[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 6]
[Senate]
[Page 8406]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                                PROGRAM

  Mr. REID. I would also say, Mr. President, that I have conferred with 
the Republican leader, and there is no reason that we will have any 
votes scheduled for Tuesday, the day we return. Monday is a legal 
holiday, and Tuesday we are going to start the stem cell debate. The 
debate on that will last for at least 2 days, so there is no reason we 
will need to come back for a vote on Tuesday. People will have plenty 
to do here, and the vote would just interrupt that.
  I have told the Republican leader, and he acknowledges that is 
probably the right thing to do. So we will have no votes on Tuesday. 
The first vote will be sometime on Wednesday.
  If there is no further business today, I would turn to the Republican 
leader.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I would just say to the majority leader 
that I agree there is no necessity to have a vote on Tuesday, the week 
after next, and I think we will proceed with the debate on the stem 
cell proposals and be ready to vote on Wednesday.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I failed to announce, but it was very 
important, those numbers that we read off were two very important 
ambassadorships: Ford M. Fraker, to be the Ambassador to the Kingdom of 
Saudi Arabia; Zalmay Khalilzad, who, of course, has served so well in 
Iraq and is now going to be the Ambassador to the United Nations. That 
is very important, and I am glad we did that.
  One thing I did not mention is, for all Senators and staff, our 
Democratic caucus, which is normally held on Tuesday, we are going to 
have that on Wednesday. It is obvious now, with no votes on Tuesday, 
that is probably the right thing to do. So, for all Democrats, we will 
have our caucus on Wednesday.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Republican leader.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, likewise on this side of the aisle, we 
will be having our policy luncheon, which normally happens on Tuesday, 
on Wednesday. We have already notified our members of that, but it 
bears repeating here today.

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