Political Quotes

“I want to join my colleague from Hawaii, Senator Schatz, whose reasons for avoiding a shutdown are points that we all share, as his State also has suffered a devastating fire now in Maui, where we in Vermont have suffered a major flood this summer and need FEMA aid. There are a couple of things I just want to say. No. 1, I want to express my gratitude to my colleagues in the Senate who have come together--Leader Schumer and Leader McConnell--in bipartisanship, where we have a way of passing a bill to keep the lights on, to keep government functioning. No good comes out of a shutdown, to quote Senator McConnell. Like Senator Schatz, I have been through it before. And as Senator Schatz has said, when you ask the folks who literally explicitly favor a shutdown, ``What is next?'' they don't have any answer and don't seem to think they need to have an answer. And we do. The consequences of a shutdown are really devastating in large ways and in small ways. A shutdown means our men and women in uniform don't get paid. Seriously? We are going to condone asking people who are protecting the safety of this Nation to do it without pay? That is what shutdown advocates are saying. It is no big deal to them. And on some small things, I got a letter from a Vermonter whose heart has been set on taking his family to a hike in the Grand Canyon. I don't know if any of you have ever done that hike. You have to go on the website. It is almost like a lottery.…”