Political Quotes

“Four-and-a-half years. He is a newbie, and he has not seen the Senate I am describing. Can you believe there was a time in the Senate when we would bring an important measure to the floor on many different issues, and Members would come to the floor--I am not making this up--and actually hand an amendment to the clerk and say: I would like to offer an amendment to the bill. Then we would debate it, and then we would vote on it. Sometimes you won, sometimes you lost, and you moved on to the next amendment. That actually happened on the Senate floor. For the people who are new to the Senate, I am sure they do not believe me, but it did happen over and over and over. We had a healthy respect for one another. The amendments went back and forth, and we ended up seeing bills passed that made a difference in America. What we are doing now is a disgrace to this institution, and it does not honor the Senate, its Members, or our Constitution when what is at stake is so important. In looking at some of the provisions that have been brought before us in the Senate's Republican repeal bills to repeal the Affordable Care Act, I do not know how they can do it. I do not know how Senators could go home and say in their home States: A million of you are going to lose your health insurance because of something I just voted for. Health insurance means a lot to me personally. I have said it on the floor. There was a time in my life when I was a brandnew law student and was married.…”