[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 149 (2003), Part 19]
[Senate]
[Pages 26709-26710]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




               RECOGNITION OF THE ACTING MINORITY LEADER

  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The deputy Democratic leader.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, one question I have gotten over here several 
times, and I have raised this issue on the floor, Senator McConnell has 
said on two separate occasions that a week from this Monday, we will be 
working. People are changing schedules and all.
  My personal feeling is we should be working. I hope the leader, 
whatever the final decision--I understand the preliminary decision is 
we would be working a week from Monday, more so than just 5 o'clock at 
night.
  If we are to have any hope of getting out of here in time for 
important events such as people's birthdays and events of that nature, 
we have to really move forward. I say that actually recognizing the 
Presiding Officer has a very important date coming up--it is the 18th 
or 20th, or something like that.
  Seriously, if we can have a signoff on what you are going to do that 
day, it would be important to everybody.
  Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, in response, through the Chair, the 
intention right now is to work Monday, make that a full working day. As 
we finished last night at about midnight, a lot of people were saying 
we can't work any harder than what we are doing right now in terms of 
taking these bills one by one, and that is the way we are going to have 
to work, unfortunately--or fortunately--in order to complete what we 
have before us; thus the intentions for the day before Veterans Day.
  The real issue, obviously, for our colleagues, because they 
understand, but for others who are listening to understand, Veterans 
Day is a day we want to be able to honor, and a lot of people will have 
to change their plans because they have to be flying to the west coast. 
But I want to make it clear our intention is to stay here and work. In 
truth, that is what the people around the country expect us to do. We 
have work right now. We have the Nation's business before us, in terms 
of the appropriations bills, the many conference reports that we are 
waiting for, the very important conference in terms of energy and 
Medicare, which is underway. So it is critical that we continue work on 
that Monday.
  It is my intention, of course, on Veterans Day, to be able to respect 
that day accordingly, as we go forward. I think we will be able to 
announce more about that in the early part of next week. The schedule 
constantly changes. I was very hopeful we could complete this Internet 
tax issue. That was really our goal. We worked very hard, but, again, 
out of consideration for our Members, we have had to move that forward 
a week. We intend to finish that the end of next week, and it is 
critical we do so.
  It is important for our colleagues to understand because about this 
time of

[[Page 26710]]

the year everybody is sort of sitting and waiting to see who is going 
to make the next move. At this point, we are trying to wrap everything 
up for the session. It means everybody needs to recognize decisions 
have to be made, very tough decisions. I am speaking in part to the 
conferees who are addressing issues right now. There are one or two 
outstanding issues in these conferences. Now is the time to make those 
decisions. If not, we will be here all the way up to Thanksgiving, and 
after Thanksgiving, and up to the December holidays. That is really 
unacceptable to me. But now is the time to wrap things up, over these 
next several weeks.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I have said on the floor previously that the 
veterans of America recognize how important our work is here. So much 
that we do reflects on these different programs. I also think if things 
are as difficult as they appear, we may have to do something on that 
Tuesday. That will certainly be up to the leader. But I also recognize 
that other than Senator Frist and Senator Daschle, no one has had a 
more difficult job these last few weeks than the Presiding Officer and 
Senator Byrd. Trying to marshal through these appropriations bills is 
extremely difficult.
  But we have made really good progress. To think we have been able in 
just the last few weeks to do as much as we have here on the Senate 
floor with the appropriations bills is significant. Debating the 
Interior appropriations conference report this coming Monday is also 
important. I think there is light at end of the tunnel. With the 
chairman cajoling, along with the Presiding Officer, we can continue to 
make progress.

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