Political Quotes

“I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, it is just a real honor to be here tonight to tell my friend, Howard Coble, how much he means to me and how much I am going to miss him here in the House of Representatives. He has not only been an outstanding leader on the House Judiciary Committee--and by the way, I hope the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Jones) will compile all those wonderful photographs and put them in some kind of a binder so that--a book maybe, so that all of us can see and enjoy all those historic caricatures that have been created in Howard's honor over these many years--but not only has he been a great member of the House Judiciary Committee, he has been a close personal friend of mine for more than 20 years. In addition to serving with him on the committee, he is somebody who is always turning to others, taking an interest in them. He has an uncanny ability to remember the mascots for virtually any high school or college that someone attended and his ability to always ask others how they are feeling. With respect to this last point, he has defused more than a few difficult conversations by asking people, ``How is your back feeling?'' Inevitably, especially if someone is older, they begin to talk about back problems and forget what they were so exercised about. He is also a great tennis player. For nearly 20 years, I have had the honor of playing tennis with him very early on Wednesday mornings.…”