On the recordJune 24, 2010
with all due respect to our Republican leader, I have to express concern on a couple of points. He was just talking about court decisions, a court decision that said BP is a person; that said all big corporations have the same rights as individuals. What we are trying to do, both in the House and the Senate, is to make sure that, in fact, the democratic process can work and that huge corporate interests that have controlled too much of this country are not allowed to do even more in terms of overriding elections and putting money into elections. I also have to disagree with our distinguished Republican colleague when he says this is all about the deficit. As we would say in Michigan, that is a bunch of bunk. This is about who we care about and how we think we should move forward as a country in terms of what is best for the majority of the American people. Very different views. Very different beliefs. Our Republican colleagues have believed if we give tax breaks to the wealthiest Americans and wait for it to trickle down, things will get better. If we back up and let corporations police themselves, everything will be OK. Well, we saw that for 8 years, 6 years of which they had control of the whole system. I tell you what, it did not trickle down to the people in Michigan.
