Political Quotes

“Once the conference is set and we begin meeting in a conference, it is like any other committee hearing where the public will be able to come in and listen. They will able to watch on C-SPAN, and it will be an open process. I will tell the Senator from Arizona that if we don't get to conference, we are going to have to have discussions, as a country, about how we manage our finances and our government moving forward, and those will be behind closed doors. So what the Senator is objecting to as to the closed-door secret meetings he is causing. I hope our Republican colleagues would allow us to move forward. As the Senator from Missouri said, we had 50 hours of debate, we had over 100 amendments which were considered. Not one amendment was offered or considered on the debt ceiling, which is now what they are objecting to if we go to conference. The Senator from Texas, I believe, offered 17 amendments, and he has been objecting because of this. Not one of them was about the debt ceiling. I know the Senator wants to have a debt ceiling debate on the floor of the Senate. He is welcome to come to the floor anytime and talk about the debt ceiling. We welcome that discussion. We believe our bills should be paid, but that is separate from what we are talking about here. We are talking about a budget resolution. Mr. McCAIN. How many amendments were considered?”