Opening up the health insurance market to more vigorous nationwide competition, as we have done over the last decade in banking, would provide more c… - John McCain

Madam President, there are many of us who will come to the floor this afternoon to pay tribute to one of the great Presidents in American history. Many of us will recollect times and experiences and contacts we had with President Reagan and the way he inspired us personally as well as a nation. When I was a prisoner of war in North Vietnam, the Vietnamese went to great lengths to restrict the news from home to the statements and activities of prominent opponents of the war in Vietnam. They wanted us to believe America had forgotten us. They never mentioned Ronald Reagan to us or played his speeches over the camp loud speakers. No matter. We knew about him. New additions to our ranks told us how the Governor and Mrs. Reagan were committed to our liberation and our cause. When we came home, all of us were eager to meet the Reagans, to thank them for their concern. But more than gratitude drew us to them. We were drawn to them because they were among the few prominent Americans who did not subscribe to the then-fashionable notion that America had entered her inevitable decline.

We asked the witnesses before the Senate Armed Services Committee the following question: Is ISIS contained? It is not. ISIS is not contained, contrary to the statements--bizarrely--made by the President of the United States literally hours before the attack on San Bernardino. This year our Senate Armed Services Committee held several hearings specifically focused on the threat of ISIL, including three hearings specifically with Secretary of Defense Ash Carter. We heard about nine lines of effort. We heard about three "arrrghs." We never heard a plausible theory of success, nor a strategy to achieve success. What do I mean by that? There is no time line on when Mosul, the second largest city in Iraq, will be taken. There is no strategy to take Raqqa. Raqqa is the base of the caliphate. Raqqa is the place where the attacks are being planned and orchestrated. We have news reports that they are developing chemical weapons in Raqqa. This is the first time that a terrorist organization has had a base, a caliphate, from which to operate. What has happened? They are expanding globally.

The job of research and engineering would be developing defense technologies that can ensure a new era of U.S. qualitative military dominance. This office would set defense-wide acquisition and industrial-based policy. It would pull together the centers of innovation in the defense acquisition system. It would oversee the development and manufacturing of weapons by the services. In short, research and engineering would be a staff job focused on innovation, policy, and oversight of the military services and certain defense agencies, such as DARPA. By contrast, management and support would be a line management position. It would manage the multibillion-dollar businesses--such as the Defense Logistics Agency and the Defense Commissary Agency--that buy goods and services for the Department of Defense. It would also manage other defense agencies that perform other critical business functions for the Department, such as performing audits, paying our troops, and managing contracts. This would not only enable research and engineering to focus on technology development, it would also provide for a better management of billions of dollars of spending on mission support activities.