Political Quotes

“Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman and my colleagues, I rise in opposition to this legislation. Last week, the Republicans filed this bill, this transportation bill that the Secretary of Transportation called the worst transportation bill he had ever seen. The Republican leadership realized that not even Republican Members would vote for this monstrosity of bad policy, so they've chopped the bill up into three parts and hope to get a separate majority on each part. This way, House Republicans hope they can pass the bill and give their Members deniability at the same time. Now, that's not a transparent process or a fair one. It's a way to hide what's really going on from the American people. Some Republicans don't want to vote for drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge; others don't want to vote for the money for the highways because some of the right-wing groups in this country are against it. So we've got this shell game going on. The bill before us, H.R. 3408, contains the text of a very bad bill that came out of the Energy and Commerce Committee. We considered that bill earlier this month. The bill provides a legislative earmark that would direct the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, or FERC, to issue a permit for the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline within 30 days of receipt of an application.…”