Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I want to respond very quickly to my good friend from Oregon. I just remind him this is a long and winding road. It is a long process. As he said, the Senate may very well move in a different direction. I tend to focus here on veterans' issues as issues that have largely brought us together. Quite frankly, this bill has a very substantial increase in spending at the VA, and that is something that I know, in committee, garnered wide bipartisan support. Let's wait and see where we go. I just want to say I think there will be continuing discussion about this, but there is also a concern, always, on something like this that is controversial. We have seen our friends do this before. Sometimes you will put an amendment in but you won't vote for the final bill. When you are trying to calculate whether you pass something, you can't have amendments that cost you votes, that don't get you votes. I am not suggesting that is my friend's purpose. It is not at all. I know it is not. I know he is very sincere in this. I am saying that could easily be the effect. All I can tell you is we will continue to work through the bill. I suspect when we get there, at the end of the day, this will be a very bipartisan bill. It will pass with a very bipartisan majority. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time. Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer) so he may respond.”