Political Quotes

“Madam President, first, I did come to the floor to talk about the urgency of the farm bill, but I also want to thank my friend and colleague from Colorado, who chairs our conservation subcommittee, for the tremendous piece of work on the conservation title in the farm bill. I thank him for all of that effort and also say to him I understand what is happening in Colorado. As he and I know, we passed disaster assistance--a permanent livestock disaster assistance program--in our farm bill, along with help for food growers in Michigan and other places. We are totally committed in the short run to helping those who have the riskiest business in the world, which is farming and ranching in this country, but we also know what they want is the economic certainty of a 5-year farm bill. So I thank my friend for all of his efforts and in coming to the floor. I want to say, for the record, there are 10 days until September 30-- 10 days until the farm bill expires and 16 million people in this country who rely on agriculture for their jobs or their livelihood are put in limbo. That is the reality of where we are. We worked so hard, on a bipartisan basis in the Senate, to pass a farm bill, and we did that as quickly as we could so the House would have time to act and we could actually get things done in the summer before we got involved in what would be happening in the fall, with all of the critically important end-of-the-year issues that have to be addressed.…”