Jeff Flake: “I think I am the best intentioned multiple- amendment loser in the House these days, I guess. I keep being told I am…”

“I think I am the best intentioned multiple- amendment loser in the House these days, I guess. I keep being told I am well intentioned, but these aren't going anywhere. Let me just say again. As I mentioned last week or a couple of weeks ago, this is the only opportunity we have. This is it. If we are going to offer any oversight, this is it. And when we get amendments that say for a facility, and let me just say that my staff e-mailed the committee last Friday and said, please, can you give us further explanations so that the authors of these amendments can come to the floor and better defend them? Please let us know what this is. We didn't get anything back from the committee. Nothing. That was 4 or 5 days ago. Now, I understand it is a difficult thing, but maybe the committee ought to think that maybe 1,500 earmarks in the manager's amendment might give rise to a little suspicion that we can't police this very well; that when we are spending money on swimming pools and facilities that we don't even know whether it is a real facility or not, that we have overstepped our bounds. I am not going to apologize for standing up and offering 12 amendments, 12 out of 1,500 that we could choose. There is nothing wrong with that. In fact, we ought to be doing it more often. So I would ask for the indulgence of the Members. This process, this is the only opportunity we have. We found out about the amendments last Wednesday.…”