[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 67 (Wednesday, April 25, 2007)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5020-S5057]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[[Page S5020]]
                          AMERICA COMPETES ACT

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
resume consideration of S. 761, which the clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (S. 761) to invest in innovation and education to 
     improve the competitiveness of the United States in the 
     global economy.

  Pending:

       Bingaman (for Sununu) amendment No. 938, to strike the 
     provisions regarding strengthening the education and human 
     resources directorate of the National Science Foundation.
       Bingaman (for Sanders) amendment No. 936, to increase the 
     competitiveness of American workers through the expansion of 
     employee ownership.


                           Amendment No. 938

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will now be 30 
minutes of debate with respect to amendment No. 938, with the time 
equally divided and controlled by the Senator from New Hampshire and 
the Senator from Massachusetts or their designees.
  Who yields time?
  The Senator from New Hampshire.
  Mr. SUNUNU. Mr. President, I understand under the order that I will 
control 15 minutes, and I believe Senator Bingaman will control 15 
minutes in opposition.
  This morning we have 30 minutes of debate on an amendment I offered 
yesterday afternoon. This amendment deals directly with the National 
Science Foundation, which I think many Members of Congress believe is 
the crown jewel for Federal initiatives, investment, and funding of 
basic scientific research--research in chemistry, mathematics, physics, 
material science--that provides benefits that are spread over countless 
areas of our economy, provides benefits over very long time horizons. 
This is basic research the markets don't invest in, venture capital 
firms don't look at. It is fundamental science carried out at the best 
laboratories and universities across America.
  I worked at one time in my career as an engineer. I studied to be a 
mechanical engineer. I worked as an electrical engineer. I have a 
little bit of an understanding of some of the scientific principles 
these laboratories, scientists, and graduate students work on every 
single day. I certainly have enough appreciation for these concepts to 
recognize that no Member of Congress should be telling the professional 
leadership, the academic leadership at the National Science Foundation, 
which program should be funded on any given day, month, or year. That 
is why the National Science Foundation has a competitive process, a 
peer review process where ideas are submitted and approved by panels of 
experts in each of these areas.
  As I say, it is competitive, it is free from politics, free from 
earmarks, the pet projects and pet policies of legislators, whether 
they are Democratic or Republican. They are insulated from those 
things, and that is why it has been so successful.
  Unfortunately, in the underlying bill before us, there is for the 
first time ever a provision to set aside some of that money for a 
specific area of interest. It may be an interesting area and a very 
valuable area--the area of human resources and education--but never 
before have we set aside in legislation funding in this way: over $1 
billion of the approximately $6.5 billion the National Science 
Foundation has to spend each year being set aside for this purpose. For 
the first time, it guarantees a specific authorization. For the first 
time, the legislation would guarantee a specific increase for this 
particular area in outyears. For the first time, and maybe even what I 
think is most fundamentally wrong, it says that because of these 
protections, this is a more important area. We don't provide this 
protection to chemistry or physics or computational mathematics. They 
do not get a designated allocation in this bill. They do not get a 
specific increase in funding year on year in this bill. But we give it 
to the area of human resources.

  As I said, that is a worthwhile area for investment, the side of 
education, it can certainly make a difference, but when we start 
setting it ahead of, on top of, and at a higher priority than the 
physics, chemistry, computational mathematics, for which the National 
Science Foundation is not just designed but for which it is world 
renowned, we are making a huge mistake. We make a mistake not just 
because it is wrong to set it ahead of these other programs but it is a 
mistake because it sets us on the wrong path, because the next time we 
do legislation such as this, someone else is going to want to set aside 
funds for another initiative and someone else is going to want to 
guarantee an increase for another area of programming. Over time, we 
will undermine, weaken, and perhaps even destroy the integrity of the 
competition and peer review process that is at the heart of the 
National Science Foundation.
  Those who will oppose this amendment will say this is about human 
resources and education and we care about those things. Well, I care 
about those things also, but it is still wrong to carve up the National 
Science Foundation funding in this way. Moreover, if we care about the 
education initiatives for science, technology, engineering, and 
mathematics, we should be looking at the report of the Competitiveness 
Council that categorized over 106 different science, technology, 
education, and math programs in 8 or 10 different agencies, and 34 of 
them are within the National Science Foundation, but a dozen are within 
the Department of Agriculture, 13 in the Department of Commerce, 9 in 
the Department of Education, 9 in the Department of Defense, 6 in the 
Department of Transportation, and so on.
  Where in this bill did we look at these 106 programs to make them 
work better? Where in this legislation did we review which of these 
programs is most effective and most focused on encouraging students to 
pursue careers in science, technology, and mathematics? Rather than do 
that, the authors of this particular provision, section 4002, say, 
well, the National Science Foundation does work in these areas, so 
let's make sure they are guaranteed $1 billion a year and guaranteed 
increases over time.
  I think that is the wrong approach to take. It is the wrong approach 
to take for the National Science Foundation. The scientists who are 
supported by that foundation have visited me in my office--I am sure 
they have visited with many other Members of Congress--and time and 
time again they have said, protect the peer review process, protect the 
investment in basic science and mathematics. That is what I intend to 
do as a Senator, and that is why I have offered this amendment to 
strike that provision that sets aside funds, that guarantees an 
increase, because it is not the right way to deal with the National 
Science Foundation.
  Mr. President, I yield the remainder of my time.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, obviously, I have great respect for my 
colleague from New Hampshire, and particularly because he is, I 
believe, the only trained engineer in the Senate, I certainly pay 
attention when he speaks on issues related to engineering and science, 
and I think we all need to do that. But I think he is clearly wrong in 
this circumstance, and let me explain why.
  The Senator is offering an amendment to strike the provisions of this 
bill that provide for annual funding increases for education and human 
resource programs at the National Science Foundation. The purpose of 
the provision that is in the bill he wants to strike is to ensure the 
continued involvement of experts at the National Science Foundation in 
improving science, technology, engineering, and math education at the 
elementary, secondary, and the postsecondary level.
  This underlying bill, S. 761, provides for substantial increases in 
funding for the National Science Foundation, and the amount of those 
increases is contained in section 401. You can see for the next 4 years 
there are substantial increases. I would reiterate, as we have many 
times in this debate, these are authorizing levels. This is not actual 
appropriation of money. That is the heavy lifting which we are going to 
have to do later on this year. This authorizes, however, significant 
increases in funding for the National Science Foundation.
  As appropriations for the National Science Foundation increase under 
this legislation, under S. 761, funds for the education and human 
resources programs will also increase by a proportional amount. We are 
not in any way

[[Page S5021]]

diverting funds from basic research or other activities of the National 
Science Foundation, and we are not specifying that they do things they 
have not traditionally done. The National Science Foundation has a very 
impressive record of accomplishment in education at all levels with 
regard to science, engineering, and mathematics.
  The National Science Foundation is the engine of innovation for K-12 
science, technology, engineering, and math education. Strengthening 
science and math education is a core mission of the National Science 
Foundation. This is not a sideline, this is a core mission. When the 
agency was founded, Congress recognized the importance of involving 
scientists in the critical questions relating to science education, and 
they made science education a key part of the agenda of that agency. 
The National Science Foundation programs range from graduate 
fellowships to programs for secondary school teachers, to informal 
museum programs. They are designed to attract students to science, 
engineering, technology, and mathematics. They are designed to give 
them the preparation and the fundamental knowledge they need to pursue 
undergraduate and graduate degrees, and they are designed to support 
the completion of those degrees.
  The EHR, which is the education and human resources directorate 
within the National Science Foundation, also pursues ways for advancing 
participation and equity in access for all who are interested in 
pursuing careers in these fields. As a research and development 
institution, the National Science Foundation is uniquely situated to 
bring insights to science and math education, and that is the reason 
why we gave them that job.
  The National Science Foundation education programs are a catalyst for 
change in education, and they have been demonstrated to do that. Let me 
give one example of a successful program, which is NSF's math and 
science partnership program. An analysis of 123 schools that 
participated in that program shows improvements in student proficiency 
in math and science at the elementary, the middle, and high school 
levels over a 3-year period. This year, the National Science 
Foundation's budget includes $30 million for these MSP, or math and 
science partnership, awards.
  A recent report by the Academic Competitiveness Council found that of 
the 10 math and science education programs at various Federal agencies 
they evaluated, all 4 of the programs they found to be effective were 
being run out of the National Science Foundation. So the authorization 
level for education and human resources in this bill reflects what the 
President asked for in fiscal 2008, plus an adjustment of $300 million 
to allow for the new programs authorized in the bill.
  Let me directly respond to the main points I understood my colleague 
from New Hampshire to be making. He started by saying no Member of 
Congress should be telling NSF how to spend their money, basically. We 
do that every time we pass an appropriations bill. We tell NSF how to 
spend their money. We also do it whenever we pass an authorization 
bill. The last time we passed the NSF reauthorization, which I think 
was 2003, we specified there precisely how much would go into education 
versus into other types of activities. So this is not in any way a 
change.
  I think everyone in Congress knows the one thing we are good at is 
micromanaging. We do not give tens of billions of dollars to any agency 
and say do what you want. We tell them we want this much spent on 
research and development, and we want this much spent on education.
  The one other point my colleague from New Hampshire made is we should 
not get into interfering with the peer review system, which is designed 
to ensure the best activities are chosen. We anticipated that problem 
and agree entirely with him. Section 4007 of this legislation, on page 
183, is entitled ``Reaffirmation of the Merit-Review Process of the 
National Science Foundation,'' and it says:

       Nothing in this division or division A, or the amendments 
     made by this division or division A, shall be interpreted to 
     require or recommend that the National Science Foundation (1) 
     alter or modify its merit-review system or peer-review 
     process; or, (2) exclude the awarding of any proposal by 
     means of the merit-review or peer-review process.

  So there is nothing in the section the Senator would have us strike 
that in any way undermines the peer review system. That is certainly 
something I would not support doing.
  I believe very strongly this is not a good amendment; that deleting 
section 4002, which is what the Senator's amendment would do, would be 
a substantial mistake, and I urge my colleagues to resist the 
amendment.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, how much time remains?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. There is 7 minutes remaining in opposition.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, if you would let me know when 3 minutes 
remain.
  I am trying to respect Senator Sununu's amendment, because he is a 
very careful student of these matters, and I am looking at the 
authorization bill, and I want to ask the Senator a few questions in a 
moment, if I may, and I will do it on my time.
  I am looking at the authorization bills for fiscal years 2003, 2004, 
and 2005, which is the current authorization bill. In each of those 
years--the authorization bill--there is a number for specific 
authorized allocations for, first, research; next, for education and 
human resources, which is the area the Senator is objecting to; next, a 
specific authorized allocation for research equipment; next, for 
salaries; and next, for the Office of Inspector General. Then we go to 
2004 and it is the same there. In each year, there is a specific 
authorized allocation for each area; one for research, one for 
education, and one for each of the others.
  The difference in this proposed authorization is that for education 
it says the number. The allocation for education shall go up as much as 
the specific authorization for research. Would the Senator be more 
comfortable--and this is my question, through the Chair, if I may ask 
this--would the Senator be more comfortable if there were specific 
number allocations which are enacted now for future years? In other 
words, if we turn the percentages or the suggestion that it ought to go 
up the same amount and say, instead of that, we will take a number and 
insert it in there for each of those years? Because that is exactly the 
way it is done in the current bill.
  Mr. SUNUNU. Mr. President, I am happy to respond. First, I would 
certainly be more comfortable if the guaranteed increases were struck 
from the bill, because that is a protection, a consideration for this 
area of funding that isn't given to other areas of funding. I would 
have concern about that allocation in past years, again because it puts 
this particular area in effect ahead of the different disciplines of 
chemistry, math, or physics. It treats it somewhat uniquely.
  To the response on the point about appropriations, Senator Bingaman 
is absolutely right. Each year we do an appropriations bill that is 
much more specific than this, where, ultimately, allocations are made 
in the specific areas of research, chemistry, or physics. That is 
based, however, on a request by the National Science Foundation itself 
in front of that Appropriations Committee. It is based on an exchange 
for that given year.
  I would agree with you, the peer review process needs to be 
protected. We shouldn't be specifying in authorizing language--even if 
you make the point it is not meaningful because it is only an 
authorization--we shouldn't be specifying how much money we are going 
to allocate to superconducting materials in 2008 or how much funding we 
are going to authorize for plasma physics in 2009.
  We should be much more responsive than that, not prejudge what the 
needs of the National Science Foundation are going to be in the 
outyears.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I will take 30 seconds, if I may. I 
think I am reading this differently than is the Senator. I am reading 
the authorization language for the year 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006--the 
existing law, there are specific authorization allocations for each 
year, not just for education but for research and for research 
equipment and for salaries and expenses. It goes up each year in the 
authorization language that exists today. So we are reading a different 
bill. I will be happy, if I am a part of any conference discussion, if 
it would help with his concerns,

[[Page S5022]]

to translate the ``as much as'' into specific numbers, if other 
Senators agree with that.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Who yields time? The Senator from New 
Hampshire.
  Mr. SUNUNU. Mr. President, let me use a portion of my time to address 
a particular point; that is, equipment. I fully recognize that 
equipment is different from funding for specific research. Capital 
equipment, infrastructure, buildings--those are going to receive 
separate allocations year on year, and they are going to receive 
separate authorization numbers. But I come back to this issue of 
whether we are going to treat the human resources area differently by 
protecting annual increases and whether we are going to ensure that in 
the future we maximize the resources available to the National Science 
Foundation for its core mission of research, of investment in math, 
science, and engineering research projects. I understand the education 
role. I understand that is part of the mission of the National Science 
Foundation, and I support that effort. But I think we need to be very 
careful before creating long-term setasides for an area such as this.
  I reserve the remainder of my time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Who yields time?
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, how much time remains?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has 2 minutes.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. How much time remains for the Senator from New 
Hampshire?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. A little over 7 minutes.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Let me use the remaining 2 minutes in opposition to the 
Senator from New Hampshire, and then the Senator can obviously use as 
much time as he would like.
  Let me just reiterate that I think this section which he is proposing 
that we strike is an important section to retain in the legislation. 
This is something which is a direct outgrowth of what the Augustine 
Commission recommended. They recommended that we increase funding for 
the National Science Foundation and that we ensure that the National 
Science Foundation substantially increase its efforts with regard to 
science education. That is what this provision does. That is what this 
section of the bill does. It says we want to increase authorization for 
the National Science Foundation, and as we are doing that, we want to 
be sure there is adequate funding, there is adequate attention given to 
science education.
  I believe, if there were a single thing which the National Academy of 
Sciences report concluded, it is that we are investing way too little 
as a country in science and engineering and math education across-the-
board--in the Department of Education, in the Department of Energy, in 
the National Science Foundation, in our schools, elementary and 
secondary and postsecondary and universities.
  This is an important provision. We should keep this in the bill. I 
know it is very important to Senator Kennedy. He was very involved in 
the discussions that went into the drafting of this portion of the 
bill. As a member of his committee, I strongly object to us deleting 
this section of the bill.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The senior Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. DOMENICI. I wonder if the distinguished Senator will yield?
  Mr. SUNUNU. Mr. President, I am happy to yield 4 minutes to the 
Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I will ask that it be taken off the 
bill, not off his time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. That time has expired. Without objection, it 
is so ordered.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Very briefly, I wish to say to the Senator that he has 
made an eloquent presentation and he has certainly shown people that he 
understands what the National Science Foundation is supposed to do and 
what it does. But there is no question that it does two things at least 
and, in most cases, more. It does research, but it also does education. 
That is enumerated in the year we are in and enumerated in the 
outyears. That, along with other activities, including research that 
the Senator is worried about, is enumerated and protected by an actual 
appropriation; that is, the thing that worries him is the one that 
should worry all of us, and that is the adequacy and assurance of 
research and that it will not be gobbled up or picked at as time 
changes.
  It seems to me we did it right here because we earmarked, in a sense, 
all the different areas and put the two worrying him the most--both of 
these are there. Both research and education are there. It seems to me 
that is what we want to do. I don't know how you could do it any other 
way and we be able to tell the Senators who helped us put this together 
that they are protected for science research and for education. That is 
really what we are trying to do because they worked hard on it. They 
thought this was an area of importance. We agreed with them. It turns 
out, as Senator Bingaman said just two moments ago, it is true, this 
bill is beginning to sound right because it is saying we were really 
hurting on basic science, and this is an area, the National Science 
Foundation, an instrumentation of our Government, which has been doing 
very well and we want to give them a lot of extra money if we want to 
do this, a bill like this, for our country.
  I thank the Senator for the time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire.
  Mr. SUNUNU. Mr. President, in closing, let me thank the Senator from 
New Mexico for his points. I certainly appreciate the commitment I have 
heard from everyone who has spoken this morning about the value of the 
peer-review process, the commitment to this critical role of research, 
basic research within the National Science Foundation, the desire to 
make sure we are not giving special treatment, unique treatment to any 
particular area within the National Science Foundation, notwithstanding 
the fact that in this legislation, there are guaranteed proportional 
increases for human resources in the educational area. Of course, I 
have to take every Senator at their word, but I very much appreciate 
the word and commitment given here to continue to champion and protect 
the integrity of the peer-review process moving forward.
  Second, I reiterate that there is very little done that I can see in 
the legislation to look at the existing science, technology, education, 
and math programs within our Government. There is support for those 
programs and even creation of some new programs in this legislation, 
but very little is done to follow up on findings we have in front of us 
about weaknesses and duplication and overlap in these programs and the 
need to make them work better for those math, science, and engineering 
students whom they are intended to benefit. I encourage my colleagues 
to continue to pursue these very questions as this bill moves off the 
floor and into conference.
  I understand there were a lot of sensitive issues and committee 
jurisdictions and tradeoffs that had to be made in constructing the 
legislation. I understand the managers of the bill are not going to 
support my amendment. But I think the message this amendment carries is 
an extremely important one. I hope it will be heeded, not just in 
deliberations over the coming year when we are dealing with math and 
science and the National Science Foundation, to protect what makes it 
work, but also as this legislation moves to conference.
  I yield any time I have remaining.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. If all time is yielded back, the question is 
on agreeing to the amendment.
  Mr. SUNUNU. I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second? There is a 
sufficient second.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
  Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from South Dakota (Mr. 
Johnson) is necessarily absent.
  Mr. LOTT. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator 
from Arizona (Mr. McCain).
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber 
desiring to vote?
  The result was announced--yeas 24, nays 74, as follows:

[[Page S5023]]

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 141 Leg.]

                                YEAS--24

     Allard
     Bunning
     Burr
     Chambliss
     Coburn
     Cornyn
     Craig
     Crapo
     DeMint
     Graham
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Hagel
     Hutchison
     Inhofe
     Isakson
     Kyl
     Lott
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Sununu
     Thomas
     Thune
     Vitter

                                NAYS--74

     Akaka
     Alexander
     Baucus
     Bayh
     Bennett
     Biden
     Bingaman
     Bond
     Boxer
     Brown
     Brownback
     Byrd
     Cantwell
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Clinton
     Cochran
     Coleman
     Collins
     Conrad
     Corker
     Dodd
     Dole
     Domenici
     Dorgan
     Durbin
     Ensign
     Enzi
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Harkin
     Hatch
     Inouye
     Kennedy
     Kerry
     Klobuchar
     Kohl
     Landrieu
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lincoln
     Lugar
     Martinez
     McCaskill
     McConnell
     Menendez
     Mikulski
     Murkowski
     Murray
     Nelson (FL)
     Nelson (NE)
     Obama
     Pryor
     Reed
     Reid
     Roberts
     Rockefeller
     Salazar
     Sanders
     Schumer
     Smith
     Snowe
     Specter
     Stabenow
     Stevens
     Tester
     Voinovich
     Warner
     Webb
     Whitehouse
     Wyden

                             NOT VOTING--2

     Johnson
     McCain
       
  The amendment (No. 938) was rejected.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote, and I 
move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Casey). The Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, let me just get the attention of 
Senators for a minute. We made good progress on this bill yesterday, 
and then, of course, we just had a vote this morning. We are anxious to 
try to complete this bill before this briefing which is scheduled with 
General Petraeus at 4 o'clock this afternoon, if we possibly can. So we 
would be very appreciative if Members would come to the floor with any 
amendments they have and offer those amendments and take a short time 
to explain them. For any of them it appears we can accept, we are glad 
to try to accept them. Some we will not be able to accept. But we are 
anxious to get any additional amendments any Senator wishes to have 
considered brought to the Senate floor as soon as possible.
  I believe both Senator Domenici and Senator Alexander want to say a 
word, and then I believe Senator Sanders wishes to speak to his 
amendment.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The senior Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I just want to second that motion as to 
what Senator Bingaman just said and ask Senators on my side of the 
aisle to take a look, as soon as you can, with your staffs at this bill 
and tell us whether you have amendments. If we are going to finish at a 
time certain, we do not want everybody to come down at 4 o'clock and 
complain. We have a lot of time, but it will be useless if Senators do 
not bring their amendments down. We know there are some floating 
around, but we certainly do not have an adequate understanding of how 
many Senators have. It would be helpful if Senators would send us a 
message that they have amendments and what they amount to. We will work 
with Senators so we can get them done quickly.
  Mr. President, I thank Senator Bingaman.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont.


                      Amendment No. 936 Withdrawn

  Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I intended to have considered an 
amendment I have offered, which is a very important amendment, which 
would provide assistance from the Department of Commerce to workers, to 
employees who want to move forward in terms of ESOPs, employee stock 
ownership plans.
  At a time when we are losing millions of good-paying blue-collar 
manufacturing jobs, white-collar information technology jobs, it seems 
to me that the ESOP concept, the worker-ownership concept, is, in fact, 
an important model the U.S. Government should be exploring in terms of 
how we help those workers purchase their own companies and keep jobs in 
the United States of America.
  I understand there is a problem with jurisdiction. The chairman and 
ranking member of the Banking Committee would like to work with me on 
this issue. I think we would like to go forward in terms of holding 
hearings and then coming forward with some legislation, which seems to 
me to be a sensible idea.
  What I would like to do is, if I could, yield to the chairman of the 
Banking Committee, Mr. Dodd, and then maybe to Ranking Member Shelby.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
  Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I thank my colleague for yielding. I thank 
my colleague for his consideration.
  For those of us who remember the days of Russell Long talking about 
the employee stock option plans, we all were lectured considerably 
during our tenure here with Russell Long, who was a strong advocate of 
the idea of employees being able to have an invested ownership in 
companies.
  I applaud my colleague from Vermont for this idea. It is one that 
certainly deserves consideration. I have told my colleague from Vermont 
I will be happy to either conduct the hearing myself or have an 
appropriate subcommittee conduct it, and be involved with it, as well 
as the Banking Committee to look at this.
  The jurisdiction may also be in the Finance Committee. I know Senator 
Baucus has an interest in this issue as well, so I want to be careful 
about stepping on the toes of another committee that may have some 
piece of this as well as the Banking Committee. But it is an economic 
development issue, and I am sure, between Senator Baucus and myself, we 
can conduct a hearing that will complement both committees' 
jurisdictions.
  Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, if my friend will yield briefly, Senator 
Baucus is a cosponsor of this legislation, along with Senator Leahy and 
Senator Lincoln.
  Mr. President, I yield back to the Senator.
  Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I thank my colleague for his observation. I 
see my friend from Alabama is in the Chamber, the former chairman of 
the committee, my ranking member, who cares about this issue as well. I 
know of his interest in the subject matter.
  So we will move forward on this issue in a timely fashion to see if 
we can have a good hearing and develop further interest in this idea, 
which I think has great merit. I thank the Senator for raising it.
  Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I yield to my friend from Alabama.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alabama.
  Mr. SHELBY. Mr. President, I thank my colleague for yielding.
  As Senator Dodd said, we are all interested in promoting the economic 
interests of our workers. The ESOP program, employee stock ownership 
program, has helped a lot of workers create wealth, save jobs, and save 
companies in this country.
  I know this is probably a subject matter for a number of committees, 
but Chairman Dodd said he would hold a hearing on this in the Banking 
Committee. I join with him in working on this issue. If this or some 
other legislation like this will help people own companies where they 
work, I think that is good for America.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont.
  Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I very much thank my friend from Alabama 
and my friend from Connecticut. We look forward to working with you.
  Mr. President, at this time, I ask unanimous consent to withdraw my 
amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The amendment is withdrawn.
  The Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that on 
Wednesday, today, April 25, at 2 o'clock, the Senate proceed to debate 
concurrently three Coburn amendments, Nos. 918, 921, and 922; that 
there be a total of 60 minutes of debate, divided as follows: 40 
minutes under the control of Senator Coburn and 20 minutes under the 
control of myself or my designee; that upon the use or yielding back of 
time, the Senate proceed to vote in relation to each amendment in the 
order listed in this agreement; that there be 2 minutes of debate 
equally divided as specified above prior to the second and third votes; 
that no amendments be in order to any of the amendments covered

[[Page S5024]]

under this agreement prior to the vote; and that the second and third 
votes in the series be 10 minutes in duration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, reserving the right to object.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia.
  The Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I am glad to accommodate the Senator 
from West Virginia. He asked if I would restate the unanimous consent 
request. I am glad to do that.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that on Wednesday, April 25, 
at 2 p.m., the Senate proceed to debate concurrently three Coburn 
amendments, Nos. 918, 921, and 922; that there be a total of 60 minutes 
of debate, divided as follows: 40 minutes under the control of Senator 
Coburn and 20 minutes under the control of Senator Bingaman or his 
designee; that upon the use or yielding back of time, the Senate 
proceed to vote in relation to each amendment in the order listed in 
this agreement; that there be 2 minutes of debate equally divided as 
specified above prior to the second and third votes; that no amendments 
be in order to any of the amendments covered under this agreement prior 
to the vote; and that the second and third votes in this series be 10 
minutes in duration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I yield the floor and suggest the 
absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BAUCUS. 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. BAUCUS. Mr. President, in Ecclesiastes, the Preacher warns:

       The race is not to the swift, or the battle to the strong, 
     nor does food come to the wise, or wealth to the brilliant, 
     or favor to the learned; but time and chance happen to them 
     all.

  America is used to being the swiftest. We are used to being the 
strongest. America has become used to winning the race. We have become 
used to receiving the cream of the world's wealth. But we would do well 
to heed the warning of Ecclesiastes, for time and chance will happen to 
us, as well.
  New global competitors have entered the race. Over time, they are 
growing stronger and more learned. America cannot leave winning the 
race to chance. We must redouble our speed. We must redouble our 
learning if we are not to fall behind.
  That is why I started in June of 2005 delivering a series of 
addresses on America's economic leadership. That is why, during the 
last Congress and this one as well, I have introduced a series of bills 
addressing American competitiveness. Those bills dealt with education, 
with energy, with trade, research, and savings. That is why much of the 
work of the Finance Committee this Congress this year will address 
America's economic competitiveness.
  The Finance Committee will shortly mark up education tax incentives. 
We will follow with tax incentives for cleaner and more renewable 
energy. This year we intend to extend trade adjustment assistance, and 
we hope to address small business health concerns as well. Each of 
these bills will help American businesses remain the world's leaders.
  The bill before us will help, and it will help a lot. The bill before 
us will promote excellence in education, technology, and science. I 
hope to contribute a series of amendments to this bill. Each, I 
believe, will bolster America's economic competitiveness.
  A noted MIT scholar once commented that:

       The ability to learn faster than your competitors may be 
     the only sustainable competitive advantage.

  Having an educated workforce able to learn and adapt is a cornerstone 
of a competitive agenda.
  My first amendment thus encourages States to incorporate 21st century 
learning skills into their curriculum. This amendment would help our 
school systems teach skills to America's students that will best 
prepare them for tomorrow's economy.
  America faces a world more integrated, more interdependent, and more 
competitive than ever. It is our challenge to succeed in this 
environment. It is our challenge to leave our children and 
grandchildren with an economy that is better than the one which we 
inherited. We must meet this challenge.
  Meeting this challenge starts with addressing education in a new way. 
This bill is just a beginning.
  We must change the way we look at education. As policymakers, we tend 
to look at our education challenge like a multiple choice test. We want 
to choose between a few simple options--more science and math classes, 
more AP classes, or better teachers. But the answers are not as simple 
as ``A,'' ``B,'' or ``C.''
  We must look at our challenge as if it were a math proof. We must 
think through every step, to reach the end result. The process is as 
important as the outcome. The outcome must be appropriate for today's 
needs, but the outcome must also be appropriate for the needs of the 
future.
  One hundred years from now--even 10 years from now--our society will 
be very different from what we see today.
  If we find the right solution, our students will excel in school. If 
we find the right solution, our graduates will be ready to enter the 
workforce. If we find the right solution, America will retain its 
economic leadership. But if we look only for simple options, we may 
never reach a solution.
  My first amendment will assist in the process of developing these 
solutions. My amendment will encourage school systems to think first 
and plan early. My amendment will encourage States to look at the big 
picture. My amendment will encourage States to look at education 
comprehensively.
  My amendment encourages States to incorporate 21st century learning 
skills into the States' education plan.
  Twenty-first century learning skills emphasize learning skills, 
collaboration, and communication skills.
  Our students must know science and math, but more importantly, our 
students must excel in problem-solving and critical thinking skills. 
Our students must excel in financial, economic, and business literacy. 
It is these skills that students today will need to be successful 
tomorrow.
  Our students must also be able to communicate effectively. Twenty-
first century skills also include language learning.
  This bill sets aside funding for foreign language programs, but in 
many rural areas like Montana there are not enough teachers. The way to 
help solve this problem is through distance learning.
  That is why I also worked hard to include in the bill a provision to 
allow language funds to go to programs that use distance learning.
  I am proud of programs such as the U.S. Arabic Distance Learning 
Network out of Montana State University. This program uses interactive 
video classrooms to allow two-way communication between the professor 
and students. This innovative solution is helping students to acquire 
important language skills.
  We must look for more ways to be creative in our education methods. 
Our schools must adapt to new challenges. Our students must begin to 
learn the skills that companies need today, and students must learn the 
skills that companies anticipate needing tomorrow.
  This bill is a piece of the process in solving the proof. I will 
continue working on this issue and I encourage my colleagues to do so 
as well.
  Many of the proposals in these amendments and this legislation are 
good solutions for serious problems, but addressing our problems is not 
enough. We must also improve the way we identify them. We must improve 
our diagnosis.
  Getting the right diagnosis is especially important to the most 
dynamic sector of our economy--the services sector. Our economy has 
evolved from agriculture and manufacturing to services. Services 
industries today comprise 80 percent of our economy. Since 1990, 
private services industries have added over 22 million jobs. In our 
international trade picture, services are a bright spot. Where we so 
often see deficits, America has a surplus in services exports.
  To keep this sector vigorous in a global market, we must track its 
health and development. But we don't.

[[Page S5025]]

  Today, the Bureau of Economic Analysis does not produce annual, 
State-by-State, sector-specific services export data. Tracking this 
kind of export data is critical to knowing where our strengths and our 
weakness lie. These data are critical to knowing where jobs are being 
created and how to build on those successes. These data are equally 
critical to knowing where jobs are being lost, and to how we can best 
help those workers.
  That is why I am offering an amendment to fund a program in the 
Bureau of Economic Analysis to study services exports in detail, 
annually, thoroughly, on a State-by-State basis. We know too little 
about this sector of our economy and its standing internationally. This 
amendment would remedy that.
  I also have amendments to improve America's energy research. My 
amendment would double funding for the Department of Energy's Office of 
Science. That office is the largest supporter of physical sciences 
research in America. It would provide more than 40 percent of total 
funding in this area nationwide. The Office oversees a broad range of 
energy-related research, including that related to renewable energy.
  For example, the Office of Science funds research and development 
projects at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, or NREL. NREL is 
the Nation's primary lab for renewable energy and energy efficiency 
R&D. The Finance Committee has heard testimony from two NREL 
representatives this year--Dr. Dan Arvizu, director of the lab, and Dr. 
Robert Farrington, manager of the lab's research on advanced vehicles.
  Both of these individuals are very impressive. I believe strongly 
that we must support their work.
  Unfortunately, that support has been lacking in recent years. In 
January, the New York Times outlined NREL's budget challenges. The 
Times pointed out that:

     Money flowing into the nation's primary laboratory for 
     developing renewable fuels is actually less than it was at 
     the beginning of the Bush administration.

  The lab got a bit of a boost after that story was published in 
January, but the administration's 2008 budget still plans a 3 percent 
cut for the lab.
  We can fix that by doubling the Office of Science's budget over the 
next 5 years. This injection of resources would provide badly needed 
funding for NREL and the other national labs. The Office of Science 
would receive $3.8 billion for 2007, a small increase over last year's 
amount. My amendment would increase the Federal commitment to DOE's 
Office of Science to $8 billion by 2011. That is double what the office 
receives now, and that is more than a 50 percent increase over what is 
called for in the underlying bill.
  This amendment is consistent with a recommendation of the National 
Commission on Energy Policy, a bipartisan group of 20 of the Nation's 
leading energy experts. Last week, the commission recommended doubling 
Federal spending on energy-technology R&D.
  But simply increasing funds for DOE's Office of Science is not 
enough. We also need to establish a new office of research outside DOE. 
My amendment to establish ARPA-E would do just that.
  I am very pleased that the underlying bill proposes an Advanced 
Research Projects Authority--Energy, or ARPA-E.
  The National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of 
Engineering, and the Institute of Medicine joined to form the Committee 
on Prospering in the Global Economy of the 21st Century. Norm Augustine 
chaired the committee. The committee recommended creating an ARPA-E: 
Advanced Research Projects Agency--Energy.
  The new agency would be modeled on DARPA--the Defense Advanced 
Research Projects Agency--in the Department of Defense. Among the 
revolutionary technologies that DARPA has developed are the Internet 
and stealth technology for aircraft.
  The Augustine Committee recommended that ARPA-E be designed to 
conduct transformative, out-of-the-box energy research.
  In the last Congress, and earlier this year, I introduced legislation 
to create an ARPA-E.
  The bill before us today proposes a variation on my legislation by 
creating an ``authority'' within the Department of Energy, instead of 
an agency.
  My amendment would move the ``authority'' out of the DOE and 
establish it as an agency, and my amendment would flesh out some of the 
details of the office.
  My amendment proposes that ARPA-E be a small agency with a total of 
250 people. A minimum of 180 of them would be technical staff. A 
director of the agency and four deputies would lead ARPA-E. My 
amendment proposes that ARPA-E be funded at $300 million in fiscal year 
2008, ramping up to $2.0 billion in 2012.
  With gasoline again rising to $3 a gallon and increased concerns 
about global warming, I believe we need to establish the most muscular 
ARPA-E possible. That is why my amendment frees the agency from the 
bureaucratic restrictions of the DOD, and that is why my amendment 
would elevate the status of the agency by establishing a direct 
reporting link to the President.
  The underlying bill has taken a critical step forward by proposing an 
ARPA-E. It is now up to the Senate and House to make this terrific idea 
a reality to address the issues of energy security, energy supply, and 
global warming.
  By advancing amendments like these, we can help to ensure America's 
economic leadership.
  Let us thereby help to ensure that America's business remains the 
swiftest. Let us ensure that our economy remains strong. Let us not 
leave our economic future to time and chance.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a 
quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mrs. McCASKILL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. McCASKILL. Mr. President, I am a proud cosponsor of the 
important legislation we have been debating this week in order to help 
America compete, to put America in a competitive place with the rest of 
the world on technology and engineering. I know how important it is 
that we make smart investments right now. In a previously adopted 
amendment I cosponsored along with Senator DeMint, we have adopted an 
amendment I proposed, along with Senator DeMint, which is important to 
this legislation.
  While I support this legislation, while I think it is very important 
we invest in technology and invest in the future of our economy in a 
new, global, technology-driven marketplace, I also am very concerned 
about the way we spend Federal money. I am very concerned about 
programs that are put in place that we don't check back on to make sure 
they are working the way they should and that we are spending money the 
way we should. The amendment that has been adopted--and I want to thank 
the managers of the bill for accepting the amendment--simply says this: 
In 3 years, the GAO has to take a look. The GAO has to come in and do a 
study on how we have spent all of these billions of dollars we are 
going to set aside--precious dollars--precious Federal tax dollars 
that, frankly, have so many needs right now, including bringing our 
deficit under control.
  I understand sometimes you have to invest money in order to make our 
economy thrive, and I am all for that investment, but it needs to be a 
wise investment. The GAO needs to come in in 3 years and look at the 
way this money has been spent and tell the American people--and, most 
importantly, my colleagues in the Senate and our colleagues in the 
House--that this money is being used the way we want it to be used: 
efficiently and, most importantly, effectively. That will give us an 
opportunity to take the temperature of these programs to make sure we 
are not throwing money down a rat hole, that we are not coming up with 
a good idea and never having the discipline to follow up and make sure 
the money is wisely spent.
  So I appreciate the acceptance of this amendment. I think it is 
important. I think doing the kind of followup scrutiny of Government 
programs is something that has been woefully lacking in Washington, DC, 
and I look forward to continuing to mandate GAO studies at intervals in 
programs such as this to make sure the money is being spent

[[Page S5026]]

the way the taxpayers would want it to be spent.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I note the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. DURBIN. 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. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in 
morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                 Iraq Supplemental Appropriations bill

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, in the next day or two, the House and 
Senate will consider the Iraq supplemental appropriations bill. This is 
the fifth year of our war in Iraq. This is the seventh time the 
President has come to Congress for an emergency supplemental bill.
  In the ordinary course of events, a President and administration will 
submit to Congress an appropriation. We carefully review it, consider 
amendments, vote on it, and send it back to the President for 
signature.
  The exceptions to the rule I just gave are for emergency situations, 
unanticipated situations, such as natural disasters, situations that 
came upon us so quickly that we could not have anticipated them. But 
for 5 straight years now this administration has insisted that this 
ongoing war is an unanticipated expenditure. I wish that were true, but 
we have known now for more than 4 years that this war is costly; first, 
in terms of human life, and, second, in terms of the Treasury of this 
country. Despite that, the President continues to send us emergency 
bills, unanticipated appropriations.
  This time, almost $100 billion is to be added to the expenses of the 
wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The total cost to date is somewhere in 
the range of $500 billion. We have appropriated that money. We have 
given the President every penny he has asked for and more. Members of 
Congress and the Senate with serious misgivings about this policy in 
Iraq have said to the President as Commander in Chief responsible for 
our men and women in uniform: We never want to shortchange them in 
battle. We want them to be safe. We want them to come home safe.
  I was one of 23 Senators who voted against this invasion of Iraq. I 
thought this was a serious mistake from the start, but I have never 
said no to the President's request for the funds for those troops. As I 
have said often, and I will repeat now, if it were my son or daughter 
in uniform, I would want them to have everything they need to come 
home. I may think this is the worst foreign policy decision in our 
time, but it is not to be taken out on our troops. They shouldn't be 
the bargaining chip in this important debate which is going on in 
Washington.
  Now comes the President with another supplemental, about $100 billion 
that he wants for the troops to have in the months to come. He will 
receive that money. There is no doubt that he will receive it. The 
Democratic majority in the House and Senate has already pledged to 
provide all the money our troops need. But we cannot ignore the 
obvious. It is time for us to have a serious discussion in this country 
about this war.
  The day before yesterday, nine American lives were given up in Iraq. 
Nine soldiers and marines lost their lives while many of us were in the 
safety of our homes or at our workplace.
  Whether it is on Sunday with the Stephanopoulos show or every day in 
the Washington Post, I try to make a point of reading the names and 
ages and hometowns of these soldiers, marines, sailors, and airmen who 
are casualties. I do that because I don't want their loss to become a 
numbing statistic. I want to try to visualize that 19-year-old soldier, 
that 23-year-old sergeant, that corporal in the Marine Corps who was 20 
years old. I want to try to visualize them in terms of my family and 
the people I love. I think every Member of Congress needs to do the 
same thing--and I hope they do the same thing--to remember that it 
isn't just 3,320 lives, these are 3,320 sons and daughters and husbands 
and fathers, mothers and wives, loved ones. These are real people and 
real lives.
  So now we are in this debate about how this war is going to end. It 
is well overdue that we have this debate.
  When we went into this war, we were told by the President that there 
were reasons for doing it. I think most Americans recall it. I recall 
the litany very well.
  First, the administration told us that Saddam Hussein and Iraq had 
weapons of mass destruction which could be used--chemical and 
biological weapons--in a terrorist mode to kill innocent people in the 
Middle East and around the world.
  Second, we were told they were developing nuclear weapons in Iraq, 
nuclear weapons that could destabilize the Middle East and even attack 
America. The leaders in this administration were giving speeches about 
mushroom clouds from these nuclear weapons.
  Then we were told that Saddam Hussein had some connection to the al-
Qaida terrorists who caused the 9/11 tragedy in America.
  Then we were told that this madman, this dictator, was so ruthless 
that he even killed and gassed his own innocent civilians, his own 
people in Kurdish regions.
  The Senate came to debate this, listening to the speeches by 
President Bush, Vice President Cheney, Secretary Rumsfeld, Secretary 
Colin Powell, and Condoleezza Rice, and the debate engaged. At the time 
of this debate, I was a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee. I 
would read the headlines in the paper in the morning and watch the 
television newscasts and shake my head because, you see, just a few 
hundred feet away from here in a closed room, carefully guarded, the 
Intelligence Committee was meeting on a daily basis for top-secret 
briefings about the information we were receiving, and the information 
we had in the Intelligence Committee was not the same information being 
given to the American people. I couldn't believe it. Members of this 
administration were in active, heated debate over whether aluminum 
tubes really meant that the Iraqis were developing nuclear weapons. 
Some in the administration were saying, of course, not, it is not the 
same kind of aluminum tube; at the same time, members of the 
administration were telling the American people to be fearful of 
mushroom-shaped clouds.
  I was angry about it. Frankly, I couldn't do much about it because, 
in the Intelligence Committee, we are sworn to secrecy. We can't walk 
outside the door and say the statement made yesterday by the White 
House is in direct contradiction to classified information that is 
being given to this Congress. We can't do that. We couldn't make those 
statements. So in my frustration, I sat on the floor of the Senate and 
listened to this heated debate about invading Iraq thinking the 
American people are being misled, they are not being told the truth. 
That is why I joined 22 of my colleagues in voting no. I didn't believe 
at the time that the American people knew the real facts.
  So what happened? We invaded, turned loose hundreds, if not thousands 
of people scouring Iraq for these weapons of mass destruction and never 
found one of them. We looked for nuclear weapons. There was no evidence 
whatsoever. We went into our intelligence files and said: OK, Saddam 
Hussein and al-Qaida--let's get this linkage put together once and for 
all. There was no evidence at all of a linkage.
  The American people were deceived into this war. That doesn't take a 
thing away from the men and women in uniform who answered the call. 
They stand and fight. They don't make the policy. The policy is made in 
Washington. And they have shown extraordinary courage.
  Now, in this supplemental appropriations bill for Iraq, we want to 
engage the White House and the American people in an active discussion 
about where this war is going. I don't want to wake up every single day 
and read a headline about 5 more Americans, 9 more Americans, 10 more 
Americans losing their lives in the middle of a civil war. We are 
saying to the President: It is time for you to accept the reality of 
the situation, and the reality is, as good as our military is--and it 
is the best in the world--it cannot win a civil war in Iraq. This war 
dates back 14 centuries. Two sects of the Islamic religion in pitched 
battle for 1,400 years about who

[[Page S5027]]

is the legitimate heir of the great Prophet Muhammad, and our soldiers 
are in the middle of this fight? Is that what we bargained for? Had the 
President come to us and said: We want to send in 150,000 American 
soldiers to risk their lives in the hopes that these two warring 
religious sects will reach an agreement in Iraq, he wouldn't have had 
two votes in favor of that. But that is where we are today.

  Meanwhile, this Iraqi Government, a Government which we have had a 
great deal to do with creating, continues to fail us.
  The supplemental appropriation we will send to the President of the 
United States starts talking about bringing American troops home, not 
all at once, not immediate, not a hasty withdrawal that would be 
dangerous for everyone, but in a systematic way. Many of us believe 
that is the only way to convince the Iraqis to stand up and take 
responsibility for their own country, to make the important and tough 
political decisions for their own future. Unless and until we do that, 
I am afraid we will continue to see the casualties grow and we won't 
see the stability we seek.
  This congressional action which we are sending to the President with 
this supplemental appropriation is not about really sending a message 
to the President, unfortunately. He is not listening. We know he has 
ignored his generals, and they are lined up to say the policy and 
strategy in Iraq is not succeeding. He has ignored the American people, 
who overwhelmingly believe it is time for American soldiers to start 
coming home. And he has refused to accept the realities of this war.
  Sadly, this administration is the architect of the worst foreign 
policy decision in recent memory. The President has led the best 
military in the world into a desperate civil war. He has spent American 
treasure at a record rate, driving us deeply into debt, and, 
unfortunately, there is no end in sight.
  The poor judgment of this administration has led to the invasion of 
Iraq, which has cost us over 3,300 American lives, over 25,000 injured, 
as many as 10,000 seriously injured with amputations and traumatic 
brain injury. His failed leadership has sent too few soldiers into too 
many battles without the training, the equipment, and the rest they 
need. And now he is extending the tours of duty of these men and women. 
I can't imagine that family back home marking the days off the 
calendar, reading the e-mails in anticipation of dad coming home, being 
told: You have to stay 90 days longer.
  Do you know, Mr. President, that this extension of the tour of duty 
for National Guard members is the largest extension since World War II? 
We are pushing these men and women to the limit. We are asking more of 
them than has been asked in 40 or 50 years. It is obvious that this 
administration had no idea at the time of this invasion of the extreme 
cost of ending this war, and frankly, they still don't.
  This failed policy in Iraq may not change until this President has 
left the White House, but that doesn't mean congressional action and 
congressional debate are any less important. If President Bush is not 
listening, then we trust that the Iraqis will listen. They should know 
this Congress will continue to work to make one thing very clear: 
American troops are coming home. The Iraqis have to stand up for their 
own country.
  I commend to my colleagues and all those who follow this debate an 
article from the New York Times of April 4 this year, just a few weeks 
ago, written by Leon Panetta, a former colleague of mine in the House 
of Representatives--a great personal friend, I might add, a man who has 
served this Government at the congressional level and then again in the 
Clinton White House and most recently was a member of the Iraq Study 
Group.
  What he basically says in this article of April 4 is, What about 
those other Iraq deadlines? What he does is he goes through and lists 
all of the deadlines the Iraqis agreed they would live by, the things 
they said they would achieve. As you go through them, you can 
understand the frustration many of us have about the current situation.
  The Iraqis promised to achieve by the end of 2006 or early 2007 the 
approval of a provincial election law. So far, no progress on that.
  The approval of a law to regulate their oil industry and share 
revenues--a very hot political topic, and while the Council of 
Ministers in Iraq has approved a draft, it has yet to be approved by 
their Parliament.
  They agreed by the end of 2006 or early this year to approve the 
debaathification law, to reintegrate officials of the former regime and 
Arab nationalists into public life. No progress at all.
  They agreed to approve a law to rein in sectarian militias. No 
progress at all.
  By March, the Government promised to hold a referendum on 
constitutional amendments. No progress at all.
  By May, the Prime Minister of Iraq committed to putting in place the 
law controlling militias. No progress at all. The approval of an 
amnesty agreement--no progress at all. The completion of all 
reconciliation efforts--clearly no progress.
  By June, the Iraqi Government promised to hold provincial elections. 
No date has been set.
  By April, the Iraqis want to take over total control of the Iraqi 
Army. Not likely based on the current situation.
  By September, the Iraqis want to be given full civil control of all 
the provinces. Today, they control 3 out of the 18 provinces.
  By December, the Iraqis, with U.S. support, want to achieve total 
security self-reliance. It is too early to tell, but does anyone 
believe that will occur?
  What Leon Panetta spelled out here is promises by Iraqis; that if we 
continue to risk American lives, if we continue to spend $8 billion to 
$10 billion a month, they will tackle the tough political issues in 
their country, and time and time again they have failed. How long will 
we wait? How many American lives will we offer up while they twiddle 
their thumbs thinking about political possibilities?
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record 
the April 4 op-ed by Leon Panetta.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                [From the New York Times, Apr. 4, 2007]

                 What About Those Other Iraq Deadlines?

                          (By Leon E. Panetta)

       Seaside, CA.--What has been particularly frustrating about 
     the debate in Washington over Iraq is that everyone seems to 
     be fighting one another and forgetting the fundamental 
     mission of the war.
       Whether one is for or against the war, the key to stability 
     is to have an Iraq that, in the words of the president 
     himself, can ``govern itself, sustain itself and defend 
     itself.'' Achieving that goal is largely dependent on the 
     political reforms that Iraqi leaders have promised but failed 
     to put in place in their country.
       As a member of the Iraq Study Group, I found that every 
     military commander we talked to felt that the absence of 
     national reconciliation was the fundamental cause of violence 
     in Iraq. As one American general told us, if the Iraqi 
     government does not make political progress on reforms, ``all 
     the troops in the world will not provide security.''
       Instead of dividing over the strategy on the war, the 
     president and the Congress should make very clear to the 
     Iraqis that there is no open-ended commitment to our 
     involvement. As the Iraq Study Group recommended, Iraqi 
     leaders must pay a price if they continue to fail to make 
     good on key reforms that they have promised the Iraqi people.
       In calling for a specific withdrawal date, the House and 
     Senate versions of the supplemental spending bill send a 
     clear message to the Iraqis (even if they do face a certain 
     veto). The worst mistake now would be to provide money for 
     the war without sending the Iraqis any message at all about 
     their responsibility for reforms. Both the president and the 
     Congress at the very least must make the Iraqi government 
     understand that future financial and military support is 
     going to depend on Baghdad's making substantial progress 
     toward the milestones Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has 
     publicly committed to.
       Unfortunately, with a few exceptions, little progress has 
     been made. Consider efforts toward stabilizing democracy and 
     achieving national reconciliation:
       The Iraqis promised to achieve, by the end of 2006 or early 
     2007, the approval of a provincial election law (so far, no 
     progress); approval of a law to regulate the oil industry and 
     share revenues (while the Council of Ministers has approved a 
     draft, it has yet to be approved by the Parliament); approval 
     of the de-Baathification law to reintegrate officials of the 
     former regime and Arab nationalists into public life (no 
     progress); and approval of a law to rein in sectarian 
     militias (no progress).
       By March, the government promised to hold a referendum on 
     constitutional amendments (no progress).
       By May, the prime minister committed to putting in place 
     the law controlling militias

[[Page S5028]]

     (no progress); the approval of the amnesty agreement (no 
     progress); and the completion of all reconciliation efforts.
       By June, the Iraqi government promised to hold provincial 
     elections (no date has been set).
       As for security issues, things are not going much better. 
     The Iraqis have increased security spending over 2006 levels 
     as promised, but they are falling behind on the number of 
     battle-ready Army units.
       By April, the Iraqis want to take over total control of the 
     Iraq Army (not likely based on current progress).
       By September, the Iraqis want to be given full civil 
     control of all provinces (to date they control 3 of 18 
     provinces).
       By December, the Iraqis, with United States support, want 
     to achieve total security self-reliance (too early to tell, 
     but does anyone really find this likely?).
       Yes, there have been some notable successes. For example, 
     the Baghdad government has made good on its promise to 
     appreciate the Iraqi dinar to combat accelerating inflation, 
     and has increased domestic prices for refined petroleum 
     products.
       But particularly in terms of reforms needed to reconcile 
     Sunnis and Shiites, progress has been minimal. And unless the 
     United States finds new ways to bring strong pressure on the 
     Iraqis, things are not likely to pick up any time soon.
       In seeking support for the so-called surge and the 
     supplemental spending bill, the Bush administration argues 
     that American forces have to provide temporary stability to 
     enable the Iraqi leaders to negotiate political solutions. 
     True, but after a while this becomes an excuse for inaction 
     on the political reforms that are essential to stability 
     itself.
       This is why the Iraq Study Group report made clear that 
     ``if the Iraqi government does not make substantial progress 
     toward the achievement of milestones on national 
     reconciliation, security and governance, the United States 
     should reduce its political, military or economic support for 
     the Iraqi government.''
       Until the Bush administration and Congress can jointly 
     convince the Iraqi government that this threat is real, there 
     will be little chance of reaching the one goal on which 
     Republicans and Democrats can agree: a safe, stable and 
     prosperous Iraq.

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, this debate is long overdue. It is time 
for us to let them know we are coming home. It is time for them to 
understand in Iraq that they have received more from the United States 
than any nation should ever ask or hope for. We have offered up our 
best and bravest men in uniform. We have brought home those broken in 
body and spirit and said we will stand by them the rest of their lives, 
knowing in the process the sacrifices that have been made by them and 
their families.
  We have spent $500 billion, which might have been spent in this 
country for a lot of things we desperately need--health care, paying 
for No Child Left Behind, medical research, basic investments in this 
country's future. We have given up on them because we had to spend the 
money in Iraq, and we continue to.

  When it comes to this bill, which we hope to send to the President, 
he has already dismissed it with a wave of the hand. I am going to veto 
this bill, he says. Well, he is going to be vetoing a bill which is 
critically important. It is important to tell the Iraqis they have to 
accept responsibility for their own future. It is important because it 
adds billions of dollars for medical care for our veterans, billions of 
dollars we need so we don't face that shameful situation at Walter Reed 
that was reported a few weeks ago, billions of dollars so our veterans 
hospitals can truly take care of these soldiers who are coming home 
with injuries that were unimaginable just years ago; a billion dollars 
for the National Guard to buy more equipment which has been destroyed 
or left behind in Iraq so they can keep America safe while they prepare 
for their next redeployment.
  These are dollars that are critically necessary for America. For the 
President to just, with the back of his hand, say: I'm going to veto 
this because this is just a political game, is to ignore the obvious. 
There is no political gamesmanship in this bill. This is a critical, 
life-and-death debate about a lot of our brave Americans whose lives 
are on the line today.
  I urge my colleagues, when this bill comes to the Senate, to search 
their hearts and ask, how many more days can we stand reading about 
nine Americans losing their lives? How many more funerals? How many 
more broken bodies returning from Iraq? How many more families heart 
broken that their soldiers are going to have to stay on and on and on 
in a war that has no end? This foreign policy decision is one that will 
haunt America for a generation. We need to do our part to speak for 
America, to speak for the families who have no other voice, and to 
speak for those soldiers. If we truly support those soldiers, support 
their coming back home to the heroes' welcome they deserve.
  I yield the floor.


                         Iraq Troop Withdrawal

  Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I believe it is appropriate to respond to 
the assistant leader on the Democratic side relative to his commentary 
because this is obviously an issue of significance, probably the most 
significant issue we face as a nation today in the area of concern for 
our citizens who are carrying the burden of service and who wear the 
uniform of America.
  I do think it is a touch cynical for the other side of the aisle to 
come to the floor of the Senate and say they are going to support the 
troops, when only 3 months into General Petraeus's leadership in Iraq 
they are suggesting that the rug should be pulled out from underneath 
his efforts. General Petraeus was sent there with an overwhelming vote 
of this body in support of his efforts to try to bring stability, 
specifically to Baghdad, and to give the Government of Iraq, which was 
freely elected--something which the other side of the aisle manages to 
ignore with a fair amount of energy--to give them the breathing space 
they need in order to be able to get going and to be able to create 
stability.
  A stable Iraq is critical to our national defense, and it is critical 
to our ability to fight terrorism. A unilateral withdrawal forced upon 
us by the Democratic leadership of this Congress within the next 3 
months--which is the proposal they put into the language of this bill--
will guarantee that Iraq goes into chaos. It will probably guarantee 
that thousands, tens of thousands of Iraqis will die as a result of 
genocidal activity or activity that will border on genocide, and that 
will make the Balkans look like it was minor in comparison to Iraq as 
far as chaos. It will establish without doubt a client state for Iran, 
probably partitioned within Iraq. It will clearly create functioning 
safe havens for al-Qaida, which has sworn, of course, to attack America 
on American soil, and has already done so and has proven its ability to 
do this.
  The fact that after only 3 months of General Petraeus being in the 
field we would pull from beneath him the ability to support the troops 
he needs there is really, in my opinion, an act of cynicism. The plan 
is set up in a manner--the language which was put into this plan is set 
up in a manner so that the Iraqi Government must meet 16 major goals in 
restructuring its Government within 2\1/2\ months. My goodness, the 
Congress of the United States, the Senate of the United States can't 
pass anything in 2\1/2\ months. Yet we expect the Iraqi Government and 
Legislature to reorganize its entire structure within 2\1/2\ months?
  That is the condition put in this bill in order to maintain funds for 
our troops who are in the field. If the Iraqi Government is unable to 
meet those conditions, then within 3 months the money is withdrawn from 
the troops in the field, General Petraeus's flexibility is removed, and 
he is essentially handcuffed. The commanders in the field are no longer 
the generals in the field. It is no longer General Petraeus and his 
colonels and lieutenant colonels, his captains and his lieutenants. The 
commanders become the leadership of the other side of the aisle. They 
make the decisions on military action within Baghdad. General 
Petraeus's hands will be tied behind him, or at least one hand will be 
tied behind him.
  Even if the Iraqi Government did the amazing thing of putting in 
place all these, significant conditions--and there should be 
conditions, no question, benchmarks for Iraq--these fairly significant 
conditions in a compressed timeframe, which guarantees they will not be 
accomplished, but let's say even if that Government were able to 
succeed in those conditions, then what is the reward for putting in 
place that type of stability and that type of restructuring? The 
language in the bill requires that the troops begin to be withdrawn and 
the money start to be cut off 3 months later. They are giving them a 3-
month breathing space of having the support they need and General 
Petraeus having the support he needs in order to accomplish his goals.
  The other side of the aisle comes to the floor of the Senate and acts 
as if

[[Page S5029]]

these are not significant; that we are not putting in place things 
which can't be accomplished; that we want to support the troops in the 
field. Well, read the conditions. The conditions cannot be met, and 
they are intentionally structured not to be met. Listen to the real 
language from the other side of the aisle.
  The majority leader says the war is lost. He wasn't talking just 
about Iraq. It appears he was talking about the entire war against 
terrorism, which happens to be a fairly significant statement. It is 
also obvious that when you make a statement like that, as the leader of 
the Democratic Party, the most senior Democratic Member of the Senate, 
one of the most senior Members of the Democratic leadership of the 
Government of this country, when you say the war is lost, you put your 
credibility on the line.
  Quite honestly, if we institute the language as proposed in this 
bill, which dramatically limits the capacity of General Petraeus and 
the American troops to succeed in their mission, well, I guess that 
will probably guarantee the war is lost, so they will have a self-
fulfilling prophecy as relates to Iraq. The consequences of that will 
be catastrophic in the area of death and destruction within Iraq.
  For us, as a nation and for our national security, should a client 
state be created for Iran within Iraq, should al-Qaida have free haven 
in Iraq, the consequences for us could be equally dramatic.
  In addition, a little point should be made here. The language in this 
bill, as it is being brought forward, is blatantly unconstitutional. It 
essentially cedes responsibility for the management of the troops in 
the field to the legislative branch. Nowhere in the Constitution did 
the Founding Fathers believe there should be 435 people running 
military decisions in the field. They had just been through a war. They 
had been through the revolution, where they had one person running the 
army in the field, George Washington. They understood that you either 
put one person in charge or you have chaos in any sort of military 
action. That is why the Constitution says the Commander in Chief shall 
be the President, and that the military shall report to the Commander 
in Chief.
  The language of this bill, on its face, is clearly unconstitutional 
because it essentially cedes responsibility for field command over our 
troops to the leadership of the Senate, the Democratic leadership of 
the Senate, ironically, which guarantees chaos in the area of order 
relative to defining and executing the mission as assigned to the 
troops in the field. You can't say to the American soldier, who is on 
the ground in Iraq, who is in Baghdad, who is doing their mission, and 
doing their mission well, very, very well--and General Petraeus has 
said there is progress occurring there--you can't say to that soldier: 
A, we are going to take the money away from you to support your 
mission; B, we are going to give your enemies a defined date when we 
are going to leave so that your enemies, our enemies, can wait you out 
and can basically harass you knowing that you are going to withdraw; 
and, C, that your new commander is the majority leader and the 
assistant leader of the Senate and the Speaker of the House.
  We can't say: When General Petraeus gives you a command, you don't 
necessarily have to listen to him because the people who are going to 
make the decision as to how you execute your mission aren't in the line 
of authority of the military or the Commander in Chief; they have 
suddenly become the legislative branch of the Government.
  The language in this bill is structured to accomplish one thing, and 
that is to assure defeat in our efforts to try to bring about a stable 
and responsible Government in Iraq. All you have to do to confirm the 
logic of that view and the accuracy of that view is to return to the 
words of the majority leader. The war is lost, he said. In order to 
assure that happens, they have brought forth the language in this bill 
which guarantees that our enemy will know when we are going to leave; 
that the freely elected Government of Iraq will not get the support it 
needs to survive as a stable and responsible Government; and that our 
soldiers will not know who is commanding them, but they will know they 
are not going to get the necessary support to accomplish their mission. 
That is defeat.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending 
amendment be set aside.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Menendez). Is there objection? Without 
objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I will yield to the chairman for a UC 
request before I bring up my amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I thank my colleague for his courtesy.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Senator DeMint be 
recognized to offer amendment No. 930; that there be 20 minutes of 
debate prior to a vote in relation to the amendment, with the time 
equally divided and controlled between Senator DeMint and myself or our 
designees; that no amendments be in order to the amendment prior to the 
vote; that at the use or yielding back of time, the amendment be set 
aside to recur at a time to be determined by the majority leader, 
following consultation with the Republican leader.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection? Without objection, it is 
so ordered.


                           Amendment No. 930

  Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, again, I ask unanimous consent to set 
aside the pending amendment, and I call up amendment No. 930 and ask 
for its immediate consideration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from South Carolina [Mr. DeMint] proposes 
     amendment No. 930.

  Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading 
of the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

  (Purpose: To prohibit congressional earmarks of funds appropriated 
                pursuant to authorizations in the bill)

       At the appropriate place, insert the following:

     SEC. __. EARMARKS.

       (a) In General.--It shall not be in order to consider a 
     bill, resolution, amendment, or conference report that 
     proposes a congressional earmark of appropriated funds 
     authorized by this Act.
       (b) Definitions.--For the purpose of this section, the term 
     ``congressional earmark'' means a provision or report 
     language included primarily at the request of a Member, 
     Delegate, Resident Commissioner, or Senator providing, 
     authorizing or recommending a specific amount of 
     discretionary budget authority, credit authority, or other 
     spending authority for a contract, loan, loan guarantee, 
     grant, loan authority, or other expenditure with or to an 
     entity, or targeted to a specific State, locality or 
     Congressional district, other than through a statutory or 
     administrative formula-driven or competitive award process.
       (c) Supermajority Waiver and Appeal.--This section may be 
     waived or suspended in the Senate only by an affirmative vote 
     of \3/5\ of the Members, duly chosen and sworn. An 
     affirmative vote of \3/5\ of the Members of the Senate, duly 
     chosen and sworn, shall be required in the Senate to sustain 
     an appeal of the ruling of the Chair on a point of order 
     raised under this section.

  Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, my amendment provides what we call an 
earmark shield for the funds authorized in this bill, the America 
COMPETES Act, S. 761.
  Specifically, it establishes a 60-vote point of order against 
appropriations bills that contain congressional earmarks for the funds 
authorized in this bill. Let me be very clear. This does not apply to 
all appropriations bills or to all appropriations earmarks. It simply 
applies to those bills that contain appropriations earmarks for the 
programs authorized in the bill that we are considering today, the 
America COMPETES Act.
  What we are trying to avoid is setting up a new fund for new 
earmarks, so we are setting this bill aside and protecting it from 
earmarks. If an appropriations bill comes to the floor for funding of 
these programs but without earmarks, no point of order would lie 
against the bill. In a similar way, if an appropriations bill comes to 
the floor with earmarks for other programs outside of the programs 
funded through the America COMPETES Act, then no point of order would 
lie against that bill either.
  My amendment only creates an earmark shield for the program we are

[[Page S5030]]

funding today. The goal of this amendment is to ensure the funds 
authorized in this bill are allocated according to a competitive or 
merit-based process.
  As my colleagues know, congressional earmarks circumvent the normal 
competitive or merit-based process, and award funds based on politics. 
This bill is focused on competition. Earmarking perverts the 
competitive process and substitutes the judgment of lawmakers and their 
staff for professional scientists and engineers who truly recognize a 
competitive proposal that merits funding.
  Congress has been able to keep earmarks out of the National Science 
Foundation and it has made that foundation one of the most successful 
Federal science agencies. The bill recognizes and affirms what is 
already explicitly in the bill. Let me read a section from the America 
COMPETES Act. My amendment is consistent with the stated intent of the 
bill, which says on page 183 that nothing in divisions A or D shall be 
interpreted to require the National Science Foundation to ``alter or 
modify its merit-based system or peer review process.''
  Many of America's leading institutions oppose earmarks for research 
because they understand earmarks siphon funds away from the research 
programs their talented researchers could compete for. Several 
universities have official policies in place opposing congressional 
earmarks. Let me read a few of their policies. I will start with the 
University of Michigan and I will quote from their policy statement.

       The University of Michigan supports competitive peer review 
     as the primary and best mechanism to allocate Federal 
     research funds. Consequently, it is the policy of the 
     university not to seek or accept government earmarks in 
     support of faculty research.

  Here is a quote from Yale:

       Yale University does not seek appropriations for individual 
     research projects that would circumvent existing merit-based 
     procedures of Federal agencies for selecting projects for 
     funding. The university has long held that evaluation of 
     proposed projects on the basis of merit as judged by peer 
     review is the best method of identifying the most promising 
     research or scholarly projects.

  And a quote from MIT's policy:

       MIT has a long-standing policy that prohibits the knowing 
     acceptance of grants and contracts funded via Congressional 
     action. Such awards are known as ``earmarks,'' and funding is 
     not generally the result of peer review. Earmarked funds are 
     often a way to secure funds for new buildings, and for major 
     equipment needed for cutting edge research, but 
     institutionally MIT avoids seeking or accepting earmarked 
     funds.

  It seems the whole country is starting to realize that the earmarking 
process we have adopted in this Congress is wasteful and actually 
subverts the goals we set for many of these bills. It is clear we do 
not need to earmark funds in order for our funding programs to be 
effective. My amendment simply creates an earmark shield for funds 
authorized in this bill to ensure they are allocated in the most 
competitive way.
  It is important to recognize that a number of Members of this Senate 
from many different committees have placed the authorization of this 
money in very specific categories that we need to protect and not 
subvert. It is time for the Senate to begin taking steps to discourage 
the use of earmarks when appropriating funds for important programs and 
we need to make sure this bill is not a new slush fund for Congress. My 
amendment will not only preserve the integrity of the competitive 
allocation process, but it will also make America more competitive by 
making these programs more effective.
  I thank the Senator for his courtesy in allowing me to bring up this 
bill. I understand we will be voting on it as part of a number of bills 
after the lunch hour.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I thank the Senator for coming to the 
floor and making his argument for this amendment at this time. He is 
right, under this unanimous consent agreement the plan would be to add 
it to a package of other amendments we are voting on later this 
afternoon at a time chosen by the majority leader.
  I will speak briefly in opposition to the amendment at this point. I 
know the Senator from South Carolina has had to leave the floor, but I 
do think it best in order that anyone who is following our discussions 
here on the floor can know the problem I have with the amendment.
  First, I agree with the concern about Congress stepping in and 
diverting funds from the good purposes we lay out in this legislation 
and diverting those to other, more parochial applications. That is a 
valid concern. I object to that and I hope we can prevent that from 
happening in the future. But I would argue this amendment is not the 
way to keep that from happening.
  This amendment sets up a unique process. It basically says you cannot 
bring an appropriations bill to the Senate floor unless you have 60 
votes. Any appropriations bill you try to bring to the floor is subject 
to a 60-vote point of order if it contains in it what is described as a 
congressional earmark. You say, What is meant by a congressional 
earmark? It goes on to say that is any provision or report language--if 
you have a report that accompanies the appropriations bill, that is 
report language--that provides or authorizes or recommends a specific 
amount of funding or discretionary authority or credit to an entity.

  That is pretty broad. Essentially what we would be saying is the 
Appropriations Committee, for example, if they determine--one example 
the Senator from Tennessee and I were talking about today as we were 
discussing this amendment was, if we said we want $60 million spent for 
the supercomputing program and the Appropriations Committee said, no, 
it ought to be $80 million, an extra $20 million for the supercomputing 
programs in a particular agency of the Federal Government, that is in 
fact within the definition of ``earmarked Congressional funding here,'' 
so a 60-vote point of order could be raised against that provision.
  I don't think the Congress wants to go to that extreme in tying its 
own hands. You would have essentially two sets of rules: one set of 
rules that would apply to most appropriations bills and a different set 
of rules that would apply to appropriations bills that would cover the 
subjects that are the subject of this legislation--that would be Health 
and Human Services, because there is a substantial amount in this 
legislation that goes to the Department of Education; that would be the 
Commerce, Science and Justice legislation. Let's see, what is the 
other--the Energy and Water appropriations bill, of course. Those are 
appropriations bills that would be subject to this different and more 
strenuous point of order requirement.
  This is well intentioned, I am certain. I have no doubt about the 
good intentions of the Senator from South Carolina. We have all been 
concerned about the overuse of earmarks in the Congress in recent 
years. I know there is a great deal going on to require more 
transparency, to require that all these things be out in public so we 
can know what is being voted on and we can object. That is the best 
shield. He talked about an earmark shield. That is the best shield. It 
is the eternal vigilance of people here in Congress, paying attention 
to what is in the bills and insisting only those things are in the 
bills that in fact further a good public purpose.
  So I do object.
  I yield the remainder of the time that is reserved in opposition to 
this amendment. But before I yield the floor, let me do another consent 
agreement.


    Amendments Nos. 931, As Modified; 923, As Modified; 941, and 960

  There are four amendments that have been filed that relate to the 
Commerce Committee's jurisdiction and that have been cleared on both 
sides of the aisle. There is a modification at the desk to amendment 
No. 931 by Senator McCaskill. She spoke to that amendment a few minutes 
ago. There is a modification at the desk to amendment No. 923 by 
Senator Obama. There is an amendment No. 941 by Senators Snowe and 
Kohl. There is an amendment No. 960 by Senators Levin and Voinovich.
  I ask unanimous consent that these amendments, as modified if 
modified, be agreed to and the motions to reconsider be laid upon the 
table.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendments were agreed to, as follows:


                     AMENDMENT NO. 931, AS MODIFIED

       At the appropriate place, insert the following:

[[Page S5031]]

     SEC. __. GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE REVIEW OF 
                   ACTIVITIES, GRANTS, AND PROGRAMS.

       --Not later than 3 years after the date of enactment of 
     this Act, the Comptroller General of the United States shall 
     submit a report to Congress that--
       (1) examines each annual and interim report required to be 
     submitted to Congress under this Act (including any amendment 
     made by this Act);
       (2) assesses or evaluates assessments of the effectiveness 
     of the new or expanded activities, grants, and programs 
     carried out under this Act (including any amendment made by 
     this Act); and
       (3) includes any recommendations as the Comptroller General 
     determines are appropriate to improve the effectiveness of 
     such activities, grants, and programs.
       (b) Survey.--


                     AMENDMENT NO. 923, AS MODIFIED

       On page 5, line 19, strike the period at the end and insert 
     the following: ``, including representatives of science, 
     technology, and engineering organizations and associations 
     that represent individuals identified in section 33 or 34 of 
     the Science and Engineering Equal Opportunities Act (42 
     U.S.C. 1885a or 1885b.''
       On page 5, line 24, strike ``for areas'' and insert ``, 
     including recommendations to increase the representation of 
     individuals identified in section 33 or 34 of the Science and 
     Engineering Equal Opportunities Act (42 U.S.C. 1885a or 
     1885b) in science, engineering, and technology enterprises, 
     for areas''.
       Beginning on page 8, strike line 9 and all that follows 
     through page 9, line 8, and insert the following:
       ``(11) the extent to which individuals are being equipped 
     with the knowledge and skills necessary for success in the 
     21st century workforce, as measured by--
       ``(A) elementary school and secondary school student 
     academic achievement on the State academic assessments 
     required under section 1111(b)(3) of the Elementary and 
     Secondary Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 6311 (b)(3)), 
     especially in mathematics, science, and reading, identified 
     by ethnicity, race, and gender;
       ``(B) the rate of student entrance into institutions of 
     higher education, identified by ethnicity, race, and gender, 
     by type of institution, and barriers to access to 
     institutions of higher education;
       ``(C) the rates of--
       ``(i) students successfully completing postsecondary 
     education programs, identified by ethnicity, race, and 
     gender; and
       ``(ii) certificates, associate degrees, and baccalaureate 
     degrees awarded in the fields of science, technology, 
     engineering, and mathematics, identified by ethnicity, race, 
     and gender; and
       ``(D) access to, and availability of, high quality job 
     training programs;
       ``(12) the projected outcomes of increasing the number of 
     individuals identified in section 33 or 34 of the Science and 
     Engineering Equal Opportunities Act (42 U.S.C. 1885a or 
     1885b) in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics 
     fields; and
       ``(13) the identification of strategies to increase the 
     participation of individuals identified in section 33 or 34 
     of the Science and Engineering Equal Opportunities Act (42 
     U.S.C. 1885a or 1885b) in science, technology, engineering, 
     and mathematics fields.
       On page 12, line 20, after ``employees'' insert the 
     following: ``, including partnerships with scientific, 
     engineering, and mathematical professional organizations 
     representing individuals identified in section 33 or 34 of 
     the Science and Engineering Equal Opportunities Act (42 
     U.S.C. 1885a or 1885b).''
       On page 17, line 18, strike the period at the end and 
     insert the following: ``, including strategies for increasing 
     the participation of individuals identified in section 33 or 
     34 of the Science and Engineering Equal Opportunities Act (42 
     U.S.C. 1885a or 1885b) in science, technology, engineering, 
     and mathematics fields.''.
       On page 19, insert between lines 22 and 23, the following:
       ``(vi) Nongovernmental organizations, such as professional 
     organizations, that represent individuals identified in 
     section 33 or 34 of the Science and Engineering Equal 
     Opportunities Act (42 U.S.C. 1885a or 1885b) in the areas of 
     science, engineering, technology, and mathematics.

                           AMENDMENT NO. 941

   (Purpose: To clarify the types of expenses available to Regional 
Centers under the Hollings Manufacturing Extension Partnership program 
    in meeting their non-Federal funding commitment, and for other 
                               purposes)

       At the end of title IV of division A, insert the following:

     SEC. 1407. CLARIFICATION OF ELIGIBLE CONTRIBUTIONS IN 
                   CONNECTION WITH REGIONAL CENTERS RESPONSIBLE 
                   FOR IMPLEMENTING THE OBJECTIVES OF THE HOLLINGS 
                   MANUFACTURING PARTNERSHIP PROGRAM.

       Paragraph (3) of section 25(c) of the National Institute of 
     Standards and Technology Act (15 U.S.C. 278k(c)(3)) is 
     amended to read as follows:
       ``(3) Financial support.--
       ``(A) In general.--Any nonprofit institution, or group 
     thereof, or consortia of nonprofit institutions, including 
     entities existing on August 23, 1988, may submit to the 
     Secretary an application for financial support under this 
     subsection, in accordance with the procedures established by 
     the Secretary and published in the Federal Register under 
     paragraph (2).
       ``(B) Center contributions.--In order to receive assistance 
     under this section, an applicant for financial assistance 
     under subparagraph (A) shall provide adequate assurances that 
     non-Federal assets obtained from the applicant and the 
     applicant's partnering organizations will be used as a 
     funding source to meet not less than 50 percent of the costs 
     incurred for the first 3 years and an increasing share for 
     each of the last 3 years. For purposes of the preceding 
     sentence, the costs incurred means the costs incurred in 
     connection with the activities undertaken to improve the 
     management, productivity, and technological performance of 
     small- and medium-sized manufacturing companies.
       ``(C) Agreements with other entities.--In meeting the 50 
     percent requirement, it is anticipated that a Center will 
     enter into agreements with other entities such as private 
     industry, universities, and State governments to accomplish 
     programmatic objectives and access new and existing resources 
     that will further the impact of the Federal investment made 
     on behalf of small- and medium-sized manufacturing companies. 
     All non-Federal costs, contributed by such entities and 
     determined by a Center as programmatically reasonable and 
     allocable are includable as a portion of the Center's 
     contribution.
       ``(D) Allocation of legal rights.--Each applicant under 
     subparagraph (A) shall also submit a proposal for the 
     allocation of any legal right associated with any invention 
     that may result from an activity of a Center for which such 
     applicant receives financial assistance under this 
     section.''.


                           AMENDMENT NO. 960

  (Purpose: To include the Great Lakes in research, development, and 
  science education programs of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric 
                            Administration)

       On page 48, line 9, strike ``ocean'' and insert ``ocean, 
     coastal, Great Lakes,''
       On page 48, line 22, insert ``Great Lakes,'' after 
     ``coastal,''.

  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, let me, to alert my colleagues as to the 
state of activity here at the current time, say what it is, as I 
understand it.
  We have a unanimous consent agreement to consider three amendments 
Senator Coburn of Oklahoma wishes to offer. That will begin at 2 
o'clock this afternoon. We are not certain if we will require a 
rollcall vote on all three of those amendments or only two of those 
amendments, but that will be determined in the future.
  We also, of course, now have a unanimous consent agreement to have a 
vote on the DeMint amendment we were discussing. That will be scheduled 
presumably after we have the votes on the Coburn amendments or in some 
sequence around that same time.
  I am informed we also have an amendment Senator Inhofe wishes to 
bring to the floor and to discuss and offer, which I hope can be done 
between now and the 2 o'clock time for beginning the discussion on the 
Coburn amendments. I see Senator Inhofe is on the floor. If he is 
agreeable to going ahead with his amendment at this time, he could 
argue in favor of his amendment, and then I will have some arguments 
against his amendment, and there may be others also wishing to speak 
against his amendment, and we could hopefully schedule a vote on that 
as well.
  That is a total of five amendments I am aware of that may require 
rollcall votes. I hope we can get all of those amendments debated and 
scheduled for votes and voted on before we have the briefing at 4 
o'clock, the briefing by General Petraeus. If we were able to do that, 
I don't know why we couldn't also go to final passage before 3 o'clock, 
or if there were a problem in doing that, of course, we could come back 
after the briefing and have final passage. But I know of no other 
amendments.
  If Senators are sitting in their offices or their staffs are sitting 
in their offices with other amendments they intend to offer to this 
legislation, we urge they come to the floor and offer those amendments 
in the very near future.
  I will defer to my colleague from Tennessee for his observations, but 
as far as I am informed, once we have disposed of these five 
amendments, we will have disposed of all of the amendments people have 
insisted on having rollcall votes on.
  With that, I yield the floor and I will allow my colleague from 
Tennessee to speak.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. That is my understanding as well. Senator Grassley 
still has an amendment about which he

[[Page S5032]]

wants us to talk. That is the only other amendment I know about, other 
than the one you said. It is my hope we could follow the schedule the 
Senator from New Mexico suggested and finish the bill before 4 o'clock. 
I think that would be the sentiment of most Senators to whom I talked. 
It will permit us to move promptly to the business before us concerning 
Iraq.
  I concur in the comments of Senator Bingaman. I hope by now we have 
had such extensive participation in this legislation over the last 2 
years that everyone believes he or she has had a good hearing. The 
Coburn amendments and Inhofe amendment are the only ones I know about 
for sure. They are scheduled, or will be, and we will have to talk with 
Senator Grassley about his proposal.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                           Amendment No. 955

  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, it is going to be my intention in just a 
moment to bring up and ask for the immediate consideration of my 
amendment, No. 955.
  We are working on a modification to make sure those on the Finance 
Committee will find it to be acceptable. I have discussed this with the 
leadership and the minority. However, it will take a minute to get the 
language up.
  Essentially, what the amendment will say is, notwithstanding any 
other provision of the law, no Federal funds shall be provided to any 
organization or entity that advocates against tax competition or U.S. 
tax competitiveness.
  Now, I cannot think of anything that would be more significant in a 
competitiveness bill than to have this language. There are several 
organizations, one of which is called the OECD, which is the 
Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development. This organization 
actually was transformed back in 1961 after the Marshall Plan came into 
effect, and they have been, over a period of time, advocating increases 
in taxes for the United States. In fact, over the past fairly short 
period of time, 24 different times they have advocated increases in 
U.S. taxes. One was--I will just list them here--a value-added tax, a 
40-cent increase in the gas tax, a carbon tax, a fertilizer tax, ending 
the deductibility of State and local taxes in the calculation of 
Federal taxes, new taxes at the State level, and a host of other new 
and innovative taxes on U.S. citizens.
  They also have advocated for a period of time a global taxation 
scheme. It is very difficult to find anyone in this country who would 
say this is in our best interest.
  Now, in this particular organization there are some things they do 
that I have found have been helpful. So the modifications I am making 
will list three things that will not be considered under this act to be 
anticompetitive. That is the language I am waiting for right now, which 
we should have in the next couple of minutes.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a 
quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota is recognized.
  Mr. COLEMAN. 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. COLEMAN. Mr. President, I rise today to offer my strong support 
for the American COMPETES Act, legislation that will help to ensure 
that our Nation remains competitive in today's increasingly global 
economy. The basis of this bipartisan legislation was a report by Norm 
Augustine called ``Rising Above the Gathering Storm,'' and a report by 
the Council of Competitiveness titled ``Innovate America.''
  I remember being at a dinner last year not too far from these 
Chambers, and well over 30 Senators were there. It wasn't a fundraiser, 
we were there to hear Norm Augustine--bipartisan, leadership, new 
Members. I think it speaks to the importance of this issue.
  Both of these reports assess the current situation. What they do is 
set out specific plans to get us where we need to be. The reports have 
served to put us on notice that we cannot take our competitive 
leadership for granted in a world that, as Tom Friedman has put so 
well, is increasingly flat.
  For the American people following our deliberations on this 
legislation, I hope you will take notice that this is one of those 
issues that rises above party politics, rises above partisan politics, 
legislation that is about Republicans and Democrats coming together to 
address fundamental challenges to our Nation's competitiveness.
  I am proud to join in that effort. Keeping our country competitive is 
ultimately about jobs. It is about ensuring that our future workforce 
can compete in a global economy and that our current workforce remains 
competitive.
  I was chairman of the Western Hemisphere Subcommittee the last 4 
years. I remember being at a conference in Mexico, with some Mexican 
academics complaining about the impact of low-wage jobs in China on the 
Mexican manufacturing economy.
  When I was in China last year talking with some Chinese academics and 
economists, they complained about the impact of low-wage jobs in 
Vietnam on the Chinese manufacturing economy.
  If we begin to lose ground, we are not going to win the race to low-
wage jobs. Our ability to be the world's greatest economic power is 
going to depend on our creativity, our productivity, and our 
innovation. If we begin to lose ground in the critical areas of math 
and science, we will also lose ground in the race for high-wage jobs, 
and that is the race we should be winning better trained workers, 
greater opportunity.
  Last month, Microsoft's Bill Gates came before the Health, Education, 
Labor and Pensions Committee to talk about keeping our country 
competitive. One of his statements particularly stood out to me.
  He said:

       The U.S. cannot maintain its economic leadership unless our 
     workforce consists of people who have the knowledge and 
     skills needed to drive innovation.

  He further said:

       We simply cannot sustain an economy based on innovation 
     unless our citizens are educated in math, science and 
     engineering.

  I could not agree more. The challenges we face are significant when 
it comes to the future competitiveness of our workforce. Today, China 
graduates at least four times as many engineers as the United States. 
In fact, I was told at one point the figure was 600,000 engineers in 
China, 350,000 in India, and 70,000 in America.
  The small nation of South Korea graduates just as many as we do. In 3 
short years, Asia will be home to more than 90 percent of the world's 
scientists and engineers.
  According to a recent poll, 84 percent of middle school students 
preferred to clean their rooms, take out the garbage, go to their 
dentist, or eat their vegetables than to do homework, something we have 
to change.
  As Tom Friedman wrote in his book ``The World is Flat,'' when he was 
growing up, his mother used to tell him to eat all his vegetables 
because kids in China were starving. Today, his mother would say: Do 
your homework because the kids in China are starving to take your job.
  Several reports have indicated that U.S. students do not perform at 
the level of their international counterparts in math and science. 
American high school students currently rank 24th out of 29 among 
developed nations in math literacy and problem solving.
  As if this were not worrisome enough, we also need to concern 
ourselves with the coming retirement wave of high-skilled workers in 
the fields of engineering, science and technology, and math.
  According to the National Science Foundation, about one-third of 
American scientists and engineers are over 50 years old. Tiger Woods 
said before a recent major tournament:

       I can't win the Masters on Thursday, but I can lose it.

  We can't win the global economic battle today, but we can lose it in 
our elementary school classrooms.
  Mr. President, the legislation before us will help go a long way 
toward preparing our future workers by improving K-12 education. For 
instance, the

[[Page S5033]]

bill increases the offering of advanced placement and international 
baccalaureate programs and expands math and science specialty schools.
  While we are beginning to take action in Washington, I proudly note 
that my State of Minnesota has been very active in ensuring the State's 
future workforce can compete with the best of them from around the 
world. Our Governor is a leader in the development of the National 
Governors Association Innovation America initiative. In Woodbury, a 
math and science academy is developing a curriculum to meet the needs 
of the 21st century workplace. In Brainerd, the chamber of commerce is 
developing an innovative program to transform education through five 
rural school districts by creating career pathways focusing on regional 
high-demand, high-pay occupations called Bridges Career Academies.
  Minnesota is doing its part.
  While the challenges to our leadership in the global economy are 
indeed significant, I am confident that through a bipartisan and 
public-private partnership approach, we will meet those challenges.
  I have a series of amendments that I anticipate and hope the body 
will act upon before we conclude deliberation on this bill. One of them 
is a bonus grants program. Both of these I coauthored with Senator 
Pryor. On the other one, he is the principal author. The bonus grants 
provide math and science partnership grants to three elementary and 
three secondary high schools in each State which make the largest year-
to-year improvement in their efforts to score highly on the State's 
math and science assessment test. This is about putting our money where 
our mouths are. This is about providing reward and incentive for 
schools to do better in these critical areas of math and science.
  The other amendment, which is a Pryor-Coleman amendment, No. 966, 
establishes a small business innovation, research, science, technology, 
engineering, and math workforce development grant program. This is a 
way to get leading small businesses to provide short-term workforce 
training opportunities for colleges in the field of science, 
technology, engineering, and math.
  The one amendment I will not offer but I do want to bring to the 
attention of the Senate has to do with expediting the FBI background 
check on doctors and scientists. We have the world-renown Mayo Clinic 
in Rochester, MN, the greatest medical facility in the world. Some of 
the doctors have been waiting years to get background checks cleared. 
We are in danger of losing them. We need to move quickly.
  I know the sense is that immigration issues will be dealt with at a 
later time. We need to deal with the immigration issue. We need to deal 
with it in the sense of stronger borders, guest worker programs, and we 
also need to look at some of these smaller pieces that are important--
expediting the ability to get background checks so we keep the best and 
brightest in this country. That debate will be for another day.
  Today, the debate is to ensure that America can compete in a global 
economy. This bill offers that opportunity. It is bipartisan. I am glad 
to be part of that effort.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma.


                           Amendment No. 955

  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to set aside the 
pending amendment and call up amendment No. 955.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The clerk 
will report.
  The bill clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Oklahoma [Mr. Inhofe] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 955.

  Mr. INHOFE. I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be 
dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

             (Purpose: To protect American competitiveness)

       At the appropriate place, insert the following:

     SEC. __. PROHIBITION AGAINST FUNDING ANTI-COMPETITIVENESS

       Notwithstanding any other provision of the Law; no federal 
     funds shall be provided to any organization or entity that 
     advocates against tax competition or United States tax 
     competitiveness.


                     Amendment No. 955, As Modified

  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, we had some objection to this amendment. 
We have been working with people from both tax committees and the 
Foreign Relations Committee. I have agreed to some language. I will 
read the language, but first I ask unanimous consent that the amendment 
be modified with the changes at the desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the amendment is so 
modified.
  The amendment, as modified, is as follows:

       At the appropriate place, insert the following:

     SEC. __. PROHIBITION AGAINST FUNDING ANTI-COMPETITIVENESS.

       Notwithstanding any other provision of the Law; no federal 
     funds shall be provided to any organization or entity that 
     advocates against tax competition or United States tax 
     competitiveness.
       Provided, however, that advocating for effective tax 
     information exchange, advocating for effective transfer 
     pricing, and advocating for income tax treaties is not 
     considered to be advocating against the competition of United 
     States tax competitiveness.

  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I have already stated what this amendment 
does. It does try to get some sense into some of these organizations 
advocating noncompetitiveness or anticompetitiveness for the United 
States. One such organization is called the OECD, Organization for 
Economic Cooperation and Development. This organization I have already 
talked about, but one of the things they advocate is high taxes for the 
United States. In order to make sure we can still use this organization 
for a function that seems to be desirable by the tax committee, I will 
read the modification. The amendment currently reads:

       Notwithstanding any other provision of the Law; no federal 
     funds shall be provided to any organization or entity that 
     advocates against tax competition or United States tax 
     competitiveness.

  This is the modification:

       Provided, however, that advocating for effective tax 
     information exchange, advocating for effective transfer 
     pricing, and advocating for income tax treaties is not 
     considered to be advocating against the competition of United 
     States tax competitiveness.

  I think we have taken care of that need.
  With that, I ask that we get into the mix here so we can get a vote 
on this or else agreement.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I appreciate the Senator's willingness 
to consider modifications in the amendment. We are still checking with 
particular Senators who have expressed an interest in this on our side. 
It will still be a few minutes before we are in a position to say 
whether this is still an amendment on which we would require a vote. I 
hope this is something on which we can agree not to have to have a 
rollcall vote. Perhaps we will know in the next few minutes.


                     Amendment No. 905, as Modified

  While I have the floor, let me indicate there is an amendment which 
has been filed which relates to the Energy Committee's jurisdiction. It 
has been cleared on both sides. It is a modification that is at the 
desk to amendment No. 905 by Senator Obama. I ask unanimous consent 
that this amendment, as modified, be agreed to and the motion to 
reconsider be laid upon the table.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment (No. 905), as modified, was agreed to, as follows:

       On page 78, strike line 21 and insert the following:
       ``(D) $27,500,000 for fiscal year 2011.

                      ``CHAPTER 6--ADMINISTRATION

     ``SEC. 3195. MENTORING PROGRAM.

       ``(a) In General.--As part of the programs established 
     under chapters 1, 3, and 4, the Director shall establish a 
     program to recruit and provide mentors for women and 
     underrepresented minorities who are interested in careers in 
     mathematics, science, and engineering. The program shall pair 
     mentors with women and minorities who are in programs of 
     study at specialty schools for mathematics and science, 
     Centers of Excellence, and summer institutes established 
     under chapters 1, 3, and 4, respectively.
       ``(b) Program Evaluation.--The Secretary shall annually--
       ``(1) use metrics to evaluate the success of the programs 
     established under subsection (a); and

[[Page S5034]]

       ``(2) submit to Congress a report that describes the 
     results of each evaluation.''.

  Mr. BINGAMAN. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum 
call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                           Amendment No. 914

  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I come to the floor to offer an 
amendment that I am going to withdraw. I ask unanimous consent, if 
necessary, to set the pending amendment aside and offer my amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The clerk 
will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Iowa [Mr. Grassley] proposes an amendment 
     numbered 914.

  The amendment is follows:

     (Purpose: To increase the fee to be paid by employers of H-1B 
   nonimmigrants and to set aside 25 percent of such fees to improve 
        programs and projects for gifted and talented students)

       At the appropriate place, insert the following:

     SEC. __. H-1B VISA EMPLOYER FEE.

       (a) In General.--Section 214(c)(9)(B) of the Immigration 
     and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1184(c)(9)(B)) is amended by 
     striking ``$1,500'' and inserting ``$2,000''.
       (b) Use of Additional Fee.--Section 286 of such Act (8 
     U.S.C. 1356) is amended by adding at the end the following:
       ``(w) Gifted and Talented Students Education Account.--
       ``(1) In general.--There is established in the general fund 
     of the Treasury a separate account, which shall be known as 
     the `Gifted and Talented Students Education Account'. 
     Notwithstanding any other provision of law, there shall be 
     deposited as offsetting receipts into the account 25 percent 
     of the fees collected under section 214(c)(9)(B).
       ``(2) Use of fees.--Amounts deposited into the account 
     established under paragraph (1) shall remain available to the 
     Secretary of Education until expended for programs and 
     projects authorized under the Jacob K. Javits Gifted and 
     Talented Students Education Act of 2001 (20 U.S.C. 7253 et 
     seq.).''.

  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, in his bestselling book, ``The World is 
Flat,'' Thomas Friedman discusses the challenges of globalism using the 
metaphor of the world getting flatter to describe how the breaking down 
of international barriers to the movement of goods, services, people, 
and ideas creates an intensely competitive global environment. I liked 
it so much, and it has so much wisdom in it.
  In chapter 8, entitled ``This Is Not a Test,'' Friedman says, ``If 
this moment has any parallel in American history, it is the height of 
the cold war, around 1957, when the Soviet Union leaped ahead of 
America in the space race by putting up the Sputnik satellite.''
  Not coincidentally, the Congress passed the National Defense 
Education Act the following year, 1958.
  That act really started Federal Government involvement in education.
  It was designed primarily to jumpstart education in math, science, 
and modern foreign languages so we would be able to match and exceed 
the achievements of the Soviets and win the cold war.
  According to Thomas Friedman, to meet the challenges of what he calls 
``flatism'' will require, ``as comprehensive, energetic, and focused a 
response as did meeting the challenge of communism.''
  As I mentioned, Federal education policy started with an urgency to 
support and encourage students to excel in fields that were considered 
to be of major importance to national security during the cold war.
  Subsequently, Federal education policy became concerned with equity 
between students of different socioeconomic classes as part of 
President Johnson's war on poverty.
  Both of these dual focuses of Federal education policy, excellence 
and equity, are legitimate and important.
  However, we sometimes seem to ping pong between the two, forgetting 
about one in favor of the other.
  The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 deepened the existing focus of 
the Elementary and Secondary Education Act on making sure that all 
students have an adequate education.
  Now while we don't have a single event like Sputnik to bring home to 
us the current challenges we face, there is a growing recognition that, 
for the sake of our future economic competitiveness, we cannot neglect 
the importance of challenging and encouraging students to excel so that 
they will some day be the scientists, engineers, and researchers that 
will create the innovations that will drive our economy.
  This means that we must not only help underachieving students to 
achieve at grade level, but we must encourage high ability students to 
achieve to their full potential.
  For years, I have been leading the charge to do a better job 
unlocking the tremendous potential that lies in gifted and talented 
young Americans. They represent a national resource that, 
unfortunately, too often goes untapped.
  Gifted students learn faster and to a greater depth than other 
students and often look at the world differently than other students. 
As a result, it takes a great deal more to keep them challenged and 
stimulated.
  If they are not sufficiently stimulated, they often learn to get by 
with minimum effort and adopt poor learning habits that can prevent 
them from achieving to their potential.
  In fact, many gifted and talented students underachieve or even drop 
out of school.
  Jan and Bob Davidson, from the majority leader's home State, wrote an 
important book called ``Genius Denied'' about how, nationwide, we are 
letting gifted students fall through the cracks and wasting their 
potential.
  The Belin-Blank Center in my home State of Iowa produced a report 
titled, ``A Nation Deceived: How Schools Hold Back America's Brightest 
Students.''
  This situation must be reversed if America is to retain its 
competitive edge which, obviously, is the purpose of the very good 
legislation before us, led by Senators Bingaman and Alexander.
  I am glad that the American competitiveness bill currently before the 
Senate recognizes the need to do a better job of helping students to 
excel in fields like math, science, and critical foreign languages.
  However, if we want to go toe to toe with countries that place a very 
high value on learning, we must do more to support and encourage the 
best and brightest American students.
  My amendment would increase the fee employers pay for H1-B visas for 
highly skilled foreign workers to immigrate to the United States and to 
use that additional funding for the Jacob Javits Gifted and Talented 
Students Education Act.
  This is the only Federal program that provides funding to support 
programming to meet the unique learning needs of our brightest, most 
promising students.
  It funds a national research center that produces invaluable research 
in instructional strategies that can truly tap into the potential of 
gifted students as well as a small grant program to encourage such 
research nationwide.
  The Javits Act also contains a grant program to encourage greater 
focus in the States on meeting the needs of gifted learners, although 
it has been funded at levels that severely limit its effectiveness. The 
quality or even existence of services for gifted students varies widely 
among our 50 States.
  While the Federal Government should not assume the primary 
responsibility for funding gifted and talented education, just as 
Congress provides funding to augment State efforts to provide an 
equitable education for disadvantaged students and students with 
disabilities, the Federal Government still has a vital national 
interest in encouraging State efforts to fully develop the gifts and 
talents of American youth.
  The proposal that is in my amendment before the Senate would 
essentially charge a fee to those investing in talent from abroad and 
use it to invest in talent for the future here at home.
  Doesn't it make sense if we are using our educational system to bring 
students or workers over here to train them better--they take advantage 
of our higher education system; they take advantage of our educational 
system generally--wouldn't it be wise to use those resources so we can 
enhance the opportunity we have for our own gifted and talented 
students right here in the United States?
  We have to put more attention on education. Now, I am offering a 
Federal program, I know, or the expansion of a Federal program, and 
funding it in a

[[Page S5035]]

way that is not appreciated by those who will soon be involved in the 
immigration bill that is going to be before us. They have asked I not 
offer this amendment, and that is why I said I would offer it and 
withdraw it.
  But I think this is a very important approach we must use if we are 
going to make adequate use of our own talented and our own gifted 
students right here at home--the homebred students whom we have--as 
opposed to thinking we have to rely, in the 21st century, in this great 
country of America, upon the talent of foreign lands.
  Now, there is a lot of talent in foreign lands that if we can draw 
upon it, we ought to draw upon it. But the fact we have to do that, or 
we think we are willing to submit to that sort of an approach, to 
advance the competitiveness of our economy in this globalization we are 
involved in, is a sad commentary.
  That is why I have offered this amendment. I want to say even though 
I am withdrawing it, I am doing it with the idea I am not giving up on 
this effort. I am going to advance this effort in other appropriate 
places in the legislative process in the future.
  Let me suggest, for those who maybe want to fight it, it is going to 
be in the near future. For those who maybe like it, would they join me 
in this effort to get this job done?
  Having emphasized competitiveness and everything involved in it, I 
want to say my philosophy of improving education in this country is not 
rested only upon Federal programs. I think four basic things are at the 
base of changing or improving our educational system, and they do not 
involve the expenditure of more money. It basically is a societal 
attitude that needs to be changed.
  No. 1, we have to think in terms that there is nothing wrong with 
homework. There are too many parents, too many teachers in this country 
who think, somehow, we have to eliminate homework. Secondly, we have to 
have the schools in this country and the parents involved think that 
education and book learning is more important than sports; thirdly, 
that weekends are not something just for leisure. Weekends have to be 
used for study as well. And lastly--and the one thing that is most 
important--parents, to a greater degree than they are presently, have 
to be involved and show interest in the education of their own kids, 
and supporting the great teachers of this country who are there doing 
both the job of parenting as well as the job of teaching.
  Those societal changes are going to do more to enhance education and 
the competitiveness of our economic system than anything we can do by 
passing any Federal program. But I think we can enhance a lot of 
programs, and this bill is a good step in that direction. I wish I had 
been able to convince the people on the Judiciary Committee that we 
ought to advance this amendment here at this time because it is very 
associated with the competitiveness of our society and the purposes of 
this bill.


                      Amendment No. 914 Withdrawn

  But I ask unanimous consent to withdraw the amendment.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, the amendment is 
withdrawn.
  The Senator from Nevada is recognized.
  Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, today, I join with over 60 of my 
colleagues from both sides of the aisle to support the prompt passage 
of the America COMPETES Act. Before I begin, I want to thank my 
colleagues who have actively participated in developing and 
cosponsoring this legislation in the 109th Congress. In particular, I 
wish to acknowledge the work of Senator Joe Lieberman with whom I began 
the task of developing competitiveness legislation over 2 years ago.
  Last August, working together, in a bipartisan manner, we were able 
to bring together a bill that combined elements of the PACE Energy bill 
that Senator Alexander, Senator Domenici, and Senator Bingaman had 
worked on, with the American Innovation and Competitiveness Act that 
Senators Stevens, Inouye, Hutchison, and I worked on. We also included 
important education provisions from Senator Kennedy, Senator Enzi, and 
members of the HELP Committee.
  Today, I am very pleased to say the cooperative, bipartisan effort we 
undertook in the last Congress has led to the consideration of the 
America COMPETES Act in this Congress. As other Members have noted, 
this legislation focuses on three primary areas of importance: 
increasing Federal investment in basic research; fostering science, 
technology, engineering, and mathematics talent in the United States; 
and developing an innovation infrastructure. The bill reflects a good 
balance of spending on key priorities, such as basic research and 
education, while being sensitive to avoiding duplication among Federal 
agencies.
  It was not easy, but we remained focused on the key recommendations 
in the ``Innovate America'' and the ``Rising Above the Gathering 
Storm'' reports. There are a lot of folks with plenty of good ideas out 
there. By sticking to the recommendations in these two groundbreaking 
reports, however, we were able to safeguard this bill from becoming so 
large, unwieldy, and expensive that it could never pass the Senate. 
This is why we have a good chance on this bill of actually passing it 
in a strong bipartisan way either today or tomorrow. One of the keys to 
this process was getting the chairmen and ranking members of the 
Commerce Committee, Energy Committee, and HELP Committee to join the 
majority leader and minority leader to introduce the final product.

  The America COMPETES Act would double funding for the National 
Science Foundation by 2011, increase support for the National 
Institutes of Standards and Technology, and the Department of Energy's 
Office of Science. I am a fiscal conservative, but the dollars we 
invest in basic research will come back to us in spades in terms of 
stimulating economic activity and helping the United States to remain 
at the forefront of global innovation.
  Our continued investment in basic research is made more essential by 
the actions of other nations such as China and India. Such countries 
are not sitting idly by waiting to see what we will do to remain 
competitive. Rather, they are undertaking ambitious efforts to expand 
their own research and development base at our expense. A study 
recently highlighted by the Council on Competitiveness indicates that 
China has surpassed the United States as the most attractive location 
for the world's top corporate R&D investors to locate their R&D 
facilities. Sadly, in 2006, the World Economic Forum announced our 
country had dropped from first to sixth place in its Global Competitive 
Index.
  We must address the long-term competitiveness challenges we face to 
maintain our leadership in innovative research, and this bill will 
enable us to do so. In addition, the bill addresses the need to 
encourage more American students, from elementary school through 
graduate school, to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering, 
and mathematics.
  Although estimates of the number of engineers, computer scientists, 
and information technology students who obtain 2-, 3-, and 4-year 
degrees vary, there is no question that the increased focus in China 
and India on educating more of their population in these fields is 
cause for serious concern. One estimate indicates that in 2004, China 
graduated about 350,000 engineers, computer scientists, and information 
technologists with 4-year degrees, while the United States graduated 
about 140,000. Over the past 3 years, both China and India have doubled 
their production of 3- and 4-year degrees in the field of engineering, 
but in the United States the production of engineers has stagnated. 
This must change.
  We need to aggressively encourage more American students to pursue 
careers in these fields, especially as our current scientific workforce 
ages. The America COMPETES Act would do this in part by expanding 
existing graduate research programs and strengthening NSF's technology 
talent program. The bill also strengthens the skills of thousands of 
math and science teachers by establishing new undergraduate and 
graduate training programs.
  Finally, the bill authorizes competitive grants to States to promote 
better alignment of elementary and secondary education with the 
knowledge and skills needed to succeed in institutions of higher 
education in the 21st century. It is very important we focus on 
transforming our educational system to meet the workforce needs of 
tomorrow.

[[Page S5036]]

Technological change and globalization have increased the need for our 
students to receive better education to remain competitive in the world 
economy for high-skilled jobs that lead to innovative solutions, higher 
incomes, and better standards of living. This emphasis on quality 
education in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics needs to 
start early in the course of a student's education.
  Unfortunately, last year, the Organization for Economic Cooperation 
and Development released a study on education that highlights the fact 
that while the United States invests significantly more per student on 
education--with an $83,000 cumulative expenditure per student ages 6 
through 15--than any other country in the world except for Switzerland, 
students from 16 other countries' students performed better, on 
average, than American students in science. Sixteen other countries 
performed better than American students in science. In mathematics, the 
numbers are even more troubling. Students in 23 other nations performed 
better, on average, than American students did--23 other nations. This 
was on an international standardized math exam.
  Other countries have more scientists and mathematicians teaching 
science and math. In the United States, we mostly have education majors 
teaching science and math. If you think about it, if your passion is 
science and math, you have a better chance of translating that passion 
to your students. I have spoken with the presidents of our schools back 
in Nevada, at UNR and UNLV and our community college, about trying to 
transform the way we teach our teachers in Nevada. The University of 
Texas at Austin has an innovative program called UTeach. They are 
actually taking science and math majors and teaching them to be 
teachers. The results so far have been very promising. The University 
of California system is pursuing a similar approach. Our country must 
try to change the way we are educating science and math teachers so we 
can inspire the next generation of Americans more effectively.
  I am also reminded of the story the president of the Museum of 
Science in Boston, Dr. Yannis Miaoulis, shared with me last year when 
discussing how to foster innovation in math and science education. Dr. 
Miaoulis discussed how in school, at a young age, students learn about 
volcanoes and make models to simulate how they work. While the 
accumulation of knowledge on volcanoes or other life science topics is 
a very good thing, unfortunately, grade schools often do not dedicate 
as much time and attention to exploring science through practical 
exploration of engineering topics--for instance, how a car works. To 
drive home his point on the need to focus more attention on engineering 
at an earlier stage in students' education, Dr. Miaoulis asked us a 
simple question: Do we spend more time in a car or a volcano?
  The answer is obvious, and his point is well taken. We need to think 
strategically about how to educate and inspire the next generation of 
Americans and increased focus on science, technology, engineering, and 
mathematics is a very important part of maintaining our Nation's long-
term global competitiveness.
  As the title of Thomas Friedman's popular book reminds us, in the 
21st century, the world is flat and the United States must adjust to 
this reality in creative ways or suffer the consequences.
  This bill before us today, the America COMPETES Act, will be a 
critical first step forward to lay the groundwork for the kinds of 
change and investments we need to make for our country to be 
competitive in this new century. The key to success on this issue is to 
move the bipartisan bill before us, while resisting the urge to attach 
every good idea that has come along in math, science, and technology 
areas. We were able to keep this work product fiscally responsible 
while addressing critical needs, and a big part of that was including 
metrics to measure and reward successful efforts and to provide more 
accountability for existing governmental programs. As our citizens, 
businesses, universities, and scientists compete in the most 
interconnected global economy in history, failure to pass a 
competitiveness bill now would seriously harm the economic and national 
security of the United States.
  I hope all of my colleagues will join with me in helping to pass this 
critical bipartisan bill as soon as possible.
  Mr. ENZI. Mr. President, I wish to speak about the importance of 
supporting and passing the America COMPETES Act.
  It has been 50 years since Sputnik was launched by the Soviet Union. 
The United States was quick to react with a flurry of activity and 
investment to spur innovation. Its launch also had a dramatic impact on 
education in this country. Students wanted to be the best and wanted to 
prove that the United States was a better and stronger country. Today 
the need is just as great, but we don't have a catalyst, like Sputnik, 
driving the need. The need is driven by our economy and companies that 
need bright and innovative workers. This need is driven by the 
competition the United States now faces from across the globe.
  Last year I was in India and saw firsthand what Thomas Friedman 
discusses in his book, ``The World is Flat''. It does not take long to 
figure out that by numbers alone, India has to educate only 25 percent 
of its population to have more literate and educated people than the 
total population of the United States. This trip reinforced my belief 
that we need to ramp up our efforts in the areas of education and labor 
to keep our country competitive.
  Add to this perspective the fact that China has 20 percent of the 
world's population and has sharply increased the proportion of its 
college-age population participating in higher education from 1.4 
percent to over 20 percent in just a generation. It should not be 
surprising that a substantial portion of our workforce now finds itself 
in direct competition for jobs with highly motivated and often well-
educated people from around the world. Unless we pay attention to these 
facts, this competition will only increase in the future.
  Here are a few of the facts that I find paint a compelling picture 
and show why this legislation is needed: Business is spending billions 
each year to train new employees and remediate the educational skill 
gaps of those already in the workforce. The American workforce is 
aging--77 million baby boomers are set to retire over the next several 
decades.
  Reading proficiency among 12th graders has declined to the point 
where just over one-third of them are even considered proficient 
readers. In addition, 47 percent of those with a college degree are not 
considered proficient readers according to the most recent National 
Assessment of Adult Literacy. Only 68 of every 100 ninth grade students 
graduate ``on time,'' in other words, within 4 years. America's high 
school graduation rate is among the lowest in the industrialized world, 
and the impact on our minority students has been especially severe, 
where this rate hovers around 50 percent.
  Nearly one-third of entering college freshmen need at least one 
remedial course. The United States has one of the highest college 
enrollment rates, but a college completion rate average to below 
average among developed countries in the world.
  Four out of every five jobs will require postsecondary education or 
the equivalent, yet only 52 percent of Americans over the age of 25 
have achieved this level of education. Seventy-five percent of today's 
workforce will need to be retrained just to keep their current jobs.

  Median earnings of a high school graduate are 43 percent higher than 
those of a nongraduate and those of a college graduate are 62 percent 
higher than those of a high school graduate. Two-thirds of the 7 
million worker gap in 2010 will be a skilled worker shortage.
  If our students and workers are to have the best chance to succeed in 
life and employers to remain competitive, we must ensure that everyone 
has the opportunity to achieve academically and obtain the skills they 
need to succeed, regardless of their background. To accomplish this, we 
need to build, strengthen, and maintain our educational pipeline, 
beginning in elementary school. We must also strengthen programs that 
encourage and enable citizens of all ages to enroll in postsecondary 
education institutions and obtain or improve their knowledge and 
skills. The decisions we make about education and workforce development

[[Page S5037]]

will have a dramatic impact on the economy and our society for 
generations to come.
  This legislation is the product of bipartisan negotiations and input 
from members of 3 Senate committees--the Senate Commerce, Energy, and 
HELP Committees. Work on this legislation began last year in response 
to the ``Rising Above the Gathering Storm'' report, the ``Innovate 
America'' report, and the President's American Competitiveness 
Initiative. I want to thank all those who worked on this bill for their 
hard work and dedication and commend them for the collegial manner in 
which this bill was crafted.
  This bill includes provisions that improve math, science, and 
critical foreign language education in our Nation from elementary 
school through graduate school. It supports improvements to teacher 
preparation, establishes stronger links between graduate schools and 
employers, provides funding to support students trained at the doctoral 
level in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, and 
enhances Federal programs that support students in graduate school.
  It should come as no surprise that I particularly support the 
education components of this bill. Education at all levels, including 
lifelong learning opportunities, is vital to ensuring that America 
retains its competitive edge in the global economy. In this global 
economy, learning is never over and school is never out. Every American 
can and should be part of our Nation's success. The education and 
skills of today and tomorrow's workforce were a high priority for me 
even before I became chairman and now the lead Republican of the 
Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee.
  The America COMPETES Act is a good starting point, but we need to do 
more. Maintaining America's competitiveness requires that all students 
have the opportunity to continue to build their knowledge and skills. 
We need to find ways to encourage high school students to stay in 
school and prepare for and enter high-skill fields such as math, 
science, engineering, health, technology, and critical foreign 
languages. For many, including those at the cutting-edge of science, 
technology, engineering, and mathematics, acquiring a postsecondary 
education or training will be the key to their success. Therefore, I 
remain committed to reauthorizing the Higher Education Act.
  Individuals in the workforce often need retraining to keep up with 
our fast-paced economy. Businesses also need help in finding well-
qualified individuals to meet their needs. The Workforce Investment Act 
and the system created to support it provide those needed services. We 
must reauthorize the Workforce Investment Act this Congress.
  Finally, our children need a strong foundation of knowledge to 
succeed in both education and knowledge. The No Child Left Behind Act 
provides funds to States and local school districts to support our 
neediest and most disadvantaged students. Those students need a hand up 
in order to succeed in the future. I look forward to working with 
Chairman Kennedy to reauthorize the No Child Left Behind Act this year.
  Fifty years after Sputnik, the United States is in another equally 
important race that will define our leadership. This race is fueled by 
innovation, education, and skills. Its success is measured by jobs and 
prosperity for American families. It is a race we cannot afford to 
lose.
  I ask my colleagues to support the passage of the America COMPETES 
Act.
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise today in support of the America 
COMPETES Act. I am pleased to join Senators Reid and McConnell, 
together with Senators Bingaman, Alexander, Inouye, Stevens, Ensign, 
Kennedy, Enzi and a majority of the Senate, in this bipartisan effort.
  I particularly commend my colleague from Nevada, Senator Ensign, for 
his foresight and leadership on innovation and competitiveness issues. 
Beginning in 2005, I started working together with Senator Ensign on 
the National Innovation Act to build a new century of progress and 
prosperity for our Nation by spurring a new wave of American 
innovation. With his leadership in the Commerce Committee, Senator 
Ensign and I supported a bipartisan approach, focused on talent, 
investment, and infrastructure, to sustain and enhance U.S. science and 
technology leadership for the future. The National Innovation Act 
addressed a number of the most critical issues involving technology 
leadership in the United States, realizing the critical need for 
increased Federal support for basic research.
  Senator Ensign and I also worked closely together on the National 
Innovation Education Act. The intent of that bill was to enhance our 
science and technology talent base and to improve national 
competitiveness through strengthened education initiatives. Our bill 
proposed initiatives spanning across the science education spectrum to 
improve quality instruction and access to learning for all students.
  I am pleased that the America COMPETES Act addresses many of the 
approaches to science research and education proposed by Senator Ensign 
and I in these measures in addition to many of the initiatives put 
forth by Senators Bingaman, Alexander, and others in the PACE bills. In 
large part, these bills sought to incorporate recommendations from the 
National Academies' report ``Rising Above the Gathering Storm'' and 
``Innovate America'' from the Council on Competitiveness.
  In this bill we seek to address the challenge of keeping the United 
States competitive in the global economy. Innovation, from the 
development of the Internet to the sequencing of the human genome, 
stimulates economic growth and improves the quality of life and health 
for all Americans. Through our investments and leadership in basic 
research and innovation, we ensure that our children and grandchildren 
will continue to have the unprecedented prosperity and opportunity that 
we enjoy today. We also have high expectations that science and 
engineering will solve essential worldwide needs from the mitigation of 
natural disasters to the development of alternative energy sources.
  This act recognizes that the Nation depends upon the development and 
the productivity of highly trained people to generate these 
innovations. It is disconcerting that only 29 percent of Americans 
believe the United States has the most innovative economy in the world. 
Nearly half choose China or Japan instead. Why? The No. 1 reason cited 
by Americans is their belief that other countries are more committed to 
their education, their youth, or their schools. In fact, tests show 
U.S. students are falling behind other developed nations in math and 
science. We must restore confidence in our education system and ensure 
it is second to none.
  For example, we need to engage the Nation's top universities to lead 
some of their best and brightest students, especially in science, 
technology, engineering and mathematics, STEM, fields, into successful 
teaching careers. In this bill we stimulate partnerships for college 
math, science, and engineering departments to work with teacher 
development programs. These programs will increase the supply of 
certified, knowledgeable teachers in areas critical to meeting 
America's needs, giving us a greater opportunity to improve student 
interest and achievement in STEM areas.
  We know that new teachers in STEM classrooms across the country need 
support and mentoring from knowledgeable, established teachers. This 
bill supports programs for existing teachers seeking to enhance their 
content knowledge, teaching skills, and leadership in STEM and foreign 
languages.
  We cannot wait for students to reach college to ensure that they are 
prepared for the future. It is troubling that many students with their 
newly obtained high school diplomas find themselves ill-equipped for 
college or the workforce. It is time to ensure that high schools 
prepare their students for the future. To do this right, States must 
start aligning what children learn starting in kindergarten, or 
earlier, to meet the evolving higher education and business needs for 
the 21st century and beyond.
  High-quality data systems are also critical to improve schools and 
student outcomes. Accountability for high school graduation numbers and 
dropout rates is important to address education reform in our high 
schools. States and schools need data systems

[[Page S5038]]

to trace successful educational outcomes back to specific programs, 
coursework, and interventions. They need to know what works and what 
doesn't work. I am pleased that this legislation contains many of the 
components of a bill I introduced last year, the College Pathways Act, 
to improve data systems and alignment.
  The National Science Foundation is the principal agency sustaining 
basic research across all science and engineering fields. Basic 
research outcomes have led to many important innovations, stimulating 
economic growth and improving the quality of life for all Americans. 
NSF focuses on the areas of discovery, learning, and in building the 
country's research infrastructure and world-class facilities. These 
areas line up directly with our three primary areas in this act: 
increased research investment, STEM education, and innovative 
infrastructure. It is critical that we develop and support each of 
these: the people, their ideas and the large-scale tools needed for 
discovery and innovation.

  To encourage more students to enter technical professions, this 
legislation increases Federal support for STEM graduate fellowships and 
trainee programs by expanding the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship 
Program and the Integrated Graduate Education and Research Traineeship 
Program by a total of 2,500 students.
  The America COMPETES Act further addresses the issue of improving 
talent across scientific disciplines by expanding the existing STEM 
Talent Expansion Program, STEP, to the scope originally intended. The 
STEP, or Tech Talent Program, which I first proposed in 2001 as part of 
the Technology Talent Act, provides competitive grants to undergraduate 
institutions to develop new methods of increasing the number of 
students earning degrees in science, math, and engineering.
  The Department of Energy's Office of Science is the principal Federal 
agency for research in high energy physics, nuclear physics, and fusion 
energy sciences. This legislation puts the Office of Science on a 
doubling track, over 10 years. We create important educational 
opportunities through Centers of Excellence in Mathematics and Science. 
These centers bring together our premier National Laboratories as 
partners with high-need high schools. National Laboratories also will 
host summer teacher institutes and will provide expert assistance to 
teachers at specialty schools in math and science.
  The bill also creates an Innovation Acceleration Research Program to 
stimulate transformational research by setting a goal for Federal 
research agencies to allocate 8 percent of their current R&D budgets to 
breakthrough research--the kind of research that gave us fiber optics, 
the Internet, and countless other technologies relied on every day in 
this country and around the world. We anticipate this funding will be 
used for ``grand challenges'' and other high-risk/high-reward research 
that will expand the frontiers of discovery and innovation.
  It is time once more for the Nation to focus on the health and 
direction of scientific research. Late in 1944, President Roosevelt 
called on a leading science and engineering advocate, Vannevar Bush, to 
report on how the Nation should prepare in the post-World War II era to 
deal with the ``new frontiers of the mind [that] are before us'' and to 
``create a fuller and more fruitful employment and a fuller and more 
fruitful life.'' The report, ``Science--The Endless Frontier,'' led to 
the development of the National Science Foundation. We call on the 
President to issue a new report on key research and technology 
challenges based on a national science and technology summit of leaders 
from labor, industry, academia, government, and elsewhere. The 
President will also establish a Council on Innovation and 
Competitiveness to, among other things, assess R&D investment and 
address future areas needed to maintain the United States as a world 
leader in research and technological innovation.
  We must continue to encourage the groundbreaking experimentation and 
longer-term outlook that made this country great. I am pleased to join 
my colleagues in this bipartisan effort to address the science, 
technology, and education needs that will fuel innovation and continue 
to drive American growth and prosperity. I urge my colleagues to join 
us and support passage of the America COMPETES Act.
  Mr. OBAMA. Mr. President, there is concern that America is losing its 
competitive leadership. I am proud to cosponsor the America COMPETES 
Act because it proposes a meaningful response to that loss of 
leadership, and I compliment the bill managers on the bipartisan manner 
in which the Senate is addressing this issue. America COMPETES is a 
strong piece of legislation, but I wish to propose amendments that I 
believe will strengthen this legislation in several areas.
  As our Nation becomes more diverse, scientists, engineers, and 
technology professionals continue to be recruited from a narrowing 
segment of our population. If we were able to increase the 
participation of underrepreseneted groups, including women, to a level 
reflective of their representation in the population, we would diminish 
the workforce issues that restrict our economic progress and generate a 
pool of talent that could refresh our ability to innovate. If we do not 
tap the diversity of our Nation as a competitive strength, we will 
diminish our capacity to innovate. Full participation by all segments 
of our populace would do more than just increase the number of workers 
in high technology fields; full participation would bring fresh 
perspectives and inventive solutions.
  To increase participation, I have offered several amendments to 
America COMPETES. The first establishes a mentoring program to support 
women and underrepresented groups as they progress through education 
programs being proposed at the Department of Energy. Mentoring is an 
effective means for experienced scientists to provide professional 
assistance and advice to developing scientists, and such a program 
would ensure the success of these education programs. I also propose 
that women and minority scientists and engineers be represented and 
consulted as strategies are developed to increase America's 
competitiveness. This inclusion should occur at the proposed National 
Science and Technology Summit, on the President's Council on Innovation 
and Competitiveness, and elsewhere. If the concerns of diverse groups 
of technology professionals are not heard, it will be too easy to 
overlook the advantages these groups can bring to the innovation 
landscape.
  I have also proposed that, to profit from the strength of our 
diversity, we must start with America's young students. Summer is a 
time when, as a result of summer learning loss, young students may lose 
several months in math skills. The summer learning loss is greatest for 
children living in poverty. Summer programs combat this loss, 
accelerate learning, and can serve to close the achievement gap in 
mathematics and problem-solving that currently robs us of the talents 
of too many children. I have introduced an amendment that supports 
summer learning opportunities, with curricula that emphasize 
mathematics and problem solving, aligned to the standards of school-
year classes.
  Finally, I propose that one of the major challenges facing us is an 
issue we understand on the basis of science; an issue that can be 
solved, at least partially, through technology; an issue that has the 
potential to greatly affect our competitiveness. It is an issue 
offering both challenges and great opportunities. Therefore, I am 
proposing an amendment to create a Climate Change Education Program to 
broaden our understanding of climate change. The program would 
emphasize information to help us comprehend climate change and to 
promote implementation of new technologies that would ensure our place 
as an international leader, willing to use science to understand our 
world, willing to apply technologies to address the serious challenges 
facing us.
  I urge my colleagues to support these amendments.
  Mrs. CLINTON. Mr. President, at a moment of profound change for our 
country, as the global economy grows more interdependent, the reach of 
technology more vast, and the consequences more important for future 
generations of Americans, I am proud to support the America COMPETES 
Act as an original cosponsor and proud to have been able to include 
several of my proposals in the final bill. I am also

[[Page S5039]]

pleased to see that partnership--not partisanship--ruled the day.
  The challenge is to achieve the promise while avoiding the perils of 
this moment.
  Modern technology is making the American workforce more and more 
productive--while making it increasingly possible for employers to hire 
the most skilled workers no matter where in the world they live. Our 
young people see so many promising new fields and avenues--but too many 
American students, even some graduates of college, are not equipped 
with the skills to compete, especially when it comes to participation 
in challenging math and science fields.
  That is why this bill is so important: education will help us 
overcome these obstacles while opening the doors to new opportunities.
  America's global economic competitiveness will rest more and more on 
the back of our education system, and the scientists, engineers, and 
inventors that the system produces--but today that back is breaking.
  The United States currently ranks 21st out of 40 industrialized 
nations in the largest and most comprehensive educational study to 
date. China produces far more engineers than the United States each 
year. Fewer well-educated scientists and engineers means fewer 
inventions, fewer high-tech exports, and fewer jobs for Americans.
  And we are trying to compete with one hand behind our back: half our 
population disproportionately avoids math and science. Women and 
minorities are routinely underrepresented in these fields.
  The National Academy of Sciences, NAS, outlined solutions to these 
and other challenges America will face as we contend with other 
counties in the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. 
Their report, ``Rising Above the Gathering Storm: Energizing and 
Employing America for a Brighter Economic Future,'' gave us a roadmap 
to avoid this storm. The America COMPETES Act will implement these 
recommendations.
  For example, this legislation would provide funding to increase the 
number of teachers serving high-need schools who are qualified to teach 
advanced, college level courses in math and science. It also supplies 
grants to community colleges to offer training to allow women to enter 
higher paying technical jobs.
  This act also provides new incentives for math and science research. 
The bill doubles the current funding for the National Science 
Foundation, NSF.
  I am also pleased this legislation includes two of my amendments. The 
first asks the National Academy of Sciences to collect and disseminate 
``Promising Practices'' in the areas of math and science education, as 
well as techniques proven to help teachers improve their instructional 
skills. Many States across the country are doing an amazing job of 
raising their State standards, while others are watering them down.
  The NAS report outlined the need for consistency in math and science 
education as one of the important recommendations in their report. That 
is why I introduced the Math and Science Consistency Act which 
instructs the National Academy of Sciences to create voluntary goals 
for learning in the areas of math and science education.
  I thank everyone involved with this package, in particular Senator 
Bingaman, for working with me to include elements of my legislation 
into the America COMPETES Act.
  If we want to truly prepare our students to compete, then it is 
especially important to look at successful models of math and science 
education and place this information in the hands of our math and 
science teachers. These promising practices will help all States 
improve their math and science education.
  It is imperative that we figure out what is working and reproduce it. 
The math and science education our children receive today is an 
investment in the economy of tomorrow.
  I also worked alongside Senator Schumer to include a provision that 
will create two new fellowship programs within the National Science 
Foundation. These new fellowship programs are modeled after the highly 
successful Newton Fellowship and Newton Master Teacher Programs in New 
York City.
  Through Math for America, the Newton Fellowship Program has brought a 
cadre of talented professionals to teach math in NYC school. 
Additionally, the Newton Master Teacher Program trains current math 
teachers who demonstrate solid math knowledge to become leaders in 
their schools through mentoring and professional development. I am 
pleased our amendment will allow these successful models to be 
replicated around the country.
  Once implemented, the first fellowship program will be available for 
professionals who possess advanced math and science skills. It will 
allow professionals from the private and public sectors to apply to 
become ``NSF Teaching Fellows.'' If selected, these individuals would 
receive a scholarship to attend a 1-year master's program that results 
in certification. The fellows would then commit to teach for 4 years in 
a high-need school. This is the commonsense approach we need in order 
to build a pipeline of math and science teachers who are experts in 
their fields.
  The second fellowship program entitled the ``NSF Master Teaching 
Fellows'' Program, will allow current teachers who hold a master's in 
math or science to apply and serve as leaders in a high-need school. In 
exchange for receiving a stipend, these fellows would commit to 
mentoring their peers, developing curricula, and assisting in 
professional development activities for 5 years.
  I am pleased that we are making a commitment to expanding the 
pipeline of math and science teachers, and this amendment is our first 
step in that expansion. I thank Math for America and the Newton Fellows 
and Newton Master Teachers for all they do every day to improve math 
education for students in New York City and around the country.
  The America COMPETES Act is a comprehensive strategy to help America 
compete and win in the global marketplace. As cochair of the Senate 
Manufacturing Caucus, I am pleased that this legislation makes a 
significant investment in the Manufacturing Extension Partnership 
Program that is critical to sustaining our nation's manufacturing base.
  I am also pleased that this bill includes a new energy research 
proposal modeled on DARPA. This is an idea that I first put forward at 
the Clinton Global Initiative in 2005, and introduced legislation on in 
January of 2006. My legislation would create a new agency to sponsor a 
diverse portfolio of projects that will: Increase national security by 
significantly reducing petroleum and imported fuels consumption; 
significantly improve the efficiency of electricity use and the 
reliability of the electricity system; and significantly reduce 
greenhouse gas emissions. Section 2005 of the America Competes Act 
mirrors many of these provisions. However, section 2005 does not 
include provisions from my legislation that provide additional 
management flexibility, and that I believe are important to the success 
of this new agency. In addition, section 2005 does not authorize a 
specific level of funding. I recognize that there are funding 
constraints, but I think that a much bigger, bolder investment is 
needed. So I am pleased that section 2005 is included in the bill, but 
I hope that we can make improvements during conference with the House.
  We must do what is best for our children and their economic future. 
When Americans have the tools for success, America succeeds and that is 
what this bipartisan legislation can help us achieve.
  Mr. MARTINEZ. Mr. President, I rise today to address S. 761, the 
America COMPETES Act. This is an effort to help prepare our children to 
enter the fields of math, science, engineering, and technology and the 
ultimate goal is to keep the United States at the forefront of these 
fields on the increasingly competitive global stage.
  I congratulate Senators Lamar Alexander and Jeff Bingaman for posing 
the questions they did to the National Academies of Sciences, 
Engineering, and Medicine and for working the panel's recommendations 
into legislation. And I agree with the findings that basically say if 
we don't do a better job of teaching our children in the areas of math, 
science, and technology, other countries will surpass us in a way that 
we might never overcome.

[[Page S5040]]

  I commend the Academies' full report to all of you, and I think they 
are on the right track. We need to take some significant and 
comprehensive steps to better prepare our young people to enter the 
Information Age workforce. It is critical to our Nation's future and it 
is critical that we approve this legislation and start preparing our 
children of today for the future of tomorrow.
  And it is critically important we start preparing for tomorrow today.
  In a 2003 Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study, 
fourth graders in three countries--Chinese Taipei, Japan, and 
Singapore--outperformed U.S. fourth graders in both mathematics and 
science. In the new world marketplace, the United States will have to 
make an even greater effort to keep our high standard of living, to 
remain competitive.
  People in India, China, Singapore, Finland, and Ireland know very 
well that brainpower is universal, it is valuable, and it is the secret 
weapon to producing good jobs and a good quality of life.
  Given that physical barriers such as distance have been torn down by 
the World Wide Web and the benefits of free trade, our foreign 
competitors know there is no reason that they can't have a standard of 
living more like the United States. So they are working hard to develop 
better trained citizens and create their own stream of discoveries.
  The challenge of our generation is to change these troubling trends. 
Our commitment needs to be redoubled.
  I am a great believer in the transforming power of education. Coming 
from Cuba at age 15, not knowing the language of this country, not 
knowing how my future would unfold, I relied heavily on the power of 
education to survive.
  My father was the first person in our family to earn a college 
degree, and he would always remind us that the only thing the 
Communists could not take from him was his education. That concept of 
an education became a valued treasure in our family. So that is why I 
worry so greatly about the education of our next generation.
  According to recent statistics compiled by the U.S. Department of 
Education, our nationwide graduation rate in public schools is about 74 
percent. That means one out of every four children who starts out as a 
freshman, does not get a high school degree. In Florida, the graduation 
rate drops to 71 percent. Nationally, if you look at young people 
between the ages of 16 and 24 who don't have a high school diploma, the 
numbers are alarming: Hispanics, 25 percent, Blacks, 11 percent, 
Whites, 6 percent.
  These are rates that have been virtually static over the last decade. 
They forecast a tragic pattern that we must change, for the good of 
these children, but also as a matter of national competitiveness in a 
shrinking but competitive world.
  We as a country are falling behind. We are losing the opportunity to 
remain competitive on a global scale unless we address these 
percentages and change them.
  So when we talk about improving education, we, as individuals, 
parents, community leaders and elected officials, need to focus on 
quality education.
  We need to encourage our young people to seek that diploma and 
degree, and we need to help those who might otherwise not have access 
to a higher education.
  And we need to remember that America has been the global leader in 
innovative technologies, and as those technologies grow and expand and 
proliferate throughout the world, we have to become even more prepared 
to compete in a global market.
  All young Americans, no matter their race, creed, or ethnicity 
deserve the opportunity to gain not just an education, but the best 
quality education. This is our obligation and our national imperative.
  We are a great nation, but that greatness will not be enjoyed by the 
next generations if we fail to properly educate that next generation. 
That is why the America COMPETES Act is so very critical.
  This bill will improve teacher training in math and science by 
creating summer programs hosted by the National Science Foundation.
  This bill will increase the support for Advanced Placement Programs 
to expand access for low income students so they might perform better 
in college preparatory courses.
  Over the next decade, this bill doubles the investment in basic 
research at our Nation's leading Federal scientific research facilities 
so that we can take research out of the classrooms and put it into 
real-world applications.
  That last point is equally important as the previous two. Yes, we 
should expand the math, science and engineering training for teachers, 
but we also need to focus now on the kinds of research that will 
elevate the production of technological innovation.
  I am certain all of us come into contact with a computer every day, 
and it is a safe bet that many of those computers have an Intel chip 
inside.
  One of the people who worked on the Academies report, Craig Barrett, 
the chairman of Intel, points out that 90 percent of the products his 
company delivers on December 31 did not even exist on January 1 of that 
same year.
  That is an amazing pace of change. Handheld computers, Blackberrys, 
flash drives, the iPhone--these kinds of advancements create 
opportunity and demand for human capital. Human capital can harness 
science and opportunity--and keep our Nation at the cutting edge of 
global innovation.
  So the challenge is clear we need to ensure our young people have the 
tools they need to harness their brainpower and keep up with the rate 
of innovation. That's going to take a greater commitment to public 
education in the areas of math, science, and engineering.
  And I can tell you that if our children can't, won't, or don't take 
advantage of these opportunities, the children of other countries will. 
Our task is to commit to their success and this legislation does just 
that.
  To conclude, I will say that the Federal Government alone will not 
solve these problems, and I don't believe Congress has a magic bullet 
to address all--or even most--of the challenges mentioned here today.
  I do, however, believe we can all support the legislation before us 
today. The report by the National Academies panel is a fair and 
realistic assessment of how we ought to proceed.
  Who could argue that we shouldn't look at ways to increase the pool 
of qualified math and science teachers, strengthen the Nation's 
commitment to research, make the United States the most attractive 
place to the Nation's and world's brightest minds, and ensure we 
protect intellectual property while allowing the freedom to innovate? 
These issues deserve the attention of our Nation.
  I know--working together--we can and will adopt initiatives that will 
provide the best education for our future generations.
  Mr. BOND. Mr. President, in today's global economy, continued 
progress in math, science, and engineering, and the transfer of this 
knowledge, is vital if the U.S. is to maintain its competitiveness and 
keep good-paying, cutting-edge jobs here at home. New products, 
processes, industries and future employment opportunities depend on the 
advances in research and their movement into the marketplace.
  Missouri is a leader in a field of science that hardly existed 20 
years ago--biotechnology. And I want Missouri to continue to be a 
leader in producing the best math and science minds in the country. How 
do we do that? One of our toughest educational challenges is helping 
our young people perform better in science and math.
  We know that America's fourth graders and eighth graders are 
performing above the international average in math and science. But 
when they get to high school, they fall behind.
  We need to do more. That is why I am pleased to support the America 
COMPETES Act, which strengthens educational opportunities in science, 
technology, engineering, and mathematics from elementary through 
graduate school, with a particular focus on math and science teachers. 
In addition, this bill makes a bold Federal investment in basic science 
research at the National Science Foundation, the DOE Office of Science, 
NASA and the National Institute of Standards and Technology.
  As many of you know, I have been a strong supporter of NSF over the

[[Page S5041]]

years. NSF plays a critical role in the economic, scientific and 
intellectual growth of this Nation. It is one of our primary tools in 
meeting the global challenges of the 21st century by pushing the 
boundaries of scientific research and technology. NSF's work will give 
us a better insight into the world around us. This work will grow our 
economy and speed innovation, improving the quality of life for all 
people.
  NSF's impact over the past half century has been monumental, 
especially in the field of medical technologies and research. The 
investments have also spawned not only new products, but also entire 
industries, such as biotechnology, Internet providers, e-commerce, and 
geographic information systems. Medical technologies such as magnetic 
resonance imaging, ultrasound, digital mammography and genomic mapping 
could not have occurred, and cannot now improve to the next level of 
proficiency, without underlying knowledge from NSF-supported work in 
biology, physics, chemistry, mathematics, engineering, and computer 
sciences.
  New NSF support for research in nanotechnology, high-speed computing, 
plant genome research, biocomplexity, and cognitive neuroscience will 
further advance the state of technological change and improve our 
quality of life through creation of new products, a better 
understanding of how humans behave, and how our ecological systems can 
survive.
  Unfortunately, the Federal Government has not always adequately 
supported NSF and the physical sciences with the dollars it deserves. 
While the Congress and the current and past Administration has strongly 
supported the life sciences, the physical sciences have been left 
behind. This has resulted in a major funding disparity between the life 
sciences and the physical sciences. This funding imbalance is alarming 
because it directly jeopardizes our Nation's ability to lead the world 
in scientific innovation. Further, we jeopardize the work of the 
National Institutes of Health because we are undermining the physical 
sciences, which provide the underpinning for medical technological 
advances.
  Inadequate funding for NSF also hurts our economy and the creation of 
good jobs. In recent years, there has been an outcry of outsourcing 
jobs to other countries. And, our high-tech industry has been 
struggling to fill high-tech positions with American born workers. The 
best remedy to this issue is not protectionism but investing in the 
education and skills of our future workforce. This means better math 
and science education and technological skills, such as computer 
literacy. This is also a major part of NSF's mission.
  My good friend Senator Barbara Mikulski and I, along with many of my 
other colleagues, were pioneers in the fight to double the funding of 
NSF. Thanks to this effort we increased funding for NSF significantly; 
however, we fell short of our goal to double funding. The bill before 
us today provides an important opportunity to refocus attention on this 
critical goal and I am pleased that this bill puts us on the path to 
double NSF funding. It is critical that doubling funding for NSF remain 
one of our highest priorities and as a member of the Appropriations 
Committee, I hope we can do our part.
  Future job and economic growth in the areas of health care, life 
sciences, defense, agriculture and transportation is directly related 
to scientific advancement. For these reasons it is important to support 
the America COMPETES Act and make an important investment in the 
economic security and growth of our country.
  Mr. MENENDEZ. Mr. President, I rise in support of S. 761, the America 
COMPETES Act. I am proud to be an original cosponsor of this 
legislation, which takes important steps to make sure we are preparing 
our young people to be competitive and working to secure our Nation's 
future in a global economy.
  That need has never been more urgent than today, when globalization 
and technology are tearing down the walls of geography, language, and 
income. Globalization has brought increased educational, technological, 
and societal advances to regions that only once dreamed of innovation. 
Today, as nations abroad are gaining a competitive edge, our younger 
generations are at risk of falling behind.
  For a nation with endless resources at its fingertips, it is 
inexplicable that the United States continues to fall far below other 
nations when it comes to higher achievement. Yet this is the reality. 
On international assessments, our young people score below the average 
compared to other developed nations on math tests. Even when we just 
look at the highest achieving students, the United States still ranks 
near the bottom.
  In the global race to have the most trained, highly-skilled, best 
prepared workforce, we are losing ground. And we are especially losing 
ground in fields that are the source of innovation and technology, 
which will increasingly become a key sector of the global economy.
  Fewer of our college students are pursuing degrees in math, science 
and engineering, and if those trends continue, by 2010 more than 90 
percent of all our world's scientists and engineers would be living 
outside the United States.
  We cannot sit back and expect that we will continue to be at the top 
when it comes to global achievement. Where other countries are 
strengthening their education systems, we are not keeping up. We must 
regain that ground by investing in our younger generations. We must 
provide quality opportunities for young people now so that they can 
gain the science, math, and technological skills they need in an 
emerging global marketplace. We stand at a critical juncture, and how 
we proceed will determine the future for generations to come.
  That is why this legislation is so critical--it is a commitment that 
we will do what is necessary to strengthen our Nation's future. This 
legislation will both bolster our research and development capabilities 
and better equip our young people to become the future leaders that 
this Nation needs. The America COMPETES Act will strengthen educational 
opportunities in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics from 
elementary through graduate school. It will create grants for master's 
degrees in math, science, and foreign language and establish programs 
to improve math instruction for elementary and secondary students. This 
legislation also calls for substantially increasing funding for the 
National Science Foundation, doubling basic research funding over the 
next decade, and the creation of a national science and technology 
summit.
  I am pleased this bill includes provisions I introduced last year to 
increase the participation of women and minorities in science. 
Specifically, this bill directs the Energy Department to increase the 
numbers of women and minorities in science and technology fields at all 
education levels--from kindergarten through the graduate level--and 
establishes a new outreach program for underrepresented minorities in 
grades K-12 to encourage careers in science and technology. While 
opportunities in these fields are becoming more accessible to all 
students, women and minorities are still sorely underrepresented in the 
sciences. It is my hope this legislation will help us to close that gap 
and ensure that young people of all backgrounds have the opportunities 
they deserve.
  This bill also contains an initiative that would authorize 
partnerships between high-need or rural school districts, higher 
education institutions and the private sector, with the goal of 
revitalizing the high school science labs in those schools. This will 
help schools purchase scientific equipment, renovate laboratory space, 
design new experiments or methods of integrating the laboratory with 
traditional lectures, and provide professional development for high 
school lab teachers. This provision--which I introduced last year as a 
separate bill--will improve the science learning experience for 
students in low-income and rural schools across the country.

  As someone who was raised to believe there were no boundaries to what 
I could achieve, I know first hand that a strong education is the key 
to success. I was not constricted by the income my parents made, or by 
the neighborhood I lived in, but only my ability and my determination. 
With the assistance of the Federal Government, I graduated from college 
and law school, and had a world of opportunity open to me. I want every 
young person to have the

[[Page S5042]]

chance to achieve their dreams an fulfill their God-given potential. 
This bill will undoubtedly help countless young people reach that goal.
  The time has come to make a robust, national commitment to the 
education of our youth at all levels, from kindergarten through 
graduate school and beyond. We cannot expect our country to be 
adequately prepared unless we are making the necessary investments in 
all of our students.
  Our Nation faces great challenges to meeting the demands of global 
innovation and competition. A nation that is united in its purpose can 
answer that challenge, as we have so many times throughout our history. 
Just as an entire generation was once inspired to dream new dreams of 
reaching space, and a nation launched a bold investment in science and 
technology that put a man on the Moon, so can we lead a generation to 
be the next great leaders and innovators. This legislation will help 
achieve that goal. It will strengthen not only the competitive future 
of our young people but of our Nation. I urge my colleagues to support 
this important bill.
  Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I wish to express my support for ensuring 
the ongoing competitiveness of U.S. capital markets, our economy and 
American workers. I have served on the Banking Committee since my first 
day in the Senate 26 years ago. During my tenure on the committee, and 
now as its chairman, preserving and strengthening America's preeminent 
position as the world's leading financial center has been among my 
primary objectives.
  Based on that experience, I would like to share what I believe are 
three important considerations that should guide us in any discussion 
of how to make America's capital markets more competitive.
  First, we must remain mindful that our markets remain the largest, 
most liquid, and most transparent on the planet.
  Second, the current and continued success of those markets depends on 
the presence of effective, efficient legal rules that protect 
investors; as such, we should resist the temptation to engage in a 
regulatory race to the bottom as a rationale to stay on top. Members of 
the Senate resisted that temptation yesterday when they voted, 
overwhelmingly, to defeat an amendment that would have significantly 
weakened a critical investor protection provision of the Sarbanes-Oxley 
Act. I want to thank the sponsors of this amendment, Senator Schumer 
and Senator Crapo, for their vote opposing yesterday's amendment. In 
doing so, they affirmed their support for an efficient and effective 
regulatory structure and ongoing efforts at the Securities and Exchange 
Commission to lower the cost of compliance for small businesses.
  Third the success of our markets also depends on our Nation's ability 
to educate, train, and recruit the kind of talented and driven people 
who can compete and win in the global economy.
  We should do all we can to promote the ongoing competitiveness of 
America's capital markets. Our Nation's ability to strengthen security, 
create opportunity, and expand prosperity for every citizen depends in 
large part on the success of our capital markets and of our financial 
services sector generally. Maintaining the preeminence of capital 
markets will not be easy. It will require honest and thoughtful 
leadership. As chairman of the Banking Committee, I look forward to 
furthering the dialogue on this important issue.
  Mr. President, I ask for unanimous consent that the following remarks 
on competitiveness that I recently delivered to the U.S. Chamber of 
Commerce in March be inserted into the Record immediately following my 
statement.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

[Prepared Remarks of Senator Dodd to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Mar. 
                               14, 2007]

First Annual Capital Markets Summit: Securing America's Competitiveness

       Thank you, Tom, for that kind introduction. And thank you 
     all for this opportunity to speak with you this morning. It's 
     hard to believe that ten years have passed since Tom became 
     President and CEO of the Chamber. He has done an outstanding 
     job of leading this remarkable organization.
       I am proud to have had Tom's and the Chamber's support on 
     some of the most important pieces of legislation with which I 
     have been associated. Laws like the Private Securities 
     Litigation Reform Act; the Y2K litigation reform act; the 
     Class Action Fairness Act; the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, which 
     has helped bring our financial services sector into the 21st 
     century; and the Terrorism Risk Insurance Act, which in the 
     aftermath of 9/11 has played a crucial role in keeping our 
     economy strong.
       In all seriousness, these pieces of legislation represent 
     hard-fought changes that have benefited the American economy 
     and in so doing have also made our Nation a more hopeful and 
     prosperous place for all.
       They represent what can happen when people decide to reject 
     partisanship and embrace partnership to create positive 
     change for America. It is once again that sense of 
     partnership that has brought us together today.
       America in these early years of the 21st century is by some 
     measures doing well. But I defy anyone to say that we cannot 
     do better. Wherever I go--from boardrooms to class rooms to 
     living rooms--Americans are deeply concerned about our 
     nation's future. And I share that concern.
       We are at a critical moment in our nation's history. Our 
     leadership in the world has been achieved over a period of 
     two and a quarter centuries by the vision and sacrifice of 
     generations of patriots and statesmen. U.S. leadership is 
     today being questioned and in some ways squandered as it has 
     never been before. The stakes for all of us as Americans 
     could not, in my view, be higher.
       The topic of today's gathering is the future of America's 
     capital markets. But in reality, we are all here out of a 
     shared concern about the future of America itself. The issue 
     before us today presents an opportunity for us all--Democrats 
     and Republicans, private entrepreneurs and public leaders--to 
     come together to have a serious discussion about ways to move 
     our country forward.
       The Capital Markets Commission report is a thoughtful 
     document that makes an important contribution to the debate 
     about the future of our Nation's capital markets.
       I commend the Chamber, the Commission and its co-chairs--my 
     good friend Bill Daley and Arthur Culvahouse--for 
     highlighting some of the key challenges facing our capital 
     markets. I look forward to analyzing the report's 
     recommendations in greater depth and examining them in the 
     Senate Banking Committee at a hearing I intend to hold in the 
     coming weeks.
       I have served on the Banking Committee since my first day 
     in the Senate. No one now in the Senate has served there any 
     longer. As a member of that Committee, and now as its 
     Chairman, I have had one overarching objective: to preserve 
     and strengthen America's preeminent position as the world's 
     leading financial center.
       That objective is so crucial because our nation's ability 
     to strengthen security, create opportunity, and expand 
     prosperity for every citizen depends in large part on the 
     success of our capital markets and of our financial services 
     sector generally.
       My service on the Banking Committee has provided me with a 
     tremendous opportunity to observe, study, and, I hope, 
     strengthen our capital markets. Based on that experience, I 
     would like to share what I believe are three important 
     considerations that should guide us in any discussion of how 
     to make America's capital markets more competitive.
       First, we should keep in mind that, as we speak, America's 
     capital markets remain the most dominant in the world. That 
     is not empty rhetoric. It is a demonstrable fact.
       For example, the total amount of financial stock in the 
     U.S.--equities, bonds, loans, and deposits--is more than six 
     times the amount of the U.K.'s, more than double Japan's, and 
     four times that of the other Asian capital markets.
       America's dominance is also proven by the market 
     capitalization of the major exchanges. Yes, IPO and trading 
     activity on overseas exchanges has been growing. I am very 
     aware of that, but the market capitalization of the major 
     U.S. exchanges dwarfs that of their overseas competitors. The 
     market cap of the New York Stock Exchange is $15 trillion 
     dollars. That is 15 times the value of the Shanghai Stock 
     Exchange, four times the value of the London Stock Exchange, 
     and three times the value of the Tokyo Stock Exchange.
       Much of the growth in capital is coming from overseas 
     investors--and according to some measures, in record amounts. 
     The most recent Economic Report of the President found that 
     foreign investment in U.S. financial stock such as U.S. 
     Treasury securities, corporate stocks, and corporate and 
     other private bonds totaled $5.7 trillion in 2005--the 
     highest level in nearly thirty years.
       In addition, 34 foreign IPOs listed on U.S. exchanges last 
     year--the highest percentage of foreign IPOs in the U.S. in 
     20 years.
       It is worth pointing out that all of this growth has been 
     achieved despite the 2001 recession, the 9/11 terrorist 
     attacks, a string of corporate scandals, and the ongoing 
     lengthy, bloody, and costly wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
       So, despite the bearishness of some, the United States 
     remains the preeminent destination for global capital.
       We're hearing a lot these days about London, and Hong Kong, 
     and Shanghai. But the fact is, the U.S. capital markets 
     remain the largest, most liquid, most innovative, most 
     resilient, and most lucrative in the world.
       And on my watch, as Chairman of the Senate Banking 
     Committee, I intend to keep them that way. Which leads me to 
     the second consideration that must guide us: our

[[Page S5043]]

     capital markets are strong precisely because of--not 
     despite--the legal architecture within which those markets 
     have been conceived and grown.
       That is probably not a particularly surprising observation 
     from someone who has helped to build that architecture. But 
     lawmakers are not the only ones who understand the value of 
     our laws to our capital markets.
       Three years ago, Alan Greenspan was asked to explain the 
     phenomenal size and strength of the American economy. He had 
     this to say: ``[A]rguably the most important factor is the 
     type of rule of law under which economic activity takes 
     place.''
       Glenn Hubbard, the former chairman of President Bush's 
     Council of Economic Advisors, echoed those thoughts in a 2004 
     report. He said: ``Effective capital markets require . . . 
     the enforcement of laws and property rights, transparency and 
     accuracy in accounting and financial reporting, and laws and 
     regulations that provide the proper incentives for good 
     corporate governance.''
       More recently, last month, a Goldman Sachs study analyzed 
     the condition of America's capital markets. It found that the 
     strength and continued appeal of those markets could be 
     explained in no small part by what the report called: ``a 
     history of solid regulation.''
       That ``history of solid regulation'' means that investors 
     know that they are reasonably certain to get a fair shake in 
     our markets. Win or lose, they invest with a high degree of 
     confidence that American balance sheets are accurate, that 
     investment products like securities and derivatives are 
     properly valued, and that the markets are well-policed 
     against those who would commit negligent, deceptive, or 
     fraudulent acts.
       So the value of the laws and regulations within which our 
     markets operate can hardly be overstated.
       Now, let me quickly add that is not to say that all 
     regulation is good--any more than it is accurate to say that 
     any regulation is bad. Our laws and regulations are not to be 
     entrenched--and attempts to revise them must not be resisted.
       On the contrary, we write our laws on paper. We don't etch 
     them in stone. We should never be unwilling to revisit and 
     reexamine past assumptions, and we will do just that under my 
     Chairmanship.
       That is why I also support the efforts of Chairman Cox and 
     Chairman Olson with regard to improving regulations 
     implementing the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. Sarbanes-Oxley was never 
     intended to handcuff companies that seek to innovate. It was 
     meant to improve accountability and transparency in our 
     public companies and restore confidence in the integrity of 
     the markets. The rulemaking currently underway will help 
     ensure that the core intent of Sarbanes-Oxley is upheld and 
     advanced.
       That is also why I support the effort by the NASD and the 
     NYSE to consolidate into a single SRO for all broker-dealers. 
     This new self-regulatory organization holds the potential to 
     not only improve the efficiency and consistency of securities 
     industry oversight, but also to reduce costs to member firms.
       I have always been open to new ideas and new approaches to 
     achieve important policy goals in new, more efficient, and 
     more effective ways. That kind of approach is more critical 
     today than ever. The stakes are simply too high for us to be 
     afraid to think innovatively and to act decisively.
       I take a back seat to no one in my commitment to the 
     preeminent power of America's markets.
       But we must resist the temptation to engage our 
     international competitors in a regulatory race to the bottom. 
     Our laws and rules to protect individual investors are a 
     crucial competitive advantage in the global marketplace. Our 
     competitors know that. If we jettison some of those legal 
     protections, we hand our competitors a victory greater than 
     any they could achieve on their own. And we would almost 
     certainly see the slow flow of capital out of our markets and 
     into those of our competitors.
       The third and final thought I wish to make today is that 
     America's continued ability to attract financial capital 
     hinges on our ability to cultivate and attract intellectual 
     capital.
       There is no question that the growth of capital markets in 
     Asia, Europe, and elsewhere merits our consideration--and in 
     certain respects, our concern. Without a doubt, the number 
     and size of IPOs in places like Moscow, London, and Hong Kong 
     is on the rise. I want you to know that I am not unmindful of 
     that.
       But a closer examination of these foreign markets reveals 
     an interesting fact: American firms are leaders there, just 
     as they are leaders here. Consider America's leadership in 
     the European capital markets. According to the McKinsey 
     report commissioned by Mayor Bloomberg and Senator Schumer, 
     three of the top five firms in the European markets--be they 
     engaged in IPOs, mergers and acquisitions, or debt issuance--
     are Americans.
       Visit virtually any emerging market in the world today, and 
     you are almost certain to find American firms shaping, 
     guiding, and leading that market into the 21st century global 
     economy. American firms are providing the lawyers, 
     accountants, analysts, investors, and entrepreneurs who are 
     structuring deals, growing jobs, and creating new wealth.
       In that regard, the growth of markets overseas is something 
     to embrace rather than fear. Because that growth is creating 
     new opportunities for American firms to earn new business.
       However, our ability to tap and shape those markets depends 
     in large measure on our ability to educate, recruit, and 
     train the best talent in the world. Last week, I listened to 
     Bill Gates. He came to Washington to sound an alarm bell 
     about how the shortage of educated and skilled workers 
     threatens our Nation's overall economic competitiveness. It 
     was a sobering assessment.
       Yet, a decline in the number of educated and skilled 
     American workers is by no means inevitable. On the contrary, 
     many of us in the Senate--Republicans as well as Democrats--
     share a strong commitment to improving the educational 
     achievement of our students. That is particularly true of 
     math and science, where we continue to lag behind many other 
     industrialized nations.
       In a global economy, we must realize that an American child 
     no longer competes for a job against the child from the next 
     town. Nor does he or she compete against a child from another 
     state or region ofthe country. No. Now our kids are competing 
     for jobs against kids from China and England and India. And 
     the best jobs will go to the kids who can think creatively, 
     can understand key mathematical and science concepts, and can 
     solve problems--regardless of where they live.
       So we must work to increase the pool of home-grown 
     entrepreneurs and highly skilled workers. At the same time, 
     we must remain open to those from other nations who have the 
     talent and drive to succeed in America. Our immigration laws 
     necessarily should place a priority on homeland security 
     needs. But that can be done without erecting needless 
     barriers to those who can help America create new wealth and 
     new jobs.
       In sum, then, when we discuss the competitiveness of 
     America's capital markets, I hope that we will keep these 
     thoughts in mind:
       First, that our markets are still the largest, most liquid, 
     and most transparent on the planet.
       Second, that the current and continued success of those 
     markets depends on the presence of effective, efficient legal 
     rules that protect investors.
       And third, that the success of our markets also depends on 
     our nation's ability to educate, train, and recruit the kind 
     of talented and driven people who can compete and win in the 
     global economy.
       Creating the change necessary to maintain the preeminence 
     of our capital markets will not be easy. It will require 
     leadership. But we dare not shrink from the challenge.
       At the outset of these remarks, I said that while today's 
     meeting is about the future of our capital markets, in a 
     broader sense, it is about the future of our country.
       I had an experience not long ago that I want to share with 
     you. My five year old daughter, Grace, was getting ready for 
     school one morning, when she looked up at me and said, ``I 
     wonder what my day is going to be like.'' It's not every day 
     that you get that question from a five year old.
       A moment later, she looked up again and said these exact 
     words: ``I wonder what my life is going to be like.'' She had 
     just turned 5. How do you answer that? It's a question that I 
     would guess many of you have heard before. Because it's a 
     question that all parents often ask about their children or 
     grandchildren.
       None of us can know with certainty the answer to that 
     question. But we do know that the lives all of our children 
     lead will depend in no small measure on the work that you and 
     I will accomplish in the next few years.
       We gather today not as Republicans or Democrats, but as 
     Americans who are committed to the future success of the 
     greatest wealth generator of all time: American capitalism.
       We all have a stake in creating hope and prosperity for 
     those who will come after us. I will work with you to build 
     on our legacy of the American dream and expand security and 
     opportunity for all Americans.
       Because these urgent times demand nothing less than all of 
     us working together to create that change.
       That is what I have been doing my entire life in public 
     service--reaching out and turning rhetoric into results, 
     ideals into initiatives, and principles into progress for our 
     country. Many talk about change. This is not a time for talk. 
     It's a time for action. Our challenges are too serious and 
     too urgent to merit anything less.
       So let us join together once again to turn people's dreams 
     into realities. And let later generations say that, at the 
     beginning of the 21st Century, after an uncertain start, 
     America's leaders charted a new course that once again 
     matched America's progress to her promise.

  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, with this bill, we are taking a major 
step forward to help America's workers compete and win in the global 
economy.
  I have been working on education, workforce and competitiveness 
issues for many years, and I will never forget a roundtable I held in 
Washington State a few years ago. Sitting around the table, we had 
business owners, higher education officials and public school 
educators.
  The big question was this--who is responsible for making sure our 
students get the skills they need? Businesses didn't want to hire 
somebody and then have to train them in the basics. Higher education 
leaders wanted to be able

[[Page S5044]]

to focus on college-level material, not remediation. And high school 
leaders were working as hard as they could just to deal with the 
demands on their plate.
  So whose responsibility is it to make sure our students get the 
skills they need?
  It is all of our responsibility, and that is what this bill finally 
recognizes. It ensures that our Federal agencies--from Commerce to 
Education to Energy to the National Science Foundation--take aggressive 
steps to keep American workers ahead of the curve.
  I am very proud that our country is home to some of the most 
innovative workers, schools, and companies in the world. But I have 
been frustrated that for too long our government has not used all the 
tools available to strengthen the hand of American workers in the world 
marketplace. This bill finally gets us on the right track, and that's 
going to pay dividends for generations.
  I worked to strengthen this bill through my amendment to improve math 
education in high school. Just yesterday, we had a hearing in the 
Senate HELP Committee, where education experts from across the country 
told us that math instructional support does not extend as far as it 
needs to in high school. That's why I offered an amendment to help 
address this shortcoming. The Murray Math Skills Program offers 
competitive grants to help high schools hire math coaches to provide 
targeted support for students and math teachers. It will ensure high 
school students have the rigorous math materials, instruction, and 
support they need to pursue college and careers in engineering, 
science, math and technology. I am excited that my amendment was 
included in this bill to make sure high school students get the math 
support they need.
  I am pleased that this bill doubles funding for the National Science 
Foundation and the Energy Department's Office of Science over the next 
10 years. It also encourages high-risk research and supports research 
at NASA.
  As I work on issues like this, I bring the perspective of not just a 
Senator, but a former educator and someone who represents one of the 
most innovative regions of our country--the Pacific Northwest. I have 
seen firsthand the connection between what we do in our schools and 
what our businesses and economy are able to do. I am proud to represent 
a state that is home to some of the most innovative workers and 
companies in the world in diverse fields like computers, software, 
biotechnology, aerospace, and many more. So as I work on these issues, 
I know how important a skilled workforce is to our quality of life.
  I also know that so much is at stake. Businesses spend about $60 
billion just to remediate new employees, and that doesn't include what 
colleges have to spend to help incoming students catch up.
  The statistics are troubling. According to a report called ``Tough 
Choices or Tough Times'' from the National Center on Education and the 
Economy, the number of engineering degrees in the United States is down 
20 percent from its peak year in 1985. This is just one indicator of 
the trouble ahead if we don't turn this ship around.
  I have heard time and again from experts, including the ``Rising 
Above the Gathering Storm'' report, that our economic future depends on 
our ability to innovate, think creatively, and create technological 
breakthroughs.
  Our students and workers need strong skills in math, science, 
engineering, technology, and problem solving to make these kinds of 
technological and scientific breakthroughs that help ensure our 
Nation's place in the world. This bill moves us in the right direction 
by putting in place several key pieces of the puzzle.
  Let me turn to the substance of the bill. The America COMPETES Act 
helps increase our country's investment in research, including the type 
of higher risk research that can lead to major breakthroughs. It also 
helps students get the skills and experiences they need from elementary 
school through graduate school in science, technology, engineering, and 
mathematics. I applaud the bill for also making great steps towards 
attracting women and minorities into these studies and careers; groups 
that have been historically underrepresented in math and science. 
Finally, the bill helps bring an array of representatives to the table 
to develop a foundation for innovation and creativity, which is so 
important to our country's competitiveness.
  When the HELP Committee first began to consider these issues in the 
110th Congress, we heard from Bill Gates, chairman of Microsoft in my 
home State, at a hearing titled ``Strengthening American 
Competitiveness for the 21st Century.'' We all heard his urgent call 
for our country to invest in education, healthcare, and basic science 
research. As Bill Gates put it:

       The U.S. cannot maintain its economic leadership unless our 
     work force consists of people who have the knowledge and 
     skills needed to drive innovation.

  This bill recognizes that truth and moves our country in the right 
direction. It is not the final word. We still have a lot of work to do 
in areas like workforce investment--but it is a critical step forward, 
and I urge my colleagues to join me in voting for the America COMPETES 
Act.
  Mr. VOINOVICH. Mr. President, I rise today to join a number of my 
colleagues in support of the America COMPETES Act, of which I am an 
original cosponsor.
  Prior to the completion of the National Academy of Sciences' ``Rising 
Above the Gathering Storm'' report more than a year ago, I joined my 
colleagues, Senators Alexander and Bingaman, in a meeting with Norm 
Augustine, the lead author of the report and the former CEO of Lockheed 
Martin. It became clear to me then that Congress had to make the 
report's recommendations a top priority in order to maintain our 
Nation's competitive edge. I am proud to come to the floor today to say 
that we are on our way toward meeting their challenge.
  In the big picture of where the United States stands, it is clear 
that the economic framework of our Nation needs to be renewed. I happen 
to believe that our Nation's health care system places our businesses 
at a disadvantage globally, and that we must build regimes globally to 
enforce intellectual property rights, which will be the currency from 
which our economies will grow. Most importantly, the time is now right 
for a national commitment toward becoming more energy independent. I 
call it a Second Declaration of Independence--this time from foreign 
sources of energy.
  However, reaching these goals will be impossible without a workforce 
full of educated and motivated young Americans. This means we must 
place more emphasis on careers based in the fields of science, 
engineering and mathematics.
  Right now, we are not getting the job done. Globally, the United 
States ranks 17th in the proportion of the college-age population 
earning science and engineering degrees, falling from third place 
several decades ago. Countries including England, South Korea, Germany, 
Australia, Singapore, Japan and Canada all produce a higher percentage 
of science and engineering graduates than the United States.
  The America COMPETES Act will help us reverse these trends. The 
COMPETES Act would strengthen mathematics, science and engineering 
education and expand opportunities for students; it also would improve 
our science infrastructure and increase our investment in critical 
research.
  Since the release of the NAS report, I have traveled throughout Ohio 
to discuss the recommendations with scientists from our State's top 
research institutions, elementary and secondary school teachers who are 
preparing tomorrow's workforce, business leaders and others. At 
Youngstown State University, I visited with local math and science 
teachers in grades 5-10 who had partnered with the University and the 
Department of Education to improve their skills and gain the tools 
necessary to pique students' interests in the math and science fields. 
I also traveled to The Ohio State University in Columbus and spent time 
at the Future Engineers Summer Camp with Ohio eighth graders, and was 
briefed on the collaboration among the University of Akron, Akron City 
Schools and the National Inventors Hall of Fame for a middle school 
focused on math and science. These are the types of programs that will 
strengthen our nation's competitiveness and these are

[[Page S5045]]

exactly the types of programs that the COMPETES Act aims to expand.
  Again, I am encouraged that so many of my colleagues in Congress have 
recognized the need to focus on these goals by sponsoring the 
bipartisan COMPETES Act. While this bill isn't perfect, it is certainly 
a step in the right direction and a great example of what my colleagues 
and I can do by working together. Too often around here we get caught 
up in driving our own train and are too busy to realize that we don't 
have any passengers. I am happy to be a passenger on this particular 
``train'' and am confident our action in the Senate this week on the 
COMPETES Act is a step in the right direction for our country and our 
position in today's global economy.
  Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, yesterday I voted to table Senator Coburn's 
sense-of-the-Senate amendment that would have called for a requirement 
that all newly authorized programs be offset by deauthorizing something 
else. I support eliminating programs which are wasteful or unneeded 
whether or not we are authorizing a new program.
  The Coburn amendment was offered to an authorization bill which 
spends no money. It targets the authorizing process, not the 
appropriations process by which Congress allocates funds and determines 
priorities among authorized programs. The Coburn amendment also fails 
to address tax cuts which dig us into a deeper and deeper deficit 
ditch.
  I support fiscal responsibility and have supported a number of strong 
budget tools this year like the provision which reestablishes a strong 
pay-go rule, which would require any new spending or tax cuts be paid 
for elsewhere in the budget or receive a supermajority of at least 60 
votes in the Senate. The amendment offered by Senator Coburn takes the 
wrong approach.
  I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Wisconsin is 
recognized.


                           Amendment No. 942

  Mr. KOHL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the pending 
amendment be set aside so I can call up my amendment, which is No. 942, 
for consideration.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  The clerk will report the amendment.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Wisconsin [Mr. Kohl], for himself, Ms. 
     Snowe, Mr. Reed, Ms. Stabenow, Mr. Brown, Mr. Levin, Mr. 
     Durbin, Mrs. Clinton, Mr. Kerry, and Mr. Leahy, proposes an 
     amendment numbered 942.

  Mr. KOHL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the reading of the 
amendment be dispensed with.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. KOHL. I ask unanimous consent to add Senators Bayh, Menendez, and 
Voinovich as cosponsors to amendment No. 942.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

(Purpose: To increase the amounts authorized to be appropriated for the 
              Manufacturing Extension Partnership Program)

       On page 34, line 17, strike ``$120,000,000'' and insert 
     ``$122,005,000''.
       On page 34, line 20, strike ``$125,000,000'' and insert 
     ``$131,766,000''.
       On page 34, line 23, strike ``$130,000,000'' and insert 
     ``$142,300,000''.

  Mr. KOHL. Mr. President, I rise today to offer this amendment to the 
America COMPETES Act which would authorize appropriations for the 
Manufacturing Extension Partnership, known as MEP, through 2011. I am a 
long-time supporter of the MEP program and believe a healthy 
manufacturing sector is key to better jobs, rising productivity, and 
higher standards of living in the United States.
  Manufacturers today are seeking ways to level the playing field so 
they can compete globally. One way to level the playing field and 
increase competitiveness of manufacturers is through the MEP program. 
MEP streamlines operations, integrates new technologies, shortens 
production times, and lowers costs, which leads to improved efficiency, 
by offering resources to manufacturers, including organized workshops 
and consulting projects.
  In Wisconsin, three of our largest corporations--John Deere, Harley-
Davidson, and Oshkosh Truck--are working with MEP centers to develop 
domestic supply chains. I am proud to say these companies found it more 
profitable to work with small- and medium-sized Wisconsin firms than to 
look overseas for cheap labor.
  The amendment I am offering would increase the amount of funding 
available to the MEP program by $19 million over 4 years, allowing MEP 
centers to reach more manufacturers and to increase the services they 
provide. I believe we would be hard-pressed to find another program 
that has produced the results that MEP has on their limited budget. In 
fiscal year 2005, MEP clients reported over 53,000 new or retrained 
workers, sales of $6.3 billion, and $1.3 billion in cost savings. This 
is the type of program in which we should be investing more, not less.
  Unfortunately, the administration doesn't support this award-winning 
program. I believe MEP is one of the most valuable assets the 
Government gives manufacturers. The program has a proven record of 
saving manufacturing jobs now, and it will strengthen the U.S. 
manufacturing base for the future. I have written to Secretary 
Gutierrez, and I have spoken to him about the need to save MEP. The MEP 
program has received wide bipartisan support in the Senate. This year, 
48 Senators signed a letter asking for increased funding for MEP, and 
the amendment I am offering has 12 cosponsors from both sides of the 
aisle.
  Ten years ago, American manufacturers were not facing the competitive 
threats they now face from low-cost producing countries such as China 
and India. The increase in competition from these countries has 
required our manufacturers to find better, cheaper, and other ways to 
produce their products, which is where MEP directly comes in. MEP can 
help these companies reduce their costs and enter new markets, thus 
allowing them to be competitive in the global marketplace. With the 
increased threats American manufacturers now face, there is more need 
than ever to increase the funding for the MEP program. So I urge my 
colleagues to support this program.
  At this time I will avoid asking for the yeas and nays.
  I yield the floor, and I suggest 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. KOHL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the 
quorum call be rescinded.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. KOHL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that notwithstanding 
adoption of Obama amendment No. 923, as modified, the previously agreed 
to DeMint amendment No. 929 still be in order.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. KOHL. Mr. President, I suggest 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. BROWN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the 
quorum call be rescinded.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, I rise in support of the Kohl amendment. I, 
first of all, appreciate the terrific work he has done in the 
Manufacturing Extension Partnership.
  I come from a State with many of the same problems the Senator from 
Wisconsin faces, including a decline in our industrial base. In too 
many cases, many of the 3 million manufacturing jobs our country has 
lost are in my State, and it especially hurts those small manufacturing 
companies, those small tool and dye makers, those small machine shops 
in Steubenville and Akron and Toledo. The work he has done on the 
Manufacturing Extension Partnership has already helped turn around some 
of those businesses in my State, in Ohio, in the Miami Valley, and the 
Mahoney Valley and everything in between.
  The MEP allows small companies--the big companies don't need the help 
so much--similar to the Agriculture

[[Page S5046]]

Extension Service, which is so important throughout the world and 
America--the Manufacturing Extension Partnership has really mattered in 
helping these small companies, whether it is cutting energy costs, 
whether it is learning how to export, working with the U.S. Export 
Assistance Center, whether it is dealing with some kind of trade 
policy, perhaps, or tax policy, helping those small companies learn how 
to compete in this increasingly difficult and competitive global 
environment. The MEP has had strong support from both parties, so I 
strongly urge my colleagues in both parties to support this amendment.
  There is simply no reason the administration every year comes and 
tries to cut this, and every year we fight back and restore the 
funding. I will be discussing later, either in this bill or sometime 
later, legislation I have introduced to allow a revolving fund through 
the Manufacturing Extension Program done locally. In Ohio I believe 
there are 11 or 12 regions of the State under MEP that can help, that 
really can help, help form MEP programs in working with these small 
businesses, these small manufacturers. In Cleveland there is a program 
called Magna, and in Kyoga County specifically they have had this 
revolving loan program--sort of a pilot program--that has helped with 
innovation and with the manufacturing, marketing, and with the 
development of new products. I think the Kohl amendment will go a long 
way in helping MEP help small businesses and help us compete globally. 
So I ask my colleagues for support of the Kohl amendment.
  I yield the floor and suggest 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. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.


                     Amendment No. 955, as Modified

  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I am informed by the chairman and 
ranking member of the Finance Committee, whose jurisdiction this would 
be under, that the amendment Senator Inhofe has offered, amendment No. 
955, as modified, which is now at the desk, is acceptable to both sides 
at this point.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that it be brought up, agreed 
to, and that the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment (No. 955) was agreed to.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I suggest 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. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  (The remarks of Mr. Reid are printed in today's Record under 
``Morning Business.''
  Mr. REID. I yield the floor and suggest 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. COBURN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Oklahoma is 
recognized.
  Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, in consultation with the managers of the 
bill, they have granted me some time to bring up three additional 
amendments that I believe are important as we look at the bill.


                           Amendment No. 918

  Mr. COBURN. First, I ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment 
be set aside and that my amendment No. 918 be called up.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Oklahoma [Mr. Coburn] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 918.

  The amendment is as follows:

                  (Purpose: To provide a sunset date)

       At the end, add the following:

                     DIVISION E--GENERAL PROVISIONS

     SEC. 5001. SUNSET.

       The provisions of this Act, and the amendments made by this 
     Act, shall cease to have force or effect on and after October 
     1, 2011.

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Under the order, the Senator is 
recognized for up to 20 minutes.
  Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, this is a sunset amendment. It is very 
plain, very straightforward. It says, can we be assured that we have, 
with absolute certainty, all the wisdom, facts, and knowledge we will 
need 4 years from now as to the viability of the programs expressed in 
this bill?
  It is one thing the American people would like to see us do--relook 
at, on a regular basis, what we authorize to make sure what we are 
doing still has application. As a matter of fact, the biggest problem I 
have noticed in our Government is that we don't do oversight, we don't 
review and reassess, except in very rare instances.
  This amendment is very simple. It just says that in 4 years, we are 
going to look at it again. We are going to sunset the bill, and 
probably a year before that Senator Alexander and his companions will 
come back, relook at it, tweak this, make the changes they need to 
make, and then have the America COMPETES Act again 4 years from now. 
The key component of what it does is it forces us to look at it because 
it is going to expire, it is going to run out of gas.
  What happens now is that we pass things and don't ever look at them 
again. I believe the Senator from Tennessee, as well as the Senator 
from New Mexico, would agree that we fail to do proper oversight in 
this body. That is one of the very lacking components of the job. It is 
hard work, oftentimes not fun, but it is very important to the future 
of this country.
  Some people will say that we should not sunset this, that the 
implication is that we know now what we are going to need to know 4 
years from now. But, in fact, we sunset a lot of things, from the 
PATRIOT Act, to the tax bills, to the Ryan White health care bill, to 
Defense bills, to veterans bills. I put forward that we need more 
sunsets because of the discipline it will force on us as 
representatives of the American people to do what is in their best 
interest, with the knowledge we have on hand at that time.
  I don't know whether this amendment will pass, but it is a great 
judgment for the American people to look at us and say are we serious 
about doing the business or are we so arrogant or elitist that we think 
we know now absolutely what we need to know 4 years from now.
  I had a good debate with Senator Durbin on the previous bill the body 
considered. One of his suggestions was that I should have offered a 
sunset to that legislation. I think that is a great suggestion. I think 
it is equally apropos that we do it on this legislation. It gives us 
the benefit of our experience over the next 3 years, it allows us to 
have the hearings in the committee and the committee work we need to 
do--as a parenthesis, this bill didn't go through any committees, 
didn't have the pleasure of the Commerce or HELP Committee--and allows 
us to look at and see what we have been doing and whether it is 
effective, whether or not the American people actually get good value 
for the money over what we intend them to do. That is our real 
obligation. It is not to create an America COMPETES Act, it is not to 
pass a piece of legislation, but, in fact, it is to make sure that 
whatever we do, the American taxpayer dollar gets a great 
accomplishment for that.

  I reserve the remainder of my time and will listen to the opposing 
points of view on this amendment.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I will speak briefly on the amendment. I 
know the Senator has two other amendments he wants to also discuss, and 
there may be others who want to come back and say something about this 
amendment.
  I urge my colleagues not to support this amendment. Under the rules 
of procedure that we follow in the Senate, an appropriation can be 
objected to if the underlying activity that the money is being 
appropriated for has not been authorized. So we try to pass authorizing 
bills. That is what this legislation is. This is authorizing 
legislation.

[[Page S5047]]

  If everything were perfect around this place, then we would always 
get our authorizing bills reauthorized in time so that there would 
never be a lapse. Unfortunately, that is not the case. There are a lot 
of authorizing bills that we have allowed to lapse. That does not mean 
that we quit funding those activities. We, in fact, continue funding 
those activities through the appropriations process until Congress 
organizes itself and passes a new reauthorization. But the old 
reauthorization remains in place until there is something new to 
replace it or until there is some conscious decision.
  These are not new activities, by and large, we are talking about in 
this legislation. A lot of this is activities that we have done for a 
long time, and we are trying to, once again, authorize them. We are 
trying to increase the amounts available for these different 
activities, whether it is science education, scientific research--
whatever the issue is.
  If the amendment of the Senator is adopted, my understanding is that 
effective on October 1, 2011, there is no authorization at that point 
from then on for any of this bill. Therefore, any Congress that tries 
to appropriate the funds, a point of order could be raised that this is 
trying to appropriate money for an activity for which there has not 
been an authorization. I think that would be unwise. That is my basic 
view.
  I certainly favor the Congress performing its appropriate job of 
coming back by the time these authorizations are completed, the various 
dollar figures we have in this bill, and looking at this again and 
doing a rewrite of the authorization. That is what we are trying to do 
with No Child Left Behind right now. I can tell you that before No 
Child Left Behind was ever enacted, there was a year or 2 years where 
the Elementary and Secondary Education Act essentially had expired by 
its language. There was no sunset such as the Senator is recommending 
here, but the 5-year authorization had expired. Yet we could go ahead 
because the underlying language still had force and effect.
  I also have great questions as to the legal effect of this amendment. 
Here we say the provisions of the act and the amendments made by the 
act shall cease to have force and effect on or after October 1, 2011.
  Some of the provisions of the act are repeals of other acts or 
repeals of other provisions. Are we saying that in one bill we would be 
saying we are repealing this provision, but we are also saying as of 
October 1, 2011, the repeal no longer has any force and effect and the 
provision comes back into effect?
  I think there are all sorts of confusion that would be sown by trying 
to adopt this amendment. I oppose it myself. As I say, I think there 
are others who wish to speak on it before we get to a vote. I know the 
Senator has two other amendments he wishes to address.
  I yield the floor, and yield to my colleague from New Mexico, Senator 
Domenici.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I don't want much time. How much time 
does the Senator have?
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator has 15\1/2\ minutes for 
all three amendments.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. President, I hope I don't use over 3 minutes. Maybe 
the Chair can notify me at 3 minutes.
  I rise to indicate that I don't think we should adopt this amendment. 
Frankly, some of the provisions in this act are only authorized through 
2011. Now we come along and authorize them for that long, meaning we 
are going to probably work at redoing them, but we have hanging over 
our heads a sunset that came into existence just a couple of years 
after we put the bill into play.
  Here is the problem: If you want to go to a sunset approach to 
minimizing our Government, then why in the world would you start with 
one of the best pieces of legislation we have adopted? This is good 
law. This is going to be doing great things. If you want to have a 
sunset provision, pick a bunch of these things you know aren't any good 
and sunset them, not sunset a bill that has some force and effect that 
carries on much broader and has the chance of doing some real good.
  This one in the end will be extremely mischievous at the most, and 
some people will claim that it did great things. The truth is, this 
bill needs more than the time allowed by this amendment because it is 
new ground, new approaches to putting more brain power into the brains 
of America's students as they go through school. You can't do that in a 
short period of time.
  This is the wrong bill, the wrong time to sunset, and it won't do any 
good. Therefore, it should not be adopted. I thank the Senator for 
yielding me 3 minutes.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Oklahoma.
  Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, the claim of Senator Bingaman that a point 
of order will lie against this is wrong. Paragraph 7, rule XVI only 
requires the Appropriations Committee to list the unauthorized 
programs. He made my point: 20 percent of our appropriations are 
unauthorized from expired or sunsetted programs. It won't stop anything 
if it is a good program.
  I contend with Senator Domenici that he thinks this is a great bill, 
but the only way we are going to know is the results of the bill. So 
based on what we think, not on what we know, is the reason this bill 
should be sunsetted so that it forces us to go back and look at what we 
might think we know today but didn't know and change it.
  It is about putting discipline into our body. It is about forcing us 
to do the work the people told us they wanted done when we came here. 
It requires us to not be fortune tellers, to not be seance dwellers, 
but to, in fact, look at the facts after 3 years, see what it has 
accomplished, and forces us to make the changes.
  The Senator knows quite well that on most of the programs we haven't 
done that. That is one of the reasons we had a $350 billion deficit. 
That is one of the reasons we had $200 billion that we spent on 
wasteful, duplicated, or fraudulent programs last year out of the $1 
trillion we spent in the discretionary budget.
  What I am trying to do is force us to do the hard work of relooking. 
I agree, does that make it hard? Yes. Nobody said it was going to be 
easy. But I would want any Senator in this body who says they know the 
outcome of this bill to put something behind that and say we don't need 
to relook at it. That is the question. This is a disciplinary force 
that says we have to come back and look at it.
  Let me remind my colleagues again. There are great ideas in this 
legislation. I don't doubt that for a minute. This didn't go through 
the committee process. This wasn't made available for amendments. On an 
$80 billion authorization--which is what it is going to be if we guess 
at the sums that are authorized for this bill--to not have it go 
through either committees of jurisdiction and come to the floor, and we 
are going to spend this kind of money and we are going to think rather 
than know it is going to work, and to say we should not look at it I 
find really ironic, and I feel pretty sure most of the American people 
would think we can't know for sure.
  It is a commonsense amendment and will cause us to do what is 
necessary.


                           Amendment No. 922

  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to set the pending amendment 
aside.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. COBURN. I call up amendment No. 922.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will report the 
amendment.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Oklahoma [Mr. Coburn] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 922.

  Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading 
of the amendment be dispensed with.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

     (Purpose: To promote transparency at the National Oceanic and 
                      Atmospheric Administration)

       At the end of title V of division A, add the following:

     SEC. 1503. NOAA ACCOUNTABILITY AND TRANSPARENCY.

       (a) Review of Activities Carried Out With NOAA Funds.--
       (1) Requirement for review.--The Inspector General of the 
     Department of Commerce shall conduct routine, independent 
     reviews of the activities carried out with grants or

[[Page S5048]]

     other financial assistance made available by the 
     Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric 
     Administration. Such reviews shall include cost-benefit 
     analysis of such activities and reviews to determine if the 
     goals of such activities are being accomplished.
       (2) Availability to the public.--The Administrator shall 
     make each review conducted pursuant to paragraph (1) 
     available to the public through the website of the 
     Administration not later than 60 days after the date such 
     review is completed.
       (b) Prohibition on Use of NOAA Funds for Meetings.--No 
     funds made available by the Administrator through a grant or 
     contract may be used by the person who received such grant or 
     contract, including any subcontractor to such person, for a 
     banquet or conference, other than a conference related to 
     training or a routine meeting with officers or employees of 
     the Administration to discuss an ongoing project or training.
       (c) Prohibition on Conflicts of Interest.--Each person who 
     receives funds from the Administrator through a grant or 
     contract shall submit to the Administrator a certification 
     stating that none of such funds will be made available 
     through a subcontract or in any other manner to another 
     person who has a financial interest or other conflict of 
     interest with the person who received such funds from the 
     Administrator.

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Oklahoma is 
recognized.
  Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, we passed the Fisheries Act, the Magnuson-
Stevens Act, which was reauthorized this year in which Senator Stevens 
undertook, correctly, the responsibility of eliminating conflicts of 
interest and created oversight on the fisheries boards.
  We have recently had notification and seen some pretty significant 
abuse within NOAA of some of their grant processes. All this amendment 
says is, we are going to add some accountability and transparency to 
the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration grants program.
  I refer my colleagues to a Baltimore Sun article which has been 
prominent in that newspaper over the last couple of weeks where over 
$10 million in a grant has failed to demonstrate results. It is riddled 
with conflicts of interest, and it has had little to no oversight from 
NOAA.
  Before we expand NOAA, one of the things we ought to do is make sure 
there are no conflicts of interest, financial or otherwise, in the 
grant process.
  I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record both articles 
outlining this situation, as well as a Stanford study on other areas of 
NOAA where there is a lack of informed consent and a lack of conflict 
of interest rules for NOAA.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

           [From the Environment News Service, Nov. 13, 2003]

     Fish Perish as Conflict of Interest Snares Management Councils

       Washington, DC.--The regional fishery management councils 
     that govern the multi-billion dollar U.S. commercial and 
     recreational fishing industry are dominated by the industry, 
     exempted from federal conflict of interest laws, and subject 
     to little federal oversight, says a new report released 
     Wednesday by three Stanford University researchers. Sixty 
     percent of appointed council members have a direct financial 
     interest in the fisheries that they manage and regulate, say 
     the authors of the report, ``Taking Stock of the Regional 
     Fishery Management Councils.''
       Stanford's Josh Eagle, Barton Thompson Jr., and Sarah 
     Newkirk conducted a review of the mandates, constitution, 
     rules, and procedures of the United States' Regional Fishery 
     Management Councils, and surveyed members of four of the 
     eight councils. Their study, sponsored by The Pew Charitable 
     Trusts, concludes that the councils have presided over the 
     economic and biological decline of many fisheries, and that 
     the councils are not likely to implement the kind of 
     management necessary to prevent future declines. ``The oceans 
     are among the nation's greatest natural resources, yet few 
     Americans know who manages the nation's fisheries or how 
     decisions affecting the sustainability of fisheries are 
     made,'' said co-author Josh Eagle, director of the Stanford 
     Fisheries Policy Project and lecturer in law at Stanford Law 
     School.
       The eight fishery councils were established in 1976 by the 
     passage of the Fishery Conservation and Management Act, now 
     known as the Magnuson-Stevens Act, to take primary 
     responsibility for the management of dozens of fisheries 
     along U.S. coasts in Atlantic, Caribbean, Gulf of Mexico and 
     Pacific waters.
       The recent collapses of once abundant species, such as cod 
     in New England and rockfish off the Pacific coast, have 
     caused hardship for fishing communities across the country. 
     In addition salmon, tuna, red snapper, lobster, and blue 
     crab, among many other species, are overfished, and many 
     scientists, including the report's authors, say an essential 
     step in helping these species recover is to put an end to 
     overfishing. Eagle said, ``With more than a third of the 
     nation's studied fish stocks overfished and the status of 
     many more uncertain, it is clear that we must apply standards 
     of good government to the management of America's fisheries 
     and place the public's interest first.''
       The councils opened a three day conference today in 
     Washington, DC to educate the public, policy makers, and 
     media on the marine fishery management process. They are 
     presenting successful management examples by region, and 
     current management and research initiatives. The councils say 
     they wish to ``help bridge the gap between perception and 
     reality regarding fisheries management'' and to provide a 
     forum for information exchange and to solicit a wide range of 
     perspectives on future management and marine research 
     directions. But Eagle, Thompson, and Newkirk say in their 
     report that the councils are unlikely to solve the current 
     problems facing the Nation's fisheries for at least three 
     reasons.
       First, council members face a conflict of interest because 
     they must limit the number of fish that can be caught to 
     ensure their conservation while also allocating the allowable 
     catch among members of the industry, who may apply pressure 
     to increase the size of their quotas. Second, because 80 to 
     90 percent of appointed council members are from the fishing 
     industry, diverse viewpoints are not fairly representated in 
     council discussions and decisionmaking, the report states. 
     Each council has only one environmental representative, one 
     state official and one federal official in addition to the 
     fishing industry members. Congress requires federal advisory 
     commissions to be ``fairly balanced in terms of points of 
     view represented and the functions to be performed by the 
     advisory commission,'' but the fisheries management councils 
     are not subject to the Federal Advisory Committee Act.
       Finally, the split in responsibilities between the councils 
     and the National Marine Fisheries Service removes effective 
     accountability for the status of the Nation's fisheries, the 
     report's authors conclude. An example from the Western 
     Pacific Fishery Management Council based in Honolulu, 
     reported by the ``Cascadia Times,'' shows how the process 
     works in practice. In June the Secretary of Commerce 
     appointed longline fisherman Sean Martin to a seat on the 
     Western Pacific Fishery Management Council. Martin is also 
     co-owner, with Jim Cook, of Pacific Ocean Producers, a 
     fishing equipment supply company.
       Longlining kills endangered sea turtles when they become 
     entangled in the 60 mile long fishing lines baited for 
     swordfish and other commercial fish species.
       On September 23, the Western Pacific Fishery Management 
     Council decided whether or not to reopen swordfishing in 
     Hawaiian waters through which endangered leatherback turtles 
     migrate. Biologists told the council the rule would harm 144 
     sea turtles per year, but on a motion by Martin, the council 
     voted 8-5 to reopen the fishery. The September 23 vote may 
     also lead to violations of the Endangered Species Act. ``It 
     would authorize a far higher number of sea turtle takes than 
     the scientific record supports,'' says William Hogarth, 
     assistant administrator of the National Marine Fisheries 
     Service, now known as NOAA Fisheries.
       Some fisheries management councils do take action to 
     protect fish species. On November 21, following action taken 
     by the federal Pacific Fishery Management Council and 
     conforming action taken by the state of California, 
     recreational and most commercial fisheries for nearshore 
     rockfishes, shelf rockfishes, California scorpionfish 
     (sculpin), and lingcod will close in all Pacific waters. ``In 
     past years, anglers had more opportunities to fish for 
     rockfish in deeper waters. This year, fishing for rockfish 
     was limited to waters shallower than l20 feet which put 
     greater pressure on nearshore species,'' explained Fred 
     Wendell, California Department of Fish and Game nearshore 
     fishery manager. And some fish populations are doing well. 
     The Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council released survey 
     data in June showing summer flounder numbers had reached the 
     highest levels ever recorded since the survey began in 1968.
       ``The robust recovery of the summer flounder stock is a 
     direct reflection of the positive impacts that the management 
     measures have had on the resource,'' said Dr. Christopher 
     Moore, council deputy director. ``The Council and Commission 
     should be extremely proud of the management decisions they 
     have made over the years to rebuild summer flounder.'' Still, 
     many members of the four fisheries management councils polled 
     by the authors of ``Taking Stock'' agreed that there are 
     problems with the current system and that these problems 
     should be addressed.
       Eagle, Thompson, and Newkirk report that more than half of 
     the council members polled said environmental interests are 
     underrepresented on the councils. Roughly a third of the 
     respondents said they had felt it unfair in one or more past 
     instances for a fellow council member to participate in a 
     decision in which he or she had a financial interest. A 
     similar percentage expressed concern about decisions in which 
     the relatives or friends of voting council members had a 
     financial interest in the outcome.
       Eagle, Thompson, and Newkirk call for changes in federal 
     policy on fisheries management councils that would institute 
     the

[[Page S5049]]

     same standards of ``good government'' that apply to other 
     federal and state agencies charged with managing U.S. natural 
     resources. First, they say Congress should separate the 
     institutional decisionmaking responsibilities for 
     conservation and quota allocation. To broaden council 
     representation, Congress could require governors to submit a 
     more diverse list of candidates, or require that nominations 
     be made by an independent body such as the National Academy 
     of Sciences, they recommend. And finally, only federal 
     management exempts federal decisionmakers, the council 
     members, from conflicts of interest. Remedies suggested by 
     the authors include lowering the recusal threshold and 
     prohibiting those holding financial interests in regulated 
     fisheries from council appointment.
                                  ____


                 [From the Baltimore Sun, Apr. 1, 2007]

Oystermen Reap Federal Bounty--Bid To Revive Bivalve Benefits Watermen 
                                  More

                   (By Rona Kobell and Greg Garland)

       At the Hyatt Regency resort in Cambridge, several dozen 
     scientists, watermen and government regulators gathered to 
     sip martinis and mingle over hors d'oeuvres. Later, there 
     were cheers and tributes as they dined on crab and filet 
     mignon. The mood was celebratory at January's annual meeting 
     of the Oyster Recovery Partnership. Yet the government-
     financed nonprofit has made little progress toward its stated 
     mission of restoring oysters to the Chesapeake Bay. Maryland 
     officials set up the group more than a decade ago in what was 
     envisioned as a groundbreaking attempt to revive a species 
     all but destroyed by overharvesting and disease. Since 2002 
     alone, the partnership has received $10 million in federal 
     funds to lead Maryland's efforts to make oysters an abundant, 
     self-sustaining species again.
       The way to do that, leading scientists say, is to leave the 
     shellfish in the water so they can reproduce and propagate 
     the species. But the partnership puts most of its oysters in 
     places where watermen can take them out--and sell them for 
     roughly $30 a bushel. ``If you're serious about the 
     ecological value of oysters, then they must remain in the bay 
     and live,'' said veteran oyster biologist George Krantz, 
     former fisheries director at the Maryland Department of 
     Natural Resources. The partnership's spending has done more 
     to create income for watermen than bring back the Maryland 
     oyster, an investigation by The Sun has found. The group not 
     only provides watermen a crop to harvest, but it also pays 
     them to do work that many scientists say has little merit. 
     The Sun found:
       While the partnership has planted tens of millions of 
     hatchery-raised oysters, less than a third have been put in 
     protected sanctuaries. Most are planted in places where they 
     can be harvested.
       The group is paying the Maryland Watermen's Association 
     nearly $400,000 this year to remove diseased oysters from one 
     part of the bay and dump them in another. Proponents say this 
     practice helps other oysters survive, but it has no proven 
     scientific value. Critics say a primary benefit is to provide 
     work for watermen.
       The head of the Watermen's Association sits on the 
     partnership's board and is among those who benefit 
     financially from the federal grants. Association president 
     Larry Simns Sr. doled out tens of thousands of dollars of the 
     grant money to watermen last year to help plant or move 
     oysters. Also, he collected $40,100 for supervising their 
     work.
       The group used $46,000 in federal funds to hold its annual 
     meeting at the Hyatt Regency, a golf resort and spa. The 
     money went not just for the fancy dinner but also for hotel 
     rooms for 50 of the guests. Private funds were used only for 
     the alcohol.
       While solid figures are not available, the Department of 
     Natural Resources estimates that there are fewer oysters in 
     the Chesapeake today than when the Oyster Recovery 
     Partnership began its work in 1994. Its efforts have failed 
     to overcome the devastating impact of two oyster parasites, 
     MSX and Dermo, that have all but wiped out the oyster 
     population. Partnership officials nonetheless consider their 
     work a huge success. ``We're certainly doing infinitely 
     better than what has been done in the past,'' said Torrey C. 
     Brown, a former state natural resources secretary who now 
     serves as the partnership's unpaid chairman. He is proud of 
     the group's extensive oyster-planting program. Partnership 
     officials say it makes sense to let watermen harvest many of 
     those oysters because the shellfish would die eventually of 
     disease. They point out that in the several years before the 
     oysters are harvested, they help the bay by filtering away 
     pollution. ``The idea that it is a watermen's welfare program 
     is nonsense,'' Brown said. ``I don't think that they're 
     getting any untoward benefit.''
       Though the partnership gets millions in federal funds, it 
     operates with virtually no governmental oversight. The group 
     gets the money as the result of a budget ``earmark'' arranged 
     by Sen. Barbara Mikulski, a Maryland Democrat, and the grant 
     is distributed. by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric 
     Administration. A top NOAA official acknowledged that his 
     agency hasn't intervened as the partnership used the grant to 
     run programs that he said are effectively subsidies for 
     watermen. Because the money was approved specifically for the 
     partnership through an earmark, agency officials believed 
     they had no authority to interfere, said Lowell Bahner, a 
     NOAA administrator who until recently oversaw the agency's 
     Chesapeake Bay office.
       ``Senator Mikulski said, `I want oysters in the water for 
     harvest by watermen,' '' Bahner said. ``Is that a subsidy? 
     That's what it looks like. And I think she would be proud of 
     that.'' Mikulski declined to be interviewed for this article. 
     But in a written response to questions from The Sun, she said 
     she expected NOAA ``to have strong oversight'' of how the 
     grant was being spent. In addition, she said the money ``was 
     never intended to be a subsidy for industry or watermen.'' 
     ``Unlike farm subsidies, this does not guarantee revenue for 
     watermen or industry,'' Mikulski said. ``This was intended . 
     . . to help jumpstart restoration for the economic and 
     environmental health of the Bay.''
       Many scientists question why the partnership is spending 
     millions of federal dollars to plant oysters, only to let 
     watermen take them before they can reach full reproductive 
     potential. ``You can't justify doing it,'' said Krantz. ``The 
     agenda has virtually excluded any scientific personnel who 
     voiced opposition to this concept. . . . The decision to take 
     them out is based on a harvester's wishes, not a 
     conservationist's wishes.''


                              rock bottom

       The Oyster Recovery Partnership traces its roots to the 
     winter of 1993, when Maryland's oyster industry hit rock 
     bottom. Watermen harvested fewer than 80,000 bushels of 
     oysters that season, taking home about $1 million. Just a 
     decade earlier, they were bringing in more than a million 
     bushels, which fetched $16 million at the dock. In the years 
     before that, the harvests were even better, providing a 
     stable income for thousands of people who earned their living 
     on the water.
       The fast decline of the oyster was alarming not just 
     because it was putting watermen out of a job. Oystering was 
     part of Maryland's identity, the old-fashioned simplicity of 
     the work immortalized in sepia-toned photographs of watermen 
     plying their wooden tongs from sail-powered skipjacks. The 
     collapse of the species was of tremendous concern to 
     scientists. Oysters are the backbone of many aquatic 
     communities, providing reefs that are crucial habitat for 
     crabs and small fish. They are also critical to the health of 
     the Chesapeake because, as they suck in water to filter out 
     food, they literally filter away pollution.
       Among those most concerned was Brown, then Maryland's 
     secretary of natural resources. He gathered everyone he could 
     think of with a stake in keeping oysters healthy, assembling 
     in one room a motley coalition of 40--watermen, regulators, 
     legislators, university professors. He hired a facilitator to 
     calm tensions at what became known as the Oyster Roundtable. 
     No one was allowed to leave the table until everyone agreed 
     on what to do next.
       But as further meetings were held, Brown said, it was clear 
     the warring parties didn't trust each other. So he suggested 
     creating a nonprofit agency that would get the various groups 
     involved in an effort to bring back oysters. It would not be 
     a research organization--plenty of those already existed. 
     Rather, it would work with scientists and watermen to plant 
     oysters in the water and monitor their progress. Ideally, the 
     group would receive a small amount of government money, but 
     it would also raise private funds.
       The Oyster Recovery Partnership was formally created in 
     1994, under a board that today numbers 18 people, including 
     seafood executives, other businessmen and environmentalists. 
     Its purpose, according to a written agreement with the state, 
     was to develop projects to promote ``the ecological 
     restoration of oysters in the Chesapeake Bay.'' The agreement 
     says nothing about helping watermen. But the group's first 
     office was in a back room of the Maryland Watermen's 
     Association headquarters in Annapolis. The partnership has 
     since moved into space across the hall. The organization got 
     off to a rocky start. It never raised the private money its 
     founders had hoped for, and its small staff often seemed 
     overwhelmed. By 2000, the group had gone through two 
     executive directors and was in poor financial shape. It 
     advertised for a new executive director and interviewed 
     dozens of candidates. Charles Frentz was one of the last. ``I 
     told them, `I am either going to put you out of business or 
     straighten you out,' '' Frentz recalls.


                            a lack of focus

       Frentz conceded that he knew little about the biology of 
     the bay--he had spent much of his career running several 
     horse racing businesses in Florida, including one that put on 
     the prestigious Breeders' Cup. He said he hadn't been looking 
     for a job; he was retired and had moved to Maryland largely 
     to marry his high-school sweetheart, an executive at the 
     Social Security Administration. But he brought with him a 
     passion for the bay that came from growing up near Sparrows 
     Point and spending summers at a family home in Tolchester 
     Beach, trawling for soft-shell crabs. More importantly, he 
     said, he could apply sound management practices to a 
     foundering organization. ``It was almost a feel-good 
     situation where you had good intentions, but there was a lack 
     of business focus,'' Frentz said. ``There was no question 
     that I challenged how they did business, why they did 
     business and how they would do business in the future.''
       When Frentz came on board, the partnership was getting 
     about $450,000 from NOAA and had little other income. It was 
     using volunteers to plant small clusters of oysters on

[[Page S5050]]

     tiny plots throughout the bay. If the partnership had any 
     prayer of significantly increasing the number of oysters in 
     the Chesapeake, Frentz reasoned, it would need to plant many 
     more baby oysters. To do that, it would need more money.
       Frentz persuaded Donald Meritt, the manager of the 
     University of Maryland's Horn Point hatchery, to produce more 
     oysters, promising to get money to upgrade the facility. 
     Frentz also cultivated Mikulski, who had been earmarking 
     money for the partnership. In his first year in the job, 
     Frentz nearly doubled the ORP's federal funding, to $850,000. 
     By 2002, the group was getting $1 million; by 2004, $2 
     million. Last year, the funding doubled again to about $4 
     million.
       As the money increased, so did Frentz's pay. He was hired 
     for $58,000 in 2000, according to the partnership. By the 
     time he retired three months ago, he was earning $151,000, 
     most of it from federal funds. He still gets $10,000 a month 
     as a consultant. Frentz frequently praised Mikulski, even 
     presenting a video tribute to the woman he called ``Our Bay 
     Lady.'' She returned the compliments. In a 2004 letter to 
     Frentz, she called him ``just about the best thing that has 
     happened to the Chesapeake Bay since the skipjack.''


                            helping watermen

       The idea of using government money to help watermen isn't 
     new. The Maryland Department of Natural Resources has for 
     years run oyster programs that are essentially subsidies. The 
     state agency moves baby oysters from the lower Chesapeake, 
     where they are abundant naturally, and spreads them around 
     the bay. A committee of oystermen tells the department where 
     they want this ``seed,'' as the babies are called, and the 
     department delivers. The idea is to help watermen from upper 
     bay counties earn a living, state officials say. The agency 
     has been doing this for decades. But when parasites began to 
     attack the bay's oysters in the 1970s and 1980s, this 
     practice turned out to have a down side. The parasites that 
     attack oysters thrive in the same salty waters where oysters 
     reproduce. So when the state moved oyster seed to lower-salt 
     waters, the parasites hitched a ride--spreading disease.
       Initially, state officials thought that wouldn't happen 
     because they believed the parasites wouldn't survive in the 
     fresh water of the upper bay. Once it was clear the parasites 
     would survive, the department continued to move the seed 
     around anyway, arguing that since the bay's oyster population 
     was so far gone, stopping the program wouldn't lessen disease 
     and would only hurt watermen. ``History is what it is,'' said 
     Chris Judy, the department's longtime shellfish director, 
     explaining why the practice has continued. ``The time to 
     [say] `Let's not move diseased seed' was at the beginning.''


                            managed reserves

       Charlie Frentz didn't want to spend millions of dollars to 
     plant disease-resistant oysters only to have the state turn 
     around and deposit diseased seed nearby. So he asked the 
     watermen to turn down the state's seed. He said the 
     partnership would instead provide hatchery-raised oysters 
     that would eventually be available for harvest. The oysters 
     would be planted on special bars that he called ``managed 
     reserves.''
       Normally, watermen can take oysters from the bay when they 
     are 3 inches long. In the managed reserves, they had to wait 
     until the oysters were 4 inches. The larger size meant the 
     oysters would have an extra year or so to live in the bay. 
     But after the first year, when one waterman was so mad about 
     the restrictions that he threw an oyster hammer at Larry 
     Simns, the partnership changed the rules. Today, when half a 
     bar's oysters reach 4 inches, watermen also can remove the 3-
     inch oysters.
       Meritt, the hatchery manager, calls the managed reserve ``a 
     really nice compromise'' because it gives many oysters an 
     extra year in the bay to provide ecological benefits. But 
     other scientists say the program is nothing more than an 
     expensive put-and-take fishery falsely billed as restoration. 
     An oyster's ability to reproduce increases exponentially with 
     each year it survives. So harvesting the animal after just 
     four years--about the time it takes to reach 4 inches--cuts 
     off its life span at a critical time, according to Krantz, 
     the former fisheries chief.
       He estimates that if an oyster reaches 5 or 6 inches, it 
     will have a 3,000 percent increase in reproductive 
     capability. Krantz and other scientists say it's crucial to 
     leave the oysters in the water; even if many will die of 
     disease, the ones that live will help propagate a species 
     that can withstand disease. Of the 950 million hatchery-
     raised oysters that the partnership has planted since 2000, 
     more than half have gone into managed reserves. About 100 
     million were planted for harvesting without any special 
     restrictions. Only about 265 million were put in oyster 
     sanctuaries where harvesting is prohibited. The sanctuary 
     oysters have done better than many expected. About 20 percent 
     of them are still alive, according to Kennedy T. Paynter Jr., 
     a University of Maryland scientist who is paid by the 
     partnership to monitor its bars. That survival rate is good, 
     Paynter said, given that half of the oysters planted anywhere 
     in the bay are expected to die in the first year. The numbers 
     appear to contradict the watermen's assertions that if 
     oysters are not harvested, they will just die of disease. 
     ``To use that as an excuse to harvest is a logical 
     absurdity,'' said University of Maryland oyster biologist 
     Roger Newell. ``If an oyster is harvested, there is a 100 
     percent chance of it dying.'' If you leave it at the 
     bottom, he said, there is a chance it will live.


                              bar-cleaning

       More lucrative for Simns and some other watermen has been 
     the ``bar-cleaning'' work--removing diseased adult oysters 
     from some of the partnership's bars and dumping them in 
     another spot. Watermen will return to the spot later to 
     harvest the oysters for private sale; while disease 
     eventually kills the shellfish, infected oysters are safe for 
     people to eat. So the watermen earn money twice in this 
     process. They are paid by the partnership to move the 
     diseased oysters, and then they get to harvest them. The bar-
     cleaning work is done in the spring, between the end of 
     oyster season and the start of crabbing season--a period when 
     many watermen have time on their hands. But removing the bad 
     oysters is also good for the bay, according to Paynter.
       When oysters die, they gape open and spread disease. So 
     it's important, Paynter said, to get them out while they're 
     alive. Paynter said, however, there is no scientific benefit 
     to putting the diseased oysters back in the bay for watermen 
     to harvest later. ``Really,'' he said, ``we'd like to take 
     the diseased oysters out and put them into the driveway.'' 
     Other scientists and state officials say bar cleaning has 
     little merit even in terms of removing disease. A state study 
     in 2005 showed that bar cleaning leaves behind infected 
     oysters.
       ``Bar cleaning may buy you a little bit of time to produce 
     more market-size oysters, but eventually disease is going to 
     take hold,'' said DNR assistant fisheries director Tom 
     O'Connell. He argues the partnership shouldn't be spending so 
     much money on bar cleaning until it is studied more. Despite 
     the lack of scientific evidence that the process works, the 
     ORP allocated almost $400,000 of this year's $4 million 
     federal grant to the Maryland Watermen's Association for bar 
     cleaning. Simns, a member of the ORP's executive board, hands 
     out that money--wearing his hat as president of the 
     Watermen's Association. He says he uses a process that is 
     above board and fair.
       He sends out ``bid forms'' to the roughly 500 watermen who 
     have oyster licenses asking them to suggest a daily price for 
     the work, he said. Then, Simns said, he sets a rate based on 
     the average of the bids he receives--last year, $450 a day. 
     He gives work to pretty much everyone who asks, Simns said, 
     about 50 watermen last year.
       Simns acknowledges that he used ORP money to pay himself 
     $40,100 last year, in part to supervise this work that is 
     done by men who are members of his association. The people 
     who are paid include his son, Larry Jr., who gets $100 day as 
     a crewman on his father's boat, partnership records show. The 
     Watermen's Association itself gets about $65,000 of the money 
     for administering the contract--money it uses for operating 
     expenses. As for his own pay, Simns argues that the 
     partnership needs him to oversee the work--he has been 
     working the water since he was a boy, and he knows all the 
     watermen. ``It's better for ORP to have someone like the 
     Watermen's Association manage the watermen,'' said Simns, 70. 
     ``They can't blow smoke at me, because I know. I've done all 
     that stuff.''
       He said Frentz assured him that his role in the Watermen's 
     Association was not a problem--that he could be on the ORP 
     board at the same time he was getting money from an ORP 
     grant. ``I don't vote on anything that has to do with the 
     Maryland Watermen's Association,'' Simns said. But his 
     position as a member of a nonprofit's board who derives 
     financial benefits from the relationship raises conflict-of-
     interest questions. Daniel Borochoff, president of the 
     American Institute of Philanthropy, a watchdog group that 
     monitors nonprofits, said it generally is not good practice 
     for an organization to pay one of its governing board members 
     for services. ``A board member receiving money to perform 
     services, that is frowned upon,'' he said.
       According to Simns, the other watermen net from $100 to 
     $125 from their $450 barcleaning checks after paying for gas 
     and the expense of keeping up a boat. Nevertheless, it can be 
     an important source of income, said Floyd ``Bunky'' Chance, 
     an Eastern Shore waterman. ``Everyone who participates likes 
     it, for the income if nothing else. . . . Most watermen are 
     just trying to keep the wolf from the door,'' he said.


                             hey, trust us

       NOAA officials acknowledge that they have done little to 
     manage or oversee the money their agency gets from the 
     earmark and passes on to the Oyster Recovery Partnership. The 
     agency does not scrutinize the partnership's salaries, 
     administrative expenses or the money it spends on its annual 
     banquet, said NOAA grant manager Rich Takacs. ``It's up to 
     the organization receiving the funds to use their internally 
     approved business practices,'' Takacs said.
       When asked for copies of the partnership's contracts with 
     the Watermen's Association for bar cleaning and other work, 
     Takacs said he didn't have any. The partnership wasn't asked 
     to provide them, he said. Takacs said the partnership's 
     approach to its bar cleaning and oyster planting operations 
     has been ``a lot of `Hey, trust us.' '' Unlike many other 
     NOAA grantees, which provide detailed reports on their 
     scientific work, the partnership provides only cursory 
     reports of one to two pages with a broad general description 
     of its work, he said.

[[Page S5051]]

       As a result, there has been no comprehensive assessment of 
     what the $10 million in federal funds granted to the 
     partnership in the past five years has done to help the cause 
     of restoring oysters to the bay, NOAA officials said. Even in 
     terms of helping watermen, the program almost certainly is 
     not cost-effective, partnership and NOAA officials admit. A 
     government analysis of the Department of Natural Resources 
     seed-moving program showed that, for every dollar the state 
     spent to create a crop for watermen to harvest, the watermen 
     earned 13 cents in oyster sales.
       Bahner, who ran NOAA's Chesapeake Bay office until last 
     year and has taken a job at the agency's Silver Spring 
     headquarters, said he believes the partnership is making a 
     valuable contribution to the bay in planting millions of 
     oysters. He also said, however, that Mikulski's earmark put 
     his agency in a difficult position.
       Federal scientists and grant managers wanted to ensure that 
     the money was used in the best way to restore oysters, he 
     said. But partnership officials argued that the program was 
     designed to help watermen and that NOAA's job was to hand 
     over the checks. ``When the program started, it was 
     primarily, `Put the oysters in the water for the watermen,''' 
     Bahner said. ``You've got this whole watermen's community. 
     It's a subsidy program.''
                                  ____


                [From the Baltimore Sun, Apr. 14, 2007]

  Oyster Grants to State Disputed--Senator Asks Details on $10 Million

                           (By Greg Garland)

       A conservative Oklahoma senator who wants to eliminate 
     congressional earmarks has asked a federal agency for a 
     detailed explanation of how $10 million in government grants 
     for oyster recovery has been spent in Maryland.
       In a letter to the head of the National Oceanic and 
     Atmospheric Administration, U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn said he was 
     ``very concerned'' about questionable spending practices 
     detailed in an article in The Sun about the Maryland's Oyster 
     Recovery Partnership. ``It sounds like a dubious use of 
     federal dollars and raises a lot of questions,'' Roland R. 
     Foster, an aide to the Oklahoma Republican, said yesterday. 
     The partnership, a nonprofit group charged with trying to 
     restore oysters to the Chesapeake Bay, receives its annual 
     funding through a federal budget ``earmark'' arranged by U.S. 
     Sen. BARBARA A. MIKULSKI, a Maryland Democrat.
       The Sun reported this month that while the group has 
     planted nearly a billion hatchery-raised oysters since 2000, 
     less than a third have been put in protected sanctuaries. 
     Most have been planted in places where they can be harvested 
     by watermen and sold. The newspaper also found that the 
     partnership is paying the Maryland Watermen's Association 
     nearly $400,000 this year to remove diseased oysters from one 
     part of the bay and dump them in another. Proponents say this 
     practice helps other oysters survive, but it has no proven 
     scientific value. Critics say its primary purpose is to 
     provide income for watermen. The partnership also used 
     $46,000 in federal funds to hold its annual dinner at the 
     Hyatt Regency golf resort and spa in Cambridge, The Sun 
     reported. Meanwhile, the bay's oyster population remains at 
     historic lows.
       In the letter to NOAA chief Conrad C. Lautenbacher Jr., 
     Coburn questioned how the earmarked funds were being used. 
     ``What oversight has NOAA conducted of this specific grant?'' 
     Coburn asked. ``[P]articularly was NOAA aware that funds were 
     being used for banquets or of the financial conflicts of 
     interest between staff and organizations receiving funding?''
       Coburn also asked for reports on how the partnership is 
     doing in meeting its stated goals and whether its federally 
     funded efforts have been cost effective. Monica Allen, a 
     spokeswoman for NOAA, declined to comment on Coburn's letter 
     but said the agency would provide a copy of its response when 
     it is completed and sent to Coburn. Stephan Abel, executive 
     director of the Oyster Recovery Partnership, said, ``It would 
     be inappropriate to comment until NOAA has had the 
     opportunity to respond.'' Foster said Coburn has attempted to 
     focus attention on earmarks as part of a campaign to end what 
     he regards as wasteful government spending. A year ago, 
     Coburn and Arizona Sen. John McCain sent a letter to all 100 
     U.S. senators announcing they would challenge every earmark, 
     or ``pork project,'' on the Senate floor.
       The problem with earmarks, Foster said, is they are made 
     based on political connections and aren't subject to 
     competition or stringent oversight. Coburn said The Sun's 
     article about the Oyster Recovery Partnership's spending 
     raises larger concerns about how NOAA handles its federal 
     grants. ``Is this one example the exception, or is this a 
     widespread problem at NOAA?'' Foster asked. Lautenbacher has 
     taken issue with The Sun's findings, saying in a recent 
     letter to the newspaper that his agency provides adequate 
     oversight of the federal funds provided to the partnership.
       NOAA officials have pointed to the fact that the 
     partnership has hired an auditor each year to do a standard 
     financial review to comply with federal requirements. In 
     2006, Senator Mikulski asked NOAA for ``an independent 
     audit'' of the partnership. In response, records show, the 
     partnership had its usual accounting firm review its own 
     audit reports from prior years. The firm found its reports to 
     be appropriate.

  Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, it has come to mind that NOAA, when they 
do the grants, lets the grantee set the terms of oversight. I ask 
unanimous consent to have printed in the Record from NOAA's official 
Web site their financial assistance application for their grants where 
they ask the grantee what kind of oversight they want rather than 
setting it up themselves.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                 NOAA Financial Assistance Application


                         C. Federal Involvement

       C1. Is the proposed activity going to be conducted in 
     partnership with NOAA or would the proposed activity require 
     NOAA's direct involvement, activity, or oversight? If yes, 
     describe NOAA's involvement, activity, or oversight, 
     including the name of the office or program that is involved.
       C2. Would the proposed activity involve any other federal 
     agency(ies) partnership, direct involvement, activity, or 
     oversight? If yes, provide the name(s) of the agency(ies) and 
     describe its involvement, activity, or oversight.

  Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, let me describe what has happened. There 
was an earmark which NOAA believed they did not have the responsibility 
to oversee, since it was an earmark, in terms of rehabitating oyster 
beds. We have seen from the investigations so far that it has been 
highly ineffective. But more importantly, what we have seen is 
conflicts of interest in terms of the board that manages the program 
and the ownership of the companies that are given the grant money.
  I won't go into the details. Senator Mikulski is in agreement that 
they should be oversighted and looked at and conflict of interest 
should be eliminated. This amendment is very simple. It just says that 
ought to happen and there ought to be a review, there ought to be a 
prohibition of use of NOAA funds for meetings. There is $46,000 yearly 
going out for a meeting out of this grant money with no real concern. 
There is no conflict of interest requirement in the grant authority-
making process at NOAA. So this amendment simply sets out that we ought 
to have basic conflict of interest rules of engagement in the grant-
making process with NOAA.
  I reserve the remainder of my time.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, let me speak, again regretfully, against 
the Senator's amendment, and I do so first on behalf of Senator Inouye 
as chairman of the Commerce Committee. This is, of course, within the 
jurisdiction of the Commerce Committee. The provisions of the amendment 
relate to the Department of Commerce and NOAA, and the statement I have 
been given by Senator Inouye is pretty straightforward and says the 
amendment, while possibly based on good intentions, actually causes 
substantial harm to numerous NOAA programs and activities and missions.
  Some of the specifics cited are that the provision requiring that 
audits be posted on the Web within 60 days does not contain safeguards 
for proprietary information that may have been gathered as a result of 
the audit. Also, a concern has been raised about the prohibition in 
section B on the use of NOAA funds for meetings. The provision in the 
amendment says:

       No funds made available by the administrator through a 
     grant or contract can be used by the person who received the 
     grant or the contract to attend any conference other than a 
     conference related to training or routine meetings of 
     officers or employees of the administration.

  One of the basic activities scientists and engineers engage in is 
doing their research and then presenting that research at conferences 
so they can have reaction from their colleagues and their peers and 
have an interchange about the validity of the work they have done. This 
would prohibit the use of funds for that purpose, which is one reason 
it would be objectionable.
  The other concern that has been raised is we are setting up a 
separate procedure here with regard to handling conflict of interest 
issues at NOAA which would be separate and apart from the general 
procedures the Federal Government has with regard to grant review 
processes. The thought is that those general processes should be made 
to apply and we should not be writing into law, particularly as an 
amendment to this legislation, some kind of separate provision and 
requirement with regard to just this one agency within the Department 
of Commerce

[[Page S5052]]

under the jurisdiction of the Commerce Committee.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, what you just heard was a denial that we 
need oversight and that people shouldn't be accountable for how they 
spend Federal dollars. The fact is, this is one program and one 
meeting. This doesn't stop meetings. This doesn't stop any legitimate 
function. This was a golf tournament and a meeting for 2 days that cost 
$46,000 of Federal funds. I will tell you, NOAA does not have any 
conflict of interest rules presently in their guidelines.
  So what the Senator is saying is, leave it the way it is today. Let's 
don't change it. That is exactly the problem, because this didn't come 
through the Commerce Committee. They would have fixed it, as Senator 
Stevens fixed the fishery boards. Instead, what we are trying to do 
with this is to fix the same thing Senator Stevens did with the fishery 
boards. Because it didn't come through committee, that didn't get 
attached. Now that we want to attach it on the floor, we don't want to 
have that done.
  The fact is, there is no oversight catalyst with these grant 
programs. By defeating this amendment, we are going to continue saying 
there is none. If you don't like this amendment, then fix it in 
conference. There is no reason why we shouldn't hold these grants to 
the light of day. There is no reason why they shouldn't be transparent. 
Everything in this Government should be transparent.
  There is nothing in these grants that is fiduciary or private that 
shouldn't be exposed. The fact is, if you are going to take money from 
the Federal Government, the American people ought to know what you do 
with it. What we are saying is, we don't want that to happen. That is 
what defeating this amendment means. It means more secrecy, less 
transparency. It means, by the way, if there is a financial conflict of 
interest, don't worry about it, we don't want to hold them accountable.
  I understand the resistance, but the American people won't understand 
the resistance. The real problem we are faced with is our Government is 
so big and into so many things that we don't know where it is being 
handled right or wrong. This is one small step to say there shouldn't 
be a conflict of interest. There ought to be reporting, there ought to 
be oversight, which there is not. We ought to be asking the GAO to 
oversee it and to look at it. That is all it does.
  Mr. President, I will rest with the will of the body on that 
amendment.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Who yields time?
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I wonder if the Senator from Oklahoma 
would permit me a couple of minutes to comment on something.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Tennessee is 
recognized.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I want to describe how this bill got to 
the floor because it has been suggested it might not have come through 
committee. The energy parts of this bill were fully considered by the 
Energy Committee when it was chaired by Senator Domenici last year, and 
it was then reported to the Senate in March. The Commerce Committee 
parts of it were fully considered by the Commerce Committee in May or 
June and reported to the full Senate then. The only parts of the 
legislation that didn't go through the regular committee process were 
from the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. That was the decision 
of that committee to do that. They had a series of roundtables and a 
series of meetings and made recommendations to the working group.
  The working group then had meetings with the administration 
officials, and Senator Domenici presided over most of them--we called 
them homework sessions--and then Senator Frist and Senator Reid 
introduced this legislation last October. It has been public all that 
time. Then Senator Reid and Senator McConnell introduced the 
legislation in January of this year, and it has been public all that 
time.
  I wanted to make sure it was known that this is legislation that has 
been fully exposed to the light of day, whatever the merits. I am not 
commenting on the merits of the comments of the Senator from Oklahoma, 
but I did want everyone to be reminded of the process through which 
this went to get to the floor.
  Mr. President, I thank the Senator for his courtesy.


                           Amendment No. 921

  Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending 
amendment be set aside, and that amendment No. 921 be called up.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, the amendment 
will be set aside, and the clerk will report the amendment.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Oklahoma [Mr. Coburn] proposes amendment 
     No. 921.

  The amendment is as follows:

    (Purpose: To discontinue the Advanced Technology Program of the 
            National Institute of Standards and Technology)

       At the appropriate place, insert the following:

     SEC. __. DISCONTINUATION OF THE ADVANCED TECHNOLOGY PROGRAM.

       (a) Repeal.--Section 28 of the Act of March 3, 1901 (15 
     U.S.C. 278n) is repealed.
       (b) Unobligated Balances.--Any amounts appropriated for the 
     Advanced Technology Program of the National Institute of 
     Standards and Technology, which are unobligated as of the 
     effective date of this section, shall be deposited in the 
     General Fund of the Treasury of the United States for debt 
     reduction.
       (c) Effective Date.--This section shall take effect on the 
     date that is 90 days after the date of the enactment of this 
     Act.

  Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, this is an amendment to eliminate the 
Advanced Technology Program. I see the Senator from Michigan is here, 
and I am sure she will mount a rigorous defense in regard to it.
  There are some things people should be aware of. We had an oversight 
hearing on this program in my Federal Financial Management 
Subcommittee. We showed it to be ineffective. Between 1990 and 2004, 35 
percent of the $2 billion of this program went to Fortune 500 
companies--Fortune 500 companies--with 65 percent of the grants under 
this program never being asked to be funded outside of the program. In 
other words, they never went to the private sector. Almost two-thirds 
never attempted to get funding in the private sector.
  This was a program that was designed to help with technology. It 
wasn't designed to be a corporate welfare program. In fact, what has 
happened is that five companies since 1990 have consumed $376 million 
of this money. Let me tell you who the companies were. They were: 
General Motors, hardly in need of taxpayer money to fund research; IBM, 
hardly in need of taxpayer money to fund research; General Electric, 
hardly in need of taxpayer money to fund research; Minnesota Mining, 
3M; and Motorola. Their combined revenues yearly are in excess of $50 
billion.
  We are going to see a large defense of this program, because there 
have been some instances where it has done some good. I don't deny 
that. But for the $2 billion we have spent on it, what have we gotten? 
The House has eliminated this program, by the way. We decreased it over 
the last 2 years. This is a program that is not working efficiently, is 
not working effectively, and we are not getting great return for our 
money.
  Mr. President, with that, I will withhold the rest of my comments and 
retain the balance of my time.
  Mr. DOMENICI. Would the Senator yield for 30 seconds to the Senator 
from New Mexico?
  Mr. COBURN. I believe you all still have time.
  Mr. DOMENICI. I intend to vote for your NOAA amendment, and I 
compliment you on what it does. I do think you have some merit in the 
other amendments, including the last one. It is just very hard to do 
that kind of thing now on this bill.
  I think you have raised some real points about that big program. We 
ought to be careful when we have a $2 billion program, and we are not. 
It is not getting out there to small and independent businesses that 
have to go and seek private assistance, and you have made good points. 
It is just hard to do it on this bill.
  The NOAA amendment, I am telling you in advance, I am for you.
  Mr. COBURN. I thank the Senator for his comments. I would note that 
the House didn't find it hard to eliminate ATP on their component piece 
of legislation that will be matched up with

[[Page S5053]]

this and, in fact, last year we eliminated ATP in the funding cycle on 
the appropriations side.
  I know there are some positive things about the program, but overall 
it is a poor investment for the Federal taxpayer.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor at the present time, and I reserve 
the remainder of my time.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Who yields time?
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I yield 5 minutes to the Senator from 
Michigan.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Michigan is 
recognized for 5 minutes.
  Ms. STABENOW. Mr. President, I appreciate the leadership role Senator 
Bingaman and Senator Alexander are playing on this critical bill, as 
well as Senator Domenici and others who have worked on putting together 
this legislation.
  It makes no sense to eliminate the Advanced Technology Program. In 
fact, the House is renaming it but extending the very same approach in 
terms of a partnership for the kind of research that takes place after 
basic research.
  I might say that 65 percent of the ATP awards have gone to small 
businesses, many of them small- and medium-sized manufacturers. The 
reality is that, yes, our large employers and small have joined 
together with universities, with the Federal Government, and with 
Federal labs to do partnerships where the Federal Government puts up 
half the money and they put up half the money to do the kinds of 
research to move the industry forward in order to be able to compete in 
a global economy.
  Frankly, this is one of the areas where we are woefully behind, I 
would suggest to my friend from Oklahoma. We are woefully behind. One 
example of this is in advanced battery technology. While we are 
developing the basic science in the United States, it is Japan and 
China and South Korea that are taking the next steps to make those 
batteries. A $50 million investment in Japan alone; a 5-year commitment 
from China of over $100 million; a 5-year commitment from South Korea 
of over $100 million. Yet in our budget in the United States we have 
$11 million to focus on what is one of the most critical parts of 
technology to move forward on alternative fuels and new breakthroughs.
  ATP is different. It is unique among Federal research programs. Most 
research is focused on advanced scientific knowledge, but there is a 
very long road from scientific discovery in a university lab to the 
commercialization of that product. This is in between that. You might 
call it a bridge project, or a bridge loan. This is that in-between 
period before industry feels confident enough to pick it up and move 
forward with it.
  The goal of ATP is to push basic research knowledge into the 
innovation pipeline. That is what it is all about. When we add more 
dollars to increase basic research, we have to make sure we are also 
not creating a bottleneck in that innovation pipeline. We have to be 
able to fund the next step in that partnership. I would suggest this 
has been a tremendous investment in terms of what has actually 
happened.
  The ATP programs have succeeded in a wide range of fields. There is 
no question, when you are doing this research it is basic research. By 
the way, we give the R&D tax credit to those same large companies my 
colleagues spoke about. We give it to large companies and small 
companies to do basic research--no different. This is the next step.
  We have seen wide-ranging successes. They have already delivered on 
cheaper, better bone marrow transplants, mammograms, cartilage repair. 
They are enabling companies to make biodegradable plastics from corn, 
improving manufacturing, and powering longer lasting lightweight fuel 
cells, all of which are critical for our future.
  The Advanced Technology Program has made investments in 
nanotechnology. They were making them long before anybody knew what 
nanotechnology was, along with investments in homeland security and 
bringing fuel cells and solar cells and microturbines to the 
marketplace.
  In 2003, the White House sponsored a fuel cell demonstration, and the 
President tested a long-life mobile phone. The phone the President 
tested was powered by advanced fuel cell technology. Without the 
advanced technology program, MTI microfuel cells would not have been 
developed. This breakthrough technology was developed to power the very 
phone the President was holding. It would not have happened without 
that joint partnership with ATP.
  There are certainly other companies where ATP projects have not been 
successful. That is the nature of high-risk, high-payoff research 
programs, and people around the world know that. Governments around the 
world know that. Right now, I should add, our companies are competing 
with governments around the world, governments that own companies, 
governments that are doing these kinds of research.
  Let's put the successes and failures in the overall context. A 2003 
survey of over 350 companies indicates the actual economic value 
resulting from ATP joint ventures exceeded $7.5 billion. The ATP annual 
report showed the program has generated $17 billion in economic 
benefits from just 41 of the 736 completed projects.
  In conclusion, this is a program that works. We should not be cutting 
off this investment in innovation in America.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Who yields time?
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, how much time remains on our side?
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from New Mexico has 
close to 5 minutes.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. How much time on the side of the Senator from Oklahoma?
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Oklahoma has 21 
minutes.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Let me go ahead and use the remainder of our time in 
opposition to the amendments, and then the Senator from Oklahoma can 
use as much additional time as he would like, obviously.
  I agree with the comments the Senator from Michigan has just made 
about the ATP program. I do think one of our weaknesses historically, 
particularly in recent decades in this country, is although we have 
done reasonably well on basic research, we have not done as well in 
taking that basic research the next step and getting it to a point 
where it can be commercialized and manufacturing can occur in this 
country.
  I have a chart I was going to show. Let me put up the chart and try 
to make the point as to where the advanced technology program is in the 
development cycle, as I understand it. This chart tries to point out 
the venture capital funds focused on late-stage research.
  There are five different categories represented on this chart: seed 
funding, startup funding, other early stage, expansion, and then later 
stage.
  Regarding venture capital funding, the higher bars on the chart, of 
course, are in the later stage. The seed funding and the startup 
funding are the two areas on which the Advanced Technology Program 
concentrates. It does so in a way which is intended to get the very 
best results.
  These programs are peer-reviewed. There is real competition, rigorous 
peer-reviewed competition in the allocation of this money. The funds go 
to those researchers and those technologists who are most likely to be 
able to take these basic discoveries and turn them into commercial 
products and commercial services. There are many examples of successes 
in this area.
  Unfortunately, we do not have as many today that we can point to, 
relative to the rest of the world, as we used to have. The competition, 
frankly, between ourselves and many of our competitors, is very severe 
at this point. When you go to a country such as Japan and look at the 
extent of the Government's support of this kind of technology 
development, it is extremely impressive. We shy away from that. We say 
we are not going to help; it is up to our individual companies to do 
the best they can. Sometimes they do well, sometimes they do poorly. 
But the Advanced Technology Program helps them to do better. It has 
been a very good investment.
  The Academies of Science did a report looking at this very thing a 
few

[[Page S5054]]

years ago. Their expert panel included top executives from companies 
such as Intel and Xerox and groups such as Sematech, venture 
capitalists, also academic researchers. They concluded the following:

       The Advanced Technology Program is an effective Federal 
     partnership program. The selection criteria applied by the 
     program enabled it to meet broad national needs and to help 
     ensure that the benefits of successful awards extend across 
     firms and industries. Its costshared, industry-driven 
     approach to funding promising new technological opportunities 
     has shown considerable success in advancing technologies that 
     can contribute to important societal goals such as improved 
     health diagnostics, developing tools to exploit the human 
     genome, and improving the efficiency and competitiveness of 
     U.S. manufacturing.

  This is a program I think deserves the increased levels of support 
that are contemplated in this legislation. I urge my colleagues to 
resist the amendment of the Senator to delete funding for the Advanced 
Technology Program.
  Is there still time on my side?
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator has 17 seconds.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. I yield the remainder of my time.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Oklahoma is 
recognized.
  Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I am somewhat perplexed. We had a debate 
on Medicare Part D. The debate was about corporate welfare. I find it 
hard to believe that we want to continue to fund General Electric and 
IBM and Intel and all these other companies with taxpayer money after 
we have claimed we do not want to do corporate welfare.
  Tell me where in that process--if the Senator from New Mexico would 
care to put his sign back up--this money is? Tell me why an IBM needs 
money at that stage. Tell me why a General Electric needs taxpayer 
money at that stage, money that is going to go to them. They have all 
the resources. IBM just announced they are buying back 10 percent of 
their stock. They have plenty of cash. They are buying back their 
stock. Tell me why, in a time when we have a $300 billion deficit, $300 
billion we borrowed from two generations from now, that we should give 
a penny to IBM, corporate welfare to enhance anything. They have all 
the resources they need. Tell me why we should give a penny to General 
Electric or Intel or any of those large companies that consume 30 
percent of this money.
  If we want to have an Advanced Technology Program, why wouldn't we 
say, yes, we will do it, but you have to be at a certain size. You have 
to truly not be able to access the capital markets. They have no 
problems accessing the capital markets for research. So what we are 
doing is taking from two generations from now and giving it to the 
richest corporations in this country and making ourselves feel good 
because it wouldn't happen otherwise. It will happen otherwise. That is 
what markets are all about.
  I will be happy to have the Senator respond to my question.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I am happy to respond. I would respond 
by saying we are not providing funds to particular companies so they 
can compete effectively. What we are doing is saying there are sectors 
of U.S. industry which are in very substantial competition with their 
counterparts worldwide. Whether it is the automobile industry, whether 
it is the semiconductor industry, whether it is the biologics industry, 
whatever the area is, we have companies in our country that are 
competing in those areas, and there is early stage research and seed 
development--early stage development into which they should be putting 
significant efforts.
  When you look at it from the point of any individual company, it 
might not make that much sense to say we are going to devote a 
substantial portion of our research dollars to this because it is long 
term. It may not pay off in 10 years. It may never pay off. But here we 
can use some taxpayer dollars to prime the pump, so to speak, and to go 
to these companies on a cost-shared basis and say: You guys get 
together. We will help you develop advanced battery technology because 
otherwise we may eliminate our dependence on foreign oil. But we are 
going to become dependent on foreign battery cells. That is not good 
for the U.S. economy as a whole.
  If General Motors happens to be one of the participants in that 
consortium of companies that is working on that advanced battery 
technology, then so much the better. But I do not consider that 
corporate welfare. I consider that good, intelligent allocation of our 
resources in order to keep our industry competitive in the world 
marketplace.
  Mr. COBURN. Let me reclaim my time. I thank the Senator for answering 
my question. I guess the difference is, in the long run, where is the 
benefit? If any of those industries are going to survive, they are 
going to be putting research dollars into those areas already. That is 
my contention. We know from the studies that, of all the Fortune 500 
companies, the money that has been given to them they would have spent 
anyway. This is just money that they don't have to spend because we are 
going to spend American taxpayer dollars on it. The fact is, anybody in 
any of those areas, especially major companies that have all the 
capital resources they need--they have an inherent self-interest to 
fund that research. Why? Because their livelihood and their existence 
depends on it.
  What we are doing is we are saying, for the big companies, the 
Fortune 500 companies, we are going to take away their risk. The market 
has already created the risk. Their risk is to develop the program. So 
I would disagree. I think it is corporate welfare, especially with 
regard to the Fortune 500 companies that have significant assets.
  All you have to do is look at what is out there today, look at the 
share buy-backs. They have more than enough money with which to fund 
all these things.
  I can give you specific examples from GE, IBM, and Intel. All of 
those projects were going to be funded anyway. We just gave them a 
gift. We just simply gave them a gift.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I ask the Senator if he will yield for a 
question.
  Mr. COBURN. I am happy to yield for a question.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Here is the information I am given. I would cite this 
to the Senator and ask if he has a reason to disagree.

  Of the single applicant awards under the Advanced Technology Program, 
78 percent have gone to small businesses, 11 percent have gone to 
medium-size businesses and nonprofits, and only 11 percent of solo 
awards have gone to large businesses. Is that accurate?
  Mr. COBURN. That is inaccurate; 21 percent of the ATP grants over the 
last 14 years went to Fortune 500 companies.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. That is 21 percent over the last 14 years?
  Mr. COBURN. Yes.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. That is contrary to the information I was given. I 
thank the Senator for yielding for the question.
  Mr. COBURN. Let me just summarize, and then I will yield back the 
remainder of my time. How much time do I have?
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator has 14\1/2\ minutes.
  Mr. COBURN. I will be happy to yield after I finish this last 
statement, and I appreciate the managers of this bill for the time they 
have given me on these amendments, and their courtesy.
  There is no question, there are positive aspects of this program. I 
said that before. The question comes--and it really comes from what 
Senator Stabenow said. We already give them an R&D tax credit. They 
already get a direct writeoff for doing this research anyway. So the 
American taxpayers are already paying for it. Now we come along and 
give them more.
  The point is, we do not need both. We do not need both. IBM gets an 
R&D tax credit, and then they get money from us under ATP for things 
they were going to do anyway. General Electric gets an R&D tax credit, 
then they get money from us in the ATP program for these things they 
are going to do anyway.
  I believe there has to come a time when we start thinking about how 
we spend our money and whether we are getting a good return. The fact 
is, with ATP, overall, all the money we have spent, we have not gotten 
back a return.
  The other point I would make is, only four States have received about 
60 percent of the money on this ATP program. Ironic, isn't it? Four 
States. So

[[Page S5055]]

there is great consensus among those people on a parochial basis to 
support this program because it is a big program for those individual 
States.
  Mr. President, I will finish by saying that all three amendments I 
have offered today are designed to increase transparency, increase 
accountability, eliminate conflicts of interests, and eliminate 
wasteful Government spending. That is what we have to be about if we, 
in fact, want to leave the heritage to our children and grandchildren 
that we will receive by such great sacrifice of those people who came 
before us. That is the real deal. The way you leave a heritage is to 
sacrifice today. We cannot have everything we want today if we want our 
kids and grandkids to have what we have experienced.
  I yield back the remainder of my time.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from New Mexico is 
recognized.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Sanders.) The Senator from New Mexico.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. 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. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I know the Senator from Georgia has an 
amendment he wishes to speak to and offer and proposes to withdraw. I 
will yield in a moment for him to do that. But let me ask unanimous 
consent that following his statement and his action, the votes in 
relation to the pending amendments occur in the following order: DeMint 
amendment No. 930, Coburn amendment No. 918, Coburn amendment No. 921, 
Coburn amendment No. 922, and Kohl amendment No. 942; that no amendment 
be in order to these amendments prior to the vote or to this final Kohl 
amendment prior to the vote; that prior to each vote in the sequence 
listed here, there be 2 minutes of debate equally divided and 
controlled in the usual form; that after the first vote in the 
sequence, the remaining votes be 10-minute votes; further, that 
provisions of previous orders governing these amendments remain in 
effect.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Georgia is recognized.
  Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from New Mexico.
  I rise today to propose and then to withdraw an amendment that will 
make sure our Nation's historically Black colleges and universities, 
our HBCUs, are not overlooked in this important bill, the America 
COMPETES Act of 2007.
  In the State of Georgia, we have eight HBCUs: Albany State 
University, Clark Atlanta University, Fort Valley State University, 
Morehouse College, Savannah State University, Spelman College, Paine 
College, and Morris Brown College.
  This is a pretty simple amendment which would simply ensure that the 
HBCUs are included in the study by the National Academy of Sciences on 
barriers and innovations to advanced technologies. Specifically, I want 
to make sure we are able to find and highlight what HBCUs are doing 
nationally to equip their students with the knowledge and skills to 
compete in the 21st century workforce.
  The underlying bill would establish a President's Council on 
Innovation and Competitiveness. My amendment simply includes HBCUs in 
the Council's recommendation for strengthening innovation and 
competitiveness capabilities in academia.
  I wish to specifically highlight two examples of programs at Spelman 
College in Atlanta. Established in 1987, the Spelman College Women In 
Science and Engineering--or WISE--Scholars Program is a model student 
development effort that has successfully facilitated the recruitment, 
retention, and graduation of more than 200 African-American females 
pursuing baccalaureate degrees in sciences, mathematics, or a dual 
degree in engineering. The WISE Program addresses a national need to 
increase the prevalence of underrepresented racial minorities and women 
in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics disciplines, while 
strengthening Spelman's capacity to continue to serve as a national 
conduit for the human resources needed to sustain the country's global 
economic competitiveness. The WISE Program continues Spelman's 
important role in providing the Nation with a skilled scientific 
workforce.
  As part of the American Competitiveness Initiative, unveiled during 
last years's State of the Union Address, the President called upon the 
Nation to, one, double the Federal commitment to the most critical 
basic research programs in the physical sciences; two, make permanent 
the research and development tax credit; and three, train 70,000 high 
school teachers to lead advanced-placement courses in math and science 
and bring 30,000 math and science professionals to teach in classrooms.
  Both the National Science Foundation and National Aeronautics and 
Space Administration believe Spelman's WISE Scholars Program is the 
vehicle to meet the Nation's increasing need for math and science 
teachers. Also, in 2003, NASA awarded the college with a $4.5 million 
grant to enhance its WISE Scholars Program.
  In 2005, six Spelman women qualified for the international RoboCup 
2005 four-legged robot soccer competition in Osaka, Japan. The students 
created computer programs for the robots to compete in the soccer 
tournament, requiring the robots to play without human intervention. Of 
the 24 teams that qualified internationally, the SpelBots, as the team 
was called, were the first and only historically Black college and 
university, the only all-women institution, and the only U.S. 
undergraduate institution to qualify for the tournament. When looking 
back years from now at historically Black colleges and robotics 
research, all searches will lead to Spelman.
  Mr. President, these are just two examples of what is taking place at 
our HBCUs all across our country. That is why I believe HBCUs and 
programs such as these should be included in the recommendations by the 
President's Council on Innovation and Competitiveness.
  Now, I am going to withdraw this amendment because I have had a 
discussion with the Senator from Tennessee and the Senator from New 
Mexico, and I think they are probably right that this might be more 
appropriate as we reauthorize the Higher Education Act, which I 
understand will be marked up in the HELP Committee here within the next 
couple of weeks, in all probability. So I am going to withdraw the 
amendment. But I do wish to put this body on notice that we need to 
recognize the contributions our HBCUs are making in math, science, and 
technology, and that is a critical component of this bill. It will also 
be a critical component of the Higher Education Act. At that point I 
will be bringing this amendment forward to highlight those men and 
women who are at our HBCUs and the contribution they are making to 
math, science, and technology innovation.

  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Georgia for 
his leadership on the issue of competitiveness. He has been one of the 
foremost advocates for this legislation, which has made its way through 
so many committees and reached the floor, and we are close to passage 
today. I thank him as well for his consistent advocacy for historically 
Black colleges and universities of which Georgia has several of the 
most prominent. He has talked to me and other members of the HELP 
Committee about that. He is exactly right. Reauthorization of the 
higher education bill is fairly imminent. Hopefully in the next couple 
of weeks we will begin to mark up a bill. Senator Chambliss has made it 
clear he expects the committee to take seriously his amendment. I have 
assured

[[Page S5056]]

him that for my part, the committee will. I know Senator Kennedy and 
Senator Enzi feel the same way. Senator Warner of Virginia has also 
noted he wants to make certain that what we do in this legislation 
takes into account historically Black colleges and universities. He, 
too, is looking toward the Higher Education Act reauthorization. It is 
very helpful of both of them to, in this case, take the floor and in 
other conversations to make us aware of what needs to happen as that 
act comes up in the next couple of weeks. The Chambliss amendment and 
his advocacy will be an important part of the discussion. I thank him 
for his leadership.


                           Amendment No. 930

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will now be 2 
minutes of debate on amendment No. 930 offered by the Senator from 
South Carolina, Mr. DeMint.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, let me take the lead in opposition to 
the amendment. This is the amendment that would set up a new 60-vote 
point of order on any appropriations bill that comes to the floor with 
anything contained in it that could be designated a congressional 
earmark. Unfortunately, the definition of congressional earmark set out 
in the amendment is very broad. It basically says: If you are 
specifying money going to an entity, either in the language of the 
appropriations bill or in the report accompanying it, and it relates to 
items being authorized in this legislation, the objection could be made 
that you had to have 60 votes. So you would have one set of rules for 
most appropriations bills and a different set of rules for 
appropriations bills that would include appropriations relevant to this 
competitiveness bill. It would be a very bad policy. I urge colleagues 
to oppose the amendment.
  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I am strongly opposed to the amendment 
offered by the junior Senator from South Carolina, which would prohibit 
congressional earmarks of funds appropriated, pursuant to 
authorizations in this bill, for the America Competes Act. The effect 
of the amendment proposed by the Senator from South Carolina could be 
waived or suspended in the Senate only by a 60-vote supermajority.
  If this amendment were agreed to, it would set up two criteria for 
all appropriations legislation, pursuant to authorizations in the 
America Competes Act--one criterion requiring a simple majority vote 
for Presidential budget recommendations and another criterion requiring 
a supermajority of 60 votes for congressional earmarks, which, 
according to this legislative provision, is virtually anything that 
Congress changes from the President's budget request.
  Under the Constitution of the United States, the Congress has the 
power of the purse. The Senate should jealously guard that prerogative. 
Our system of government includes checks and balances that have served 
us well through over 200 years as a Republic. And the power of the 
purse is a check on the ambitions of the executive branch.
  Earlier this year, the Senate considered comprehensive ethics reform. 
It passed with an overwhelming majority of 96-2. In addition, the 
Senate Appropriations Committee has announced a new policy of increased 
transparency and accountability in regard to earmarks, which uses the 
same definition of earmarks contained in the ethics bill that was 
adopted overwhelmingly on the floor of the U.S. Senate. These changes 
in the appropriations process are intended to help restore confidence 
in the Congress. It ends ``business as usual'' in Washington. It 
restores integrity to the appropriations process. It will increase 
accountability and openness. Moreover, Senators will be required to 
certify that neither they nor their spouses have a financial interest 
in any earmark. I have asked Senators to submit a letter to Senator 
Cochran and me certifying they have no financial interest in a project 
being proposed for an earmark. Those letters will be available for 
public inspection.
  Earmark disclosure, as important as it is, is only one part of a much 
broader package of ethics reforms that has already passed the Senate. 
This includes strengthened gift and travel rules for Members of the 
Senate, strengthened lobbying disclosure, and outlawing some of the 
notorious lobbying abuses in which Mr. Abramoff and others were 
involved. We should not cherry pick this legislation. It needs to be 
enacted as a whole.
  In the meantime, I would like to remind my colleagues that when we 
considered the joint funding resolution earlier this year, which 
included all of the pending appropriations bills from the previous 
Republican-controlled Congress that had yet to be enacted, the House 
Appropriations Chairman, Mr. Obey, and I made a bold move and 
eliminated 9,300 earmarks that were in bills authored when the Senator 
from South Carolina was in the majority. We eliminated every single one 
of them--all 9,300 earmarks. The joint funding resolution, which was 
signed into law on February 15, 2007, contained no new earmarks.
  In summary, the process of earmarking funds has gotten out of 
control. The status quo is not satisfactory. That is why I have taken 
the initiative to establish new standards for transparency and 
accountability. That is why I joined with House Appropriations 
Committee Chairman David Obey to eliminate earmarks from the fiscal 
2007 funding resolution.
  I strongly oppose the amendment from the Senator from South Carolina. 
The Senate has already voted on an ethics reform package that revises 
the method by which earmarks will be considered. The Senate 
Appropriations Committee has already put in place rules that will 
increase the transparency and accountability for earmarks in the fiscal 
2008 process. But most of all, I oppose the amendment by the Senator 
from South Carolina because it would establish two criteria for 
earmarks--those proposed by the President would require only a simple 
majority, while those proposed by the Congress, in which the power of 
the purse resides, would require a 60-vote supermajority.
  The Framers of our Constitution chose to give the power of the purse 
to the Congress for a reason. They did not want an overbearing, 
unaccountable executive branch.
  I hope my colleagues will reject the proposal by the Senator from 
South Carolina.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from South Carolina.
  Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Tennessee for all 
his work on this bill. The question is, after we have gone through 
these many months of work on this bill to make America more competitive 
and we have directed funds to the Federal agencies that we think are 
most appropriate and would be most helpful in raising the quality and 
skill level of our labor force, do we want it to happen? Do we want 
this authorization bill to be implemented as we have written it? As the 
sponsors have been very careful to point out, this is an authorization 
bill, not an appropriations bill. What my amendment does is ensure that 
this bill is carried out the way it is authorized and that the 
appropriators do not take money for the National Science Foundation and 
say: I want some to go to my State or to this university, and we spread 
it out instead of using the merit-based peer review process. We change 
a bill that has a lot of thought and bipartisan support, and we 
basically turn it over to the appropriators to change. If Members want 
this bill implemented the way it is written, please support the 
amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to amendment No. 
930.
  Mr. DeMINT. I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There appears to be.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
  Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Delaware (Mr. Biden), 
the Senator from Delaware (Mr. Carper), the Senator from South Dakota 
(Mr. Johnson), and the Senator from West Virginia (Mr. Rockefeller) are 
necessarily absent.
  Mr. LOTT. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator 
from Kansas (Mr. Brownback), the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain), and 
the Senator from Ohio (Mr. Voinovich).
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber 
desiring to vote?

[[Page S5057]]

  The result was announced--yeas 22, nays 71, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 142 Leg.]

                                YEAS--22

     Allard
     Burr
     Chambliss
     Coburn
     Cornyn
     DeMint
     Dole
     Ensign
     Feingold
     Graham
     Grassley
     Hagel
     Inhofe
     Isakson
     Kyl
     Lugar
     Martinez
     McCaskill
     Sununu
     Thomas
     Thune
     Vitter

                                NAYS--71

     Akaka
     Alexander
     Baucus
     Bayh
     Bennett
     Bingaman
     Bond
     Boxer
     Brown
     Bunning
     Byrd
     Cantwell
     Cardin
     Casey
     Clinton
     Cochran
     Coleman
     Collins
     Conrad
     Corker
     Craig
     Crapo
     Dodd
     Domenici
     Dorgan
     Durbin
     Enzi
     Feinstein
     Gregg
     Harkin
     Hatch
     Hutchison
     Inouye
     Kennedy
     Kerry
     Klobuchar
     Kohl
     Landrieu
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lincoln
     Lott
     McConnell
     Menendez
     Mikulski
     Murkowski
     Murray
     Nelson (FL)
     Nelson (NE)
     Obama
     Pryor
     Reed
     Reid
     Roberts
     Salazar
     Sanders
     Schumer
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Smith
     Snowe
     Specter
     Stabenow
     Stevens
     Tester
     Warner
     Webb
     Whitehouse
     Wyden

                             NOT VOTING--7

     Biden
     Brownback
     Carper
     Johnson
     McCain
     Rockefeller
     Voinovich
  The amendment (No. 930) was rejected.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, we have a briefing at 4 o'clock. We are 
going to do this next vote and complete that. We have scheduled another 
vote right at 5:30. We are going to finish this bill tonight. If people 
have amendments, they should offer them.
  These two managers have worked extremely hard to finish this bill. 
This will be a feather in the cap for bipartisanship. We are going to 
stay here tonight until we finish this bill. We have, as I understand 
it, about three amendments left after we do this one, but we should all 
have the opportunity to go to that briefing. So we will be back here at 
5:30 after this next vote.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico is recognized.


                           Amendment No. 942

  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Kohl 
amendment No. 942 be the pending amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. I am informed that additional debate on this amendment 
is not needed and that there is no request for a rollcall vote, so I 
ask we proceed to a voice vote on this amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to amendment No. 
942.
  The amendment (No. 942) was agreed to.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mr. BOND. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I believe we can proceed to the second 
rollcall vote, which is the Coburn amendment No. 918.


                           Amendment No. 918

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will now be 2 
minutes of debate on amendment No. 918 offered by the Senator from 
Oklahoma, Mr. Coburn.
  Who yields time?
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, this amendment is one which I think 
would be bad policy, a bad precedent for us here in the Senate. It 
basically puts a hard and fast, drop-dead date on any legislation 
contained in this bill and says there is a sunset provision so that any 
program authorized here, any kind of activity permitted under this 
legislation, would be prohibited following that date in 2011. It is not 
the kind of sunset we would normally adopt on legislation. I don't 
think it is appropriate here. I urge colleagues to oppose the 
amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Who yields time in support of the amendment?
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I yield back the time on this side.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to amendment No. 
918.
  Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I request the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There is a sufficient second.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk called the roll.
  Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Delaware (Mr. Biden), 
the Senator from South Dakota (Mr. Johnson), and the Senator from West 
Virginia (Mr. Rockefeller) are necessarily absent.
  Mr. LOTT. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator 
from Kansas (Mr. Brownback), the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain), and 
the Senator from Arkansas Mr. (Stevens).
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber 
desiring to vote?
  The result was announced--yeas 27, nays 67, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 143 Leg.]

                                YEAS--27

     Allard
     Bayh
     Burr
     Chambliss
     Coburn
     Corker
     Cornyn
     DeMint
     Dole
     Ensign
     Enzi
     Graham
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Hagel
     Inhofe
     Isakson
     Kyl
     Lott
     Martinez
     McCaskill
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Specter
     Sununu
     Thomas
     Thune

                                NAYS--67

     Akaka
     Alexander
     Baucus
     Bennett
     Bingaman
     Bond
     Boxer
     Brown
     Bunning
     Byrd
     Cantwell
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Clinton
     Cochran
     Coleman
     Collins
     Conrad
     Craig
     Crapo
     Dodd
     Domenici
     Dorgan
     Durbin
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Harkin
     Hatch
     Hutchison
     Inouye
     Kennedy
     Kerry
     Klobuchar
     Kohl
     Landrieu
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lincoln
     Lugar
     McConnell
     Menendez
     Mikulski
     Murkowski
     Murray
     Nelson (FL)
     Nelson (NE)
     Obama
     Pryor
     Reed
     Reid
     Roberts
     Salazar
     Sanders
     Schumer
     Smith
     Snowe
     Stabenow
     Tester
     Vitter
     Voinovich
     Warner
     Webb
     Whitehouse
     Wyden

                             NOT VOTING--6

     Biden
     Brownback
     Johnson
     McCain
     Rockefeller
     Stevens
  The amendment (No. 918) was rejected.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Mexico is recognized.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote, and I 
move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that following 
the disposition of the previously ordered amendments, the only other 
amendments in order be Senator Landrieu's amendment No. 975, Senator 
Dorgan's amendment No. 958, and a managers' amendment, which must be 
cleared by both managers; that after disposition of the above 
amendments, the bill be read the third time, and the Senate, without 
any intervening action or debate, vote on final passage of S. 761.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.

                          ____________________