Political Quotes

“Let me say at the outset, my respect for my colleague, Senator Grassley of Iowa, has not been diminished by this experience, but enhanced. It has been a joy to work with him over the last year and a half in preparing this important legislation. It is complex. It is difficult. He has shown both legislative and intellectual stamina throughout. He has been fair in his dealings with me, and to the moment where we were successful in passing this bill on the floor of the Senate by an overwhelming vote of 97-1, a strong bipartisan vote, I think we both took pride in the fact that we had given it virtually everything that we could to make the best possible legislation for a very difficult challenge. Having said that, I will acknowledge, as the Senator from Iowa has, that once that bill left the Senate floor, once the conferees were appointed, a totally different process took place, which was very disappointing to me. It was totally different in that it was not bipartisan. In fact, as I stand here today and look up at the clerk's desk and see the conference report from this committee, this is the first time I have ever laid eyes on it. I wasn't there. I wasn't invited to the conference committee meetings. I wasn't asked to sign the conference committee report. In fact, virtually no Democrats--at least on the Senate side--were involved in any of that negotiation. That is truly unfortunate. There is no reason why this had to be a partisan endeavor.”