Political Quotes

“Mr. President, approximately 1 hour ago, I was at the White House with Speaker Boehner. We had made a joint statement to the press during the nighttime there at the White House, and at that time I was cautiously optimistic that we could complete the work on the people's business to fund the government until the end of this fiscal year-- October 1. Now we are 38 hours away from this deadline of the government shutting down, so it is clear from the math that in less than 2 days a decision must be made as to whether the government closes or stays open, whether we put the American people first and reach an agreement, or have, as I will explain in a few minutes, issues having nothing to do with government funding cause the government to shut down. We met last night, the Speaker and I, with the President for quite a long time, 1\1/2\ or 2 hours. The meeting was initially one where the President, the Vice President, Speaker Boehner, and myself were present to try to work through these issues. We then went into a meeting with our staffs to try to work through these issues. The numbers are basically there. That is where we are. My staff, the President's staff, and the Speaker's staff worked through the night to try to come up with an appropriate way to end this impasse. I repeat, the numbers are basically there, but I am not nearly as optimistic--and that is an understatement--as I was 11 hours ago. The numbers are extremely close.…”