I stand to strongly support my amendment No. 4312, which I introduced today, along with Senators Gregg, Cornyn, Enzi, Alexander, and Hutchison, and I urge all of my colleagues, both sides of the aisle, to support this commonsense…

I have a bill directly on point that lifts all liability caps on BP for this event, but also sets up an expedited claim process.

I would again urge us and plead that we can act to address the ongoing crisis in the Gulf through a focused bill.

It establishes an expedited claims process because it is crucial that these folks not just be made whole eventually, but they start to be made whole now because they are struggling month to month.

I apologize to Senator Lautenberg. As a member of the Committee coming from the most affected State by this ongoing crisis, for having the gall to have legislation to try to address it now.

The point is that we need a permanent revision of the law, but there is clearly disagreement about how to do that.

It absolutely does that without equivocation to give certainty on that issue to the people of the Gulf Coast who are going through an ongoing crisis.

I come to the floor to talk about the ongoing oil disaster in the gulf. Being from Louisiana, we view this, correctly, as an ongoing disaster. This is not history. This is not a past event. This is not just some issue to debate in…

This bill is very simple. You have it before you. It does two things. First of all it removes any and all liability cap on BP for this event.

I want to thank Senator Murkowski for her great work on this.

I would hope that really immediately, by UC hopefully, we could pass those two concepts put together.

I want to thank our colleague Lisa for her enormous contribution on this expedited claims idea.

That is absolutely my intention. That is what this bill would do. Several Senators on the other side correctly pointed out that we should not depend on the goodwill of BP. So let's not depend on the goodwill of BP. Let's fix it here. Let's…

I am overjoyed that I have been let into this discussion considering that heavy oil is now getting into Louisiana marshland and is impacting my State and the State of Senator Landrieu more than any other in the country. It is an ongoing…

I want to fix a problem, not just make a speech. We are not going to pass by unanimous consent a permanent change to the liability cap. I have a version that I think should pass, and I am going to keep fighting for it. But as oil continues…

I rise to discuss flood insurance extension and our need to address that now, to get rid of uncertainty in the market and real concern that this will not be done in time, and the vital National Flood Insurance Program may be allowed to…

I would ask that we make part of this discussion the not just authority, but mandate that the President set up a quick loan program for fishermen and others in the fisheries industry.

I talked with her in the last few weeks about an aggressive SBA response to the current crisis in the Gulf.

I would think that we shouldn't outsource our responsibility for cleaning this up.

I want to do everything we can to get folks out there--local community folks--cities, counties, businesses, volunteers, state government--to try to do everything we can to stop this oil from coming ashore.

The President shall establish a loan program under the fund to provide interim assistance to fishermen and aquiculture producer claimants during the claims procedure.

The State of Louisiana and local parishes have made a proposal to do emergency dredging and use the dredged material to build up the barrier islands.

Timing is the big issue, and this request has been out there for a week or more.

What this could do to Florida, if all of this oil washes along our shores; what it's going to do to our tourism industry, what it's going to do to our fishing business, what it's going to do to recreational boating, what it's going to do…

This is obviously a historic event with a big negative impact on fisheries. If this doesn't qualify, I don't know what does.