Political Quotes

“Madam President, I am the last speaker after this very good debate, which was preceded by months and months of serious discussion. I think every one of us is better for going through this process. We understand the Senate better. We have deeper feelings about this hallowed institution, about what it has done, what it can do, and what is wrong with it as well. I think every one of us agrees that the Senate needed to be fixed, and we also agree that we did a lot last year, despite the fact that it was broken. We had different paths to fix it, but fix it we must and fix it we will. I will say this: Obviously, there are going to be some rules changes and some statutory changes. But a lot of what will make this work is the agreement--informal but serious--between Senators Reid and McConnell, which Senator Alexander and I were part of. I say to my colleagues, hopefully, we are opening up a bit of a new era, where bills are allowed to come to the floor, except under extraordinary circumstances, where amendments are allowed to be added to those bills, except under extraordinary circumstances, and there is vigorous debate. I ask my colleagues to forbear--it is easy for any Senator to stand up and bollix up the whole works. The spirit of the new agreement says think twice, or maybe three times, before you do, because that was the path that led us to the dysfunction. I, too, want to salute my colleagues, Senators Harkin, Udall, and Merkley for the great job they did.…”