David Obey: “I would just like to observe, if we really want to measure whether anything real is happening here or not we would…”

“I would just like to observe, if we really want to measure whether anything real is happening here or not we would recognize that right now outside of the Wisconsin delegation on the House floor there are exactly two people from other States. Virtually everybody in this House, on both sides of the aisle, knows this is just one of those demeaning political exercises. We have simply got a couple of hours where people are going to get up and bash the President or bash Mr. Dole or bash somebody else. It does no credit to anyone in this institution. I got into politics for the same reason I am sure the gentleman did, and our other colleague from Wisconsin, Mr. Kleczka, did, and I hope everybody else did, because we thought politicians were supposed to solve problems, not use them in order to gain a political edge here or gain a political edge there and bamboozle somebody again. There is literally nobody on this floor. How on Earth can we ask people to vote on this legislation when they have not read it, they have not heard the debate, they could care less about the debate? They are already getting ready to go to the airport, and we are pretending this is a real legislative day. Grow up, fellas. Grow up.”