Thomas Daschle: “I thank the President for that clarification and his interpretation of what has just been presented to him. Mr.…”

“I thank the President for that clarification and his interpretation of what has just been presented to him. Mr. President, I have heard the majority leader on many occasions come to this floor and make an impassioned speech to all of our colleagues that we are going to stay on this bill until we get it done. I heard him say that eloquently and passionately on NATO. I heard him say that when we talked about the budget. I heard him say that when we talked about the Coverdell bill. I have heard him say that on so many occasions this year--we are going to stay on this piece of legislation until we get it done because we have to finish it so we can move on. I do not want to misinterpret his remarks. I know he would like to see some completion of the tobacco bill. I just wish he and our colleagues would show the same passion and resolve to finish this bill so that we can move on. That is all we are asking. Let's move on to other pieces of legislation once we have completed our work on this. This is an open invitation to go off of this legislation, move on to other things, and, oh, by the way, if there is time, and if my Democratic colleagues play their cards right and behave, we will probably have a chance to come back to tobacco. That is the problem. I want very much to make this month as productive as the last month was. But you know how it was productive? It was productive when we said we were going to stay on a bill until we finished it. We finished the highway bill.”