[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 156 (2010), Part 15]
[Senate]
[Pages 23503-23505]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                         SENATE ACCOMPLISHMENTS

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, just as the majority leader started to 
leave the floor, I said to him, what an amazing 2 years. I just left an 
interview upstairs where a major network asked me: What do you think 
you have accomplished over the last 2 years?
  I said to him: I can't speak for what happened 30 or 40 years ago in 
the Senate; I wasn't around. But I can tell you that in the 28 years I 
have been in the House and Senate, I have never seen a more amazing, 
productive session of Congress.
  In the Senate, you had to put it into perspective. At the same time 
we were accomplishing these things, we were facing record numbers of 
filibusters--more obstacles than ever in history. Yet, when you look at 
the record that was written over the last 2 years in this Chamber and 
in the House of Representatives, working with the President, it is 
nothing short of amazing.
  Allow me to go through my checklist here. I am sure others will 
question some things I put on the list and add some of their own 
particularly the Senator from Iowa, Senator Harkin, who certainly is an 
inspiring leader on so many of these important issues.
  First and foremost, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. That 
is what the President came to Washington to initiate to stop this 
recession and slow down the growth in unemployment. None of us is happy 
with the state of the economy, but it would have been dramatically 
worse had we not done that.
  Two, Wall Street reform. We looked at the root causes of the 
recession and said we are going to change the law and add oversight and 
investigators to stop Wall Street from bringing us another recession 
some day in the future.
  No. 3, the HIRE Act, a jobs package to encourage businesses to hire 
unemployed workers. We have been focusing on jobs since we got here, 
and we need to continue that focus.
  No. 4 was a measure we passed in this lameduck session, the middle-
class tax package, extending middle-class tax breaks for working 
families and lower income families, I might add, as well as others in 
the year to come so we can

[[Page 23504]]

keep this economic growth moving in the right direction.
  No. 5, credit card company regulations, long overdue. People 
complained about abuses by credit card companies, and we passed major 
regulatory reform.
  No. 6, small business lending fund. The Small Business Credit and 
Jobs Act could provide up to $300 billion in loans to small businesses 
across America that were having trouble finding money in the private 
sector. That could, I think, dramatically increase jobs from small 
businesses.
  No. 7 occurred as part of our agenda in the lameduck session, the 
extension of unemployment insurance. Time and again we did it and then 
in the tax package we extended it for 13 months so that millions of 
Americans would have a basic check to buy with each week.
  First-time home buyers tax credit is No. 8, which encourages more 
people to buy homes for the first time and it gave them a tax incentive 
to achieve that.
  The next item I will mention is health care reform. Some would put it 
as No. 1. I certainly would put it as No. 1 or No. 2. This is the first 
President in almost 90 years to successfully tackle the challenge of 
the rising cost of health care and the need for basic reform. Sure, it 
is controversial, but as the provisions of this health care reform bill 
unfold and are implemented, they can bring us to a point where the cost 
of health care will come down and there will be more available to 
people who currently are not protected.
  No. 10, the Children's Health Insurance Program. We reauthorized and 
expanded it. After two vetoes by the former President, this bill 
expanded health insurance coverage for over 4 million previously 
uninsured children.
  No. 11--my hats off to the Senator from Iowa--food safety. There were 
times in the last week or two that it was a dead duck in the lameduck. 
Somehow or another, it found its wings and started to fly and was 
passed by both the House and the Senate.
  I worked on this measure for 16 years. The Senator from Iowa brought 
it across the finish line with the kind of skills he has developed as a 
leader in the Senate. It is great to team up with him. People's lives 
will be saved and people spared serious illness because of this bill.
  No. 12, child nutrition, a favorite of the First Lady. I thank 
Senator Blanche Lincoln, who is leaving us, for her leadership on this 
issue. We are providing nutritious meals to hungry children and 
increasing the Federal reimbursement rate for school meals so local 
governments do not have to absorb the increased cost.
  No. 13--here is an issue front and center in my career in the House 
and Senate--tobacco regulation. The bill we passed calls on the Food 
and Drug Administration to regulate the manufacture, sale, and 
promotion of tobacco products. The things we did in this bill, I say to 
Senator Harkin, would have been unthinkable 10 years ago. But we did 
them to try to keep these tobacco products out of the hands of kids.
  No. 14 on my list is something that passed a few hours ago, ratifying 
the New START treaty. This is what the President needed. This is what 
America needed. We only have one President. We want to give him the 
authority to keep America safe. We want his word to be good. We want 
him to engage former adversaries as future allies with the passage of 
the New START treaty.
  No. 15 is one near and dear to my heart. It was originally introduced 
by Hillary Clinton, and when she left to join the President's Cabinet, 
I asked if I could take up the cause of passing the veterans caregiver 
assistance bill. In a word, it means those disabled veterans who return 
home, who are fortunate to have a spouse, a parent, or a member of 
their family who will sacrifice their own lives to make sure they are 
comfortable in their homes will receive some help from the government. 
These are people who get to stay home as disabled veterans and, because 
someone in the family will stay with them where they want to be, at 
considerably less expense to our government but in the right, positive 
environment for our disabled veterans. This bill gives those veteran 
caregivers a little additional assistance, some respite time, and a 
modest stipend each month so they can continue to do this invaluable 
work on behalf of the men and women who sacrifice so much for our 
country.
  No. 16 we passed today as well, the 9/11 Health and Compensation Act. 
We said so much in tribute to first responders--police, firefighters 
and others--who came to Ground Zero when they were called. Today we 
said we were going to stand by them with any illness that came about as 
a result of that experience.
  No. 17, repeal of don't ask, don't tell. I went to that ceremony 
today, and I have to tell you, I thought it was one of the most 
profound experiences I had. To see an auditorium filled with people who 
cared so much for this issue, many of whom have seen their lives 
wrecked because of discrimination based on their sexual orientation. 
The Pledge of Allegiance was given by retired Air Force COL Margarethe 
Cammermeyer. I know her story well because I told it so many times. She 
was an Air Force nurse who risked her life to save the lives of 
servicemen in Vietnam who rose through the ranks until one day she 
announced, when asked, that she was a lesbian. She was discharged, 
retired from the service. Never in the course of her military career 
had anything about her sexual preference had any impact on her service 
to the Nation, but she was discriminated against because of who she 
was.
  She gave the Pledge of Allegiance today with tears in her eyes and 
joined all of us applauding President Obama as he finally signed this 
bill repealing don't ask, don't tell.
  No. 18 is a bill I worked on, and the most unlikely political odd 
couple on Capitol Hill, Jeff Sessions. It is the Fair Sentencing Act 
which reduced the unfair disparity in sentencing between crack and 
powder cocaine. There are literally thousands of men and women serving 
time in prison because of this disparity in sentencing. Senator 
Sessions and I reached an accommodation, an agreement, a compromise on 
sentencing which brings us closer to the reality of the danger of the 
narcotics involved. I thank him for his bipartisan cooperation.
  No. 19 is the first bill signed by President Obama as President of 
the United States, the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, to try to once and 
for all end discrimination of women in the workplace.
  No. 20, the hate crimes prevention bill. That is one I think is 
absolutely essential to renew the promise in America that we will never 
discriminate against people based on sexual orientation, race, gender, 
creed, or national origin. That bill was long overdue. The Matthew 
Shepard family, who helped us pass that bill, was instrumental in 
moving America forward in the field of human rights.
  I am sure Senator Harkin can add three or four of his own to that 
list.
  When I look back and reflect on 2 years of hard work, it is worth the 
effort. All the long nights, all the time away from family, some of the 
frustration, all of the anger, all of it was worth it when we look back 
in time and say in our time here, many of us believe we have helped to 
move America forward with the work we have done in the Congress.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.
  Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I listened very carefully to my friend 
from Illinois as he went down his list. I admit it is a pretty thorough 
list. I may have missed one. I was conversing with another Senator 
briefly. Did I miss the higher education bill? The list covered 
everything else, I say to my friend. The Higher Education Act, which 
historically, I say to Senator Durbin, in 1992, Senator Kennedy, then 
the chair of the committee which I now chair, had done a study to see 
whether direct loans would be better than the indirect loans that go 
through banks for students going to college.
  We had this study done, this pilot program. In 1993 and 1994, the 
pilot program ran. By 1994, the data was in. The Direct Loan Program 
worked well. It saved tons of money, and the schools

[[Page 23505]]

liked it, students liked it. Our goal was that in 1995, we were going 
to then expand it nationwide. Of course, we know what happened in 1995. 
We lost the Congress. It went to the Republican side.
  The Republicans did not want to expand the Direct Loan Program. They 
wanted to keep it going through the banks. Banks loved it. Who does not 
like free money? From 1995 on, we never had the opportunity to ever 
expand the Direct Loan Program and save all this money, until finally 
when Barack Obama became President and Democrats took over the House 
and the Senate, we were able to pass it and, as the Senator knows, we 
signed that into law, I think if I am not mistaken, in February of this 
year right after we passed the health care bill, and it was part of the 
health care bill.
  In passing that bill, we went from indirect loans to Direct Loan 
Program and save $60 billion in 10 years. We took that money and put it 
in better Pell grants for students.
  I say to my friend to illustrate, sometimes it takes a long time 
around here to get things done. If you persevere and the stars align 
right, you can get it done. It is also a way of saying to my friend 
from Illinois, thank you for what you did for food safety. I get a lot 
of accolades. I just happened to be here as chairman of the committee 
at the right time to get it through. Anyone who knows anything about 
this issue knows Senator Durbin was the Senator who got this going. I 
always wondered how many years ago. He said 16 years ago.
  Again, there is perseverance, stick to it. When you know what is 
right and good for this country, do not give up and hang in there. 
Senator Durbin hung in there for 16 long years. We finally got the bill 
done and passed. I think the President will be signing it into law some 
time before January 5.
  A lot fewer people will get sick, a lot more families will be 
healthy, and our food will be safer because of the efforts of Senator 
Durbin. I publicly thank him for all of his work on this bill.

                          ____________________