ms. murkowski: thank you, madam president. i'd like to take a few minutes this afternoon -- the presiding officer: excuse me. request that further proceedings under the quorum call be rescinded. the presiding officer: without objection. ms. murkowski: madam president, i'd like it take a few minutes this afternoon to speak to an amendment to the agriculture bill that has been introduced, and this is amendment number 1910, and it has to do with the high energy cost grants. and this is a program within the rural utility service. and i'd like to just lay out to my colleagues a bit about this program. the high-energy cost grants are available for improving and providing energy generation, transmission, and the distribution facilities that serve communities with average home energy costs that exceed 275% of national average. so 275% of the national average. you have to see your home energy costs must exceed this level in order to -- to make yourself available to this high energy cost grant program. these grant funds can be used for

ms. murkowski: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from alaska. ms. owski: thank you, mr. president. i rise this afternoon to congratulate my colleague from alaska, senator begich, and hi his -- recognize his maiden speech here on the senate floor. the -- the tradition and the significance of giving a maiden speech is one that perhaps in recent years that tradition has not been followed as -- as intently as it has in days gone past. but i think the significance that senator begich has -- has attributed with his remarks today, the collection of bills that he has introduced on the senate floor speaking about america's role as antarctic nation and the key that alaska holds as a leader in that responsibility. i appreciate what he is doing to shine the spotlight on these issues, whether it's how we deal with the impacts of climate change, whether it's how we deal with the health consequences, how we deal with -- with renewed and increased commerce in -- in antarctic that is potentially ice-free. i applaud him for his efforts and -- in again shining the ligh

ms. murkowski, the process is broken. the process is broken. my question question and statement is this -- will you ask begich and young to join you in a three-day on-camera agenda where we can do probing and interrogating questioning, because you people are not standing before us for accountability, and as long as we have this disconnect and just popcorn moments, we're going nowhere. thank you for the opportunity to make a comment. thank you. >> we've got -- we have lost a few people up front here but when we started out this evening, we had about 690 people that were seated in this auditorium. i don't know how many we have in the overflow. this is my small attempt here in anchorage to reach out to hear from my constituents. i have done the same up in fairbanks. we had 600 people up there. we're going to be down on the penninsula next weekend and i'm going to be up in the valley friday, i believe it is, not this friday, the following friday. we have to have a level of communication with our constituents. we fail to do that, we get disconnected