No one ever said that fighting the war against terrorism and defending our homeland would be easy. So let's support our troops, law enforcement workers, and our mission to keep our nation and our children safe in the days and years to come.

Research has shown time and time again that infants who receive the high-quality child care and early education programs do better in school, have more developed social skills, and display fewer behavior problems.

No Congress ever has seen fit to amend the Constitution to address any issue related to marriage. No Constitutional Amendment was needed to ban polygamy or bigamy, nor was a Constitutional Amendment needed to set a uniform age of majority to ban child marriages.

Let me first state that I believe that marriage is a sacred union between one man and one woman.

I also believe that the Supreme Court should be the final arbiter of all federal questions.

Our country is the most generous, open, tolerant, and democratic in the world.

Second, marriage is an issue that our Founding Fathers wisely left to the states.

There is no disputing that Lincoln was a great man.

As children, many of us were taught never to talk to strangers. As parents and grandparents, our message must change with technology to include strangers on the Internet.

As the Nation's primary supporter of research in the physical sciences, the DOE Office of Science led the way in creating a unique system of large-scale, specialized, often one-of-a-kind facilities for scientific discovery.

I do think that Social Security reform needs to be bipartisan, and we are going to have to reach that in this debate at some time before we can find really meaningful reform.

If we are to meet the growing electricity demand in the United States without significantly increasing emissions of greenhouse gases, we must maintain a diverse supply of electricity, and nuclear power must be part of that mix.

If we don't continue to pursue alternative, emissions-free energy sources like nuclear fuel, we are at risk of increasing our dependence on costly natural gas.

Mr. Speaker, high natural gas prices and the summer spike in gasoline prices serve as a stark reminder that the path to energy independence is a long and arduous one.

Our congressional district is the fastest growing in the state. Nowhere is there a greater need for new and improved roads and transit systems that will spare us the hours we spend each day in traffic.

Our dependence on foreign energy sources is our Achilles heel, not just in the realm of diplomacy, but in terms of our future as the world's economic leader.

Our health care system is the finest in the world, but we still have too many uninsured Americans, too high prices for prescription drugs, and too many frivolous lawsuits driving our physicians out of state or out of business.

Right now, too many women who reach retirement age find themselves widowed or single, relying on their Social Security check for over half of their income.

Since 1935, this has been a pay-as-you-go system, and I always believed when I first started talking about Social Security that there was a little box that had my name on it and it had my benefits for when I retired. That is not true.

Since coming to Congress, I have been advocating for increased resources for research in the physical sciences and for the Department of Energy Office of Science in particular.