Political Quotes

“I know we do two things here: we do politics, and we do public policy. The fact is that MSHA has suspended and/or withdrawn the regulation, and the gentleman's amendment says that MSHA cannot promulgate a new regulation until October of 2004. The hope is that these new personal dust monitors, this new technology will in fact continue to show the successes that it has so that MSHA can continue with the regulatory efforts and to get their new technology into the workplace as soon as possible. But under the gentleman's amendment, MSHA would be prohibited until October, 2004, from proceeding. I do not think that is in the right light. I think what we are seeing here is some coal politics on the floor of the House. I think it is unfortunate. This is commonsense policy coming from MSHA. We ought to congratulate them for the wisdom in suspending what they were going to do to look at this new technology. But if it works, why would we want to wait until October of 2004 to implement it? I would urge my colleagues to reject the amendment.”