[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 104 (Wednesday, July 13, 2011)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4542-S4552]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
MAKING APPROPRIATIONS FOR MILITARY CONSTRUCTION, THE DEPARTMENT OF
VETERANS AFFAIRS, AND RELATED AGENCIES FOR THE FISCAL YEAR ENDING
SEPTEMBER 30, 2012--MOTION TO PROCEED
Cloture Motion
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Pursuant to rule XXII, the Chair
lays before the Senate the pending cloture motion, which the clerk will
state.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
Cloture Motion
We, the undersigned Senators, in accordance with the
provisions of rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate,
hereby move to bring to a close debate on the motion to
proceed to Calendar No. 91, H.R. 2055, an act making
appropriations for military construction, the Department of
Veterans Affairs, and related agencies for the fiscal year
ending September 30, 2012, and for other purposes.
Harry Reid, Richard J. Durbin, Patty Murray, Daniel K.
Inouye, Christopher A. Coons, Sheldon Whitehouse,
Barbara Boxer, Robert P. Casey, Jr., Tim Johnson, Frank
R. Lautenberg, Sherrod Brown, Jack Reed, Dianne
Feinstein, Jeff Merkley, Benjamin L. Cardin, Mark L.
Pryor, Carl Levin, Charles E. Schumer.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. By unanimous consent, the mandatory
quorum call has been waived.
The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on the
motion to proceed to H.R. 2055, an act making appropriations for
military construction, the Department of Veterans Affairs, and related
agencies for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2012, and for other
purposes, shall be brought to a close?
The yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule. The clerk will call
the roll.
The assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 89, nays 11, as follows:
[Rollcall Vote No. 109 Leg.]
YEAS--89
Akaka
Alexander
Ayotte
Barrasso
Baucus
Begich
Bennet
Bingaman
Blumenthal
Blunt
Boozman
Boxer
Brown (MA)
Brown (OH)
Burr
Cantwell
Cardin
Carper
Casey
Chambliss
Coats
Coburn
Cochran
Collins
Conrad
Coons
Crapo
Durbin
Enzi
Feinstein
Franken
Gillibrand
Graham
Hagan
Harkin
Hatch
Heller
Hoeven
Hutchison
Inhofe
Inouye
Isakson
Johanns
Johnson (SD)
Kerry
Kirk
Klobuchar
Kohl
Kyl
Landrieu
Lautenberg
Leahy
Levin
Lieberman
Lugar
Manchin
McCain
McCaskill
McConnell
Menendez
Merkley
Mikulski
Moran
Murkowski
Murray
Nelson (NE)
Nelson (FL)
Portman
Pryor
Reed
Reid
Risch
Roberts
Rockefeller
Sanders
Schumer
Shaheen
Shelby
Snowe
Stabenow
Tester
Thune
Udall (CO)
Udall (NM)
Warner
Webb
Whitehouse
Wicker
Wyden
NAYS--11
Corker
Cornyn
DeMint
Grassley
Johnson (WI)
Lee
Paul
Rubio
Sessions
Toomey
Vitter
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. On this vote, the yeas are 89, the
nays are 11. Three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn having
voted in the affirmative, the motion is agreed to.
The majority leader.
Mr. REID. Madam President, I would hope following the Republicans'
luncheon they will allow us to move to this bill. Senator Johnson and
staff are ready to move forward on this legislation. We would hope
after the luncheon they would allow us to be on it. So it would be open
for amendment. There are lots of spots open for people to offer
amendments. This would be our first appropriations bill. I think it
would be, especially in that we are working on these budgets, deficit-
reduction programs right now here and at the White House, a good
message to everybody
[[Page S4543]]
that we can do an appropriations bill and stay within our legislative
framework as far as spending.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Franken). Without objection, it is so
ordered.
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I also ask unanimous consent to speak
as in morning business for--well, it will not be 20 minutes but let me
ask for up to 20 minutes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
State of the Ocean
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, nothing is more important in the short
term than resolving our debt limit impasse, and I would urge my
colleagues to take Social Security out of their gun sights. It has not
contributed to our debt or deficits.
I would urge my colleagues to focus not on Medicare benefit cuts but,
rather, on health care system reforms that will save not only Medicare
and Medicaid costs but private health care and health insurance costs
as well--cost savings throughout the system. I would urge my colleagues
to yield a bit on defending every tax loophole, every tax gimmick and
tax preference as if they were tax hikes. They are not. They are just
not. They are earmarks in the Tax Code. They are special benefits in
which ordinary Americans usually do not share, and we should not put
the special interests first, ahead of ordinary Americans who did not
get special tax deals.
But as important as all of that is in the short term, there are some
things that are more important in the long term than our debt limit,
and I rise to speak about one.
In April of this year a group of scientific experts came together to
discuss an issue with consequences that will influence the planet and
our American society for generations to come. They met at the
University of Oxford to discuss the current state, and eventual fate,
of our oceans. ``The ocean,'' as stated in the workshop's summary
report, ``is the largest ecosystem on Earth, supports us and maintains
our world in a habitable condition.''
For 3 days, 27 scientists representing 18 prominent research and
conservation organizations worldwide, reviewed the latest findings on
ocean stressors--and in particular the consequences of multiple,
combined stressors--for marine life and for the human population. The
scientists found that stressors in combination magnify the negative
effect of each one occurring alone.
Based on this determination, the scientists at this meeting
concluded:
We have underestimated the overall risks and that the whole
of marine degradation is greater than the sum of its parts,
and that degradation is now happening at a faster rate than
predicted.
In short, things for the ocean are worse than we thought and getting
worse faster than expected.
All too often, we take for granted the fact that our oceans feed us,
support our coastal communities, and drive our tourism economies.
Unfortunately, these ocean ecosystems are severely stressed, from
nutrient pollution, chemical dumping, overfishing, marine debris,
invasions of exotic species, warming waters and, perhaps most alarming,
a drop in ocean pH to levels not seen for more than 8,000 centuries:
acidification of our oceans. Individually, these stressors would be
cause for concern. In combination with each other, this expert group of
scientists concluded, they are driving our ocean toward the brink of a
mass extinction and ecosystem collapse.
One example of the multiplier effect on marine life comes from
plastic debris and toxic chemicals. Plastics make their way as trash
into the ocean where they break down into small particles that are
consumed by marine life, like sea turtles, sea birds, and microscopic
plankton. Consumption of plastic alone becomes fatal for marine life,
when they consume so much indigestible material that they stop eating
all together and starve to death. But the surfaces of plastic particles
also easily absorb chemical pollutants, so they amplify the load of
chemical pollution on these creatures.
The levels of chemical pollution are themselves on the rise in even
the most remote seas where no human development exists. Many of these
chemical pollutants, like flame retardants and fluorinated compounds
are poured down home sinks, or expelled as waste from industrial
facilities, directly into the ocean. Plants and animals have not
evolved ways to break down these new synthetic compounds, so they
``bioaccumulate,'' meaning they become increasingly concentrated as
they are passed up the food chain, or passed in marine mammals from
mothers to calves in their milk, until many of our top oceanic
predators, our most majestic creatures, are now swimming toxic waste.
Another example of what the scientists call ``negatively
synergistic'' environmental harms is the combination of destructive
fishing practices, nutrient runoff, and the presence of hormone-
disrupting pharmaceuticals in our wastewater on coral reefs. But now,
these precious ecosystems, known as the rainforests of the sea, do not
have to just contend with overfishing, nutrient, and wastewater
pollution. Now the reefs, like the mangroves, salt marsh estuaries, and
seagrass meadows, in their damaged and less resilient state, must also
face a rapidly changing climate and its dual effects of ocean warming
and acidification. Coral reefs are more likely to bleach when exposed
to both increased temperature and acidification than if they are
exposed to either condition separately.
Add both conditions to pre-existing stressors, and 35 percent of the
world's reefs are classified as in a critical or threatened stage.
Scientific projections indicate that without urgent action, coral reef
ecosystems could be eliminated in 30-50 years.
The death and decline of coral reefs, the most diverse ecosystems on
the planet, dramatically impairs the reproduction and development of
hundreds of other species that call them home. When a reef ecosystem
collapses and does not recover, it quickly becomes dominated by algae,
and the phenomenal biodiversity once present disappears. For human
society, this is accompanied by a loss of food, loss of income, and
damage to the billion-dollar per year tourist industries.
The workshop report echoes the overwhelming body of peer-reviewed
science and literature on climate change and carbon pollution, stating
that:
Human actions have resulted in warming and acidification of
the oceans and are now causing increased hypoxia (lack of
oxygen). Studies of the Earth's past indicate that these are
the three symptoms . . . associated with each of the previous
five mass extinctions on Earth.
We are now talking about changes whose precedents can only be found
in geologic time. I have often said how we have veered outside of the
bandwidth of carbon concentration that has prevailed for 800,000 years.
This comparison is to mass ocean extinction events 55 and 251 million
years ago. Back then, the rates of carbon entering the atmosphere in
the lead-up to these extinctions are estimated to be 2.2 and 1.2
gigatons of carbon per year, respectively, over several thousand years.
But, as this new report identifies, ``Both these estimates are dwarfed
in comparison to today's emissions of roughly 30 Gt of CO2
per year.'' Such a massive dumping of carbon pollution into our
atmosphere creates the prospect of devastating damage to our oceans.
And, in fact, we may already be witnessing this devastation. In one
breathtaking part of the report, the scientists remark that, ``The
speeds of many negative changes to the ocean are near to or are
tracking the worst-case scenarios from the IPCC and other
predictions.'' The IPCC, or Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change,
created several scenarios predicting how the Earth's natural systems
could respond to ever-increasing amounts of carbon dioxide in the
atmosphere. This report says observations are worse than the IPCC's
worse case scenarios. The predictions of the IPCC have received a lot
of special-interest-sponsored mockery on this floor, but these are not
predictions now, they are observations. For instance, the decrease in
Arctic Sea ice cover and the melting of the Greenland and Antarctic ice
sheets, which hold enough water to
[[Page S4544]]
raise sea levels by more than 200 ft, are actually occurring, and
faster than expected. Correspondingly, sea levels are rising.
Likewise, the report observes that ``acidification is occurring
faster than in the past 55 million years, and with the added man-made
stressors of overfishing and pollution undermining ocean resilience.''
These observations should be sobering. Not only are the changes
great, but they are happening so quickly that marine life cannot adapt.
Numerically, the average ocean pH has decreased from 8.2 to 8.1 since
the industrialized revolution. This seems like a small change, but the
pH scale is logarithmic, so the change is profound. If that same amount
of change in pH occurred in our blood, we could suffer respiratory or
kidney failure. It is not difficult to imagine how this change has huge
consequences for marine life and especially the calcifying organisms,
like coral reefs, shellfish, and plankton, which are increasingly
becoming soluble in their environment as it becomes increasingly
acidic. If this unprecedented rate of change in ocean pH continues it
could mean an almost 200 percent decrease by mid century. It is not an
exaggeration to say that we are on the verge of an ecosystem collapse
that we could see happen in a single generation.
Though mass extinction events have occurred in the past, workshop
participants state that, ``comparing the current environmental change
with these events is difficult because the rates of environmental
change are unprecedented. It is therefore difficult to predict what the
outcome of the current anthropogenic experiment will be.'' However, the
report continues: ``it can be said that we are pushing the Earth system
to its limits.''
The workshop participants concluded, ``Unless action is taken now,
the consequences of our activities are at a high risk of causing,
through the combined effects of climate change, overexploitation,
pollution and habitat loss, the next globally significant extinction
event in the ocean.'' Again, they mean in geologic time.
So what will we do? This is not the first report to state with
certainty that our oceans, and thus our ocean dependent populations and
economies, are in serious jeopardy. In 2003 the Pew Ocean Commission
report led off with the following, ``America's oceans are in crisis and
the stakes could not be higher.'' In 2004, the U.S. Commission on Ocean
Policy, as mandated by Congress in the Oceans Act of 2000, published
their final report and pronounced, ``The importance of our oceans,
coasts, and Great Lakes cannot be overstated; they are critical to the
very existence and wellbeing of the nation and its people. Yet, as the
21st century dawns, it is clear that these invaluable and life-
sustaining assets are vulnerable to the activities of humans.''
Nearly two centuries ago, the poet Byron could write:
Roll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean--roll.
Ten-thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain;
Man marks the earth with ruin--his control
Stops with the shore.
Well, no more. Now, in 2011, this international group of scientists
reminds us that we are now marking the oceans with ruin and that ``the
human interactions with the ocean must change,'' to quote their report,
``to sustainable management of all activities that impinge marine
ecosystems.''
Mr. President, we must work together to preserve and protect the
ocean ecosystems we rely on so heavily, for we too are greater than the
sum of our parts. In a bipartisan effort, Senator Snowe and I have
introduced the National Endowment for the Oceans to provide dedicated
funding for ocean and coastal research, restoration, protection, and
conservation. Too often, the knowledge and the information we need to
better protect and understand these ecosystems comes too late or comes
not at all. We hope to change that.
Together, we can still turn the tide to protect our ocean and our
society, but if we are to have any chance, we must act soon, and we
must make progress quickly. I look forward to working with my
colleagues to confront these looming challenges.
I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. COATS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Cardin). Without objection, it is so
ordered.
Mr. COATS. Mr. President, I am in somewhat of a unique position as a
returning Senator after being out of Congress for 12 years. I never
contemplated running for the Senate again or being back on this floor
in any capacity except as a former Senator, but I had a chance to do it
over, I guess is the best phrase, and assess what is important and why
I am here.
I ran for only one reason. I am deeply concerned about the direction
of our country and our plunge into debt. I want to try and avoid coming
here and assessing blame, but rather set aside who is responsible. I
want us to avoid the politics of all this and simply recognize this is
the situation we face. Our fiscal situation has potentially dire
consequences for the future of this country, not just for our children
and grandchildren, but even for this generation.
Our economy is not in good shape. We still have not recovered from
one of the deepest recessions since the Great Depression. There are a
lot of people out of work. The official unemployment number is 9.2
percent. The real number is a lot higher than that because many people
have given up looking for work, or they extended their time in school
because they know that if they graduate and get out into the job market
they are not going to be able to find work in the area they are trained
for, or perhaps in any area. A lot of people have tried and tried and
simply cannot find work.
It is clear and I think there is a consensus--if not total consensus
at least pretty close to total consensus--that we simply have run out
of money. As a government we have made promises that we can no longer
afford to pay for and fulfill, without serious financial restructuring.
We have enjoyed a lot of largess and a lot of prosperity in the past.
As a result, commitments were made for spending in discretionary
programs, building highways, and sewer systems, etc.--a lot of good
things but things we simply no longer can afford.
We see this happening across the world. There has been a 60-year
spurt or commitment to credit and now the money has run out to pay for
all that. Whether it is southern Europe, other parts of the world or
the United States, this is a very difficult situation. For the last 6
or 7 months a lot of us have worked very hard to try to find a
solution. We are now in the month of July, and we are approaching the
date in which we reach our debt limit. We no longer can continue to
borrow without raising that limit.
About 40 percent of everything we spend now has to be borrowed. That
is unsustainable. We are told that funding for the basic programs that
help the senior citizens of our country enjoy the rest of their lives--
Medicare and Social Security--are drying up, and it will not be long
before either benefits have to be cut or programs become insolvent. No
one here wants to see that happen. What we do want to see happen,
though, are necessary steps to preserve those programs for the future.
This crisis is occurring all over the world. We are watching it take
place as it creeps through different countries, and now we are facing
that. Whether it is a liberal economist or conservative economist or
someone in between, or someone with no political interest, there is
consensus that we have to take action and we need to take it now. We
cannot postpone it. We have been doing this for years.
We all knew the baby boomers would retire and put tremendous pressure
on our budget, and that is exactly what has happened. The quicker we
take action, the less painful it will be. It is going to be painful
because we have put fixing this problem off for so long.
For 6 or 7 months there has been a sincere effort by a lot of people
to solve this problem--Republicans and Democrats. These are people who
genuinely have concern for the future of this country and believe we
need to address these issues, as painful as they are. It goes against
political instincts of preparing and positioning oneself for
reelection, whether it is 2012 or beyond.
But as I said from the beginning, we must find a way to transcend
politics
[[Page S4545]]
and the 2012 election. Unfortunately, the closer we get to the crisis,
the more we see politicians positioning themselves so as not to be
blamed.
The reason we came here was not to position ourselves politically so
we can succeed in the next election. The reason we came was to deal
with the problem in front of us right now and that needs to be
addressed right now. What is the rough consensus? The rough consensus
is that if we don't have at least, over the next 10 years, $4 trillion
to $6 trillion of cuts in discretionary spending and in some of the
mandatory programs, we are not going to have a credible program the
financial world will be able to look at and say: You can still trust in
the value of the dollar and ability to continue viewing America as a
safe haven to place investments.
There is a consensus that unless we make structural changes--not just
cuts and nicks and little slices here and there, but structural
changes--in the entitlement programs, they will not be solvent in the
years ahead. Then we will have to turn to those senior citizens and
beneficiaries and low-income people and say: I am sorry. We simply
cannot pay you what we had committed to pay you. Your benefits are
going to have to be reduced, or we are going to have to raise taxes to
pay for it.
Without comprehensive tax reform, we are not going to have the kind
of package we need to create a dynamic, growing economy that can solve
some of our revenue problems. It is not just cutting, it is not just
growth, but it is a combination of those items and structural reform
that is necessary in a package, and that is what we have been debating:
how to get there.
What is disturbing to me lately is that we have shifted away from
that central focus, and now we are focusing on who will take the blame
when we default or don't default on August 2. There is a lot of
political posturing around here. This is not about corporate jets. It
is not about all these ads out there and mailings and so forth saying:
Congress is going to take away your Social Security. Congress is going
to slash your Medicare benefits.
I guess I am asking that we acknowledge the reality of the situation
we are in, that we do our very best to put this above the politics of
2012, and work to find some sensible solution to all of this.
I believe comprehensive tax reform can potentially provide a way to
address the need for revenue and the need for growth. As we know, there
are hundreds, if not thousands, of special expenditures, exemptions,
subsidies, credits in the Tax Code that were put in for the few and not
for the many, that have complicated our Tax Code to the point where no
one can understand it except for someone with an advanced degree in
accounting or law.
So I believe tax reform is essential as a part of whatever reform
package we finally come up with to address the debt. Senator Wyden and
I, on a bipartisan basis--a Democrat from Oregon, a Republican from
Indiana--have put together a comprehensive tax reform package. We don't
call it perfect. We are open to suggestions. But it eliminates those
special exemptions and uses the revenues gained from cutting loopholes
to lower tax rates for Americans. Our corporations pay the highest
corporate tax rate of every one of our global competitors except one.
There are 36 countries that compete and sell their products around the
world, and we are 35 out of 36 when it comes to our tax rate. We want
to level playing field with the rest of them because we think we can
outcompete, and that will be a significant and positive impact on our
economy. So using those revenues from eliminating loopholes as a way of
lowering tax rates and addressing some of the needs we have is
certainly something we ought to be exploring.
Lastly, let me just say we need to focus on the reality of the
situation in a personal way because we get caught up in numbers, and we
get caught up in generalities. What are we trying to do? We are trying
to get this economy moving again so people who have been searching for
work for 2 and 3 years can get their jobs back; so young couples who
wish to raise a family have the opportunity to buy a home; so parents
who are saving and trying to get their children into good schools for
postsecondary education have the ability to do that; so college
graduates can come out of school with a degree and find a place to work
and begin a career.
We owe it to the people of our country who are suffering right now,
and there are many. We owe it to this Nation that has provided so much
opportunity and so much prosperity for so many people. No country in
the world has come close to what America has achieved. We owe it to our
children and our grandchildren who will inherit what we have done or
not done. The reality is, we are going to transfer a debt load onto our
children and future generations that they may not be able to overcome.
I don't want to leave that legacy. I don't want to be part of a
generation that does that. So I think it is time for us to stand up and
do what is necessary to address this problem.
Letters and emails from Indiana are running 100 to 1 in favor of
cutting government, and running 100 to 1 against cutting anything in
Social Security or Medicare. I have people coming into my office every
day saying: We know we have to get our fiscal house in order, but let
me tell you why our program needs to be exempted.
As politicians, we want to say yes to people. As responsible, elected
officials faced with a very difficult situation, we have to, with
compassion, look at people and say: No, we are not able to do this. We
are not able to afford this, but we are taking this action today so we
can afford it in the future. We are taking action now so we can leave
future generations with the same types of opportunities our generation
has enjoyed and the benefits that come from living in America. That may
cost some people their elections. There are a number of people here who
are willing to sacrifice for that purpose.
Do we want to leave and say: Well, I survived all these years
unscathed politically, or do we want to leave here saying at the right
time we did the right thing? At the time of crisis, at a time when our
country desperately needed us to come together to address this very
serious problem that could plunge our country into a deep recession, if
not depression, at a time when financial institutions around the world
are fragile, at a time when wars and conflicts are popping up all over
the globe, did we do the right thing? What do we want our legacy to be
regardless of the consequences?
We are 2 or 3 weeks away from defaulting on our debt. There are a lot
of excuses around here about that and some even think it will not have
many consequences. It will. The idea of using that as leverage to gain
what we need to do doesn't appear to have worked.
I think if we keep our focus simply on default or not default, we
still have a major problem. Just simply finding a way to get through
this and raising the debt limit does not solve the underlying problem.
That has to be addressed. I wish we had been able to do that because
the situation is dire. We cannot wait until 2013. We need to do it now.
So here I am. I don't have answers. I have some guidelines from
people who know a lot more about this than I do, people who do not have
a political stake in this in terms of what they think we need to do to
put together a package. We need a plan that has credibility with the
financial world, so that what has happened in Greece, Portugal and
Ireland and maybe now in Italy or Spain, and other places in the world
will not happen here because we have restored some confidence and faith
in the American people and the investment see the United States as a
safe haven for their money. We need credibility so others know we have
seen the problem, we have recognized it, we have taken meaningful
steps, and while it will be painful and take time--America has come
through.
To paraphrase Winston Churchill: America always will do the right
thing after it has tried all the wrong things. Well, we spent a lot of
years doing the wrong things and not recognizing that we were building
up an unsustainable fiscal situation that would come back to haunt us.
We have tried a lot of methods and postponements and deferments and
everything else. What we have not done is stand up to the problem we
have and do what is necessary, take this above politics, and do what is
right for America.
Mr. COATS. I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Merkley). The Senator from Alaska.
[[Page S4546]]
croatia
Mr. BEGICH. Mr. President, I rise to speak briefly about progress in
the nation of Croatia, which I was honored to visit recently.
At the invitation of the Croatian Minister of Defense, I participated
in what is known as the ``Croatian Summit,'' a gathering of leaders
from Eastern Europe.
The theme of this year's summit was: ``A New Decade for Southeast
Europe: Finalizing the Transition.''
Less than 15 years after a terrible ethnic war that devastated
Croatia, the nation is making enormous progress. It is rapidly making a
transition to a market-based economy and its government leaders are
committed to a strong and lasting partnership with the United States.
They are a great partner of ours in Afghanistan and in other trouble
spots across the globe.
That is personally important to me because 100 years ago this year,
my grandfather emigrated from Croatia to this country. John Begic--then
it was spelled B-E-G-I-C--then 17 years old, left his farm and
eventually settled in northern Minnesota's Iron Range.
John Begic and his young bride, Anna Martinich had four children.
Their youngest, Nicholas, made his way to America's new frontier of
Alaska even before we were a state. He was my father.
Nick Begich was an educator and eventually was elected Alaska's lone
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives in 1970. I am honored to
follow in his footsteps as a Member of the Senate, where I am the only
Member of Croatian decent.
My recent visit to Dubrovnik was my first to Croatia. I was honored
to represent this body at the summit, along with officials from the
State Department and U.S. Embassy.
I was impressed with the great progress underway there, as well as
the excellent job being performed by our embassy personnel. There are
enormous opportunities for partnership between the United States and
Croatia, and I am anxious to pursue those.
I ask unanimous consent that my remarks at the Croatia Summit be
printed in the Record to document my participation in the summit and
the strong partnership between our nations.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:
Croatia Summit Panel: Security Challenges in the Altered Mediterranean
Thank you, Defense Minister Bozinovic, for that kind
introduction.
Thanks to all the government leaders of Croatia and to the
people of Croatia for the warm hospitality you have extended
to me in the short time I've been here. It's also an honor to
meet with many of the other leaders of the region at this
Summit.
Visiting Croatia has been a life-long dream of mine, never
realized until yesterday. It was exactly 100 years ago that a
17-year-old farmer by the name of John Begic left the family
farm in the small village of Podlapaca, over the mountains
from the Adriatic not far from Zagreb.
Upon landing at Ellis Island, they gave him a new name--
Begich--with an H. And permission to establish himself in
America. John Begic was my grandfather. He eventually settled
in Minnesota's Iron Range.
John Begic and his young bride, Anna Martinich, had four
children. Their youngest--Nicholas--made his way to America's
new frontier of Alaska even before we were a state. He was my
father.
Nick Begich was an educator and eventually was elected
Alaska's lone member of the United States House of
Representatives in 1970. I'm honored to follow in his
footsteps as a member of the United States Senate, where I am
the only member of Croatian decent.
From the moment of my election nearly three years ago, the
people of Croatia have treated me as a long-lost son. In
fact, I've had better coverage in the Croatian press than my
hometown newspapers back in Alaska!
When I was invited to participate in this Croatian Summit,
I jumped at the opportunity. Not because I'm an expert in the
issues of this region, but more to commend the people of
Croatia for your enormous progress and your great partnership
with my country.
Croatia has made remarkable political progress since the
end of the war more than 15 years ago. You are a welcome
member of NATO and will soon become the 28th member of the
European Union. Both of these landmarks came with enormous
challenge, and I salute your achievement. There will be bumps
in the road to this new future.
And there is no doubt that Croatia has earned membership in
both. As a NATO member, Croatia has stepped up to the
responsibility of providing security in both the region and
internationally.
As a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, I am
closely tuned to military engagements across the globe. By
the end of this year, nearly 10,000 soldiers from my own
state of Alaska will be serving in harm's way in Afghanistan.
This is one of the highest percentages of any state. Their
service on the front lines is not without controversy back
home, and I know you face the same questions here. So I thank
you for your partnership.
Croatia's troop commitment in Afghanistan--330, soon to be
350--is one of the highest per-capita contributions in the
International Security and Assistance Force there. And
Croatia has taken the lead in establishing a military police
training center in Afghanistan, to which other members in the
region will also contribute trainers.
This cooperation alone, in faraway Afghanistan, involving
countries that not long ago were embroiled in a vicious war,
brings a certain stability to the region of the former
Yugoslavia and creates a unique opportunity.
Fifteen years ago Croatia was a security consumer, with UN
Peacekeeping troops deployed throughout the country. It is
now a security provider, with 472 troops deployed across the
globe, including in Kosovo, the Golan Heights, Afghanistan,
Western Sahara, India-Pakistan, and in counter-piracy
operations in the Gulf of Aden. They even have staff officers
assigned to NATO operations in Libya.
One impressive observation: Croatia recently hosted the
U.S.-led ``Immediate Response'' military exercise involving
troops from countries throughout the region. Most
importantly, Serbian troops participated.
Imagine, just more than 15 years since Serb and Croat
troops fought it out throughout this country, Serbian and
Croatian troops cooperated side by side in an exercise to
ensure security in the region. This is a testament to the
determination of the governments of Serbia and Croatia to put
the past behind them. This type of cooperation ensures that
this region will have a secure and prosperous future.
Croatia has also demonstrated a desire to play a
constructive role in assisting neighboring Bosnia and
Herzegovina. Bosnia's stability and prosperity are absolutely
key to security in the region.
Croatia is in a position to play a positive and leading
role in assisting countries in the region in their efforts at
Euro-Atlantic integration. Joining the EU and NATO, with
their shared values of democracy, human rights and rule of
law, is perhaps the best way to ensure security and
prosperity in the region.
In early May, I was honored to welcome to my office
Croatian President Josipovic. I congratulated him then on the
enormous progress Croatia has achieved in a little more than
a decade after a devastating war.
I understand that per capita income is the second highest
in the former Yugoslav states. Health, education and other
quality of life factors are on par with many European
countries. Despite these signs of progress, the president
reminded me that Croatia's economy remains troubled, with
high unemployment and outdated industries. That's a situation
we can certainly sympathize with in my country.
One note of caution: Croatia still has a long way to go to
reform its overly bureaucratized economy in a way that will
ensure prosperity ensures stability and encourages
investment.
Croatia, like many of its European neighbors, is in a
position to play a positive role in providing security in a
Mediterranean that is in transition. I noted earlier that
Croatia has provided staff officers as members of the NATO
team conducting operations in Libya. Croatia has also stated
publically that it is working with the anti-Ghadafi
Transitional National Council, and has recognized it as the
legitimate voice of the Libyan people.
Just as the countries of East and Central Europe had their
own European Spring in 1989 and after, North Africa and the
Middle East is groping toward a kind of democracy and social
justice that for the most part had eluded them. The nations
of Europe, especially those like Croatia who made the
transition from dictatorship to democracy, can and are
playing a special role to help all the people of the
Mediterranean achieve democracy, rule of law and prosperity.
Euro-Atlantic engagement with the pro-Democracy movements in
North Africa and the Middle East is the best way to ensure
their revolutions do not take a turn down the wrong path.
The U.S. is anxious to assist with economic partnerships
with this region. One specific area is with increased
tourism.
From what little I've been able to see of Dubrovnik, you
have an enormously attractive city which many Americans would
love to visit. And we'd certainly welcome Croatian visitors
to our states, including Alaska. I am working with Senator
Mikulski of Maryland on her visa waiver bill to ease the
ability of Croatians to get visas to visit the United States.
Let me conclude by restating how excited I am to be here in
Croatia and to commend you for a productive and lasting
partnership with the United States. I hope this conference
creates many more opportunities for cooperation within this
region.
Mr. BEGICH. Mr. President, I wish to say thank you for the
opportunity to
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put on the Record my experiences in Croatia this last weekend and,
again, seeing the country after 15 years ago going through incredible
devastation to where they are today.
I yield the floor, and I note the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The assistant bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Carolina.
Mrs. HAGAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Budget Listening Tour
Mrs. HAGAN. Mr. President, I rise today to report to the Senate on
the completion of my North Carolina Budget Listening Tour. While people
in this town were mired in political gamesmanship that seems to be
pushing parties further apart, I wanted to hear directly from community
leaders and business leaders in North Carolina about how they think we
should be approaching the responsibility we have to reduce our deficit
and our debt. I held listening sessions all over the State--from
Raleigh to Greensboro and Charlotte to Wilmington--and I heard from
North Carolinians of every kind: small business owners, health care
workers, veterans, entrepreneurs, and more.
The message I heard could not have been more different from the
partisan bickering in Washington that is dominating the airwaves. In
Washington, we see negotiators walking away from the table, refusing
any and all compromise, putting politics ahead of what is best for the
American people. In North Carolina, people were coming to the table and
putting party aside for commonsense solutions to meet our shared budget
obligations. To me, the message was crystal clear: Washington needs to
take a lesson from North Carolina. It is far past time to put
partisanship aside and do what is right for the American people.
At the Charlotte listening session, I heard from the executive
director of a health care nonprofit responsible for caring for the
elderly. She told me about important ways we can reduce health care
costs and save lives, such as expanding access to preventive care for
seniors to reduce the onset of expensive chronic diseases. Gayla Woody,
the director of aging at the Centralina Council of Governments, told me
the story of how one of her clients--a man caring for his wife with
Alzheimer's--was able to continue to care for her at their home thanks
to the comparatively small investments made in the Family Caregiver
Program rather than a more expensive nursing home. They both also told
me we cannot afford an extreme plan to turn Medicare into a voucher
program for vulnerable seniors. Balancing the budget on their backs is
not a solution I can support.
I also heard from small business owners, economic development
coordinators, and community bankers at our Wilmington and Raleigh tour
stops. They told me about how Washington's partisan paralysis is
preventing them from having the sort of certainty they need to be able
to make the hard decisions to invest in their businesses and to grow
jobs in this economy for their companies. If these businesses don't
know whether they ought to be investing in new equipment or new
employees, then we are not going to be able to sustain the economic
growth that is a necessary component to reducing our deficit and our
debt.
I also heard from a veteran of the U.S. Marines Corps and current
chaplain for the Onslow County Special Incident Response Team. This
dedicated public servant talked about the importance of protecting
services for our veterans. And I will fight for them just as hard as
they fought for us. He also talked to me about the importance of
priorities. He said we ought to keep our promises to those who
sacrificed for us--our seniors and our veterans--but we also need to
invest in our children and their education. It was important for the
future, he believed, and I agree he was right.
While the challenge of reducing our deficit may appear daunting, I
don't believe meeting it is impossible if Washington takes to heart the
message I heard all over North Carolina last month. Both sides--
Democrats and Republicans--need to put aside partisanship and come to
an agreement that is bipartisan and balanced, one that includes a
shared sacrifice but also fulfills the sacred promises made to our
seniors and our veterans and makes the critical investments necessary
for a prosperous American future. Above all else, they do not want us
to kick the can down the road one more time. They sent us here to make
hard decisions. Putting them off to resolve during some future crisis
is simply not an option.
These broad goals and values are widely shared across party lines. I
recognize turning them into a bipartisan, balanced solution to our
fiscal challenges will not be easy, but the consequences of failing to
do so are simply too great to ignore.
Thank you, Mr. President. I yield the floor and note the absence of a
quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
The Debt
Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I come to the floor today as a Member of
the Senate--specifically, though, as a Senator from Wyoming because in
Wyoming our families know they have to live within their means. Wyoming
is a State that lives within its means. In Wyoming, our very
constitution requires that our State live within its means.
Washington has a total debt now that is over $14 trillion and
continues to climb every day. Wyoming's total debt is zero. How did
Washington fail where Wyoming succeeded? Well, in Washington, this city
overspends in Washington there is nothing really to stop it. In
Wyoming, we live within our means because our constitution demands that
we balance our budget every year. It is time for Washington to take a
lesson from Wyoming and the other States that balance their budgets
every year.
The President says, ``All of us agree that we should use this
opportunity to do something meaningful on debt and deficits.'' Well,
passing a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution is possibly the
most meaningful thing we could do.
This city's finances are in disarray. Our Nation's finances are in
disarray. It has been over 800 days since this body has passed a budget
resolution. Since the last time a full budget was passed, our country
has spent over $7 trillion, and $3.2 trillion of that was money we did
not have.
Our total debt now is over $14 trillion. People say: How much money
is that? The number is astonishingly large. Let's try to put it a
little bit into perspective. Every day, Washington borrows over $4
billion. We borrowed over $4 billion yesterday, $4 billion today, and
if someone will lend us the money, we will borrow over $4 billion
tomorrow. That is over $2 million a minute, every minute. Every single
day, Washington borrows enough money to buy tens of thousands of new
homes. Every single hour, Washington borrows enough to buy nearly 2
million barrels of oil. Every single minute, Washington borrows enough
to send 53 students to private college for a full year. Every single
second, Washington borrows enough to buy two new automobiles. We paid
over $200 billion last year in interest on the debt alone. The
President talks about a tax on private jets. That is enough money--the
interest alone--to buy over 200 private jets every day.
It is not enough to think about this in the large terms; you have to
try to put it in terms that people understand. Because we are spending
and borrowing so much money, it is difficult to put it into terms that
people grasp and that they see. It is good to hear the President
acknowledge that we have to stop making more than the minimum payments
in order to pay off and deal with this incredible debt.
The President has also announced his willingness to make a deal that
he says involves meaningful changes to Medicare, to Social Security,
and to Medicaid. To his credit, the President has accepted that much of
the problem with saving these programs springs from his own side of the
aisle. He says, and I agree, that now is the time to do it.
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The Associated Press quoted the President asking the most important
question of all: ``If not now, when?'' Well, the clock is ticking. In
just 13 years, Medicare will be bankrupt. We have to strengthen
Medicare. In 25 years, the same will be true of Social Security. Unlike
our debt limit, this is not a limit Congress can simply legislate away.
We have to act now to prevent these programs from failing not just
today's generation but future generations.
The Senate minority leader said: I commend the President for putting
Social Security and Medicare on the table.
He is correct in doing that. So with the President seeing the light
on so many issues, why are we still talking about finding a solution
instead of actually getting one passed here in the Congress? Because,
for all that he claims to understand, the President has still fallen
back on the same tax-and-spend policies that made this economic
situation worse. It is clear that the policies of this administration
have taken a tough problem and may have made it worse. On the
President's inauguration day, the unemployment rate in this country was
just under 8 percent. Today, it is 9.2 percent. Every American child
who is born today will owe roughly $45,000. Let's compare that to the
day President Obama was inaugurated. Every child then owed roughly
$35,000. So in just those short years, the debt on a child born in
America, the debt they are born with has gone up from $35,000 to
$45,000. These disturbing economic results are the direct result of the
past 2 years of policies.
Liberals want to hold the U.S. credit rating hostage for more tax
hikes, and the President is leading the charge. He is trying to push
more tax hikes despite the very fact that even he has now said it is
the worst time to raise taxes. Back in 2009, President Obama said: The
last thing you want to do is raise taxes during a recession. So why,
then, is he calling for $400 billion in tax increases today? And why is
the Senate Budget Committee chairman trying to one-up the President by
calling for $2 trillion? Well, of course, the President will not admit
he wants to raise taxes. He likes to use wiggle words. He uses words
such as ``revenue'' or the ``spending in the Tax Code'' instead. But
when you translate this Washington doublespeak, it comes out ``higher
taxes.''
With the spin exposed, liberals are trying another tack: They are
trying to claim they will delay the tax increases until the economy
recovers. They are not saying they are not going to raise taxes; they
say: Let's put it off for a while. This week, the President showed what
this really means. He said, ``Nobody is going to raise taxes right
now.'' He said, ``We are talking about potentially 2013 and the
outyears.'' So, in other words, this is not really about waiting until
the economic recovery comes; it is about waiting until 2013, until
after the President's reelection campaign.
More troubling still, the President has already signaled that he
wants to spend more in the future. Our problem is not that we are taxed
too little, it is that we spend too much. Yet the President wants to
spend even more. At his press conference, he said he is only tackling
our debt so we can be ``in a position to make the kind of investments I
think are going to be necessary to win the future.'' When the President
talks about investment, it is common knowledge that what he is talking
about is spending.
Finally, for all his posturing about getting this done, now it is
really the President who seems to want to kick the can down the road.
His plan may cut trillions, but Washington would be able to take as
long as 10 years to do it.
Minority Leader McConnell has already blown the liberal cover on
these very cynical political bluffs. He said, ``The President has
presented us with three choices: smoke and mirrors, tax hikes, or
default.'' Well, Republicans choose none of the above.
As a doctor, I have taken the Hippocratic Oath. The oath says: Do no
harm.
Raising taxes will harm our economy. Cutting spending at a snail's
pace will do very little to help. We have to tackle our fiscal problems
today. The first step toward solving these problems should be to pass
an amendment to our Constitution requiring Washington to balance its
budget.
A balanced budget amendment would require Washington to spend no more
money than it takes in every year. Such an amendment would force
Washington to live within its means as many States do and as families
across the country do.
I come to the floor as cosponsor of the balanced budget amendment. As
a matter of fact, every Republican in the Senate is a cosponsor of the
balanced budget amendment, 47 Republican Senators. Every one is a
cosponsor of the balanced budget amendment. We are united and will
remain united. This is a commonsense approach, and it will show the
American people that they can trust their government with their money
once again because right now the American people have little confidence
they are getting value for the money they send to Washington.
I believe we need to lead today, not defer leadership until tomorrow.
Americans are courageous; they deserve a courageous government. That is
why I know the American people overwhelmingly support a balanced budget
amendment to the Constitution.
The President said the other day that it is time to ``eat our peas.''
We all saw him on television saying it is time to ``eat our peas.'' I
agree with another President, Ronald Reagan, who said it is time to
``starve the beast.'' The beast is Washington and the Washington
wasteful spending that the American people are seeing every day.
Mr. President, Americans pay their debts. They want their country to
do so too. It is time for Washington to listen. It is time for a
balanced budget constitutional amendment, and then it is time to start
paying off this massive debt.
I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. BENNET. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Hagan). Without objection, it is so
ordered.
Mr. BENNET. Madam President, like you, I have heard a lot of loose
talk over the past months invoking the Founding Fathers--loose talk to
underscore an expedient argument about what they would be doing if they
were legislating today. But the way our Founders are often used is as a
caricature to distort history for the benefit of partisan and narrow
interests.
To hear some people talk about it, you would think the Founders were
engaged in a process of dismantling a country rather than building one.
That version of events is not only wrong but it also thoroughly
diminishes the founding generation's extraordinary accomplishments and
the lessons we should draw from them.
Our Founders met enormous challenges with great courage and sacrifice
to start a country around an ideal. In the same vein, our modern
history has been characterized by meeting great challenges with
distinct qualities. We are hard working. We meet our challenges by
refusing to allow their complexities or attendant political difficulty
to lead us toward accepting failure as an option. We are inclusive. We
meet our great challenges by meeting them as one, by crafting solutions
that involve buy-in, participation, and sacrifice from all parts of the
political landscape, and the American people.
We act with courage. We meet our great challenges when, and only
when, the leaders of the day have the courage to decide they will be
the ones who meet those challenges, that they will transcend the short-
term incentives and political imperatives of their time to do something
of greater importance.
These traits have enabled us to end a Civil War, overcome the Great
Depression, and march toward civil rights. But they have also allowed
us to do smaller and still very important things such as work together
in the 1980s to protect and preserve Social Security.
Today, that honorable past and the sacrifice it entailed has been
hijacked to protect and defend narrow interest group politics and tax
loopholes.
Our tax and regulatory codes are backward, facing in a way that is
straining our recession-battered middle class and failing to drive
innovation in our economy. As a result, middle-class
[[Page S4549]]
income continues to fall, the gap between rich and poor grows wider,
and all of us wait for a 20th-century economy to produce 21st-century
jobs. That wait will be in vain.
It will particularly be in vain for those of our citizens unlucky
enough to be born poor and who therefore stand a 9 in 100 chance of
ever graduating from college in the United States of America in the
year 2011. That is because year after year we have torn each other up
so much on issue after issue, because of the smallness we have
exhibited in the face of what our big challenges are, and now we find
ourselves at a crisis point without a politics capable of even
addressing the kinds of challenges we face each year, let alone a
generational crisis like our deficit and debt.
I have come to the floor for months arguing for the need for a
comprehensive approach to addressing our deficits and debt. What
Colorado wants is nothing more than what this country has seen from
past generations of leaders in past times of crisis. As I have said
over and over, what people in red parts of the State and what people in
blue parts of the State want is a solution that materially addresses
the problem. They know we are not going to fix it overnight, but they
want it materially addressed. They want a demonstration that we are all
in it together, that everybody has something to contribute to solving
the problem. They emphatically want it to be bipartisan because they
don't believe in an either-party-going-it-alone approach when it comes
to our debt and our deficit.
I add a corollary to that, which is that we need to assure our
capital markets that the paper they bought is actually worth what they
paid for it.
It was in the spirit of getting together on a solution like that my
colleague, Senator Mike Johanns, and I wrote a letter to the President.
Sixty-four Members of the Senate--evenly divided between both parties--
signed onto an approach that called for entitlement reform, tax reform,
and discretionary spending cuts. The math compels this answer. The
economy needs this certainty. Colorado and the country want this
result. It should achieve the $4.5 trillion in deficit reduction over
10 years and should have a 3-to-1 ratio of spending cuts to revenue
increases. That is what the Bowles-Simpson Commission recommended.
Our political system seems intent on thwarting an approach supported
by Senators in both parties. Both parties seem willing to submit to
that flawed system's perverse incentives.
While I am convinced that many in this body and the House would
actually like to make this deal, these interests distort the
conversation into a partisan war and rip it apart from the inside.
On one side, some advocate for no changes to the Medicare Program; on
the other, for no changes to revenue. Yet these are among the two
biggest drivers of our long-term debt--and everybody knows it.
Only in Washington could people pretend that significant deficit
reduction could be accomplished while ignoring the two biggest fiscal
challenges we face. I am a former school superintendent, and what that
tells me is that Washington has a severe math problem. We are in need
of remediation.
When it comes to a solution on the debt, the contrast between
Washington's dysfunction and Colorado's common sense could not be
clearer. Yesterday, I had a call with Colorado business leaders who
spanned the ideological spectrum--both Democrats and Republicans--to
talk about our deficit and debt. Despite their differing party
affiliations, there was clearly a consensus that everything needed to
be on the table when it comes to the debt--including both tax revenue
and entitlement changes. But somehow this common sense gets lost in the
current debate.
If changes to entitlements are off the table, we as leaders will
fail. If changes in revenue are off the table, we as leaders will fail.
I turn to the American people watching this debate with worry or
disgust and say: If challenges to our ideological beliefs or to the
politics that historically define our debate are off the table, then as
a generation we cannot meet the challenges we face, and we are not
going to be able to support the aspirations we have for our kids and
our grandkids.
This is about courage: courage on the part of Democrats who know
refusing to touch Medicare is an argument we could win, but the price
of winning that argument may be losing America's ability to pay its
bills; courage on the part of Republicans who know revenues are
unpopular but who secretly understand that we can't simply cut our way
out of this budget hole. And in a moment of such crisis, this should be
the least Americans can expect of us.
During the worst recession since the Great Depression, Madam
President, it was my privilege to spend the last 2\1/2\ years traveling
my State while we were going through this horrible economic turmoil.
Americans and Coloradans have made gut-wrenching decisions in their
personal lives--about where to send their children to school, how and
where to live, what medicines they can afford, and what medicines they
might hope to live without. Local officials have been held accountable
to citizens for the decisions they have had to make. Yet Congress has
struggled to reflect the ideals and aspirations of the people we
represent.
This DC political culture serves special interests but it doesn't
even register the needs of Coloradans. No business would sacrifice the
economic interests of its shareholders, because the ones that do are
gone. No mayors in Colorado would threaten their bond rating for
political ideology--not one. It wouldn't occur to one of them to
threaten their credit rating, because mothers, fathers, taxpayers, and
everyday citizens would have their heads, and rightfully so. I think
the difference is that no special interest stands between a Colorado
local government official and the people he or she represents.
Having served in local government, I have to say what often seems to
be an unattainable standard for a high officeholder is simply life in
the real world for the rest of us. Last week, we came to Washington to
cast a series of inconsequential votes. But by the end of the week,
some of us were encouraged by the talk coming from the President and
the Speaker.
My friend John McCain came to the floor pushing the need for a
breakout strategy, referenced a Wall Street Journal editorial that
called for a far more comprehensive and far-reaching plan. But now we
learn a comprehensive deal feels once again out of reach. We are told
we will have to settle for something small that one more time kicks the
can down the road; that taxes and entitlements are just too hard for
Washington politics.
I may not have spent enough time here to see through these political
games. This may all be part of an elaborate strategy to get to yes. But
I shudder--I shudder--when I wonder what investors, our creditors, and
the American people think of this political game of chicken. Unlike
Congress, they do not conduct their business with winks and nods, and
they solve their problems before they become insurmountable.
All of which brings me back to our Founders and the political
leadership of other generations past that made these enormous and
difficult decisions. As for us, we have chosen to put them off time
after time, and now we are at an inflection point where we need to get
this done. We have a $1.5 trillion deficit and almost $15 trillion in
debt. Revenue is at a 60-year low and spending is at over a 60-year
high. And we have the path to begin to bridge this. The Simpson-Bowles
commission has given us that path forward.
I am the first to say--and I should say--this debt is something we
all own. I voted for things that contributed to it, as have all of my
colleagues, and of all the things that comprise the debt, there is
something each member of our great Nation wants or needs. We all share
in the responsibility for how we arrived at this point.
So to be clear, if anybody thinks this is merely an attack on the
institution, we need to understand this massive debt is something for
which we are all responsible. Those who voted to fight the wars and to
pass the tax cuts did so as a reflection of what they believed was a
moment of truth. These decisions were not made in a vacuum. We got here
because we aspire to be a society that is better than our competitors.
We are all responsible. We are all responsible for the crisis that
looms. But the inflection point we have reached has
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led to a different mandate, a different moment of truth. The American
people are asking us to lead.
This is a country of patriots, of incredibly courageous people who
take on challenges little and big every day. I have tremendous respect
for my colleagues and for this institution, and I am well aware that
until about 6 months ago I had never even been elected dogcatcher. So I
recognize how much I have to learn. But clearly--clearly--we are not
living up to the standard of courage that past generations of leaders
and every generation of ordinary Americans have set for us. Congress is
certainly not living up to the standard the people of Colorado and of
this country expect from us.
I wonder if maybe we have looked at this the wrong way. The President
has put entitlement cuts on the table, and that is the right thing to
do. I encourage him to do more.
As for the question of revenue, I will tell any politician that this
is not the time to be wedded to the status quo. There is nothing
magical about current revenue levels, about our Tax Code, or about all
the loopholes and special interest perks that we account for only by
borrowing more and more money.
But there is something else important to mention, which is also lost
in the debate. We have waged two long and costly wars. I don't want to
re-litigate today the wisdom of going to war. My colleagues in the
Senate and House--many of whom are still here in the Congress--had to
cast difficult votes to send our young men and women into harm's way.
But regardless of your position for or against, Congress ultimately
made a decision to layer those costs on top of our current budget. We
did this instead of accounting for them as part of our annual expenses.
That was the decision that Congress made, and it began our slide from
surplus to deficit.
So for a moment let us separate the costs of these wars from the
important and robust debate we are having about entitlement spending--
Medicare, Social Security, and our discretionary programs--and resolve
a threshold question, or maybe two: Are we, as a generation, going to
pay for these wars or are we going to continue to borrow from foreign
governments and stick our kids with the bill? Are we even willing to
make just a down payment on their incremental costs? Because that is
what we are talking about.
The amount outlined by the Debt and Deficit Commission--$785 billion
in tax reform--which, by the way, would lead to lower rates, doesn't
even cover the incremental expense of the war commitments we have made.
But it would be a good start. Are we willing to walk away from this
moment and say we put the burden of fighting and dying in these wars on
our sons and daughters, and at the same time leave the burden of paying
it to our grandchildren?
And, after all, are we really willing to threaten the full faith and
credit of the United States by failing to raise the debt ceiling for
debts we already owe? This is not like cutting up your credit card.
This is like getting your mortgage this month and saying, I'm not going
to pay it because I spent my money somewhere else. Are we really
willing to do that by failing to act comprehensively against our debt
at a moment of global fragility in the capital markets? Would we risk
all of this just for politics?
Interestingly enough, in their wisdom, the Founders understood and
anticipated this very problem. They had a spirited debate about whether
the Federal Government should have what they called ``a general power
of taxation'' or whether we should have a system of ``internal and
external taxation''--a system where the States could impose taxes but
the Federal Government would be limited to collecting its revenue
through duties on imports.
Ultimately, the Founders resolved the question in favor of the
general power of taxation for the exact reasons that are staring us in
the face today. So rather than talk about the Founders, I actually want
to read what they said on this subject, in the hopes it will give us
some guidance. Let me quote from Federalist No. 30. I apologize for the
length, Madam President, but, as always, their words impoverish our
own.
If the opinions of those who contend for the distinction
[between internal and external taxation] were to be received
as evidence of truth, one would be led to conclude that there
was some known point in the economy of national affairs at
which it would be safe to stop and say: Thus far the ends of
public happiness will be promoted by supplying the wants of
government, and all beyond this is unworthy of our care or
anxiety.
They went on to say:
Let us attend to what would be the effects of this
situation in the very first war in which we should happen to
be engaged. We will presume, for argument's sake, that the
revenue arising from the impost duties answers the purposes
of a provision for the public debt and of a peace
establishment for the Union. Thus circumstanced, a war breaks
out. What would be the probable conduct of the government in
such an emergency? Taught by experience that proper
dependence could not be placed on the success of
requisitions, unable by its own authority to lay hold of
fresh resources, and urged by considerations of national
danger, would it not be driven to the expedient of diverting
the funds already appropriated from their proper objects to
the defense of the state? It is not easy to see how a step of
this kind could be avoided; and if it should be taken, it is
evident that it would prove the destruction of public credit
at the very moment it was becoming essential to the public
safety. To imagine that such a credit crisis might be
dispensed with, would be the extreme of infatuation. In the
modern system of war, nations the most wealthy are obliged to
have recourse to large loans. A country so little opulent as
ours must feel this necessity in a much stronger degree. But
who would lend to a government that prefaced its overtures
for borrowing by an act which demonstrated that no reliance
could be placed on the steadiness of its measures for paying?
The loans it might be able to procure would be as limited in
their extent as burdensome in their conditions. They would be
made upon the same principles that usurers commonly lend to
bankrupt and fraudulent debtors, with a sparing hand and
enormous premiums.
I am going to paraphrase that in a minute. But it is almost as though
Alexander Hamilton, who wrote these words in 1787, were sitting here
today. And from the bottom of my heart, I wish he were. He closed the
Federalist Paper No. 30 with an admonition to ideologues, writing that:
. . . [s]uch men must behold the actual situation of their
country with painful solicitude, and deprecate the evils
which ambition or revenge might, with too much facility,
inflict upon it.
As we have at other times in our history, we experienced the kind of
evils that Hamilton anticipated on 9/11. We responded. And now, at this
extraordinary time, it is left for us to get our house in order.
In truth, these are small decisions, when we consider them in the
context of what our Founders faced. Their greatness is measured by the
large task they took on and conquered. Ours is merely a junction
between our own institutional impulse toward fecklessness and our
individual love for our country and for our kids. When faced with
similar decisions, families cut back; they sacrifice. And now we must
do the same. Now, to paraphrase Hamilton, the last thing we need to do
now is act in a way that jacks up our interest rates.
The 100 of us who are here in the Senate didn't create the system in
which we operate. None of us decided it would be fun to have special
interest groups scoring our every move or lobbyists hounding us about
this or that tiny little provision or television channels reducing
everything we do and say to a story line of endless minute conflict.
And look, I understand what the incentives are here. It is possible we
could fail and get away with blaming somebody else. It is possible
cutting off our nose to spite our face could be a smart political move
in this insane system. But there is a reason we venerate the Founders
and Lincoln and the great legislative and executive figures of the last
century. They were great not only because of what history threw at
them, but because of the way they threw themselves at history.
They raised their hands. They showed real courage not only when they
had to but when they didn't. They made themselves of use.
The Founders were practical people--dare I say it, Madam President,
practical politicians searching for an ideal that became the United
States of America, and they created in their practicality what Lincoln
called the last, best hope of Earth. Think of that. Think of our actual
history, not a cartoon, and imagine that we stumble, not because the
Founders in their time failed to form a union but because in our time
we failed to act as one.
[[Page S4551]]
Madam President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a
quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Whitehouse). Without objection, it is so
ordered.
The Budget
Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President, I think it is fair to say we have two
really major problems we are grappling with here in this Congress. More
importantly, the people all across our country are grappling with them.
First, there is an economy that is far too weak. It is growing far
too slowly, if at all, and it is certainly producing far too few jobs.
The latest data is particularly discouraging on the job-creation front.
Until we turn this around and get strong growth, we are not going to
produce nearly the number of jobs we need.
The second big problem that strikes me as very disturbing is the
unsustainable level of Federal spending and corresponding deficits and
debt that have mounted as a result of all that spending. Federal
spending since the year 2000, from 2000 to 2010, has doubled from just
a couple of years ago when spending was less than 20 percent of our
total economic output. Today, it is nearly 25 percent of our total
economy, and that is way too large and unsustainable.
All this spending has predictably led to huge deficits. We have been
running annual deficits these last couple of years of nearly 10 percent
of our entire economy--really staggering in size, $1.5 trillion for the
last couple of years running. The deficits are covered by issuing debt,
so we have been accumulating debt at this really breakneck pace.
Of course, all of this debt has caused us to crash into our debt
limit, and we are now mired in this debate, in this discussion, in
these ongoing, very difficult negotiations over what to do because we
have reached the statutory ceiling of the amount of money the Federal
Government is permitted by law to borrow--$14.3 trillion. That is a
number which is very difficult to grasp because of its sheer enormity,
but there we are. We are at the limit, and we have to decide what we
are going to do about it.
I am not impressed with where the current negotiations seem to be and
where they have been. I think we have yet to see a plan from the
President that lays out exactly what he is willing to cut in spending
to put us on a sustainable path.
The President proposed a budget. I sit on the Budget Committee. We
looked at that budget, we had testimony about that budget, and what we
learned was it is not a serious budget. It would continue with huge
deficits and mounting debt. It did not address any of the fundamental
problems. When that budget was on the Senate floor for a vote, the
President's budget got zero votes. The President subsequently backed
away from his own budget but has not proposed an alternative.
Unfortunately, my colleagues in this Chamber on the other side have
proposed no budget whatsoever.
So here we are, the world's largest enterprise, the U.S. Government,
preparing to spend this year--as we did last year--something on the
order of $3.7 trillion without so much as a blueprint for how we are
going to spend that, rules that would govern how it gets allocated in
different categories, guidelines for where the revenue is going to come
from, how big the deficit will be--none of that. We are simply
proceeding along without a budget. I have to say I think that is
shockingly irresponsible. Now we go into these discussions about the
debt limit. Frankly, it is not clear to me that we are any closer to a
resolution today than we were several weeks ago.
Some of us have suggested a solution. We have suggested a way out of
this impasse that I would like to describe today. The solution we are
proposing is that we go ahead and raise the debt limit by the amount
the President has asked. Many of us are not particularly enthusiastic
about that, but we acknowledge that failure to do so will at some point
in, presumably, early August result in a considerable disruption and a
partial government shutdown. It will not result in a default on our
debt, and there are many of our ongoing expenses we could continue to
cover from ongoing tax revenue, but it would nevertheless be very
disruptive, and it is my hope that we never get there and instead find
a resolution.
The resolution some of us are proposing--specifically Senator Mike
Lee from Utah, whom I credit a great deal for his leadership--Senator
Lee and I have introduced a bill, together with a number of other
colleagues--I think we have over 25 cosponsors in the Senate--based on
the idea we call cut, cap, and balance. We would agree to raise the
debt limit by $2.4 trillion, as the President has requested, provided
that we get ourselves on a path to a balanced budget. By that, we see
three pieces: cuts in immediate spending; statutory caps in spending
over the next few years; and a balanced budget amendment to the
Constitution, which we acknowledge would take several years to achieve.
But the point is that the combined effect of these measures would
clearly put us on a path to a balanced budget, end the practice of
running deficits, and eventually end the need to raise debt limits
because we would not be issuing new debt. We would, instead, as a
government be living within our means.
If you ask me, this is very reasonable, to suggest that the Federal
Government ought to live within its means. It is reasonable for
families. Families do not have any choice; they live within their
means. Businesses have to live within their means or they do not
survive. And 49 of the 50 States have a requirement that they balance
their budgets every year, and they find a way to do it.
This President would not be the first Democratic President to embrace
this if he were to embrace this idea. President Clinton, working with a
Republican-controlled Congress in the 1990s, first embraced the idea
that we ought to strive for a balanced budget, that it was a worthwhile
goal, that it was an achievable goal, and within a few years, in fact,
they achieved it, two different parties working together--not always
enjoying each other's company as much as one might like, but the fact
is they got it done. I think we ought to consider using that model
today.
As recently as 2007, we were actually quite close to a balanced
budget. Our deficit was just over 1 percent of our total economy, as
opposed to today, where it is nearly 10 percent of our total economy. I
fully acknowledge that we cannot get there overnight, as much as many
of us would like to. We have dug a deep hole. We are borrowing almost
40 cents of every dollar we spend. It would be too sudden and Draconian
to think we could balance the budget overnight. So we suggested a path
that might take 8 or 9 or 10 years to actually reach a balance, but it
would surely put us on a path that would get us there, and that would
be enormously constructive, not only in the sense that it would ensure
the long-term fiscal viability of our country, which is in and of
itself an absolutely vital goal, but it would also create some
certainty in the market, reduce the risk of huge inflation and huge
interest rates and the other dangers that accompany the irresponsibly
large deficits, and in the process help to encourage stronger economic
growth and job creation.
I think we ought to be flexible in how we get there. We have proposed
one way. It is not the only way to do it, but it, importantly, is
premised on this principle that we can reach a balance and we ought to
do that. It is absolutely critical that we demonstrate that we have the
political will and the ability to tackle this, arguably the biggest
challenge we face.
We have seen what has been unfolding in Europe because they chose not
to tackle these problems in recent years. I suggest we are not that far
behind some of the countries in Europe that are in the middle of truly
devastating sovereign debt crises. We are not quite there yet, but if
we do not change the path we are on, that is the direction we are
heading.
Let me walk through the particular items in this approach we are
advocating in which we would cut, cap, and balance.
First is to cut spending. We are suggesting a cut from the 2011
levels of $142 billion. That is actually less than
[[Page S4552]]
4 percent of the amount of money the government spent last year--we are
still in the current year, but the fiscal year of 2011. It would still
spend more than we spent in 2010, so it is very hard to see how this
could fairly be described as any kind of Draconian cut. It is a very
modest cut in spending. By 2012, the levels will be almost $\1/2\
trillion more than the levels of spending in 2008. But that is the
first step, to cut spending in the immediate future, in this next
fiscal year.
The second is to cap spending over the next several years. To do
this, we have established a set of caps, statutory limits on how much
the government can spend each year based on the level of spending in
the budget resolution I introduced on the Senate floor, which had
almost all the Republicans' support. I wish we had some Democratic
support, and I still hope we will get some. But the important thing
about this budget resolution and these cap levels is they reach a
balance--not overnight; it takes 9 years. But by controlling spending
and adopting progrowth policies that encourage an expanding economy, we
would, following these cap levels, be able to balance our budget. Then,
finally, we are advocating that as part of this package, as part of an
arrangement, we would agree to raise the debt ceiling. We would also
pass in both the House and Senate a balanced budget amendment to the
Constitution and send it off to the States.
We would not suggest the increase in the debt limit be contingent
upon State option, but I am confident the States would, in fact, pass a
balanced budget amendment to the Constitution if we in Congress would
send it to them. It would have three big features and, again, the
details ought to be a subject of discussion. One that would not be open
for negotiation would be that the first outlays need to equal revenues.
That is obviously the fundamental definition of a balance. We don't run
deficits; we make sure we spend no more than we take in.
The second aspect some of us feel strongly about, and I am one of
them, is we ought to limit spending as a percentage of our economy so
the economy doesn't keep growing, which is what happens when the
government occupies too large a segment of our economy.
Finally, we have advocated that we not create a mechanism that simply
guarantees big tax increases in order to balance the budget, and to do
that we would like--and we have included--a supermajority requirement
to raise taxes so that a simple majority wouldn't be enough. It would
require a supermajority which would only occur, presumably, in truly
extraordinary circumstances.
I believe very strongly we can have strong economic growth and the
job creation we need, but to get there we have to create an environment
in Washington; we have to pass legislation and create an environment
that encourages risk taking, encourages business formation, encourages
new hiring, and we have not been doing such a good job. One of the ways
to do that is to put us on a sustainable, viable fiscal path, and the
cut, cap, and balance approach would do that.
We would raise the debt limit by the full amount that the President
has asked for provided he agree with us to put this country on a path
to a balanced budget. I do not think that is asking too much. I think
that is a way to achieve long-term fiscal sustainability, and just as
importantly it is a way to create an environment for the strong
economic growth and job creation we need.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Florida.
Mr. NELSON of Florida. Mr. President, I request unanimous consent to
speak up to 20 minutes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
(The remarks of Mr. Nelson of Florida pertaining to the introduction
of S. 1364 are printed in today's Record under ``Statements on
Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')
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