Angus King

I'm still concerned about the high rate of unemployment among veterans.

In my view, cutting maintenance isn't a savings. It may be a savings this year, but it's ultimately something that's going to have to happen.

Both houses, the Senate and the House, do not assume the sequester numbers

I am sure you agree.

Here's the scenario that keeps me up at night. The North Koreans torpedo a ship, a South Korean ship.

Using the word 'transparency' in connection with China strikes me as something of an oxymoron.

What we have in place is the ability for the alliance to have--we've planned and thought through some of these events.

I think Senator Graham put it quite well.

It seems to me that the key to the situation is our relationship with China, which has come out over and over.

When Assad falls--I won't say if and when because it's when as far as I'm concerned Assad falls

I view that as the next Pearl Harbor risk.

That to me means that the work you're doing, General Kelly, in the SOUTHCOM on the high seas is not only a drug issue or a criminal issue, but it's a very serious national security issue.

If you move everybody to Fort Benning, it's going to be hard to get them there.

One of the potential cures, if you will, or at least ameliorations, is greater flexibility to DOD in terms of how it's going to be achieved.

We have to step up the military--our military effort against Assad in some ways

Life is not an on-and-off switch. It's not we have to have a huge infrastructure or nothing.

It seems to me the strategic challenge... is how do we decrease response time while still maintaining a relatively small footprint?

I'm less interested in the details of what happened and more interested in what do we learn from it.

I think the government could be a lot better consumer and could help with a lot of these delivery processes.

We need to talk about, fundamentally, how to lower health care costs, and to say it cannot be done is ridiculous.

Is there any straightface argument for Medicare not bargaining for drugs?

I agree with Senator Johnson that the public has to have a stake in the game.

We have got this, to me, amazing law that says the biggest purchaser in the society cannot bargain, and I do not understand why we do that.

To me, it is competition between providers. That is... there are only two ways to regulate price in our society.

The math around our entitlement programs is fundamentally flawed.