``Level the Playing Field.'' When I ask small business owners what they would like the Federal Government to do to help them thrive, the answer I most frequently hear is, ``level the playing field.'' It may be a cliche, but there's truth…

I would like to ask through the Chair if the Senator from Ohio would yield for this question. He may recall the time not that long ago when we closed down the government of the United States for a period of time, and there were some radio…

I ask unanimous consent for 5 additional minutes. The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so ordered.

During the period of time we were waiting yesterday for a decision by the House of Representatives, which they still didn't come to--during that period of time, we had an opportunity to have many personal conversations among…

I have one further question. In terms of the impact on our Nation, as the Secretary of the Treasury has told the leader, can he give us, for the record, an idea of what we face if the Republicans in the House continue to delay and hold to…

Majority vote. =========================== NOTE =========================== On page S5064, July 29, 2011, the Record reads: Mr. DURBIN. Majority veto. The online Record has been corrected to read: Majority vote. =========================…

There have been Members of the Senate and House who have gone before the cameras and come to the floor in each of those bodies and argued that defaulting on the national debt is really not a big deal, although we have never done that one…

in 1939, we passed a law and the law created the debt ceiling. Before that law was passed, whenever the Government of the United States of America wanted to borrow money, it had to come to Congress. Congress had to approve it and the…

I thank my colleague from New York, Senator Schumer, as well as Senator Mikulski from Maryland for coming to the floor this morning and speaking about the crisis we face. The debt ceiling default, which will occur in 6 days if we do not…

let me salute my colleague from West Virginia. It is a sad task that we have to come to the floor to recognize those who have passed. He pays tribute to a young man whose life was cut too short but who was determined to serve our country…

Federal budgets rarely set aside adequate resources in anticipation of disasters, and instead, rely on emergency supplemental funding requests.

In fact, the SBA disaster loans help borrowers recover losses that the private sector insurance does not cover.

I asked them how many of you believe that man's activity on Earth is changing the climate that we live with?

It would seem to me that what you're suggesting is that we are understating the premiums necessary to cover the risk, which is probably a great political decision on our part, but not a very good actuarial decision in terms of what we need…

I've had the good fortune of meeting a lot of Illinois farmers, which is your family background.

So you see the weather pattern and also the residential or settlement pattern coming together?

We are not prepared. Our weather events are getting worse, catastrophic in fact . . . The Federal government is ignoring the obvious.

So we just can't argue that things are more expensive now than they were 20 years ago, and a small event today may cost a lot more money than it did 20 years ago?

These have been adjusted accordingly?

We stopped talking about this on Capitol Hill. We decided that the debate over global warming was too contentious, too politically charged, and too divided for us to have any meaningful conversation about what to do with it.

The point I'd like to get to is whether or not we can come to some consensus here, beyond the political debate about climate change, about the reality of what we face.

So when you have a--a large storm or a hurricane, you get even more damage because of, you know, that large amount of water that's there.

As private sector insurers decline to issue policies in risky areas, due to exposure to erratic weather patterns, will more and more of the financial burden shift to the Government?

If we guess wrong, in terms of a program that is supposed to protect people from a disaster, let's say crop insurance, if we guess wrong, we have something called a supplemental appropriation, which means we make up the difference with a…

I think it's a big mistake. I think that we are overlooking the obvious. Dramatic things are happening.