Jack Reed

There will be two votes tomorrow at noon on confirmation of the Costa and Guaderrama nominations. ____________________

I would be honored to yield to my colleague from Tennessee for her closing. The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Young of Indiana). The time of the gentleman from New York has expired. ____________________

I appreciate the gentleman's comments, and I appreciate those kind words. As we move forward, I'd like to bring a good friend of ours from Wisconsin into this conversation. He has been a stalwart down here on the House floor, and has…

I've tried. I've read numerous parts of it especially when I'm up late at night and I can't sleep. It seems like a panacea for those sleepless nights because it immediately puts me back to bed.

I so appreciate it, and I wholeheartedly agree with that sentiment. At this point in time, I would like to yield to my good friend from Kansas (Mr. Huelskamp).

I so appreciate that comment. With that, I would like to yield to another colleague of ours, a great Member of the freshman class from Florida, Colonel West. {time} 1750

Well, I thank the gentleman from Pennsylvania for joining us here tonight. In listening to your comments, I wholeheartedly agree that what we're seeing at the end of this year, if Washington, D.C., does not get its act together--and we as…

Our problem is given the value of homes relative to the loans they cannot access this refinancing market.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I thank the witnesses for their excellent testimony.

I think you have got to try it. You have got to try these things.

They seem not to be performing one of their obligations, which is to provide for efficient markets; is that fair?

Paralysis, I think, is the worst situation at the moment.

It could be a powerful stimulus for recovery, literally putting billions of dollars into the households for education, health care, discretionary spending, et cetera.

I would say that China's not alone. There are several nations around the world that are expanding their amphibious warfare capabilities.

The first decision that came out of that was we have to do a scrub of the fleet mix of vehicles.

I think, has huge implications is the F-35B, with the sheer size of the procurement dollars required for that activity.

I think it reflects the interest that China has in overseas areas in which they're very interested in looking for natural resources and things like that, and they begin to have the capability to project power.

I think statistically there's a 200 percent increase when you look globally at investment in amphibious capabilities beyond the United States.

Sequestration is not a hypothetical. It is the law of the land.

So it's a work in progress?

Are cracks in nearly identical locations on opposite sides of the ship, as apparently were identified in the LCS-1, indicative of a systematic flaw in the design of the LCS-1, and if so, how will the Navy address this issue?

Then the other issue here, too, is there was at least a very theoretical consideration of moving these platforms onto BMD capabilities.

Obviously, as always, please commend those that you lead for their extraordinary efforts.

Just for the record, the 313-ship target total, is that still under the Secretary's guidance, is that still the requirement for the Navy?

The reason I fully support this decision is because if you want to maintain the largest, most sustainable, and most capable fleet you can have, you need to do all of the maintenance and modernization.