[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 134 (Tuesday, September 22, 2009)]
[Senate]
[Pages S9634-S9635]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




     DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR, ENVIRONMENT, AND RELATED AGENCIES 
                        APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2010

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
resume consideration of H.R. 2996, which the clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (H.R. 2996) making appropriations for the Department 
     of the Interior, environment, and related agencies for the 
     fiscal year ending September 30, 2010, and for other 
     purposes.

  Pending:

       Feinstein modified amendment No. 2460, to support the 
     participation of the Smithsonian Institution in activities 
     under the Civil Rights History Project Act of 2009.
       Carper amendment No. 2456, to require the Administrator of 
     the Environmental Protection Agency to conduct a study on 
     black carbon emissions.

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Madam President, it is my understanding we are now on 
the bill and that the time until 12 o'clock noon will be equally 
divided. At noon, there will be a vote on the Feinstein amendment. So 
the floor is now open. I hope individuals who have amendments will come 
to the floor and that we will be able to offer those amendments and 
debate them as soon as possible.
  I yield the floor and note the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
order for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
time in a quorum call be equally divided between both sides.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. I note the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BROWN. 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for the quorum call be rescinded.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. BROWN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in 
morning business for up to 5 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                              Health Care

  Mr. BROWN. Madam President, I have come to the Senate floor pretty 
much every day since the start of the session--for the last couple of 
months--sharing letters from Ohioans about health care. I just did a 
big townhall meeting in Cleveland yesterday and I did one in Columbus, 
Cincinnati, Youngstown, and I have done other meetings in Dayton and 
Cambridge and other places. But my office gets dozens--hundreds, 
really, a week--of letters from people who oftentimes were very pleased 
and satisfied with their health insurance, and then when they got 
particularly sick, they found out they lost their health insurance 
coverage.
  I just want to read a couple of letters my office has received in the 
last couple of weeks or so.
  James, from Hancock County, in northwest Ohio--in Findlay--writes:

       When my kidneys began to fail, I was forced to leave my job 
     as an engineer for an electronics company. I went on dialysis 
     for several years and eventually had a transplant. I 
     currently have health care because of my wife's employment. 
     In trying to find a new job, I've had employers tell me my 
     preexisting conditions could drive up their health costs and 
     that they could find other workers without health issues. I, 
     and other people with chronic health problems, will never 
     find good paying jobs with benefits. Please, I want to work 
     and contribute to society. I didn't choose to get sick.

  Several things are happening with James in this letter. First of all, 
we are outlining the whole idea of preexisting conditions. As the 
Presiding Officer from New York State knows, insurance companies will 
no longer be allowed to deny care for a preexisting condition or 
discriminate based on gender, disability, or geography. Companies will 
not be able to put a lifetime or annual cap on coverage.
  The second thing is that this legislation will help those small 
businesses that too often have one employee who is very expensive so 
that the small business will see its premiums jacked up so high they 
often have to cancel their insurance and then their other employees 
lose their insurance coverage. Our legislation will help those small 
businesses while eliminating these but through insurance company 
reforms, and then a public option, will help to enforce those rules.
  Robert from Columbus writes:

       Last year, I lost my job and, as a result, my wife, teenage 
     son, and I needed to pick up private health insurance. After 
     researching various companies, we applied to one insurer. My 
     son and I were accepted, but my wife was rejected. Her sin? A 
     preexisting condition. During a previous job while insured, 
     she was diagnosed with mild and treatable high blood 
     pressure. She had one office visit and one prescription a 
     couple of years ago and she gets turned down today.

  How absurd, Madam President, that someone with a very treatable 
preexisting health care problem--high blood pressure, but not a problem 
so chronic that she missed work or spent time in hospitals and all 
that, but a very treatable condition--was denied care as a result of 
this preexisting condition and then couldn't get coverage that her 
husband and her teenage son could get. Our legislation again, through 
these insurance company reforms, would make sure that doesn't happen.
  Let me share one more letter because I know Senator Alexander and 
Senator Feinstein are going to call a vote in a minute. Georgene from 
Cuyahoga County, in the Cleveland area, writes:

       My 52 year old sister inherited muscular dystrophy and has 
     been on total disability for a few years. She's also had 
     double knee replacement and hip replacement surgeries. Due to 
     her condition, she's fallen several times and damaged her 
     knees. The doctor recommended she get her leg amputated and 
     fit with a prosthetic. Her husband's insurance covers her and 
     approved the amputation surgery but is now denying her the 
     prosthetic and wheelchair. They had to file for bankruptcy 
     due mainly because of medical bills and now live in a small 
     apartment. I could go on with personal stories from my own 
     life or extended family, but you get the picture.

  Madam President, this simply happens too much, where people such as 
Georgene have not been well served by the system. They have insurance, 
and they were relatively happy with it, but it has now become 
inadequate. Insurance isn't real insurance, it is not adequate 
insurance, if people get so sick or have such high costs that they get 
excluded from their insurance.
  What happens too many times is bankruptcy. The most common cause for 
bankruptcy in this country is because of huge health care costs. The 
most common situation among those who declare bankruptcy is because of 
health care costs, and the most common situation is among people who 
have insurance but their insurance simply doesn't cover everything. 
Their expenses are such that their insurance gets canceled and they end 
up in bankruptcy.
  Madam President, I again urge my colleagues to look seriously at this 
bill as we move forward--the bill that came out of the Health, 
Education, Labor and Pension Committee, as it merges with the bill 
coming out of the Finance Committee--in the next week or two to get 
this bill to the President's desk this fall. In my State alone, 390 
people every single day are losing their insurance. And for people 
around here trying to delay this, it is simply wrong. We need to move, 
not hurriedly, but at a steady pace to get this bill to the President's 
desk this fall.
  Madam President, I yield the floor, and I thank Senator Feinstein and 
Senator Alexander.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that once 
the Senate reconvenes at 2:15 today, it then stand in recess subject to 
the call of the Chair.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

[[Page S9635]]

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Obviously that is for the purpose of the Senate 
photograph.
  Madam President, I note that 12 o'clock has arrived. We will have a 
vote on the Feinstein-Alexander amendment No. 2460. I will take a brief 
moment to describe it.
  This is an amendment cosponsored by Senators Alexander, Levin, 
Schumer, Cochran, Bennett, Warner, and I ask unanimous consent to add 
the name of Senator Boxer.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Madam President, this amendment simply makes $250,000 
available so the Smithsonian can carry out activities under the Civil 
Rights History Project Act of 2009. Obviously this means this has been 
authorized. It is also paid for.
  This is a joint project between the Library of Congress and the 
Smithsonian, which aims to collect video and audio recordings of the 
personal histories and testimonials of individuals who participated in 
the civil rights movement.
  By coordinating the effort at the national level, the project will 
build upon and complement previous and ongoing documentary work on the 
American civil rights movement. I think it is a very special effort 
because it essentially will mean that youngsters who are present in 20, 
30, 40, or 50 years, will be able to have audios and videos that 
contain the actual photographs and actual wording of people who 
participated themselves in the great civil rights movement of this 
country.
  I urge my colleagues to support the amendment.
  If there are no other comments by the ranking member--would the 
ranking member like to make a comment? Then we will ask for the yeas 
and nays.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, I congratulate the Senator from 
California for her leadership. We Americans are united by our founding 
documents and our language and our history, not by our race or 
ethnicity or where we come from, so therefore we are very hungry for 
stories about ourselves. The great writers of American history, such as 
David McCullough, whose books are sold out immediately, would wish we 
had the same sort of documentation the Senator from California has 
proposed here about the writing of the Constitution or the American 
Revolution or the Civil War or the great world wars. Ken Burns would 
like to have more of it for his upcoming series on the national parks. 
This will mean we will have more of it for the great civil rights 
struggles of the 1950s and 1960s and 1970s. Alex Haley, the author of 
``Roots,'' said an older person dying is like a library burning down. 
This will help to make sure we keep those libraries.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Madam President, I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There is a sufficient second.
  The question is on agreeing to the amendment.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk called the roll.
  Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from West Virginia (Mr. Byrd) 
and the Senator from Wisconsin (Mr. Kohl) are necessarily absent.
  I also announce that the Senator from Arkansas (Mrs. Lincoln) is 
absent due to a death in the family.
  Mr. KYL. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator 
from Oklahoma (Mr. Coburn).
  The result was announced--yeas 95, nays 0, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 290 Leg.]

                                YEAS--95

     Akaka
     Alexander
     Barrasso
     Baucus
     Bayh
     Begich
     Bennet
     Bennett
     Bingaman
     Bond
     Boxer
     Brown
     Brownback
     Bunning
     Burr
     Burris
     Cantwell
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Chambliss
     Cochran
     Collins
     Conrad
     Corker
     Cornyn
     Crapo
     DeMint
     Dodd
     Dorgan
     Durbin
     Ensign
     Enzi
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Franken
     Gillibrand
     Graham
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Hagan
     Harkin
     Hatch
     Hutchison
     Inhofe
     Inouye
     Isakson
     Johanns
     Johnson
     Kaufman
     Kerry
     Klobuchar
     Kyl
     Landrieu
     Lautenberg
     LeMieux
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lugar
     McCain
     McCaskill
     McConnell
     Menendez
     Merkley
     Mikulski
     Murkowski
     Murray
     Nelson (NE)
     Nelson (FL)
     Pryor
     Reed
     Reid
     Risch
     Roberts
     Rockefeller
     Sanders
     Schumer
     Sessions
     Shaheen
     Shelby
     Snowe
     Specter
     Stabenow
     Tester
     Thune
     Udall (CO)
     Udall (NM)
     Vitter
     Voinovich
     Warner
     Webb
     Whitehouse
     Wicker
     Wyden

                             NOT VOTING--4

     Byrd
     Coburn
     Kohl
     Lincoln
  The amendment (No. 2460), as modified, was agreed to.

                          ____________________