i always have area and if you have an objective you want, you want to bill rhodes, then you do that which is necessary to make it happen. if you choose not to, your ideologically pure, you win your next election, and you decline. or people make the conclusion as they have on our water spill for which there was no federal regulation whatsoever, of which i was probably responsible because i was governor for eight years. but did nothing about it. if you don't take responsibility, you have no future. that gets to the very bottom of what divides this country. it is not republicans and democrats. roy blunt and i have been friends for years. he likes me, and i like him. things work. but, you have to be willing to raise taxes. to pay for things where we are eons behind. modern bridge structures. the list is endless. you want a good way to find out where a good standard is, you go to nist. he will do it fairly and at low cost. to dr. low, who runs a university, which does not have endless amounts of money, i am full of sympathy. i can't walk away as a senator from being part of a solution to his p

i always have area and if you have an objective you want, you want to bill rhodes, then you do that which is necessary to make it happen. if you choose not to, your ideologically pure, you win your next election, and you decline. or people make the conclusion as spill foron our water which there was no federal regulation whatsoever, of which i was probably responsible because i was governor for eight years. but did nothing about it. responsibilityke , you have no future. bottom ofto the very what divides this country. it is not republicans and democrats. roy blunt and i have been friends for years. he likes me, and i like him. things work. but, you have to be willing to raise taxes. to pay for things where we are eons behind. modern bridge structures. the list is endless. you want a good way to find out where a good standard is, you go to nist. he will do it fairly and at low cost. to dr. low, who runs a university, which does not have endless amounts of money, i am full of sympathy. away as a senator from being part of a solution to his problem. that is what we are doing here. we are wal

no matter how bad it gets, no matter how much stuff is thrown at them, internally bill clinton once said to young rhodess, whatever anybody else says about you you have to be who you are and don't listen to the rabble yelling at you. does christie have that? have you ever been with him that he has the iron makeup that he can they can more of this crap when it comes? because it's going to come from the prosecutors and the state legislature. more coming here. >> i think that is one of his great strengths hi, can take it. >> and mark mentioned the example of bill clinton. anybody who covered bill clinton does not count any politician out if they have the act to show that resilience. and maybe he does. >> were you there in new hampshire in '92 when he was handing out videos? >> exactly. you don't want to count him out. but i don't think he is a good fit in this party. and in the end that's a bigger problem for him. >> will his ego carry him, mark? the sheer strength of his will power to fight this crap storm? >> it's attractive to people. it's attractive to donors. i'll say again. i've said this on the prog

the bill is the product of the product of a bipartisan agreement struck earlier this month by rhode islandrat jack reed and a nevada republican and eight other senators. which will probably become a lead next week, will reauthorize unemployment benefits for the next five months. be covered by extending so-called pensions moving, which was set to phase out this year. sat ruling gives companies more pensionmake payments to funds. governor mccoy will raise the minimum wage in his state to $10.10 per hour by 2017. that is the highest of any state in the country. the governor plans to sign the a restaurant where he and the president gathered for lunch. now time for hotshots, a look at some of the most compelling images of the day. in hamburg, germany, it's time for a centuries-old spring , guiding swans back to the city's outer link. wildlife workers helped about 100 swans back to the lake. the swans are an important part of the city. there is an old belief among locals that homburg will remain free as long as swans live on the river. -- while here in new york we are still getting in tokyo,empe

rhode island needs a long-term bill to eliminate this current ancestor of uncertainty and allow the state to move forward with a program that puts citizens to work and keeps our economy going. i appreciate the opportunity to testify before you today and look forward to your questions. >> thank you. we have been asked to do an unusual intervention. because of my respect and admiration -- >> we are talking about something we are in total agreement on. >> this, too. >> well, infrastructure, right? >> 2 out of 100 -- >> that's good. we are delighted to have the witnesses here, and i want to make sure you got my message this morning. i thought we would have a chance to talk. i had a hard job once. i tell my friends up here. being the mayor of the city, there is no hiding place there. like the trash system ends up in your front yard. it did in mind. i have a statement i will not read. i will submit it for the record. i am sure the chairman will allow me to do that. in there i would make a reference to what happened yesterday. we are talking about changes in ozone, how that could put us out of a

of the recently launched senate action force headed by barbara boxer and rhode island senator sheldon whitehouse. >>> a new bill would regulate california ally medical marijuana spri. sb 1262 was introduced late last month by a southern california lawmaker. it could oversee farmers and markets as well as the doctors who prescribe medical pot. california was the first state to authorize medical marijuana back in 1996 but no one knows how many dispensaries and patients there are in the state because the law did not give government agencies a role in tracking the information. >>> a colorado couple has opened what may be the first legal marijuana club. the owners say members will have to bring their own marijuana and only food and drinks will be sold. members will be asked to sign a code of conduct saying they will not drive stoned. >> we went to the town. we went to the marshal. we went to jeff guard, our attorney, he talked with the d.a. and we basically got everybody's approval. >> marijuana became legal in colorado in the first of the year. washington is the only other state to legalize marijuana. >>> 7:16. wel

thanks to all my colleagues, especially my colleague from rhode island, who have been involved in this process. i look forward to moving to this bill very soon and am hopeful that congress can finally, finally resolve this matter as soon as possible to help restore some stability for the millions of unemployed americans looking to get back to work. madam president, i yield the floor. suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: quorum call: a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from new jersey. mr. menendez: mr. president, i ask that the quorum call be vitiated. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. menendez: mr. president, i rise to express my robust concern about russia's actions and the continuing escalations of tensions in central and eastern europe. even with ukranian troops leaving crimea, russia continues to extort the ukraine, disavowing an agreement on gas prices that was part of a bilateral agreement allowing russia to lease the black seaport in the crimea for its fleet. russia is now arguing that it no longer has to provide the discounte

thursday, march 13 through monday, march 24, senators king, reed of rhode island, rockefeller and casey be authorized to sign duly enrolled bills or joint resolutions. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. reid: i ask unanimous consent, madam president, that that -- i have a brief statement here. i know everyone is excited to hear, but everyone should be advised that when we return after next week, there is so much, so much to do. we need to pass the ukrainian bill that the foreign relations reported yesterday. we have a new bipartisan unemployment insurance compromise introduced today that was put together by a group of bipartisan senators. we have the s.g.r., the called doc fix to prevent a 24% cut to medicare payments to doctors, which will be extremely hurtful to patients. we have to do that. we have a backlog of nominations we have to do. and everyone should understand that i hope it's not necessary, but because of the enormous amount of work we have to do this month, senators should be on notice, all senators that there is a high probability that we will need to be in session the weekend of march 29 and 30 before

connecticut, massachusetts, montana, new york, pennsylvania, and rhode island are playing by the new rules congress established in the farm bill and thankfully, thankfully they are saying that they are not going to let low-income food insecure people in their states feel the pain of these cuts even if congress is going to cruelly and cowardly cut snap in the name of deficit reduction. i sit on the agriculture committee and i remember when the committee didn't have the notes to abolish the heat and eat program entirely. the $20 level was supported by the chairman of the committee and now the law of the land. yet the distinguished speaker of this thousands continues to say that states are somehow cheating when they are doing -- when all they are doing is following the law that he shepherded through this house. perhaps he didn't read the bill. or perhaps he doesn't understand the fact that there are millions and millions of people in this country who are hungry. i want to commend the governors of these states, including the republican governor of pennsylvania, and the governor of my home state of massachusetts, for doing the righ

president, the senator jack reed of rhode island, senator elizabeth warren of massachusetts and i are putting together a package of bills. we're going to address this issue from a lot of different perspectives. there is no reason why a college student should sign up for a private loan with higher interest rates and worse conditions for payback when they are still eligible for government loans which are more flexible and lower interest rates, yet some of these irresponsible schools steer their kids into private loans. the kids don't know any better. neither do their parents. secondly, they end up loaning money to these students and to their families, that they will never, ever, ever be able to pay back. jack reed says they ought to have some skin in the game. at some point, if they have overextended in loans, they ought to have to eat some of those losses, where the students can't pay it back. and senator warren, elizabeth warren, is tackling the even bigger issue about refinancing college loans. what's it all about? i see senator stabenow on the floor today. it's about giving a fair shot to these families and these stud

the article reported that in rhode island, a utility received permission to raise prices 12% over the previous year. in pennsylvania, the utility bills have tripled in some places. what's shocking to me is "the new york times" is connecting these increases back to the epa's regulations. so i have to wonder, is it even remotely possible that the utility mact rules created 8000 net permanent jobs as the epa said it would? if this is cause electricity prices to triple in some areas, how is that possible? if or again the congress, i was in business. when input cost will up, it doesn't create jobs. it lowers profits, put strains on the margins of the business. the same is to withhold economy. winning input cost as significant as electricity begins to soar in cost or wobble in reliability, the impact is negative and then felt across the entire economy. it destroys jobs, doesn't create 8000 new jobs. the obama epa can get away with this kind of distortion proves the agency in my opinion is out of control. this is something i'm going to focus on for the rest of the year. it's so much important for us not to. dpas impact may be cold now -- ol

bill by the end of april. the committee heard from state and local officials on the issue the panel includes transportation officials from rhode island and vermont as well as mayors of indianapolis and oklahoma city. [inaudible conversations] >> good morning. we will come to order in today's hearing will provide the committee the opportunity to hear from state and local officials as transportation stakeholders about the importance of federal transportation funding and their priorities are the reauthorization of map-21. today's panel truly represents a great cross-section of the country. as transportation leaders at the state and local level they know what is at stake. without sustainable funding and a sound highway trust fund. i'm a former county supervisor in another lifetime and i know how tough that job is and how important maintaining safe and efficient transportation systems are to local communities. when something goes wrong people show up at your door and i know that from personal experience. according to the u.s. department of transportation's recently released 2013 conditions and performance report about 49% of highwa

. >> five senators an each side drafting this bill, bipartisan effort, take a look at who is involved. the lead sponsors on both sides, jack reed of rhodecoming from states with high unemployment. >> this has been a very stressful situation for lawmakers and the 2 million families of the long term unemployed whoever suffered since december 28. 75 days without benefits now. it should be bipartisan. we see a democratic and republican co span for from ohio, from two states with high unemployment. this should be bipartisan. the question they've struggled with is how to pay for it. the good thing about this deal is they did pay for it with offsets. >> it's retroactive, which sounds great, but if you were unemployed and being threatened with losing your car, your bill collector didn't wait on washington to decide what it wants to do with unemployment benefits for their payment. is this good news or do you think washington still just doesn't get it? >> i think they still don't get it. you're absolutely right. we know our bills, mortgages, rents all come in regardless of what the government is doing. you have people 75 days without these benefi

bill. thank you. a senator: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from missouri. mrs. mccaskill: i'd like to yield eight minutes to the senator from rhode island, senator reed. the presiding officer: the senator from rhode island. mr. reed: thank you, madam president. there is absolutely no doubt that when a sexual assault occurs in a military unit, when a service member is a victim or a perpetrator of sexual assault, then we've all failed. it's not just the military chain of command, it's all of us. and that's why the efforts of senator mccaskill and senator gillibrand has been so critical and so important. they've galvanized this debate, they've forced action when action wasn't being taken. and now the question is: what is the pathway forward that's going to achieve what we all want to do, a reduction of sexual abuse in the military forces? mr. reed: i expressed before concerns with the approach that senator gillibrand's taken because i firmly believe, based on experience in the active military, that leadership has to be involved in every stage -- recruitment, training, evaluation, promotion and retention. and when we take the command

had the gentleman from rhode island prefiled this amendment during judiciary committee consideration of the bill, we may have been able to accept it during markup. however, without notice of the amendment, we were not able to determine at markup whether the amendment implicated any attorney-client privilege concerns. we are now satisfied, given existing reporting requirements, that this amendment does not present a privileged problem. and for these reasons i support the adoption of this amendment, urge my colleagues to do so and reserve the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman reserves the balance of his time. the gentleman from rhode island is recognized. mr. cicilline: i thank the chairman for his support and yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from virginia. mr. goodlatte: i yield back as well. the chair: all time having been yielded back, the question is on the amendment offered by the gentleman from rhode island. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it. he amendment is agreed to. purs

bill would be paid for by closing loopholes the biggest corporations take advantage of. the 21st century worker tax cut would draw on a proposal from my colleague, senator reed of rhode island, who is also a cosponsor of this bill. his proposal closes a loophole that lets corporations claim outsized tax breaks by paying their executives in stock options instead of regular paychecks. this bill would also stop multinational corporations have shifting profits into tax havens like bermuda and the cayman islands to avoid paying their fair share. madam president, there is bipartisan support for closing loopholes. house ways and means chairman dave camp proposed eliminating each of them. up giving tweaks to our struggling workers is the right thing to do. as we continue this important debate how to expand opportunity to those who are struggling today we need to make sure we are giving today's work force the best shot in today's economy. we should increase our outdated minimum wage to give millions of workers a raise and then democrats and republicans need to come together to update our tax code and give today's struggling workers the tax relief they deserve. the 21st century worke