Political Quotes

“last week I came to the floor and urged all of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to come together in a commonsense, bipartisan way and extend for a significant period of time the very important National Flood Insurance Program. That program, which is essential to the country, involves a lot of properties essential to real estate closings, to allow that important part of our economy to happen as we struggle to get out of this recession. That program would otherwise expire 1 week from this Friday. I also wrote Senator Reid that same day, as I came to the floor, urging him to support this legislation, extending this vital program, to be passed quickly, hopefully unanimously, through the Senate. The good news is that I have reached out to many folks--Democrats and Republicans--since then, and we have continued to build consensus to do that, to make sure there is no threat of the National Flood Insurance Program lapsing yet again, as it did, unfortunately, four times in 2010--no good reason--for a total of 53 days. Every time that happens or is even threatened to happen, within a few days there is great chaos and uncertainty in the real estate market. Good closings are put off. Our economy slows down for no good reason, as we need every closing in sight to do exactly the opposite and to improve the economy. Again, the good news is that we have built consensus, and I think we have reached consensus to avoid that sort of lapse.…”