Political Quotes

“Mr. President, first, I wish to thank Senator Pryor. Senator Pryor and a group of us have introduced a piece of legislation that rights a wrong; that makes sure our military continues to receive their COLA in full course and in the full amount. As the Presiding Officer knows, we had a budget issue we worked through, and in that process the COLA for our active retired military was reduced by 1 percent. We all knew we would take the time, because we had the time after the budget passed, to fix this problem. We have already done it for our disabled retired veterans and now we need to fulfill the final and full promise of their COLA in total. I spoke last night about this issue, and then we had the vote on cloture, with the result being 94 to 0--94 to 0. If that isn't an indication of how much support there is to make sure the COLA comes back in full force, I don't know what is. I do know starting right after that vote we began hearing from people already coming up with, well, I voted for cloture, but I have a caveat. I have some qualifications I want to add on that vote. I want to have these things in Washington that are called pay-fors. Let me make it very clear to the veterans in my State--and there are 77,000 veterans who live in my State. The highest per capita in the Nation is in Alaska. They have paid the bill. They paid the bill time and time again. This is a perfect photo to use as an example of our military who have served in combat, who served on the frontlines.…”