Political Quotes

“Mr. President, we have had a great deal of conversation these past several days regarding cyber security. There is no question that we all agree it is a critical issue. I am sure every Member of this body shares the concern that our Nation is vulnerable to cyber attacks, and those attacks could have severe economic and national security ramifications. We saw just this week over 180 amendments filed to the cyber legislation. I think it is pretty clear that a lot of us have ideas on how best to protect our critical infrastructure. I think that is just one of the reasons I was disappointed that the amendment tree was filled and cloture was filed on the cyber measure. I don't think that was the process we were promised when the Senate overwhelmingly agreed to consider the cyber security bill. Because Members were denied the opportunity to have a thoughtful and complete debate, the cloture vote failed on a bipartisan basis this morning. We have heard a lot about the electric grid during this debate and how legislation is needed to protect our Nation's transmission systems from cyber attack. What perhaps has been missing from this debate and discussion is a recognition that Congress had already moved to protect our grid system, and they did so 7 years ago. They enacted the bipartisan Energy Policy Act of 2005. I am the ranking member on the committee of jurisdiction. I reassure my colleagues that we already have mandatory cyber security standards in place for our electric grid.…”