Jobs, Energy, Families, and Disaster Refief Act of 2008 - Motion to Proceed
Floor Speech
JOBS, ENERGY, FAMILIES, AND DISASTER RELIEF ACT OF 2008--MOTION TO PROCEED -- (Senate - July 28, 2008)
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Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, without prolonging this discussion endlessly, I want to take a moment to congratulate my friend from Oklahoma for his courage in making an extraordinarily important point to our colleagues, which is the way you pass legislation on a consultative basis. I would say to my friend from Oklahoma, I remember when we were in the majority and I was the second ranking member of our conference, having to tell our Members frequently that the only way we could get anything accomplished was to take tough votes, and that was the challenge of being in the majority. If you want to move something along, you have to give the minority an opportunity to have their votes.
There was always grumbling about it: Can't you do anything? Invariably people would say: I am up this cycle; I can't possibly do this.
In order to make a law rather than just check the box, the process in the Senate means the minority gets to offer amendments. What is going on here is a fundamental shifting of the way the Senate has historically acted. I know the majority leader is under a lot of pressure from his Members frequently to avoid tough votes. I have been there. I have heard those demands. But if your operating mode is to avoid all tough votes, you never accomplish much.
We haven't given up on this side. Our hope is that this Congress could actually be remembered for having done at least a few things that were important to the country. So I want to shift now to the issue that we have been sort of sparring back and forth on over the last week or so, and that is the energy issue. I owe the majority leader a report on a leadership meeting I had just a few hours ago. We had a good discussion. I think my membership and my leadership team believed that the consent agreement he offered earlier today went a long way toward meeting the requirements that many of us on this side of the aisle had believed were sort of a bare minimum threshold of credibility to actually have a chance of making a law rather than checking a box. When we finally end our public discussion tonight, I just want to say to my friend the majority leader publicly, I would like to have a discussion privately about how we might go forward. It sounds to me like we are very close to having a consent agreement that would give us a chance to operate on a major issue in the way the Senate has historically dealt with significant issues.
I want to end my comments tonight on a note of optimism, that we might be close to doing something important for the country on a very large issue. Again, on the question of the way the Senate functions, I congratulate not only the Senator from Oklahoma but the Senator from Pennsylvania for their strong insistence that they be allowed and that all Senators, really, be allowed to be part of the legislative process. It is really the only way we can actually pass laws, rather than just score points with each other. I think the American people would like to see us do something significant about the No. 1 issue in the country.
I end the evening publicly--and I will continue conversations with the majority leader privately--on a note of optimism that we might well be on the verge of getting an agreement that would be acceptable to both sides and give us a chance to go forward.
I yield the floor.
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