[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 34 (Thursday, March 16, 2006)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2291-S2293]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                    Amendment No. 3023, As Modified

  Mr. President, I send to the desk amendment No. 3023, as modified, 
and ask unanimous consent that it be agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment (No. 3023), as modified, was agreed to, as follows:

  (Purpose: To strengthen homeland security by adding $10 million to 
 National Defense for an interoperable and survivable mobile wireless 
 communications network enabling clear, reliable communications among 
  DoD and first responders for the military homeland defense command)

       On page 9, line 20, increase the amount by $10,000,000.
       On page 9, line 21, increase the amount by $10,000,000.
       On page 27, line 23, decrease the amount by $10,000,000.
       On page 27, line 24, decrease the amount by $10,000,000.
  Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will please call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, we are prepared to go to final passage. We 
cannot do that without first thanking people. This has been a marathon, 
and people--many people--have worked around the clock to get us to this 
position.
  Let me thank a colleague because we would not be finishing at 7:15 
without the extraordinary work of Senator Patty Murray.
  Thank you, Patty.
  She convinced literally dozens of our colleagues to drop amendments 
tonight; otherwise, we would have been here until 2 o'clock in the 
morning. So special thanks to her.
  And thanks to my staff director, Mary Naylor; and John Righter, my 
deputy staff director; Lisa Konwinski, my counsel; and, most of all, my 
chart master, Kobye Noel.
  And thanks to the staff of Senator Gregg: Scott Gudes and Denzel 
McGuire, outstanding professionals.
  Of course, my personal thanks to the chairman of the committee, who 
has been so decent to deal with, and so honorable to deal with.
  On our side, Mr. Chairman, we thank you for your courtesies.
  With that, let me conclude on the budget itself.
  Mr. GREGG. No.
  Mr. CONRAD. Oh, yes.
  Borrow and spend--that is what this budget represents.
  Mr. President and colleagues, as shown on this chart, this is what is 
going to happen to the debt under this budget. It is up, up, and away. 
A vote for this budget is a vote for more debt, higher interest rates, 
a weaker economy, the export of American jobs, the selling off of 
America, piece by piece.
  Colleagues, we could do a whole lot better than this. I urge my 
colleagues to vote no.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire.
  Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I have been asked to remind Senators that 
there will be two more votes, after the final vote on the budget, on 
judges.
  Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There is a sufficient second.
  The question is on the adoption of the concurrent resolution.
  The clerk will please call the roll.
  The legislative clerk called the roll.
  The result was announced--yeas 51, nays 49, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 74 Leg.]

                                YEAS--51

     Alexander
     Allard
     Allen
     Bennett
     Bond
     Brownback
     Bunning
     Burns
     Burr
     Chambliss
     Coburn
     Cochran
     Cornyn
     Craig
     Crapo
     DeMint
     Dole
     Domenici
     Enzi
     Frist
     Graham
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Hagel
     Hatch
     Hutchison
     Inhofe
     Isakson
     Kyl
     Landrieu
     Lott
     Lugar
     Martinez
     McCain
     McConnell
     Murkowski
     Roberts
     Santorum
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Smith
     Snowe
     Specter
     Stevens
     Sununu
     Talent
     Thomas
     Thune
     Vitter
     Voinovich
     Warner

                                NAYS--49

     Akaka
     Baucus
     Bayh
     Biden
     Bingaman
     Boxer
     Byrd
     Cantwell
     Carper
     Chafee
     Clinton
     Coleman
     Collins
     Conrad
     Dayton
     DeWine
     Dodd
     Dorgan
     Durbin
     Ensign
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Harkin
     Inouye
     Jeffords
     Johnson
     Kennedy
     Kerry
     Kohl
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lincoln
     Menendez
     Mikulski
     Murray
     Nelson (FL)
     Nelson (NE)
     Obama
     Pryor
     Reed
     Reid
     Rockefeller
     Salazar
     Sarbanes
     Schumer
     Stabenow
     Wyden
  The concurrent resolution (S. Con. Res. 83), as amended, was agreed 
to.
  (The resolution will be printed in a future edition of the Record.)
  Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote and to lay 
that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I would be remiss if I did not make at 
least a short statement on the budget we just passed. I agree with 
those who believe that government is simply out of control. We just 
passed a budget that promises a budget deficit in the vicinity of $400 
billion, a truly staggering amount of money. Our Federal Government is 
borrowing in excess of a billion dollars a day to fund the awesome 
amount of obligations that we have authorized. While I would have 
preferred

[[Page S2292]]

a vastly smaller budget today, I know it is simply not politically 
feasible to do so at this time. I pledge to work toward creating an 
environment where we can achieve responsible spending and fiscal sanity 
while meeting our obligations. The budget we have just passed does 
represent a step, albeit a small one, toward fiscal responsibility. 
Getting our entitlement spending under control, reining in earmarks and 
other wasteful discretionary spending, and maintaining the conditions 
necessary for strong, stable economic growth are all necessary to 
achieve a balanced budget, and it will take the concerted efforts of 
each and every one of us to achieve this in the future.
  Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, today, the Senate allowed its budget 
process to be hijacked by those seeking to move a policy issue that has 
been rightly rejected so many times. I opposed the manipulation of 
process in the Budget Committee and I opposed final passage this 
evening. Using the reconciliation process to advance a single 
controversial policy--a policy that should be considered through the 
appropriate legislative channels--is shameless.
  We debated drilling in the Arctic last spring. We debated it again 
last fall, and at that time, a number of House Republicans shot the 
idea down. Then, in December, we wasted more time on the issue. This 
year, nine members of the Budget Committee reached out ahead of time to 
Chairman Gregg and Ranking Member Conrad asking that the budget process 
not be used to revisit drilling in the Arctic Refuge, and yet, it was. 
I ask unanimous consent that a copy of the letter be printed in the 
Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                                      U.S. Senate,
                                    Washington, DC, March 6, 2006.
     Hon. Judd Gregg,
     Chairman, Budget Committee,
     Washington, DC.
     Hon. Kent Conrad,
     Ranking Member, Budget Committee
     Washington, DC.
       Dear Chairman Gregg and Ranking Member Conrad: As members 
     of the Budget Committee, we write to express our opposition 
     to the inclusion of any language or mechanism in the fiscal 
     year 2007 budget resolution that assumes revenues from 
     drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge or allows for 
     the insertion of any provision that opens the Coastal Plain 
     of the Refuge to oil and gas drilling and exploration. We 
     also strongly oppose the inclusion of any Arctic Refuge 
     reconciliation instructions for the Energy Committee in the 
     budget resolution.
       It is irresponsible to base the country's budget on highly 
     speculative and dubious projections of lease revenues for the 
     coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The 
     reality is that leasing portions of the Arctic Refuge would 
     likely not bring in the assumed levels of revenue to the 
     federal treasury, and yet, the Congressional Budget Office 
     (CBO) assumes $6 billion in revenue from leasing of the 
     Arctic Refuge, and the President's fiscal year 2007 budget 
     proposal presupposes $7 billion in revenue from a 2008 Refuge 
     lease sale. Previous drilling proposals called for leasing 
     between 400,000 and 600,000 acres of the Arctic Refuge. The 
     Administration proposal would therefore require that industry 
     bid at least $11,667 per leased acre. The facts of oil and 
     gas leasing on Alaska's North Slope and elsewhere in the 
     country show that such a proposal is far out of touch with 
     reality:
       Since 1991, 38 leases on the North Slope and in near-shore 
     waters have brought in an average of only $64.38 per leased 
     acre. The Administration's projection is 181 times this 
     historic average.
       Last year, the oil industry bid $161.55 per acre for areas 
     offshore of the Arctic Refuge--an amount that is nearly an 
     order of magnitude lower than the Administration's 
     projections.
       The CBO acknowledged in December 2005 that higher oil 
     prices do not necessarily result in higher lease bids when it 
     wrote that other factors, such as operating and capital costs 
     and the attractiveness of competing projects elsewhere, 
     influence bid amounts.
       The North Slope leasing history demonstrates CBO's point. 
     In the last five years, when North Slope crude averaged 
     $33.60 a barrel, the average price per acre was $48.15. In 
     the five years prior to that, when North Slope crude averaged 
     $19.60, the average price per acre was $93.58. Additionally, 
     preliminary analysis of two lease sales held on March 1, 2006 
     reveals an average per acre price of less than $40 on a day 
     when North Slope crude was selling for $59.11.
       This kind of budget charade will simply not help reduce our 
     huge and growing federal deficit.
       As we all know, the President acknowledged our addiction to 
     oil during his State of the Union address. As with any 
     addiction, recognition of the problem is the first step 
     toward change. Thus, now more than ever, instead of looking 
     to drill to the past in areas such as the Arctic National 
     Wildlife Refuge, we should truly dedicate ourselves to a 
     cleaner energy future. The American people expect Congress 
     and the Administration to stop wasting their time on dead-end 
     drilling schemes and to instead chart an energy vision 
     reflective of the 21st century.
       Again, we encourage you to reject any requests that are 
     intended to misuse the budget process to open the Refuge to 
     oil and gas drilling and exploration and we thank you for 
     your consideration of this matter.
         Russ Feingold, Patty Murray, Tim Johnson, Bill Nelson, 
           Robert Menendez, Paul S. Sarbanes, Ron Wyden, Robert C. 
           Byrd, Debbie Stabenow.

  Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I oppose drilling in the Arctic National 
Wildlife Refuge, but if we are going to debate this policy, we should 
do so openly--not through a backdoor budget maneuver. My colleagues who 
want to open the Arctic Refuge to drilling should go through the 
regular legislative process that the rest of us use to advance policy 
initiatives. After all, what message do you send when you manipulate a 
process simply because the normal procedure does not give you the 
outcome you want? That is not a message this body should endorse.
  Proponents will say that using the budget process is the only way 
they can get an up-or-down vote. My response is simple. I know how hard 
it is to be very close to having the votes to pass legislation, but not 
quite being there. Senator McCain and I worked very hard on our 
campaign finance reform legislation to get the votes needed to move 
forward--it took years--but we stuck with it until we could get the 
legislation passed. We fought hard but we fought fair. We did not--and 
we would not have--tried to advance our legislation by manipulating the 
budget process. This single reconciliation instruction opening up the 
Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is simply out of bounds.
  My concerns, however, go beyond the obvious abuse of process. The 
bottom line is that the revenue assumptions are highly speculative and 
in no way reflect reality. For a second, let's ignore the fact that 
last year a Bush adviser was quoted as saying that ``even if you gave 
the oil companies the refuge for free, they wouldn't want to drill 
there'' and let's look at the numbers.
  The Congressional Budget Office assumes $6 billion in revenues while 
the President's budget puts the number at $7 billion. Based on past 
proposals, 400,000 to 600,000 acres in the Arctic National Wildlife 
Refuge would be on the leasing block. Therefore, to achieve the 
administration's estimate, companies would have to pay between $17,500 
and $11,667 per acre to make it to the $7 billion level. To get to 
CBO's estimate, they would have to pay between $15,000 and $10,000 per 
acre to get to a total of $6 billion. Now let's consider these numbers 
a bit more closely to see how they line up with reality:
  Since 1991, 40 lease sales on the North Slope and in near-shore 
waters have brought in an average of only $60.47 per leased acre in 
real 2006 dollars. CBO's projections are 165 times greater than the 
inflation-adjusted average during the last 16 years.
  Think that higher gas prices will mean higher lease bids? Think 
again. In December of 2005, CBO said that higher gas prices at the pump 
don't directly translate into higher lease bids by oil companies, and 
cited other factors--such as operating and capital costs and the 
attractiveness of competing projects elsewhere--that influence bid 
amounts.
  Additionally, the reconciliation instruction assumes $3 billion in 
Federal revenues, based on a 50/50 split between the State of Alaska 
and the U.S. Treasury. Given public statements by members of the Alaska 
delegation, as recently as last December, this 50/50 split is, at best, 
speculative.
  Some may argue that oil company activities in the Arctic Refuge could 
be done in an environmentally safe manner. I would point out to them 
that earlier this month the largest crude oil spill in the history of 
oil and gas operations was discovered on Alaska's North Slope. To quote 
an employee of the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation, 
``Hopefully, the tundra will recover. It's never going to be perfect.'' 
I don't think anyone wants to contemplate the possibility of such an 
accident occurring within the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
  During his State of the Union Address, the President acknowledged our

[[Page S2293]]

addiction to oil. I hoped that this would mean we could move forward to 
discuss real energy solutions, solutions that protect our national 
security, our citizens, and our environment, as I continue to believe 
that we can do all three. In fact, there are bipartisan bills out there 
to move our transportation sector to renewable sources of energy and 
sadly we spend our time talking about this issue, an issue that divides 
us. When are we going to move past this divisive debate to discuss real 
energy solutions for the 21st century?
  If we do not stand against misuse of the legislative process, then 
every member of this esteemed body is at risk. Today, I cast a vote 
against abuse and in favor of the integrity of the Senate.

                          ____________________