Political Quotes

“most of us remember the tectonic shift that occurred in the Senate in 2001, in the month of May, when our colleague, Jim Jeffords, changed parties. He moved from being a Republican to becoming an Independent Senator and lined up with the Democratic Caucus. Never before had control of the Senate changed on the decision of one Senator. It wasn't the first time Jim Jeffords had followed his conscience and made history. I can recall his alliance with my predecessor, Senator Paul Simon. At a time many years ago, in 1994, when Rwanda was facing a genocide, Paul Simon and Jim Jeffords were the two voices in the United States who stood up and called for the Clinton administration to do something to stop this genocide. Unfortunately, it did not occur and hundreds of thousands of people lost their lives. But that call to action by Jim Jeffords was just one of the achievements of his public career he can point to with pride. During that genocide, he was the ranking Republican of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on Africa. The chairman of that committee, Paul Simon, joined with him in that effort. Five weeks after the slaughter in Rwanda began, Senators Simon and Jeffords phoned GEN Romeo Dallaire, head of the U.N. peacekeeping force in Kigali, and asked what he needed. The desperate general said he needed 5,000 American troops to stop the killing. Those two Senators, Jeffords and Simon, got on the phone, begging the White House to send the troops.…”