Political Quotes

“Mr. President, today, I want to talk about something that has been going really right here in the U.S. Senate, and that is the use of regular order to consider the annual appropriations bills. What do I mean by ``regular order''? For starters, regular order refers to allowing bills to go through the committee process--including hearings and a markup--where members of the committee have a chance to amend and approve the bill before being referred by the committee to the Senate as a whole for additional debate and deliberation. The regular-order process is key. It provides the time and space for real deliberation. It allows for input from a broad array of Members and promotes collaboration and compromise. It is a transparent process, one that ensures that both Senators and the American people can see how the legislation in question is made and have ample time to digest it, not to mention the fact that by ensuring the input of more Senators, the regular-order process helps ensure that a broader swath of the American people is represented in any final legislation. One of Congress's most basic responsibilities is funding the government. For all the reasons I just listed, the way we should be doing that is through regular order. But we haven't been doing the greatest job of that lately here in the Senate. But this year, for the first time in 5 years, the Senate Appropriations Committee has processed all 12 appropriations bills through the committee.…”