Political Quotes

“Madam President, when the Senate invoked cloture on this bill yesterday evening, and adopted the procedure used after cloture, those of us who oppose portions of this bill lost any opportunity to address the problems we see and seek to repair them. I voted against the motion to invoke cloture because I hoped that, if the cloture motion failed, the Senate would have a chance to consider a better bill, and to improve it through the traditional method of debate and amendment. That did not happen. I have spoken, as have others, about the defects of this proposal. Its tax cuts are unwisely skewed toward the wealthy, including an estate tax provision that would benefit a few thousand of our most fortunate taxpayers at great cost to the Treasury. These benefits for the wealthiest among us will not, despite the claims of our Republican colleagues, help our economic recovery. Nearly everyone says that should be our top priority, and it should be. As a host of economists across the ideological spectrum have demonstrated, tax cuts for the well-to-do have little impact on economic growth. It is not just that these benefits for the wealthiest will have no positive impact on our economy. What is worse, the upper income tax cuts and estate tax provisions that Republicans support would add more than $100 billion to the national debt over the next 2 years. Republicans in this Chamber repeatedly tell us that the 2010 election was a call for more fiscal restraint.…”