[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 22]
[Senate]
[Pages 30968-30969]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                   FARM, NUTRITION, AND BIOENERGY ACT

  Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, we have been working very diligently on 
both sides of the aisle today to put together a list of amendments we 
could agree with each other would be the maximum number and substance 
of amendments that would be offered on the farm bill. Senator Reid, 
Senator McConnell, Senator Harkin, Senator Conrad, and myself have all 
been engaged in different conversations today about these amendments. 
At the end of the day, the lists we have come up with are very long on 
both sides. I think the total number exceeds 275.
  As we all know, on bills of this magnitude, an overwhelming number of 
those amendments will ultimately disappear. We will dispose of them by 
either bringing them to the floor by accepting them or by the authors 
and proponents of those amendments agreeing at the end of the day that 
they simply don't want to do anything other than talk about their 
amendments.
  We are not able to enter into a unanimous consent agreement on this 
right now. I understand the leadership is going to wait until in the 
morning to do that. But by starting first thing in the morning, I think 
we do have the opportunity to move through a significant number of 
these amendments, and I encourage the proponents of the amendments on 
both sides of the aisle to think seriously about whether you want to 
see a farm bill completed, and if you do, then come down, agree to a 
minimal amount of time we can use for debate and discussion on the 
amendments, and let's move through these amendments with as much haste 
as we possibly can.
  I do regret that--we are here ready to agree to a unanimous consent 
that this will be the complete list and we will begin working and we 
look forward to being here tomorrow in that same frame of mind, to 
agree to the list of amendments as proposed on both sides of the aisle. 
We are not happy with some of their amendments and I understand they 
are not happy with some of the amendments coming from this side. Again, 
that is the way this body has always worked, and I hope in the morning 
we are ready to proceed and we can move toward debate, discussion, and 
voting on these various amendments, and that we can conclude this as 
soon as possible, whether that is before we leave this week--it may be 
impossible--but in any event, we will begin work on it tomorrow.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, while my friend is on the floor and my 
friend from South Dakota is on the floor, through the Chair to my 
friend from Georgia, looking at these two lists kind of puts a smile on 
your face, because it is quite a list. There is a multitude of tax 
issues and a lot of things totally not relevant to this farm bill.
  But I would say through the Chair to my friend that I am going to 
take a look at this--I have had some good meetings with my staff and 
Senator Harkin today--and make a decision about what we should do on 
this tomorrow. But the question I have of my friend from Georgia is how 
long do we have to work on this, work our way through these amendments? 
There are about 280 or 290 amendments. I sit here today and I say 
again, I have no doubt that the vast majority of the Democrats--with a 
significant majority of Democrats, with a handful of help from the 
Republicans, cloture would be invoked on this bill.
  So I say to my friend, how long do you think we should play around 
with all of these amendments? Is there a magic number we need to have 
votes on some of them? When should I file cloture? If farm State 
Senators and if other Senators want a farm bill, time is wasting. We 
have a few more days left in this work period before Thanksgiving, and 
when we come back after Thanksgiving we have a very short 3 weeks to 
get all of the Federal Government's work done that has to be done 
before the calendar year ends. So I don't expect my friend to answer 
the question without talking to my counterpart on the other side, but I 
want him to think about how much longer do we do this little gesture we 
are going through here? We have wasted a lot of time. The question the 
Republicans have to make a decision on is do they want a farm bill? We 
want one. We want a farm bill. We will take the bill that came out of 
committee--the vast majority of us--but we know there are some 
amendments we need to do. I think it is important we do the Dorgan 
amendment. I think it is important we do the Lugar amendment. I do 
think the substitute and the payment limits are something we need to 
do, but I don't know how much more of this we should be concerned 
about.
  I will have some meetings in the morning and we will report back to 
the ranking member of this very important committee.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Georgia is recognized.
  Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I say to the majority leader I 
appreciate his comments. Obviously, I don't have the answer to the 
question as to how long we should consider the amendments before we 
file cloture. That is a decision for the majority leader to make on his 
own, hopefully in consultation with the leadership on this side. But 
what I would say is we started this process last week. There were 
procedural issues that had to be resolved last week. We sat around for 
a couple of days without being able to bring up amendments. Here we are 
again. We have sat around today, again, without having the opportunity 
to bring them up. After having served 8

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years in the House, I have an appreciation of the Senate as I have 
never had before. It is a deliberative body that our forefathers 
decided it should be, and I have seen no better example of that 
deliberation than I have on this particular bill.
  That being said, we won't know when it is the right time to file 
cloture until we begin the work, and if we begin the work on this 
tomorrow, I know from our side of the aisle--and I will make the 
commitment--we will move these amendments as quickly as possible. There 
is the great likelihood that a number of these amendments won't be 
called up, but we won't know until we get into the process.
  My farmers and ranchers want a farm bill. They like the one we have, 
but this bill, in my opinion, improves ag policy for the next 5 years. 
If we should not be able to get a farm bill, then an extension of the 
current farm bill is one of the options that is out there.
  I have said all along that I think we could improve that product and 
this farm bill does that. So I hope we can come here in the morning 
with the idea that we are going to take up these amendments and we will 
take the Grassley and Dorgan amendment as the first one. That is on 
payment limits. I am opposed to the amendment and I will have a lot to 
say about it during the debate, but we are ready to talk about it and 
we are ready to begin the process. I hope that with all of the counsel 
available to the majority leader, he will be prepared with us to begin 
the debate and vote on these amendments in the morning.

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