Political Quotes

“before too long here we are going to be voting. We are going to have three votes, I think, on whether we are going to move forward on a tax bill. I frankly think there are things in the underlying bill that is before us today that would do some good. The bonus depreciation provision is something many of us have supported in the past. We think that is good tax policy with regard to encouraging small businesses to invest, by giving them a quicker way to write off those capital investments. So there are some things in the underlying bill that make some sense. But the whole exercise we are going through here is a charade for a couple of reasons. One, you cannot originate revenue measures in the Senate. That is something that has to happen in the House of Representatives. So anything that comes out of here, if it were to pass, would be blue-slipped by the House of Representatives. You have a constitutional issue to deal with here in the first place. Secondly, you have a procedure, a process set up whereby there is not an opportunity for us to offer amendments. We put a tax bill on the floor, a piece of legislation, a vehicle that ought to be open to amendment. There are many of us with ideas about things that we think would promote economic growth and create jobs in our economy, but we are not going to have the opportunity to offer those amendments. Frankly, a tax debate is something that many of us welcome.…”