Joe Lieberman: “I come to the floor to urge our colleagues to support this fiscal year 1998 national defense authorization bill. I am…”

“I come to the floor to urge our colleagues to support this fiscal year 1998 national defense authorization bill. I am proud to be a member of the committee from which this bill has emerged, the Senate Armed Services Committee. I particularly wish to thank our chairman, Senator Thurmond, and our ranking Democrat, Senator Levin. These are two extraordinarily able, wise Members of the Senate who have worked together very well to produce this bill that meets our national security needs. We all know that we are in a post-cold war period. Perhaps the needs of defense are less in the minds of the public, but these are not matters that should be decided by public opinion polls. These are matters of national security, at the very root of why governments are formed, and they call out for leadership by those who have been given the privilege of serving, leadership in the interest of national security by all of us across party lines, across both Chambers of Congress, across Pennsylvania Avenue between the Congress and the White House to do the best that we can to provide for our national defense today and, in some ways even more difficult, particularly at a time of relative security such as we are in today to make the investments that are necessary so that we will meet the multiple possible threats to our security in the decades ahead.”