“I take it as an insult, and I will not lie down and say people can call me dishonest, misleading or misrepresenting — I have never intentionally done so and like I say, ‘If dueling were legal in Kentucky, if they keep it up, you know it’d be a duel challenge.'”

— Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), on This Week, responding to plagiarism charges.

Roll Call: “Just minutes after the swearing-in of the newest senator, New Jersey Democrat Cory Booker, the Senate dove headfirst back into a standoff over executive and judicial branch nominations.”

“Democrats failed to overcome, 56-42, a filibuster against the choice of Rep. Melvin Watt (D-NC) to become the top housing finance regulator, with Republicans also looking to block Patricia Ann Millett’s nomination to fill one of three vacant seats on the District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals.”

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) was in New York City for a fundraiser and praised Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) but had some choice words for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV), the New York Daily News reports.

Said Coburn: “I have great relationships with Chuck Schumer. I don’t say that in Oklahoma… There’s no comity with Harry Reid. I think he’s an absolute asshole.”

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) threatened “to throw a wrench into Senate operations over the investigation of last year’s attack on Americans in Benghazi, Libya,” Roll Call reports.

“The Republican could cause a bottleneck for routine executive branch appointments that require Senate confirmation on which Senate Democrats wouldn’t want to burn through the time needed to overcome an objection.”

Sen.-elect Cory Booker (D-NJ) is set to become the most junior senator on Halloween, Roll Call reports.

He will be sworn in by Vice President Joseph Biden at noon on Oct. 31.

“When Mike Lee toppled longtime Republican Sen. Robert F. Bennett here in 2010, it was the tea party’s first big triumph. But now, after a 16-day government shutdown, it’s Lee who faces a revolt within his own party,” the Washington Post reports.

“Lee’s approval ratings in Utah have cratered, and prominent Republicans and local business executives are openly discussing the possibility of mounting a primary challenge against him. Top Republicans are also maneuvering to redesign the party’s nomination system in a way that would likely make it more difficult for Lee to win reelection in 2016.”

Wall Street Journal: “Critics in the Republican Party, including former governors and
sitting legislative leaders, openly blame Mr. Lee for helping chart a
course they say weakened the party’s standing nationally and dented a
state economy reliant on tourists drawn to its national parks.”

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-AZ) told ABC News that he doesn’t need “99 new friends” in the Senate.

Rick Klein: “That’s just as well, but the problem for Republicans who see Cruz’s actions these past few weeks as problematic is that he doesn’t need any friends in Washington to do it all over again. Cruz is deriving his power – and the power of his convictions – well outside of Washington. Like Sarah Palin before him, efforts to shun and sideline him figure to only make him stronger, at least in the near future. Cruz’s reaction to the series of events he helped trigger speaks to the split inside the Republican Party: He sees victory in the process and defeat in the outcome. Most of his erstwhile friends see a disastrous process and the only hopeful signs in the way it came to an end.”

“He still thinks he’s smarter than everybody else. He might be able to
work a calculus problem better than I can. But he can’t legislate better
than I can.”

— Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV), in a Huffington Post interview, about Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX).

Dallas Morning News:
“It might be time for Ted Cruz to get a dog. Because as the saying
goes, if you want a friend in Washington, that’s what you do. And by the
time Cruz’s crusade to defund Obamacare finally crashed to a halt
Wednesday, the Texas senator had precious few friends left. The
government shutdown alienated colleagues in both parties. It generated
fresh animosity toward the tea party and a flurry of recriminations
toward Cruz. Voter support for the Republican Party plunged. And the
health care law survived unscathed.”

“My junior colleague has become a national figure in record time. I don’t think there’s a time in the history of our state we’ve had two more influential senators than we do right now. And I think that’s good for Kentucky.”

— Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY), quoted by the Lexington Herald-Leader, on Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY).

The Fix: “Here’s one of the worst kept secrets in Washington: The two men tasked with finding a solution to the government shutdown and the looming debt ceiling deadline over the next few days don’t like each other all that much.”

“Politics — particularly when the stakes are this high — is a personal business, and trust is at the core of any deal. It’s why McConnell and Vice President Biden were able to negotiate a fiscal cliff deal when no one else could. The two men aren’t even close to ideological allies, but they trusted each other at some basic level. That’s what matters. And that’s what Reid and McConnell seem to lack. Circumstances in politics are always changing and neither McConnell nor Reid could have lasted this long in politics without being willing and able to adjust when necessary.”

Paul Kane: “If the two wily 70-somethings who are trying to
resolve the current crisis make a deal once again, they will do so
despite an increasingly bitter and distant relationship that some say is
so fraught with animosity that it endangers their talks.”

“I love Ted Cruz. I love the fact that he’s got the pee and vinegar in him to want to take on things. But I believe if you’re going to try and win battles, then you need to pick battles that you can win, rather than kill your troops going up a hill that you can’t.”

— Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK), quoted on the Laura Ingraham Show.

Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-OK) “underwent emergency heart surgery in Tulsa on Friday after a routine test showed extreme blockage in five arteries,” the Oklahoman reports.

“Inhofe said it would be a few days before it is safe to fly on an airplane and he wasn’t interested in driving back to Washington while recuperating. It is not clear when the Senate will hold more roll call votes regarding the partial government shutdown.”

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV), “in an unusual aside in the midst of a tense debate over the budget impasse, took to the floor to remind lawmakers about the rules of decorum. Guidance like: Senators should not address each other by their first names, they should address each other in the third person … and so on,” Fox News reports.

Said Reid: “We all have to understand that these rules create a little bit of distance so senators are more likely to debate ideas and less likely to talk about personalities. And if we do that, we maintain a more civil decorum as a result. So I bring this matter to the attention of senators because we’ve fallen out of this habit. It’s gotten worse the last month or so.”

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) “faced a barrage of hostile questions Wednesday from angry GOP senators, who lashed the Texas tea party freshman for helping prompt a government shutdown crisis without a strategy to end it,” Politico reports.

“At a closed-door lunch meeting in the Senate’s Mansfield Room, Republican after Republican pressed Cruz to explain how he would propose to end the bitter budget impasse with Democrats, according to senators who attended the meeting. A defensive Cruz had no clear plan to force an end to the shutdown — or explain how he would defund Obamacare, as he has demanded all along, sources said.”

Said one Senate Republican: “He kept trying to change the subject because he never could answer the question. It’s pretty evident it’s never been about a strategy – it’s been about him. That’s unfortunate. I think he’s done our country a major disservice. I think he’s done Republicans a major disservice.”

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) recently challenged Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) at a closed-door meeting, saying there is a GOP “leadership vacuum” in the upper chamber, The Hill reports.

Two GOP senators confirmed the exchange but Coburn declined to talk about his private conversation.

John Dickerson: “In keeping with that sense of civility — in which members refer to each
other as ‘my good friend’ when they mean ‘that craven charlatan’ — I will characterize my reporting on the views of many of Cruz’s Republican colleagues in a similarly circuitous manner: Their affection for him this week became so qualified as to be indistinguishable from hatred.”

“They don’t keep Senate records about this kind of thing, but it’s likely that no senator has created as many enemies in his party in as short a time as the junior senator from Texas.”

Sen. Ted Cruz’s (R-TX) “crusade to dismantle President Obama’s health care law has helped cement his status as an emerging hero of the Tea Party and conservative grass roots. But it is stoking resentment and derision from many other Republicans, including his own Senate colleagues, who see his campaign as impractical, self-interested and potentially damaging to the party’s electoral efforts in 2014 and beyond,” the New York Times reports.

Politico: “You can get ahead in politics by ticking off some of the people in Washington all of the time, or all of the people in Washington some of the time… Cruz is testing the consequences of ticking off everyone in Washington all of the time.”

David Hawkings: “Other than applause from a modest collection of fellow Republicans, did he gain much of genuine worth for his considerable talk-a-thon troubles? The ledger of political costs and benefits looks close to impossible to push toward balance.”