Joe Lieberman: “seeing none of my colleagues on the floor, I will proceed for a moment or two and then suggest the absence of a quorum.…”

“seeing none of my colleagues on the floor, I will proceed for a moment or two and then suggest the absence of a quorum. Yesterday, Senator McCain and I laid down the basic arguments for our amendment. The fact is that the planet is warming. It is warming as a result of human actions. This is no more just a matter of science, although most scientists agree with this. We can see it. We can see it in the kinds of satellite photos that Senator McCain showed such as in the case of the State of Florida. The most graphic evidence is the satellite photos of the polar icecaps. The way in which they have diminished, shrunk, over the last 10, 15, 20 years is startling, with the obvious effect that the water is rising. One could pick their favorite story of evidence. The one that we cite a lot is the Inuit people, the native people in northern Canada, saw robins a few years ago for the first time in their 10,000-year history. They did not have a word for ``robin.'' They had to create a word. That reality is something my friend from Vermont is aware of. Senator Jeffords has been a great crusader, in the best sense of the word, for environmental protection. He is from the green state, as he says. He has been a wonderfully green Senator in the best sense of that term, and I thank him for his support of this amendment. This amendment is the only amendment that will come before the Senate that will do something about global warming.…”