John McCain

How the administration could adopt and propose a course that leaves the only active U.S. human spaceflight program remaining after the Shuttle... exposed to that sort of risk is simply inconceivable to me.

The President has decided to cancel the program. Why? To me, it's not clear, and neither the President nor anyone in his administration has made a compelling case for why we should abandon the Constellation program.

This decision is purely budgetary, and not one-- as many have tried to portray it-- a matter of safety.

Their failure to have a plan to protect those opportunities makes that talk nothing more than empty promises.

The plan proposes adding resources to DHS, particularly Border Patrol, but not for DOJ's components.

On April 19, Senators McCain and Kyl released a 10-point plan to increase Southwest border security.

I feel very highly confident of that.

We want to make sure that we do not make any of those mistakes that you referred to, Senator McCaskill, in terms of the contracting process.

The stakes couldn't be higher.

Iran is closer to possessing a nuclear weapons capability today than it was a year ago.

Iran's rulers cannot be allowed to obtain nuclear weapons.

We meet here today to discuss U.S. policy toward Iran, which at present is focused foremost on the imperative of preventing that government from acquiring a nuclear weapons capability.

I'm not asking about a country historically. I'm asking about Iran.

We're asking for your assessment as to when they will have a nuclear weapon that is deliverable because that is obviously a very critical point in this entire situation.

There has been no progress in disarming Hezbollah.

But none of these actions have had any perceptible affect on Iranian behavior.

I think we and the Chinese agree that we need to send a strong message to Iran.

Your rosy scenario is not corroborated by the facts on the ground.

Why doesn't the United States, with our allies, who have agreed that they would act with us--I'm talking about the French, British, and Germans--act unilaterally, at least to put some sanctions that could have some effect on the Iranian…

Do you believe that China will agree to sanctions at all through the U.N. Security Council?

I'll be very interested to see if your prediction comes true; that meaningful sanctions will be agreed to by the Russians and the Chinese. They've been playing rope-a-dope with us for now over a year.

Make no mistake, if Iran achieves a nuclear weapons capability, it will not be because we couldn't stop it, but because we chose not to stop it.

We see the latest evidence of that today in reports that the Syrian government has transferred long-range Scud missiles to Hezbollah.

It is long past the time to put teeth into our policy.

The record of the past year is discouraging.