I certainly want to say at the outset congratulations to you for being the first woman to chair the Committee of Veteran's Affairs.

Zach arranged a public seminar that drew 400 individuals on a cold Maine night and garnered broad attention not just in Maine but nationwide.

Those who fight and die serving our country... deserve our deference, our reverence, and eternal gratitude.

I rise today to join with Senator Stabenow of Michigan to introduce The Preservation of Access to Osteoporosis Testing for Medicare Beneficiaries Act of 2011. The companion bill in the U.S. House of Representatives is being introduced by…

We would welcome the opportunity to brief the subcommittee on the results of this review once completed.

we would welcome the opportunity to brief the subcommittee on the results of this review once completed.

I rise today to introduce legislation with my colleague, Senator Collins, to authorize the Department of Defense to carry out a pilot program to sell certain products at commissaries that serve areas with military installations that have…

But with the threshold you are using as a standard, they only have to increase lending by 2.5 percent.

The objective is not to assist the TARP recipients, but the net effect is that it is happening.

We share your concerns about ensuring that every investment made in an institution is done so in an institution that is healthy.

We have got to turn this economy around. We have to create jobs, and I know that we created 244,000 jobs last month.

The Administration opposed direct lending as well. It essentially did not want the government to become a bank.

What I was saying earlier in my opening comments about TARP refinancing is that ultimately, what it suggests is that there is going to be minimal new small business lending, with very few new institutions participating in the program.

What is your response to that? ... we want to make sure that smaller entities, smaller businesses, are having access to these loans?

If banks have only maintained the 12 percent trend that is already occurring, they can lock-in on an interest rate of 1 percent.

From what I understand, it is not exactly happening with the maximum effect.

As Ranking Member of this Committee, I certainly know firsthand that there is no more urgent imperative than job creation in our country.

Now, perhaps more than ever, we will rely on small business to lead us out of our continued economic morass as they have done time and time again in the past.

as ranking member of the Senate Small Business Committee, I am delighted to rise today, on the eve of National Small Business Week, with Senator Landrieu, who is Chair of the Committee, to introduce the Small Business Tax Equalization and…

So, I'm going to explore with you the issue of distance.

The question is, what's our return on investment? Are we clearly safer? Yes, we are. But, at what cost?

Now, is there any way that we can sort of synchronize these background checks, you know, so that we can have one unified background check?

When it comes to maritime security, we can, and must do better to protect our country's 360 ports and maritime facilities.

Secure ID cards like the TWIC are vital in insuring that access to critical port facilities is restricted to known-persons.

Unfortunately, we can see from today's report that the TWIC credential has failed on all counts.