Political Quotes

“Mr. President, if what the Senator from Florida said is going to occur, it indeed would be a broken system. But the majority leader has said and said publicly that there are many other important matters that both sides of the aisle wish to address other than the ones he has raised himself, and he is willing to work with Republicans on a process to permit the Senate to consider these matters and complete the bill as soon as possible. I do not know exactly what the Senators are saying when they say this is a closed process, when the majority leader says, no, it is not. I mean, they want to debate amendments. You cannot debate amendments unless you get to the bill and offer amendments. I wish to debate amendments too. There are provisions in this bill that I do not like that I voted against in committee as chairman. There are a number of provisions I would like to see stricken in this bill. But you cannot strike a provision or try to strike a provision before the bill is on the floor to debate. The issue here is whether this filibuster against bringing this bill to the floor so we can debate the amendments is going to succeed. That is the issue today. Should we be able to debate amendments? You bet. I fought for that as long as I have been either chairman, ranking member or member of the Armed Services Committee and other committees. Of course, we ought to be able to debate amendments. But the debate today is whether we can get to the point where we can debate amendments.…”