Political Quotes

“I rise today to urge my Republican colleagues--to urge the Republican leader--to drop their filibuster of the Wall Street reform bill. I wish I could say this is the first time we have seen efforts to block moving forward to even debate a critical issue before the Senate, but, as the Presiding Officer knows, the party of no has now 171 different times either filibustered or threatened to filibuster critical legislation that is important for moving America forward. Historic--171 times; never heard of before. With all due respect, the idea that the bill has to be perfect before we begin to debate it makes absolutely no sense. There have been numerous times, because of the importance of a piece of legislation, that I have supported and everyone on this floor has supported moving forward to proceed to a bill knowing it would need to have changes before we would support the final outcome of the bill. We do that all the time. Personally, there are changes I want to see and will work hard for in the legislation that is before us. There are provisions, there are amendments I will support in order to make sure this does not have unintended consequences. I would guess the majority of us are in that situation.”