Byron Dorgan: “To my colleague from Nevada, this hallway in the Capitol outside this Chamber is never ever populated by those who are…”

“To my colleague from Nevada, this hallway in the Capitol outside this Chamber is never ever populated by those who are paid to represent the interests of people who work at the bottom of the economic ladder. They do not have full-time lobbyists crawling the Halls of Congress saying: By the way, give us a break on dividends; give us a break on this issue or that issue. No, unfortunately, it is these families, the families who work hard, at the bottom of the economic ladder, struggling every paycheck, trying to make ends meet, who get the short end of the stick every time you open it up and look at the details. I was surprised. I am a Lutheran Norwegian from North Dakota, kind of stoic. I don't rise to the passion of some of my colleagues from New York, but this makes me angry. That is just because it is fundamentally wrong. It talks about our character, that we decide we are going to give some tax cuts, we are going to help some people out, but you know what. We will take a look at the top people and just give them a thick layer of butter on their bread, but to the bottom people we will say you don't count.”