Conditioned on this question the incoming secretary needs to have the courage to speak truth to power to congress, yes but also to his commander in chief. Half. Mr. Durbin mr. President . Speaking in morning business, i rise to express my support for the president s nominee dr. Ashton carter to serve as our nations 25th secretary of defense. A few words of thanks first for chuck hagel our former colleague in the senate who served as secretary of defense. Hes a friend. Hes had a long career in public service. Hes a veteran from vietnam and the people of nebraska rewarded him by asking him to represent them in the United States senate. As our nations first person 6 enlisted rank he had a unique ground level view on matters of war and peace and a strong, strong commitment to our troops. I thank chuck hagel for his service. Dr. Ashton carter has an impressive distinguished record of service as well in government. An advisor scholar. He has what it takes to be a great secretary of defense.
It was either with you are chairman smith asking about working with faithbased organizations. We do work with that. In fact, we visited with the archbishop in kurdistan when we were there to talk about the work they are doing. I know the king and jordan has been very open in meeting with different religious leaders both sort of from an islamic perspective to reduce the lore of isil, but also how do we work with the various religious groups. Syria was one of the most tolerant countries in the entire middle east before all this took place. It is important but there are many groups we work with to try and reduce the tension that is going on. Is there a way to hold those areas that you have the refugees in going to school and being abused with whatever type of abuse that is. Gender abuse, we will say how do you go about making you said you are helping those countries deal with that and trying to make sure they are protected, but how do you go about holding that country or that government a