Political Quotes

“I am very glad that there are those watching us tonight and are paying attention to what we are saying because we have lots of constituents. I have lots of constituents back in Ohio certainly that are watching, and I am sure there are constituents watching from Maine and New Jersey and elsewhere. And I think they need to know how this bill came into being. We received this bill as a body, over 700 pages, I believe, on a Friday morning. We began that debate. We debated Friday afternoon and through the night and at three o'clock in the morning when most of the people who are watching us tonight were probably asleep. They finally called the vote. I would remind my colleagues that this is probably the most important piece of domestic legislation that this body has considered maybe in many years, and we recall that the President told us it was going to cost $400 billion. Now we find out that his own administration's actuary had indicated it was going to cost over $550 billion, and apparently he was told he would be fired if he told the Congress, those of us who are supposed to be representing the people of this country. He was told he would be fired if he told us the actual cost, an action that the CRS, the Congressional Research Service, is now saying was probably an illegal act. But anyway, at three o'clock in the morning they called the vote here in the people's House. And at the end of that 15-minute voting period, the bill had lost because it is a bad bill.”