[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 156 (2010), Part 5]
[Senate]
[Pages 6133-6147]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




 RESTORING AMERICAN FINANCIAL STABILITY ACT OF 2010--MOTION TO PROCEED

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that at 3 p.m., 
Monday, April 26, the Senate proceed to the consideration of Calendar 
No. 349, S. 3217, a bill to promote the financial stability of the 
United States by improving accountability and transparency.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, reserving the right to object.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Republican leader.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Reserving the right to object, and I will object, here 
we go again. The majority leader is once again moving to a bill, even 
while bipartisan discussions on the content of the bill are still 
underway.
  Just about an hour ago, the majority leader said:

       I'm not going to waste any more time of the American people 
     while they come up with some agreement.

  Well, I do not think bipartisanship is a waste of time. I do not 
think a bill with the legitimacy of a bipartisan agreement is a waste 
of time.
  Is it a waste of time to ensure that the taxpayers never again bail 
out Wall Street firms? Is it a waste of time to ensure that the bill 
before us does not drive jobs overseas or dry up lending to small 
businesses? Is it too much to ask, should an agreement be reached, that 
we take the time to make sure every Member of the Senate and our 
constituents can actually read the bill and understand the details?
  This bill potentially affects every small bank and lending 
institution in our country. It has serious implications for jobs and 
the availability of credit to spur economic growth. It has important 
consequences for the taxpayers, if done incorrectly.
  I think Americans expect more of us. I think they expect us to take 
the time to do it right. I would add, my impression was that serious 
discussions were going on. I think they should continue. Therefore, Mr. 
President, I object.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
  The majority leader.
  Mr. REID. Thank you, Mr. President.
  Here we go again. This is a bill that has been out here for a month--
weeks. I think people even reading slowly would have a chance to work 
their way through that in a month. This Kabuki dance we have been 
involved in for months now--my friend, and he is my friend, the ranking 
member of that committee, the distinguished senior Senator from 
Alabama, worked with the chairman of the committee for weeks and 
weeks--weeks going into months--trying to come up with a deal we could 
move forward on. That was no longer possible. No negotiations went on. 
My friend from Alabama said that is enough.
  Then we get the Senator from Tennessee coming in and spending weeks 
with my friend, the chairman of the Banking Committee, Senator Dodd. 
That fell through.
  We are moving to this bill because we need transparency, we need 
accountability, we need someone to respond to Wall Street because they 
have not responded to us.
  This game is apparent to the American people. My friends on the other 
side of the aisle are betting on failure

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again, as they did with health care, as they have done on everything 
this year. They did not get--health care was not Obama's Waterloo. 
Maybe they want this to be his Waterloo, but it is not going to be. We 
are going to move forward on this piece of legislation because the 
American people demand it.
  I have said publicly on many occasions, we need to get on this bill. 
Remember, we are not finalizing the bill. We are asking for the simple 
task we used to do easily: move to the bill. I am only asking 
permission to get on the bill--to get on the bill--and then start 
offering amendments. I am not asking everybody to approve the bill as 
it is written. All I am asking for is we move to the bill.
  If there is an agreement reached between the ranking member and the 
chairman of the committee, it is easy to take care of that. There would 
be a substitute amendment. They would agree to it and probably it would 
be accepted pretty easily. So to think this is some way to bail out 
Wall Street firms is an absolute joke. Read the bill.
  So in light of the objection, I now move to proceed. I am moving to 
proceed. It takes me 2 days. It takes the Senate 2 days for this to 
ripen. We are going to have a vote Monday. We should be on the bill 
today offering amendments, having opening statements on the bill. Those 
who think it is good, say something good about it. Those who think it 
needs to be improved, improve it. But, no, we are going to waste the 
next 4 days getting on the bill.


                             Cloture Motion

  So in light of the objection, I now move to proceed to Calendar No. 
349, S. 3217, and 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 Calendar No. 349, S. 3217, the Restoring American 
     Financial Stability Act of 2010:
         Harry Reid, Christopher J. Dodd, Byron L. Dorgan, Mark 
           Udall, Roland W. Burris, Daniel K. Inouye, Sherrod 
           Brown, Robert P. Casey, Jr., Mark Begich, Patrick J. 
           Leahy, Tom Udall, Patty Murray, Tom Harkin, Richard J. 
           Durbin, Frank R. Lautenberg, Benjamin L. Cardin, Bill 
           Nelson, Jack Reed.

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, just so the American public knows this also, 
if there is an agreement reached between Senators Dodd and Shelby and 
anyone objected to that agreement, I would have to start all over with 
a bill because it would be a new bill and we would have the same games 
being played. So if they can come to an agreement, more power to them. 
They will work this out as an amendment to the bill or a substitute.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the vote on the motion to 
invoke cloture on the motion to proceed occur at 5 p.m., Monday--I will 
drag the vote; some people wanted it earlier, some wanted it later, and 
we will not close the vote until at least a quarter to 6--so that will 
be on Monday, April 26, at 5 p.m., and with the mandatory quorum being 
waived.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Republican leader.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I would only add, briefly, that Senator 
Dodd and Senator Shelby are on the floor. I would encourage them to 
continue to do what they have been doing, which is to try to reach an 
agreement.
  The only place where I would disagree with my good friend, the 
majority leader, is I think it does make a difference which bill we 
turn to. Hopefully, the bill we turn to will not be a bill that came 
out of the committee on a party-line vote but, rather, a bill 
negotiated on a bipartisan basis by those who know the most about the 
subject: Senator Dodd, Senator Shelby, and the members of their 
committee.
  It is still my hope we will be able to go forward on a bipartisan 
basis, and I look forward to hearing from Chairman Dodd and Ranking 
Member Shelby about the progress they make.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Dakota has the floor.
  The Senator from North Dakota is recognized.


            Nomination of Brigadier General Michael J. Walsh

  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I am tempted to ask the minority leader, 
while he is on the floor, whether he might help us proceed to overcome 
the objections of Senator Vitter and achieve the promotion that was 
offered 6 months ago but since has been blocked for a distinguished 
soldier. I guess I will withhold on that and wait for another moment.
  But let me indicate quickly--and I will be happy to respond to a 
question then--the Outfall Canals/Pump to the river, which my colleague 
is so significantly criticizing the Corps of Engineers for--let me read 
specifically:

       The Corps will conduct a supplementary risk reduction 
     analysis as part of the detailed engineering feasibility 
     study, including the NEPA compliance documentation, for 
     options 2 and 2a, if Congress appropriates funds for the 
     study.

  Congress has actually voted on these funds through the Appropriations 
Committee and said: No, we would not do that.
  So my colleague knows that holding up the promotion of a soldier is 
not going to achieve his ends. The Appropriations Committee has already 
voted.
  I am happy to yield to the Senator from Virginia for a question.
  Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I appreciate that. I have a question. I 
appreciate the comments of the Senator from North Dakota, and I agree 
with his comments. I have to say--and I know some of my colleagues were 
here earlier.
  Before I came to this body, I spent a career as a CEO of a business 
and a CEO of a State. While I have great respect for this body and the 
rules and traditions of this body, something seems a little strange 
when 15 months into a new administration, this President can't get his 
nominees up for a straight up-or-down vote--put the management team in 
place. If there is a challenge or a problem with the qualifications of 
the gentleman the President proposes to be the head of the Corps of 
Engineers, we ought to debate that and vote him down, but he should not 
be held in this kind of gray secret hold or this area of abeyance. A 
number of my colleagues have spoken about this already. All of the 
freshman and sophomore Democratic Members--and I am sure we would 
welcome our Republican colleagues to do the same--are saying this 
process of putting people on hold, particularly seeking holds that have 
no relationship to their qualifications for the job, is wrong.
  I don't know how to answer this when people around Virginia ask me: 
Why can't you get stuff done, and why can't these things be moved 
forward?
  So a number of us--we may be new to the body, but just because of the 
very action that is being debated right now--are going to continue to 
press this issue. I commend the Senator from North Dakota.
  Again, is the Senator from North Dakota aware of any substantive 
reasons this man who served our country for so long in our military 
should not be confirmed as the head of the Army Corps of Engineers?
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I would say to the Senator from Virginia, 
there are no reasons with respect to this person's military service. I 
have not heard any reasons from the Senator from Louisiana. He is not 
holding up his promotion because he thinks the man is unfit or didn't 
earn the promotion; he is holding up the promotion because he says he 
is demanding other things from the Corps of Engineers.
  Despite my irritation, let me say I don't dislike my colleague from 
Louisiana. I intensely dislike what he is doing, and I expect most 
informed soldiers in this country should dislike what he is doing 
because I believe it puts a soldier in the position of being a pawn as 
between the demands of a U.S. Senator and some agency.
  I will go through at some point--the Senator, I know, is leaving this 
afternoon, and that is why I, as a matter of

[[Page 6135]]

courtesy, told him when I would come to the floor. But at some point 
later when others aren't waiting, I will go through and describe the 
issues, responses to the issues, because the rest of the story is much 
more compelling than the half story given to us by the Senator from 
Louisiana.
  The Ouachita River levees, the authorization for that Ouachita River 
and tributaries projects specifies that levee work is a nonfederal 
responsibility. Congress has not enacted a general provisional law that 
would supplant this nonfederal responsibility and allow the corps to 
correct levee damages not associated with flood events.
  As much as a person--as someone here--doesn't like that answer, that 
is the answer. Again, my colleague is saying--if you strip away all the 
bark, my colleague is saying: I demand we spend more money on something 
that will give us less flood control. Well, look, the Senate 
Appropriations Committee has been confronted with that, and the Senate 
Appropriations Committee said: No way, we are not going to do it.
  One final point, and then I will come back at some later point and 
the Senator from Louisiana will respond and I will respond to him and, 
hopefully, someday he will decide there are other ways for him to 
achieve the means to an end rather than use the promotion of this 
dedicated soldier as a pawn in this effort he is making.
  This Congress has appropriated $14 billion to help the people of New 
Orleans and Louisiana. How do I know that? Because I chair the 
appropriations subcommittee that funds these things. I chair that 
subcommittee. I have been willing and anxious to help the people of 
Louisiana and New Orleans. I have been willing to do that because I saw 
what they were hit with: an unbelievable tragedy. I saw it. But I think 
it is pretty Byzantine to come to the floor and hear the relentless 
criticism of the Corps of Engineers that has stood with the people of 
Louisiana and New Orleans, and even today is helping rebuild with that 
$14 billion. I think there is a time when you wear out the welcome of 
certainly this Senator and others who have been so quick and so anxious 
to help, and you wear out the welcome of agencies such as the Corps of 
Engineers when you suggest somehow that they are a bunch of slothful 
bureaucrats who can't do anything right.
  I have seen people wear out their welcome, and I tell my colleagues 
this: This exercise in using this soldier as a pawn in this little 
game, trying to misread the law and the authorities of the Corps of 
Engineers to demand that they do what they can't do in order to satisfy 
one Senator, it is the wrong way to do business in this Senate.
  I have not convinced my colleague to release his hold and allow, 
after 6 months, this soldier's career to move forward. I know this is 
just one. There are 100 of them on the calendar. This is one, but it is 
one that is unusual. It is one that is unusual because one soldier's 
career that has been recommended for promotion by Republicans and 
Democrats alike is being held up by only one person. I have not heard 
one other person come to this Chamber and say: I think it is a good 
idea to use a soldier's promotion as a pawn to try to get what I want. 
There is not one other person who has done that, and I don't think 
there is another Senator who would do it. If there is, let's hear from 
them.
  I will come back later. I know my colleague wishes to speak. Had he 
wanted me to yield, I certainly would have yielded, even though he 
would not yield to me. There are certain things we shouldn't do around 
here. Again, I don't dislike him, but I certainly dislike what he is 
doing because I think it is so fundamentally wrong and undermines the 
kinds of circumstances in which we have always evaluated the merit of 
promotions for soldiers who have served this country.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Louisiana.
  Mr. VITTER. Mr. President, I am disappointed. I am disappointed. I am 
disappointed my distinguished colleague is continuing to simply 
blindly, in my opinion, be a fierce defender of a bureaucracy which is 
truly broken. Not a pawn in anything, a member of the leadership, one 
of the top nine officers of the leadership of this bureaucracy.
  For my part, I will continue to fight to change, to fundamentally 
change that bureaucracy and, for starters, to have them follow the law, 
to have them follow their mandates, their authorizations in the WRDA 
bill and the other legislation I have outlined.
  I have outlined the authorization clearly to the corps. I will 
outline it again. I have outlined these significant studies that are 
overdue, have never been produced, not because of the fault of anyone 
else, not because of the State of Louisiana. I will meet with them next 
week. I will continue to work on that. I invite the Senator to work on 
that sort of fundamental change, not just fiercely defending this, in 
my opinion, truly broken bureaucracy.
  I will also note, as the majority leader noted, one Senator cannot 
kill this nomination. One Senator cannot stop this promotion. The 
Senate can move on it, so I invite the Senate and the majority leader 
to do that. It is completely within the majority leader's--his party's 
power to move on that and to proceed with this nomination, and 
certainly one Senator cannot stop that. But this one Senator will 
continue to fight to hold the corps' feet to the fire to make them live 
by their mandates, to move forward on these critical protection issues 
for Louisiana.
  Thank you, Mr. President.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Dakota.
  Mr. DORGAN. Let me just quickly say I intend to work with everybody 
in this Chamber who comes here to work in good faith to solve problems. 
But in my judgment, it is an unbelievable mistake to use the promotion 
of soldiers as a pawn in these circumstances.
  I would say that as chairman of the subcommittee that funds all of 
these projects and all of these issues, I have been pleased to send all 
of that money--$14 billion--down to Louisiana. But as I said, my friend 
is fast wearing out his welcome. I think my friend might want to learn 
the words ``thank you,'' thank you to this Chamber, thanks to the rest 
of the American people who said to some people who were hit with an 
unbelievable tragedy: You are not alone. You are not alone. This 
country cares about you and is going to invest in your future. But I 
also think thank you to the Corps of Engineers. It is quite clear they 
have probably made some mistakes in all of our States. It is also clear 
that it would be a pretty difficult circumstance for a State or for 
people in any State to fight these battles without the experience and 
the knowledge and the capability of the Corps of Engineers.
  I just think from time to time constructive criticism is in order. I 
think also from time to time a thank-you is in order. I also think in 
every case--in each and every case, the truth is in order. I will go 
through and in every single circumstance describe where the Senator 
from Louisiana has said the Corps of Engineers has the authority and 
has the funding, and I will show him that he is dead wrong, and I think 
he knows it.
  But if this impasse continues, my colleague, Senator Reid, the 
majority leader, does have the capability to take 2 days of the 
Senate's time to file a cloture motion, and my expectation would be 
that the vote would be 99 to 1 because I don't know of one other Member 
of the Senate who wants to hold up the promotion of soldiers in order 
to meet demands that a specific Federal agency cannot possibly meet.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Louisiana.
  Mr. VITTER. Mr. President, just to close, I have said thank you many 
times, certainly to the American people, to these bodies in Washington 
representing the American people. The Senator is certainly right about 
that generosity and about a lot of the work of the corps.
  I do disagree with the Senator in sort of lightly tripping over as a 
minor mistake design flaws that caused 80 percent of the catastrophic 
flooding of the city of New Orleans. I wouldn't think that is a minor 
mistake to trip over. But I will continue to work with the

[[Page 6136]]

corps to resolve these issues, and I will go through every one of those 
additional 11 items I outlined because we are waiting on that critical 
work and on those critical reports. That is not only authorized, but it 
is mandated in the 2007 WRDA bill and other bills, and we need that to 
move forward.
  Thank you, Mr. President.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut is recognized.
  Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I note the presence of my colleague and 
friend from Alabama, the former chairman and now ranking member of the 
Banking Committee on the Senate floor, and I will be very brief. We 
have heard the proposal by the majority leader, the objection by the 
minority leader, and the announcement that there will be a filing of a 
cloture motion which will mature, I think, on Monday around 5 o'clock 
or so when a vote will occur.
  Let me briefly express, first of all, my thanks to Richard Shelby, my 
colleague from Alabama. For many months--going back more than a year, 
actually--we have been working together now on this. Over the last 38 
or 39 months that I have been privileged to be chairman of the 
committee, we have sat next to each other. There have been some 42 
proposals that have come out of the Banking Committee over the last 38 
months, and I think 37 of them are now the law of the land.
  There have been a wide range of issues, including things such as 
flood control, but also dealing with port securities, with risk 
insurance, with housing issues, with credit cards--all sorts of issues 
that our Banking Committee has wrestled with in the midst of the worst 
economic crisis since the Great Depression.
  So before another word is said, before another amendment is filed or 
another motion made, let me say thank you to Richard Shelby and my 
other members of the committee for their cooperation and the work we 
have done together on that committee. Very few votes that have occurred 
have been negative votes. We had a few of them that happened; that is 
understandable from time to time. But, by and large, we have worked 
together.
  I want our colleagues to know, but also I think most of us want the 
American public to know, that despite political differences, the fact 
that we come from different parts of the country doesn't separate our 
common determination to see to it that we put ourselves on a much more 
solid footing than, obviously, we were at the time this crisis emerged. 
We want to never again see our Nation placed in economic peril as it 
was over the last several years, with as many jobs and homes lost and 
retirements evaporating, health care disappearing because of job loss. 
We have been dealing with all of the problems: small businesses 
collapsing, credit shutting down, capital not available for new starts 
and new ideas.
  So we have put together a bill. Granted, it was not a bipartisan vote 
in committee, but as I am sure my colleague will recognize, much of 
what is in this bill today is different than the one I offered in 
November. I am not going to suggest that my friend from Alabama and 
others loved every dotted I and crossed t, but I believe he will 
acknowledge that there is a lot of cooperation represented in this 
bill, trying to come to some common territory so we can say to the 
American public: Never again will you be asked to spend a nickel of 
your money to bail out a financial institution. The presumption is 
failure and bankruptcy. We want to wind you down in a way that doesn't 
jeopardize other solvent companies and the rest of our economy in the 
country. We want to make sure consumers get protected, when they have a 
place to go--when a product they buy fails, there is a place they can 
go. We recently saw an automobile company where the accelerator jammed 
and people were put at risk. There was a recall on that product because 
it placed people at risk. Nothing exists today that allows for a recall 
of a financial product that puts you at risk. Our bill tries to do 
that. We try to complete an early-warning system so we can pick up 
economic problems before they metastasize into major issues. There are 
other pieces of it as well.
  We are working to come to a common understanding of how best to 
achieve those goals and results. My hope is, because of the magnitude 
of the bill, we can get to a debate and discussion. My experience over 
30 years in this Chamber is that we never get to a resolution of issues 
until we have to. As long as there are sort of discussion groups going 
on in various rooms of the Capitol and meetings that we have--that is 
all helpful and can help us understand issues better, but the only way 
we get to a resolution of conflicting ideas, in the final analysis, is 
to be on the floor of this Chamber, where Members bring their ideas and 
we work on them together. We try to accept the good ones or modify them 
to make them fit into the structure. The bad ideas we try to reject 
when we can. But you have to be here.
  Senator Shelby and I, as hard as we work, we know we don't represent 
98 other people in this Chamber. Other Members who are not members of 
our committee or who are members of our committee certainly have every 
right to be heard on this bill and to express their ideas as to how we 
can do a better job of achieving what we are trying to achieve. But we 
need to get there. If we don't even have the chance to start this 
process, you can't ask the two of us to resolve it for everybody. It is 
too much. We can try to come close and we can try to reflect the views 
of our respective caucuses and the American people, but don't expect us 
to sit there and write a complete bill to deal with an entire meltdown 
of the financial sector of our Nation. We can help get there. We have 
good ideas on how to achieve it. But we need this body to function. It 
cannot function as long as we are debating whether we can even get to 
the bill.
  We have spent more than a year on this, and over a month ago we 
finished our work in the committee. It was voted out of committee. It 
wasn't a bipartisan vote, but we moved forward. Now we have a chance 
for this body to act on the product that came out of committee, which 
will be before us. Where we can get agreement and some changes, we will 
have a managers' amendment or a substitute or whatever procedural way 
necessary to try to accommodate those, reflecting the ideas of our 
colleagues. Others can bring their ideas to the debate. We need to have 
that. That cannot occur until we are actually here doing it.
  I urge my colleagues, principally, I say, on the minority side but 
not exclusively--I think there are those on the majority side as well--
everybody can play hold-up and say: If I don't get my way and if you 
don't do what I want, then I will object to getting to the bill. If 
that is the case, who wins on this matter? Certainly not the American 
people, who expect a little more out of this Chamber than whether each 
100 of us insists upon our own agenda. It doesn't work that way, 
unfortunately. This is not an executive body. We are coequals here, 
even those in the leadership. We have a right to be heard.
  My colleague from Arkansas, chairman of the Agriculture Committee--
they marked up a bill dealing with derivatives and other matters, as 
they should. There is jurisdiction of that matter in their committee. 
We did the same. We have some jurisdiction over the subject matter. We 
need to harmonize the rulemaking on that subject matter.
  I hope that on Monday afternoon, Senator Shelby and I will continue 
working with each other, as will our staffs today, tomorrow, and over 
the weekend, to try to come to some understanding on some of these 
matters. I am not going to tell you to count on the two of us to solve 
all of our problems. We cannot.
  I ask everybody, let's get to the debate. The American people cannot 
tolerate us doing nothing, waiting around to see if another crisis 
comes and whether we can respond to it. That is unacceptable.
  About 5 on Monday, we need to have the votes to go forward. The two 
of us will sit in our respective chairs and present our ideas and talk 
and discuss how these ideas can emerge, and we will invite our 
colleagues to come to the floor to debate, discuss, and offer

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their ideas, and we will try to make this an even better bill. We think 
we have a good one, but we also know that anybody who suggests to you 
that they have written the perfect piece of legislation, be wary of 
them. I have never seen a perfect bill in 30 years--maybe a Mother's 
Day resolution or something, but aside from that, don't count on 
perfection to be offered here. It is anything but perfect. I hope we 
get to that moment.
  We have had our discussions over the last week, and I will continue 
talking about the substance of our bill. We cannot turn into a petulant 
organization here that screams at each other. We need to get about the 
business the American people sent us here to achieve. With the 
relationship I have had with my friend from Alabama, I remain 
optimistic we will get the job done.
  Legislative processes are not the most beautiful things to watch. It 
is what our Founders designed, what those who have come before us have 
been able to use to achieve some of the great successes of our Nation 
on many different matters.
  We are now confronted with another great challenge as to whether we 
can step up and resolve the kinds of issues that would avoid the kind 
of catastrophe we almost witnessed in our Nation. That is our job. We 
are chosen by the citizens in our States to represent not only their 
interests but our fellow countrymen's interests as well.
  I look forward to the vote on Monday. I hope we may not have to have 
it, that we can proceed to the bill and let Senator Shelby and I and 
the committee members and others do the work and shape a good bill.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alabama.
  Mr. SHELBY. Mr. President, first, I thank Senator Dodd for his 
leadership on the Banking Committee. I worked with him, as he said, 
day-in and day-out, and this is the fourth year of his chairmanship. We 
have achieved a lot together in a bipartisan way.
  Both sides of the aisle are working together for a common goal. We 
share a lot of these goals. What are some of the goals?
  Ending bailouts. Senator Dodd and I both believe that nothing should 
be too big to fail--financial institutions and, I believe, 
manufacturing and anything else. Nothing should be too big to fail. We 
are working toward that end.
  Protecting consumers. We are very interested in a consumer agency. We 
want to balance that, while protecting the deposit insurance fund and 
so forth.
  Regulating derivatives. Let's be honest, they played a big role--a 
lot of them in the closet, unknown, and so forth--in our financial 
debacle. Derivatives are used every day legitimately by so many of our 
businesses, not only in America but all over the world. So we need to 
regulate derivatives while protecting jobs and our economic growth. It 
is a common desire. Details matter here. The Presiding Officer 
understands that. Senator Dodd understands it very well.
  As we are moving down the road in the process, we are continuing to 
negotiate and to do it in good faith, trying to reach a common goal. 
Who knows what will happen between now and Monday or next Tuesday or 
Wednesday or Thursday. I hope it is a bipartisan bill and that we can 
gather a lot of people on both sides of the aisle to support it. I 
think that is one of our goals.
  What is the main goal? To do it right. Don't just do it, but do it 
right. Will it be perfect? Nothing is perfect, as Senator Dodd talks 
about. But if we work in good faith, as we are trying to while the 
process is going forward, I think we can make some real progress toward 
the common goal--to have a strong financial system that is well 
regulated, to have derivatives that are brought out of the closet to 
work, and to have a consumer agency that will work for all of us. There 
are many other things, but that is my goal, and I share that with 
Senator Dodd.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Colorado is recognized.
  (The remarks of Mr. Udall of Colorado pertaining to the introduction 
of S. 3247 are located in today's Record under ``Statements on 
Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')
  Mr. UDALL of Colorado. Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Franken). The Senator from New Mexico is 
recognized.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. I thank the Chair.
  (The remarks of Mr. Bingaman pertaining to the introduction of S. 
3248 are printed in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced 
Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')


                               Earth Day

  Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I wish to speak for a moment about Earth 
Day. This is the 40th anniversary of Earth Day--the 40th Earth Day, in 
fact, the 22nd of April. I am speaking now because of my great 
admiration for the work of Senator Gaylord Nelson in establishing this 
Earth Day. I was reminded of it in two respects in the last week. One 
was getting to visit with his widow, Carrie Lee Nelson, who is a great 
personage herself, who made a great contribution to his career in 
public service and continues today to advocate for the same issues he 
advocated for, particularly as they relate to the environment.
  Also earlier this year, Don Ritchie, our Senate Historian who speaks 
to us on Tuesdays at the Democratic lunch each week when we get 
together, gave what I thought was a fitting tribute to Gaylord Nelson 
that I wanted to share with people. I asked permission to do that. Don 
Ritchie agreed that was something that was acceptable. I would like to 
read through this and take 2 or 3 minutes.
  As the Senate Historian, he recounted the facts as follows:

       This past weekend, the Mini Page, a syndicated children's 
     supplement that appears in 500 newspapers across the country, 
     paid special tribute to a former U.S. Senator, Gaylord 
     Nelson, for launching the first Earth Day on April 22, 1970. 
     Five years after his death, Senator Nelson remains an icon of 
     the environmental movement.
       Senator Nelson used to say he came to environmentalism by 
     osmosis, having grown up in Clear Lake, WI. He promoted 
     conservation as Governor of Wisconsin and, after he was 
     elected to the Senate in 1962, he used his maiden speech to 
     call for a comprehensive nationwide program to save the 
     natural resources of America. He went on to compile an 
     impressive list of legislative accomplishments, which 
     included preserving the Appalachian Trail, banning DDT, and 
     promoting clean air and clean water. But it was Earth Day 
     that gave him international prominence and served as his 
     lasting legacy.
       Senator Nelson worried that the United States lacked a 
     unity of purpose to respond to the increasing threats against 
     the environment. The problem, in his words, was how to get a 
     nation to wake up and pay attention to the most important 
     challenge the human species faces on the planet. Then a 
     number of incidents converged to help him frame a solution. 
     In 1969, a major oilspill off the coast of Santa Barbara 
     covered miles of beaches with tar. Senator Nelson toured the 
     area in August and was outraged by the damage the oilspill 
     had caused, but was also impressed with the many people who 
     rallied to clean up the mess. Flying back from California, 
     the Senator read a magazine article about the anti-Vietnam 
     War teach-ins that were taking place on college campuses. 
     This inspired him to apply the same model to the environment.
       In September 1969, the Senator charged his staff with 
     figuring out how to sponsor environmental teach-ins on 
     college campuses nationwide, to be held on the same day the 
     following spring. Rather than organize this effort from the 
     top down, they believed that Earth Day would work better as a 
     grassroots movement. They raised funds to set up an office 
     staffed by college students, with a law student, Denis Hayes, 
     serving as the national coordinate. They identified the week 
     of April 19 to 25 as the ideal time for college schedules and 
     the possibility of good spring weather. Calculating that more 
     students were on campus on Wednesday made Wednesday, April 
     22, the first Earth Day. Critics of the movement pointed out 
     that April 22 happened to be Vladimir Lenin's birthday, but 
     Senator Nelson rebutted that it was also the birthday of the 
     first environmentalist, Saint Francis of Assisi.
       An astonishing success, the first Earth Day in 1970 was 
     celebrated by some 20 million Americans on 2,000 college 
     campuses, at 10,000 primary and secondary schools, and in 
     hundreds of communities. Forty years later, its commemoration 
     this week is expected to attract 500 million people in 175 
     countries.

  I will at some later point talk about the environmental legacy of one 
of our own Senators from New Mexico, Senator Clinton Anderson, who was 
one of the prime sponsors and promoters of

[[Page 6138]]

the Wilderness Act and worked with Gaylord Nelson on many of these same 
environmental issues and, of course, with President Kennedy, Stewart 
Udall, and with President Johnson.
  There are many people who deserve great credit for the legacy in this 
country and the focus on environmental issues, and Earth Day is an 
appropriate time to acknowledge their contributions.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I commend the Senator from New Mexico for 
drawing our attention to Earth Day. It has certainly become a national, 
if not global, observance that calls to mind the relationship we have 
with this Earth that we live on and our responsibilities. We are now 
considering legislation involving carbon and the impact of carbon on 
the environment and on this planet. There are some differences of 
opinions on the floor of the Senate about whether this is a challenge 
and, if it is, how to address it.
  Early next week, three of our colleagues are going to step forward 
with a proposal. Senator John Kerry has spearheaded an effort, working 
with Senator Barbara Boxer and Senator Bingaman, to come forward with 
an idea of clean energy. He will be joined by Senator Joseph Lieberman 
and Senator Lindsey Graham. It is a bipartisan effort.
  What they are seeking to do in this bill is certainly consistent with 
the goals of Earth Day and our national goals: First, to reduce our 
dependence on foreign oil, to encourage domestic energy sources that 
are renewable and sustainable so we can build on our future; second, to 
create jobs, which is our highest priority in this Congress with the 
recession we face. We understand the reality that countries such as 
China see a great potential for building solar panels and wind turbines 
and a variety of different forms of technology to promote energy 
efficiency and to promote the kind of clean energy approach that we 
should have as part of our future. Third, of course, is that we want to 
do something about pollution--carbon emissions, the impact they have on 
our lungs and on our atmosphere.
  I think this is a noble agenda. It is an ambitious agenda because it 
engages the entire American economy. We want to be sure we do the right 
thing, the responsible thing, when it comes to clean energy and our 
future but not at the cost of economic growth and development. I happen 
to believe a case can be made that absent our effort, we are going to 
fall behind in the development of industries that have great potential.
  There was a time that the two words, ``Silicon Valley,'' sent a 
message not only to America but to the world that we were leading in 
the information technology development arena. I cannot even guess at 
the number of jobs, businesses, and wealth that was created by that 
information technology leadership in the United States. Now we need to 
seize that leadership again.
  It is frustrating, if not infuriating, to think that 50 years ago, 
Bell Labs in the United States developed solar panels. Now, of the 10 
largest solar panel producers in the world, not one is in the United 
States. That has to change. It is something of a cliche, but I say it 
in my speeches and it resonates with people, that I would like to go 
into more stores in America and find ``Made in America'' stamped on 
those products.
  When it comes to this type of technology--solar panels, wind 
turbines--there is no reason we can't build these in the United States 
so that we are achieving many goals at once: a clean energy 
alternative, reducing our dependence on foreign oil, creating good-
paying jobs in industries with a future, and in the process doing the 
right thing for Mother Earth. Earth Day is a time to reflect on that.
  I have often spent Earth Day back in Illinois, downstate with 
farmers, and I can't think of any class of people in America closer to 
Mother Nature every single day of their lives. Most of them are not all 
that comfortable with these so-called environmentalists. They think 
they are too theoretical and not grounded in the reality that farmers 
face in their lives. But I have tried to draw them together in 
conversation, and almost inevitably they come up with some common 
approaches.
  Whether we are talking about soil and water conservation or reduction 
of the use of chemicals on the land, all of these things are consistent 
with both environmental goals and profitable farming. So I look at our 
stewards of the agricultural scene in America as part of our 
environmental community who can play a critical role in charting a 
course in making policies for the future.
  Mr. President, I hope that soon we will be moving to financial 
regulatory reform. It is a Washington term known as Wall Street reform, 
or basically trying to clean up the mess that was created by this last 
recession. This is a bill that is controversial. It has been worked on 
by many committees in the Senate. Senator Blanche Lincoln in the 
Agricultural Committee took on a big part of it. Most people are 
surprised to think of Wall Street and the Ag Committee at the same 
time, but those of us from Chicago are not. We have a futures market 
which has been in place for almost a century, starting with the Chicago 
Board of Trade, and it deals in futures--derivatives, if you will--that 
are based on agricultural commodities and currency and interest rates 
and a certain index. That operation in Chicago is governed and 
regulated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. The jurisdiction 
of that, as it started with agricultural products, has been relegated 
to the Agriculture Committee.
  Senator Lincoln met this week and did an outstanding job of reporting 
a bill on that section of the bill related to derivatives and futures 
regulated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. She was 
successful in reporting the bill from her committee, with the support 
of Senator Grassley of Iowa making it a bipartisan effort. Another 
Republican Senator expressed an interest in helping as well. So I give 
her high praise in this charged political atmosphere in which we work 
in this body. It says a lot for her that she can put together this type 
of bipartisan coalition.
  At the same time, Senator Dodd, in the Banking Committee, has been 
working on a bill as well, trying to bring the two together on the 
Senate floor and have a joint effort to deal with this issue.
  Now, why are we doing this? Well, we are doing this for very obvious 
reasons. We know that leading into this recession, Wall Street and the 
big banks in America got away with murder. At the end of the day, the 
taxpayers of this country were called on to rescue these financial 
institutions from their own perfidy.
  When we look at the things they did in the name of profit, it turned 
out to be senseless greed. At the end of the day, many people suffered. 
As a result of this recession, $17 trillion was extracted from the 
American economy--$17 trillion in losses. Mr. President, $17 trillion 
is more than the annual gross national product of the United States. So 
if we took the sum total value of all the goods and services produced 
in our country in 1 year, we lost that much value in this recession. It 
was the hardest hit the American economy has taken since the Great 
Depression in 1929.
  Of course, a lot of it had to do with bad decisions. Some individual 
families and businesses made bad decisions. They borrowed money when 
they shouldn't have. They got in too deeply, bought homes that were too 
expensive. They might have been lured into it, but they made bad 
decisions. The government made some bad decisions. We thought, as a 
general principle, encouraging home ownership was great for our 
country; that the more people who own a home, the more likely they will 
make that home a good investment for themselves, and the more likely 
they will be engaged in their neighborhood and their churches and in 
their communities, and the stronger we will be as a nation. That was 
the starting point. So we opened up opportunities for home ownership, 
reaching down to levels that had not been tried before, and, 
unfortunately, that went too far.

[[Page 6139]]

  The private sector was to blame. When we look at so many people who 
were lured into mortgages and borrowing far beyond their means, we see 
there was also a lot of deception going on. People were told they could 
get a mortgage and make an easy monthly payment and weren't told their 
mortgage would explode right in front of them, as the subprime 
mortgage, in a matter of months or years, would have a monthly payment 
far beyond their means. They weren't told there was a provision in that 
mortgage which had a prepayment penalty that stopped them from 
refinancing, and that they were stuck with high interest rates from 
which they couldn't escape. They weren't told that just making an oral 
representation about their income was not nearly enough; that they 
needed to produce documentation about their real net worth.
  These so-called no-doc closings, which became rampant in some areas, 
led to terrible decisions, encouraged by greedy speculators in the 
financial industries. So the net result was that the bottom fell out of 
the real estate market and $17 trillion in value was lost in the 
American economy. Most of us felt it in our 401(k)s, in our savings 
accounts, and in our retirement plans. We saw it with businesses that 
lost their leases and lost their businesses and had to lay off their 
employees.
  The President was faced with 800,000 unemployed Americans in his 
first month in office. That is an enormous number of people. The total 
today is about 8 million actively unemployed, with 6 million long-term 
unemployed. It is huge, and it affects every single State. In my State, 
there is over 11 percent unemployment. In Rockford, IL, it is close to 
20, and Danville about the same. I have visited those communities, and 
I can see the pain and the sacrifices that are being made by people who 
have lost their jobs.
  So the President came in and asked us to pass a stimulus bill, which 
we did. It was some $787 billion that was injected into the economy in 
an effort to get it moving again, providing tax breaks for 95 percent 
of working families and middle-income families across America. It was a 
safety net for those who had lost their jobs, not only in unemployment 
benefits but also COBRA or health insurance benefits, and finally an 
investment in projects such as highway construction, which would create 
good-paying American jobs right now and produce something that would 
have value for our economic growth in the years to come.
  At the same time, though, as we go through this painful process of 
coming out of this recession, we have to make changes in Wall Street 
and the financial institutions to guarantee that we would not face this 
again. That means taking an honest look at some of the practices that 
are taking place today, and that are legal today. We got into this 
thinking--and I was part of it; most of us were--that if we had an 
expanding financial sector in the United States, it would expand jobs 
and opportunities and business growth and global competition.
  Unfortunately, it went overboard. Many financial institutions, which 
are now being called on the carpet, took the authority given them by 
the Federal Government to an extreme. That is what we are trying to 
change. We want to make sure there is some accountability on Wall 
Street and with the big banks, so that we understand what they are 
doing and that their investments don't end up being a gamble where 
people can lose their life savings or investments.
  We want to make sure as well that we empower consumers in the United 
States. This bill that is going to come before us has the strongest 
consumer financial protection ever enacted into law in the United 
States. We are going to create an agency which is going to protect and 
empower consumers--protect them from the tricks and traps and shadowy 
agreements and fine print stuck in mortgages and credit card 
statements, in student loans, in retirement plans, and all of the 
things that people engage in daily in their lives where one sentence 
stuck in a legal document can end up being someone's downfall.
  We want to protect consumers from that and empower consumers to make 
the right decisions, so that there will be clarity in these legal 
documents that can bring a person's financial empire to ruin. That kind 
of clarity and plain English is going to be guaranteed by a Federal 
group that is going to keep an eye on the financial industries.
  Some of these large banks are fighting us. They don't want to see 
this happen. They do not believe there should be this kind of consumer 
financial protection. But we are going to fight to make that happen so 
consumers across America have a fighting chance when they enter into 
agreements, so that they will have a legal document they can understand 
and one that they can work with, and then they will have an agency to 
back them up.
  Currently, we have only had one Republican Senator vote for this kind 
of reform--Senator Grassley of Iowa voted for it in the Agriculture 
Committee version that came out of Senator Lincoln's committee. But on 
the Banking Committee, not a single Republican would vote for it. I 
hope they will have a change of heart.
  I understand there are negotiations underway, but I hope the 
negotiations don't water down the basic agreement in this bill. We need 
a strong bill. We need a bill that meets the test of what we have been 
through as a nation. After all of the suffering that has taken place--
the businesses lost, the savings lost, the jobs lost--for goodness' 
sake, let's not come up with some halfhearted effort. Let's stand up to 
the Wall Street lobbyists who are going to try to water down this bill 
and tell them no. We are going to call for a vote on a bill that has 
some teeth in it, something worth voting for, something that will 
guarantee that we will never go through this kind of recession ever 
again in our economy.
  I think we owe that to the American people, and I hope that next 
week, come Monday afternoon at 5 o'clock, when this Senate convenes for 
a vote, I hope we have a strong bipartisan vote to move forward on this 
whole idea of Wall Street reform. I believe that is in the best 
interests of our country. I commend Senator Dodd and Senator Lincoln. I 
urge them to come together, bring their two bills together, and to come 
up with an agreement that can lead us into this kind of happy day where 
we have this kind of legislation.
  Mr. President, I thank you for allowing me to speak in morning 
business, and if there is no one seeking recognition, 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. REED. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                         Rhode Island Flooding

  Mr. REED. Mr. President, last month, my State was hit by the worst 
nonhurricane floods in the history of the State, at least in the last 
200 years.
  Our Governor has preliminarily assessed the damage in the hundreds of 
millions of dollars, which is a significant figure for the smallest 
State in the Union. This disaster came at the worst moment for my 
state. Rhode Island is struggling with an economic collapse that has 
left it with a 12.7-percent unemployment rate and decimated State and 
local financial resources.
  Indeed, many of the homeowners and businesses who were hit hardest by 
the floods were among those already struggling to make ends meet. I 
toured the State, along with my colleague, Sheldon Whitehouse, and met 
with constituents from Cumberland to Westerly, from the north to the 
south, as they worked to clean their homes and businesses. We could see 
the turmoil, as well as their physical and emotional strain and stress. 
They are tired. They are frustrated, and they are asking for our help. 
I admire the spirit of people who are willing to pitch in and help 
their neighbors, and that was evident throughout the crisis. This 
significant blow came on top of the economic blows we have already 
suffered. A flood like this is difficult in good times and

[[Page 6140]]

it is truly trying in bad times, as we have seen in Rhode Island.
  I wish to commend FEMA and all the professionals in emergency 
management who have come to Rhode Island for their help in the 
recovery. They are doing a marvelous job. The speed of the response, 
including from Secretary Napolitano, has been tremendous. She was up 
there on Good Friday looking at the flood damage. The FEMA teams were 
on the ground. Deputy FEMA Administrator Rich Serino was there. He 
visited the damage with me. This is emblematic of the commitment of the 
FEMA task force. It is not only FEMA. It is also the Small Business 
Administration. The regional EPA director was there, the regional small 
business administrator was there. We had representatives from the Army 
Corps of Engineers and the district engineer.
  The most emblematic story was told to me in Washington by a Rhode 
Islander who was visiting. She was a visiting nurse. She said her 
sister was at home on Easter. She had some flood damage. The doorbell 
rang, and it was FEMA. They said: We work 7 days a week. Here is the 
estimate of the damages, and we will be able to help you in this way.
  Even with this dramatic and effective response, the damage was 
widespread. It covered every corner of the State. This was the first 
time we have seen, in my lifetime and going back a long time, not only 
surface water coming over the banks of rivers--there are some areas 
that perennially flood, similar to anywhere in the country--this was 
groundwater. We had been so saturated with rain for weeks and weeks. 
When the final deluge came, there was no place to hold the water. It 
came up through cellars, through sump pumps, through everything. There 
were very few parts of the State, very few homes unaffected by at least 
minor basement flooding; in some cases, very major water damage.
  The story of the Pawtuxet River is an example of what transpired. Let 
me also say that in my course of traveling around, I was reeducated in 
the development of northern industrial communities. I am looking at the 
Senator from New Hampshire. The development started with a mill on a 
stream for water power. Then they built mill cottages around that. 
Those mills are still there. Those cottages are generally occupied 
today by relatively low- or moderate-income people. The mill owner, I 
recall now, put his house on the top of the hill, not around the mill. 
So that is Rhode Island. That is Massachusetts. That is Connecticut. 
That is New Hampshire. When these waters flood, you perennially get 
some communities that see damage from surface water. This is the first 
time we saw this incredible groundwater as well.
  We are a community of rivers and mill villages. The Blackstone River 
is where the American Industrial Revolution began, the Pawtuxet River 
in Cranston, the Pawcatuck River, the Pocasset River in Johnston and 
Cranston--they all were above flood stage. The Pawtuxet River, in my 
hometown of Cranston, on March 15, crested at a record high of 15 feet. 
Remarkable. Neighborhoods along the banks flooded as homes and 
businesses were evacuated. I toured those neighborhoods later in the 
week and saw the damage. Again, along with Senator Whitehouse, I worked 
to support a major disaster declaration which was promptly granted. The 
people of Rhode Island appreciate President Obama very quickly 
supporting a major disaster declaration, not only for individuals but 
also for public entities, the cities and towns. This is something he 
did with great speed and great efficiency. I thank him personally.
  Actually, the initial flooding was around March 12 or 13. Then we got 
the second deluge. It was a two-stage event. As the rains were falling, 
one woman profiled on local television looked in exhaustion at the new 
furnace she just installed. In anticipation of the second flood, there 
was an attempt to move vehicles, furnaces, et cetera around, to shore 
up or raise equipment on factory floors. But the rapidity and extent of 
the rain was such that the flood was there before many people could 
react.
  Let me try and give a sense of the damage. This horizontal axis runs 
south-north under the overpass. This is Route 95, the principal 
interstate running along the east coast. It was shut down for two days 
because of flooding. The road was completely inundated with water, 
completely covered. Then, in the next picture, this is the city of 
Warwick's wastewater plant, totally engulfed in water. In addition to 
that, the city of Warwick is also home to our airport. So for 2 days, 
when you got off a plane, you saw a sign that asked you to respectfully 
use restrooms someplace else or the Porta-John because the airport 
could not use their toilets. The whole city asked their citizens to 
suspend flushing for 2 days. So this impact is something we have never 
witnessed before. The next photograph is the Warwick Mall, one of the 
major shopping centers in the State of Rhode Island. It is totally 
engulfed in water and the inside is flooded. These are stores and 
retail establishments. They are still trying to reopen it. This 
facility employs about 1,000 people. They are still out of work. When 
you a have 12.7-unemployment rate and 1,000 people can't work because 
they have been flooded, that is adding excruciating pain to something 
that is already difficult. I must commend the owner of the mall, Aram 
Garabedian. Aram is indefatigable. Nothing is going to defeat him. 
Immediately, he was in here cleaning up. It is on the road to recovery 
and return, but this has been a blow economically to the State. As I 
said, in Rhode Island, because of our small size and community, there 
are five or six principal malls. Essentially, 20 percent of our mall 
sector is out of business.
  The next photograph is typical of the property damage. This is in my 
hometown of Cranston. Notice the sign: ``Give this land back to the 
river.''
  The river decided for a moment to reclaim it. This is the result of 
the surface flooding and the subsurface water coming up. This looks 
like the entire inside of the home has been destroyed and removed. Here 
is a hot water heater, a toilet. Although the house is standing, what 
is inside is basically a shell. This is a homeowner who now has to 
rebuild their house, essentially, and replace water heaters, toilets. 
One of the issues we have is that in some of these areas, because of 
the subsurface flooding, they are not a flood zone. Unless they have 
recently borrowed money on a mortgage, there is probably little 
requirement for them to have flood insurance. Typically, in these 
communities, the houses have been occupied for 20, 30, 40 years by one 
family. They have either paid off the mortgage or they don't require 
flood insurance. So many people, frankly, don't have flood insurance. 
Then, of course, there is going to be wrangling with the insurance 
companies because, in some cases, where it was just subsurface water, 
that does not fit their definition of a flood. So depending on your 
policy, or if you have coverage, there are thousands of homes in Rhode 
Island that are significantly damaged. The owner has no resources to 
rebuild unless he gets some assistance. Again, FEMA has been very good 
for temporary assistance, but we have to look more long term.
  Finally, this is Hopkinton, RI, which is part of our rural area in 
the west. This photo shows the scope of the flooding there. This 
structure is totally surrounded by water. I was in other parts of this 
area, in another community, Charlestown. There was a bridge that was 
closed. As you walked across the bridge on the other side, because of 
the water moving under the ground, it looked as if someone had dropped 
a 500-pound bomb. It was a huge crater. Now the town has to rebuild the 
bridge. Of course, they don't have the money to do so.
  All this is indicative of the situation in Rhode Island. A further 
point. This photograph was taken a week after the flooding. Notice it 
is sunny. This is a week after the flooding. These owners couldn't even 
get to their building after a week. This could have been worse in this 
particular locale because farther upstream there is a dam, the Alton 
dam. It was overtopped and the waters were going over it. There was so 
much concern that it was in danger of

[[Page 6141]]

collapsing that there was an emergency evacuation order for the town of 
Westerly, which is a sizable community to the south on the coast. They 
were afraid the dam would give and a major metropolitan area, in Rhode 
Island terms, would be engulfed with water. Luckily the dam held, and 
the damage was significant but restricted to flooding along the 
Pawcatuck.
  Within the context of jobs, too, several of our facilities and 
factories were knocked out. Bradford Printing and Finishing has already 
let go of its employees. They were underwater. They are still trying to 
literally get back to work. It has been closed for cleanup. Again, 
workers are on the street, not because they don't have demand for their 
product. It is because they can't get to the machines where they are 
flooded. Another company in northern Rhode Island, along the Blackstone 
River, Hope Global, an extraordinary CEO Cheryl Merchant, they were 
flooded in 20005. I was there. I had to take a boat into their factory. 
This time, in anticipation, they literally lifted the equipment. This 
is a major producer of OEM for the auto industry, webbing and belts, 
seatbelts, et cetera. They pushed up all that heavy equipment. The 
water came in, but it didn't reach the equipment. They are back in 
production, but the preparations and the cleanup are about $1 million. 
It is hard for the manager of the plant to explain to the board of 
directors why they are going to spend $1 million every 5 years just to 
keep the equipment dry.
  We have to do something in terms of mitigation. Even in the best 
times, FEMA would have been necessary. But we are in a very difficult 
situation. The State is, as we speak, trying to fill a $220 million 
shortfall in this year's budget. Again, this is a State where $220 
million is a significant part of the budget. It is not a rounding 
error. They are already anticipating a $400 million shortfall next year 
in the 2011 budget. The bond rating has been lowered once in the last 
several weeks. It may be lowered again, if this economic distress and 
this flood damage can't be, in some way, mitigated and supported in 
terms of cleanup or reconstruction.
  Frankly, my constituents know--and we all have seen similar scenes of 
flooding from the Midwest, from the Southwest, from the Central part of 
America--every time, at least in my recollection, this Senate has stood 
and provided support for those communities.
  I have supported emergency expenditures for flooding in communities 
elsewhere in the country, except really up in Rhode Island because we 
have never had an experience before of this nature, of this size, of 
this scope. They, frankly, do not begrudge the aid because, as I sense 
and as my colleagues and constituents sense, someday we might be in 
that position where we are going to have to ask for it. Well, we are in 
that position right now. So for everyone who has been here--and it is a 
significant number--and asked on behalf of their constituents for help 
because of a devastating flood, I am joining those ranks. We will have 
an opportunity, I hope, in the appropriations process through the 
supplementals to provide additional assistance to the State of Rhode 
Island, for my constituents to deal with this situation, both the 
economic distress and the physical damage from this flooding.
  So, Madam President, I again thank you for the opportunity to talk 
about what happened, and I will be back again because, as we have 
responded to the needs of other parts of the country, we ask that we be 
given the same treatment.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
order for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Shaheen). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that I be 
permitted to speak as in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                   Reuters Investigation of WellPoint

  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Madam President, earlier today my staff brought to my 
attention an article that had just come out on Reuters. I read it and 
felt an outrage and dismay and decided I was going to come to the floor 
and speak about it.
  Today, an investigative story published by Reuters details how 
WellPoint, a medical insurance company--as a matter of fact, the 
Nation's largest health insurance company, with 33.7 million 
policyholders--used a special computer program to systematically 
identify women with breast cancer and target their health policies for 
termination--in other words, an effort to specifically target women 
with breast cancer and then drop their health insurance. I would like 
to ask every American to read this jaw-dropping story. Instead of 
providing the health care for which these seriously ill women have 
paid, WellPoint subjected these paying customers to investigations that 
ended with WellPoint's administrative bureaucrats canceling their 
insurance policies at their time of greatest need.
  Under attack by both cancer and WellPoint, these women were left 
ailing, disabled, and broke. Let me give you a few examples.
  Yenny Hsu, a woman from Los Angeles, was kicked off of her insurance 
policy after a breast cancer diagnosis because WellPoint said she 
failed to disclose that she had been exposed to hepatitis B as a child. 
Now, that has nothing to do with breast cancer, but it did not stop 
WellPoint from terminating her coverage.
  In Texas, a woman named Robin Beaton was forced to delay lifesaving 
surgery because WellPoint decided to investigate whether she had failed 
to disclose a serious illness. The serious illness in question was a 
case of acne. WellPoint delayed her surgery for 5 months, causing the 
size of the cancerous mass in her breast to triple. By the time they 
finally dropped their investigation, she needed a radical double 
mastectomy.
  Another loyal, paying WellPoint customer who faced this situation was 
Patricia Relling of Louisville, KY. Ms. Relling was an interior 
designer and art gallery owner who never missed a payment. But that did 
not stop WellPoint from canceling her insurance in the middle of her 
fight with breast cancer. WellPoint abandoned her at her weakest 
moment, forcing her to pay enormous medical bills on her own. This 
woman, who was once a highly successful business owner, is now 
subsisting on Social Security and food stamps.
  Meanwhile, WellPoint made a profit of $128 million by stripping 
seriously ill Americans of their insurance coverage in this manner, 
according to the House Energy and Commerce Committee. This is likely a 
low estimate because WellPoint refuses to provide a total number for 
rescissions across the company's subsidiaries. WellPoint earned a $4.7 
billion profit in 2009--a $4.7 billion profit in 1 year. Angela Braly, 
the CEO of WellPoint, received $13.1 million in total compensation in 
2009. This was a 51-percent increase in her salary over the prior year.
  WellPoint is not alone in doing this to people, but they are an 
egregious offender. According to the House Energy and Commerce 
Committee:

       WellPoint and two of the nation's other largest insurance 
     companies--UnitedHealth Group Inc and Assurant Health, part 
     of Assurant Inc--made at least $300 million by improperly 
     rescinding more than 19,000 policyholders over one five-year 
     period.

  According to Health Care for America Now, these large companies--the 
big, for-profit American medical insurance companies--have seen their 
profits jump 428 percent from 2000 to 2007. All during this period, 
they have doubled premium costs. So they have made huge profits in 7 
years, and they doubled premium costs.
  Time and time again, our for-profit insurance corporations have 
demonstrated that their hunger for profit trumps any moral obligation 
to their customers. This latest story is just the latest example of the 
kind of outrageous behavior we have come to expect from certain medical 
health insurance companies.

[[Page 6142]]

  The health insurance reform law passed by Congress and signed by 
President Obama will end the practice of unfair rescission and 
discrimination because of preexisting conditions. But we must clearly 
be vigilant in order to ensure that the law has teeth and is heavily 
enforced. We cannot turn our backs for 1 minute because left to their 
own devices, I truly believe these companies will look for ways to 
throw paying customers to the sharks for the sake of profit. These are 
strong words, and I am not known for these strong words. But the more I 
look into the large, for-profit medical insurance industry of the 
United States, the more I am embarrassed by it.
  A situation unfolding in my own State now is further proof of this. 
On May 1--that is 9 days from now; it is 1 week from Saturday--more 
than 800,000 Californians who hold insurance policies issued by 
WellPoint's Anthem Blue Cross subsidiary will face rate hikes of up to 
39 percent.
  I have received deeply personal letters from literally hundreds, if 
not thousands, of Californians whose lives are going to be devastated 
by these rate increases. We have 12.7 percent unemployment. We have 
over 2.3 million people unemployed. We are very high in house 
foreclosures, people can't find jobs, and at the same time the 
insurance premiums are being jacked up. This is terrible because many 
of these people had a premium increase almost as large as the 39 
percent that is going to happen on May 1, last year, and then they know 
they face it again the next year.
  I cannot say that all of this is responsible for these premium 
increases, but in my State alone, 2 million people in the last 2 years 
have gone off of health insurance. That is 1 million people a year who 
find they can't afford health insurance. So they have gone off of it, 
more on Medicaid, and many have no coverage whatsoever. This is at a 
time when this same company is reaping billions of dollars of profit. 
So what do I conclude? There is no moral compass. There is no ethical 
conduct.
  These are families with children. They are students or the elderly. 
One woman had been a client of Anthem for 30 years. She had never been 
sick, and she got sick. Cancer survivors, small business owners, they 
are about to be crushed.
  WellPoint will tell us that these premium rate hikes cannot be 
avoided. They will tell us that others are to blame: hospital charges, 
prescription drug prices, the rising cost of medical care. They blame 
the government. They blame the economy. But the fact is, they are 
making money, and billions of dollars of money.
  If there was any doubt about whether corporate greed has anything to 
do with WellPoint's plan to jack up rates on customers, I think today's 
story by Reuters answers the question definitively.
  In order to prevent these kinds of unfair premium rate hikes on 
Americans, I have introduced a bill that would establish a health 
insurance rate authority. It would give the Secretary of Health the 
mandate to see that rates are reasonable. Two days ago, the HELP 
Committee held a hearing on this bill. The chairman of the committee, 
Senator Harkin, made some very strong statements in favor of it, as did 
other Democrats. The Republicans who spoke, of course, opposed it 
because they are in a mode where they oppose virtually everything right 
now, but they opposed it.
  So here is what my bill would do. It would give the Secretary of 
Health the authority to block premiums or other rate increases that are 
unreasonable. In many States, insurance commissioners, as the Presiding 
Officer knows, already have this authority. They would not be affected. 
Commissioners have the authority in some States--in some insurance 
markets they have it--and in others they do not. In about 20 States, 
including my own, California, companies are not required to receive 
approval for rate increases before they take effect. So my legislation 
would create a Federal fallback, a fail-safe, allowing the Secretary to 
conduct reviews of potentially unreasonable rates in States where the 
insurance commissioner does not already have the authority or the 
capability to do so. The Secretary would review potentially 
unreasonable premium increases and take corrective action. This could 
include blocking an increase or providing rebates to consumers.
  Under this proposal, the Secretary would work with the National 
Association of Insurance Commissioners to implement this rate review 
process and identify States that have the authority and capability to 
review rates now. States doing this work obviously should continue. 
This legislation would not interrupt or effect them. However, consumers 
in States such as California and Illinois and others--about 20 some-odd 
States--would get protection from unfair rate hikes.
  The proposal would create a rate authority, a seven-member advisory 
board to assist the Secretary. A wide range of interests would be 
represented: consumers, the insurance industry, medical practitioners, 
and other experts.
  I think the proposal strikes the right balance. As the Presiding 
Officer knows, we have worked with the administration in drafting it. 
We worked with the Finance Committee. We worked with the Secretary of 
Health. We tried to get it into the Finance Committee's health reform 
bill. We were not able to do so. The President took this bill and put 
it in the reconciliation bill. Unfortunately, the Parliamentarian found 
that its policy implications overcame its budgetary savings, and 
therefore a point of order would rest against it. So it was dropped at 
that time. So we are trying again. It is necessary.
  Nine days from now, 800,000 Californians will get up to a 39-percent 
increase in their premium rate. It is greed, pure and simple.
  So the legislation I have introduced provides Federal protection for 
consumers who are currently at the mercy of these large, for-profit 
medical insurance companies whose top priority is their bottom line. 
The bottom line for us is we have a duty to protect the American people 
from this kind of greed and this kind of lack of any moral compass.
  If these companies were having a hard time, I would say: Look, it 
can't be helped. But they are not. They have enjoyed something no other 
American business has, and that is an antitrust exemption. Only Major 
League Baseball has an antitrust exemption. So they are able to go all 
over the country and merge and acquire insurance companies in order to 
control market share. Once they control market share, they then begin 
to boost rates. Therefore, over the past 7 years of doing this, they 
have developed a 428-percent increase in their bottom line, which is 
their profits.
  If a CEO thinks it is OK to deprive women of their health coverage 
when they become seriously ill with breast cancer, we can't trust them 
to do the right thing, period. This ought to be convincing to every 
Member of this body, whether it is this side of the aisle or the other 
side of the aisle, that we need to move to see that there is a 
reasonable, prudent system where people don't have to endure when they 
have breast cancer and they go in, that they are going to lose their 
medical insurance. This Reuters story points it out chapter and verse 
today, and I have indicated several stories.
  So, in my view, it is time for Congress to step in and fix this rate 
hike loophole in the health insurance reform law. We have to put 
patients before profits. We have to protect the American people from 
this kind of a lack of moral compass and candidly unchecked greed. I 
hate to say that, but that is the way I see it.
  I will likely attempt to put this as an amendment to the regulatory 
reform bill. As I say, the matter has had a committee hearing, and in 
view of the fact that 800,000 people face these rate increases a week 
from Saturday, I think we need to take some action.
  I would implore Anthem to understand and to not raise these rates. 
They have postponed this rate increase once before; they certainly can 
do it again.
  I thank the Chair. I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.

[[Page 6143]]


  Mr. CORKER. Madam President, I rise today to address the financial 
regulation proposal that is before us right now. I wish to talk about 
some of the conversations that are taking place about our status. No. 
1, I think everybody in this body knows that people on both sides of 
the aisle would like for us to come to an agreement that makes our 
country's financial system stronger, protects consumers, and tries to 
insure us against the kinds of things we have all witnessed over the 
last couple of years. I think on both sides of the aisle there is 
tremendous desire to see that happen.
  There has also been some discussions, though, about the process 
leading up to this. I know the Senator from Nevada has talked a little 
bit about the fact, for instance, that they negotiated with Senator 
Corker for 30 days. This bill is 1,400 pages long, and I think by all 
accounts most people felt as though we were almost completed--the 
analogy that is being used is, we were on the 5-yard line and the 
lights went out. Somehow or another, taking 30 days to try to discuss a 
1,400-page bill and get it right has been discussed as taking a long 
time. I don't consider that a long time at all.
  As a matter of fact, I think it is remarkable the kind of progress we 
have made when we actually sat down as two parties trying to reach a 
compromise on something that is as important to the American people. So 
I wish to say that a lot of us on this side of the aisle have dealt in 
good faith, have actually gone out on a limb to deal in good faith--as 
a matter of fact, have broken protocol, in some cases, to try to deal 
in good faith.
  When statements are made that if you try to negotiate and you get to 
the 5-yard line but for some reason the White House and people on the 
other side of the aisle decide to go on because they are losing some 
Democrats--which, by the way, I would assume in a bipartisan 
negotiation you lose some Republicans, you lose some Democrats, because 
you have reached a middle-of-the-road piece of legislation. So to 
categorize that as making that much progress and then: Well, we are 
losing a few Democrats so we have to stop and go our own way--which has 
been publicly stated by my friends on the other side of the aisle as to 
what happened--to talk about that as if that is a problem on our side 
of the aisle creates a little bad faith, just to be candid. I mean, for 
the next person who comes along and tries to work something out with my 
friends on the other side of the aisle and this happens, I think it is 
going to discourage that from happening in the future. So I hope we 
will tone down those kinds of things.
  Then they talked about the fact that we went through the committee 
with this bill. At the time it was only a 1,336-page bill. It has 
expanded since that time. But we voted this bill out of committee in 21 
minutes with no amendments. This was not a real vote. The understanding 
we all had was that the makeup of the Banking Committee was such that 
it would be difficult to get to a bipartisan agreement there and that 
we might harden ourselves against each other by offering amendments. I 
filed 60 amendments myself, none of which were messaging amendments. 
They were all technical amendments, and others, to try to fix this 
bill. But for some reason, the rules changed and we weren't going to be 
able to do that in committee, and we didn't want to harden ourselves 
against each other, and we were going to fix it before it came to the 
Senate floor.
  Now we file a motion to proceed to the bill without it being fixed 
before it comes to the floor. It just seems as though there is this 
little shell game where we keep moving the goalpost to such a point 
where, again, we are going to end up with a situation where a bill 
comes to the floor, but there has been no bipartisan consensus.
  Now, I will say this: I do think Chairman Dodd has tried to do some 
bipartisan things, and I know I personally have had an effect on this 
bill. I thank him for that. I thank Senator Warner for the work we have 
been able to do together, and Senator Reed and Senator Gregg and 
others. But the fact is, we haven't reached a bipartisan agreement. So 
I hope some of the statements that are being made about where we are 
and how we got here and the revisionist history that is being created 
to sort of make one side of the aisle look worse than the other side of 
the aisle will cease. It doesn't do any good.
  The fact is, there are people on both sides of the aisle who want to 
see financial regulation take place. This whole notion that if you are 
against this bill as written, you are for Wall Street, and if you are 
for this bill as written, you are against Wall Street, is an 
unbelievably silly argument. The fact is, I think everybody in this 
country knows when major regulation takes place, the big guys always do 
best. They have the resources to deal with compliance and all of those 
kinds of things. As a matter of fact, I doubt there are many people on 
either side of the aisle who are hearing much from Wall Street right 
now. Who they are hearing from is their community bankers who are 
concerned about a consumer protection agency that has no bounds and has 
no veto.
  All of a sudden, it is used potentially as a social justice mechanism 
in this country. They are concerned about that. They are probably 
hearing from manufacturers who actually make things and buy hedges or 
derivatives to make sure their material prices can be hedged again down 
the road so they don't lose money fulfilling a contract.
  When we talk about that either you are for this bill and against Wall 
Street or vice versa, that is just a low-level argument. It has nothing 
to do with the facts. The fact, from where I sit, is we have a lot of 
people in this body who want a good bill. It seems to me the best way 
to get to a good bill is to at least get the template of the bill 
agreed to in advance, to get the bill agreed to as it relates to 
orderly liquidation.
  I think we all want to make sure that if a large organization or any 
organization fails, it fails, but certainly with these highly complex 
bank holding companies, we want to see that happen. Make sure we deal 
with revenues in such a way that most of the trades go through a 
clearinghouse, so at the end of the day, people who are making money 
bad, make money good so we don't have an AIG-type situation again. Yet 
we have an appropriate end-user exclusion for people using these 
derivatives to actually make their businesses safer. We want to make 
sure we have appropriate consumer protection. We want to make sure that 
is done in balance; that a consumer protection agency doesn't undermine 
the safety and soundness piece; that those people are making sure that 
our banks and financial institutions are sound; that people who do 
business with them know they are going to be sound; and that we don't 
have a consumer protection agency undermining that by trying to, again, 
use financial mechanisms as a way of creating social justice in this 
country.
  Those are three big titles. It seems to me, if we can get agreement 
there, before the bill comes to the floor, then we can then do all 
kinds of amendments on the floor. I think there are a lot of good ideas 
that my friends on the other side have. I think there are a lot of good 
ideas that would come from this side of the aisle. It seems to me that 
the best way to have a great debate is to start with a template that is 
bipartisan and then let people change it in ways they see fit. We can 
vote on those. To me, that is the best way to go.
  I hope that instead of the tremendous interference that is taking 
place at the White House--I have never seen such involvement in what 
appears to be the actual drafting of legislation, sending it straight 
to a committee, and it being voted out. I have never seen such 
involvement. I hope we can tone that down, that we can tone our 
rhetoric down as far as trying to blame the other side for how we ended 
up in this position, when there are a lot of people on both sides who 
have exercised good faith in trying to get here. It just pushes people 
apart when these realignment of history discussions take place, when 
that is not what has happened.
  Let's give Chairman Dodd and Ranking Member Shelby some time to work 
through these issues. That is what

[[Page 6144]]

needs to happen. They and their staffs need to finish working through 
these issues, with input from other Members, and then let's have a 
great debate. I know we have a weekend coming up and the floor will 
shut down in the next 24 hours or so. I hope the staffs and these two 
Members will continue to work through the weekend and try to get this 
bill right. I hope we will quit throwing accusations back and forth and 
that we will cool down the rhetoric, and I hope we have an opportunity 
to begin again with a bipartisan template that we can amend and then 
create some great legislation for this country.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Dakota is recognized.
  Mr. DORGAN. Madam President, are we in morning business?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. We are not. We are on the motion to proceed to 
S. 3217.
  Mr. DORGAN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in 
morning business for as much time as I may need.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                            The START Treaty

  Mr. DORGAN. Madam President, I have come to speak about the New START 
Treaty--Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty--with the Russians. I wish to 
talk about that in some detail.
  A week ago, I and other colleagues were in Russia at a site near 
Moscow looking at a facility that we in the United States are funding 
to try to make this a safer world, to safeguard nuclear materials and 
nuclear warheads in the Soviet Union. I wish to talk a bit about this 
program as it relates to this new START Treaty.
  Some of my colleagues have expressed concern and are determined that 
they are not necessarily supportive of the START arms reduction treaty 
unless other things are done. I wish to talk about that just a bit.
  First, I will describe the unbelievable succession of something we 
have been doing called the Nunn-Lugar program, the Nunn-Lugar 
Cooperative Threat Reduction Program. We talk about what doesn't work 
and what fails, but we don't talk so much about what does work. I will 
do that for a moment.
  I ask unanimous consent to show three things I have had in my desk 
drawer.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. DORGAN. This is a wing strut from a backfire bomber, a Soviet 
backfire bomber. This is a bomber that would have carried nuclear 
weapons that would threaten this country as a potential adversary. This 
is from this airplane. As you can see, this airplane, this backfire 
bomber, doesn't exist anymore. We didn't shoot it down. I have the wing 
strut because we sawed it up as part of an arms control and reduction 
treaty reducing delivery vehicles. This bomber don't exist and carry 
nuclear weapons because the Nunn-Lugar program helped dismantle that 
bomber under agreements we have had with the Soviet Union and now with 
Russia.
  This photo is of a typhoon-class ballistic missile submarine the 
Soviets had. It carried missile launch tubes. This is a missile tube 
from that submarine. You will see that these tubes don't exist in the 
submarine anymore. They are now scrap metal. This is copper wire that 
comes from that Soviet submarine that used to prowl the seas with 
nuclear weapons threatening our country. This ground-up copper wire 
from that submarine was not because we sank the submarine but because 
we have a program by which we reduced the delivery vehicles for nuclear 
weapons. We and the Soviets--now the Russians--have agreed to a 
systematic reduction of weapons and delivery vehicles.
  This photo is of a missile silo in the Ukraine. This is an SS-18 
missile silo. It was blown up as part of the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative 
Threat Reduction Program. This is what is left of the scrap metal.
  I have a hinge here from this particular site in the Ukraine that 
housed a missile that had a nuclear warhead aimed at our country. 
Instead of a missile being on the ground in the Ukraine, there is now a 
field of sunflowers. A field of sunflowers is now planted where a 
missile that carried a nuclear warhead once existed.
  This is unbelievable success, in my judgment, and something we ought 
to celebrate. With the help of the Nunn-Lugar program Ukraine, 
Kazakhstan, and Belarus are now nuclear weapons-free. Albania is 
chemical weapons-free; 7,500 deactivated nuclear warheads; 32 ballistic 
missile submarines gone; 1,419 long-range nuclear missiles gone; 906 
nuclear air-to-service missiles gone; 155 nuclear bombers gone. We 
didn't shoot them down. We didn't destroy them in air-to-air combat or 
undersea warfare. We paid some money in a program called Nunn-Lugar 
with the Soviets and Russians to saw the wings off bombers and grind up 
the metal in submarines and take out missile silos in the Ukraine with 
missiles aimed at our country. Therefore, it is a safer world. The 
question is, How much safer and what more do we need to do?
  I have previously read a portion of something into the Congressional 
Record. I will do it again ever so briefly.
  On October 11, 2001--not many Americans know this--1 month after the 
9/11 attack, George Tenet, Director of the CIA, informed the President 
that a CIA agent, code-named ``Dragonfire,'' had reported that al-Qaida 
terrorists possessed a 10-kiloton nuclear bomb, evidently stolen from 
the Russian arsenal. According to Dragonfire, the CIA agent, this 
nuclear weapon was now on American soil in New York City. That was 1 
month after 9/11. The CIA had no independent confirmation of this 
report, but neither did it have any basis on which to dismiss it. Did 
Russia's arsenal include a large number of 10-kiloton weapons? Yes. 
Could the Russian Government account for all the nuclear weapons the 
Soviets built during the Cold War? No. Could al-Qaida have acquired one 
of those weapons? It could have. If a terrorist had acquired it, could 
they have detonated it? Perhaps. Smuggled it into an American city? 
Likely.
  So in the hours that followed this report on October 11, 2001, 1 
month after 9/11, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice analyzed what 
strategists then called the ``problem from hell.'' Unlike the Cold War, 
when the United States and the Soviet Union knew that an attack against 
the other would elicit a retaliatory strike in greater measure and 
therefore perhaps destroy both countries, the al-Qaida terrorist 
organization had no return address and had no such fear of reprisal. 
Even if the President were prepared to negotiate, al-Qaida had no phone 
number to call.
  This comes from a book that was published by Graham Allison, a former 
Clinton administration official. I first learned about the incident 
from a piece in Time magazine, on March 11, 2002. The book that 
describes the detail of it is pretty harrowing. It is a pretty 
frightening prospect. I will not read more of it. I have read a fair 
amount of it.
  After some while, it was determined that this was not a credible 
intelligence piece of information. But for a month or so, there was 
great concern about the prospect of a terrorist group having stolen a 
nuclear weapon, smuggled it into an American city, and being able to 
detonate it. Then we were not talking about 9/11; we were talking about 
a catastrophe in which hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people 
would be killed and life on Earth would never be the same. When and if 
ever a nuclear weapon is detonated in the middle of a major city on 
this planet, life will change as we know it.
  That brings me to this question of nuclear reduction treaties and the 
work that has gone on. We have about 25,000 nuclear warheads on this 
planet. I have just described the apoplectic seizure that existed in 
October of 2001 because one CIA agent suggested he had credible 
evidence or a rumor that one terrorist group had stolen one small 10-
kiloton nuclear weapon. Think of the angst that caused for about a 
month, which most Americans don't know about. But that was one weapon. 
There are 25,000 on this Earth--25,000 nuclear weapons. Russia probably 
has around 15,000.

[[Page 6145]]

  This is not classified, by the way. This is from a recent estimate by 
the Union of Concerned Scientists. Most people say it is accurate. The 
United States has 9,400. China has 240. France has 300. Britain has 
200.
  The loss of one to a terrorist group--the detonation of that nuclear 
warhead in a major city would change life as we know it on planet 
Earth. So the question is, What do we do about that? We struggle to try 
to accomplish two goals--one, to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons 
to others who don't now have it, to prevent terrorists from ever 
acquiring it, and working very hard to accomplish both even while we 
again try a systematic reduction of nuclear weapons from the 25,000 
level and particularly among those that have the most nuclear weapons. 
We understand it is very difficult to reach these agreements, and when 
reached, it is very difficult to get them agreed to, get the support by 
what is necessary in the Senate.
  About 95 percent of the nuclear weapons are owned by the United 
States of America and by Russia. There are a lot of groups in this 
world that are very interested in acquiring one nuclear weapon with 
which to terrorize this planet.
  We are now operating under the Strategic Offensive Reductions Treaty, 
known as the Moscow Treaty. It requires the United States and Russia to 
have no more than 2,200 deployed nuclear weapons--there are many more 
than that; I am talking about deployed in the field--by 2012.
  The Strategic Offensive Reduction Treaty we are now operating under 
does not restrict any nuclear delivery vehicles at all--airplanes, 
missiles, and so on--and it does not have any verification measures and 
it expires in 2012.
  A few weeks ago in Prague, the Czech Republic, President Obama and 
Russian President Medvedev signed a new strategic arms control treaty. 
It is called START. I compliment the administration for successfully 
completing this treaty. I was part of a group in the Senate that 
continued to meet with and review with the negotiators the progress of 
their work. Their work was long and difficult, but they reached an 
agreement with the Russians.
  It limits each side to 1,550 deployed strategic nuclear warheads, 
which is 30 percent lower than the Moscow Treaty under which we are now 
operating.
  It limits each side to 800 deployed and nondeployed ICBM launchers, 
SLBM launchers, and heavy bombers--these are all delivery vehicles--
equipped for nuclear armaments. That is one-half of what the START 
treaty allowed.
  It sets a separate limit of 700 deployed ICBMs and SLBMs and deployed 
heavy bombers that are equipped for nuclear weapons.
  The treaty, in addition, has a verification regime, which is very 
important. You can have a treaty with someone, but if you cannot verify 
and inspect, then you have a problem. This treaty with the Russians has 
onsite inspections and exhibitions, telemetry exchanges, data exchanges 
and notifications, and provisions to facilitate the use of a national 
technical means for treaty monitoring.
  This, in my judgment, is a good treaty that will strengthen this 
country. It will reduce by 30 percent the number of strategic nuclear 
warheads that Russia could possess and target at the United States. It 
allows our country to determine our own force structure and gives us 
the flexibility to deploy and maintain our strategic nuclear forces in 
a way that best serves our own national security interests.
  The new Nuclear Posture Review, as my colleagues know, says the 
United States will maintain the nuclear triad of land-based missiles, 
ballistic missile submarines, as well as bombers. The Obama 
administration has said as long as nuclear weapons exist, this country 
will maintain a safe, secure, and effective arsenal to deter any 
adversary and to protect our allies.
  This new START treaty gives us an important window into Russia's 
strategic arsenal and to ensure that Russia will not be able to 
surprise us and try to change that balance.
  This treaty contains no limits on our ability to continue developing 
and fielding missile defenses. Our country is doing some of that. 
Frankly, I have some questions about the cost and the effectiveness of 
some of what we are doing. Nonetheless, there is no limitation on that 
in this treaty.
  As was done in the case of START, Russia has made a unilateral 
statement regarding missile defenses. Its statement is not legally 
binding and does not constrain us in any of our U.S. missile defense 
programs.
  In my judgment, this treaty is very important. It is a very important 
first step--only a first step--because much more needs to be done. But 
it is important in terms of enhancing our security and world security. 
This will bolster, in my judgment, the Nonproliferation Treaty. It 
demonstrates that the United States and Russia are living up to their 
part of the deal under the NPT to begin reducing arms. I think it will 
strengthen Washington's hand in a tighter nuclear nonproliferation 
regime, especially at the May NPT conference.
  Some Senators have said, as would be the case, I suppose, with any 
treaty: We are concerned about this because we think it weakens 
America's hand; we think it cuts our nuclear arsenal too deeply. I 
think they are wrong on that point. They are wrong. We have plenty of 
nuclear weapons. Not enough nuclear weapons is not among our problems; 
we have plenty. So do the Russians. We can blow up this planet 150 
times and more. We have plenty of nuclear weapons. The question is, How 
do we and the Russians and others begin to reduce the number of nuclear 
weapons, and, most important, how do we stop the spread of nuclear 
weapons?
  Let me put up a chart that shows what the Chairman of the Joint 
Chiefs of Staff said last month:

       I, the Vice Chairman, and the Joint Chiefs, as well as our 
     combatant commanders around the world, stand solidly behind 
     this new treaty, having had the opportunity to provide our 
     counsel, to make our recommendations, and to help shape the 
     final agreements.

  This is the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs. He says he and the Joint 
Chiefs believe this represents our country's best national security 
interest.
  Here is what some others are saying. Douglas Feith, not particularly 
unexpected. I can pretty much guess what he will say on anything 
dealing with security if I saw his name tag, I guess. Doug Feith, a 
former Defense official under the previous administration, says:

       Since the administration is so eager for [the treaty], the 
     main interests of conservatives--

  Meaning him and his friends, neo-cons among other things--

     will relate to modernization. Republicans are interested in 
     the U.S. nuclear posture, the political leverage they have 
     will be the treaty . . . One of the hot issues is going to be 
     the replacement warhead . . .

  What does he mean? We are going to use this treaty as leverage to 
force the government to develop a new nuclear warhead program called 
the RRW, the Reliable Replacement Warhead.
  I am chairman of the subcommittee that funds that program. We stopped 
funding that warhead. That warhead was an outgrowth of the Congress 
deciding we are not going to fund the provision before it for another 
nuclear warhead. We remember the provision: Now we have to build earth-
penetrating, bunker-buster nuclear weapons. That was the thing about 5 
years ago.
  The Congress said: We are not going to build earth-penetrating, 
bunker-buster nuclear weapons. There is no end to the menu of nuclear 
weapons some people want. We are not going to do that. That morphed 
into Reliable Replacement Warhead, RRW, that was to begin replacing our 
existing stock of warheads in a big program with the Navy, Air Force, 
and so on. We stopped that as well. We did not stop it because we did 
not have the money or anything like that. We stopped it because it is 
not necessary.
  We have a process by which we certify that the current nuclear 
stockpile works, that it is effective. We have a process by which we do 
that. We have a lot of interest by other groups that

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have weighed in on the science of this, saying our existing stock of 
nuclear weapons will last much longer than some had suggested without 
spending hundreds of billions of dollars for replacement. Yet some will 
never be satisfied.
  Here are statements by some Senators who also will want to use the 
ratification of this START treaty as leverage. One Senator said:

       Well, I can tell you this, that I think the Senate will 
     find it very hard to support this treaty if there is not a 
     robust modernization plan.

  That is the need to design and build new nuclear weapons.
  Another one said:

       The success of your administration in ensuring the 
     modernization plan is fully funded in the authorization and 
     appropriations process could have a significant impact on the 
     Senate as it considers the START follow-on treaty.

  And another one:

       My vote on the START treaty will thus depend in large 
     measure on whether I am convinced the administration has put 
     forward an appropriate and adequately funded plan to sustain 
     and modernize the smaller nuclear stockpile it envisions.

  As chairman of the Appropriations Energy and Water Development 
Subcommittee, I can tell my colleagues that the proposed budget for 
nuclear weapons, which is in my subcommittee, for fiscal year 2011 from 
this administration is more than enough to maintain the safety and 
reliability of our nuclear weapons; sufficient so that any Chairman of 
the Joint Chiefs can say with confidence and authority whose 
requirement it is to certify each year, that we have a nuclear arsenal 
that can be maintained as reliable and safe for the long-term future.
  The National Nuclear Security Agency, the agency that oversees 
nuclear weapons, would see a 13-percent or $1.3 billion increase under 
this President's proposal. There are some who have argued this budget 
increase and planned future increases may not be sufficient to maintain 
the current stockpile. But that is just not the case. If we look at the 
budget request, the administration's budget request includes $7 billion 
for nuclear weapons activities. That is an increase of $624 million in 
this coming year. It invests significant money in what is called life 
extension programs. The nuclear weapons in our arsenal are not just the 
old nuclear weapons. We spend money all the time on life extension 
programs to make sure they are reliable.
  I can go on and talk about the budget. The fact is, this President 
has sent us a budget that does what he thinks is necessary for the life 
extension programs and the additional funding. At a time when we have 
significant financial problems, he is proposing additional funding in 
this area.
  This is a quote from Linton Brooks, who was the NNSA Administrator 
from 2003 to 2007 under George W. Bush, in February of this year:

       START, as I now understand it, is a good idea on its own 
     merits, but I think for those who think it's only a good idea 
     if you only have a strong weapons program, I think this 
     budget ought to take care of that.
       Coupled with the out-year projections, it takes care of the 
     concerns about the complex and it does very good things about 
     the stockpile and it should keep the labs healthy. . . .

  That is what he said. That is important to understand when my 
colleagues come to the floor of the Senate and say: I don't know that I 
can support arms reductions because we want to make sure we have more 
money spent on nuclear weapons to build a whole class of new nuclear 
weapons.
  Understand, there is nothing partisan here. The person who last 
headed this agency under George W. Bush said this budget takes care of 
that. It will give us the confidence we need.
  The September 2009 ``Report on the Lifetime Extension Program'' by 
the JASON Program Office, which is a very respected group of 
scientists, said this:

       JASON finds no evidence that accumulation of changes 
     incurred from aging and life extension programs have 
     increased risk to certification of today's deployed nuclear 
     warheads.

  Simple.

       Lifetimes of today's nuclear warheads could be extended for 
     decades, with no anticipated loss in confidence, by using 
     approaches similar to those employed in the life extension 
     programs to date.

  We have people around here who are just unbelievably anxious to get 
moving to begin building an entire new class of nuclear weapons. Yet we 
have evidence from the science of nuclear weapons that the existing 
stock of nuclear weapons can be maintained with life extension programs 
for decades. Why would we do that?
  I wish to make a concluding point. I wanted to talk about the START 
program because it is so important to the future of our relationship 
with Russia. But much more important than that, it is important for the 
world.
  I pulled out of my desk a wing strut from a backfire bomber and 
ground-up copper from a Russian submarine. I have taken a hinge from a 
missile silo in the Ukraine that had an SS-18 with a nuclear warhead 
aimed at the United States. I have all those in my desk just to remind 
me every day there is a way to reduce the number of nuclear weapons: 
reduce the delivery vehicles without having air-to-air combat, without 
firing intercontinental ballistic missiles, and without detonating 
nuclear warheads. It is the kind of program we have engaged in, the 
Nunn-Lugar program, the Global Threat Reduction Program, and it is also 
treaties such as the START treaty.
  If it is not our responsibility and if it does not fall on our 
shoulders to provide the world leadership to stop the spread of nuclear 
weapons, who else is going to do that? Who else? If you read the book 
by Graham Allison or understand the consequences of both 9/11 and also 
October 11 of the same year and the report by a CIA agent code named 
Dragonfire, that a terrorist group had stolen a 10-kiloton weapon and 
would detonate it in an American city, if that doesn't send chills down 
your spine for the future of this world, then there is something 
fundamentally wrong with your system.
  We have to understand if we do not back away from this difficult 
specter of a new world in which terrorists are trying very hard to 
acquire nuclear weapons--they don't have to acquire very much. They 
have to acquire the equivalent of perhaps a 2-liter bottle of highly 
enriched uranium. Think of one of those 2-liter Coke bottles at the gas 
station that sits on the counter the next time you go past, 2 liters of 
soft drink. Think of 2 liters of highly enriched nuclear material to 
produce one nuclear weapon.
  Some of my colleagues, at least some folks kind of made light of, and 
some commentators on the radio made fun of the very large group of 
foreign leaders that was called to this town a week ago to deal with 
this question of how we get our arms around and begin securing loose 
nuclear materials that exist around the world. That was nothing to 
laugh at. That was a historic opportunity by this administration, a big 
deal by this President to say: You know what. That leadership is our 
responsibility, and we are going to call leaders from all around the 
world to talk about these loose nuclear materials that can be acquired 
by a terrorist organization and made into a bomb, and we are going to 
secure these materials. We are spending money to do that. We are 
spending money in our budget to do that. But this President said: Let's 
work much harder. Let's rededicate ourselves, and not just us, let's 
all of us rededicate ourselves to gather and secure the loose nuclear 
material and prevent access to that material by a terrorist 
organization.
  Again, this responsibility falls to us. It is our responsibility to 
lead, to help stop the spread of nuclear weapons. It is also our 
responsibility, hopefully, to lead toward where the nonproliferation 
treaty insists we go; that is, to fewer and fewer and fewer nuclear 
weapons on this planet.
  I understand we will not and should not disarm unilaterally. I fully 
understand that. But I also understand that having 25,000 nuclear 
weapons stored in various locations on this planet is not healthy for 
the long-term prospect of life on Earth. So it is our responsibility. 
It is an important step, a step only in the direction because it is not 
the giant step. But an important first step is to ratify this START 
treaty.
  The Russians and the Americans worked very hard to construct a treaty

[[Page 6147]]

that I think has great merit and will provide for a safer world. 
Following the ratification of this treaty, then there is even more work 
to do, much more work to do. But this is the step along the way that is 
important for all of us to embrace.
  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. DORGAN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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