Ed Markey: “I thank the gentleman. Mr. Dicks and I started 36 years ago at the height of the Cold War, with each country building…”

“I thank the gentleman. Mr. Dicks and I started 36 years ago at the height of the Cold War, with each country building more and more nuclear weapons, more and more defense systems in an ever escalating war of nerves that kept both countries and the whole world on edge. In this Republican fantasy land, gold-plated nuclear weapons systems budget, there are going to be programs that have long outlived their usefulness that are lavished with canyons filled with cash. In this fantasy land, the Cold War never ended. The Soviet menace lives on, making it necessary to maintain vast stockpiles of nuclear weapons and build new bombers to penetrate the Iron Curtain. In this fantasy land, there are mountains of money for intercontinental ballistic missiles towering over the landscape and providing shade and comfort to the legions of defense contractors making nuclear weapons we no longer need and we can no longer afford. In this fantasy land, the Republicans want to retroactively re-fight the Cold War that we won. This makes no sense. Mr. Chairman, it is time to get real. Sequestration is coming. The Republicans, in their budget, are ignoring the doomsday clock that has nearly reached midnight for millions of hardworking Americans. We must prepare for this reality. The bill the Republicans have brought to the floor today provides the Pentagon with a billion more dollars than this year's spending level, and $3 billion more than the Obama administration requested.…”