[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 102 (Thursday, July 11, 1996)]
[Senate]
[Pages S7745-S7748]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              QUORUM CALL

  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Stevens). In my capacity as a Senator from 
Alaska, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  Mr. BRYAN. Objection.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Kyl). Objection is heard.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk resumed the call of the roll, and the 
following Senators answered to their names:
     Bryan
     Coats
     Conrad
     Craig
     Daschle
     Inouye
     Kempthorne
     Kyl
     Lott
     Mack
     Nickles
     Reid
     Santorum
     Stevens
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. A quorum is not present.
  Mr. LOTT addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The distinguished majority leader.
  Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I move to instruct the Sergeant at Arms to 
request the presence of absent Senators.
  Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There appears to be a sufficient second.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is agreeing to the motion. The 
yeas and nays have been ordered. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
  Mr. NICKLES. I announce that the Senator from Rhode Island [Mr. 
Chafee] and the Senator from Vermont [Mr. Jeffords] are necessarily 
absent.
  Mr. FORD. I announce that the Senator from Vermont [Mr. Leahy], the 
Senator from Illinois [Ms. Moseley-Braun], and the Senator from 
Washington [Mrs. Murray] are necessarily absent.
  The result was announced--yeas 93, nays 2, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 192 Leg.]

                                YEAS--93

     Abraham
     Akaka
     Ashcroft
     Baucus
     Biden
     Bingaman
     Bond
     Boxer
     Bradley
     Breaux
     Brown
     Bryan
     Bumpers
     Burns
     Byrd
     Campbell
     Coats
     Cochran
     Cohen
     Conrad
     Coverdell
     Craig
     D'Amato
     Daschle
     DeWine
     Dodd
     Domenici
     Dorgan
     Exon
     Faircloth
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Ford
     Frahm
     Frist
     Glenn
     Gorton
     Graham
     Gramm
     Grams
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Harkin
     Hatch
     Hatfield
     Heflin
     Helms
     Hollings
     Hutchison
     Inhofe
     Inouye
     Johnston
     Kassebaum
     Kempthorne
     Kennedy
     Kerrey
     Kerry
     Kohl
     Kyl
     Lautenberg
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lott
     Lugar
     Mack
     McConnell
     Mikulski
     Moynihan
     Murkowski
     Nickles
     Nunn
     Pell
     Pressler
     Pryor
     Reid
     Robb
     Rockefeller
     Roth
     Santorum
     Sarbanes
     Shelby
     Simon
     Simpson
     Smith
     Snowe
     Specter
     Stevens
     Thomas
     Thompson
     Thurmond
     Warner
     Wellstone
     Wyden

                                NAYS--2

     Bennett
     McCain
       

                             NOT VOTING--5

     Chafee
     Jeffords
     Leahy
     Moseley-Braun
     Murray
  The motion was agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. A quorum is present.
  The distinguished majority leader is recognized.
  Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I begin by pointing out that in order to 
come off of a quorum call I had to use this procedure of instructing 
the Sergeant at Arms to get the presence of the Members here. It is the 
first time I ever had to do that as majority leader, and I do not like 
to do it. I remember grumbling loudly when it was done by a former 
majority leader. In fact, I usually voted no because I hated the 
procedure. However, I had no alternative, because I was trying to come 
off of a quorum call so we could have some discussion about the 
situation we find ourselves in. That exercise is reflective of why we 
are in this situation right now.
  Apparently, Mr. President, there is a planned concerted effort to 
have gridlock in the U.S. Senate. We need to do the people's business. 
I am committed to that. I still think that the best thing to do for 
ourselves politically is to do what is right for the country, and for 
us to be locked down and not able to move any legislation after the 
exercise we went through to vote on the small business tax relief 
package and the minimum wage, to sort of clear the decks and move on to 
other issues, and now I find that instead of gridlock being broken it 
is beginning to get worse every day.
  Mr. President, we have now in this Congress had to file 73 cloture 
motions, I presume probably the largest in history. There were 40 in 
the 102d Congress, 51 in the 103d Congress, and already 73 in the 104th 
Congress. Now, I am new in this position. I am trying mightily to do a 
good job by finding a way to produce, finding a way for the Senate to 
act, while honoring the needs of 100 Senators. It is not easy. It is 
very hard. It takes cooperation. It takes communication. I have been 
doing that. I tried to talk to my colleagues, one by one, small groups, 
repeated meetings, and I tried doing it across the aisle.
  I say, honestly, I found the Democratic leader open and helpful in 
many instances, and I tried to work with others. Senator Pryor from 
Arkansas has a bill that he has been working on for years. He started 
this whole effort of having the taxpayer bill of rights. For heaven's 
sakes, we ought to have that. The taxpayers ought to have some rights 
when it comes to dealing with the Internal Revenue Service. Yet we have 
not been able to get that bill cleared. Why? I do not understand.
  As soon as I was elected to this position I said, ``Look, enough on 
this Federal Reserve Board holdup. Let the Senators talk. Decide on a 
time, have our say, and vote.'' They are the President's nominees. We 
may not like them. I did not like all of them. I voted against one of 
them. Some of you voted against one of them, maybe somebody voted 
against two of them, but we agreed on a time with the distinguished 
majority leader and those that had problems--the Senator from Iowa had 
held up these nominees from his own administration for weeks. I said, 
``Enough. Give them the time, talk about it, vote, and go on.''
  Small business tax relief and minimum wage have been sitting in our 
lap for weeks, months, balling up everything. I could have been willing 
to just continue it that way because I did not like the way it was set 
up, but it would have wound up tying up the small business tax relief, 
minimum wage, taxpayers bill of rights, the Billy Dale White House 
travel issue, and I do not know whatever else was balled up in the 
Gordian knot. I said for the good of the Senate, for Democrats and 
Republicans, and some of my colleagues did not like my concerted, 
aggressive continuous effort to find a way to resolve that issue, but I 
stayed with it and I stayed with it. The Democratic leader and I have 
worked, and we ran into little problems. Sometimes he misunderstood 
what I said. Sometimes I could not carry out what I thought I could. 
Sometimes he could not. We had to rework it, but we did it. We set up a 
process to do it.

  Regular order. I remember Senator Mitchell saying what we need to do 
is the regular order. There is a way you do things around here. You 
bring up a bill reported by a committee, have debate, offer amendments, 
you vote and win or lose, and you move on, and then it goes to 
conference.
  Now, on both sides we are beginning to block appointments of 
conferees. This is a relatively new device--not unprecedented, but are 
we going to start

[[Page S7746]]

doing it on every bill? I do not like it. We ought to go to conference 
on Coast Guard authorization of conferees. Finally, we did it today 
after being held up for, gee, 2 months.
  I am going to try to go to appointment of conferees on health care. 
For 80 days, it has been held up to appoint conferees on the health 
care bill--80 days--while we have had these running negotiations. There 
have been complaints that, ``Well, gee, we are not in on the 
discussions.'' How about regular order? How about we appoint conferees, 
make sure it is a fair appointment, and go to conference.
  I want to tell you who I recommend that we appoint on the health care 
conference: Senator Kassebaum. You know of her work in this area. She 
has been very diligent. She voted against putting the medical savings 
accounts in the bill when it was on the floor of the Senate. She has 
said, standing right there, that she thinks what I have been working on 
and what we are trying to do is eminently fair and reasonable, and we 
ought to go with the medical savings account compromise we have worked 
out. She wants to move this legislation. Senator Roth, Senator Kennedy, 
Senator Moynihan, and myself, Senator Lott. There are five Senators 
that are about as equally balanced as you could possibly get and allow 
the majority party to have a one-vote edge with one of the Senators in 
the majority certainly committed to getting the job done and certainly 
unbiased in what she wants to do and how it is achieved.
  So we worked through that agreement and carried it out this week. I 
said Tuesday that, sundown Wednesday, we are back to business. Minimum 
wage, voted on. Small business tax relief, voted on. Finance Committee 
improvements in the small business area, accepted. TEAM Act, voted on. 
Right to work, cloture motion, voted on. The decks are clear and ready 
to go.
  Appropriations bills. DOD, Department of Defense appropriations bill. 
Do we need it? Is it the right thing for the country? Have we already 
debated everything that is in it? Yes. The authorization bill. We spent 
2 weeks on that. Then, with a little cooperation at the end, we 
concluded it and voted on it this week. That was clear. We have two of 
the most effective managers of legislation in the Congress wanting to 
handle this bill. Senator Stevens from Alaska and Senator Inouye from 
Hawaii are ready to go. The truth of the matter is that if they had 40 
minutes, they could probably finish it. They want to go to work. And 
then it is blocked--blocked before an effort was even made on nuclear 
waste.
  Yesterday, we thought everything was all ready to go on the 
Department of Defense appropriations. I am in my office and, all of a 
sudden, we are talking about nuclear waste, not on DOD. We blew 4 hours 
or more yesterday when we could have probably completed the Department 
of Defense appropriations bill. But, again, in an abundance of wanting 
to be fair, I understand how important this is to the Senators from 
Nevada. I am sympathetic to how they feel. But I am more sympathetic to 
doing the job and doing what is right for all of America.

  What about the Senators from Minnesota, who have nuclear waste piling 
up in their State to the limit, sitting out in cooling pools? If you 
want to talk about the environment, this is the most dangerous issue in 
this country--nuclear waste, sitting in open pools in Minnesota, in 
Vermont, in Idaho, in South Carolina, North Carolina. It is all over 
America. What about the other 48 Senators that are directly involved in 
this nuclear waste issue and the States that are involved--sorry to get 
carried away there. It is dangerous to be sitting here. This is worse 
than nuclear waste.
  I want to do it for the country's sake. Britain, France, Sweden, and 
Japan have stepped up and addressed the issue of nuclear waste. Yet, we 
cannot bring ourselves to deal with this. It is not easy. 
Transportation is a problem. Temporary storage and permanent storage. 
It has to go somewhere. Nobody wants it. Nevada does not want it, 
nobody wants it.
  But there are safe ways we can do this. It is the right thing to do. 
It is right for the country. Now we found that not only did it delay us 
last night--I thought we did the right thing to let the Senators talk 
and express their concerns; they were entitled to that. But they agreed 
that we would close it up about 6 o'clock last night, and they agreed 
that we would come back at 10 o'clock and we would be on the Department 
of Defense appropriations bill. Lo and behold, I had a cup of coffee, 
and I woke up and, gee, we are back on nuclear waste again.
  Now, I am trying my best, but for America's sake, I need some help on 
both sides of this aisle so that we can move this legislation. I set up 
campaign finance reform. I did not agree with it, did not like it, did 
not want to waste the time of the Senate on it. I admit that. But we 
set up a fair and agreed-to process that Senator McCain of Arizona 
agreed to, Senator McConnell agreed to, and Senator Feingold, and 
others, agreed to. We took it up, debated it, and we voted. Regular 
order.
  On judges. You know, I do not like to not move appointments that are 
not controversial. So I tried it. I tried four. It was objected to by a 
Democrat because his judge was not on the list of four. So we worked on 
it and came back and said, ``Let us do the four and we will keep 
going.'' It was objected to by a Senator. He said, ``My judge is not on 
the list.'' I said, ``OK, I will work on that.'' I put a lot of time 
and effort into it. I came back and said, ``How about 10?'' Then there 
was objection to one of those that we worked out later on. So we took 
one off and said, ``Here are nine; how about nine?'' That was objected 
to because there were, I guess, seven that were not on the list with 
the nine. So if their judge was not on the list, they objected. So we 
could not move nine. I said, ``Well, OK, I could not get four, could 
not get 10, and could not get nine. How about one at a time?"
  I even, at the request of the Democratic leader--and I thought it was 
a reasonable request--I gave him the list of the order for the next 2 
weeks. We talked about it, and I told him I would keep working on it.
  I am not interested in balling these things up. I am interested in 
moving this place. So we lined up nine. When I brought the first one up 
the day before yesterday, bam, objection again. But, overnight, some 
additional consideration was given to it. Yesterday, we moved two. Yea, 
two. Two judges. Wonderful. I would like to do another one today and 
another tomorrow.
  My point in all of this is to say that I am trying. But now we find 
that the Department of Defense appropriations bill is being held up. 
The nuclear waste issue, which I was not going to bring up until 
Friday, lay down cloture, and vote on next Tuesday to see where we 
were--and not a lot of cloture motions win around here. But now I had 
to file a cloture motion on nuclear waste.
  Health insurance conferees--80 days it has been held up.
  Taxpayer bill of rights--I mentioned that. I cannot imagine that 
anybody is going to stand up and admit they object to bringing this 
thing up.
  White House Travel Office--we have had our fun with that. We have; 
you have. Nobody in the end when we get to a vote is going to pass it 
98 to 2 or 100 to 0. Why not do that?
  Gambling Impact Study Commission--I do not particularly like it. I do 
not like national commissions. I do not like subpoena powers. My State 
is not particularly happy about it. But some are. A lot of people feel 
gambling is a problem in this country.
  So I said, Look, it is supported by the distinguished Senators, like 
the Senator from Illinois, Senator Simon, a highly respected Senator; 
Senator Lugar from Indiana; Mr. Coats; Congressman Frank Wolf. I was 
not going to stand in the way of bringing that up. I could not. So I 
want to schedule it. I said let us bring it up, get UC, and move on. I 
was told, ``Well, you know, we will probably have objection to that. 
Maybe we can work that out.'' I am ready.
  The stalking bill--here is a bill that one night had been cleared, 
and all day. At the last minute, bam, it got stopped. I never did quite 
figure out what the problem was with bringing up a bill that would have 
some limit, some controls, on stalking of people and women and 
children. But I understand there is a little tete-a-tete thing going 
on. I am willing to meet with the Senators involved and work that out. 
But nobody in here is opposed to this stalking bill; not any of us.

[[Page S7747]]

  So I am just beginning now to wonder what is going on here. We need 
to work together. We need to move these bills.
  We need to move to the foreign ops appropriations bill. We need to do 
it tonight. Next week we need to do the legislative appropriations 
bill.
  Treasury-Postal Service--we have work to do, and we are completely 
balled up. This is wrong.
  So I have a series of unanimous-consent requests that I want to go 
through here now. I want to say up front to the distinguished leader 
that this will not necessarily be the end of it for you or us. Maybe we 
can work some of them out. I am ready. But as of right now we are 
completely balled up, and it is not my fault.
  I want us all to sober up here now and get on with the business of 
the Senate.
  With that--and he has been very patient--I am glad to yield to the 
Senator from South Dakota who I know would like to help.
  But we have to do it now. We cannot just keep talking about it.
  I am beginning to feel like Charlie Brown. I keep running up to kick 
the football, and it ``ain't'' there. I have tried one time, two times, 
and three times on the judges. I thought it was your ball. You know 
because it kept disappearing into your cloakroom.
  Let us quit this stuff.
  I would be glad to yield.
  Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, now the majority leader knows why they 
pay him much more now.
  Mr. LOTT. They do? (Laughter.)
  Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, I am delighted that he has taken the 
speech that I put in his desk from George Mitchell from about 2 years 
ago and used it almost verbatim. Obviously, as leaders, we face these 
frustrations with some frequency. I have learned that now myself over 
the last 18 months.
  I say to the distinguished majority leader that there are many things 
that he has done since he has taken this office that many of us have 
found to be very productive, and we appreciate his willingness to 
cooperate on so many things in the short time that he has been majority 
leader. I have been asked almost daily by members of the media how I 
view the first few weeks of the majority leader's tenure, and I have 
given him very high marks because of his determination to continue to 
find ways to deal with the many issues that he has listed.

  There have been times in this Congress when we have been able to 
accomplish a number of things. We passed the unfunded mandates bill 
last year. We passed the line-item veto. We passed the congressional 
accountability legislation. We passed telecommunications reform. We 
passed in the Senate a couple of bills that may or may not ultimately 
become law, including welfare reform. We might be able to do that 
again.
  On those occasions where Democrats and Republicans have worked 
together, we have had overwhelming votes. Just this week we passed the 
minimum wage bill by an overwhelming vote in part because the 
leadership has been able to find ways to work together.
  The majority leader made a point that he has had to file--he used the 
words ``had to file''--a number of cloture motions. I must tell you 
that I do not know why he and his predecessor have felt compelled so 
often to file cloture motions on the very day they lay a bill down.
  How many times have we seen bills laid down and cloture motions filed 
on the very first day? What kind of a message for bipartisanship does 
that send? How many opportunities are we going to have to participate 
in the legislative process when that happens?
  I would like to go through that list of all of those bills and find 
out how many times on the first or second day a cloture motion was 
filed. That is not the way we used to do business around here. I hope 
we can get back to the good old days when we legislated.
  He mentioned conferences. He mentioned the fact that we have been 
reluctant to go to conference. There is one very simple reason for 
that. We have been unable to go to conference because we do not know 
they exist once we agree to them. There have been occasions--I cannot 
tell you how many--when we have agreed to go to conference, then 
discover that House and Senate Republicans find some room to meet and 
agree, and then they tell the other Democratic conferees what they have 
agreed to. That is the conference. We're not even told about it until 
it's over.
  Mr. President, that is not the way to legislate. In the good old days 
it took Democrats and Republicans to make a conference.
  The majority leader has at least expressed a desire to see more 
bipartisanship in conferences. I am very hopeful that happens because 
once it does, we will be in a much better position to agree to go to 
conference.
  Talk about kicking the ball. How about when you feel like you are the 
ball? [Laughter.]
  That is really what we are talking about here. It is not a question 
of where the ball is. The ball is here, and we are getting kicked. 
[Laughter.]
  It is not a very advantageous position for us to be in.
  Let me talk briefly about the health care reform conference. The 
majority leader says conferees have been blocked for 80 days. Maybe it 
has been so long that the majority leader has forgotten what happened 
80 days ago. Eighty days ago, the Senate voted on MSA's. The Senate 
voted not to include MSA's in this portability bill. Why? Because we 
all agreed we wanted to keep our eye on the ball, so to speak. 
[Laughter.]
  We wanted to be able to say, ``Look, we know that if expand this bill 
to include other kinds of things, nothing will get done.'' I had my own 
list of thing I wish could have been added. In fact, one of the 
toughest votes I have had to cast in a long time was against the 
measure offered by the Senator from New Mexico and the Senator from 
Minnesota on mental health. I did not want to vote against that. But I 
can recall so vividly the distinguished chair of the Labor Committee 
and the distinguished ranking member saying, ``Our plan is to oppose 
all amendments regardless of how good they may be because we know that, 
if this bill gets loaded up, nothing is going to get done.''

  I do not know how much more visionary they could have been. How 
prophetic it was, because that is exactly what has happened. Eighty 
days later, the bill languishes. Do you know what we are hung up on? We 
are hung up on the insistence of the minority that the majority accept 
its position and make sure it prevails in the conference. That is 
really what we are talking about here.
  They want to put MSA's back in the bill. We said, ``We are prepared 
to put MSA's back in the bill. But let us simply test it first. We have 
been debating about whether we can figure out a way to have a test that 
meets with both sides' satisfaction. But why should we agree to go to 
conference with the likelihood that we would not even be in the room, 
based on past performance? That has happened, and it is likely to 
happen again, given the makeup of the committees.''
  Now the leader has come up with a new MSA formula, and it is 
certainly encouraging. But I am guessing that the Senate conferee will 
still be in favor of MSA's.
  In fact, I am sure that will be the conference position under the 
plan proposed by the majority leader. So if the Senate is on record in 
opposition to MSA's, again, it seems to me we feel like we are the 
football, and we're getting kicked again. We are just not going to do 
it.
  If we can work out a way to ensure that we can reach an agreement in 
a bipartisan fashion, I am all for it.
  The last thing--the majority leader talked about the taxpayer bill of 
rights. Well, we may have amendments to the taxpayer bill of rights; 
that's a matter we have been unable to work out up until today. As a 
result of our negotiations, I think we can now work out our 
differences.
  He talked about the White House Travel Office. Again, we have 
amendments. We would like to be able to work out an arrangement that 
would allow these amendments to be taken up.
  The majority leader mentioned that he still cannot get the Gambling 
Impact Study Commission done. I want the Record to show that this is 
the first request we have ever seen to clear the Gambling Impact Study 
Commission.
  The distinguished majority leader mentioned the stalking bill. The 
distinguished Senator from New Jersey

[[Page S7748]]

[Mr. Lautenberg], proposed an amendment to the stalking bill weeks ago. 
Republicans have that amendment for weeks. The reason the stalking bill 
does not come up--because they do not want that amendment added to this 
bill.
  So that is the issue, Mr. President. We can deal with any one of 
these bills. But it has to be in a bipartisan way.
  That is all we are hoping we can do. We will continue to work with 
the majority leader to make his tenure as majority leader less 
frustrating and more productive. And I stand here ready to do it this 
afternoon.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I do feel a need to respond to some of the 
Democrat leader's comments. First of all, after you pass a bill, you do 
not take that proverbial ball we have been talking about and go home. 
You go to conference. That is the way you do business around here.
  Now, with regard to these cloture motions, about how we file them on 
the first day that a bill is brought up, I learned that from Senator 
Mitchell. He did it all the time.
  So I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record, Mr. 
President, an analysis of what has happened with regard to these 
cloture motions.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:


        CLOTURE COMPARISONS BETWEEN THE 103D AND 104TH CONGRESSES       
------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                           103d    104th
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Number of legislative items having cloture filed against                
 them...................................................    20.0    28.0
Of those cloture petitions, number filed on same day as                 
 legislative item is first laid before the Senate (or                   
 motion to proceed is made).............................    12.0    15.0
The average number of days of consideration of the                      
 remaining legislative items prior to a cloture petition                
 being filed............................................     4.6     4.6
------------------------------------------------------------------------

       Conclusion: The Republican majority filed 54 percent of 
     their cloture petitions on the first day a measure was 
     considered (or first motion to proceed made).
       The Democrat majority filed 60 percent of their cloture 
     petitions on the first day.

  Mr. LOTT. On this, it does compare cloture motions between the 103d 
and 104th Congress. The number of legislative items having cloture 
filed against them in the 103d, 20, and 104th, 28. Of those cloture 
motions, the number filed on the same day as a legislative item is 
first laid before the Senate or motion to proceed is made, 12 in the 
103d, and 15 in the 104th.
  When I actually got a comparison here of first-day filings by the 
Republican majority, I find it is 54 percent of their cloture motions 
on the first day a measure was considered, the Democratic majority 
filed 60 percent of their cloture motions on the first day.
  So maybe we all need to do a little work on that. But our record is 
not any worse--in fact, it is better--than the one we found from the 
previous Congress when I believe Democrats were in charge.
  Mr. DASCHLE. On that point, if the majority leader will yield 
briefly, there are three categories: Amendable vehicles, motions to 
proceed, and conference reports.
  Now, on the motions to proceed and conference reports, we will 
compare notes here, but let us look at amendable vehicles and see what 
the record is between Democrats and Republicans. I would like to put 
that in the Record.
  Mr. LOTT. My only point is we did not invent this procedure, and we 
have not been any worse percentagewise than our predecessors.
  Now, the next point, talking about how we have worked together, on 
occasion we have, but let us take the unfunded mandates. I remember 
that one very well. I remember how long it took us at the beginning of 
last year to pass a very popular bill that there should not have been 
any problem with. It took us 3 weeks--3 weeks--to get the unfunded 
mandates bill through here and then it passed 86 to 10--86 to 10.
  Now, with regard to the conferences, I do not know what you are so 
horrified about that maybe Republicans talk to each other when there is 
a conference going on. I remember a crime bill on which Senator Simpson 
from Wyoming was working. I remember some sort of conference the 
Democrats had excluded Republicans on a Sunday afternoon. I remember 
that. We did not invent that procedure either.
  But let me point this out. On three major issues that we have passed 
this year and sent to the President--I was involved at the direction of 
Senator Dole in trying to help move those conferences--line-item veto, 
bipartisan effort; telecommunications, bipartisan effort--Senator 
Hollings, Senator Pressler, Senator McCain, we were all there, 
bipartisan. I remember it. And again I did not like a lot of what was 
going on but Democrats were in that room when that final deal was made; 
small business regulatory relief. This Congress ought to be embarrassed 
that we have not passed a big regulatory reform package. Fifty-eight 
Senators voted for that, and yet it languishes in the Senate because we 
cannot get 60 votes once again for cloture. But we did in a bipartisan 
way pass small business regulatory reform.
  On the health care issue, the vote in the Senate, I remind my 
colleagues, was a very close one, 52 to 46. And if the vote were held 
today in the Senate on the experiment proposal that we have offered, it 
would pass, I would be willing to bet you, overwhelmingly. And by the 
way, the President has accepted the concept of a broad-based experiment 
for medical savings accounts. Now, you might argue over the word 
``broad,'' but we are not talking about 2,000 or 10,000. You are 
talking about several hundreds of thousands would be involved in this 
medical savings account experiment.
  My colleagues, we have won. The American people have won. Why do we 
not declare victory? We have said we will go with an experiment. You 
have said the President has said, ``I will accept it.'' What is the 
problem?
  I know, there are a lot of details that need to be ironed out; you 
have to understand every little word, exactly how the deductibles will 
be determined, and when would there be a vote, and how would there be a 
vote to extend it, sunset it or whatever. You know where you work those 
out? Not running up and down the hall out here and your office or my 
office. You work it out in a conference. We can negotiate, go back and 
forth with the Senator from Massachusetts until the cows come home, but 
sooner or later we have to go to conference and work it out.

  Now, talk about compromise. I wish this bill had medical malpractice 
in it. But the conferees have already agreed, the House has agreed to 
recede, take that out. We want it. I want it. But we want legitimate 
portability, ability to carry your insurance between jobs. We want an 
opportunity to deal with preexisting illnesses. We think it is 
important that the self-employed be able to deduct more of the costs of 
their health insurance premiums. But compromise is under way.
  The so-called MEWA's--a Washington word, but the ability of small 
businesses to form pools to give coverage to their workers, I do not 
understand--I will never understand--why the Federal Government should 
be telling small businesses you cannot form pools to provide coverage 
to your workers. In these fast food restaurants, the majority of the 
workers cannot get and the employers cannot provide health coverage. 
But if they could form a pool with the restaurant association or the 
National Federation of Independent Businesses, they could get it. But 
that was dropped in an effort to show good faith and compromise. We 
have bent over backwards, I have bent over backwards to try to be 
reasonable in coming to a compromise, and we are close enough we ought 
to go to conference with a fair group of conferees and get the job 
done.

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