House Journal: Page 1992: Tuesday, May 8, 2001
To the members of my staff, Becky, Susan and Dan, I couldn't have asked for better.
To keep me anywhere near organized is a big task and I very much appreciate all that
they did for me.
And to Kyle, the big guy that's been sitting up here all year, I want to thank him.
He did a great job as the Page for me this year and we appreciate all his hard work.
And everybody in the bill room and the journal room and indexing and the doormen
and the pages and everybody else, we couldn't run this place without you. You make
this place doable, you make this place livable, and we appreciate each and every one of
your efforts.
Mr. Majority Leader, I don't think anybody's had a better organized session. I
think your efforts to keep the members informed about what was going on, when we
were debating bills, and your openness with that, was something to behold, something
that I had never accomplished to the degree you did as the majority leader, and you
need to be commended for that. Beyond that, I appreciate your friendship and your
counsel. We had a tough year together. It's not easy to be taken to task in a very
tough way in the paper as we worked our way through this legislative session, there
were certainly some assaults upon us, and I know how that affects you and it affects
me, but we got the job done, and I want to tell you I appreciate your leadership and I
thank you for your leadership for our caucus and also for the entire General Assembly.
It's time to go home, we have one more bill to do, it is time to go home. I know my
two young children have been with my mother-in-law because my wife is on a business
trip. I want to get home and I want to kind of relax for a while and as I look at those
things as I usually do, you'll have to forgive me for quoting my favorite poet, Jimmy
Buffet, and it's only right because I have to go to a wedding next week in the Bahamas,
so there won't be any special session next week. When I thought about the Bahamas, I
had to go to Jimmy Buffet, and forgive me, of the difficulty this year there were two
things that struck me, and one of these songs, called "Barometer Soup", says "For we
have plowed the seas and smoothed the troubled waters; come along, let's have some
fun, the hard work has been done." And indeed we did hard work this year. And
lastly, as I hopefully get out of the state next week just for a few days, see, as the song
"Changes in Latitudes, Changes in Attitudes," which I think symbolizes the feeling of
family in here, which simply says, "If we couldn't laugh, we'd all go insane." And I
think this is a family that laughs together, occasionally cries together when we have
tragedies, but it is a family that does work together, makes a difference in the lives of
Iowans; and so while we always hesitate to leave this family, we are excited to get back
to our real families.
And so I wish everyone the best in the future. We will gather again next month,
hopefully for just a very short session. I want to thank you once again for all your hard
work. Go home to your families, go home to your friends, be proud of what you did,
we'll fight another day on different issues, but as a body, the Iowa House of
Representatives, we did good work this year and I thank you for that. Thank you very
much.
SENATE AMENDMENT CONSIDERED
Gipp of Winneshiek called up for consideration House File 742, a
© 2001 Cornell College and
League of Women Voters of Iowa
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