[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 154 (2008), Part 8]
[Senate]
[Page 10396]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           ORDER OF PROCEDURE

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I am going to ask for consent, in a few 
minutes, to have the override of the farm bill occur at 2 o'clock 
today. Senator Gregg will have 15 minutes, Senator Chambliss and 
Senator Harkin will have 15 minutes divided between them, a total of 30 
minutes. That debate will take place before 2 o'clock, and at 2 o'clock 
we will vote.
  I also inform all Members we still don't have particulars resolved on 
the budget. There are a number of alternatives. We can't do anything on 
it until we get the legislation from the House. They are going to take 
that up sometime this afternoon. As I said, the alternatives are, when 
it gets here we run out--I think there was at least a gentleman's 
agreement, although not on the record, that the 4 hours we used 
yesterday would run against the 10 hours, so we would have 6 hours to 
complete that today. We would vote sometime this evening on that. That 
is one alternative.
  The other alternative is to consider all talking over with. I am sure 
we need to hear more on the budget, but that would be one alternative. 
We could come back after the recess at a time--when a vote is this 
close I think I need authority to determine when the vote would take 
place, but we would have 15 minutes of debate on that, and then we 
would vote on the budget. So that is what we are working on. We do not 
have it done yet.
  Mr. McCONNELL. If the majority leader would yield for a question.
  Mr. REID. I will be happy to.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Is the Senator suggesting we do the farm bill around 
2?
  Mr. REID. Yes. I say to my distinguished colleague, counterpart, we 
would complete the debate on that and that debate would be 15 minutes 
with Senator Gregg, 15 minutes divided between Senators Harkin and 
Chambliss, a total of 30 minutes. We would do that in the next hour and 
10 minutes and then vote at 2 o'clock.
  Mr. McCONNELL. That would be the last vote prior to--
  Mr. REID. That, I say to my friend, we don't have resolved yet. We 
have to work out the time on the budget. I think, even though it is 
early Thursday and we are used to working late on Thursday and most all 
day Friday, we could make an exception and try to get out somewhat 
early on Thursday. But we have to work that out with you folks, as to 
how we would do the time. We could ask for a show of hands, asking if 
we want to finish, if we should have the vote tonight. I don't think 
the show of hands would be helpful to what I wish to accomplish. So we 
are going to try to do the second alternative, use all the time; when 
we come back, we will have a time certain--not a time certain but 
fairly certain--and we will try to have it on Monday or Tuesday when we 
get back, to have a vote on passage of the budget.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that, when the Senate 
considers the conference report to accompany S. Con. Res. 70, the 
budget resolution--
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Can we have order in the Chamber, please. The 
majority leader.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I am going to offer two unanimous consent 
requests. If they are both approved, then we will have no more votes 
today, other than the one on the override of the President's veto on 
the farm bill.

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