Political Quotes

“I want to begin by discussing process with my good friend from Massachusetts, where I think he makes some good points, but I think he fails to recognize the progress that this bill represents. My good friend knows, because we have the privilege of working together on the Rules Committee, I have thought for many years, frankly, that we needed to get back to regular order. I remind this House the last time we actually operated under it in an appropriations process was in 2006. My friends were actually in the majority when we got rid of open rules on appropriations bills. My friends never brought all 12 appropriations bills to the floor and where they were subject to amendments by various Members. I would agree with my friend, this is not a perfect process that we have. If I had my way, we would go back to the way we operated in 2006, before the last Democratic majority, actually bring the bills down individually and, frankly, give every Member an open shot at amendment. I think that is the appropriate way to proceed. Again, my friends thought differently when they were in the majority and never made a move to restore regular order--quite the opposite. We have actually fought to do that. We did have a period of open rules on appropriations bills. We didn't get every bill down here, I regret to say, but we got quite a few of them down. But my friends decided they would engage in poison pill tactics.…”