[Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 141 (Monday, September 8, 2008)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8101-S8102]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                                SCHEDULE

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I had the good fortune last month to go to 
Afghanistan. It was, of course, tremendously educational. We had the 
opportunity--a number of five Senators, Democrats and Republicans--to 
visit with our allies in Kurdistan and Kazakhstan. It was a good trip. 
Then, of course, we completed our trip by going to look--which I had 
not done--at medical facilities in Germany. All of the troops who are 
injured or hurt in any way in Iraq or Afghanistan go through that 
facility. So it was a good trip.
  It made it very apparent to me that we should do everything within 
our power to pass the Defense authorization bill because 7 years after 
9/11, we all recognize that our No. 1 enemy, Osama bin Laden, is still 
free, and al-Qaida has rebuilt its safe haven, it appears, in Pakistan. 
The central front of the war on terror, we have learned, cannot be won 
in Iraq. Yet that is where our troops are located. Our treasure and our 
strategic focus remains in Iraq, but it should be other places. That is 
why it is so critical to pass a Defense authorization bill that not 
only supports our troops and our families but also takes a step toward 
a smarter war on terror.
  The Defense authorization bill gives the troops a much needed pay 
raise of almost 4 percent. It also renews a number of special pay 
increases provided to troops who fill high-skilled areas that were so 
undermanned. We all know because of what has happened with the Bush and 
now McCain efforts, troops are in Iraq and our resources are in Iraq. 
Afghanistan has seen a surge in violence and suicide attacks are up. We 
have more coalition forces being killed in Afghanistan than in Iraq, 
roadside bombings have increased, and opium production is up with 
Afghanistan producing 93 percent of the world's opium. So we have to 
refocus on Afghanistan.
  Our troops have done a tremendous job in Iraq and, of course, in 
Afghanistan. It does your heart a lot to be able to visit with those 
troops in the battlefield as we did. So it is time we get this Defense 
authorization bill passed. We have to do that. We need the funds for 
the programs in Afghanistan that are critical to winning the peace that 
have been ignored for far too long.
  This legislation increases the size of the Army to 532,000; the 
Marine Corps, 194,000; along with other steps to improve readiness and 
reduce the strain and improve the capabilities of our Armed Forces. We 
have had other occasions with our Republican allies to pass a Defense 
authorization bill in the Senate, but we haven't been successful in 
doing that. So I hope we are allowed to go to the bill.
  I have had a number of conversations with Senator Levin, the chairman 
of the committee. Each conversation I have with him, he tells me he is 
going to confer with Senator Warner, the former chairman and now 
ranking member of that most important committee. We want to get on the 
bill. We want to get the bill passed. This bill is not an opportunity 
for people to vent their frustration on all of the issues that are 
floating around this country. This is a bill that deals with the safety 
and security of our Nation and the well-being of our troops. So when we 
get on the bill, I hope we can move forward and complete legislation on 
this

[[Page S8102]]

most important part of what we are trying to do.
  This is the first issue we are going to take up when we get here. So 
my goal is to do what we have to do to work on the Defense bill this 
week.
  We have an energy summit this Friday. It has been requested by a 
significant number of Senators, including the gang of 10, which I am 
told is now up to a gang of 22--or if it is not 22, last week it was 
16. It is a lot of Senators. So we are going to have the energy summit 
this Friday. It doesn't mean we will not have votes this Friday, but at 
least starting at 9:30 on Friday morning we are going to have an energy 
summit. My desire is to spend next week dealing with energy.
  We have a piece of legislation we have had the opportunity to move 
to. It was a bill on speculation which was very important. I would 
think it could be a vehicle to work with. If our Republican colleagues 
wish to get rid of the speculation part of it, in an effort to be 
cooperative and show some degree of conciliation on our side, what we 
would be willing to do is have that as a vehicle.
  The first amendment to be offered on that piece of legislation would 
be the Bingaman-Baucus legislation, which is a Democratic proposal that 
has been on the calendar, the only difference being there is a drilling 
provision in it. The second amendment would be the gang of whatever it 
is--now we are up to 22--and then I would hope we could have some kind 
of an agreement if the Republicans are not satisfied with the Bingaman-
Baucus amendment or the gang of 22 amendment; if they want to come up 
with an amendment dealing with legislation, fine. That would be the 
next amendment in order. I hope we can agree on a limited number of 
amendments dealing with energy on this Energy bill. It is my 
understanding--and I understand this fairly well--that both the 
Bingaman amendment and the gang of 22 amendment have drilling 
provisions. So I hope we can move forward. We have attempted in the 
past, as everyone knows, to do energy legislation, including that with 
drilling. But, so there is no confusion or consternation on anyone's 
behalf, next week we should be able to do the drilling votes and other 
votes as they relate to energy.
  The state of the economy is very desperate, for lack of a better 
description. Oil and gas are just part of our economic crisis. Since we 
left for our recess and the conventions are over, we have only more bad 
news, which means we should look forward also during this work period 
to see if we can do an economic stimulus bill. Why is one necessary?
  Well, the Bush economy has lost jobs every month this year. Just last 
month alone 84,000 jobs were lost. A total of more than 600,000 jobs 
have been lost this year alone. The total number of jobless Americans 
is now about 10 million. A number of people are out of work also, but 
they stopped keeping track of the unemployment after they had been on 
the rolls for a certain period of time. Housing values have decreased 
by almost 20 percent. The unemployment rate has soared now to over 6 
percent.
  American workers are holding up their end of the deal because one of 
the interesting things through all of this is that productivity by our 
work force is up by 20 percent since 2000, but wages have not kept pace 
with productivity.
  Then, finally, the news of Freddie and Fannie--these two huge 
financial operations that have been so important since the 1930s in our 
country--are now in trouble, and the Federal Government is taking them 
over, which is certainly another strong piece of evidence about the 
disastrous shape of our economy. I hope we can move on and do something 
with an economic stimulus package. To this point, Senator McCain has 
been unwilling to do that. Let's hope this string of bad news items 
will bring him back to saying we need to do something with the 
stimulus.
  We have--I am sure Senator McConnell has, and I know my colleagues, 
the counterparts on the Democratic side of the Congress--received calls 
from Secretary Peters. We have tried in the past on a number of the 
bills we have put forth to put money in the highway trust fund to 
replenish it. We were thwarted from doing that. We have to do 
something. Secretary Peters said now States are only getting part of 
their money. Eighty percent of them have dropped; 50 percent have 
basically dropped to nothing. We can pass the highway trust fund 
replenishment bill immediately. We have a bill from the House that 
starts doing that on October 1. We would have to move the date forward. 
We are willing to pass it today. Democrats are willing to pass this 
today. I say to the Bush administration, to Secretary Peters, we are 
willing to do this today. She said it needed to be done immediately. I 
talked to her over the weekend. I acknowledge that is the case.
  For this $8 billion, we will create eight times 47,500 high-paying 
jobs for people. So we should do that. I would hope we can get my 
colleagues on the other side of the aisle to move forward by unanimous 
consent today to pass that. What we would like to do, as I have 
indicated, is move the time forward from October 1. Secretary Peters 
said we need to do that. It passed the House by a 387-to-37 vote. I 
hope we can do that. In effect, what we could do is transfer $8 billion 
from the general fund to the highway trust fund.
  There is a funding shortage looming, and we hear strong support from 
both Democrats and Republicans, with now Secretary Peters. I am 
confident she speaks for the administration. So we could pass this 
legislation immediately.
  There are other priorities we need to work on this work period. If we 
have time to do that, we certainly will do that. We have the tax 
extenders. Without going through the list, I look forward to working 
with my friend, Senator McConnell, to see what we can do to move 
forward on these things.
  Finally, before we leave here, we must find some way to fund the 
Government. If the Republicans want to do it on a week-by-week basis, 
that is fine. If they want to wait to do it until after the election so 
we have to come back for a lameduck, we are willing to do that. If they 
want to do it sometime in February, we are willing to do that. We are 
not interested in games being played on the CR. We simply want to make 
sure Government is allowed to function. There have been Republicans on 
the other side of the Capitol--in the House--saying they want to close 
down the Government. I hope some of those people have read recent 
history where Gingrich tried to do that and it didn't work out well for 
the Republicans and certainly not for this country.
  I look forward to this short work period we have left to show the 
American people we can get some things done. I hope that is, in fact, 
the case.

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