Tom Coburn: “I want to raise a few points. First, I have great respect for the Senators from Mississippi and Louisiana. If they will…”

“I want to raise a few points. First, I have great respect for the Senators from Mississippi and Louisiana. If they will note, my votes have reflected that, when we have sent money for both. The President did request $2.5 billion, $2.7 billion for this. But he also requested that we not do this specific thing, that we not do this. The Senator from Mississippi makes a point they have already collected $125 million--actually they told us $125 million, maybe it is more--from insurance. They did have a big loss. We had a hurricane down there and everybody will agree, because of the hurricane, the ships are going to cost more, no matter what we do. They are going to cost more because they were delayed. We know that in defense contracting. Is it in Northrop Grumman's interest to recapitalize this shipyard? Yes. There is no question about it. Do they have a positive cashflow of $2.6 billion this year? Yes. The reason we should not do this is because there will be no money coming from the insurance industry. Under the legal loss doctrine, we will obviate all those policies. So by doing this, it is true, any money that comes comes back to the Navy. I agree, that is in here. But the fact is, there will be no money coming back because they will have and utilize in their insurance contracts the legal loss doctrine. That doctrine will obviate any obligation, any liability these insurance companies have to do it.…”