Political Quotes

“I thank Mr. Israel for helping organize this Special Order this evening, and I do want to commend you for what you've been doing to help try to change the tone of this institution. You're absolutely right when you talk about the level of noise, the partisan vitriol. I think we all realize that many of our constituents come to us from time to time, and they see partisanship for the sake of partisanship. They don't always see the philosophical differences that may underlie those partisan debates. They get annoyed with it, and they see carping and whining. They hear Republicans criticizing Democrats over their policies, Democrats criticizing Republicans. And I think at times they would just like us to turn the temperature down, improve the tone and try to find solutions to the problems that face us, especially on issues of war and peace. It was after the Second World War in the late 1940s and right up until the demise of the former Soviet Union, this Nation seemed to have a bipartisan policy to carry us through the cold war. It was called the policy of containment, and that doesn't mean that everybody in Congress felt universally that containment was a great policy, and they might have disagreed with certain aspects of that policy. But nevertheless, containment was the policy and it was able to survive from one administration to the next.”