See below for video of a fascinating exchange between Sen. Cory Booker, who has been holding the floor of the US Senate for nearly 24 hours now, and his friend Sen. Tim Kaine, who askes Booker about the economy and about the future of democracy.
First, Sen. Booker talks about Sen. Kaine, saying Kaine’s “like a pastor to me, he’s one of the more honorable men I’ve met in my life and struggles like me about faith and public service.” Sen. Booker then heaped praise on Sen. Kaine’s book (“Walk Ride Paddle: A Life Outside“), saying “I didn’t think it was going to be as beautiful as it was – I laughed, I wept, when you were attacked by spiders and things like that, I’m sorry I was laughing at your misfortune sir… It’s a great book, I’ve read a lot of my colleagues’ books, but this one really touched me.”
Sen. Booker then yields to Sen. Kaine, while holding the US Senate floor, saying that Kaine helped make his holding the Senate floor possible.
Sen. Kaine’s first question to Sen. Booker was about the economic situation we’re in. Sen.. Kaine said:
“I’m a big Bible reader…I’ve thought about it during your your talk since last night is this part of the Gospel of Matthew where he’s challenging people that he thinks are hypocrites and he says to them ‘You can discern the faces of the sky but you can’t discern the signs of the times.’..The way I view this vigil that you have been powerfully engaged upon is you are attempting to discern and explain the signs of the times to your colleagues and to our country and that’s very important that we do.
And I’d like to ask you one question about the signs of the times economically…You walked through how strong the economy was on the day this president was inaugurated and two months later the challenges of a volatile stock market, the challenges of rising prices, the challenges of declining consumer confidence, the challenges of predictions that there might be slow growth or even a recession. We will have a vote on the Senate floor tomorrow about Canadian tariffs, based on a resolution that I’ve introduced that we will have a vote on.
You talked at length about those tariffs and the effect that they have on Americans. As…I’ve traveled around my Commonwealth, my farmers and my small businesses, they’ve seen it before, they saw it in Trump term one, they know how dangerous it will be. They don’t want to pay more for groceries! They don’t want to pay more for building supplies! Farmers don’t want to pay more for fertilizer! My shipyards don’t want to pay more for aluminum and steel! They were promised that they would pay less, not pay more. They don’t want to be part of a campaign to demonize a nation that has been a friend of the United States and stood side by side with us in every war since the War of 1812. They don’t want to be part of a juvenile assertion by this president that that sovereign nation is the 51st state. They don’t want to be part of a name calling effort to call the prime minister of a sovereign nation ‘governor’. They’re trying to read the signs of the times.
Why is this administration that came in with such a strong economic hand doing so much so quickly to both hurt us economically but also to tarnish a relationship that has stood the test of time with an ally? The president often says that his goal is America first. We would all agree as members of this body in America first. But we would all passionately disagree with America alone. What is America alone going to get us? What will we turn to, who will we turn to when the allies that we’ve spent decades building relationships with now feel pushed aside? Yesterday, China announced that they were going to be working with Japan and Korea on a free trade zone, possibly to respond to US tariffs. Other nations are having to engage in hedging behaviors because they thought we were our we were friends and now they doubt that reality anymore.
And so as you look at the signs of these economic times – and then I’ll get to a second question about the signs of the times in our democracy – how are we to understand this and more importantly how how are we best to rectify it? How can we stand up for our families and reduce their burdens, not increase them? How can we stand shoulder to shoulder with linked arms with our allies to face off against adversaries? Reflect on the signs of the times and point us in the right direction, please.”
Finally, Sen. Kaine asks Sen. Booker about the future of our demoracy. Very powerful.
“This is a question about the signs of the times in our democracy. We will celebrate 250 years of American democracy in celebration – not a coronation, not a requium, not a wake, but a celebration. A week ago Sunday, 250 years ago, Patrick Henry stood on the floor of Henrico Parish, now known as St John’s Episcopal Church on Churchill in Richmond, at a moment of decision where people were challenged to understand the signs of the times at a moment of tyranny. And he asked the immortal question – and I almost view your vigil as asking the same question – about where we would stand in such a moment. And there were different forks in the road, a phrase that has attained some meaning recently. And Patrick Henry said, ‘as for me, give me liberty or give me death’.
You’re giving a liberty speech, my colleague. You’re giving a liberty speech as the nation begins to think about 250 years of democracy. The opposite of liberty, that which Henry was fighting against, was tyranny, was tyranny. I am one that believes that we should mark anniversaries, we shouldn’t just act steady state like this country was ordained and we’ll just go on forever regardless. We’re coming up on 250 years of American democracy and there is a live question about its continued existence that this generation is grappling with. Henry gave that speech at St John’s Church and a few months later, July 4 1776, the US declared its independence from England and our history in this new chapter began. And at various points along the way, during the 1850s say or during the 1950s, generations just like ours have had to grapple with the question of whether the experiment will continue or not.
Some of our national symbols have some unusual aspects to them that point to this experiment. We have a national anthem that ends with a question. Not an assertion, not a declaration, but whether the flag will still stand over the home of the free and the land of the brave question mark.
The state flag that Virginia adopted on July 5, 1776 is a most unusual flag – it has a woman representing Roman virtue standing astride a deposed tyrant whose crown is knocked off, who is holding a broken chain in his hand that he’s laying on the ground. It’s one of only six state flags with a woman on it. It’s the only state flag that features toplessness, which occasionally creates some raciness in school as students ask about it. But it’s also the flag with the most unique state motto of of any state. All states have mottos. 49 states’ mottos are positive – hope, eureka, excelsior, onward and upward…Michigan’s has the most unusual positive motto in Latin, ‘if you seek a pleasant peninsula look around you’. Well I wasn’t looking for a peninsula, but I’d rather it be pleasant than not. Virginia is the only flag and the only state with the motto that’s not positive, it’s a rebuke: sic semper tyrannis, thus be it always, thus be it ever to tyrants…it’s the only one that’s a rebuke. And it has stayed…since July 5, 1776. Many state flags have been changed in the last 20 years…Again the verb tense…always ever, it’s not in the current tense…it’s in the future tense, thus be it always to tyrants, thus be it ever to tyrants… asks us two questions 250 years later: do we retain the ability to recognize tyranny, do we retain the virtue to defeat it? Can we recognize tyranny? Can we retain the virtue to defeat it?
My friend, you are standing on the floor in the tradition of Patrick Henry. 250 years later you’re raising a question about liberty and our fidelity to it. And so my question to you would be, what gives you hope that the answer we will give to these questions as Americans as those commemorating a quarter millennium of American democracy, what gives you confidence that we will answer these questions in a way that will honor those who came before us?”
P.S. Missed this – Sen. Mark Warner also joined in the Sen. Cory Booker filibuster…
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