Political Quotes

“I rise to talk about why we are here, but I will just begin with a definitive statement: There is not one of the 49 Democrats in this Chamber who wants the government to shut down. And I will conclude with this, but I will just state that if the government of the United States shuts down, it is for one reason and one reason only, and that is that the majority leadership does not want to work weekends. I will come back to that in a minute. Why are we here? We are here debating on a House continuing resolution drafted without Democratic support or consultation at the eleventh hour and sent over to us on the last day of a spending authorization period. Most folks in the Chamber know--but those watching on television may not--we were supposed to have a budget and an appropriations bill by October 1. That did not happen. So the leadership suggested that we agree to work and find an appropriations bill and a budget by December 8. That didn't happen. Then there was the suggestion that we delay until December 22, and that didn't happen. Then there was a vote on December 22 to delay until January 19--today. Apparently, that is not going to happen. The request today is that we pass a continuing resolution that would put this matter to the 16th of February, and we would then be in the fifth month of the fiscal year without a budget deal. Why would we want to do that? What we should want to do is not budget by continuing resolution, but actually do a budget deal.…”