mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from nevada. mr. reid: i ask unanimous consent that the call of the quorum be terminated. officer without objection. mr. reid: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to the consideration of h.r. 4691 which is a 30-day extension of provisions which expire on sunday, february 28. they are unemployment insurance extension, cobra, the health insurance for the unemployed, flood insurance, satellite home viewer act, highway funding, s.b.a. business loans and small-business provisions of the american recovery act, s.g.r., which is the so-called doctor fix, and poverty guidelines, received from the house and at the desk, the bill be read three times, passed, the motion to reconsider be laid made and laid on the table. i would say, mr. president, that this matter passed the house unanimously today. the reason it passed the house unanimously today, if we don't do something about this, all around america, about 1.5 million peop

mr. reid? >> mr. speaker, before i answer the question let me make another tribute to our troops. they are working with incredibly incredible bravery with fortitude and dedication to defeat those who brought terrorism to the streets of britain. by denying them ground and air support by offering the population in afghanistan a more prosperous future. i know the house will join me in paying tribute to the seven soldiers who lost their lives since the house last met. lance corporal deron hicks from first battalion, lance sergeant david greenhorn. from six battalion attached to third battalion of their rifles. riflemen mark marshall. from the second battalion the duke of lancaster regiment, sean dorsey. from 36 engineer regiment royal engineers, first battalion guards, lt. douglas. from first battalion scots guards, and sergeant david walker. these men of exceptional bravery are great courage and skill whose loss is deeply felt. we send our profound condolences to their families and loved ones. meeting with others in addition to my duties in the house i thought of such duties today. >

mr. reid: madam president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: i understand the objection of the senator, the republican leader. but i don't know what my friend, senator shelby -- and i say that -- he is my friend -- i don't know what problem he has. whatever it is, i would almost bet a lot that it has nothing that would be comparable to holding up these extremely sensitive, keeping-our-country-safe positions. i just think it's outlandish. and i can't imagine this is the right thing to do. mr. mcconnell: madam president? the presiding officer: the republican leader. mr. mcconnell: a little earlier today the massachusetts secretary of state formally certified the election of scott brown as the new u.s. senator and the newest member of this body. he'll come to washington and be sworn in on the senate floor, as is customary, later today. and we all look forward to welcoming him. the people of massachusetts are eager to have senator brown working on their behalf. republicans look

mr. reid: mr. president, i would ask unanimous consent that following the remarks of senator demint, that his vote and the next vote be ten minutes in duration. the presiding officer: without objection, so ordered. mr. demint: mr. president? the presiding officer: the cloture vote having been invoked, the motion to refer -- under the previous order, all postcloture time is ewes yielded back and the senator from south carolina, mr. demint, may be recognized for up to 10 minutes. the senator from south carolina. mr. demint: mr. president? the presiding officer: will the senate be 0 in order! please, senators, be in order. thank you. mr. demint: thank you, mr. president. i know many here are very anxious to start a new government agency, and i won't hold you up for very long. but it's important that we recognize some things that are happening, and there's probably one good thing we could do tonight maybe to stop the landslide -- the presiding officer: will the senate be in order, please. mr. demint: -

mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: mr. president, i ask now unanimous consent notwithstanding rule 22 that the senate consider the following nominations: calendar number 561, clifford stanley to be under secretary of defense of person ale he will and readiness, calendar number 603, plawr a kennedy for a u.s. representative, calendar number 614, phillip goldberg to be assistant secretary of state for intelligence. calendar number 615, karen wagner to be under secretary for intelligence and analysis, with the department of homeland security that the nominees be confirmed en bloc, the motion to reconsider be laid on the table enbelong, any statements relating to these nominations appear at the appropriate place in the record as if read and the president be immediately notified of the senate's action, prior to there being a statement on whether or not this is accepted, let me just say that these are all critically important to the safety and security of this nation. clifford stanley, under secretary of defense, laura kennedy,

mr. jamie reid. >> mr. speaker, he will be aware he is the only -- what's her bikini give constituents, my constituents that we will meet the necessary changes to the planning system in order to enable them to invest in confidence and certainty. >> mr. speaker, i hope that there is all party support for the nuclear expenditure that is necessary to give a security in our part. it is eight minutes past 12 and i understand the conservative party policy is -- [laughter] >> is that nuclear power is a last resort. that is not the basis on which a plan for the future. you can change your policies every day. we will remain consistent in support for the energy needs of our country. >> mr. nick clegg. >> i'd like to add my own expressions of condolences to the family and friends of corporal neil riley and corporal lance shell, the third battalion. who tragically lost their lives serving so bravely in afghanistan this week. i just like to return to the issue of defense been. the government is about to make a statement

mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the leader. mr. eid: following remarks of the leaders the senate will be in a period of morning business for an hour with senators permitted to speak for up to ten minutes each. the first half-hour will be controlled by the democrats. the second by the republicans. following morning business, the senate will proceed to executive session to resume post cloture debate on the tphopbgs of -- nomination of patricia smith to be solicitor for the department of labor. this is another one of the endless delays we've had to go through here. we're in a post cloture, 30 hours of doing nothing. we've had so many 30 hours of doing nothing that it's hard to comprehend the wasted time of all the staff, senators' time could be better put to use, people could be drafting legislation. on and on with contemplating what could be done but for this end hr-ts stalling we've seen -- endless stalling we've seen. the senate will recess for the weekly caucus meetings. following the smith nomination the senate will proceed to vot

mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: mr. majority leader. mr. id: the issue before the senate today is what we do with mother nature. mother nature has been very difficult to deal with. the presiding officer being from the state of alaska, he is used to this kind of weather, but most of us aren't. we have one snowstorm that's usually it for the year, but we have had a series of them this year. maybe it's a result of the senator from alaska bringing the weather with him. mr. president, what we're trying to do -- we don't have it worked out yet -- we may be able to get consent to have the -- start the judge vote pretty soon and have that run for a reasonable period of time and then have the second vote be open for some considerable period of time so that people if they are here could vote on both and go home to their washington residence or some people having trouble getting here could be here in time to vote on that. we're close to being able to work that out. i would also say that we are contemplating, if we can work out the procedural difficulti

mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. reileader. mr. reid: mr. president, we have had a -- this has been an historic storm. i was in nevada, left friday morning early, and had a beautiful weekend there. highs in the low 60's. but getting back here was another story. it was very, very difficult. but i'm here. a lot of senators simply have not been able to get here. the staff is under great duress to get here. the subway -- the metro, as we call it, that is so important to people who live and work here, is basically only an underground transit vehicle now. anything above the ground is not working. so if you live right in d.c., you can come to work, but if you're in either maryland or virginia, you can't get here, if you depend on the subway. so, as a result of that, we've had to change things. even those that get here have extreme difficulty driving. people are still recommended by police authorities not to go on the roads. they're dangerous and difficult, and some -- especially if you get off the main drag -- are impassable. so, mr. president, as

mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the leader. mr. reid: there's nothing that i can say to assuage the anguish that my friend, the republican leader, mitch mcconnell, now feels. it's a unique relationship that come with our staff members, especially someone that has been with us as many years as kyle has been with leader mcconnell. these people become part of us. as we can see kyle simmons has become part of mitch mcconnell. my dealings with kyle simmons are meetings that are held in my office or in senator mcconnell's office, and if there were a way to describe my dealings with kyle simmons, it would be to go to the dictionary and go to -- under the h's and go to "humility," and there would be kyle simmons. he is just as mitch mcconnell described him. he's a man who has loads of humility. he doesn't talk very often, but whenever he talks, we listen. so i wish you the very best, kyle, in the things you do, and i recognize that your boss, mitch mcconnell, was speaking for the entire senate in our relationships with our staff. but, of co

mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. eid: following leader remarks, the senate will be in a period of morning business until 3:00 p.m. today with senators permitted to peek for up to 10 minutes each. at 3:00 perform, the senate will proceed to executive session to debate the nomination of patricia smith, to be the salter of the department of labor. the vote on the nomineeation to invoke cloture on thew nominationominee-- on that nomir at 5:30 p.m. today. nursing our economy back to health is about setting a new foundation for our future security and stability. it is about recognizing that what got us into this mess will not get us out of this mess. it is about making sure that kind of crisis can never again threaten american families. there are three things above all else that i want to see in president obama's budget. number one, a plan to put americans back to work. number two, a plan to ease our deep deficit and bring fiscal discipline back to government and leave our children a stronger economy. and finally, number th

mr. reid: the senate stands in adjournment until friday 9:30, february 26. that is followed by federal reserve chairman ben bernanke's testimony before the senate banking committee. >> i come from latin america. i am never expecting to find this kind of poverty. >> photographer and documentary filmmaker on a different side of the nation's capital in the shadow of power, sunday on c-span's q. and a. >> homeland security secretary janet napolitano testified before a house in a about her agency's budget request for the next fiscal year. she answered questions about the consolidation of some of the department's programs and denied reports that the board of security staff has been cut. this is three hours. >> the committee on homeland security will come to order. the committee's meeting today to receive testimony from secretary janet napolitano on the presidents fy2011 budget request for the department of homeland security. i want to thanks secretary napolitano for being flexible about testifying in support of the president's fiscal year 2011 budget request for t

mr. abdulmutallab they say that richard reid the shoe bomber was myr mirandised within the first five minutesf his detention. mr. abdulmutallab is apparently still talking to and cooperating with authorities. the attempted politicization of his arrest seems to be misfiring. >>> next up, a snapshot of today's republican party, i don't mean republican leadership in congress or michael steele, i mean, average every day self-identifying republicans, joe the republicans if you will, polled coast-to-coast by research 2000, this poll was commissioned by daily coast, now, daily coast is an influential liberal website, the polling firm that did the survey is a nonpartisan mainstream polling organization, and this is what they found out about today's republican party. not just its base, but the party. you ready? the number of rank and file republicans who think president obama should be impeached for something? is 39%. the number of rank and file republicans who think president obama is a socialist? more than 6 0%. the number of rank and file republicans who think the president was not born in this cou

mr. chairman. >> thank you. senator reid. >> thank you chairman volcker and mr. secretary.s now at bank holding companies. the investment bank model seems to be a footnote in history but when you go on the street very few are performing like banks which is to take deposits and provide safe return and also to make commercial loans and residential and consumer loans. my sense is the essence of your proposal is not simply to prevent proprietary trading but to get them to make commercial loans and consumer loans and residential loans. >> i don't want them diverts from that. >> can you and you have, but can you once again sort of stress how this proposal would focus them on those activity? >> well i think the only answer i have to that is focuses on those activities by removing temptation to get highly involved in more speculator types with immediate returns they seem to be high and you have highly paid people that want to keep that kind of activity going. i think commercial banks i would like to understand they're basic role in the scheme of things that you just outlined and co

reid? >> thank you, mr. chairman. i want to follow up on the point that it is my understanding canada and the united kingdom have allowed gays and lesbians to serve openly since the 90s in great britain, since the early 2000s. they're fighting side by side with us today in afghanistan. what i would like to see more of, does that suggest there combat effectiveness -- we have had the opportunity to work with them in joint operations? does that add credibility to what you are undertaking? >> it is clearly something we need to address. we need to talk to those countries's military's in formal and in-depth way about their experience. their experience is a factor but i also would say that each country has its own culture and its own society and has to be evaluated in those terms as well. >> one of the aspects in your prepared remarks is the presumptive difference in terms of the attitude, differing ranks within the military. is that something you can comment upon now? have you done a search for the attitudes based on age or

senator reid. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. mr. secretary, i want to follow up on the point that senator collins made, because it is my understanding that canada and the united kingdom have allowed gays and lesbians to serve openly in the case of canada since the early '90s and in great britain 2000, and they are fighting side-by-side with us in afghanistan and in fact, i would think that we would like to see more of their regimens and brigades there. does that, i think suggest as admiral mullen mentioned before that the combat effectiveness is not m pai m impair and we hav opportunity to work with them in joint operations, and does that add credibility or weight to the discussions that you are undertaking? >> well, it is clearly something that we need to address. with knee to we need to talk to those countries in the military formal and in depth way about their experience. i believe that their experience is a factor, but i also would say that each country has its own culture and its own society, and it has to be evaluated in those

reid punching bag. there is a gender divide here. only women will be able to hit mrs. si, only men will be able to hit harry reid. we're trying to find out whether they really would deny a conservative woman, the opportunity to hit harry reid when they would make that opportunity available to a man, not shockingly they didn't call us back. it has been a palpable undercurrent in conservative politics this year including now at cpac. awkwardly even the suicide attack on an irs building became fodder for jokes at cpac today. here's how grover norquist was introduced. >> let me say, i'm happy to see grover today. he was getting a little testy in the past couple of weeks and i was just really, really glad it was not him identified as flying that airplane into the irs building. >> i don't know. maybe wait until the building is not smoking anymore. maybe wait until after the funeral. >>> an ill-timed joke is not the end of the world. it is not humorous misfires. it's the deep consistency of how much we are seeing about violence against the government on the right now. here is

mr. speaker, harry reid's scrooge gift to the american people was the senate version, their national healthcare act, complete with funding for abortion and illegals the of merry christmas, american people. they delird a christmas present with 60 votes which demonstrated that all the demonstrations that took place since august weren't counting very much in the minds of harry reid and the democrats in the senate. and that was christmas eve. a lot of people went home for christmas. and over christmas and new year's most of the public life goes dormant and some of the people thought that going dormant was the right thing to do and no one would pay attention and why would members of congress go out on the stump and do town hall meetings and talk about how bad the house bill and senate bill is and how unbelievablely bad it would be if they would do what one would expect them to do, appoint a conference committee to merge the two bills and resolve their differences. but the democrats didn't think that the american people would be paying attention. that's one of the reasons why they passed the bill

mr. chairman. >> senator reid. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. the follow-up, how would you implement if you were to do it through your regulatory process? >> we would do it as part of our overall risk management assessment. we would look at the range of activities that the company engages in. there might be some activities that would be specifically prohibited by legislation, perhaps owning a hedge fund, for example. there are other activities, such as purchasing credits desalt swaps. i think it would be appropriate for the supervisor to, first of all, ascertain that the use of credit default swaps is primarily intended to hedge other positions and therefore is overall a net reduction in risk for the company as opposed to an increase. secondly, even if the purposes of the program are in some sense legitimate there is still the question of whether the company has adequate managerial risk management resources to properly manage those risks. what we saw in the previous crisis, this is one of the things we really learned. many large and complex comp

. >> neil: did harry reid condemn him and say you did it again, mr. president? anything?cally, that's what a he said. he said stop picking on las vegas. believe me, stop picking on las vegas is innocent enough. but when this is not the first time. if this were the first time, i could understand that. this is not. we made a big deal and i made it on your show about the last time this president picked on las vegas. we have had it. we're done. this is a state suffering dramatical dramatically. families are hurting. do not add to the burden. >> neil: are things picking up, though? are you off the mat, i guess? i see the numbers and they're looking better than they were. >> they are, but this is not enough to get us out of the slump that we've been in. six months after the legislative session, we're $1 billion short, $900 million short of making the revenue for state needed expenditures. we'll call a special session and go in and cut the budget. it does not help this state to denigrate the tourism industry. it's our number one industry. i want the president to do more. i want

reid. >> thank you, mr. chairman. clark, you mention in terms of the threat as a receive theiric self-radicalization that would lead to violence. there are several different, as you suggest, categories that's not simply islamic radicals but a host of others. is there a strategy in the department of defense to identify these potential categories and to, you know, essentially work explicitly against them or to at least be aware of them? >> well, the first point, there are -- we have the people in the public domain said we didn't use the magic term. radical islamics. and so we didn't do it obvious purpose. it wasn't because we were trying to be politically correct. it was because our task was to deal with violence and there was one of them. i don't know how people could read our comments about self-radicalization and not understand that we're -- that this kind of, you know, radical islamic behavior is part of that group. we said specifically, the indicatorred are inadequate. the army published the list of 10. this is bet

mr. horne, please. >> thank you, senator reid. senator corker, thank you for spending time with us. name is steve horne, vice president for dow jones as the senator introduced a year earlier. i spent over 30 years building very complex databases and transforming highly complicated data into usable information. i have testified many times over the last year on the impact of the financial meltdown and the need for the comprehensive analytic database is to capture the appropriate real time information necessary to prevent waste, fraud and abuse of the act and real time i think was discussed earlier including those of the t.a.r.p. program to show the people the money is being used to read it is s. 910 with a companion bill passed for the house h.r. 1242 by a vote of 421 to nothing. these bills have been strongly endorsed by organizations such as the u.s. chamber of commerce, omb and center for democracy and technology. using the same basic infrastructure of the database that would be created under the legislation that i have described, we had dow jones identified over 400 leading indica

reid. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. mr. secretary, i want to follow up on the point that senator collins made, because it is my understanding that canada and the united kingdom have allowed gays and lesbians to serve openly in the case of canada since the early '90s and in great britain 2000, and they are fighting side-by-side with us in afghanistan and in fact, i would think that we would like to see more of their regimens and brigades there. does that, i think suggest as admiral mullen mentioned before that the combat effectiveness is not m pai m impair and we hav opportunity to work with them in joint operations, and does that add credibility or weight to the discussions that you are undertaking? >> well, it is clearly something that we need to address. with knee to we need to talk to those countries in the military formal and in depth way about their experience. i believe that their experience is a factor, but i also would say that each country has its own culture and its own society, and it has to be evaluated in those

reid called on the president to lay off las vegas. the president wrote back explaining he wasn't saying anything negative about the city. you remember last year, mrraged the city's mayor when he told bank execs they shouldn't be flying off to vegas on the taxpayers' dime. >>> the president didn't apologized. but today, his chief of staff will for something he said last summer. rahm emanuel was cited for calling liberal activists retarded. emanuel has apologized and will meet with members from the special olympics. >>> four days until the big game. and the saints and colts will practice separately today. yesterday, it was question and answer time, as reporters from around the world descended on sun life stadium. with more sports, here's steve weissman of espn news. >> good morning, america. the night after kobe used memphis to set a record, lebron makes the grizzly his target, as well. cavs up 12. lebron, finds anderson varejou. o.j. mayo thinks he has an easy lay-in. later in the third, james to j.j. hickson. he had a career high with 15 dimes later, cavs up early. lebron had 22. cavs. >>> how about kevin durant, coming off of 45 points. thunder

force is chosen by the lead orse they have party in the senate, whether senator reid or senator connell, ms. belohse or mrboehner is going to reflect the viewpoints and flossnoifs different parties. it will be a bipartisan report or won't be a report at all. then it comes to congress and has to be voted up or down by a supermajority. once again, it moots the ability to game it. one side can't game the other, the proposal must be bipartisan and fair. end of quote. and any attempt to raise taxes would never see the light of day on the house floor. the bill is carefully crafted to ensure a bipartisan process to the to the protect the right theefs minority party. given the enority of the challenge, the commission needs to be able to look at every component of our fiscal policy to fairly assess where we stand and how we can best move forward on a sound financial future. the language is clear nirk changes in the tax code must help simplify the system and increase economic growth and tax revenue. what no one is saying is by opposing the commission -- opposing the commission concept altogether and failing to put

mr. kingston: i can't imagine what the harry reid u.s. senate was thinking. i mean, how stupid do they think the american people are? how callus can they be to the sense of fair play? what kind of almost thuggery is it when you do that to people? i just -- it doesn't sound right for the taxpayers all over the country to have to float the bill for one state and as the gentleman from missouri pointed out there was also a special interest bill for florida. and, you know, and i think the presumption was, people are christmas shopping, they're getting ready to have their families in, they're not paying attention, let's just push for whatever we can. well the funny thing happened in massachusetts, they were apparently paying attention. and i think that that has woke up a lot of people around here. you know, we have a group in the house called blue dog democrats. i'm not exactly sure what a blue dog is because they certainly vote like the old dog democrats from what i can understand. but i don't think there's any distinction except for there's a lot of democrats rig

mr. obama doesn't even want to try. so what it comes down to is money and philosophy. committed liberals like nancy pelosi and harry reidant the nanny state to provide. therefore, making americans more dependent on government. staunch republicans, like john mccain and lamar alexander want competition to lead the way and shoulder at a big government health care scenario. so it looks like the two sides are not going to meet on this thing. finally, talking points believes the u.s.a. is now heading towards bankruptcy. that would make every citizen sick. there dismo way americans can afford another multi trillion-dollar entitlement. so, health care reform, yes, but it has to be smaller and more market-place driven. and that's the memo. now for the top story tonight, reaction of reaction. joining us from washington congressman dennis kucinich and congressman woman michele bachmann. congresswoman, what was the headline for you today? >> i think the take away today, bill, is that we accomplished more at the white house beer summit than we accomplished today at the white house health care summit. [ laughter ] i think a lot of pe

reid was read his miranda rights and convicted inside of the federal court system. joining us now from washington, republican congressman, tom rooney. pleasure to see you, mr.me back. walk me through the -- how american people can tell the difference between one party, republicans and democrats, whichever one it is, trying to get the other one for being a bunch of weasels that don't know what they're doing, and politicians who are actually using american resources to ensure the development of our country. and protection. >> i hope it's because we're listening to our constituents. and i think that you're seeing that divide get a little bit closer, and these days go on. specifically with this issue. i've been talking to a lot of democrats who i think are coming onboard with the idea that, you know, the trials in new york were a mistake, and we just issued a bill today to have all the detainees tried down at the state of the art courtroom we have at gitmo. i've been working the halls trying to get some democrats to come onboard. i haven't had success yet, but i do feel like we're getting closer. i think when it comes to safety, it's our biggest job as a federa

mrs. tiger woods' nine iron. we'll talk about woods' use of the word entitled. and when rachel joins me, more on the breaking news, specter signs out of the public option. reids if there are 51 votes, he'll make it happen. matt iglesias joins rachel in washington. i find the flight i . then a great hotel my kids will love. yeah. but wait... here's the really cool part. when i book them at the same time... voila! i can save up to 450 bucks. and we all know that can come in pretty handy. book flight and hotel, and save more. where you book matters, expedia. ♪ dot com somewhere in america... there's a home by the sea powered by the wind on the plains. there's a hospital where technology has a healing touch. there's a factory giving old industries new life. and there's a train that got a whole city moving again. somewhere in america, the toughest questions are answered every day. because somewhere in america, more than sixty thousand people spend every day answering them. siemens. answers. >>> back to cpac. discussing the essence of the tiger woods apology, i felt entitled with jean robinson. what does that mean? there's no way these stories could ever overlap,

mr. president, just leave us alone and let us muddle through this. [applause] >> third, this is to senator harry reid to pass laws to tell me what to do and how to live my life. you're not my mother. [applause] government can never know the scope of the economic problems that they're trying to fix. they can't because no one can. because the economic data collected by government is months old by the time it gets compiled. therefore, it's old information and usually incomplete. and it's only from the fortune 500 companies that they can collect that information. small businesses, individual artisans and the subterranean economy where 80% of new jobs come from can never be measured. we have to idea where in economy is. and finally, whatever action government takes, just getting the machinery in motion takes months, if not years, to have any effect on the economy at all. so the administration is using yesterday's data to make today's decisions that won't have an impact for years. does that make any sense at hall? no. the late foreign minister of israel once said about the palestinians can equally be said

mr. obama does not have a health care bill. he did not present anything. he allowed pelosi and harry reidto get things done. setting politics aside. i think it would be better for everybody -- if you look at the popularity ratings that congress has right now, they are all in trouble. host: i keep reading different analysts suggesting this is not a time for big solutions to any policy problem, that it is better to take things incrementally. would you agree with that? guest: that is where the electorate is. the challenge president obama faces is the problems he inherited are bigger than the country is willing to trust government and the political system to solve. and that is especially true in health care where people -- it is a huge part of our economy, people feel passionate personally about it. and even though he has proposed a private sector solution, people get nervous about big change. we may end up with an instrumental solution. healthcare is the kind of problem where if we are really going to tackle it over the long haul, you are going to have to get everybody in the system, you hav

but majority leader reid will fire cloture on friday to fifth and has assured us the senate will vote to and debate monday at 5:00. mrpresident, when this president was elected he said he would govern from the center. if craig becker to be nominations approved we will see the undermining of long-standing practice in labor law that should be the prerogative of the united states congress. as the congress of the united states and his wisdom occurrence decides to pass efca, then that's an act of congress. it should not happen. card checks should not happen because pamela did bureaucracy of the national labor relations board is the one to do it. gentoo without thasbvious my conclusions on his agenda. i urge my colleagues to vote no on the cloture motion on mr. becker's nomination. >> resident. >> senator from illinois. >> is to present, the ticket book of the history of this great nation at least in my lifetime you cannot miss what happened to america immediately after world war ii. veterans came back from that war, thousands of them and they were greeted with the g.i. bill. which open the door for them to buy homes, star

reid is lecturing the president about his comments on las vegas? good grief, the president writes him a letter, oh, i'm so sorry about las vegas. and meanwhile, he's just saying, mraid to those "game change" guy. >> tables have turned. mike allen, thanks so much. we'll be checking you out at politico.com all day long. >> you'll having a good time, doing a good job, haven't broken anything? >> just poor mike barnicle's heart. thanks a lot, mike allen. >>> coming up, stocks are mixed ahead of new economic data due out this morning. we'll get a check on business before the bell with cnbc's erin burnett. plus, jean chatzky, jonathan capehart, and mike barnicle when we come right back. ♪ hey bets, can i borrow a quarter? sure, still not dry? i'm trying to shrink them. i lost weight and now some clothes are too big. how did you do it? simple stuff. eating right and i switched to whole grain. whole grain... [ female announcer ] people who eat more whole grain tend to have a healthier body weight. multigrain cheerios has five whole grains and 110 calories per serving. more grains. less you. make the switch. get $5 in coupons. another heart attack could be lurking, waitin

mr. speaker, when you look at those principles, t 10 principles that representative king just described, these were and are promises that this democ13 majority, speaker pelosi, leader reid and over the last, really, two years now, he was saying that these things, as he was asking the american people to give him an opportunity to bring change you can believe in, as the next president, indeed he was successful in doing that. but many of these principles if not all of them, were promised by the president. i don't know what the total number of cigna tores, signatures on the declaration of health care independence that representative king has. i think it approaches 100. i'm not going to ask him specifically how many are republican versus how many are members of the democratic party and the house of representatives but golly, i would think that speaker pelosi would love to sign this declaration of health care independence. indeed, at the blair house, her summary remarks, she said that absolutely not one dime of money, taxpayer money was going to fund abortions. i don't know if she really believes that, mr. speaker. i guess the proof of the pudding will be whether or not she c

mr. chairman. madame secretary, welcome. one of the first questions is low income assistance. it is a critical program for my region and throughout the country depending on the severe circumstances of the weather. and senator reid of rhode island and i sent a letter with 46 other senators that the methodology that was used to distribute the low income funding, the release of emergency funding and 490 that was reloosed. we set aside the heating degree days. our state receive 50% less and so did rhode island. on the heating degree fund, states like florida, and i understand it's unusual cold in florida received $3.9 in emergency assistance, texas, alaska, maine, received nothing. 30 would have 30 heating degree day, last december maine would have been 375, 44 times the energy required. so i'm trying to make sense of what was methodology used. i'm not arguing they shouldn't have received funding, i'm arguing why there was such difference in the amount of funding that severe cold weather states received in the release of this emergency funding. last year maine received $29 million, this year $14 million. if you use unemployment, rhode island has the second highest in the country. we submitted a letter to you. i wou

mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: reserving the right to object. there has probably never been a time in the history of our country when we had economic conditions that are like they are today. unemployment all over this country averaging some 10%. some states as high as 14%. if there were ever an emergency with our economy, it is tonight, it is today. and to think that we're not going to declare this an emergency -- millions of people are unemployed, millions of people have been unemployed for long periods of time and their unemployment benefits are running out. they're not able to buy their health insurance because the program is going to expire on monday. the senate has a history of treating unemployment benefits as an emergency. no one, i repeat, can argue that the current economic downturn doesn't represent a grave emergency. so, mr. president, i am forced to object. the presiding officer: objection is heard. mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader is recognized. mr. reid: i now a

mr. reid: madam president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: i ask the chair to lay before the senate a message with the house with respect to h.r. 1299, the united states capitol police authority legislation. the presiding officer: the senate lays before the chair -- the chair lays before the senate a message from the house. are. the clerk: the house agrees to the husband from the -- a title an act to make technical corrections for certain administrative authorities of the united states capitol police and for other purposes. [inaudible] mr. reid: i move to concur on the house amendment to the senate amendment and i have a cloture amendment. thpridg officer: the the clerk will report. the clerk: we, the undersigned senate hereby move to bring to a close the the debate on the motion to concur on the house amendment to the senate amendment to h.r. 1299, the united states capitol police administrative technical corrections act signed by 17 senators as follows. : reid, feingold

mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: this morning the senate will proceed to a period morning business. senators will be allowed to speak for up to 10 minutes each. there will be no roll call votes during today's session. however, there will be a vote tuesday morning before the caucuses will have probably be an hour after we come in, but we'll make that decision a little later today. we'll see if we can get an agreet. if not, that's what we'll do. we'll continue to try to reach an agreement to extend the 30-day expiring provisions including unemployment insurance, cobra, flood machine, highway funding, small business loans, small business provisions for the american recovery act, and the satellite home view act. the s.g.r. and poverty provisions all extremely important. especially to those people who are unemployed and those people who on midnight sunday night will lose the ability, almost 1.5 million people in rural america, will no longer be able to watch

mr. reid: mr. president, following leader remarks the time until 9:55 will be equally divided and controlled between the two leaders or their designees. at 9:55 the senate will proceed to a series of up to two roll call votes. the first will be on the motion to waive the applicable budget points of order with respect to the reid amendment 3310. the points of order waived we will proceed to a vote on the motion to concur to the house amendment to the senate bill to bill h.r. 2947 with the reid substitute amendment. following the votes, the senate will proceed to a period of morning business with senators permitted to speak up to ten minutes each. we hope we'll be able to reach an agreement to pass a short-term extenders legislation today. the next item of business on the floor will be the bipartisan travel promotion legislation. mr. president, following the remarks of the senator from kentucky, i would yield four minutes to the senator from new york, senor schumer. mr. mcconnell: mr. president, earl