Political Quotes

“one of the privileges I have as majority leader is the opportunity to welcome, on rare occasion, fellow legislators from various places. Today, we are fortunate to have legislators from the European Parliament who are here as part of a regular transatlantic legislative dialog. It is very important. This is a tradition that started in 1972 and has continued every year since. The current delegation includes members of the Parliament from the newest European Union countries of Romania, Bulgaria, Estonia, as well as from the founding members of Italy, France, the Netherlands, and Germany. We are pleased as well to see colleagues from the United Kingdom, Ireland, Spain, the Czech Republic, Poland, Portugal, and Finland. The European Parliament today has 727 members who sit in 9 different political groups, not by country, representing the entire political spectrum of Europe from left to right. They work in more than 20 languages, representing 450 million people who elect the Parliament in free and democratic elections every 5 years. It wasn't very long ago that some of these nations represented by our colleagues here today broke free from totalitarian communism. Now they are participating in the European Union as full and equal members, enjoying the benefits of growing market economies and stable democratic governments under the rule of law.”