president, let me just say as i yield back time providing -- mr. risch: is the next -- is the vote -- mr. president, the next vote going to be on this amendment or are the judges going to be voted on first? the presiding officer: that is correct. the next vote is on the risch amendment. mr. risch: thank you. mr. kerry: i will yield back the time momentarily. i want to say one inning, the -- one thing, the two principal officers are bill perry who says the absence of the -- the b absence of the tactical nuclear should not detract from the merits of this treaty and he is in favor of our ratifying this treaty and jim schlesinger who was his co-author, who worked with republican presidents as secretary of defense and secretary of energy said that the ratification of this treaty is obligatory. i yield back the balance of my time. mr. risch: can i have my last minute? the presiding officer: the senator from idaho. mr. risch: mr. president, and, senator kerry, i respect that. i would remind everyone that i filed the letter dated december 17, senator kerry and s

president, let me just say as i yield back time providing -- mr. risch: is the next -- is the vote -- mr. president, the next vote going to be on this amendment or are the judges going to be voted on first? the presiding officer: that is correct. the next vote is on the risch amendment. mr. risch: thank you. mr. kerry: i will yield back the time momentarily. i want to say one inning, the -- one thing, the two principal officers are bill perry who says the absence of the -- the b absence of the tactical nuclear should not detract from the merits of this treaty and he is in favor of our ratifying this treaty and jim schlesinger who was his co-author, who worked with republican presidents as secretary of defense and secretary of energy said that the ratification of this treaty is obligatory. i yield back the balance of my time. mr. risch: can i have my last minute? the presiding officer: the senator from idaho. mr. risch: mr. president, and, senator kerry, i respect that. i would remind everyone that i filed the letter dated december 17, senator kerry and s

mr. risch: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from idaho. mr. risch: first i want to thank the chairman of the committee and the ranking member of the committee for the cooperation that we have had throughout this matter, and i -- as i said when i started my debate on this, i really believe everyone's working in good faith, in the best interests of the united states to attempt to develop and ratify a treaty that will be in the best interests of the united states. i was particularly encouraged this morning to hear the chairman of the committee indicate that he believes that the substance of what we're talking about here is an important issue, and i know he believes that. i know that the intelligence community believes it. i know that a lot of other parties that are involved with this believe that this is a very important issue. and we're going to talk about why this is an attorney issue as we go forward. after all, when we're dealing with a subject like this, we're talking about the security, the people of the united states of america, it is not a

mr. risch: we've 15 minutes left, other than my 10 minutes of closing? the presiding officer: that's correct. mr. risch: i would yield the floor to senator sessions. mr. sessions: mr. president, i would be asked to be vied of four minutes. mr. president, i think senator risch is correct and senator chambliss is correct to make the point that tactical nuclear weapons are more available for theft and to transship than stle-- than strategic nuclear weapons and it is a high policy of the unid states to reduce the risk of terrorists obtaining weapons of this kind, and this treaty does nothing about that. it does nothing about tactical nuclear weapons, which the russians care about; it is a big part apparently of their defense strategy. and they gave not one w on it. and whereas our president, who says he wants to move towards zero nuclear weapons in the world, a fan taft cal view -- a fantastical vw really, one which endangers our world, creates instability around the world and would he create more national security risk- did not negotiate this in any effecti

president, let me just say as i yield back time providing -- mr. risch: is the next -- is the vote -- mr. president, the next vote going to be on this amendment or are the judges going to be voted on first? the presiding officer: that is correct. the next vote is on the risch amendment. mr. risch: thank you. mr. kerry: i will yield back the time momentarily. i want to say one inning, the -- one thing, the two principal officers are bill perry who says the absence of the -- the b absence of the tactical nuclear should not detract from the merits of this treaty and he is in favorf our ratifying this treaty and jim schlesinger who was his co-author, who worked with republican predents as secretary of defense and secretary of energy said that the ratification of this treaty is obligory. i yield back the balance of my time. mr. risch: can i have my last minute? the presiding officer: the senator from idaho. mr. risch: mr. president, and, senator ker, i respect that. i would remind everyone that i filed the letter dated december 17, senator kerry and senator l

mr. risch: mr. president, i also -- mr. crapo: mr. president, i also have honored to join this bipartisan group who is speaking to the nation tonight about the fact that we cannot any longer delay dealing with the most significant problem our nation faces -- our debt and our fiscal difficulties. i was one of the members of our president's commission on fiscal responsibility and reform and had the opportunity over the past year to work on a bipartisan basis with people on that commission who took testimony from experts, evaluated the issues, studied the economies of the world, studied the details of what was happening in the american economy and came forward with a plan. this plan got 11 of the 18 votes on that commission. it was required by the president's order to get 14 of the 18 votes in order to force that plan to congress for a vote. and i was disappointed that that didn't happen, but let me make a couple of points of clarification. 11 of the 18 votes represents over 60% of the votes of th

mr. risch: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from idaho. mr. risch: mr. president, fellow senators, i come to the floor today to make some general comments about the matter under consideration and that being the possible ratification of the new start treaty. first let me say that i come at this with -- i think -- a unique perspective in that i sit on both the foreign relations committee and the intelligence committee. in addition to that, i'm rather new here, and so it is a fresh set of eyes, if you will, on these kinds of issues. the ability to be able to talk about these, to debate them, and then cast a vote is somewhat frustrating in that i share my friend and the distinguished senator from california, senator feinstein, the chairman of the intelligence committee, just like her, my views of this matter are colored to some degree and are affected to some degree by matters that we can't talk about here and that we can't disdisclose. nonetheless, that obviously cannot stop us from having what hopefully is a productive discussion about this subject matter.

risch. the presiding officer: the senator from indiana. mr. lugar: mr. president, let me just state at the outset that the amendment offered by the distinguished senator, senator risch, would in essence determine nature the treaty. we have been down this trail yesterday with a long debate about missile defense, but in fact the net result of amending the preamble and the text of the treaty is to kill it. that's the issue before the senate. there may be members in our body who do not like the treaty. there have been some, apparently, from time to time who have not been prepared to support any treaty with russia. i've recited at least from my recollection of previous debates that many senators simply said you can never trust the russians. you can't deal with the russians. simply what we ought to be doing is to build up defenses of our own so that regardless of what the russians have, what the russians intend to do, that we are prepared for that. indeed, that was some of the argumentation at the time that president ronald reagan first seriously got into these

mr. risch: thank you, mr. president. i'd like to respond briefly to my good friend from montana. first of all, let me say, i, of course, was at the hearings that the good senator referred to in our energy and natural resources committee, and ordinarily i wouldn't involve myself at all in -- in the internal matters in montana. natural resource issues are best decided by the people who live in the particular counties and the particular states where that resource is located. on this particular issue, however, one of the areas of land that's included in the land mass that my good friend from montana described in his bill is an area that's referred to as mount jefferson. and mount jefferson and the area included admittedly is entirely within the state of montana. however, the only way the southern part can be accessed is through the state of idaho, and i -- and i have to say that i couldn't agree more with my good friend from montana and that is that we need to keep our eye on the ball on jobs, jobs, jobs. the particular area in question is not a large area. i think that the total amo

mr. risch: this easily could be "the" most serious issue that we deal with in recent years and in future years. we have an enemy today that is at the door. this is an enemy that is out there somewhere and you can talk about philosophically. it's an enemy that is at the door. last year, the federal government spent around $3.8 trillion. that really doesn't mean anything to me or probably much to anybody because nobody knows what $3.8 trillion is. if you say it's a little over $7 million a minute, it starts to sound a little bit more like you could understand it. but none of that is important. it's how much do you have. and the federal government was short 41% of that money. 41 cent out of every dollar -- 41 cents out of every dollar that the united states government spent it borrowed. i hope everyone listened closely to the senator from nebraska when he said that if we funded only social security, medicare, medicaid, and the interest on the national debt, we would be short of the money coming in

mr. risch: mr. president, i also -- mr. crapo: mr. president, i also have honored to join this bipartisan group who is speaking to the nation tonight about the fact that we cannot any longer delay dealing with the most significant problem our nation faces -- our debt and our fiscal difficulties. i was one of the members of our president's commission on fiscal responsibility and reform and had the opportunity over the past year to work on a bipartisan basis with people on that commission who took testimony from experts, evaluated the issues, studied the economies of the world, studied the details of what was happening in the american economy and came forward with a plan. this plan got 11 of the 18 votes on that commission. it was required by the president's order to get 14 of the 18 votes in order to force that plan to congress for a vote. and i was disappointed that that didn't happen, but let me make a couple of points of clarification. 11 of the 18 votes represents over 60% of the votes of the commissioners on that commission. that'

mr. kerry: i move to table the risch amendment and i ask for the yeas and nays. and i ask unanimous consent that this be a ten-minute vote. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. is there a sufficient second? there appears to be a sufficient second. the question is on the motion to table. the clerk will call the roll. vote: vote: vote: the presiding officer: are there any senators wishing to vote or to change a vote? if not, on the motion to table, the ayes are 61, the nays are 32. the motion to table is agreed to. mr. reid: mr. president? mr. president? the presiding officer: without objection, the majority leader is recognized. mr. reid: we're in a position now, we don't have the consent agreement completely fixed, but we know what we're going to do. we're going to have three votes, three different amendments. it will be a half-hour debate on each amendment. so we likely will have another series of votes at 8:15 or thereabouts tonight. we'll have -- senator kerry will offer a consent agreement to that effect very shortly. in the meantime,

mr. kyl: but that we would be on the treaty and if people did not want to talk about the don't ask, don't tell, then we would be on the mccain-risch amendment and that that debate would conclude before 3:00 and then the mccain-risch amendment would follow the vot vote -- the vote on that would follow the vote on the don't ask, don't tell. mr. reid: i think that's totally appropriate. i would just add to my friend, while the chair is considering the consent agreement, one of the reasons we were able to get this agreement is we've worked pretty hard the last few days and the people thought we should have the afternoon off after we finish this information. as far as i'm concerned, i'll be in my office but if -- if people want more time, that's fine. but that was one of the conditions that some people wanted on your side and that's fine with me. we'll come in about midday tomorrow to resume consideration of the start treaty. mr. kerry: well, mr. president, reserving the right to object. the presiding officer: the senator from massachusetts. mr. kerry: so i understand that we now have a revised request which is that between now and the

mr. brown: senators should expect up to 3 roll call votes at 3:00 p.m., it will be in relation to the risch amendment and on confirmation of two judges, including judge pierson of cleveland. if there is no further business to come before the senate, i ask that it adjourn under the previous order. the presiding officer: the senate stands adjourned until senate stands adjourned until >> we now join our regularly scheduled tv programming already in progress. >> they have one person, one vote. i don't want to go into all my tirades about the american system and the senate and the way it looks in a kind of change. but you get teary and change. why z. so important important? americans here and many people on the left politically are against it because they say the tea party will get in and take away marriage in all of this. that is a concern, but it shouldn't be the major concern because the europeans don't have that. what they miss is that the changes that the left puts in when the left gets into power, when it has majority are irreversible. so if you bring back the right to unionize you are jus

mr. president, on march 17, 2010, the president pro tempore appointed, pursuant to senate resolution 458, senators mccaskill, hatch, klobuchar, whitehouse, udall of new mexico, shaheen, kaufman, barrasso, demint, johanns, risch and wicker to perform the duties provided for by rule xi of the senate's impeachment rules. under the leadership of its chairman, the senator from missour, mrs. mccaskill, and its vice chairman, the senator from utah, mr. hatch, the committee heard five days of testimony between september 13 and september 21. during that time the committee heard from 26 witnesses, 14 who were called by the house of representatives and 12 witnesses who were called by judge porteous. the committee also conducted pretrial depositions of four witnesses and admitted into evidence the testimony of a number of witnesses, including judge porteous, who had testified in prior proceedings, more than 300 factual stipulations, and hundreds of exhibits. mr. president, the senate is indebted to all of the members of this committee, who so conscientiously discharged their responsibility in this important constitutional matter. in addition to the committee's leadership, i would like to take particular note of the cont

mr. risch: mr. president, is amendment 4839 at the desk? the presiding officer: it is. the clerk will report. the clerk: the senator from idaho, mr. risch, proposes amendment numbered 4839 to treaty document 111-5. in the preamble to the new start treaty, insert after strategic offensive arms of the parties the following: acknowledging there is an interrelationship between nonstrategic and strategic -- mr. risch: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from idaho. mr. risch: i ask unanimous consent further reading of the amendment be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. risch: thank you, mr. president. mr. president and fellow senators, what we are going to do is tomorrow at noon when we take up, we're going to start with amendment number 4839. now, amendment number 4839 deals with the relationship between strategic versus -- strategic weapons, which this treaty deals with and technical weapons which this treaty does not deal with but should, and that is essentially the purpose of this. i think virtually everyone who is involved in thi