ms. murkowski: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from alaska. ms. quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. ms. murkowski: madam president, i ask unanimous consent that my intern sarah boger be allowed privileges of the floor throughout the consideration of the debate on sharon gleason, the nomination of sharon gleason. the presiding officer: without objection. ms. murkowski: thank you, madam president. this is a big day for us in alaska in kwrarbg's legal his -- in alaska's legal history. the senate is considering the nomination of sharon gleason. sharon is the first woman to be nominated for united states district court judge in alaska. she is an outstanding nominee and i regard it as a privilege to speak in support of her nomination today. sharon gleason is a native of rochester, new york. she earned her bachelor's degree from washington university in st. louis. she received her law degree from the university of california-davis. upon graduation from davis, sharon was elected to the order of the coif, which is the na

ms. murkowski: thank you. i have come to the floor to discuss a provision from the energy and water appropriations bill that apparently senator bingaman has just spoken to. this would require the sale of $500 million worth of oil from our nation' nation's strategic m reserve, spro. i think it would set a dangerous and unsustainable precedent for the future. as i understand it, the administration first requested this sale in its fiscal year 2012 budget proposal and justified it by asserting that there was an integrity issue in one of the camps where the spro oil -- in one of the calf earns where the spro oil was stored. we heard this some months asmg they asserted that the sale was necessary because d.o.e. had to drain the oil in that cavern. the committee subsequently authorized the sale in its version of the bill which was then released in june. so at that point in time based on d.o.e.'s representation, it was -- i guess it was kind of hard not to argue that this sale was not justified. but then events took a

ms. murkowski: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from alaska. ms. murkowski: thank you, madam president. a lot of discussion, of course, about jobs in this country, where they are, what we can do to -- to help incent them. i had the opportunity while i was up in the state last week to host three different town halls that focused on the state of our nation's economy and what was happening with jobs and job creation. and as i asked alaskans for their input, what i heard consistently from community to community was, we can allow for job creation that is meaningful, we can allow for opportunities here in our state and across the country, but the first thing that you can do is to get the government out of the way. that was probably my biggest takeaway out of the town halls from alaska -- get the government out of our way so that we can move forward as -- as small business owners and operators, as those who are looking to advance jobs in resource development, move the government back and we can make some things happen. i do think that one of the key ways t