PONDERAY — No issues were off the table and no question went unanswered when Sen. Jim Risch, R-Idaho, spoke to a packed house at the Ponderay Events Center Monday afternoon.

Nearly 100 people, including a cadre of local elected officials, listened intently as Idaho’s junior senator addressed issues ranging from national security to energy to health care reform at a luncheon sponsored by the Greater Sandpdoint Chamber of Commerce.

As a member of five senate committees, including the Energy and Natural Resources Committee and the coveted Foreign Relations Committee, Risch said he has a unique vantage to some of the most important issues facing America.

On the topic of foreign relations, Risch named North Korea and Iran as his most pressing concerns. While he has faith that Iran’s younger, more secular citizens will eventually right their county, he called North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong Il, a “nut case” and said and there are valid reasons to worry about the country.

“The largest threat we have, in my judgment, is North Korea,” he said.

Risch’s forays into energy and national security were just appetizers to the main entree of the day, health care reform. Risch said the controversial reform measures being debated in Washington, D.C., are dominating everyone’s time and energy.

“Today in Washington, the health care debate is taking oxygen out of the air on just about everything,” he said. “It’s all health care all day long.”

Risch said he is not in favor of any of the bills currently on the table and said all four need to be scrapped and rebuilt before he would consider supporting reform.

“It is irresponsible and reckless for anyone to talk about passing these bills without knowing where they will take us,” he said. “Somebody needs to stand up and say, ‘We have the best health care in the world.’ And it’s not because of the United States government.”

Risch said it would be impossible to bring health care to the masses without spending exorbitant amounts of money. He said there is a reason why everything in America, including cars, homes and food, is expensive, and it’s because Americans will not settle for less.

“Why? Because we’re Americans and we demand the best and we expect the best,” he said.