Political Quotes

“Madam President, reserving the right to object, again, I appreciate the generosity of Senators Hatch and I think Wyden on this. Some 200 amendments have been filed by 46 Senators. We have had two votes. We have six pending, but the six pending--they have had some interesting adjustments in terms of second-degree amendments, in terms of not being actually called for votes. Now we have an offer of nine more. That is a good step, but the majority leader came to the floor at the end of the first full day of debate to file cloture to shut down debate. We had only two votes all week. I would like to have more votes. I think all of us on all sides of the discussion on this debate--the pro-free-trade Republicans and the anti-free-trade Republicans, the pro-free trade Democrats and the overwhelming majority of Democrats who don't like the way the rules are under TPA--would be willing to come together and pick out 20 or so amendments of the 200 that have been offered by 46 different Senators and have that debate with time limits. We should do all of that. Instead, we have nine amendments here. As I said--in case I didn't say it three times--we have had only two votes so far. There are nine amendments here. Most of these amendments--including level the playing field, which seems to have unanimous support--level the playing field is nongermane. So if Senators vote for cloture now, then all of those nongermane amendments are dropped and most of these nine will not see the light of day.…”