Political Quotes

“Again, I listened to the debate on the Kerry amendment. Again, as I stated earlier, I went down the various points of the proposal. The amendment basically is designed to open up the McCain legislation to the kinds of unbridled litigation that can occur in this area. As I said earlier, we have not argued that we have crafted a perfect bill. It is our fervent hope that this legislation will become unnecessary, because the problems that many anticipate we hope will not occur. But if they do occur, if, as some claim, we are going to face serious problems in this country, then we think it is the wiser course of action for Congress to enact legislation that would encourage the resolution of the Y2K problem. That is what we have attempted to do with this bill. We have had to compromise it, because it asks for compromise. Senator Wyden, our distinguished colleague from Oregon, is responsible for at least 11 or 12 changes, that I know of, in this bill from its original crafting. I worked on three or four of the ones dealing with the punitive damages and directors' and officers' liability in the States in this bill. We have compromised slightly. But every day you have to move the goal post to serve yet another constituency. We would like to have a bill that everyone would support. It would be wonderful to have a piece of legislation that 100 Senators would get behind.”