I love these members, they get up and say, 'Read the bill ... What good is reading the bill if it's a thousand pages and you don't have two days and two lawyers to find out what it means after you read the bill?'

For decades, the violence in the Middle East has claimed a multitude of innocent civilian victims: Men, women and children, Arab and Israeli.

Too many of my constituents, like many other hard working Americans across the country, are suffering unnecessarily due to our flawed health care system.

There is no better illustration of that crisis than the fact that the president is openly violating our nation's laws by authorizing the NSA to engage in warrantless surveillance of U.S. citizens.

None of us condone terrorism in any way, shape, or form, and I believe Hezbollah is a terrorist organization that was, is, and remains a threat to peace in the Mideast, and must be dismantled and disarmed.

Once the violence has ceased, the US should immediately call on the World Bank and other international institutions to convene a donors conference to rebuild Lebanon's shattered infrastructure.

My friends in the Congress, I have known Coretta King since I went south during the civil rights movement as a lawyer. She was a vibrant, consistent, totally dedicated partner with her husband.