W. Weldon

I am proud to call him not just a colleague, but someone that all of us can look up to in this country as a true role model for America. Congratulations, Jim. The people of Philadelphia are real proud to call you their own.

I would add it is the feeling of this committee that that letter has no standing whatsoever. It is a political document. But I would say to the President, Where is your letter for the 13,000 Philadelphia, PA, tri-State workers that are…

The Secretary would like to have it, because it would end up supporting his needs for additional money for readiness that his President will not give in to because he pulls his defense budget number out of the air, as you know.

The commission has the same authority these commissions had, which is basically to come back to Congress and do what the Secretary has not been able to do, and that is give us the straight scoop on what our defense needs are.

One further point besides the sale of Russian submarines to Iran, which we now have documented, we also know that the Russians offered to take the SS-25, which is their mainstay nuclear intercontinental ballistic missile, and offer that…

I do not disagree with the gentleman. In fact I applaud his leadership on the issue of military installations and facilities. My point is we are taking a bigger and bigger chunk out of the defense budget for nondefense items, up 361…

In other words, the gentleman is saying that if it is determined that the theater ballistic missile system should have space-based interceptors, it is OK?

What I said is what I said. Do not put words in my mouth. What I said is I want the Secretary of Defense to come back within 60 days and make recommendations to us that we can act on.

The gentleman's amendment further ties the hand of the gentleman's administration and the Defense Department. What we are saying is, let Secretary Perry come back and tell us what he wants and then we can respond.

What this bill simply says, we do not put a dollar amount. We simply say to the Secretary, come back to us within 60 days and tell us what is doable in terms of implementing national missile defense. We then have to take his…

I want to clarify what Dr. Evers, the Deputy Director of the Ballistic Missile Defense Office with the administration said yesterday in my office. The maximum amount for a full-blown ballistic missile defense system for our Nation would be…

I just want to add that in that assessment done for the Secretary, General O'Neill tells us that we can get a 90 percent effective rate against three SS-25s that would be the likely scenario of a third world nation getting SS-25…

First of all, in response to the comments of my colleague, the gentleman from California [Mr. Cunningham] the Russians also, as we know, have been selling their submarines. They recently sold at least two submarines to Iran.

I consider myself a fiscal conservative. I have as many watchdogs in my office as any of my colleagues, but this is also an issue involving our national security. Please vote ``yes'' on the amendment.

I rise today to welcome and to pay tribute to 43 of the best and brightest young people that I have in my congressional district in Pennsylvania. Each year I invite every high school in my district to send their outstanding male and female…

I would like to say at the outset that even though there were two Republicans against two Democrats on this issue, my position would have been at the outset that there are many, many Democrats, including most on the Armed Services…