On the recordJune 16, 2011
I am disappointed that we had to file cloture again. I would hope, though, that in the ensuing days, the Republicans on the other side will let us get on this bill. This is a bill Senator McConnell and I started working on when we were both whips many years ago. The purpose of the bill is to eliminate the need to have all of these nominations to these relatively minor posts confirmed by the Senate. And the work done by the chairman and ranking member of the Budget Committee, Senators Schumer and Alexander, has been exemplary. We now will have--when this legislation passes, and I really think it will pass, even if we have to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed and on the bill itself--hopefully that will not be necessary, but if we do, that is what we will have to do. This bill would take away the necessity of our having to do some 200 nominations for some of these minor posts I talked about. I hope we can get on this bill when we come back next week. It will be the right thing to do. There is so much to do. This would set the tone of this work period that has not been so good to this point. ____________________
