Jeff Merkley

The challenges now for us in Congress to put the same type of effort into this that all of our witnesses have put into the conversation.

Whiskey, that's for drinking and water that's for fighting.

We don't want to spend the next 20 years just enriching lawyers. We want to solve the problem.

I certainly resolve to do what I could to assist.

There could be a path that was better for irrigators, better for the river, better for the fish, better for the tribes.

I had an amendment last December that said these findings of law that translate the requirements that are in the law into what is permissible needs to be declassified so we can have the debate.

The standard for collecting phone records on Americans is now all phone records all the time all across America.

I believe that what you just said is you want that information to be declassified that explains how you get from these standards of law to the conduct that has now been presented publicly.

I do think it is time that that become understandable in public because otherwise how in a democracy do you have a debate if you do not know what the plain language means.

The Spouses of Heroes Education Act would grant post-9/11 era widows and widowers the same educational benefits that Congress has authorized for their children.

The public has a right to know, but the way to bring it to public attention is not to commit crimes.

We should measure the success of our Nation not by the GDP or the Dow. We should measure it by the success of our families.

We are going to keep pursuing these issues because citizens across the country demand it.

Do we have a challenge with the pace of technological change in having other parts of the economy change fast enough to create replacement living-wage jobs?

The challenge of living-wage jobs disappearing and much lower wage jobs reappearing.

Unfortunately, over the last decade at least, the American Dream has slipped slowly out of reach for many families.

I think this is something of grave concern.

The American Dream is a powerful concept that has driven generations of Americans to strive for a better life.

With the changing or the more extensive droughts, we're going to see that this problem of accumulated fuels becomes of more and more dreaded effect.

I really appreciate the administration's support for the LWCF.

We don't want to lose this mill.

We've got to do more on the front end.

I appreciate that you've taken special attention, personal attention to this issue.

This has been a key, key set of programs.

How do we responsibly address forest health if we can't have a robust fuels reduction program on the front end?