Joe Biden: “the way that translates to me is that the Republicans have concluded they are not going to allow Senators Kennedy…”

“the way that translates to me is that the Republicans have concluded they are not going to allow Senators Kennedy, Lautenberg, Kohl, or Bradley to have a vote on their amendments. I understand that. I am a big boy. I understand how that works, if that is what they have decided to do. To suggest that we wait until cloture, by definition, cloture means these would not be in order. Now, every single bill that I know of that we ever pass through this place has nongermane amendments on it. I cannot think of one off the top of my head that does not have nongermane amendments on it. That is the practice. That is the practice. That is the rule. That is the way we proceed. And the theoretical reason for cloture is that people are taking too much time on this bill. I have time agreements on all these amendments. Before the next half-hour is up, every Democratic amendment on any subject that is in this bill, we can get a time agreement on. We can settle this thing tonight. We can get this done. I thought the reason for cloture was worry on the part of the majority leader that we would never get to a final vote on this bill. I am telling you I can get a time agreement on all of the Democratic amendments. We can get to a vote on this bill tonight. But what I am being told here is, we can only get to a vote on this bill tonight if we only vote on the things the Republicans want to vote on. That is what this translates to. I understand that. I accept that.”