Dick Durbin: I can tell you this: I have great respect for Joe Biden -...

And the banks - hard to believe in a time when we're facing a banking crisis that many of the banks created - are still the most powerful lobby on Capitol Hill. And they frankly own the place.

Dick Durbin

banking-crisis powerful believe

We can't do much about ensuring that the homeland is safe if our local police and sheriffs' departments don't have the personnel they need to keep our streets and neighborhoods secure.

Dick Durbin

police safe needs

We have a long way to go, some tough issues ahead of us, and I'm sure there will be some obstacles in the path ... But the good faith effort that's being put into this absolutely is encouraging to me and gives me hope.

Dick Durbin

issues giving long

We have 11 million people in this country that need a pathway to citizenship.

Dick Durbin

pathways country people

If you look at the record and the enviable record which Sandra Day O'Connor has written, you find she was the fifth and decisive vote to safeguard Americans' right to privacy, to require our courtrooms to grant access to the disabled, to allow the federal government to pass laws to protect the environment, to preserve the right of universities to use affirmative action, to ban the execution of children in America.

Dick Durbin

law children america

You know, the purpose of reconciliation is to avoid the filibuster. The filibuster is an effort to talk something to death.

Dick Durbin

filibuster effort purpose

In my lifetime, it's the Supreme Court, not Congress, that integrated our public schools, that allowed people of different races to marry, and established the principle that our government should respect the value of privacy of American families. These decisions are the legacy of justices who chose to expand American freedom.

Dick Durbin

government race school

It simply isn't fair for senators to cut to the front of the line when seniors around the country have been forced to wait for hours to get a flu shot.

Dick Durbin

senior cutting country

Illinois Senator Paul Simon, once said "The test for a Supreme Court nominee is not where he stands on any one specific issue. The test is this: Will you use your power on the court to restrict freedom or expand it?"

Dick Durbin

illinois issues use

We all join the President in applauding the sacrifices made by our brave men and women in uniform. But we must continue to provide them the tools they need to accomplish the difficult tasks they face.

Dick Durbin

sacrifice brave men

Hard to imagine 40 years ago people could be convicted of a crime, fined, sent to prison for using the most common forms of birth control.

Dick Durbin

birth-control people years

It is unacceptable that disabled veterans in Illinois rank at the bottom of the list when it comes to disability pay. We owe our disabled veterans more than speeches, parades and monuments.

Dick Durbin

illinois veterans-day speech

Let me tell you, the first president to recognize the state of Israel was Harry Truman, a Democrat. And every president since, Democrat and Republican, have stood closely with Israel.

Dick Durbin

harry-truman israel president

Those of us who believe in God and those of us who have dedicated our lives to helping others in the name of God don't want to take a second seat to anyone who is suggesting that one word out of the platform means that the Democrats across America are godless.

Dick Durbin

helping-others mean believe

If we do nothing, as the Republicans suggest, we're going to see health care costs reach a point where small businesses can't afford it and families can't afford it. We're going to see people turned down from pre-existing conditions. We're going to find the Medicare doughnut hole - a gap in coverage that's going to hurt a lot of seniors.

Dick Durbin

senior hurt people

The Supreme Court is the last refuge in America for our rights and liberties.

Dick Durbin

liberty rights america

The courage of federal Judge Frank Johnson is well-known.He was the one that gave the legal authority for the right to march from Selma to Montgomery, and he suffered dearly for it. He was ostracized and rejected. His life was threatened as a result of it.

Dick Durbin

well-known march judging

Under unitary executive theory, the [George W.]Bush administration has claimed the right to seize American citizens in the United States and imprison them indefinitely without a charge.

Dick Durbin

administration united-states citizens

Justice [Sandra Day] O'Connor has been the critical decisive vote on many issues that go to the heart of who we are as a nation.

Dick Durbin

issues justice heart

Justice O'Connor was the fifth vote to uphold the time-honored principle, which bears repeating, of separation of church and state. There was real wisdom in the decision of our forefathers in writing a Constitution that gave us an opportunity to grow as such a diverse nation, and we should never forget it.

Dick Durbin

real writing opportunity

I can tell you this: I have great respect for Joe Biden -- a former colleague in the Senate (who) served us a vice president. He's an extraordinary person and I count him as a dear friend, he owes it to himself and his family to take a hard look at this.