James T. Callahan: “it must be confusing to the people who are watching this, both in the gallery and on C-SPAN, about what we are talking…”

“it must be confusing to the people who are watching this, both in the gallery and on C-SPAN, about what we are talking about today. During this time of our political careers in history, it is an election year. It is like selling Coca-Cola and Pepsi-Cola. You have one side that says Pepsi-Cola is better, and one side that says Coca-Cola is better. What we do is create spin efforts. We try to convince the American people that one side is going to do all of these evil things, and the sky is going to fall if indeed a certain individual is elected President. You hear things about cutting Medicare. There is not a provision anywhere in Washington where anybody has introduced or even suggested that we cut Medicare. All of this is partisan politics, trying to convince you, trying to manipulate you, the audience, into believing their side or our side of any particular issue. They just talked about the environment. We are not going to destroy the environment. Not one individual in this entire body wants to do anything to do harm to the environment. So as you go through these little periods of speeches on the floor of the House, keep in mind that it is that time of year. You are intelligent people. You can make your own mind up. Base it on character, base it on history, base it upon the future, base it on whatever you want. But keep in mind that these are like television ads.…”