[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 100 (Wednesday, June 30, 2010)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5638-S5641]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         ADDRESSING THE ISSUES

  Mr. DURBIN. In response to the Republican leader's speech, I have 
three words: Drill, baby, drill. That was the chant we heard across the 
United States from the Republican side of the aisle during the last 
Presidential campaign. The notion was that if we just started drilling 
in every direction, we could solve America's energy problems. It was an 
irresponsible chant, failing to address the most fundamental issue of 
our time: the future of America's national energy picture.
  What you heard this morning from the Republican leader is a return to 
the subject but ignoring the past. What we know is this: We know we 
have become more and more dependent on foreign oil. It costs us, as a 
Nation, $1 billion a day that we are sending overseas to other 
countries to buy their oil to sustain our economy. This dependence, 
unfortunately, leads to commitments we have to make--military 
commitments, political commitments, economic commitments--because of 
this dependence on foreign oil.
  The second reality is this: We understand there is a new, emerging 
energy technology in the 21st century. It is an energy technology based 
on efficiency, economy, and the reduction of costs. There are other 
countries in the world that are taking the lead in this area, not the 
least of which is the nation of China.
  I recently heard from Michael Bennet of Colorado, who spoke to us at 
a Democratic Senate luncheon. He came up with a statistic which in many 
ways is hard to believe but equally scary, and here is what it is: The 
largest export of the United States of America of any product is in the 
aircraft industry. Look at Boeing. Look at all of the aircraft we are 
exporting around the world. It is our major export. Yet if you compare 
our major export to the export by China--by China--of energy technology 
to the world, they are now at 50 percent of the value of our annual 
aircraft exports. China has decided that the future of the world is 
based on new, clean energy technology, and they are doing something 
about it. They don't come to their leadership and squabble, at least 
not in a public fashion; they get focused--focused on creating 
businesses and jobs and being ready to compete in the 21st century.
  The third premise of our energy policy goes to something on which the 
Senator from Kentucky may or may not agree with me. I happen to believe 
the activities of humans on this Earth make a difference when it comes 
to the planet. I happen to believe when we look at glacial melt around 
the world, it reflects the fact that the world is changing. Ever so 
gradually, it is getting warmer. As the Earth increases its 
temperature, it changes weather patterns, the currents of the oceans, 
the land we live on, the crops we grow, and our future. Some people 
don't accept that. Some don't see a connection. They don't believe any 
of the carbon released into the atmosphere creates a problem. I have 
met many of them. Some are people who in good faith don't come to the 
same conclusion I reach. I respect them, but I respectfully think they 
are wrong.

[[Page S5639]]

  What have we learned from the gulf crisis? We have learned a lot. 
Yesterday I had one of the vice presidents of BP America in my office. 
I talked to him about how we have reached this point. I said: When we 
have reached the point where we are drilling deep, going after the 
tough, deep oil to fuel our economy and its needs, we are engendering 
more problems and more challenges than before. Had there been a spill 
of oil in downstate Illinois or in Alaska or Texas, it would have been 
terrible, but it could have been contained much more quickly than this 
gusher of oil coming from the floor of the Gulf of Mexico. As we 
explore in new areas, tougher, more challenging areas, we run greater 
risk. That is a reality.
  I take exception to the remarks of the Senator from Kentucky who 
suggested this administration is not doing everything in its power to 
deal with this spill in the gulf. Let's look at what we have done. This 
President called in BP and made it clear that the cost of this damage 
will be borne by that oil company, not by the taxpayers. I was 
pleasantly surprised when the Governor of Mississippi, Haley Barbour, a 
man who in the past was as passionate in his beliefs as I am in my 
Democratic beliefs, came out and praised President Obama for sitting 
down with BP and getting a commitment of $20 billion in a fund to deal 
with the economic losses associated with this spill. BP has bought 
commercials that most of us have seen saying: We will pay for this, all 
of it. I don't know if the Senator from Kentucky thinks that is 
unimportant. I believe it is important.
  Secondly, I am as troubled by the continuing spill as anyone. I know 
the President feels that has to end and end immediately. But as the 
Senator from Kentucky knows, we don't have a U.S. department of deep 
sea drilling. It doesn't exist. What we are relying on is the private 
sector's capacity, technology, equipment, and expertise to find a way 
to cope with this problem. I am as frustrated as any American that on 
day 75 of this spill, it has not come to an end. But it continues. The 
President focuses on this every day, as does his Cabinet.
  Yesterday we had a meeting with Interior Secretary Ken Salazar. The 
man has spent day after weary day devoting himself completely to this. 
Carol Browner, an environmental assistant in the White House, was there 
talking about the massive commitment which we have made. She was asked 
pointblank: Are you providing the booms, the things they spread out in 
the water to stop the flow and spread of this oil, are you supplying 
all of the booms requested by all of the States in the Gulf of Mexico?
  She said: We are supplying not only 100 percent of their requests but 
over 100 percent of their requests, and we are going to continue to 
manufacture and secure this boom to protect our shoreline. She said: Of 
course, we haven't done everything right, but when we see a problem, we 
move on it quickly to try to solve it.
  We are talking about the commitment of thousands of vessels to skim 
the surface of the gulf and to try to salvage as much of this oil as 
possible. It is a massive national commitment by our government, by the 
private sector. The suggestion of the Senator from Kentucky that the 
President is not focused on it is not accurate nor fair.
  I believe we need to focus on energy. We need to be honest about the 
future when it comes to energy. If we accept the premise that we will 
continue to be dependent on foreign oil indefinitely, that we will 
spend a billion dollars a day, sending it to many countries which not 
only disagree with us in terms of our values but turn around and spend 
our dollars against us to foster and to be patrons to terrorism, if we 
accept that, then we will do nothing about a national energy policy. If 
we accept the premise that we should do nothing about clean energy 
technology and all the potential for business and jobs it creates, that 
America is going to take a back seat to China and other countries, then 
we will do nothing about the national energy policy. If we accept the 
premise that there is no global warming and we should not lose a 
moment's sleep worrying about it, then we will do nothing about a 
national energy policy.
  That is what we hear from the other side of the aisle, do nothing, 
say no. Over and over throughout this congressional session, the 
response of Senate Republicans has been say no. When we tackled the 
tough and controversial issue of containing health care costs, runaway 
costs that are affecting every business, every family and every level 
of government, Republicans said: No, we will not engage. We will not be 
part of that conversation.
  When we went after Wall Street reform and said: After this recession, 
we have learned lessons; we will not allow these titans on Wall Street 
to repeat their mistakes and kill more jobs in the future, all but four 
Republicans said: No, we are not interested in that conversation. We 
don't want to be part of that effort.
  Now we find again, in one of the most telling and important issues of 
the moment, unemployment compensation for the hundreds of thousands of 
Americans out of work, Republicans have said, no, we will not lend a 
helping hand to the people of America out of work.
  I look at the numbers of those who are unemployed across the country, 
who will lose their benefits because Republicans continue to say no. I 
look at States such as Kentucky, the home State of the Republican 
leader, where 22,600 Kentucky families had their unemployment cut off 
because Senator McConnell and his colleagues voted no when it came to 
extending unemployment benefits. In my State of Illinois, 80,000 
families had their unemployment cut off this month because Republicans 
said no. One of my friends who is a woman out of work, with a family, 
called me over the weekend at home. We keep in touch. She said: Let me 
tell you, Senator, what it means. They are cutting off the utilities. I 
don't know what to do. Three kids in the house and a grandson, and they 
are cutting off my utilities.
  That is the real world of the real votes cast by the other side of 
the aisle.
  This morning the New York Times had an editorial which I want to make 
reference to. I ask unanimous consent that this editorial be printed in 
the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                [From the New York Times, June 30, 2010]

                   Who Will Fight for the Unemployed?

       Without doubt, the two biggest threats to the economy are 
     unemployment and the dire financial condition of the states, 
     yet lawmakers have failed to deal intelligently with either 
     one.
       Federal unemployment benefits began to expire nearly a 
     month ago. Since then, 1.2 million jobless workers have been 
     cut off. The House passed a six-month extension as part of a 
     broader spending bill in May, but the Senate, despite three 
     attempts, has not been able to pass a similar bill. The 
     majority leader, Harry Reid, said he was ready to give up 
     after the third try last week when all of the Senate's 
     Republicans and a lone Democrat, Ben Nelson of Nebraska, 
     blocked the bill.
       Meanwhile, the states face a collective budget hole of some 
     $112 billion, but neither the House nor the Senate has a plan 
     to help. The House stripped a provision for $24 billion in 
     state fiscal aid from its earlier spending bill. The Senate 
     included state aid in its ill-fated bill to extend 
     unemployment benefits; when that bill failed, the promise of 
     aid vanished as well.
       As a result, 30 states that had counted on the money to 
     help balance their budgets will be forced to raise taxes even 
     higher and to cut spending even deeper in the budget year 
     that begins on July 1. That will only worsen unemployment, 
     both among government workers and the states' private 
     contractors. Worsening unemployment means slower growth, or 
     worse, renewed recession.
       So if lawmakers are wondering why consumer confidence and 
     the stock market are tanking (the Standard & Poor's 500-stock 
     index hit a new low for the year on Tuesday), they need look 
     no further than a mirror.
       The situation cries out for policies to support economic 
     growth--specifically jobless benefits and fiscal aid to 
     states. But instead of delivering, Congressional Republicans 
     and many Democrats have been asserting that the nation must 
     act instead to cut the deficit. The debate has little to do 
     with economic reality and everything to do with political 
     posturing. A lot of lawmakers have concluded that the best 
     way to keep their jobs is to pander to the nation's new 
     populist mood and play off the fears of the very Americans 
     whose economic well-being Congress is threatening.
       Deficits matter, but not more than economic recovery, and 
     not more urgently than the economic survival of millions of 
     Americans. A sane approach would couple near-term federal 
     spending with a credible plan for deficit reduction--a mix of 
     tax increases

[[Page S5640]]

     and spending cuts--as the economic recovery takes hold.
       But today's deficit hawks--many of whom eagerly 
     participated in digging the deficit ever deeper during the 
     George W. Bush years--are not interested in the sane 
     approach. In the Senate, even as they blocked the extension 
     of unemployment benefits, they succeeded in preserving a tax 
     loophole that benefits wealthy money managers at private 
     equity firms and other investment partnerships. They also 
     derailed an effort to end widespread tax avoidance by owners 
     of small businesses organized as S-corporations. If they are 
     really so worried about the deficit, why balk at these 
     evidently sensible ways to close tax loopholes and end tax 
     avoidance?
       House lawmakers made an effort on Tuesday to extend jobless 
     benefits but failed to get the necessary votes, and it 
     remains uncertain if an extension can pass both the House and 
     Senate before Congress leaves town on Friday for a weeklong 
     break. What's needed, and what's lacking, is leadership, both 
     in Congress and from the White House, to set the terms of the 
     debate--jobs before deficit reduction--and to fight for those 
     terms, with failure not an option.

  Mr. DURBIN. The New York Times editorial today reads: ``Who Will 
Fight for the Unemployed?''
  I want to quote a few sentences from it:

       Without doubt, the two biggest threats to the economy are 
     unemployment and the dire financial condition of the states, 
     yet lawmakers have failed to deal intelligently with either 
     one.
       Federal unemployment benefits began to expire nearly a 
     month ago. Since then, 1.2 million jobless workers have been 
     cut off. The House passed a six-month extension as part of a 
     broader spending bill in May, but the Senate, despite three 
     attempts, has not been able to pass a similar bill. The 
     majority leader, Harry Reid, said he was ready to give up 
     after the third try last week when all of the Senate's 
     Republicans and a lone Democrat, Ben Nelson of Nebraska, 
     blocked the bill.
       Meanwhile, the states face a collective budget hole of some 
     $112 billion, but neither the House nor the Senate has a plan 
     to help. The House stripped a provision for $24 billion in 
     state fiscal aid from its earlier spending bill. The Senate 
     included state aid in its ill-fated bill to extend 
     unemployment benefits; when that bill failed, the promise of 
     aid vanished as well.
       As a result, 30 states that had counted on the money to 
     help balance their budgets will be forced to raise taxes even 
     higher and to cut spending even deeper in the budget year 
     that begins on July 1. That will only worsen unemployment, 
     both among government workers and the states' private 
     contractors. Worsening unemployment means slower growth, or 
     worse, renewed recession.

  I might add a comment here. This morning's newspapers, the Washington 
Post and the New York Times, at least the ones I have seen, and the 
Chicago papers as well, question what the reaction of our economy is 
going to be. They looked at the stock market yesterday. One day does 
not make a trend, but there is a growing concern that we are sliding 
back into a recession because of the failure of Republicans to support 
not only the President's stimulus package but also to send unemployment 
benefits to those needy people across America. This is a repeat, 
unfortunately, of a chapter in American history when after the Great 
Depression, President Roosevelt initiated the New Deal and injected 
into our economy massive amounts of money to create jobs so people 
would go to work, earn a paycheck, and spend it for goods and services, 
breathing life back into a dying economy, trying to turn it around. 
After 4 years of that effort, President Roosevelt, at the urging of 
more conservative political leaders, said: We better start focusing now 
on the deficit. They started tapping the breaks on spending, and the 
unemployment rate shot up again, creating a follow-on to the Great 
Depression which was not relieved until the beginning of World War II.
  Sadly, it appears we are about to repeat that historical mistake. We 
know Republicans continue to argue that because of our deficit, we 
should not worry about the recession or spending money to stimulate the 
creation of jobs. The money we send out to unemployed people is turned 
around immediately into the economy. These people are living hand to 
mouth. Every dollar they receive is spent. As it is spent at a 
business, it creates business profits and small business jobs. One 
thing leads to another as the multiplier takes that dollar, respends it 
many times in our economy and breathes life back into an economy which 
has been fraught with a recession. That is the reality of the need 
today. The failure to meet that need will guarantee the deficit 
continues and gets worse. It will be a self-fulfilling prophecy as 
Republicans turn down unemployment benefits, arguing that we can't 
afford it as a nation because of the deficit and, as a result, drive up 
unemployment in the country, driving up the very deficits they say they 
want to end. It is a lesson of history. Those who ignore history are 
likely and condemned to repeat it.
  Returning to this New York Times editorial:

       So if lawmakers are wondering why consumer confidence and 
     the stock market are tanking (the Standard & Poor's 500-stock 
     index hit a new low for the year on Tuesday), they need look 
     no further than a mirror.
       The situation cries out for policies to support economic 
     growth--specifically jobless benefits and fiscal aid to 
     states. But instead of delivering, Congressional Republicans 
     and many Democrats have been asserting that the nation must 
     act instead to cut the deficit. The debate has little to do 
     with economic reality and everything to do with political 
     posturing. A lot of lawmakers have concluded that the best 
     way to keep their jobs is to pander to the nation's new 
     populist mood and play off the fears of the very Americans 
     whose economic well-being Congress is threatening.
       Deficits matter, but not more than economic recovery, and 
     not more urgently than the economic survival of millions of 
     Americans. A sane approach would couple near-term federal 
     spending with a credible plan for deficit reduction--a mix of 
     tax increases and spending cuts--as the economic recovery 
     takes hold.

  This New York City editorial summarizes what I consider the 
situation. In a short period of time, after the memorial to our fallen 
colleague Senator Byrd, who served this Nation and West Virginia so 
well, we will probably have one vote tomorrow evening and then head 
back to our homes. For many people it will be a time of relaxation with 
family. For many Senators it is a rest that is needed after a lot of 
days spent in session in the Senate. As we return, in my home State, 
80,000 families won't be celebrating the Fourth of July. They will be 
wondering how they are going to pay their utility bills and feed their 
families. For the rest of us who live in comfort, full-time employment, 
it may be a world removed. But for them, it is the world of reality 
they face every single day. Their life has become more complicated, and 
their burden is heavier because this Senate has failed to extend 
unemployment benefits.
  Mr. President, 1.2 million Americans in the month of June will lose 
their unemployment benefits because not one single Republican would 
vote to help Americans who have lost their jobs through no fault of 
their own. Where they would find permission to spend money on so many 
other things, when it comes to investing in American families who have 
fallen on hard times, they turn a deaf ear. That, to me, is sad and 
unfortunate. We need to address many issues in this Congress. It 
troubles me that we would consider going home for anything near a 
holiday or a relief from our Senate duties and ignore the burdens 
facing Americans who are in unemployed status or who have trouble in 
their families because of this weak economy.
  I sincerely hope a handful--three or four Republicans--will consider 
voting for unemployment benefits for those across America who are out 
of work. We come to the aid of the American family when people are in 
need. When there is a natural disaster, we are there. This is an 
economic disaster. It requires an emergency response. We should not 
leave Washington without dealing with it.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Udall of New Mexico). The Senator from 
Alaska is recognized.
  Mr. BEGICH. Mr. President, I say to the Senator from Illinois, I was 
presiding for about a half hour. I was not planning on speaking. I know 
my staff right now is getting very nervous that I am speaking on the 
floor of the Senate without their knowledge, but I do want to say a 
couple things.
  I say to the Senator, one, he is absolutely right on unemployment 
benefits and what we need to do in the next day or so. But I want to go 
back to his first comment. I was at the meeting yesterday with the 
President, and I sat next to Senator Alexander and heard the question 
on the oilspill issue. The comment from the Republican leader was that 
the President just brushed it aside. I am not here to defend the 
President. He can do his own job defending himself. But the point was, 
we

[[Page S5641]]

were doing everything in a very bipartisan way on the oilspill.
  Tomorrow we have another briefing with the Coast Guard. We had a 
briefing yesterday. There is a committee meeting I am supposed to be at 
right now on some liability issues around the Deepwater and what is 
going on with offshore. There are meetings all over this place.
  I know the Republican leader was not at the meeting, so I am sure he 
got the information secondhand. But I was. It was not brushed off. I 
think all of us, I do not care what State we are from--I am from an oil 
and gas State--believe in the development of oil and gas, but we are 
all concerned about the problems down in the gulf and the tragedy and 
the 11 lives that were lost there. So we are 100 percent committed in 
this body in a bipartisan way.
  What I found amazing--and the Senator's point was we can do more than 
one thing in this body. I believe I can. I know everyone around me and 
around my caucus believes that. So we are going to work on the 
oilspill. Absolutely we want to cap it. But that is going on now. They 
are 16,000 feet down on a second drill, a relief drill. They are about 
1,000 feet away. We know that is being worked on.
  But the reality is, we have to have a comprehensive energy plan in 
this country. The fact is, if we want to talk about jobs and job 
creation in the future, that is a huge potential for us.
  This debate, when we get to it--I know some want to make it cap and 
tax, cap and trade, cap and cap, cap and something. But the reality is, 
this is about a comprehensive energy plan. This is about creating a 
plan that gets us more secure for our national security. I say to the 
Senator, he talked about the amount of money we spend overseas going to 
countries that do not like us. They spend that money against us. It is 
in our best interests to develop a comprehensive plan, not using the 
excuses that have gone around this place for the last 40 years. We need 
to get busy and do it for the consumer, do it for our national 
security, do it for our economic security, and do it for the future of 
job creation in this economy.
  So if we want to talk about the oilspill, absolutely. We will work 
double-time on that. We are doing it from every end of the Capitol and 
all across this country. As a matter of fact, today another report came 
out. A multinational effort, a multicountry effort from around the 
world has come to our assistance in the gulf. But we also need to be 
dealing with a comprehensive energy plan.
  In Alaska, we are doing it. By 2025 we intend to have 50 percent of 
our energy produced by renewable energy. Even though we are dependent 
on oil and gas for the economic viability of our State, we recognize 
the diversity that has to happen: In Kodiak, AK, 10 years ago, zero; 
today, almost 85 percent renewable energy. The largest Coast Guard 
station in this country is in Kodiak, AK, which will be run by 
renewable energy: biofuels, hydro, wind energy.
  We have to be real about this issue. I understand the politics of 
November is coming. Everyone wants to be for something, against 
something so they can figure out what constituencies they win or lose 
in an election. The people who will lose if we do not get a 
comprehensive energy plan is the public. It does not matter if we are 
Democrat or Republican, Green Party, Independent. You name it. We are 
going to be affected because we will continue to import from foreign 
sources that do not like us. We will continue to put our country at 
risk from a national security perspective, and we will not recognize 
that we are now No. 2, No. 3 when it comes to energy technology and 
China is beating us.
  That is unacceptable for this country to be No. 2 or No. 3 on this 
issue. We should be No. 1. For people to come down wanting to pigeon-
hole this and claim we do not have the capacity in the Senate to do 
more than one thing is unbelievable. We will work double-time on the 
oilspill. But we must work double-time on developing an energy policy 
that moves us to better security for our country, our economic 
security, and to make sure we see the future. The future is a new 
energy economy that creates new jobs in this country.
  So I was not planning to speak, I say to the Senator from Illinois, 
but he sparked me. I get agitated sometimes when this body--not the 
Senator, obviously, but the Republican leader--when they want to just 
do one thing. It is like when a person gets a meal on a plate, and one 
person just likes to eat the corn first, complete it all, and then they 
move to the next thing. We have the capacity to do many things in this 
Senate. We have spent 40 years--from the last major embargo in 1974--
twiddling our thumbs and doing small, little, special interest 
legislation for energy. Now let's do the right legislation for the 
American people and do it right for our national security.
  So I will stop on my rant. My staff is probably sweating bullets 
right now. They had no idea I was going to be down here doing this. I 
am off to a committee hearing.
  I thank the Chair.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, if the Senator would yield briefly for a 
question, 21 years ago, I went up to Prince William Sound to see the 
Exxon Valdez spill. I say to the Senator, I know he knows, as a native 
of Alaska, firsthand how terrible these spills can be, the impact they 
can have in the short and long term. But I commend the Senator for his 
statement because we can do more than one thing if we are working 
together. If we are divided and at war politically, we do not 
accomplish much.
  What the President wants us to do is deal with the gulf oilspill but 
also not ignore the need for a national energy policy that is going to 
make us stronger, create more jobs, and make us less dependent on 
foreign oil.
  I thank the Senator from Alaska for his comments.
  Mr. BEGICH. I thank the Senator for sparking me for the day.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New York is recognized.
  Mr. SCHUMER. Thank you, Mr. President.
  While I will be speaking on the subject of Senator Byrd, I, too, want 
to join my colleague from Illinois in commending our Senator from 
Alaska on this issue and so many others. The Senator's staff does not 
have to worry. He speaks fluidly, eloquently, and without flaw. But, 
second, I think his courage on this issue has helped inspire our caucus 
to move forward.
  We come from different States. For some States it is easier; for some 
States it is harder to take on this issue. Probably for Alaska it is 
one of the two or three hardest States to do it, and the Senator has 
done it with courage, with intelligence, with drive, and I think 
ultimately with success.
  So I thank the Senator.

                          ____________________