Political Quotes

“we started out this week hoping we could complete a minibus--that means to do what we did a couple weeks ago and complete three appropriations bills at the same time. We had three good subjects. We had the underlying bill, Energy and Water. We moved from that and added to that Financial Services and Foreign Operations. We were unable to get a consent agreement that we could treat the package of bills the same way we treat other appropriations bills; that is, you cannot legislate on an appropriations bill and there have to be germane amendments offered. I was disappointed that we didn't get that agreement. I accept that. The best news out of this is that, with the underlying bill, we have two of the finest Senators the Senate has ever had, Senators Feinstein and Alexander. They are knowledgeable, easy to work with, and they understand that legislation is the art of compromise. They have done a wonderful job in the last 24 hours, working down the amendments. We have a number of amendments on the Republican side--a finite list--and we should have a Democratic list very quickly. We need to work it down a little more. I appreciate very much the good work of Senator Alexander and Senator Feinstein. The normal process would be to pull the bill. We are not going to do that. We are going to leave the bill on the calendar so we can move to it in a minute's notice, really. We will keep it around, and we hope to be able to move to that soon.…”