[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 148 (Monday, December 8, 2014)]
[Senate]
[Page S6365]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     TRIBUTES TO DEPARTING SENATORS


                               Mark Pryor

  Mr. NELSON. Mr. President, in just a few moments one of my best 
friends in the Senate is going to give his farewell address. Senator 
Mark Pryor of Arkansas, a former State legislator, former attorney 
general, and two-term Senator, was caught in this tidal wave in the 
last election that caused those of us in the Democratic Party in the 
former old Confederacy, now known as the South--and of course parts of 
the South these days don't look anything like the old Confederacy. As a 
matter of fact, my State of Florida is a good example. It is a 
compendium of people from all over the United States because folks from 
all over the country have moved to Florida, and thus it is a microcosm 
of the country.
  Arkansas is a State where the Pryor family has served with great 
distinction and enormous public service for decades. Although it 
temporarily comes to an end with Senator Pryor leaving the Congress in 
January, that is not the end of his public service. His mom and dad 
served so ably for years and years in the Governor's mansion, as well 
as the Senate, serving the people of this country and Arkansas. Mark 
and his family served our country so ably over the years and that 
public service will continue.


                            Jay Rockefeller

  I reflect back just a few days ago when Senator Rockefeller gave his 
farewell speech. He is another extraordinary public servant who has 
demonstrated selfless public service. He is a Senator who, because of 
his family heritage, could have done anything he wanted, but he chose--
after a life of privilege, growing up as a young man, and after having 
spent time abroad--to go to one of the poorest States in the Union. He 
first was a volunteer to the poor and later developed a distinguished 
record of public service that included secretary of state, Governor, 
and now a five-term Senator. I will speak later about other colleagues 
who are leaving.
  These are just two examples. Senator Rockefeller and my seatmate 
Senator Pryor are extraordinary public servants who when you talked to 
them and when you looked in their eyes, if they gave you their word, 
that was it. You didn't have to worry about it.
  Some say it is a throwback to the old days. The old days is a 
throwback that we ought to go to, when if a Senator gave you his or her 
word, that was it, when there was civility among Senators, when there 
was not an avalanche of outside money that came in to try to define you 
with statements that were not true.
  We see what has happened to our politics in America today with 
exceptional millions of dollars coming into a State, buying up 
television, to create a statement in 27 seconds often that is not true 
and that fact checkers say is not true, factcheck.org and Politifact.
  Yet when we talk to the TV stations and the broadcast stations and 
show them the fact checkers, they will still run the TV ads. But rather 
than talk about the mistakes that were made with the Citizens United 
Supreme Court case and missing by one vote in this Chamber several 
years ago--we had 59 votes and we needed 60 to cut off debate so we 
could get to the DISCLOSE Act, a DISCLOSE Act that did not counter the 
Supreme Court decision, it just said if you are going to spend all this 
money, you are going to have to say who it is that is doing the 
contribution.

  Of course, if we had been able to pass that, then all of this money 
would not be flowing because it is hiding behind this masquerade of the 
Committee for Good Government or the ABC committee for whatever. So 
they masquerade behind that veil to spend all of that money in order--
for their ultimate purposes.
  It caught a number of our people. Just look at what happened in the 
runoff election this last Saturday. Look at the imbalance of the 
spending on TV that occurred since the general election and the runoff 
in the State of Louisiana.
  I will speak about Senator Landrieu, Senator Udall, Senator Begich, 
and Senator Kay Hagan later.
  I wanted particularly to talk about Senator Rockefeller, our chairman 
of the commerce committee, and Senator Pryor, one of the finest public 
servants I have ever had a chance to serve with.

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