Tom Harkin: “it is hard to believe, but we are on the farm bill. As any casual observer might notice, we are not doing anything. We…”

“it is hard to believe, but we are on the farm bill. As any casual observer might notice, we are not doing anything. We sit here with an empty Chamber. The farm bill has now been on the floor for over a week. The farm bill was laid down a week ago yesterday, as a matter of fact, and nothing has happened. Why hasn't anything happened? Because we can't get anything from the other side. We want to move ahead. We wanted to ask unanimous consent to go ahead with an amendment with a time limit, vote on it, and move to another amendment, but the other side refuses. The Republican leadership refuses to move ahead on the farm bill. I suggested earlier today that we may at least want to have some amendments up. We cannot get consent on the other side. So here we sit. At this rate, we may not have a farm bill. We worked very hard on it this year. First, on the other side in the House, they got a farm bill passed early. We met and worked hard on it all summer long and worked with the Finance Committee to get extra funds to meet our obligations. I am checking on this right now, but I believe we had a record movement of a farm bill through our committee this year--a day and a half, a short day and a half. Now, this is my seventh farm bill. I have never seen anything move that fast. It was the result of weeks and weeks and months and months of working with the other side, with everybody working together, hammering out agreements, before we brought it to the committee.”