SACRIFICE of 2004

Mr. President, I want to make a couple comments on one of the pending amendments, the so-called Daschle amendment dealing with veterans. In many cases, this amendment is more about helping politicians than it is helping veterans. We have done a lot to help veterans--we being the Members of this body, Members of this Congress. I want to go to the facts.

Just look at history. In 1993, we were spending less than $15 billion. If you look throughout the next several years, the year 2000, it still increased only to about $17 billion, $18 billion. Since then, in the last 4 years, we have gone up from about $18 billion to now we are about $28.5 billion. So we have

had a dramatic increase in the last few years, frankly, in large part due to President Bush's requests.

Those are the facts.

If you want to gauge our support for veterans on how much money we are spending, we see a relatively flat, very slow growth during the Clinton years and a very rapid increase under President Bush's last 3 years.

Now we have an amendment that says, we know this is discretionary, as it always has been. Appropriators take care of discretionary items. As alluded to by Senator Bond, we have had big increases because we had some demands, and the appropriators and budgeteers met those demands. Now we have an amendment that says: Let's throw that away, an amendment that will increase spending by $300 billion.

It also increases the deficit by $300 billion. Some of the people who say they are in favor of this say they believe in pay-go. They make speeches: We want pay-go. But they don't pay for this amendment. So this amendment would increase the deficit by $300 billion.

Then I look at the way it is written, and it is one of the worst amendments, as far as putting something together from a fiscal standpoint, that I have ever seen. It says: Let's take the 2004 discretionary figure and freeze it; for the next 10 years we will freeze it. Then we will set up a new entitlement, not based on the number of veterans receiving care but on the number of people who are eligible to receive care. On the eligibility side, we will come up with some type of per capita contribution and figure it all out. CBO estimates over 10 years it will cost $300 billion.

We are spending a little less than $30 billion a year right now, but we are going to multiply that based on the number of people who might be eligible.

Senator Warner is eligible but my guess is he doesn't receive all of his health care in a veterans hospital. My father-in-law is eligible but he doesn't receive his health care under veterans. A lot of people in the military served with great distinction but they don't receive their health care through the VA health care system.

I don't know who designed this new formula. This kind of amendment belongs on the budget, not on a DOD authorization bill. This is really amending the budget, saying we are going to take a discretionary item and turn it into a mandatory item, and we have decided to grab some kind of fictitious name based on the number of people eligible, not the people who are in the system, not the people who are likely to receive the care, and pluck it out of the air and say: Here is what we are going to do.

And then it also says GAO, after a couple of years, if they don't like it and think it is enough, we will set some other kind of process on automatic pilot to have Congress vote on it in the next 10 days or so. It is just a ridiculous way to fund a department or to take care of veterans.

I am all in favor of taking care of veterans. Senator Warner alluded to the fact that we have done a lot for veterans in the last few years. You bet we have. Last year, concurrent receipts--I believe there was an amendment agreed to, and the ultimate cost was $22 billion. Senator Warner agreed to an amendment last week to expand that almost another billion dollars. We did TRICARE for life. We did Service Members Group Life Insurance. We did expanded benefits for former POWs, auto and housing grants, and veterans buying first homes. We increased the VA home loan guarantee up to a maximum mortgage of $240,000. We did the Montgomery GI bill to assist transitioning from military to civilian, and we enacted a 52-percent increase in education benefits. I can go on and on. We have done a lot. It is expensive. So this line will continue to increase.

Then I look at this amendment. It doesn't really say anything about need. It comes up with a very awkward formula, almost like an HMO-type thing, and says, by the number of eligibles, we are going to figure out so much money and multiply it and throw it in. That will not meet veterans needs. In the appropriations process, we have committees that have hearings. What do you need? What is pressing? We vote and appropriate money. We have had a faster rate of increase in veterans care than in almost any other area in the Federal budget.

The amendment we have pending before us has a budget point of order, and appropriately so. It would increase the deficit by $300 billion over and above the budget. Maybe some people don't care about deficits. This Senator does. This amendment is not paid for. It violates pay-go. For those people who voted for pay-go, they should say this is not paid for. They make speeches in their States and say, I believe we should have pay-go. This doesn't meet that test.

At the appropriate time, I will make a budget point of order, and I hope our colleagues will sustain that. I might also note that I am keeping a record of all the budget points of order that have been made and the number of people who vote to waive those points of order. Since last year's budget was adopted, we have had amendments to increase spending and increase the debt by over $1.4 trillion. This amendment will just be a couple hundred billion dollars on top of that. We are keeping a running log.

In the last month, there was an amendment to make IDEA an entitlement. We made a budget point of order and defeated that. That would have increased the debt by $87 billion. A week or so before that, there was an amendment to expand retroactively unemployment compensation that would have increased the deficit by $9 billion. We defeated that. A week before that, there was an amendment on trade adjustment assistance, and it would have cost an additional $6 billion. None of these amendments were paid for, and we defeated them. So in the last month, I think we have had three votes that would have increased spending--i.e., the deficit--by over $100 billion. The amendment we will be voting on will increase the deficit by a couple hundred billion dollars. Again, I hope my colleagues will show a little sanity and say, let's try to really help veterans, let's not try to help politicians. Let's sustain the budget point of order on this amendment.

I yield the floor.

I am happy to yield.

I would have to look at the figures. The baseline scored by OMB was 521. The baseline scored by CBO was 477. The figure we had before us in the budget resolution, I would want to check. CBO is in the process of revising that. We use CBO scoring. My guess is it would be significantly less than the 521 by OMB, and 477 by CBO, and we now expect, if we stay with the projections--i.e., the spending figures that we had assumed in the budget resolution, 821 on discretionary spending--the debts would probably be in the neighborhood of not 477 but closer to 420, in spite of the fact that I know my friend from Delaware made a speech last week saying he thought it would be 600. It would be closer to 420.

I am not sure. I think the Senator from Delaware has the floor. I don't want him stating----

Mr. President, I am happy to debate my colleague, or any colleague, on the budget. We spent several days debating the budget. I am more than happy to debate it. I will tell my colleague that we basically have assumed a freeze in nondefense, non-homeland security in the budget resolution. I hope we will be able to enforce that freeze. I have been very vigilant in trying to enforce the budget.

We have made about 80 points of order to contain the growth of spending, most all of which have been sustained. There were very few votes by our colleagues on the Democrat side, with the exception of Senator Miller, and I thank him and compliment him for that. Since we were successful in sustaining those budget points of

order, we have saved Federal spending to the tune of in excess of over $1.3 trillion. I happen to have these votes, and I happen to have a chart that shows the votes, just like this vote. CBO scores this vote-- if this amendment were to be adopted--saying it would increase spending by $300 billion. It basically doubles VA. I hope we will be successful. That will be scored on the running chart I am keeping. I mentioned over $100 billion of additional spending. We defeated that in the last month using budget points of order.

I hope we will defeat this amendment, and it will save $300 billion- plus and I think make us a lot more responsive. I happen to believe we are making a serious mistake to put everything into that side of the equation.

I mentioned discretionary spending of $821 billion, which is our budget figure. We are going to be spending $2.4 trillion. Two-thirds of the budget is now entitlements. One-third is discretionary spending. I believe we would have a better control, better oversight if we would keep more in the discretionary side. This is the opposite of that effort.

I yield the floor.

Will the Senator yield?

To inform my colleague, the budget also would reduce the deficit by half in 3 years. That is not easily done when you have a $400 billion deficit. So please keep that in mind as well.

Reserving the right to object, I wish to speak for a few minutes. I did not complete my remarks in the last debate.

Five minutes will be fine.

That would be fine.

Mr. President, I enjoyed having a little colloquy with my very good friend, Senator Biden. I just want to put in the Record a couple of facts. One, the deficit under the budget resolution we had estimated is $474 billion. I believe it will come in significantly less than that, possibly $420 billion to $440 billion. I am not sure. The budget resolution was for 2005, and that figure is $367 billion, considerably less than what OMB was estimating this year at $521 billion or CBO at $477 billion. So the budget resolution shows over $100 billion in deficit reduction by 2005, and also $255 billion in 2006. So it goes down by over $100 billion in over 2 years. That cannot be done unless there is some constraint on the growth of spending.

That being said, we had significant assumptions for growth in VA. Total spending in 2004 for VA was growing from $61.45 billion in budget authority to $70.8 billion, about a 15-percent increase just in 2004 to 2005 in VA. Now, that is a lot, especially when one assumes or if one knows that we are basically going with a freeze in nondefense spending. That means other things have to be cut to make room for veterans. We have done that in our budget, and we have shown probably a greater percentage increase in veterans care than almost any other section of the budget.

So I wanted to state for the record, when I heard my friend saying-- last week I think he said it was $600 billion, and I said I think it is going to be more like $420 billion. In the budget resolution for 2004, we estimated $474 billion. I believe it will be much less than that. For 2005, we were assuming $367 billion. I hope it will be less than that. For 2006, it will be $255 billion, with revenues coming in now greater than anticipated because the economy is working and because the tax cuts we passed did stimulate the economy. The stock market and the NASDAQ are up 40 or 50 percent since the tax bill we passed last year and the tax cuts.

I heard my colleague say it is because we want tax cuts for the wealthy. The only tax cuts we assumed in the budget resolution were extending what I call family friendly tax cuts: the tax credit per child staying at $1,000 per child instead of going to $700; marriage penalty relief, so married couples who have taxable income up to $58,000 will pay a 15-percent rate instead of a 25-

percent rate; and an expansion of the 10-percent bracket. Those are all family friendly. A lot of veterans want those tax cuts, too.

There are a lot of allusions to, we really need higher taxes so we can spend more for veterans. Veterans want these tax cuts. A lot of veterans have children. A lot of veterans are married and want to eliminate the marriage penalty, at least if they have incomes up to $58,000. That is where the bulk of the tax cuts we are trying to pass this year are. That is what we assumed in the budget.

So I wanted to make those few points. We hope to get the deficit down. I believe if we pass the budget, or if we adhere to the discipline we recommended in the budget, we will have the deficit down by over $100 billion. We will not if we adopt amendments that call for this program to double or another program to double and call it all an entitlement. That is a great way to have runaway spending.

This amendment is very irresponsible, and I would urge my colleagues to vote to sustain the budget point of order.

I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I, too, would like to comment on one of the legacies of our late President Ronald Reagan, the legacy of ensuring that the free world would prevail over the Soviet Union in the cold war.

I thought it was interesting that in one of the comments about Reagan very recently made on National Public Radio, June 8 of this year, Mr. Gennady Gerasimov, spokesman for Mikhail Gorbachev, said this:

I see President Reagan as a grave digger of the Soviet

Union and the spade that he used to prepare this grave was

SDI, a Strategic Defense Initiative, so-called ``Star Wars.''

The trick was that the Soviet leadership believed that this

SDI defense is possible and then--because it's possible, we

must catch up with the Americans. And this was an invitation

to the arms race, and the Soviet economy could not really

afford it and this way Reagan really contributed to the

demise of the Soviet Union.

Who better to know that than the spokesmen for Mikhail Gorbachev who have said similar things? Twenty-one years ago, President Reagan posed a very important question to the American people. He asked us to consider whether the free people of the world should continue to have to rely upon the threat of a massive retaliation of nuclear weapons to prevent an attack by the opposition. He asked: What would it take to free the world from this threat? He answered as follows:

I know this is a formidable, technical task, one that may

not be accomplished before the end of this century. Yet,

current technology has attained a level of sophistication

where it's reasonable for us to begin this effort. It will

take years, probably decades of effort on many fronts. There

will be failures and setbacks, just as there will be

successes and breakthroughs. . . . But isn't it worth every

investment necessary to free the world from the threat of

nuclear war? We know it is.

We began making that investment. It was one of the reasons we had a deficit during the Reagan years. It was part of the so-called defense buildup, to invest billions of dollars in the research--yes, there were failures, but there were many successes--to develop a Strategic Defense Initiative, an ability to defend ourselves against a ballistic missile attack from an enemy. A lot of Americans probably think we developed that strategic defense, that we have that capability today. They might remember that during the first Persian Gulf war Patriot missiles shot down some of the Scuds that were fired by Saddam Hussein.

But the grim reality is strategic defense is still not a reality. We still don't have the ability to defend against a missile attack. What happened during the Persian Gulf war? We used an air defense system to shoot down airplanes, and in the field, literally, as we shipped it from the United States to Israel and to Saudi Arabia and to Kuwait, made modifications in it so that we hoped it might work to shoot down some of the missiles that Saddam Hussein shot toward Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. In fact, some of those missiles--roughly a third of them--were intercepted by the Patriot. It was a crude weapon that was modified in the field. It had never been tested against other missiles. Yet we used what we had at the time because of the threat that existed.

Throughout the Clinton years and the first Bush administration, research continued. Every time we got close to, as they say, bending metal, actually building a missile, somebody would object and say we are not quite there yet. We haven't proven it can work. It is going to cost a lot of money, or the Russians--then the Soviets--might be unhappy with it.

After the demise of the Soviet Union, we agreed to scrap the ABM Treaty, and both President Putin and President Bush agreed that there was no need for a treaty that would define how many missiles each country could have and how many nuclear warheads because, frankly, we didn't have the need for them anymore and they were costly to maintain. We would destroy as many of ours as we wanted to destroy, and they could destroy all of theirs that they wanted to destroy. It was too expensive to keep around. There are still some. There are still some in Russia, I might add, where some believe it still might be worth trying to develop this offensive capability because the U.S. has never deployed a ballistic missile defense. There are those in China who believe the same thing, and also in North Korea, who I suspect believe we are bluffing.

Let me quote something from a high-ranking official in Iran, from Iran's clerical hierarchy, delivered at Tehran's Al-Hussein University very recently, and reported in the May 28 edition of a newspaper in London:

We have a strategy drawn up for the destruction of Anglo-

Saxon civilization and for the uprooting of the Americans and

the English. The global infidel front is a front against

Allah and the Muslims, and we must make use of everything we

have at hand to strike at this front, by means of our suicide

operations or by means of our missiles. There are 29

sensitive sites in the U.S. and in the West. We have already

spied on these sites and we know how we are going to attack

them.

There is more that we could bring to the information from the intelligence community, that is open material that we are all aware involve plans by leaders in North Korea, Iran, and other places to try to develop missile technology and nuclear technology to attack places such as the United States. The North Koreans already have the capacity to attack Hawaii and Alaska, and we don't yet have a missile defense system in place to stop it.

Thanks to President Bush and the efforts of the Congress and the missile act that we passed, we have put into place a program to actually develop and deploy a missile defense system. It

is not the be-all and end-all. It would not destroy everything the Soviet Union used to be able to use against us, but it would stop the kinds of missiles that North Korea, Iran, and perhaps others might want to send our way.

Yet today we are at a crossroads. We begin debating today the Defense Authorization Act and expect amendments to be offered once again to cut the heart out of the missile defense program, prevent it from being deployed to actually be able to shoot down the missiles of an attacking country. It is interesting what is at work here. I say cut the heart out. They want to cut out over half a billion dollars--$515.5 million-- from the missile defense program. Why? They claim it hasn't yet been operationally tested. What does operational testing mean? It means you take it out of the laboratory kind of testing and put it into the ground; put the missile into the silo, and you run against it a real test with an offensive missile like the one you want to be able to defend against and see if you can knock it down. That is real operational testing, battlefield conditions.

Sometimes you cannot afford to do that kind of testing, and you have to go with what you have just as we did in the first Persian Gulf war. There are other examples. The JSTAR is a program that had never been operationally tested, but we found that we needed it and, as a result-- it is the Joint Surveillance and Target Attack Radar System, which is an aircraft that played an important role in the 1991 Persian Gulf war by providing warning to forces on the ground when the Iraqi military was on the move. This had never been tested. JSTAR was in preproduction; it was a preproduction aircraft. They literally had to outfit it on the way to the theater. We used it and it worked.

The Predator is another example, and the Global Hawk. Unmanned aerial vehicles have been valuable assets on the war on terrorism. They were not operationally tested. They were hardly ready for use, but we needed something that could do what they did. That is the way it is with missile defense today. We need to have the ability to shoot down a missile aimed at us by, for example, Iran or North Korea or some other enemy that might think we are bluffing.

What about this claim that it hasn't been operationally tested? Mr. President, this is how we operationally test it. We put it into the silo, erect the radars, send a target missile against it, and see if it will work. We have had many tests--something like 18 tests, and all of the most recent tests have been successful. We are quite confident it will work. It needs to be tested in battlefield conditions, and this is the way to get it done. But the cuts that are being proposed would prevent us from buying the number of missiles we need in order to conduct this testing and still have enough left in the ground to prevent an attack should there be one launched against us.

There is a basic catch-22 being imposed against us. That catch-22 is that you cannot deploy it until you can operationally test it, and you cannot test it until you deploy it.

It would be folly for us to support an amendment that would prevent us from fielding these missiles. Eventually, we are only talking about 20 interceptors based at Fort Greeley in Alaska and Vandenberg Air Force Base. The money that has been set aside for the first tranche of these missiles is already now producing the missiles to put in the first set of silos. We are now talking about the downpayment on the additional interceptors, No. 21 through No. 30. We have already cut the long lead procurement funding for interceptors No. 31 through 40. So we have already delayed that, which will make it much more costly.

The bottom line is, as we have been told by General Kadish--the general who runs this program--it will be much more time-consuming and expensive if we cut the money out of the budget this year to prevent the production of these missiles that are going to be needed both for operational testing, as well as to be prepared to defend against an enemy attack should it come.

The point I want to make today is this: The Soviet Union was brought to its knees because it believed President Reagan when he said we are going to develop a means of countering your most effective weapon, so you might as well not even try to spend the money and the effort and the time to create this program because we will be able to defeat you; we are not kidding.

It has been over 20 years since President Reagan made that announcement, and we still do not have the missiles in the ground. I am afraid some of our potential enemies are going to conclude that we were bluffing all along, that we do not have the will to spend the money and to put the program in place to provide this kind of defense.

The point of this defense is not just to be able to operationally test it and have it in the ground to stop a missile should one be launched against us, but to deter nations that might believe we are bluffing, to deter nations from spending the money to build these offensive weapons in the first place, to deter these leaders, these people in places such as North Korea and Iran, from concluding that if they will simply spend the money it will take to build the nuclear weaponry and the missiles to fire them, that we will somehow forget about developing missile defenses or conclude that it is too expensive, and the richest Nation on Earth, the Nation that has the financial capability of providing this kind of defense, will decide not to do it.

The point of our exercise today is to move forward with the bill that the committee has put before us. It is a good bill. The bill has an authorization for enough money to buy the next group of missiles we need to put in the silos for testing purposes, for the purpose of shooting down a missile should one be launched against us--we do not have that ability today--and third, to deter countries that might be thinking they can go ahead with the development of this kind of a system because the United States will never get around to deploying an effective missile defense system.

Now is the time for us to act. It is not the time for us to blink in the face of these dictatorial countries. Should we support the amendment that would cut the heart out of missile defense funding for this year, it would send a signal to these countries that the United States has been bluffing all along. We were not bluffing when Ronald Reagan made that important announcement. The Soviet Union understood that. Can we do any less today than to make it crystal clear to our would-be enemies that we are not bluffing, that we mean what we say, that we intend to protect America, that we intend to protect others who are our allies, and that we will not permit an offensive ballistic missile to strike our land and kill our people? To do anything else would be morally irresponsible.

As President Reagan said, if we have the capability of defending ourselves and preventing this kind of conflagration, should we not take advantage of that wonderful capability? I am optimistic about our ability, and I am confident about the American people, and I am sure they want us to confirm to the world that we mean what we say, just as Ronald Reagan meant what he said.

Mr. President, I ask for the regular order with respect to amendment No. 3409.

Mr. President, I send a perfecting amendment to the desk.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. President, in 1898, as the Spanish-American War drew to a close, then-COL Theodore Roosevelt warned his Rough Riders about the reception they would receive once they returned home:

The world will be kind to you for 10 days. Everything you

do will be all right. After that, you will be judged by a

stricter code.

We have come a long way in the treatment of our veterans, and our recent commemoration of Memorial Day, our dedication of the World War II Memorial, the observance of the 60th anniversary of D-day, attest to the gratitude our Nation feels toward the men and women who have defended our freedom. Ultimately, the real test of our gratitude, however, is not found in parades or ceremonies. The real test is whether we honor our promises and provide our veterans with the help and benefits they need.

Sadly, we are not meeting that test. In recent years, large numbers of veterans have seen their health care delayed or denied outright. The reason is clear: Our system for funding the VA is broken. The VA's enrolled patient population has grown 134 percent since 1996, while appropriations have risen only one-third as quickly.

The President's task force to improve health care delivery for our Nation's veterans, created by President Bush through Executive Order 13214, reported a significant mismatch in VA between demand and available funding. That mismatch is translated into lengthy waiting lists, forcing hundreds of thousands of veterans to wait for months, even years, to see a doctor, increased out-of-pocket payments resulting in veterans paying six times more for their health care than when this President took office, from $200 million in 2001 to an expected $1.3 billion next year, and new enrollment restrictions.

Last year, Secretary Principi ruled that 200,000 priority 8 veterans could no longer enter the VA health care system. If nothing is done, the Congressional Budget Office now predicts the number denied access through this one policy will grow to 1.5 million by the year 2013. The Bush administration refuses to acknowledge the system is broken and preaches a policy of ``demand management.''

Let's be clear, demand management means taking any and all steps necessary to restrict the number of veterans treated by the VA, including rationing care, sending the bill collectors after veterans, and blocking enrollments. The principle of demand management says to the veteran: Take your health concerns somewhere else because we cannot help right now.

That is not a policy, that is a disgrace, and it is time we reject that principle that governs the care we offer our veterans today. Veterans have a fundamental right to health care, and we have an obligation to ensure that the VA has the resources to provide them. The answer to the VA health care crisis is simple: We need a new funding system that will allow us to provide health care to every American

who served in the Armed Forces of the United States.

My amendment today would spell out that objective in the law. The amendment would remove veterans health care from the annual politics of appropriations cycles. Instead, veterans health care would be funded like other vital programs, including military retirement, Social Security, and Medicare.

Each year, the Veterans Health Administration receives funding from two sources: First, an annual discretionary amount which remains unchanged from year to year locked in at the funding level for fiscal year 2004; second, an annual sum of mandatory funds. This amount would adjust each year to reflect changes in demand from veterans and the rate of health care inflation.

At the end of 2 years, Congress will be required to revisit the decision, and the GAO would study whether this system has functioned according to plan and whether the funding formula should be refined. Congress would then be required to update the law to reflect the lessons learned after 2 years of actual operation.

In effect, we would be creating a 2-year trial and then deciding how to refine the model and move forward. Meanwhile, every veteran who needs health care would receive it. President Bush's own task force recommended such a system saying: ``The Federal Government should provide full funding . . . through a mandatory funding system'' or other modifications to the current appropriations process.

I reemphasize, that was the President's own task force on this system. The Committee on Veterans Affairs in the House of Representatives offered its own bipartisan endorsement of mandatory funding earlier this year.

A February 25 letter signed by Republican chairman Chris Smith and Democratic ranking member Lane Evans stated:

Rather than supporting administration proposals that could

reduce demand . . . and shift costs to other parts of the

Federal medical system, the committee recommends treating

spending on veterans programs the same as spending on Social

Security and Medicare.

Leading veterans organizations have also joined in an unprecedented coalition to fight for health care budget reform. The American Legion, AMVETS, the Blinded Veterans, Disabled American Veterans, the Jewish War Veterans, the Military Order of the Purple Heart, Paralyzed Veterans of America, the Veterans of Foreign Wars, Vietnam Veterans of America--they have all banded together to work toward a system that guarantees health care for our veterans.

I believe their coalition, the Partnership for Veterans Health Care Reform, has identified a compelling solution to the VA funding crisis, and I have pledged my support in making it a reality. South Dakota veterans associated with these groups have joined in enthusiastic support.

This is not an abstract debate over numbers for my friends back home. These veterans have sat on waiting lists, these veterans take the phone calls from the VA's new bill collectors, these veterans have friends and neighbors who are prohibited from enrolling in the current VA health system.

Earlier this year, these South Dakota veterans were moved to action. Nearly 500 veterans from nearly 50 communities in every corner of our vast State signed a petition urging us to adopt mandatory funding for the VA.

South Dakota's American Legion CDR Wayne Vetter brought me this powerful statement, and I sent a copy to the White House. I am sorry to report that I have not yet heard a response from the President or anyone in the White House with regard to this statement.

It is time that we recognized that health care for those who return from war is a cost that follows directly from our Nation's military operations.

Ask any veteran. The burden of military service lives long after the parades are over and the medals and ribbons have been stashed in a closet. There are no more fundamental needs for these men and women than access to quality, affordable health care. Our veterans once kept this country safe and strong. Today they need a health care system to keep them strong. We must adequately fund the system that provides that care.

We can eliminate the annual budget problems in Washington and create a system where veterans can rely on the VA to be there when they need it. We have done it for military retirees. We have done it for Social Security recipients. We have done it for Medicare. We ought to do it for veterans.

The debt we owe our veterans must be something that lasts beyond the parade, beyond the ceremonies, beyond the 10 days of gratitude Teddy Roosevelt told his Rough Riders to expect. The debt is unending and our willingness to repay that debt must be unending as well.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, we will have a period for consideration of the bill for the purpose of debate only. No amendments will be offered until we clarify how we might resolve our parliamentary situation.

I have to say our distinguished chairman has done an outstanding job in getting us to this point, as has our ranking member. I am very concerned that as close as we are to completion, we have not been able now to move forward. We have only had two votes on this bill so far today. It is now 4 o'clock. I have laid down an amendment. I am willing to do a side-by-side, if necessary. We have other legislation pending.

I was told we cannot have a vote on my amendment because the Senator from Massachusetts, Mr. Kerry, is in town, and we cannot allow him to parachute down and have a vote. I think that is very unfortunate. He is here to vote, and I would think we would accord every Senator the right and opportunity to vote on this amendment and whatever other pending legislation.

We can finish this bill. We have already agreed under unanimous consent to finish this bill for debate purposes by the end of the day. All we have left are whatever amendments are going to be offered between now and 6:30 p.m. We are so close. I only hope we consider the admonition of both of our managers, that we work together as we have for the last many days now to complete our work.

Let's have a vote on the veterans amendment, let's have a vote on the other pending legislation, and let's move forward with these amendments in the same good faith we have demonstrated to date. We could have been far more confrontational with regard to unrelated amendments. We have not done that. At the urging of Democratic leadership, we have withheld many of those amendments. I hope we would show the same good faith as we complete this bill.

Senator Kerry ought to have a chance to vote. There ought to be an opportunity to dispose of these amendments. How ironic it is that we are the ones who appear to want to finish, and certainly our manager wants to finish, but there are those on the other side, for whatever reason, who are unwilling, reluctant to allow us the votes that are pending on the amendments that have now been laid down.

I urge reconsideration of that point of view at this point. It is counterproductive. It says all the wrong things about the desire to complete our work before the end of this week with all we have to do. I urge my colleagues to do that.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I am not sure to which second-degree amendment the distinguished chairman is referring.

If we can get a vote, we can certainly accommodate the Senator from Virginia. All we are looking for is a vote. It does not have to be on this particular amendment. If he wants to offer a second- degree amendment, we are certainly willing to look at ways with which to accommodate the majority in that regard. But a vote is important. It is relevant, of course. It ought to be offered.

As to the Kerry matter, I do not know if the distinguished chairman heard--he was standing here--Senator Frist noted to me as he was standing here that he did not want to accord Senator Kerry the opportunity to vote today, knowing, of course, Senator Kerry was here today.

We can work through these issues if we can demonstrate a little more patience and a little more good will, and we can get the job done.

I will be happy to yield.

First of all, I share the recollection of the distinguished assistant Democratic leader. Yes, we did accommodate those who had to travel for purposes of national campaigns in past elections. One would think we would do so in this case. We are trying to govern. We have the campaigns to run. One would hope we could keep the campaigns off the Senate floor.

It is ironic that some in the majority who have been pressing to get this legislation done now keep us from getting it done for that reason. We have wasted a couple of hours here. We could have finished this amendment and moved on. I think everybody agrees we need to finish this legislation. No one has worked harder at it than the distinguished chairman. But now we are being told we cannot do that. I did not know it was finished unless it involves giving Senator Kerry a chance to vote. It is not the right thing to do. We know that.

I hope we come to our senses and get on with getting the business of the Senate done.

I rise in strong opposition to the Daschle amendment. I strongly share the Senator's goal of improving health care and benefits for our Nation's veterans. I think for a number of reasons this is a misguided approach and will not achieve the desired goal of assuring access for all veterans.

I speak to this with a good deal of experience. Currently, I am chairman of the Appropriations VA-HUD Subcommittee. This is the committee that funds the VA. Since 1995, I have been in the leadership as either the chairman or the ranking member, and I can assure my colleagues that throughout that timeframe VA medical care has been a top priority on a bipartisan basis for that committee. The VA has received from that committee very strong support for medical care.

Since 1998, VA medical care has increased by $11 billion, and since 2001 it has increased by $7.3 billion, or 34.7 percent. That is a huge increase, and we made those increases because there were needs. Under the appropriations process, we can respond to those needs. That is why I think the Daschle amendment may have some questionable long-term implications.

Under the current system of discretionary appropriations, the Congress has the flexibility to make the necessary funding adjustments on an annual basis to respond to the challenging health care needs of veterans and to ensure proper accountability with the system so that veterans' needs are being adequately addressed.

Under the mandatory system proposed by the Senator from South Dakota, there would be a fixed funding system based solely on enrollment levels and a contrived inflationary index. Further, discretionary appropriations would be capped at the 2004 appropriations level for VA medical care. Let me go back and take a look. Here is something. I am reading from a chart that has been prepared by the Budget Committee. It shows, going back to 1993, that in that year, for example, the Consumer Price Index, CPIU, hospital and related services, was up 8.37 percent. The CPIU medical care was up 5.97 percent. But VA medical care was up 9.1 percent in the appropriated accounts. In other words, if we had been using either of those formulas, we would have gotten less under the formula than we actually got appropriated.

Of the last 10 years, there were 4 years--1996, 1997, 1998, and 1999--when the index would have provided more. But overall, as I said, let's go back to 2002. Then the highest index on medical care was 4.72 percent. The budget was increased 7.6 percent. In 2003, the hospital and related services index went up 7.36 percent, but the VA medical care budget increases in the appropriations bill went up 12.3 percent. That is almost a 5-percent higher rate of increase under the appropriations formula.

I think that shows the flexibility with which the appropriations process works. But there are other things we have to do in the appropriations bill. First, the funding formula creates an artificially fixed level. It doesn't reflect the unique medical care needs of veterans. The VA system was specifically created to respond to the unique needs of veterans who suffered health problems born on the battlefield. VA provides special services for veterans who have been exposed to environmental hazards or toxic substances or suffered spinal cord injuries or loss of limbs. This is especially evident in our veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, many of whom we have met in Walter Reed Hospital to see the care they are getting in the regular military hospitals.

But our veteran population is aging. They are going to need special long-term care services not accounted for under the Daschle funding formula. Veterans in need of nursing home care are expected to increase from some 640,000 to over 1 million by 2012 and remain at that level until 2023.

More importantly, I think the mandatory funding option eliminates the strongest tool of the Congress, the purse strings, to ensure accountability within the VA health care system. We are fortunate that the VA now has a very strong leader who is a great administrator and who is thoroughly committed to the needs of veterans, Secretary Tony Principi. He has made tremendous strides in improving the VA health care system because he demands the VA be accountable and responsive to the needs of veterans. Nevertheless, I have seen years where the VA has not had the same kind of leadership that it has under Secretary Principi. I believe it is necessary and was necessary at previous times that Congress have the ability to ensure the VA system is held accountable and makes the necessary reforms so they can provide timely, quality health care services to our Nation's veterans.

Even the President's task force acknowledges that providing sufficient funding to the VA will not by itself guarantee timely access. Let me give an example. Over 10 years ago, we were able to push successfully for improvements to health care access by forcing the VA to open more community-based outpatient facilities so veterans would not be forced to drive hours to receive medical care. I know how important that is. In my home State of Missouri some veterans would spend a whole day driving to the veterans hospital in Colombia, MO, or St. Louis or Kansas City. We found by adopting a system of community- based health care clinics we could provide the services, the primary care services, the pre-op services, in a setting that was less expensive. We could take them in a hospital that is more accessible and save much time and energy for the veterans, while ensuring they get the health care they need. We have been able to successfully push the VA to develop a comprehensive capital needs assessment, known as CARES, to realign the VA care and medical infrastructure so the system is modernized and located closer to where veterans live.

Many people have fulminated against the CARES process because its purpose is to look at unneeded veterans facilities. I have heard some statements that are totally unwarranted, saying that the CARES project is going to take away needed facilities, needed care for veterans.

To the contrary, the whole concept of CARES was one that we pushed in our

Appropriations Committee and that the previous administration, the Clinton administration, adopted. The General Accounting Office had found that the VA is currently wasting $1 million per day on unneeded and empty buildings. That comes right out of the medical care budget. When you have a huge hospital that is 10-percent full, the costs are astronomical for serving that small population.

Under the CARES process, those services will be moved to a more appropriate structure, and the funds will then be used to provide services, whether it is community outpatient services or some other specific kind of service or just putting more money into the medical professionals to make sure the veterans get the health care they deserve.

The GAO had found that more than 25 percent of veterans enrolled in VA health care, over 1.7 million veterans, live over 60 minutes driving time from a VA hospital. Under the Daschle system, Congress would no longer have the ability to force the VA to make the reforms necessary, as outlined under its CARES program, to improve care and access for our veterans. Instead, the system could build in waste and failure to be responsive to the needs of those who are supposed to benefit from the system.

The third problem with the amendment is that the VA cannot spend all of the additional funds contemplated in the Daschle amendment due to infrastructure and hiring concerns. The VA has an outdated and aging infrastructure. That is why we are pushing the CARES program. In many cases, VA does not have the space to accommodate the needs of patients and health care workers. We need to make sure that money is funneled into providing those facilities to meet the current and future needs of veterans rather than the facilities designed to meet the needs of veterans 40 years ago when their needs were very different and their locations were very different.

In some hospitals, patients are forced to wait in hallways because of the lack of waiting area space. As mentioned earlier, CARES will address these infrastructure needs, but it is going to take years to implement fully the CARES restructuring process. Further, many of my colleagues know that there is a severe nursing shortage in this country. In some facilities, the VA is having a difficult time retaining and recruiting qualified nurses. The VA is also seeking physician pay reform legislation because it is currently restricted in what it can pay for doctors, which hurts the VA's ability to recruit and pay doctors. Those are aspects on which we have to continue to work.

Last, the Daschle amendment imposes a set ceiling on VA health funding as opposed to the current system which has no ceiling and allows Congress to provide more funding as necessary.

As I said at the outset, we provided a 34.7-percent increase in VA health care funding since 2001. If the Daschle amendment had been in place using the available indexes, the likelihood would be that there would be at least 10-percent less funding that would be going to the VA as a result of the fixed mandatory funding system.

In closing, I urge my colleagues to oppose the Daschle amendment. Members can oppose the Daschle amendment and be concerned about the needs of veterans and help us work to make sure veterans get the health care they need, continuing to support our efforts in the Senate, in the Appropriations Committee, to get the kind of funding we need. We have done so on a bipartisan basis. I intend to continue to work to do so.

However, we are going to have to have the flexibility to make sure we hold the VA accountable, to make sure they provide the services, and that they make the changes necessary.

Funding is critical. I certainly agree with that. I am proud to say we have succeeded in providing that funding over the past several years. Funding, however, is not the sole antidote for the problems addressing the VA health care needs. We must ensure that the VA system remains responsive and accountable to our veterans.

I fear adoption of an amendment such as this would be an empty promise to our Nation's veterans who have special needs and demand a health care system that is accountable and responsive to their needs. Our system of checks and balances has played a critical role in transforming the VA health care system which is now underway to ensuring that we will be able to meet the health care needs of veterans well into the 21st century.

The Daschle amendment significantly reduces the role of Congress in ensuring improvements in reforms to the VA health care system so it is more accountable to the needs of the veterans. By capping the discretionary amount of appropriations at the 2004 level, our hands would be tied in making adjustments to the funding needs of our veterans. This is especially dangerous considering the hundreds of thousands of troops currently deployed across the globe fighting the war on terror and in Iraq. I strongly believe in putting the needs of veterans first.

Those needs are not best served by these amendments which would, in my opinion, based on my experience working with the system, hurt our ability to meet that goal. That is why I close by urging my colleagues not to support the amendment by the Senator from South Dakota.

Mr. President, I rise to speak to the Reid amendment, which I understand has been formally withdrawn at this moment but certainly is the topic of consideration and discussion.

It will return, according to the Senator from Nevada, for the consideration of the Senate.

That amendment by Senator Reid of Nevada would require Attorney General Ashcroft to provide the Judiciary Committee with all the documents in the Justice Department's possession relating to the treatment and interrogation of detainees.

This is an extremely serious issue for America. Literally, the world is watching us and asking whether the United States will stand behind its treaty obligations in this age of terrorism.

It is clear that our enemies do not respect the rules in their relentless quest to kill Americans. The barbaric treatment of Nicholas Berg and Paul Johnson have reminded us all of that fact.

But this is what distinguishes the United States from the terrorists we fight. There are some lines we in the United States will not cross. Torture is one of them. We have said repeatedly, since the time of President Abraham Lincoln, that torture is inconsistent with the principles of liberty and the rule of law that underpins our democracy.

Two weeks ago, Attorney General Ashcroft appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee as our Nation's chief law enforcement officer. He said on the record that the administration opposes torture and that torture is not justified or, in his words, productive. But he refused at that time to provide us with the Justice Department memos dealing with coercive interrogation tactics.

I asked him repeatedly: Attorney General Ashcroft, under what legal or constitutional basis would you deny this committee copies of these memos?

I asked him if he was asserting executive privilege on behalf of the President. He said he was not.

I asked him if he could identify any statute by which he would be absolved from his duty to respond favorably and positively to a request by the Senate Judiciary Committee for these memos, and he could not cite any statute.

At one point he said he personally believed that it was not appropriate to produce these memos. I responded by saying that, as interesting as that may be, the Attorney General's personal beliefs are not the law. It is the law which governs us.

Now, at the eleventh hour, today, in an effort to defeat the growing pressure to release these memos, the White House has provided Congress with a number of documents, including one of the Justice Department's torture memos. But a quick review of the documents provided reveals they have given us only a small part of what we have asked for. Just last week the Senate Judiciary Committee considered a request for some 23 documents of the Department of Justice related to interrogation techniques and torture. That request for subpoena was defeated in the Senate Judiciary Committee on a party-line vote, 10 to 9, all Republicans voting against disclosure of the documents, all Democrats voting in favor. We take a look at the documents produced voluntarily by the White House today and find only 3 of the 23 documents subject to the subpoena have actually been produced.

But the Justice Department's torture memo, which has been produced after it was leaked on the Internet for all to read, is a memo which we now know raises very troubling questions and completely contradicts statements made by Attorney General Ashcroft before the Judiciary Committee. It makes it clear if Congress and the Senate are to meet their obligation under the Constitution, we must ask harder questions and we must dig deeper.

In the memo, the Justice Department makes unprecedented assertions about executive power, assertions that I believe violate basic constitutional principles. The Justice Department concludes the torture statute, which makes torture a crime, does not apply to interrogations conducted under the President's Commander in Chief authority.

At the hearing 2 weeks ago before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Attorney General Ashcroft said unequivocally it was not his job to define torture. He went on to say, it is not the job of the administration to define torture. He said that is the job of Congress.

Sadly, as we take a look at this Department of Justice memo produced long before the Attorney General's testimony, we find on page 13 the following statement, and I ask listeners to reach their own conclusion as to whether what I am about to read from Attorney General Ashcroft's memo on interrogation is an attempt to define torture. I quote from the Department of Justice memo dated August 1, 2002:

The victim must experience intense pain or suffering of the

kind that is equivalent to the pain that would be associated

with serious physical injury so severe that death, organ

failure, or permanent damage resulting in a loss of

significant body function would likely result.

How can anyone read those words and reach any other conclusion but that the Department of Justice in August of 2002 issued this memorandum defining torture. That, of course, is something the Attorney General said was not their job. He is right; it was not their job. But it was done, anyway.

They also claim torture must involve ``intense pain or suffering of the kind that is equivalent to the pain associated with serious physical injury so severe that death, organ failure, or permanent damage resulting in a loss of significant body function will likely result.''

Ask yourself the obvious question: Why did the Department of Justice produce this memo? Who asked for it? Was it the intelligence agencies of the U.S. Government? The White House? We honestly do not know the answer to that.

If this opinion by the Attorney General's office was at the request of some other agency of Government, we should know that. We should know which agency of Government said to the Attorney General, we need an advisory opinion, we need your best guess as to how far we can go in interrogation techniques.

Although the Attorney General said to us repeatedly, the law speaks for itself--when he said that, he was referring to our laws, our Constitution, the treaties we have entered into--in fact, the Attorney General and his Department of Justice decided the law was not enough. They needed to add very graphic and specific definitions such as the one I read.

Now, of course, there is an important and underlying issue here. Under our Constitution, which we have all sworn to uphold--not only Members of Congress but members of the President's Cabinet--the President does not have the authority to choose which laws he will obey or to make his own laws. There is no wartime exception to our Constitution.

Article I, section 1 of the Constitution says all legislative powers are vested in Congress. Article II, section 3 of the Constitution says the President shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed. Article VI provides that laws made by Congress and treaties ratified by the Senate are the supreme law of the land.

Retired RADM John Hutson was a Navy judge advocate for 28 years. From 1997 to the year 2000 he was the judge advocate general, the top lawyer in the Navy. He rejects the Justice Department interpretation of torture law, saying:

If the president's inherent authority as commander in chief

trumps domestic and international law, where is the limit? If

every sovereign can ignore the law, then no one is bound by

it.

The Supreme Court considered a similar question related to the Justice Department position. President Truman, faced with a steel strike during the Korean war, issued an Executive order to seize and operate the Nation's steel mills. In the historic Youngstown steel case, the Court found the seizure of the steel mills was an unconstitutional infringement on Congress's lawmaking power and that it was not justified in wartime as an exercise of the President's Commander in Chief authority.

Justice Hugo Black, writing for the majority, said:

The Constitution is neither silent nor equivocal about who

shall make laws which the President is to execute . . . The

Founders of this Nation entrusted the lawmaking power to the

Congress alone in both good and bad times.

It seems clear the Justice Department memo was the basis for a Defense Department memo that makes very similar arguments about torture. For example, the Department of Defense memo argues the statute outlawing torture does not apply to the detention and interrogation of enemy combatants by the President pursuant to the Commander in Chief authority.

The difficult question we have to answer is this: What have these memos produced by the Department of Justice wrought? We know, now, because of the graphic illustration of the abuses at Abu Ghraib prison, that soldiers in the uniform of the United States of America performed some horrible and shameful acts for which no one has made any excuses. Even the President has said that does not represent America. What they did was clearly wrong.

The important and obvious question for all to ask as a follow-on is, Was this an incident involving the conduct of a handful of officers or did it represent a policy promulgated by this Government, supported by memoranda from

the Department of Justice and those from the Department of Defense? Therein lies the critical question.

Last week, President Bush was asked about the Justice Department torture memo and he said he did not remember if he had ever seen it; he said he issued an authorization that conformed with U.S. law and treaty obligations, and he would not say whether he would authorize the use of torture but that we should be ``comforted'' by the ``laws on the books.''

The President is correct; the law is very clear. The United States is not permitted to engage in torture or cruel, inhumane, or degrading treatment. But I am not comforted because we don't know if the administration followed the Justice Department interpretation which would allow the President to set aside these laws. We have gone too far.

We have to follow the paper trail to determine who requested the memos and what was done in response to them. We need to find out whether the legal arguments contained in these memos were used to justify the use of torture at Guantanamo, at Abu Ghraib, or any other facility controlled by the United States of America. We need to know whether the President or anyone else in this administration authorized the use of torture as defined by the Department of Justice memo.

The Senate has an obligation to the Constitution and the American people to answer these questions. The only way to do that is to obtain all of the relevant documents.

The great challenge of our age in combatting terrorism while remaining true to the principles which our country is based upon is to make certain we respect liberty and the rule of law. We must not sacrifice freedom and the rule of law at the altar of security. We must respect the freedoms protected by the Bill of Rights. Our laws must not fall silent during time of war.

I urge my colleagues to support the Reid amendment. I yield the floor.

Will my colleague yield for a couple questions?

Mr. President, I ask my colleague, the chairman of the Budget Committee, how big was the deficit in the budget you brought to the Senate floor, the budget you voted out of committee?

We are already starting off with the Senator recommending a vote for a budget that has $400 billion-plus.

I ask the Senator if he wants to respond to that comment.

Mr. President, I say to my friend, I didn't want to debate it. I was trying to get the facts. The facts are that, notwithstanding what he suggested he has saved by budget points of order, he brought a budget to the Senate floor that is in deficit over $400 billion.

Surely.

Again, I am not here to debate this. The facts are that he brought a budget to the floor of the Senate that is over $430 billion, and some believe it is over $500 billion in deficits. I agree with my friend that we should be careful about putting in entitlements. Entitlements, in a sense, if you think about the effect on the budget--I know the Presiding Officer is a former Governor--there are two types of expenditures: direct expenditures and tax expenditures.

My friend also wants to essentially, in layman's terms, make an entitlement of the tax cuts; in other words, make them permanent. They do not want to make permanent the ability of veterans to have what this amendment calls for. I understand that. It is a logical argument. I do not begrudge that. I think it is an intelligent argument to make.

I want to point out this is about values and priorities. If you want to know what a country values, if you want to know what a company values, if you want to know what a nonprofit values, look at its budget, and you will know. You will know what it values, on what it puts the highest value.

I can understand one can make the argument, and there is truth to the argument, that tax cuts spur the economy, everything gets better, and it works out better. I got all that. Believe it or not, after 30 years here, I figured that out, and there is some truth to it. Really, this is a values debate, not wanting to put something permanently into the law that is an entitlement in the case of what veterans now and in the future would be entitled to. It is not a lot different fundamentally in its effect on the actual budget, the numbers in the budget, than essentially making permanent tax cuts from now infinitum. And they are big numbers.

Again, the disagreement is real, genuine, and intellectually is defensible, but it is a difference of perspective. The reason the Senator from Delaware comes to the floor, very seldom my colleagues will notice, is that in this case, when you think about a budget that I voted against--I do not support the budget, I do not support the priorities within the budget by the Budget Committee--to turn around and say that when I vote not to sustain a point of order that somehow I am the one increasing the budget, it is a little bit like my saying to you: Here is the deal. What we are going to do in the family, we are going to have one car, drive it 22 miles a week, and not drive it any further than that. We are not going to turn the thermostat up over 60 degrees. And, by the way, we are going to build a new swimming pool in the backyard.

If I do not get a vote on that--it seems to me when I come along and say we should be able to drive the car to church more often because the kids are not going to church because the church is 14 miles away, we should have more money for gas in the car, we should not have built the swimming pool--we do not get a chance to do that.

I get a budget, which is legitimate, shoved on me because you guys run the show, the Republicans run the show. I got that. I understand it. I do not complain about that. More people voted for Republican Senators than Democratic Senators. But the idea that somehow when I suggest we should have a different priority and seek to change the budget I am busting the budget when, in fact, what has happened is the priorities that the chairman of the Budget Committee has placed in the budget--and very successfully, and he has led that committee very successfully and he has led it unanimously; there are no diversions on his side from what he proposes--is a little bit disingenuous in terms of the average person listening to this.

It is as if I have to accept we are building a swimming pool instead of providing more gas in the car to get the kids to church. So I want to get more gas in the car to get the kids in church. I do not want to build a swimming pool. I do not want to do that.

The only vehicle I have as a Senator is to vote for changing the budget that I do not want. What these are attached to is we say: What you put down in the budget, these tax cuts and the way they work and you are seeking to make them permanent, all those things, they are not my priorities. So the way I want to pay for that is I do not want to build a swimming pool.

Now, you have built a swimming pool, but what I do not want to do is keep it open because it costs me a lot of money to keep it open. The money I can save by not filling the pool, not having a pool service come, not having to buy the chlorine, not having to buy the equipment is enough money for me to get the gas to get the kids to church on Sunday. That is what I want to do. That is what I am doing here.

The fact is, the difference between 1993 and now is we are at war. My friend will say a lot of veterans who are going to benefit from this proposal are ones who are not at war now. One of the things we are trying to do in an All-Volunteer Army is make it more appealing for people to get into the service, to stay in the service, so that, in fact, when they volunteer to get in this Army, there are benefits that flow from it. They make enough sacrifices already in this Volunteer Army.

We had trouble getting money early for bulletproof vests for these guys. I was just in Iraq, and I met a young man in Kuwait. Our generals introduced him to us. We had dinner, and they said: These are the heroes; these are the kids who drive the transport trucks from Kuwait City all the way up to Baghdad. Do my colleagues know what they are doing because we have not provided them what they need? They have been given the authority to augment their vehicles any way they want. I was joking with them. A lot of them are becoming spot welders. They are literally getting scrap metal and welding it to their vehicles. They are given the authority to do what they want because they are getting shot dead.

We were out there, and these kids were on this incredibly dangerous mission. We said: Do the mission, but we realize you have to improvise.

So they are telling me: I got this piece of steel, and I put it on my side door and welded it on. What I wanted to do was get some underneath so that when the bombs blow up, they don't blow through the seat. It is amazing.

My point is, we are asking these kids to do all this. Right now in category 7 and 8, there are 400,000 veterans seeking VA help who are told: Don't apply. To the best of my knowledge--I do not claim to have a real expertise in this area--but there are 90,000 veterans under the present system waiting for admission to get into veterans hospitals, and there are 40,000 who wait 2 to 6 months just to get a doctor to sign off on them qualifying to get prescriptions from their local VA hospital at the lower price.

Whether or not this proposal that has been put forward is the answer to any of this, I cannot guarantee, but there is

something wrong in Denmark. Something is wrong here. Something is not working. If you wonder if I am telling the truth, go home and ask your Democratic- or Republican-registered veterans. Ask them if they are happy with the way things are working right now. Find out how many of those 400,000 people are told do not apply, and 90,000 are trying to get into the hospital.

Again, I acknowledge, based on the fact we decided to build a swimming pool in this budget instead of doing this, this will increase the deficit. I got it. Just like the administration budget initially proposed did not even include money for Iraq. Does anybody think $25 billion is going to get us through next year in Iraq? Raise your hand. Come to the floor and tell me. Anybody. I want you to stand here and go on record and say: I believe that $25 billion is going to cover the nut in Iraq and Afghanistan for next year.

Let's get a little truth in budgeting here. I understand the Senator. I got it. I respect him. He has made a basic value judgment. He believes very strongly--and there is some evidence for his belief--that if, in fact, we have these massive tax cuts, the bulk of which go to the wealthiest, it will, in fact, trickle down. He will argue--and there is some evidence to it--that some of it has already started to happen, and the best way to help veterans, poor folks, IDEA folks, and all those folks is get the economy roaring. That will bring in more revenue. I got it. That is a legitimate argument. But the basic fundamental argument we have is the die are not even cast. The table has been set, and I either sit down and sup at the table when I do not like the menu and refrain from trying to change the menu, or I attempt to change the menu.

So this notion that the VA health care system is in good shape, that we have done so much for veterans--which we have done more--we are creating a whole heck of a lot more veterans now, a whole heck of a lot more, and the need is going to increase more because we are at war and we are likely to be at war for a while.

Again, I do not want to belabor the point. I respect my friend, the chairman of the Budget Committee. I respect the fact he has little choice but to ask us to vote for a budget that is already, by his standards, $435 billion or so out of whack. I respect that.

I respect the fact that he believes, notwithstanding the fact that his own outfit points out a significant portion of that deficit last year and this year relates to the tax cuts, we will earn it all back; we will be able to cut the deficit because of the economic growth and all of that. I have that. But I have also been through this once before. I went through this once before in the Reagan era. It did not work then. Reagan came back and raised taxes. I do not think it is going to work now.

I will yield the floor with one final comment.

Was there a time? There is a time. Well, I respect that, and I thank my friend from Oklahoma. We just have a difference in our priorities and the way in which we value our value system.

I thank the Chair.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, first, I will call up my amendment, and I ask that it then be set aside.

Mr. President, I understand, and I wish to speak about an amendment that will be offered later, amendment No. 3400. It is an amendment I am cosponsoring with Senators Murray, Dayton, Corzine, Durbin, and Lautenberg.

My amendment would bring a small measure of relief to the families of our brave military personnel who are being deployed for the ongoing fight against terrorism, the war in Iraq, and other missions in this country and around the world. It is actually an amendment the Senate adopted unanimously to last year's Iraq supplemental spending bill, and I hope my colleagues will join me in supporting this measure again this year.

The men and women of our Armed Forces undertake enormous sacrifices in their service to our country. They spend time away from home and from their families in different parts of the country and different parts of the world and are placed in harm's way in order to protect the American people and our way of life. We owe them a huge debt of gratitude for their dedicated service.

The ongoing deployments for the fight against terrorism and for the campaign in Iraq are turning upside down the lives of thousands of Active-Duty National Guard and Reserve personnel and their families as they seek to do their duty to their country and honor their commitments to their families, and, in the case of the Reserve components, to their employers as well. Today, there are more than 160,000 National Guard and Reserve personnel on active duty.

Some of my constituents are facing the latest in a series of activations and deployments for family members who serve our country in the military. Others are seeing their loved ones off on their first deployment. All of these families share in the worry and concern about what awaits their relatives and hope, as we do, for their swift and safe return.

Recently, many of those deployed in Iraq have had their tour extended beyond the time they had expected to stay. Sometimes this extension has played havoc with the lives of those deployed and their families. Worried mothers, fathers, spouses, and children expecting their loved ones home after more than a year of service must now wait another 3 or 4 months before their loved ones' much anticipated homecoming. The emotional toll is huge. So is the impact on a family's daily functioning, as bills still need to be paid, children need to get to school events, and sick family members have to be cared for.

Our men and women in uniform face these challenges without complaint, but we should do more to help them and their families with the many things that preparing to be deployed requires.

During the first round of mobilizations for operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, military personnel and their families were given only a couple days' notice that their units would be deployed. As a result, these dedicated men and women had only a very limited amount of time to get their lives in order. For members of the National Guard and Reserve, this included informing their employers of the deployment. I commend the many employers around the country for their understanding and support when their employees were called to active duty.

In preparation for deployment, military families often have to scramble to arrange for childcare, to pay bills, to contact their landlords or mortgage companies, and take care of other things we usually deal with on a daily basis.

The amendment I will be formally offering later today will allow eligible employees whose spouses, parents, sons, or daughters are military personnel who are serving on or called to active duty in support of a contingency operation to be able to use their Family and Medical Leave Act, FMLA, benefits for issues directly relating to or resulting from that deployment. These instances could include preparation for deployment or additional responsibilities that family members take on as a result of a loved one's deployment, such as childcare.

I do not want you to just take my word for it. Here is what the National Military Family Association has to say in a letter:

The National Military Family Association has heard from

many families about the difficulty of balancing families'

obligations with job requirements when a close family member

is deployed. Suddenly, they are single parents, or, with the

grandparents, assuming the new responsibility of caring for

grandchildren. The days leading up to a deployment can be

filled with predeployment briefings and putting legal affairs

in order.

In that same letter, the National Military Family Association states:

The military families, especially those of deployed

servicemembers, are called upon to make extraordinary

sacrifices. This amendment offers families some breathing

room as they adjust to this time of separation.

Let me make sure there is no confusion now about what this amendment does and does not do. This amendment does not expand eligibility for FMLA to employees not already covered by FMLA. It does not expand FMLA eligibility to Active-duty military personnel. It simply allows those already covered by FMLA to use the benefits they already have in one additional set of circumstances, and that is to deal with issues directly related to or resulting from the deployment of a family member.

I was proud to cosponsor and vote for legislation that created the landmark Family and Medical Leave Act during the early days of my service to the people of Wisconsin as a Member of this body. This important legislation allows eligible workers to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave per year for the birth or adoption of a child, the placement of a foster child, to care for a newborn or newly adopted child or newly placed foster child, or to care for their own serious health condition or that of a spouse, a parent, or child. Some employers offer a portion of this time as paid leave in addition to other accrued leave, while others allow workers to use accrued vacation or sick leave for this purpose prior to going on unpaid leave.

Since its enactment in 1993, the FMLA has helped more than 35 million American workers to balance responsibilities to their families and their careers. According to the Congressional Research Service, between 2.2 million and 6.1 million people took advantage of these benefits in 1999 through 2000.

Our military families sacrifice a great deal. Active-duty families often move every couple of years due to transfers and new assignments. The 10 years since FMLA's enactment has also been a time when we as a country have relied more heavily on National Guard and Reserve personnel for more and more deployments of longer and longer duration. The growing burden on these service members' families must be addressed, and I think this amendment is one way to do so.

This legislation has the support of a number of organizations, including the Wisconsin National Guard, the Military Officers Association of America, the Enlisted Association of National Guard of the United States, the National Guard Association of the United States, the Reserve Officers Association, the National Military Family Association, and the National Partnership for Women and Families. The Military Coalition, an umbrella organization of 31 prominent military organizations, specified this legislation as one of five meriting special consideration during the Iraq supplemental debate.

We owe it to our military personnel and their families to do all we can to support them in this difficult time. I hope this amendment will bring a small measure of relief to our military families.

Mr. President, I urge my colleagues to support the amendment when we have the opportunity to vote on it. I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I thought I might take advantage of this moment while so many of the Republicans are at a White House reception to share a few thoughts about a bill we are obviously not going to be able to vote on today.

Sixty years ago, Franklin Roosevelt signed the GI bill. He showed us in doing so how to honor our veterans and he launched the greatest expansion of the middle class in our Nation's history. Never before has an act of legislation and the vision of and the investment by one President done so much for so many Americans.

President Roosevelt said that on the day it became law, the signing of this bill ``gave emphatic notice to the men and women in our Armed Forces that the American people do not intend to let them down.''

Today, throughout the day, the Senate has had an opportunity to make history in the spirit of Roosevelt and his commitment to the Greatest Generation. Senator Daschle's amendment, which he tried to bring up earlier, would take an important step toward the full mandatory funding of veterans health care. It would say to the 500,000 veterans closed out of the VA health system in the last 2 years: You are welcome. There is care for you.

In the 10th year of its enactment, it will provide care to 3 million veterans who otherwise will be shut out of the system, and it will end the practice of rationing health care for those who have already given so much to this country and who have had an expectation that health care will be there for them.

Now, last night, in the normal course of business in our Senate, I was informed by the minority leader that his amendment would proceed today and that he would, under the normal procedures of the Senate, bring it up in an effort to have an early vote. I cancelled my events and I returned here hoping to be able to vote on this important issue. There was no request for lengthy debate. There has been--I know the Senator from Virginia will agree with this--no effort to delay this bill. In fact, the minority leader has expressed every good intention to try to move forward as fast as possible on this bill.

Under the normal courtesies of an institution that runs on courtesy, normally, it is absolutely consistent with the rules and traditions of the Senate that time might be made available to a minority leader to offer an amendment and for a vote to be ordered. But, evidently, this is not a normal time for those courtesies in the life of the Senate. I regret that for the Senate and for the country and for veterans. So today we could have acted and have honored 26 million Americans who wore the uniform and provided important funding for them.

More than a decade ago, Senator Daschle and I worked to help veterans exposed to Agent Orange receive the recognition, the care, and the benefits they deserved. I am very happy to join him today in supporting this amendment, whenever it will come up, in whatever way I can, whether I am here or not here. I will support this effort in the days, months, and in the years ahead to provide to our veterans the resources they deserve and increasingly have been denied.

Yes, there have been increases in the veterans budget, but the test is not whether you have increased the budget, the test is whether you are meeting the need. And the need is not being met.

I am honored to stand with the veterans who are backing Senator Daschle's amendment. The VFW, the American Legion, AMVETS, the Paralyzed Veterans Association, Disabled American Veterans, the Blinded Veterans Association, Jewish War Veterans, the Military Order of the Purple Heart, and Vietnam Veterans of America--all of them would have loved to have seen the Senate do its business today when it could have.

That is a distinguished group of veterans. A lot of courage, a lot of honor, a lot of kindness comes from the men and women who belong to those organizations. They are Americans whose opinions and guidance I trust. And they deserve to be heard.

In this time of great sacrifice, it is even more important that we show our veterans we honor them and respect them. We have to do so with more than words. We have to show them by our actions and our deeds.

During a time of war, a time when tens of thousands of Americans are asked to fight and possibly die for their country, our message ought to be loud and clear: When you come home, your country will take care of you because you took care of us.

This is an important issue to our country, to our veterans, and to the men and women in harm's way in Iraq, Afghanistan, and around the world--today's service members who will be tomorrow's veterans.

I have been around here long enough not to worry about these kinds of things. This day will pass and others will come. But Americans will measure how we do our business, and they will measure the seriousness of purpose and the courtesies we extend to each other. So while this vote may not take place while I am here, my support will never wane and my commitment to veterans will never be diminished. I regret whatever rationale has entered into this decision that we cannot proceed for a very simple vote on a very straightforward issue.

I yield the floor.

One of my good friends on the other side of the aisle is the senior Senator from Virginia, and I am a good friend with the junior Senator, too. I will say to him that I respect the position he has been put in. I have been here 20 years. I know how this place works and how it negotiates. I know exactly what the conversation was in the well of the Senate earlier.

I have no illusions about where we find ourselves now. I am not complaining. I am just here to make my statement of support. I will continue to do what I am doing because I believe we can do better by veterans in this country. I will continue to take that issue to the country over these next days.

We have an opportunity to make a choice today. If we don't, then we will continue to talk about this issue over the next months, and the American people will make a choice in November.

I suspect under the health care and benefit plans the Senate gives itself, the Senator won't need this.

Mr. President, not this particular proposal.

Mr. President, that is if you did the full funding. This is a compromise that has been worked out which is a lesser amount of money, recognizing the significant amounts that are available.

Be that as it may, we are talking over 10 years. The last tax cut for people earning more than $200,000 a year was over $1.2 trillion. So it is a question of where the rubber meets the road. You have veterans over here who served their country who have a need for health care, and you have a lot of wealthy Americans over here who don't particularly have a need for a new tax cut. This is a place for choices. All we are asking is for a choice to be made.

I thank the Senator from Virginia and yield the floor.