[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 37 (Tuesday, March 3, 2009)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2658-S2679]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                                 RECESS

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate stands in 
recess until 2:15 p.m. today.
  Thereupon, the Senate, at 12:38 p.m., recessed until 2:15 p.m. and 
reassembled when called to order by the Presiding Officer (Mr. Burris).
  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

[[Page S2659]]

                   Motion to Commit With Instructions

  Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I send a motion to the desk and ask for 
its immediate consideration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the motion.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Nevada [Mr. Ensign] moves to commit the 
     bill (H.R. 1105) to the Committee on Appropriations with 
     instructions to report the same back to the Senate with the 
     following amendment:

  Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that further 
reading of the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:
       Sec. ___. (a) Across-the-Board-Reduction.--Amounts 
     appropriated under this Act for--
       (1) fiscal year 2009 shall be reduced by $18,981,000,000; 
     and
       (2) fiscal year 2010 shall be reduced by $3,274,000,000.
       (b) Implementation.--The Director of the Office of 
     Management and Budget shall administer the reductions in 
     subsection (a) to the amount of budget authority provided or 
     obligation limit imposed for any discretionary account of 
     this Act.
  Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I don't think we need a long time to 
discuss this amendment. It is a pretty simple amendment. What it says 
is, we are going to take this bill back to the Appropriations Committee 
and have the Appropriations Committee make the appropriate cuts so this 
bill comes back at the 2008 funding level.
  We have to ask ourselves: When is the Senate going to start being 
fiscally responsible? The other side of the aisle criticized us, and 
rightly so, for free spending over the last 8 years. That was one of 
the things President Obama campaigned on and the Democrats across the 
country campaigned on. They said they were going to be the party of 
fiscal responsibility.
  The debt held by the public has continued to increase. The problem is 
that under the President's new budget, over the next 5 years, the debt 
is actually going to double. Over the 10-year budget he has proposed, 
the debt held by the public is going to triple from already 
unsustainable levels.
  My amendment says that we give spending a little haircut around here. 
It is not significant. It is saying that at a time when we recently 
passed a stimulus package, which tremendously increased Government 
spending, let us not take last year's spending bills and also 
tremendously increase their levels of spending. The current omnibus 
proposes an 8-percent growth in the size of our Government from one 
year to the next. We are talking about a record deficit this year. 
$1.75 trillion is a big number; people can't even get their arms around 
that number.
  If you to spent $1 million a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, 
beginning at the time Jesus was born, you still wouldn't be at your 
first $1 trillion today. Our deficit this year is $1.75 trillion. To 
add to that deficit with this spending bill, I believe, is outrageous.
  There is a saying--and I don't remember who said it, exactly or how 
it was said, but it is basically along these lines: The systems of 
government such as we have always collapse due to two reasons: The 
first one is a moral collapse, the second one is followed by an 
economic collapse. You can understand why they happen in that order. 
Because what happens if people aren't moral enough to care about future 
generations? What they do is they vote people into office who give them 
what they want. They borrow from the Treasury to get it, and when the 
debt gets too high, it collapses the economy.
  What we are doing around here is exactly that. We are repeating the 
mistakes of history. We are borrowing from our children. We are running 
up huge debts. If folks don't think our economy can't completely 
collapse due to the huge debt burden we are passing, they have another 
thing coming. Confidence in the dollar right now is questionable around 
the world. Looking into the future, as we run up these larger and 
larger deficits and add to a huge burgeoning debt in the United States, 
people around the world are going to wonder about the strength of the 
dollar. They are going to wonder whether they want to continue to buy 
our Treasury bonds and finance our debt. If they stop buying our bonds, 
our economy collapses. It literally falls off the cliff.
  We have a fiscal responsibility to be moral enough to care about 
future generations of Americans, to not continue to add dollar after 
dollar, million after million, billion after billion, trillion after 
trillion onto their debt load. I would encourage this body to adopt 
this reasonable amendment to this bill; that instead of increasing the 
Government 8 percent over last year on these particular spending bills, 
let us freeze it at last year's level. We are not asking to cut 
anything, but let's freeze it at last year's level.
  It will be up to the Appropriations Committee to decide whether some 
accounts are more worthy than others. They can plus up those or cut 
others that are not as worthy. They can take care of Members' projects 
if they wish to take care of Members' projects. But the bottom line is, 
this amendment would at least start down the road of fiscal 
responsibility to future generations.
  I have a couple other comments. Can anybody rightly say this bill is 
full of good spending, of justified spending? We have heard about all 
the earmarks. Let me note a few of them, if you think this bill is full 
of good spending. Mr. President, $1.79 million--and I am not 
exaggerating--$1.79 million for swine odor and manure management 
research. I am a veterinarian by profession. I understand that pigs 
smell and pig farms smell worse than almost anything else. But when did 
it become the responsibility of the Federal Government to control pig 
odor? Shouldn't that be the responsibility of pig farmers?

  Of course we need to pay back the labor unions. There is $190,000 to 
the Plumbers Local Union 27 and Steamfitters Union 449, and that is in 
Pennsylvania for the Western Pennsylvania Pipe Trades Regional Training 
Project. We also have almost $500,000 for the George Meany Center for 
Labor Studies at the National Labor College.
  I have a whole list. As a matter of fact, I ask unanimous consent to 
have this list of earmarks printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                            Notable Earmarks

       These earmarks are listed in the Joint Explanatory 
     Statement which was published in the Congressional Record of 
     February 23, 2009; after each earmark is the page number in 
     the Record where it is listed.
       $1.76 million for a honey bee lab (H1691).
       $1.79 million for swine odor and manure management research 
     (H1692).
       $767,000 for subtropical beef germplasm (H1692).
       $245,000 for aegilops cylindrica (jointed goatgrass) 
     (H1700).
       $469,000 for ethnobotanicals (ethnobotany is ``the plant 
     lore and agricultural customs of a people'') (H1698).
       $5.8 million to the Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the 
     Senate in Boston for the planning and design of a building 
     and possible support for an endowment (H2296).
       $5 million for New Leaders for New Schools, an organization 
     whose executive director is likely to be named the next chief 
     of staff at the Department of Education (H2371).
       $190,000 to the Plumbers Local Union 27 & Steamfitters 
     Local Union 449, Coraopolis, Pennsylvania, for the Western 
     Pennsylvania Pipe Trades Regional Training Project (H2364).
       $238,000 to the San Francisco Department of Economic and 
     Workforce Development, San Francisco, California, for the 
     Green Jobs Workforce Development Training Pilot project 
     (H2365).
       $238,000 to Marquette University, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, for 
     a dental health outreach program (H2335).
       $95,000 to the State of New Mexico, Santa Fe, to collect 
     and analyze data about the need and potential locations for a 
     dental school within the state (H2348).
       $571,000 to the U.S. Virgin Islands Department of Health, 
     St. Thomas, Virgin Islands, of which $190,000 is for 
     facilities and equipment for a mental health facility 
     (H2350).
       $476,000 to the George Meany Center for Labor Studies at 
     the National Labor College, Silver Spring, Maryland, for 
     curriculum development (H2297).
       $1.6 million to the Michigan Community College Association 
     for an alternative energy training initiative (H2299).
       $1.2 million for eyeglasses for students whose educational 
     performance may be hindered because of poor vision (H2285).
       $618,000 for teacher training in the Samoan language 
     (H2279).
       $485,000 for a boarding school for at-risk Native students 
     from remote villages across western Alaska (H2284).
       $476,000 to expand the PE4life physical education program 
     across Iowa (H2289).
       $428,000 to the University of Texas Libraries for the 
     Latino Veterans Oral History Project (H2368).
       $381,000 for the Cedar Rapids Symphony Orchestra (H2280).
       $381,000 for a business school in Des Moines, Iowa to 
     recruit and train captioners and court reporters (H2293).

[[Page S2660]]

       $357,000 for Farmingdale State College in New York to 
     develop a green building curriculum (H2297).
       $333,000 to train college students in closed captioning 
     (H2295).
       $285,000 for an associate degree program for air traffic 
     controllers (H2293).
       $262,000 to support the advancement of underrepresented 
     minority pharmacists and pharmaceutical scientists (H2294).
       $243,000 for the commercial driver's license training 
     program at White Mountain Community College in New Hampshire 
     (H2305).
       $238,000 for the University of Hawaii to provide cultural 
     education (H2297).
       $238,000 for emergency and preparedness education programs 
     in Beverly Hills, California (H2291).
       $238,000 for daily physical education activities in Detroit 
     (H2281).
       $214,000 for the Stony Brook University School of 
     Journalism in New York to teach scientists how to effectively 
     communicate with the public and the press (H2303).
       $190,000 for Hawaii Community College to provide cultural 
     education (H2297).
       $190,000 for Southeastern Illinois College to develop a 
     mining and mine safety curriculum (H2302).
       $143,000 for equipment at the University of Guam Marine 
     Laboratory (H2303).
       $95,000 for scholarships and program costs related to 
     prosthetic dentistry and clinical prosthodontics (H2293).
       $95,000 for Indiana University of Pennsylvania for 
     curriculum development for a mine safety course and research 
     on the use of mine maps (H2298).
       $95,000 for Murray State University in Kentucky to purchase 
     equipment for the Breathitt Veterinary Clinic (H2300).
       $65,000 for a feasibility study of potential Iowa school 
     sites (H2282).
       Certain earmarks that have been linked to a lobbying firm 
     reported to be under federal investigation include $951,500 
     for a Direct Methanol Fuel Cell (DMFC) (H2044), $951,500 for 
     Adaptive Liquid Crystal Windows (H2038), and $951,400 for an 
     anti-idling Lithium Ion Battery Program (H2038).

  Mr. ENSIGN. There are plenty of others we could go through, but for 
the sake of time, let's just be fiscally responsible right now. Let's 
add a little fiscal responsibility into this body, and let's adopt this 
amendment that says we are going to freeze spending from Government 
that was not already plussed-up in the stimulus bill. Let's be fiscally 
responsible.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington is recognized.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, I rise to oppose the amendment that has 
just been offered by the Senator from Nevada. I go home every weekend 
and I talk to families across my State. There is no doubt that people 
are hurting. Thousands of people have been laid off from their jobs, 
and thousands more are worried that this week they are the ones who are 
going to be laid off from their jobs.
  Since we first came into session in January, we have been working as 
hard as I have ever seen to address these challenges that are facing 
millions of Americans today--losing their jobs, losing their homes, 
losing their retirement. We are trying to get this economy back on 
track and instill some confidence in this country so we can move 
forward. We passed a major economic recovery package just a few weeks 
ago. It is being implemented as we speak and will be implemented over 
the coming weeks and months.
  Here we are today talking about a bill that basically is the 
responsibility of Congress, every single year, to fund the Government 
agencies that help make our country work. We should have had this bill 
passed 3, 4, 5 months ago. We did not. This bill was done. It was ready 
to go by the end of July. All of the appropriations committees had 
finished their work. They had passed them out of the Appropriations 
Committee, almost all of them on a unanimous vote, some of them with 
just a few negative votes in committee.
  But the responsibility of the Senate and House and Congress every 
year is to pass our spending bills. We pass these bills in order to 
make our agencies work, whether it is the Food and Drug Administration 
that makes sure our food is safe, whether it is our air traffic 
controllers who manage the flights out of our airports, whether it is 
our health care agencies that do research and important work for this 
Nation's health, whether it is Government agencies that fund 
agriculture or any of the other agencies we have. These are people who 
go to work every day whose function it is to make our economy and our 
country work so that average citizens do not have to sit at home and 
worry about whether the drug they purchase is safe or whether the 
agriculture they buy at the market is safe or whether their schools are 
funded or whether we provide individuals the basic health care 
Americans know they need in order to keep their families secure.
  It is too bad these bills didn't pass a few months ago. Why didn't 
they? Because we had an administration whose bottom line was to say no. 
The President at the time, President Bush, said: I will say no to these 
bills as they come to my desk.
  But here in the Senate and in the House, we said: These bills are 
important, but if this President is going to veto them, we are going to 
wait a few months for the election.
  That happened, we have a brandnew President, and, unfortunately a few 
months late because we were working on an economic stimulus package, we 
are here to pass these bills. I wish they were done a few months ago. I 
know all of us do. But we should not delay it any further. All of the 
people who worked with us to get these bills passed, everyone in the 
country, whether it is a YMCA that has a domestic violence center that 
is waiting for $100,000 that we marked up in committee and appropriated 
last year for them, or highway projects we marked up in this bill, or 
transit projects, across the board, whether it is law enforcement, 
whether it is consumer product safety, whether it is the numerous 
housing agencies that are funded in this--they have known for several 
months what they are going to get. They are waiting for us to finish 
our work this week, by this deadline, Friday, so we do not go back to a 
CR. It is our responsibility to pass these bills.
  The Senate had a very strong vote just a few hours ago to say we are 
not going to work off a continuing resolution. We are going to do a 
responsible job of funding these agencies, as we said.
  The amendment of the Senator from Nevada that now comes before us 
sends us into a tailspin. It says we are going to send these bills back 
to the Appropriations Committee to cut some $20 billion out of them and 
come back to us. First of all, just from a process point of view, this 
is not going to happen by this Friday, and if we do not get this bill 
passed by this Friday, the Government shuts down. I can talk about the 
consequences of that. I have been in this body before when the 
Government shut down. It is not pretty, and we do not want to be there 
for a million reasons that I am happy to talk about for some time, but 
we will leave that for another day.
  The fact is, to send this bill back to the Appropriations Committee 
and tell them to cut $20 billion out of it, that will underfund 
critical initiatives this Senate and this House believe are important.
  Let me talk for a minute about housing. We all know that one of the 
reasons our economy is in such trouble today is because of the housing 
crisis that has come before us. In this bill--if we do not pass it as 
it is written and before the Senate today, we have about 45,000 
families who will lose their jobs on top of the thousands we have 
already seen. We cannot afford to put those families in jeopardy. Yet 
that is essentially what will happen if the amendment of the Senator 
from Nevada is agreed to.
  We are working hard to make sure our families do not go into 
foreclosure. The amendment of the Senator puts all of those families at 
risk. Single-family guaranteed housing loans are at risk under the 
amendment of the Senator. Federal law enforcement efforts through the 
Department of Justice are at risk through the amendment of the Senator. 
Antiterrorist enforcement programs through the Department of Treasury 
are at risk under the amendment of the Senator. U.S. attorneys are at 
risk. Food and medical product safety--right at a time when we are all 
worried about peanut butter--is at risk. Consumer product safety--the 
risk goes on. All of these priorities that we worked through our 
committee on a bipartisan basis and said we need to move these 
initiatives forward are at risk under the amendment of the Senator.
  I believe we have to all go back to our responsibilities. All of us 
wish the bill could have passed a few months ago. It didn't. It is in 
front of us now. We need to pass this bill, get it to the President's 
desk, and then we will have

[[Page S2661]]

an opportunity to look at a budget for 2010. Our Budget Committee will 
look at that budget hard, we will pass the budget out--it will have to 
pass in the Senate and House--and it will set the parameters for next 
year's appropriations bills. Those appropriations committees will then, 
in the next few months, begin to work on their bill. For anybody who 
has issues, small or large, that is the appropriate place to begin the 
debate and amendment process and hopefully in regular order to pass 
those bills and move forward. But we should not jeopardize this bill at 
this point. That is not responsible. That is not what any of us should 
be doing at this point.

  Finally, let me talk about the debt issue we have been hearing so 
much about. None of us wants to operate this country in debt. All of us 
are fiscally responsible. I have heard every Member of the Senate come 
forward and talk about making sure we keep our house in order.
  Who got us to where we are today? The Republicans who came into power 
under George Bush turned historic surpluses into historic deficits by 
not being honest about the costs in front of us--whether it was the 
Iraq war or whether it was other costs that were paid off-budget, 
emergencies across the country--not coming forward and being honest 
about the fact that we do need to fund health care research or 
education for our kids. Why have these bills not passed before the 
election? Because even Republicans didn't want to cut education or to 
cut health care, which would have been what we had to do to meet the 
President's budget level.
  I take a backseat to no one when it comes to making sure our country 
moves forward in a fiscally responsible way and deals with the debt we 
have. But at the cost of laying off thousands of people because we are 
not being responsible and up-front about the job we have to do is 
irresponsible.
  I hope our colleagues will defeat the amendment by Senator Ensign, 
move on, pass this bill this week, and then we can have all the debate 
we want about the budget that will come before this body shortly, about 
the appropriations moving forward.
  Let me remind all of us that what we are talking about here is 
extremely important. No one wants to get a pink slip. No one wants to 
see their job lost. No one wants to see their health care at risk, 
their education at risk, or for that matter, within my appropriations 
bill, their flight from their airport at risk because we have not added 
air traffic controllers, which is in this bill. There are many other 
issues in this bill that are at risk under the proposal of the Senator, 
and I urge our colleagues to defeat this amendment and move forward, 
doing what we were sent here to do, and that is be responsible.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nevada is recognized.
  Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I wish to first address a few of the 
misrepresentations of my amendment by the Senator from Washington. My 
amendment does not cut any specific program, and you know it. It says 
to the Appropriations Committee: We will send this back to the 
Appropriations Committee, and you determine which programs are funded 
and which ones are not funded. But you will fund them at last year's 
level. If you want to raise the level in certain areas, then you will 
have to cut funding in other areas.
  We just have to ask ourselves the question: Does anybody believe 
there is wasteful Washington spending? Does our Government have any 
wasteful spending in it? If you say there obviously is wasteful 
spending, when was the last time we cut anything? When was the last 
time we cut any wasteful spending? Congress needs to address this 
wasteful spending. Part of the Appropriations Committee job is 
oversight. The Committee then figures out what is working, what is not 
working, fund what works and cut what does not work. But that doesn't 
happen around here. All they do is add and add.
  If you check the Constitution, the purse strings are controlled by 
Congress, not by the President. Democrats are entering their third year 
of that control in both houses. So what we have to do here is exercise 
our authority and say we are going to be fiscally responsible. You can 
say you are fiscally responsible all you want, but unless you act on 
it, the words are hollow.
  Businesses across America are looking for ways to cut waste from 
their budgets during this economic downturn. Do you know what they are 
finding? Talk to them. I have been in business myself. I understand 
that when times are good, you sometimes add staff you don't need, you 
waste money in places you don't need to, and that is in the private 
sector. The Government is less efficient than the private sector.
  Times are tough in this country, instead of thinking we will just add 
to the deficit, we will just raise taxes, let's look for efficiency and 
let's eliminate wasteful spending. We have a bill in front of us that 
is going to increase spending over last year's level by 8 percent. Is 
that fiscally responsible? We just passed a nearly $1 trillion spending 
bill called the stimulus bill, and now we are going to increase this by 
8 percent? It seems to me that is not fiscal responsibility. That is 
the height of irresponsibility.
  Let's have a debate on this, but let's have a honest debate.
  We are not cutting any specific programs. Do not say we are cutting 
education. Do not say we are cutting health care. Do not say we are 
cutting police and firefighters because this amendment does not do 
that.
  What this amendment says is, let's send this bill back to the 
Appropriations Committee, to last year's level. The Appropriations 
Committee can determine which programs are funded at what level. If you 
believe there are certain priorities that need more funding, then fund 
them; otherwise, let's be honest about this debate. And I am more than 
happy to go back and forth with the other side about the merits. But if 
anybody thinks there is not wasteful spending going on in Washington, 
DC, you need to wake up and smell the coffee because it is outrageous 
how much waste there is in our Government today--outrageous. We do not 
require fiscal discipline in our agencies, and that is what we need to 
start doing.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New York is recognized.
  Mr. SCHUMER. I ask unanimous consent to address the Senate as in 
morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


           president obama's missile shield letter to russia

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, I rise today in support of President 
Obama's critical recognition that Russia must be a major player in 
blocking Iran's development of dangerous weapons. Yesterday, it was 
reported that the President wrote to Russia's President Dmitri Medvedev 
signaling an openness to re-examining the contested missile defense 
system in Eastern Europe, while urging Russia to help us stop Iran from 
developing nuclear warheads and long-range weapons.
  This overture by President Obama is Reaganesque in its boldness. It 
has the potential to represent the most cooperative approach to a 
global threat by our two countries since President Reagan and Gorbachev 
signed the missile treaty 20 years ago.
  It signals the ushering in of a new era of tough and smart thinking 
about foreign policy that has been desperately lacking in the White 
House. Rather than alienating potential allies, President Obama and his 
team are demonstrating that they will abandon the Bush unilateral 
approach to nuclear nonproliferation in favor of galvanizing 
international support to meet the challenge posed by these deadly 
weapons.
  I am not an after-the-fact supporter of this strategy. I have long 
thought that the key to de-fanging Iran's nuclear threat lies in 
Russia's cooperation in imposing tough economic sanctions on Iran. In 
fact, in an opinion piece published by the Wall Street Journal last 
summer, I urged President Bush to offer to Russia a deal: in exchange 
for walking back the missile defense system that Russia so opposes, the 
U.S. should get Russia to back the United States' economic sanctions on 
Iran that are our best stick for making sure that their nuclear threat 
does not become a reality.
  I also made this suggestion in person at the White House last year. I 
was literally told by Vice President Cheney ``We can't do that.'' Well, 
there's new

[[Page S2662]]

leadership in Washington and President Obama says ``Yes we can.''
  Today, there should be no lingering doubt that Iran represents a 
profound threat to our global security. The latest International Atomic 
Energy Agency report confirms that Iran remains in hot pursuit of a 
nuclear program. The report told us that Iran now possesses 1,010 
kilograms, 2,222 pounds, of low-enriched uranium, which raises concerns 
that it now has sufficient uranium and the means to enrich it to 
produce nuclear warheads.
  Whether President Ahmadinejad actually intends to make good on his 
threat remains to be seen. But what we do know is that the 
administration needs to use every diplomatic tool in our arsenal to 
halt Iran's progress in the development of deadly nuclear weapons.
  In the recent past, we have made some progress in ratcheting up 
economic pressure on Iran by sanctioning four of Iran's major state-
owned banks. This move has dramatically limited Iran's ability to 
conduct international business, as a growing number of foreign banks 
are unwilling to risk reputational harm or loss of access to U.S. 
financial markets. More economic pressure can and must be applied.
  These sanctions are effective against Iran for several reasons. 
Despite the fact that the leadership and government of Iran is a 
theocracy, the Iranian people are largely secular and look westward for 
their cultural bearings. It's a common sight to see satellite dishes 
hidden in air-conditioning ducts, so Iranians can stay abreast of 
Western culture. Its growing youthful population also has strong ties 
to the west. MTV is a popular TV channel among the young in the 
country, not al-Jazeera. Iran is also wealthier than most neighbors in 
its region, and its inhabitants have enjoyed a higher standard of 
living than most people living in the Middle East.
  However, Russia is blunting the impact of the sanctions. Economic 
self-interest motivates Russia's arguments that there is no evidence 
that Iran has a secret nuclear weapons program and that sanctions would 
undermine the International Atomic Energy Agency's efforts. Russia 
makes money from business with Iran, since Russia currently supplies 
over 75 percent of Iran's arms imports. Russia continues to supply Iran 
with nuclear fuel and to train Iran's nuclear engineers.
  More ominously, Prime Minister Putin's nationalist rhetoric, designed 
to remake Russia into a global power and restore nationalist pride to 
the Russians, has led Russia into an even tighter embrace with Iran, an 
embrace that must be untangled if we are ever to truly eliminate the 
Iranian nuclear threat.
  It is also not a secret that little has raised Russia's anger and 
fueled its nationalist impulses more than the Bush administration's 
missile shield plan. Putin argued that such a plan would both reignite 
the arms race of the 1980s and damage Russia's relations with the 
United States, Poland, and the Czech Republic. He also said that the 
shield would prompt Russia to increase its own defenses and abrogate 
its commitments to demilitarize under the Treaty on Conventional Armed 
Forces in Europe.
  Despite Russia's loud complaints over this missile shield, the Bush 
administration plowed ahead, securing reluctant agreement from our 
allies at the NATO summit earlier last summer to move forward with its 
implementation.
  Let me be clear. The United States is committed to both protecting 
against the threat of a nuclear Iran and protecting a free and 
prosperous Eastern Europe. But the Bush administration's plan to deploy 
the missile defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic has never 
made much sense. The technology has never been proven to work, it has 
not been determined to be cost-effective, and it will do nothing to 
tackle the ultimate source of this threat, Iran's stubborn refusal to 
abandon its nuclear program. At the same time, it does very little to 
preserve the necessary and very important independence of Eastern 
Europe.
  In this context, it seems clear that the U.S. and Russia each have 
something to gain from each other. President Obama appears to recognize 
this dynamic. In exchange for joining the West in imposing economic 
sanctions on Iran until they stop their pursuit of nuclear weapons, I 
encourage the administration to roll back its predecessor's plans for a 
missile shield. It makes sense. With Russia on board, economic 
sanctions will have much greater success, and countries like China will 
certainly think twice before engaging with the Iranian regime. Russian 
participation will give multilateral sanctions against Iran real teeth, 
and we can halt Iran's nuclear program before it is too late.
  The President's gesture to Russia is the kind of smart, targeted 
diplomacy our dangerous world needs. Given that a nuclear Iran is such 
a profound threat, this strategy makes eminent sense. The United States 
could give up a non-vital missile program in Eastern Europe in exchange 
for vitally needed Russian cooperation to prevent Iran from going 
nuclear. President Obama and President Medvedev do not need to look 
into each other's soul. They just need to be able to trust each other's 
handshake.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Hawaii is recognized.
  Mr. INOUYE. Mr. President, the measure before us, H.R. 1105, is 
consistent with the funding levels approved in the budget resolution. 
Therefore, I sincerely believe there is no justification for any 
amendment to reopen this bill to further cuts.
  The Republicans argue there is an overlap between the funds added in 
the recovery bill and the omnibus bill before us. At the request of 
Republican Members, Senator Cochran and I called upon our staff to 
conduct a bipartisan review of the impact that the Recovery Act has on 
the omnibus bill. That review determined that there is, at most, 
minimal overlap. Let me explain. First, there are 900 programs in the 
omnibus bill. Fewer than 20 percent receive stimulus funds. For those 
who may want to offer an across-the-board cut to this bill, they would 
be harming more than 80 percent of the programs for the Department of 
Agriculture, Commerce, Justice, Treasury, HUD, Energy, and so on.
  Second, of the programs with stimulus funds, only 100 have an 
increase in the 2009 omnibus bill above the 2008 funding level, and 
many of those increases just cover inflation or are relatively small. 
Nearly half of these programs averaged about $5 million in increase 
between 2008 and 2009. In many cases this does not even cover the cost 
of inflation.
  Analysis will show there are 30 programs in the bill before us which 
grow substantially between 2008 and 2009 by a total of $15 billion. Of 
the omnibus growth of the $15 billion we measured, $13 billion is 
either entirely unrelated to the stimulus bill or is required in 
addition to the Recovery Act funds to achieve policy objectives or was 
funded in response to strong political support which would eliminate 
any chance of reducing it.
  I would like to mention a few critical priorities that would go unmet 
if the Congress were to pass a CR rather than the omnibus. On food and 
medical product safety inspections, this omnibus bill would provide the 
Food and Drug Administration with an increase of nearly $325 million, 
of which $150 million is included in the current continuing resolution.
  If this measure is not enacted into law, the proposed increased 
funding for the FDA would be reduced by $175 million. This reduction in 
funding would significantly decrease the number of food and medical 
product safety inspections, both domestic and overseas, that the FDA 
could perform.
  On the matter of consumer product safety, this measure would provide 
the Consumer Product Safety Commission with an increase of $25 million 
or 32 percent above the 2008 level. Without this funding increase, this 
Commission would not be able to implement many of the reforms and new 
directives contained in the newly enacted Consumer Product Safety 
Improvement Act to make children's products safer, such as the consumer 
complaint database, an overseas presence, and increased inspector 
general staffing, and staffing generally.
  On the matter of the enforcement of securities law, inadequate 
resources for the Securities and Exchange Commission would hamper the 
ability to undertake vigorous enforcement of security laws to help 
bolster the integrity of the financial markets just when such 
enforcement is needed.

[[Page S2663]]

  On the matter of the Federal Aviation Administration, this agency 
faces a crisis in maintaining an adequate workforce of trained air 
traffic controllers. Without the increase provided in this omnibus 
bill, the FAA would be forced to freeze or reduce the number of new air 
traffic controllers the agency can bring on board and train, worsening 
the experience shortage we already have in our air traffic control 
towers. One accident is one too many.

  These are only some of the many priorities in this legislation that 
would go unmet if we fail to pass this bill as written. This omnibus 
bill is a good package. It is bipartisan and noncontroversial. It is in 
compliance with the budget resolution for the committee.
  Again, I believe there is no justification for an amendment to reopen 
this bill to further cuts that would do harm to the important national 
priorities I have mentioned.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Sanders). The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. INOUYE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


            Motion to Commit With Instructions, as Modified

  Mr. INOUYE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate 
proceed to vote in relation to the Ensign motion to commit with 
instructions, as modified with the changes at the desk; and that no 
amendments be in order to the motion prior to a vote in relation to the 
motion to commit; that upon disposition of the motion to commit, 
Senator Hutchison be recognized to offer an amendment which provides 
for a reduction in funding with no amendment in order to the amendment 
prior to a vote in relation to the amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The motion to commit with instructions, as modified, is as follows:

       Mr. Ensign moves to commit the bill H. R. 1105 to the 
     Committee on Appropriations of the Senate with instructions 
     to report the same back to the Senate with the following 
     changes:
       Sec. ___. (a) Amounts appropriated under this Act for--
       (1) fiscal year 2009 shall be reduced by $18,981,000,000; 
     and
       (2) fiscal year 2010 shall be reduced by $3,274,000,000.

  Mr. INOUYE. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There appears to be a sufficient second.
  The question is on agreeing to the motion.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
  Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Indiana (Mr. Bayh), the 
Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Conrad), and the Senator from 
Massachusetts (Mr. Kennedy) are necessarily absent.
  Mr. KYL. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator 
from Nebraska (Mr. Johanns) and the Senator from Alabama (Mr. 
Sessions).
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber 
desiring to vote?
  The result was announced--yeas 33, nays 61, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 75 Leg.]

                                YEAS--33

     Alexander
     Barrasso
     Bennett
     Brownback
     Bunning
     Burr
     Chambliss
     Coburn
     Corker
     Cornyn
     Crapo
     DeMint
     Ensign
     Enzi
     Graham
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Hatch
     Hutchison
     Inhofe
     Isakson
     Kyl
     Lugar
     Martinez
     McCain
     McConnell
     Murkowski
     Risch
     Roberts
     Thune
     Vitter
     Voinovich
     Wicker

                                NAYS--61

     Akaka
     Baucus
     Begich
     Bennet
     Bingaman
     Bond
     Boxer
     Brown
     Burris
     Byrd
     Cantwell
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Cochran
     Collins
     Dodd
     Dorgan
     Durbin
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Gillibrand
     Hagan
     Harkin
     Inouye
     Johnson
     Kaufman
     Kerry
     Klobuchar
     Kohl
     Landrieu
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lincoln
     McCaskill
     Menendez
     Merkley
     Mikulski
     Murray
     Nelson (FL)
     Nelson (NE)
     Pryor
     Reed
     Reid
     Rockefeller
     Sanders
     Schumer
     Shaheen
     Shelby
     Snowe
     Specter
     Stabenow
     Tester
     Udall (CO)
     Udall (NM)
     Warner
     Webb
     Whitehouse
     Wyden

                             NOT VOTING--5

     Bayh
     Conrad
     Johanns
     Kennedy
     Sessions
  The motion, as modified, was rejected.
  Mrs. MURRAY. 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. The Senator from Texas.


                   Motion to Commit with Instructions

  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I have a motion at the desk which I 
would like to call up for consideration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The bill clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Texas [Mrs. Hutchison] moves to commit the 
     bill H. R. 1105 to the Committee on Appropriations of the 
     Senate with instructions to report the same back to the 
     Senate with the following change:
     Amend spending levels in the bill so as to report back a bill 
     with an aggregate non-security spending level at fiscal year 
     2008 funding level, adjusted for inflation, by reducing 
     duplicative or non-essential funding in the $787,000,000,000 
     stimulus bill also referred to as the American Recovery and 
     Reinvestment Act of 2009.

  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, the amendment that was just defeated 
was to hold us to the 2008 spending levels after the $1 trillion of 
stimulus spending that has already been passed and signed by the 
President. My amendment would be for the nonsecurity spending for 2008, 
plus the rate of inflation at 3.8 percent.
  Basically, what I am doing is asking that we commit the bill to the 
Appropriations Committee to amend and find the places in the omnibus 
bill that is before us or the stimulus bill from 2 weeks ago where we 
would take out the amount of spending that is duplicative or 
nonessential in the amount of approximately $12 billion. This is a very 
modest cut, but it would begin to put us on the road toward some fiscal 
responsibility. We have just passed a $1 trillion stimulus package. It 
is in all of the areas that we could spend money on, and many of those 
are duplicated in what we are taking up on the floor right now.

  So if you take the nonsecurity spending of 2008 and you add the 
regular inflation at 3.8, the Congressional Budget Office says that it 
would be about $12 billion in cuts that the Appropriations Committee 
would be able to find. So we are not saying here to slash across the 
board. We are certainly holding harmless defense and veterans. But we 
are saying that the Appropriations Committee should look at what we 
have passed and see where there is duplication and cut $12 billion out 
of this spending bill, and then we will be setting the precedent that 
we are going back to fiscal responsibility, which is setting the budget 
and having a reasonable increase--the rate of inflation--which has been 
the normal procedure here until this year.
  When you look at the bill that is before us, it would cost about $408 
billion, according to the Congressional Budget Office. When you account 
for the previous continuing resolution, which provided funding for 
defense, military construction, veterans affairs, and homeland 
security, the top line fiscal year 2009 spending level would exceed $1 
trillion. This does not include last year's supplemental nor the 
stimulus which we have just passed, which, when you combine those 
bills, would be another total of $1.4 trillion. That is a 49-percent 
increase over a 1-year period. If we want to exclude the emergency or 
one-time actions, such as supplementals or the stimulus, then you would 
have an increase over last year's spending by $83 billion, which would 
be an 8.8-percent increase over last year's spending. That is more than 
twice the rate of inflation, at 3.8 percent.
  Let's take some examples. I will look at my committee, Commerce 
Committee, and the areas of my jurisdiction. We authorize broadband 
grants. We share this jurisdiction with the Agriculture Committee. We 
provided a total of $7.2 billion for broadband grants and loans in the 
stimulus package, $4.7 billion for the NTIA, and $2.5 billion for rural 
utility service. Yet in this bill we are adding another $400

[[Page S2664]]

million. That totals, for the fiscal year 2009 spending, a 4,500-
percent increase. Why do we need another $400 million when we haven't 
even begun to spend the $7.2 billion from the stimulus yet?
  How about the National Institute of Standards and Technology? This is 
a program I support. It is a valid program, just as the previous one. 
But here we are increasing the NIST funding by $31 million over last 
year's funding level and we just gave NIST $220 million not 2 weeks 
ago. So the Institute of Standards and Technology would be increased 
not by $31 million, but $251 million over a 1-year period.
  These are only some of the items in my own committee's jurisdiction. 
There are 122 accounts in this bill that received stimulus funding, and 
I support most of what is in this bill because the Appropriations 
Committee took up these spending bills last year. We had the ability to 
amend, in most cases, and we know what is in those bills. However, they 
were increased on the House side since we took them up last year, and 
now we have, between now and October 1 of this year, this spending bill 
for all of the accounts except the security accounts.
  Why don't we show the American people that we are going to exercise 
fiscal restraint; that we know we have just passed $1 trillion in 
stimulus spending--some of which arguably is stimulus and some of which 
arguably is not, but we passed that stimulus bill--and it is going to 
cost our taxpayers $1 trillion. We hope it will increase the revenue, 
because we hope it will increase jobs and it will keep people in their 
jobs. That is what we want it to do. But now we are in the regular 
appropriations cycle, from today until October 1, and we are talking 
about $408 billion more in spending, some of which has already been 
provided for in the stimulus package we passed.
  The American people, some of whom have lost their jobs, some of whom 
have received notice that their mortgages are going to be foreclosed 
and their homes are going to be taken, are saying: What are they doing 
up there? How can they spend money like that without any regard to what 
is fiscally responsible? And how we are going to pay it off? Because 
this is more debt, and we are going to increase, and increase again, 
and everyone who owns something or who has a mortgage understands this.
  We don't have to do this. We can say today, in a bipartisan way, that 
we are going to turn a new page; we are going to turn a new page in 
this Congress and the Appropriations Committee is going to do its work. 
The Appropriations Committee is going to, in a bipartisan way, start 
looking at this $408 billion bill and compare it to the 122 accounts in 
this bill that got stimulus 2 weeks ago and we are going to find $12 
billion in cuts--$12 billion out of $408 billion. It could come out of 
the stimulus. If that were the preferred way to go, we could go back 
into the stimulus in the outyears. It doesn't have to be in the next 2 
years, it can be in the outyears of the stimulus. The Appropriations 
Committee would be authorized to go into either bill and shrink $12 
billion.
  It seems almost unthinkable that we would not be able to cut $12 
billion out of $1.408 trillion of taxpayer money that is coming out of 
Washington and which is debt because we don't have the money to pay for 
it.
  I urge my colleagues to pass this amendment. Let us show the American 
people that we do understand we should have fiscal responsibility and 
restraint, as every household in this country is experiencing right 
now; and that from now forward our appropriations bills are going to be 
in the regular order; that we are going to have a budget, and we are 
going to live within that budget, and we are not going to add 5 percent 
or 8 percent and then bring it over here and pass it with no 
amendments. That is business as usual. That is not change, it is not 
bipartisanship, and it is not acceptable.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I reserve the remainder of my 
time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Kaufman). The Chair recognizes the Senator 
from Florida.
  Mr. MARTINEZ. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to be recognized 
for 20 minutes and that the time not be counted against Senator 
Hutchison's time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                                  CUBA

  Mr. MARTINEZ. Mr. President, as this mammoth appropriations bill is 
being considered, there are some ramifications that go way beyond the 
fiscal impact of this bill and the prudence of those measures. It is 
about the policy implications of some of the things that have been 
woven into this bill. I am particularly referring to those issues 
referring to our relationship with Cuba.
  This Senate has debated over many years issues relating to Cuba, a 
close neighbor; unfortunately, over the last half century, not a 
friendly neighbor. I think back to about 1898, when this Senate was 
very much in favor of Cuba's freedom from Spain and American forces 
intervened. In 1902, Cuba's freedom as an independent nation, freed 
from Spain, was granted as a result of actions by our Congress as well 
as our President.
  As the Senate considers taking steps that would change the current 
approach to policy regarding Cuba, we should reflect on how and why we 
have the current policy in place and the ramifications of adjusting 
that policy at this moment in time, even temporarily.
  The United States-Cuba policy is a living, breathing entity. Over the 
years, it has been adjusted, loosened, tightened, and tested. Ten 
successive U.S. Presidents have affirmed the policy, bolstering 
provisions for the sake of those brutalized by the regime, seeking no 
harm to the general Cuban public while denying the regime the resources 
it so desperately needs to keep the stranglehold on power.
  The United States has always had the general welfare of the Cuban 
people in mind as evidenced by our generous humanitarian aid and the 
promise it is of untethered assistance. The United States is the No. 1 
supplier of humanitarian aid to Cuba. The American people, in 2007 
alone, sent $240 million in private assistance through reputable 
humanitarian assistance organizations. The foundation of our policy 
takes aim at the actions of the regime that expropriated private 
property without compensation--property owned by American citizens. On 
top of this foundation is our message that Cubans deserve access to 
free and fair elections, basic human rights, and the rule of law.
  The United States built this policy so as to stand with the Cuban 
people, who are denied the freedoms we as Americans receive as a 
birthright. As we consider stripping enforcement of the sanctions, I 
wish to spend some time talking about what this policy means to the 
Cuban people, the American Government, and me personally, as someone 
who witnessed the violence of this revolution firsthand.
  United States-Cuba relations during the Castro era have largely been 
defined by Cuba's record of anti-Americanism and aggressive acts of 
hostility. When Fidel Castro took power in the early days of 1959, 
there were promises of democracy, free press, and elections. But such 
reforms never took place. In fact, a violent dictatorial regime came in 
its place. Many executions took place--killings without trial, without 
due process. Our President, then Dwight D. Eisenhower, built a 
framework for the anti-Castro policy by placing trade sanctions on 
sugar, oil, and guns.
  When barrels of Soviet oil began to arrive in Havana, United States 
oil companies in Cuba refused to continue refining oil, paving the way 
for further nationalization of United States assets--oil refineries in 
this instance. All of these nationalizations took place without 
compensation to American companies. And to this day, there never has 
been compensation. All of the properties owned by Americans were taken. 
Later, little by little, properties owned by Cubans were taken until 
there was no vestige of private property left in Cuba whatsoever.
  My own personal story, my own life, was touched, as I was a young boy 
when all of this took place. Ultimately, as a result of persecution of 
those of us who were people of faith, as well as the stifling 
atmosphere in a totally controlled society, as a teenager, I emigrated 
to the United States. I watched firsthand the tensions between Cuba and 
the United States in a very personal way.

[[Page S2665]]

  I remember watching the television and the news accounts of tensions 
rising between the United States and Cuba--escalating and leading up to 
the Cuban Missile Crisis.
  That began in July of 1962, when Raul Castro went to Moscow, and the 
bonds between Cuba and Russia strengthened.
  The Castro brothers engaged with Russia and agreed to allow the 
Soviets to deploy nuclear missiles, under Moscow's jurisdiction on the 
island of Cuba. By the fall of 1962, Soviet freighters began delivering 
shipments of middle-range ballistic missiles.
  In an address to the nation on October 22, 1962, on the eve of my 
16th birthday, President John F. Kennedy warned of the imminent danger 
presented by the emerging Soviet-Cuba alliance.
  In describing Cuba's nuclear strike capabilities, Kennedy said:

       Several of them include medium range ballistic missiles, 
     capable of carrying a nuclear warhead for a distance of more 
     than 1,000 nautical miles. Each of these missiles, in short, 
     is capable of striking Washington, D.C., the Panama Canal, 
     Cape Canaveral, Mexico City, or any other city in the 
     southeastern part of the United States, in Central America, 
     or in the Caribbean area.

  Five days later, in a letter to Russian Primer Nikita Khrushchev, 
Fidel Castro offered the island in sacrifice and urged the Soviets to 
use nuclear weapons against the United States if necessary.
  Let's be clear, the Castro regime, under Fidel and Raul Castro, 
then--as they are today--in power, wanted first strike nuclear attacks 
against the United States. Fidel Castro urged the Russians to let the 
missiles fly toward our soil.
  Fortunately for all, Khrushchev's response to the Castro request was 
to urge, ``. . . patience, firmness and more firmness.''
  And these events are the foundation for U.S. Cuba policy; brutality, 
the theft of U.S.-owned assets, and the threat of nuclear catastrophe. 
All of these things perpetrated by the Castro brothers who were in 
power in 1959, and who remain in power today.
  In the years between the Cuban Missile Crisis and now, the United 
States has made many good faith efforts and attempts to unilaterally 
engage Cuba and restore relations.
  Without fail, every single attempt has failed due to the actions of 
the Castro regime.
  Several attempts involved our offering concessions similar to those 
in the bill before us today.
  In 1975, Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, during President Gerald 
Ford's presidency, tried to broker a deal with Cuba that would have 
lifted the trade sanctions and normalized relations. But the regime 
chose another route. It wanted to project power abroad. It was more 
interested in acting as a surrogate of the Soviets than it was in 
better relations with the United States. So Cuba sent troops to Angola. 
These troops engaged in a war as surrogates of the Soviet Union, where 
Cuban men died and where the Cuban Armed Forces were engaged in battle. 
They seized the capital city of Luanda, and the group then proclaimed 
independence from Portugal.

  In an effort to promote peace and stability, Secretary Kissinger had 
no choice but to tell Cuba that as long as they had troops in Africa, 
the deal to normalize relations with Cuba was off the table.
  In April 1980, during the Presidency of Jimmy Carter the U.S. 
Government once again reached out to the Cuban regime. This was 
rebuffed in a different way. This time it was as a result of more than 
10,000 Cubans who were seeking asylum in the Peruvian Embassy; Cuban-
American exile groups reached out to the island asking if willing 
Cubans could be allowed safe passage to the United States.
  The response from the Cuban people was overwhelming and more than 
125,000 Cubans fled for freedom in what became known as The Mariel 
boatlift. In the months that the boatlift took place, the U.S. 
established an interests section in Havana and reciprocated by allowing 
Cuba to establish theirs in Washington.
  This would have been a bright spot for U.S.-Cuba relations except for 
the fact that the Castro regime took advantage of our generosity.
  As thousands of Cubans lined up for the chance to live in freedom, 
the Castro regime opened its prisons and mental hospitals and sent 
patients and their worst criminals, murderers, thieves, and drug 
dealers into the United States with the idea that they would be turned 
loose to wreak havoc in the U.S.
  This was not only cynical but also an act of aggression during a time 
when President Carter had extended a hand of friendship.
  Once discovered, the Castro regime refused to take back the criminals 
and many were absorbed by our prison system where they remain to this 
day because they will not accept them back.
  The Mariel Boatlift, as it is now known, was symbolic of the desire 
of the Cuban people to live freely and the flight of the people of Cuba 
to friendlier places, but also of the frustrating attempts to have a 
better relationship with the Cuban government.
  Frustrated with the conditions allowed by the Cuban regime, more than 
125,000 Cubans made the journey to the United States. Many were 
reunited with family and friends, and all had a chance at a better 
life.
  In February 1982, the U.S. Secretary of State added Cuba to the list 
of countries supporting international terrorists. The U.S. State 
Department issued a report detailing Cuba's activities.
  The State Department asserted that Cuba had, quote, ``encouraged 
terrorism in the hope of provoking indiscriminate violence and 
repression, in order to weaken government legitimacy and attract new 
converts to armed struggle.''
  Cuba was noted to have very active operations throughout Central 
America and especially in Nicaragua, El Salvador, and Guatemala.
  It was reportedly providing, ``advice, safe haven, communications, 
training, and some financial support to several violent South American 
organizations.''
  The long record of the Cuban government's lack of respect for human 
life extends beyond the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. In 1996, the Castro 
regime engineered a civilian murder that shocked the conscience of all 
Americans.
  On February 24, 1996, the regime ordered the shoot down of two 
unarmed civilian planes flying over international waters on a 
humanitarian mission.
  Four people were killed. Three U.S. citizens and a permanent U.S. 
resident; Armando Alejandre, Jr., Carlos Costa, Mario de la Pena, and 
Pablo Morales.
  These men were part of a Florida-based humanitarian organization 
called ``Brothers to the Rescue,'' a group credited with spotting and 
saving the lives of thousands of Cubans who spotted and helped rescue 
Cubans trying to raft across the Florida Straits.
  Following a thorough Federal investigation, it was determined the 
regime premeditated the shoot down as part of a conspiracy called 
Operation Scorpion--a mission designed to send a message to the Cuban 
exile community.
  In the months leading up to the shoot down, Cuban-piloted MiG jets 
practiced intercepting and firing on slow-moving planes similar to 
those flown by the Brothers.
  Further, the regime infiltrated an agent into Brothers for the sole 
purpose of encouraging the group to fly into the regime's death trap.
  This agent disappeared the day before the shoot down and reappeared 
in Havana to denounce the humanitarian group.
  The Southern District of Florida would eventually find and charge 14 
individuals including Cuban spies.
  The reaction from the international community was swift and harsh.
  The United Nations Security Council passed a resolution condemning 
Cuba.
  The European Union followed suit. Here in the United States, we 
strengthened sanctions against Cuba through the Helms-Burton Act.
  A known state-sponsor of terror, the Cuban regime engaged in 
premeditated murder, in international airspace.
  And the same people who orchestrated this unprovoked attack, Fidel 
and Raul Castro, are still in power today.
  Incidents such as these strengthen the resolve of Cubans looking for 
a better life.
  Jose Marti, a Cuban hero, referred to as the ``Apostle for Cuban 
Independence,'' once said, ``Man loves liberty, even if he does not 
know that he loves it. He is driven by it and flees from it where it 
does not exist.''

[[Page S2666]]

  Many have fled Cuba for our shores.
  During the early days of the regime from 1959 to 1962, it is 
estimated that the U.S. resettled 200,000 Cuban refugees.
  There are well over 1.5 million Cuban refugees in the U.S. and many 
more in Spain, Mexico, and throughout Latin America and the world where 
the Cuban Diaspora has gone, escaping tyranny and seeking freedom.
  According to the State Department:

       These include former political prisoners, persecuted 
     religious minorities, human rights activists, forced labor 
     conscripts, and those discriminated against or harmed based 
     on their political or religious beliefs.

  Those who choose to stay behind and courageously oppose the regime's 
radical ways are subjected to violence, torture, and even murder.
  According to Armando Lago, an economist who has attempted to compile 
a list of every person killed since the start of the Cuban revolution, 
Raul Castro was personally responsible for 550 executions in 1959 
alone--executed without trial, without cause, without mercy--Raul 
Castro, the figurehead of Cuba's modern regime.
  Lago has documented 500 murders by prison guards, 500 deaths from 
medical neglect, 200 suicides of political prisoners, and more than 
1,000 assassinations and disappearances.
  Those who have voiced opposition to the regime's policies have been 
forced to endure harsh consequences.
  Under the Cuban Criminal Code, the regime has the legal authority to 
detain and arrest anyone deemed not in line with the Communist State.
  These individuals are defined under Article 103 of the Cuban Criminal 
Code as:

       Any person who incites against the social order, 
     international solidarity or the communist State, by means of 
     oral or written propaganda or in any other way; prepares, 
     distributes or possesses propaganda . . . Any person who 
     disseminates false news or malicious predictions likely to 
     cause alarm or discontent among the population, or public 
     disorder . . . [or] Any person who permits utilization of the 
     mass communication media shall be punished with one to four 
     years imprisonment.

  Once in prison, these individuals are subjected to unsanitary 
conditions, harassment, and beatings.
  Here are just a few of the conditions reported by the Inter-American 
Commission on Human Rights.

       The nutrition and hygienic situation, together with the 
     deficiencies in medical care continue to be alarming and have 
     caused numerous medical problems among the prison population. 
     Anemia, diarrhea, skin diseases and also parasitism due to 
     polluted water, appear to be commonplace in the majority of 
     the country's prisons, while in some such as the Manacas and 
     Combinado del Este facilities cases of tuberculosis have been 
     recorded.
       Moreover, inmates who have made any form of protest about 
     the treatment received or who reject reeducation, which 
     according to information received consists of political and 
     ideological training, have been subjected to reprisals such 
     as beatings, being shut up in punishment cells (which are 
     extremely small, with the door closed and where the prisoner 
     can be kept for months without seeing the light of the sun), 
     being transferred to prisons normally far from where their 
     families live, suspension of family visits, or denial of 
     medical treatment.

  This is in sharp contrast to the much publicized detention facility 
in Guantanamo. I have visited there and conditions are as good there or 
better than those in Florida jails. Organizations can visit Guantanamo. 
That is the only jail in Cuba that can be visited by an international 
organization like the Red Cross. The Cuban government refuses any human 
rights organization permission to visit their prisons.
  The fact is the only uninspected, deplorable prisons in Cuba are 
those run by the Cuban government. Their gulag continues today 
unchecked, and would continue even in spite of us reaching out through 
this bill in this misguided way.
  According to the U.S. State Department's 2008 Report on Cuban Human 
Rights released last week:

       . . . the government continued to deny its citizens their 
     basic human rights and committed numerous, serious abuses.
       The government denied citizens the right to change their 
     government.

  In describing these abuses of human rights, the report states:

       The following human rights problems were reported: beatings 
     and abuse of detainees and prisoners, including human rights 
     activists, carried out with impunity; harsh and life-
     threatening prison conditions, including denial of medical 
     care; harassment, beatings, and threats against political 
     opponents by government-recruited mobs, police, and State 
     Security officials; arbitrary arrest and detention of human 
     rights advocates and members of independent professional 
     organizations; denial of fair trial; and interference with 
     privacy, including pervasive monitoring of private 
     communications.

  The report notes,

       . . . severe limitations on freedom of speech and press; 
     denial of peaceful assembly and association; restrictions on 
     freedom of movement, including selective denial of exit 
     permits to citizens and the forcible removal of persons from 
     Havana to their hometowns; restrictions on freedom of 
     religion; and refusal to recognize domestic human rights 
     groups or permit them to function legally.

  One of the political prisoners mentioned in the State Department 
report is a man named Tomas Ramos Rodriguez, who was released on June 
16 after 18 years in prison.
  Following his release, Tomas Ramos noted that ``prison authorities 
beat prisoners with truncheons on a near-daily basis with impunity. 
Families of prisoners continued to report that prison staff sometimes 
goaded inmates with promises of rewards [if they would] beat a 
political prisoner.''
  In describing the prison conditions, Tomas Ramos recalled the ``cell 
floors that had standing pools of water contaminated with sewage.''
  Additionally, the report tells the story of a physician named Rodolfo 
Martinez Vigoa, who complained to the Ministry of Public Health about 
the condition of the local health clinic in Artemisa as well as the 
salaries of his employees.
  In response, instead of taking care of the problem, the regime stood 
by as ``approximately 300 persons arrived at Martinez's house and 
shouted insults, calling him a traitor and a counter revolutionary. The 
government later stripped Martinez of his medical license.''
  There is a long litany of the human rights abuses that exist in Cuba. 
The fact is, with these conditions, we would dare not have a free-trade 
agreement with Colombia because of concerns about human rights. 
President Obama, during his campaign, indicated he was concerned about 
human rights conditions in Colombia so, therefore, he would not be for 
a free-trade agreement with Colombia. It would seem to me that to be 
consistent, he would have to veto this bill if, in fact, it contains a 
relaxation of trade with Cuba, particularly if it gets into the area of 
providing credits, which is what this bill would do, to those in Cuba 
who do not pay their bills.
  The fact is, there have been some pretend changes in Raoul Castro's 
regime since he took over Cuba. Citizens are allowed to use cell 
phones. That sounds like a great thing. The problem is the average 
Cuban makes $17 a month. The average cell phone in Cuba costs about 
$64. With the activation fee as high as $120, never mind the contract 
fee on a month-to-month basis.
  Another change is Cuban citizens can now stay in hotel rooms that 
have been historically reserved only for tourists. The problem is, 
hotel rooms cost as much as 11 times the average monthly salary of a 
Cuban. These are not changes, these are sham assurances aimed at hiding 
the regime's struggle to remain financially solvent.
  One clear change that has occurred is the rise of short-term arrests 
for so-called dangerous activity. Arbitrary detentions of prodemocracy 
activists have increased five times, from 325 in 2007 to 1,500 in 2008. 
These are just those that have been documented. Hundreds more, I am 
sure, take place that would be difficult to document because they 
happened in parts of the country where our diplomats certainly are not 
allowed to travel, and certainly there are no human rights 
organizations that could monitor it.
  The regime's promise of change has fallen short of what the Cuban 
people want and deserve. Where are the anticipated reforms? There have 
been 2 years of Raoul's rule and nothing has happened.
  Even the most modest calls for reform go unanswered. Since the 
average Cuban earns $17 a month, but the prices of goods and services 
are almost what they are here, many families find it very difficult to 
get by.
  For those Cubans who have family members living abroad, here in the 
U.S. or Spain or elsewhere, they can receive remittances without a 
Government penalty. But the Cuban Government, unlike any other 
Government in the world, takes 20 percent from any incoming money.

[[Page S2667]]

  A person living in the United States who sends funds to Brazil, 
Ecuador, Colombia, or China, they can expect to pay a private 
transaction fee of somewhere in the neighborhood of 2.5 percent. The 
Cuban Government takes a 20-percent cut right off the top. In this bill 
we will unilaterally be letting the Cuban Government receive unlimited 
remittances, asking them to do nothing--unilaterally lifting the 
restrictions on remittances while asking the Cuban Government to do 
nothing.
  Would it not be nice if we were to tell the Cuban Government that in 
exchange for allowing them to now receive unlimited remittances, which 
may not be a bad thing, then they should, in fact, act in a way that 
allows the poor people of Cuba and those here sacrificing to send them 
help, not to be taking a 20-percent cut from the moneys they send to 
their relatives and loved ones in Cuba. These are not measures designed 
to serve the interests of the Cuban people.
  But there is another yet darker side to this regime, as the anti-
Americanism and the antagonism to our country has exemplified the 
actions of this regime throughout its time. Cuba and its anti-
Americanism has fallen in line with Venezuela.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent I be allowed to have 5 
additional minutes to conclude my remarks.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. MARTINEZ. The relationship between Venezuela and Cuba is very 
close and obviously designed in their alliance to exercise an anti-
American policy. But it does not stop there. It also includes the very 
dangerous Government of Iran.
  Fidel Castro visited Iran in 2001. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visited Cuba 
in 2006, following a visit in 2000 by then-President Khatami. The fact 
is, Chavez is in and out of Cuba regularly. The fact is, these 
governments are functioning as an alliance of sorts in the region, 
trying to thwart and provoke an anti-American attitude.
  Before voting on this spending bill, we ought to give serious 
consideration to what changing the U.S. policy toward Cuba would mean 
going forward. While some may feel that the U.S. policy is punitive, it 
was created with the interests of the Cuban people in mind. Relaxing 
restrictions and allowing additional remittances would provide the 
regime with additional revenue, cash that would help it maintain its 
repressive policies.
  According to the Cuban Assets Control Regulation: Persons visiting a 
member of the immediate family, who is a Cuban national, for a period 
not to exceed 14 days, those are allowed today once every 3 years.
  What is likely to happen under these proposed changes in the omnibus 
is a spike increase in tourist travel under the guise of humanitarian 
activity. That does not serve the interest of the Cuban people and 
those who seek freedom inside Cuba.
  In addition to that, this legislation before us would extend credit 
through the U.S. banking system to a Cuban nation that recently 
disclosed it owes more than $29 billion to the Paris Club, a debt they 
stopped making payment on back in the 1980s.
  In fact, Cuba has the second worst credit of any nation in the world. 
And to that country, we are now proposing, in this legislation, in 
these financial times we are living in, to provide the Cuban Government 
with credit that can purchase agricultural goods in this country and 
also medicine, in fact, to the tune of some $780 million a year.
  They have been doing just fine paying cash on the barrel head. This 
bill will give them credit. Why would we do that to this Cuban 
Government? Why would we do that to this enemy of the United States, 
when we would not sign and ratify a free-trade agreement with a country 
such as Colombia, which is a friend, a partner, an ally.
  As we consider changing U.S. policy regarding Cuba, why are we doing 
it in a way where we ask for nothing? We tie neither of the changes 
called for in this omnibus to any yardstick of improvement. We do not 
call for the release of political prisoners; we do not call for 
lowering of the remittance fee from 20 percent to something more 
reasonable; we do not ask for any signs of positive behavior. We just 
lay the changes out there and then hope for the best. That is not the 
way we ought to approach a regime that has rebuffed our overtures for 
normal relations and humanitarian aid and instead seeks to undermine 
our alliances and our interests in the region.
  The fact is, the Cuban Government is no friend of the United States. 
This is not just some benign dictator in Latin America; this is a 
government that purposely, during the entire time that it has existed, 
has had an antagonism and has exhibited every type of hostility toward 
the United States, which it continues to exhibit to this day.
  Now, there are those who believe that Raul Castro is a reformer. 
After 2 years in power, as I pointed out earlier, little or no reforms 
have taken place. Great hopes were raised by him with many who are 
hoping for some sign. Yesterday, those signs of change were even 
further dashed when he had a major shakeup in his Government, and 
Carlos Lage, who has essentially been the Prime Minister of the Cuban 
Government, and one of those people whom folks believed was, in fact, a 
reformer, and the hopes were all pinned that if Lage would take over, 
that he might be the next President--in fact, he was fired yesterday, 
and he is no longer any sign of hope for undermining change in Cuba.
  In fact, what happened yesterday in Cuba, by any other standard, by 
any other measure in any other country would be considered a military 
coup. We already have a totalitarian system. Now Raul Castro has put 
all of his friends from the military, all aging people in their 
seventies and older, as close to him as he can put them. Some of them 
are the most radical, the most vicious of those who have enforced 
Cuba's totalitarian regime over the years that it has existed, and they 
are now in the throes of government.
  So, essentially, what we have here is not an example of a change in 
regime but one that is only consolidating power, trying to only exact 
more repression from its people, while at the same time exhibiting 
hostility and anti-Americanism anywhere that it goes and anywhere that 
it speaks.
  So I would hope we can have this debate outside of this omnibus bill 
because it would be great to have a discussion on what our policy ought 
to be on Cuba--not to have it lumped into this massive spending measure 
that has to be passed by Friday. I would love for us to talk about Cuba 
in terms of how we encourage respect for human rights, how we encourage 
this Government to behave as a normal, law-abiding nation. The fact is, 
this unilateral act which, frankly, would not be met with any 
reciprocity is a mistake. It is a sign that we are trying now to 
legislate policy in a bill that is about spending and a very dramatic 
change in U.S. foreign policy.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma is recognized.


                           Amendment No. 596

  Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending 
amendment be set aside and that amendment No. 596 be called up.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Oklahoma [Mr. Coburn] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 596.

  Mr. COBURN. 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 require the use of competitive procedures to award 
  contracts, grants, and cooperative agreements funded under this Act)

       On page 1120, between lines 6 and 7, insert the following:


                     prohibition on no-bid earmarks

       Sec. 414.  (a) Notwithstanding any other provision of this 
     Act, none of the funds appropriated or otherwise made 
     available by this Act may be used to make any payment in 
     connection with a contract unless the contract is awarded 
     using competitive procedures in accordance with the 
     requirements of section 303 of the Federal Property and 
     Administrative Services Act of 1949 (41 U.S.C. 253), section 
     2304 of title 10, United States Code, and the Federal 
     Acquisition Regulation.
       (b) Notwithstanding any other provision of this Act, none 
     of the funds appropriated or otherwise made available by this 
     Act may be awarded by grant or cooperative agreement unless 
     the process used to award such grant or cooperative agreement 
     uses competitive procedures to select the grantee or award 
     recipient.

  Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I have to identify with the words of 
Senator

[[Page S2668]]

Hutchison about how the American public have to view this bill, 
especially in light of the fact of the stimulus bill we just passed. I 
will add some more to those comments as we go through this amendment.
  This is a very straightforward amendment. It has been voted on by the 
Senate several times. Last time it passed 97 to 0. All it requires is 
that the money expended in this, where appropriate, be competitively 
bid.
  I am sure there is going to be people who vote against this this time 
because of the situation in which we find ourselves. I wonder how you 
go back to your State and say that you do not think we ought to 
competitively bid the money we are going to spend on behalf of the 
American people. But some are going to say that.
  We will hear all sorts of things. What this requires is all 
contracts, all grants, and cooperative agreements awarded under this 
act to be competitively bid. What do we know about competitive bids and 
what do we know that President Obama campaigned on? His campaign was, 
anything over $25,000 in the Federal Government ought to be 
competitively bid. So I have no doubt that my friend, the President, 
will endorse this idea. It is an essential part of his campaign to help 
us clean up the corruption, clean up the cost excesses, and clean up 
the overruns that we have seen.
  The other thing is, we already have several laws that require it. But 
then we have words in the appropriations bill that exempt us from those 
laws requiring competitive bidding. So what do we do in this bill? We 
actually take away the enforcement of existing statutes so we do not 
have to competitively bid. Is it not interesting that the reason we do 
not want competitive bids mainly has to do with earmarks. It has to do 
with the fact that people have earmarks in the bill that they want to 
go to a certain set of people; maybe not the best qualified to perform 
that function or task under which the Government wants this service to 
be done, but you can bet your bottom dollar it is where the Senator or 
the Congressman wants it to go so he can get credit for it.
  So not only do we have a tendency for less than sunshine, what we 
have bred is tremendous inefficiency. And it goes back to the very idea 
of why earmarks are so damaging to this country, which is because they 
give elevation and attention to the politically entitled money class. 
That is where 80 percent of the 7,700 earmarks in this bill are; they 
are to the politically entitled money class in this country, the people 
who can give campaign donations. That is who they are to.
  So we do not want competitive bidding because the person we are 
counting on sending money back for a campaign contribution will not get 
the contract. So the deal does not get completed. In May 2006, the 
Senate voted 98 to 0 to require that we have competitive bidding on the 
stimulus package. We voted 97 to 0. What did we do in conference? They 
took it out so their friends do not have to competitively bid. Where I 
come from, in Oklahoma, we call that corruption. We call it corruption. 
That is a tough word. But that is what is going on with a lot of the 
money that our grandchildren are going to pay back that is going to go 
on this bill and in the stimulus bill.
  The other reason we should do this is because no-bid contracts 
historically, when you look at them, never give value. What we get is 
cost overruns.
  Great example: The census this next year is going to cost close to 
$20 billion. The census in 2000 cost $10 billion. Now we have to be 
scratching our head to say, why would it double? Well, $1 billion of 
that is because the Census Bureau had a no-bid contract for electronic 
data collection that fell on its face.
  In spite of oversight by this body, in spite of assurances that it 
would not happen, we wasted $800-plus million on one contract that we 
cannot utilize anything from. That is the competency of no-bid 
contracts. If we do a review of this bill in the future, and we did not 
put in competitive bidding, we are going to see that same thing to a 
lesser degree across the whole board.
  The other thing, the reason we should use competitive bidding, is 
that all of us would do it if it was our own money. We would want to 
get value. We would want to make sure we got the most value for the 
dollar that was spent.
  We do not do that because it is not our money. Now there is a 
Congressman on the other side from Arizona who has above his desk 
written in great big red ink: The greatest pleasure in the world is to 
spend somebody else's money. But it instills all sorts of mischief when 
we do it.
  So this is very straightforward, very direct. There are no tricks. It 
just says: Let's do what everybody else in the country would do who was 
making the decision about spending $410 billion. They would make sure 
each segment of it got some competitive bidding so we could reassure 
ourselves that at least we were getting value. It is not hard to do. It 
is easy guidelines. It is straightforward. Let's not exempt this bill 
from that.


                           Amendment No. 608

  I ask unanimous consent to set aside the pending amendment and call 
up amendment 608.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Oklahoma [Mr. Coburn] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 608.

  Mr. COBURN. 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 provide funds for the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights 
  Crime Act from funds already provided for the Weed and Seed Program)

       On page 135, line 6, strike the period and insert ``of 
     which $10,000,000 shall be available for grants to state or 
     local law enforcement for expenses to carry out prosecutions 
     and investigations authorized by the Emmett Till Unsolved 
     Civil Rights Crime Act established under Public Law 110-
     344.''.

  Mr. COBURN. This is an amendment that is about a serious issue. I 
agree that $10 million in a bill of $410 billion is not a lot of money 
in relationship, but let me tell you what this $10 million is going to 
do. There are 100 unsolved civil rights murders from the 1950s and 
1960s and 1970s that have not been investigated, that have not come 
forward because Congress hasn't put the money there.
  Last year, under great fanfare, several of my colleagues were 
critical of me because I wanted to pay for it as we passed the Emmett 
Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime bill. What I said in opposing that 
bill initially, which I never was successful in getting it paid for, 
was that there is plenty of money at the Justice Department if we just 
direct the Justice Department to put $10 million to this. There are 
three cases recently that are coming due, three that have been solved 
now. We have several other leads. Timing is of the essence.
  What I was told is: No, we will appropriate this money this year. 
That is what we were told. I won't go into the five pages of quotes by 
the general cosponsors of the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime 
bill, about how they would put the money in right now. Guess what is 
not in this bill. What is not in this bill is any money to the Justice 
Department to be directed to the Emmett Till unsolved civil rights 
crimes. They said to my staff: Don't worry about it. There is plenty of 
money at the Justice Department to do it. So the same argument that was 
not good enough last year when we tried to pay for it is now turned 
around, and they say: It is the same amount of money. We now have it, 
in their judgment. But we didn't last year.
  The fact is, there is a sham being perpetrated. It is to claim a 
moral position and say you will fund something and then, when it comes 
time to have to give up an earmark or have to eliminate something else, 
you can't quite have the courage to pull up to the level of moral 
transparency and keep your commitments.
  The information is fading away quickly. They are old crimes. People 
who have testimony are dying and won't be available for the future. Yet 
we have the insistence to say it doesn't matter to spend that money 
now.
  There is nothing in this bill more important than solving unsolved 
civil rights crimes. The reason is because it says something about our 
justice system. It says we realize that justice delayed is justice 
denied, and the hurt and trauma that came out of this country in the 
civil rights movement will

[[Page S2669]]

only get closed when we have true justice. For us to now in a petty way 
say: We will get it next year, do you realize that ``next year'' is 
coming September 30, and 6 months from now, two or three more witnesses 
will be gone, two or three more people who committed a crime will not 
get convicted because the evidence and the testimony will be gone? Yet 
we can't bring ourselves to the point of saying this is a priority. 
This says something about who we are, that we are going to give up a 
few earmarks so we can actually stand on the side of justice. The 
hypocrisy of the debate we heard last year and then what we hear today 
at the staff level about why we can't fund this is unfortunate.
  I advise the Senator from Connecticut, I have two more amendments to 
offer. I will talk a very short time and then be finished, if that is 
OK with him.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. I thank my friend. I have come over to speak in 
morning business, and I will be happy to wait until he is done.
  Mr. COBURN. I will come back to the floor and discuss these 
amendments again, but I will give the courtesy to my friend from 
Connecticut of being fairly short.


                           Amendment No. 623

  The next amendment is amendment No. 623. I ask unanimous consent that 
the pending amendment be set aside and amendment number 623 be called 
up.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. Objection.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. I object on behalf of the Democratic leader.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
  Mr. COBURN. I renew my request to set aside the pending amendment and 
call up amendment No. 623.
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, having heard from higher authorities, I 
withdraw my objection.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Oklahoma [Mr. Coburn] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 623.

  Mr. COBURN. 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 prohibit taxpayer dollars from being earmarked to 14 
   clients of a lobbying firm under Federal investigation for making 
  campaign donations in exchange for political favors for the group's 
                                clients)

       At the appropriate place, insert the following:
       Sec. __.  Notwithstanding any other provision of this Act, 
     none of the funds made available under this Act may be 
     obligated or otherwise expended for any congressionally 
     directed spending item for--
       (1) DIRECT Methanol Fuel Cell (IN);
       (2) Solar Energy Windows and Smart IR Switchable Building 
     Technologies (PA);
       (3) Adaptive Liquid Crystal Windows (OH);
       (4) Anti-idling Lithium Ion Battery Program, California 
     (CA) ;
       (5) Advanced Engineering Environment for Sandia National 
     Lab (MA);
       (6) Multi-Disciplined Integrated Collaborative Environment 
     (MDICE) (MO);
       (7) Hydrogen Optical Fiber Sensors (CA);
       (8) Flexible Thin-Film Silicon Solar Cells (OH);
       (9) CATALYST: Explorations in Aerospace and Innovation 
     education program;
       (10) Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, for 
     renovation and equipment;
       (11) Mount Aloysius College, Cresson, PA, for college 
     preparation programs;
       (12) Washington & Jefferson College, Washington, PA, for 
     science education outreach programs;
       (13) DePaul University, Chicago, IL, for math and science 
     teacher education in Chicago Public Schools; and
       (14) Nazareth Hospital, Philadelphia, PA, for renovation 
     and equipment.

  Mr. COBURN. I gave my assurance yesterday to the majority leader that 
I would offer no division of any amendments so he would not worry that 
we would have more votes than he wanted. But I will make the point at 
this time, at the rate we are going, we will have less than 12 
amendments on a $410 billion bill that spends $363 million a page. I 
would love for every American to know we are so good in the committee 
that none of us should be able to have significant amendments to modify 
this bill that I guarantee has $50 billion worth of waste, fraud, 
abuse, or lack of direction in how the money is spent. So to be able to 
get four amendments on the floor, just four on a $410 billion bill, 
which we are only going to spend 3 days on, I have to agree to limit 
what the American people should know about this bill. That tells you 
where we are in the Senate. But I agreed to do that to be able to at 
least bring some forward.
  This amendment is entitled PMA earmarks. We are in the midst of an 
investigation of a lobbying firm that is alleged to have committed some 
very serious felonies. It is uniquely curious that as this has 
progressed, they have decided to shut down. However, within the bill, 
not through necessarily their clients' fault, and not saying what they 
are trying to do was necessarily wrong in terms of the intent of the 
earmark, within this bill are 14 earmarks that you can see, if you have 
any common sense, if you look at the lobbying efforts of the PMA firm 
and then look at campaign contributions in the Congress, you can see a 
very worrisome pattern. That is the very reason I don't do earmarks. If 
I did earmarks, the last thing I would do would be take any campaign 
money from somebody for whom I did an earmark.
  Needless to say, the accusation and the alleged straw donor technique 
used by this lobbying firm to funnel campaign funds to Members who then 
give earmarks through this bill, 14 of them listed in this bill--all 
this amendment does is say: In the cloud of this and the way it looks, 
ought we be continuing to do that under the cloud of what look to be 
very serious allegations of impropriety at the least and, at the worst, 
quid pro quos for placing earmarks in campaign funds?
  We will vote on this amendment. It probably won't pass. Then the 
American people make a judgment about how well connected we are to 
reality. The stench associated with this investigation is at the root 
cause of us having $300 billion worth of waste a year in Congress in 
the money we spend. It is at the root cause that we can't get 
commonsense amendments passed that lack competition, lack funding, real 
priorities in a timely fashion, such as the Emmett Till bill. This is 
at the root of it. It is the pay-to-play game. All this amendment does 
is wipe out those. It just strikes them. It won't delay the bill. It 
does nothing but strike them. If they are legitimate, let them come 
back in this next year's bill and be done in an ethical, 
straightforward, aboveboard, transparent manner that doesn't utilize 
the concept of under-the-table, false campaign contributions, 
allegedly.


                           Amendment No. 610

  I ask unanimous consent that that amendment be set aside, and I call 
up amendment No. 610.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. McCaskill). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  The clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Oklahoma [Mr. Coburn] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 610.

  Mr. COBURN. 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 prohibit funding for congressional earmarks for wasteful 
                      and parochial pork projects)

       At the appropriate place, insert the following:
       Sec. __.  Notwithstanding any other provision of this Act, 
     none of the funds made available under this Act may be 
     obligated or otherwise expended for any congressionally 
     directed spending item for--
       (1) the Pleasure Beach Water Taxi Service Project of 
     Connecticut;
       (2) the Old Tiger Stadium Conservancy of Michigan;
       (3) the Polynesian Voyaging Society of Hawaii;
       (4) the American Lighthouse Foundation of Maine;
       (5) the commemoration of the 150th anniversary of John 
     Brown's raid on the arsenal at Harpers Ferry National 
     Historic Park in West Virginia;
       (6) the Orange County Great Park Corporation in California;
       (7) odor and manure management research in Iowa;
       (8) tattoo removal in California;
       (9) the California National Historic Trail Interpretive 
     Center in Nevada;
       (10) the Iowa Department of Education for the Harkin grant 
     program; and
       (11) the construction of recreation and fairgrounds in 
     Kotzebue, Alaska.

  Mr. COBURN. This is a simple little amendment. Out of the 7,700 
earmarks,

[[Page S2670]]

I took 11 that looked a little stinky to me, a little questionable--
just 11. If I had my way, I would offer an individual amendment on 
every earmark in this bill, but just 11. I will go through them very 
lightly for a moment, and then I will come back and talk on it later, 
maybe this evening.
  I want you to put this in your mind, that this year we are borrowing 
$6,000 from every man, woman, and child. That is how much we are going 
into debt, $6,000 for every man, woman, and child. Put that in your 
mind as we talk about whether these ought to be a priority: A $1.9 
million earmark for the Pleasure Beach water taxi service in 
Connecticut. That may be great to do, but we are borrowing all this 
from our grandkids. Our kids are already broke, so now we are borrowing 
from our grandkids. Our kids will never have the same standard of 
living we have. Now we are going into our grandkids, and next year we 
will be going into our great grandkids. Should we spend $2 million on a 
water taxi service? I will show the pictures later of where this is to. 
It will knock your socks off.
  There is a $3.8 million earmark to preserve the remnants of the old 
Tiger Stadium in Detroit. It may be a good idea to preserve that. 
Should we be doing that now when we are borrowing all that money? Is 
that a priority for the Congress? If it is really a priority for the 
Congress, I don't belong here. I just don't think the same way the 
Congress thinks if that is a priority right now for us, to preserve an 
old stadium that we are not going to do anything with, and we can 
preserve it later, spending that kind of money.
  There is $238,000 for the Polynesian Voyaging Society of Honolulu, 
which organization runs sea voyages in ancient-style sailing canoes. 
Tell me, as we borrow $6,000 from every man, woman, and child in this 
country, that is a priority. I can't see it being a priority. I don't 
think anybody from my State can see that being a priority. I don't know 
about the rest of the States. I would be interested to hear the answers 
of the Senators who are going to vote against this amendment and what 
they tell people. I would like to have it in my repertory. I would like 
to know what to tell people about this kind of foolishness.
  There is a $300,000 earmark to commemorate the 150th anniversary of 
John Brown's raid on the arsenal at Harper's Ferry National Historic 
Park in West Virginia. Let's do it for no money. Let's just commemorate 
it, and let's save 300 grand for our grandkids.
  There is $1.719 million for pig odor and manure management in Ames, 
IA. That goes to Iowa State University. Pigs stink. We know why. We 
know where they live. So is that a priority for us right now?

  There is $475,000 for the Orange County Great Park in California. 
More millionaires live there than anywhere else in the world. Yet we 
are going to spend money for a new park now when we are borrowing this 
amount of money?
  Here is my favorite: $200,000 earmarked for tattoo removal in Mission 
Hills, CA. We are going to take Federal money, send it to California, 
and say: You can have this money to remove tattoos. I would think under 
a personal responsibility platform if you were responsible for getting 
a tattoo put on you, you might ought to be responsible for getting it 
taken off, and I do not think our grandchildren ought to be paying for 
it.
  There is $1.5 million for the California National Historic Trail 
Interpretive Center. We are going to build another interpretive center 
at a time of economic malaise--as President Obama calls it, a crisis. I 
do not think it is a crisis. I think we are in a deep slump, but I do 
not think it is a crisis yet. It is a crisis to those people who have 
lost their job. But the more we say ``crisis,'' the worse we make it. 
But we are going to do an interpretive center now? Is now the time we 
should be doing it, knowing we are borrowing the money? Remember, for 
every $1 million we borrow, we are going to pay back $3 million. I am 
not including long-term interest costs in any of these numbers.
  Then there is a $5,471,000 earmark for the Harkin grant program in 
Iowa, which says Iowa gets treated differently than every other State 
in this country. They actually get direct money going directly for 
public education outside all the other programs. We have been doing it 
for years, but everybody else in this country gets to pay so Senator 
Harkin can look good in Iowa. I have attacked this earmark before. It 
is wrong. It is unfair. It is not befitting the body. But it is going 
to stay in. So we have brandnew schools in Iowa, and the rest of us 
deal with what we have in our States.
  Then we have $380,000 for the construction of recreation and 
fairgrounds in a town in Alaska. It may be a good idea. But should we 
do it now? Should we do it at that cost?


                     Amendment No. 623, as Modified

  Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that on amendment No. 623, 
lines 19 through 21 be removed.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Would the Senator clarify the language to be 
stricken from his amendment.
  Mr. COBURN. On amendment No. 623, lines 19 through 21.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair thanks the Senator.
  Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment (No. 623), as modified, is as follows:

       At the appropriate place, insert the following:
       Sec. __.  Notwithstanding any other provision of this Act, 
     none of the funds made available under this Act may be 
     obligated or otherwise expended for any congressionally 
     directed spending item for--
       (1) DIRECT Methanol Fuel Cell (IN);
       (2) Solar Energy Windows and Smart IR Switchable Building 
     Technologies (PA);
       (3) Adaptive Liquid Crystal Windows (OH);
       (4) Anti-idling Lithium Ion Battery Program, California 
     (CA);
       (5) Advanced Engineering Environment for Sandia National 
     Lab (MA);
       (6) Multi-Disciplined Integrated Collaborative Environment 
     (MDICE) (MO);
       (7) Hydrogen Optical Fiber Sensors (CA);
       (8) Flexible Thin-Film Silicon Solar Cells (OH);
       (9) CATALYST: Explorations in Aerospace and Innovation 
     education program;
       (10) Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, for 
     renovation and equipment;
       (11) Mount Aloysius College, Cresson, PA, for college 
     preparation programs;
       (12) Washington & Jefferson College, Washington, PA, for 
     science education outreach programs;
       (14) Nazareth Hospital, Philadelphia, PA, for renovation 
     and equipment.

  Mr. COBURN. Madam President, I will end now so I can yield to my 
friend, the chairman of my committee, the Senator from Connecticut, so 
he will have an opportunity to speak on the floor but not before I ask 
unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a listing of the 
earmarks provided today by Taxpayers for Common Sense. I ask unanimous 
consent that list be printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                                         Solo, with
            Senator               Solo earmarks  Number of   Solo and with  Number of  other members,  Number of
                                                  earmarks   other members   earmarks   and president   earmarks
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Cochran........................     $75,908,475         65    $470,857,775        204    $563,152,775        210
Wicker.........................       4,324,000          9     390,993,300        143     453,735,300        146
Landrieu.......................      10,328,500         31     332,099,063        177     487,845,063        179
Harkin.........................      66,860,000         56     292,360,036        177     370,123,036        185
Vitter.........................       4,034,000         16     249,182,063        142     403,558,063        154
Bond...........................      85,691,491         54     248,160,991         86     333,429,191         98
Feinstein......................      76,899,425         46     235,027,932        153     776,706,649        183
Inouye.........................      46,380,205         42     225,077,157        106     225,893,157        110
Shelby.........................     114,484,250         64     219,398,750        125     219,398,750        125
Grassley.......................         355,000          8     199,144,486        119     276,907,486        127
Murkowski......................          74,000     ,75071      181,499,75        093     181,595,750         95
Murray.........................      39,228,250         44     170,960,050        155     500,923,962        177
Lincoln........................               0          0     167,348,125         93     298,025,125         97
Pryor..........................               0          0     167,048,125         92     297,725,125         96
Menendez.......................               0          0     159,759,300        171     273,276,160        182
Lautenberg.....................         760,450          3     158,760,500        173     272,277,360        184

[[Page S2671]]

 
Hutchison......................       9,851,000         35     152,859,250        106     267,153,966        113
Levin, Carl....................       3,800,000          2     152,111,836        178     158,521,836        181
Stabenow.......................               0          1     152,024,336        178     158,434,336        181
Byrd...........................     122,804,900         60     151,786,400         76     175,459,400         80
Cardin.........................       1,271,000          7    149,835,1501         22     357,955,150        127
Mikulski.......................       8,229,625          9     142,020,875         89     350,140,875         94
Boxer..........................       7,546,250         16     139,495,021        116     515,511,738        133
Schumer........................      21,952,250         37     137,959,867        209     724,706,765        218
Bingaman.......................      13,807,750         22     134,582,375        107     214,165,375        117
Akaka..........................         835,000          2     132,775,702         50     132,775,702         51
Durbin.........................      35,577,250         48     132,418,750         97     218,058,154        108
Dorgan.........................      36,547,100         10     127,910,091         62     197,896,091         66
Specter........................      25,320,000        134     126,771,246        265     168,471,246        267
Domenici*......................      19,588,625         13     125,081,702         82     281,468,702         99
Webb...........................       8,568,000          7     112,710,750         71     202,031,858         74
Coleman*.......................       1,055,000          8     109,183,625         83     208,071,685         90
Reid...........................      26,628,613         56     108,705,429        108     142,048,429        113
Martinez.......................      18,758,000          8     106,711,896         62     502,217,592         73
Casey..........................      27,169,750         11     103,440,139        137     145,140,139        140
Nelson, Ben....................       5,506,000         10     103,316,050         80     512,740,050         90
Klobuchar......................       4,740,000          6     100,155,625         67     175,108,685         70
Kerry..........................               0          0      97,015,450        123     132,015,450        126
Wyden..........................         427,750          3      94,859,425        104     266,537,425        115
Dole*..........................       9,162,250         19      93,974,205         72     126,670,205         79
Bennett, Robert................      18,026,500         23      93,568,150         63     195,731,150         66
Warner.........................          95,000          1      91,702,750         56     181,023,858         59
Sessions, Jeff.................       4,250,500         12      89,930,750         31      89,930,750         31
Smith, Gordon*.................               0          0      88,696,675         84     260,374,675         95
Kennedy, Ted...................         714,000          1      86,416,450        124     121,416,450        127
Cornyn.........................       2,518,000          5      85,965,000         52     199,738,716         58
Johnson, Tim...................      12,341,000         23      81,570,400         65     114,340,400         66
Inhofe.........................      53,133,500         34      80,161,625         73      80,161,625         74
Cantwell.......................         143,000          2      78,327,050         96     132,096,380        102
McConnell......................      51,186,000         36      75,548,325         53     267,789,325         57
Baucus.........................       2,496,750          9      75,402,750         62     134,250,750         65
Tester.........................       1,863,000          4      71,504,000         52     130,352,000         55
Voinovich......................      13,501,000          6      70,528,820        103      76,969,820        107
Kohl...........................      23,832,000         44      63,496,500         89      70,696,500         93
Hatch..........................         711,000          7      63,219,650         42     164,926,650         44
Burr...........................       1,284,000          3      61,940,500         35      61,940,500         35
Thune..........................       4,275,000          6      59,589,400         38      92,359,400         39
Leahy..........................      36,161,125         52      58,197,375         75      62,025,375         76
Ensign.........................               0          0      52,589,000         26      55,289,000         28
Biden..........................               0          0      52,061,420         55      52,061,420         55
Dodd...........................               0          0      49,462,574         61      49,462,574         61
Brownback......................      12,020,048         21      47,721,273         68      72,711,273         74
Roberts........................       2,202,000         11      46,908,875         60      82,664,875         68
Brown, Sherrod.................       3,161,500          8      46,738,860         86      56,816,860         89
Carper.........................               0          0      46,232,420         53      46,232,420         53
Chambliss......................       4,253,000          7      45,706,125         67      48,372,125         69
Craig*.........................       1,012,000          2      44,921,389         45      45,421,389         46
Salazar, Ken*..................       7,500,000         20      44,639,900         69     191,969,110         79
Lieberman......................       1,164,000          2      43,742,976         59      43,742,976         59
Conrad.........................               0          0      42,290,313         40      42,290,313         40
Graham.........................       9,545,000         14      40,634,500         37      45,214,500         39
Crapo..........................         100,000          1      39,439,389         52      74,390,389         55
Hager..........................       7,195,000          5      38,830,550         41      43,450,550         43
Reed...........................      10,755,750         24      38,399,822         71      38,399,822         71
Nelson, Bill...................       5,715,750         11      37,632,965         58      37,632,965         58
Lugar..........................       3,276,000         10      35,481,153         52      35,481,153         52
Alexander, Lamar...............       5,544,500         11      32,116,000         37     179,765,000         41
Allard*........................       5,798,750          7      30,655,900         43     154,408,110         49
Isakson........................       1,425,000          2      29,993,375         48      30,902,375         50
Collins........................         380,000          1      28,724,500         45      32,174,500         47
Snowe..........................               0          0      26,807,500         42      30,257,500         44
Whitehouse.....................               0          0      26,456,572         45      26,456,572         45
Kyl............................       4,950,000          3      25,768,000         10      60,262,000         12
Gregg..........................      10,028,000         19      24,175,000         39      24,253,000         40
Sununu*........................       3,207,500          8      17,756,500         23      17,756,500         23
Corker.........................         760,000          1      17,716,500         16     165,365,500         19
Bayh...........................       1,188,000          4      14,957,760         17      14,957,760         17
Barrasso.......................       2,713,000          4      12,373,350         19      12,373,350         19
Sanders........................       5,877,725         16      10,942,725         26      10,942,725         26
Enzi...........................       1,725,000          5      10,894,350         18      10,894,350         18
Bunning........................         735,000          5      10,618,175         13      10,618,175         13
Clinton*.......................               0          0       6,714,000          3       6,714,000          3
Rockefeller....................               0          0       5,019,000          1       5,019,000          1
Coburn.........................               0          0               0          0               0          0
DeMint.........................               0          0               0          0               0          0
Feingold.......................               0          0               0          0               0          0
McCain.........................               0          0               0          0               0          0
McCaskill......................               0          0               0          0               0          0
Obama*.........................               0          0               0          0               0          0
Stevens*.......................               0          0               0          0               0          0
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

  Mr. COBURN. With that, Madam President, I yield the floor, and I 
thank the Senator from Connecticut.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. Madam President, I thank my friend from Oklahoma.
  (The remarks of Mr. LIEBERMAN are printed in today's Record under 
``Morning Business.'')
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. 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. INOUYE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. INOUYE. Madam President, the motion offered by the Senator from 
Texas, Mrs. Hutchison, is very similar to the motion of the Senator 
from Nevada that the Senate defeated. There is only one difference 
between the two motions. This motion allows for the cost of inflation 
to be provided, and the previous one did not.
  I have already informed the Senate why making reductions in this bill 
is not a good idea, but I wish to remind my colleagues once again that 
the level of funding in this bill is consistent with the amount 
approved by the Congress in the budget resolution. Second, as the 
Senator from Texas knows, the omnibus bill was written by the 
Appropriations subcommittees in a bipartisan process and these bills 
were reported out of the committee--five of them unanimously and two 
almost unanimously. The subcommittees worked with their House 
counterparts to craft this legislation. It reflects a fair compromise 
between the two bodies.

[[Page S2672]]

  But, once again, the argument in favor of cutting the omnibus is that 
there is overlap between the funds in the Recovery Act and in the 
omnibus bill. As I have noted previously, this simply is not the case. 
The funds in the Recovery Act are either unrelated to the omnibus or 
were assumed in the levels approved by the Recovery Act.
  This motion also suggests that the committee should cut nonessential 
spending. I, for one, would argue that this bill contains only 
essential funds, but I recognize for a few of my colleagues 
nonessential spending equates to earmarks. I wish to remind my 
colleagues once again that on the question of earmarks, there is $3.8 
billion in congressionally directed spending in this bill. This 
represents less than 1 percent of the total bill. If you eliminated all 
of the earmarks in this bill, including those of Hawaii and Texas, you 
would still have to cut at least $8 billion more from other valid 
programs. If we have to cut this bill to the fiscal year 2008 level, 
that means there are a number of worthy projects that will have to be 
reconsidered.
  For example, the State and Foreign Operations chapter of the bill 
provides a total of $5.5 billion for programs to combat HIV/AIDS--$388 
million above former President Bush's request and $459 million above 
the fiscal year 2008 request. This increase was supported by Democrats 
and Republicans. Of this amount, $600 million is provided for the 
Global Fund to fight HIV/AIDS, which is $400 million above the request. 
Additionally within the total, $350 million is provided for USAID 
programs to combat HIV/AIDS. These additional funds, which pay for 
life-sustaining and antiretroviral drugs, prevention and care programs, 
would be lost to the detriment of 1 million people who would receive 
lifesaving treatment this year. With this funding, 2 million additional 
HIV infections would be prevented this year. Instead of 10 million 
lives we are saving today, we have the opportunity to save 12 million 
people. We have the opportunity with this bill to save or care for 1 
million more orphans and vulnerable children who are either infected 
with HIV or have been orphaned because a parent died from HIV. Do we 
think that the Senate wants to reconsider this item?
  Freezing funding would mean $350 million less for the FBI to protect 
our Nation and our communities from terrorism and violent crime. The 
FBI would have to institute an immediate hiring freeze of agents, 
analysts, and support staff. This will mean 650 fewer FBI special 
agents and 1,250 fewer intelligence analysts and other professionals 
fighting crime and terrorism on U.S. soil. Surely the Senator from 
Texas doesn't want us to go back and reduce funding for the FBI.
  More than 30 Members requested the committee add funds for operations 
of our national parks. If we have to cut program goals, we will lose 
3,000 park rangers. While there are funds in the Recovery Act for the 
Park Service, these funds were not for rangers or park operations; they 
were to cover deferred maintenance projects. These are projects that 
are ready to go and can be started almost immediately to stimulate the 
economy as intended. There is no duplication between the Recovery Act 
and the omnibus for our national parks.
  I could stand here all day and list example after example of the 
types of programs that are funded in this omnibus bill with the 
increases that the Senator's amendment would eliminate. These examples 
shouldn't come as any surprise to the Members of the Senate, if they 
remember that these bills were written by our subcommittee chairmen and 
ranking members in a bipartisan fashion. They were marked up in open 
session with all Members able to offer amendments and the final product 
was drafted with our House colleagues on a bipartisan basis. Once 
again, the omnibus bill is a good package of bills. It is bipartisan, 
it is noncontroversial, and it is in compliance with the budget 
resolution totals for the committee. The idea of stimulus overlap is 
not based on fact. The question of earmarks is a minor point in the 
significant bill that protects Democratic priorities. So I believe this 
bill deserves the support of every Member of the Senate. I urge my 
colleagues to vote against this motion.
  If I may speak on another subject, the Senator from Oklahoma raised 
questions regarding the Polynesian Voyaging Society. Students learn in 
different ways, and educators are constantly pressed to find inspiring 
ways to educate our young people, particularly those who are considered 
at risk. That is what the Polynesian Voyaging Society offers. The 
voyages organized by the Society help to train educators and scientists 
in ocean resource stewardship. In addition, through the use of the 
Internet, the society interactively communicates with students during 
the voyage to share the knowledge gained.
  This initiative supports cultural education programs geared toward 
enhancing leadership skills and cultural knowledge through deep sea 
voyaging for students. These traditional voyaging skills utilize 
noninstrument navigation skills whereby participants have to rely upon 
themselves and their crews to arrive safely at their destination. The 
voyage is much more than one of miles; it is a voyage of young people 
discovering that they are able to accomplish more than they ever 
thought possible.
  This knowledge of self-reliance and interdependence helps to 
transform students, especially native Hawaiian students, so they may 
chart a positive future. The program also makes science more accessible 
to school students as they follow the journey. Many students are 
encouraged to study science and care about the environment because of 
this program. Numerous college science majors mentioned activities on 
the Polynesian Voyaging Society as the reason why they chose to study 
science.
  This leadership opportunity has been shown to be especially effective 
with at-risk youth diagnosed with mental illness. The success of 
traditional methods of addressing mental illness in adolescents 
involves a strong family support system. One study revealed the 
students who participated in this program showed great improvement 
regardless of the support that the student received from family. In 
effect, this program has been able to transcend existing social 
problems within the student's own family so that these young people can 
grow and develop into contributing members of the community.
  As noted in the National Academies' Study, ``Rising Above The 
Gathering Storm,'' creating opportunities and incentives for students 
to pursue science studies is a critical component of ensuring America's 
future competitiveness. The Polynesian Voyaging Society's programs are 
geared toward providing such opportunities.

  On a personal note, the program is geared to assist Native Hawaiians, 
in particular. As we find in Native societies throughout the United 
States, Native Americans have not only been mistreated and victims of 
discrimination, they have been deprived of their culture. In earlier 
days, they were forced to become Christians. They were forced to wear 
suits. They were forced not to wear feathers.
  While in this Polynesian program, I have spoken to many of the 
students, and there are certain points that should be made. Several 
students came up to me, for example, and said, ``I am proud to be a 
Hawaiian.'' That is one of the things we have found lacking in Native 
Hawaiian youth--pride in their ancestry--especially when they learn 
their ancestors took a voyage much longer than the one Columbus took 
across the Atlantic, double the length, and the Hawaiians knew where 
they were headed--to Hawaiki, which is presently the State of Hawaii. 
Columbus thought he was going elsewhere, and he got lost. It makes them 
a bit proud of their ancestry. They learned their ancestors were great 
warriors, great voyagers, great administrators, and great farmers. This 
is a very inexpensive way to restore the pride that is much in need 
among our Native Hawaiian youth.
  I have been told that the assistant leader will be seeking 
recognition. I am happy to yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois is recognized.
  Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, before I make a few remarks about the 
underlying bill, I want to say that those following this debate on the 
floor are witnessing a piece of history. Senator Dan Inouye of Hawaii 
has made such amazing contributions to this country. As a young man, 
his service in World War II led to his being honored

[[Page S2673]]

with the Congressional Medal for his bravery in battle. He has carried 
the wounds of that battle now for many years. He used his time in the 
service to inspire him to higher levels of public service in our 
Government and beyond the military, serving in Congress and as a U.S. 
Senator from the State of Hawaii. He is, in fact, a legend in the 
history of the Senate. I am honored to call him a colleague. 
Parenthetically, 6 years ago, when I was sworn in to my second term, I 
chose Senator Inouye to escort me for that swearing-in ceremony because 
of my great respect for him and all he has meant to our country, his 
State of Hawaii, and to me personally.
  What you just heard in his comments about Native Hawaiians you could 
have heard as well about his commitment to Native Americans. From the 
beginning, Danny Inouye has been there to fight for those who 
oftentimes were not given the same treatment, same respect, and same 
rights as other Americans. His voice has made a difference time and 
time again. When he comes to us and talks about this underlying Omnibus 
appropriations bill and some of the programs that will help Native 
Hawaiians and Native Americans, it is with a commitment from the heart. 
He really believes in helping these people, many of whom have been 
treated badly by the United States in our founding years.
  I wanted to preface my remarks by saying, for those looking for a 
reason to support this bill, Senator Danny Inouye, our chairman, has 
given a good, solid reason, so that we can balance the books and right 
the wrongs that occurred in previous generations.
  I want to come down to practical considerations. The pending 
amendment would dramatically cut this bill. Some of the cuts would make 
a big difference. I look back and remember what happened not that long 
ago, over two holiday seasons, when parents and families across America 
were frightened that the toys they were buying were dangerous. The 
paint contained lead that could have a negative physical impact on a 
child. We traced many of the toys back to China and found that not only 
were they careless in their manufacture, but we were careless, as a 
government, in our inspection.
  The agency responsible for it, the Consumer Product Safety 
Commission, was one of the small agencies that most people never heard 
of. When it became a scare and concern for parents in America, we 
started to pay attention. In my subcommittee, we had this particular 
Commission. I decided to make a substantial change in the funding and 
staffing so that this Commission could protect Americans not just from 
dangerous toys but dangerous products all around. So what we did in the 
bill was provide $105 million for the Consumer Product Safety 
Commission, an increase of $25 million over last year's spending, and 
$10 million above the committee's report. The idea is to put the people 
and resources there and overseas to make sure we protect American 
families and consumers from dangerous products. I think most people 
would agree that is money well spent. When any of us go into a store 
and buy a product, we assume some agency of the Government took a look 
at it. It turns out that, in many cases, this small Commission could 
not keep up with that challenge. If the pending amendment by Senator 
Hutchison prevails, that money won't be there. This agency will be cut 
back again, and families will be vulnerable again. I don't want that to 
happen.
  We also put in $943 million for the Securities and Exchange 
Commission. It is an increase of $37 million over the previously 
enacted level. The additional money we are putting into the SEC is a 
direct result of reports of dereliction of duty and their failure to 
respond to serious challenges. We all know about the Bernard Madoff 
scandal, where that man created a Ponzi scheme that went undetected and 
unpunished until there were innocent victims all across the United 
States of this man's chicanery. The SEC, it turns out, had been warned 
years before and didn't follow through.
  The SEC has an important role in our free market economy to make 
certain that stocks and other financial instruments are done in a 
transparent and honest way. That is why we are increasing the size of 
the appropriation for this agency. The pending amendment would cut that 
back at a time when we are in such economic turmoil. We need to have 
certainty as Americans that we are safe when we invest and that 
somebody in the Government is keeping an eye on those transactions and 
those companies.
  The same is true for the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. It is 
an important Commission that deals with financial instruments, such as 
futures, and those instruments that relate to things such as the cost 
of oil. We paid close attention to that when gasoline was $4.50 a 
gallon. I provide $146 million through my committee to the CFTC. That 
is a 31-percent increase over last year's appropriation. Why? So they 
can buy the computers to keep up with the hundreds of thousands and 
millions of transactions, so they can detect wrongdoing and correct it 
before innocent people lose their life savings, and before people who 
count on the integrity of the American financial institutions are 
defrauded. I think that is money well spent, and it is money we should 
spend in this instance.
  I say to those who are cutting back and say: We are just making 
across-the-board cuts, it is not really going to touch us, there are 
three specific examples where money is included in this appropriations 
bill to protect American families and consumers, money that is small in 
comparison to larger appropriations but can make a significant 
difference in the role of Government and, I guess, the fact that the 
function of Government to help the helpless and protect those who need 
it is honored. I hope everybody will come to the floor and think long 
and hard about this bill.
  I will add one closing fact. Many people remember the flooding that 
occurred in Cedar Rapids, IA, last year. It was devastating. One of the 
buildings devastated was the courthouse in Cedar Rapids. As a result, I 
had a request from Senators Charles Grassley and Tom Harkin to come up 
with emergency funds to rebuild this courthouse in the right way, so 
that it could be safe and functional after the flooding. We had $182 
million in the 2009 Consolidated Security, Disaster Assistance, and 
Continuing Appropriations bill for that purpose. It is an earmark, make 
no mistake about it. We earmarked the funds for that courthouse that 
was devastated by floodwaters at the request of Senators Grassley and 
Harkin. I believe this was the right expenditure. It is an earmark that 
we can justify as being important not just to Iowa but to the Nation. I 
hope both Senators know we listen carefully to them in our 
subcommittee. With Senator Brownback of Kansas, we work to be 
responsive to the real needs of our colleagues across America. This is 
a responsible bill. I commend it to my colleagues. I hope we can enact 
it soon because on Friday our temporary spending measures will expire, 
and we need a long-term Omnibus appropriations bill so that we can get 
to work on the next fiscal year in an orderly manner, under the 
leadership of Chairman Inouye.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Hawaii is recognized.
  Mr. INOUYE. Madam President, I am overwhelmed by the generous remarks 
of the distinguished Senator from Illinois. Thank you very much.
  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. REID. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. REID. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that at 5:45 
today, the Senate vote in relation to the Hutchison amendment, with the 
4 minutes prior to the vote equally divided and controlled between 
Senators Hutchison and Inouye or their designees, and that the previous 
order prohibiting amendments prior to a vote remain in effect. Madam 
President, the 4 minutes will cause a vote not to be right at 5:45, but 
it will be close.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. REID. Madam President, I alert all Members that we have a number 
of people who want to speak in relation to the Coburn amendments. We 
also are told by the Republican staff that there

[[Page S2674]]

are a number of Senators who would be willing to offer amendments on 
the Republican side. I have spoken to the Republican staff, and they 
say they can lay down two of those and debate them tonight. That is 
fine with us.
  Tomorrow, of course, we are going to come in at 9:30. Then we have to 
go to the House because Prime Minister Brown is here. That is at 10:30. 
And then there are other things going on. The Republican leader and I 
have been invited to a lunch with Prime Minister Brown, and there are 
other things. We have a steering meeting of the Republicans, I 
understand, during the lunch hour--I think that is what it is called. 
We have a chairman lunch. We are not going to be able to have the votes 
on any of these amendments until after we finish these things 
tomorrow. That will give us the afternoon to have some votes and find 
out where we are on this bill tomorrow.

  We have had some good debate today. These have been very difficult 
amendments. I think they go to the heart of the bill, especially those 
offered by Senator McCain, Senator Ensign, and Senator Hutchison. The 
rest of them I will have comments on at a later time.
  I hope Senators understand where we are and where we are headed on 
this legislation.
  Mr. INOUYE. Madam President, I yield back the remainder of the time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. All time is yielded back.
  The question is on agreeing to the motion.
  Mr. INOUYE. I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There appears to be a sufficient second.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk called the roll.
  Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. 
Conrad) and the Senator from Massachusetts (Mr. Kennedy) are 
necessarily absent.
  Mr. KYL. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator 
from Nebraska (Mr. Johanns) and the Senator from Alabama (Mr. 
Sessions).
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore (Mrs. Shaheen). Are there any other 
Senators in the Chamber desiring to vote?
  The result was announced yeas 40, nays 55, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 76 Leg.]

                                YEAS--40

     Alexander
     Barrasso
     Bayh
     Bennett
     Brownback
     Bunning
     Burr
     Chambliss
     Coburn
     Cochran
     Collins
     Corker
     Cornyn
     Crapo
     DeMint
     Ensign
     Enzi
     Graham
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Hatch
     Hutchison
     Inhofe
     Isakson
     Klobuchar
     Kyl
     Lincoln
     Lugar
     Martinez
     McCain
     McCaskill
     McConnell
     Murkowski
     Nelson (NE)
     Risch
     Roberts
     Thune
     Vitter
     Voinovich
     Wicker

                                NAYS--55

     Akaka
     Baucus
     Begich
     Bennet
     Bingaman
     Bond
     Boxer
     Brown
     Burris
     Byrd
     Cantwell
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Dodd
     Dorgan
     Durbin
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Gillibrand
     Hagan
     Harkin
     Inouye
     Johnson
     Kaufman
     Kerry
     Kohl
     Landrieu
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Menendez
     Merkley
     Mikulski
     Murray
     Nelson (FL)
     Pryor
     Reed
     Reid
     Rockefeller
     Sanders
     Schumer
     Shaheen
     Shelby
     Snowe
     Specter
     Stabenow
     Tester
     Udall (CO)
     Udall (NM)
     Warner
     Webb
     Whitehouse
     Wyden

                             NOT VOTING--4

     Conrad
     Johanns
     Kennedy
     Sessions
  The motion was rejected.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Mississippi is 
recognized.


                           Amendment No. 607

  Mr. WICKER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending 
amendment be set aside and that I be allowed to call up my amendment.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered. The clerk will report the amendment.
  The bill clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Mississippi [Mr. Wicker] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 607.

  Mr. WICKER. Madam 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 require that amounts appropriated for the United Nations 
 Population Fund are not used by organizations which support coercive 
                 abortion or involuntary sterilization)

       On page 927, strike line 14 and all that follows through 
     page 929, line 20, and insert the following:
       (b) Availability of Funds.--Funds appropriated under the 
     heading ``International Organizations and Programs'' in this 
     Act that are available for UNFPA and are not made available 
     for UNFPA because of the operation of any provision of law, 
     shall be transferred to the ``Global Health and Child 
     Survival'' account and shall be made available for family 
     planning, maternal, and reproductive health activities, 
     subject to the regular notification procedures of the 
     Committee on Appropriations of the Senate and the Committee 
     on Appropriations of the House of Representatives.
       (c) Prohibition on Use of Funds in China.--None of the 
     funds made available under ``International Organizations and 
     Programs'' may be made available for the UNFPA for a country 
     program in the People's Republic of China.
       (d) Conditions on Availability of Funds.--Amounts made 
     available under ``International Organizations and Programs'' 
     for fiscal year 2006 for the UNFPA may not be made available 
     to UNFPA unless--
       (1) the UNFPA maintains amounts made available to the UNFPA 
     under this section in an account separate from other accounts 
     of the UNFPA;
       (2) the UNFPA does not commingle amounts made available to 
     the UNFPA under this section with other sums; and
       (3) the UNFPA does not fund abortions.
       (e) Report to Congress and Dollar-for-Dollar Withholding of 
     Funds.--
       (1) In general.--Not later than 4 months after the date of 
     the enactment of this Act, the Secretary of State shall 
     submit a report to the Committee on Appropriations of the 
     Senate and the Committee on Appropriations of the House of 
     Representatives indicating the amount of funds that the UNFPA 
     is budgeting for the year in which the report is submitted 
     for a country program in the People's Republic of China.
       (2) Deduction.--If a report submitted under paragraph (1) 
     indicates that the UNFPA plans to spend funds for a country 
     program in the People's Republic of China in the year covered 
     by the report, the amount of such funds that the UNFPA plans 
     to spend in the People's Republic of China shall be deducted 
     from the funds made available to the UNFPA after March 1 for 
     obligation for the remainder of the fiscal year in which the 
     report is submitted.
       (f) Rule of Construction.--Nothing in this section may be 
     construed to limit the authority of the President to deny 
     funds to any organization by reason of the application of 
     another provision of this Act or any other provision of law.

  Mr. WICKER. Madam President, I also ask unanimous consent that the 
following Senators be added as cosponsors of amendment No. 607: Senator 
Enzi, Senator Bunning, Senator Inhofe, Senator Coburn, Senator Vitter, 
and Senator Grassley.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. THUNE. Madam President, would the Senator yield?
  Mr. WICKER. I will yield to the Senator.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from South Dakota.
  Mr. THUNE. I ask unanimous consent to be added as a cosponsor to the 
Senator's amendment.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. WICKER. Madam President, I spoke at some length yesterday about 
this amendment. It deals with one issue and one issue only--whether 
U.S. taxpayer dollars will be provided in this omnibus bill to help 
fund coercive population control policies, such as China's one-child 
policy--a policy that relies on coerced abortion and forced 
sterilization.
  Specifically, this pro-child, pro-family, pro-woman amendment would 
restore the Kemp-Kasten antipopulation control provision, which has 
been a fundamental part of our foreign policy for almost a quarter 
century. As it has always done, Kemp-Kasten allows the President of the 
United States to certify that funds are not used for coercive family 
practices. As it has always done, the provision would allow the 
President to release those funds after he has made such a 
certification.
  My amendment is needed because the underlying bill reverses this 
longstanding provision. The omnibus bill

[[Page S2675]]

that we have before us purports to retain Kemp-Kasten, but then it also 
includes six troubling words that effectively kill the provision. In 
addition to Kemp-Kasten, the bill directs funds to the United Nations 
Population Fund, or UNFPA ``notwithstanding any other provision of 
law.''
  Perhaps these words were added inadvertently. I don't know. But the 
words that are added--those six little words--represent a loophole that 
in effect guts Kemp-Kasten and alters this longstanding bipartisan 
foreign policy in the process.
  Some people may ask why restoring Kemp-Kasten is important, and here 
is why. The U.N. Population Fund, a group that is in line to receive 
some $50 million in this bill, has actively supported, comanaged, and 
whitewashed crimes against women under the cover of family planning. 
Under the Kemp-Kasten provision, the last administration withheld money 
from UNFPA for this very reason. I would like to quote then-Secretary 
of State Colin Powell, who stated:

       UNFPA support of and involvement in China's population 
     planning activities allows the Chinese Government to 
     implement more effectively its program of coercive abortion. 
     Therefore, it is not permissible to continue funding UNFPA at 
     this time.

  That is the end of the quote from our Secretary of State.
  A further analysis by the U.S. State Department of the Chinese 
program on family planning reveals this--I will quote from the State 
Department analysis:

       China's birth limitation program retains harshly coercive 
     elements in law and practice, including coercive abortion and 
     involuntary sterilization.

  Does anyone in this Senate want to spend U.S. funds to support these 
activities: coercive abortion and involuntary sterilization? I think we 
ought to have a unanimous consensus in the Congress that we have no 
business spending our taxpayers' dollars on such things. The report 
goes on to say:

       The State Department summarized these practices in its 2007 
     China Country Report on Human Rights Practices. . . . These 
     measures include the implementation of birth limitation 
     regulations, the provision of obligatory contraceptive 
     services, and the use of incentives and penalties to induce 
     compliance.

  Further in the report, and I continue to quote:

       China's Birth Limitation Program relies on harshly coercive 
     measures such as so-called ``social maintenance'' fees.

  And to skip down further:

       In families that already have two children, one parent is 
     often pressured to undergo sterilization. A number of 
     provinces have legal provisions that require a woman to have 
     an abortion if her pregnancy violates government regulations. 
     . . .

  I wish we could stop this practice worldwide. China is a sovereign 
nation, and they have the power to impose these laws on their people. 
But taxpayer funds should not be spent from the U.S. Treasury to assist 
an organization that funds such practices in China.
  The most recent State Department report on UNFPA activities shows 
that their funds are indeed funneled to Chinese agencies that 
coercively enforce the very practices I just read about. Are we to 
believe that in less than a year the UNFPA has changed its practices? 
That is not a bet I am willing to take with the taxpayers' money.
  The Wicker amendment should be adopted to once again give the 
President, President Obama, the opportunity to certify that UNFPA, or 
any other organization, is not participating in family planning 
techniques such as the harsh techniques I just read about.
  My amendment does not represent a radical shift or departure from 
what is normal. In fact, it simply returns the language in this bill to 
language that was agreed upon by both Republicans and Democrats in last 
year's Foreign Operations appropriations bill during a time when 
Democrats controlled the House of Representatives and controlled the 
Senate of the United States. The language that I am offering was agreed 
upon by Republicans and Democrats.
  Finally, there have been concerns voiced about the need not to make 
changes in this bill. We have been told this bill has been 
preconferenced. Persons say that in doing so we might delay the bill's 
passage by sending it back to the House for approval. I admit the 
funding contained in this bill is important, but that does not mean we 
can forget about our jobs as legislators. I do not believe the other 
body will let this bill die simply because we are doing what is right, 
by clarifying our country's policy of standing against coercive 
population control practices like forced abortion and forced 
sterilization.
  I realize opinions in this Chamber and across our country vary 
greatly on the issue of abortion. I am pro-life and I am mindful that 
some Members in this body would describe themselves as pro-choice. But 
regardless of where we come down on that issue, can't we agree that we 
do not want to spend taxpayer dollars to force this on women who do not 
want this procedure? We ought to all be able to agree that is wrong and 
that is a misuse of American taxpayer funds.
  The United States should not turn its head on coercive family control 
programs like sterilization and forced abortion, and our taxpayers 
should not have their dollars used to help fund such horrible acts. My 
amendment will help stop that from happening. It restores a 
longstanding foreign policy provision. It reflects our Nation's 
commitment to promoting human rights. I urge its adoption.
  I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Louisiana.
  Ms. LANDRIEU. Madam President, I rise to speak on the underlying bill 
just for a moment. I know some of my colleagues are on the floor of the 
Senate, and I will be very brief.
  I come to the floor to support the underlying bill and also to give a 
few brief remarks about the legislative branch, which I chair, for the 
record. The legislative branch in this bill is funded at $4.4 billion--
not an insignificant amount of money but very small relative to the 
overall bill. There is a $43 million increase over last year, which is 
an 11-percent increase, which would seem on the face of it rather 
significant, so I thought I would like to explain.
  It is more than the cost of living, more than inflation, but there 
are three very good reasons we thought--both Republican and Democrat on 
our committee--that this was the right thing to do. First of all, 
building up Congress's oversight responsibilities at this time is 
critical. We have seen much of the scandal and corruption and 
unregulated situations that have led us to the place we are. Congress 
needs to make sure we are doing a better job with our inspector general 
offices, with our general oversight, particularly because we are 
stepping up so much additional spending for stimulus and investment. 
Our committee thought that was the responsible thing to do, to actually 
invest in greater oversight. So about 38 percent of this increase is 
related to that.
  Second, there is a backlog of life safety issues related to this 
great Capitol complex. Trust me, there is no money in here for carpet 
or fancy lighting or extra offices for anyone. This is for basically 
asbestos removal--which can be life threatening, as you know, and cause 
serious harm to those people who work in this Capitol, both our staffs 
and the workforce. That is an unmet need. There is over $1 billion of 
unmet needs. This bill attempts to just deal with some immediate 
situations.
  Finally, now that the Capitol Visitor Center is open, there are some 
additional security requirements of our Capitol Police. This project 
was started many years ago. It was supported by both Democrats and 
Republicans. It is now open, was dedicated recently, but we have to 
operate it appropriately. We have to make sure it is secure, not just 
for ourselves and our staff, but for the millions of visitors who come. 
There is some increased funding for Capitol Police that reflects that 
this Capitol Visitor Center is the greatest expansion of this building 
in over 100 years. It was not just a small addition, it was quite a 
large addition, and we need that extra security.
  Finally, there is a full request, that was met, by the Library of 
Congress to provide new modern technology for the visually impaired. It 
is something that was a high priority for the community of the blind 
and the visually impaired, millions of Americans who have no access to 
books as we normally read them but need these digital talking

[[Page S2676]]

books. Not only does it help the Library of Congress but ensures every 
library in America, including school libraries, has access, so children 
who do not have their sight, and adults, can read and remain part of 
this economy.
  Those are the reasons this bill has been expanded by 11 percent. I 
hope my colleagues understand. We have gotten pretty much broad-based 
support.
  As I said Madam President, 38 percent of the total increase goes 
towards increased staffing for the Government Accountability Office and 
the Congressional Budget Office to allow for greater oversight of the 
Federal Government. The help of these agencies is more critical than 
ever during this time of economic uncertainty and national crisis. GAO 
and CBO intend to beef up their staffing levels to meet Congress's 
needs as we tackle the many critical issues facing us today.
  Nearly 23 percent of the overall fiscal year 2009 increase goes to 
the Architect of the Capitol for fire and life safety projects in the 
Capitol Complex--including $56 million for asbestos removal and 
structural repairs in the utility tunnels which provide steam and 
chilled water throughout the entire complex.
  Congress is facing a tremendous backlog of structural problems in our 
aging infrastructure here on Capitol Hill which has grown to over $1.4 
billion. This bill provides a small but much-needed step towards 
addressing this backlog. Many of our buildings in the Capitol Complex 
lack the adequate fire and life safety requirements to keep Congress in 
compliance with health and safety regulations. As I said, I am proud of 
the funding included in this bill which will address these inadequacies 
and help make the Capitol safer for our staff and for our visitors. It 
would be irresponsible not to tackle these problems now--we will just 
be kicking them down the road where they will be more expensive and 
more difficult to repair.
  The bill includes funding for the United States Capitol Police to 
hire and train additional personnel to provide security for the now 
open Capitol Visitor Center. The CVC which opened December 5 is a huge 
success and a much-needed addition to our Complex providing security, 
educational opportunities, restaurant facilities and many other 
amenities to the millions of visitors who arrive on our doorsteps each 
year. The bill also provides funding to fully implement the merger of 
the Library of Congress Police force with the Capitol Police. This 
long-awaited merger is essential to maintaining streamlined security 
throughout the Capitol Complex. Quite simply, this bill will provide 
the resources needed to the Capitol Police to effectively perform their 
required missions without putting more on their plate than they can do.
  This bill fully funds the Library of Congress, including the 
Library's request for the Books for the Blind and Physically 
Handicapped. The Library's fiscal year 2009 budget includes $29 million 
to move forward on the Digital Talking Book for the blind project. This 
project is a high priority for this Congress and for the blind 
community. It is vital that the blind receive uninterrupted access to 
something the rest of us take for granted--books and other reading 
materials that allow us to work and learn. This bill supports that 
important goal allowing this project to proceed on schedule and provide 
more titles than originally anticipated. This is a key issue of 
fairness which we can and must address now.
  The funding in this bill puts the Legislative Branch on solid footing 
for the future and invests in the right priorities. We should strongly 
support it.

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from South Dakota is 
recognized.


                           Amendment No. 635

  Mr. THUNE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending 
amendment be set aside and I be able to call up amendment No. 635 and 
make it pending.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered. The clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from South Dakota [Mr. Thune], proposes an 
     amendment numbered 635.

  Mr. THUNE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent 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 provide funding for the Emergency Fund for Indian Safety 
                      and Health, with an offset)

       On page 458, after line 25, insert the following:


              emergency fund for indian safety and health

        For deposit in the Emergency Fund for Indian Safety and 
     Health established by subsection (a) of section 601 of the 
     Tom Lantos and Henry J. Hyde United States Global Leadership 
     Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria Reauthorization 
     Act of 2008 (25 U.S.C. 443c), for use by the Attorney 
     General, the Secretary of Health and Human Services, and the 
     Secretary of the Interior in accordance with that section, 
     $400,000,000, to be derived by transfer of an equal 
     percentage from each other program and project for which 
     funds are made available by this Act.

  Mr. THUNE. Let me explain very simply what this amendment does.
  Last summer, President Bush signed into law a $50 billion foreign aid 
bill; HIV and AIDS was the purpose, the direction of the bill. Included 
as part of that PEPFAR bill was a $2 billion authorization that I and a 
bipartisan group of Senators worked on, including that redirected money 
to critical public safety, health care, and water needs in Indian 
Country. All of the Senators who worked on the amendment's inclusion in 
the final package, including now Vice President Biden and Secretary of 
State Clinton, recognized there are great needs internationally, but 
they also realized we have equal or maybe even greater needs right here 
at home on our Nation's reservations.
  The final PEPFAR bill created a $2 billion, 5-year authorization 
beginning in fiscal year 2009 for an emergency fund for Indian health 
and safety. Over the 5-year authorization, $750 million could be spent 
on public safety, $250 million on health care, and $1 billion for water 
settlements.
  In order to ensure that the emergency fund for Indian health and 
safety was funded as quickly as possible, I and six of my colleagues 
sent a letter to President Bush last year asking that he include 
funding in the fiscal year 2010 budget for the emergency fund. Then we 
worked to get a total of 21 Senators to send a similar letter to 
President Obama on November 24, 2008. I believe this continued 
bipartisan effort underscores the support for addressing the needs that 
exist in Indian Country.
  What the amendment does is seek to remedy this without raising the 
overall cost of the omnibus bill. It simply reduces discretionary 
spending throughout the bill by $400 million, the fiscal year 2009 
authorized amount from PEPFAR, and redirects that money to the 
emergency fund for Indian safety and health. This amounts to less than 
one-tenth of 1 percent cut from each program funded in the omnibus 
bill.
  Bear in mind the omnibus bill includes an overall funding increase of 
8.3 percent over last year's appropriated level--that on top of the 
stimulus bill that passed earlier this year that, as we all know, 
poured billions of dollars into many of these Federal agencies. So what 
I am suggesting is we carve out one-tenth of 1 percent of the cost of 
this bill. As I said, take the overall increase in this year's bill 
from 8.3 percent over last year's appropriated amount to an 8.2-percent 
increase over last year's amount.
  Since this appropriations bill was put together--I think it was put 
together in very short order behind closed doors, not to mention the 
fact that none of the nine appropriations bills were ever voted on in 
the Senate--I believe my amendment is a commonsense proposal that will 
ensure that we allocate tax dollars where they are needed the most.
  The needs are great in Indian Country and I know many of my 
colleagues on both sides of the aisle would agree.
  Nationwide 1 percent of the U.S. population does not have safe and 
adequate water for drinking and sanitation needs. On our Nation's 
reservations this number climbs to an average of 11 percent and in the 
worst parts of Indian Country to 35 percent.
  This lack of reliable safe water leads to high incidences of disease 
and infection. The Indian Health Service has estimated that for each $1 
it spends on safe drinking water and sewage systems it gets a 
twentyfold return in health benefits.

[[Page S2677]]

  The Indian Health Service estimates that in order to provide all 
Native Americans with safe drinking water and sewage systems in their 
home they would need over $2.3 billion.
  Nationally, Native Americans are three times as likely to die from 
diabetes compared to the rest of the population.
  An individual that is served by Indian Health Service is 50 percent 
more likely to commit suicide than the general population.
  On the Oglala Sioux Reservation in my home State of South Dakota the 
average life expectancy for males is 56 years old. In Iraq it is 58, 
Haiti it is 59, and in Ghana it is 60, all higher than right here in 
America.
  One out of every three Native American women will be raped in their 
lifetime.
  According to a recent Department of the Interior report, tribal jails 
are so grossly insufficient when it comes to cell space, that only half 
of the offenders who should be incarcerated are being put in jail.
  That same report found that constructing or rehabilitating only those 
detention centers that are most in need will cost $8.4 billion.
  The South Dakota attorney general released a study at the end of last 
year on tribal criminal justice statistics and found: homicide rates on 
South Dakota reservations are almost 10 times higher than those found 
in the rest of South Dakota and forcible rapes on South Dakota 
reservations are seven times higher than those found in the rest of 
South Dakota.
  Clearly there are great needs in Indian County and my commonsense 
amendment would be a good step forward in addressing some of these 
needs because the emergency fund for Indian safety and health can be 
used for: detention and IHS facility construction, rehabilitation, and 
replacement; investigations and prosecutions of crimes in Indian 
Country; cross-deputization and other cooperative agreements between 
State or local governments and Indian tribes; IHS contract health care; 
and water supply projects approved by Congress.
  Passage of my original amendment to PEPFAR clearly shows a commitment 
by the Senate to addressing domestic priorities for Native Americans.
  I urge support for my amendment to fund this authorized emergency 
fund for fiscal year 2009.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Alaska.


                           Amendment No. 599

  Ms. MURKOWSKI. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to set the 
pending amendment aside for the purpose of calling up an amendment.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, I would ask the Senator from Alaska 
which amendment she is sending.
  Ms. MURKOWSKI. This is amendment No. 599.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Alaska [Ms. Murkowski], for herself, Mr. 
     Begich, and Mr. Inhofe, proposes an amendment numbered 599.

  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam 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 modify a provision relating to the repromuglation of final 
 rules by the Secretary of the Interior and the Secretary of Commerce)

       On page 541, strikes lines 1 through 10 and insert the 
     following:
       (1) the Secretary of the Interior and the Secretary of 
     Commerce may withdraw or repromulgate the rule described in 
     subsection (c)(1) in accordance with each requirement 
     described in subchapter II of chapter 5, and chapter 7, of 
     title 5, United States Code (commonly known as the 
     ``Administrative Procedure Act''), except that the public 
     comment period shall be for a period of not less than 60 
     days; and
       (2) the Secretary of the Interior may withdraw or 
     repromulgate the rule described in subsection (c)(2) in 
     accordance with each requirement described in subchapter II 
     of chapter 5, and chapter 7, of title 5, United States Code 
     (commonly known as the ``Administrative Procedure Act''), 
     except that the public comment period shall be for a period 
     of not less than 60 days.

  Ms. MURKOWSKI. The amendment I bring forward this evening would 
modify section 429 of the bill we have before us. This amendment does 
not cost us any money. It will, in fact, eliminate a major obstacle to 
job creation, including many of the construction projects that were 
funded under the recently passed stimulus bill.
  To be more specific, I am introducing an amendment to modify section 
429 to require the Departments of Interior and Commerce to follow the 
process provided by existing law to withdraw and alter two provisions 
that were essential ingredients last year in the decision by former 
Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne when he listed the polar 
bears of northern Alaska as threatened under the Endangered Species 
Act.
  Section 429, as it now stands, would allow those agencies to withdraw 
those regulations arbitrarily and then reissue them immediately without 
public comment. My amendment does not overturn the listing of the polar 
bears as threatened, even though up in Alaska most of us feel the 
listing was premature and perhaps totally unnecessary, but it will 
require the Department to follow existing public notice and comment 
statutes, if they want to modify last year's listing decision and the 
related carbon emissions rule in the future.
  We are asking that you follow the process that is in place. Section 
429 of the omnibus provides a provision that allows the Secretaries of 
Interior and Commerce to withdraw the final rule relating to the 
interagency cooperation under the Endangered Species Act and the final 
rule relating to endangered and threatened wildlife plants, the special 
rule for the polar bear.
  This section allows the Secretaries of either Commerce or Interior, 
or both, to withdraw the two Endangered Species Act rules promulgated 
under section 7 of that act within 60 days of adoption of the omnibus 
bill and then reissue the rule without having to go through any notice 
or any public comment period, or be subject to any judicial review as 
to whether their actions were responsible.
  Last year, after years of comment and review, the Interior Department 
elected to list the polar bear as threatened, solely because of the 
fear that greenhouse gas emissions will raise temperatures sufficiently 
in the future, causing the Arctic pack ice that the bear relies on for 
habitat to melt, making it more difficult for the bears to feed.
  During the scientific review that was conducted before the listing 
decision, there was very little to no evidence that indicated that 
neither very carefully limited subsistence hunting activities by the 
Alaska Natives, nor onshore or offshore oil and gas exploration or 
production activities in any way would disturb the bears or place 
stress on their population.
  So it was for that reason, based on all the science and the research, 
for that reason that the listing decision specifically provided, and 
this was set forth in section 4(d) of the act, it provided that oil or 
gas development or subsistence hunting will not be impacted by any 
action plan the Department will craft to remedy bear population issues 
in the future. Those provisions were added after extensive public 
comment and based on a full scientific review.
  Now, without any scientific review, at the last minute, someone in 
the House of Representatives has decided to impose as fact their 
opinion that the bears should be listed as threatened without 
limitation. This provision makes a mockery of what we know and accept 
and applaud with the scientific review process.
  In all the science leading up to the listing, there was no evidence 
that oil or gas exploration and development were having any effect on 
the bears which are already carefully regulated under the Marine Mammal 
Protection Act. In fact, the populations of both the Beaufort and 
Chukchi Sea areas have actually risen by around 500 bears since 1972, 
and any anecdotal evidence of minor recent declines is purely 
anecdotal.
  Now, yes, Fish and Wildlife researchers have some evidence that bears 
may have dietary issues that may impact juvenile survival rates if the 
ice melt causes dislocation of the seal populations. But that problem 
has nothing to do directly with oil or gas or subsistence activities.

[[Page S2678]]

  Withdrawal of the 4(d) protections could prompt lawsuits to stop any 
action that would increase carbon dioxide or any greenhouse gas 
emissions anywhere in the country, not just in the State of Alaska but 
anywhere in the country, if the project had not first consulted with 
U.S. Fish and Wildlife on potential impacts.
  What this means, the potential for this is that every powerplant 
permit anywhere that might increase carbon emissions could face a 
lawsuit. Damage could extend past fossil fuel projects to include an 
incredible array, agricultural practices, any increase in livestock 
numbers, new road construction, literally any project or activity that 
might increase greenhouse gas emissions.
  Suits that could be triggered by this seemingly limited change could 
stop many of the construction projects that this body has provided 
funding for in this stimulus bill to help get this Nation's economy 
moving again.
  Now, the Center for Biological Diversity has already stated it 
intends to use the polar bear listing to regulate greenhouse gas 
emissions. But I am afraid such overreaching could actually harm 
environmental protections. That is because such an effort to overreach 
could trigger such a backlash that it harms support for the entire 
Endangered Species Act.
  The administration is planning to ask Congress to pass cap-and-trade 
legislation this year to regulate greenhouse gasses. Debate over that 
bill is the proper place for this issue to be tackled, not through a 
back-door amendment to this key appropriations bill that will not 
permit public process.
  For my home State of Alaska, the amendment's impacts are immediate 
and they are far reaching. It is almost certain to result in lawsuits 
to stop oil and gas development in northern Alaska, both onshore and 
off. Such suits certainly could stop the exploration needed to produce 
new natural gas finds. We know this is vital to the viability of an 
Alaska natural gas line to bring our clean-burning natural gas to the 
lower 48.
  This project has been supported by the administration and most every 
Member of this body. We recognize that such sites could endanger Native 
subsistence activities, not just for the bears and marine mammals that 
the bears prey upon but for any species, such as the western and 
central Arctic caribou herds. These are vital food sources for our 
Alaska Natives.
  So what my amendment does is it requires that if either the carbon 
emissions consultation rule or the polar bear 4(d) rule is to be 
withdrawn or reissued, such action is subject to the requirements of 
the Administrative Procedures Act, with at least a 60-day comment 
period.
  What this does, it essentially gets us back to the status quo, where 
the Secretaries can now withdraw or repromulgate these regulations, but 
they have to follow the APA. Nothing Earth shattering, we are not 
plowing new ground. We are saying, follow the process we set up. The 
provision in the budget bill does much more than overturn Bush 
administration rules, it violates the public process and scientific 
review called for in the Endangered Species Act, and by doing that it 
weakens and risks support for the act.
  As it stands, under section 429, the Secretaries can make dramatic 
and far-reaching changes with their rules and regulations and do so 
without having to comply with the longstanding Federal process 
requiring public notice and comment by the American public and by 
knowledgeable scientists. We should not make a mockery of the formal 
ESA review process and the APA, the Administrative Procedures Act. We 
should support this amendment to strike the House waiver of those acts 
and require that those laws be enforced.
  I cannot stress how important this is to the Nation, to the American 
energy production of the workings of the stimulus bill, and eventually 
to the integrity of the Endangered Species Act and this Nation's 
administrative process.
  Now, this afternoon President Obama issued a new directive on the 
ESA. But it is only pertaining to the optional consultation portion of 
section 7. The directive requests the Secretaries of the Interior and 
Commerce to review the regulation issued on December 16, 2008, and 
determine whether to undertake new rulemaking. Until such review is 
completed, the President requested the heads of all agencies to 
exercise their discretion, under the new regulation, to follow the 
prior longstanding consultation and concurrence process.
  But this Presidential order did not address the issue of the polar 
bear 4(d) rule and does not remove the House omnibus rider. It does not 
maintain the Administrative Procedures Act requirement, and it does not 
negate the need for my amendment.
  I yield the floor.
  Mrs. MURRAY. I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to a 
period of morning business with the time equally divided in the usual 
form.
  Mr. COBURN. I would ask if the Senator would modify her amendment to 
allow for me to speak on the Wicker amendment. Could we do that?
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, I modify my request and ask unanimous 
consent that Senator Coburn be allowed to speak for 5 minutes on the 
amendment, and following his remarks, the Senate move to a period of 
morning business, with the time equally divided in the usual manner 
with a 10-minute limitation.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  The Senator from Oklahoma.


                           Amendment No. 607

  Mr. COBURN. Madam President, I wanted to spend a minute talking about 
the Wicker amendment No. 607. I am having trouble, from a philosophical 
viewpoint, understanding why the language is in this bill the way it 
is. There is no confusion as to my stand on pro-life issues, pro-choice 
versus pro-life. I stand in the corner of pro-life. But I want to 
debate this issue as if I were pro-choice, that I believe that the law 
as we have it today should be enforced. If, in fact, we believe that 
if, in fact, women have a right to choose, why in the world would we 
send money to UNFP that is going to take that right away from women in 
other countries? It is beyond me that these little six words in the 
bill, ``notwithstanding any other provision of law,'' are intended to 
eliminate the ability of the President to certify that our UNFP money 
is going to be used for coercive abortions and coercive sterilizations. 
I am having trouble understanding why those in this body who absolutely 
believe without a doubt that a woman has a definite right to choose on 
whether to carry a pregnancy to term, have a definite right to choose 
the number of children they are going to have or have none, we would 
allow this bill to go through here this way that will deny that ability 
to Chinese women.
  If somebody in our body can explain that to me, I would love them to 
do so. You can't be on both sides of this issue. Either you believe in 
a woman's right to choose or you do not or you only believe in a 
woman's right to choose in America. And because the Chinese have too 
many people, you don't think that same human right ought to be given to 
women in China. I won't go into the details. There is no question that 
UNFP will mix this money, and we will fund forced abortions in China. 
That is what these six words do. They mean American taxpayer dollars 
are going to go to China to enforce coercive abortion against the will 
of women and force sterilization against the will of women in China. 
China is not in bad shape. They don't need our money in the first 
place. But then we are going to send that money over there to enable 
and allow that policy to progress. I find it disconcerting that anybody 
who is pro-choice could not vote for the Wicker amendment. Because what 
it says is, you are double minded. The standard applying in this 
country is one thing, but human beings throughout the rest of the 
world, that same standard doesn't apply. I think it is unfortunate that 
this was put in here. We will rue the day it was.
  In fact, we lessen our own human rights campaigns for equal treatment 
and the protection of human rights around the world as we do that.
  I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Oklahoma.
  Mr. INHOFE. Madam President, I request the regular order.

[[Page S2679]]



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