[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 53 (Tuesday, March 27, 2007)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3785-S3789]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




 U.S. TROOP READINESS, VETERANS' HEALTH, AND IRAQ ACCOUNTABILITY ACT, 
                                  2007

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Under the previous order, the 
Senate will resume consideration of H.R. 1591, which the clerk will 
report.
  The bill clerk read as follows:

       A bill (H.R. 1591) making emergency supplemental 
     appropriations for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2007, 
     and for other purposes.

  Pending:

       Cochran amendment No. 643 (to amendment No. 641), to strike 
     language that would tie the hands of the Commander-in-Chief 
     by imposing an arbitrary timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. 
     forces from Iraq, thereby undermining the position of 
     American Armed Forces and jeopardizing the successful 
     conclusion of Operation Iraqi Freedom.

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from North Dakota.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, before my colleague from Missouri, Senator 
Bond, leaves the floor, I wonder if I might just engage him in a 
colloquy for just a moment.
  Mr. BOND. Sure.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I came to the floor to speak about 
agriculture disaster provisions in the emergency supplemental bill. We 
had some people on the Senate floor yesterday questioning whether they 
are valid, whether they are necessary provisions to help family 
farmers. I noted the Senator from Missouri was a cosponsor of mine, as 
we worked together to put the agriculture disaster program in the 
emergency supplemental bill.
  Let me make a point and then ask a question of my colleague from 
Missouri.
  First of all, I appreciate very much his help. I know Missouri has 
been hit with a devastating drought and other weather-related disasters 
for family farmers. It has been the case in other parts of the country 
as well. We have been working for some long while just to reach out a 
helping hand to those farmers out there struggling who got hit with 
weather-related disasters to say: You are not alone. As is the 
tradition in this country when you get hit with a weather-related 
disaster and lose everything, this country wants to help you some. We 
help everyone around the world. It is time to take care of things at 
home. That is what this provision is about.

  I ask the Senator from Missouri about his motivation for being a part 
of those of us who worked together to get this put in the emergency 
supplemental bill. I know he strongly supports it.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Missouri.
  Mr. BOND. Mr. President, I thank my colleague from the Dakotas. 
Before he arrived on the floor, I made the case for it. The Senator 
asked about the situation in Missouri. I told them about the 
devastating ice storms. We have had a historic drought. What we need is 
a comprehensive national policy to deal with the problems and not just 
for the Dakotas or Missouri but for Colorado, Texas, Nebraska, Kansas, 
California--throughout this country--where people have been devastated 
by extreme weather conditions.
  We have livestock producers who were hit the hardest. There is no 
safety net in place for livestock producers. They are not protected by 
crop insurance, the farm bill, or disaster protection under the USDA 
since the standard is crop loss and there were no crops to be lost in 
the middle of the winter in an ice storm. But the devastation is there.
  This body and this Government came to the rescue of people who were 
absolutely wiped out by Hurricane Katrina and other natural disasters. 
Well, the impact in the farm area is very severe. No, it is not the 
same as a hurricane, but the weather disasters have caused tremendous 
hardships and threaten to put many farmers under and destroy rural 
communities.
  That is why I am very pleased to join with my colleague in urging 
this body to keep the agricultural disaster program, the relief we have 
not had for 3 years, in this bill.
  I thank my colleague.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from North Dakota.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Missouri for his 
leadership on this issue as well.
  Let me say that the Congress did help farmers in the gulf region who 
lost their crops. I understand we helped cities that were devastated 
and lost buildings and lives and so on. We also helped farmers who lost 
their crops.
  My point is--and I think the point of the Senator from Missouri is--
there is

[[Page S3786]]

no difference between a person who loses their entire crop in Missouri 
or North Dakota or in the gulf region because of a hurricane. We do not 
name droughts. We name hurricanes. But if Hurricane Katrina took your 
entire crop away, this Government would say: We want to help you. So, 
too, should we help in the case of a drought or ice storms, as the 
Senator from Missouri just described. I certainly appreciate his help 
on these matters.
  I wanted to come to the floor because yesterday there was some 
discussion by several Members of the Senate referring to the 
agriculture disaster piece as pork. Now, our farmers know about pork, 
and they know you do not legislate pork, you eat pork. There is a big 
difference.
  I am just curious, why is it every time you try to do something in 
this country to help people who need help, it is called pork. Well, if 
you invest, for example, in public policy, as we have, to say build a 
road in Iraq, that is national security. If you have a provision in an 
appropriations bill that says build a road in this country, it is pork. 
If you build a health clinic in Iraq, that is national security. If you 
build it here, it is pork. If you build a water project in Iraq, that 
is national security. If you build it here, it is pork.
  Why is it, to someone in this Chamber, investing in this country is 
always pork, but as long as it is investing somewhere else in this 
world, that is just fine. Mr. President, $18.1 billion went out of this 
Chamber in unbelievable ways for reconstruction in Iraq. Let me tell 
you, any time someone is sending one-hundred-dollar bills out of the 
back of a pickup truck, you don't think there is going to be graft and 
fraud and corruption? You take a look at what has happened with respect 
to the taxpayers' money and the way it was spent in Iraq. I described 
some of that on the floor of the Senate previously.
  We paid a corporation $220 million to reconstruct 142 health clinics 
in Iraq. Twenty got done. The rest--122--never got done. A courageous 
Iraqi doctor went to the Iraqi Health Minister and said: Well, can I 
see these Iraqi clinics that were supposed to have been rehabilitated 
with American taxpayer dollars?
  The Iraqi Health Minister says: Well, those were ``imaginary 
clinics.''
  The money was not imaginary. The American taxpayer got fleeced. The 
money is gone.
  But why is it when we come to this Chamber and talk about investing 
in people's lives in this country--a farmer, his wife, and two kids, 
who live out under a yard light, who planted in the spring, trying to 
make a go of it, hoping it would not rain too much, hoping it would 
rain enough, hoping it would not hail or they would have crop disease 
or insects, hoping they would raise a crop. Finally, when they get a 
crop, they hope the price is sufficient so maybe they can make a 
living. Then, along comes a storm, an unbelievably devastating storm--
perhaps an ice storm, perhaps a torrential rain--that wipes out their 
entire crop, washes it away. Or maybe it is a drought. All of a sudden, 
that farmer has nothing. Oh, they put the seeds in the ground, but 
nothing came up, or they put the seeds in the ground, and it washed 
away. The farmer ends up with nothing.
  Look, the grand tradition in this Chamber has always been to provide 
some disaster aid to farmers who lose everything. Why? Because we want 
to maintain a network of family farms in this country. This is not new. 
We have been doing it for some long while. When we have devastating 
weather-related disasters hit family farmers, we help them with a 
disaster bill. It is only recently that has become controversial.
  Twice I have run that disaster bill through the Appropriations 
Committee. Senator Conrad, myself, and others put together a bipartisan 
bill. As an appropriator this year, I offered it with my colleague, 
Senator Feinstein from California, and Senator Bond from Missouri--
bipartisan. We offered it a third time. It is going to come to the 
floor now. It is in this bill, and we have people complaining about 
it. This is investing in our country's strength. This is the best 
notion of our country to say to family farmers: You had some trouble. 
It wasn't your fault. We want to help you through this difficult time.

  Now, we have usually done this without great controversy. The 
controversy this time is because the last two times I got this through 
the Senate, I was a conferee and I went to the conference. The 
President was threatening to veto a bill that had agriculture disaster 
help in it for family farmers. So twice we went to conference and the 
U.S. House conferees, at the request of the then-Speaker of the House, 
Mr. Hastert, blocked it on behalf of the President.
  Well, it is here a third time and we will go to conference. This time 
I will be a conferee and my colleague Senator Feinstein will be a 
conferee, Senator Bond will be a conferee, and there will be bipartisan 
support on the Senate side. The difference this time is we go to the 
conference and the House conferees will come to conference having 
passed their own disaster bill for family farmers. This time we are 
going to get this to the President's desk, at long last.
  Some say: Well, why just farmers? Why family farmers? There is 
something unusual about those who produce from the land in this 
country. It goes back to the homestead days in sod huts out there, 
alone, trying to raise a family, raise a crop, make a living. We could 
do, I suppose, without family farmers, but it wouldn't be the same 
country. You could have corporate agri-factory farms from California to 
Maine, but it wouldn't be the same country. Once they control food 
production, then ask yourselves: What is going to be the cost of food 
in this country?
  Someone once wrote, and I have mentioned him on the floor a few 
times--Rodney Nelson, in fact, a North Dakota rancher who wrote a piece 
of prose about ranching and farming. He asked this question, and I 
think it is important for the country. He said: What is it worth for a 
kid to know how to plow a furrow, how to teach a newborn calf to suck 
milk from a pail? What is it worth for a kid to know how to weld a 
seam? What is it worth for a kid to know how to build a door, to build 
a lean-to, to grease a combine, to pour cement? What is it worth for a 
kid to learn all of those things? There is only one university in 
America where you learn all of that, and that is the family farm, 
America's family farm. It is an unbelievable asset to this country.
  We are asking for something very simple that has been done routinely 
prior to this President beginning to block it, and that is when trouble 
comes, when weather disasters wipe out an entire crop, we say to 
families living out there under the yardlight, trying to raise a family 
and raise a crop: You are not alone. This country wants to help. That 
is why we brought this in this bill to the floor of the Senate. It 
won't make anybody whole, but it does say to farmers: Maybe you will 
have a chance to keep going. They live on hope. How else could you 
plant a crop and do anything other than hope that things will work out?
  This country has a rich tradition of supporting family farmers, 
because it is in this country's interests. The seedbed rolls from big 
cities to small towns and enriches and nourishes this country. We have 
always known that and we have always done the right thing.
  Family farmers have been hard hit in the last couple of years with 
weather-related disasters. This Congress took action with respect to 
one facet of those weather-related disasters. We said farmers in the 
Gulf of Mexico who lost their entire crops due to a hurricane named 
Katrina, you are going to get some help. The rest of you, we are sorry. 
Well, listen. I was supportive of saying to those farmers we are going 
to give you some help. It doesn't matter to me whether it is a Katrina 
or a drought that doesn't have a name or an ice storm that is not 
named, weather-related disasters that destroy farmers' crops, in my 
judgment, ought to be responded to by this Congress to say to those 
family farmers: This has destroyed your crop, but not your hope. We 
want to give you hope to be able to continue farming. That is what this 
disaster piece is all about. I am proud to stand here and support it. 
Those who believe this is some kind of pork do not understand what 
essential investment in this country's strength is all about. An 
investment in America's family farming is a good investment in this 
country's future.
  My colleague from California who worked with me in the Appropriations

[[Page S3787]]

Committee to get this done is on the floor, so let me yield the floor 
to her and thank her for her leadership in responding to these needs as 
well.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from California is 
recognized.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I thank the Senator very much. Thank you, Mr. 
President.
  I very much commend the Senator from North Dakota. I think he said it 
well and in a very inspiring way. If I had to summarize it, it would be 
that we in America try to take care of our own--not only people in 
other nations, but people who have been the victims of real disaster in 
this country.
  The fact is we haven't been doing it for 3 years, and the disasters 
have piled up: in 2005, 2006, and 2007. This package takes care of that 
problem. In my State, California, we suffered two devastating disasters 
in the last 2 years which have resulted in Federal disaster 
declarations: a heat wave and a freeze. We are currently suffering a 
drought. Governor Schwarzenegger has certified through March 13 a loss 
from the freeze of $1.397 billion. The total damage has yet to be 
figured.
  I think people don't understand how big this was in California. We 
have losses in 35 out of 58 counties, many the most productive in the 
country, that produce more agricultural products than 22 other States, 
in 40 different types of crops. They include avocados, strawberries, 
grapes, walnuts, guavas, lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower, artichokes, 
asparagus, and celery.
  The losses include $817 million in damage to California's citrus 
crops. Lemons, limes, mandarins, grapefruit, navel oranges, and 
Valencias are dead in the field. Here is what some of it looks like. 
This is one tree.
  Now, most people know Florida has oranges, but those are the oranges 
we make juice out of. When you eat an orange, a tangerine, or a 
grapefruit, or you put a lemon in your ice tea, those fruits are from 
California. But not this year. We have lost at least 50 percent of the 
navel orange crop, 65 percent of the Valencia crop, and 65 percent of 
our mandarins. My farmers need this assistance.
  Some of my colleagues are asking, why do we need to provide this 
funding? Farmers should have their own insurance. The answer is, in 
California most farmers already do have insurance, but here is the rub: 
It is not going to be nearly enough to cover the damage.
  Let me provide an example. According to the Department of 
Agriculture's Risk Management Agency, citrus growers will be able to 
collect up to $311 million in crop insurance. Now, that sounds like a 
lot, but the farming costs for California's citrus industry for this 
year's operations alone total $560 million. What do I mean by farming 
costs? This is the amount farmers have spent to irrigate, spray, prune, 
everything that is necessary to prepare a crop for harvest. But this 
year, there is no harvest. Therefore, they absorb the $560 million.
  They also have to begin to get ready for next year's harvest. They 
need to get their loans. That will also be an incurrence of $560 
million in normal farming costs. That adds up to $1.2 billion in 
regular farming costs, and only $311 million--at most--in available 
insurance they can recoup. And they are not guaranteed a crop next 
year.
  Add on to that the $100 million these growers spent in January on 
wind machines, irrigation, and other methods to protect their orchards 
from the freezing temperatures, plus the costs they are incurring now 
to remove the dead fruit and branches.
  Now, 85 percent of citrus is grown by family farmers--that is just a 
fact--not the big agricultural combines. These are responsible farmers. 
In fact, 75 percent of the citrus acres in California are insured, but 
again, insurance alone will not cover the needs of my constituents. 
This is why we need this assistance.
  When some people saw there was also an appropriation for dairy milk 
loss, some people actually laughed. I was offended, because in July of 
2006, California experienced 2 weeks of blistering, triple digit 
temperatures. For 12 days the San Joaquin Valley, the most productive 
agricultural region of this country, had temperatures over 105 degrees.
  What does this mean? Well, 20,552 milk cows died and 10,738 calves 
died. Those are counted animals--over 30,000 dead. That doesn't include 
our losses in poultry. There were so many dead carcasses, the rendering 
plants could not handle the load. The State temporarily lifted the ban 
on burying dead livestock in landfills, but that was still not enough. 
These cows died because of the heat. Even the cows that survived 
produced 25 percent less milk than is normal. So the death of these 
animals, plus the stress put on the ones still producing, resulted in 
more than $228 million in milk losses for my dairymen.
  In addition, because regular breeding could not take place for a 
month because of the death of so many animals, my farmers will again 
face at least $228 million in losses for 2007. That is why my 
colleague, Senator Barbara Boxer, has joined with me in helping us push 
for the addition of this relief into our emergency supplemental.
  This is a total of $460 million in losses. We are asking for only $95 
million, and that is in this supplemental. What is more, this funding 
can be accessed by dairymen on the gulf coast, including Mississippi, 
Louisiana, and Arkansas, who also suffered losses due to the 
hurricanes.
  Let me conclude. This has not been easy, and I thank Senator Byrd, 
Senator Dorgan, Senator Conrad, Senator Kohl, and Senator Reid for 
their work on this Agricultural Disaster package, and also the 
Republican leadership on the Appropriations Committee who acceded to 
the request.
  America is a great nation, and one of the reasons we are a great 
nation is we don't only care about others; we care about our own. If 
there is ever a time when we could help our own, it is in this 
supplemental appropriation. So what I say is: Hands off, please. We 
have worked hard to get where we are. The losses have been substantial. 
The disasters have been large. Families who can't pay their mortgages, 
who lose their boats if they are fishermen, lose their farms if they 
can't make the payments, can be helped by this assistance. So I hope it 
remains in. I hope we resist an effort to remove this from the 
supplemental package. Again, I thank those who have helped with this.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I note the absence of a quorum.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Casey). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, we are considering the supplemental 
appropriations bill. I spoke earlier about the agricultural disaster 
piece in that bill. I believe other colleagues will be over to talk 
about that as well. My colleague, Senator Feinstein from California, 
just finished discussing it. She was a major cosponsor of it. I have 
indicated previously that my colleague, Senator Conrad, is coming. He 
worked to create a coalition of interest and support of the 
agricultural disaster piece. So when others come, I expect we will have 
more discussion about this important issue.
  I wish to talk for a moment about the supplemental appropriations 
bill and the issue of Iraq. Earlier, one of my colleagues was 
describing the issue of Iraq and the controversy that the Congress 
might get involved and somehow interfere and that there cannot be 535 
commanders in chief. I understand that. I wish to make a couple of 
points about Iraq, however.
  The issue of Iraq, as you know, casts a shadow on virtually 
everything else in this country. We are spending, in terms of the lives 
of American soldiers and America's treasure, an unbelievable amount 
with respect to the war in Iraq. All of us want this country to 
succeed. There is nobody here who doesn't want America to succeed in 
whatever we are involved in.
  I wish to make this point: The National Intelligence Estimate has 
just been completed. There is a classified and an unclassified version. 
The unclassified version tells all of us and the American people that 
what is happening in Iraq is largely sectarian violence. It is not a 
fight against the ``terrorists.'' It is sectarian violence--Shia

[[Page S3788]]

trying to kill Sunni, Sunni trying to kill Shia. That is a civil war by 
classic definition. That is what we face in Iraq. There is an al-Qaida 
presence in Al Anbar Province. We understand that. What is happening 
there is largely a civil war.
  Now, the head of our intelligence services in this country testified 
twice. The former head, Mr. Negroponte, and the current head have 
testified within the last 2\1/2\ months. Both of them have said exactly 
the same thing. They have both said the greatest terrorist threat to 
this country is al-Qaida, its networks around the world, and its 
determination to strike us in our homeland. So the greatest threat to 
our homeland is from the terrorist group al-Qaida. Both have described 
al-Qaida as operating in a safe hideaway in northern Pakistan.
  If the greatest threat to our country is al-Qaida, if the leadership 
of al-Qaida is directing threats against our homeland and they are in a 
secure hideaway in northern Pakistan, if that is the greatest threat to 
our homelend, and if, in fact, what is happening in Iraq, according to 
the National Intelligence Estimate, is a civil war, then I think the 
question is, What better protects our country? Is it beginning to 
extract from a civil war? After all, the Iraqi people have seen Saddam 
Hussein executed. They have seen the opportunity to vote for their own 
new Constitution. They have been given the opportunity to vote for 
their own new Government. The only question remaining is, Do those same 
people have the will to provide for their own security? So the question 
is, What better protects our country? Is it the opportunity to extract 
from a civil war at some point soon or is it the determination to 
ignore the presence of the al-Qaida leadership in northern Pakistan?
  If we begin to withdraw and extract from a civil war in Iraq, do we 
then have a better capability to keep our eye on the ball, the greatest 
threat to our country, the leadership of al-Qaida and their network 
around the world? If that were the case, wouldn't this country wish to 
begin to take action against the greatest threat to our homeland and 
threat to our security, the leadership of al-Qaida?
  That is not me describing that. That is from the National 
Intelligence Estimate, the combined judgment of the intelligence 
communities in our Government.
  You can make a pretty strong case that Osama bin Laden, who boasted 
about murdering innocent Americans on 9/11/2001--he still speaks to us 
from time to time from a ``secure hideaway,'' as described by the head 
of our intelligence. Al-Zawahiri and Osama bin Laden, after all of 
these years having passed since 9/11, still exist. Their leadership 
apparently is still intact, according to the head of our national 
intelligence services. We generally know where they are. They are 
apparently in a country that is supposed to be cooperating with us--
Pakistan.
  The question is, Why have we not brought to justice the leadership of 
al-Qaida, if that is our greatest threat? The answer, I suppose, is 
because this country has 140,000-plus soldiers in Iraq prosecuting a 
war in the middle of what is now a civil war in Iraq.
  We can debate forever, perhaps, the conditions that got us to this 
point--terrible intelligence, the most unbelievable intelligence 
failure, perhaps, in the history of this country. This country told the 
world that the country of Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction 
that threatened America. Now it turns out, we understand, to take one 
example, that the issue of mobile chemical weapons laboratories--that 
intelligence was given to us by German authorities. That came from a 
fabricator who is now alleged to have been a drunk--a single source, 
perhaps drunk, fabricator persuades this country to tell the world Iraq 
has mobile chemical labs. But it turns out they didn't.
  I could go on at great length about the intelligence failures. 
Whatever the intelligence failures were, we went to Iraq. This country 
went to Iraq, and a number of things have happened. We have unearthed 
mass graves. Several hundred thousand Iraqis were murdered by a brutal 
regime headed by Saddam Hussein. There are a number of brutal regimes 
in this world. We don't take it upon ourselves--unless it is in our 
national interest--to send troops to those brutal regimes. But Saddam 
Hussein was, in fact, a brutal dictator. He has been executed. The 
world is better for that. The country of Iraq has shed itself of a 
brutal dictator. His execution comes amid other opportunities for the 
people of Iraq. They have a constitution, a brandnew one; they wrote it 
and voted for it. They have a new government. They have created and 
voted for that government. And now we have tens and tens and tens of 
thousands of American soldiers in Iraq, in the middle of a civil war.
  We have taken our eye off the ball because the issue really is the 
terrorist organizations that wish to commit acts of terror against our 
country. The head of our national intelligence says that al-Qaida is 
the greatest terrorist threat to our country. They are in secure 
hideaways in northern Pakistan. It seems to me that the ability to 
begin to extract ourselves from the middle of a civil war in Iraq gives 
us the opportunity to put pressure on and work with other countries to 
bring to justice the greatest terrorist threat to this country, the 
terrorist organization that murdered Americans on 9/11/2001. That ought 
to be our overriding goal. If that is the greatest terrorist threat, it 
seems to me our most important job is to eliminate that threat, and 
sooner rather than later.

  So I end where I began. No one in this Chamber has a difference of 
opinion about whether we want our country to succeed. We love our 
country, and we want to succeed. We honor our soldiers, and we insist, 
when we send America's sons and daughters to war, that they have all 
the things they need and the support they need to do their job. But 
from a policy perspective, I believe this President has made very 
serious mistakes.
  One of my colleagues, this morning, said the general will tell us 
whether things are going well. I cannot tell you how many briefings I 
have been in--top-secret briefings--month after month after month and 
year after year in which the top generals have come to us and said 
things are going really very well, when, in fact, that hasn't been the 
case. Only later have we discovered it was not the case; it never was 
the case.
  It seems to me that this country has to evaluate what it can do at 
this point to begin to find a way to withdraw and extract from a civil 
war in Iraq. Perhaps there needs to be partitioning, I don't know. I 
know that is a tough subject to introduce these days. But if there are 
no alternatives, perhaps you have to partition the parties fighting 
each other, the Sunnis and Shias, and try to find another device to 
deal with the issue.
  In any event, it seems to me it is in this country's best interest to 
keep our eye on the ball, and the ball here is, according to head of 
our intelligence, that the greatest terrorist threat to our country is 
the leadership of al-Qaida and their network. We have not, in my 
judgment, with respect to al-Qaida and the deepening problems of the 
Taliban in Afghanistan, kept our eye on the ball. That is one of the 
reasons there needs to be a change.
  This notion of ``stay the course'' or ``cut and run,'' which was the 
slogan--there is the slogan of the week or the slogan of the month. The 
administration's slogan of the month last year was ``stay the course'' 
or ``cut and run.'' It was always a false choice that was never a 
substitute for thoughtful debate. It was a thoughtless chant of things 
that mattered very little.
  What matters most to this country is that we are engaged in pursuits 
which will provide opportunity to strengthen this country, which do 
honor and justice to the efforts of our soldiers, and which relate to 
responding to the terrorist threat because the threat against this 
country is a very serious, abiding, long-term threat. All of us want to 
succeed in dealing with that threat.
  Mr. President, one of my colleagues, Senator Conrad, has arrived. I 
think he intends to speak on this agricultural disaster issue. Let me 
at this point yield the floor, and I think other colleagues will speak 
on the agricultural disaster piece I spoke on earlier.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.

[[Page S3789]]

  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, this week, the Senate will once again have 
the opportunity to demonstrate its support for America's family farmers 
and ranchers by improving emergency agricultural disaster assistance as 
part of the supplemental appropriations bill.
  For over a year, I, along with Senate colleagues from both sides of 
the aisle, have attempted repeatedly to convince the Congress of the 
United States and this administration to provide desperately needed 
disaster assistance.
  As part of the hurricane supplemental last year, the Senate approved 
an agricultural disaster package. That measure was dropped in 
conference as a result of opposition from the administration. The need 
for this legislation has only been made more compelling by the severe 
disasters that have hit California, Colorado, Kansas, Nebraska, New 
Mexico, and Oklahoma during the final weeks of 2006.

  In my own home State of North Dakota, in 2005, we had a disaster that 
was devastating to thousands of farm and ranch families. This is what 
we saw across North Dakota--flooded lands, over a million acres of land 
that could not even be planted and another million acres of land that 
was drowned out. Then, irony of ironies, the next year we had a 
devastating drought--the third worst drought in this Nation's entire 
history, hitting not only North Dakota but right down the heartland of 
America.
  This is a farm field near my home, in Burleigh County. I live in 
Bismarck. This is a farm field in that same county, and you can see 
almost nothing growing.
  Here is the U.S. Drought Monitor, and they determine on a scientific 
basis the effect of drought across America. This is from July 25, 2006, 
and you can see drought right down the heartland of America--in our 
case, exceptional drought. That is the dark brown right on the border 
between North Dakota and South Dakota--exceptional drought. The next 
category going down the scale, extreme drought, an even broader area 
between the two States. We also see exceptional and extreme droughts in 
these parts of the country, and then severe drought. That is the tan. 
Virtually all of North Dakota had exceptional, extreme, and severe 
drought conditions. And, of course, not just North Dakota, it was right 
down the heartland of the country.
  This is a headline from July 30, 2006, from the Grand Forks Herald: 
``Dakotas the Epicenter of a Drought-Stricken Nation. More than 60 
percent of the United States in drought.''
  This has been an absolutely bizarre set of circumstances: One year, 
extreme flooding; the next year, extreme drought. But that is the 
reality of what we have confronted, and if assistance is not provided, 
thousands of farm families will be forced off the land.
  The President's chief economic adviser was in my office to visit me 
on another matter at the same time there were independent bankers from 
my State there to talk to me about agricultural assistance--bankers 
talking to me about the desperate need for drought assistance. They 
told me and told the President's chief economic adviser that if 
assistance were not forthcoming, they would lose 5 to 10 percent of 
their clients. These are farm and ranch families who work hard, who 
love this country, who work the land, and who are some of the most 
independent people you would ever want to meet. The last thing they 
want is a government handout, but if they do not have a helping hand 
extended to them, they are going to be out of business. That shouldn't 
be the result. We should provide the very basic assistance we have 
provided in other times in other parts of the country to those who have 
been hard hit.
  Let me make certain that people understand. To get any assistance, 
producers will need to demonstrate they have had a 35-percent loss, and 
they will get no help for that first 35 percent of loss. That is the 
floor. They have to have lost 35 percent before they get anything, and 
then the assistance will apply to the losses beyond 35 percent.
  Nobody is getting rich on this program. Some have suggested this bill 
will result in farmers becoming more than whole because of crop 
insurance. That is simply incorrect. Under the provisions, a producer 
receiving disaster assistance cannot recover more than 95 percent of 
the expected value of the crop, after both crop insurance and the 
expected market income from the crop have been deducted.
  This is desperately needed. It is done in a way that is fair and 
balanced and prevents abuse. I hope my colleagues will support it.
  I thank the Chair, and I yield the floor.

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