our lawmakers to advance your providential purposes. may they think your thoughts striving always to do your will. lord, lead them together to find solutions to the problems that beset our nation and world. calm their fears and strengthen their faith, as you use them to accomplish your will. let your peace guard their hearts. we pray in your strong name. amen. the president pro tempore: please join me in reciting the pledge of allegiance to the flag. i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. mr. mcconnell: mr. president? the president pro tempore: the majority leader. mr. mcconnell: today the senate is continuing to consider s. 1 a bill to approve the keystone x.l. pipeline. chairman murkowski and senator cantwell are here this morning to manage debate and there are several amendments pending. we ll begin voting on those and any other amendments i
percentage of scientists who are in agreement with what this amendment says. and with that, mr. president, i would yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from louisiana. mr. vitter: mr. president, at this point i ask unanimous consent to call up amendment 80 which i have discussed previously today and which is at the desk. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. the clerk will report. the clerk: the senator from louisiana, mr. vitter, proposes an amendment numbered 80. mr. vitter: mr. president i ask that further reading of the amendment be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. vitter: and mr. president, i ask that the amendment be modified with the changes at the desk. the presiding officer: the amendment is so modified. mr. vitter: thank you mr. president. i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from new jersey. mr. menendez: mr. president i rise to set aside and ask consent to set aside the pending am
vote: the presiding officer: are there any senators wishing to vote or change their vote? if not on this vote, the yeas are 75, the nays are 23. under the previous order requiring 60 votes for the adoption of this amendment the amendment is agreed to. ms. murkowski: move to reconsider. a senator: move to lay on the table. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mcconnell: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. mcconnell: could we have order in the senate. the presiding officer: the senate will be in order. mr. mcconnell: yeah, i d like to remind everybody these are supposed to be 10-minute roll call votes and to the extent that you don t make it in the 10 minutes, you inconvenience everybody else, and i would hope people would be respectful of their colleagues and stay close to the floor and vote during the 10 minutes. we ve actually reached a milestone here that i think s noteworthy for the senate. we just cast our 15th roll call vote on
and of the 181 waivers granted by this committee last congress, 175 of them were republicans. that s 97% republicans. three 3% democrats. again in the last congress, democrats had to abide by the rules. the republicans did not. i have an amendment to try to eliminate big tax breaks for big oil companies. and every time i ve tried to get a vote on it, on an energy bill i ve been told, sorry the tax rule says you can only do this you can only do that on a tax bill. then when i offer it on a tax bill, sorry. it s a farce. and i think the majority is hiding behind the rules to keep members from voting on anything you don t like. i have an old fashioned definition of rules. i was taught when you have rules you re supposed to follow them. and given the number of waivers that this committee has provided to get around the rules, i think we taught to be transparent about that. my hope is, the same with the previous amendment, if you re required to report these things then maybe you
less than 200 votes. also, a bill sponsored by the republican over the keystone to outline will be in the house this week. to the keystone xl pipeline and specifically what congress should do about it, we want to get your thoughts on if congress should approve passage and building of the keystone pipeline. if you support the measure if you oppose the measure want to make your thoughts on congress and how they should act on keystone, on , you can contact us on twitter, facebook or e-mail. mikeng us on the phone, lillis on the hill. good morning. can you give us a little background on the scheduled votes on keystone and how this happens? guest: sure, obama was trying to delay without having to deal with it and hoping to get out of office. no unanticipated this would foren in the lame duck something to the louisiana race was going to be close. but when republicans came back and said, hey, let s vote on this one more time and this is not the first time they ve voted on it.