Political Quotes

“Madam President, if I may, I want to thank the Senator from Oregon for those remarks. My colleagues might be interested to know that I was chairman of Rules, and Bob was the ranking member, and this was during the period before the first inauguration of Barack Obama. As we all know, the Rules Committee is in charge of making the arrangements for the occasion. Bob was really just a wonderful person to work with. In the first place, we worked really well together. We sat down, we went over the problems, and we talked about solutions. Then came the subject of the Senate lunch following the inaugural. Well, I didn't pay much attention to it. Then I realized that this was a huge thing. It was in National Statuary Hall. There were decorations. We had to get a fine painting. In this case, I arranged for it to be a great California landscape by Thomas Hill, which came from the museum in New York. To plan for it, there is something that has been traditional, which is the meal tasting, and Senator Bennett and his wonderful wife Joyce and my husband and I went up to the fourth floor, and the table was set as it would be set at this lunch. We did a tasting from every culinary caterer who was bidding to do the lunch, believe it or not, and I think there were four of them. So there were four entrees and four salads and four desserts. And Joyce and Bob and Dick and I sat there, and we went through the motions and did it. But it was with great humor.…”