Political Quotes

“Mr. President, a few points. No. 1, Senate bill 993, which I was a cosponsor of, principal sponsor last year--it was a very good bill. S. 1, much of the base of that is 993, but it is a new and improved version. I strongly support S. 1. When we talk about this issue of competition between the public sector and the private sector--I will put my voting record up. For example, my ranking from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is a 92 percent voting record in support of business issues; National Federation of Independent Business, 94 percent. I am not going to be part of any legislation that in any way is going to have an adverse impact on our business community. And I have not done that in S. 1. One of the members of the business community I spoke with last week made this very, very good point--Bob Bannister, National Association of Homebuilders. He said, ``There is no such thing as an unfunded mandate. Everyone of them are funded but they are funded by tax dollars. We in the business community that are paying the taxes--we pay them.'' That is why the business community strongly supports S. 1 as written. But now we have the amendment. I respect my colleague from Connecticut, but this amendment says that in those areas where there may be competition, then we are not going to allow this process to work. But that is what S. 1 is, it is a process.”