[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 56 (Wednesday, April 18, 2012)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2476-S2489]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              RESTORE ACT

  Mr. WICKER. Mr President, this week marks the somber anniversary 2 
years ago, on Friday, April 20, 2010, of an explosion on the Deepwater 
Horizon oilrig in the Gulf of Mexico which took 11 lives and triggered 
the worst oilspill in American history. We still remember the families 
of those who were lost and those who were injured on that fateful day. 
We are forever grateful to the thousands of volunteers and relief 
workers from all over the world who responded in the wake of this 
disaster.
  In Mississippi, like other Gulf States, the BP oilspill caused 
immeasurable damage not only on the shoreline but also to all sectors 
of our economy. Misperceptions of tainted seafood and oil-covered 
beaches devastated our seafood and tourism industries. Local businesses 
already challenged by a difficult economy were crippled by the 
disruption in market demand.
  The moratorium that the Obama administration put on drilling cost our 
economy critical jobs related to domestic energy production and its 
associated support industries. The administration's delays on drilling 
permits are still stalling job creation along the gulf coast.
  Many of my colleagues and I have come to the floor in recent weeks to 
talk about a better energy policy, specifically to offer solutions to 
lower gas prices. The administration's slowdown of domestic energy 
production keeps us dependent on foreign energy providers, ultimately 
hurting Americans at the pump.
  There is no doubt that the residents of Mississippi and other Gulf 
States are resilient and have persevered through unprecedented 
circumstances. But there is work left to do. I urge all of my 
colleagues to remain committed to the coast's full recovery. I applaud 
the Senate's recent bipartisan passage of the RESTORE Act as part of 
the Transportation bill. It is imperative that coastal communities have 
the resources they need to rebuild and revitalize.
  Under the provisions of the RESTORE Act, local officials will have 
the ability to prioritize the economic and ecological projects that are 
most critical to their own recovery. Local communities are in the best 
position to make these decisions, and needless government redtape 
should not stand in the way. Directly distributing Clean Water Act 
fines would ensure that the affected parties are compensated 
accordingly.
  The RESTORE Act is an encouraging step forward for all Gulf Coast 
States.
  I urge the House of Representatives to show the same support for the 
gulf coast in passing this important piece of legislation. Both parties 
can agree that the revitalization of our Gulf States is a priority and 
that providing local perspectives is vital to our recovery efforts. The 
disaster that occurred 2 years ago was an extraordinary tragedy with 
long-term consequences, and we cannot forget about the needs that 
persist.
  The gulf coast provides one-third of the seafood harvested in the 
continental United States. The gulf coast is home to 6 of our country's 
10 largest commercial ports. Mississippi and all Gulf States make up a 
vibrant part of this country, and the residents and businesses there 
are key contributors to the national economy.
  There is no doubt that keeping our gulf strong is vital to our 
national interest, and part of that would be the passage of the RESTORE 
Act.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maryland is recognized.
  Mr. CARDIN. Mr. President, I concur with my friend from Mississippi 
on the importance of passing the RESTORE Act. It is in our 
transportation reauthorization bill, and it is an important part. It 
not only helps the Gulf States but all the States that border oceans in 
this country. It is an important part of the bill that we worked out in 
a consensus manner in the Senate.
  I take this time and ask unanimous consent that I may speak as in 
morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                       Surface Transportation Act

  Mr. CARDIN. Mr. President, we need to pass a long-term transportation 
reauthorization bill. The Senate has done this. The Senate passed its 
bill 2 months ago by a very strong margin of 74 to 22. I call it a 
consensus bill and not a bipartisan bill, because we went beyond 
bipartisan. This bill came out of the two committees of jurisdiction, 
the Banking Committee and the Environment and Public Works Committee, 
by a unanimous vote. The Finance Committee dealt with the financing 
provisions.
  This bill gives us predictability in transportation funding. Here is 
the problem: The other body, the House, is currently working on a bill 
that would basically be a short-term extension of our transportation 
program. We need a long-term commitment as to the Federal partnership 
in transportation. We need that for many reasons. We need it for 
predictable funding so our local governments can commit to do the types 
of transportation programs that are necessary for our safety, necessary 
for economic expansion, and necessary for our communities.
  We are missing the construction season by the failure to enact a 
long-term transportation reauthorization plan. Major projects cannot be 
planned--whether it is to replace a bridge, major maintenance programs, 
new highways, or expansion of our transit systems.
  This translates into jobs. We are in a recovery. We all want to do 
everything we can to maintain and expand job opportunities in this 
country so our economy can recover at a quicker pace. The 
transportation reauthorization bill that passed the Senate is 
responsible for 3 million jobs.
  In my State of Maryland, 28,700 jobs are connected to the passage of 
the transportation reauthorization program--21,000 in highways and over 
7,000 in transit.
  The Senate bill, as I pointed out, was a consensus bill. It was done 
in the finest manner of legislating. I compliment Senators Boxer and 
Inhofe on the Environment and Public Works Committee, on which I serve, 
for marshaling this bill through. There were

[[Page S2477]]

numerous challenges in the Senate, and a number of committees had to 
consider it and, of course, there was floor consideration. During that 
entire process, we maintained the consensus and the balance that is 
important.
  Let me point out that here you have a bill that invests in transit 
and roads and bridges. We were able to reach a compromise to make sure 
that both priorities were preserved in the transportation 
reauthorization bill.
  I authored an amendment, with Senator Cochran, that dealt with local 
input into the transportation decisions. We had the right balance 
between the Federal Government's partnership working with our States 
but allowing the locals to have input particularly on transportation 
enhancement programs. We have reform in our bill that consolidates a 
lot of specific programs into broader programs, providing greater 
flexibility, but still maintaining accountability on the Federal 
partnership.
  During this most recent work period, when we were off for Easter and 
Passover, I visited various parts of Maryland. I was down in western 
Maryland, Appalachia country. I heard firsthand how important 
reauthorization of this transportation bill is to the economy of 
western Maryland. This is a rural part of our State. They need to build 
a north-south highway that will connect Pennsylvania, West Virginia, 
and Maryland. The bill we passed--the transportation reauthorization 
bill--contains some very important provisions to allow that highway to 
be constructed. It provides toll credits so Pennsylvania can complete 
an important segment of this north-south highway. It also contains a 
stronger match so that it makes it more feasible that we can move this 
highway to completion. The completion of the north-south highway means 
jobs and hope to the people of that region of America. It is very 
important to get that done. It will mean jobs. They told me--the 
companies that are directly dependent upon that highway being 
constructed--if we don't pass a multiyear reauthorization bill, that 
project gets delayed. Once it is delayed, we lose job opportunities.
  I also spent part of the work period visiting other parts of 
Maryland. I was a few miles from here at the Metro Command, at the 
Carmen Turner facility in New Carollton, where they operate the bus and 
rail command center for the Nation's transit system, which is both bus 
and rail in this area. It is the Nation's system. The Federal 
Government depends upon this, upon the Washington transit system. Many 
people who work in the Capitol come to us through the transit program. 
It is true in all of the Federal facilities.

  That is an aging system. The rail system needs to be repaired. It is 
the second busiest rail transit system in the Nation. It is in 
desperate need of repair. Without predictable funding, major projects 
will be delayed. I will give you a list of some of the projects we need 
to do for the Washington metro transit system:
  Overhauling the Landover and Southern Avenue bus maintenance shop in 
Prince George's County, MD; improving perimeter security at the 
Bladensburg bus garage, also in PG County; complete the design and 
construction of 10,000 feet of test track at Greenbelt that is needed 
to test the new, safer 7,000 series railcars due to arrive in 2014.
  I remind my colleagues that we had a tragedy on the transit system 
here not too long ago. There was a study done as to improvements that 
need to be made, including replacement of railcars to safer cars. These 
changes need to be done to improve safety of people who depend upon the 
transit system in this region. Also we need to continue to implement 
systemwide switch testing and replacement needed to comply with the 
National Transportation Safety Board's safety recommendations following 
the June 2009 red-line crash. All of that will be delayed. Yes, safety 
will be put at risk if we do not pass a reauthorization of the 
transportation program.
  It is interesting that one part of my State is very rural, which I 
visited, and the other part of the State is urban, and it is important 
to that region. It is important to the entire country. We need to get 
this done. Every State is impacted by bridge replacement, highways, and 
transit.
  The Maryland Department of Transportation tells me that due to the 
uncertainty, they are planning on a 20-percent reduction in the 
projects that would otherwise be done in this year. That will have a 
huge impact on our workforce--a huge impact on our economy.
  As I am speaking, the House is taking action. It is going to pass a 
short-term extension. That is not good enough. That doesn't solve the 
problem. That doesn't give us the predictability or allow us to 
complete the north-south highway in western Maryland, or make the 
improvements we need to in the WMATA system, or in any State, to be 
able to move forward with transportation projects. That is not good 
enough. We need to do more.
  However, I am pleased to see the House taking some action. I urge 
that as soon as they complete action, let's get into conference and 
resolve the differences between the House and Senate and get a bill 
back on the floor as quickly as possible. We did our work. We passed a 
bipartisan consensus bill. They are passing a partisan bill in the 
other body. They are delaying things again. That is not good.
  Let's get together and complete a conference as quickly as possible. 
Let's get Americans back to work building roads and transit systems 
that are vital to the continued economic recovery of this Nation.
  With that, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. RUBIO. 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. RUBIO. I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, I think this is topical to the item we are 
debating, which is to proceed to the Violence Against Women Act, and I 
wish to take a moment to highlight a couple of egregious examples 
around the world where young girls and women are being threatened by 
violence in what remains a scourge throughout the planet, and then I 
will focus on here at home as well.
  On April 17--and this is a pretty shocking incident--about 150 Afghan 
school girls were poisoned after drinking contaminated water. It 
appears by all signals that it was a deliberate contamination of the 
water. They are blaming this on conservative radicals who are opposed 
to female education. So there is evidence to suggest that 150 girls 
from Afghanistan were poisoned because they went to school. This is 
happening in the 21st century.
  A new report from the Human Rights Commission on Pakistan says there 
were 943 Pakistani women killed in 2011 and they were killed for 
``honor.'' Of the 953 victims, 93 were minors. Around 595 of the women 
killed in 2011 were accused of having ``illicit relations,'' and 219 of 
them were accused of marrying without permission. Again, this is the 
21st century we are talking about where these things are happening. In 
fact, this same report, in 2010, says there were 791 honor killings of 
women in Pakistan.
  Here is one that is really disturbing and very sick. In South Africa, 
a group of young males in Soweta were filmed raping a 17-year-old who 
was believed to be mentally ill. In fact, the term ``rapevideo'' was 
trending on Twitter in South Africa on Wednesday. It is estimated by 
some organizations that a woman is raped every 26 seconds in South 
Africa. There is a report with regard to this specific Soweta rape that 
the men promised the girl 25 cents if she kept silent.
  Let's turn to our hemisphere for a moment, where, tragically, of the 
25 countries around the world with the highest homicide rates for 
women, 14 are in Latin America and the Caribbean, according to a recent 
survey by a Geneva-based research organization called Small Arms 
Survey. The three most dangerous countries for women were El Salvador, 
Jamaica, and Guatemala, respectively.
  As a region, a U.N. study found in 2011 that the Americas, including 
the United States and Canada, were ranked

[[Page S2478]]

second only to Africa for female homicide rates. While females 
represent only 10 percent of the murder victims in the Americas, the 
sheer level of violence in the region, particularly in Latin America, 
puts women at risk.
  Here at home, I was honored a few weeks ago to sign a letter, along 
with Senators Kirk, Blumenthal, and Cornyn, which we wrote to about 40 
organizations back on April 12 to inform them that the parent company 
of the Village Voice publications they advertise on owns backpage.com, 
an online classified advertising Web site linked to dozens of child-
trafficking cases in this country. We asked these companies, charitable 
organizations, and public, educational, and cultural institutions to 
work together to use their economic influence to stop this from 
happening, to stop this online child sex trafficking that is being 
facilitated by sites such as these.
  I want to report to my colleagues today that there has been some 
progress. This letter is already having an impact. We have had 
representatives from two of the recipients of the letter respond that 
their companies will quickly act to end their advertising on the 
Village Voice publications.
  The fact is what I just outlined now is happening here in the United 
States of America. I highlighted things happening around the world, and 
I highlighted a case of something we can be doing right now here in the 
United States.
  The reason I come to the floor on occasion to speak about human 
rights violations that are happening around the world and in our own 
country is to remind us that atrocities are not just things that 
happened in history, they are happening today. If we just open a 
newspaper and open our eyes, we will find modern-day atrocities that 
rival things we have read about in history. Things we might believe are 
unimaginable or impossible are occurring in this century. Here in our 
country, we have instances such as this, where it is estimated that up 
to 300,000 children could potentially be at risk--300,000 people, young 
women, children, et cetera, in our hemisphere--to become victims of 
human trafficking. Part of that happens here in our own country. So we 
have an obligation to focus on these issues.
  I will continue to use this forum and any opportunity I get to 
highlight human rights abuses that are happening across the world and 
in our own country because awareness is always the first step toward 
confronting these issues. The notion that one can somehow get away with 
this without condemnation encourages people to do more of it, 
encourages people to think they can get away with it, encourages people 
to think it may even be culturally acceptable. It is not culturally 
acceptable for any civilized people to stand by and watch human beings 
being enslaved, trafficked, abused, or targeted. We cannot stand by 
silently--and I am not claiming anyone in this Chamber does this--and 
argue that it is culturally acceptable to carry out an honor killing of 
a woman because she got married without permission. That is outrageous 
and it is absurd. It has no place in our world.
  If this Nation is to remain a leader on human rights, then those of 
us who serve it have an obligation to use forums such as this to call 
attention to egregious examples, such as those I cited today, and to 
condemn them in the loudest voice possible. So in the weeks and months 
to come, I hope to continue to come to the floor and provide not just 
examples of abuses happening around the world but also examples, such 
as the one I finished with today. That is an example of how we can, 
working across the party aisle in this Chamber, work collaboratively to 
do something about it. This letter to the advertisers on backpage.com 
in the Village Voice is just one example of the things we can be doing 
to ensure we condemn and put a stop to some of these most heinous 
practices.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, before I proceed to the Senator from 
Missouri, I want to thank my friend from Florida for his principled and 
passionate statement. He speaks from his own experience--his family's 
own experience in leaving a dictatorship in Cuba and coming to the 
freedom of this country, but he speaks more broadly from the depths of 
American history and American experience. We are a very different 
nation. We are different from our beginning because we defined 
ourselves not by our geographical borders but by our values and the 
values expressed in the Declaration of Independence about those human 
rights, that life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are the 
endowment of our Creator. Those rights, obviously, were not just the 
endowment God gave the people of the United States but all human beings 
anywhere on this planet. It is what makes us a great nation. I think 
the extent to which we hold to that principle that was the motivation 
for our founding is one by which we can measure ourselves day by day.
  I really appreciate that the Senator from Florida has committed 
himself both to the upholding and the application of the principle of 
human rights, the sanctity of human rights, and America's role in 
protecting them, and to persistently continue to come to the floor to 
speak of particular cases where that principle is being violated. I 
happened to be on the floor for the postal reform bill, but I wanted to 
take this opportunity to thank him for his very compelling statement.
  I yield the floor to my friend from Missouri.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.


                             Postal Reform

  Mrs. McCASKILL. Mr. President, I spent a lot of my childhood in a 
very small town in Missouri. From the time I was about 3 years old 
until the fourth grade, I lived in a town called Lebanon, MO. My dad 
was a life insurance salesman and sold life insurance, in fact to many 
of the soldiers at Fort Leonard Wood, and my mother's family had the 
corner drugstore about a block off Main Street in Lebanon, MO.
  I have fond and vivid memories of my childhood in Lebanon, and one of 
them was the trip I would take whenever I was hanging out down at my 
family's drugstore. This was my great-uncle and great-aunt who had 
raised my mother, so they were like my grandparents. He was the 
pharmacist and she ran the lunch counter at the drugstore, and I would 
go with my great-uncle on his run to the post office. We would walk up 
2 blocks and go into the post office. I even remember how it smelled. I 
remember how it looked. I remember what happened there. My memory is 
that it was a gathering place, that I would have to tug on my great-
uncle's coat and say, ``Let's go, Uncle Tom. Let's go'' because he 
would invariably find people at the post office with whom he needed to 
visit. It wasn't a big place, but it was a very important place in 
Lebanon, MO.
  I rise today to talk about an amendment that will save that sense of 
community for dozens of rural towns in Missouri. I am very aware, as a 
former auditor and someone who spends a lot of time looking at our 
budgets and trying to figure out the numbers, of the crisis we have in 
terms of the fiscal sustainability of our Postal Service.
  I commend the work of the committee on which I am lucky to serve with 
Senator Lieberman as the chair and Senator Collins as the ranking 
member. It is one of the places where we have maintained strong 
bipartisanship in the Senate. In fact, I believe Senator Lieberman's 
committee could serve as a role model for other committees on how to 
work in a bipartisan way. And I commend Senator Carper and many 
others--Senator Brown of Massachusetts and also Senator Merkley--who 
have worked on this amendment, also, trying to find a way to save these 
rural post offices.
  I know we have a problem here, but when we look at the numbers, 
closing rural post offices doesn't help. It is 1 percent--less than 1 
percent--of the budget. It is less than 1 percent of the amount of 
savings we need to save out of the postal budget. So in 167 different 
communities in my State, something that is essential far beyond the 
bricks and mortar to those communities would close all in the name of 
less than 1 percent. That doesn't make sense to me.
  The strength of our Postal Service has been that it is reliable, that 
it is affordable, and that it goes to the very last mile. What will we 
lose in these communities if we shut down these

[[Page S2479]]

post offices? Senior citizens would lose a place where they can depend 
on getting their prescription medicines. Many of these communities have 
no pharmacies--in fact, most of them don't--and they rely on the mail 
for their drugs. Small business owners would lose a shipping location. 
The small business owners in these rural communities depend on that 
post office to take packages to and to receive packages from. I think 
this is a sacrifice we should not make. These post offices are worth 
fighting to save.
  When I go home and meet with Missourians and when I get outside of 
St. Louis and Kansas City and Springfield and Columbia, almost every 
single time, someone walks up to me and talks about their post office. 
They feel strongly that it is the one symbol they have in their 
community that makes them viable as a community, and I would hate to 
see them lose it.
  I believe we should look at the closure of these post offices as a 
very last resort. Frankly, to me, it looks knee-jerked because it 
doesn't appear to me to be very thoughtful. I have not been able to get 
the post office to even give me the rhyme or reason as to why some of 
these post offices are closing. Very few of them save a significant 
amount of dollars.

  This amendment would impose a 2-year moratorium on rural post office 
closures to allow the Postal Service to enjoy some of the reforms that 
have been put in this bill in a very thoughtful and thorough process by 
Chairman Lieberman and many of his colleagues. It would also say after 
2 years that there is a specific list of transparent criterion that 
must be considered before a post office could be closed.
  First, it would have to ensure that seniors could retain the same 
access to their prescriptions they receive in the mail, that seniors 
and those with disabilities would have the same access to postal 
services they currently do, and make sure small businesses are not 
financially harmed by a rural post office closure.
  This is not kicking the can down the road. This is being more 
thoughtful about preserving the part of the Postal Service that defines 
it. I am hopeful this is not a Republican or a Democratic issue. I am 
hopeful this is a rural issue.
  We all know the last mile is the most expensive. Throughout the 
history of our country, government has stepped in and done a little 
more to give services the last mile. No business model in the world 
works when you have to take services that last mile down that one road, 
all the way down to a house at the end of the road sometimes several 
miles. It didn't work for electricity, so we did things to help with 
rural electric co-ops. It didn't work for phones, so we did the USX 
fund to help with phones. It didn't work for broadband, so we stepped 
in and have done things to assist with broadband. Now we are going to 
say to these rural communities: The last mile is not as important. 
These post offices are not as important. We can make due without it.
  I think that is a big mistake, and I hope we can save these rural 
post offices. This is very important in my State, and I want young 
girls who are growing up in these small communities to have the same 
warm and fond memories of the local post office that I carry with me 
every day.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I thank Senator McCaskill for her 
statement. What is interesting, this is one of those cases where maybe 
we appreciate something more than we would every day when we think it 
may disappear. It is true of institutions as well as people. There is 
no question that post offices, both in rural areas and small towns--and 
I will say for Connecticut, in neighborhoods and cities--that the post 
office has played an important community-building role. But beyond 
that, in a tough time economically, a lot of people depend on those 
post offices for their mail, for their prescription drugs, and for the 
business interactions they need. But here is the other side of it, 
which my friend from Missouri knows very well.
  We have 32,000 post offices in America. If we consider them to be 
retail outlets, which they are, that is more retail outlets than 
Walmart, Starbucks, and McDonald's combined. But we are talking about 
necessities. So we are very concerned that post offices not be closed 
in a precipitous manner if some have to be closed.
  So as my friend from Missouri knows, we put language in this bill 
that doesn't stop the process of review but forces the Postal Service 
to consider other options, such as consolidating post offices within a 
reasonable distance, reducing the number of operating hours, for 
instance, and permitting a contractor or a rural carrier to provide 
retail services in the communities served by the post office.
  We also allow an appeal to the Postal Regulatory Commission, and I 
know there are other amendments that will come in to strengthen that 
part of the bill.
  We have to find a balance between the financial pressures on the post 
office--which, if unresponded to, will take it down--and the continuing 
dependence that millions of American people, including in small towns 
and rural areas, have on the post office.
  Just a final word. Some of our colleagues have come to the floor and 
spoken about the post office as if it was in its entirety a relic which 
has no purpose anymore because of the Internet. Obviously, the Internet 
is affecting the volume of first-class mail. But the fact is today--I 
repeat, every day 563 million pieces of mail are delivered by the 
Postal Service, as you said, consistent with the promise of universal 
service anywhere you are, anywhere your business is.
  Incidentally, that capacity to deliver to the last mile is one of the 
great, unique, irreplaceable assets of the Postal Service, so 
irreplaceable that big private sector companies such as FedEx and UPS 
depend on it. People depend on the Postal Service increasingly for 
packages too. I maybe have a limited horizon, but I still can't 
conceive of an Internet that can transport a package from one place to 
another, and a lot of those packages are needed by the recipients, 
including, particularly, prescription drugs.
  So I thank my friend from Missouri. I say that Senator Collins and I 
would like to work with her. I think we can find a way without doing 
damage to the purpose of the bill to accommodate the concerns about the 
preservation of rural post offices, and I look forward to doing so.
  I might add this for the information of Members who haven't said this 
yet today: Yesterday, both cloakrooms hotlined--in the vocabulary of 
the Senate--a request to every Senator to indicate whether they have an 
intention to file amendments. At this point, we have a list of over 50 
amendments that have been filed. Senator Collins and I, Senator Carper, 
and Senator Brown are working to try to reduce that to a number that 
can be the basis, I hope, of a bipartisan agreement to go ahead and 
debate those amendments and vote on them.
  We have a cloture vote that probably will occur tomorrow, unless 
vitiated, which will critically determine whether we have the 60 votes 
that say we can go forward. If we get those 60 votes, I think we can 
come to an agreement on a number of amendments, have a good, open 
debate, both sides, and then pass this bill.
  If we don't pass this bill or if we don't achieve the 60 votes 
tomorrow, it is not as if nothing is going to happen to the post 
office. The fact is the deficit will continue to build, and let me be 
more specific.
  A while back the Postmaster General issued a notice, which he was 
required to do, saying that as of May 15, less than a month from now, 
he would have a list of mail processing facilities--not post offices 
but mail processing facilities--which are candidates for closure. I 
believe he will close some on or about May 15 unless there is movement 
on this bill.
  So I hope we can reason together; that we can agree on a good, 
balanced, representative, bipartisan group of amendments and, most of 
all, that we will not block the bill from being taken up for the lack 
of 60 votes to grant cloture and stop any attempt at a filibuster.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a 
quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant editor of the Daily Digest proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.

[[Page S2480]]

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                              Pat Summitt

  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, today, the University of Tennessee, 
where I was once President, announced that our basketball coach, Pat 
Summitt, is resigning after 38 years in that position. Women's college 
basketball will never be the same without Pat Summitt and women's 
college basketball would not be the same were it not for Pat Summitt's 
38 years of leadership. There will be much said about her winning 
record, and it is an astonishing accomplishment: 1,098 wins in 
basketball, more than any other coach, man or woman, in the sport; 8 
national championships; in the Southeastern Conference, 32 Southeastern 
Conference titles, 31 straight trips to the NCAA tournament. But the 
statistic I always valued most, especially when I was president of the 
university, was every single one of Pat Summitt's athletes who have 
completed their eligibility with her have graduated from the University 
of Tennessee. That is over 38 years. So she has a remarkable record, 
for which we all are very grateful.
  It is hard for people outside Tennessee to understand how much Pat 
Summitt has become a part of the lives of so many citizens in our 
State. She actually was asked by the university to take over the 
basketball program when she was in her early twenties. This was in 
1974. Back then, many women's basketball games were played with three 
women on one end and three women on the other end, offense and the 
defense.
  She changed all that in a big-time way. When I say women's college 
basketball would not be the same without her, I mean that because 
almost every women's coach in America would attest to the fact that Pat 
Summitt has played a role, either an important model or personal role 
in their development. Even before big games, she would have over to her 
house in Knoxville the opposing team and the opposing coach. She always 
had time for community events in Knoxville, despite her busy schedule 
as such a winning coach. She is a terrific person individually and a 
great model.
  She taught many of us in Tennessee the game of women's college 
basketball. She was so upfront and personal about it, with her famous 
stare, which could stare anybody down, and her discussion of these 
extraordinary athletes she had and what their pluses were and what the 
things were that they had to work on, that we all felt we not only knew 
her, but we knew the athletes as well.
  I have enjoyed watching Pat Summitt's team for many years. I made a 
point to watch three of her games in person this year in Knoxville. I 
arranged my Senate schedule around it because I feared this might be 
her last season. She announced last year that she has Alzheimer's 
disease and she is now devoting herself to fighting that disease. So I 
am sure she will be as accomplished in some appropriate way in the next 
stage of her life as she has been in the last 38 years.
  I wanted to come to the Senate floor and say, on behalf of all the 
people of our State, that women's college basketball will never be the 
same without Pat Summitt, and women's college basketball would never be 
what it is today if it weren't for Pat Summitt.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I rise to thank my friend for his 
moving and eloquent statement, as a Senator from Connecticut, a proud 
fan and admirer of UConn women's basketball, with the great coach Geno 
Auriemma. No one appreciates someone such as Coach Summitt more than 
those who have competed against her, including Coach Auriemma and the 
great players in the University of Connecticut women's basketball 
history.
  She sets the standard and she has set the standard. I join my 
colleague in his praise of her, and with some confidence, wishing her 
well in the future.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I thank Senator Lieberman. I think it 
is appropriate, and most fans of women's college basketball would 
agree, that the first two Senators on the floor to commend Pat Summitt 
would be the Senator from Tennessee and the Senator from Connecticut.
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. It is fortuitous and I cannot believe it is 
accidental.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. I thank the Senator for his generous remarks. I know 
Pat would as well.
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. If Geno Auriemma were here, he would have at least 
echoed what I had to say and added some great stories and words of 
tribute because I know the respect that Coach Auriemma has for Coach 
Summitt.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant editor of the Daily Digest proceeded to call the roll.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Merkley). The Senator from Minnesota.
  Mr. FRANKEN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. FRANKEN. I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business 
for about 20 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                         Postal Service Reform

  Mr. FRANKEN. Mr. President, I rise today to talk about the importance 
of the Postal Service to Minnesota and to urge my colleagues to make 
thoughtful changes to strengthen S. 1789.
  The Postal Service has proposed a cost-cutting plan that would close 
or consolidate nearly 3,700 mostly rural post offices. This plan will 
eliminate thousands of jobs in communities across the country and will 
leave many residents and businesses without direct access to the Postal 
Service. Of course, that includes Oregon, the Presiding Officer's 
State.
  In Minnesota, 117 post offices are on the closure list. That includes 
the post office in Calumet, MN, a town of 367 people in northeastern 
Minnesota. I have heard from the mayor of Calumet, John Tourila, about 
the hardship that closing the post office would have on his community. 
He told me about disabled residents who can't get a driver's license 
and how important it is that they are able to walk to the post office. 
He also told me about an elderly couple in the town. The husband has 
Alzheimer's, and he and his wife take a walk every day, hand in hand, 
to the post office.
  When the Postal Service held a public meeting in Calumet to discuss 
the proposed post office closure, over 70 residents showed up. That is 
a lot. That is about one-fifth of the town.
  These are the stories I hear when I travel across Minnesota, 
especially in rural Minnesota. Post offices are the center of so many 
communities. They serve as the gathering place and a source of 
information. Individuals and businesses rely on the Postal Service to 
receive medications, paychecks, absentee ballots, equipment, and even 
livestock. If the Postal Service's closure plan is implemented, it will 
have a devastating impact on rural Minnesota.
  The Postal Service has also proposed to close 250 processing 
facilities. Five of Minnesota's processing facilities are on the block. 
Under the Postal Service's plan, all of the mail processing activities 
currently taking place in Duluth, Bemidji, Mankato, Rochester, and 
Waite Park would be moved to the Twin Cities.
  For anyone who hasn't driven around Minnesota, let me explain what 
that means. When someone in Bemidji, MN, sends a birthday card to her 
neighbor or a local small business sends an invoice to a customer a few 
streets away, that letter will be sent more than 200 miles south to the 
Twin Cities to be processed before it is sent 200 miles back north to 
Bemidji.
  That doesn't make any sense. During Minnesota winters when roads are 
impassable, that is going to mean severe mail delay. It is going to 
drive business away from these communities.
  The processing centers in Rochester and Duluth are also on the list. 
These are the third and fourth largest cities in Minnesota. Duluth is 
over 150 miles away from the Twin Cities. Closing these processing 
centers will significantly impact local businesses and will drive 
business away from the Postal Service. One important example is the 
Duluth News Tribune. This one business distributes over 2 million 
pieces of mail annually through the Postal Service. Last year, they 
paid the Postal Service well over $400,000 for these

[[Page S2481]]

services. If the Duluth processing center is closed, the Postal Service 
will no longer be able to guarantee overnight delivery of local 
newspapers. The Duluth News Tribune is going to have to find a 
different way to deliver their papers--the daily paper. That will cost 
both the businesses and the Postal Service a lot of money.
  I have heard from hundreds of Minnesotans and met with postal 
workers, mayors, concerned community members, and business leaders who 
rely on the Postal Service. What they all agree on is that we need a 
strong and financially sound Postal Service. They understand that tough 
choices need to be made and that some cuts are on the way. But not like 
this, not by closing five of Minnesota's seven processing facilities 
and forcing the workers to move to the Twin Cities if they want any 
hope of keeping their jobs, not by closing nearly 3,700 post offices to 
save less than 1 percent of the budget, not by slowing down mail so 
much that it will basically render it useless for many businesses.
  The Post Office is in the Constitution. It is in the Constitution. It 
has been around since the beginning of our country. There is a reason 
for this. For centuries, universal service has been at the heart of the 
Postal Service's mission. It is the mission that is described in the 
Constitution. No matter where people live--be it in Minneapolis or 
International Falls, MN--people count on the Postal Service delivering 
their mail. The Postal Service gives us a connection to the outside 
world. Somehow we have lost sight of that.
  Senators Lieberman, Carper, Collins, and Scott Brown put forward a 
bill to reform the Postal Service. I wish to thank them all for their 
important work moving this bill forward. S. 1789 would refund 
overpayments the Postal Service has made to the Federal pension 
program. It will also reduce the requirement that the Postal Service 
prefund retiree health care benefits. I am very supportive of both of 
these provisions. It could save the Postal Service over $15 billion 
over the next 2 years.
  However, I believe the bill can be strengthened to maintain delivery 
standards and better protect rural post offices. I have been working 
with a group of my colleagues, including the Presiding Officer, led by 
Senator Sanders, to improve the bill. I wish to thank Senators Carper 
and Lieberman for working with us.
  The managers' amendment addresses some of our concerns. Most 
importantly, it would require the Postal Service to retain regional 
overnight delivery standards. This will protect many processing 
facilities. Importantly for Minnesota, it will likely keep the Duluth 
processing facility open.
  But the substitute still doesn't do enough to protect rural post 
offices. I have introduced an amendment with my friends and colleagues, 
Senators Tester and Levin, that will give communities the opportunity 
to fight to prevent the closure of their local post offices and 
processing facilities.
  Right now the Postal Regulatory Commission can review post office 
closure decisions, but it can only issue advisory options. Our 
amendment would give the commission authority to reverse post office 
and processing facility closure decisions. That would guarantee that 
individuals and communities impacted by closures would have real 
recourse. I urge my Senate colleagues to support our amendment.
  We need to make thoughtful changes to S. 1789 and we need to act now. 
Last December, I joined with a number of my Senate colleagues in 
pushing the Postmaster General for a 5-month moratorium on postal 
closures. The moratorium is now running out and the Postal Service is 
not waiting. It can't. On May 16, the Postal Service will close 
thousands of post offices and hundreds of processing centers. We need 
to act now.
  Mr. President, I wish to now change the subject to speak about a 
topic that hits close to home for many Minnesotans.
  (The remarks of Senator Franken pertaining to the introduction of S. 
2295 are printed in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced 
Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')
  Mr. FRANKEN. Mr. President, I yield the floor and suggest the absence 
of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in 
morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                      Tribute to Coach Pat Summitt

  Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I noted earlier the very eloquent 
exchange between the Senator from Tennessee and my colleague from 
Connecticut, Senator Lieberman, on Pat Summitt's resignation as the 
coach for women's basketball at the University of Tennessee. I wanted 
to comment very briefly at the opening of my remarks on Pat Summitt--
like Senator Lieberman, a fan of UConn women's basketball team, a rival 
to the University of Tennessee, deeply entrenched rival, enthusiastic 
and stalwart rival--in recognition of her enormous contribution to 
women's sports.
  As a coach, leader, and mentor Pat Summitt transformed women's 
athletics in America fundamentally and forever. Her passion for 
excellence and her fight for fairness made her a force on and off the 
court. In a cause larger than herself, she achieved recognition for 
women's basketball, not just for her own team, and enriched the lives 
and careers of countless women.
  Although her team was a rival of the University of Connecticut and I 
rooted against her when she played us, I wish her every good thing in 
the years ahead and admire her continued courage and fortitude.


                      NCAA Academic Progress Rate

  Mr. President, I want to speak on another basketball topic, one that 
is serious to the University of Connecticut and to my State where we 
have some wonderful student athletes--we do. The University of 
Connecticut has great student athletes. Connecticut residents have 
watched with pride as the UConn Huskies, both the women's and men's 
teams, have brought home numerous basketball championships.
  I am a strong believer that success in the classroom must accompany 
success on the court. I support efforts by universities and the NCAA to 
develop rigorous academic standards for student athletes. I believe 
schools failing to meet these standards should be penalized. But I also 
believe these standards must be applied fairly, not capriciously or 
arbitrarily.
  Regrettably, the NCAA's application of its own rules appears to be 
arbitrary, unjust, and unfair against the UConn men's basketball 
program. Last October, the NCAA adopted new standards that determined a 
school's eligibility based on 2- or 4-year average academic progress 
rates, so called APRs. These standards set a high bar for performance, 
but unfortunately they did not provide schools with a phase-in period 
for the new rules.
  Because these standards are based on several years of data, it is 
possible a school could be retroactively punished for actions that 
occurred before the rules were implemented. That is exactly what has 
happened to the UConn men's basketball team. Those players have been 
told they will not be eligible to compete in the 2013 postseason, 
including the Big East tournament and March Madness, because of the APR 
scores from the 2006 to 2010 academic years.
  None of the players from those seasons remain on the UConn team now. 
This severe punishment falls on players who are clear of any 
substandard academic performance. In fact, UConn's recent student 
athletes have demonstrated exemplary academic performance. The team's 
academic progress rate for the 2010 to 2011 academic area was nearly 
perfect. The team's academic progress rate for the fall 2011 semester 
was, in fact, perfect.
  Instead of commending this improvement, the NCAA is ignoring it. The 
NCAA is basing its 2013 eligibility decision on data from the 2006 to 
2010 academic years. If they had included the scores from the 2010 to 
2011 academic years, UConn's average would be high enough to meet the 
NCAA's new standards.
  UConn's administrators, coaches, and student athletes have placed a 
strong

[[Page S2482]]

emphasis on academic performance. The school and students have worked 
hard to meet these standards and to improve academics. They have 
demonstrated laudable success. Instead of this progress being 
acknowledged, it has been ignored by the NCAA, and these student 
athletes have been harshly punished for their predecessors' actions, 
not for their own.
  I have written--joined by my colleague from Connecticut, Senator 
Lieberman--to the President of the NCAA, Mark Emmert, raising these 
objections. We have been joined by other colleagues of the delegation. 
I ask unanimous consent that letter be printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

       Dear President Emmert: We write to express our concern with 
     the implementation of the National Collegiate Athletic 
     Association's (NCAA's) new structure for the Academic 
     Progress Rate (APR). As currently implemented, we believe 
     this structure will have unfair negative ramifications for 
     our academic institutions and their students.
       As you are aware, last October the NCAA Board of Directors 
     adopted new standards (four year average of 900 or two year 
     average of 930) that institutions must meet in order to 
     qualify and participate in NCAA post-season championship 
     events. These standards were made effective immediately and 
     were to be applied to student-athlete academic performance 
     that had already occurred.
       We appreciate and support the NCAA's pursuit of new 
     standards as a means to improve academic achievement. We are 
     dismayed, however, that the NCAA based eligibility for the 
     2013 NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament on data from the 
     already completed academic years of 2009 10 and 2010 11. As a 
     result, student-athletes and their institutions were given no 
     phase-in period, no opportunity to adjust to the new 
     standards, and no chance to avoid the penalty. We are deeply 
     concerned that with this action the NCAA is ignoring the 
     reality that more current data are now available to determine 
     an institution's most current APR for purposes of determining 
     eligibility for the 2013 Tournament. Using the most current, 
     available data would remedy the existing unfairness.
       While we understand and support the goals of ensuring 
     quality educational opportunities for student-athletes and 
     the need for strong sanctions for failure to meet those 
     goals, we have misgivings about the retroactive 
     implementation of the penalty. In particular, the NCAA 
     appears to have imposed an overly harsh and unfair penalty by 
     imposing APR sanctions retroactively for conduct and 
     circumstances that had already occurred. By including 
     previous years in a rolling four year average, it should have 
     been clear at the time of adopting the new standard that some 
     universities would be unable to avoid the new penalties--even 
     if the university had achieved a stellar score in the most 
     current year. Due to this rule's retroactive application, 
     student-athletes, who are not in any manner culpable for the 
     APR performance that is the basis of these new penalties, 
     will be punished.
       The uncompromised commitment to the academic success of 
     student-athletes remains the paramount responsibility for any 
     academic institution engaged in intercollegiate athletics. 
     With this obligation in mind, we support necessary and 
     reasonable measures that condition participation in 
     intercollegiate post-season events on a requisite level of 
     academic progress or achievement by student-athletes. 
     However, and no less critical, the process for developing, 
     adopting and implementing regulatory type measures that will 
     be applicable to all academic institutions must be grounded 
     in fundamental fairness. Only then will the regulatory 
     structure appropriately address the institutional 
     responsibility for academic success without penalizing 
     innocent individual student-athletes.
       With the enactment of the new APR penalty structure, 
     however, we believe the NCAA has failed to meet this 
     important standard. The NCAA has the means to address this 
     matter at its upcoming meeting of the Committee on Academic 
     Progress on April 23. We therefore call on the NCAA to review 
     and modify the APR rule this session to remove its 
     retroactive application. Such an approach would be a sensible 
     and fair way to resolve this matter while ensuring tough 
     standards and penalties to ensure future compliance.
       Thank you for your consideration of our concerns.

  Mr. BLUMENTHAL. This letter expresses our outrage and frustration 
with this process. It is a process that may be well intentioned. Its 
goals may be laudable. Raising academic standards must be done, and I 
support that effort enthusiastically and passionately. But the 
application of any rule must be fair, and applying them arbitrarily and 
unjustly undermines the credibility of the cause that is sought.
  As we say to President Emmert of the NCAA: The present performance, 
current data, and facts as they now are on the ground, on the court, in 
the classroom are the ones that should be operative and determinative. 
To deny this team an opportunity to demonstrate its excellence on the 
court as well as in the classroom and punish it for the failures of 
past teams is simply unfair and arbitrary. I hope its decision will be 
changed.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I thank my friend and colleague from 
Connecticut for his words. I stand with him in this cause. You can say 
this is parochial, but it is obvious that we are all--both of us and 
most everybody in Connecticut are very proud of our UConn basketball 
programs, both the men's and the women's. But there by the grace of the 
NCAA go every one of our colleagues and their teams.
  Everybody understands and agrees that there has to be academic 
standards. As Senator Blumenthal said so well, these standards are 
being unfairly applied to the University of Connecticut men's 
basketball program in this case because they have been punished 
essentially already and they have corrected the shortcomings. They have 
had what might be described as a perfect record in terms of players 
achieving academic--the threshold standard.
  To keep them out of the NCAA tournament next year is unfair. Frankly, 
in a direct sense, it hurts the University of Connecticut in terms of 
the revenues it needs to continue to produce not only good basketball 
but great academic offerings. It also deprives basketball fans around 
the country of a competition with all the best teams in it. And it has, 
for our program at the University of Connecticut, consequences beyond 
next year. In my opinion, this is cruel and unusual punishment.
  I am very glad to be joining with Senator Blumenthal. He has taken 
the lead on it, but I stand arm in arm with him and the other members 
of the Connecticut congressional delegation. We are going to push 
forward until we get this unjust decision overturned.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Levin). The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  (Mr. CASEY assumed the Chair.)
  Mr. HARKIN. 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.


                      Matt Rutherford's Solo Sail

  Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I just had a very wonderful phone call 
from a young Matt Rutherford, a 31-year-old man. I have spoken about 
him on the floor on a couple of occasions. He just made it safely home 
on his boat, the St. Brendan. He just crossed the finish line, coming 
out of the Atlantic Ocean into the Chesapeake Bay.
  For those of you who have not followed this story, about 309 days ago 
young Matt Rutherford, on a 27-foot sailboat--a 36-year-old sailboat to 
boot--left the Chesapeake Bay on one of the most audacious adventures 
ever undertaken. It has never been done before. He sailed his little 
boat out of the Chesapeake Bay. He sailed it in the Atlantic Ocean, up 
around Newfoundland, Labrador, by Greenland, and sailed that little 
boat through the Northwest Passage, from the Atlantic Ocean over to 
Alaska. He has been certified now as the first person to ever do so 
solo in a small sailboat.
  He sailed around Alaska. He sailed it from Alaska down to Cape Horn. 
Mind you, he is by himself on a 27-foot boat. He rounded Cape Horn and 
came up the east coast of South America, sailed up through the 
Caribbean, and is back, as of just a few hours ago, into the Chesapeake 
Bay--solo, nonstop, all by himself. He never touched land in all these 
days. He will set foot on land this Saturday at a homecoming in 
Annapolis at the National Sailing Hall of Fame dock in Annapolis, this 
Saturday around noontime. I am sure it will be a big welcome for Matt 
Rutherford.
  To add frosting to the cake of what he did--which, again, is an 
incredible, incredible adventure--he did it to raise funds for CRAB, 
Chesapeake Region Accessible Boating, which is an organization that 
helps people with disabilities, including wounded warriors from our 
armed services who have service-connected disabilities, to get them out

[[Page S2483]]

on boats that will teach them how to sail, to let them know they too 
can participate in that recreational activity.
  So to Matt Rutherford, who has done something that has never been 
done before, welcome back. I am glad you are safe. I am glad you made 
it OK.
  To those of you who want to catch up on this incredible, incredible 
journey--I mean, think about Robert Peary going to the North Pole. 
Think about Roald Amundsen going to the South Pole. Think about Sir 
Francis Chichester sailing around the world in the Gypsy Moth IV, who, 
by the way, stopped once, or Joshua Slocum, who was the first person to 
sail solo around the world. Think about Sir Edmund Hillary climbing 
Mount Everest. These are the kinds of people whom Matt Rutherford now 
stands alongside of in sailing solo. You can go to the Web site to 
catch up on this. It is www.solotheamericas.org. To think about him 
sailing all the way around by the North Pole, all the way down, almost, 
to the South Pole, back up to America again--nonstop, never touched 
land, never stopped, and did it solo in a small 27-foot sailboat--it is 
one of the great adventures of our time--of any time.
  So I am happy he is back and he is safe and will be back on dry land 
this Saturday.


                          Rebuild America Act

  Mr. President, as chair of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions 
Committee, I have come to the floor on a number of occasions over the 
last year to express my concern about the distressed state of the 
American middle class. I do so again today in order to share with my 
colleagues my ideas for how we can rebuild the middle class in America 
and make our economy work for those who work for a living.
  Over the past year, while Washington has been gripped by a fear of 
budget deficits, I gave speech after speech here on the Senate floor 
pointing out an even more serious deficit: the deficit of vision in 
Washington, our failure to confront the current economic crisis with 
the boldness earlier generations of Americans summoned in times of 
national challenge.
  By this economic crisis, I do not just mean the current economic 
downturn. Instead, I am referring to the economic crisis that has taken 
place over the last 30 to 40 years that has resulted in a shrinking 
middle class, rising inequality in our country, a weakened economy, and 
a sense that the American dream is slipping away. This is the 
fundamental challenge--the fundamental challenge--facing our Nation 
today: rebuilding the American middle class.
  Altogether, I now have chaired five HELP Committee hearings on the 
crisis of the middle class. Last year my State staff visited all 99 
counties in Iowa to gain greater insight into the challenges facing 
working Americans. During these events, I have heard from a diverse 
array of Americans, including economists, employers, union members, 
community college students, and everyday, hard-working, middle-class 
families. Not surprisingly, we found that more and more people are 
struggling just to make ends meet. Their jobs are insecure, their 
savings and pensions have shrunk, and they see an economic system that 
is rigged in favor of the very rich and the powerful.
  At a hearing last June, I invited Amanda Greubel, a social worker in 
her local Iowa school district, to share her story with the HELP 
Committee. During her testimony, she defined what it means to be in the 
middle class in this way:

       My husband and I didn't have dreams of great wealth. We 
     never expected to have summer homes or expensive cars or 
     vacations on the Riviera. We chose careers that inspire us, 
     knowing that we would never make six-figure salaries. All we 
     have ever wanted is security and a little comfort . . . to 
     know that our bills are paid, our needs are met, that we can 
     have a getaway every now and then, that our children can 
     pursue higher education without the burden of student-loan 
     debt, and that someday we can retire and enjoy our final 
     years together in the way we choose. . . . When I think back 
     over our adult lives, it strikes me that we did everything we 
     were always told to do in order to have the American dream. . 
     . . We did everything that all the experts said we should do, 
     and yet still we're struggling. When you work as hard as we 
     have and still sometimes scrape for the necessities, it 
     really gets you down.

  That was Amanda.
  Unfortunately, those of us in Washington have not listened enough to 
people such as Amanda. People such as Amanda do not feel this way 
because of factors such as ``globalization'' or ``technology change.'' 
Indeed, harnessing those developments has helped to make the U.S. 
economy the envy of the world.
  Instead, the crisis of the middle class can be traced largely to 
unwise policy choices made here in Washington. For starters, for the 
last three decades, too many here in Washington have bought into the 
failed economic doctrine that says if we give more and more to the very 
wealthy and to the largest corporations, then prosperity will somehow 
trickle down to the rest of us. That idea has utterly failed to work 
for the American people. It is time we get back to policies that are 
premised on how our economy really works. A strong, vibrant middle 
class with money in their pockets to spend drives the economy forward 
because, very simply, businesses will not make things if they do not 
have any customers.
  As Mr. Nick Hanauer, a very successful private sector investor, put 
it in a recent Business Week column:

       Rich business people like me don't create jobs. Middle-
     class consumers do, and when they thrive, U.S. businesses 
     grow and profit.

  So what is the best way forward? Instead of the slash-and-burn 
approaches of the past year and the failed economic doctrines of the 
past few decades, we need a way forward that rebuilds the middle class 
by reflecting the hopes and the can-do spirit of the American people, 
people such as Amanda Greubel.
  To meet the great challenge of our day, restoring and revitalizing 
the middle class, after having a number of hearings last year, as I 
said, and countless visits with people throughout my State, I recently 
introduced sweeping legislation called the Rebuild America Act. It now 
has a number, S. 2252. This legislation provides comprehensive 
solutions to rebuilding the American middle class.
  Some will say it is too bold and too ambitious, but I disagree. The 
sweep of this legislation is commensurate with the extraordinary 
challenge it addresses. The bill aims to rebuild the middle class in 
four broad ways: creating jobs, investing in the future, helping 
families, and bringing balance back into our tax system. Let me touch 
briefly on those four principles.
  One, we need to create jobs for all Americans, including for groups 
of Americans such as people with disabilities who have been especially 
hard hit by the recent recession. With the official unemployment rate 
over 8 percent, and some unofficial measures as high as 17 percent, the 
middle class will continue to lose ground.
  When jobs are scarce, workers do not have the leverage to demand fair 
treatment, paychecks stop growing, or even fall, and even people who 
are fortunate enough to have a job become fearful of losing it. People 
have less discretionary money in their pockets or the confidence to 
spend it. In the absence of robust consumer demand, businesses choose 
not to expand or invest.
  Secondly, we must invest in our future. Not only will investing in 
our infrastructure help create badly needed jobs in the short term, 
these investments will lay the groundwork for sustained economic growth 
in the long term. So my bill tackles this challenge head on by 
providing for robust new investments in America's infrastructure, 
including, of course, time-tested things such as roads and bridges, 
energy efficiency systems, also rebuilding and modernizing our public 
schools, rebuilding our manufacturing base in America.
  In addition, there is also the investment in the human 
infrastructure: helping prepare great teachers, providing better 
pathways to good jobs for workers, job retraining so that the old jobs 
that are now gone, we can now take those workers and retrain them for 
the future jobs, to ensure that current and future workers will have 
the education and skills they need to be successful and to be in the 
middle class.
  Three, we need to do more to help middle-class families succeed. It 
is time for us in Washington to wake up to the harsh reality that 
middle-class families have been living in for the last few decades. 
Unfortunately, the programs and policies that helped create

[[Page S2484]]

the middle class have been either intentionally discarded or have 
fallen victim to neglect.
  For example, the real value of the minimum wage has declined for the 
last four decades, dragging down all workers' paychecks. In 1968, that 
was the height. That was when someone making the minimum wage had the 
highest purchasing power ever since we had a minimum wage--1968. Since 
that time, it has fallen in real terms. If, in fact, the minimum wage 
had kept pace just with inflation from 1968 to today, the minimum wage 
would be slightly over $10.30 an hour. Right now the Federal minimum 
wage is $7.25 an hour. So think of it this way: The same class of 
people that was making the minimum wage in 1968 is basically the same 
class of people making the minimum wage today: young people, 
minorities, people in businesses that are just starting, people who are 
not highly educated, new immigrants to this country, for example. So 
the same people who are making the minimum wage then are the same kind 
of class of people making the minimum wage today.
  But think about it this way. That same class of people today--today--
has 30 percent less buying power than that same class had in 1968--30 
percent less. Think about that. That same person making the minimum 
wage today is making 30 percent less than his or her counterpart in 
1968.
  So what my bill does is basically over a stage raise that minimum 
wage and then peg it to inflation in the future so we do not have that 
erosion again in the future. Also families and workers have seen basic 
rights, such as the right to organize and to bargain collectively, 
eroded. It is harder and harder and harder all the time for people to 
organize and join a union in this country.
  The right to overtime pay has been eroded under the Fair Labor 
Standards Act. So a lot of these things have been eroded by misguided 
regulations, bad court decisions, and years of lax enforcement.
  The fourth part of the bill. It is essential that we put balance back 
in the economy through a balanced tax system that will help reduce our 
deficit, get our fiscal house in order over the longer term. To do so, 
among other provisions, my bill includes a tax on Wall Street trades, 
often called a financial transaction tax. At just 3 cents per $100 
dollars in trade value, that would raise $350 billion over 10 years.
  Again, you might say, well, is this something now? No. We had a 
transaction tax, a financial transaction tax, in this country until 
1966. Then it was done away with. Well, that is again one of the 
reasons why we have seen this terrible inequality grow in our society 
where more and more of our wealth goes to fewer and fewer people.
  A small transaction tax would do two things. It would raise money. It 
would also discourage a lot of the spinning and the churning of 
transactions on Wall Street whereby some of these traders make hundreds 
of thousands of dollars a day, megamillions of dollars a year, but not 
adding much to our economy at all. So it's a small transaction tax.

  In addition, the bill requires high-income taxpayers to pay their 
fair share. Well, sort of like the Buffett rule that the present 
occupant of the chair, the distinguished Senator from Rhode Island, 
championed the other day that we voted on here. It got voted down on 
party lines. I do not understand this, that we cannot even ask those 
who have the most in our society to pay their fair share.
  Well, just because we lost the vote on the Senate floor the other day 
does not mean we have to give up on it. I am sure the Senator from 
Rhode Island, Mr. Whitehouse, is going to continue his efforts, as he 
always has, to make sure that we have more fairness in our tax system. 
So that is in our bill also.
  Restoring balance and fairness to the Tax Code is critical to the 
success of our economy and is critical to the rebuilding of the middle 
class in America. So in sort of broad strokes, that is my Rebuild 
America Act, S. 2522.
  Over the last few years, the American people have heard from too many 
of us politicians and talking heads that our country is broke, that we 
can no longer afford the investments that make for a strong middle 
class. You know, that is sort of the premise of the Ryan budget in the 
House, cut and slash. The premise is one that has been in favor around 
this town for far too long. Here is the premise. The premise is that we 
are broke, the United States of America is broke and we cannot afford 
to do these things.
  This is false. The United States of America remains a wealthy Nation. 
We are the wealthiest Nation in the history of the world. We have the 
highest per capita income of any major country. So one might reasonably 
ask: If we are so rich, how come we are so broke? Think about that. If 
we are the richest Nation in the history of the world, if we have the 
highest per capita income of any major country, then why can we not 
afford to invest in our infrastructure, invest in better teachers, make 
sure our kids get a good education without a mountain of debt on their 
heads? Why cannot we invest in making new energy systems that are 
cleaner and more productive for the future?
  We can. We can do these things. The problem is not that we are broke, 
the problem is that because of actions or inactions by this government 
over the last 30 years, America's wealth has not been spread among our 
people in a reasonable way. The wealth has been concentrated in fewer 
and fewer and fewer hands. And the middle class in the meantime has 
been decimated.
  I submit that there can be no sustainable economic recovery to 
America, no sustained return to fiscal balance, without the recovery of 
the middle class. That is exactly the aim of the Rebuild America Act. 
It is comprehensive. Yes. Ambitious. Of course. But it rises to the 
challenge of our time.
  I urge my colleagues to join me in advancing this legislation and 
doing all we can to restore the American middle class. It is the 
fundamental challenge of our time.
  I yield the floor and I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mrs. SHAHEEN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                         Postal Service Reform

  Mrs. SHAHEEN. Mr. President, the U.S. Postal Service is a fundamental 
part of our Nation's history and what it means to be an American. In 
fact, it was actually talked about in our Constitution.
  Nationwide, the Postal Service employs 550,000 Americans, and it 
serves as the linchpin of an industry that contributes over $1 trillion 
to our economy. I have heard from a number of businesses in New 
Hampshire--one being Goss International in a neighboring community, 
which has been a major competitor in the area of printing presses, and 
now they are making wind turbines, or parts of wind turbines. They are 
very concerned, as is a company called Polaris Direct, about what is 
going to happen to our Postal Service and are we in Congress going to 
resolve this issue.
  In New Hampshire, the Postal Service provides thousands of jobs, as 
well as a critical economic connection for many of our rural 
communities, which are not often in some areas of New Hampshire 
connected to the Internet, so they don't have high-speed broadband, and 
the Postal Service is their connection with much of the outside 
commerce and community.
  Today, as we know, the Postal Service is facing a fiscal crisis that 
threatens its future. We should all be concerned about Draconian 
proposals that seek to slash 220,000 good jobs, close 3,700 post 
offices, and make mail delivery slower across America. The bill before 
us today attempts to avoid the worst of these outcomes, and I commend 
all of the bipartisan managers of the legislation, including Senator 
Lieberman, Senator Collins, and Senator Carper, for their tireless work 
to save the U.S. Postal Service.
  I was proud to join a group of 28 Senators who pushed for important 
changes to the bill in an attempt to better protect rural post offices, 
develop new sources of business, and maintain the reliable and timely 
service Americans have come to expect. Some of these changes have been 
incorporated into the legislation, and I think they are an important 
step toward improving it.
  With that said, I think we have more work to do. I know there are a 
lot of

[[Page S2485]]

people in this body who wish to see us debate a number of amendments 
related to the bill and try to make changes to improve the work already 
done. Rural communities rely on the Postal Service, and I think 
Congress and this Senate should improve the legislation to make sure 
that people have a real voice in the process when their post office is 
threatened.
  If we don't act, the Postal Service could go bankrupt or could be 
forced to make devastating service cuts. So while this legislation is 
not perfect, I urge my colleagues to vote for cloture tomorrow so we 
can consider relevant amendments and make sure this important American 
institution, the U.S. Post Office, is saved for all Americans who so 
desperately need the services it provides.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Georgia.
  Mr. ISAKSON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to address the 
Senate as in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                                 Africa

  Mr. ISAKSON. Mr. President, I rise to speak to the Senate, but in a 
broader sense to the American people and, in particular, to the young 
people of America. An Internet posting went viral a few weeks ago, by a 
group called Invisible Children about Joseph Koni in Uganda, the 
Central African Republic, Congo, and the South Sudan.
  As a member of the Africa Subcommittee of the Foreign Relations 
Committee and one who travels to Africa quite frequently, I have just 
returned from a trip to meet, in part, with our special forces and U.S. 
advisers who have been deployed in those countries to help assist in 
the search for Joseph Koni.
  I wish to share with the Senate the information about what America is 
doing, what Joseph Koni has done, and how important our commitment is 
to Central Africa and to see to it that this evil man is brought to 
justice. Joseph Koni is under indictment by the International Criminal 
Court today, but for 26 years he has roamed Central Africa with his 
Lord's Resistance Army, killing, raping, and maiming the African 
people. By some estimates, Joseph Koni has abducted 66,000 children 
into his army and young women as sex slaves. He has displaced over 2 
million Africans into camps, and they have had to be displaced because 
their villages were destroyed and their families disrupted. He has 
killed untold tens of thousands of people. He is by any stretch of the 
imagination an evil person. Invisible Children's posting, which went 
viral on the Internet, has caught the attention of America's youth, 
because they see the damage that has been done to the youth of Africa, 
and they want to know what America is doing.
  I am proud to include in my remarks what America is doing, and has 
been doing even before the posting went viral on the Internet and most 
people didn't know who Joseph Koni was. Our President deployed 100 
special advisers to the Central African Republic, in the Sudan and 
Uganda, about 2 months before this posting went viral. I met with them 
in a private, secured briefing, a lot of which I cannot talk about but 
a lot of which I can.
  Because of U.S. technology, U.S. resources, and the commitment of 
these individuals, we are assisting to a much higher level in the 
intelligence that we are gaining on Joseph Koni. A lot of people think 
Koni is in Uganda. He isn't there and hasn't been there for 5 or 6 
years. He is somewhere near the Central African Republic, where it is 
extremely easy to hide. We thought Vietnam had jungles. You haven't 
seen foliage until you've seen the Central African Republic, the Sudan, 
and the Congo. There is no electricity, no roads, no paths, and no 
listening devices. Intelligence is all human intelligence. We are 
fortunate to have great intelligence operatives over there and great 
resources there, and we are gaining more and more information.
  I commend our forces also in what they have done in an amnesty 
program. They dropped leaflets in villages that are known to house some 
of Koni's workers and cronies. They drop leaflets that offer amnesty 
for anybody who leaves Koni, comes back to their village, and gives 
information to our forces, the Ugandan Army, and the African Union Army 
as to where Joseph Koni might be. We are getting closer all the time. 
We are not there yet, but thanks to the assistance of our foreign-
deployed individuals, the commitment of our country, the commitment of 
Uganda, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Central African 
Republic, and the new country of South Sudan, we are going to close 
that noose and stay until the job is finished, because Joseph Koni 
needs to be brought to justice. He is an evil man who has killed and 
raped far too many people and maimed far too many people, and Africa is 
too good a friend of the United States for us not to offer the 
necessary assistance.

  My message to the American people and our youth is we are doing our 
job. Joseph Koni hasn't been caught, but we are in pursuit. I commend 
Senator Kerry, the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee; Senator 
Coons, chairman of the Africa Subcommittee; and Senator Lugar and 
myself have joined together to support legislation that will be 
introduced in the Senate to include Joseph Koni, or information leading 
to the arrest and conviction of Joseph Koni, in our rewards program 
that we offer mostly now for terrorist capture. That will be an 
incentive for more information to be brought forward so that the noose 
will grow tighter.
  It is time for Joseph Koni to be brought to justice, and the United 
States is making every effort to assist in that process in Central 
Africa.
  My other reason for going to Central Africa is equally important. I 
was accompanied by members of CARE. CARE is a tremendous 
nongovernmental organization that delivers humanitarian aid, 
assistance, education, knowledge, and technical assistance to countries 
around the world and, in particular, in the nation of Africa. It was 
the second time I traveled with CARE; the first time was 10 years ago 
to Ethiopia, where I saw CARE's outreach in terms of basic education 
and improvement and enhancement of educating young Muslim women.
  On this trip, I got to see what they are doing firsthand in the city 
of Gulu on the border with the Congo and Northern Uganda--an area that 
5 or 6 years ago, because of Joseph Koni, had been destroyed, people 
were displaced, everybody was in hunger, and there was a lot of 
violence. It is now a beautiful village. Granted, it is not a village 
such as you and I might know, Mr. President--thatched huts with 
thatched roofs, mud huts with thatched roofs, small enclaves of African 
citizens eking out an existence in a very difficult part of the world.
  Because of what they are doing in their project, known as the village 
savings and loan, they are bringing about microeconomics in Africa, and 
they are empowering women. The village savings and loan program is a 
very simple program that teaches basic economics and capitalism to 
these villages. Groups form together, they are given a strongbox, 
literally like the ones that used to be on the stagecoach in the old 
``Lone Ranger'' days. In that box, each of the women will make 
contributions of the money that they have into the strongbox, and they 
get a passbook savings account just like the occupant of the chair and 
I used to get when we were in elementary school a long time ago. Then 
they make loans out of that money they save to other people in the 
village to start businesses, whether it is making beads, using the shea 
tree to make shea butter, or doing boutique cloth, or whatever it may 
be. As those industries develop, those cottage industries develop, the 
money they make goes back into the savings and loan to be reinvested in 
other plans.
  We met a young lady who was making beads, and I bought about 12 
strands. My wife and grandkids love them. She makes beads for a German 
distributor in Europe. It is unbelievable what you can see being 
developed because of what CARE is doing. They are empowering African 
women and families and are bringing about the principles of economics 
that you and I enjoy and appreciate, and they are uplifting people who 
need that with empowerment, so they can be sufficient on their own, so 
they can rise up economically and educationally.
  I also visited with the CDC folks delivering PEPFAR and health care 
and better awareness and better testing to identify those with AIDS, to 
get our retrovirals distributed to those mothers who are pregnant, so 
their babies

[[Page S2486]]

can be born without AIDS and live a happy life. One of our great 
challenges now in Africa--it used to be that the challenge was what we 
did with all the children who died because they were born to a mother 
with AIDS. Now we see what we can do to keep them through their life 
because they live a normal and happy life. And their mother, although 
infected with AIDS, because of the U.S. technology and retrovirals, and 
the CDC is providing them with a lifetime of drugs and an opportunity 
to live as normal and productive a life as possible.
  It was great to go with CARE and to see U.S. tax dollars deployed and 
helping uplift the nation, uplift the people, help solve the greatest 
scourge on the continent, which is AIDS and its spread, and help people 
to be able to reinvest in themselves. CARE is a great nongovernmental 
entity that happens to be housed in Georgia, which is helping all over 
the continent of Africa, and they are empowering women and African 
citizens, and they are making their plight in life better, and they are 
reducing the amount of Federal assistance we will provide in the years 
to come because they will be more productive, which is the payback you 
want to see from foreign assistance dollars when they are invested.
  As far as Joseph Koni is concerned, America knows he is a bad man, 
that he is indicted by the International Criminal Court, and America is 
making the investment of intelligence and manpower to assist the 
Central African Republic, Uganda, the Congo, and the South Sudan to 
pursue him until he is captured. He needs to be brought to justice for 
the evil and terror he has contributed to the continent of Africa.
  I was proud to go and see America's investment of our best, our men 
and women in harm's way in Africa who are looking for him and providing 
the assistance necessary to bring him to justice.
  With that said, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Ohio is recognized.
  Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Georgia. I 
so appreciate Senator Isakson's comments about Africa. He is lucky 
enough to represent the CDC, which is one of the greatest organizations 
in human history, which has made such a difference in health care for 
low-income people in this country and around the world and, frankly, 
not just low-income people but what we call the public health of this 
country. Few achievements are greater than the achievements of public 
health, whether it is eradicating smallpox internationally--we are both 
old enough--the Presiding Officer may not be--to remember kids that we 
knew from grade school who were afflicted with polio and the fear of 
every parent that their child might get that, and the CDC and the 
public health system in this country removed that threat with vaccines 
and all that.


                         The Export-Import Bank

  Mr. President, I rise briefly for 4 or 5 minutes to talk about one 
way that companies in my State grow and create jobs, and that is by 
selling their products around the world. President Obama set a goal to 
double exports from the United States in the next 5 years. I am part of 
the President's advisory council. There is a handful of Senators and a 
few Members of the House of Representatives who are part of this 
advisory committee, along with many business leaders in the country, 
CEOs of large companies, presidents and CEOs of small companies, small 
businesses, too, to advise the President.
  Earlier today, I joined with Fred Hochberg, president of the Export-
Import Bank of the United States, and Eric Burkland, president of the 
Ohio Manufacturing Association in Columbus, to discuss the need to 
reauthorize the Export-Import Bank.
  Ohio has had quicker increases in job growth than other States. We 
are coming back; our unemployment rate is now lower than the national 
average, but it is still far too high. Too many Ohioans want to work 
and cannot find jobs. Some have jobs but are not working full time or 
their pay has been cut or is stagnant. Manufacturing is gaining 
nationally, adding 470,000 jobs since January 2010. To put that into 
historical perspective, for 12 years, from 1997 to 2010--12-plus 
years--we saw a manufacturing job loss in this country every single 
year from the year before, with fewer factories, fewer workers, and 
less manufacturing. But since early 2010, we have seen almost every 
single month, in Ohio and across the country, job growth in 
manufacturing. It is still not enough. It is positive, but we are not 
out of the woods yet. I fear we take a step back if Congress fails to 
reauthorize the Export-Import Bank.
  We know that Ohio manufacturers and small businesses can compete with 
anyone in the world, from Zanesville to Springfield, to Ashtabula, to 
Toledo; American manufacturers can compete with anybody in the world if 
there is a level playing field.
  We know how to make things in Ohio. When we stamp ``made in Ohio'' on 
a product, we know it was made with pride and by some of the most 
efficient, progressive companies in the world, and some of the best 
workers in the world.
  Exporting is tough, especially for small businesses. Fewer than 1 
percent of the Nation's nearly 26 million small businesses export their 
products. Very few small businesses are able to export for a whole host 
of reasons.
  I hear from small business owners who want to expand and who want to 
get access to foreign markets, but they can't secure private financing 
due to the credit risks associated with some overseas investments. One 
of the most important resources to help small businesses and midsize 
manufacturers to boost their exports is the Export-Import Bank.
  Ex-Im's mission is simple: It facilitates exports and contributes to 
job creation in the United States. It does it through loans, through 
guarantees, through insurance. It fills in gaps through trade financing 
at no cost to taxpayers. The market sometimes doesn't deliver in these 
situations. The Ex-Im Bank can fill in some gaps and help companies 
that have the ability to grow and export to actually do that.
  The Ex-Im Bank generates revenue to the U.S. Treasury. Yet despite 
this record of success in exports, jobs are at stake because Congress 
cannot agree to the Ex-Im reauthorization. The Ex-Im Bank's lending 
authority expires May 31. We know companies that export products create 
jobs, pay higher wages, and are more likely to remain in business. 
Export-supported jobs linked to manufacturing already account for an 
estimated 7 percent. One out of fourteen of Ohio's total private sector 
jobs, 1 out of 14 Ohio workers are linked to export. More than one-
fourth of manufacturing workers in Ohio depend on exports for their 
jobs--the eighth highest among the 50 States.
  We need to do a better job in ensuring that America's small 
businesses have access to that global market. The Ex-Im Bank helps. It 
provides credit that otherwise wouldn't be available to turn export 
opportunities for businesses into increased jobs, higher wages, and 
increased sales.
  In 2011, the bank worked with almost 100 Ohio businesses to support 
more than $400 million in export sales. According to the National 
Association of Manufacturers, Ex-Im supports 290,000 export-related 
jobs. More than 8 percent of Ex-Im's transactions supported small 
businesses last year.
  Renewing the bank's charter should be a cause all Senators support, 
just like the 25 times the Senate has overwhelmingly reauthorized the 
agency since its establishment in 1934. Think about that. Since 1934, 
time after time after time, this body has unanimously or overwhelmingly 
reauthorized--kept going--the Export-Import Bank--but not today, for 
whatever reason. Perhaps it is the same reason as when the Presiding 
Officer's Buffett rule was on the floor of the Senate this week that a 
number of Senators said no to moving forward. I don't know if it is 
because the Republican leader has said he wants President Obama to fail 
or if it is just this rigid philosophy that there is no positive role 
for government.
  Whether it is the highway bill, the Buffett rule or the Ex-Im Bank, 
we know at least that the Ex-Im Bank works, and it is strongly 
supported by the chamber of commerce, the National Association of 
Manufacturers, and the machinists who testified in our Banking 
Committee this week. It is supported by all kinds of people who want to 
see this economy grow. Unfortunately, a number of my colleagues, for 
whatever reason, don't want to move forward.
  This is a matter of American jobs. It is a matter of competitiveness. 
We had

[[Page S2487]]

a trade deficit with China of $295 billion in 2011, meaning every day 
we buy about $800 million more in goods from China than we sell to 
China. The first President Bush, some years ago, said that $1 billion 
in exports or imports could translate into 13,000 jobs. When we have a 
$295 billion deficit, with one country alone last year, one can see the 
kind of job loss it means. We know China's Export-Import and 
development banks provide as much as $100 billion in export credits 
each year. That is three times as many new export credits as the U.S. 
Export-Import Bank does.
  So we know, even with reauthorization, that China still does way more 
of this than the United States. Yet we are unilaterally disarming if we 
allow this May 31 date to come and go and the Ex-Im Bank 
reauthorization expires. It makes no sense for our manufacturers, for 
our big and small companies, and it makes no sense for our workers and 
our communities that will all be hurt if we don't do that.
  It is time to end the delay. It is time to reauthorize the Export-
Import Bank.
  I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. 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. Bennet). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.


                       Surface Transportation Act

  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. First, I want to thank my colleague, Senator Cardin, 
and just recently Senator Brown of Ohio, for referencing the highway 
bill.
  The state of play on that at this point is that the House has just 
passed another extension. We passed an extension back at the end of 
March that extended the existing highway program to the end of June. 
What that bill did is cause significant job loss because not knowing 
for sure what the highway plan will be means that jobs will fall off 
the list of the departments of transportation around the country. So a 
further extension to September--which just passed the House 1 hour 
ago--just makes the situation even worse.
  The solution to that problem is to make sure the House and the Senate 
appoint their conferees so we can get to conference quickly on that 
bill and get out a lasting authorization.
  So I want to again thank Senator Cardin for spending some time on the 
floor this afternoon on that subject. We will keep the pressure on 
until we actually have a highway authorization as we go through these 
different procedural hurdles.


                             Climate Change

  I came to speak on the floor about an issue that many in Washington 
would prefer to ignore; that is, climate changes that are being caused 
by our carbon pollution. Nature keeps sending us messages about what is 
happening out there, and in Washington we continue to ignore those 
messages. But they keep on coming.
  Every week for the past 15 months I have distributed in our caucus, 
as the Presiding Officer knows, a quick thumbnail summary of the week's 
Climate News.
  The stories from this week include that ``Temperature Variations''--
which relate to the extra energy put into the climate by the warming 
weather--``Could Lower Life Expectancies of the Chronically Ill.'' That 
is one story.
  Another is a new report from the NOAA that ``Coral Risks Extinction 
Due to Climate Change.'' More than 50 coral species in U.S. waters are 
likely to go extinct by the end of the century, and the experts cited 
human-driven releases of carbon dioxide as a key driver of the ocean's 
warming and acidification that is causing these extinctions.
  A third is, ``Tree Diseases Likely to Spread as Temperatures Rise.'' 
According to a new report by the U.S. Forest Service, forest diseases 
are expected to spread more quickly in the western U.S. as climate 
change warms the region's forests.
  The fourth is a recent study published in the journal Nature, which 
finds that rising carbon dioxide levels drove temperature increases at 
the end of the last Ice Age. At the end of the last Ice Age, 
atmospheric CO2 concentrations rose 80 parts per million. 
Over the past 100 years, CO2 concentrations have risen 
roughly 100 parts per million. So the effects are linked very closely 
to climate.
  Other news, as reported in the Providence Journal on March 30, said: 
The winter's warm air temperatures have helped drive up water 
temperatures in the Gulf of Maine, in line with a continuing trend, and 
the warm waters could result in lobsters molting their shells earlier 
than usual and ocean algae blooming ahead of schedule.
  Jeffrey Runge, a biological oceanographer at the University of Maine 
and a researcher at the Gulf of Maine Research Institute in Portland, 
told the paper that the Gulf of Maine water temperatures have been 
rising gradually since at least the 1870s, but the increase has been 
pronounced in the last decade or so.
  Moving from the North to the South, we have Professor Emeritus Orrin 
H. Pilkey, a professor of geology at Duke University, who wrote in the 
Charlotte Observer on March 25 that new peer-reviewed research 
demonstrates that sea level rise and storm-surge elevations could be 
greater along much of the U.S. coastline than has been predicted. His 
opinion piece went on to say that North Carolina, Washington, 
California, Louisiana, Florida, and Maine have convened sea level rise 
panels that estimate a sea level rise of 3 to 5 feet by the year 2100.
  A new study has come out from the Center for Biological Diversity 
confirming the link between massive oyster die-offs in the Pacific 
Northwest and ocean acidification caused by carbon dioxide emissions. 
The release reports that each day the oceans absorb 22 million tons of 
carbon dioxide pollution from cars and industry, setting off an 
unprecedented chemical reaction that since the Industrial Revolution 
has made the world's oceans 30 percent more acidic.
  Just this morning in the Senate, Senators Bingaman and Murkowski held 
a bipartisan hearing on the devastating effects of sea level rise on 
coastal communities. So it is good that some leaders on both sides of 
the aisle are starting to talk about the terrible consequences of 
climate change.
  However, the special interests who control so much of what goes on 
around here and who deny that carbon pollution causes global 
temperatures to increase and deny that melting ice caps will raise our 
seas to dangerous levels still have a stronghold. Dr. Pilkey, writing 
in the Charlotte Observer, warned that the deniers' influence is, 
tragically, starting to influence local planning decisions, despite 
what he calls ``new studies that predict higher than previously 
predicted sea level rise and storm-surge levels in coming decades.'' He 
concludes:

       Preservation of the status quo (including real estate 
     prices) may prevail on our coasts, but in a democratic 
     society such as ours, the state has no right to shield 
     citizens from unpleasant environmental realities.

  In the face of so much evidence constantly, daily, of a changing 
climate, we have special interests working overtime in Washington to 
propagate a myth. This myth is that the jury is still out on climate 
change caused by carbon pollution. So with the jury still out, we don't 
need to worry about it or even take precautions.
  This is simply outright false. Virtually all of our most prestigious 
scientific and academic institutions have stated that climate change is 
happening and that human activities are the driving cause of this 
change.
  On October 21, 2009, I think all of us in the Senate received a 
letter from virtually every leading scientific organization in the 
country, stating:

       Observations throughout the world make it clear that 
     climate change is occurring, and rigorous scientific research 
     demonstrates that the greenhouse gases emitted by human 
     activities are the primary driver. These conclusions are 
     based on multiple independent lines of evidence, and 
     contrary assertions are inconsistent with an objective 
     assessment of the vast body of peer-reviewed science.
       Contrary assertions are inconsistent with an objective 
     assessment of the vast body of peer-reviewed science.

  So the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the 
Chemical Society, Geophysical Union, Institute of Biological Sciences, 
Meteorological Society, Society of Agronomy, Society of Plant 
Biologists, Botanical Society, and on and on it goes of the scientific 
community signed up for this.

[[Page S2488]]

  It is, of course, not just the scientific community that knows that 
the jury is not in fact still out; that knows that in fact the verdict 
is in and that it is time to act. The insurance industry is alarmed 
about our inaction and has started to take action, holding a press 
conference with myself and Senator Sanders not too long ago.
  Marsh & McLennan, one of the largest insurance brokers in the world, 
called climate change ``one of the most significant emerging risks 
facing the world today.'' The insurance giant AIG has established an 
Office of Environment and Climate Change to assess the risks to 
insurers in the years ahead.
  It is not just the insurance industry. It is our intelligence 
community, it is our military services, many of our electric utilities, 
some of our biggest capitalists and investors all recognize that the 
jury is not still out; that in fact a verdict is in, and we should act.
  Unfortunately, Governor Romney once wrote:

       I believe that climate change is occurring. I also believe 
     that human activity is a contributing factor.

  Under the pressure of the Republican primary, he has changed his 
views and now claims: ``We don't know what's causing climate change on 
this planet.''
  Well, that runs contrary to the evidence. More than 97 percent of the 
climate scientists most actively involved in publishing on this issue 
accept that the verdict is actually in on carbon pollution causing 
climate change and oceanic changes--97 percent. Think of that in terms 
of your own life if you were relying on expert opinion.
  If you had a child who was sick and you went to a doctor and they 
said: She is pretty sick and she needs treatment, you thought: Well, 
let's be prudent and let's get a second opinion. So on you went and got 
a third opinion and a fourth opinion. Let's say you were just a wildly 
determined parent, and you went and got 99 more second opinions so that 
you had 100 opinions of doctors, and 97 of those 100 doctors said: Yes, 
your child is ill and you need to do something about this.
  How foolish would you be if you did not pay attention to the 97 
percent and you allowed the 3 percent to sway your judgment and not 
take action to protect your child. Well, it looks as if Governor Romney 
is with the 1 percent when it comes to the economy for the middle 
class, and he is with the 3 percent when it comes to the science of 
carbon pollution.
  This is not very debatable stuff. The basic principle that carbon 
dioxide traps heat in the atmosphere and traps more of it as its 
concentration increases was determined in 1863, at the time of the 
American Civil War. There is nothing new about this.
  In the early 1900s it became clear that changes in the amount of 
carbon dioxide in the atmosphere could account for significant 
increases and decreases in the Earth's annual average temperatures, and 
that carbon dioxide released from what we call anthropogenic sources, 
manmade sources--primarily then the burning of coal--would contribute 
to these changes. This is well-established stuff, and the effects are 
measurable.
  Over the last 800,000 years, until very recently, the atmosphere 
stayed within a bandwidth of 170 to 300 parts per million of carbon 
dioxide, 170 to 300 parts per million. That is the bandwidth, and that 
is a measurement. That is not a theory. We know that. We can find 
ancient bubbles in ancient ice and measure, and there are different 
ways that scientists do this, but it is measurement.
  Since the Industrial Revolution, we have burned carbon-rich fuels, 
also in a measurable way. Now we know we burn up to 7 to 8 gigatons a 
year. That is the release. A gigaton, by the way, is a billion with a 
``b'' metric tons. When you release that enormous amount of carbon into 
the atmosphere, it is predictable that it would have a result, and, 
indeed, it is having a result. We now measure carbon concentrations 
climbing in the Earth's atmosphere--again, a measurement, not a theory. 
The present concentration exceeds 390 parts per million. For 8,000 
centuries we were in a bandwidth of between 170 and 300, and in recent 
years we have veered out that bandwidth. We are at 390 parts per 
million and climbing.
  The increase has a trajectory--there is nothing very new about 
plotting trajectories either. Children do that in school, soldiers do 
that in the field, corporations do that to plan their businesses, and 
scientists do that. We do that every day. If you follow the trajectory 
of our carbon pollution, it predicts 668 parts per million at the end 
of this century and 1,097 parts per million at the end of the next 
century. Those carbon concentrations are not just outside the bounds of 
8,000 centuries but of millions of years.
  It is coming home to roost particularly in our oceans, which is a 
matter of real concern to me as a Senator from the Ocean State. In 
April of last year, a group of scientific experts came together at the 
University of Oxford to discuss the current state of our oceans. Their 
workshop report stated:

       Human actions have resulted in warming and acidification of 
     the oceans and are now causing increased hypoxia.

  That is when there is not enough oxygen in the water to sustain life.

       Studies of the Earth's past indicate that these are the 
     three symptoms . . . associated with each of the previous 5 
     mass extinctions on Earth.

  We experienced two mass ocean extinctions, 55 and 251 million years 
ago. Last year at Brown University in Providence, RI, paleobiologist 
Jessica Whiteside published a study demonstrating that after the 
earlier extinction 251 million years ago, it took 8 million years for 
plant and animal diversity to return to preextinction levels. We also 
know that in the lead-up to those extinctions, scientists have 
estimated that the Earth was emitting carbon into the atmosphere at the 
rate in the first one of 2.2 gigatons and 1 to 2 gigatons per year, 
respectively. You recall we are currently releasing at the rate of 7 to 
8 gigatons per year.
  We are taking some very dangerous chances with our planet. We have 
very solid information that is the product of measurement and not 
theory about the changes that are already underway. It is a continuing 
disgrace that in this building and in this Chamber, we are unable to do 
anything about this issue because of the continuing power of a small 
group of special interests who are controlling the debate, who are 
interfering with progress, and who are putting us all at risk.
  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. MORAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. MORAN. I ask unanimous consent that I be allowed to address the 
Senate as in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                         Postal Service Reform

  Mr. MORAN. Mr. President, I am here this evening to express concern 
about the developments of the day in which I thought we were going to 
be addressing the issue of postal reform with the goal of making 
certain that this Senate, this Congress makes decisions in short order 
that would preserve the financial viability, the future of postal 
delivery and the Postal Service of the United States. I am concerned 
now because apparently the process has been put in place by which 
virtually no amendment can be offered to the 21st Century Postal 
Service Act of 2011.
  On two occasions I voted to proceed to this piece of legislation. It 
is an important one, in my view. The idea of reforming and improving 
the opportunity for the financial viability of the Postal Service is 
important to the country. It matters to the Nation. We have an 
obligation under the U.S. Constitution to provide postal service. It 
matters in the sense that there are many items that are transported in 
commerce on an ongoing daily basis in which the Postal Service is the 
method by which that transportation occurs, by which we certainly 
deliver mail and packages. Shipping occurs in the United States as a 
result of the viability of the U.S. Postal Service. It is important, in 
my view, especially to me as a Kansan.
  One of the things that is pending in the absence of reform, 
improvements, and financial stability in the Postal Service is the 
potential demise of many rural post offices across Kansas and around 
the country. In my view,

[[Page S2489]]

and I have expressed this to the Postmaster General, the U.S. Postal 
Service on many occasions has made a decision that I think, while it 
may save a few dollars, reduces the service the Postal Service provides 
and ultimately hastens the day in which the Postal Service has even 
more challenges remaining viable. One of those was the decision by the 
Postal Service to close many rural post offices across the country, 
130-plus in Kansas.
  We have had attendance at more than 90 of the community meetings that 
revolve around the potential closing of a post office. I have expressed 
great concern in the committee. I serve on the Committee on Homeland 
Security, in which this bill originates. During that markup and debate, 
I expressed concern then and expressed concern on several occasions to 
the Postmaster General that there is no basis for making an intelligent 
decision about which post office should or should not be closed. In 
fact, when citizens across Kansas and across the country attend one of 
these community meetings, their question to the representative of the 
Postal Service is, What can our community do? What can I do to make 
certain our post office remains open and we have the opportunity to 
receive and have mail delivered from here at the U.S. post office in 
our community?

  In working with the committee, provisions were added to the 21st 
Century Postal Service Act that create criteria by which these 
decisions would be made and the community has an opportunity to appeal 
should the decision be adverse and those criteria not met.
  In my view, the Senate should not delay any longer addressing the 
issue of what we do to make certain the Postal Service is and remains 
viable today and in the future. It matters, as I say, for a series of 
reasons but certainly to me as a Kansan who is concerned about what 
happens to the community, its senior citizens, if there is no longer 
postal service provided.
  I know there are some in the Senate and in the House of 
Representatives and across the country who want to make certain the 
Postal Service is operated as a business. I certainly support that 
concept and believe we ought to do what is necessary to improve the 
business environment by which the Postal Service conducts its business. 
There is a long list of those. Some of them are addressed in the 
legislation that I hope remains pending here in the Senate.
  But there is another reason in addition to the need to provide 
service to Americans that we need to address this issue. I want to make 
certain the decisions we make today eliminate the need that there ever 
would be a call upon the taxpayers of the United States to provide 
taxpayer dollars to support the Postal Service.
  I am here this evening to encourage my colleagues but particularly 
the majority leader to work to find an agreement by which amendments 
can be offered to this bill so that we do not lose the opportunity we 
have this week and next to address this issue of making certain we make 
changes to the Postal Service that allow it to be successful.
  I am concerned that, as I understand it, there is no agreement yet 
that would allow Members of the Senate to offer amendments to this 
legislation. While the provisions of this bill are important to me and 
important to Kansans, I also recognize the importance to every Member 
of the Senate to be able to offer legislation, to have debate, to make 
certain that our rights are protected. I know that particularly in a 
sense as a member of the minority, as a Republican in the Senate, but I 
know that even more as a member of a minority called rural America. I 
do not want to lose the opportunity in the Senate for me to be able to 
speak on issues that are important to my constituents and to be able to 
offer amendments to legislation that is important to a minority of 
Americans called rural America.
  What I am troubled by and what I want to see addressed is the 
legislation that is pending. I do not want it to disappear because 
there is no agreement for Members of the Senate, all 100 of us, 
majority and minority, to offer amendments. So I am asking the majority 
leader to work with Senators to make certain their amendments are 
available for consideration in this legislation. Don't put me and other 
Senators, who care about this legislation, in the position of not being 
able to support moving forward because the rights of some Senators have 
been violated in their ability to offer amendments to this piece of 
legislation.
  Again, this matters. The Postal Service desperately needs our 
attention. The American people who are served by the Postal Service 
desperately need our attention. We need to set the stage today in which 
the taxpayers of the United States are protected from any future calls 
for support for the U.S. Postal Service. We need to make certain in 
that process, as we pursue this legislation, that the ability of those 
who live in rural communities, where it is very difficult for the 
Postal Service to be financially viable, to have access to the Postal 
Service is not trampled on by the desire to see that only those post 
offices that are financially viable individually are the ones that 
remain. In fact, I remind my colleagues that the Postal Rate Service 
Commission in their study said we could close 3,700 post offices in the 
United States and save less than .7 percent of the money necessary to 
put the Postal Service back on a financially sound basis.
  This legislation is important. The concepts that are contained in it 
matter to me as a Member of the Senate who represents a very rural 
State, Kansas. But I also know how important it is to make sure we do 
not lose our ability to offer amendments on this legislation or 
legislation in the future.
  Please, Mr. Majority Leader and other Senators, please come together 
to make certain those rights are protected so this legislation can be 
fully considered by the Senate.
  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. REID. 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.

                          ____________________