the way of the future for Afghanistan is with the national unity government, having a very professionalized army and police

It would be a grave mistake to withdraw from Afghanistan on an arbitrary timeframe not based upon conditions on the ground.

The support that the Taliban have from the average Afghan is not favorable.

I think that's just part of the reality that we face there. Plus, we have--for the first time in, I don't know, living memory, have a real partner that we can work with who has a chance to make Afghanistan work.

He won. He could afford to be magnanimous. That is free political advice to the president of another country.

In my view, this document is trying to strike a balance between presidential authority and congressional authority in the area of, particularly, warmaking.

I rise to speak about a little-discussed aspect of the Affordable Care Act. Before touching on the main subject, I should point out that I think as of tonight there will be more than 11 million Americans who will have already signed up for…

I hope we can use that influence to move this along.

If we had the Gates budget of 2012, the defense budget this year would be somewhere around $612 billion.

Do you seriously believe Putin cares about agreements?

I think we have to think about it in terms of the moral obligation to do that.

there are two items I want to touch on today. One is bad news and the other is good news. This week we learned there was a data breach of 80 million people's records--300,000 in Maine--at Anthem. Fortunately the data breach did not include…

first I wish to associate myself with the comments of the Senator from Maryland and my senior colleague from Maine. I know this industry is growing in Maine. It is entrepreneurial, exciting, energetic, and they are adding jobs and only…

I also come to the floor today with some good news. It comes as no surprise that our debates here in the Senate focus generally on challenges, such as the one I just outlined, that face the United States. After all, that is our task and it…

The question that bothers me is, okay, if we decide it's been in the National interest to close it, there still are some people there that are very dangerous.

if we're going to decide to close the facility and--or if, collectively, the United States Government's going to decide to close the facility based upon that, we'd better know that it's real, and not just a perceived threat.

I hope that you will focus very intensively on time and risk. I think those are the two factors.

our disengagement should be based upon conditions on the ground and not arbitrary dates in a calendar.

I appreciate your willingness to take this on, and I do hope you will view this as an extraordinary opportunity.

All of your experience, all of your knowledge, all of your wisdom that you have accumulated over the years are of no value if you do not share them.

The President isn't well served if he doesn't have people who tell him the straight truth.

There has to be an offensive capability which our adversaries understand, and understand will be applied.

I tell people in Maine that we cannot audit the Department of Defense, and their jaws drop. We got to fix that.

It is also that political solution that is desperately needed so they have the will to fight, so they believe in their government.

If Senator Inhofe was here, he would tell you that currently it takes 23 years to get a new airframe from conception to the tarmac and into flight. That is unacceptable.