[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 156 (2010), Part 13]
[Senate]
[Page 18979]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                     NEGOTIATING WITH THE PRESIDENT

  Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I was going to ask the minority leader, 
Mitch McConnell, who just insulted many of us by saying we don't care 
about small business or the economy, and as the chair of the Small 
Business Committee, I was going to ask him this: Since President Obama 
has been in such good faith in the last couple of days negotiating this 
package with him, my question was, does he regret saying on national 
television that his No. 1, primary goal is to unseat the President? I 
was going to ask him how he felt about that. That is a tough place to 
start a negotiation, which is why some of us are interested in how 
these negotiations might be going with that as a starting point. But he 
ran off the floor and did not answer that question. I am going to 
continue to ask it. Thank you.
  Let me just add that I do not agree with every policy of the 
President. Obviously, I am in a major fight over offshore oil and gas. 
But it is very interesting to us who have been in negotiations for 
quite some time on many important issues, how you start with saying: My 
goal is to defeat you, but here is the package we want you to accept. 
Some of us are having a hard time with that kind of negotiation.
  Thank you, Mr. President.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Dakota.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, what is the order?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator is recognized to speak for 10 
minutes.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I think I had requested 20 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. It is 20 minutes. The Chair is sorry.

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