Max Baucus: “I thank my friend from Arizona. I will be very brief because I know others want to speak. This last conversation is…”

“I thank my friend from Arizona. I will be very brief because I know others want to speak. This last conversation is extremely important. Northern Africa and other Arab countries are in a state of flux, to say the least. The Arab spring has caused lots of questions and profound implications that we don't begin to now fathom. Those countries don't have executive governments that have any experience. They have replaced tyrants who preceded them. These are Muslim countries. Many of the people who live in these countries believe other parts of the world are more wealthy and they have been put upon. Add to that, these are countries which, in most respects, have very high unemployment. Add to that, most of the demographics of these countries are such that close to half of the population is under the age of 25 or 30, maybe even younger than that. It is a powder keg, and these are countries which don't have the history and culture of the first amendment freedom of speech we have. I say all this because I urge all of us on both sides of the aisle to work together. It is an extremely complicated, complex situation. It used to be not too many years ago that politics stopped at the water's edge. It used to be not too many years ago that on foreign policy issues, because they are nonpartisan, we as a country worked together. We addressed the world with one voice. So I strongly caution my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to not make this a partisan issue; that is, U.S.…”