[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 12 (Thursday, January 26, 2012)]
[Senate]
[Page S137]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         FAREWELL TO THE PAGES

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, if I could just take a moment. I know my 
friend from Arkansas is here to speak.
  This is the last day this group of pages, who have been here since 
September, will spend in the Senate. I believe I am going to speak at 
their graduation--I am quite sure that is true--tomorrow.
  I think the pages render such terrific service to this body. They do 
a lot of things. They get very little credit for what they do, but we 
depend on them for some of the most menial tasks a lot of times. But 
they are always polite. I have never had one treat me impolitely in all 
of the years I have been in the Senate. I can only speak from personal 
experience, and I have said this before on the Senate floor, and I will 
say it again: My two oldest grandchildren--granddaughters--both served 
in the Senate as pages, and it really changed their lives. I say that 
without any reservation. They became more in tune with what is going on 
in our country, and it hasn't left them. They look back with great--I 
don't know if ``reverence'' is the right word, maybe that is the wrong 
choice, but they look back certainly fondly on their experience here in 
the Senate.
  I hope these young men and women understand how much we appreciate 
what they do. I do hope from a personal perspective that they have 
benefited as much as my two granddaughters did during their time here.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Franken). The Senator from Arkansas.

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