Mitch Landrieu: “I thank the leader, Senator Daschle, for his comments and for the respectful way in which he has addressed the situation…”

“I thank the leader, Senator Daschle, for his comments and for the respectful way in which he has addressed the situation we find ourselves in now, because the Members of this body have been working very hard the last couple of days on very important matters. As you know, each and every one of these matters is extremely important to our constituents from our own States, but some of these matters transcend our own States and our districts. Some of these matters transcend individual industries. Actually, the matter that is before the Senate, and the main reason for the filibuster--or one of the reasons; there are two or three--but the one I have been coming to the floor and speaking about, with several of my colleagues, is the fact we are in the process of passing a bill--if I can pick it up; it is quite heavy--a bill with about 600 pages in it of tax cuts, $137 billion that includes almost every industry you can imagine, large and small, in every part of the country, but the one group of people that is not in here, even if you read from the first page to the last, and even the small print, the one group of people who you will not find in this bill is the 643,000 men and women of the Guard and Reserve and the families they represent. There is not one sentence of tax relief for them.…”