Political Quotes

“I wish to speak for a moment about the Dodd-Frank bill that we are going to vote on apparently tomorrow evening. I wanted to talk a little bit about politics, which is not my specialty, and then a little bit about the substance. I know the Presiding Officer has been highly involved in this bill and made a positive contribution. I read recently comments made by our leader, the majority leader here, and the President, and actually the chairman of the Banking Committee regarding the fact that the reason the bill is the way it is is partisan politics, and basically insinuating that Republicans did not want to deal with a financial regulatory bill. Nothing has disappointed me more than the fact that we have a bill that has basically ended up wrapping folks around the axle as they tried to get two or three votes on our side of the aisle to pass this bill. We had a tremendous opportunity to pass a bipartisan bill. We had a tremendous opportunity to pass a bill that would have shown the American people that we in this body have the ability to work together on big issues and solve problems. I think it is a shame we did not do that. I have to say, from my perspective--and I think I put as much time into this bill as anybody here in the Senate--it ended up being about partisan issues.…”