Thomas Daschle: “This is the end of business as usual, at least as it affects our relationship with the States, local governments, and…”

“This is the end of business as usual, at least as it affects our relationship with the States, local governments, and tribal governments. I commend the managers of the bill on both sides of the aisle for their hard work. They have done an outstanding job in the course of the last 2 weeks to bring us to this point. Senator Kempthorne and Senator Glenn have shown the demeanor and the comity between themselves, and certainly the patience in working with all of us, to make passage of this bill possible. Let me also say that because we took the time, because we deliberated thoroughly for the last 2 weeks, because we have had the opportunity to offer amendments and considered them carefully, this is a much better bill than the version that was presented to this body just 2 weeks ago. It has been improved by the process. Those improvements resulted in broad bipartisan support for the legislation in the end. To all of my colleagues, I say it is important that everyone understand the difference between the House and the Senate.”