Good morning, everyone. The committee will come to order. Were here today to consider the nomination of Dan Brouillette to be the secretary of energy. He currently is serving as the deputy secretary of energy, and i am certainly one who believes that you have done an excellent job as second in command to secretary perry. So we welcome you back to the committee. Its good to have discussion with you last week. I want to thank you really want to thank you for all youve done at the department, for your willingness to serve to this point, and for your willingness to step up in this new and higher capacity. Weve got our colleagues here this morning to introduce the deputy secretary, both texas and louisiana are well represented. Mr. Deputy secretary, you should feel very welcome by having these gentlemen next to you. So we will start with senator cassidy up here at the dais followed by senators cruz and kennedy to introduce the deputy secretary this morning. So senator cassidy, if you would
David is the opinion editor of the Washington Times and the former president of the National Rifle association. He also served as a chairman of the American Conservative Union and his new book which he coauthored with thomas mason is called shall not be abridged shall not be infringed. The new assaults on your Second Amendment. Obviously Second Amendment can easily shaded to policy debate. I would like to keep this conversation on constitutional grounds to do that lets you start with a test of the amendment itself. Taking out my trusty pocket constitution. It reads a well regulated militia being necessary for the free state. It shall not be infringed. As we already said you borrow part of the text from the title of your book can you talk a little bit about that choice. The wording is important and shall not be infringed is important because the Second Amendment does not grant the people of the United States the right to keep and bear arms. It is a recognition of the fact that the right