[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 12]
[Senate]
[Pages 16950-16976]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




               3% WITHHOLDING REPEAL AND JOB CREATION ACT

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
resume consideration of H.R. 674, which the clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (H.R. 674) to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 
     1986 to repeal the imposition of 3 percent withholding on 
     certain payments made to vendors by government entities, to 
     modify the calculation of modified adjusted gross income for 
     purposes of determining eligibility for certain healthcare-
     related programs, and for other purposes.

  Pending:

       Reid (for Tester) amendment No. 927, to amend the Internal 
     Revenue Code of 1986 to permit a 100-percent levy for 
     payments to Federal vendors relating to property, to require 
     a study on how to reduce the amount of Federal taxes owed but 
     not paid by Federal contractors, and to make certain 
     improvements in the laws relating to the employment and 
     training of veterans.


                 Amendment No. 928 to Amendment No. 927

      (Purpose: To provide American jobs through economic growth)

  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I call up my amendment numbered 928.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Arizona [Mr. McCain] proposes an amendment 
     numbered 928 to Amendment No. 927.

  (The amendment is printed in the Record of Tuesday, November 8, 2011, 
under ``Text of Amendments.'')
  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to enter into a 
colloquy with my Republican colleague, the Senator from Kentucky, Mr. 
Paul, and the Senator from Ohio, Mr. Portman.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I feel it is very important that we spend 
some time on this issue. I think all Americans realize we are in almost 
unprecedented difficult economic times, and that despite efforts that 
have been made over the now nearly 3 years, our economy has not grown 
and it has not provided the kind of job growth and opportunity many of 
us had anticipated.
  When we look at previous recessions--and this is a near depression by 
some calculations--the recovery has been amazingly and agonizingly slow 
as compared to recoveries from other recessionary periods.
  In the view of this Senator, the remedies have, in many respects, 
made the problem worse rather than better. If we look at some objective 
criteria, I argue that the situation in America today is worse than it 
was on January 2009, when this administration came to office. We have 
had the stimulus package, the Health Care Reform Act, increases in 
spending in numerous areas, and the Dodd-Frank bill, which was going to 
fix the regulatory system in this country to prevent any financial 
institution in America from ever again being too big to fail--in other 
words, no financial institution would ever need taxpayer dollars to the 
degree that America's economy would be impacted adversely in case that 
institution failed.
  Well, here we are. Here we are, nearly 3 years later, and 
unemployment is at 9 percent, even though after the stimulus package 
was passed all the predictions were that maximum unemployment would be 
8 percent and headed down. The recovery has been anemic. In my home 
State of Arizona, still nearly half the homes are under water. In other 
words, they are worth less than the mortgage payments the homeowners 
are required to make.
  Working together with my colleague from Kentucky, Senator Paul, and 
Senator Portman of Ohio, we have put

[[Page 16951]]

together a series of proposals and ideas that have been generated both 
within this body and outside of this body, and we believe--we believe 
with the utmost sincerity--there should be areas in this proposal that 
we and our colleagues on the other side of the aisle could come to 
agreement on. We wish to see this entire package. We think it is 
important in its entirety. There is no doubt in our minds that when you 
look at the 9-percent approval rating Members of Congress have with the 
American people, they certainly want to see us do something 
constructive as well.
  I guess I would ask my colleague from Kentucky how he thinks we 
should have put this package together, what we should have included, 
and what haven't we included. What is the situation in his home State 
as far as a need for this kind of legislation?
  Before going to my friend from Kentucky, let me add that I talk to 
large and small businesspeople all over this country, and they all tell 
me the same thing. They all tell me the same thing. They have no 
certainty as to what the future holds for them, which then causes them 
not to invest or to create jobs. Overseas, they are sitting on $1 
trillion. Here in the United States they are sitting on a $1\1/2\ 
trillion and not investing because they do not know when the next 
regulatory act is going to come down. They do not know when the next 
regulation is going to be issued. They do not know when the next tax 
increase is going to occur.
  I saw on television the other day that the owner and founder of Home 
Depot, Kenneth Langone--and he also wrote a piece for the Wall Street 
Journal--said he couldn't start Home Depot today. He couldn't start it 
today because of the environment that exists. Intended or not--and I 
know my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have the most 
honorable of intentions--the result of all this regulation has been a 
climate which has restrained investment, which has then restrained and 
killed job creation and caused this economy to be mired in the 
doldrums. Obviously, that has had a terrible impact on every-day 
Americans.
  Before my colleague comments, I first want to thank the Senator from 
Kentucky for the key role he has played in putting this package 
together, and I hope this is the beginning of our fight for passage of 
this legislation.
  Mr. PAUL. I hope this is the beginning of a conversation with the 
other side and with the President. I told the President personally that 
I want to help with the problems we have in our country. We have 14 
million people out of work, with 2 million additional people out of 
work since this administration began. So we are serious about our 
Republican jobs plan, and there can be some areas of some common 
interest.
  There currently is a supercommittee talking about some of these tax 
reform ideas. Our side is putting forth a message, we are putting forth 
a plan, and we are willing to work with the other side. The problem is, 
it is my understanding the other side has walked away from the table. 
The other side is unwilling to talk or to engage with us. I have asked 
the President personally to come to Capitol Hill and talk to us. I have 
talked with the members of the supercommittee and have indicated we are 
willing to work with them.
  We have some good ideas to create jobs, and some of these ideas the 
other side has already agreed to. Lowering the corporate income tax. 
There are Members of the other party who understand we need to be 
competitive with the rest of the world. So lowering the overall rates, 
simplifying the code, and getting rid of some of these loopholes. These 
are things the President talks about as he campaigns. But if he were 
serious, he would come and talk to us. Instead, what I have heard at 
his campaign stops is Republicans are too stupid to understand his plan 
so he is going to break it up. Well, that may get laughs at his 
campaign rallies, but it isn't getting anything done.
  I think the American people need to know our jobs plan will create 
jobs, and we are willing to talk with the President and with the other 
side. I think we are willing to get things done, and I think we have 
important things in the bill that will do that.
  Mr. McCAIN. Maybe my friend from Kentucky and I can talk about many 
of the various provisions in this legislation. There are a lot of 
provisions that were based on input from outside and inside this body. 
Some of this, by the way, closely mirrors legislation which has already 
passed the House of Representatives as well.
  We lead off with a requirement for a balanced budget amendment to the 
Constitution. I was here many years ago when the balanced budget 
amendment failed by one vote. When you ask the American people if 
government, and the Congress, shouldn't live under the same constraints 
they have, they are in total support of that.
  I have seen polls--and I wonder if my friend from Kentucky has--that 
show 80 to 90 percent of the American people support a balanced budget 
amendment to the Constitution when informed what it is. At the very 
least we ought to put that up for a vote in this body.
  Mr. PAUL. Yes. Routinely, decade after decade, polls show anywhere 
from 75 or 80 percent or more support a balanced budget amendment. We 
need it, because we have shown ourselves to be fiscally irresponsible. 
Through the years, we have had Gramm-Rudman-Hollings and we have had 
all different types of restraints, but we disobey our own rules. We 
say, oh, it is an emergency. But then suddenly all the routine spending 
we do becomes emergencies, and the debt gets bigger and bigger.
  Those in the debt commission say the most predictable crisis in our 
history is the coming debt crisis in this country. They are seeing it 
in Europe. We need to be serious in our country and fix these problems 
before we get to a crisis situation. That is what our Republican jobs 
plan does. It addresses it--a balanced budget amendment, tax reform, 
and a regulatory moratorium. We can't keep heaping on new regulations 
that put us at a competitive disadvantage with the rest of the world.
  Mr. McCAIN. I want to go back a second to the point the Senator from 
Kentucky made. Congress cannot bind future Congresses. I was here at 
the time of Gramm-Rudman-Hollings, and Gramm-Rudman-Hollings was one of 
the most strict budgetary requirements ever passed by this body. It 
required automatic spending cuts in the event that budgets were 
exceeded and excess spending was, obviously, taking place. But one 
Congress cannot bind future Congresses. So over time--over a very short 
period of time--the restraints imposed on spending by Gramm-Rudman-
Hollings went into the mist and we went back to business as usual.
  I will be very candid with my colleague. There are people who have 
legitimate concerns about a balanced budget amendment and what it would 
take to get there and the Draconian measures that may be entailed. But 
I ask, what is the alternative? What is the alternative? Mortgaging our 
children and our grandchildren's future? I believe currently that 
stands at a $44,000 debt for every man, woman and child in America. So 
why don't we in this body have a debate over a balanced budget 
amendment to the Constitution and find out exactly where people are?
  At the same time, we have learned over the years that Congresses 
cannot bind future Congresses, and so that is the problem with enacting 
automatic spending cuts, or whatever spending cuts or other measures we 
achieve here. We cannot bind future Congresses, appropriately. So the 
only way to address this issue is by amending the Constitution of the 
United States, which I know the Senator from Kentucky and I do not view 
as a measure taken lightly. I have been opposed to most changes in the 
Constitution. I think our Founding Fathers got it pretty well right. 
But this is an issue that I think has to be addressed.
  Mr. PAUL. Those who say balancing the budget would be extreme, I 
think what is extreme is a $1.5 trillion deficit. We are en route now, 
at the rate we are spending money, to a decade within which the budget 
will be consumed by entitlements and interest. There will be nothing 
left for national defense or for anything else if we keep on the same 
spending pattern. So we do have to do something.

[[Page 16952]]

  What we have shown so far is that fiscal restraint has been an utter 
failure up here. After Gramm-Rudman-Hollings we had pay as you go. That 
was broken 700 times in the first 5 years we were supposedly paying as 
you go by simply saying it is an emergency. Every routine expenditure 
became an emergency and so we went around it. So that is a good context 
for the Republican jobs plan--that everything will be in the context of 
balancing our budget.
  But then there are other important matters, such as tax reform. 
Historically, the one thing government can do to create jobs or to 
lessen unemployment is to lower the upper rate. Kennedy did it in the 
1960s and unemployment was cut in half. Reagan lowered the top rate 
from 70 to 50 and unemployment was cut in half. Reagan lowered it again 
from 50 to 28 and unemployment was cut in half. And interestingly, as 
you cut the top rate, you didn't cut revenue. Revenue stayed at 18 
percent of GDP through all the lowering of the top rate.
  What lowering the top rate does is it unleashes economic growth. The 
other side has this vision they are going to hire people in government 
and somehow fix unemployment. You can hire hundreds of thousands of 
people and you don't put a dent in it. To cure unemployment, or lessen 
unemployment, you need to have millions of people hired, and that can 
only be done in the private sector. I think that is the difference in 
the vision between our side and their side. Our vision is unleashing 
the private sector, and theirs is to hire a few more people to dig 
ditches and fill them in. It is a different vision.
  Mr. McCAIN. Isn't it a fact that Americans are not only very unhappy 
because of the economic condition we find ourselves in but also because 
they perceive an inequity and an inequality in our economy today? In 
other words, they see financial institutions on Wall Street making 
record profits and paying record bonuses. They see large corporations 
that pay no income taxes--none--zero. They see that and then see 
themselves paying their taxes, the least of which may be withholding 
taxes or sales taxes or whatever taxes they are still paying. It seems 
to me that tax reform would address these inequities.
  I note that Senator Portman from Ohio is here, and he knows this 
better than anybody, having been, in his previous incarnation, the head 
of the Office of Management and Budget. Over the years, we have carved 
out loophole after loophole and have provided some with a better or 
special deal. It is a damning indictment of the Congress and the 
administration that we let it happen, but it is what it is. So we now 
have major corporations--I would cite General Electric as an example--
that paid no taxes last year. An average citizen--who doesn't have a 
lobbyist here in Washington and who can't get a carveout or a special 
loophole for their small business--is paying these taxes.
  So how do we resolve that inequity? It seems to me that is 
accomplished through tax reform. Give people a simplified Tax Code. The 
Senator from Ohio has some much better ideas about this: three tax 
brackets, eliminate all but charitable deductions--even put a ceiling 
on that--and home mortgage deductions, and then the American people 
would at least believe they are being treated fairly. Today, they do 
not believe they are being treated fairly. And I am talking about 
middle-income Americans.
  I think statistics confirm that most Americans believe there is a 
large disparity between the wealthiest and the less well off in 
America. I would ask my colleague from Ohio to comment, since he knows 
more about that than I do.
  Mr. PORTMAN. The Senator from Arizona is absolutely right, and I 
appreciate his passion on this issue. He has the whole Senate focused 
on the idea of repatriating profits from overseas back to America to 
invest in jobs and growth, and he has now focused us on the need to 
reform the Tax Code on the individual side and on the corporate side.
  On the individual side, as he talked about, we have an incredibly 
complex Tax Code--thousands and thousands of pages. By lowering the 
rates and broadening the base--getting rid of some of this underbrush--
we will create economic growth. It is a necessary shot in the arm right 
now with over 9 percent unemployment.
  On the corporate side, right now we have a corporate rate that is the 
second highest in the world among all developed countries. The highest 
is Japan, and they want to lower theirs. This means jobs are going 
overseas instead of staying here. By lowering the rate, getting them 
down to the average of these other countries, we will bring more 
investment back to this country.
  Mr. McCAIN. What is the response to the suggestion of bringing the 
corporate tax rate down to 25 percent, let's say, because we say 
corporations are taxed too much in America, yet at the same time we 
also find corporations paying no taxes?
  Mr. PORTMAN. By bringing the rate down to 25 percent on a revenue-
neutral basis, what we do is get rid of a lot of the preferences, the 
exclusions, the credits, the tax deductions that enable companies right 
now to pay little or no taxes. We think everybody should be paying 
taxes. We think everybody should be subject to a fair tax system. We 
also think we shouldn't have to spend billions a year in complying with 
a Tax Code that is so complex. So instead of hiring more tax lawyers, 
we want people to get out there and hire more Americans to do the 
work--productive work--to get our economy moving.
  Tax reform is a way to give this economy a shot in the arm right now. 
It is one of many structural reforms that is in this legislation that 
the Senator from Kentucky and the Senator from Arizona have put 
together with me. It is very consistent with this idea that America's 
best days are ahead of her, if we restructure some of these basic parts 
of our economy: Tax reform, necessary; lowering health care costs, 
absolutely critical; allowing us to explore for energy on our shores 
and create jobs and economic opportunity; being sure we are reducing 
the regulations that are strangling small businesses. These are all 
structural reforms we can and should do. By the way, there is 
bipartisan support for every single one of those elements.
  So I commend the Senator from Arizona for raising these issues, for 
his passion for them, and the Senator from Kentucky. I hope the Senate 
will give us the opportunity to vote on this, and it should be a 
bipartisan vote because so many of these issues are issues that 
transcend partisanship, and in each case there are Democrats and 
Republicans who understand the need to move our economy forward by 
making these structural changes.
  Mr. McCAIN. For just a minute, I would like to discuss with the 
Senator from Kentucky and the Senator from Ohio that enhanced 
rescission or what used to be known as line item veto.
  The Senator from Ohio once had the misfortune--his reward will be in 
Heaven, not here on Earth--of being the head of the Office of 
Management and Budget and saw these appropriations bills come over, and 
many of them were that thick. Going through line by line, we find these 
special interests, special deals we call porkbarrel projects which have 
no justification, which were never debated, which were never discussed, 
which were never brought to the light of day except maybe occasionally, 
but certainly it contributed enormously to our debt and deficit.
  So he had the option of going to the President of the United States 
and saying: Veto the whole bill and send it back and it may be 
overridden or accept these pork-laden, big, thick appropriations bills.
  Isn't that a dilemma we should not force the President of the United 
States to have, that kind of Hobson's choice?
  Mr. PORTMAN. Absolutely. That is one of the elements of this jobs 
bill. It was particularly tough on defense bills because we have our 
national defense at stake and we have our soldiers and marines and 
sailors out there, and the bill comes to the President of the United 
States, and is he going to sign it? If he doesn't sign it, there is a 
risk

[[Page 16953]]

there will be at least a gap in funding; if not, as you say, be 
overturned. So there is a lot of pressure to sign it.
  What happened, the President signed these pieces of legislation with 
the earmarks in them, and we have more spending than we should and 
spending is not going to the priorities. It is not going to the 
national priorities.
  So this legislation is simple. It says, back in the late 1990s, 1996, 
Clinton signed a line-item veto bill. Constitutionally, it was 
questionable, and sure enough the Supreme Court overturned it. Now we 
have come back with another way to do this so-called enhanced 
rescission, but it is basically a legislative line-item veto where 
Congress would have the right to be able to review what the President 
rescinded. If they didn't act within a short period of time, it would 
be rescinded. The Congress could act to overturn the President.
  We believe it is constitutional, meets all the obligations that were 
set out in that Supreme Court case that overturned the first line-item 
veto and yet puts the pressure on the Congress not to put this 
porkbarrel spending in, and if they do, we would have the light of day 
shone on it and Congress would have to individually take up these line 
items, these porkbarrel projects.
  We think this is a constructive way forward that is constitutional, 
that meets all the concerns that have been raised, and would help to 
get the spending down and to prioritize spending at a time when we have 
record deficits and debt.
  Mr. McCAIN. I would say to the Senator from Kentucky, the President 
probably would veto some items we wouldn't like vetoed because there 
are some differences in philosophy between ourselves and the President 
of the United States. But I am willing to take not only that risk but 
that penalty associated with trying to get elimination of the 
porkbarrel spending.
  We have made some progress, I will admit, in the elimination of some 
of the ``earmarks,'' but we have a long, long way to go. Frankly, it is 
a disease I have watched recede a bit over time and then it pops back 
up. Again, it is something like the balanced budget amendment--it needs 
to have a permanent fix.
  Mr. PAUL. The line-item veto, interestingly, that the Senator 
proposed and got to the floor in the form of a bill separate from this 
has cosponsors from both parties. It does have bipartisan support. Many 
on the other side of the aisle see some of the waste. There is no 
reason why we couldn't begin to work together on some of this.
  But, once again, I get back to if the President is going to go on the 
road and call us too stupid to understand and his jobs plan has to be 
broken up, that is not a good way to get to a consensus. The President 
needs to come to Capitol Hill and needs to talk with the other side and 
work on these ideas.
  Do we need a line-item veto and do we need a balanced budget 
amendment? Do we need to do something different or just do the same? 
The problem with just doing the same is we haven't had a budget in 2 or 
3 years around here. The appropriations bills are supposed to agree 
with the budget, but they can't because there is no budget. There is a 
rumor that the appropriations bill will go to the conference committee 
between the two Houses and they will actually airdrop in whole other 
appropriations bills.
  Do we need more scrutiny? Do we need a balanced budget amendment? Do 
we need a line-item veto? Absolutely. Because what we are doing around 
here is not working and is adding up to trillions of dollars of annual 
deficits.
  Mr. McCAIN. If the scenario takes place as the Senator from Kentucky 
just pointed out, that all of a sudden everything is decided by members 
of the Appropriations Committee, then it does deprive the other members 
of this body of their input into the entire process and takes the 
authority and responsibility from 100 and puts it in the hands of a 
few. That seems, to me, a disservice to the people of Arizona whom I 
represent.
  Mr. PAUL. I think the overriding message--and I appreciate the 
comments from the Senator from Ohio--is that we have a jobs plan and we 
have our ideas. There is overlap in our ideas with some of the ideas 
from the other side.
  The message is, we are willing to talk to the other side. We are 
willing to say these are some proposals, and let's try to find areas of 
agreement.
  We think it is more important than a campaign right now. We think it 
is more important, the joblessness and the economy, that we try to do 
something about it. We are willing to come to the table. We are willing 
to bring our ideas, we are willing to have a debate with the other 
side, and we want to get solutions. We are not doing this just to be 
partisan. We want to figure out a way to make our economy better.
  Mr. PORTMAN. Absolutely. Let me give an example of where we could 
come together on something simple, and again it is something the 
Senator from Arizona and the Senator from Kentucky have included in 
their legislation.
  Everybody knows the Federal regulators are putting more and more 
pressure on small businesses all around the country. We hear it every 
time we go home. I can't think of a time I have been home at a plant 
tour where somebody hasn't raised with me a Federal regulation that is 
causing them difficulty because it is increasing the cost of hiring 
somebody.
  At a time of over 9 percent unemployment, we have to do everything we 
can to get this economy moving, and one is to lessen that regulatory 
burden and make sure it is smart.
  So one of the pieces of the legislation we are promoting is to say to 
the Federal agencies: Go through a cost-benefit analysis, including 
looking at what the impact is going to be on jobs. Who could be against 
that? That needs to be done not just in the so-called executive branch 
agencies but also in the independent agencies which are not subject to 
these current cost-benefit rules. It is more cost-benefit rules looking 
at jobs but also making sure everybody has to comply with it.
  Then, when they come up with an idea for a regulation, make sure it 
is consistent with the policy of the elected representatives because 
too often we will see the regulators go off on their own and come up 
with ideas that they think might be good for the economy. That is one 
reason we have--according to some statistics now--as much of a cost on 
the economy from regulations as from taxes.
  Finally, it says when you come up with something, it has to be the 
least burdensome alternative. If the EPA had done this, for instance, 
in some of the legislation that the Senator is concerned about, the 
Senator from Kentucky, they would not be able to come up with huge new 
costs on business because they would have to come up with a cost-
effective way to meet the policies set out by the Congress. They don't 
have to do that now. Who could be against that?
  So these are specific items that are within this bigger project of 
getting America back on track, increasing our jobs, dealing with the 
fact that America's competitiveness is at risk that are commonsense, 
bipartisan ideas everyone should be able to agree with.
  I again encourage the Senate to allow us to have a vote. Let's 
encourage a full debate on both sides of the aisle. Let's have a 
bipartisan vote on it. Let's show people whom, after all, we are 
elected to represent that we can come together as Republicans and 
Democrats and deal with the real problems facing our economy.
  Mr. McCAIN. I see the Senator from Washington is here, and I don't 
want to encroach on her time.
  I would just like to say we are going to spend a lot more time today 
on this issue and this proposal. The American people want change in 
Washington. They want us to address the concerns and problems they 
face, and we believe we have a great blueprint for moving forward in 
that direction. As my friends from Ohio and Kentucky have said, we are 
eager to sit down with our colleagues on the other side of the aisle 
and discuss at least some of these which we think we can come to 
agreement on. Maybe our approval rating, if we did so, could climb back 
up into double digits.

[[Page 16954]]

  I yield the floor.


                           Amendment No. 927

  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, I have come to the floor this afternoon 
to discuss the VOW to Hire Heroes Act, which is an amendment to help 
put our Nation's veterans back to work that we will be voting on 
tomorrow, on the eve of Veterans Day.
  The real meaning of Veterans Day is to remind ourselves to take care 
of service-connected veterans and their families. That is what this 
amendment does.
  We all realize, of course, this Chamber has had its share of 
disagreements and discord lately, and it is no secret that we are 
sharply divided on any number of economic and political issues that are 
facing average Americans right now. But this is one issue we should 
never be divided on.
  I have served on the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee for over 16 
years, and I can tell you that veterans have never been a partisan 
issue. We have all made a promise to those who signed up to serve, and 
we all need to keep it. That is why I have been so pleased to work to 
help put this amendment together in a comprehensive and bipartisan 
manner.
  This amendment brings all ideas to the table, Democratic and 
Republican, Senate and House, those from the President and from Members 
of Congress, and it uses all those ideas to address one of the most 
daunting and immediate problems facing our Nation's veterans--finding 
work.
  On this Veterans Day, after almost 10 years of war, nearly 1 million 
American veterans will be unemployed. It is a crisis that faces nearly 
13 million other Americans. But for our veterans, many of the barriers 
to employment are unique.
  That is because those who have worn our Nation's uniform, and 
particularly for those young veterans who spent the last decade being 
shuttled back and forth to war zones half a world away, the road home 
isn't always smooth. The redtape is often long, and the transition from 
the battlefield to the workplace is never easy.
  Too often today our veterans are being left behind by their peers who 
didn't make the same sacrifices for their Nation at a critical time in 
their lives. Too often they don't realize the skills they possess and 
their value in the workplace is real. Too often our veterans are not 
finding open doors to new opportunities in their communities.
  But as those who know the character and experience of our veterans 
understand well, that shouldn't be the case. Our veterans have the 
leadership ability, discipline, and technical skills to not only find 
work but to excel in the economy of the 21st century. That is why, 2 
years ago, I began an effort to find out why, despite all the talent 
and drive I know our veterans possess, this problem persists.
  To get to the crux of this problem, I knew I had to hear firsthand 
from those veterans who were struggling to find work. So I crisscrossed 
my home State of Washington and communities large and small, at worker 
retraining programs, in VA facilities, and in veterans halls. I sat 
down with veterans themselves to talk about the roadblocks they face. 
What I heard was heartbreaking and frustrating.
  I heard from veterans who said they no longer write that they are a 
veteran on their resume because of the stigma they believe employers 
attach to the invisible wounds of war.
  I heard from medics who return home from treating battlefield wounds 
and can't get a certification to be an EMT or even to drive an 
ambulance. I spoke with veterans who said many employers had trouble 
understanding the vernacular they used to describe their experiences in 
an interview or on their resume. I talked to veterans who told me the 
military spent incalculable time getting them the skills to do their 
job in the field but very little time teaching them how to transition 
the skills they have learned into the workplace when they come home. 
The problems were sometimes complicated and sometimes simple. Most 
importantly, though, they were preventable. But the more I relayed the 
concerns of our States' unemployed veterans to Federal Government 
officials for answers, the more I realized there were none. It became 
clear that for too long we have invested billions of dollars in 
training our young men and women with the skills to protect our Nation 
only to ignore them once they leave the military. For too long at the 
end of their career we patted our veterans on the back for their 
service and then pushed them out into the job market--alone.
  That is why in May of this year, as chairman of the Senate Veterans' 
Affairs Committee, I introduced a bipartisan veterans employment bill 
to ease the transition from the battlefield to the working world. It is 
a bill that will allow our men and women in uniform to capitalize on 
their service while also making sure the American people capitalize on 
the investment we have made in them.
  For the first time it requires broad job skills training for every 
servicemember as they leave the military as part of the military's 
Transition Assistance Program. It allows servicemembers to begin the 
Federal employment process prior to separation in order to facilitate a 
truly seamless transition from the military to jobs in our government, 
and it requires the Department of Labor to take a hard look at what 
military skills and training should be translatable into the civilian 
sector in order to make it simpler for our veterans to get the licenses 
and certifications they need.
  All of these are substantial steps to put our veterans to work. Today 
they are being combined with the other great ideas in this 
comprehensive amendment that is now before the Senate, including an 
idea championed by my House counterpart, Chairman Miller, that will 
ease the employment struggle of our older veterans by providing them 
with additional education benefits so they can train for today's high-
demand jobs, and an idea that has been championed by President Obama, 
Senator Baucus, and many others that provides a tax credit for 
employers who hire veterans.
  With this amendment we are taking a huge step forward in rethinking 
the way we treat our men and women in uniform after they leave the 
military. For many of us, particularly those who grew up with the 
Vietnam war, we are also taking steps to avoid the mistakes of the 
past, mistakes that I believe we stand perilously close to repeating.
  Every day we read about skyrocketing suicide statistics, substantial 
abuse problems, and even rising homelessness among the post-9/11 
generation of veterans. While there are lots of factors that contribute 
to those challenges, failure to give our veterans the self-confidence, 
the financial security, and dignity that a job provides often plays a 
very crucial role.
  On this Veterans Day we need to redouble our efforts to avoid the 
mistakes that have cost our veterans dearly and have weighed on the 
collective conscience of this Nation. We can do that agreeing to this 
amendment, but also by looking back to a time when we stepped up to 
meet the promises we made to our veterans.
  I mentioned on the Senate floor many times that my father was a 
veteran of World War II. But what I do not always talk about is the 
fact that when he came home from war, he came home to opportunity--
first at college and then to a job, a job that gave him pride, a job 
that helped him and my mother raise seven children who have gone on to 
support families of their own. This is the legacy of opportunity we 
have to live up to for our Nation's veterans. The responsibility we 
have on our shoulders does not end on the battlefield. It does not end 
after the parades on Friday. In fact, it does not end.
  I urge my colleagues to put aside our differences, to come together 
and meet the challenges of putting our Nation's veterans to work.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Merkley). The Senator from Wisconsin.
  Mr. JOHNSON of Wisconsin. I ask to be recognized for not more than 10 
minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

[[Page 16955]]




                           Amendment No. 928

  Mr. JOHNSON of Wisconsin. Mr. President, I rise to speak in support 
of the McCain amendment, which is Jobs Through Growth Act. I do not 
think there is any question that the No. 1 solution to the deep 
financial hole in which we find ourselves in this country today is in 
economic growth. The fact is, we do find ourselves in a very deep 
financial hole. Within a day or two, or certainly within the next week, 
we will surpass the $15 trillion landmark in this country. That would 
be a problem, $15 trillion worth of debt, if our economy was $100 
trillion large, but it is not. It is about $15 trillion large. So our 
debt-to-equity ratio has now reached 100 percent, which is a very 
dangerous metric.
  In order to understand how that affects our economy I ask people to 
understand or think about how their own personal economy is affected if 
they are in debt, too deep into personal debt. The fact is, when you 
are in debt over your head you simply cannot increase your consumption 
because any extra money you have, just beyond the basics, is spent 
servicing that debt.
  The exact same dynamic happens with our Nation. We find ourselves in 
way too much debt. Unfortunately, there is no end in sight. The last 3 
years we added $4 trillion to our Nation's debt, and the prospect for 
this year is that we will add another $1 trillion. During President 
Obama's term we will have added $5 trillion to our Nation's debt. This 
scares consumers, and it scares business investors as well. We all 
recognize when the government gets into this much debt and spends so 
much money that it does not have, eventually it will have to take from 
all of us--either in the form of inflation or in the form of taxes.
  We are simply not coming to grips with the problem. I like to put 
things into historical perspective as we talk about supposedly cutting 
our budgets. Ten years ago, in 2001, our Nation spent $1.9 trillion. 
This year we spent $3.6 trillion. We doubled spending in just 10 years. 
The debate in which we are engaged right now is whether, according to 
President Obama's budget, 10 years in the future we will spend $5.7 
trillion or, as the House budget calls for, $4.7 trillion.
  Let's take a look at 10-year spending. In the last 10 years we spent 
$28 trillion. Again, the debate is whether in the next 10 years we 
spend $46 trillion, as President Obama budgeted, or whether we would 
spend only $40 trillion.
  I don't care how we look at it, $40 or $46 trillion is not a cut in 
comparison to $28 trillion. Unfortunately, the supercommittee that is 
charged with finding $1.2 trillion worth of savings is at an impasse, 
and it is at an impasse because it looks like my colleagues on the 
other side of the aisle have walked out. I am afraid they simply do not 
want a deal because President Obama is already in reelection mode, and 
he does not want a result so he can run against a do-nothing Congress.
  I am one Senator who came here willing to work with anybody willing 
to acknowledge the problem and who is willing to work with me, work 
with our side to seriously address the problem. That is exactly what 
the six Members, the Republicans on that committee, were trying to do.
  We all recognize the No. 1 solution to our debt and deficit crisis is 
economic growth. What is holding back growth? It really is the high 
level of uncertainty, the lack of confidence. I say to a great extent 
that lack of confidence and high level of uncertainty was caused by 
President Obama's agenda. There is no doubt about it. He came into 
office in tough economic circumstances, but his policies have made the 
situation far worse. They have moved us 180 degrees in the wrong 
direction.
  I mentioned the $15 trillion worth of debt. President Obama's budget 
would have added $12 trillion, but that understates the problem because 
we underestimate the cost of health care. That will add trillions of 
dollars as more employers drop coverage and people go on the exchanges 
at highly subsidized rates. The fact we are not achieving the projected 
growth rates in those budgets will add trillions. If we only average 
2.5 percent growth, that will add $3 trillion to our debt and deficit 
over the next 10 years.
  What do global investors, what do American investors take a look at 
when they look at the U.S. economy? If we are going to be investing in 
business, if we are going to grow our economy. If we look around the 
world and say where are there economies growing, it is not the United 
States. It is China, it is India, it is in places like Brazil. Strike 
1.
  Take a look at the tax environment and look at the United States, 
with one of the highest tax rates in the world, at 35 percent, and 
strike 2.
  Then we look at the regulatory environment and we are going to 
realize, according to President Obama's own Small Business 
Administration, that the cost of complying with Federal regulations is 
$1.75 trillion. Think about that. Put that in perspective. That is a 
number that is larger than all but eight economies in the world. It is 
12 percent the size of our economy. That is what we burden our job 
creators with each and every single year. Strike 3.
  We need a growth agenda. We need to recognize that America needs to 
be an attractive place for business expansion and job creation. The 
Jobs Through Growth Act recognizes that and it utilizes pieces of 
legislation that are already available to actually address the problem. 
We need a credible plan to restrain the growth in government.
  As I pointed out earlier, that is all we are doing. We are not 
cutting government, we are just restraining the growth in government. 
We absolutely need dramatic, significant tax reform. Our marginal tax 
rates are too high, our Tax Code is 70,000 pages long and costs $200 
billion to $300 billion to comply with. We need to utilize our God-
given natural resources in this country. We need an energy utilization 
policy that will create hundreds of thousands if not millions of jobs 
over the next decade or two.
  We need free trade. It must be fair, but we need to recognize as 
these billions of people around the world seek to improve their lives 
and develop their economies, it actually offers us a phenomenal market 
opportunity. We cannot be afraid of that. We need to embrace it. We 
need to understand that we do not have a choice whether we are going to 
compete in this world. We must compete, and we are certainly capable. 
We have the finest, most productive workers in the world.
  Finally, we absolutely need regulatory reform. Part of the Jobs 
Through Growth Act is a bill I introduced a couple of months ago called 
the Regulation Moratorium and Jobs Preservation Act of 2011. It is a 
pretty simple bill. It basically says until our economy gets back on 
its feet again we will stop issuing new rules and new regulations that 
harm economic growth until the unemployment rate drops below the level 
it was when President Obama took office, which would be 7.8 percent. It 
is a reasonable proposal, one I hope can gain bipartisan support.
  I have to believe every Member of Congress, like me, is visited daily 
by businesses in their district and in their State. They are coming to 
Washington and calling us on the phone and describing the harm that 
President Obama's regulatory agencies are inflicting on their ability 
to create jobs.
  I urge all of my colleague to support the very sensible legislation, 
the Jobs Through Growth Act.
  I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Jersey.
  Mr. MENENDEZ. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                           Amendment No. 927

  Mr. MENENDEZ. Mr. President, this Friday we will celebrate Veterans 
Day, and this year we will also be celebrating Military Families Month. 
It is time to recommit ourselves to helping every military family, as 
the First Lady and Dr. Biden are doing with a

[[Page 16956]]

program called Joining Forces to address the unique needs of those who 
serve and the needs of their families.
  We as a Congress and as a nation need to do exactly that. We need to 
reach across the aisle. We need to put aside our differences and join 
forces. We need to help businesses help veterans and their spouses 
build careers. We need to make sure schools are doing all they can to 
help military children. We need to promote community involvement by 
asking all of us to do what we can to help military families in our 
local communities. But there is more we can and should do to honor our 
heroes.
  Honoring our heroes means providing jobs and job training and every 
job opportunity possible to unemployed veterans in my State of New 
Jersey, where we have over 450,000 veterans, 12 percent of them 
unemployed. That is why I am proud to be a cosponsor of the VOW to Hire 
Heroes Act.
  Every year, 160,000 Active-Duty servicemembers and 110,000 National 
Guardsmen and reservists come home. When they transition to civilian 
life and are looking for options to get back to work at home, they need 
to know that someone will be there to help them, that businesses will 
help them to start new careers or continue where they left off. We 
should be giving businesses a tax credit for hiring a returning veteran 
and giving them more of a tax credit if they hire a wounded veteran.
  I would like to see American businesses pledge to hire 100,000 
veterans or their spouses by the end of next year. I don't think that 
is asking too much. I hope my colleagues don't think that is too much 
either. I don't think it is too much to ask Congress--both parties, 
without the politics, in a bipartisan effort--to honor our veterans by 
passing a veterans jobs bill the President can sign into law.
  As we approach Veterans Day, as our last troops come home from Iraq, 
as our military presence around the world enters a post-Iraq era, we 
need to commit ourselves as a nation to helping every one of our men 
and women in uniform, particularly in these hard economic times. This 
year, with the unemployment rate for veterans at almost 12 percent 
nationally, as it is in New Jersey, with nearly 1 million unemployed 
veterans nationwide, I would hope we can find bipartisan support for 
something we should all be able to agree on; that is, jobs for 
veterans. That is the VOW to Hire Veterans Act. Veterans cannot and 
should not have to wait for the help they deserve. No delays, no 
filibusters, no politics--just a bill for the President to sign and 
help for our Nation's veterans now. To me, that is about fairness and 
it is about keeping our promise to our veterans.
  I think we can always do better for our veterans and their families, 
and every veteran deserves better. Our duty to them is not just 
remembering their service. It is not just saying ``thank you'' once or 
twice a year on Veterans Day or Memorial Day--and we certainly should 
march in a Veterans Day parade or go to a Memorial Day observance. We 
should do those things. This is also about delivering on the promise of 
a grateful nation every day. It means providing the health care and 
services veterans need when they come home and helping them transition 
back into the workforce.
  Our brave men and women did not wait to sign up to serve their 
country, and they should not have to wait to get the benefits they 
earned defending it. They should not have to come home only to stand on 
the unemployment line after putting themselves on the line serving 
their Nation. That is why I am proud to have cosponsored a good, solid, 
bipartisan jobs package to help our military men and women transition 
from their work defending our Nation's freedoms to civilian work 
rebuilding our Nation's economy. It would ensure that disabled veterans 
who have exhausted their unemployment benefits get the training and 
rehabilitation they need, the counseling they need, the vocational 
rehabilitation and employment benefits they need, and job assistance 
tailored to a 21st-century job market.
  It establishes a competitive grant program for nonprofits that 
provide mentoring and training programs for veterans. It allows 
employers to be paid for providing on-the-job training to veterans.
  It would provide returning heroes and wounded warriors work 
opportunity tax credits for businesses that hire veterans and more for 
businesses that hire disabled veterans. The credit for unemployed 
veterans expired at the end of 2010. This provision is essentially a 
work opportunity tax credit for hiring vets, a credit up to $2,400 for 
short-term unemployed and up to $5,600 for long-term unemployed and an 
increased credit of up to $9,600 for hiring unemployed wounded 
veterans.
  I fully support and believe in this bill. We made a promise to 
veterans, and it is a promise we must keep. So while I believe reducing 
the deficit is a critical issue, we cannot and should not balance the 
budget on the backs of those who have served. Veterans are not 
bankrupting America, they are protecting it. It is not veterans 
programs, health care, or services that should be cut.
  I said it before, and I will say it again: A grateful nation not only 
honors its heroes once a year on Veterans Day or Memorial Day, but it 
better be able to look every veteran in the eye when he or she comes 
home from service and say: We meant what we said, and we will keep our 
promise.
  We must be prepared to deliver on that promise. I certainly am. I 
come to this Chamber on behalf of every New Jerseyan to say to every 
man and woman who has served in uniform and to the more than 450,000 
veterans in my home State of New Jersey that we will keep working for 
fairness for every veteran and their family. There will always be 
political obstacles in our way, but we will fight the good fight to 
keep our promise to you, as you have served us. Be assured that you 
have the respect and thanks of a grateful nation for the sacrifices you 
and your families have made. To me, that thanks is ultimately 
demonstrated not by what we say but by how we act.
  May God bless our troops, and may this opportunity be an example of 
our willingness to come together on behalf of those who wear the 
uniform and serve the Nation and have the gratitude of a grateful 
country.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, what is the parliamentary situation?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's second-degree amendment is the 
pending question.
  Mr. McCAIN. That is the pending business before the Senate?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. It is the pending question.
  Mr. McCAIN. Is there any unanimous consent on speakers?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. There is not.
  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I will continue to discuss the pending 
amendment before the Senate, and I would yield such time, without 
yielding the floor, as the Senator from Tennessee may use.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Tennessee.


                      Residential Mortgage Market

  Mr. CORKER. Mr. President, I rise to speak about a bill we introduced 
called the Residential Mortgage Market Privatization and 
Standardization Act. I wish to speak briefly on this bill that deals 
with the pressing issue that I know the Senator from Arizona probably 
as much as anybody in the Senate has spoken about and has championed 
for many years.
  The current dynamic permit conservatorship is not sustainable with 
Fannie and Freddie and the GSEs as they are today. There has been 
discussion about various things happening with these organizations. The 
FHFA, which actually regulates Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, is begging 
Congress for direction but, in their words, is only getting mixed 
signals. Today, we introduced a bill to give a very clear direction as 
to what ought to happen to these major GSEs.
  Together, they sit atop $5 trillion in obligations, plus hundreds of 
thousands of our REO properties--in other words, properties they have 
taken back and are now overseeing throughout America. With a $5 
trillion book, any mistake they make is very expensive, and

[[Page 16957]]

obviously the taxpayers of this country know full well that billions of 
dollars continue to flow in these organizations to keep them afloat. 
Yet these organizations today are lameduck organizations with no clear 
guidance on their future. They really have no idea what the future 
holds. The organizations themselves basically are treading water.
  Over the most recent decade, Fannie and Freddie became corporate 
welfare schemes for mortgage banks. There is no question that what was 
happening was the governance balance sheet was helping fund corporate 
welfare programs or basically mortgage brokers could sell off to Fannie 
and Freddie mortgages they had put in place and have them guaranteed.
  As they raced to the bottom to lower guarantee fees so they could 
take a bigger market share for the biggest mortgage originators, they 
actually helped fuel the housing bubble that has led us to where we are 
today. There is no question about it.
  So many people talk about Fannie and Freddie and say that without 
them, we would not have affordability in housing. Well, at the end of 
the day, Fannie and Freddie don't make housing more affordable. What 
they do is simply make interest rates too low. What that actually does 
is push up home prices. That is the exact equation that occurs in this 
process. Housing affordability is determined by your monthly mortgage 
payment. Fannie and Freddie make interest rates cheap, but the price of 
housing ends up being more expensive as a result of that. So, in 
effect, the taxpayer is suddenly on the hook for losses when these 
housing prices are pushed up, and the fact is we end up having a bubble 
like we have had.
  The market can and will take over the functions of mortgage credit 
risk if we make the transition in an intelligent way, and that is what 
this bill does. Our plan phases out Fannie and Freddie over 10 years, 
but it does so in a way that allows for feedback from the markets. 
Gradually reducing the guarantee share of new mortgage-backed 
securities allows us to see the market's price credit risk. We also add 
transparency to the market by making the valuable data at the GSEs 
publicly available.
  One of the things that has happened in both Fannie and Freddie 
through the years is that they have developed, obviously, more 
expertise than any entities in the country because they, in essence, 
have been almost monopolies in this process. So what we would like to 
do is make that data publicly available to folks who will be doing this 
on the private side.
  Uniform documents managing the servicing process will give investors 
and homeowners alike certainty in how they will be treated by their 
service. This is part of the plumbing of a system that needs to be 
addressed, and our plan does that.
  In other words, this plan not only phases down Fannie and Freddie 
over a 10-year period through a process that gives market signals so we 
can understand what is happening in the marketplace as it is occurring, 
but it also creates a mechanism for private investors to come back into 
the market. Ten years from now, under our plan, we will have a housing 
finance system based more on market fundamentals free of taxpayer risk 
and more able to price credit appropriately.
  The idea that the private market cannot price credit risk is a total 
red herring. The biggest risk in a 30-year fixed rate mortgage is the 
prepayment risk. This is called convexity in bond market parlance. The 
private market has already figured this out. We have homeowners 
throughout our country who constantly prepay mortgages and the market 
has figured out a way to price this. So private lenders can and will 
price credit risk. We have just been very accustomed to the government 
selling this too cheaply, but the market can easily price this. All we 
need to do is put those mechanisms in place that allow the private 
sector to be able to do that.
  It is time to move beyond Fannie and Freddie. We cannot pretend this 
problem away. Our plan is thoughtful, and it will earn back private 
capital over time.
  We have offered a piece of legislation that we think is something 
that can receive bipartisan support. It allows Fannie and Freddie to be 
phased out over time. It allows us to see market signals as they are 
occurring. It allows--and the Presiding Officer and I know because we 
have worked on this and looked at these things in the Banking Committee 
itself--it allows us to actually put in place those mechanisms that 
will allow the private sector to come in and backfill as the guarantee 
continues to diminish over time.
  I am offering this bill hopefully to be a marker. If people want to 
change it and talk with us about things that they think might enhance 
this bill, we are open to that. But we believe at this time, a year and 
a half after Dodd-Frank passed, it is time for us to actually begin 
looking at a real way to phase down Fannie's and Freddie's involvement 
in the marketplace. I hope Republicans and Democrats will join with us 
and try to make this bill better if they wish to do that, but certainly 
move us in a direction of doing something that is thoughtful and will 
move us along toward a private market in residential finance.
  Thank you very much. I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arizona.
  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I thank my colleague from Tennessee. As 
Senator Corker knows, we had an amendment on the Dodd-Frank bill to do 
away with Fannie and Freddie over a 5-year period. I think it is 
obvious that the Senator from Tennessee has done a lot of homework and 
in-depth examination of this issue. But I think the Senator from 
Tennessee would agree that what went on with Fannie and Freddie is one 
of the worst crimes inflicted on the American people all during the 
1990s and well into 2000 and which was a major contributor to the 
housing collapse, which then triggered the financial collapse which we 
still haven't recovered from. I wonder if the Senator from Tennessee 
wishes to elaborate.
  Mr. CORKER. Well, I don't think there is any question. I know the 
Senator from Arizona has been a reformer all of his life. What we find 
in this body is we end up having a corporate welfare system built 
around many of the things we do here. As much as I hate to say it, both 
sides of the aisle through time empowered this organization to be what 
it is. We have built an industry in our country around ensuring that 
the status quo stays in place. It is unfortunate. As the Senator from 
Arizona knows, as well or better than anybody in this body, the 
taxpayers are bearing the brunt of this. To me, it is way past time for 
us to deal with this.
  I know many people say, Well, in the height of the housing crisis, 
this is not the time. But the fact is, the way this bill is crafted--
and it sounds as though the amendment of the Senator from Arizona, 
which I remember supporting strongly--generally would have phased out 
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac over a period of time. I think we have gone 
to tremendous extremes to phase this out in a way that makes sense and 
allows the private sector to come back. If we think about the type of 
finance that takes place in this country around all types of 
complexities, there is no reason, as long as we create the proper 
structure for the TBA market for the private market to function, there 
is no reason that the private sector cannot do this on its own.
  It is amazing, when we think about what has happened with low 
interest rates. Most homeowners in our country look at the payment they 
are going to make. When you have artificially low rates, what happens? 
The price of housing actually goes up, so we end up in a situation 
where we have this bubble and prices drop tremendously, and then what 
happens? The taxpayer ends up bearing the brunt of it.
  I could not agree more with the Senator from Arizona, who has always 
taken on tough issues, and maybe I am responding longer than he wants 
me to. This is one of those issues where I know that many people back 
home--candidly, there is a whole industry that is built around this, 
and I know a lot of times people don't want to take on something, don't 
want to change

[[Page 16958]]

something like that because they know it is tough back home. I am glad 
the Senator from Arizona has championed this issue the way he has. As 
he mentioned, we have done a lot of work on it also. I think this is a 
sensible bill that will allow our country to get back where it needs to 
be. I know the Americans the Senator from Arizona so well represents 
and cares so deeply about these transgressions on our citizens--I know 
they will support this if we will allow this type of legislation to 
come to the floor and be voted on.
  Mr. McCAIN. I think the Senator from Tennessee--and I want to get 
back to the jobs bill--but I think the Senator from Tennessee would 
agree, as long as Fannie and Freddie are in existence and have the 
opportunity to behave in a manner that they did in the past, we risk 
another housing bubble followed by a housing collapse. That is why I 
think the Senator's proposal is something that deserves our attention 
and that of the country, so we don't have a repetition of the pain that 
the people in Tennessee and Arizona are experiencing today.
  Nearly half the homes in my home State of Arizona are under water. 
They are worth less than their mortgage payments. As long as that is 
the case, it is going to be very difficult to see a way for a strong 
economic recovery to take place. I think phasing Fannie and Freddie out 
is probably one of the key elements in bringing about not only 
beneficial change--and a number of other things have to happen too--but 
to prevent the kind of catastrophe that was visited on us in 2008.
  Mr. CORKER. It is interesting, when we have a bubble that is taking 
place, a lot of times the private sector becomes very concerned that a 
bubble is developing and they begin to slow down the process. They 
begin to see that, wait a minute, there is a lot of risk here, it is 
getting pretty frothy. The housing prices in Arizona and California and 
other places are getting awfully high. Maybe we should be cutting back. 
But as long as there is a government entity on the other side of that 
that is going to take all the risk and they can dump it off to them--
all it is is a machine, and the more they do, the more money they make. 
That is what is missing in this current formula. There is no gauge 
there to slow the process when the bubble is becoming overheated. That 
is one of the huge contributing factors that I know the Senator has 
talked about a great deal to what we saw.
  Candidly, the reason the Senator is offering this jobs bill today is 
because we have been through such a financial crisis and it has brought 
our country to its knees. On top of that, we have had a tremendous 
amount of regulation that has enhanced the slowdown even more. But the 
fact is, I would say to the Senator from Arizona, he might not be 
offering this piece of legislation that he has done such a great job 
leading on today had it not been for this bubble that was created. He 
might not even be here today. We might be talking about a totally 
different subject on the Senate floor.
  I thank the Senator for his leadership and for his time, and I yield 
the floor.
  Mr. McCAIN. I thank the Senator from Tennessee, and he also has been 
one who is more than willing to take on the tough challenges and issues 
we face, with a commitment to a bipartisanship that I think we all 
need. I thank the Senator from Tennessee.
  (Mrs. HAGAN assumed the chair.)
  Mr. McCAIN. Madam President, I wish to inform my colleagues that I 
have a lot to say about this jobs bill. There is no unanimous consent 
agreement. I believe this is of transcendent importance. I see the 
Senator from Minnesota here. I apologize ahead of time, but we only 
have until tomorrow morning to address this issue. This is a compelling 
issue for this Nation. I intend to talk for a fairly extended period of 
time.
  For the benefit of my colleagues, this amendment is identical to the 
Jobs Through Growth Act which was introduced on October 17. I am 
pleased about joining most of my Republican colleagues--and I wish to 
highlight the hard work done by my colleagues Senators Paul and Portman 
in putting this legislation together. In fact, I wish to thank all of 
the Senators, and some of them bipartisan, who put this jobs bill 
together. It requires a lot of discussion. There are issues of 
transcendent importance.
  I don't have to tell any American how difficult our economic times 
are, how slow the recovery has been, if at all, the risk of further 
recession, and it is time we did something different. I would point out 
to my colleagues that for 2 years the other party had control of this 
body and had control of the House of Representatives--for 2 years, 
until the 2010 election. During that period of time, we passed a 
stimulus bill, we passed health care reform, we passed other big 
spending bills, all on the promise that the American economy would 
recover. It didn't. In fact, by any measurement, things are far worse 
than they were in January of 2009.
  As the President has a jobs bill and the majority leader has put 
forth legislation as part of that jobs bill, we Republicans have a jobs 
bill. I know my friends on the other side of the Capitol also agree 
wholeheartedly with the majority of what we are proposing today. The 
difference between our plan and theirs is that we want to create jobs 
through growth and they want to create jobs through government 
spending, through spending and borrowing and taxing. That doesn't work. 
What they have proposed amounts to nothing more than another stimulus 
bill, and we saw that movie before. It added to our debt and our 
deficit, and we lost jobs.
  Today, my colleagues and I are putting forth a plan to create jobs 
through sound policies. Economic growth is a fundamental part of long-
term, sustainable job creation, and that is what our plan offers the 
American people.
  I wish to quote from an article in Forbes magazine by Peter Ferrara 
entitled ``The GOP Jobs Plan Vs. Obama's.''

       Senate Republicans have taken the lead in proposing a jobs 
     plan alternative to President Obama's in the form of the Jobs 
     Through Growth Act, led by Senators John McCain, Rand Paul of 
     Kentucky, and Rob Portman of Ohio. Republicans are remarkably 
     unified behind these economic and jobs growth ideas, with 
     House Republicans having already long supported or even 
     passed several components of that plan.
       The 28 components of their program add up to exciting 
     prospects for finally sparking the long overdue economic 
     recovery, based on proven economic logic, and proven 
     experience concerning what works in the real world. Most 
     important are the proposals for both corporate and individual 
     tax reform, closing loopholes in return for reducing the 
     rates.
       Lower marginal tax rates are the key to providing the 
     necessary incentives for economic growth and prosperity. The 
     marginal tax rate is the rate on the next dollar to be earned 
     from any investment, enterprise, or productive activity. That 
     is the key because it determines how much the producer is 
     allowed to keep out of the next unit of what he or she 
     produces.
       At a 50-percent marginal tax rate, the producer can keep 
     only half of any increased production. If that rate is 
     reduced to 25 percent, the portion the producer can keep 
     grows by 50 percent, from one half to three fourths. That 
     powerfully increases the incentives for more productive 
     activity, such as savings, investment, starting new 
     businesses, expanding businesses, creating jobs, 
     entrepreneurship, and work.
       The Republican Jobs Plan involves closing the special 
     interest loopholes that enable Obama corporate cronies such 
     as General Electric to get away with paying no taxes on $14 
     billion in corporate profits, in return for reducing rates to 
     internationally competitive levels. The U.S. suffers 
     virtually the highest corporate tax rate in the 
     industrialized world, nearly 40 percent, with a 35 percent 
     federal rate, and another nearly 5 percent in state corporate 
     rates on average.
       Even Communist China enjoys a 25% corporate rate. In the 
     supposedly mostly socialist European Union, the corporate 
     rate on average is even lower than that. In formerly 
     socialist Canada, the federal corporate rate is 16.5%, going 
     down to 15% next year.
       The GOP Plan would reduce the federal 35% rate to 25%, 
     which is the minimum reduction to restore international 
     competitiveness for American companies. Note that closing 
     loopholes may well raise the average corporate rate, on which 
     Democrats and liberals have focused, but it is the marginal 
     tax rate that drives the economy. . . .
       The GOP Jobs Plan also includes reducing the top personal, 
     individual income tax rate to 25% as well, in return for 
     closing loopholes. The Ryan budget already passed by

[[Page 16959]]

     the House would apply that rate to family incomes over 
     $100,000, with a 10% rate applying to incomes below. Those 
     rate reductions would powerfully boost incentives as well, as 
     proven by the dramatic response to the Reagan tax rate 
     reductions in the 1980s. . . .
       Another component of the plan would eliminate the double 
     taxation of U.S. corporate profits earned abroad by the U.S. 
     ``worldwide'' corporate tax code, which adds U.S. taxes on 
     top of the taxes on foreign profits by the host country. The 
     GOP plan calls for adopting the ``territorial'' tax code of 
     most of our international competitors, which allows profits 
     to be taxed in the country where they are earned, and not 
     again when they are brought home. That would unlock for 
     reinvestment in the U.S. the $1.4 trillion in American 
     corporate profits earned overseas that remain parked there to 
     avoid U.S. double taxation.
       The GOP Jobs Plan also recognizes the enormous problem of 
     excessive, runaway regulation, which increases the cost of 
     production, and so further discourages it. Reducing such 
     costs would consequently increase production, economic 
     growth, and jobs.
       Step one in the plan to reduce such regulatory burdens is 
     to repeal Obamacare, with its employer mandate adding to the 
     cost of each job by requiring employers to buy more 
     expensive, politically driven health insurance coverage for 
     every employee. That repeal would also reduce future taxes 
     and spending by trillions as well.
       Further critical relief would result from the GOP Jobs Plan 
     plank to repeal Dodd-Frank, which is threatening to squelch 
     credit for businesses and consumers essential to jobs and 
     recovery. The GOP proposal cites research showing that higher 
     costs for financial services resulting from Dodd-Frank would 
     cost the economy nearly 5 million jobs by 2015.
       Another critical area of overregulation is energy. The 
     Republican program would require the Interior Department to 
     move forward in order to free up leasing and development of 
     drilling on public lands onshore. It also eliminates EPA foot 
     dragging on air permits necessary for offshore drilling, and 
     removes EPA authority for unnecessary and burdensome 
     greenhouse gas regulation altogether. This deregulation would 
     ensure a steady supply of low cost energy, essential to 
     booming economic growth.
       Also in the proposal is the REINS (Regulations from the 
     Executive In Need of Scrutiny) Act, which would require 
     Congressional approval of all major federal regulations 
     imposing more than $100 million a year in costs. This will 
     reestablish the original Congressional check on Executive 
     power, and democratic accountability for regulatory burdens, 
     so politicians can no longer hide behind faceless bureaucrats 
     to evade public scrutiny for regulatory drains on our freedom 
     and prosperity. This would provide an important solution to 
     excessive regulatory burdens and costs across the board.
       The Tea Party will favor the plan's plank for a Balanced 
     Budget Amendment to the Constitution, which would include 
     necessary tax and spending limitations in the Constitution. 
     Also included is a statutory line item veto, giving the 
     President more power to cut spending. Reduced government 
     spending, deficits and debt will reduce the government drain 
     on resources in the private economy needed to create jobs and 
     growth.
       Finally, the plan even includes a provision for free trade, 
     giving the President renewed fast track authority to 
     negotiate further trade agreements eliminating foreign trade 
     barriers and opening new markets for American goods. For 
     nearly 3 years, President Obama failed to even send to 
     Congress free trade agreements President Bush had negotiated 
     with South Korea, Colombia and Panama. But that didn't stop 
     him from political rhetoric blaming Congress for failing to 
     pass them, though Congress did approve them within weeks of 
     Obama finally submitting them. That abusive rhetorical style 
     veers into dishonorable.
       The GOP program is an exciting, comprehensive strategy for 
     creating another generation-long economic boom. It includes 
     all the components of Reaganomics under Congressional 
     control--lower tax rates, deregulation, and restrained 
     spending. Besides the economic logic of each of these 
     components discussed above, the experience with Reaganomics 
     proves the plan will work within a year or so of adoption to 
     get the economy booming again.
       After Reaganomics was adopted in 1981, the economy took off 
     on a 25-year economic boom in late 1982, what Art Laffer and 
     Steve Moore have rightly called the greatest period of wealth 
     creation in the history of the planet. Twenty million new 
     jobs were created in the first 7 years alone, even while an 
     historic inflation was tamed. American economic growth during 
     the 80s was the equivalent of adding the third largest 
     economy in the world, West Germany, to the American economy.
       By contrast, Obama's Jobs Plan is recycled, brain dead, 
     Keynesian economics already tried and failed throughout the 
     Obama Administration, and all around the world for decades 
     before wherever it has been tried. It is about half the size 
     of Obama's nearly one trillion dollar 2009 so-called stimulus 
     plan, but contains otherwise the same policies. That 2009 
     stimulus didn't stimulate anything except runaway government 
     spending, deficits and debt.
       Part of the jobs plan is devoted to increased government 
     spending on supposed infrastructure, which only recalls the 
     laughable ``shovel ready'' jobs of Obama's 2009 stimulus 
     (even Obama has joked about it). Another part is increased 
     spending to bail out spendthrift Democrat states, which Obama 
     calls hiring more teachers, firemen and cops (a state and 
     local government function, not a federal function).
       But economic growth is not based on increased government 
     spending, a fallacy which Wall Street Journal senior 
     economics writer Steve Moore has rightly labeled ``tooth 
     fairy'' economics. That is because the money for such 
     spending needs to come from somewhere, and so drains the 
     private sector to the extent of such increased government 
     spending, leaving no net effect in any event.
       What drives economic growth and prosperity is incentives 
     for increased production, as Reaganomics proved. Obama's 
     assault on such incentives is why trillions are sitting on 
     corporate and bank balance sheets, and America is suffering a 
     capital strike and capital flight. The Occupy Wall Street 
     protestors in threatening property and profits are just 
     further undermining incentives and contributing to that 
     capital strike and capital flight, which only contributes 
     further to extended and increased unemployment.
       The other half of the jobs plan includes temporary payroll 
     tax cuts, which are a continuation and expansion of temporary 
     payroll tax cuts Obama convinced the December, 2010 lame duck 
     Congress to adopt for this year. But such temporary tax 
     reductions do not stimulate economic growth and jobs either, 
     as permanent cuts and incentives are necessary for permanent 
     jobs. That was just proved by the failure of this year's 
     temporary payroll tax cut to promote the long overdue 
     recovery.
       But even worse than the 2009 stimulus is that this current 
     half stimulus echo is accompanied by Obama's proposal for 
     $1.5 trillion in permanent tax increases. That now includes 
     Obama's support for a 5% millionaire's surtax. Those 
     permanent increases only further reduce incentives for 
     production, and only contribute further to economic downturn 
     and stagnation under any economic theory.
       Those tax increases, moreover, would come on top of all the 
     tax increases Obama has already enacted under current law for 
     2013, which major media institutions as well as most of the 
     public are unaware. In that year, the Obamacare tax increases 
     go into effect, and the Bush tax cuts expire, which Obama has 
     refused to renew for the nation's job creators, investors, 
     and more significant small businesses. Under those tax 
     increases, the top tax rates for every major federal tax, 
     except the corporate income tax, already virtually the 
     highest in the industrialized world, with no relief in sight. 
     . . .
       In sharp contrast to Reaganomics, such Keynesian 
     Obamanomics has already failed miserably to generate a timely 
     recovery consistent with the history of the American economy. 
     Before this last recession, since the Great Depression, 
     recessions in America have lasted an average of 10 months, 
     with the longest previously lasting 16 months. But here we 
     are 46 months after the last recession started, and still no 
     real economic recovery, with unemployment still [at] 9%, the 
     longest period of unemployment that high since the Great 
     Depression.
       Moreover, it cannot be said this is because the recession 
     was so bad, as the experience in America has been the deeper 
     the recession the stronger the recovery. Based on these 
     historical precedents, we should be nearing the end of the 
     second year of a booming economy right now. In this crisis, 
     for Obama to now just advocate more of the same, with only 
     new, warmed over rhetoric, is a complete abdication of 
     leadership. Moreover, at this point, outdated economists 
     still peddling hoary Keynesian fallacies should be subject to 
     civil liability for fraud.
       As I explain in my new publication just out this week from 
     Encounter Books, ``Obama and the Crash of 2013,'' more likely 
     than recovery is a renewed double dip recession in 2013, with 
     all the tax rate increases, regulatory burdens building to a 
     crescendo, rising interest rates by then, etc. resulting from 
     Obamanomics. Congressional Republicans should just tell Obama 
     thanks, but no thanks, on his Jobs Plan, and pass their own 
     plan proven to work. Then they can insist he explain to the 
     public why he stands in the way.

  It is a very interesting article there in Forbes, and it is a fairly 
long one, but I think it puts in adequately the argument for adoption 
of this legislation, but it also points out one of the results.
  I would point out, in Investors Business Daily, an editorial entitled 
``Better in Rwanda.'' It says:

       The U.S. has slipped again in world rankings that assess 
     the ease of starting a new business. If we're to bring down 
     our stubbornly high unemployment rate, this trend has to be 
     reversed.
       According to the World Bank's ``Doing Business 2012'' 
     report, America is 13th among

[[Page 16960]]

     183 countries ranked in the ``Starting a Business'' category. 
     In the 2011 report, the U.S. ranked 11th. The year before, it 
     was No. 8.
       In 2009, the U.S. was ranked No. 6. It was fourth in 2008 
     and third in 2007.

  These are not Republican documents. This is not a Republican 
assessment. This is the assessment according to the World Bank: that 
doing business in the United States of America has gone from the third 
best country to do business in, in 2007, to 13th in 2012.
  This is ample and adequate proof that we have borrowed too much, we 
have taxed too much, we have issued so many regulations that we have 
people such as Mr. Langone, the founder of Home Depot--who I will quote 
from in a minute--who says that today he could not start Home Depot all 
over again, one of the great success stories, by the way, in recent 
years.

       In the 2012 ranking, the U.S. trailed such job creators as 
     Macedonia, Georgia, Rwanda, Belarus, Saudi Arabia, Armenia 
     and Puerto Rico, which are ranked No. 6 through No. 12.
       Big companies aren't usually founded as multinational 
     corporations. Most begin as small businesses. And it's small 
     businesses--which employ more than half of the domestic 
     nongovernment workforce--that generate the bulk of new 
     employment opportunities.

  From this article:

       Our own research shows that small businesses create more 
     than 80% of the new jobs in this country. This isn't some 
     fantasy we've cooked up. It's been confirmed in the New York 
     Times by reporter Steve Lohr, who wrote in September that 
     it's an ``irrefutable conclusion that small businesses are 
     this country's jobs creators. Two-thirds of net new jobs are 
     created by companies with fewer than 500 employees,'' Lohr 
     wrote, ``which is the government's definition of a small 
     business.''
       But job creation is more than a function of size. Lohr 
     cites a National Bureau of Economic Research report that says 
     the age of a business is the biggest factor. ``Start-ups,'' 
     says John C. Haltiwanger, a coauthor of the study and an 
     economist at the University of Maryland, ``are where the job 
     creation really actually occurs.''
       Yet it's the small and new businesses that are being choked 
     by government policy. The capital gains tax rate on 
     investments held more than a year, Lohr wrote, directly 
     impacts angel investors' role in providing seed capital for 
     startups. This is a rate that the administration wants to 
     hike from 15% to 20% on households earning more than $250,000 
     a year.
       That's just a single instance of poor public policy. There 
     are many more in the 160,000 pages of federal regulations and 
     in the web of state and local rules that squeeze small 
     businesses and start-ups so tightly that they simply cannot 
     hire. Until this burden is lifted, America's jobs problem is 
     not going to get any better.

  Quite an indictment that the United States of America, the beacon of 
liberty and hope and freedom, an example to all the world, has gone 
from the third best place to do business, to start a business in the 
world, now to No. 13 in just 5 short years.
  So what is the result? I would point out to my colleagues that a 
person such as Mr. Langone, whom I have watched on television on 
several occasions, certainly an outspoken individual to say the least, 
says he could not start his business again under the present 
environment.
  I quote from a Wall Street Journal article, October 15, 2010, 
entitled, ``Stop Bashing Business, Mr. President,'' by Ken Langone.
  The subtitle is, ``If we tried to start The Home Depot today, it's a 
stone cold certainty that it would never have gotten off the ground.''
  I quote from his article.

       If we tried to start Home Depot today, under the kind of 
     onerous regulatory controls that you have advocated--

  Mr. Langone is writing to the President in this--

       If we tried to start Home Depot today, under the kind of 
     onerous regulatory controls that you have advocated, it's a 
     stone cold certainty that our business would never get off 
     the ground, much less thrive.

  It is quite an indictment. He goes on to say:

       Rules against providing stock options would have prevented 
     us from incentivizing worthy employees in the start-up 
     phase--never mind the incredibly high cost of regulatory 
     compliance overall and mandatory health insurance. Still 
     worse are the ever-
     rapacious trial lawyers.

  He goes on to say:

       I stand behind no one in my enthusiasm and dedication to 
     improving our society and especially our health care. It is 
     worth adding that it makes little sense to send Treasury 
     checks to high net-worth people in the form of Social 
     Security. That includes you, me and scores of members of 
     Congress. Why not cut through that red tape, apply a basic 
     means test to that program to make sure that money actually 
     reduces federal national spending and isn't simply shifted 
     elsewhere.

  So it is a very interesting article. He says:

       A little more than 30 years ago, Bernie Marcus, Arthur 
     Blank, Pat Farrah and I got together and founded The Home 
     Depot. Our dream was to create a new kind of home-
     improvement center catering to do-it-yourselfers. The concept 
     was to have a wide assortment, a high level of service, and 
     the lowest pricing possible. We opened the front door in 
     1979, also a time of severe economic slowdown. Yet today, 
     Home Depot is staffed by more than 325,000 dedicated, well-
     trained and highly motivated people offering outstanding 
     service and knowledge to millions of consumers.

  Then he goes on to say:

       If we tried to start Home Depot today, under the kind of 
     onerous regulatory controls that you have advocated, it's a 
     stone cold certainty that our business would never get off 
     the ground, much less thrive.

  A man by the name of Jim McNerney is the CEO of Boeing Company. He 
writes: ``What Business Wants From Washington.'' Again, I quote from 
October 31, 2011. Mr. McNerney says:

       America works best when American business and government 
     complement one another: Business plays the vital role in 
     economic expansion and job creation, while government 
     oversees the environment in which businesses can innovate and 
     compete. This approach fueled prosperity for generations and 
     produced the world's largest and most powerful economy. We 
     seem far adrift of that ideal today. The regulatory climate 
     is a perfect example. A tsunami of new rules and regulations 
     from an alphabet soup of federal agencies is paralyzing 
     investment and increasing by tens of billions of dollars the 
     compliance costs for small and large businesses.
       No one wants to discard truly meaningful public safety or 
     environmental regulations. But what we face is a jobs crisis 
     and regulators charged with protecting the interests of the 
     people are making worse the problem that is hurting them 
     most. Regulatory relief in the energy sector alone could 
     create up to two million new jobs and we won't have to borrow 
     a penny to pay for it.

  He goes on to talk about the supercommittee. He says the White House 
and Congress should build on that momentum and ``enact comprehensive 
pro-growth tax reform that benefits everyone; proceed with regulatory 
reform; and reform and restructure existing entitlement programs.''

       If Washington can once again find the ability to mix 
     democracy and effective governing, American business will 
     once again unleash America's economic potential.

  So Mr. McNerney, in his article, reflects the views of everybody I 
talk to, small businesses and large. They want tax relief. They want 
regulatory relief. In fact, what they want more than anything else is 
some kind of certainty about the economic future and the playing field 
in which they will have to compete. Will there be increasing regulatory 
burden? Will there be a raise in taxes, as is facing us in 2013? Can we 
have a tax code they can understand and comprehend that is fair to one 
and all? Can they unleash their savings accounts and the money they 
have kept in reserve and invest and hire with some confidence that 
there will be a return on that investment, that they will succeed for 
themselves and their children?
  That is what this jobs bill is all about. That is what we are trying 
to get done. This is an attempt to look at the problems America faces 
today, which, by the way, do spill over onto our national security 
problems, as the former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of staff pointed 
out.
  So it affects all of America. It hurts us in so many ways. Yet we sit 
here, and apparently the select committee, the supercommittee as it is 
called, is at some kind of gridlock. We sit here today with one 
amendment here, one amendment here, back and forth, and then run right 
out to the media and attack each other for being uncooperative and why 
are we not more congenial and why are we not willing to compromise.
  Well, I will plead guilty for perhaps not being willing to compromise 
on some issues because some issues are a matter of principle. We do not 
compromise principle, I have found out. But we do come forth with 
proposals

[[Page 16961]]

and try to find those on which we can agree. I do not know why we do 
not agree on a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution. Every 
State, every mayor, every city councilman, every county supervisor, 
every one of them is faced with the first problem of a balanced budget.
  Why should we exempt ourselves? Why can't we together work out the 
details concerning a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution? The 
overwhelming majority of Americans would heave a sigh of relief if we 
ever did that because then they would know we would be more careful 
stewards of their tax dollars. It seems to me we could move forward 
with that.
  Enhanced rescission authority. I believe the President of the United 
States should have enhanced rescission authority, what we used to know 
of as the old line-item veto, taking those lines in appropriations 
bills he objects to and vetoing them--and I will not go through the 
complications of how it is done--but have them taken out, with certain 
restrictions as to how many times he could do it. Then, like every 
Governor--not every Governor but most Governors in America have--to 
line item out, without having to veto the entire appropriations bill, 
sometimes maybe even causing damage to our ability to govern.
  I am well aware if we voted for an enhanced rescission by the 
Congress of the United States, signed by the President, the President 
would probably line-item veto some programs that I would object to him 
doing so. I am willing--more than willing--to take that pain as opposed 
to today where we continue to have appropriations bills which in many 
cases people have not read or truly understand.
  Tax reform. Every place I go people talk to me about the need for tax 
reform. I have yet to meet an American who understands completely the 
Tax Code. I have yet to meet an American who believes our Tax Code is 
fair. I have yet to meet an American who says: If you would just give 
me three tax brackets, a very small number of deductions, and then I 
could fill out my tax return on a post card or in the case of some of 
the countries--the Baltic countries that used to be under the Soviet 
Union--on my computer. Then you would see greater compliance, you would 
see less of a need for the IRS, and you would see Americans more than 
willing to pay their fair share if they believed the system was fair.
  It is not fair when major corporations and individuals pay no taxes 
because they have bright lawyers, and they take advantage of all of the 
loopholes and deductions they have been able to get put into the Tax 
Code over the years with the help of very powerful lobbyists in this 
town.
  Repatriation and territorial reform. The Presiding Officer, the 
Senator from North Carolina, and I have proposed a pretty simple 
proposal; that is, the $1.4 trillion that is now sitting overseas 
because they will not bring it back because of the tax situation; that 
we could bring that money home, and we could provide a permanent 
incentive with that for repatriating these foreign earnings.
  I say to my friend from North Carolina, I have been kind of 
astonished at some of the resistance to this where people say it would 
not do any good. Help me out. It would not do any good to bring $1.4 
trillion back to the United States of America? Do we really believe 
that would just go in peoples' wallets and purses? Of course not.
  The Senator from North Carolina and I have talked to too many people, 
corporation executives, who have said: Yes, I will not only create jobs 
and invest that money, but I will give you a plan. I will give a plan 
that we will implement with that money--that IBM or Boeing or other 
major corporations that have this money parked overseas.
  They are enthusiastic about it. Yet, unbelievably, there are people 
who argue that it would have no effect whatsoever on our economy. It is 
hard to understand.
  Now we obviously get into ObamaCare. I noticed that the latest 
polling showed, I believe, that some 54 percent of the American people 
want the health care law repealed. Thirty-some percent still support 
it. The fact is that over time, as Americans learn more and more about 
the health care law we passed, they have become more and more opposed 
to it. They are angry because the whole purpose of the health care act 
was to provide all Americans with health care that is affordable but 
also to bend the curve of the inflation of health care in America 
because we all know the present inflation of health care is 
unsustainable. It is unsustainable. Yet what has been the result since 
the passage? Inflation of health care continues to go up; the cost of 
health care, whether it be to the men and women serving or average 
citizens, continues to go up, and it has to stop. We need to look at 
that and look at medical malpractice reform. In Texas today, they 
passed medical malpractice reform, and it seems to work, and most 
people are happy with it.
  The Dodd-Frank bill--it still is stunning to me that we passed this 
regulatory reform bill; they called it a financial takeover that the 
Dodd-Frank bill is commonly known as--the whole purpose of it was that 
we would have legislation that would ensure that never again would any 
institution be too big to fail because the taxpayers never again should 
have to bail out any financial institution. Is there anybody who 
believes that these huge institutions on Wall Street haven't grown 
bigger, that they are not bigger to fail than they used to be? The fact 
is that they are. What did we get? We got a whole bunch of regulations 
and different bureaucracies, some of them less accountable than others, 
and obviously a damper on some of the financial activities.
  We need to make sure no financial institution is too big to fail. We 
need to assure the American people that never again will they suffer 
the way they have during this period of time because of the malfeasance 
of others. Unfortunately, the Dodd-Frank bill did not achieve that 
goal.
  We need to have a moratorium on regulations. Senator Johnson of 
Wisconsin has a bill that prohibits any Federal agency from issuing new 
regulations until the unemployment rate is equal to or less than 7.7 
percent. Senators Snowe and Coburn have introduced legislation that is 
part of this Freedom from Restrictive Excessive Executive Demands and 
Onerous Mandates Act, which strengthens and streamlines the regulatory 
act by requiring regulators to include ``indirect economic impacts'' in 
small business analyses, requiring periodic review and sunset of 
existing rules, and expanding business review panels as a requirement 
for all Federal agencies instead of just the Environmental Protection 
Agency and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.
  I notice my colleague, Dr. Barrasso, from Wyoming on the floor, who 
knows more about programs in the health care reform act. I will try to 
be polite and refer to it today as the health care reform act.
  I ask unanimous consent to engage in a colloquy with the Senator from 
Wyoming.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. McCAIN. Does Senator Barrasso believe or could he tell us, 
perhaps, the effects on the cost of health care since passage of this 
legislation and perhaps what we need to do to really fix health care in 
America, which we all agree needs to be fixed?
  Mr. BARRASSO. I agree with my colleague from Arizona. I thank him for 
his leadership and congratulate him for the piece of legislation that 
is currently on the floor. I am here to speak in support of it because 
I want to get small businesses hiring again and get people back to 
work.
  We need to find ways to make it easier and cheaper for the private 
sector to create jobs. This health care law my colleague has asked me 
about is one thing the President promised, saying: If you pass it, 
health insurance for families will go down--he said about $2,500 per 
family per year. Instead, we have seen--in response to the Senator--
health insurance rates go up. Across the board, people agree they have 
gone higher and faster than if the law had never been signed.
  I think it was interesting and telling yesterday that the voters of 
Ohio went

[[Page 16962]]

to the polls and voted overwhelmingly--almost 2 to 1--to say they don't 
want to be forced to participate in the President's so-called health 
care law. What people in Ohio and people in my State and in all of the 
States around the country are asking for--and this is my goal--is to 
provide people with the care they want from the doctor they want--the 
care they need from the doctor they want at a cost they can afford.
  There are things we need to do, but to put these additional expenses 
and mandates on the small businesses of this country, the job creators, 
just makes it harder and more expensive for those small businesses to 
hire more people. At a time in this Nation when we have 14 million 
Americans out of work, over 9 percent unemployment, we need to take 
positive steps to help them get back to work. I view this health care 
law and the expenses as a heavy, wet blanket on small businesses that 
are trying to hire people. We know of small businesses around the 
country that know that the penalties are significant when they hire 
that 50th employee. We have businesses that could grow, but they are 
not going to hire that extra person because of the significant expenses 
to the business. They need some certainty. They are getting so much 
uncertainty out of Washington with rules, regulations, redtape, the 
expense of the health care law, and the threats that keep coming of 
increased taxes. Small businesses and businesses are just not hiring.
  That is why I am here to commend and compliment my colleague from 
Arizona for bringing forth to the American people a positive proposal 
to put people back to work.
  Mr. McCAIN. I ask the Senator this on two other issues. One issue was 
not included in the health care reform act, which is the issue of 
medical malpractice, which the Senator, Dr. Barrasso, has had a lot of 
personal experience with. The other is this--which I think is 
symptomatic of really the way we cobbled this whole thing together, 
which is that we have now found a provision in the bill that cannot be 
and will not be enforced, the so-called CLASS Act.
  Mr. BARRASSO. Both of those are areas where there can be significant 
savings.
  Folks have said that if they do this sort of legislative approach to 
remove this lawsuit abuse, the savings to the Federal budget would be 
about $50 billion over the budgeting timeframe--$50 billion. Any 
physician, nurse, practitioner, or physician assistant would say the 
savings would even be greater because of the additional tests and so-
called defensive medicine that is practiced in an effort to protect 
hospitals, physicians, health care providers from the possibility of a 
lawsuit. They do a lot of extra diagnostic studies--x rays, CAT scans, 
MRIs, and blood tests--to try to not miss something, which is very 
unlikely, but they want to protect themselves from a suit. I think the 
savings would be even greater, but even the government accountants say 
it would save $50 billion.
  The other is the so-called CLASS Act--something one of my Democratic 
colleagues said was comparable to a Ponzi scheme that even Bernie 
Madoff would be proud of. It was an accounting gimmick, a bookkeeping 
trick used during debate and passage of the so-called health care law. 
It was aimed at trying to bring money in in the first 5 years of an 
accounting scheme where they would then not have to pay for any 
services and to start paying for services about the sixth year, and 
then the expenses would go up and up. What they have now realized and 
what we realized on this side of the aisle initially, right away, and 
pointed out on the floor before the vote, is that this could not work 
long term.
  In an effort to try to use this scheme to say the health care law 
would pay for itself, they forced this through, crammed it through, as 
they did with the rest of the health care law. Now we find out that 
even the administration says this cannot work, it is not going to work. 
OK, just repeal that part of the law. Oh, they sure don't want to do 
that because that would admit it was a scheme from the beginning.
  Mr. McCAIN. Would it not also disturb the predictions as far as the 
fiscal impact of the CLASS Act as well?
  Mr. BARRASSO. It would. It would undermine the argument of the 
President, who says this is going to pay for itself, when, in fact, it 
is not.
  It is interesting, if you ask people watching at home or when you go 
to townhall meetings, do you think under this health care law your 
health care will be better or worse, they will say worse. Very few 
think it will be improved under this law the President forced through. 
And then if you ask the same group of people, a cross-section of people 
in our States, if they think the cost of their care will go down, as 
the President promised, or go up, they all say it is going to go up. So 
they are going to have to pay more, get less, and be unhappy with it, 
which is why I think yesterday in Ohio two-thirds of the voters who 
turned out--and the margin was over a 1 million voters difference 
between those for and against. They overwhelmingly voted to say: We 
don't want to have to live under the Obama health care law; we want to 
be able to opt out of that, which is all small businesses want to do. 
They don't want to have to deal with these expensive bandaids. Let's 
work together and within our States and work with other small 
businesses, but we don't want to live under these very expensive 
Washington mandates, which makes it that much harder for us to hire 
people.
  Mr. McCAIN. Can we return just for a minute to medical malpractice 
reform because many people, when you talk about that, believe there has 
to be appropriate compensation when malpractice occurs. We all know 
malpractice occurs, so we don't want the innocent victims of medical 
malpractice--however it occurs in the health care scenario--to not be 
able to get just compensation in the case of malpractice on the part of 
the caregiver.
  Mr. BARRASSO. That is exactly right. I agree. Studies have shown that 
in the system we live under today, less than one-third of the money 
actually goes to people who are deserving and ought to be receiving 
that money, and the other two-thirds goes to the system--lawyers, 
courts, and expert witnesses. So very little of the money paid in 
premiums actually gets to the injured party.
  There are ways to do a better job of that with significant savings in 
the process--making sure people are appropriately compensated if an 
injury occurs but at the same time getting savings out of a system 
which is overwrought with money going to the wrong place and which also 
results in so many unnecessary tests being done in efforts of doctors 
and nurses and hospitals to protect themselves.
  Mr. McCAIN. I thank the Senator. I appreciate his unique expertise in 
the health care issues that are still transcendent in this country. I 
thank him for his enormous contributions.
  I want to continue with some of this legislation.
  The Unfunded Mandates Accountability Act, which was originally an act 
of Senator Portman's, requires agencies specifically to address the 
potential effect of new regulations on job creation and to consider 
market-based and nongovernmental alternatives to regulation, broadens 
the scope of the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act to include rules issued 
by independent agencies and rules that impose direct or indirect 
economic costs of $100 million or more, requires agencies to adopt the 
least burdensome regulatory options and achieves the goal of the 
statute authorizing the rule and creates a meaningful right to judicial 
review of an agency's compliance with the law. If there is anything 
that has grown out of control, in the view of this Member, it is 
government regulations. First, we had a trickle, but now it is a flood, 
of government regulations, which then impose additional costs, which 
then take money away from job creation and, in particular, small 
business people. This is where accountability of the unfunded mandates 
is, at the very least, called for.
  Senator Barrasso may want to discuss this next provision. The 
Government Litigation Savings Act reforms

[[Page 16963]]

the Equal Access to Justice Act by disallowing the reimbursement of 
attorneys' fees and costs to well-funded special interest groups that 
repeatedly sue the Federal Government. The bill retains Federal 
reimbursements for individuals, small businesses, veterans, and others 
who must fight in court against wrongful government action by 
eliminating taxpayer-funded reimbursement of attorneys' fees for 
wealthy special interest groups. The legislation helps eliminate 
repeated procedural lawsuits that delay permitting exploration and land 
management.
  If the Senator would like to comment.
  Mr. BARRASSO. Madam President, I would like to comment. Section 8 of 
this Jobs Through Growth Act is the Government Litigation Savings Act. 
This was something introduced in the House by Cynthia Lummis, a Member 
of Congress from Wyoming, and myself in the Senate. This legislation 
will return the Equal Access to Justice Act--or what I refer to as 
EAJA--back to its original purpose.
  The small business entity or individual citizen should not have their 
individual liberties overrun by Washington. EAJA was meant to provide 
people with limited financial resources--veterans, Social Security 
claimants, small business owners--the ability to defend themselves 
against harmful government actions. That is how it was intended to be 
used. It allows individuals to sue the Federal Government, to recover 
part of their attorneys' fees and the costs.
  This was a well-intended law, but it has been exploited--exploited by 
large environmental groups with large legal departments--and it is 
being used now as a profit center for these large organizations through 
litigation against our government, and they are all getting paid to do 
it. The total amount that has been paid is unknown, and the reason it 
is unknown is that since 1995 something called the Paperwork Reduction 
Act defunded all the reporting requirements.
  There is an attorney in Wyoming, Karen Budd-Falen, who has conducted 
research to see how much money a lot of these environmental groups have 
made. She found 14 different environmental groups have brought over 
1,200--14 groups have brought over 1,200--Federal cases in 19 States 
and the District of Columbia. They have collected over $37 million in 
taxpayer dollars through this Equal Access to Justice Act and similar 
laws, and this doesn't even include settlements and fees that were 
sealed from public view. This is what we can find in public documents.
  Lowell Baier, who is the president emeritus of the Boone and Crockett 
Club, tracked through the IRS 990 forms and found that of the most 
litigious so-called nonprofit groups, they average over $9 million a 
year of taxpayer money, which of course hinders economic growth, limits 
creation of jobs by individuals and by small businesses and by energy 
producers, farmers, and ranchers.
  So I am very happy to see my colleague included our efforts in this 
overall jobs package because I think these are the sorts of things we 
are trying to overcome and that make it harder and more expensive for 
the private sector to create jobs. I want to find ways to make it 
easier and cheaper for the private sector to create jobs.
  If I could, we have been talking about the private sector. The 
majority leader has said: Oh, the problem isn't the private sector. He 
said it was the public sector--the government. Government is doing just 
fine. It is the private sector that has lost over 1\1/2\ million jobs 
from February of 2009 to September of 2011.
  Mr. McCAIN. I thank my friend.
  Included in this package is the Employment Protection Act, introduced 
by Senator Toomey. It requires the EPA to analyze the impact on 
unemployment levels and economic activity before issuing any 
regulation, policy statement, guidance document, endangerment finding 
or denying any permit. Each analysis is required to include a 
description of estimated job losses and decreased economic activity due 
to the denial of a permit, including any permit denied under the 
Federal Water Pollution Control Act.
  Senator Johanns has contributed the Farm Dust Regulation Prevention 
Act, which prevents the EPA from regulating dust in rural America while 
still maintaining protections to public health under the Clean Air Act.
  The National Labor Relations Board reform was introduced by Senator 
Graham of South Carolina. From backdoor card check, to threatened jobs 
in South Carolina, the out-of-control National Labor Relations Board is 
paying back union officials at the expense of worker rights and jobs. 
To create more jobs, legislation prohibiting the NLRB from stopping new 
plants and legislation to prevent coercive, quick-snap union elections 
should be passed.
  I am sure my colleagues are very well aware of the unprecedented and 
incredible action by the NLRB that basically prohibited a major 
aircraft manufacturing company from locating in the State of South 
Carolina, where it is a right-to-work State--an unbelievable overreach 
by a Federal bureaucracy--which still staggers the imagination, but it 
also shows that elections have consequences.
  There is also the Government Neutrality and Contracting Act. It 
repeals the President's order requiring government-funded construction 
projects to only use union labor. This would reduce costs of Federal 
jobs projects by as much as 18 percent. That was Senator Vitter's 
contribution.
  Senator Shelby has introduced the Financial Regulatory Responsibility 
Act, which requires financial regulators to conduct consistent economic 
analysis on every new rule they propose, provide clear justification 
for the rules, and determine the economic impacts of proposed 
rulemakings, including their effects on job growth and net job 
creation.
  With so many of these pieces of legislation I am talking about, a lot 
of Americans might say: Don't we do that already? Unfortunately, we 
don't.
  Senator Roberts has the Regulatory Responsibility for our Economy 
Act, which codifies and strengthens President Obama's January 18 
Executive order that directs agencies within to review, modify, 
streamline, expand or repeal those significant regulatory actions that 
are duplicative, unnecessary, overly burdensome or would have 
significant economic impacts on Americans.
  Congressman Gibbs, over on the House side, has the Reducing 
Regulatory Burdens Act, which eliminates a new duplicate EPA regulation 
that will cost millions of dollars to implement without providing 
additional environmental protection.
  On domestic job energy promotion we have, from Senator Vitter, the 
Domestic Jobs, Domestic Energy, and Deficit Reduction Act that would 
require the Department of the Interior to move forward with offshore 
energy exploration and create a timeframe for environmental and 
judicial review.
  Senator Murkowski has included the Jobs and Energy Permitting Act, 
which eliminates the confusion and uncertainty surrounding the EPA's 
decisionmaking process for air permits, which is delaying energy 
exploration in the Alaska and outercontinental shelf. It will create 
over 50,000 jobs and produce 1 million barrels of oil a day.
  There is no one in this body who knows as much about these issues as 
the distinguished Senator from Alaska.
  Senator Barrasso again has brought forward the American Energy and 
Western Jobs Act. The bill streamlines the preleasing, leasing, and 
developmental process for drilling on public land and requires the 
administration to create goals for American oil and gas production.
  The Mining Jobs Protection Act by Senators McConnell, Inhofe, and 
Paul requires the EPA to use or lose their 404 permitting review 
authority. Under this bill, the EPA will have 60 days to voice concerns 
about a permit application or the permit moves forward. Any concerns 
voiced by the EPA would need to be published in the Federal Register 
within 30 days.
  Senator Inhofe has contributed the Energy Tax Prevention Act, which 
prohibits the EPA from using the Clean Air Act to regulate greenhouse 
gases.
  The Repeal Restrictions on Government Use of Domestic Alternative

[[Page 16964]]

Fuels Act would repeal section 526 of the Energy Independence and 
Security Act of 2007, which prohibits Federal agencies from contracting 
for alternative fuels such as coal-to-liquid fuel.
  The Public Lands Job Creation Act of Senator Heller eliminates the 
burdensome and unnecessary delay in approval of projects on Federal 
lands by allowing the permitting process to move forward unless the 
Department of the Interior objects within 45 days. This will streamline 
the permitting process for domestic energy and mineral production on 
BLM lands without compromising environmental analysis.
  Senator McConnell has introduced the renew trade promotion authority, 
which would provide the President with fast-track authority to 
negotiate trade agreements that will eliminate foreign trade barriers 
and open new markets for American goods.
  We all know trade promotion authority is vital to the eventual 
enactment of free-trade agreements. I am incredibly depressed that we 
would not have renewed this trade promotion authority along with the 
passage of the long overdue free-trade agreements we just passed 
through this body.
  The President and my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have 
become fond of saying Republicans have no plan for creating jobs and 
putting America back on a path to fiscal prosperity. Nothing could be 
further from the truth. As I have just laid out in the plan before us 
today, we have compiled many job-creating measures offered by our 
colleagues in the Senate.
  Furthermore, since January, our colleagues in the House of 
Representatives have passed at least 22 job-creating bills. Guess how 
many of the bills that were passed by the House of Representatives have 
gotten consideration in the Senate. Five.
  Similar to our plan, our colleagues in the House have focused a great 
deal of attention on empowering small businesses and reducing 
government barriers to job creation. Here are just a few of the 
commonsense, job-creating measures passed by the House, none of which 
have been considered by the Senate: review of Federal regulations, 
reducing regulatory burdens, the Energy Tax Prevention Act, the Clean 
Water Cooperative Federalism Act, Consumer Financial Protection and 
Soundness Improvement Act, Protecting Jobs From Government Interference 
Act, Transparency and Regulatory Analysis of Impacts on the Nation Act, 
Cement Sector Regulatory Relief Act, and the EPA Regulatory Relief Act.
  So the next time we hear the President of the United States say 
Republicans are blocking or have failed to take up or failed to bring 
forward a proposal, we have proposals, and we have measures that have 
been passed by the House. The proposals in this jobs plan bill deserve 
the consideration of this body.
  We need to prove to the American people that we will do everything we 
can to eliminate the waste of their hard-earned dollars. Enacting an 
enhanced rescission authority to give the President statutory line-item 
veto authority to reduce wasteful spending is an issue we have been 
looking at for years.
  Why do we need to grant the President enhanced rescission line-item 
veto authority? According to a database created by Taxpayers Against 
Earmarks, washingtonwatch.com, and Taxpayers for Common Sense, for 
fiscal year 2011, Members requested over 39,000 earmarks totaling over 
$130 billion. Just last December, we were forced to consider, at the 
very last minute, an Omnibus appropriations bill that was 1,924 pages 
long and contained the funding for all 12 of the annual appropriations 
bills for a grand total of $1.1 trillion. In the short time I had to 
review that massive piece of legislation before it was brought to the 
floor, I identified approximately 6,488 earmarks, totaling nearly $8.3 
billion.
  We need an enhanced rescission act.
  Thankfully, the massive omnibus was not enacted. But these earmarks, 
and the process by which they make their way into spending bills, are 
evidence that the system is badly broken and in need of reforms.
  I have more to say, and I have taken too much time in the eyes of 
many of my colleagues, perhaps, and I want to apologize to any of my 
colleagues who had planned to speak on the floor and have been 
preempted by my long remarks. But I feel that we have an obligation to 
the American people to address the issues that are of greatest concern 
and the greatest amount of pain to them today, and that is jobs and the 
economy--jobs and the economy.
  I care a lot about our national security challenges and I care a lot 
about what is going in the world. But when I go home and a woman stands 
up at a townhall meeting with her two children and says, I don't have a 
job and I am being kicked out of my home next week; when we have people 
who are being thrown out of their houses, and over half of the homes in 
my home State of Arizona are under water--in other words, worth less 
than the mortgage payments they are required to make--when we have 
chronic unemployment that in some cases, such as down in Yuma, AZ, is 
well into double digits, then we have to get going on getting some jobs 
and the economy back on the right track.
  I want to repeat--and I don't mean to be confrontational with my 
colleagues, but we tried for 2 years, when the other side had the 
majority in the House and the Senate and they had passed major pieces 
of legislation that were advertised to get our economy back on track--
they didn't--can't we try something different? Can't we try the kinds 
of things that have brought us out of other recessions? Can't we ask 
our colleagues in the Senate to create a simplified tax system that the 
Heritage Foundation says, by lowering the corporate rate to 25 percent, 
the number of jobs in the United States would grow on an average of 
581,000 annually from 2011 to 2020? Can't we look at this regulatory 
system, which has put such a damper on small businesses and large? 
Can't we give American people a break from the flood of new regulations 
that continues to come down and is a major factor in this environment 
of uncertainty amongst businesses small and large?
  The approval rating of the American people of Congress is now, the 
latest poll I saw, 9 percent. That is something that I joke about, but 
it is also something that grieves me a great deal because I believe the 
overwhelming majority of the Members of Congress are here and are 
dedicated to serving their constituents in the most honorable fashion 
and in the best possible way they can, according to their values and 
their principles.
  But it is a fact that the American people are very angry and they are 
very upset. One of the major reasons is, of course, they have not seen 
progress in the economy. And that is very understandable. We are now 
seeing these Occupy Wall Street people. The tea partiers will probably 
be rejuvenated. We are seeing expressions of anger and frustration all 
over the country, and it is unfortunate. But I believe that a couple of 
things are going to happen unless we act in a more efficient fashion 
that addresses the concerns of the American people, and that is I 
believe you will see the rise of a third party in this country, and I 
think also you will see greater and greater manifestations of 
opposition to business as usual here in Washington.
  As I said at the beginning of my remarks, I am more than eager to sit 
down with my colleagues on the other side of the aisle and come 
together particularly on some of the issues that clearly we have stated 
on both sides we are in favor of.
  Again, my apologies to my colleagues whose time I may have preempted 
on the floor. But I think this issue of jobs, which we will be voting 
on tomorrow, is one that deserved more than passing attention.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Whitehouse). The Senator from Connecticut.
  Mr. BLUMENTHAL. I thank the Senator from Arizona for his remarks, and 
certainly for me, at least, he owes no apology for having spoken his 
mind. I always welcome the opportunity to listen, and I have done so, 
and am honored to follow him.

[[Page 16965]]




                           Amendment No. 927

  Today I speak as we approach Veterans Day, and I believe this 
Veterans Day may be particularly significant for our Nation in part 
because we have the opportunity in this Chamber to honor some very 
special veterans, the Montford Point marines, who graced us with their 
presence yesterday as we celebrated the 236th birthday of the U.S. 
Marine Corps. They were present then. They were present in 1942, when 
they stepped forward to serve and fight for this Nation. They are 
African Americans who fought and served for this Nation at a time when 
they anticipated no recognition and certainly no honor, and we have the 
opportunity between now and Veterans Day to approve a measure that 
would grant them the Congressional Gold Medal, which they richly 
deserve and they have earned through their service. They are the 
epitome of the Marines--they happen to be marines--and of the service 
men and women whom we honor on this Veterans Day. They happen to be men 
of the ``greatest generation,'' the World War II generation. They are 
among the greatest of that generation.
  I had the great honor to be with them yesterday, in fact to be the 
honored guest in the Russell Building when the commandant and I had the 
privilege to honor them. Their presence yesterday reminds us of our 
continuing obligation to all veterans and of the need to make the well-
being of our veterans a priority, as I have sought to do.
  Indeed, my first bill, entitled Honoring All Veterans, has as its 
objective to leave no veteran behind. It offers a comprehensive set of 
measures to assure that we keep faith with every veteran, every veteran 
who needs a job, every veteran who needs better health care or 
counseling or training or education. These commitments we have made as 
a nation to all of our veterans and now we have the opportunity to keep 
those promises and keep faith with them, as we have a solemn obligation 
to do every day, every year, not just Veterans Day.
  I want to thank Senator Harkin of Iowa for cosponsoring the 
legislation I have offered, and also to thank Senator Tester, Chairman 
Murray of the Veterans Committee, and Ranking Member Burr of that 
committee for their work to address these challenges recognized by the 
Honoring All Veterans Act and this comprehensive measure, VOW to Hire 
Heroes amendment. Truly, we should vow to hire our heroes, and we 
should do so not just in words but in deed, not just in rhetoric but in 
action, and I am proud to be a cosponsor of the important tax credit 
provision in the Tester veterans jobs amendment for businesses that 
hire veterans.
  Helping veterans is a challenge that will require the engagement of 
everyone in the community, from Congress to veterans service 
organizations and business leaders across the board, across the 
country, across the State of Connecticut.
  At a recent veterans hiring forum I hosted in Connecticut, I heard 
firsthand the challenges in veterans recruitment, and what innovative 
companies such as United Reynolds were doing to hire skilled and 
talented veterans in this symposium in that setting. They provided an 
example of what we can and should do.
  I see my cosponsorship of this amendment as honoring a commitment to 
push for legislation to provide incentives to firms to hire unemployed 
veterans, and to make it easier for companies to connect with veterans 
so they can fill some of the jobs that are now available. There are 
jobs available, and we should give our veterans the skills they need, 
skills they may have acquired in part during their service that need to 
be honed and expanded, and we have that opportunity. I want to thank 
all of those Senators for championing this measure.
  My own legislation, Honoring All Veterans Act, allows a veteran to 
take the Transition Assistance Program, known as TAP, an interagency 
workshop coordinated by the Departments of Defense, Labor, and Veterans 
Affairs for up to 1 year after separation at any military facility. The 
bill before us makes participation in the program mandatory. Low 
participation rates in this program are especially concerning, as 
junior members tend to be those most in need of the services provided 
by TAP, and the benefits available through the VA for many skills such 
as simple skills, writing resumes or interviewing have never been 
needed or learned before. Not having such skills, not knowing how to 
interview or write a resume puts them at a severe disadvantage when 
they are attempting to enter and succeed in the workplace after they 
exchange their military uniform for civilian clothes.
  Section 222 of the VOW to Hire Heroes Act authorizes an assessment of 
the equivalence between skills developed in military occupational 
specialties and qualifications required for civilian employment with 
the private sector.
  I like to say that when you call out the National Guard, you call out 
the best in America. When you call out the Connecticut National Guard, 
you call out truly the very best in America. The military recruits the 
most talented men and women in America to serve, and then invests 
heavily in those skills and their professional development. Yet when 
they enter the civilian world, very often those skills are simply 
unrecognized by laws requiring separate training or licensure, and we 
ought to do more to recognize the expertise and experience the military 
gives to these brave men and women. That is why I authored a similar 
provision in the Honoring All Veterans Act to ensure that civilian 
employers and educational institutions recognize a veteran's military 
training.
  The Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America reported--and I am 
quoting--61 percent of employers do not believe they have a complete 
understanding of the qualifications ex-servicemembers offer. And, 
recently separated servicemembers with college degrees earn on average 
almost $10,000 less than their nonveteran counterparts.
  I applaud my colleagues for including section 222 in the VOW to Hire 
Heroes Act. It is a vital step toward helping employers find the 
employees they need and toward closing the income gap that exists now.
  The legislation before us also expands education and training 
opportunities for older veterans by providing 100,000 unemployed 
veterans of past eras and wars with up to 1 year of additional GI 
benefits to go toward education and training programs at community 
colleges and technical schools. I am proud of the bipartisan compromise 
to extend this period for 1 year. I hoped it would be even further 
broadened and extended, but this measure is a great first start toward 
providing skills for job opportunities that now exist and can be filled 
by men and women coming out of our military to civilian life.
  Let me say, to come back to the Montford Point marines, I want to 
thank Senator Pat Roberts who was with me yesterday at the 236th 
birthday celebration, and most especially I thank the Senator from 
North Carolina, Kay Hagan, who is with us today, for her leadership on 
this issue. Truly, we can make this Veterans Day special for all of us 
in this Nation if we approve this Congressional Gold Medal to men who 
stepped forward to serve and fight when this Nation failed to 
appreciate their service and valor. Now we have the opportunity to make 
good on our commitments to them as veterans--to all of our veterans--in 
this measure. I am proud to join colleagues on both sides of the aisle 
in nearing now the number that is necessary to approve that measure, 
and I hope we can reach that kind of bipartisan consensus on that 
legislation, but also on the broader VOW to Hire Heroes Act, that can 
lead us back to the kind of bipartisan approach on so many issues that 
we need to emulate in this body.
  I thank my colleagues for supporting this measure, and I yield the 
floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Carolina.
  Mrs. HAGAN. Mr. President, I stand today, just 2 days away from 
Veterans Day, to urge my colleagues to support our courageous service 
men and women, our veterans and their families, by voting for the VOW 
to Hire Heroes Act of 2011. This legislation would have a tremendous 
impact on every

[[Page 16966]]

part of our country, but it would be especially significant in my home 
State of North Carolina, the most military-friendly State in the 
Nation.
  In North Carolina we are blessed to be home to so many of our 
country's heroes. I don't think most people understand that nationwide 
military servicemembers account for only 1 percent of our country's 
population. But in North Carolina, more than one-third of our 
population is either in the military, is a veteran, or has an immediate 
family member who is in the military or is a veteran. Over 700,000 
veterans call North Carolina home.
  I know that makes our State stronger. I know because, like so many 
North Carolinians, I too come from a strong military family that 
instilled in me a sense of responsibility to my community and to my 
country. My husband, my father, my brother are all Navy veterans. My 
father-in-law was a two-star general in the Marine Corps, and my two 
nephews have both served in Iraq and Afghanistan.
  I know because I have traveled my State's eight military bases from 
Fort Bragg to Cherry Point to Camp Lejeune to bases in Iraq, 
Afghanistan, and Kuwait. I have seen up close the incredible demands 
placed on our military and the remarkable bravery and patriotism they 
exhibit each and every day.
  I know because whether I am meeting a general, a young private, a 
wounded warrior, or a 90-year-old veteran traveling on one of the 
Flights of Honor that bring our World War II veterans to DC to see 
their monuments, there are certain qualities that I always recognize in 
those who serve in the Armed Forces. These are selflessness, personal 
integrity, and an unmatched work ethic and unwavering courage.
  I take it personally as a Senator from North Carolina, as well as a 
proud daughter, wife, and sister of a veteran when our military members 
and their families are hurting. I take it personally when this country 
of ours does not live up to the promises we make to our service men and 
women. Right now our military families are unquestionably hurting. 
Right now we have lapsed in our commitment to our heroes.
  As has been said many times on this floor, the unemployment rate 
among Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans is an unconscionably high 12.1 
percent. That is more than 3 percentage points higher than the national 
average unemployment. That is about a quarter of a million men and 
women, all of whom have put their lives on the line to protect our 
country, who are now struggling just to earn a paycheck--240,000 heroes 
with irreplaceable skill sets and experience who cannot find a job.
  We cannot forget that every unemployed veteran has a family, a family 
who has likely spent untold sleepless nights worrying if their loved 
one is safe. Now, after years of selfless service, these families are 
forced to worry if they can pay their monthly bills, if they can even 
afford to keep their homes.
  According to HUD's 2010 Annual Homeless Assessment Report, more than 
1,000 North Carolina veterans are homeless and spend every night 
without a roof over their head. That is simply 1,000 too many. This is 
not a fate that we can accept for our veterans. This is not the country 
we strive to be. We need to support our veterans when they make the 
transition from the military to the civilian workforce. We need to 
provide them with the training and resources they need to transfer 
those skills to the private sector. We need to encourage our business 
owners to employ some of our country's most highly trained, highly 
ambitious, and highly motivated individuals.
  The VOW to Hire Heroes Act does just that. It provides a tax credit 
of up to $5,600 for hiring veterans. For our wounded warriors it 
includes a tax credit of up to $9,600--for hiring veterans with 
service-connected disabilities. It requires our service men and women 
transitioning to the civilian workforce to participate in the 
Transition Assistance Program, which provides services such as resume 
writing workshops and career counseling to help these individuals land 
the jobs that are available. It expands education and training 
opportunities at our community colleges and technical schools for 
100,000 unemployed veterans who served prior to September 11.
  I am pleased to say that some provisions of this legislation are very 
similar to a bipartisan bill that Senator Scott Brown and I introduced 
earlier this year. The priorities this legislation focuses on are not 
Democratic priorities. They are not Republican priorities. Supporting 
our veterans is and has always been an American priority. We owe it to 
them, but we also owe it to our future.
  I hope many saw the August cover story in Time magazine that 
described our veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan as ``the 
next greatest generation.'' If you have not read it, I highly encourage 
you to do so. The author, Joe Klein, whom I met on a military transport 
plane in Afghanistan, spent the past 5 years visiting with Iraq and 
Afghanistan veterans across the country, including two best friends he 
met from North Carolina. These friends, Dale Beatty and John Gallina, 
whom I met last year in Charlotte, joined the North Carolina National 
Guard together, deployed to Iraq together, and nearly died together 
when their humvee was blown up by an antitank mine. Dale lost both his 
legs and John suffered a traumatic brain injury.
  When a local homebuilders association offered to build Dale a home, 
Dale and John were both inspired to assist other handicapped veterans. 
Today their nonprofit Purple Heart Homes, headquartered in Statesville, 
NC, helps build and adapt homes for service-disabled veterans.
  Dale and John represent, as ADM Mike Mullen said, ``part of a 
generation who is flat out wired to contribute, flat out wired to 
serve.'' As GEN David Petraeus told Time magazine, our veterans ``have 
had to show incredible flexibility, never knowing whether they're going 
to be greeted with a handshake or hand grenade. They've been exposed to 
experiences that are totally unique. . . . I believe they are our next 
great generation of leaders.''
  There are many more Dale Beattys and John Gallinas out there, but we 
cannot leave our next great generation of leaders standing in an 
unemployment line. We must come together and fight for our veterans and 
their families just as hard as they have fought for our freedoms. We 
must pass the VOW to Hire Heroes Act.
  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.
  Mr. BEGICH. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the 
quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. BEGICH. Mr. President, I rise today to express my strong support 
for the VOW to Hire Heroes Act. Very simply, it is a bill that will 
help our returning heroes get good jobs as they transition back into 
civilian life.
  The bill is supported by Democrats and Republicans alike. I look 
forward to the passage of this bill tomorrow--perfect timing as our 
country prepares to honor the bravery, sacrifice, and commitment of our 
American veterans.
  Since I first walked into this Chamber nearly 3 years ago, it has 
been a great privilege to serve on the Committee on Veterans' Affairs. 
I am also proudly serving on the Armed Services Committee. From these 
positions I have worked on behalf of the 74,000 veterans who call 
Alaska home and the more than 28,000 Active-Duty and Reserve component 
men and women serving our great country.
  My State of Alaska, for all its unique geography and demographics, 
has the distinction of being the home of the largest proportion of 
veterans per capita of any other State in our country.
  Alaska has a proud history of defending our country. This poster 
shows our troops preparing for battle on Alaska's soil during World War 
II. Although many Americans are still not aware, there was fierce 
fighting in the Aleutians as the Japanese launched a diversionary 
attack in preparation for the Battle of Midway. One of my most 
rewarding moments so far as a Member

[[Page 16967]]

of this body was making sure that two dozen brave members of the Alaska 
Territory Guard, all distinguished Alaskan Native Elders, finally got 
the recognition they earned for their courageous service to this Nation 
more than a half century ago. We can see by this poster, a few of them 
here long before Alaska was a State and our country was engaged in 
World War II, these Alaskan heroes answered their Nation's call on 
America's most remote frontlines.
  In 2009, the Senate approved an amendment to the National Defense 
Authorization Act that I sponsored with my colleague, Senator 
Murkowski, that President Obama signed into law. Twenty-five surviving 
territorial Guardsmen finally received their retirement pay and 
recognition they earned so many years ago. I have done my level best to 
support our troops in other ways, including expanding services and 
programs for homeless veterans, including more support for women 
veterans and expanding telehealth services for our rural veterans.
  Supporting the post-GI bill. This provides tuition assistance for 
veterans and takes into consideration living expenses so students can 
better focus on their education. It allows for servicemembers to pass 
this entitlement to their immediate families.
  Every time I meet a veteran, I thank him or her for their service to 
our country. I know they appreciate that. All Americans should go out 
of their way to thank our veterans, not just on Veterans Day but every 
day. But thank you only goes so far. It doesn't pay the mortgage or buy 
groceries. Our veterans really need good jobs. The statistics are 
shameful. More than one in four veterans under the age of 24 is without 
a job. A quarter million post-9/11 veterans are unemployed.
  As you can see by this chart, that is a 12-percent unemployment rate, 
and it simply is unacceptable. The VOW to Hire Heroes Act will create 
new direct Federal hiring authority so jobs will be waiting for our 
veterans the day they leave the military. It will provide tax credits 
for employers who hire veterans and wounded veterans who have been 
looking for work. It will improve the transition process as 
servicemembers leave the battlefield and enter the workforce. This 
legislation also expands training opportunities at community colleges 
and technical schools for 100,000 unemployed veterans who served before 
September 11. It expands additional Montgomery GI benefits for older 
veterans for up to 1 year.
  Let me take a few moments to talk about an additional challenge faced 
by veterans in my home State. Many of Alaska's returning warriors come 
home to the most remote areas of America. Alaska boasts unsurpassed 
beauty. It can also be a challenging and dangerous place to live.
  Right now, as I speak on this floor, the northwest coast of Alaska is 
being struck by winds approaching 100 miles per hour and storm surges 
of 8 feet or more. With waves up to 30 feet, coastal erosion and 
flooding is truly and certainly going to happen. If this were happening 
today on the east coast of America, this storm would have some name to 
it, and we would not be hearing or reading about anything else but that 
storm. To give you a concept of how far reaching this storm is, imagine 
a storm reaching from Mexico, along the west coast, up to Washington 
State. That is the size of the storm that is occurring right now.
  So if you think veterans in other parts of the United States face 
challenges in employment, job training, access to health care, and 
there is no doubt they do, you should see some of our circumstances in 
Alaska.
  Here are two stories about real Alaskans. The first story is about a 
disabled Army veteran living in Kipnuk, a small Yupik Eskimo village on 
the far western coast of Alaska. This vet suffered a spinal cord injury 
in 2006 that requires yearly evaluation. He must travel to a VA 
hospital in Seattle to receive his care. That is a trip of thousands of 
miles and thousands of dollars.
  Additionally, for more routine illnesses, such as the flu, he is 
forced to travel to Anchorage, to a VA clinic there, still a jet flight 
away from his home, and, again, close to $1,000.
  There is the retired Air Force veteran who needed to have hardware 
removed from his wrist and shoulder following a failed surgery. The VA 
sent him to the hospital in Seattle despite the fact that several 
hospitals in Anchorage--closer and less costly to get to--could have 
performed the procedure.
  There are many stories similar to this that I hear every single day 
when I travel my State. It doesn't matter where I go; one veteran or 
veteran's family member will tell me a very similar story. That is why 
we continue to push for a piece of legislation that I have introduced, 
the Alaska Hero's Card. It is so simple when you look at what we are 
trying to do.
  If health care services are available closer to home, then any 
Alaskan veteran would simply present the card at the federally 
qualified health clinic and get the services. It limits their time 
traveling away from their families, it lowers the costs of the VA, and 
it gives services where they need them and can get them. It is truly a 
win-win. More importantly, it allows, as I said, veterans to be with 
their families.
  Mr. President, you have been an incredible advocate on health care 
issues. When you try to do health care rehabilitation and services and 
take someone from a rural community and take them to a large community, 
the odds are the rehabilitation will go slower or the service will not 
be as effective. We have to do what we can to ensure that they have the 
service closer to their homes and their families and at a lower cost.
  As we approach Veterans Day, I would like to recognize the Arctic 
warriors serving our country. The members of the 4th Stryker Brigade 
Combat Team from Fort Wainwright, AK, have been serving with 
distinction in Afghanistan since May of this year. The 4th Airborne 
Brigade Combat Team will deploy to Afghanistan at the end of this month 
for a total of more than 9,000 Alaskan-based troops on the ground 
there.
  In addition, there are 550 airmen and soldiers still in Iraq today 
but will be coming home by the end of the year. Our Alaska National 
Guard units and members are in both countries, Iraq and Afghanistan.
  To our Arctic warriors, thank you. Thank you for your service and 
sacrifice to our country, and thank you to the families who are 
supporting our Arctic warriors as they serve this great country. So to 
honor them and all the brave men and women who have served and are 
currently serving, let's come together on the floor of this Chamber. 
Let's put our differences aside. Let's pass the VOW to Hire Heroes Act 
and help put America's veterans back to work.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Jersey.
  Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be 
permitted to speak as in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                              Air Quality

  Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, with all of the important issues we 
constantly face in life, none compares to our concern for the health of 
our children. But the health of our children depends not only on us but 
what others might be doing--such as poisoning our air with secondhand 
smoke or deliberately fouling the air our kids breathe.
  Few would stand by while a smoker puffs away where your child is 
inhaling. That is why we worked so hard to prohibit smoking on 
airplanes--to keep someone else's smoke out of our children's lungs. 
Yet when emissions from a powerplant in one State threaten people in a 
neighboring State, too often nothing is done about it. Make no mistake, 
pollution doesn't recognize State boundaries. Communities across our 
country are being forced to bear the consequence of another community's 
polluters, and this is happening in my State of New Jersey, where 
people are suffering because dirty air is blowing into our communities 
from out-of-State smokestacks.
  Look at this horrible picture. Anything more threatening would be 
hard

[[Page 16968]]

to imagine. The toxins coming out of smokestacks like these don't 
disappear. They typically wind up polluting playgrounds and school 
yards in New Jersey, and other eastern States. In fact, a single 
powerplant in eastern Pennsylvania is responsible for more sulfur 
pollution in New Jersey than all our State powerplants combined.
  This year the Environmental Protection Agency took a major step 
toward protecting children from out-of-State emissions when it adopted 
the cross-State air pollution rule. This commonsense safeguard requires 
polluters to reduce the levels of dangerous soot and smog that they 
release into the air. The rule sends a clear message to powerplants in 
upwind States that they can no longer dump their dirty air on States 
that lie downwind.
  Unfortunately, one of our Republican colleagues has proposed a 
resolution to block the EPA's efforts. This misguided message would put 
polluters' profits before the health of our families and children, and 
the consequences would be devastating.
  Air pollution can cause asthma attacks, heart attacks, strokes, and 
cancer. Long-term exposure can also damage the immune, neurological, 
and reproductive systems. Nationally, almost 1 in 10 children now 
suffer from asthma. That is according to the Centers for Disease 
Control and Prevention. In some parts of New Jersey, one out of every 
four residents has asthma. We should be working to make skies cleaner 
for these children--not dirtier.
  Some on the other side say we cannot afford to worry about the health 
of our children and our communities right now. They claim the new rule 
will kill jobs. This is not about killing jobs, it is about saving 
lives, and we should not allow ourselves to be misled. According to 
EPA, the new rule will prevent 34,000 premature deaths and 15,000 heart 
attacks from taking place.
  The new standard would also prevent as many as 400,000 asthma 
attacks, improving life for children such as my own grandson who 
suffers from asthma. My daughter makes sure she finds an emergency 
clinic before my grandson plays ball or indulges in a sport because if 
he starts to wheeze, he has problems.
  My sister, who was on the board of education in a city in New York 
State, was at a board of education meeting when she began to start to 
wheeze. In her car she kept a small device, a little respirator, and 
she ran for the parking lot. She didn't make it. She collapsed in the 
parking lot and died 3 days later.
  For those who insist we cannot have both clean air and a strong 
economy, I say we cannot have a strong economy without clean air. 
Simply put, if you cannot breathe, you cannot work.
  The fact is, many powerplants, factories, and other companies are 
ready to work with the EPA to reduce their impact on the environment. 
Take the example of Public Service Electric and Gas, which is New 
Jersey's largest utility. PSEG has already invested resources to reduce 
soot, smog, and mercury pollution by more than 90 percent. In the 
process the company has created over 1,600 construction jobs. That is 
why PSEG supports the EPA rule.
  Ralph Izzo, the president of the company, said:

       Our experience shows that it is possible to clean the air, 
     create jobs, and power the economy at the same time.

  The bottom line is, this rule will protect the health of our economy, 
our workers, and our children. I urge my colleagues to reject this 
dangerous amendment and protect every American's right to breathe clean 
air.
  With that, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maryland.
  Mr. CARDIN. Mr. President, earlier today in the Environment and 
Public Works Committee--the Presiding Officer was at that meeting--
something unusual happened. We had a major bill that will extend the 
Highway Surface Transportation Act for 2 years, passed by a unanimous 
vote, all the Democrats and Republicans joining together in order to 
move forward a bill that will help create jobs. I hope we will find the 
same spirit of cooperation on the legislation that is now before us. It 
helps create jobs for our community and, with the Tester amendment, we 
have a win-win situation.
  This, first and foremost, is about creating jobs. The Tester 
amendment allows us to create more jobs that will help American 
families, help our economy, and even help our budget deficit, because 
when more Americans are working, more are paying taxes, and less 
government services are needed.
  All agree we need to help our returning veterans, those who have 
served so well in Iraq and Afghanistan, defending the principles of our 
country and defending our basic freedom. On Friday, we will celebrate 
Veterans Day, and I know all of us will be speaking about how much we 
appreciate the service of our veterans. We need to show our 
appreciation not only by words but also by deeds. Yes, we fight to make 
sure our veterans have the health services they need, and we want to 
make sure all of our military have the support they need. We want to 
make sure our military families are properly taken care of. But one 
thing we can do with this legislation is help veterans get jobs when 
they return home.
  The unemployment rate among our returning veterans is higher than the 
unemployment rates in our general community. We need to help our 
veterans find employment. That is one way we can show our appreciation 
for the men and women who have served our Nation.
  The bill before us, with the Tester amendment, will give incentives 
to employers to hire returning warriors from Iraq and Afghanistan. It 
will expand the education and training services so they have the skills 
necessary for civilian employment. It will help us deal with a chronic 
problem we have of returning veterans, under the age of 24, where the 
unemployment rate is 21 percent. This bill, with the Tester amendment, 
will allow us to do something to help our returning veterans and help 
our economy.
  But the underlying bill also goes further. It helps small businesses. 
Small businesses are the growth engine of America. That is where job 
creation takes place. That is where innovation takes place. We 
currently have a requirement that has not yet gone into effect that 
would require small businesses that have contracts with the government 
over $10,000 to withhold 3 percent of those funds in order to make sure 
taxes are paid. We need to repeal that provision, and this bill will 
repeal that provision. We should go after those who are delinquent in 
taxes, and we have a provision to make sure we do that, but for small 
business to tie up that type of capital affects their ability to 
compete. It affects their ability to expand job opportunity. Repealing 
that provision is important to help small business help our economy.
  It also would eliminate an administrative burden for a lot of our 
local governments. It also will make it more competitive for small 
businesses. The 3-percent withholding would affect actually the cost of 
production. All that means a stronger economy and more jobs.
  This bill is a win-win bill. It helps our veterans. With the Tester 
amendment, it helps small businesses by repealing a provision that is 
extremely burdensome. It is fully paid for so it does not add anything 
at all to the deficit, and it will help us grow our economy. By passing 
this bill, not only will we help our veterans, we will help our small 
businesses and we will help our economy.
  I urge our colleagues to show the same type of cooperation we did on 
the surface transportation bill today in our committee. Let's use that 
same spirit of cooperation to get this bill moving, with the Tester 
amendment. Let us pass it and send it back to the House and, hopefully, 
we can get it to the President shortly for signature and help our 
veterans and help our economy.
  With that, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Colorado.


                           The Global Economy

  Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, I am going to replace the Presiding 
Officer in the chair in a few moments, but before that, I wished to 
come to the floor and talk about our economy and some work this 
Congress needs to be engaged in if we are going to get things moving on 
the right track again.

[[Page 16969]]

  Today, the stock market plunged 400 points because of concerns that 
are going on in Europe, especially with Italy. It is a debt crisis that 
has been on the front page of every newspaper around the globe for 
weeks and in some cases months.
  I am reminded of the discussion we had over the summer that consumed 
the Congress for an entire summer, about the lifting of the debt 
ceiling. Article after article after article said that if the Congress 
couldn't figure out how to work this out in a bipartisan way and make a 
material difference in the trajectory of our deficit and our debt that, 
for the first time, our credit rating would be downgraded. For the 
first time in the history of the United States of America, the full 
faith and credit of the United States would be called into question.
  That was on the front page of every newspaper for weeks. In the end, 
we stumbled across that finish line, and in the end our debt was 
downgraded. I would argue we are about to face the same thing again and 
have the chance again to do the right thing--to act in a bipartisan 
way, to create a thoughtful approach to our debt and our deficit that 
allows us to continue to invest in our economy.
  Families in Colorado, much as the families in Rhode Island, are 
struggling in an economy that is the worst since the Great Depression. 
We are coming out of it now, but there are significant structural 
issues in that economy. I have shown this chart before. There are four 
simple lines. The blue one is the productivity index, which shows our 
economy has actually gotten substantially more productive since the 
early 1990s, substantially more productive during this recession for a 
variety of reasons. One reason is that our companies have had to learn 
to compete with the rest of the world in a way they have not before, so 
they became more efficient. The benefits technology has brought has 
driven up this curve. Unfortunately for our workers but understandably 
for our businesses, they have had to figure out how to get through this 
recession with fewer people so they can get through to the other side.
  The second curve is our gross domestic product, the size of our 
domestic economy, and it is not where it was before the recession, but 
it is headed back there.
  The other two lines are the unemployment level, which this chart says 
is 14 million people, but I think the number is closer to 25 million, 
when we consider who has stopped looking for work and when we consider 
who is underemployed in this economy. Then this line is a tragedy for 
our families, which is falling median family income.
  This chart--it is a little hard to read--is a pretty good depiction 
of what is happening. This red line represents the bottom 90 percent of 
income earners in this country. Think about that. We are talking about 
the bottom 90 percent. That is everyone, except for 10 percent. It 
shows the share of the income in the United States that they are 
earning. It starts out here in the 1920s and goes to today, where the 
bottom 90 percent are earning roughly 47 percent of the income. The 
last time that was true, by the way, was 1928, the year before the 
Great Depression and the market crash. The top .1 percent earns 10 
percent of the economy--.1, not 1 percent--.1. The last time that was 
true was 1928. All through the productive times in the 20th century, 
the 1950s and the 1960s and the 1970s, there wasn't that kind of 
imbalance in our economy. This group earned roughly--90 percent earned 
roughly 70 percent of the economy and everybody else earned a fair 
share of the economy, and the economy grew and we were able to build 
for the future.
  Those are structural issues in the economy we can help with, we can 
work together to fix, but what we have to do right now is avert 
predictable crises that are within our control so we don't make matters 
worse.
  Sometimes when I travel, people don't know why we need to worry about 
what is going on in Europe. This afternoon I wanted to bring a chart 
that shows the soaring debt of all these European economies and the 
United States. We are the blue line here. This is Greece up here. 
Everybody is in tough shape. Everybody has made promises they can't 
keep. Everybody has levered up in a way that isn't sustainable. But 
what is also true is that we are all interrelated. If something bad 
happens in Europe, something very bad is going to happen here, just as 
when the capital markets fell apart at the beginning of the last 
recession.
  This chart shows how dependent our economy is on exports to Europe. 
Between one-fifth and one-sixth of the total value of our exports goes 
to Europe. If the European banks fail, if the governments can't pay 
back their debt and the economy comes to a screeching halt in Europe, 
they are not going to buy our exports. Those are American jobs we need 
to worry about. Those are American jobs we need to defend and protect 
and we need to understand this relationship.
  Look at the exposure of our U.S. banks to Europe. This red part is 
the euro area. It is 29 percent of the total international exposure of 
our banks, with 23 percent to the U.K. More than half of the foreign 
exposure of our banks is European debt.
  We were unable to come to a rational conclusion on the debt ceiling. 
So the Congress punted this decision to a supercommittee and asked them 
to please help us make the decision. My own hope is that the 
supercommittee takes a page out of the bipartisan proposals that were 
reached--the one that was led by Bowles and Simpson, the one by Rivlin 
and Domenici. I think the details are less important, frankly, than the 
size, but that takes $4 trillion out over the next 10 years, a balance 
of cuts to revenue of roughly 3 to 1, that sends a message to the world 
that the United States is serious about dealing with its fiscal 
matters. If we don't do that in advance of this European crisis that is 
on the front page of every newspaper in the country, I can assure my 
colleagues that the choices we have in front of us will be even tougher 
than they would have otherwise been.
  Sometimes I get the feeling that people around here actually don't 
think the American people are watching this screaming match, are 
watching the disagreements, are watching the political games, but they 
are. They know exactly what is going on here, and they understand the 
seriousness of these issues because they are living through that 
economy I spoke of earlier. That is what they are worrying about. They 
are making less today than they were 10 years ago. They are making the 
same amount they were making 20 years ago. They can't afford to send 
their kid to college. They can't afford their health care, and they 
would like us to help straighten that out, but at a minimum they would 
like us to prevent matters from getting worse. They would like to see 
us work together.
  Some people here think Congress has always been unpopular, that it is 
just as an institution an unpopular place. Not so. Look at this. Here 
is Congress's approval rating today: 9 percent. That is a pretty 
catastrophic fall-off in the last 10 years, and I would argue it has an 
awful lot to do with our inability to address problems the way people 
in their local communities are doing. There is not a mayor in Colorado 
who would threaten the credit rating of their community for politics--
not one. Not a Republican mayor, not a Democratic mayor, not a tea 
party mayor, not one would imagine doing it for a second because people 
in our communities would know that all that would do would be to drive 
up our interest rates, make us spend more money on interest and less on 
infrastructure, more on interest and less on education, more on 
interest and less on the health and welfare of our citizens.
  We know that at the local level, but somehow here we get to color 
outside the lines. We are now at 9 percent, which is almost at the 
margin of error for zero. We did some research to find out what else is 
at 9 percent. We could not find virtually anything in public polls 
taken all across this country. My goodness, the Internal Revenue 
Service has a 40-percent approval rating compared the our 9 percent. BP 
had a 16-percent approval rating at the height of the oilspill, and we 
are at 9 percent. There is an actress who is at 15 percent. More people 
support the United

[[Page 16970]]

States becoming communist--I do not, for the record--at 11 percent than 
approve of the job we are doing. I guess we can take some comfort that 
Fidel Castro is at 5 percent.
  Look, we are suffering--and when I say ``we,'' I mean families across 
this country--through the worst recession since the Great Depression. 
We can see on the front page of every single newspaper what the stakes 
are here if we do not act in a comprehensive way on our debt and our 
deficit. We know that both parties have different approaches to the 
challenges we face. But at the end of the day, these challenges are the 
challenges of the American people, not the challenges of a bunch of 
politicians in Washington who are worrying about the next election.
  My hope is the supercommittee shows leadership here, that it gives 
the opportunity for every Member of this body to express their 
leadership here, and that all of us are able to go home to red parts of 
our State and blue parts of our State and say to the people: We saw the 
problem coming, and we led the world. We materially addressed the 
problem we faced. We acted in a bipartisan way. We came up with a plan 
that said: Do you know what. We are all in this together for the 
benefit of our kids and our grandkids, for the people who are suffering 
through this economy.
  There is $2.3 trillion of cash sitting on companies' balance sheets 
in the United States of America tonight that is not being invested 
because no one knows what interest rate environment they are going to 
be in because they do not know what Washington is going to do. We 
shattered confidence in this economy this summer. We should not do it 
again.
  This is a popular number, this 9 percent, these days, you may have 
noticed, on the Presidential campaign trail. It is not a popular number 
for the American people: 9-percent approval. Let's do something right 
here, and let's drive these numbers back up, and let's restore 
confidence in the American people.
  With that, Mr. President, I thank you for your patience and yield the 
floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Bennet). The Senator from South Dakota.
  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in 
morning business for up to 15 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                          Net Neutrality Order

  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I rise today in support of S.J. Res. 6, a 
resolution of disapproval of the FCC's net neutrality order.
  Over the last 2 years, the Federal Communications Commission put 
forward a variety of what are considered net neutrality policies. On 
September 23 of this year, the FCC published a final rule in the 
Federal Register which is set to go into effect on November 20 to 
impose harmful net neutrality regulations on our Nation's 
telecommunications companies.
  The digital world in which we now live has changed dramatically the 
way we retrieve information, communicate with one another, and engage 
in commerce. Technological advances, even in the last few years, have 
pushed our economy forward. These advancements in technology and their 
adoption often depend heavily on access to broadband technologies.
  While the telecommunications industry has flourished, boosted our 
economy, and made critical investments in broadband deployment across 
the country, this administration believes that imposing additional 
regulations is a step in the right direction.
  In places across the country, such as my home State of South Dakota, 
there is still work to be done when it comes to unfettered and 
affordable access to high speed broadband. With the FCC voting recently 
to reform the Universal Service Fund to shift to a focus on broadband 
deployment, it seems to me that simultaneously moving forward with net 
neutrality regulations will have a chilling effect on this now thriving 
industry.
  We learned last week from the Department of Labor that the 
unemployment rate still hovers around 9 percent. The American people 
want to see Federal policies that encourage innovation and spur job 
growth, not yet another regulatory overreach by an overzealous agency. 
Unfortunately, the FCC net neutrality policy will give considerable 
authority to unelected bureaucrats to decide what a company's network 
management should look like.
  The Federal courts have ruled that the FCC lacks the authority under 
the Telecommunications Act of 1996 to move forward with net neutrality 
regulations. Still, the Democratic appointees of the FCC have 
persisted, without regard to the courts, to settle the political debt 
owed by the Obama administration to special interest groups in favor of 
regulating the Internet. The FCC and this administration must be 
brought into line and abide by the separation of powers. The FCC must 
only execute the responsibilities given to it by Congress and not 
overreach its regulatory authority.
  Freedom of the Internet belongs in the marketplace, not in the hands 
of Federal regulators. The FCC has moved forward to fix a problem that 
does not exist. This is a solution in search of a problem. Industry-
imposed standards and transparency have the capability to increase 
competition, while more unnecessary government regulations will almost 
certainly have the opposite effect.
  Under a light regulatory structure, the Internet has become vital to 
commerce and our Nation's economy over the past 15 years. The Internet 
has helped digitally shrink the distance that otherwise would inhibit 
the free flow of ideas, information, and business transactions from one 
part of the world to another. The Internet's adaptability and 
decentralized characteristics are central to that success.
  This Federal regulatory action represents unnecessary government 
overreach and has the potential to seriously damage an increasingly 
important sector of our economy. I do not believe the Federal 
Government can successfully regulate network access and development 
without negative effects on the consumer or the industry.
  Allowing this unnecessary regulation to move forward has the 
potential to stifle broadband deployment and competition, which could 
ultimately lead to fewer choices for consumers, higher prices, and 
discourage innovation.
  I believe the net neutrality regulations, if allowed to move forward, 
will have negative effects on this industry and our economy, and I 
would encourage my colleagues, tomorrow, to support this resolution of 
disapproval.
  The economy does not need this. Our job creators do not need this. 
And the millions of Americans who are benefiting from the information 
revolution that has been brought about by the Internet do not need this 
either.
  This is an opportunity for us to send a little bit of a message to 
industry that we understand, we get what they are saying about 
overregulation, we get that these piles of regulations continue to 
drive up the cost of doing business in this country.
  My colleague, the Presiding Officer, noted in his remarks the need 
for economic certainty--businesses need to know what the rules are 
going to be. It seems to me, at least, that creating a whole set of new 
rules and piling new regulations on this very important medium--on a 
way in which we have grown commerce in this country, opened markets 
across the world, created opportunities for consumers in this country 
to become more productive with their lives--is an absolute wrong 
approach at this particular point in time, particularly with the 
unemployment rate being what it is.
  We want to make it less expensive, less costly, easier for our job 
creators to create jobs in this country, not put up unnecessary 
barriers and more obstacles and drive up the cost and make it more 
difficult for people in this country to create jobs.
  Businesses are looking for economic certainty. They are looking to 
Washington, DC for policies that will lessen the impediments and the 
number of obstacles to job creation in this country.


                 Access To Capital For Job Creators Act

  Mr. President, I also want to mention in that vein that earlier today 
I introduced a piece of legislation called the Access to Capital for 
Job Creators Act. This bill will make it easier for small

[[Page 16971]]

businesses to better access capital in order to expand and create jobs.
  If you think about the things the job creators around the country 
want and need in order for them to get that capital off the sidelines, 
to get out of cash and to get invested again and get that money back 
into our economy and back into creating jobs, they want to see a 
government that lives within its means. They want to see a government 
that does not spend money it does not have.
  We have to be serious about cutting spending here at the Federal 
level and getting back to more of a historic norm when it comes to the 
cost of our government as a percentage of our entire economy. 
Historically, for the past 40 years, that has run in the 20- to 21-
percent range. That is what we spend on the Federal Government as a 
percentage of our entire GDP. Now it is up in the 24- to 25-percent 
range. That means the Federal Government, as a percentage of our entire 
economy, is growing relative to our private economy. We want to see the 
private economy grow and expand and the Federal economy get smaller.
  Our job creators also want to see our Tax Code reformed in a way that 
is simple, clear, and fair, and that provides the right types of 
incentives for them to create jobs and does not drive investment 
overseas and create jobs there as opposed to creating those jobs right 
here at home.
  If we can get tax reform that lowers rates on individuals and 
businesses and broadens the tax base in this country, I think you will 
see an explosion of economic growth, which is ultimately the best 
solution we could possibly have to all the fiscal, economic challenges 
our country faces.
  Our job creators want smart, commonsense regulations, not more and 
more regulation for regulation's sake, which I think is what we see a 
lot today. We have seen bill after bill that has passed the House of 
Representatives that is designed to sort of roll back the 
overregulation, the regulatory overreach we have seen from this 
administration. Many of those bills have come over here to the Senate, 
where they have died, unfortunately.
  But we need to be looking at these things in a way that will again 
lower the impediments, lower the barriers, lower the hurdles to job 
creation in this country. That is why I think smart, commonsense 
regulation is the way to go, and to get away from the regulatory 
overreach we are seeing all too much of today.
  We need affordable energy policies, opening access to the vast 
resources we have in this country. We need to open markets around the 
world and look at ways we can make our small businesses create more 
opportunities for them to export their products to other places around 
the world.
  But the legislation I have introduced today addresses yet another 
issue which I think small businesses have talked about; that is, access 
to capital. We need to better address the need for capital in order to 
create jobs and expand our economy.
  Last week, the House of Representatives passed this very bill. It was 
introduced by Representative Kevin McCarthy. On a near unanimous vote 
in the House of Representatives of 413 to 11 they passed this 
legislation and sent it this direction. This bill would allow small 
businesses to better attract capital from accredited investors 
nationwide under rule 506 of Regulation D of the Securities Act of 1933 
by removing the general solicitation provision.
  That sounds like a lot of Washington speak, and it is. But the very 
simple translation of that is this will make it easier for small 
businesses to access the much needed capital they need to expand and 
grow their businesses.
  This provision is a roadblock in its current form for small 
businesses that are looking to obtain needed capital because it 
requires investors to have a preexisting relationship with an issuer or 
intermediary before the potential investor can be notified that 
unregistered securities are available for sale.
  So if a small business is looking for investors, unless they have a 
preexisting relationship with that investor, there is no way for them 
to get the message out that they are looking for capital to those with 
whom they do not have that kind of relationship already in place.
  The provision as it currently exists severely hampers the ability of 
small businesses to obtain needed capital from investors, and as a 
result, many businesses are limited to only the universe of investors 
with which they clearly have these preexisting relationships.
  This legislation would remove that solicitation prohibition and allow 
businesses to attract capital from accredited investors nationwide.
  With unemployment at 9 percent, we need to pass legislation that will 
enable our job creators to expand and to create jobs.
  As I said, this bill passed with overwhelming bipartisan support in 
the House of Representatives. I would hope we can do the same in the 
Senate and address this very fundamental need among our businesses, our 
small businesses, to get access to much needed capital to expand their 
businesses; that, along with using a commonsense approach to 
regulation, an approach that gets away from this massive 61,000 pages 
of new regulations that we have seen issued since this administration 
took office, to tax reform that is simple, that is clear, that is fair, 
that provides incentives to keep jobs here at home as opposed to 
shipping them overseas, affordable energy policies, reducing government 
spending, improving export opportunities for our small businesses. 
Those are the types of policies our job creators have said they need.
  We are going to have an opportunity to vote on the rollback of this 
net neutrality regulation and some other regulations tomorrow that are 
making it more difficult, more costly for our small businesses to 
create jobs. I hope we will see strong bipartisan support both with the 
disapproval resolution that we are going to be voting on net 
neutrality, as well as the one on cross-State air permitting. Those are 
both things that I think will do a lot to make it less expensive for 
small businesses in this country to create jobs.
  I hope as well that we will look at other opportunities in the form 
of the legislation introduced by Senator McCain, Senator Portman, and 
others, that has a whole series of the things I mentioned, all of which 
will create jobs and grow our economy, make this country more 
prosperous and stronger, and put us on a more sound and economic and 
fiscal footing as we head into the days ahead.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Rhode Island.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I am here this evening to express my 
unwavering support for the men and women who have answered the call of 
duty in our military services, our Guard and Reserve, and for their 
family members whose love and steady support for them have carried our 
servicemembers through challenging times and difficult missions.
  In honor of Veterans Day, coming up the day after tomorrow, and 
Military Family Month, which we observe all month long this November, 
we need to reflect on the enormous contributions military families have 
made on behalf of all of us.
  Since September 11, the spouses, children and parents of our service 
men and women have been faced with huge demands. They have endured 
repeated deployments, and spent many holidays and birthdays and 
anniversaries apart from each other. We should do everything we can in 
our communities to help military families cope with the difficulties 
and stresses of these multiple deployments.
  I commend First Lady Michelle Obama and Dr. Jill Biden for their 
commitment to our troops' families and for their work on initiatives to 
address the unique challenges military families face in this 
environment. I especially appreciate the First Lady's recent visit to 
Rhode Island. It provided a warm and welcome boost to military family 
members in my State, which has the second highest per capita National 
Guard deployment rate of all the States, as well as a significant 
active-duty presence at Naval Station Newport.

[[Page 16972]]

  With so many men and women leaving home to serve on multiple 
deployments, the strain on the family can be particularly difficult. 
Last month I had the privilege of meeting two extraordinary Rhode 
Island students, Kathleen Callahan, who goes by Katie, and Kaitlyn 
Hawley, who presented a powerful and compelling message to school 
superintendents and educators from across Rhode Island who came 
together to learn about how they can better respond to the needs of 
military families.
  These two impressive young ladies shared their personal stories and 
described the challenges their families faced while their parents were 
deployed. The event was part of a collaborative initiative to help 
military-connected children thrive in school through deployments. I was 
proud to share in this joint effort with the Rhode Island National 
Guard, with Governor Chaffee, with our Commissioner of Education, the 
Commanding Officer of Naval Station Newport, our Military Child 
Education Coalition, and my senior Senator, Jack Reed.
  Katie is the daughter of a National Guard member. She described how 
her father's deployment affected the roles in her family. Like most 
children of deployed servicemembers, Katie assumed additional 
responsibilities in caring for her younger sibling and helping her 
mother, whom she referred to as a superwoman. Together, they shouldered 
the burden of her father's absence and kept the family intact and 
sound.
  Katie described the feeling of--to use her words--silent suffering 
that can occur when military families feel isolated in civilian 
communities that may not completely understand what it is like when a 
loved one is deployed.
  Kaitlyn is the daughter of an active-duty member. She talked about 
her experience living in eight different States and attending seven 
different schools. Kaitlyn is a highly motivated student and she 
explained how she threw herself into her schoolwork during her father's 
deployment. However, she cautioned that for other students, the 
opposite can also occur. Some students may have a lot of difficulty 
focusing on their schoolwork when a parent is deployed half a world 
away. As Kaitlyn so well put it, there is no one-size-fits-all approach 
to coping with the stress of deployment.
  I am proud of Katie and Kaitlyn for their courage, their resilience, 
and their powerful articulation of a message that I hope everyone 
hears. We owe our military families an enduring debt of gratitude for 
everything they have done. We should do everything we can to ensure 
that no family feels isolated or left out or endures the silent 
suffering Katie described. I hope every American, as we approach 
Veterans Day, will actively support our military families, and do what 
we can to make our communities more welcoming and supportive in 
accommodating their needs.
  As Veterans Day approaches, let's celebrate our military families and 
recognize their extraordinary contributions. Let us thank not only our 
service men and women but also the spouses, children, and other family 
members who have shared in the sacrifice of military service. We should 
also remember the families of our civilian and intelligence 
servicemembers deployed in danger and away from their families around 
the world.
  In concluding, I wish to also express my strong support for the 
bipartisan legislation the Senate is considering to boost employment 
opportunities for veterans. Unemployment has been disproportionally 
high among veterans and we must act now. The last thing our returning 
service men and women need is to have to face an unemployment line. I 
urge my colleagues to swiftly pass this much needed legislation, which 
I am very proud to cosponsor.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota.
  Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I rise today to speak in support of the 
VOW to Hire Heroes Act 2011, which has been offered as an amendment by 
my friend from Montana, Senator Jon Tester. This Friday is Veterans 
Day. On this day every year, Americans join together to honor the men 
and women in uniform who have served and sacrificed for our country. 
Think of the work we do for our veterans. Some of it is very small. 
Small to us, but not small to them. We have people call our office all 
the time when their benefits are messed up, when redtape gets in the 
way. I will never forget one last year where one of the Patriot guards, 
who stands on the side and holds the flag during funerals for our 
servicemembers, came to me in tears and said her son had been badly 
hurt serving our country. In fact, he had lost his leg. When he came 
back, he was at Walter Reed. He was fitted with a prosthetic leg, and 
then he came home. When he was trying to get his benefits, he was told 
he could not get his benefits for losing his leg--this is a true 
story--because the records had been lost that showed that he lost his 
leg.
  He had no leg. We worked on it. And within a week we got his 
benefits. Those stories are told all across the country. There is 
redtape. We must all help them. But it just goes to show, when you see 
those stories what our young soldiers are doing every single day.
  This also means fighting for legislation that fulfills American's 
promise that we will care for our soldiers when they return. When our 
soldiers signed up to fight for our country, there was no waiting line. 
And when they come home to the United States of America and they need a 
job or they need a home or they need medical care or they need an 
education, there should not be a waiting line. Yet, sadly, when you 
look at the past decades, too often there is. When I came into the 
Senate, as my friend from Rhode Island came in in 2006, we all remember 
the horror stories with our veterans' health care. We remember what had 
happened at our medical hospitals. We remember the stories of soldiers 
getting lost in the cracks. That is why we worked so hard to make sure 
they got the health care they deserve.
  We provided for historic funding increases to ensure top-quality 
health care for American servicemembers and military retirees. We also 
passed a post-9/11 GI bill to expand educational benefits for veterans 
who have served in the past decade. But there is more work to be done 
to support our veterans.
  Consider two shocking facts. The unemployment rate for Minnesota 
veterans who have served since 9/11 is nearly 23 percent, the third 
highest in the Nation. Yet our unemployment rate is one of the lower 
ones in the Nation. Our unemployment rate is two points better than the 
national average. Yet it is almost double the national average for 
veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and more than three times our 
State's overall unemployment rate.
  Second fact. An estimated 700 Minnesota veterans are homeless on any 
given night. During the course of the year, an estimated 4,000 
Minnesota veterans will experience an episode of homelessness or a 
crisis that could lead to homelessness. This is not right. That is why 
I am calling on my colleagues today to vote to support the VOW to Hire 
Heroes Act. This important bill goes a long way in providing our 
returning veterans the leg up they need in transitioning into the 
workforce.
  I will list just a few important provisions of this bill. It 
encourages companies to hire unemployed veterans by offering them tax 
credits to do so. The bill provides employers a tax credit of up to 
$5,600 for hiring veterans who have been looking for a job for more 
than 6 months, as well as a $2,400 credit for veterans who are 
unemployed for more than 4 weeks. The bill also provides employers a 
tax credit of up to $9,600 for hiring veterans with service-connected 
disabilities who have been looking for a job for more than 6 months.
  Second, the VOW Act increases training for returning veterans so that 
by the time they step out of their uniforms they have the skills and 
the tools they need to get out there and market themselves to find a 
job. The

[[Page 16973]]

bill does this by making it a requirement for returning troops to 
participate in the Transition Assistance Program, a job-training boot 
camp coordinated by the Departments of Defense, Labor, and Veterans 
Affairs, that teaches veterans how to get those jobs, write those 
resumes, apply their military skills to civilian jobs.
  Third, the VOW Act expands education benefits for older veterans, 
people who are not eligible for the post-9/11 GI bill.
  The bill provides 100,000 unemployed veterans of past eras and wars 
with up to 1 year of additional Montgomery GI benefits to go toward 
education or training programs at community colleges or technical 
schools.
  Fourth, the VOW Act ensures that disabled veterans receive up to 1 
year of additional vocational rehabilitation and employment benefits.
  Last, the VOW Act allows servicemembers to begin the Federal 
employment process prior to separation, to help them transition 
seamlessly into jobs at the VA, the Department of Homeland Security, or 
the many other Federal agencies that could use their skills and 
dedication.
  The fact is our returning veterans have battle-tested skills that are 
valuable to employers in all kinds of fields. Helping our veterans turn 
the skills they learned in the military into good-paying jobs not only 
honors our promise to support those who have sacrificed for our Nation, 
it also helps strengthen our Nation.
  One of my top priorities in the Senate has been to cut through the 
redtape and streamline credentialing for servicemembers who have 
achieved certain skill sets through their military training. I am 
offering an amendment to the VOW Act that will streamline credentialing 
for returning military paramedics. I learned about this one time when I 
was driving around our State and I met a number of those who served in 
Iraq and Afghanistan. They served as paramedics on the front lines, and 
they learned incredible skills and how to save lives. Those skills 
weren't all transferable into becoming paramedics once they returned to 
the United States. At the same time, we have an incredible shortage of 
paramedics in our rural areas.
  So I am going to introduce this as an amendment that would fix this 
problem by encouraging States to give paramedics credit for the 
military medical training they have received. Not only does it help 
veterans, but it relieves the shortage of emergency medical personnel 
in rural areas.
  With commonsense solutions like these and those contained in the VOW 
Act, I believe we can help returning veterans transition into the 
workforce, not only fulfilling our commitment to them but also helping 
to lift our economy. Having traveled to the western part of our State 
in the last few weeks, I cannot tell you the number of job openings 
right now for welders and tool and die. I have been at companies that 
literally have dozens of openings--not only starting jobs but for 
engineers. They want military personnel and they need to connect with 
them and we need to encourage our employers to hire veterans when they 
come back.
  Our State has always been a State that understands the debt we owe to 
the men and women who have served and sacrificed for us. We literally 
wrap our arms around them. I want to end with a story from last 
Veterans Day.
  After doing our statewide event, I headed up to Wadena, MN, which is 
an area that was torn apart by a tornado, literally ripped up. Their 
high school was destroyed. The high school bleachers were three blocks 
from where they had been. On Veterans Day, they held the annual event, 
but they could no longer have it at the high school, which was 
destroyed. They could no longer have it at some of the other places 
they used to, so they were all in an elementary school the entire 
time--all the high school kids and all the veterans sitting on old 
bleachers in that elementary school. I spoke there.
  What I will never forget is the elementary school kids singing a song 
that I had never heard before, but I had heard the melody. I remember 
the Ken Burns movie on World War II. These are the lyrics:

       All we've been given by those who come before,
       The dream of a nation where freedom would endure,
       The work and prayers of centuries have brought us to this 
     day,
       What shall be our legacy? What will our children say?
       Let them say of me I was one who believed
       In sharing the blessings that I received.
       Let me know in my heart when my days are through
       America, America, I gave my best to you.

  That is what those elementary school kids sang after the whole school 
had been torn apart--with veterans at their side: ``America, America, I 
gave my best to you.''
  I think that is what we have to remember as we approach this vote on 
this VOW Act. This vote, to me, is so simple--that we simply give a tax 
credit so more employers will hire those who have sacrificed for our 
country, those who gave their best for our country. That is what this 
vote is about.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Rhode Island is recognized.


                     Cross-state Air Pollution Rule

  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, it was fairly recently that this 
summer I came to the Senate floor to commend the Environmental 
Protection Agency for finalizing what we called the cross-State air 
pollution rule, which limits the out-of-State pollution that one State 
can dump into the wind currents that drop on other States.
  To my State, Rhode Island, this is particularly important. Nearly a 
decade after the EPA began working to address this problem of 
interstate air pollution, we finally had a path forward that is 
sensible and protective of public health. That was then, this is now.
  Today, Senator Paul of Kentucky proposes to halt this progress, to 
undo that rule through a Congressional Review Act resolution. That 
resolution would, one, void the cross-State air pollution rule and, 
two, bar EPA permanently from ever writing a ``substantially similar'' 
rule. This means that EPA could never use the Clean Air Act to create a 
cost-effective pollution trading program to address upwind pollution.
  Mr. President, this hits home in my State of Rhode Island. Rhode 
Island has the sixth highest rate of asthma in the country. More than 
11 percent of the people in my State suffer from this chronic disease, 
and many of them are children.
  In 2009 there were 1,750 hospital discharges in Rhode Island for 
asthma cases. Those hospital stays cost about $8 million in direct 
medical costs, not to mention the costs of the medication or missed 
days of work and school.
  On a clear summer day in Rhode Island, driving along the sparkling 
Narragansett Bay, commuting into work, you will often hear the warning 
on drive-time radio:

       Today is a bad air day in Rhode Island. Infants, seniors, 
     people with breathing difficulties should stay indoors today.

  On those days, people in those categories are forced to stay at home, 
missing work, school, and other important activities. Others even in 
good health are urged to avoid strenuous activities on these bad air 
days. These are real costs--costs paid in lives and reduced quality of 
life, in medical bills, public services strained responding to health 
risks, and in missed days of work and school--all from pollution in our 
air.
  We don't know everything about the causes and cures of asthma, but we 
do know one thing: air pollution triggers asthma attacks. We know air 
pollution is a preventable problem.
  Rhode Island has worked hard and made great strides to reduce air 
pollution. We passed laws to prohibit cars and buses from idling their 
engines and to retrofit all State schoolbuses with diesel pollution 
controls. We require heavy-duty vehicles used in federally funded 
construction projects to install diesel pollution controls, adhere to 
the anti-idling law, and use only low-sulfur diesel. Our transit agency 
voluntarily retrofitted half of its bus fleet with diesel pollution 
control equipment.
  But Rhode Island cannot solve its air pollution problem on its own. 
In fact, Doug McVay, who is acting as chief of Rhode Island's Office of 
Air Resources, told me all of Rhode Island's major

[[Page 16974]]

sources of air pollution--not just powerplants but any source that 
holds a major title 5 permit--emit less than 3,000 tons a year of 
nitrogen oxide, also called NOX, and sulfur dioxide, also 
called SO2.
  Let me repeat that. All major sources in Rhode Island taken together 
emit annually less than 3,000 tons of these two pollutants. Polluters 
that will be subject to the cross-State air pollution rule in other 
States have single units that emit more than that. Some of the larger 
coal-fired boilers may emit 10,000 to 12,000 tons of these pollutants 
every year, nearly four times the pollution emitted by all Rhode Island 
major sources combined.
  In Rhode Island, we are willing to pull our weight in achieving air 
pollution reductions. Indeed, we have done more than pull our own 
weight; we are pulling above our weight. But we need all States to be 
pulling their weight, too, to make the air safe to breathe in America 
from coast to coast.
  This year at my request the GAO completed a report about tall 
smokestacks at coal powerplants. The report found that in 1970, the 
year the Clean Air Act was enacted, there were two what they call tall 
stacks--smokestacks over 500 feet in the United States--two.
  By 1985 there were more than 180 tall stacks. As of 2010, 284 tall 
smokestacks were operating at 172 coal powerplants, representing 64 
percent of the coal-generating capacity in our country. The industry 
literally smokestacked its way into compliance with the Clean Air Act.
  What do I mean by that? In the early days of the Clean Air Act, some 
States allowed sources of pollution to build tall smokestacks instead 
of installing pollution controls. The concept back then was that 
pollution sent high enough into the atmosphere would be sent far away 
from the source and would not contribute to air pollution problems--at 
least in that State. Well, it turns out this air pollution causes 
problems downwind in other States.
  As the GAO report put it, tall stacks generally disburse pollutants 
over greater distances than shorter stacks and provide pollutants 
greater time to react in the atmosphere to form ozone and particulate 
matter.
  For this antiquated practice, Rhode Island pays the price. 
Smokestacking, instead of scrubbing, is what is behind a lot of the 
ozone in Rhode Island that gives rise to those bad air days. The GAO 
found that more than half of the boilers attached to tall stacks at 
coal powerplants do not have a scrubber to control sulfur dioxide 
emissions--more than half, no scrubber, just a tall smokestack to pump 
it out to the downwind States. Nearly two-thirds of boilers connected 
to tall stacks do not have postcombustion controls for nitrogen oxide.
  So how does it get to Rhode Island? As GAO concluded, in the Mid-
Atlantic U.S. the wind generally blows from west to east. Ozone can 
travel hundreds of miles with the help of high-speed winds known as the 
low-level jet. This phenomenon particularly occurs at night due to the 
ground cooling quicker than the upper atmosphere, which can allow the 
low-level jet to form and transport ozone and particulate matter with 
its high winds.
  This wind map shows that condition. These are all the midwestern 
powerplants, and this is the wind that carries them down here to, among 
other States, Rhode Island.
  Five States on this map--Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Illinois, 
and North Carolina--have been identified by EPA as contributing 
significantly to Rhode Island pollution.
  This electricity that comes from uncontrolled powerplants tied to 
these tall smokestacks might seem cheaper to consumers than a well-
controlled powerplant, a powerplant that is scrubbed instead of 
smokestacking its pollution, but that is really not so. There are 
costs. The costs just got shifted. The lungs of children and seniors in 
Rhode Island and other downwind States pay for that cheap electricity, 
and, truth be told, the lungs of children and seniors in many of the 
upwind States are paying as well. The States upwind of Rhode Island are 
downwind of someone else. Ohio and Pennsylvania are upwind of Rhode 
Island, but they are downwind of other States. That is why EPA's 
regulatory impact analysis determined that instate and upwind pollution 
reductions from this rule will save approximately 3,209 lives in Ohio 
and 2,911 lives in Pennsylvania every year by 2014 and prevent hundreds 
of heart attacks, emergency room visits, and hospitalizations in those 
States. This rule opposed by Senator Paul will even save an estimated 
1,705 lives in his home State of Kentucky every year by 2014.
  It is not just lives saved. EPA estimates that by 2014, the benefits 
from this rule will range between $110 billion and $280 billion. At the 
same time, EPA estimates that the rule will cost utilities $4.1 billion 
to comply in 2012 and another $.8 billion through 2014--a grand total 
of $4.9 billion against $110 billion to $280 billion in quantifiable 
benefits.
  At the lower end of the range, this rule generates a 22-to-1 ratio of 
benefits over costs. For every $1 in cost to the polluters who are 
creating this pollution, to clean it up, there is $22 in benefit to the 
rest of the country. That is a pretty good investment, and that is at 
the low end.
  At the high end, if it is $280 billion, we are talking about a 56-to-
1 ratio of benefits over costs. We have people from polluting States 
who, to save a buck for their polluters who are running it up 
smokestacks instead of scrubbing their pollution, to save the buck in 
putting the scrubber and quit smokestacking their pollution and dumping 
it on Rhode Island and other States, are willing to blow $56 in 
benefits to Americans across the country, even in their States. It 
doesn't make any sense.
  The cross-State air rule is good for public health. It is fair. There 
is no other way Rhode Island can affect these States. We have done 
everything we can to clean our air. We could stop everything, and we 
would still be a nonattainment clean air quality State because of what 
gets bombed in on us from other States. If we don't have EPA defending 
us, we have no defense at all from States that choose to export their 
pollution rather than clean it up. And it is very cost effective, 
better than 51 by the highest estimates. So that is why I will be 
voting against Senator Paul's resolution to void this rule. I urge my 
colleagues to do the same.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire.
  Mrs. SHAHEEN. Mr. President, I rise this evening to join my colleague 
from Rhode Island and those who have come to the floor throughout the 
day today, to join them in strong opposition to the efforts by Senator 
Paul to nullify the Environmental Protection Agency's cross-State air 
pollution rule.
  As we have heard on the floor, his resolution would strip the EPA of 
its authority to protect our air from certain kinds of air pollution 
emitted by powerplants. That rule was put in place specifically to 
protect downwind States, such as New Hampshire and those of us in the 
Northeast and on the east coast, from air pollution that originates 
from outside our borders. I am particularly concerned by the attempts 
to stop these protections because in New Hampshire we have been 
fighting for them for over a decade, and they are long overdue.
  Clean air is a bipartisan matter for us in New Hampshire. As my 
friend and colleague Senator Ayotte noted on the floor last night:

       In New Hampshire, we have a long, bipartisan tradition of 
     working to advance commonsense, balanced environmental 
     protections.

  I couldn't agree with her more. She and I know that even if we 
eliminated all local sources of air pollution from within New 
Hampshire's borders, we would still have counties in the State with 
unacceptably high levels of pollution. That is because of the 
overwhelming pollution that comes into New Hampshire and the Northeast 
on air currents from the Midwest.
  In the Northeast, we are considered the tailpipe for the rest of the 
country. That is why, in 1997, when I was Governor, New Hampshire 
joined with

[[Page 16975]]

seven other Northeast States to demand that the EPA begin cracking down 
on this transported air pollution. When New Hampshire joined that 
effort in 1997, this is what I said about it:

       When you climb Mount Washington in New Hampshire and see 
     smog that is blown in from the Midwest, it's clearly time for 
     a national crackdown on air pollution . . . it's time to 
     address the major sources of a pollution that is fouling our 
     air and affecting the health of our people. We've done our 
     part in New Hampshire to cut down on emissions, and it's time 
     for the EPA to get tough on major polluters upwind.

  I have here a picture of the White Mountains, which is where Mount 
Washington is. That is the highest point in New Hampshire and, 
actually, in the whole Northeast. What this picture shows very clearly 
is the impact of this air pollution that is coming in from upwind.
  We can see these are the White Mountains. On a clear day, you can see 
a beautiful blue sky, green trees, beautiful landscape. On a hazy day, 
this is the impact of that smog. It looks as if somebody took a gray 
paintbrush and painted over the White Mountains in New Hampshire.
  It is really unbelievable to me that we are here, 14 years after this 
action was brought in 1997, still debating transported air pollution. 
The time for debate is over. The air quality improvements from this 
rule will benefit over 289,000 children who are at risk for asthma in 
New Hampshire. New Hampshire has one of the highest rates of childhood 
asthma in the country. In my State alone, air pollution is estimated to 
cost businesses more than 17,000 lost days of work annually due to 
health problems. Yet we are still hearing the same old arguments that 
forcing polluters to clean up will hurt the economy, will hurt our 
businesses. No. In fact, we have lots of research that shows that is 
not true.
  Talking points about job-killing regulations ignore the fact that a 
recent economic analysis by the Political Economy Research Institute 
found that the EPA's cross-State air pollution rule and the proposed 
mercury rule will create 290,000 jobs per year over the next 5 years in 
important sectors of our economy such as construction, craft labor, and 
industrial manufacturing. Companies such as ThermoFischer Scientific, 
which has a plant in Newington, NH, is a leading manufacturer of 
environmental monitoring equipment and a great example that good policy 
creates jobs right here in the United States.
  By reducing air pollution, these protections are estimated to provide 
about $640 million in benefits to the New Hampshire economy alone. 
Nationwide, the health and environmental benefits are estimated at $120 
billion to $280 billion each year. That is because when air pollution 
comes across our State borders, it is our New Hampshire companies that 
are forced to make up the difference. Without these rules, we have an 
unfair system where the burden of keeping our air clean falls 
disproportionately on downwind States such as New Hampshire.
  Higher air pollution costs our businesses through the loss of worker 
productivity and greater medical expenses, and it also affects our 
critical tourism industry in New Hampshire which depends on the clean 
air of the White Mountains and the health of our beautiful lakes and 
forests and streams. In New Hampshire, this tourism industry and the 
outdoor recreation economy, much like in Colorado where the Presiding 
Officer is from, supports 53,000 jobs, generates $260 million per year 
in sales taxes, and accounts for 8 percent of our State's gross 
domestic product. Transported air pollution has a direct impact on this 
industry, as we can see so clearly in this photograph, and on the 
quality of life of New Hampshire's 1.3 million citizens. It is time for 
the EPA to move forward with their cross-State air pollution rules.
  I urge all of my colleagues in the Senate to reject this resolution 
by Senator Paul and to protect the health and welfare of all of the 
citizens in this country.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a 
quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Begich). The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, I ask that the order for the quorum call 
be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, I want to take just a few minutes to talk 
about Veterans Day and important work already going on in Colorado to 
support our returning servicemembers and their families.
  This Friday, Veterans Day holds special significance. America's part 
in the war in Iraq is coming to a close this year, and we have started 
drawing down combat troops in Afghanistan. In Colorado, that is going 
to mean about 400 Fort Carson soldiers will come home from Iraq in 
December alone.
  Many of the bravest 1 percent of Americans who shoulder 100 percent 
of the responsibility of keeping our country safe will be coming home 
all across the country. As these servicemembers return to their 
families and many transition to civilian life, we need to make sure we 
are ready to make good on the promises we have made.
  I asked leaders from the Colorado veterans community to make 
recommendations for how to make Colorado the best State for veterans 
and military families to live and work. After months of thoughtful 
conversation, they produced a comprehensive report called ``Better 
Serving Those Who Have Served'' that offers solutions on how to address 
the challenges facing America's veterans. A key part of this report is 
a new proposal to create a National Veterans Foundation, modeled after 
work being done in Colorado Springs that enabled public and private 
agencies to better collaborate to support veterans and military 
families. This week, I will introduce a bill to bring that Colorado-
based innovation to the rest of the country. The bill would create a 
congressionally chartered National Veterans Foundation to support 
communities attempting to work on a blueprint model like Colorado 
Springs. The foundation would help fill gaps in services to veterans by 
helping communities align and leverage their resources.
  I have also joined Senator Tester and the Presiding Officer and 
cosponsored the VOW to Hire Heroes Act. The VOW to Hire Heroes Act does 
much to help veterans find good-paying jobs, including providing 
significant tax incentives to businesses that hire veterans. The Senate 
will likely be voting on this important legislation tomorrow, and I 
urge colleagues to support its passage.
  Before I sit down, I wanted to mention that 2 weeks, maybe 3 weeks 
ago, I was down in Colorado Springs visiting Fort Carson, and I went to 
see an elementary school on the post. As a former school 
superintendent, I have spent a lot of time over the years in schools 
and tend to want to be there when the children are there so that you 
can actually get a sense of whether there is any learning going on. 
This meeting was different because it was a meeting after school, after 
the children had gone home. Ninety percent of them live on the post. 
Their entire lives have been defined by these two wars in Iraq and 
Afghanistan. Their entire lives have been defined by the deployment of 
one parent--in some cases two parents--who have served two or three or 
four tours of duty on behalf of this country in Iraq and Afghanistan.
  Thousands of our troops are going to be coming home over the next 
year. I think we need to be asking ourselves whether we really are 
ready to honor the commitments and promises we have made.
  As others have said tonight, when we are coming out of what is the 
worst economic calamity we have faced since the Great Depression, we 
need to make sure we are doing absolutely everything we can for these 
veterans but also for the people who are the moms and dads, the 
children at elementary schools just like the one I visited, all across 
the country.
  The children in this school, according to the teachers with whom I 
met, have faced extraordinary challenges at home as a result of all 
this. It is another example of the work we should be doing

[[Page 16976]]

together here in a bipartisan way as we ask people to serve their 
country in these foreign wars.
  I continue to hope at some point there is going to be a breakthrough 
here and we are going to get past the partisan cartoon we have 
confronted for the entire time I have been in the Senate and get back 
to the work of the American people and get back to the work that will 
support the children in that elementary school at Fort Carson. I want 
to say on this floor and for this record how grateful I am to their 
teachers for teaching but also for giving their Senator an insight into 
the lives of the young people they are serving.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

                          ____________________