Political Quotes

“I wish to follow up on the remarks of Leader Reid by reminding everyone how unfortunate but in some ways necessary this situation is. This whole debate, in my view, is worth having. It is unfortunate it is so close to the end of the year because the Senate actually offered a bill, as the Presiding Officer may remember, earlier in September to try to avoid getting to this last minute. But this whole controversy started just a few days after Hurricane Irene had raked the east coast and wreaked havoc from North Carolina, through Connecticut, into Vermont and New Hampshire, and people are still reeling. The way this controversy started was Representative Cantor said: Before we can provide help, we need to find an offset in the budget. In other words, before we can help the victims of Irene--the thousands of homes that were flooded, the electrical wires on the ground, the businesses flooded out--we have to go to Washington and find a program to cut. I strongly objected then, and I have objected every day since then to that Cantor doctrine. So this is an argument and a debate worth having. This could have been completely avoided if, the day after, Representative Cantor, with all the outcry from his own district and newspapers around the country, many of which editorialized against that position, would have just said: I am sorry, I made a mistake. And I have had to say that in my political career: I am sorry, I made a mistake.…”