Political Quotes

“I yield myself the balance of the time. Madam Chairman, let me just comment on a few points here that were made by my friends on the other side of the aisle. There was some concern about the timing of the hearing and the people who were invited. I just want to make this point: when the hearing was held, we have to have advance notice. We had witnesses coming in from across the country, so we are going to have the hearing on the day we said because of the expense incurred by those private citizens who wanted to come here and testify to help protect private water rights. The second point is this was a bipartisan bill, as my colleague from Colorado (Mr. Polis) admitted. He was an original cosponsor of the bill. Maybe that was a reason why my friends on the other side of the aisle did not call a witness for or against the original legislation. I just wanted to make that point. The hearing was scheduled, and it had to go through because of the expense of the private citizens coming in to testify. I want to make another point, too, that some of my colleagues have made. Several of them have said that this legislation redefines Federal water rights. Madam Chairman, that is simply not true. If they read the bill, they would see that the definition is for the purpose of this act only, meaning that the definition is only for this act, so that doesn't hold up either.…”