Kevin Roberts: “thank you for being able to maintain order in this very crowded Chamber. It should be a crowded Chamber. It is not. I…”

“thank you for being able to maintain order in this very crowded Chamber. It should be a crowded Chamber. It is not. I say it should be because this should be a required debate. As a matter of fact, we should have had the debate. I am the ranking member of the Senate Rules Committee. The distinguished Senator from Texas just pointed out if we went to regular order, we would be having a meeting of the Rules Committee, having a very interesting debate, a very educational debate. I think especially for the class of 2010 and the class of 2012 on the majority side, who did not have the advantage of listening to Bob Byrd's lecture to every class that came in, his sermon to every class that came in--we all became born again to our responsibilities as Senators, seeing the light with only his advantage of being both in the majority and the minority. I regret that is not the case. I regret we are not in the Rules Committee. I rise, like the distinguished Senator from Texas and others who have spoken about this, our leader, Senator Alexander in particular, giving us a real history on what is going on here or what is not going on. We are trying to discuss the so-called nuclear option that the majority leader reportedly wishes to employ. We are apparently brought to this point as a result of the leader's frustration. I was here when, obviously, he was simply frustrated with the pace of the Senate and how the Senate operates.…”