Tag Archives: Dick Durbin

News, Politics, Government

Remarks by the President on the Economy — Knox College, Galesburg, IL

Leave a comment

By The White House

Knox College
Galesburg, Illinois

12:13 P.M. CDT

THE PRESIDENT: Hello, Galesburg! (Applause.) Well, it’s good to be home in Illinois! (Applause.) It is good to be back. It’s good to be back. Thank you. Thank you so much, everybody. (Applause.) Thank you. Everybody, have a seat, have a seat. Well, it is good to be back.

I want to, first of all, thank Knox College — (applause) — I want to thank Knox College and your president, Teresa Amott, for having me here today. Give Teresa a big round of applause. (Applause.) I want to thank your Congresswoman, Cheri Bustos, who’s here. (Applause.) We've got Governor Quinn here. (Applause.) I'm told we've got your Lieutenant Governor, Sheila Simon, is here. (Applause.) There she is. Attorney General Lisa Madigan is here. (Applause.)

I see a bunch of my former colleagues, some folks who I haven't seen in years and I'm looking forward to saying hi to. One in particular I've got to mention, one of my favorites from the Illinois Senate — John Sullivan is in the house. (Applause.) John was one of my earliest supporters when I was running for the U.S. Senate, and it came in really handy because he’s got, like, 10 brothers and sisters, and his wife has got 10 brothers and sisters — (laughter) — so they’ve got this entire precinct just in their family. (Laughter.) And they all look like John — the brothers do — so he doesn’t have to go to every event. He can just send one of his brothers out. (Laughter.) It is good to see him.

Dick Durbin couldn’t make it today, but he sends his best. And we love Dick. (Applause.) He’s doing a great job. And we’ve got one of my favorite neighbors, the Senator from Missouri, Claire McCaskill, in the house, because we’re going to Missouri later this afternoon. (Applause.)

And all of you are here, and it’s great to see you. (Applause.) And I hope everybody is having a wonderful summer. The weather is perfect. Whoever was in charge of that, good job. (Laughter.)

So, eight years ago, I came here to deliver the commencement address for the class of 2005. Things were a little different back then. For example, I had no gray hair — (laughter) — or a motorcade. Didn’t even have a prompter. In fact, there was a problem in terms of printing out the speech because the printer didn’t work here and we had to drive it in from somewhere. (Laughter.) But it was my first big speech as your newest senator.

And on the way here I was telling Cheri and …read more

Source: FULL ARTICLE at The White House Press Office

News, Politics, Government

GOP senator: Time to change military force law

Leave a comment

The top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said Wednesday that Congress should overhaul the 2001 authorization for the use of military force to encompass the use of drones for targeted killings.

Weighing in on an issue of both national security and civil liberties, Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., said the law passed days after the Sept. 11 terror attacks needs to be revised to deal with emerging threats and ensure greater congressional oversight.

“For far too long, Congress has failed to fully exercise its constitutional responsibility to authorize the use of military force, including in the current struggle against al-Qaida, so I urge the committee to consider updating current anti-terrorism authorities to adapt to threats that did not exist in 2001 and to better protect our nation while upholding our morals and values,” Corker said at the start of a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on counterterrorism.

The law gave President George W. Bush the authority to launch the invasion of Afghanistan and target al-Qaida, saying the commander in chief has the authority to attack “nations, organizations or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on Sept. 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons, in order to prevent any future acts of international terrorism against the United States by such nations, organizations or persons.”

Since then, President Barack Obama has used the law‘s authority to target terrorists with fatal drone strikes, including Americans overseas.

The issue came to the forefront in recent weeks as Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., waged a nearly 13-hour filibuster of John Brennan‘s nomination for CIA director over the president’s authority to use drones in the United States. The Senate eventually confirmed Brennan.

Corker said the Foreign Relations Committee, which has jurisdiction, should put “in place specific policy guidance for how and when the president can use these authorities, including lethal action and the use of drones, in regular consultation with Congress, so we can restore the appropriate balance of power between the legislative and executive branches of government while maintaining flexibility for the president to respond swiftly under threat of attack.”

Former Rep. Jane Harman, D-Calif., now the president of The Wilson Center, told the committee that she never imagined that 12 years after the law that it would be used against disparate enemies.

The No. 2 Democrat in the Senate, Dick Durbin of …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox US News

Articles of Interest

President Rand Paul?

Leave a comment

By Steve Deace

Rand Paul 4 SC President Rand Paul?

If Rand Paul goes on to become President of these United States one day, we will look back on the events of March 6th, 2013 as the catalyst for making that happen. And because of those events, Rand Paul now has more political capital to spend than any elected Republican in the country.

Rand Paul’s 13-hour filibuster on the Senate floor over the issue of whether or not a White House can unilaterally determine to kill Americans using drone strikes, with no regard whatsoever for the 5th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, did something on a national policy level that hasn’t happened much in recent years—it united the right-of-center coalition in America around principled leadership.

The only other two recent examples of this I can think of were what Scott Walker did to the unionistas in Wisconsin and what Mike Huckabee did for Chick-fil-a. But those events, important as they were, didn’t accomplish what Rand Paul did last week. What we saw was one man’s crusade – if for only one night – bringing the ruling class to its knees. We saw Rand Paul bend Washington, D.C. to his will. We saw him grab them by the throat and force them – milquetoast RINO Mitch McConnell and liberal statist Dick Durbin alike – to respond to him.

When was the last time a Republican in the nation’s capitol did that on a matter of public policy? Has McConnell, the Republican leader in the U.S. Senate, ever done that? What about Republican Speaker of the House John Boehner? We already know the answer. The last time a Republican in the beltway moved heaven and earth on a matter of public policy was when George W. Bush wanted to invade Iraq.

Let’s hope this turns out better than that.

You may wish Rand Paul had done this on an issue you care more about than this one, and you may doubt his sincerity (when isn’t it a good time to doubt a politician’s sincerity?), but you also can’t deny the potential political power of this moment. There were the GOP’s other bright shining and emerging stars, Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz, side-saddling up next to Rand. There was John Thune, who looks like Tarzan but plays like Jane when it comes to politics, hopping on the bandwagon to do something that looked hard for once. Then the next morning, there were the hackneyed symbols of RINO face palms, John “little ball of hate” McCain and Lindsey Graham, predictably lining up to condemn Rand—which only adds to his conservative street cred.

Do you know why what Rand did was so powerful? First, because we are starved for anything that resembles leadership, and leadership is what Rand was showing. We are like parched throats in a desert desperately seeking anything that resembles a drop of water. So many of you have called or emailed me the last few years wondering when someone will stand up and fling the monkey poop right back into the face of a corrupt ruling class. …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Western Journalism

Articles of Interest

Senator Ends Long Floor Speech Blocking CIA Pick

Leave a comment

By Breaking News

Rand Paul 4 SC Senator ends long floor speech blocking CIA pick

WASHINGTON— A tea party senator from Kentucky used an old-style filibuster lasting nearly 13 hours to block Senate confirmation of John Brennan’s nomination to be CIA director.

Sen. Rand Paul ended his filibuster shortly after midnight, but Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, also a Kentucky Republican, said he would continue to oppose Brennan’s confirmation and try to keep the debate going.

After Paul yielded the floor, Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., filed a motion to cut off debate on Brennan’s nomination and bring it up for a vote.

Paul ended his lengthy speech with a joke. He said that he was tempted to go another 12 hours and try to break former South Carolina Sen. Strom Thurmond’s filibuster record of 24 hours, but he needed to use the bathroom.

“I discovered that there are some limits to filibustering and I’m going to have to go and take care of one of those in a few minutes,” Paul said.

Read More at OfficialWire . By Richard Lardner.

Related posts:

  1. CIA…
  2. McCain Cool To Suggestion Of Hagel Filibuster WASHINGTON (OfficialWire) — Republican Sen. John McCain, a sharp critic…

…read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Western Journalism

News, Politics, Government

Gates backs lawmakers' oversight of drone program

Leave a comment

Robert Gates, a former defense secretary and spymaster, is backing lawmakers’ proposal to form a special court to review President Barack Obama‘s deadly drone strikes against Americans linked to al-Qaida.

Gates, who led the Pentagon for Presidents George W. Bush and Obama and previously served as the Central Intelligence Agency‘s director, said Obama‘s use of the unmanned drones follows tight rules. But he shares lawmakers’ wariness over using the unmanned aircraft to target al-Qaida operatives and allies.

“I think that the rules and the practices that the Obama administration has followed are quite stringent and are not being abused. But who is to say about a future president?” Gates said in an interview broadcast Sunday.

The use of remote-controlled drones — Obama‘s weapon of choice to strike al-Qaida with lethal missiles in places such as Pakistan and Yemen — earned headlines last week as lawmakers contemplated just how much leeway an American president should have in going after the nation’s enemies, including its own citizens.

“We are in a different kind of war. We’re not sending troops. We’re not sending manned bombers. We’re dealing with the enemy where we find them to keep America safe. We have to strike a new constitutional balance with the challenges we face today,” said Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill.

“The policy is really unfolding. Most of this has not been disclosed,” the second-ranking Senate Democrat added.

The nomination of John Brennan, Obama‘s counterterrorism adviser who oversaw many of the drone strikes from his office in the West Wing basement, kick-started the discussion.

During Thursday‘s hearing, Brennan defended drone strikes only as a “last resort,” but he said he had no qualms about going after Anwar al-Awlaki in September 2011. A drone strike in Yemen killed al-Awlaki and Samir Khan, both U.S. citizens. A drone strike two weeks later killed al-Awlaki’s 16-year-old son, a Denver native.

Those strikes came after U.S. intelligence concluded that the elder al-Awlaki was senior operational leader of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula plotting attacks on the U.S., including the failed Christmas Day bombing of an airplane as it landed in Detroit in 2009.

“I think it’s very unseemly that a politician gets to decide the death of an American citizen,” said Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky. “They should answer about the 16-year-old …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox US News

News, Politics, Government

Lawmakers urge oversight of drone program

Leave a comment

President Barack Obama‘s use of unmanned drones to kill Americans who are suspected of being al-Qaida allies deserves closer inspection, lawmakers said Sunday as even some of the president’s allies suggested an uneasiness about the program.

Obama‘s stance toward the terrorist threats facing the United States has left some Democrats and Republicans alike nervous about the unmanned drones targeting the nation’s enemies from the skies. Questions about the deadly program dogged Obama‘s pick to lead the Central Intelligence Agency last week and prompted lawmakers to consider tighter oversight. All killings carried out under the drone program have ballooned under the president’s watch.

“We are in a different kind of war. We’re not sending troops. We’re not sending manned bombers. We’re dealing with the enemy where we find them to keep America safe. We have to strike a new constitutional balance with the challenges we face today,” said Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill.

“The policy is really unfolding. Most of this has not been disclosed,” the second-ranking Senate Democrat added.

Before John Brennan’s confirmation hearing to lead the CIA on Thursday, Obama directed the Justice Department to give the congressional intelligence committees access to classified legal advice providing the government‘s rationale for drone strikes against American citizens working with al-Qaida abroad. That 2012 memo outlined the Obama administration’s decision to kill al-Qaida suspects without evidence that specific and imminent plots were being planned against the United States.

The nomination of Brennan, Obama‘s counterterrorism adviser who oversaw many of the drone strikes from his office in the West Wing basement, kick-started the discussion about how the United States prosecutes its fight against the terrorist group.

Sen. Angus King, an independent from Maine, said he prefers a review before the remote-operated aircraft fire on someone.

“It just makes me uncomfortable that the president — whoever it is — is the prosecutor, the judge, the jury and the executioner, all rolled into one,” King said. “So I’m not suggesting something that would slow down response, but where there is time to go in and submit it to a third party that is a court, in confidence, and get a judgment that, yes there, is sufficient evidence here.”

Former Defense Secretary Bob Gates, himself a former CIA chief, suggested “some check” on a president’s ability to order drone strikes against American al-Qaida operatives would be appropriate and lent support …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox US News

News, Politics, Government

Senate chair: Count up Hagel vote after hearing

Leave a comment

Top Senate Republicans said Tuesday they would reserve judgment on Chuck Hagel‘s nomination until after his confirmation hearing next week, a positive sign for President Barack Obama‘s choice to head the Defense Department.

Hagel, who already has drawn strong opposition from six Senate Republicans, continued his outreach to lawmakers on Tuesday, meeting with 11 senators. Among them were Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Sen. John McCain, whose support for the nomination could smooth the way for the former GOP senator and provide political cover for other Republicans to back the nominee.

“Senator Hagel and I are old friends and we had a very frank and candid conversation, and I’ll be looking forward to the hearing and asking him questions,” the Arizona Republican told reporters at a news conference on his recent overseas trip. “He should be given the opportunity of a hearing before any of us make a judgment.”

Durbin, the No. 2 Democrat in the Senate, said he pressed Hagel on a number of issues, but kept returning to the basics.

“Chuck Hagel would be the first enlisted man, the first volunteer to serve in Vietnam” to become defense secretary, Durbin said after a meeting with Hagel. “He served our nation in combat. He was wounded. I can understand why Obama has chosen him.”

Hagel, during a brief conversation with reporters in the Capitol, declined to answer specific questions, simply saying, “we have a hearing next week and I look forward to answering questions.”

The Hagel nomination gained momentum last week as Sens. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., two of the strongest pro-Israel Democrats in the Senate, said the former Nebraska senator had addressed their concerns about his stand on Iran sanctions and support for Israel.

But Hagel still faces ambivalence among Republicans, if not outright opposition, and could emerge from the Senate committee vote with only party-line support. Sen. Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma, the panel’s top Republican, has announced his opposition as have several other committee members.

Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said earlier in the day that it was too soon to count the votes and he would have a better assessment of the support for Hagel after his confirmation hearing on Jan. 31.

Asked if there were any Republican votes for Hagel, Levin said, “I haven’t seen any, but there may be that I haven’t seen. That doesn’t mean that there won’t be.”

Hagel was scheduled to meet on Wednesday with Sen. Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H., a committee member who has said she was perplexed by the nomination.

Another panel member, Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., said Tuesday, “I look forward to visiting with him and hearing his testimony and we’ll see where it goes.”

Durbin said Hagel was scheduled to meet with 20 other senators.

Concerns about Hagel replacing Defense Secretary Leon Panetta have centered on whether he is sufficiently pro-Israel, his description of pro-Israel groups as a “Jewish lobby,” and his stand on gay rights. Some GOP lawmakers also are concerned about potential cuts to defense spending and Hagel’s past support for reductions in nuclear weapons.

“That’s of great importance to me,” said Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee, the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Corker’s state is home to the Y-12 nuclear facility and significant cuts in the nuclear arsenal would affect his state.

“I want to delve beyond the one-liners and sentences that have been brought forth by groups. It’ll be a very earnest conversation. I always start with an open mind. But I do have concerns,” said Corker, who is scheduled to meet with Hagel on Friday.

Democrats hold a 55-45 advantage in the Senate and would have the votes to confirm Hagel on a simple majority, but they would need five Republican votes for the 60-vote threshold to break a GOP filibuster. A Republican effort to block Obama‘s choice of a former Republican senator would set off a firestorm as Senate leaders try to negotiate new rules on filibusters.

Separately, a GOP-leaning group launched an anti-Hagel ad campaign in the home states of five Senate Democrats up for re-election next year.

“Say no to Chuck Hagel before it’s too late,” said the commercials from Americans for a Stronger Defense. The spots target Sens. Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, Mark Begich of Alaska, Mark Udall of Colorado, Mark Pryor of Arkansas and Kay Hagan of North Carolina.

___

Associated Press writer Richard Lardner contributed to this report.

Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox US News