John Cornyn: “So it is a very strange process we are engaged in here. I respect the distinguished chairman, but I remind him, at the…”

“So it is a very strange process we are engaged in here. I respect the distinguished chairman, but I remind him, at the time we voted on this, to quote him, the distinguished chairman of the Budget Committee said, ``It certainly will not do any damage to this resolution if it were to pass.'' I understand there was a subsequent conversation with the Parliamentarian that raised this issue. But I suggest in most proceedings that I am familiar with, there is some notion of waiver, that you have a responsibility to speak early, rather than to create a false impression that we are going to do something here to keep taxes low, to create a 60-vote budget point of order, rather than lay low and then raise an issue late in the game that could have been raised and addressed earlier. None of that is to impute any bad faith to the distinguished chairman of the Budget Committee. It is just to say this is a very strange process, one I think the American people, anybody who happens to be listening or watching, would say: This must be a Washington, DC phenomenon where we suspend reality, we accept amendments by a bipartisan vote and now a motion to instruct, only to ignore them even though they represent the will of the Senate. I think that does not enhance the image of the Senate or the Congress in the eyes of the American people. The fact is, if we do raise taxes, it will be like a wet blanket on the American economy.”