Thomas Daschle: “We certainly do need to move forward on that. We have suggested 20 amendments on the Patients' Bill of Rights.…”

“We certainly do need to move forward on that. We have suggested 20 amendments on the Patients' Bill of Rights. Recognizing that there could be 60 or 70 amendments, given the way many Senators feel about that important piece of legislation, we have said not 60, not 50, not 40, but 20 amendments, and time limits on those amendments. The answer was, well, there may not be time to do 20 amendments. Here we are today. We were told that there wasn't time to do 15 amendments on this bill. I have to give great credit to our ranking member, the manager on our side. He could have filibustered this legislation. I know how he feels about it. He could have been out here making the Senate go through all the hoops. We have talked about this. In the interest of expediting the legislation, moving this through, the Senator graciously has acknowledged that there will be another day. We will work through this in conference. The Senator has said that more than anybody. Ironically, the one man who could have held this thing up for weeks, if not months, is sitting here ready to vote. It is really an irony, it seems to me, that in spite of all the attention about expediting this bill, in spite of all the pressure and all the effort made to express the urgency of getting this done, we sit here this afternoon, at 2 o'clock, waiting for final passage.”