[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 23]
[Senate]
[Pages 31547-31576]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




    MAKING EMERGENCY SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATIONS--MOTION TO PROCEED

  Mr. McCONNELL. Madam President, I understand that the majority may 
move to proceed to the supplemental bill passed by the House last 
night. That bill imposes at least two policy restrictions that will 
compel a veto: directing the readiness standard the Defense Department 
must follow before a unit may be deployed, and expanding the 
interrogation procedures established in the Army Field Manual over to 
the intelligence community.
  The House bill will also compel the immediate withdrawal of forces, 
regardless of what General Petraeus's orders may be. Petraeus has 
established a reasonable timeline for the transition of mission and 
drawdown, and, frankly, we ought to support him. The Marine 
expeditionary unit identified by General Petraeus in September for 
withdrawal has left Iraq, and an Army brigade is headed home over the 
next month.


                             cloture motion

  Madam President, I move to proceed to Calendar No. 484, S. 2340, the 
troop funding bill. I send a cloture motion to the desk.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The cloture motion having been presented under 
rule XXII, the Chair directs the clerk to read the motion.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

                             Cloture Motion

       We, the undersigned Senators, in accordance with the 
     provisions of rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate, 
     do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the motion to 
     proceed to S. 2340, a bill making emergency supplemental 
     appropriations for the Department of Defense for the fiscal 
     year ending September 30, 2008.
         Mitch McConnell, Saxby Chambliss, Bob Corker, Wayne 
           Allard, Thad Cochran, John Cornyn, Kay Bailey 
           Hutchison, Lisa Murkowski, Orrin Hatch, Richard Burr, 
           Trent Lott, Mike Crapo, Pat Roberts, Chuck Grassley, 
           Jon Kyl, Norm Coleman, Mel Martinez.

  Mr. McCONNELL. Madam President, Secretary Gates stated clearly 
yesterday that the Army and Marine Corps will run out of operating 
funds early next year. This funding shortfall will harm units preparing 
for deployment and those training for their basic missions. We should 
not cut off funding for our troops in the field, particularly at a 
moment when the tactical success of the Petraeus plan is crystal clear. 
Attacks and casualties are down. Political cooperation is occurring at 
the local level. We should not leave our forces in the field without 
the funding they need to accomplish the mission for which they have 
been deployed.
  The Pelosi bill, if it was to get to the President's desk, of course, 
would be vetoed, as was the supplemental bill sent to the President 
earlier this year that contained a withdrawal date. Because we have a 
responsibility to provide this funding to our men and women in uniform 
as they attempt to protect the American people, we need to get a clean 
troop funding bill to the President.
  There is no particular reason to have all the votes that are likely 
to be coming our way tomorrow. I have indicated repeatedly to the 
majority leader--and we have at the staff level--that we would be more 
than happy on this side of the aisle to move both the farm bill cloture 
vote and whatever cloture vote or votes we end up having on the troop 
funding issue up to today. I hope there is still the possibility of 
doing that. I know Members on both sides of the aisle, in anticipation 
of the 2-week break, have travel plans. I am all for staying here 
longer if it makes sense, but under this particular set of 
circumstances, it doesn't make sense.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Ms. STABENOW. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum 
call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                             The Farm Bill

  Ms. STABENOW. Madam President, I rise to speak about the importance 
of the farm bill. I also wish to express the same deep concern about 
what is happening on process in the Senate, as so many of my colleagues 
and the majority leader have. This is the second week we have been 
trying to pass a food and energy security bill that is important for 
every community. The process that has gone on, frankly, since the 
beginning of the year, is one of delay, slow walking, and filibusters 
over and over again.
  Yesterday, I showed a chart that read ``52 filibusters so far this 
year.'' Tomorrow we have potentially three more votes to close off 
filibusters. One relates to funding on the war that is tied to a policy 
change the majority of Americans want to have happen to move our men 
and women out of the middle of a civil war, to refocus us instead on 
the critical areas of counterterrorism, training, support for Americans 
who remain, those things the majority of Americans want to see happen. 
We have to stop a filibuster on that tomorrow morning. We then have two 
votes potentially on stopping filibusters on the farm bill. So my 
``52'' is, as of tomorrow, potentially 55 filibusters this year.
  We have never seen the level of filibustering that we have had in the 
current session of the Senate with our friends on the other side of the 
aisle.
  In spite of the slowdown, in spite of the blocking of efforts to vote 
on amendments and to get a farm bill done last week, in spite of 
efforts this week, I am proud to say that yesterday we were able to 
work together to pass a reauthorization of Head Start. This is 
something that was done on a bipartisan basis. It will go to the 
President. We expect him to sign it. It will increase standards for 
teachers and extend resources so more children can receive Head Start 
funding. Head Start is so important to prepare children for school, to 
give them a head start. It is a wonderful program that involves parents 
being a part of the effort of preschool education. Despite what as of 
tomorrow will be 55 filibusters this year, we once again have put 
forward something that is important to the American people--investing 
in our young children, getting them ready to go to school. The Head 
Start bill did pass. I am pleased it did.
  Concerning the farm bill that is in front of us, we have worked so 
hard together. We have a bill that came out of committee unanimously, a 
strong bipartisan effort to not only support traditional agricultural 
commodities but also to move us in new directions for the future. I am 
pleased, in addition to traditional farm programs that are supported in 
Michigan, that we were able to add support for the 50 percent of the 
crops grown that haven't been under the farm bill; specialty crops, 
fruits and vegetables are now a part of this farm bill. That is 
important.
  We have also tied that to a partnership to expand nutrition, a 
significant new program expansion--it is beyond a pilot--the chairman 
of the committee has let in on fresh fruits and vegetables as snacks in 
schools, rather than children going to a vending machine and getting 
soda pop or candy. There are many parts of this farm bill that focus on 
nutrition. In fact, most people will be surprised to know the majority 
of the farm bill, over 60 percent, is in fact focused on nutrition. We 
need to get this done. We need to get this done both for our growers as 
well as for children, seniors, food banks that receive help, farmers' 
markets, organic farmers. This is very important.
  We also in this farm bill have done something very significant--I 
notice our chairman from the Finance Committee on the floor who has led 
us in this, he and our ranking member--and that is creating a permanent 
disaster relief program as a part of the farm bill. I am very pleased 
that fruit and vegetable growers will be able to participate. We need 
to be able to respond quickly when there is a disaster--a flood, a 
drought, other kinds of disasters.
  We also have moved this farm bill more aggressively in the direction 
of alternative energy, alternative fuels, biofuels. This is important 
in getting us off gasoline, off oil, when we look at prices continuing 
to rise every day. It is also a way to create jobs. In Michigan, we are 
creating hundreds of jobs now, with thousands to come, from

[[Page 31548]]

ethanol plants and biodiesel plants. As we move to cellulosic ethanol, 
we will be able to create new opportunities for my sugar beet growers 
and the folks up north who are involved in timber and wood products, as 
well as switchgrasses and other areas. This is important. It is time to 
get this done, alternative energy for the future, addressing our energy 
needs, supporting our farmers.
  I am proud also that American car companies within the next 3 years, 
by 2012, half of what they produce, half of what they manufacture will 
be flex-fuel vehicles, ethanol, other flex fuels. We need to get this 
farm bill done to be able to support that effort.
  Rural development is a critical part as well. I have small 
communities all over Michigan that would not have water and sewer 
projects if it was not for USDA rural development--another critical 
part of this bill.
  I would simply say we have seen now, since last week, delay after 
delay after delay on giving us the opportunity to move forward and get 
this farm bill done. Now is the time to do that. I hope tomorrow we 
will vote to stop filibustering, we will vote to proceed to a critical 
bill.
  Folks think the farm bill is only about rural communities, but all of 
us are impacted by every part of this farm bill. We need to get this 
done. It is time to get this done. I do not want to keep having to 
change this chart over and over again, although I fear I will, on how 
many times there is delay, how many times there is filibustering going 
on.
  We have a farm bill in front of us that needs to get done for all of 
us. It has been done in a truly bipartisan way. It has very broad 
support. Now is the time to get this done for our American farmers and 
our families.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Nelson of Nebraska). The Senator from 
Montana.


                        Drug Safety Intimidation

  Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, I see my good friend from Iowa, Senator 
Grassley, is on the floor. We will both speak on the same subject. I 
have a statement, and then I think he wants to speak next on the same 
subject.
  Today, Senator Grassley and I are placing in the Congressional Record 
a Senate Finance Committee staff report which describes a very 
disturbing series of events related to the safety of the diabetes drug 
Avandia.
  I commend Senator Grassley for his efforts on this issue, and I 
recommend this report to my colleagues.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the report be printed in 
the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

       COMMITTEE STAFF REPORT TO THE CHAIRMAN AND RANKING MEMBER

                          Committee on Finance

                  United States Senate, November 2007

    The Intimidation of Dr. John Buse and the Diabetes Drug Avandia


                            A. Introduction

       The United States Senate Committee on Finance (Committee) 
     has jurisdiction over the Medicare and Medicaid programs. 
     Accordingly, it has a responsibility to the more than 80 
     million Americans who receive health care coverage under 
     those programs to oversee the proper administration of these 
     programs, including the payment for medicines regulated by 
     the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Given the rise in 
     health care costs and the need to maintain public health and 
     safety, Medicare and Medicaid dollars should be spent on 
     drugs and devices that have been deemed safe and effective 
     for use by the FDA, in accordance with all laws and 
     regulations.
       This report summarizes the Committee Staff's findings to 
     date regarding GlaxoSmithKline's (GSK) intimidation of an 
     independent scientist who criticized Avandia, a drug GSK 
     manufactures to control glucose levels in diabetics. This 
     report is based upon an intensive review of documents 
     provided by GSK and others.
       In a letter dated May 21, 2007, the Committee asked GSK 
     about allegations that its company executives intimidated a 
     research scientist in 1999. At the time of the alleged 
     intimidation, GlaxoSmithKline was called SmithKline Beecham. 
     In 2000, SmithKline Beecham merged with Glaxo Wellcome to 
     create GlaxoSmithKline. Accordingly, throughout this report, 
     the newly formed company will be referred to as 
     GlaxoSmithKline/GSK.
       In response to the Committee's letter dated May 21, 2007, 
     that first raised these concerns about retaliation, GSK 
     quickly issued a press release to repudiate the allegation. 
     Specifically, the Wall Street Journal wrote, ``[GSK] called 
     the suggestion `absolutely false.''' However, internal 
     company documents seem to contradict that claim and reveal 
     what appears to be an orchestrated plan to stifle the opinion 
     of Dr. John Buse, a professor of medicine at the University 
     of North Carolina who specializes in diabetes.
       In particular, GSK's attempt at intimidation appears to 
     have been triggered by speeches that Dr. Buse gave at 
     scientific meetings in 1999. During those meetings, Dr. Buse 
     suggested that, aside from its benefit of controlling glucose 
     levels in diabetics, Avandia may carry cardiovascular risks.
       The effect of silencing this criticism is, in our opinion, 
     extremely serious. At a July 30, 2007, safety panel on 
     Avandia, FDA scientists presented an analysis estimating that 
     Avandia caused approximately 83,000 excess heart attacks 
     since coming on the market. Had GSK considered Avandia's 
     increased cardiovascular risk more seriously when the issue 
     was first raised in 1999 by Dr. Buse, instead of trying to 
     smother an independent medical opinion, some of these heart 
     attacks may have been avoided.
       According to documents provided to the Committee by, among 
     others, GSK, and the University of North Carolina, it is 
     apparent that the original allegations, regarding Dr. Buse 
     and GSK's attempts at silencing him are true; according to 
     relevant emails, GSK executives labeled Dr. Buse a 
     ``renegade'' and silenced his concerns about Avandia by 
     complaining to his superiors and threatening a lawsuit.
       Even more troubling, documents reveal that plans to silence 
     Dr. Buse involved discussions by executives at the highest 
     levels of GSK, including then and current CEO Jean-Pierre 
     Garnier. Also, GSK prepared and required Dr. Buse to sign a 
     letter claiming that he was no longer worried about 
     cardiovascular risks associated with Avandia.
       After Dr. Buse signed the letter, GSK officials began 
     referring to it as Dr. Buse's ``retraction letter.'' 
     Documents show that GSK intended to use this ``retraction 
     letter'' to gain favor with a financial consulting company 
     that was, among other things, evaluating GSK's products for 
     investors. After cutting short Dr. Buse's criticism, GSK 
     executives then sought to bring Dr. Buse back into GSK's 
     favor.
       While publicly silent subsequent to signing the 
     ``retraction letter,'' Dr. Buse still remained troubled about 
     Avandia and its possible risks. Years later, he wrote a 
     private email to a colleague detailing the incident with GSK:

       ``[T]he company's leadership contact[ed] my chairman and a 
     short and ugly set of interchanges occurred over a period of 
     about a week ending in my having to sign some legal document 
     in which I agreed not to discuss this issue further in 
     public.''

       Dr. Buse ended the email, ``I was certainly intimidated by 
     them. . . . It makes me embarrassed to have caved in several 
     years ago.''
       GSK's behavior since the Committee first brought these 
     allegations to light has been less than stellar. Instead of 
     acknowledging the misdeed to investors, apologizing to 
     patients, and pledging to change corporate behavior, GSK 
     launched a public relations campaign of denial. Specifically, 
     GSK sent out a press release titled ``GSK Response to US 
     Senate Committee on Finance'' which stated that the 
     allegations raised by the Committee were ``absolutely 
     false.'' Further, CEO Jean-Pierre Garnier denied having any 
     knowledge of the alleged intimidation of Dr. Buse in an 
     interview that ran in July in The Philadelphia Enquirer.


                    B. Detailed Review of Documents

       The Committee initiated an investigation into the risks and 
     benefits associated with the diabetes drug Avandia in the 
     spring of 2007. That investigation was prompted when the New 
     England Journal of Medicine published an article by Dr. 
     Steven Nissen and Ms. Kathy Wolski, noting that Avandia was 
     associated with serious cardiovascular risk, including heart 
     attacks.
       Dr. John Buse is an expert in diabetes with extensive 
     research experience in the thiazolidinedione (TZD) class of 
     drugs. This class includes Rezulin (troglitazone), Actos 
     (pioglitazone), and Avandia (rosiglitazone). In 1999, Dr. 
     Buse sent a letter to the FDA stating that Rezulin should not 
     be withdrawn over worries about liver toxicity. He noted that 
     the liver toxicity and other safety issues surrounding the 
     alternatives--rosiglitazone and pioglitazone--were not yet 
     known. He noted that the three compounds ``are dramatically 
     different in their interaction with their proposed 
     receptor.''
       Dr. Buse added that he was a consultant for Takeda-Lilly, 
     the manufacturer of Actos and had been a consultant for 
     SmithKline Beecham, which manufactured Avandia. Documents 
     from this period show that Dr. Buse was an investigator for a 
     SmithKline Beecham study on rosiglitazone as a treatment for 
     diabetes.
       Also in early 1999, Dr. Buse gave speeches at meetings of 
     the Endocrine Society and the

[[Page 31549]]

     American Diabetes Association (ADA). At both meetings, he 
     suggested that Avandia may carry increased cardiovascular 
     risks.
       In June 1999, GSK executives discussed Dr. Buse in a series 
     of emails they titled, ``Avandia Renegade.'' One email reads:

       ``[M]ention was made of John Buse from UNC who apparently 
     has repeatedly and intentionally misrepresented Avandia data 
     from the speaker's dais in various fora, most recent among 
     which was the ADA. The sentiment of the SB group was to write 
     him a firm letter that would warn him about doing this again 
     . . . with the punishment being that we will complain up his 
     academic line and to the CME granting bodies that accredit 
     his activities. . . . The question comes up as to whether you 
     think this is a sensible strategy in the future (we don't 
     really do too much work at UNC to make any threats).

       The email series also includes threats that might be made, 
     including a lawsuit and contacting Dr. Buse's colleagues at 
     UNC. SB in this email refers to SmithKline Beecham which is 
     now GSK.
       In response to this series of emails, Dr. Tachi Yamada, 
     GSK's head of research at the time, wrote in an email that he 
     had discussed Dr. Buse with GSK's CEO Dr. Jean-Pierre Gamier 
     as well as David Stout, a senior GSK executive. Dr. Gamier 
     and Mr. Stout are copied on the email. Specifically, Dr. 
     Yamada's email reads:

       ``In any case, I plan to speak to Fred Sparling, his former 
     chairman as soon as possible. I think there are two courses 
     of action. One is to sue him for knowingly defaming our 
     product even after we have set him straight as to the facts--
     the other is to launch a well planned offensive on behalf of 
     Avandia.. . .''

       Indeed, Dr. Yamada called Fred Sparling, Dr. Buse's 
     department chairman. Three days later, Dr. Buse wrote a 
     letter to Dr. Yamada attempting to clarify his position on 
     Avandia. Dr. Buse's letter began, ``I wanted to set the 
     record straight regarding all the phone calls and questions I 
     have received. . . .'' The phone calls that Dr. Buse referred 
     to were made by GSK officials including Dr. Yamada regarding 
     the speeches that Dr. Buse gave at conferences suggesting 
     cardiovascular problems associated with Avandia.
       Dr. Buse continued, ``I believe as a clinical scientist 
     that the null hypothesis should be that rosiglitazone has the 
     potential to increase cardiovascular events.'' Dr. Buse went 
     on to say that his chairman had informed him that GSK 
     executives perceived him as ``being for sale'' because he 
     received speaking fees from Takeda. Dr. Buse added that he 
     heard ``implied threats of lawsuits from my chairman and 
     James Huang. . . .'' who was then a product manager with GSK.
       Dr. Buse ended the letter to Dr. Yamada by writing, 
     ``Please call off the dogs. I cannot remain civilized much 
     longer under this kind of heat.''
       Along with his letter to Dr. Yamada, Dr. Buse enclosed a 
     separate letter. GSK officials later referred to that second 
     letter as the ``Buse retraction letter.'' In the ``retraction 
     letter,'' Dr. Buse attempted to clarify the remarks he made 
     at the medical conferences regarding Avandia.
       On July 1, 1999, Dr. Yamada wrote to Dr. Buse, thanking him 
     for the detailed explanation. Dr. Yamada's email reads, ``As 
     you may be aware, my phone call to Fred Sparling was aimed at 
     being educated. . . .'' The letter is copied to CEO Jean-
     Pierre Garnier.
       That same day, several GSK employees discussed Dr. Buse in 
     an email chain that questioned whether or not Dr. Buse signed 
     the ``retraction letter'' that was prepared by GSK. The email 
     reads:

       ``[H]ave you heard back from Dr. Buse? Did he sign your 
     proposed letter? Assuming he does retract, what are we 
     planning to do to let the world know that Dr. Buse retracted 
     his statements?''

       A second GSK employee responded, ``John Buse kindly signed 
     the clarification letter on his letterhead without any 
     change.''
       Later that day, the first GSK employee wrote, ``I'm not 
     certain what damage has now been caused by the Yamada phone 
     call to [Buse's] seniors. . . . Maybe we can obtain 
     clarification of how such situations with U.S. opinion 
     leaders in [the] future should be handled. Yeesh!''
       On July 2, 1999, several GSK officials discussed whether to 
     share with financial analysts, what they term the ``Buse 
     retraction letter.'' These financial analysts were evaluating 
     GSK's products for investors.
       In an email, a GSK employee wrote discussed talks he had 
     with the financial analysts. Several GSK executives were 
     copied on this email, including CEO Jean-Pierre Garnier, Dr. 
     Tachi Yamada, and Mr. David Stout. The email reads:

       ``I also discussed how Dr. Buse has also confirmed that 
     caution should be used in comparing the efficacy data and 
     [adverse events] data he presented. That these should not be 
     taken out of context and that the study designs, baselines, 
     etc., etc., . . . were different. . . . As a result of our 
     conversation, [FINANCIAL COMPANY NAME REDACTED] will remove 
     the `?' under the cardiovascular events and they are removing 
     the John Buse table on efficacy presented at the ADA 
     meeting.''

       But even after Dr. Buse signed the retraction letter, GSK 
     executives were torn over whether or not they could trust the 
     former ``Avandia Renegade.'' On one hand the documents reveal 
     that some GSK executives were eager to work with Dr. Buse. 
     For instance, in late November 1999, a GSK official sent an 
     email to several executives which read, ``We need to see John 
     Buse ASAP now that we know that he is involved with the NIH 
     [study].''
       On the other hand, others at GSK never fully believed that 
     Dr. Buse had completely dropped his concerns with regard to 
     Avandia and its possible cardiovascular risks. In fact, even 
     though Dr. Buse remained silent in public, he continued 
     privately to voice his opinions about cardiovascular problems 
     with Avandia. For example, after signing the retraction 
     letter, Dr. Buse wrote to the FDA Commissioner in March 2000 
     where he noted:

       ``In short, the lipid changes with troglitazone and 
     pioglitazone can only be viewed as positive. They are very 
     similar in nature. . . . As mentioned above, I remain 
     concerned about the lipid changes with rosiglitazone. . . . 
     Rosiglitazone is clearly a very different actor. I do not 
     believe that rosiglitazone will be proven safer than 
     troglitazone in clinical use under current labeling of the 
     two products. In fact, rosiglitazone may be associated with 
     less beneficial cardiac effects or even adverse cardiac 
     outcomes.''

       The following month, GSK officials acquired a copy of Dr. 
     Buse's letter to the FDA. GSK executives faxed Dr. Buse's FDA 
     letter among themselves with a cover note reading, ``We need 
     to address this as a company. . . . Looks like Dr. Buse 
     doesn't buy into our lipid or cardiovascular story.''
       Following Dr. Buse's FDA letter, GSK drafted another letter 
     to Dr. Buse from one of its executives, Martin Freed. The 
     letter reads, ``I remain concerned about your ongoing 
     aggressive posture towards rosiglitazone and SmithKline 
     Beecham. In my opinion, you have presented to [FDA] several 
     unfair, unbalanced, and unsubstantiated allegations.''
       Later in 2000, Dr. Buse reached out to GSK officials, 
     asking them to sponsor a continuing medical education (CME) 
     program about TZD use. Dr. Buse wrote in his request:

       ``I spoke to Rich Daly, the head of marketing (and sales?) 
     for Takeda. He was going to run the idea of joint support for 
     the CME program by the Takeda lawyers to make sure there are 
     no FTC issues in what I proposed. I highlighted to him that 
     the benefit to Takeda and [SmithKline Beecham] would be the 
     potential to grow interest in the class as a whole and as a 
     very public display of the end of the ``glitazone wars.''

       By late 2000, GSK officials appeared to believe that they 
     had the former ``Avandia Renegade'' under control. Emails 
     from this time refer to GSK as ``SB,'' as GSK had not yet 
     been created from the merger. In November, a GSK/SB executive 
     wrote:

       ``Just a quick note about your comment on Buse. . . . I am 
     getting messages that he is really coming around to the SB 
     side of things. He has stopped his out-right bashing and is 
     now more TZD positive with kind comments on Avandia. . . . 
     David Pernock spoke to him and said something to the effect 
     that [Glaxo Wellcome] is his friend now but GSK will be the 
     future and he needs to realize that. . . .
       ``I spoke to him separately on a couple of occasions . . . 
     and let him know that our relationship got off on the wrong 
     foot but that is in the past and we want to move on from 
     here. . . . FYI and thanks for your help in bringing J. Buse 
     back to the middle and hopefully beyond.''

       However, based upon the documents in the Committee's 
     possession, GSK executives continued to try and shape Dr. 
     Buse's views regarding Avandia. For example, in early 2001, 
     Dr. Buse contacted GSK officials, requesting citations for a 
     textbook he was writing. One official suggested that GSK 
     should both provide and interpret the information for Dr. 
     Buse, stating in an email:

       ``Our chances on having Buse reflect our views and messages 
     will be enhanced greatly if we tell him what they are rather 
     than relying on him to development [sic] on his own accord 
     via examining data. . . . [F]inally our view of the big 
     picture lipid story including LDL characteristics and fat 
     redistribution cannot be easily gleaned from our collection 
     of pieces. There is no evidence that Dr. Buse will come to 
     these views without some guidance and support. Of course care 
     will need to be taken to work any overview pieces in a way 
     that appears academic rather than too commercial to enhance 
     the probability that Dr. Buse will adopt our views as his 
     own.''

       Concern with Dr. Buse reemerged in 2002, as his 
     professional stature grew. That September, GSK officials 
     discussed bringing him further into the fold. A GSK official 
     described him as the ``most powerful Endocrinologist in the 
     Carolinas. . . . [H]e is gaining power nationally and 
     internationally.'' The email continued:

       ``[We feel] as if Dr. Buse [is] primed to move to a more 
     middle-of-the-road stance concerning TZDs. The timing for 
     this `shift' has to be right. In my opinion, that right time 
     will be with the launch of Avandamet. He is very excited 
     about the launch of this

[[Page 31550]]

     new combo product and very critical of [COMPANY NAME 
     REDACTED] for not moving faster on their combo. . . . His 
     experience with and advocacy for Avandamet could prove 
     invaluable for it's [sic] in the Blue Ridge region and 
     beyond.''

       A different GSK official responded, ``As long as we are on 
     the same page, we could consider him. . . .'' The following 
     week, another official wrote, ``It looks like marketing would 
     like us to move forward using Dr. Buse as an investigator in 
     the Avandamet program. Are you OK with this?'' Avandamet 
     refers to a combination drug for glucose control that 
     combines Avandia with metformin.
       Based on the documents in the Committee's possession, it 
     appears that Dr. Buse remained silent about his concerns 
     regarding Avandia for approximately two years. However, in 
     2005, he once again privately voiced his opinion that Avandia 
     carried cardiovascular risks. In an email he sent to Dr. 
     Steven Nissen, chairman of the Cardiology Department at the 
     Cleveland Clinic, he again revealed his ongoing concerns 
     about Avandia and described his treatment by GSK. 
     Specifically, Dr. Buse wrote:

       ``Steve: Wow! Great job on the muriglitazar article. I did 
     a similar analysis of the data at rosiglitazone's initial FDA 
     approval based on the slides that were presented at the FDA 
     hearings and found a similar association of increased severe 
     CVD events. I presented it at the Endocrine Society and ADA 
     meetings that summer. Immediately the company's leadership 
     contact[ed] my chairman and a short and ugly set of 
     interchanges occurred over a period of about a week ending in 
     my having to sign some legal document in which I agreed not 
     to discuss this issue further in public.''

       Later in the email, Dr. Buse confirmed GSK's treatment of 
     him when he wrote, ``I was certainly intimidated by them but 
     frankly did not have the granularity of data that you had and 
     decided that it was not worth it.''
       Dr. Buse concluded in his email, ``Again congratulations on 
     that very important piece of work. It makes me embarrassed to 
     have caved in several years ago.''


                             C. Conclusions

       The documents in the Committee's possession raise serious 
     concerns about the culture of leadership at GSK. Even more 
     serious perhaps is our fear that the situation with Dr. Buse 
     is part of a more troubling pattern of behavior by 
     pharmaceutical executives.
       Specifically, in 2004, Dr. Gurkirpal Singh of Stanford 
     University testified at a Committee hearing that an executive 
     at Merck sought to intimidate him by calling his superiors. 
     Merck also warned Dr. Singh that they would make life very 
     difficult for him, if he persisted in his request for data on 
     Merck's drug, Vioxx. It was later discovered that Vioxx 
     increased the risk of heart attacks and it was withdrawn from 
     the market.
       Merck's intimidation of Dr. Singh as it sought to protect 
     Vioxx bears striking similarities to apparent threats by GSK 
     against Dr. Buse to protect Avandia. The Committee is very 
     concerned that this behavior may be more prevalent in the 
     pharmaceutical industry than is evidenced by these two cases.
       Corporate intimidation, the silencing of scientific 
     dissent, and the suppression of scientific views threaten 
     both the public well-being and the financial health of the 
     federal government, which pays for health care. The behavior 
     of GSK during the time that Dr. Buse voiced concerns 
     regarding the cardiovascular risks he believed were 
     associated with Avandia was less than stellar. Had Dr. Buse 
     been able to continue voicing his concerns, without being 
     characterized as a ``renegade'' and without the need to sign 
     a ``retraction letter,'' it appears that the public good 
     would have been better served.

  Mr. BAUCUS. The report presents evidence that a pharmaceutical 
company allegedly tried to intimidate a doctor who raised concerns 
about Avandia's link to heart problems.
  A few years ago, the Senate Finance Committee uncovered a similar 
situation connected to the drug Vioxx.
  These actions are unacceptable.
  It is critical that our prescription drugs be developed based on 
rigorous experimentation, the facts, and the science, not on 
intimidation and threats of lawsuits.
  We place a great deal of trust in pharmaceutical companies to make 
safe and effective products. The health of millions of Americans, from 
young children to retirees, depends on the careful work of these drug 
manufacturers.
  Today, as I said, Senator Grassley and I are placing in the 
Congressional Record a Senate Finance Committee staff report which 
describes a very disturbing series of events related to the safety of 
the diabetes drug, Avandia.
  The report presents evidence that a pharmaceutical company allegedly 
tried to intimidate a doctor who raised concerns about Avandia's link 
to heart problems. This occurred after the doctor gave speeches at 2 
scientific meetings where he warned of the cardiovascular risks to 
those using Avandia, a drug designed to control glucose levels in 
diabetics.
  To make matters worse, the company in question denied trying to 
intimidate the doctor in the press. That claim is seriously challenged 
by e-mails presented in the staff report.
  It appears that the company labeled the doctor as a ``renegade'' and 
all but silenced him by complaining to his department chairman and 
threatening a lawsuit.
  In an e-mail contained in the report the doctor in question describes 
signing a legal document in which he agreed not to discuss the issue in 
public. He goes on to say that he felt intimidated by the actions of 
the pharmaceutical company.
  Is this the tip of the iceberg or just an isolated case? Nobody 
really knows. But just 3 years ago the Senate Finance Committee 
uncovered a similar situation connected to the drug Vioxx. A clinical 
professor at Stanford University said Merck scientists had tried to 
intimidate him after he raised questions in public about the effects of 
Vioxx.
  It was later discovered that Vioxx increased the risk of heart 
attacks and the drug was withdrawn from the market. Just last week 
Merck agreed to pay $4.8 billion to settle Vioxx lawsuits.
  As in the Vioxx case, the concerns raised by the doctor in the 
Avandia case were followed by complaints by other researchers. And 
yesterday the FDA added an additional ``black box'' warning to the 
Avandia label.
  With the Finance Committee's continued spotlight on this behavior, I 
hope we can deter similar abuses in the pharmaceutical community.
  Again, it is critical that our prescription drugs be developed based 
on rigorous experimentation, facts and science, not on intimidation and 
threats of lawsuits.
  I, again, recommend the report to my Senate colleagues, and I very 
much thank my colleague from Iowa, Senator Grassley, for his efforts 
here and, again, for his efforts on the work of this investigation.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I rise to follow Senator Baucus on 
exactly the same subject. I thank him for the period of time now, this 
year, he has been chairman of the committee, succeeding my 
chairmanship, because he has been very cooperative in my efforts to 
finish investigations that carried over with the change of Congress 
from Republican to Democratic, and also for helping us initiate new, 
needed investigations.
  But I also wish to take some time to comment exactly on what he had 
made reference to in the very report he has now submitted for the 
Record. Since he has submitted a copy, I will not ask permission to do 
that.
  It was about 3 years ago--in fact, the exact date was November 18, 
2004--I convened a hearing on the worldwide withdrawal of Vioxx, a 
blockbuster pain medication.
  That hearing turned a spotlight on systemic problems at the Food and 
Drug Administration. We found that the Food and Drug Administration 
maintained a very cozy relationship with the drug industry and 
suppressed scientific dissent regarding agency actions on drug safety.
  At that Vioxx hearing, we also heard about Merck using its power, its 
influence, and access to try and discredit an FDA safety expert, Dr. 
David Graham--a person who is still on the staff at the FDA trying to 
do the job of being a policeman for safety for the consumers of 
American pharmaceutical products.
  Merck also tried to intimidate a Stanford researcher, Dr. Gurkirpal 
Singh. The company warned him to stop asking for more safety data on 
Vioxx, despite the fact he was one of their paid consultants.
  What is troubling is that 3 years later, I am here with my colleague, 
Senator Baucus, to talk about yet another case where pharmaceutical 
executives use power, use their influence, and use access to intimidate 
a medical researcher.

[[Page 31551]]

  In essence, another company wanted to put an end to another scientist 
who was voicing concerns about the cardiovascular risks associated with 
a drug.
  Now, in this case--similar to Vioxx--we are talking about a diabetes 
drug, Avandia.
  Today, Senator Baucus and I are releasing a staff report showing how 
executives at GlaxoSmithKline intimidated Dr. John Buse, a medical 
researcher at the University of North Carolina.
  Together, our respective staffs reviewed documents provided by the 
company and by others, and they found bothersome internal e-mails that 
reveal how these pharmaceutical executives think. In these e-mails, 
high-level company officials discussed the possibility of threats--I am 
talking about threats by pharmaceutical executives--against Dr. Buse of 
North Carolina University. These threats included the possibility of 
filing a lawsuit.
  Company executives called Dr. Buse an ``Avandia Renegade'' and had 
him sign a retraction letter they wanted to give to financial analysts. 
These analysts were evaluating the company's products for investors.
  So what we have are three cases--starting with Dr. Graham, then Dr. 
Singh, and now Dr. Buse--where companies intimidated researchers who 
dared to express concerns about the safety of what they thought were 
risky drugs. In the case of both Vioxx and Avandia, the drugs actually 
turned out to carry some very serious risks.
  What I am here to say today is that attacks on medical researchers by 
the pharmaceutical industry must stop. And it has to stop right this 
minute.
  Until this practice ends, I wish to let America's scientists know I 
am very interested in their concerns. Scientists should feel free to 
contact my office if a pharmaceutical company threatens their career or 
attacks their reputation when they raise the alarm about possible 
dangerous drugs.
  They can also anonymously provide information and documents by mail 
or by fax to the committee. Here is the fax number: 202-228-2131.
  That is the warning that I put out, and the invitation that I put 
out.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. President, it does not look like anybody else wants to speak, so 
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.
  Mr. WEBB. 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. WEBB. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in 
morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                   Educational Benefits For Veterans

  Mr. WEBB. Mr. President, my first day in the Senate I introduced 
legislation that would provide educational benefits for those who have 
served in our military since 9/11 that would be the equivalent of the 
educational benefits that those who served in World War II received.
  We are very fond in this body and elsewhere in the U.S. Government of 
talking about those who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan as being 
the new ``greatest generation.'' Well, it seems to me very logical that 
if we are going to use that rhetoric, we should be able to provide 
those who have served in this difficult time with the same educational 
benefits as those who served during World War II.
  I was very privileged, for 4 years, to serve as a committee counsel 
on the House Veterans' Committee at a different point in my life, and 
was able to study the benefits that had been provided to our veterans 
from the American Revolution forward.
  I also noticed an interesting phenomenon; and that was, a good part 
of the veterans' benefits package that was provided to those who served 
in World War II was done so because of the wisdom of those who had 
served in World War I--partially because they did not receive these 
sorts of benefits. The World War I veterans were very adamant that the 
veterans coming back from World War II be treated differently than they 
were. One of the end results of that was the GI bill.
  Very recently, former Senator Bob Dole testified in front of the 
Veterans' Affairs Committee, of which I am a member. I asked him about 
his own experiences, having been wounded in World War II, and how the 
World War II GI bill assisted him in his transition to the civilian 
world. This is what he said in part:

       I think [the World War II GI bill was] the single most 
     important piece of legislation when it comes to education, 
     how it changed America more than anything I can think of. 
     [We] ought to take the same care of the veterans today.

  I could not agree more strongly. The people who served in World War 
II--there were 16 million of them--were offered an entirely different 
concept in terms of fairness in American society when they returned. 
Eight million of them were able to take advantage of a GI bill that 
provided for their tuition when they went to college, bought their 
books, and gave them a monthly stipend.
  This education benefit has gone up and down since the enactment of 
World War II GI bill. When I came back from Vietnam, the benefit was a 
monthly stipend that was not very helpful to most Vietnam veterans. 
That has been on my mind for years, as I think about the service of our 
veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan.
  Just as the World War I veterans stepped forward and took care of the 
World war II veterans, I believe it is the responsibility--not wholly, 
but strongly--of those of us who served in Vietnam and who experienced 
a lot of the disadvantages of service, once we got out, to make sure we 
take care of those who are serving now and who have served in Iraq and 
Afghanistan. It is for that reason I introduced this bill.
  To look back on the educational benefits that were derived from this 
experience, I asked my staff to take a look at those Members of this 
body--our colleagues--who served in World War II, just to see where 
they were able to go to school and to see how the World War II GI bill 
benefitted them, and then to compare that with what they would have 
been able to do today if they were the same individual having served in 
Iraq and/or Afghanistan and were coming back with today's Montgomery GI 
bill, which basically is a peacetime GI bill that was put in place well 
before 9/11 and was designed more as a little bit of a bump to assist 
in recruitment than a true readjustment benefit for people who had been 
in war.
  Our chairman, Senator Akaka, was able to go to the University of 
Hawaii under that program, the World War II GI bill. Today, if one were 
applying for the Montgomery GI bill, 41.5 percent of his education 
would have been paid for.
  Senator Inouye, who is a cosponsor of our bill, was able to attend 
George Washington Law School. Today, that would cost $48,460 a year. 
The Montgomery GI bill would pay for 12.4 percent of that.
  Senator Lautenberg, who also is a cosponsor of this bill, was able to 
go to Columbia on a full boat, graduating in 1949. Today, to go to 
Columbia, it would cost $46,874 a year. The Montgomery GI bill would 
pay for 12.8 percent of that.
  Senator Stevens was able to go to UCLA and Harvard Law School. His 
staff declined to be specific about how much of that was assisted by 
the GI bill, but if one were to go to Harvard Law School today, it 
would cost $54,066, which is about 11 percent of what the Montgomery GI 
bill would take care of.
  Senator John Warner, my senior Senator from Virginia, my esteemed 
colleague and friend, has told me many times he would not be in the 
Senate today if it had not been for the educational benefits of the GI 
bill. He was able to go to Washington and Lee for an undergraduate 
degree. Today that would cost $42,327 for 1 year, of which the 
Montgomery GI bill would pick up 14 percent. He was then able to go to 
UVA Law School, full boat, as a reward for his service. Today that 
would cost $44,800.
  Just to be fair, I am standing here today because Uncle Sam made a 
bet on me. I was able to go to the Naval Academy. The taxpayers of 
America

[[Page 31552]]

paid for that. The taxpayers of America would pay for that today, the 
same amount. I was also in a different situation than most of my 
Vietnam war veteran colleagues because after I was wounded and had 
medical difficulties with a bone infection in my leg, I was medically 
retired from the Marine Corps and was able to go to law school on a 
program called Vocational Rehabilitation, which was the exact same 
program as the people who served in World War II received. I was able 
to go to Georgetown Law School. Today that would cost $51,530 a year. 
The Montgomery GI bill would pick up 11.6 percent of it.
  So on the one hand, we are saying this is the next great generation. 
This is the next greatest generation. We never cease to talk about how 
much we value their service, these people leaving home on extended 
deployments again and again, giving us everything we ask, and then we 
are giving them a GI bill that was designed for peacetime.
  It is not because we don't spend money on education. We just passed 
legislation for Federal education grants. I voted for it. I assume the 
Presiding Officer voted for it. If you add up these grants--and these 
are grants--this is not rewarding someone for affirmative service. If 
you add up these grants, it is going to cost $18.2 billion this year. 
We are having a difficult time getting an exact number on what my GI 
bill proposal would add up to, but the best estimates we have had 
informally are about $2 billion.
  I would submit that with the cost of this war now heading well north 
of $1 trillion, and with the President coming over and saying he wants 
$200 billion on top of that and on top of an appropriations bill, we 
could spend this money in a way that will allow the people who have 
served since 9/11 a first-class future. We are saying they are that 
good; let's let them be that good.
  For that reason, I hope all of my colleagues will step forward and 
join me so we can get this legislation passed this year.
  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 legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                     FHA Modernization Act of 2007

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, each day that goes by, the depth and 
severity of our country's subprime mortgage foreclosure crisis emerges. 
It is very difficult. This week I spoke to former Secretary of the 
Treasury Rubin. I spoke also to the present Secretary of the Treasury, 
Mr. Paulson, and they both recognize we have some severe problems with 
our subprime mortgages. This is very deep. It is very hard.
  Hundreds of thousands of mortgages are now delinquent nationwide--
hundreds of thousands. That is fully twice as many as last year, and 
last year was not a good year. The most alarming fact is this could be 
just the beginning. Experts agree as more mortgage rates continue to 
expire, not thousands, not tens of thousands, but hundreds of thousands 
of American families could be at risk.
  When these introductory ``teaser'' rates expire, these teaser rates 
where they tease people into taking these loans, sometimes that they 
couldn't afford--a lot of times that they couldn't afford--when these 
higher rates arrive, the mortgages that many families can afford today 
will become impossible to pay off tomorrow. This will leave many with 
just two options: lose their homes or try to work something out on 
refinancing.
  That is what this is all about. Some say if a borrower gets into 
financial trouble, it is their obligation and it is their 
responsibility to find a way out. That is not true. If you have a piece 
of property, and it is a home and it is being foreclosed upon, you as 
the owner of that property are going to lose money. There is no 
question about it. You usually lose about 35 to 40 percent of the value 
of the home. So the borrower gets hurt. Also, the entity where the home 
is, a county or a city, if you have that property under foreclosure, 
the windows are boarded up, and it just loses value. So the tax base of 
that community suffers.
  So we need to do something about that. We are talking about families 
losing the roof over their heads. Therefore, we need to do something 
about it.
  The chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, Ben Bernanke, recognized 
that a sharp increase in foreclosed properties for sale could weaken 
the already struggling housing market and thus, potentially, the 
broader economy. He was being very deliberate. The word ``should'' 
should have been used, not ``could.'' But he was being, as he should be 
as chairman of the Federal Reserve, very cautious.
  In Nevada, this crisis is hitting very hard. In 2006, in August, the 
number of foreclosure filings had gone up by more than 200 percent. We 
could see another 21,000 foreclosures, we are told, by the beginning of 
2009 in Nevada. That is a lot of foreclosures.
  One of the things we need to do is have more money for counseling, 
which the administration has cut back.
  There are three items we need to work on in the near term: providing 
funding for foreclosure prevention counseling, modernizing the FHA 
administration, and providing temporary but necessary tools to the 
government-sponsored enterprises, Fanny and Freddie--that is Fannie Mae 
and Freddie Mac--so they can keep funding available to make or 
refinance subprime mortgages. So we need to do this.
  The Senate Banking Committee passed a bipartisan FHA Modernization 
Act of 2007 on September 9, 2007, by a vote of 20 to 1. This has broad 
support of consumers and the industry alike.
  As the name of the bill indicates, this legislation is intended to 
bring needed changes to the Federal Housing Administration that will 
make the agency more capable of providing the services that homeowners 
need in today's all-too-perilous environment.
  The FHA program encourages the private sector to make mortgages by 
offering government-backed insurance for the full balance of the loan.
  Traditionally, since its inception in 1934, the FHA has played a 
major role in providing home purchase financing to minority, first-
time, and lower income home buyers.
  Beginning in the mid-1990s, and until now, however, as more exotic 
loans entered the marketplace, FHA saw its overall market share drop 
dramatically.
  In some cases borrowers considered the more exotic loans easier to 
get. In many other cases, borrowers were directed into those loans by 
brokers who often didn't have the borrower's best interests at heart.
  Unfortunately, these exotic loans often lured borrowers with false or 
misleading information and contained ``teaser'' interest rates that, 
once expired, borrowers couldn't afford.
  These were predatory loans--and the consequences of these shady 
practices are becoming more evident every day.
  This crucial reform bill modernizes the FHA program by, among other 
things, lowering mortgage- down-payment requirements and raising the 
loan limits for FHA-backed loans.
  The result will be a better loan option for families that are having 
trouble keeping up with their exploding mortgage payments. They will 
have the option of refinancing to an FHA-backed loan with the peace of 
mind that comes with it.
  And for future homebuyers, a fully backed FHA loan with honest, up-
front terms, will help prevent crises like we now face, and ensure that 
more American families will experience all the safety, comfort and 
stability that comes with homeownership.
  Third, the PROMISE Act would temporarily lift the cap on the amount 
of loans Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac can purchase as investments for a 
period of 6 months.
  The bill could bring as much as $145 billion dollars into the 
subprime mortgage marketplace and prescribes that the vast majority--at 
least 85 percent

[[Page 31553]]

of these resources--be used to refinance subprime loans.
  The past decade has seen remarkable growth in American homeownership. 
What's more, these gains have been enjoyed from coast to coast and 
among groups that have traditionally been shut out.
  We need to ensure that this progress continues.
  Mr. President, I have a unanimous consent request here that I have 
been told the Republicans will object to. I will make the request and 
then withdraw it. As I said, I have been told they will object.


                   Unanimous Consent Request--S. 2338

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate 
proceed to the immediate consideration of Calendar No. 481, S. 2338, 
the FHA Modernization Act of 2007; that the Dodd-Shelby amendment at 
the desk be considered and agreed to; the bill, as amended, be read the 
third time, passed, and the motion to reconsider laid upon the table; 
and that any statements relating thereto be printed in the Record.
  Mr. President, I now will withdraw that request.
  What a shame that there is an objection to a bill that passed the 
House overwhelmingly, came out of committee over here on a vote of 20 
to 1, and now there is an objection to it. That is really too bad. We 
will renew this request before we leave here for Thanksgiving. This 
will be much-needed relief. Even though the President hates the 
Government, this Government that was created many years ago has been a 
lifesaver for home building in our country, and we need to modernize 
it; it is long overdue. I hope the Republicans will withdraw their 
objection to this bipartisan, much-needed legislation.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Salazar). The unanimous consent request is 
withdrawn.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, 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. COBURN. 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. COBURN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in 
morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I heard the majority leader's speech. I 
wanted to put him on notice that I will object to the bringing forward 
of this bill. It was introduced September 19 and reported out of the 
Banking Committee on November 13, 2 days ago. We received notice, via 
hotline, that they were attempting to clear the bill by unanimous 
consent yesterday afternoon.
  This bill addresses a very delicate and complicated area of housing 
policy on which we cannot afford to make mistakes. I know many 
Senators, including myself, are strong advocates of how we can help 
those who find themselves in trouble now. I know the authors of the 
bill would like to pass it expeditiously. However, it is a big bill. It 
is an important bill. Under the unanimous consent request, that would 
mean we would not debate it and offer amendments. For those two 
reasons, I object, as a Senator from Oklahoma, and I know several other 
Senators would as well.
  The problem with hotlining bills is they don't get due deliberation. 
Here is a stack of bills that were offered by unanimous consent in the 
Senate before the August break. Most of the Senators had never read the 
bills, didn't know what was in the bills. Thankfully, many of them were 
objected to by Members of the Senate. It is not a good way to 
legislate.
  This is an important issue. We seem to have a tendency that we are 
afraid to do the real work we need to do because we will be criticized 
as the one stopping the bill. I am not afraid to stop a bill. I believe 
we need to get things right. It is not about not wanting to help those 
in need today, but there are several significant things in this bill.
  First of all, the bill changes it so that if you have a $417,000 
home, you can get a mortgage; if you are in trouble, we are going to 
take care of that. That is twice the median price of a home in this 
country. It lowers the downpayment to 1.5 percent. It exposes American 
taxpayers to $1.6 billion over the next 5 years. We can solve this 
problem. We cannot solve this problem by blowing a bill through here 
without good debate, rigorous discussion of the issues, and alternative 
options, via amendments, which will address, No. 1, how we got where we 
are in terms of the subprime mortgage mess; No. 2, how we restore 
confidence in that market; No. 3, how do we work to secure better 
oversight on the mortgage industry that put people in the position of 
owning property they could not afford; and the predatory lending 
practices Senator Reid talked about. We can address those. Doing it 
under a hotline, under unanimous consent, where we don't have an option 
to study the bill and think about what other options there can be or 
how many hearings were held on the bill and what is the response, is 
not the way to legislate.
  I believe the President has not said he would not support this bill. 
I may be wrong, but I seem to recall that from the past.
  I also would like to put in the Record an article from the Roll Call 
of September 17 entitled ```Hotlined' Bills Spark Concern.'' I ask 
unanimous consent to have this article printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                    [From Roll Call, Sept. 17, 2007]

                    ``Hotlined'' Bills Spark Concern

                           (By John Stanton)

       Senate conservatives are upset that the leaders of both 
     parties in the chamber have in recent years increasingly used 
     a practice known as ``hotlining'' bills--previously used to 
     quickly move noncontroversial bills or simple procedural 
     motions--to pass complex and often costly legislation, in 
     some cases with little or no public debate.
       The increase was particularly noticeable just before the 
     August recess, when leaders hotlined more than 150 bills, 
     totaling millions of dollars in new spending, in a period of 
     less than a week.
       The practice has led to complaints from Members and 
     watchdog groups alike that lawmakers are essentially signing 
     off on legislation neither they nor their staff have ever 
     read, often resulting in millions of dollars in new spending.
       In order for a bill to be hotlined, the Senate Majority 
     Leader and Minority Leader must agree to pass it by unanimous 
     consent, without a roll-call vote. The two leaders then 
     inform Members of this agreement using special hotlines 
     installed in each office and give Members a specified amount 
     of time to object--in some cases as little as 15 minutes. If 
     no objection is registered, the bill is passed.
       According to a review by Roll Call of Senate records, from 
     July 31 to Aug. 3, of the 153 hotlines put out by leadership, 
     75 of those were legislative measures, 61 were nominations, 
     and 17 were post-office-naming bills. While a number of the 
     legislative hotlines were routine procedural motions--such as 
     reporting a House-passed bill to a particular committee for 
     consideration--others were for bills authorizing hundreds of 
     millions of dollars in new spending.
       According to GOP aides, that run of hotlined bills 
     concerned the chairman of the conservative Republican 
     Steering Committee, Sen. Jim DeMint (S.C.), enough that he 
     made the issue of hotlining the topic of discussion during 
     last week's regular RSC luncheon. Although these aides said 
     DeMint and other conservative lawmakers have yet to broach 
     the topic with their leaders, it likely will become an issue 
     if the trend continues. ``It's inevitable that it will come 
     up,'' one aide said.
       According to the Library of Congress' legislative database 
     THOMAS, of the 399 bills or resolutions passed by the Senate 
     this year--which range from recess adjournment resolutions to 
     the Iraq War supplemental bill--only 29 have been approved by 
     a roll-call vote. The rest have been moved via unanimous 
     consent agreements, the vast majority of which were brokered 
     using the hotline process.
       Critics also point out that hotlining is often done during 
     ``wrap-up'' at the end of the day--which can occur well after 
     Members' offices have closed for business--and is 
     particularly popular in the runup to recesses.
       In a March 2006 floor speech, Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) 
     harshly criticized the practice. ``The calls are from the 
     Republican and the Democratic leaders to each of their 
     Members, asking consent to pass this or that

[[Page 31554]]

     bill--not consider the bill or have debate on the bill but to 
     pass it,'' Sessions said.
       ``If the staff do not call back . . . the bill passes. 
     Boom. It can be 500 pages. In many offices, when staffers do 
     not know anything about the bill, they usually ignore the 
     hotline and let the bill pass without even informing their 
     Senators. If the staff miss the hotline, or do not know about 
     it or were not around, the Senator is deemed to have 
     consented to the passage of some bill which might be quite an 
     important piece of information.''
       During that brief pre-recess period this summer, the 
     chamber passed S. 496, a bill sponsored by Sen. George 
     Voinovich (R-Ohio) making changes to the Appalachian Regional 
     Development Act of 1965. According to the Congressional 
     Budget Office, those changes will cost $294 million over five 
     years.
       In many cases, bills are placed before the Senate for only 
     a few days or even hours before they are hotlined. For 
     instance, the Senate received H.R. 727--a bill sponsored by 
     Rep. Gene Green (D-Texas) amending the Public Health Services 
     Act--from the House on March 28, according to THOMAS. Senate 
     Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Senate Minority 
     Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) hotlined the bill the 
     following day. According to CBO, the bill is expected to cost 
     $40 million between 2008 and 2012.
       Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) said hotlining bills is not 
     necessarily a bad thing but that Members have increasingly 
     seen the process as a right. ``People think they can hotline 
     [a bill] and you have to agree,'' Coburn said, adding that 
     ``a lot of Members are offended'' if anyone raises an 
     objection or wants to offer changes to a bill.
       Coburn also said that because of limited floor time, ``we 
     don't have time to debate everything . . . but if you object, 
     they ought to be willing to negotiate with you. But usually, 
     they put the press after you.
       ``They accuse you of being against veterans, of being 
     against breast cancer patients . . . I've been accused of so 
     many things,'' Coburn lamented. But he insisted that when 
     sponsors of bills he has objected to take his concerns 
     seriously, they often are able to work out an agreement.
       For instance, he points out that earlier this year, when 
     Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) brought a small-business bill to 
     leaders to be hotlined, Coburn initially objected because of 
     problems with the bill. He and Kerry entered into 
     negotiations to resolve their differences, and the Senate 
     ultimately passed the package by unanimous consent. ``We gave 
     a couple of things, he gave a couple of things and we passed 
     the bill,'' Coburn explained.
       Bill Allison, a senior fellow at the government watchdog 
     group Sunlight Foundation, said the process of hotlining has 
     added to the lack of transparency and accountability in 
     Congress. ``Hotlining bills diminishes the accountability of 
     Congress. Senators are forced into an `all-or-nothing' 
     posture--place a secret hold on legislation and negotiate in 
     the back room, or keep their objections to themselves. The 
     Senate is supposed to be a deliberative body, and those 
     deliberations should occur in the light of day and be part of 
     the public record,'' Allison said.

  Mr. COBURN. The increasing practice of this body of passing bills by 
unanimous consent rather than debate and knowledge about what we are 
agreeing to does the Senate a disservice. All you have to do is watch 
C-SPAN and see how much time is spent in quorum calls in this body. I, 
for one, would never object to unanimous consent for us running several 
bills at the same time so we can continue to discuss them. We should 
not be passing bills without good thought, good debate, and an 
amendment strategy that will improve the bill and protect the future 
taxpayers of this country. That has to be a requirement as we address 
it.
  I thank Senator Reid for his attention to what is truly a real 
problem. But the process is really what matters on this issue. We need 
to get it right. There is too much risk. Therefore, if we decide to 
bring this request back up, I will come back down and object.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak 10 
minutes as in morning business.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I rise today to talk about the bridge 
fund bill that passed the House of Representatives last night. I don't 
know why it has to be so hard to pass an emergency supplemental to 
assure that our troops in the field get the money they need to support 
them in the job we are asking them to do.
  The President has asked for almost $200 billion to get us through 
some point in January or possibly into the spring. But the bill that 
has come over is roughly in the $50 billion range and it has all kinds 
of constraints and strings and mandates from the Congress.
  Our military strategies should not be determined by events 6,000 
miles from the theater where our young men and women have boots on the 
ground. This bridge fund bill is the latest attempt in a year-long 
effort to constrain the ability of our generals and our brave men and 
women in uniform to fight this war effectively.
  During the past year, the Senate has been forced to vote 40 times on 
bills limiting the generals' war strategy. None of those bills passed 
but one, and it was vetoed.
  Since this assembly line of bills started last February, the 
situation in Iraq has changed so much. General Petraeus has implemented 
a strategic readjustment that has produced encouraging progress. Last 
week, U.S. commanders and the Iraqi Government proclaimed that al-Qaida 
had been routed in every neighborhood in Baghdad, citing an 80-percent 
drop in the murder rate since its peak.
  The British Broadcasting Corporation reports:

       All across Baghdad . . . streets are springing back to 
     life. Shops and restaurants which closed down are back in 
     business. People walk in crowded streets in the evening, 
     where just a few months ago they would have been huddled 
     behind locked doors in their homes.

  This is from the BBC.
  Some 67,000 Iraqis have joined U.S.-organized citizens watch groups. 
Roadside bomb attacks have receded to a 3-year low, while finds of 
weapons caches have doubled in the last year. The progress has been so 
impressive that General Petraeus has recommended a drawdown of troops 
because conditions on the ground merit such action.
  In the last 10 months, so much has changed in Iraq, and yet on the 
floor of the Senate, nothing has changed at all. We are still voting on 
bills for premature withdrawal, not taking into consideration what is 
happening on the ground, even when victory is in sight.
  This is a new day in Iraq, and the Senate should recognize that fact 
by providing a vote of confidence in our generals instead of 
threatening to pull the rug out from under them.
  If there are Senators who believe the war is lost, they should vote 
to defund the war instead of threatening to tie the hands of our 
commanders which would needlessly endanger our troops.
  We know from our troops in the field that we must keep our 
commitment. This war has been costly for America in lives and dollars. 
The consequences of failure, after all we have spent in our treasure 
and our young men and women, would be catastrophic. If we abandon Iraq 
prematurely, it will become a sanctuary for terrorists, and they will 
launch attacks on the American people.
  There is also a real danger that Iraq could become a satellite of 
Iran. The Iranian Government has a long record of sponsoring terrorism 
and arming the insurgents who are killing our brave soldiers in Iraq.
  For all these reasons, we cannot abandon Iraq. We can leave when the 
generals say it is safe to leave because Iraq will be stable, that it 
will not be a terrorist training ground, and that is the only way we 
can leave Iraq, if we are to uphold the integrity of the United States 
of America.
  We must persevere and succeed in this war, just as generations before 
us have done when we fought and defeated fascism, communism, and 
nazism. Our soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines, and Coast Guard have 
sacrificed greatly to keep us safe and free, and we must support them 
in this mission. The mission of a stable Iraq rather than a breeding 
ground for terrorists must be accomplished.
  The bill is coming to the Senate from the House which passed it after 
a long,

[[Page 31555]]

arduous debate last night. I urge my colleagues not to do something 
that would so damage the integrity of the United States of America and 
hurt our troops on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan by putting them 
in danger by underfunding them, by not giving them the vote of 
confidence they deserve. It would be unthinkable.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a 
quorum.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mrs. LINCOLN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.


                             The Farm Bill

  Mrs. LINCOLN. Mr. President, I come to the floor today to discuss one 
of the issues we have been talking about an awful lot recently, and 
that is the farm bill; more specifically, the unique nature of 
agricultural production in the United States.
  We are all going to leave next week and go home, hopefully, to 
celebrate Thanksgiving with our families, to talk about this wonderful 
blessing we have in this great country of ours--the enormous bounty 
that exists, the blessings of living in a free country, living in a 
place where we do not have to worry about going to the grocery store 
and finding the shelves empty or we do not have to worry about those 
things that are produced here not being safe or acceptable. That is 
because we have not only very conscientious producers and farmers, but 
we have a system and respect in our Government that recognizes how 
important it is to the American people to maintain that bounty.
  As we all go home to celebrate Thanksgiving and give thanks for this 
wonderful country in which we live and the bounty that it provides us, 
I think it is so important to talk about the big tent that exists in 
this country, the big tent that encompasses all of the diversity of 
agricultural production in different regions across our Nation. It is 
an important aspect that we should embrace, and I hope my colleagues 
will think about that as well.
  As we discuss the farm bill and agricultural production, my 
colleague, the Presiding Officer, is representing a wonderful 
agricultural State, beautiful and vast, and it is very different from 
mine in terms of its assets and what it contributes to this great land. 
My State is different than Colorado. It is vast and different, just 
within the boundaries of my State, but certainly in terms of what it 
brings to the table in our Nation in terms of the bounty that it 
provides.
  Perhaps one of the most frequent questions from so many, particularly 
of my urban colleagues--because I do share a seat with so many other 
farm Senators on the Agriculture Committee, but a lot of times the 
question from my urban colleagues is, why are farms in Arkansas 
different from, say, farms in North Dakota or Michigan or Indiana or 
Colorado or other regions of our Nation?
  Although the answer is pretty simple, it does require quite a lot of 
time to talk about. It looks as if we have a good bit of time today, so 
I thought I would seek this opportunity and, for the benefit of those 
inquisitive Senators who sometimes ask why are things different in 
different parts of our country and in all of our different States, 
offer an explanation that I give, certainly, to my colleagues and to 
others who are interested and concerned about us as a nation 
maintaining the safe and abundant and affordable supply of food and 
fiber that exists in this country for which we are all so thankful.
  First, and this should come as no surprise, each of our States 
produces the agricultural products for which its climate and its soil 
are best suited. That is one of the things we do in Arkansas. It, 
obviously, has been that way for years. Farms in Arkansas might be 
older than those in some of the States that exist to our west. As our 
country was explored and discovered, many of those lands in the West 
were discovered, and their climates and their soil types were 
different. As we have grown as a nation, they have adapted themselves 
to the crops for which they are best suited. For the colder climates of 
the Midwest, it makes sense to produce corn and wheat and sugar beets. 
For us in the South, with our more humid climates, and given, 
certainly, our soil types--we have a large clay content and often sandy 
soil along our river bottom--we are suited for cotton and rice 
production. So that is the first explanation I try to give people, to 
talk about those differences so we better understand what the 
differences are.
  Second, you have to take into consideration what the markets are for 
our commodities. Again, we are a vast country, full of so many 
blessings and diversity. As we have grown, international markets have 
grown and changed as well.
  Let's start with corn. By now I think everyone in this body is 
familiar with the fact that we mandate a corn ethanol market through 
the renewable fuels standard. It is important that we move toward a 
renewable fuel. It has multiple purposes. Renewable fuels will help us 
clean up the environment and will certainly lessen our dependence on 
foreign oil. It also gives secondary markets for our growers. But so 
far we have only gotten pretty far on corn-based ethanol.
  We have mandated this market for corn, and it has done quite well. We 
make sure those corn growers' prices stay up because there is a market. 
There are tax incentives that are built in to ensure those markets are 
going to be there for corn.
  In addition to the creation of the market, we place a prohibitive 
tariff at the borders of our country to ensure that only American 
farmers have access to that corn market. That is for good reason. That 
marketplace has really matured in terms of ethanol production and the 
direction we are going to the point we are now realizing that renewable 
fuels are going to need to come from other sources as well; that we 
cannot just depend on that corn-based ethanol program but that we have 
to start looking toward cellulosic and biodiesel and biomass and a 
whole host of other renewable energy sources. But the fact is, we still 
protect that corn market to a tremendous degree.
  For sugar, we have a unique program that doesn't make payments to 
farmers, but, like ethanol, it limits the international competition, 
and it supports the processing of these commodities.
  Sometimes sugar is supported in the processing facilities, and 
therefore those protected markets and that payment coming down to those 
farmers is a little bit trickier to understand than the regular 
commodity program.
  Rather than offering a whole lot of detail on a program that does not 
directly impact my State, I would rather direct folks to the 
individuals who represent the States here that are affected by those 
crops. I think it is most important to let those who understand crops 
in their States give their descriptions because they have a better 
intuitive idea of how those programs work and how their growers benefit 
and how the economy benefits from it and certainly how the American 
people benefit. There are a lot of Members who can tell you about that.
  As the President knows, we on the Ag Committee--everyone has their 
specialty and certainly their best understanding when it comes to corn 
and sugar. I kind of focus on the folks who know those the best to be 
able to provide you the details. But, in short, sugar has an entirely 
separate program subject to different disciplines but with a market 
that is very domestic and exclusively limited to American sugar 
farmers. So you have two of these products now, or commodities, that 
have very different disciplines in terms of what protects them or what 
provides them that very defined as well as insured marketplace through 
both the constricting of the marketplace without allowing imports to 
come in and also the incentives they have in the way those safety nets 
are provided to them through their processing.
  Now, here is a market that I do know about and that I can talk about, 
and that is what comes from my region of the Nation, which is cotton 
and rice.

[[Page 31556]]

  First and most importantly, I need to point out that these two 
commodities are subject to very intense global competition. Rather than 
simply state that as a fact, I will offer a couple of explanations.
  Rice is a stable commodity globally, all over the world. As such, it 
is produced in many regions, including the developing world, those 
nations which are not as developed as we are or as old and efficient as 
we are. The same is true for cotton.
  What is also true is that our market is open to direct competition 
from international producers while our access into their foreign 
marketplace is extremely limited. Now, that means our border is open to 
their rice and cotton being shipped into our country. So our growers 
not only have to compete to get into our marketplaces, but they have to 
compete here with products that are allowed to come in from other 
countries--the rice and cotton, specifically.
  I think the best example or one of the best examples is Japan. 
Japan's rice tariff comes in at over 400 percent. That is more than 
enough to keep American rice out of their marketplace, I have to tell 
you, a 400-percent tariff on rice going into Japan. Yet our markets are 
open. Our markets are open to commodities coming into this country.
  Another good example that can be used is the treatment of rice in the 
recently negotiated Korean Free Trade Agreement. For every product 
produced in the United States of America, we reduce the Korean tariff, 
limiting our access into theirs immediately or phased in over 20 years, 
every one with the exception of one commodity--it is rice, one 
commodity that is not allowed to be exported into the Korean 
marketplace.
  So it just goes to show you the fact that our commodities, although 
they are different and grown differently and a whole host of different 
things, also are treated differently in the global community and in the 
global economic venue. At this point, you should start to be seeing a 
pattern here in terms of the differences not only in how we grow our 
commodities but also how our commodities are dealt with in the 
marketplace. Our market is open to competition, while our export 
markets remain closed to our growers of our commodities.
  Now, do not get me wrong, I am not here advocating that we need 
unabashed free trade for agriculture because I know that to expose the 
Third World to our productivity would decimate vulnerable parts of 
their economies that support the poorest of the world's poor. So that 
is not what we are talking about. This dynamic is more than a reality 
for U.S. farmers; it is a part of America's obligation within the World 
Trade Organization.
  Now, I will summarize that point just briefly. In the WTO, the United 
States and other developed nations must report their subsidy level, and 
they must restrict their tariff level. The conversion is true for the 
developing nations that are members of the WTO. They are not subject to 
even reporting their subsidy, and they have little to no obligation 
with respect to opening their markets.
  Now, again, I am not saying this is a total and complete outrage; I 
am merely trying to paint a more comprehensive picture of what American 
agriculture is up against in the global economy. Without a doubt, as we 
have heard in multiple different meetings across the Hill that many of 
us go to, whether it is our lunch groups or our hearings in committee 
and others, we hear all of the talk about global trade and about the 
global economy and developing countries and where they are going, 
placing priorities in education and infrastructure investment and a 
host of other things, and we see our trade deficit growing. Yet 
agriculture has always been one of those areas where not only we as 
Americans feel it is important to maintain that domestic production of 
a safe and affordable and available food supply, but we also know it is 
a big issue to other countries that they can maintain some domestic 
production and hopefully as much as they possibly can grab hold of in 
terms of that domestic production.
  With that said, it simply cannot be ignored that these disparities in 
international competition contribute to the world in which the U.S. 
cotton and rice producers must compete and therefore influence how they 
must structure their operations. So, again, for us, in meeting 
different demands, in looking at the global marketplace and trying to 
figure out how we structure ourselves as growers, it is not just about 
the soil type or the weather and the climate; it is also about the 
international marketplace, which leads me to the explanation of the 
last question which is posed to me; that is, Why are Arkansas farms so 
big?
  It should not be difficult for Members of this Chamber to understand 
that when you face intense competition and your foreign markets are 
closed, you have to create efficiencies. You have to create 
efficiencies elsewhere in your business operation in order to be able 
to compete because you do not set the world market price. You have to 
be able to compete on that international global stage by your own 
efficiencies.
  It is the good fortune of everyone in America that our farmers are 
the most efficient farmers in the world. Certainly, we are the 
beneficiary of that in this great country, but people all across the 
globe understand that, that not only are we the most efficient and can 
do it the most affordably, but we produce the safest and set a standard 
in many instances across the globe of what is going to be produced in 
future generations in terms of sustenance of life. We have improved our 
efficiencies in ways that cannot be described here in a short period of 
time, but suffice it to say that the American farmer is the most 
efficient on Earth, and are we not all glad? That is something for us 
to be proud of in this body and across this land. If you are not or if 
you take our bounty for granted in this great Nation, you should be 
ashamed of yourself. That is the reason this bill is so important, is 
that we have been handed this blessing. We have worked hard on this 
Earth in this great land of ours. But we certainly have reason to be 
proud.
  Despite our efficiency in cotton and rice country, we are still 
operating on very thin margins of profit. In some years, we merely hope 
for profit that really never comes.
  What we have done to help level that playing field is to expand our 
operation to further reduce our per-unit cost and, in turn, create a 
competitive economy of scale. Now, that means we have to spread our 
risk out over a greater abundance of production because that is one of 
the only ways we have to get the efficiency to be able to be 
competitive in a very restrictive market, and that is to have a large 
economy of scale and mitigate our risk over a greater area.
  Now, unfortunately, many newspapers and some of my colleagues 
attribute USDA statistics for commercial-size operations to many of our 
Arkansas and southern farms and assume we are no longer family farms 
simply because of our size. What a terrible misrepresentation. I think 
it really diminishes what we are about in this body, which is to 
embrace our diversity and embrace the good work all of these hard-
working farm families do across this Nation. And without a doubt, it is 
simply untrue. I do not know of too many nonfamily farms in my State. 
There are a lot of people who are going to tell you that because they 
belong to a cooperative or because they maybe farm more acreage, they 
are not a family farm. In fact, I do not even know of one.
  What I do know a lot about is fathers and sons, wives, daughters, 
brothers and sisters who work the land with one another. They have to 
come together. They have to build their operation, come together, and 
stay together if they are going to survive. Even when that generation 
upon generation finds that one of those brothers or sisters happens to 
move to the city to become a doctor or maybe an electrician or maybe a 
fireman or maybe a lawyer, they still help share the risk of what that 
farm has to do, which is to create that economy of scale in order to be 
competitive.
  So hopefully we can still consider those people a family farm, 
because,

[[Page 31557]]

guess what, they are still a family, and they are still farming and 
they are all carrying the risk of what it takes to be competitive in 
that global marketplace. Now, their operations may exceed several 
thousand acres, and they most certainly are still family farms.
  In fact, I cannot imagine a definition of a family farm that does not 
include the overwhelming majority of Arkansas farmers, but apparently 
such a definition exists. USDA seems to come up with these definitions, 
and they print them out up here in Washington, inside this bubble, and 
they fail to realize that there is a lot of diversity in this great 
country. There are a lot of family farms that exist. It is not just 
family farms in the Midwest, it is not just family farms on the east 
coast, but it is family farms in other regions of the country too--yes, 
in our region of the country too.
  Now, I will go ahead and put my colleagues on notice that until those 
misrepresentations cease--and I have to tell you, they have been long 
and hard for many years in terms of the misrepresentations of what a 
farm is and who constitutes that farm. You know, I am a daughter of a 
farmer, but I cannot imagine the way I get labeled as having been this 
huge farmer when I am not even farming. Yet that misrepresentation 
continues to come out there just because it is convenient and it is 
sensational and people can use it.
  Well, I have to say that it does not matter to me what happens to me, 
but it does matter what happens to those hard-working farm families who 
are working so hard to make sure we enjoy that safe and abundant and 
affordable food supply regardless of what happens in the international 
community. My colleagues know they are going to hear a lot more from me 
on farm policy that supports farmers throughout this great country as 
the debate goes on.
  It is my opportunity to describe and talk about the individuality of 
each of these areas. I will hone in on my part of the country because I 
leave how other commodities are farmed up to those who farm them. But I 
can definitely tell you, having walked rice levees and scouted cotton 
and chopped down coffee bean plants in a soybean field, how our farms 
run and why they run that way, I understand the markets. I understand 
the global trade implications that exist. I understand that all of the 
programs we design oftentimes in the farm bill don't fit us.
  For example, take disaster assistance. I was glad to work with my 
colleagues in the Midwest who wanted to see a disaster assistance 
program, even though it doesn't benefit my farmers that much. When you 
have a farm in the South and you are farming rice, you have to control 
your environment. Have you ever seen a rice field that has no water on 
it? Unless it is being harvested, you haven't. The reason is, you have 
to control that environment. When it comes to disaster assistance, 
those counties get the same national disaster declaration on a drought. 
But guess what. They are never going to get that disaster assistance 
because they hardly ever hit the 35-percent yield loss that comes with 
another stipulation in disaster assistance, because they have 
controlled their environment.
  I will tell you what: They have spent twice the effort and resources 
and money in plowing into that crop what they needed to combat that 
drought and that disaster that was occurring. So they need another 
tool. They need another tool within the confines of our farm 
legislation that allows them to market their crop, to market their crop 
in this competitive global marketplace so the Government doesn't have 
to do it for them.
  As I plow through this--and I know I will have many other 
opportunities to do so--I hope I have answered some questions or at 
least demonstrated some of the differences in our ag land down in the 
southern half of the Nation. We are all a little different. I have to 
tell you, for that we should be extremely grateful and proud, and we 
should embrace that diversity. As a nation, that is what makes us 
strong, our diversity and our willingness to embrace it and our 
willingness to respect it. That is what makes us Americans. Despite 
these differences, it has always been my view that regardless of the 
type of crop or the region of the country you live, if you contribute 
to the production of safe agricultural commodities, I consider you a 
farmer. I consider you an American farmer. I don't judge that and I 
don't judge you as an American farmer based on whether you are in one 
region or another or how big your family is or how big your farming 
operation is. I judge you by the fact that you are willing to go to 
work and work hard every day to do the best you can, to be as efficient 
as you possibly can, not only in this country but in the global 
marketplace, with tremendous respect to the environment, the 
conservation of land, and the ability to produce a safe and productive 
food supply. That is who farmers are.
  If we let other people define who a farmer is and a farm family is, 
then we will be sorely disappointed when we start to outsource our food 
to other countries. I think we have become sorely disappointed to find 
ourselves dependent on foreign oil, to have outsourced our need for 
energy in the oil arena to other parts of the world. We will find 
ourselves once again in the next several years with a trade deficit in 
agriculture, outsourcing our food supply. I don't think Americans want 
to go there; I really don't. I think they are willing to listen for the 
diversity and expertise and the hard work that goes on by America's 
farmers to continue to produce that safe and abundant, affordable food 
supply. As a farmer, regardless of the region of the country, we have 
to help our farmers keep meeting that competition.
  I have the reputation of being that kind of person, of reaching out 
and working with people, understanding differences, accepting 
differences and accepting other people's ideas. I hope we all have that 
attitude. But mostly, I try to be respectful of people. Unfortunately, 
my farmers and I have not been given that same respect by everybody. I 
am going to continue to work hard to prove my point because I am going 
to earn that respect. I am going to earn that respect not only in what 
we have done in this underlying bill, in creating the greatest, most 
substantial reform in decades. We started over here in current law and 
most of the extremes that people want are way over here. Guess where we 
have moved. In terms of providing the reforms that the media and others 
all clamor about, we have come from here all the way over here. That 
last little bit people want to ask of us will outsource the food supply 
that southern growers have so proudly provided this country for many 
years.
  I am proud to be here to defend and support and be proud of Arkansas 
farm families. They have worked hard. They will continue to work hard. 
I have fought this fight for several years, and I will continue to 
defend the programs and my farmers who use them within the limits of 
the law. Creating greater reform is important. Our farmers want to make 
sure they are in compliance with the law and that they are working hard 
within the parameters to do their very best. But they also want to be 
able to be competitive, because they want to continue to provide that 
safe and abundant supply of food and fiber. And they can--most 
efficiently, most effectively, most safely, as well as with the 
greatest respect to the environment. I hope people will not continue 
the sensationalized stories and misrepresented facts in order to get 
something done that does nothing but move forward in outsourcing our 
food and fiber supply.
  I hope I have brought some clarity here today. I will continue to try 
to do that. I look forward to working with my colleagues. We have a 
long road ahead of us to get something done. But I think everybody will 
agree it is worth it. It is well worth it, as we return home to be with 
our families, to give thanks for this wonderful Nation we live in and 
the bounty it provides. I hope we will come back and sit down and get 
to work supporting America's farm families and the hard work they do, 
recognizing all of the tremendous challenges they face, mostly 
challenges they have no control over. Whether it is the trade 
agreements they operate under, whether it is the environment

[[Page 31558]]

and the weather they deal with that they have no control over, it is 
certainly within the confines of the requirements and the regulations 
we present them to empower them to do a better job or certainly the 
best possible job in taking good care of the land and being good 
stewards of this great land we have.
  I thank the Chair. I look forward to working with my colleagues.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. McCaskill). The Senator from New 
Hampshire.
  Mr. GREGG. Madam President, I understand the Senator from Idaho 
intends to speak. I ask unanimous consent that I be recognized to speak 
after he is concluded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Idaho.
  Mr. CRAPO. Before she leaves the floor, I commend my colleague 
Senator Lincoln. I agree with her strong defense and support of 
America's farmers, particularly our family farms and the need for a 
farm bill. She and I may come from different parties, but we have shown 
that you can work together. I consider her to be one of my very good 
friends and allies as we work toward good policy. I appreciate the 
opportunity to sit here and hear her remarks. It is great to see 
someone stand up and respond to the attacks we see coming against 
American agriculture. It seems every time we have a farm bill, the 
attacks begin again. Yet it is in America where the American consumers 
spend the lowest percentage of their disposable income on food and 
fiber because we have such strong farm policies.
  I also agree with her comments about the need for us to remember we 
are in global markets. Those who produce food and fiber in other 
nations have tremendous subsidies from their governments where their 
governments enable them to compete unfairly against our producers. In 
fact, not only do their governments provide unfair, extensive subsidies 
to their producers, they also erect significant anticompetitive trade 
barriers, both tariff and nontariff trade barriers, so that the 
products they send to us are subsidized and the products we try to send 
to them are stopped at the border because of these barriers. It is 
because of these kinds of international market circumstances and the 
global competition we face these days that it is important for us to 
recognize the role of the farm bill in helping American producers level 
that playing field.
  Again, I appreciate so much the opportunities I have had to work with 
Senator Lincoln on this and many other issues. We have worked together 
to strengthen and improve American policy.
  I came to talk about the farm bill, and I will do that. But before 
doing so, I want to talk a little bit about the process, because I am 
very disturbed by the position the Senate is in right now. We could 
have been debating amendments to the farm bill for a week or two now. 
Instead we have been stalled by a procedure that has filled the 
amendment tree, for those who don't follow the rules of the Senate. The 
amendment tree has been filled up so no one can file amendments to the 
farm bill. Yet I understand there are over 260 amendments that have 
been prepared and which are out there waiting in the wings from 
different Members of the Senate. We are not going to see all 260 of 
those amendments debated and voted on. That never happens. But we 
should see a significant number of them debated and voted on.
  Those of us who serve on the Agriculture Committee or the Finance 
Committee have seen both pieces of this farm bill be very vigorously 
debated at the committee level with all sorts of amendments and work 
developing the right kinds of process. Now it is time for that same 
process to occur here on the floor. Yet we have not seen one amendment 
allowed to be brought forward. The farm bill affects so many people's 
lives through providing food and fiber and security and enabling global 
competitiveness and ensuring a better environment. I could go on. But 
we must allow all Senators the opportunity to bring forth amendments 
they believe need to be debated before we have the final vote on the 
farm bill.
  We have all heard by now the debate here in the Chamber and in other 
places about numbers, highlighting the multiple rollcall votes we have 
had on previous farm bill debates. Let me review a few of those. 
According to the information I have, during the 2002 farm bill debate, 
which is the most recent farm bill we have had, there were 49 amendment 
votes, including 25 rollcall votes. In 1996, on the farm bill preceding 
the current one, there were 26 amendment votes, including 11 rollcall 
votes. And during the farm bill debate previous to that in 1990, there 
were 113 votes, including 22 rollcalls. In 1985, there were 88 votes, 
33 of which were rollcalls. Yet now during this debate or nondebate, we 
have had zero votes on any amendments because the amendment tree has 
been blocked.
  I am discouraged by that because we could have made significant 
progress on this farm bill. Now what we see is a maneuver which is 
proposing that cloture be entered which would cut off debate on the 
farm bill and push it forward without giving us the opportunity for a 
full and robust debate on amendments.
  I encourage our leadership on both sides to get past this impasse. I 
know there has been a lot of progress made in terms of an effort to 
limit the number of amendments and try to get a determination of how 
many amendments will be allocated to each side and allow us to move 
forward. But for whatever reason, we haven't been able to get that 
agreement resolved. The farm bill is too important for these kinds of 
partisan politics and maneuvers. I know there are concerns about 
certain amendments that may be brought. There are some on either side, 
depending on the amendment, who would prefer not to see the amendment 
brought because it could cause an embarrassing vote on behalf of some 
Members. I will face that same dynamic as amendments are brought 
forward. There will be amendments that will be difficult to face. But 
it is something we must do. It is the tradition of the Senate that we 
fully deliberate on matters such as this and that debate is not closed 
down.
  I say again to our majority leader and our minority leader, we need 
to work together, avoid cloture votes, and avoid restrictions that 
prohibit Members from bringing their debate forward in this Chamber and 
allow us to have a full and robust debate so we can move the farm bill 
forward.
  I remain committed to working together to move this farm bill forward 
in the Senate through a full, fair, and open process, and I hope we can 
get to one soon.
  Now, let me turn to my comments on the farm bill itself. Many people 
say we should not call it the farm bill--in fact, I think it actually 
does have a different title now--because the farm bill is much more 
than just a bill that deals with commodities programs.
  In fact, the farm bill, with the new addition of the Finance 
Committee title, will have 11 titles in it, only one of which is the 
commodities title. There are other titles dealing with rural 
development, with energy policy, and, as most people are not aware, 
with the food programs of our Nation.
  In fact, if you look at the allocation of resources in the farm bill, 
only about 14 percent of the cost of the farm bill is truly allocated 
to the agricultural commodity programs. Over 60 percent--I think around 
66 percent--of the cost of the bill goes to our Nation's food programs, 
such as our Food Stamp Program and the other programs that we have in 
international aid.
  Then there are the programs dealing with conservation, which I am 
going to talk about in a minute, which is probably the most significant 
conservation effort in which this Congress gets engaged in any kind of 
an ongoing basis. Yet far too few Americans realize the commitment to 
the preservation and conservation and improvement of our environment 
that is contained in the farm bill.
  There are more than 25,000 farms and ranches in Idaho producing more 
than 140 commodities statewide. Idaho leads or is ranked among the top 
States in the production of potatoes, peas, lentils, mint, sugar beets, 
onions, hops,

[[Page 31559]]

dairy products, wheat, wool, cherries, and other commodities. 
Therefore, the farm bill is of vital importance to a more than $4 
billion Idaho agricultural industry, which is an essential part of 
Idaho's economy.
  In preparation for this farm bill authorization, like Chairman Harkin 
and Ranking Member Chambliss, the House Agriculture Committee and 
former Agriculture Secretary Johanns, and others, I sought input from 
producers and those interested in the farm bill throughout the townhall 
meetings and hearings I had in Idaho, and I listened to many of my 
constituents voice their criticisms, bring forward their suggestions, 
and bring forward their praise of the last farm bill--the current farm 
bill under which we are operating.
  What I heard loudly and clearly was that the basic structure of the 
2002 farm bill is solid, and rather than starting from scratch, we 
should make changes to it and improvements to that basic structure as 
needed but not lose that structure that has been so helpful to our 
farmers and to our rural communities in particular throughout America. 
I have been pleased to work with my colleagues on the Senate Ag 
Committee and in the Congress in general to craft a bill that I believe 
sticks with that principle.
  The bill before us today does not wipe away existing farm policy but 
builds on it for a stronger Federal farm policy. As Senator Lincoln 
indicated, it makes some very significant and needed reforms to move in 
the direction of addressing the concerns that many have raised about 
some inequities in the farm bill processes.
  The legislation includes essential provisions, such as the new 
specialty crops subtitle that strengthens specialty crop block grants 
and other important programs. I have appreciated working with Senator 
Stabenow, Senator Craig, and others on this effort, and I thank 
Chairman Harkin and Ranking Member Chambliss and Senator Conrad and 
others who have worked with us in shaping Federal farm policy that 
bolsters U.S. agriculture through provisions such as these specialty 
crop programs.
  Additionally, I thank Chairman Baucus and Ranking Member Grassley on 
the Finance Committee for the time they spent in crafting a tax title 
for the farm bill that enables us to make some additions and tweaks 
that were needed. It has been an honor to be one of the Senators who 
serves on both the Finance and Agriculture Committees, the two 
committees with products that will be merged together on the floor of 
the Senate to make up this year's farm bill.
  There are a number of highlights in the tax title of the farm bill I 
want to mention. In the tax title of the farm bill, I worked with 
several Senators to include improvements to the Endangered Species Act 
through incentives for landowners to assist with species recovery. For 
years we have struggled with the burden that the Endangered Species Act 
puts on private property owners. Notably, about 80 percent of the 
endangered or threatened species in America are found on private 
property. Yet we have put the burden of protecting and preserving and 
recovering those species unduly on our private property owners.
  This bill I have introduced and worked on with many others in the 
Senate will provide participants with the option of a tax credit 
instead of the Conservation Reserve Program, Wetlands Reserve Program, 
and Grasslands Reserve Program.
  This farm bill also provides support for wheat, barley, sugar, wool, 
and pulse crop producers. Pulse crops would become eligible for 
Counter-Cyclical Program assistance.
  The Noninsured Assistance Program would provide coverage for 
aquacultural producers who are impacted by drought.
  There are significant investments in energy programs that would 
assist producers with efforts that support energy independence.
  Changes to Project SEARCH would allow financially distressed rural 
communities in Idaho and nationwide to access increased Federal 
assistance for their water infrastructure needs.
  The Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Program would be significantly expanded 
to enable all States to participate. Expanding this program nationwide 
will further the effort to provide healthy food choices for our 
children. This program is a win-win for children, students, and 
producers.
  I have visited Idaho schools and have seen firsthand how the Fresh 
Fruit and Vegetable Program has been a big support to our students, and 
I look forward to seeing the additional benefits brought through this 
program by making it available to more students.
  There are many other provisions of importance in this extensive 
legislation that I could bring up and review, but instead I want to 
just focus on one vital area of the bill--the conservation title--
before concluding my remarks.
  I have appreciated having the opportunity to work with my colleagues 
on the conservation title, which provides landowners with both the 
financial and technical assistance necessary to achieve real 
environmental results.
  As I said earlier, no Federal policy contributes more to the 
improvement and protection of our environment than the farm bill, 
through the incentive-driven conservation programs. The conservation 
title provides $4.4 billion in new spending for conservation programs. 
The title continues with the current combination of conservation 
programs with improvements to make them work.
  For example, the Senate farm bill makes changes to the EQIP, or 
Environmental Quality Incentives Program, to ensure that private forest 
land owners receive the help they need to better manage their land.
  Chairman Harkin made numerous changes to the Conservation Security 
Program, which has been renamed the Conservation Stewardship Program. 
The Senate farm bill provides $1.28 billion in new spending for that 
program.
  There are also adjustments made to increase participation of 
specialty crop producers in the Conservation Stewardship Program, 
dedicated conservation program resources and higher technical 
assistance levels to increase participation of beginning and socially 
disadvantaged farmers and ranchers. The title also provides added 
emphasis to encourage pollinator habitat improvements on agricultural 
and forest land.
  Funding is provided for the Wetlands Reserve Program and the 
Grasslands Reserve Program, which did not have baseline funding 
starting in 2008. The Wetlands Reserve Program would be provided with 
funds to enroll 250,000 acres per year through 2012. The Grasslands 
Reserve Program would be provided with $240 million for fiscal years 
2008 through 2012.
  The Conservation Reserve Program would be maintained at 39.2 million 
acres. The Wildlife Habitat Incentives Program would be continued with 
$85 million per year for fiscal years 2008 through 2012. The Farmland 
Protection Program would be reauthorized at $97 million per year 
through the duration of the farm bill. The conservation title provides 
for the creation of a framework to facilitate the participation of 
farmers in greenhouse gas reduction and other environmental services 
markets.
  Now, I understand the challenges faced in writing this farm bill and 
the significant investment that has been made in conservation programs, 
especially having to cover baseline shortfalls for the Wetlands Reserve 
Program and the Grasslands Reserve Program. However, a broader 
investment is needed in our conservation programs, such as the 
Environmental Quality Incentives Program and the Grasslands Reserve 
Program, so we can better capitalize on the conservation interest and 
needs across this Nation.
  I will continue to work for investments in working lands 
conservation, such as the EQIP program and GRP, or Grasslands Reserve 
Program.
  With any legislation that is as comprehensive as this, there are 
always provisions that each of us would like to see come out 
differently. However, on a whole, this bill before us builds upon past 
farm bills and sets U.S. agriculture on the right course. Throughout 
the crafting of this bill, it has been refreshing to see that more 
people are starting to understand each aspect of

[[Page 31560]]

this important legislation. Truly, there are few pieces of legislation 
that have the ability to impact so many lives. This bill affects our 
Nation's food security, our global competitiveness, the condition of 
our air, water, and land, as well as many other aspects of our lives.
  I look forward to getting past the impasse we face on the Senate 
floor and moving forward to a timely debate and the enactment of a farm 
bill that enables sound Federal farm policy.
  Madam President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire.
  Mr. GREGG. Madam President, I rise to address the issue which has 
been noted by the Senator from Idaho, which is the process under which 
the farm bill is being considered in the Senate.
  A number of the Members on the other side of the aisle, primarily the 
leadership, have spoken on this process and have made the 
representation that in some way we, on our side, are slowing down this 
bill. Nothing could be less accurate, in my opinion.
  I know, although I do not happen to support the farm bill because I 
think it is bloated in many ways and essentially ignores the concept of 
a marketplace, the farm bill is going to pass. It always does pass. It 
always passes with a very large majority, which is assured by the fact 
that enough commodities are put into the subsidy system so that you can 
add up enough people to support it, so it will always pass with a large 
majority. And there will be 20 or 25 people who will vote against it.
  So I have never held any belief or even thought for a second this 
farm bill was not going to pass the Senate. It is going to pass the 
Senate. It has not been my intention to either slow it down or try to 
defeat it because I know I cannot do either--or I did not think I could 
do either.
  My intention was to improve it and to address issues which I think 
are relevant to it or which are appropriate to the issues which the 
Senate should be addressing today generally.
  But, unfortunately, on the procedure that has been structured by the 
majority leader, all Members of the Senate, but especially members of 
the minority--the Republican Members of the Senate--have been shut out 
of the ability to amend this bill.
  The majority leader has essentially created a system which you could 
call the ``permission slip'' approach to legislating. If he does not 
give you a blue permission slip, you cannot bring forward an amendment 
on this bill.
  Obviously, that does not work for those of us who wish to amend the 
bill. But, more importantly, it does not work for the institution. The 
essence of the Senate is the ability to amend legislation when it is on 
the floor.
  Washington described the Senate as the place where the hot coffee 
from the cup--referring to the House--it is the saucer into which that 
hot coffee is poured, so it can be looked at, thought about, and 
reviewed to make sure there is not hasty action, to make sure there is 
not precipitous action, to make sure there is not action which will 
come back to haunt us because we did not try our best to anticipate the 
consequences.
  So the Senate was structured to be a deliberative institution. That 
was its purpose. Our Founding Fathers designed it with that intent in 
mind, as expressed by George Washington. It has always worked that way. 
We have always, when we have had major pieces of authorizing 
legislation on the floor, had the opportunity to amend that 
legislation. Even if they are not major pieces of legislation, in many 
instances we have had the ability to amend it in just about any way we 
wanted. There was a statement that you have to do relevant amendments. 
Well, under the rules of the Senate, there is no such thing as relevant 
amendments. Everything is relevant. Irrelevant amendments are relevant 
because that is the way the Senate is structured. That is the way we 
work. If there is an issue of the time which a Member wants to bring 
forward to discuss and have voted on, the idea is the Senate will do 
that. Now, there is a procedure to cut off and go to relevant or 
germane amendments, but that procedure is a very formal procedure known 
as cloture and it takes 60 votes. That should not be done on a bill of 
this size until there has been adequate debate and a reasonable number 
of amendments considered.
  I noticed that the Senator from Michigan, whom I greatly admire and 
enjoy working with, had a large chart today which talked about the fact 
that there have been 55 filibusters by the Republican Party since the 
Senate has convened. That is sort of like, as I have said on occasion, 
the fellow who shoots his parents throwing himself on the mercy of the 
court because he is suddenly saying he is an orphan. The simple fact is 
the only reason there have been 55 cloture motions filed around here is 
because the majority party has decided to try to shorten debate and 
shorten the amendment process at a rate that has never occurred before. 
Bills are brought to the floor and cloture is filed instantaneously. 
That never used to happen around here. It is not our party which has 
been trying to extend these debates; it is the other party which has 
been trying to essentially foreshorten the debates in an extremely 
artificial and premature way and limit the capacity of the minority to 
make its points and to raise the issues it considers to be important.
  On almost every one of these bills--the 55 that are noted--agreement 
could have been reached, timeframes could have been agreed to, an 
amendment list could have been set, and we could have proceeded under 
regular order. But regular order was not allowed because the other side 
of the aisle wants to manage the Senate the way the House is managed: 
Where the majority party essentially does not allow the minority to 
offer amendments to the bills unless the majority party agrees to the 
amendments. Well, I can understand that in the House. There are 435 
people there and it would be pretty much chaotic. But in the Senate, we 
are not designed that way. The whole purpose of this institution is to 
allow extensive discussion of legislation and amendments on 
legislation, whether the amendments are relevant or irrelevant.
  So the process that is being put in place is harmful, in my opinion, 
to the fundamental institution of the Senate, when you have a majority 
leader who comes forward, immediately fills the tree, and then says the 
majority leader is not going to allow any amendments to the bill unless 
the amendments are accepted by the majority leader which, of course, on 
its face is a little absurd. Obviously, if we were all going to offer 
amendments that agreed with the majority leader, we would all be in the 
majority leader's party. That is why we have a two-party system. The 
idea is a two-party system. The one party sometimes disagrees with the 
other party and tries to make the points we feel are important to 
govern us. But the majority leader closes the floor down, says we have 
a permission slip process where you have to get his blue slip of 
approval before we can move forward, and then he files cloture on the 
bill after having not allowed any amendments to move forward. I think 
that does fundamental harm to the institution. It creates a precedent 
around here that may well be a slippery slope for us as an institution. 
I remember a couple of years ago there was a big debate about whether 
we should do cloture, or needed cloture, on the issue of Supreme Court 
judges. On our side of the aisle, because there was a lot of foot 
dragging about some of the Supreme Court judges who were being 
nominated, there were many who felt we should go forward and have a 
ruling of the Chair which says it only takes 51 votes; the Constitution 
does not allow filibusters against Supreme Court judges. Well, some on 
our side of the aisle felt that was a slippery slope, that that type of 
a procedural heavy-handedness by the majority would harm the 
institution and would lead to serious ramifications down the road when 
the parties changed governance.
  This institution will not always have a Democratic majority. The 
facts are pretty obvious. We change around here. The American people 
like to have Government change. They like change. They get frustrated 
with the way things are going, so they make a change. There will be a 
Republican majority; I absolutely guarantee that. But

[[Page 31561]]

the Democratic leadership, the majority leader, is in the process of 
setting a precedent, if he is successful, which will be extraordinarily 
harmful should a Republican majority take control and use that same 
precedent. So I think it is a huge mistake that this process has 
proceeded in this way and it is inconsistent with the facts on the 
ground.
  The majority leader has said we can only have relevant amendments--
relevant, ironically, as defined by the majority side. Well, history 
has shown us that is not the case. Even on farm bills--even on farm 
bills--especially on farm bills, amendments are brought forward which 
are irrelevant to the farm bill all the time. In fact, ironically, the 
majority leader has brought forward a number of those amendments. In 
1996, for example, he offered an amendment to the farm bill regarding 
the importation of tea and the Board of Tea experts. In 1990, he 
offered an amendment to the bill regarding testing consumer products 
containing hazardous and toxic substances. In the year 2000, he offered 
an amendment to the farm bill regarding the Social Security trust fund 
and tax policy. In the year 2000, the majority leader offered an 
amendment to the farm bill regarding pest management in schools. The 
manager of the bill, Senator Harkin, in the year 2000, offered an 
amendment regarding fees on pesticide manufacturing. In the year 1985, 
he offered an amendment regarding the creation of additional bankruptcy 
judges in the State of Iowa.
  I would argue that none of those amendments, under the most liberal 
interpretation of what is relevant, would be defined as relevant in a 
postcloture exercise and, therefore, by the actions of the majority, 
and specifically the majority leader and the chairman of the committee; 
they have set a precedent that even if it weren't the right of the 
membership of the Senate, they have set a precedent that amendments 
which are not--which are irrelevant to the underlying bill can be 
brought forward, and they should be brought forward.
  For example, today the majority leader came down and made a very 
compelling statement relative to the dire straits that people are in 
who are having their mortgages foreclosed on because of this subprime 
meltdown we are having. It is serious. It is very serious. It is 
serious to those people especially, but it is also serious to the 
Nation as a whole because it is affecting the credit markets and it may 
be contracting the economy. I filed an amendment which would address 
that issue. Some farmers I suspect are caught up in this subprime 
foreclosure exercise, unfortunately. I bet there are some farm families 
who have been hit by this. I know there have been. So I think it is 
probably pretty relevant to these people who are farmers and, 
therefore, an argument could be made it is relevant to the bill. But I 
am not making that argument. I am saying that issue should be raised 
right now--we shouldn't wait--that the amendment I have offered which 
would essentially say that if your home is foreclosed on, you don't get 
hit with a tax bill for phantom income, which is what happens today. If 
you happen to be unfortunate enough to have your home foreclosed on, 
you get a tax bill from the IRS, even though you lost your home and 
even though you didn't get any income out of the foreclosure sale. That 
puts a little more pressure on the person who has had their home 
foreclosed on. That is a traumatic enough event, but to then have the 
IRS come after you, that is horrible. So this amendment would basically 
stop that practice. It would say to the IRS: No. You can't deem that as 
income.
  There are going to be some farmers who are going to need that 
protection, and there are going to be a lot of Americans who are going 
to need that protection, unfortunately. So we should take that 
amendment up. I would be happy to offer that amendment right now, but 
if I offered it right now, it would be objected to under the proposal 
because the majority leader has deemed it is not relevant to the farm 
bill and, therefore, he is not going to allow it to be debated. I 
happen to think it is a pretty darned important amendment.
  There are a couple of other amendments I have suggested. I have 
suggested 11 amendments to the bill. That is not outrageous. Some of 
them I think could probably be negotiated. I even suggested I would 
take 15 minutes of debate on them, 7\1/2\ minutes divided equally on 
each one of them. Unfortunately, the other side of the aisle rejected 
that idea--or they didn't formally object to it, but they told us we 
would want to talk a little bit more about some of these amendments. 
But the assistant majority leader on the Democratic side of the aisle 
came down to the floor and specifically called out a few of my 
amendments and said that they were the problem. They were the problem 
because they shouldn't be heard on this farm bill. He mentioned the 
mortgage amendment which we discussed.
  He also mentioned an amendment which I happen to think is pretty darn 
relevant to this bill, especially to rural America and farm 
communities, which is that in most of rural America today, there is a 
crisis relative to the ability of baby doctors to practice their 
profession. It is virtually impossible, for example, in northern New 
Hampshire to see an OB/GYN unless you drive through the mountains and 
down to the southern or mid part of the State. That is true across this 
country, because OB/GYN doctors--baby doctors--people who deliver 
babies in rural communities can't generate enough income because the 
populations aren't large enough to pay the cost of their insurance 
against frivolous lawsuits or lawsuits generally. So I have suggested 
that for those doctors specifically, so we can get more of them into 
the rural communities delivering babies for all the people who live in 
the rural communities but obviously for farm families, that we give 
protection to them--protection which tracks--it is not outrageous 
protection--the California protection for doctors which occurs 
generally under California law so the cost of their premium for 
malpractice insurance will not drive them out of practicing and 
delivering babies in rural America and especially to farm families.
  The Senator from Illinois said that was a frivolous--he didn't use 
the term ``frivolous''--he implied the amendment wasn't a good 
amendment; we shouldn't have to debate that amendment on this bill. Why 
not? Why not take up that amendment? Fifteen minutes I am willing to 
debate that amendment, 7\1/2\ minutes on both sides, and vote on it.
  Well, it is not because it is not relevant and it is not because it 
shouldn't be taken up; it is because there are a number of Members on 
their side of the aisle who said we don't want to vote that issue. It 
is a hard vote. Why? Because it makes sense. That is why I think it is 
a hard vote. But there are other people on the other side of the aisle 
who simply don't want to have to cast that vote. It is not about the 
relevance of that amendment; it is about the desire to avoid casting a 
difficult vote. Well, you were sent here; you should make difficult 
votes on public policy that is important, and that happens to be a 
fairly significant point of public policy that is important, whether 
women in rural America can have adequate and prompt access to an OB/
GYN. I think that is pretty darn important.
  Then the assistant leader said an amendment I had on the list, my 11 
amendments--a small number of amendments--was not appropriate because 
it dealt with the Gulf of Mexico. Well, this amendment says, as a 
follow-on to the Oceans Commission, which did a very large, extensive 
study of the status of the ocean and America's involvement and what we 
should be doing relative to the ocean, which was completed about 2 
years ago and which was created, authorized, and funded as a result of 
an initiative by Senator Hollings from South Carolina, with my support 
as a member of the appropriations subcommittee that had jurisdiction 
over NOAA, and the conclusion of this Commission, which was filled with 
the best and most talented scientists and leaders we have on the issue 
of how the ocean was being impacted, was that

[[Page 31562]]

the Gulf of Mexico is being uniquely impacted by fertilizer runoff from 
the Midwest coming down the Missouri, the Mississippi, and the other 
tributaries of the Mississippi and going into the Gulf of Mexico, and 
we are getting a dead zone there, a very significant dead zone because 
of the phosphates and I think the nitrates. The Commission called for 
action. It said: We have to do something as a country about this.
  But what does this farm bill do? It expands dramatically the 
incentive to put more acreage into production, and I say: Fine. That is 
great. But it doesn't address the runoff issue, which is that 
additional production is going to occur, or the runoff issue that is 
occurring as a result of already existing production. So all this 
amendment does is say let's give NOAA the ability to go out and study 
this problem and see if they can come up--working with the Department 
of Agriculture--with some ideas on how we might be able to abate the 
harm we are doing as an unintended consequence of expanding our 
agricultural community, the harm we are doing to the Gulf of Mexico. 
But no, no, we can't take up that amendment. No, no. It doesn't get a 
blue slip, permission slip from the majority leader.
  Then the fourth amendment which was mentioned or cited by the 
assistant leader as being something that was problematic--and that is 
sort of a conservative description of the way he addressed the issues--
was an amendment I have that says the firefighters should have the 
ability to pursue collective bargaining.
  Now, maybe farms don't have fires. Maybe barns don't burn down and 
silos don't blow up. Maybe there weren't any wildfires in San Diego. 
Maybe I missed all that. But it seems to me that fire protection is a 
pretty big part of everybody's lifestyle in this country, and having 
fire departments that know what they are doing and are properly paid, 
have proper equipment and training is really important whether you 
happen to be in New York City or on a farm somewhere in the Midwest or 
the West. So I cannot imagine under what scenario it is deemed that 
this amendment should not be discussed and voted on.
  Again, I am willing to do this for a briefer period of time. I am not 
trying to slow the bill down. I want to get a few issues up that I 
think are important to the definition of the problem as I see it in the 
farm region.
  Then I had a series of amendments--well, I only had 11, but 5 of the 
amendments I had dealt with the budget process.
  This farm bill does fundamental harm to the concept of responsible 
budgeting. It plays games with our budget process. We hear so much from 
the other side of the aisle about how they use pay-go to discipline 
spending around here. That is the term, the motherhood term we hear, 
``pay-go.'' It turns out that it is ``Swiss cheese go'' as far as the 
other side of the aisle is concerned regarding spending restraint. On 
15 different occasions, they have gimmicked pay-go, played games with 
it to the point where they have spent almost $143 billion in this 
Congress which should have been subject to pay-go but was not subject 
to a pay-go vote because they managed to gimmick their way around it.
  This farm bill is a classic example of that procedure occurring 
again. By changing dates--1 day--so that they shift years and take 
items out of the pay-go--what is called the pay-go scorecard--they are 
able to avoid pay-go charges in this bill to the tune of $10 billion. 
That is not small change, by the way. We should have a pay-go vote on 
that $10 billion if we are going to maintain the integrity of the 
budget process. That is reasonable. I have asked for that vote.
  In addition, they have created a new emergency fund--a $5 billion 
emergency fund. The way we have handled emergencies--and there are, I 
admit, many emergencies in farm country--is that we have always paid 
for those emergency costs through an emergency supplemental, whether it 
is because of a flood or if there is a drought or if there is a 
hurricane. We fund the costs after they have occurred, and we pay the 
costs of the emergency. What this would do is set up what amounts to a 
slush fund--what I am afraid will become basically walking-around 
money--of $5 billion and a floor so that we are going to be guaranteed 
that every year for the next 5 years at least a billion dollars will be 
spent on emergencies, whether there is an emergency or not. You know, 
if a large wind blows a mailbox over in North Dakota, it is going to be 
declared an emergency because somebody is going to want to get their 
hands on that billion dollars. That makes no sense from a budget 
standpoint. We know that human nature--especially legislative nature--
will spend that money once it is allocated, and we should not do it up 
front, create a floor; we should do it the traditional way, which is to 
pay for emergencies when they occur. Now, some people here obviously 
disagree with me. I suspect I will not win that vote. But it doesn't 
mean we should not have a vote on that point of budget discipline and 
the importance of budget discipline.
  In addition, on the budget issue, there is a $3 billion gimmick in 
here that is so creative it sets a new standard for creativity. There 
always has been movement of money from the discretionary side of the 
account to the mandatory side, and vice versa, to free up more 
spending. That is a game that has been played a long time, where an 
expenditure that is discretionary will suddenly find out it is being 
put under a mandatory account, so the money being spent in the 
discretionary account can be freed up to spend it on something else. If 
you get it into the mandatory accounts here, you basically put it on 
autopilot and don't have to worry about it ever again.
  This bill takes this concept to a new dimension. It takes a mandatory 
spending responsibility and moves it over to a tax credit, so that we 
now have a $3 billion tax credit where we used to have a $3 billion 
mandatory expenditure, and then it takes the $3 billion that was being 
spent on the mandatory side of the account and spends it on a new 
program. So, essentially, by using the tax law in a very creative way, 
you have generated new spending of $3 billion. I think that is terrible 
budget policy. I think we should address it, debate it, talk about it 
on the floor, and definitely vote on it before we allow this bill to go 
to cloture.
  Obviously, there are a lot of issues raised by this bill; otherwise, 
there would not be 240 amendments filed. The majority of them have been 
filed by the other side of the aisle. But the fact that the procedure 
has been structured in a way that these amendments, which are totally 
reasonable, which are parts of significant issues of public policy, 
such as whether women in rural America will be able to see an OB/GYN or 
whether farmers get the equipment they need or whether a person whose 
home is foreclosed on will get hit with an IRS tax penalty or whether 
the Gulf of Mexico should be looked at relative to maintaining its 
vitality as a environmentally sensitive area--we are not going to be 
allowed to look at all of these issues because the majority leader set 
up a blue-slip permission process, which is totally antithetical to the 
system the Senate historically works under and undermines the capacity 
of issues to be debated and voted on. I just think, as I said, it is 
doing fundamental harm to our institution. Even if I didn't want to 
bring these amendments forward, I would not want to have a process that 
denied the right of other people to bring amendments like them forward.
  The fact that the leadership on the other side of the aisle wants to 
insulate its membership from making tough votes on things like baby 
doctors being available to farmers and farms getting the equipment they 
need and people whose homes are foreclosed on not being subject to IRS 
penalties--the fact that they want to protect their membership, that is 
understandable. That is their leadership. Their leadership is clearly 
trying to protect them in their jobs. To abuse the process of the 
Senate to accomplish that, to create a procedure where you basically 
foreclose amendments in a manner that actually is even more strict and

[[Page 31563]]

more contracted than what the House does, does more harm than good to 
the institution. As I said earlier, it puts us on an unnecessary and 
inappropriate slippery slope, and it is a fundamental change in the way 
the Senate works.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts is recognized.


                             Senate Choices

  Mr. KENNEDY. Madam President, on tomorrow, we will be voting on 
several items. Two are going to be related to our policy on Iraq. 
Tonight, I wish to express my views on the choices that are before the 
Senate and the American people. I know later in the evening a number of 
colleagues will speak to this issue. I welcome the chance to now 
express my view.
  Madam President, I oppose the minority leader's effort to provide a 
$70 billion blank check to President Bush for his failed Iraq policy. I 
will support legislation approved yesterday in the House of 
Representatives requiring the President to begin to bring our combat 
troops out of Iraq in 1 month and complete the withdrawal by December 
of next year. I hope the Senate will support it, and I hope President 
Bush will sign it into law.
  Earlier this month, we reached another tragic milestone in Iraq. We 
have lost more Americans in Iraq this year than in any other year. It 
is another painful and somber reminder of the enormous price in 
precious lives the Iraq war continues to impose. It is long past time 
for the administration to change course and end the national nightmare 
the Iraq war has become. Our military has served nobly in Iraq and done 
everything we have asked them to do. But they are caught in a 
continuing quagmire. They are policing a civil war and implementing a 
policy that is not worthy of their enormous sacrifice.
  The best way to protect our troops and our national security is to 
put the Iraqis on notice that they need to take responsibility for 
their future so that we can bring our troops back home to America 
safely. As long as our military presence in Iraq is open-ended, Iraq's 
leaders are unlikely to make the essential compromises for a political 
solution.
  The administration's misguided policy has put our troops in an 
untenable and unwinnable situation. They are being held hostage to 
Iraqi politics, in which sectarian leaders are unable or unwilling to 
make the difficult judgments needed to lift Iraq out of its downward 
spiral.
  BG John F. Campbell, deputy commanding general of the 1st Cavalry 
Division in Iraq, spoke with clarity about the shortcomings of Iraq's 
political leaders. He said:

       The ministers, they don't get out. . . . They don't know 
     what the hell is going on on the ground.

  Army LTG Mark Fetter said that ``it is painful, very painful'' 
dealing with the obstructionism of Iraqi officials.
  About conditions on the ground, Army MG Michael Barbero said:

       . . . it's not as good as it's being reported now.

  All of these military deserve credit for their courage in speaking 
the truth. We should commend them for it. These are courageous, brave 
military speaking the truth.
  Yet the President continues to promise that success is just around 
the corner. He continues to hold out hope that Iraq's leaders are 
willing and capable of making essential political compromises necessary 
for reconciliation.
  The American people know we are spending hundreds of billions of 
dollars on a failed policy that is making America more vulnerable and 
putting our troops at greater risk. The toll is devastating. Nearly 
4,000 American troops have died, tens of thousands of Iraqis have been 
killed or injured, and over 4 million more have been forced to flee 
their homes. Nearly a half trillion dollars has been spent fighting 
this war.
  It is wrong for Congress to write a blank check to the President for 
this war. It is obvious that President Bush wants to drag this process 
out month after month so he can hand off his policy to the next 
President. It is time to put the brakes on this madness. It is up to us 
to halt the open-ended commitment of our troops that President Bush has 
been making year after year. We need to tell the Iraqis now that we 
intend to leave and leave soon. Only by doing so can we create the 
urgency that is so clearly necessary for them to end their differences.
  We cannot allow the President to drag this process out any longer. 
This war is his responsibility, and it is his responsibility to do all 
he can to end it. It is wrong for him to pass the buck to his successor 
when he knows thousands more of the courageous members of the Armed 
Forces will be wounded or die because of it. Every day this misguided 
war goes on, our service men and women and their families continue to 
shoulder the burden and pay the price.
  If this issue were only about the tragedies of the war, there would 
be reason enough to end it. But it has become about so much more. Now 
we are also starting to see the fallout at home as the President 
refuses to deliver the relief our families need.
  Earlier this week, the President signed a Defense appropriations bill 
that includes a 10-percent increase in funding compared to last year, 
but he vetoed a bill that includes an increase half that big that would 
fund cancer research, investments in our schools, job training, and 
protection for our workers. That bill included $4.5 billion more than 
the President proposed for education. He said that $4.5 billion more 
for students is too much. Yet he has asked for 35 times that much more 
for the war in Iraq. He wants us to say yes to $158 billion for Iraq 
when he says no to $4.5 billion for American children.
  In Iraq, anything goes. The sky is the limit. Billions and billions 
of dollars for Iraq. But here in America, right here at home, a modest 
investment in our school children gets a veto.
  The bill included $3 billion to improve the quality of our teachers. 
Those funds would have been used to hire 30,000 more teachers, provide 
high-quality induction and mentoring for 100,000 beginning teachers, 
and provide high-quality professional development for an additional 
200,000 teachers. One week of the failed policy in Iraq is the cost. We 
could do all of this for our teachers for the cost of a single week in 
Iraq, but the President says no.
  The bill that he vetoed included $7 billion to provide high-quality 
early education through Head Start. Yesterday, the Senate approved a 
Head Start bill to strengthen the program and make Head Start even 
better. The bill goes a long way in strengthening the quality of the 
personnel, tying Head Start to kindergarten and other education 
programs in the States and consolidating all the various programs in 
the States that are available to children to make them more effective. 
Each of these improvements make an enormous difference in the lives of 
Head Start children. Funds the President vetoed would be used to build 
a basic foundation for learning that will help low-income and minority 
children for the rest of their lives. We can improve this foundation 
for the cost of a little more than 2 weeks in Iraq.
  But even as we work in Congress to improve this vital program, the 
President says no. No, no, no to this program, no to the Head Start 
children. We are only reaching half of those who are eligible for the 
program at this time. We have over 4 million poor children under the 
age of 5 in the United States of America; we only reach 1 million of 
them. We all know what a difference early intervention makes for 
children in education. It is critically important for us to continue 
strengthening the academic programs, socio-emotional support, and 
health services delivered through Head Start and yet the President 
continues to say no.
  The same misguided rationale applies to other investments in this 
bill. The President's choices cast aside urgently needed research on 
heart disease, diabetes, asthma, infectious disease, and mental health, 
and many other areas that could find cures and bring relief to millions 
of our fellow citizens.
  This chart shows $4.9 billion in cancer research which would fund 
over 6,800 grants; diabetes research, pandemic flu, with all the 
dangers we are facing with the potential for a pandemic flu--that is 
necessary--support for the CDC, one of the prime health

[[Page 31564]]

agencies to help protect Americans. It does such a good job in terms of 
immunizations and community health centers, which is a lifeline for 15 
million of our fellow citizens, so many of whom have lost their health 
insurance. And the answer is no to those individuals.
  It is true, in terms of American workers, the President rejects 
funding to enforce the labor laws that keep workers safe and to give 
them a level playing field. Instead, the President's veto takes bad 
employers off the hook and puts the safety and lives of American 
workers at risk. The President's choices are devastating to veterans as 
well. Listen to this, Mr. President. Each year nearly 320,000 brave 
servicemen return to civilian life, many coming from Iraq and 
Afghanistan. Tens of thousands--here is the chart. These are the 
returning veterans from Afghanistan and Iraq. Tens of thousands of 
reservists and National Guard have lost their benefits and even their 
jobs because they served their country. That is why the appropriations 
bill provided $228 million to help veterans find jobs, obtain training, 
and protect their right to return to former jobs. They are guaranteed 
now under existing law, but what is happening is that law is not being 
implemented. We found that three-quarters of returning veterans do not 
even know about their rights and, in many instances, they are losing 
their jobs, they are losing their overtime pay, and they are losing 
their pensions. That is why today one out of four homeless people in 
the United States is a former veteran. The bill we approved would help 
address this issue, but that was also vetoed.
  The bill we will have a chance to vote on tomorrow in the Senate, 
which was approved by the House of Representatives yesterday, also 
takes an important step in reining in the Bush administration's use of 
torture. It is difficult to believe that in this day and age, Congress 
needs to legislate against the use of torture to prevent the President 
of the United States from abusing prisoners. Torture and cruel, 
inhuman, and degrading treatment are already prohibited by law. Yet, 
once again, we must legislate, not because the conduct we would 
prohibit is somehow unlawful, but because the Bush administration 
continues to twist and distort existing law in its misguided, immoral 
interrogation practices.
  The Nation was shocked by the horrible images from Abu Ghraib prison, 
and America was shamed in the eyes of the world. The administration 
tried to whitewash the episode by blaming it on low-level soldiers, but 
the truth about our use of torture couldn't be concealed. Led by 
President Bush, Vice President Cheney, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld, 
and Attorney General Gonzales, the administration had set a course that 
undermined fundamental American values in the craven belief that 
torture could somehow make us more secure.
  Our interrogators were authorized to shackle prisoners in stress 
positions, induce hypothermia, and use sleep deprivation, extend 
isolation, bombardment with lights and loud music, and even now the 
infamous practice of waterboarding. The Justice Department's Office of 
Legal Counsel--listen to this, Mr. President--the Justice Department's 
Office of Legal Counsel gave its approval to the legality of these 
practices in the morally outrageous Bybee torture memorandum. The Bybee 
torture memorandum was in place for more than 2\1/2\ years until Mr. 
Gonzales appeared before the Judiciary Committee when he wanted to be 
the Attorney General of the United States. He could look over that 
committee and tell that if he had to defend that memorandum, he would 
never make it, and he was right.
  What happened? The administration repealed the Bybee torture 
memorandum, and Mr. Gonzales got through the Judiciary Committee, 
although there were more than 40 votes in the Senate against his 
confirmation.
  Under the Bybee memorandum, if the President approved the use of 
torture, no one could be prosecuted for breaking our Nation's laws or 
international obligations.
  Do my colleagues understand? Under the Bybee memorandum, if you were 
going to prosecute an individual for using torture, you had to 
demonstrate a specific intent that the purpose of the torture in which 
you were involved was not to gain information but just to harm the 
individual. Unless a prosecutor would be able to demonstrate that the 
purpose of torturing an individual was not to gain information, you 
were effectively let off, free.
  As the distinguished Dean of Yale Law School, Dr. Koh, said, it was 
the worst piece of legal reasoning he had seen in the history of 
studying laws in the United States and legal opinions.
  The administration withdrew the Bybee memo in embarrassment when it 
became public. Indeed, the now-Attorney General Mukasey refused to 
denounce waterboarding as torture.
  Only leaders who fail to understand the founding principles of 
America could approve such behavior. Our country needs to stand beyond 
reproach for the sanctity of each individual, for freedom, for justice, 
for the rule of law. But the administration turned its back on all 
these traditions and on the ideals of America itself.
  In 2005, Congress passed the Detainee Treatment Act to ensure that 
all interrogations conducted by the Department of Defense would comply 
with the Army Field Manual, a comprehensive and effective approach to 
interrogation that prohibits the use of torture and cruel, inhuman, and 
degrading techniques in favor of techniques that are most likely to be 
effective in gaining necessary information.
  LTG John Kimmons said, when releasing the manual:

       No good intelligence is going to come from abusive 
     practices. I think history tells us that. I think the 
     empirical evidence of the last five years, hard years, tells 
     us that. The Manual itself tells us that the use of torture 
     is not only illegal, but also it is a poor technique that 
     yields unreliable results, may damage subsequent collection 
     efforts, and can induce the source to say whatever he thinks 
     the [interrogator] wants to hear.

  Last May, General Petraeus echoed these statements in a letter to all 
our servicemembers in Iraq saying that ``torture and other expedient 
methods to obtain information'' are not only illegal and immoral, but 
also generally ``neither useful nor necessary.''
  We now know, however, that the 2005 act left open a loophole that 
undermines the basic safeguards against torture and cruel and degrading 
treatment. We applied the field manual to the Department of Defense, 
but not to the CIA.
  Last year in the Military Commissions Act, Congress left it to the 
President to define by Executive order the interrogation practices that 
would bind all Government interrogators, including the CIA. The 
President's Executive order drove a Mack truck through this small 
loophole. The vague terms of the order permit many of the most heinous 
interrogation practices.
  The provisions of the bill we will have an opportunity of voting on 
tomorrow closed that loophole. They require that all U.S. 
interrogations, including those conducted by the CIA, conform to the 
Army Field Manual. This very simple and easily implemented reform means 
no more waterboarding, no more use of dogs or other extreme practices 
prohibited by the Manual. There will still be great flexibility in use 
of interrogation methods and our interrogators will be able to 
effectively get the required information, but torture will be off the 
table.
  This bill is an opportunity to restate our commitment to the ideals 
and security of our Nation. It is an opportunity to repair the damage 
done to our reputation by the scandal of Abu Ghraib and the abuses of 
Guantanamo. It is an opportunity to restore our Nation as the beacon 
for human rights, fair treatment, and the rule of law. It is an 
opportunity to protect our brave service men and women, both in and out 
of uniform, from similar tactics. It is a simple but vital step in 
returning our Nation to the rule of law and the ideals on which America 
was founded, and it deserves to be enacted into law as soon as 
possible.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Florida.
  Mr. MARTINEZ. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be 
allowed to speak as in morning business.

[[Page 31565]]

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.


                        Subprime Lending Crisis

  Mr. MARTINEZ. Mr. President, I wish to take a moment to express my 
strong support for modernization of the Federal Housing Administration. 
As you know, there is a serious financial issue affecting a lot of 
Americans. The subprime lending crisis is driving up foreclosure rates 
in Florida and across the country.
  The problem is that from 2004 to 2006, financial institutions gave a 
lot of people mortgages they could not afford. These were low-interest, 
nothing-down, sometimes no-document loans that made the initial monthly 
payment very affordable. But because these were adjustable rate 
mortgages, a lot of people soon found themselves in a lot of financial 
trouble. After 24 months, or whenever the initial low downpayment 
period was over, the next market-driven rates set in and monthly 
mortgage payments climbed substantially.
  Another factor compounding the problem, especially in places such as 
Florida, is that housing prices are stagnant or declining. So with no 
equity, higher monthly payments, and no chance to sell without taking a 
substantial loss, a lot of homeowners who have subprime loans are 
finding themselves in the perfect storm and, sadly, they are facing 
financial foreclosure.
  Imagine the heartbreak of a family losing a home to foreclosure. 
About 2 million families in America are in that predicament today. This 
summer we saw the first wave of foreclosures, and because of the lag 
time between interest rate adjustments, we are likely to see another 
wave before too long. But the good news is that there is a strong 
public-private partnership offering help.
  The Federal Housing Administration is offering certain homeowners an 
option to refinance their existing mortgages so they can make their 
payments and keep their homes. Additionally, FHA is coordinating a wide 
variety of groups that offer foreclosure counseling. This is to 
identify homeowners before they face hardships, help them to understand 
their financial options, and allow them to find a mortgage product that 
works for them.
  I commend President Bush and Housing Secretary Alphonso Jackson for 
stepping in to help with this difficult situation. I also commend the 
private institutions that are helping families avoid foreclosure. But 
where we need more action right now is right here in the Congress.
  I am pleased we have put together a bipartisan FHA reform bill that 
will lower downpayment requirements, allow FHA to insure bigger loans, 
and give FHA more pricing flexibility. These reforms will empower FHA 
to reach more families that need help. It would also help first-time 
home buyers, minorities, and those with low to moderate incomes.
  Over the past 72 years, FHA has been a mortgage industry leader, 
helping more than 34 million Americans become homeowners at no cost to 
the taxpayer. With this legislation, we build an even better program 
that complements conventional mortgage products and allows FHA to 
continue to serve hard-working and creditworthy Americans.
  I commend Senators Dodd and Shelby for their leadership on this issue 
in the Banking Committee. The legislation we have before us is the 
result of a lot of time and dedication from members of that Senate 
Banking Committee. It isn't an easy process to get legislation through 
this committee, but it is a fair one. With this legislation, we have 
the opportunity to use the resources of the Federal Government in a 
reasonable and responsible manner in order to mitigate against future 
home losses.
  As former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, I know this 
program well, and I would ask my colleagues who may have questions or 
concerns with this legislation to talk to me about it. I would love to 
tell you why this is a good idea for America.
  I would also add that Senators Dodd and Shelby and I have worked hand 
in hand with the administration throughout this process, and that this 
legislation that was reported from the Banking Committee--and, as I 
said, has bipartisan support--also enjoys the support of the President 
and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. In fact, I have a 
letter from Secretary Jackson to Chairman Dodd and Ranking Member 
Shelby dated September 19 expressing enthusiastic support for the bill.
  This is a bill that will help families. At a time when America seems 
to be looking to Congress for answers on issues from energy to the 
crisis that is going on with the foreclosure problem, to so many other 
issues, here is a time when we can come together and get something done 
that is good for the American people.
  To make the argument this legislation has not been given due 
deliberation is both unfair and unfounded. FHA reform is an issue that 
has been debated here in Congress for many years. In fact, I know we 
debated this issue here when I was Secretary of Housing and Urban 
Development.
  The Banking Committee has had hearings and Members have been an 
active part of the process. At the markup in September, members voted 
21 to 1 in favor of reporting the legislation from committee. I believe 
the one Senator who did object in committee now supports the 
legislation.
  So, again, I ask my colleagues to take a good look at the merits of 
this legislation and support our efforts to provide hard-working, 
creditworthy Americans with an avenue to safe, sound, and affordable 
mortgage lending.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Alaska.


                        Tribute to Senator Byrd

  Mr. STEVENS. Mr. President, I come to the floor to honor the 
President pro tempore, our great friend, the senior Senator from West 
Virginia. Senator Byrd will celebrate his 90th birthday next Tuesday. 
In Alaska, we call this a significant milepost. Milestones in Alaska 
get covered with snow too often.
  I remember watching from the gallery in 1959 when Senator Byrd took 
office. I was a member of the Eisenhower administration at the time. He 
had been here for nearly a decade by the time I came to the Senate in 
1968. Senator Byrd and I have worked together on the Appropriations 
Committee now for 36 years. We have each chaired that committee and we 
have each had the honor of becoming the President pro tempore. He has 
been President pro tempore twice.
  Senator Byrd has been called a symbol of our history, and those of us 
who served with him, and continue to serve with him, rely on his 
knowledge of the Senate and its history and traditions. I wish I had 
the time to go into some of the times I have listened to Senator Byrd 
recite poems or history, or tell of his times of researching the 
history of the Roman Senate. I served as the whip here for 8 years when 
Senator Byrd was giving his history lessons, and it was my honor to sit 
here and listen to those history lessons, and I learned a great deal 
from him.
  His devotion to the Senate and to those of us who serve with him are 
reasons for us to call him the patriarch of the Senate family. I know 
of no one who has done so much to keep the spirit of the family alive 
in the Senate. Over the years, Senator Byrd has come to the floor many 
times to honor me personally and to honor my family. He comforted me 
here on the floor when my wife Ann passed away. He comforted me in 
times of sorrow; he comforted me in times of joy.
  He came to me on the day I first became a grandfather. And I will 
never forget that, because he gave a speech about the meaning of 
becoming a grandfather, and he told me I had my first taste of 
immortality because I was a grandfather. Those words have stayed with 
me for a long time. I now have 11 grandchildren, but I will never 
forget that speech about the first one.
  I also remember the kind remarks he has made to me on many other 
occasions. He came to the floor and offered congratulations of the 
Senate when I remarried, and he came again when Catherine and I had our 
first daughter,

[[Page 31566]]

our only child, Lilly. Earlier this year, he came to the floor to 
congratulate Lilly on her graduation from law school. And with Lilly, I 
remember when she was young and a baby, and I was the whip, we had a 
birthday party for Lilly every year here, and Senator Byrd never missed 
one of those. He became Uncle Robert to Lilly. He has had a marvelous 
relationship with the children of Senators who have served with him.
  The nurturing and caring quality that Senator Byrd has brought to 
this Chamber for so many years reminds us we are a family. We had the 
sad occasion to gather with him and support him when he lost his 
beloved wife. But I have come here today to congratulate the Senator 
from West Virginia not only for his service to our Nation and to the 
Senate, but for his longevity. He is the only Senator who is older than 
I am, and I thank him for his friendship and for all he has done for me 
and my family personally.
  Catherine and I wish him a very happy birthday, and we hope the 
Senate will join in extending to the President pro tempore our sincere 
congratulations on his birthday.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Louisiana.


                         National Adoption Day

  Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I appreciate the opportunity to be 
recognized to speak for a moment with my colleague Senator Coleman on 
National Adoption Day, which is this Saturday.
  Before I do that, let me thank the Senator from Alaska, the senior 
Senator, for his beautiful remarks relative to our other colleague from 
West Virginia, a man whom we have all come to know and love and respect 
for his years and quality of service to this body and to our country. 
Many of us will have other words to say on behalf of Senator Byrd on 
his birthday, which is coming up very soon.
  I wanted to come to the floor with my colleague from Minnesota to 
speak about a very important issue that we try to remember and reflect 
on through the whole month of November, but particularly on National 
Adoption Day on November 17. I also wanted to take this opportunity to 
remind ourselves of the importance of family and the laws we try to 
pass here in Congress to encourage families to be strengthened and 
expanded through the miracle of adoption.
  Many Members of Congress, including myself, are adoptive parents. We 
have personally experienced the joy of building our families through 
adoption. We are proud promoters of this practice that is not uniquely 
American, but is embraced by Americans in a way that it is not embraced 
in most countries in the world. And we are proud of that. In America, 
we like to believe it is not the color of our skin or even being from 
the same part of the world that makes a family. It is a bond, a love 
that can be shared between people and families and children, even if 
those children are of a different race or a different background. It is 
a very unique aspect of America that is quite open and quite 
extraordinary.
  In America, we adopt many children, thousands of children. Over the 
last decade, the numbers have increased every year, in good measure due 
to the work that has been done in the United States, right here in 
Congress.
  Let me back up a minute to say that, obviously, our ultimate hope and 
wish is that all children could stay with their birth families. In an 
ideal world, you would want all children born in every country, every 
day and every year, to be able to be born into families who want them, 
can care for them, can nurture them, and will stay whole and permanent. 
But we know in the reality of the world in which we live, that is not 
possible. War, famine, disease, addiction, violence, and gross neglect 
separate families, separate children from their birth parents every 
day.
  I think it is one of our primary responsibilities as responsible, 
functioning governments, particularly democracies, to do what we can to 
connect those children who are separated from that special bond with a 
birth parent to another nurturing, loving adult as quickly as possible. 
It would seem that the most natural thing in the world is to understand 
that a child without a parent is very vulnerable. Even children with 
parents who are educated and able to navigate through life still have 
great challenges. So, you can imagine the vulnerability of children 
with no parents to protect them, alone to raise themselves. Children 
don't do that very well. And governments don't raise children. Human 
beings--parents--do. So we need to do our best.
  We are working at it, but we have a long way to go. That is why every 
November, our Presidents, President Clinton, and before him President 
Bush, take a minute, as our current President will tomorrow at the 
White House, to acknowledge that November in America is National 
Adoption Month. We focus the attention of our country on our efforts 
and we congratulate ourselves on our progress, but there is still a 
gap. We have 514,000 children who have been removed from their birth 
families and placed in the care of the community, in foster care. 
Today, over 115,000 of these children are waiting to be adopted, and 
the majority of their parents already have had their parental rights 
terminated. These children are waiting to be placed in a permanent 
family through adoption, whether kinship or regular, or long-term 
guardianship.
  So I come to the floor today to recognize some of these children who 
are waiting today, and to say that while we are making progress, we 
have some beautiful children who are still waiting to be adopted. There 
are many misconceptions about some of the children who are in our 
public child welfare and foster care systems. The survey recently 
conducted by the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption indicated that the 
majority of Americans mistakenly believe that many of the children in 
foster care are ``juvenile delinquents.'' According to the survey, an 
unbelievable number of Americans, have thought about adopting a child 
from foster care, but because of their misperception that there is 
something wrong with these children, that they are damaged goods, they 
back up or they back away.
  The facts will show that it is not the children who are in foster 
care who are delinquent. It was a problem from the parental end; that 
the parents somehow failed to step up or were unable to step up. These 
children are not damaged goods. They are doing beautifully in school. 
Many grow up to be quite successful, but they, like all children, need 
parents and protection.
  This is a young girl, Natalyia, who is 8 years old. She has been in 
foster care since 2001 and is one of the children in Louisiana who is 
waiting to be adopted.
  This is two siblings. Sometimes a child is an only child and 
sometimes a child has brothers and sisters. I am one of nine children. 
I know, Mr. President, you came from a fairly large family. Sometimes 
the unfortunate thing is that parents walk away, or disease or violence 
separates them from groups of children.
  These are two young boys, Terron and Montrell, who are about 7 and 8 
years old. They are in foster care in Louisiana, looking for parents 
here in the United States.
  This is two other brothers who have been in foster care for a while. 
Their names are Ronnie and Kody. They are 11 and 13 years old, also 
looking for a family here in the United States.
  We have thousands and thousands of children of all ages in the United 
States looking for families. We have millions of orphans around the 
world. As I said, there are tens of thousands of children right here in 
the United States who are waiting to be adopted. I am proud of the laws 
we have tried to pass here on the floor of the Senate, giving 
appropriate tax credits and providing other opportunities for children 
to move into loving and permanent families.
  I think our time is limited. I don't want to take any more time, but 
I ask unanimous consent to allow the Senator from Minnesota to finish 
up our talk here on the Senate floor, to acknowledge National Adoption 
Day and National Adoption Month, and then turn to the leadership, if I 
could.

[[Page 31567]]

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there objection?
  The Senator from Minnesota.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I am wondering if my friend from Minnesota 
will be kind enough to allow the two leaders to engage in a little work 
here on the floor? As soon as we finish, he would retain the floor.
  Mr. COLEMAN. Mr. President, I graciously yield the floor to the two 
leaders.
  Mr. REID. My friend is gracious in everything he does. I appreciate 
that so much.


    Conditional Recess or Adjournment of the Two Houses of Congress

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the Senate proceed 
to H. Con. Res. 259, the adjournment resolution.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will report the 
concurrent resolution by title.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       A concurrent resolution (H. Con. Res. 259) providing for a 
     conditional adjournment of the House of Representatives and a 
     conditional recess or adjournment of the Senate.

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there objection?
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, reserving the right to object, could 
the majority leader tell me what the schedule is likely to be for 
tomorrow?
  Mr. REID. Yes. We will do a unanimous consent request in a minute for 
your approval or disapproval. What we are going to do is come in in the 
morning. I want to come in early because of requests from both your 
side and my side that we vote first on an Iraq matter that the minority 
has brought to the floor; then we would vote on a motion to proceed to 
the bridge bill that the House voted on last night; and then we would 
vote on the motion to invoke cloture on the farm bill. At that time, 
hopefully, we would be ready to wind things down until after 
Thanksgiving.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there objection?
  There being no objection, the Senate proceeded to consider the 
concurrent resolution.
  Mr. REID. I ask unanimous consent the current resolution be agreed to 
and the motion be laid upon the table.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  The concurrent resolution (H. Con. Res. 259) was considered and 
agreed to.
  The concurrent resolution reads as follows:

                            H. Con. Res. 259

       Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate 
     concurring), That when the House adjourns on the legislative 
     day of Thursday, November 15, 2007, or Friday, November 16, 
     2007, on a motion offered pursuant to this concurrent 
     resolution by its Majority Leader or his designee, it stand 
     adjourned until 2 p.m. on Tuesday, December 4, 2007, or until 
     the time of any reassembly pursuant to section 2 of this 
     concurrent resolution, whichever occurs first; and that when 
     the Senate recesses or adjourns on any day from Thursday, 
     November 15, 2007, through Thursday, November 29, 2007, on a 
     motion offered pursuant to this concurrent resolution by its 
     Majority Leader or his designee, it stand recessed or 
     adjourned until noon on Monday, December 3, 2007, or such 
     other time on that day as may be specified by its Majority 
     Leader or his designee in the motion to recess or adjourn, or 
     until the time of any reassembly pursuant to section 2 of 
     this concurrent resolution, whichever occurs first.
       Sec. 2.  The Speaker of the House and the Majority Leader 
     of the Senate, or their respective designees, acting jointly 
     after consultation with the Minority Leader of the House and 
     the Minority Leader of the Senate, shall notify the Members 
     of the House and the Senate, respectively, to reassemble at 
     such place and time as they may designate if, in their 
     opinion, the public interest shall warrant it.


                          ORDERS FOR TOMORROW

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate vote 
at 9:30 a.m. tomorrow on the cloture motion on the motion to proceed to 
S. 2340, the Senate Iraq Emergency Supplemental Appropriations bill; if 
cloture is not invoked, the Senate then vote on cloture on the motion 
to proceed to H.R. 4156, the Orderly and Responsible Iraq Redeployment 
Appropriations bill; if that cloture is not invoked, the Senate then 
vote on cloture on the substitute amendment to the farm bill; I further 
ask unanimous consent that the cloture vote on H.R. 2419, the 
underlying bill, be delayed to occur, if needed, upon the adoption of 
the substitute amendment; I further ask unanimous consent that the time 
for debate prior to the first vote be equally divided between the 2 
leaders or their designees; that the last 10 minutes be reserved for 
the 2 leaders, with the majority controlling the last 5 minutes; and 
that there be 2 minutes for debate before the second and third votes.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there objection?
  Mr. REID. I say to my friend, it is my intention to come in in the 
morning at 8:30. That would allow any Senators who wish to talk about 
the farm bill and Iraq to do that tonight and in the morning we have a 
few speakers and you would have some speakers, and that should conclude 
the events tomorrow. I think we need to come in early because we have 
had a number of requests, as you know.
  I do say this, I appreciate the understanding of my friends on the 
other side. As they know, there is a debate tonight of all Democratic 
Presidential candidates, and they needed to be here in the morning. 
That is required. They probably needed the time anyway, but I couldn't 
push forward on that tonight, especially with the debate starting in 2 
hours in Las Vegas.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, let me say a couple of things before the 
distinguished Republican leader leaves. We had a brief conversation 
here in the well of the Senate a couple of minutes ago. I am 
disappointed we cannot proceed to the Transportation appropriations 
bill. The President tells us he wants bills. We do everything we can, 
and it is difficult to get them done, but we have now completed an 
extremely difficult conference. It has been open. Republicans have 
participated. I am not going to go into the details of the bill, but it 
is a transportation bill. It deals with such important parts of 
America's infrastructure which are so desperately needed.
  I hope, I say to my friend, that maybe before we leave here tomorrow 
there will be another thought given to this. It would be nice if we 
could send this bill to the President and do it before we leave here 
for recess. Senator Bond and Senator Murray on our side, the managers 
of this bill, have worked very hard trying to get everything done. They 
worked today. We got a hold on it here taken off. Somebody objected 
here. We took that off. I am so grateful for their hard work, their 
bipartisan work on this legislation.
  I do say this, Senator Bond, who has been one of the members of the 
Appropriations Committee for some time, has been pretty easy to work 
with over the years. He has been very reasonable. Senator Murray told 
me he has been extremely reasonable during this most difficult bill. I 
am not going to ask unanimous consent to go forward on it. I have been 
told by my friend, the distinguished Senator from Kentucky, there would 
be an objection. I do feel sorry we have not been able to do that.
  Finally, I will say a few words on an important issue, breast cancer 
and environmental research. I indicated earlier this year I was going 
to move forward, if necessary, on cloture. There is one Republican 
Senator who has held up this extremely important bill. This legislation 
would authorize money for 5 years to study the possible links between 
the development of breast cancer and environment. One key provision in 
the legislation would create an advisory panel to make recommendations 
about these grants.
  Over the past 6 years, this bill has enjoyed very broad, bipartisan 
support. During the 109th Congress, this bill was reported out of the 
HELP Committee, but one Senator on the other side, one Republican, 
objected to our request to pass it.
  I am bound and determined to pass this legislation. Why I have not 
moved on it earlier is the following reason: We have gotten great work 
on a bipartisan basis out of the HELP Committee. Senators Kennedy and 
Enzi--one would not think they are political soulmates, but they are. 
They balance each other out. Senator Enzi confided in me--I

[[Page 31568]]

don't necessarily mean confided in me, but he told me that he was going 
to have a hearing on this very soon, before the first of the year, to 
see if he could work out the problems the one Senator had. If that in 
fact is the case, this matter could be brought out of the committee to 
the floor and passed very quickly rather than my taking a week or so on 
the legislation. So I want all those who are so concerned about this 
legislation to know I have not forgotten about it, but based on Senator 
Enzi's representations, I am not going to try to invoke cloture on this 
bill at this time. If we do not get something done during the first few 
months of the next year, we will do that. Hopefully we can pass it in 
December.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, could the majority leader yield for a 
question?
  Mr. REID. I am happy to yield for a question.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, I am listening carefully to what you 
said. I am here on the floor working very hard trying to get the 
Transportation and Housing bill to the President, as he has asked us to 
do. We worked together in a strong bipartisan way. All of the 
Republicans and all the Democrats in both the House and Senate signed 
the conference committee report. This is critical infrastructure. I 
note the Senator from Minnesota is on the floor. He had a bridge 
collapse in his State. We have had a housing crisis we addressed within 
this bill. We know airport expansion is a critical infrastructure 
piece. I see the Senator from Louisiana is on the floor. There is very 
important infrastructure there.
  If I heard the Senator correctly, we are not going to be able to move 
forward on this critical piece of legislation that only has one hurdle 
left to get to the White House. If I could, in effect, clarify it, my 
understanding is there is an objection and we will not be able to move 
it past the final hurdle?
  Mr. REID. I answer to my friend who has done such an outstanding job 
on this bill, as she does on everything, this bill did have in it $195 
million to replace I-35 West, the bridge in Minneapolis. We all 
witnessed the tragedy of the collapse of that bridge. A picture is 
worth 1,000 words so I will not give 1,000 words, other than to say I 
ask everyone to call up in their mind's eye the devastation that took 
place when that bridge unexpectedly collapsed. The bill also, I say, 
includes an additional $1 billion for urgent bridge repairs in all 
States in the wake of that tragedy. That is only a small part of that 
legislation and it is unfortunate we couldn't send that to the 
President before the recess. We still could, maybe when we get back in 
the morning, and we could do it before we leave here. That is still 
possible.
  Mrs. MURRAY. I say to the majority leader, I thank him for trying to 
move forward. I hope our minority leader will work with his caucus to 
try to help us move this forward. It is critical infrastructure that 
thousands of communities are counting on this week, heading for a 
jampacked Thanksgiving holiday. Everyone is going to realize the impact 
of not investing in our infrastructure. I hope we can continue to try 
to work something out.
  I thank the majority leader.


                  UNANIMOUS CONSENT REQUEST--H.R. 3996

  Mr. REID. I ask unanimous consent that the majority leader, after 
consultation with the Republican leader, may turn to the consideration 
of H.R. 3996, the Tax Extender/AMT bill, and that it be considered 
under the following limitations: that there be 2 hours of debate 
equally divided between Senators Baucus and Grassley or their designees 
prior to a cloture vote on the bill; if cloture is invoked, there be no 
amendments in order to the bill; if cloture is defeated, there then be 
1 hour for debate on Senator Lott's amendment No. 3620, providing for 
AMT repeal and 1-year extension of expiring tax provisions; that 
following that vote there be 1 hour for debate on Senator Baucus's 
amendment providing for a 1-year AMT patch and a 2-year extension of 
expiring tax provisions with the cost of the expiring tax provisions 
offset; that each amendment vote would require 60 votes in the 
affirmative; that following those votes, if an amendment is agreed to, 
the bill be read a third time and the Senate vote immediately, without 
any intervening action or debate, on final passage of the bill. If 
neither amendment achieves 60 votes and cloture is not invoked on the 
bill, then the bill be returned to the calendar; if cloture is invoked 
on the bill, then the Senate proceed to complete action on the bill 
under the provisions of rule XXII.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Reserving the right to object.
  Ms. LANDRIEU. Reserving the right to object.
  Mr. McCONNELL. I know Senators Grassley and Baucus are here to 
discuss this issue. I believe the majority leader knows I am going to 
be offering another alternative consent agreement to his here 
momentarily. I ask we both be allowed to do our respective consent 
agreements and then let others discuss the AMT.
  Bearing that in mind, Mr. President, I object.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Objection is heard.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, Senate Republicans have time and time 
again voted to reform and repeal the alternative minimum tax, a stealth 
tax that was promulgated in 1969 to ensure some 155 wealthy Americans 
paid at least some level of Federal tax but which today threatens to 
entrap more than 20 million American taxpayers this year alone.
  I know the majority leader shares my desire to fix the alternative 
minimum tax and to extend other expiring tax provisions later this 
year. In fact, as the IRS has told us, the inexplicable inaction at 
this point has already the potential to wreak havoc on the tax-filing 
season. I have been encouraging my colleagues on the other side of the 
aisle to work with us to do this for quite some time.
  So both my friend, the majority leader, and I know this is an issue 
that must be addressed. That is common ground, and that is good. But 
let's be clear. Republicans want to extend the alternative minimum tax 
patch and expiring tax provisions without increasing taxes on other 
Americans. Furthermore, we want to protect 90 million American 
taxpayers, including small business owners, from a massive tax increase 
that will soon take effect if Congress does not act to extend rate 
reductions contained in the tax relief measures we passed in 2001 and 
2003.
  I would suggest that there are fundamental differences of opinion 
between the 2 parties on tax policy. This is not a surprise; we all 
know this. And it is a debate we have been having for years. But on 
this there is much we can agree on. Let's begin with a base bill that 
accomplishes what is noncontroversial, what we mutually agree upon; 
that is, extending the AMT patch for 1 year and extending expiring tax 
provisions for 2 years.
  In view of the differences between the parties on tax increases, 
let's allow 2 amendments per side to be in order, each of our own 
choosing. I can tell you now that our amendments will be focused on 
ensuring tens of millions of Americans do not face tax increases. While 
I would not presume to tell my friend, the majority leader, what 
amendments his side should offer, I would suggest it would be an 
excellent opportunity for him to offer the tax increases that are 
included in the Baucus proposal and the Rangel AMT bill as passed by 
the House as the other. Since we object to the majority's efforts to 
increase taxes, as they apparently will object to our efforts to extend 
tax relief, let's require that all amendments be subjected to a 60-vote 
hurdle.
  In summary, I propose we start with common ground and say 
controversial pay-fors and add-ons must get 60 votes.
  Therefore, I ask unanimous consent that the majority leader, with the 
concurrence of the Republican leader, may turn to the consideration of 
H.R. 3996; provided further that there then be a substitute amendment 
in order, the text of which is the 1-year alternative minimum tax fix 
with a 2-year extenders package without the tax-raising offsets; I 
further ask unanimous consent that each side be allocated four tax-
related amendments to be offered to the substitute, and that each 
amendment under this order and passage of the underlying bill require 
60

[[Page 31569]]

votes for adoption or passage as the case may be.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there objection?
  Mr. REID. Reserving the right to object, Mr. President, during the 
past 7 years, we have had an interesting financial program in this 
country led by President Bush; that is, spend whatever you want, just 
use a credit card. That is, he wants new programs. He has had plenty. 
Just write out one of the IOUs that came from the credit card. Or if 
you want to reduce taxes, do not pay for it, just call for the credit 
card, which it seems the limit on that never runs out, just more and 
more.
  When this man, this man, President Bush, took office, there was a $7 
trillion surplus over 10 years. Now there is a deficit of $9 trillion. 
That is what the Bush fiscal policy has done to this country.
  We in this Democratic-controlled Congress believe things should be 
paid for. We have done that working with the House on everything. We 
believe we are going to do our very best to do it on this legislation.
  But I would suggest to my friend that one of the requests I had is 
that we vote on--have every opportunity to vote on--what the House sent 
us.
  But without belaboring the point, I think we have two different ways 
of how this Government should run. One should be on a pay-go basis. If 
you want to increase spending, you pay for it. If you want to cut 
taxes, pay for that. For 7 years the Republicans have not agreed with 
that. As a result of that, we find ourselves in a difficult situation. 
So I respectfully object to my friend's request.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Objection is heard.
  The Senator from Montana.
  Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, I regret that the Republican side has 
objected to the request offered by the majority leader. But I am very 
pleased, frankly, with the objection by the majority leader to the 
minority leader.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. If the Senator from Montana would 
suspend for just a moment.
  Under the previous order, the Senator from Louisiana and the Senator 
from Minnesota had the floor for a few minutes before the leadership.
  Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, if I might ask my colleagues to indulge me 
a little because this is an important subject on the issue at hand. I 
ask their indulgence for 5 minutes.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. BAUCUS. I thank my friends. Mr. President, the goal is to try to 
fix the alternative minimum tax and to try to get these tax extenders 
passed. The goal is not to relitigate the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, which 
I think would be the subject of the amendments that the minority side 
would offer if their consent requests were granted. We are not here to 
relitigate that; we are here to figure out some way to make sure this 
Congress allows the alternative minimum tax patch to pass so Americans 
do not have to pay an alternative minimum tax for tax year 2007, which 
is the goal.
  I am very disappointed, frankly, that we are not allowed to get to 
that point because the other side objected to the request offered by 
the majority leader to set up a series of votes which would enable us 
to get to that point--namely, where this body could pass the 
legislation, probably an amendment by Senator Grassley and myself--
which would accomplish most of the objectives by the other side; 
namely, dealing with the alternative minimum tax, not paid for, but pay 
for the extenders.
  That would have been the third vote if we were to get there; that is, 
if the minority party allowed us to get there. But, apparently, they do 
not care about that. Apparently, they do not care about the alternative 
minimum tax. Apparently, they want to relitigate the 2001 tax cuts, the 
2003 tax cuts, to have it extended with mischievous amendments.
  I remind my colleagues we are here today because back in 1969, 
Congress passed the alternative minimum tax because so many wealthy 
taxpayers were not paying any taxes. So we passed AMT. But we made a 
mistake, frankly; we did not index it. And lo and behold, after all of 
these years, now taxpayers between $100,000, $200,000, $300,000 of 
income, many of them are going to have to pay the alternative minimum 
tax very soon.
  But, ironically, it is the most wealthy taxpayers in America who are 
not affected by the alternative minimum tax. It does not hit them. It 
does not affect them. It does not affect the most wealthy. It just 
affects those with incomes between, say, $100,000 and $200,000 in 
income.
  Why does it not affect the most wealthy? Because on the alternative 
minimum tax, the capital gains rates are not the alternative minimum 
tax rates, rather the capital gains rates under the AMT are the regular 
capital gains rates, and most wealthy people get most of their income 
paying capital gains taxes because their income is passive rather than 
ordinary income.
  So it is a bad provision, the AMT, and we have to fix it. And mark my 
words, we are going to try to find a way to fix it because it has to be 
fixed. I am very disappointed, frankly, that the other side would not 
let us fix it now. It is important we fix it now because the IRS is 
going to send out forms. The programmers who do the programming for the 
Tax Code, for the tax provisions in the Tax Code, have to get the right 
programs out to the American people.
  If we dally, if we wait--it looks as if now we are going to wait 
until certainly after Thanksgiving. It looks as if probably we have to 
wait to the end of the year. Who knows when? Maybe the day before 
Christmas. That is not the way to do business. So we will find a time. 
We can bring up legislation to make sure there is a so-called AMT 
patch, that we do not have AMT affect taxpayers for this year. And we 
also have to bring up these so-called extender provisions.
  I think we should pay for those extenders. But we may not be paying 
for the AMT, and that was going to be the third amendment that was 
going to be offered today so we can get moving. But I guess that is 
going to come up another day. I am very disappointed we are not there.
  Mr. President, the journalist Norman Cousins once said: ``Wisdom 
consists of the anticipation of consequences.''
  By this or any measure, the alternative minimum tax is the most 
unwise of policy. Congress plainly did not anticipate the AMT's 
consequences. And the wise course now is plainly to stop it from 
increasing the taxes of millions of Americans.
  The Tax Reform Act of 1969 created the AMT. Congress saw that under 
the tax code of that time, 155 high-income households took advantage of 
so many tax benefits that they owed little or no income tax. So 
Congress responded with the AMT.
  But Congress did not anticipate the consequences. Notably, Congress 
failed to index the AMT for inflation. And now an increasing number of 
middle-income Americans are finding themselves subject to this tax.
  Now, the AMT punishes people for having children. The AMT punishes 
people for paying high State taxes. And the AMT punishes people with 
complexity.
  And many taxpayers who owe the AMT do not realize it until they 
prepare their returns. Worse yet, many do not realize it until they get 
a letter from the IRS. Many never see it coming.
  Listen to what the Congressional Budget Office has reported:

       [I]f nothing is changed, one in five taxpayers will have 
     AMT liability and nearly every married taxpayer with income 
     between $100,000 and $500,000 will owe the alternative tax.

  But oddly enough, the AMT would have less effect on households higher 
up the income scale. Surely these are not the consequences that 
Congress intended.
  Protecting working families from the alternative minimum tax is my 
top tax priority this year. And it remains my goal to repeal AMT 
altogether.
  We could do something about it, today. We have a chance to anticipate 
the consequences, today. We could enact wiser policy, today.

[[Page 31570]]

  Last week, the House passed the bill that was the subject of the 
unanimous consent request that the Leader just made. It would protect 
more than 23 million families from a tax increase this year under the 
AMT. It would extend a number of important tax cuts for research, 
college expenses, and other priorities. And it is paid for. It is 
fiscally responsible.
  Under the unanimous consent agreement just propounded, the Senate 
could have acted. If we had agreed to this unanimous consent request, 
we could have prevented the AMT from wielding its unintended 
consequences 1 more year.
  I'm disappointed that the Senate did not consent to consider this 
bill today. But I am not sorry for choosing to protect taxpayers from 
the AMT, even at some cost. Too many folks are at risk of an unfair tax 
increase, if Congress fails to act on the AMT.
  Provisions like the college tuition deduction, State and local sales 
tax relief, and the research and development tax credit are also in 
this bill. Those provisions make a real difference for America's 
families and businesses. I am disappointed that we were not able to 
extend these expiring provisions. People deserve greater certainty 
about their tax relief.
  Now I don't support all of the provisions in the House bill. I would 
not have written it this way. There are certain targeted provisions 
that are not strictly extenders that I would not have put in the bill. 
There are some offsets that I would not have used or that I would write 
differently.
  But I do support tax relief. And I support fiscal responsibility. And 
this was our chance to both ensure tax relief for 23 million Americans 
and also to avoid saddling our children and grandchildren with debt.
  Mr. President, many of my colleagues have insisted that we pay for 
extending the Children's Health Insurance Program. Many have insisted 
that we pay for extending the farm bill. And many have insisted that we 
pay for preventing cuts to doctors under Medicare.
  Well, if paying-as-you-go is good enough for children's health, if it 
is good enough for America's farmers, and if it is good enough for 
Medicare, then it ought to be good enough for tax cuts, too.
  So I regret that there has been objection to considering the House-
passed AMT bill. I regret that those who are objecting have prevented 
us from saving 23 million Americans from the unintended consequences of 
the AMT. And I regret that those who are objecting have prevented us 
from moving forward to enact wiser tax policy.


                         National Adoption Day

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Minnesota.
  Mr. COLEMAN. Mr. President, I take the opportunity to turn this body 
to the attention of a matter that has bipartisan support that will 
bring us together. There are some very contentious and challenging 
issues that we have to deal with, but what I am going to talk about now 
in the moments I have is something that is not a Democratic or 
Republican issue. It is an issue that concerns all of us.
  It was the poet Carl Sandburg who said: Each young child is God's 
opinion that the world should go on. In our busyness and preoccupation 
that we have with the affairs of state, we should remember there is 
probably nothing more important to the future than making life better 
for a child, something we all agree with.
  I am talking on the floor today to share a simple way we can all do 
that in the Senate and in the country. I am pleased to have the 
opportunity to join my colleague from Louisiana, Senator Landrieu, in 
supporting a resolution to recognize National Adoption Day, which is 
coming up this Saturday, November 17.
  I would say my colleague from Louisiana brings not only the passion 
and the intellect to this issue, but she brings a lot of heart to the 
issue. And I think that is most powerful. I applaud her for her 
leadership. It is a pleasure to work with her on issues of adoption.
  National Adoption Day is an annual series of events designed to draw 
attention to this crucially important social service of uniting kids 
who need loving families and families who need kids to share their 
love. Adoption is one of the greatest win-wins because it fulfills two 
of the greatest needs of human kind: receiving and giving love. 
Adoption, since it involves the welfare of the vulnerable children, is 
a process that must be handled with care. The challenge is not to make 
it so legalistic and bureaucratically demanding that it keeps needy 
kids apart from worthy families.
  Many legal professionals and nonprofit agencies put in countless 
hours to facilitate adoption. This is a day to thank them for their 
efforts and focus our attention as a society on what we can do to 
create greater opportunities for adoption.
  Last year, for the first time, National Adoption Day was celebrated 
in all 50 States, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. In total, 
more than 300 events were held throughout the country to finalize the 
adoptions of more than 3,300 children in foster care and to celebrate 
all families that adopt.
  This year, the partners are anticipating an even greater number of 
finalized adoptions as a greater number of cities and communities 
participate in NAD events.
  This Saturday, hundreds of volunteer lawyers, foster care 
professionals, child advocates, and local judges will come together to 
celebrate adoptions and to draw much needed attention to the 114,000 
children in foster care still in need of adoptive homes.
  I am thankful my friend from Louisiana showed us the faces of those 
kids so we understand it is flesh and blood that we are dealing with.
  I would like to encourage my colleagues in this Chamber to invest 
more of their time and effort into this special area of constituent 
service throughout the year. Each December, my staff and I hold a party 
in Minnesota to gather and celebrate all of the families, Minnesota 
families, that we have assisted in adoption. It is the most joyous 
event that I participate in. The expressions of love and gratitude are 
simply overwhelming.
  One by one, as I see the kids and imagine the circumstances they have 
come out of to the place where they have found a home, it makes all of 
the frustrating and seemingly futile hours of this job just melt away.
  I also thank my colleagues for their support earlier this year in a 
provision that Senator Landrieu and I championed to ensure adopted 
teenagers who seek an education were not forced to choose between a 
loving family and financial aid for college. Previously, youth who 
``aged out'' of the foster care system qualified for virtually all 
loans and grants, while those who were adopted were essentially 
penalized in terms of college financial aid eligibility. Our measure 
simply amended the definition of ``independent student'' to include 
foster care youth who were adopted after their 13th birthday. This will 
ensure that a student does not see his or her financial aid eligibility 
decline as a result of being adopted.
  Since taking office, I have taken great satisfaction in helping 
hundreds of families navigate the international adoption process. Many 
of my colleagues are aware of the potential crisis relating to the 
completion of over 3,000 adoptions between the United States and 
Guatemala.
  Due to the implementation of the Hague Convention on Intercountry 
Adoption, which is an internal agreement intended to safeguard adopted 
children from trafficking, significant and necessary changes are taking 
place in adoption law in the United States and Guatemala.
  The Government of Guatemala previously announced their nation will 
implement The Hague Convention standards as of January 1, 2008, and 
will require all adoption cases to meet those standards. This would 
have effectively stopped the processing of all adoption cases with non-
Hague countries, including the United States. The United States is 
expected to complete Hague implementation this spring. However, in the 
meantime, it is imperative we work to ensure that families

[[Page 31571]]

currently in the process of adopting have the ability to continue with 
that adoption. To highlight these concerns, 52 of my Senate colleagues 
joined with Senator Landrieu and me in sending a letter to the 
President of Guatemala encouraging an interim measure for pending 
adoption applications in Guatemala. This action by the Guatemalan 
Government will help ensure that orphaned children do not remain 
outside the care of a loving family for lengthy periods of time.
  Additionally, I have been in close contact with the Department of 
State, the Guatemalan Government, and anxious Minnesota families as 
this issued progressed. The Guatemalan Government is currently debating 
provisions that would allow U.S. adoptions that are in process to 
continue, despite the implementation of The Hague Convention in 
Guatemala. I know that matter was being debated. I received a message 
from the State Department. Originally, I thought the measure was 
passed, and then I was told they hadn't. The State Department informs 
me there will be no action taken today, as it was not on the agenda, 
but both versions of the law are under consideration and do contain 
grandfather clauses that would protect the in-process cases. This bill 
apparently will be coming up next week. We have been in touch with the 
consular general, with the Ambassador. If no bill is passed, The Hague 
Convention will become effective on December 31. But we have assurances 
from senior Government officials responsible for implementation that 
pipeline cases will continue to be processed under the old system.
  I will be traveling to Guatemala right after Thanksgiving in order to 
discuss these critical issues with key United States and Guatemalan 
officials. They have a new President-elect who was elected in November, 
President Colom. We will continue to work on this. I will not be 
traveling alone. Traveling with me will be countless stories of 
affectionate Minnesota families who are hoping to complete this process 
so they can receive and give love. I have also had the privilege of 
working with families on other international adoptions. Many are 
unaware of the devastating human tragedy of decades of unrest and civil 
war in Liberia. Recently, I had the honor to escort a new young 
Minnesotan, Miss Patience Carlson, adopted by a Chaska, MN, family to 
the White House to be in the Oval Office and to meet with the 
President. The Carlsons had been within days of completing the adoption 
of their soon-to-be daughter Patience--what a perfect name for this 
young lady--when violence broke out in Liberia. As rebel forces moved 
into Monrovia, the orphanage began to run low on supplies and the 
Carlsons became desperate to unite with their new daughter. It was an 
honor to work on their behalf with the U.S. Embassy in Liberia to help 
complete the adoption.
  I have traded stories with Senator Landrieu about how we have both 
been in those situations. We said we are going to get the kids out of 
the war zones and do what has to be done. That is the passion she 
brings.
  The Carlsons got to meet the President of the United States. I have 
often related the story about an event in northern Minnesota called the 
Great Think-Off. Scholars, religious leaders, and regular people gather 
together to debate the great issues of the day and search for a common 
solution. One year the question was: What is the ultimate meaning of 
life? After several days of long-winded attempts by great philosophers 
and professors and others, a young girl who had patiently waited her 
turn went up to the microphone and said: The ultimate meaning of life 
is to do permanent good. She sat down and the meeting was adjourned.
  Adoption is such a permanent good. It changes the lives of kids who 
have been through more in their short lives than most people could 
handle in a lifetime. It changes the lives of parents and siblings who 
make room in their lives for another, through which they learn the more 
you love, the more love there is to give.
  I urge my colleagues and those who read this record to find time to 
reflect on the importance of adoption, visit the Web site at 
www.nationaladoptionday.org, and find a way they can contribute in a 
small way to this unique social service that makes such an important 
difference in the lives of so many people.
  I am grateful for the work that the partners of National Adoption Day 
do. The Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute, the Alliance for 
Children's Rights; Children's Action Network, Casey Family Services, 
Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption and the Freddie Mac Foundation have 
once again come together to provide resources, guidance and 
encouragement to the cities planning events this November.
  In the end we all have a responsibility to make sure the world goes 
on and we do that every time we give a child access to the love every 
child needs.
  I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Louisiana.
  Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I would like to conclude our 
presentation with a few wrap-up remarks. Before my colleague leaves the 
floor, I wish to say that orphans everywhere have found a bold, brave, 
and articulate champion on their behalf. I am so pleased that Senator 
Coleman has joined me as a co-chair of the Adoption Caucus to help lead 
the 213 Members of Congress who have joined our coalition. As the 
Senator pointed out, it seems that around this place adoption is the 
only issue on which we can all agree and work so well together. I don't 
know if it is a tribute to us or to the children who bring us together 
in a very special way. I thank him.
  The States of Arizona, Hawaii, Iowa, Kentucky, North Carolina, 
Oklahoma, and Wyoming have more than quadrupled the number of public 
agency adoptions in their States. It takes a lot of effort, not only on 
what we do in Congress, but for Governors, legislators, caseworkers, 
social workers, and judges. I wish to call those States out today to 
thank them for their extraordinary work. All States are making 
progress, and we are happy with what the statistics will show. But 
those seven states are making special progress.
  Secondly, we want to be sensitive in our movement, if you will, to 
the role of birth parents and to honor the choices that birth parents 
make to the process of making good decisions and creating good 
outcomes. Sometimes we focus a lot of attention on the adopted child 
and the adoptive family. I am not sure we spend enough time honoring 
the role of the birth parents who make this very brave and generous 
choice. I would like our Congress to be sensitive this coming year to 
what we can do to honor and highlight birth parents who also are part 
of that great triangle of adoption.
  Finally, I urge our State Department to support adoption. I know they 
are preoccupied with many important, significant and grave issues, from 
international diplomacy to conducting wars, which are very important 
and consequential actions. However, our State Department has taken 7 
years to implement the rules and changes required by the Intercountry 
Adoption Act of 2000 that Congress passed. Every day and every week and 
every month that these rules are delayed, there are literally thousands 
of children who die. Without these rules, we can't keep open the 
avenues of international adoption. I will say this to our critics--
there aren't many, but there are a few--every time there is a bad story 
about someone, maybe an agency, maybe a lawyer, maybe a disreputable 
person--and you know there are many disreputable people in the world, 
unfortunately--who does something wrong, does not fill out a document 
correctly or does not go through the proper procedures, and there is a 
big scandal in international adoption. The whole system is shut down 
under the guise of trying to get the ethics right.
  Nobody is more committed to ethics and adoption than the two of us. 
We work every day to make it transparent, make it relatively easy, 
reduce the challenges associated with it, and have it meet every law 
and cross every T. However, every time a bank is robbed in this 
country, we don't shut down the

[[Page 31572]]

banking system. We go after the bank robber. We find them and put them 
in jail. The banking system stays open. Every day people cash checks 
and deposit money and take money out and make loans and keep this 
economy going. Every time we shut down adoptions from a country, 
millions of children die. That is the consequence of our action. We 
need to focus on the roots of the problem. We need to find solutions 
that address the problems and their causes, but which also meet the 
best needs of the children in that country. I want the State 
Department--and I hope they are listening--to understand that those of 
us in Congress understand about ethics. We understand about laws. We 
want things to be as appropriate and as legal as possible. When 
mistakes are made in a country, the answer is not to shut down the 
adoption of children from there. When we do this, we not only break the 
hearts of thousands of our constituents who are waiting to receive 
these children and believe they are doing God's will by taking in 
orphans who would die otherwise and have no one to care for them, we 
also hurt the children who we are trying to protect. Our State 
Department very callously brushes that aside. They are going to hear 
from us this year. They need to finalize the rules required by the law 
that we passed long ago. We need to continue our efforts to improve our 
system of international adoption. We have to get the State Department's 
attention. I intend to work with my colleagues to do so.
  I thank the Senator from Minnesota. He will be traveling to Guatemala 
over the holidays, which is a great testament to his leadership and 
dedication to helping us do the right thing by the children of 
Guatemala. We pledge to this Congress to give the best leadership we 
can on an issue that we all can come together on. It is quite 
refreshing.
  I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from New Jersey.


                                  Iraq

  Mr. MENENDEZ. Mr. President, more than 3,860 men and women of the 
American military have died in the war in Iraq. At last count, 21 were 
killed in November alone, and we are only halfway through. In the 
Senate, we are worried about getting out of work in time for 
Thanksgiving. In Iraq, they are worried about making it to 
Thanksgiving. As I speak today, more than 28,450 American soldiers have 
come home from Iraq with their lives changed forever by wounds, with 
missing arms and legs, with traumatic brain injuries that will forever 
alter how they cope with everyday life, with more cases of post-
traumatic stress disorder than ever seen before, with life-altering 
blindness that cuts light from their lives forever.
  As I speak, American taxpayers are footing a $455 billion bill for 
this war, with long-term estimates soaring well beyond $2 trillion. At 
the same time, children are going without health care. Students are 
being denied proper education. Our bridges are going without repair. 
Our borders are going without being completely secured, and we heard 
today of a case in which we still can't get our screening down pat to 
secure the possibility of someone bringing an explosive device into our 
airports. That is the legacy of the war in Iraq.
  In the context of this set of grim statistics, while watching images 
on television of horrific explosions and bloody bodies, Americans were 
asked at the beginning of the year to accept a so-called surge of our 
troops into that country, an additional force that was supposed to 
provide the breathing room for the feuding political factions to 
achieve reconciliation. Those factions, of course, are Iraqi factions.
  The Bush administration knew that peace could not be achieved solely 
militarily, that it had to be achieved politically. The administration 
unilaterally decided that more troops, more weapons, more military 
would make the political reconciliation happen. So we have to ask: What 
has been the result? Our men and women of the military have carried out 
their mission with unparalleled skill and bravery. They have sacrificed 
life and limb for their country. That is why we must ask these 
questions. Because they always respond, no questions asked. But it is 
our obligation to ask for them.
  Through their excellent work, they have achieved results. But has it 
brought Iraq closer to a lasting peace? Has the political 
reconciliation--the very purpose of the additional troops--been 
achieved? Absolutely not. Absolutely not.
  The front page of today's Washington Post paints a startling picture, 
a picture of the hard truth. Our generals--our generals on the ground--
tell us that a political settlement remains elusive. In fact, their 
concern over this failure is growing. Let me quote from this morning's 
article in the Washington Post:

       Senior military commanders here now portray the 
     intransigence of Iraq's Shiite-dominated government as the 
     key threat--

  ``As the key threat''--

     facing the U.S. effort in Iraq, rather than al-Qaeda 
     terrorists, Sunni insurgents or Iranian-backed militias.

  Let me read that again.

       Senior military commanders here--

  U.S. military commanders--

     now portray the intransigence of Iraq's Shiite-dominated 
     government as the key threat facing the U.S. effort in Iraq, 
     rather than al-Qaeda terrorists, Sunni insurgents or Iranian-
     backed militias.

  So here we are, 6 months into the surge, with more troops in Iraq 
right now--175,000--than ever before, and the main purpose of adding 
these troops remains just an aspiration, well out of our reach.
  So I ask my colleagues who supported the surge of troops, is this the 
result you envisioned? A situation in which dozens of Americans are 
still dying every month despite a reduction in violence? A situation in 
which the sons and daughters of America are more than ever acting as 
the police force--as the police force--in a country that remains 
volatile and deadly? A situation in which the people we need most to 
achieve stability--the leaders of the various Iraqi political 
factions--look at a never-ending American military presence in their 
country and see little reason to reconcile?
  Are we going to remain in the middle of an internal struggle for 
power, as General Petraeus reported in September? I was shocked when 
General Petraeus had as part of his testimony that the main conflict in 
Iraq was a struggle for power and resources within the different 
factions of Iraqi society. Are we sending our sons and daughters to 
create the space for the Iraqi politicians to fight over power and 
resources? That is what we sent our sons and daughters for? That is why 
we keep them there? Is that what we bargained for?
  We cannot accept the status quo in Iraq. When our military commanders 
say that, in fact, the biggest challenge to us is the intransigence of 
Iraqi leaders to come together, more so than al-Qaida, more so than 
Sunni insurgents, more so than Iranian influences, that is one 
incredible statement.
  Things must change, and to change it will take strong action. It 
requires a choice: Do we stay the course when we know that peace and 
political stability cannot be achieved looking down the barrel of a 
gun? Military presence does not achieve political reconciliation. 
Remember, former General Pace of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said once: 
Well, we need the Iraqis to love their children more than they hate 
their neighbors. That is a powerful truism, but that does not come at 
the point of a rifle. That comes about through reconciliation. It comes 
through power sharing. It comes through revenue sharing. It comes 
through all of those things that, notwithstanding the arguments that we 
are creating the space for the Iraqi leadership to do, the Iraqi 
leadership has failed to do, and there is no movement in sight toward 
that goal. Or do we choose a course that impresses upon the political 
leaders in Iraq that they must reconcile and bring peace to their 
country swiftly?
  We need to make them understand the true urgency of this task. We 
need to make them understand America will not always be there to play 
policeman. Instead of continuing to enable an endless and unchanging 
involvement in Iraq, we can set a timetable to begin

[[Page 31573]]

bringing American troops back home. I believe that only then will we 
have the Iraqis understand that we are not there in an endless 
occupation, that they are going to have to make the hard choices for 
compromise, negotiations necessary to achieve a government of national 
unity on those issues of reconciliation, power sharing, revenue 
sharing, on the core issues that possibly can create the opportunity 
for a strong federal government in Iraq to survive. But as long as they 
believe we will stay there in an open-ended set of circumstances--
shedding our blood and spending our national treasure--what is the 
urgency, the impetus for them to stop jostling over power, influence, 
and resources? Not only could we preserve the lives of countless 
American troops, not only could we save billions upon billions of 
taxpayer dollars, we also could make certain that the Iraqis know they 
will have to stand up to achieve the peace we all seek, the 
opportunities we would love to see for the Iraqi people, because until 
the Iraqi Government and military actually believe we will not be there 
forever, they will not actually take charge of their own country.
  Transitioning our troops out of Iraq, that is what I choose. It is 
what the American people have continuously said they have chosen. It is 
what I urge my colleagues to choose. We have that opportunity coming 
tomorrow on the vote on bridge funding. That creates an opportunity to 
begin such a transition. I hope we will avail ourselves of that 
opportunity because if we have to read more and more of our generals 
saying that the intransigence of Iraq's Shiite-dominated Government is 
the key threat facing the U.S. effort in Iraq rather than al-Qaida 
terrorists, Sunni insurgents, or Iranian-backed militias, we are in 
deep trouble--we are in deep trouble.
  We have to have an opportunity to change the course, and pride--
pride--I hope is not the impediment for people recognizing that. We 
have lost too many lives already. We have spent an enormous amount of 
money. It is time for change. It is time for a change in course. It is 
time to make sure the Iraqis know they have to stand up for their own 
future, they have to make the hard decisions possible to have a 
government of national unity. That opportunity comes tomorrow for the 
Senate. I hope we will avail ourselves of it.
  With that, Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, today we had a very interesting hearing 
where we had General Casey and Secretary Geren and others before the 
Armed Services Committee. I want to make sure that before we leave on 
this recess we have one more chance to talk about the significance of 
the McConnell-Stevens emergency supplemental appropriations bill. It is 
vital to our troops overseas, and it is important to the future of our 
Armed Forces.
  As Senator McConnell stated earlier today--and I am quoting now--he 
said:

       Because we have a responsibility to provide this funding to 
     our men and women in uniform as they attempt to protect the 
     American people, we need to get a clean troop funding bill to 
     the President.

  I would like to associate myself with these words and these remarks 
and also express my support for the supplemental he has sponsored.
  The emergency supplemental offered by the Democrats, on the other 
hand, is the epitome of everything that is wrong with the 110th 
Congress. It is a bill we all know does not have the 60 votes needed to 
pass. This is not new to this Congress. We have had 61 votes related to 
Iraq measures; 29 of those votes were here in the Senate. If those on 
the other side of the aisle want to continue to play politics, now is 
not the time to do it.
  The current war supplemental expires in 2 days--now, the reason I 
know that is true is that happens to be expiring on my birthday--which 
I hope I don't--and the Department of Defense will be required to start 
pulling from their nonwartime budget to pay for ongoing operations in 
Iraq and Afghanistan.
  I understand that some of my colleagues want us out of Iraq 
regardless of what the facts on the ground may be, but not sending a 
clean supplemental bill to the President before we go home for the 
Thanksgiving recess is an absolute travesty. Forcing the Department of 
Defense to start reprogramming funds to keep our brave men and women 
fully equipped in Iraq and Afghanistan will jeopardize our efforts to 
maintain, sustain, and transform our Armed Forces, not to mention 
create an accounting nightmare. We went through this once before and we 
saw the trauma that resulted from it.
  Deputy Secretary of Defense Gordon England, in a November 8 letter, 
stated that a delay in war funding would force us in December to begin 
preparing to close facilities, laying off Department of Defense 
civilian employees, and delaying contracts. According to England, it 
would completely drain the Army's operations and maintenance accounts 
by the end of January, and the training of the Iraqi security forces 
will be delayed without this supplemental.
  While fighting the war on terror, we cannot forget about our efforts 
to sustain and transform our Armed Forces. Pulling money away from such 
projects will cost us dividends in the future. We talked about that 
this morning, that we have a lot of things that are happening for our 
ground forces. We have the future combat systems we are involved in 
right now, and we cannot allow FCS to keep sliding as it does.
  Other countries that are potential adversaries would be in a position 
actually to have better equipment than we do. A good case in point 
would be our best artillery piece happens to be called a Paladin. It is 
World War II technology. It is actually one where, after every round, 
you have to get out and swab the breech. People do not realize that. 
There is an assumption out there in America that America has the best 
of everything--the best strike vehicles, the best lift vehicles--and it 
is just not true. We do not. But this is one of the problems we will 
have if we do not continue to fund these efforts.
  I have a hard time understanding why now, of all times, we would 
withhold funding for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Why now, when 
we are turning the corner in Iraq and our troops are making remarkable 
progress under the leadership of General Petraeus, would we hand the 
enemy off, tell them to lay low until December of 2008, and you can 
have the country then?
  This proposed emergency supplemental by the Democrats sends the wrong 
message to our troops fighting in Iraq and in Afghanistan. It tells 
them: We will give you the funding to fight your war, but we don't 
believe in what you are doing.
  I do not presume to speak for every American service man and woman 
fighting overseas, but I have met with a great many of them and have 
spoken with many of the families back home. It is kind of interesting 
that I have had the opportunity--and I say opportunity in a very 
sincere way--to have visited the area of responsibility of Iraq more 
than any other Member; actually, some 15 times, and I will be returning 
there in 2 more weeks. So when I talk about the military, these are the 
ones whom I have talked to on the ground. I watched Ramadi change from 
the al-Qaida declared capital to Iraqi control. That was a year ago 
right now when they declared Ramadi would become the terrorist capital 
of the world. I can remember Fallujah, when we were going from door to 
door, our marines, who were doing a great job. It is now completely 
secure, but not by Americans. It is secure by the Iraqi security 
forces.
  I visited the Patrol Base Murray south of Baghdad and met with local 
Iraqis who came forward and established provisional units of 
neighborhood security volunteers. These individuals heard that the 
Americans were coming and were waiting to greet them when they arrived.

[[Page 31574]]

  I watched these Neighborhood Watch and Concerned Citizens groups take 
root in Anbar Province--I think everyone realizes now that Anbar 
Province is kind of the success story over there--local civilians who 
were willing to take back their cities and their provinces. These 
citizens actually go out and paint circles around undetonated IEDs and 
RPGs, and it is something they are doing so we don't have to do it. Now 
in Iraq, in visiting the joint security stations, you see that our 
kids, instead of going back to the green zone in Baghdad, for example, 
go out and actually live with the Iraqi security forces and develop 
intimate relationships with them. When you see these operations take 
place, it is very gratifying.
  We had the report yesterday up in 407 in a security environment about 
the successes in Iraq, and while that was a classified briefing, the 
information they gave is not classified. When you look, you can 
compare, as shown here--and I wish I had a chart so it could be shown--
October of 2005, the Iraqi security forces had 1 division headquarters, 
4 brigade headquarters, and 23 battalions they were leading in their 
own areas of responsibility. Now, 2 years later, in October of 2007, 
the Iraqi security forces have 10 division headquarters, 33 brigade 
headquarters, and 85 battalions. It shows that two-thirds of the entire 
area we have in Baghdad is now under control and under security. More 
than 67,000 Iraqis are serving as the concerned local citizens 
assisting coalitions and Iraqi security forces to secure their own 
neighborhoods.
  Locals in Baghdad's east Rashid district are helping secure forces 
and locate IEDs. All of these things are going on right now.
  I want to wind up. I know the majority leader has time he wants to 
share with us. But I have to say that Lieutenant General Odierno stated 
on November 1:

       Over the past four months, attacks and security incidents 
     have continued to decline. This trend represents the longest 
     continuous decline in attacks on record.

  None of this is to say the war is over. We understand that. But I 
would have to say this: When I listened to my very good friend, the 
senior Senator from Massachusetts, talk about the doom and gloom, the 
facts that he cited just flat aren't true. We are winning. We are 
aggressively winning. Good things are happening. I have to say you 
don't get that from reading reports. You need to go over there and look 
for yourself.
  The senior Senator from Massachusetts and I agree on a lot of things. 
He has been very active with me on doing something about the western 
Sahara problem. He is concerned about what Joseph Coney is doing in 
northern Uganda. We are together on a lot of things. But as far as Iraq 
is concerned, he has never made a trip--not one. I have been to A.O.R. 
15 times. You have to go over there. I see it as our responsibility as 
Members of this Senate body. We are encouraged to go over by the 
military because this encourages our troops who are over there. When 
you go, they look at you in the eyes and they say: Why is it a lot of 
the American people don't agree with what we are doing over here? They 
know there were actually several terrorist training camps in Iraq prior 
to the time we were over there. In one they were teaching people how to 
hijack airplanes. All of those are closed down now. It has been a very 
significant thing. Nothing is more important than continuing along the 
lines of victory as we are today and finishing the job we have been 
carrying on in Iraq.
  I applaud all of the young people over there. I said today in this 
hearing that I was a product of the draft and I always felt we would 
never be able to conduct this type of activity unless we had compulsory 
service. I have always supported compulsory service. But when I go over 
and I see these young volunteers, all of them total volunteers who are 
over there, the dedication they have, the commitment they have, I get 
very excited and I realize I was wrong. Those guys are doing a great 
job and we don't need to have compulsory service because we have great, 
dedicated Americans who are volunteering on a daily basis. The 
retention rates have never been higher than they are right now. Those 
individuals who come to the end of their term are reupping in numbers 
and in statistics we have never seen before. So good things are 
happening. We need to get this supplemental finished so we can have the 
continuity of funding over there and not have to rob other areas of our 
defense system. I am hoping we will be able to do this.
  I thank you very much for the time.
  I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The majority leader is recognized.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I appreciate my friend from Oklahoma 
yielding the floor. I appreciate it very much. He had the right to the 
floor and I hope he was able to complete his statement.


                              Golden Gavel

  Mr. President, first, I want to recognize the Presiding Officer. One 
of the accolades that we are allowed, and certainly look forward to 
giving to the Members of the Senate, is for those people who preside 
over the Senate for 100 hours a year. My friend from Colorado has 
reached that pinnacle an hour or so ago. That is a tremendous 
accomplishment, 100 hours presiding over the Senate. I congratulate my 
friend and look forward to the first time we get back after 
Thanksgiving recess on a caucus day where we make the presentation of 
the very fine golden gavel. As I have said before, it is a very nice 
presentation. You will be able, for many years to come, to talk to your 
children and grandchildren about presiding over the Senate for 100 
hours in 1 year.
  So thank you very much, I say to my friend from Colorado, who does an 
outstanding job not only presiding but being the Senator he is 
representing the people of Colorado.


            Transportation Appropriations Conference Report

  Mr. President, it is interesting; one Republican Senator said, when 
we were trying to clear something earlier, to one of my Democratic 
friends, the reason they couldn't clear our appropriations bill, the 
Transportation appropriations bill is that they were told the situation 
with the Republicans is they don't want us to do anything, so they 
object to everything they can, and that is pretty obvious. So we were 
prevented from going to the Transportation appropriations bill. It was 
quite unique that in the time we were doing this the Senator from 
Minnesota was on the floor. He, above all others, should be weighing in 
and trying to help us get the Transportation appropriations bill 
passed. There is money in it to rebuild the bridge in Minnesota.
  But we have something else that is vitally important: terrorism 
insurance. We are arriving at a point where construction cannot go 
forward. Now construction is already taking place--certainly it can--
but construction projects that are on the drawing boards in a month or 
so will not be able to go forward because they can't get terrorism 
insurance because we have not provided it. We have been ready for some 
time to do that. There is a bill that has been cleared on our side that 
the Republicans are holding up--a bill dealing with the very foundation 
of this country--whether the business community in our country is going 
to have the benefit of terrorism insurance. Without that, it is a 
dramatic hit to what we need to do in this country for the business 
community.
  I think it is unfortunate. We asked our staffs to check with the 
minority and they said no, they couldn't clear it; maybe tomorrow. 
Well, we have a lot of tomorrows around here that seem to never come. 
It would be a real shame if we could not clear tomorrow the terrorism 
insurance that is so extremely important to this country.


                                  Iraq

  It was interesting to hear my friend from Oklahoma speak about the 
war in Iraq. But I would ask everyone to look at--and I am sure it is 
not only in this newspaper--a daily newspaper that I had the 
opportunity to read today, the Washington Post, the front page 
headline:

       Iraqis Wasting An Opportunity. Brigadier General John F. 
     Campbell, deputy commanding general of the 1st Cavalry 
     Division,

[[Page 31575]]

     complained last week that Iraqi politicians appear out of 
     touch with everyday citizens. ``The ministers, they don't get 
     out. They don't know what the hell is going on on the 
     ground.''

  If you turn over to page 22, which is carrying this forward--and 
there are also some interesting things said in this article.

       So how to force political change in Iraq without 
     destabilizing the country further? ``I pity the guy who has 
     to reconcile that tension,'' said Lieutenant Colonel Douglas 
     Ollivant, the chief of planning for U.S. military operations 
     in Baghdad whose tour ends next month.

  Mr. President, the situation in Iraq is very desperate. This 
newspaper article says, among other things:

       The Army officer who requested anonymity said that if the 
     Iraqi government doesn't reach out, then for former Sunni 
     insurgents ``it's game on--they're back to attacking again.''

  We have supported the troops for the entire duration of this war. We 
are the ones who recognized that there wasn't body armor for our 
troops, that mothers and fathers and brothers and sisters and wives 
were writing personal checks to send armor to the valiant troops in 
Iraq. We are the ones who recognized that. We are the ones who did 
something about the situation we have at Walter Reed, which was a 
scandal, how our veterans were being taken care of, but the President 
wouldn't sign our bill: $4 billion more for these valiant men and women 
who are suffering from things that have never been suffered in any war 
ever before. It is a war that has never been fought before. It is a war 
where these men and women are subject to these phantom attacks, and 
when they go home after their tour or tours of duty end and they have 
all their limbs and they can see, they are not paralyzed, they haven't 
been shot, they still have to get over this post-traumatic stress 
syndrome, because they have seen their friends get killed or blown up 
and injured.
  I think it is very important to talk about how good our soldiers are, 
and that is what my friend from Oklahoma is doing. We agree. We have to 
understand that Iraq is in a state of crisis. You can't have it both 
ways. The President said he needed these extra troops to get the 
political situation in tow in Iraq. He has gotten the troops and now he 
wants to keep them longer. The troops in Iraq now are--because there 
are some people who are coming home and some who have just gone over 
there--there are about 180,500 some troops are there now to be exact, 
right now in Iraq. We don't know how many contractors are there, but 
there are estimates of up to 150,000. How much longer, Mr. President? 
How much longer do the American taxpayers have to take care of a 
country that is the richest or the second richest oil country in the 
whole world? How much longer?
  Yesterday we were told that Iraq has a balanced budget. Isn't that 
nice. I am glad they do. Why do we need to keep pouring money into 
them--$12 billion a month. Infrastructure. We have spent billions and 
billions of dollars on infrastructure in Iraq. How much are we spending 
here in America? Our President has to look beyond Iraq and look at 
America.
  Earlier today my friend, the Senator from Wisconsin, Senator 
Feingold, came and asked unanimous consent that we could move forward 
on the Feingold-Reid legislation, which, in effect, says we have to get 
our troops out of Iraq very quickly, except those who are there for 
counterterrorism, force stabilization, and limited training of Iraqis. 
We are a coequal branch of government. That is why we believe, Senator 
Feingold and I, that after June 30 of next year, funds would only be 
used for the programs I have mentioned: counterterrorism, protecting 
our assets, and limiting training of Iraqis.
  But in our legislation it is not a suggestion, not a goal, but 
binding policy. That legislation recognizes our strong national 
interest in Iraq and the Middle East, but brings to an end the 
rubberstamp and unwavering loyalty in a never-ending war which is the 
hallmark of the Republican-controlled Congress. That legislation 
fundamentally changes course in Iraq and this almost unimaginably high 
price that grows every day. And there are 4,000 dead Americans.
  (Mr. Sanders assumed the Chair.)
  Mr. Reid. Mr. President, I was talking about how unusual this war is. 
Twelve and a half percent of the wounded have eye injuries. I don't 
know how many we have lost track of because we don't have recent 
reports, but more than 35,000 have been injured, and 12\1/2\ percent of 
them have eye injuries. That is how this war is different than other 
wars in one way.
  Last week, a young marine came to my office, 21 years old. He entered 
the Marines when he was 17. He came to my office with his wife and baby 
daughter. He had been on his second tour in Iraq. His legs were blown 
off. I said, ``What happened?'' He said, ``We went to a house where we 
thought there were some people doing some things that we needed to take 
a look at. We walked out and somebody detonated a bomb and blew me 
up.'' He said it had been difficult to adjust. He was holding his baby 
in the wheelchair. His wife was over his shoulder. Senator Durbin was 
with me when we visited this young man. Senator Durbin told me today in 
the cloakroom that he has trouble getting this image out of his mind. 
We all do. A 21-year-old hero, who will live the rest of his life with 
these debilitating wounds of war.
  He is not the only one, as we know. As if the toll of lives and limbs 
were not enough, this war also costs billions from our Treasury. We 
were told by the Joint Economic Committee earlier this week that the 
war--with the $200 billion he requested--all borrowed money, with a 
credit card that has no expiration date and certainly no limit. And 
that is only the direct costs. We were told by the Joint Economic 
Committee what the cost of extra borrowed money is doing to our energy 
policy in this country, and the other things they list is double that.
  To this point the war has cost America $1.6 trillion. That is a lot 
of money. We are not just spending our money; we are maxing out on our 
children and grandchildren's credit cards. But perhaps the most 
dangerous cost of this war will be measured in the damages done to our 
Armed Forces' ability to protect and defend our country. Military 
readiness is at a 30-year low. Our flexibility to respond to emerging 
threats beyond the borders of Iraq is greatly hampered. I am not saying 
this, and the Presiding Officer, the Senator from Vermont, is not 
saying this; this comes from General Casey, the head general of the 
Army. He said:

       The current demand for our forces exceeds the sustainable 
     supply. We are consumed with meeting the demands of the 
     current fight, and are unable to provide ready forces as 
     rapidly as necessary for other potential contingencies.

  That is the lead general of the Army saying that. What is more, we 
have heard time and time again during the last few months what is 
happening with recruitment. I have to tell you, I am offended when I 
hear people from the Pentagon tell us ``we are meeting our recruiting 
goals.'' You can meet any goal if you keep lowering the standards. You 
don't need to be a high school graduate anymore. You can have a 
criminal record. Our military has been hit hard. Not only is 
recruitment not heading in the direction that I think is appropriate, 
but what is happening to our officers? These people who go to our 
military academies are the best and the brightest. I have the 
opportunity to select people--and I have for a long time--to go to 
these academies. The best and the brightest of Nevada go to these 
academies. They finish their mandatory term, and then they are 
quitting. We are 3,000 captains short right now, and it is going to get 
worse.
  Mid-level officers are so hard to come by. We are doing everything we 
can to keep them. Huge amounts of money are being given to these people 
to have them stay in the military.
  Let's not forget the cost of the war on the men and women in our 
National Guard and Reserve. These are men and women we need protecting 
us and responding to emergencies here at home. But we know, as was 
exemplified in the storm that hit Kansas, when the Governor said most 
of his National Guard is in Iraq and the equipment they have

[[Page 31576]]

is ruined--that is the way it is all over the country. These citizen 
soldiers have already had 2 to 3 tours of duty of 12 to 18 months each.
  Our men and women in uniform have performed more than admirably; they 
have performed heroically. But these troops--now more than 180,000--
awake each morning on that foreign sand to face another day of risk 
they cannot predict, and the appreciation they get from the Iraqis is 
that we do everything we can to protect the Shia, the Sunni, and the 
Kurds, and they all try to kill us.
  It is no wonder GEN Colin Powell said that ``the Army is about 
broken.'' He was being generous.
  If Senators cannot find the courage to stand against the President's 
failed war policy, I fear GEN Colin Powell might be right. The cost of 
the war extends beyond Iraq. The whole Middle East has been 
destabilized. There is a civil war going on in Israel with the 
Palestinians. Lebanon--could we call that a civil war? It is not much 
of a stretch. They cannot even hold a Presidential election. Iran is 
basically thumbing their nose at the world, and we are standing by 
saber rattling with almost no diplomacy for Iran.
  What is going on in Iraq? An intractable civil war that has become 
even more pronounced in recent weeks, when the Turks gathered 100,000 
troops on the northern border of Iraq. The crisis in Pakistan 
exemplifies what is going on. We not only have trouble in the Middle 
East, but we have lost our moral standing throughout the world as a 
result of this. The Bush administration focused on a person and a 
country, and now we have the situation we have in Pakistan.
  The border between Pakistan and Afghanistan has become less stable. 
Musharraf now seems intent on derailing the path toward democracy. 
Billions of dollars of American taxpayer money is not fully audited or 
accounted for. And perhaps as bad as any of this, bin Laden is still 
wandering around and sending, when he feels like it, a tape to us so we 
can look at that. He continues to make these tapes taunting us, and his 
al-Qaida network, according to the President's own intelligence, is 
regrouping and is stronger than ever.
  Meanwhile, on the other side of the border, conditions in 
Afghanistan--once hailed as a victory--continue to unravel. Ten 
American soldiers were killed this week.
  Now Afghanistan supplies 93 percent of the world's opium. This year 
is going to be another all-time high production year. The people of 
Afghanistan suffered through the most violent year since the U.S. 
intervention. This year, 2007, is the bloodiest year in the history of 
the war for American troops in Iraq. In Afghanistan, violent incidents 
are up 30 percent. There is a rapidly rising influx of foreign 
fighters, and there was a report this morning that the Taliban has 
vastly stepped up the number of improvised and suicide attacks.
  We cannot send more troops there. Listen to what General Casey and 
General Powell said:

       Many costs of the war in Iraq have been quantified: 
     American deaths, Americans wounded, trillions of dollars in 
     taxpayers dollars.

  The other costs are not easy to calculate. How long is it going to 
take to repair our military? The estimated dollar value is hundreds of 
billions of dollars. How many additional troops and dollars will it 
take to win in Afghanistan? How do you calculate that?
  The risk is that the next national security threat becomes a national 
security disaster because we don't have the troops to take care of it. 
And all for a war that our troops are fighting harder to win than the 
Iraqi politicians, who, after months and months of our troop 
escalation, have failed to achieve any meaningful political benchmarks.
  Now the Secretary of State is saying those benchmarks don't mean 
anything anymore. But they did at one time, and they do to the American 
people--$12 billion a month, and they have a balanced budget? Ours 
isn't balanced. They are doing infrastructure development there. We are 
not. They are building hospitals over there. We are not. So now in this 
war--soon to be in the sixth year--our troops are no safer, national 
security is no better protected, Iraq is no closer to reconciliation 
than in the fifth or the fourth or third years.
  We must not forget that we sent our troops to Afghanistan following 
9/11 to go after those who attacked us, break up terrorist cells, and 
stop future terror plans from becoming reality. Now, 6 years later, we 
have moved far away from that critical fight.
  It is long past time to get our national security strategy back on 
track, and the only way to do that is to stand up to our President. It 
is our constitutional duty, and our moral responsibility, to do so.
  I compliment my friend from Wisconsin for offering his effort today 
to move forward on the Feingold-Reid legislation. That is what we need 
to do--bring our troops home.
  Mr. President, I am going to be here in the morning and I will talk 
about the bill we got from the House. I appreciate the work they did. 
It wasn't easy to get it over here. It is not nearly strong enough for 
me. I am going to support it. Earlier this week, we gave the President 
of the United States $470 billion for the troops. We were all happy to 
do that. He signed that bill and, on the same day, within minutes, he 
vetoed a bill for the American people--the Labor-HHS, a bill that takes 
care of some of the education needs of this country, a bill that allows 
medical research to go forward for dreaded diseases in this country. He 
said no. So many things for our communities were in that bill. He said 
no. But to Iraq, he says yes. Don't you think it is appropriate, I say 
to the American people and the Presiding Officer, that to this man, who 
wants an additional $470 billion, we say, OK, but we want some 
accountability? Don't the American people deserve accountability for a 
war that has already cost the taxpayers $800 billion directly, and 
twice that in indirect costs? I think so.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending motion to 
proceed be withdrawn.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

                          ____________________