Lois Frankel Quotes

What Congress does is respond to pressures that are upon it.

I think politicians get hamstrung by the nature of politics when the private sector can really do great things.

You know the way Washington works. Once you start floating ideas, they are immediately attacked by all the different interest groups before the ideas can be brought to fruition.

In my opinion, it is not in our interest to have complicated negotiations with a region, and then have to follow it up with 535 negotiations at home. I have experienced recounts, and it is better to vote once.

Getting one bill passed is close to impossible. Ask any kid who has spent a summer in Washington, or better yet a semester, and can't understand how people tolerate its menu of constant frustration. Imagine mastering it.

In constant pursuit of money to finance campaigns, the political system is simply unable to function. Its deliberative powers are paralyzed.

You do not need to have a 2,400-page bill come out of Washington, D.C.

The Congress is virtually incapable of passing any reforms unless they first get permission from the powerful special interests who are most affected by the proposal.

I think there's a lot to learn from Rockefeller on how to pass legislation.

If it's necessary to join a caucus and get a committee assignment, I'll do it.

America's political system has evolved over the last 50 years in ways that have enhanced the power of business lobbies.

One of the tragedies of the Bush administration is that we went back to business as usual, make a deal with the Democrats, let's all be friends in Washington philosophy.

There's a lot of politics over who gets the next allocation of Congressional funding.

Look, I think by the time my case was over and other ones, everybody on both sides of the aisle in Congress said we can't run a government by this kind of process and they repealed the law and that's good.

People need to understand that in Washington, the process is the punishment.

Politics are a very unsatisfactory game.

You can't use tact with a Congressman! A Congressman is a hog! You must take a stick and hit him on the snout!

I've seen senators, whose character and intelligence I know reasonably well, vote a certain way just because staff tells them to.

You cannot rely on House or Senate staff to pass a piece of legislation for you, but if you have antagonized staff, they can block you.

The last thing you want is to have to make a decision for political purposes.

You cannot make elected officials … do what they will not do.

The employment had no reference whatever to anything pending in Congress.

I don't care what kind of speeches you make as long as you don't vote against the appropriations.

There’s a sausage machine on Capitol Hill. We’ve given the sausage machine the right kind of ingredients. Now it’s up to the sausage machine to turn out the right kind of legislation.

Our hope is that an omnibus bill is put together so we can work through our friends on the leadership staff to insert the language at the very end of the process, instead of working through the normal appropriations process—which involves too many people and could jeopardize our legislative fix.