Political Quotes

“Thank you, Mr. President. I appreciate the comments of Chairman Corker, and I appreciate the two punch lines of the Senator from Kansas to his argument that I am strongly in support of. The first is that this is a very momentous topic, and there are many, many questions about an ultimate deal that we have to grapple with. Second, it is so much of the moment that the congressional sanctions themselves are so wrapped up in the discussion that Congress must have a role to fulfill our constitutional obligation and to actually do what we essentially set in motion by passing the congressional sanctions. We must have a role. So to the chairman and to all who are supporting the bill, I think we have got it in a good place on the floor, and I am proud to be a strong supporter of it. The only issue on which I would offer a slightly different take than the Senator from Kansas is this. I think by all objective standards, the negotiations to this point have produced a status quo that has been better than where we were before the negotiations. If you think back to before November 2013, Iran--although under punishing sanctions--was moving forward in a very dramatic way to build up an architecture. While the sanctions were hurting the Iranian economy, there was some argument that it was not slowing down their nuclear program. It was accelerating it because they were feeling isolated.…”