[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 57 (Tuesday, April 10, 2007)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4232-S4233]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    OPENING OF THE THIRD WORK PERIOD

  Mr. REID. Madam President, throughout the world, Easter has been 
celebrated. This was done on Sunday. On that joyous day, Pope Benedict 
spoke of the human condition with a very heavy heart, and I quote:

       How many wounds--how much suffering there is in the world. 
     Nothing positive comes from Iraq, torn apart by continual 
     slaughter as the civilian population flees.

  As we open the third work period this year, Pope Benedict's words 
weigh on my mind. I hope we will honor them as we continue to work in a 
bipartisan manner to address that suffering by moving America in a new 
direction at home and abroad.
  That was the promise we made to the American people when the 110th 
Congress opened 3 months ago; not a promise made only by Democrats but 
by Democrats and Republicans. Although we have only completed the first 
two work periods of the session, we have made considerable progress.
  When we began in January, we knew all our goals depended on changing 
the way Washington works. So our first order of business was passing 
the toughest lobbying ethics reform legislation in our Nation's 
history. We were guided through that by the chairman of our Rules 
Committee, Senator Feinstein.
  Next, with the skill of Senators Kennedy and Baucus, we voted to give 
working Americans a much deserved and long overdue raise by finally 
increasing the minimum wage.
  After the minimum wage, we addressed the fiscal mess left by the last 
Congress and passed a continuing resolution on a bipartisan basis, then 
enacted tough spending limits and limited earmarks for this fiscal 
year.
  We then set our sights on keeping our country safe by finally passing 
the recommendations set forth by the 9/11 Commission, recommendations 
that came many years ago. This legislation was led by Senator 
Lieberman, as he skillfully led us on this long overdue legislation.
  Next, we passed, under the guidance of our brilliant chairman, Kent 
Conrad, a balanced budget that put American families first by cutting 
taxes for working people, increasing investment for education, 
veterans, health care, and implementing the same pay-as-you-go rules 
that every American family must follow.
  While addressing these crucial priorities here at home--ethics 
reform, minimum wage, homeland security, a return to fiscal 
responsibility, and a balanced budget for working families--we have 
also continued to seek a new direction for the war in Iraq at every 
opportunity, as the American people called for us to do last November. 
That is why we passed--with Senator Byrd and Senator Murray--last week 
an emergency supplemental appropriations bill that fully funded our 
troops while also setting forth a new course in Iraq.
  The President has put our troops in the middle of a civil war. That 
was never supposed to be their mission. Every day the price we pay 
grows worse--soon to be 3,300 American lives lost, tens of thousands 
more wounded, and according to the Massachusetts Institute of 
Technology, 600,000 Iraqis have been killed. Our American Treasury has 
been depleted by about a $\1/2\ trillion because of this war. Yet there 
is still no end in sight for our troops or our taxpayers.
  Let me be clear. Democrats are committed to giving our troops the 
funds they need. The supplemental appropriations bill that we are 
trying to send to President Bush will provide every dollar the 
commander has requested and it will go further by providing funding to 
address the unconscionable conditions at Walter Reed and the other 
military health care facilities the President's budget left out.
  Democrats are united in our commitment to fully funding our troops on 
the ground in Iraq and here at home, but we are also committed to 
providing our troops a strategy for success in Iraq, which President 
Bush has failed to do from the very start of this war more than 4 years 
ago.
  Virtually all experts, military and civilian, agree the war cannot be 
won militarily. Success can only come when all the political leaders in 
Iraq reach a settlement. Even General Petraeus, who is our commander on 
the ground there, said that only 20 percent of the war can be won 
militarily. It can only be won politically, diplomatically, and 
economically. Eighty percent of the war must be conducted through 
economics, through politics, and through diplomacy.
  Pope Benedict, the spiritual leader of more than a billion people, 
said on Easter Sunday, and again I quote:

       Nothing positive comes from Iraq, torn apart by continual 
     slaughter as the civilian population flees.

  That is why we are telling the President he needs to make good on his 
promise to get the Iraqi people to meet the benchmarks they set for 
themselves but have never followed through on. After 4 years, it is 
long past time for Iraq to take responsibility for its own failures and 
its own future.
  American troops are putting their lives at risk every single day, but 
Iraqi leaders are not willing to take the political risk of governing 
their own country. That must change. That is what Congress is 
demanding, that is what the American people, by a large majority, 
demand. The President should be leading us in that direction, not 
threatening to veto funding for our troops unless we rubberstamp his 
flawed plan.
  Over the next 2 weeks, the President has an opportunity to work with 
Congress to let his views be heard on how to improve this bill. Speaker 
Pelosi and I invited him last month to sit down and work with us to 
develop a strategy together. We remain ready to do that. But this will 
require a commitment by the President to move beyond the political 
theater and take a seat at the table of negotiation, of compromise, of 
direction change.
  Recall the Pope's Easter message: ``Nothing positive comes from 
Iraq.''
  While we continue to press the President and his supporters in 
Congress to chart a new course in Iraq, we will move to the next set of 
issues crucial to the American people: expanding Federal funding for 
stem cell research, lowering Medicare prescription drug costs, 
delivering a new national energy

[[Page S4233]]

policy, and implementing tough, fair immigration reform.
  This week, we will focus the Senate's attention on S. 5, the Stem 
Cell Research Enhancement Act. We will be led by Senators Harkin, 
Kennedy, and Feinstein. Democrats and Republicans joined together last 
year to pass legislation that would have made stem cell lines more 
available to scientists, while at the same time strictly regulating how 
they could be used. This legislation gives hope to millions of 
Americans.
  The actions of the Senate and House gave hope to as many as 100 
million Americans and tens of thousands of Nevadans who suffer from 
cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, spinal cord injuries, heart 
disease, and Lou Gehrig's disease. Sadly, President Bush vetoed that 
bipartisan bill, and as a result we must take on this urgent cause 
again. This week, we will debate the Stem Cell Research Enhance Act and 
will fight to see that it becomes law.

  Following debate on the stem cell bill, we will turn our attention to 
reducing drug costs for senior citizens. The flaws in the Medicare drug 
program are well documented, but many of them can be traced back to one 
simple fact: The current law puts drug companies and insurance 
companies ahead of seniors. Regardless of whether we supported or 
opposed the law that created the Medicare drug benefit, all of us want 
to make the program work better for seniors and people with 
disabilities, and right now they are paying too much because the 
Federal Government is unable to negotiate lower priced drugs. S. 3, the 
Medicare Prescription Drug Price Negotiation Act of 1967, will fix that 
injustice by making it easier for the most vulnerable in our society to 
afford the medicine they need.
  We are being told by the minority that they are not going to allow a 
provision to be changed in the law which says Medicare can negotiate 
for lower price drugs. Why? I guess they and the President believe that 
HMOs and insurance companies and all these managed care entities 
deserve to have an advantage over Medicare. It is unfair. Medicare 
should be able to negotiate for lower prices and, in effect, compete 
with these money-hungry HMOs and insurance companies.
  Next, we will move to energy legislation that will improve our 
national security and protect our environment. For the past several 
weeks, gas prices have risen dramatically. Last week, they rose 11 
cents--in 1 week. The average price I heard in this morning's news is 
about $2.90 a gallon. In places in California, it is approaching $4 a 
gallon for gasoline. One reason for this spike is the fear premium 
caused partially by the administration's inept foreign policy. Another 
reason is the empty words and unfunded promises of the administration's 
shortsighted energy policy. President Bush's budget choices have robbed 
the Treasury of the funds we need to invest in a better, more 
sustainable energy policy, and his friends in the oil and energy 
industry have failed to fill the void by investing in alternatives to 
oil.
  I am hopeful in the coming weeks the Senate will consider legislation 
that will put us on the right track toward increased production and use 
of renewable fuels, renewable electricity, and energy-efficient 
products, buildings, and vehicles. This will improve our energy 
security and reduce the risk of global warming.
  After energy policy, we will focus on the challenge of comprehensive 
immigration reform. We all agree America's immigration system is 
broken; our borders remain unsecured. Our laws remain underenforced. 
Eleven or twelve million undocumented immigrants continue to live in 
the shadows. Last year, the Senate passed bipartisan immigration reform 
that would have fixed our broken borders. Unfortunately, the 
legislation fell victim to partisan politics in the House and to 
inaction by the President, so we must readdress the issue--again. We 
will start with a bill that takes a tough and smart approach to fixing 
the borders, cracking down on enforcement, and laying out a path to 
earned legal status for undocumented immigrants already here and 
contributing to our society.
  In January, we promised the American people a new era of open, honest 
Government. We promised a new direction that will put families and 
working people, college students and senior citizens first. We also 
promised a new course in Iraq that honors the service of our men and 
women in uniform. Heaven knows we have tried, but the President is 
charging forward with the same mindless strategy in Iraq that the Pope 
calls a continual slaughter. Defined in the dictionary, slaughter is to 
kill in a bloody and violent manner and in large numbers. This 
slaughter must end. For the sake of humanity and our country, it should 
be no more.
  In these first few months, we have made progress. As we begin our 
third work period, there is much left to be done, but I am confident 
that with a continued commitment to bipartisanship, we will rise to the 
challenges ahead and answer the call for renewal of the American dream.
  It would be wrong for me not to end by saying we have had the 
cooperation, most of the time, from the minority. It has been most 
helpful. We could not have passed these bills without the help of the 
Republicans. I have a warm, cordial relationship with my counterpart, 
Senator McConnell. He is easy to work with. We have had some procedural 
bumps in the road, but we have worked through those, and as a result of 
this we have been able to accomplish some good things for our country.
  I apologize to my colleagues for taking the time I did, but I ask 
that there will be a full hour for morning business--is that true?
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. REID. I thank the Chair.

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