Bob Kerrey: “there are an awful lot of us who are now, as we head through the deliberation of this bill and the various amendments…”

“there are an awful lot of us who are now, as we head through the deliberation of this bill and the various amendments being offered--and, to be clear, I voted, on the budget resolution, in favor of the amendment being offered now by the Senator from New Hampshire. I will disclose, though, that I do not know how I am going to vote on the same amendment because I want to get a bill. I want the fine work that Senator McCain and the Commerce Committee have done to yield a piece of legislation that the President can sign. I think it is terribly important. There are parts of this bill, on the other hand, that give me a considerable amount of concern. First of all, I hope that at some point I can have this discussion in the presence of the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, who understands these issues very, very well. First of all, I would like to talk about how we got to where we are today. The whole thing began back in 1996. There were a lot of discussions between the attorneys general, led by Michael Moore from the State of Mississippi. A settlement ensued as a result of one company, Liggett, disclosing information. This accelerated rapidly, and on the June 20, 1997, an agreement was reached.”