Date: 2010-04-26
Speaker: MARK UDALL (democrat)
Chamber: S
State: Colorado

Senator MERKLEY of Oregon. AL FRANKEN and. of course. Senator MCCASKILL. who I spoke about as well. It is quite a group here. these new Members. their first or second terms in the Senate. I hope my other colleagues and their staffs were listening this evening. It wasnt just eloquence. it was common sense. They are people who have gone home and listened to their constituents. While we all may not agreeand I cant suggest that every amendment they have talked about is one I would necessarily even be supportive of when the debate beginsI firmly believe every Senator has equal status in this Chamber. Whether you are a chairman or a new Member. you are a Senator. and you deserve the courtesies of this institution. You deserve the history of this institution. You deserve to be heard and respected for your ideas and to be given the time to present them. to debate them. and to have an upordown vote on your proposals. That is how this institution is supposed to operate. I have been here for three decades. and in all of my three decades here. I have never gone through a period such as we have over the last couple of months where we cant even get to debate some of these critical matters. I am still optimistic. I guess that explains why I have been here for 30 years. I still want to believe this is going to work. that all we have been through is not for naught. As does my colleague from Missouri. I have great respect for my colleagues in this Chamber. Democrats and Republicans. and I have over the years. even with people I have had basic and fundamental disagreements with. I am convinced the majority of us herean overwhelming majoritywant to be associated with passing legislation that we believe will make a significant difference in the economic life of our Nation by at least limiting or prohibiting the kind of activities that led us to the problems and economic difficulties we are in. I hope in the coming days we will have a chance to move to this bill. I hope sooner rather than later. It may be a matter not well known by many. but we only have by my count about 45 or 50 legislative days left in this session. We are working about 31/2 days a week. We are here for about another 14 or 15 weeks. when you exclude the August break. the break for Memorial Day. the Fourth of July and. of course. our departure sometime I presume in early October for the elections. That does not give us a lot of time. Last week we spent the entire week on five nominations that. as I recalland I may be correctedpassed I believe overwhelmingly when the votes finally occurred. So 5 days on 5 people who were filibustered and delayed. That is all we did last week. That was it: five nominations that were ultimately agreed tonot controversial nominations. just ones where votes were designed to slow the process. I dont think the American people want us to leave our work in this Congress without having addressed this issue. I will end on this particular note. If. for some reason. Lord forbid. a major financial institution were to begin to fail this evening. we are in no better shape than we were in the fall of 2008. There is an implicit guarantee that such an institution would receive the backing of the them and our economy. Despite what I perceive to be overwhelming objections to that kind of a bailout occurring. that is one issue on which there seems to be unanimity. Yet. if tonight a problem began to emerge. we would be in a similar situation as we were 18 months ago. I dont know of a single Member here who would want that to occur. That issue alone ought to cause every one of us to move to get to this debate. That is a principal part of this legislation. There are other features as well. but that alone ought to be motivation to begin this debate. listen to each others thoughts and ideas. and to conclude that discussion and debate by passing this legislationor at least an amended version of this legislation. I thank these 12 or 13 colleagues for their patience. their eloquence. their determination. and their conviction. As I get ready to leave this Chamber in the coming months. I will leave with a high degree of confidence that this Chamber will be in good hands. After listening tonight to your words. advice. counsel. and determination. it is with a sense of optimism that we will get this bill done. I am confident of that as I stand before you this evening. With that. I yield the floor.