On the recordApril 6, 2011
Our soldiers on the front lines all over this world understand what a fight is about. If you have ever visited them in Iraq and Afghanistan, they have values. They know about their grandmothers and grandfathers, and they know about their families back home with their children. They know what they are fighting for. They will understand that we are here fighting for values. This government shutdown is not the blame or the fault of the President of the United States or the Democrats in the House or in the Senate. There has been an offer of $73 billion. It is a question of whether or not you want to solve this problem on the backs of grandmothers and granddads, on the backs of the families of the military persons who are on the front lines in Iraq and Afghanistan. Do you want to throw college students right out on their rear that are right in the middle of their school term by canceling their Pell Grants? Do you want to tell mothers taking their children to the clinic that there is no more Medicaid for them? Do you want to turn the lights out and close the door and say: America, we don't have any more values. I do not want to shut this government down. You are not going to shut it down on my watch, if we can work together. I am going to stand and fight for values, and we're going to pull together. We will stand and we will survive. However, let them shut the government down, if the Republicans refuse to compromise. Shut it down. Shut it down.…
