On the recordDecember 21, 2010
The challenge, I think, every person who is elected to Congress faces is: How do you challenge the institution but respect it? How do you stretch the limits but abide by tradition and see its importance? David Obey has managed, over the course of a long career, to do it. He came here as a young man, aged 30. When he came here and saw what was here, he didn't like everything he saw, and he did challenge it. He moved up in the hierarchy here, out of turn, faster than many people thought he should because he did challenge the institution, but he did it in a way that he respected what the Congress had to do as an institution. You know, people talk about his irascible temper, or his irascibility, but he leaves with the same passion to challenge the institution--to challenge its limits but to respect fundamentally that this institution has traditions that we all are custodians of. When we are at our best, we manage to do both. David Obey, over a long career, you have done that. Thank you very much.
