During his travels yesterday, the Watchdog heard snatches of Senator Bernie Sanders’ filibuster on CNN-Radio. Would that Sanders’ speech and colloquy with other senators were a required course in every college in America! The following is from Sanders’ web site .
“There is a war going on in this country, and I am not referring to the wars in Iraq or Afghanistan. I am talking about a war being waged by some of the wealthiest and most powerful people in this country against the working families of the United States of America, against the disappearing and shrinking middle class of our country,” said the senator. You can watch the speech below (the largest of many postings of the speech on YouTube.com) or read the text here.
Saying he was prepared to speak “as long as possible” against a tax deal between the White House and congressional Republicans, Sen. Bernie Sanders took to the Senate floor to make the case against deepening the deficit and widening the income gap in America by extending Bush-era tax breaks for the very wealthy. “I am simply here today to take as long as I can to explain to the American people the fact that we have got to do a lot better than this agreement provides,” Sanders began (video).
After eight and a half hours of speaking without leaving the Senate floor, Sanders brought his day-long stand to a close Friday night. He concluded, “If the American people stand up and say, we can do better than this, that we don’t need to drive up the national debt by giving tax breaks to millionaires and billionaires, that if the American people are prepared to stand – and we’re prepared to follow them – I think we can defeat this proposal. I think we can come up with a better proposal which better reflects the needs of the middle class and working families of our country and, to me, most importantly, the children of our country. And with that, Madam President, I would yield the floor.”
