Political Quotes

“I thank the gentleman from California, my good friend, for yielding and for the job that he has done as chairman of the Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Subcommittee in the past. Let me begin by saying that we all want the government to reopen--all on this side, all on that side. We don't agree with this shutdown. I also want strong border security, and I know you all want strong border security. We disagree about how to get there. These can both be accomplished with a little word called ``compromise.'' I heard everybody throw around that word quite a bit and then go back to their hardened positions and forget what a compromise is. So I looked it up in the dictionary, because I thought maybe I was mistaken about what a compromise is. The dictionary says it is ``a settlement of differences by mutual concessions; an agreement reached by adjustment of conflicting or opposing claims, principles, et cetera, by reciprocal modification of demands.'' We can't call for a compromise and then go back to our hardened positions and say: ``I want everything I want, and you get nothing you want.'' This bill is not a compromise. If you would bring up the compromised conference bills between the House and the Senate, you would have my support, but that is not what this is. This is the Senate bill. We have a conference bill between the House and the Senate that was prepared to be brought to the floor last year and never made it. Bring up that conference report.…”