Jay Rockefeller

Action is needed, but not through a heavy-handed Federal mandate.

This hearing has been called to explore a pressing concern: the increasing level of distracted driving relating to the use of communications devices, and the safety risks posed by that use.

The Federal Government does have a direct role to play in ensuring the safety of truck, motor coach, and school bus operations.

We thought long and hard about how to write this bill and ultimately modeled it after the national minimum drinking age law.

Without broadband, we won't have an economy.

I just reject that the same way as I reject the fact that there are plenty of people in West Virginia and other States that don't sign up for the Children's Health Insurance Program because they don't know where to sign up, how to sign up…

I think the whole focus brought new energy to our Nation's broadband challenge.

TSA's success is vital to our Nation's transportation, to all the people who use it, and also, most importantly, to our Nation's security.

I think it's probably the most important agency because it has to do with homeland security.

Six years is simply unacceptable.

This has been a cornerstone of who I am as a person and as a legislator throughout my career.

With so much at stake, we must share the truth as soon as possible.

I know for a fact that Sen. Rockefeller is giving veterans and soldiers alike, much needed support through the VA system in WV.

I am a fan of Shinseki. I have no problems saying that.

Americans by nature react to episodes and then we sort of forget them.

It is shocking. It is just shocking.

That is the wrong way to do things.

But we make the soldier prove everything.

It should not require a U.S. Senator and his dogged staff to get this information to the men and women who need it so urgently.

There is a lack of thoroughness or a lack of concern, a lack of care.

There has always been a lack of coordination between the Department of Defense and the VA.

We have a responsibility to make clear to the DOD just how important it is to prevent exposures when possible.

The fact that they were not warned of or protected from exposure to Sodium Dichromate--a dangerous chemical--is an enormously serious problem.

DOD and its contractors have failed to meet their responsibility to our men in uniform.

I mean, for heaven's sakes, they knew they were going to send you to this camp, to Qarmat Ali, and therefore, they had to have been there.