Ernest Istook

Printing ballots in multiple languages costs millions of dollars every year. It also discourages immigrants from integrating into American society and gaining the benefits that come from speaking English.
Ernest Istook

Research and development needs permanent tax credits to build the technology that spurs our growth. But no government programs alone can get America's students to study more science and math; parents must push and help their children to meet this goal.
Ernest Istook

The American people do not want people thumbing their nose at the law. It undercuts the very fabric of our society and the system of civil justice and of criminal justice as well.
Ernest Istook

The birth of democracy in Iraq is one of the great positive changes of our era.
Ernest Istook

The courts are using the First Amendment to attack religion, when they should be using it to protect religion.
Ernest Istook

The motives of these parents vary, many parents don't like the curriculum being taught to their kids, or are wary of the threat of peer pressure or the presence of drugs or violence lurking in too many of our schools today.
Ernest Istook

There are a lot of Grinches out there that would like nothing better than to take any references to religion out of the holiday season.
Ernest Istook