Political Quotes

“Mr. President, I rise with my colleagues to support this motion to bring this legislation to the floor to begin a debate. There were 1.3 million Americans who were pushed off an economic cliff on December 28 when their extended unemployment benefits ended. They are searching for work. They have to search for work. They are in a market where there are typically two or three applicants for one job. Yesterday I read a story from the Washington Post that talked about the opening of a new dairy plant in Maryland. They were expecting a lot of interest in the 36 jobs: 1,600 applicants. I would wager that many of those applicants never thought in their lives, after being a vice president of sales in a company or a sophisticated manager of the financial aspects of a company, that they would be applying for work in a dairy. Some of them might even be on extended benefits, and that is the only thing keeping them whole. And they are looking for work, 1,600 applicants for 36 jobs. This is not unique to Maryland. It is in my home State of Rhode Island. It is in States all across this country, Nevada, Tennessee, Arizona, States with unemployment numbers above the national average of 7 percent. In my case, it is 9 percent. We have to help these families. And as Senator Durbin pointed out, we have done this on a bipartisan basis until very recently. This is a smart economic program. This program, according to CBO, will create 200,000 jobs next year if we extend it.…”