Internet Tax Nondiscrimination Act

Mr. President, I rise today to join with my colleagues from Maine to introduce legislation to restore fairness to the Medicare program. This package of legislation will reduce regional inequalities in Medicare spending and support providers of high-quality, low-cost Medicare services.

The high cost of health care in Wisconsin is skyrocketing: A survey issued a few days ago found that the cost of health care benefits for employees in this State rose 14.8 percent this year, to an average of $6,940 per employee. That's 20 percent high than the national average of $5,758 for workers in businesses with 500 or more employees.

These costs are hitting our State hard, they are burdening businesses and employees, hurting health care providers, and preventing seniors from getting full access to the care that they deserve.

One of the major contributing factors to the high cost in our state is the inherent unfairness of the Medicare Program.

With the guidance and support of people across our State who are fighting for Medicare fairness. I have proposed this legislation to address Medicare's discrimination against Wisconsin's seniors, employers and health care providers. The Medicare program should encourage the kind of high-quality, cost-effective Medicare services that we have in Wisconsin. But as many in Wisconsin know, that's not the case.

To give an idea of how inequitable the distribution of Medicare dollars is, imagine identical twins over the age of 65. Both twins worked at the same company all their lives, at the same salary, and paid the same amount to the Federal Government in payroll taxes, the tax that goes into the Medicare Trust Fund.

But if one twin retired to New Orleans, Louisiana, and the other retired to Eau Claire, Wisconsin, they would have vastly different health options under the Medicare system. The twin in Louisiana would get much more.

For example, in most parts of Louisiana, the first twin would have more options under Medicare. The high Medicare payments in those areas allow Medicare beneficiaries to choose between an HMO or traditional fee-for-service plan, and, because area health care providers are reimbursed at such a high rate, those providers can afford to offer seniors a broad range of health care services. The twin in Eau Claire does not have the same access to care, there are no options to choose from in terms of Medicare HMOs, and sometimes fewer health care agencies that can afford to provide care under the traditional fee-for- service plan.

How can two people with identical backgrounds, who paid the same amount in payroll taxes, have such different options under Medicare? They can because the distribution of Medicare dollars among the 50 States is grossly unfair to Wisconsin, and much of the Upper Midwest. Wisconsinites pay payroll taxes just like every American taxpayer, but the Medicare funds we get in return are lower than those received in many other states.

My legislation will take us a step in the right direction by reducing the inequities in Medicare payments to Wisconsin's hospitals, physicians, and skilled nursing facilities.

Last year, with the introduction my Medicare fairness legislation along with the efforts of many other Senators, we put Medicare fairness issues front and center in Congress. The Senate Budget Committee approved my amendment to promote Medicare fairness in any Medicare reform package. A wide range of Senators from both parties endorsed my proposal to create a Medicare fairness coalition. The House passed a number of Medicare fairness provisions that were a result of these successes, and both House and Senate leadership endorsed Medicare fairness issues. Now that we have finally brought these issues the attention that they deserve, we need to build on that momentum to pass Medicare fairness provisions into law.

My legislation demands Medicare fairness for Wisconsin and other affected States, plain and simple. Medicare shouldn't penalize high- quality providers of Medicare services, most of all. Medicare should stop penalizing seniors who depend on the program for their health care. They have worked had and paid into the program all their lives, and in return they deserve full access to the wide range of benefits that Medicare has to offer.

I look forward to working with my colleagues to move this legislation forward. I believe that we can re-balance the budget, while at the same time encouraging efficient, quality enhancing services, and that's what my legislation sets out to do.

Mr. President, I rise today with my colleague from Maine to introduce legislation to help businesses form group-purchasing cooperatives to obtain enhanced benefits, to reduce health care rates, and to improve quality for their employees' health care.

High health care costs are burdening businesses and employees across the Nation. These costs are digging into profits and preventing access to affordable health care. Too many patients feel trapped by the system, with decisions about their health dictated by costs rather than by what they need.

The cost of health care in Wisconsin is skyrocketing: A recent survey found that the cost of health benefits for employees in Wisconsin rose 14.8 percent this year, to an average of $6,940 per employee. That's 20 percent higher than the national average of $5,758 for workers in businesses with 500 or more employees.

We must curb these rapidly-increasing health care premiums. I strongly support initiatives to ensure that everyone has access to health care. It is crucial that we support successful local initiatives to reduce health care premiums and to improve the quality of employees' health care.

By using group purchasing to obtain rate discounts, some employers have been able to reduce the cost of health care premiums for their employees. According to the National Business Coalition on Health, there are more than 90 employer-led coalitions across the United States that collectively purchase health care. Through these pools, businesses are able to proactively challenge high costs and inefficient delivery of health care and share information on quality. These coalitions represent over 7,000 employers and approximately 34 million employees Nationwide.

Improving the quality of health care will also lower the cost of care. By investing in the delivery of quality health care, we will be able to lower long term health care costs. Effective care, such as quality preventive services, can reduce overall health care expenditures. Health purchasing coalitions help promote these services and act as an employer forum for networking and education on health care cost containment strategies. They can help foster a dialogue with health care providers, insurers, and local HMOs.

Health care markets are local. Problems with cost, quality, and access to health care are felt most intensely in the local markets. Health care coalitions can function best when they are formed and implemented locally. Local employers of large and small businesses have formed health care coalitions to track health care trends, create a demand for quality and safety, and encourage group purchasing.

In Wisconsin, there have been various successful initiatives that have formed health care purchasing cooperatives to improve quality of care and to reduce cost. For example, the Employer Health Care Alliance Cooperative, an employer-owned and employer-directed not-for-profit cooperative, has developed a network of health care providers in Dane County and 12 surrounding counties on behalf of its 170 member employers. Through this pooling effort, employers are able to obtain affordable, high-quality health care for their 110,000 employees and dependents.

This legislation seeks to build on successful local initiatives, such as the Alliance, that help businesses to join together to increase access to affordable and high-quality health care.

The Promoting Health Care Purchasing Cooperatives Act would authorize grants to a group of businesses so that they could form group- purchasing cooperatives to obtain enhanced benefits, reduce health care rates, and improve quality.

This legislation offers two separate grant programs to help different types of businesses pool their resources and bargaining power. Both programs would aid businesses to form cooperatives. The first program would help large businesses that sponsor their own health plans, while the second program would help small businesses that purchase their health insurance.

My bill would enable larger businesses to form cost-effective cooperatives that could offer quality health care through several ways. First, they could obtain health services through pooled purchasing from physicians, hospitals, home health agencies, and others. By pooling their experience and interests, employers involved in a coalition could better attack the essential issues, such as rising health insurance rates and the lack of comparable health care quality data. They would be able to share information regarding the quality of these services and to partner with these health care providers to meet the needs of their employees.

For smaller businesses that purchase their health insurance, the formation of cooperatives would allow them to buy health insurance at lower prices through pooled purchasing.

Also, the communication within these cooperatives would provide employees of small businesses with better information about the health care options that are available to them. Finally, coalitions would serve to promote quality improvements by facilitating partnerships between their group and the health care providers.

By working together, the group could develop better quality insurance plans and negotiate better rates.

Past health purchasing pool initiatives have focused only on cost and have tried to be all things for all people. My legislation creates an incentive to join the pools by giving grants to a group of similar businesses to form group-purchasing cooperatives. The pool are also given flexibility to find innovative ways to lower costs, such as enhancing benefits, for example, more preventive care, and improving quality. Finally, the cooperative structure is a proven model, which creates an incentive for businesses to remain in the pool because they will be invested in the organization.

We must reform health care in America and give employers and employees more options. This legislation, by providing for the formation of cost-effective coalitions that will also improve the quality of care, contributes to this essential reform process. I urge my colleagues to join me in cosponsoring this proposal to improve the quality and costs of health care.

Mr. President, I am pleased to re-introduce the Quality Cheese Act of 2003. This legislation will protect the consumer, save taxpayer dollars and provide support to America's dairy farmers, who have taken a beating in the marketplace in recent years.

When Wisconsin consumers have the choice, they will choose natural Wisconsin cheese. But the Food and Drug Administration, FDA, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture, USDA, may change current law, and consumers won't know whether cheese is really all natural or not.

If the Federal Government creates a loophole for imitation cheese ingredients to be used in U.S. cheese vats, some cheese labels saying ``domestic'' and ``natural'' will no longer be truly accurate.

If USDA and FDA allow a change in Federal rules, imitation milk proteins known as milk protein concentrate, casein, or dry ultra filtered milk could be used to make cheese in place of the wholesome natural milk produced by cows in Wisconsin or other part of the U.S.

I am deeply concerned by recent efforts to change America's natural cheese standard. This effort to allow milk protein concentrate and casein into natural cheese products flies in the face of logic and could create a loophole that could allow unlimited amounts of substandard imported milk proteins to enter U.S. cheese vats.

My legislation would close this loophole and ensure that consumers could be confident that they were buying natural cheese when they saw the natural label.

Over the past decade, cheese consumption has risen at a strong pace due in part to promotional and marketing efforts and investments by dairy farmers across the country. Year after year, per capita cheese consumption has risen at a steady rate.

Recent proposals to change to our natural cheese standards, however, could decrease consumption of natural cheese. These declines could result from concerns about the origin of casein and milk protein concentrate.

The addition of this kind of milk could significantly tarnish the wholesome reputation of natural cheese in the eyes of the consumer.

This change could seriously compromise decades of work by America's dairy farmers to build up domestic cheese consumption levels. It is simply not fair to America's farmers!

Consumers have a right to know if the cheese that they buy is unnatural. And by allowing milk protein concentrate milk into cheese, we are denying consumers the entire picture.

This legislation will require that labels paint the entire picture for the consumer, and allow them enough information to select cheese made from truly natural ingredients.

Allowing MPCs or dry ultra-filtered milk into natural cheeses would also harm dairy producers throughout the United States. Some estimate that the annual effect of the change on the dairy farm sector of the economy could be more than $100 million.

The proposed change to our natural cheese standard would also harm the American taxpayer. If we allow MPCs to be used in cheese, we will effectively permit unrestricted importation of these ingredients into the United States. Because there are no tariffs and quotas on these ingredients, these heavily-subsidized products would displace natural domestic dairy ingredients.

These unnatural domestic dairy products would enter our domestic cheese market and might further depress dairy prices paid to American dairy producers. Low dairy prices result in increased costs to the dairy price support program. So, at the same time that U.S. dairy farmers would receive lower prices, the U.S. taxpayer would pay more for the dairy price support program.

This change does not benefit the dairy farmer, consumer or taxpayer. Who then is it good for?

It would benefit only unscrupulous foreign MPC producers out to make a fast buck at the expense of Americans.

This legislation addresses the concerns of farmers, consumers and taxpayers by prohibiting dry ultra-filtered milk from being included in America's natural cheese standard.

Congress must shut the door on any backdoor efforts to stack the deck against America's dairy farmers. And we must pass my legislation that prevents a loophole that would allow changes that hurt the consumer, taxpayer, and dairy farmer.

Mr. President, I rise today to offer a measure which could serve as a first step towards eliminating the inequities borne by the dairy farmers of Wisconsin and the upper Midwest under the Federal Milk Marketing Order system.

The Federal Milk Marketing Order system, created nearly 60 years ago, establishes minimum prices for milk paid to producers throughout various marketing areas in the U.S. For sixty years, this system has discriminated against producers in the Upper Midwest by awarding a higher price to dairy farmers in proportion to the distance of their farms from Eau Claire, Wisconsin.

My legislation is very simple. It identifies the single most harmful and unjust feature of the current system, and corrects it. Under the current archaic law, the price for fluid milk increases depending on the distance from Eau Claire, Wisconsin, even though most local milk markets do not receive any milk from Wisconsin.

The bill I introduce today would prohibit the Secretary of Agriculture from using distance or transportation costs from any location as the basis for pricing milk, unless significant quantities of milk are actually transported from that location into the recipient market. The Secretary will have to comply with the statutory requirement that supply and demand factors be considered as specified in the Agricultural Marketing Agreement Act when setting milk prices in marketing orders. The fact remains that single-basing-point pricing simply cannot be justified based on supply and demand for milk both in local and national markets.

This bill also requires the Secretary to report to Congress on specifically which criteria are used to set milk prices. Finally, the Secretary will have to certify to Congress that the criteria used by the Department do not in any way attempt to circumvent the prohibition on using distance or transportation cost as basis for pricing milk.

This one change is so crucial to Upper Midwest producers, because the current system has penalized them for many years. The current system provides disparate profits for producers in other parts of the country and creating artificial economic incentives for milk production. As a result, Wisconsin producers have seen national surpluses rise, and milk prices fall. Rather than providing adequate supplies of fluid milk, the prices have led to excess production.

The prices have provided production incentives beyond those needed to ensure a local supply of fluid milk in some regions, leading to an increase in manufactured products in those marketing orders. Those manufactured products directly compete with Wisconsin's processed products, eroding our markets and driving national prices down.

The perverse nature of this system is further illustrated by the fact that since 1995 some regions of the U.S., notably the Central states and the Southwest, are producing so much milk that they are actually shipping fluid milk north to the Upper Midwest. The high fluid milk prices have generated so much excess production, that these markets distant from Eau Claire are now encroaching upon not only our manufactured markets, but also our markets for fluid milk, further eroding prices in Wisconsin.

The market-distorting effects of the fluid price differentials in Federal orders are manifest in the Congressional Budget Office estimate that eliminating the orders would save $669 million over five years. Government outlays would fall, CBO concludes, because production would fall in response to lower milk prices and there would be fewer government purchases of surplus milk. The regions that would gain and lose in this scenario illustrate the discrimination inherent to the current system. Economic analyses show that farm revenues in a market undisturbed by Federal orders would actually increase in the Upper Midwest and fall in most other milk-producing regions.

While this system has been around since 1937, the practice of basing fluid milk price differentials on the distance from Eau Claire was formalized in the 1960's, when the Upper Midwest arguably was the primary reserve for additional supplies of milk. The idea was to encourage local supplies of fluid milk in areas of the country that did not traditionally produce enough fluid milk to meet their own needs.

That is no longer the case. The Upper Midwest is not the primary source of reserve supplies of milk. Unfortunately, the prices didn't adjust with changing economic conditions, most notably the shift of the dairy industry away from the Upper Midwest and towards the Southwest, and specifically California, which now leads the Nation in milk production.

The result of this antiquated system has been a decline in the Upper Midwest dairy industry, not because it can't produce a product that can compete in the market place, but because the system discriminates against it. Today, Wisconsin loses dairy farmers at a rate of more than 5 per day. The Upper Midwest, with the lowest fluid milk prices, is shrinking as a dairy region despite the dairy-friendly climate

of the region. Other regions with higher fluid milk prices are growing rapidly.

In an free market with a level playing field, these shifts in production might be fair. But in a market where the government is setting the prices and providing that artificial advantage to regions outside the Upper Midwest, the current system is unconscionable.

I urge my colleagues to do the right thing and bring reform to this out dated system and work to eliminate the inequities in the current milk marketing order pricing system.

Mr. President, I rise to re-introduce a measure that will begin to restore democracy for dairy farmers throughout the Nation.

When dairy farmers across the country voted on a referendum four years ago, perhaps the most significant change in dairy policy in sixty years, they didn't actually get to vote. Instead, their dairy marketing cooperatives cast their votes for them.

This procedure is called ``bloc voting'' and it is used all the time. Basically, a Cooperative's Board of Directors decides that, in the interest of time, bloc voting will be implemented for that particular vote. It may serve the interest of time, but not always in the interest of their producer owner-members.

I do think that bloc voting can be a useful tool in some circumstances, but I have serious concerns about its use in every circumstance. Farmers in Wisconsin and in other states tell me that they do not agree with their Cooperative's view on every vote. Yet, they have no way to preserve their right to make their single vote count.

After speaking to farmers and officials at USDA, I have learned that if a Cooperative bloc votes, individual members simply have no opportunity to voice opinions separately. That seems unfair when you consider what significant issues may be at stake. Coops and their members do not always have identical interests. We shouldn't ask farmers to ignore that fact.

The Democracy for Dairy Producers Act of 2003 is simple and fair. It provides that a cooperative cannot deny any of its members a ballot if one or two or ten or all of the members chose to vote on their own.

This will in no way slow down the process at USDA; implementation of any rule or regulation would proceed on schedule. Also, I do not expect that this would often change the final outcome of any given vote. Coops could still cast votes for their members who do not exercise their right to vote individually. And to the extent that coops represent farmers interest, farmers are likely to vote along with the coops, but whether they join the coops or not, farmers deserve the right to vote according to their own views.

I urge my colleagues to return the democratic process to America's farmers, by supporting the Democracy for Dairy Producers Act.

Mr. President, today I am reintroducing legislation to eliminate from the Federal Tax Code percentage depletion allowances for hardrock minerals mined on Federal public lands. I am pleased that the Senator from Washington, Ms. Cantwell, is joining me as an original cosponsor.

President Clinton proposed the elimination of the percentage depletion allowance on public lands in his FY 2001 budget. President Clinton's FY 2001 budget estimated that, under this legislation, income to the Federal treasury from the elimination of percentage depletion allowances for hardrock mining on public lands would total $487 million over 5 years and $1.20 billion over 10 years. The Joint Committee on Taxation estimated that it would save $410 million over 5 years and $823 million over 10 years. These savings are calculated as the excess amount of Federal revenues above what would be collected if depletion allowances were limited to sunk costs in capital investments. Percentage depletion allowances are contained in the tax code for extracted fuel, minerals, metal and other mined commodities. These allowances have a combined value, according to estimates by the Joint Committee on Taxation, of $4.8 billion.

These percentage depletion allowances were initiated by the Corporation Excise Act of 1909. That's right, these allowances were initiated nearly one hundred years ago. Provisions for a depletion allowance based on the value of the mine were made under a 1912 Treasury Department regulation, but difficulty in applying this accounting principle to mineral production led to the initial codification of the mineral depletion allowance in the Tariff Act of 1913. The Revenue Act of 1926 established percentage depletion much in its present form for oil and gas. The percentage depletion allowance was then extended to metal mines, coal, and other hardrock minerals by the Revenue Act of 1932, and has been adjusted several times since.

Percentage depletion allowances were historically placed in the Tax Code to reduce the effective tax rates in the mineral and extraction industries far below tax rates on other industries, providing incentives to increase investment, exploration and output. Percentage depletion also makes it possible, however, to recover many times the amount of the original investment.

There are two methods of calculating a deduction to allow a firm to recover the costs of its capital investment: cost depletion, and percentage depletion. Cost depletion allows for the recovery of the actual capital investment, the costs of discovering, purchasing, and developing a mineral reserve, over the period during which the reserve produces income. Using cost depletion, a company would deduct a portion of its original capital investment minus any previous deductions, in an amount that is equal to the fraction of the remaining recoverable reserves. Under this method, the total deductions cannot exceed the original capital investment.

Under percentage depletion, however, the deduction for recovery of a company's investment is a fixed percentage of ``gross income,'' namely, sales revenue--from the sale of the mineral. Under this method, total deductions typically exceed, let me be clear on that point, exceed the capital that the company invested.

The rates for percentage depletion are quite significant. Section 613 of the U.S. Code contains depletion allowances for more than 70 metals and minerals, at rates ranging from 10 to 22 percent.

In addition to repealing the percentage depletion allowances for minerals mined on public lands, my bill would also create a new fund, called the Abandoned Mine Reclamation Fund. One fourth of the revenue raised by the bill, or approximately $120 million dollars, would be deposited into an interest bearing fund in the Treasury to be used to clean up abandoned hardrock mines in states that are subject to the 1872 Mining Law. The Mineral Policy Center estimates that there are 557,650 abandoned hardrock mine sites nationwide and the cost of clearing them up will range from $32.7 billion to $71.5 billion.

There are currently no comprehensive Federal or State programs to address the need to clean up old mine sites. Reclaiming these sites requires the enactment of a program with explicit authority to clean up abandoned mine sites and the resources to do it. My legislation is a first step toward providing the needed authority and resources.

In today's budget climate we are faced with the question of who should bear the costs of exploration, development, and production of natural resources: all taxpayers, or the users and producers of the resource? For more than a century, the mining industry has been paying next to nothing for the privilege of extracting minerals from public lands and then abandoning its mines. Now those mines are adding to the nation's environmental and financial burdens. We face serious budget choices this fiscal year, yet these subsidies remain persistent tax expenditures that raise the deficit for all citizens or shift a greater tax burden to

other taxpayers to compensate for the special tax breaks provided to the mining industry.

The measure I am introducing is fairly straightforward. It eliminates the percentage depletion allowance for hardrock minerals mined on public lands while continuing to allow companies to recover reasonable cost depletion.

Though at one time, there may have been an appropriate role for a government-driven incentive for enhanced mineral production, there is now sufficient reason to adopt a more reasonable depletion allowance that is consistent with depreciation rates given to other businesses.

The time has come for the Federal Government to get out of the business of subsidizing one business over another. We can no longer afford its costs in dollars or its cost to the health of our citizens. This legislation is one step toward the goal of ending these corporate welfare subsidies.

I ask unanimous consent the text of the legislation be printed in the Record.

Mr. President I rise today with my colleague from Maine to introduce legislation to help first responders do what they do so well, protect our communities in an emergency.

The Department of Homeland Security will create a massive shift in the Federal Government. Nobody will feel the impact of this shift more than the brave men and women who work in law enforcement, as firefighters, as rescue workers, as emergency medical service providers, and in capacities as first responders.

We must make sure that these first responders have the resources that they need.

While I commend the Administration for raising the funding dedicated to first responders in the President's budget, I am concerned that new layers of bureaucracy and reorganization could reduce these funding levels, or just as harmful, put up barriers to first responders actually receiving these funds.

The Federal agencies in the proposed Department of Homeland Security must listen to the priorities of our communities. After all, the needs of first responders vary between regions, as well as between rural and urban communities. In Wisconsin, I have heard needs ranging from training to equipment to more emergency personnel in the field, just to name a few.

My legislation would promote effective coordination among Federal agencies under the Department of Homeland Security and ensure that our first responders, our firefighters, law enforcement, rescue, and EMS providers, can help Federal agencies and the new Department of Homeland Security to improve existing programs and future initiatives.

It would first establish a Federal Liaison on Homeland Security in each state and coordinate between the Department of Homeland Security and state and local first responders.

This office would serve not only as an avenue to exchange ideas, but also as a resource to ensure that the funding and programs are effective.

For example, my hope is that the Homeland Security Department will make programs such as the Fire Act a high priority. The Fire Act provides grants directly to fire departments across our nation for training and equipment needs. I recently visited one excellent example of this program in West Allis, Wisconsin, where the Department received a grant in 2001 to implement a wellness and fitness program for their firefighters. I am told that it is one of the first departments in the State to meet the goals of this program, and I commend the department for its efforts.

My legislation would also direct the agencies within the Department of Homeland Security to coordinate and prioritize their activities that support first responders, and at the same time, ensure effective use of taxpayer dollars.

As part of this coordination, the First Responders Support Act establishes a new advisory committee of those in the first responder community to identify and streamline effective programs.

Last year, both the original Senate and House homeland security bills lacked the provisions needed to ensure that the new Department of Homeland Security communicates and coordinates effectively with first responders.

During the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee mark-up of the Homeland Security bill, the Committee added our First Responders Support Act to the legislation. They did so knowing that we would have to reconcile the overlap between our legislation and the language in the Chairman's mark creating an office for state and local government coordination. Our amendment, which was approved by the full Senate, did just that. Unfortunately, our proposal was dropped from the final bill during backroom negotiations.

Because of this omission, I promised to make enacting this legislation one of our top priorities this Congress. That's why we are re-introducing this legislation today.

We must be aggressive in seeking the advice of our first responders, and helping them get the resources that they need to provide effective services. They are on the front lines, and deserve our strong support.

In almost any disaster, the local first responders and health care providers play an indispensable role. If the Department of Homeland Security is to be effective, we need to ensure that the resources are delivered to the front line personnel in an effective and coordinated manner. I urge my colleagues to join me in cosponsoring this proposal and support our first responders.

Mr. President, today I am reintroducing legislation that would terminate the operation of the Navy's Extremely Low Frequency communications system, Project ELF, which is located in Clam Lake, WI, and Republic, MI.

I would like to thank the senior Senator from Wisconsin, Mr. Kohl, and the Senator from Oregon, Mr. Wyden, for cosponsoring this bill.

Project ELF is a Cold War relic that was designed to send short one- way messages to ballistic and attack submarines that are submerged in deep waters. The bill that I am introducing today would terminate operations at Project ELF, while maintaining the infrastructure in Wisconsin and Michigan in the event that a resumption in operations becomes necessary.

Project ELF is ineffective and unnecessary in the post-Cold War era. This antiquated system does not facilitate the rapid mobilization that our military says it needs to respond to current threats from weapons of mass destruction. The horrific attacks of September 11, 2001, emphasized the need for rapid, reliable two-way communications. Since ELF cannot transmit detailed messages, it serves as an expensive ``beeper'' system to tell submarines to come to the surface to receive messages from other sources, and the subs cannot send a return message to ELF in the event of an emergency. It takes ELF four minutes to send a three-letter message to a deeply submerged submarine.

With the end of the Cold War, Project ELF becomes harder and harder to justify. Our submarines no longer need to take that extra precaution against Soviet nuclear forces. They can now surface on a regular basis with less danger of detection or attack. They can also receive more complicated messages through very low frequency, VLF, radio waves or lengthier messages through satellite systems. Taxpayers should not be asked to continue to pay for what amounts to a beeper system that tells our submarines to come to the surface to receive orders from another, more sophisticated source.

Further, continued operation of this facility is opposed by most residents in my state. The members of the Wisconsin delegation have fought hard for years to close down Project ELF. I have introduced legislation during each Congress since taking office in 1993 to terminate it, and I have recommended it for closure to the Base Realignment and Closure Commission.

Project ELF has had a turbulent history. Since the idea for ELF was first proposed in 1958, the project has been changed or canceled several times. Residents of Wisconsin have opposed ELF since its inception, but for years we were told that the national security considerations of the Cold War outweighed our concerns about this installation in our State. Ironically, this system became fully operational in 1989, the same year the tide of democracy began to sweep across Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. Now, fourteen years later, the hammer and sickle has fallen and the Russian submarine fleet is in disarray. But Project ELF still remains as a constant, expensive reminder to the people of my State that many at the Department of Defense remain focused on the past.

There also continue to be a number of public health and environmental concerns associated with Project ELF. For almost two decades, we have received inconclusive data on this project's effects on Wisconsin and Michigan residents. In 1984, a U.S. District Court ordered that ELF be shut down because the Navy paid inadequate attention to the system's possible health effects and violated the National Environmental Policy Act. Interestingly, that decision was overturned because U.S. national security, at the time, prevailed over public health and environmental concerns.

Numerous medical studies point to a possible link between exposure to extremely low frequency electromagnetic fields and a variety of human health effects and abnormalities in both animal and plant species.

In 1999, after six years of research, the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences released a report that did not prove conclusively a link between electromagnetic fields and cancer, but the report did not disprove it, either. Serious questions remain, and many of my constituents are rightly concerned about this issue.

In addition, I have heard from a number of dairy farmers who are convinced that the stray voltage associated with ELF transmitters has demonstrably reduced milk production. As we continue our efforts to return to a sustainable balanced federal budget, and as the Department of Defense continues to struggle to address readiness and other concerns, it is clear that outdated programs such as Project ELF should be closed down.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of this bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I am pleased to reintroduce legislation that would put an end to automatic cost-of-living adjustments for Congressional pay.

As my Colleagues are aware, it is an unusual thing to have the power to raise our own pay. Few people have that ability. Most of our constituents do not have that power. And that this power is so unusual is good reason for the Congress to exercise that power openly, and to exercise it subject to regular procedures that include debate, amendment, and a vote on the record.

Regrettably, current law permits Members to avoid such an open procedure. All that is necessary for Congress to get a pay raise is that nothing be done to stop it. Unless Congress affirmatively acts, the annual pay raise takes effect.

This stealth pay raise technique began with a change Congress enacted in the Ethics Reform Act of 1989. In section 704 of that Act, Members of Congress voted to make themselves entitled to an annual raise equal to half a percentage point less than the employment cost index, one measure of inflation.

On occasion, Congress has voted to deny itself the raise. Traditionally, this has been done on the Treasury-Postal appropriations bill. But that vehicle is not always made available to those who want a public debate and vote on the matter. In one instance, the Treasury- Postal bill was slipped into the conference report on the Legislative Branch appropriations bill, and thus completely shielded from amendment. And during 2002, the Senate did not consider the Treasury- Postal bill at all.

This makes getting a vote on the annual congressional pay raise a haphazard affair at best. And it should not be that way. No one should have to force a debate and public vote on the pay raise. On the contrary, Congress should have to act if it decides to award itself a hike in pay. This process of pay raises without accountability must end.

The question of how and whether Members of Congress can raise their own pay was one that our Founders considered from the beginning of our Nation. In August of 1789, as part of the package of 12 amendments advocated

by James Madison that included what has become our Bill of Rights, the House of Representatives passed an amendment to the Constitution providing that Congress could not raise its pay without an intervening election. Almost 214 years ago, on September 9, 1789, the Senate passed that amendment. In late September of 1789, Congress submitted the amendments to the States.

Although the amendment on pay raises languished for two centuries, in the 1980s, a campaign began to ratify it. While I was a member of the Wisconsin State Senate, I was proud to help ratify the amendment. Its approval by the Michigan legislature on May 7, 1992, gave it the needed approval by three-fourths of the States.

The 27th Amendment to the Constitution now states: `No law, varying the compensation for the services of the senators and representatives, shall take effect, until an election of representatives shall have intervened.''

I try to honor that limitation in my own practices. In my own case, throughout my 6-year term, I accept only the rate of pay that Senators receive on the date on which I was sworn in as a Senator. And I return to the Treasury any additional income Senators get, whether from a cost-of-living adjustment or a pay raise we vote for ourselves. I don't take a raise until my bosses, the people of Wisconsin, give me one at the ballot box. That is the spirit of the 27th Amendment. The stealth pay raises like the one that Congress allowed last year, at a minimum, certainly violate the spirit of that amendment.

This practice must end. To address it, I am reintroducing this bill to end the automatic cost-of-living adjustment for Congressional pay. Senators and Congressmen should have to vote up-or-down to raise Congressional pay. My bill would simply require us to vote in the open. We owe our constituents no less.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, today I am introducing a measure aimed at curbing wasteful spending. In the face of our return to Federal deficits, we must prioritize and eliminate programs that can no longer be sustained with limited Federal dollars, or where a more cost- effective means of fulfilling those functions can be substituted. The measure that I introduce today eliminates or modifies three Federal programs: it establishes a means test for large agribusinesses receiving subsidized water from the Bureau of Reclamation, it terminates the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, USUHS, a medical school run by the Department of Defense, and it ends the future production of submarine launched D5 missiles, commonly known as the Trident II missiles. Eliminating or reforming these three programs would save the taxpayers in excess of $8 billion over ten years.

The irrigation means test provision is drawn from legislation that I that have sponsored in previous Congresses to reduce the amount of Federal irrigation subsidies received by large agribusiness interests. I believe that reforming Federal water pricing policy by reducing subsidies is important as a means to achieve our broader objectives of achieving a truly balanced budget. This legislation is also needed to curb fundamental abuses of reclamation law that cost the taxpayer millions of dollars every year.

In 1901, President Theodore Roosevelt proposed legislation, which came to be known as the Reclamation Act of 1902, to encourage development of family farms throughout the western United States. The idea was to provide needed water for areas that were otherwise dry and give small farms, those no larger than 160 acres, a chance, with a helping hand from the Federal Government, to establish themselves. According to a 1996 General Accounting Office report, since the passage of the Reclamation Act, the Federal Government has spent $21.8 billion to construct 133 water projects in the west which provide water for irrigation. Agribusinesses, and other project beneficiaries, are required under the law to repay to the Federal Government their allocated share of the costs of constructing these projects.

As a result of the subsidized financing provided by the Federal Government, however, some of the beneficiaries of Federal water projects repay considerably less than their full share of these costs. According to the 1996 GAO report, agribusinesses generally receive the largest amount of Federal financial assistance. Since the initiation of the irrigation program in 1902, construction costs associated with irrigation have been repaid without interest. The GAO further found, in reviewing the Bureau of Reclamation's financial reports, that $16.9 billion, or 78 percent, of the $21.8 billion of Federal investment in water projects is considered to be reimbursable. Of the reimbursable costs, the largest share, $7.1 billion, is allocated to irrigation interests. GAO also found that the Bureau of Reclamation will likely shift $3.4 billion of the debt owed by agribusinesses to other users of the water projects for repayment.

There are several reasons why large agribusinesses continue to receive such significant subsidies. Under the Reclamation Reform Act of 1982, Congress acted to expand the size of the farms that could receive subsidized water from 160 acres to 960 acres. The RRA of 1982 expressly prohibits farms that exceed 960 acres in size from receiving federally- subsidized water. These restrictions were added to the Reclamation law to close loopholes through which Federal subsidies were flowing to large agribusinesses rather than the small family farmers that Reclamation projects were designed to serve. Agribusinesses were expected to pay full cost for all water received on land in excess of their 960 acre entitlement.

Despite the express mandate of Congress, regulations promulgated under the Reclamation Reform Act of 1982 have failed to keep big agricultural water users from receiving Federal subsidies. The General Accounting Office and the Inspector General of the Department of the Interior continue to find that the acreage limits established in law are circumvented through the creation of arrangements such as farming trusts. These trusts, which in total acreage well exceed the 960 acre limit, are comprised of smaller units that are not subject to the reclamation acreage cap. These smaller units are farmed under a single management agreement often through a combination of leasing and ownership.

The Department of the Interior has acknowledged that these trusts do exist. Interior published a final rulemaking in 1998 to require farm operators who provide services to more than 960 nonexempt acres westwide, held by a single trust or legal entity or any combination of trusts and legal entities to submit RRA forms to the district(s) where such land is located. Water districts are now required to provide specific information about farm operators to Interior annually. This information is an important step toward enforcing the legislation that I am reintroducing today.

My legislation combines various elements of proposals introduced by other members of Congress to close loopholes in the 1982 legislation and to impose a $500,000 means-test. This new approach limits the amount of subsidized irrigation water delivered to any operation in excess of the 960 acre limit which claimed $500,000 or more in gross income, as reported on its most recent IRS tax form. If the $500,000 threshold were exceeded, an income ratio would

be used to determine how much of the water should be delivered to the user at the full-cost rate, and how much at the below-cost rate. For example, if a 961 acre operation earned $1 million dollars, a ratio of $500,000, the means-test value, divided by its gross income would determine the full cost rate. Thus the water user would pay the full cost rate on half of their acreage and the below-cost rate on the remaining half.

This means-testing proposal was featured in the 2000 Green Scissors report. This report is compiled annually by Friends of the Earth and Taxpayers for Common Sense and supported by a number of environmental, consumer and taxpayer groups. The premise of the report is that there are a number of subsidies and projects that could be cut to both reduce the deficit and benefit the environment. The Green Scissors recommendation on means-testing water subsidies indicates that if a test is successful in reducing subsidy payments to the highest grossing 10 percent of farms, then the Federal Government would recover between $440 million and $1.1 billion per year, or at least $2.2 billion over five years.

When countless Federal programs are subjected to various types of means-tests to limit benefits to those who truly need assistance, it makes little sense to continue to allow large business interests to dip into a program intended to help small entities struggling to survive. Taxpayers have legitimate concerns when they learn that their hard- earned tax dollars are being expended to assist large corporate interests in select regions of the country, particularly in tight budgetary times.

The second element of my bill will help our Armed Services obtain physician services at a more reasonable cost by terminating the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, USUHS. The measure is one I proposed when I ran for the U.S. Senate, and was part of a larger, 82-point plan to reduce the Federal budget deficit. The most recent estimates of the Congressional Budget Office, CBO, project that terminating the school would save $273 million over the next five years, and when completely phased-out, would generate $450 million in savings over five years.

USUHS was created in 1972 to meet an expected shortage of military medical personnel. Today, however, USUHS accounts for only a small fraction of the military's new physicians, less than 12 percent in 1994, according to CBO. This contrasts dramatically with the military's scholarship program, which provided over 80 percent of the military's new physicians in that year.

What is even more troubling is that USUHS is also the single most costly source of new physicians for the military. CBO reports that based on figures from 1995, each USUHS trained physician costs the military $615,000. By comparison, the scholarship program cost about $125,000 per doctor, with other sources providing new physicians at a cost of $60,000. As CBO has noted, even adjusting for the lengthier service commitment required of USUHS trained physicians, the cost of training them is still higher than that of training physicians from other sources, an assessment shared by the Pentagon itself. Indeed, CBO's estimate of the savings generated by this measure also includes the cost of obtaining physicians from other sources.

The House of Representatives has voted to terminate this program on several occasions, joining others, ranging from the Grace Commission to the CBO, in raising the question of whether this medical school, which graduated its first class in 1980, should be closed because it is so much more costly than alternative sources of physicians for the military.

The real issue we must address is whether USUHS is essential to the needs of today's military structure, or if we can do without this costly program. The proponents of USUHS frequently cite the higher retention rates of USUHS graduates over physicians obtained from other sources as a justification for continuation of this program, but while a greater percentage of USUHS trained physicians may remain in the military longer than those from other sources, the Pentagon indicates that the alternative sources already provide an appropriate mix of retention rates. Testimony by the Department of Defense before the Subcommittee on Force Requirements and Personnel noted that the military's scholarship program meets the retention needs of the services.

And while USUHS provides only a small fraction of the military's new physicians, relying primarily on these other sources has not compromised the ability of military physicians to meet the needs of the Pentagon. According to the Office of Management and Budget, of the approximately 2,000 physicians serving in Desert Storm, only 103, about 5 percent, were USUHS trained.

USUHS has some dedicated supporters in the U.S. Senate, and I realize that there are legitimate arguments that those supporters have made in defense of this institution. The problem, however, is that the Federal Government cannot afford to continue every program that provides some useful function, especially when such services can be procured elsewhere.

The final provision of my legislation terminates another wasteful defense program, the continued production of new Trident II submarine- launched ballistic missiles. Trident submarines, and the deadly submarine-launched ballistic missiles they carry, were designed specifically to attack targets inside the Soviet Union from waters off the continental United States.

Let me say at the outset that this provision would in no way prevent the Navy from maintaining the current arsenal of Trident II missiles. Nor would it affect those Trident II missiles that are currently in production.

The Navy currently has ten Trident II submarines, each of which carries 24 Trident II, D5, missiles. Each of these missiles contains eight independently targetable nuclear warheads, for a total of 192 warheads per submarine. Each warhead packs between 300 to 450 kilotons of explosive power.

By way of comparison, the first atomic bomb that the United States dropped on Hiroshima generated 15 kilotons of force. Let's do the math for just one fully-equipped Trident II submarine. Each warhead can generate up to 450 kilotons of force. Each missile has eight warheads, and each submarine has 24 missiles. That equals 86.4 megatons of force per submarine. That means that each Trident II submarine carries the power to deliver devastation which is the equivalent of 5,760 Hiroshimas.

And that is just one fully equipped submarine. As I noted earlier, the Navy currently has ten such submarines.

Through fiscal year 2003, the Navy will have been authorized to purchase 408 Trident II missiles for these submarines. Even taking into account the 86 Trident II missiles that have been expended in testing through calendar year 2002, the Navy will still have 322 missiles in stock once those authorized to be purchased during FY2003 are completed.

The Navy needs 240 missiles to fully equip ten Trident II submarines with 24 missiles each. That leaves 82 ``extra'' missiles in the Navy's inventory. And the Navy still plans to buy at least 132 more missiles over the next two years, for a total purchase of 540 missiles. My bill would terminate production of these missiles after the currently authorized 408, saving taxpayers $6.6 billion over the next ten years.

The tragic events of September 11, 2001, and the recent resumption of nuclear activities by North Korea, serve as chilling reminders that there is still a potential threat from rogue states, and from independent operators such as al-Qaeda, who seek to acquire ballistic missiles and other weapons of mass destruction. I also recognize that our submarine fleet and our arsenal of strategic nuclear weapons still have an important role to play in warding off these threats. Their role, however, has diminished dramatically from what it was at the height of the Cold War. Our missile procurement decisions should reflect that change and should reflect the realities of the post-Cold War world.

Our current ballistic missile capability is far superior to that of any other county on the globe. And the capability of the Russian military, the very force which these missiles were designed to counter, is seriously degraded.

We should not be buying more Trident II missiles at a time when the governments of the United States and Russia have signed the Moscow Treaty, which calls for deep reductions in our nuclear forces. To spend scarce resources on building more missiles now

is short-sighted and could seriously undermine our efforts to negotiate further arms reductions with Russia.

In conclusion, the time has come to rethink our Federal budget priorities, and to redirect needed funds appropriately. Eliminating or reforming these three programs will go a long way to doing just that, and I urge Congress to act swiftly to save money for the taxpayers. I ask unanimous consent that the text of this legislation be printed in the Record.

Will the Senator yield for a question?

Mr. President, my colleague from Arizona, I know, did not intend to think that if I were here last night, I would have advanced the cause of his legislation. I have no amendment to offer to the legislation. I had an opportunity yesterday to speak on several amendments. I think he probably inartfully described his angst about last evening. I didn't cause this legislation to be delayed. I am sure he knows that.

Aside from that, I wonder if the Senator from Nevada will tell me about the urgency of legislation on the floor. The majority leader expresses an interest in moving this Senate along on legislation we need to get done. I am pretty unimpressed with the plea to do that when we understand that next week we are going to find nearly 2 days taken in a carnival situation with judgeships, when we have approved 98 percent of the judges who have been sent to us by the White House.

Now, in the middle of next week, as we try to finish this session, we are told we are going to have 30 hours, or take the better part of 2 days, to sit here around the clock to talk about the several judges we have not confirmed. I ask the Senator from Nevada if that seems to him like we have an urgent situation when somebody is going to take 30 hours out of the middle of next week and move off to have a 30-hour discussion on judgeships.

I am pretty unimpressed with the plea for cooperation and expedited procedures on these issues as long as somebody is going to take nearly 2 days out of the middle of next week to do something that has nothing to do with moving appropriations bills.

As I ask the question, I wish to make an additional comment. I am an appropriator as well. I am not very impressed with what has happened. We were supposed to have done the appropriations bills and finished by October 1. We have been off and on appropriations bills. Look, if this is a priority, let's get on appropriations bills and stay on appropriations bills. That is what we ought to do. Isn't that the case, I ask my friend from Nevada?

Mr. President, will the Senator from Nevada yield for a question?

I wonder if perhaps next week when the other side wishes to take 30 hours in the middle of the week to talk about the handful of judges--I believe the four who have not been confirmed by the Senate--I wonder if perhaps we should not take the time next week to talk individually about the 168 we have confirmed. Perhaps we ought to go through each one and talk about all 168.

If time is not the issue--if the majority leader says time is urgent to talk about all of these other bills but in the middle of next week they will use 30 hours to come to the floor and talk about the 4 who have not been confirmed--perhaps we ought to take 60 hours to talk about the 168 we have confirmed.

Let us move on the things that matter now and scuttle the 30 hours next week and this 30-hour discussion of the handful of judges who have not been approved. That doesn't make any sense to me.

Mr. President, I have not spoken on this issue this morning. This is a very important issue. I have been a supporter of the moratorium. I have supported the initial moratorium and the extension of the moratorium and will support again a moratorium. As far as I am concerned, it could be permanent if the proposition is, let us not tax the connection to the Internet. That was the presumption from the start. Let us not retard the growth of this industry. Let us not allow States to create some special tax that could be discriminatory or punitive with respect to the Internet itself.

Having said that, it is very important we create a definition that is appropriate. We have a current law. That current law could just be extended. Some of my colleagues say, if you just extend that and do not do anything about the circumstance with DSL, then you have an unfairness. That is something I understand and I am certainly willing to deal with that. But if we do not deal with the issue of how you interpret or how you describe what it is you are exempting, you can have serious financial problems. We are talking about billions of dollars' worth of problems for State and local governments.

When we passed this moratorium out of the Commerce Committee, my colleague, Senator Hollings, was absolutely correct. We passed it out, I believe, 31 to 0. But we did it by saying we understand the definition of what is going to be exempted is not yet right. There is great controversy about it. So we will move this bill to the Senate but will work on solving the problem of the definition and what it means and its consequences before we get to the Senate. We tried very hard to do that but regrettably that has not been done. I want people to understand the framework in which this comes to the floor. Yes, the Commerce Committee passed it 31 to 0, but with the caveat that the definition of what is exempt is not yet solved or at least not yet agreed. So between then and now we have tried hard to see if we could fix that. At this point, it is not yet fixed.

Mr. President, I agree with that view expressed by Senator Burns.

Let me continue by saying definitions are everything. The reason the States are very concerned is if the definition is not correct--that is, if it is not specific in exactly what Congress proposes--we could see billions and billions of dollars lost to the State and local governments in revenue they otherwise would have expected.

We have a situation where we have a moratorium that expired. The moratorium ought to be extended. I was prepared to extend it permanently if we could find a definition that would be acceptable. That has not yet proven to be the case. Some are now discussing, and I was in some discussions a few moments ago, about a shorter term extension, perhaps 4 years, and use the definition that exists in current law in the moratorium that expired November 1 and try to fix the position with respect to DSL, which is a problem. I don't know how this will come out, but we have a responsibility to try to get this right. We would not want to do something permanently that has a problem attached to it, that will be a growing problem for State and local governments.

Let me describe something that was in the newspaper recently because it tells the dilemma we face if we get this wrong. We have been moving in information technology from the old circuit switch telephone network to an Internet-based network. Whether we communicate by voice, e-mail, wireless, instant message, the data is being transmitted over the Internet in digital packets.

If anyone wonders what I mean, look at a story in the Minneapolis Star and Tribune. It is Quest Corporation announcing this past week that it will roll out an Internet-based telephone service in Minnesota. It describes that. That is the Internet-based service called VoIP, Voice Over Internet Protocol. They say the approach to moving this out over the Internet--that is, telephone service over the Internet--will save on regulatory expenses and other costs and break the regulatory logjam that exists. The article goes on to say:

The Quest Internet phone service would also be exempt from

salestax if Congress, as expected, extended and expands a tax

ban on Internet access to include Internet telephone service.

You can see the consequences. If you do not understand exactly what you are doing and you have a definition that is not articulate and not focused exactly on what you intend to accomplish, we can have very significant consequences for State and local governments.

Let me end where I started by saying I happen to have supported both of the previous moratoriums, and I will support a moratorium now because I don't believe we want tax policy that retards the development of the Internet. I don't believe we want tax policy that in any way injures or interrupts the substantial expansion in technology and information technology that we have seen in a very short period of time.

However, even as we do this, let's make sure that we do not injure or provide significant problems for State and local governments because while we want to exempt the connection to the Internet, we did not want to, with an unfunded mandate as my colleague from Tennessee calls it, or some other approach, we begin preempting a retinue of State and local taxes that have

been legitimately allied to various kinds of services. It is not unusual to pay a tax on certain kinds of telephone services. It is not unusual. That is one of the methods by which State and local governments have developed a revenue base.

We described a very specific area that is off limits. Let's make sure that description is appropriate, fair, and specific relating to how the Congress intends this to work.

I know my colleague from California wishes to speak. I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I say to the Senator from Arizona, this is not my amendment, so I would have to consult with the author of the amendment.

As you know, the amendment is prompted by a news story today from the White House suggesting they will not be answering inquiries except by certain Members of Congress. So that prompted her to offer this amendment.

I will certainly consult with--she is on the Senate floor, so perhaps we can ask her directly.

Madam President, I mentioned that the event that has prompted this amendment, I understand, was in the newspaper this morning. It was apparently a report that the White House would limit their responses to questions from Members of Congress.

I, at one point, chaired the appropriations subcommittee here in the Senate that actually funds the operations of the White House. We always work very closely with the White House. When they request the necessary funding, we provide it. We never have any difficulty. The same is true with respect to the agencies. We fund all of the agencies of the executive branch. We spend a great deal of money in doing that. We work together to find the appropriate number and the appropriate amount of resources that are needed.

The White House is a little different. When they make the request, we fund the request. That is the way we deal with the White House.

But with the executive agencies, of course, we have disagreements and differences from time to time, but we end up sending billions and billions--hundreds of billions--of dollars for expenditures through these agencies. If ever--if ever--the Members of the Congress are prevented from asking questions about how the money is used, how the money is spent, then there is something fundamentally broken.

So I was as surprised as my colleague from Michigan to read the story in the newspaper this morning. I know it is nettlesome, I know it is a pain, it is a bur under the saddle to get questions from Members of Congress if you are a member of the executive branch.

At one point, I was a member of the executive branch in State government,

and all the State legislators were always peppering us with questions. Sure, that is a nuisance. Nobody likes that. But the fact is, the congressional actions here determine how much money is made available. The same is true in the State legislatures. They have every right--in fact, they have a responsibility--to the taxpayer to try to determine how that money is spent. If they have questions about it, they ask those questions. If they ask those questions, they darn well expect an answer, even if it is considered a nuisance by those who are receiving the questions.

So my hope is they will just accept this amendment at some point today. I understand what has prompted the amendment.

Let me just, for a moment, talk about the underlying proposition before the Senate; that is, the bill that is brought to the floor today, the moratorium on Internet taxation. I want to see us pass a piece of legislation. I do not think it is satisfactory to have the moratorium expire on November 1, and then to just let that be the word. That is not where I would like to see this end up.

So we have a bill on the floor that came from the Commerce Committee. That legislation passed the Commerce Committee unanimously, but it was not quite the way it seemed when you take a look at that vote because we also agreed that the definition of that Internet tax moratorium was faulty or at least not agreed to, and we would work on it coming to the floor of the Senate.

We have not yet reached a compromise. That definition is the key. It is the linchpin to this legislation. So we have to find a way to resolve that. We thought this morning perhaps there was a way to do that. That appears not to be the case. I think we still have some distance between the various thoughts about how one would craft this in a way that is helpful to not retard and not injure the buildout of the infrastructure for the Internet and, at the same time, be fair to State and local governments with respect to their revenue base and not be preempting the opportunity they need and they would have, as they have always had, to tax certain services. So we continue to try to talk and see if we can find a way to reach some kind of agreement on this definition.

Now, I want to make an additional point because I think it is important to continue to make this point even as we work on these issues. We have this issue on the Senate floor today. I understand why that is the case, because this issue had a November 1 deadline by which the moratorium on Internet taxation expired.

We have a responsibility to try to see if we can pass this legislation. So there was a deadline with respect to this legislation.

But there was a deadline on appropriations bills as well. That deadline was October 1. It is now November. We still have appropriations bills that have not been considered in the Senate. Yesterday there was great urgency about an appropriations bill. Everybody cooperated to try to get that done. We are told today there is great urgency about legislation. We are told that the majority leader wants the Congress to work on Veterans Day and so on.

Then we are told, despite the fact that there is this urgency to get appropriations bills done and they request cooperation, that beginning next Wednesday we will spend 30 hours so that the majority can talk about the four judges they have not been able to get confirmed.

It seems to me perhaps we should talk about the 168 judges we have confirmed. If we are going to take time in the middle of next week, after having worked on Veterans Day, because we believe there is such an urgency--and I believe there is an urgency with appropriations bills; we should get them done--if we are going to take 30 hours in the middle of the week in order to try to convince the American people that the Congress is not moving forward on judgeship nominations, and they are going to take 30 hours to talk about four judges who didn't get confirmed by the Senate, I think perhaps then we need to take much more time to talk about the 168 judges we did confirm.

I am a little miffed at having these talk shows and others get all their talking points about how the Senate is stalling on judgeships. We are not stalling on judgeships. Most all of the Federal judges who have been nominated by this President have been confirmed by this Senate.

We have an advise and consent responsibility. The Constitution does not say the President has a right to pick somebody and say to that person: For the rest of your life you will be a Federal judge.

That is not the way the Framers of the Constitution described it. This described a dual role. The President shall nominate; the U.S. Senate shall confirm--advise and consent. Even George Washington ran into some tough sledding. Even George Washington lost a Federal judge in the Senate because they wouldn't confirm one of George Washington's judgeship appointments or nominations. So it started with George Washington.

But when you talk about cooperation, this Senate has provided extraordinary cooperation with this President. We have confirmed 168 judges. We have tried in every way possible to be cooperative. We have the lowest vacancy rate in 15 years on the Federal bench. Why? Because this Senate has worked with the President to confirm 168 judges.

I understand my colleague wishes me to yield. I do so without losing my right to the floor.

Providing that I am recognized at the conclusion of the remarks of the Senator from Arizona.

Mr. President, I yield to the Senator from Kansas for a question.

I will agree, provided I am recognized following the presentation.

Mr. President, I know my colleague from West Virginia is preparing to speak. I will not be long. I will make a couple of comments to finish what I was discussing about next week's schedule.

It is true the minority party in the Senate does not schedule the Senate; the majority party does and the majority leader does. This Senate is 51 to 49. Some pretend it is 100 to zero. In the circumstances, for example, with the energy conference, I am a Democratic conferee, and we have been disinvited and not allowed to attend any of the conferences with respect to the Energy bill. That is the wrong way, in my judgment, to do business in the Senate. It pretends as if one-half of the Senate doesn't exist when you do that.

Having said all that, I understand we don't schedule the Senate; the majority leader does. We find ourselves now in the first week in November, with a number of very important appropriations bills not yet completed, with stories earlier in this week that the majority may well want to put unfinished appropriations bills in another appropriations conference and create an omnibus bill, and bring it to the Senate as a conference report so Members of the Senate would be prevented from offering any amendments to the legislation.

Well, that is not acceptable; it is not the way to do business. I don't know whether that is what is being planned. I can only tell you that is what I read early this week, as described by some majority party aides, I guess they are called.

In addition to the urgency of getting appropriations bills completed, we are

now told next week's schedule will include 30 hours of debate on judges. Actually, there won't be any business before the Senate to debate; it will just be an opportunity for the majority party to ruminate for 30 hours about how unfair it has been that 4 nominees have not been approved by the Senate--4. Mr. President, 168 judicial nominees sent to us by the President have been confirmed by the Senate, and 4 have not been. Yet you would be led to believe by all of the information spewed out of this Chamber, from all of the political vents that exist here, that somehow the Senate has just been unwilling to approve judgeships.

We have the lowest vacancy rate on the Federal bench in 15 years. Why? Because this Senate has been cooperative with this President with respect to judgeships. He has nominated and we have confirmed 168. If next week they want to spend time, in a moment when it is urgent to finish our work on appropriations bills, instead to talk about the 4 judges who were not confirmed by the Senate, I want to come to spend some time talking about the 168 judges, including 2 from my State, both Republicans, both of whom I supported and was pleased to do so--I want to talk about the 168 judges we did confirm. I want the American people to understand what our record is with judges.

My colleague from West Virginia knows about the Constitution, perhaps more than anyone in this Chamber. He has studied it, he has lived it, and he carries it in his pocket every day. His copy of the Constitution is one I enjoy seeing when he pulls it out of his pocket during debate on the floor of the Senate, because he describes it in vivid detail and gives life to this fabric of American Government. The Constitution does not say the President has a right to put a man or woman on the Federal bench for the rest of their lives. That is not what the Constitution says. The Constitution says we will provide lifetime appointments to the judiciary in the following manner: The President shall nominate, and the Senate shall give its advice and consent. So there are two steps: The President shall nominate and the Senate shall decide yes or no.

There are circumstances where a President might say: I want to put someone on a very important Federal bench who is way outside the norm in terms of behavior, thought, or experience, or whatever; and the Senate has a right to say in that circumstance we are sorry, that is a person we are simply not going to confirm, Mr. President.

That is not terribly unusual. George Washington failed to get one of his nominees confirmed--America's first President. So it is not unusual for the Senate to say, no, this is not a candidate we agree should be put on the Federal bench for a lifetime.

In most cases, the President has sent us nominees we are satisfied with, and 168 of them have been approved; 4 have not been. In the middle of this time, when time is so critical and the appropriations bills are so urgently needed to be completed, the majority wants to ruminate and vent for 30 hours in the middle of next week about the 4 who have not been approved.

I say, as my colleague from Nevada has, I make no excuses for deciding not to support the nomination of Mr. Estrada. I make no excuses for that. Mr. Estrada wouldn't answer the questions when asked by the Senate Judiciary Committee. How do I know that? Because the same day that he was a witness before that committee, the same day his nomination was considered by that committee, a nominee for a judgeship in North Dakota was there before the committee. That candidate from North Dakota, whom I supported--and, incidentally, is a Republican--is a fine judge. I was pleased to support him. He answered the very questions put to him by that committee that Mr. Estrada refused to answer.

Mr. Estrada refused to answer questions. He and the administration refused to release information that was requested. I have no reason to make any excuses for deciding to vote against Mr. Estrada. I wouldn't have voted for him and didn't vote for him. I am not apologetic about that.

If next week in the middle of all of this urgency we are going to take 30 hours and decide just to have the majority party ventilate about the four who did not get approved by the Senate, then I say--my colleague from Nevada is here--I would like to be part of a process that talks about the 168 Federal judges we did approve, all Republican incidentally--168 of them we did approve. We will get some pictures and get their story. I will talk about a few of them. I hope my colleagues will as well because the American people need to understand the story, and the story is not of the four who didn't get approved by the Senate.

The story is the lowest vacancy rate in 15 years on the Federal bench because the Senate has moved forward on judgeships and because we have confirmed judges sent to us by this President and because we have succeeded in that effort. That is the story next week. If we are going to have 30 hours for the other side to ventilate about the 4 who didn't make it, I want 60 hours to talk about the 168 we did confirm.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, today I am introducing a private relief bill on behalf of Donald C. Pence of Stanford, NC, for compensation for the failure of the Department of Veterans Affairs to pay dependency and indemnity compensation to Kathryn E. Box, the now-deceased mother of Donald C. Pence. It is rare that a Federal agency admits a mistake. In this case, the Department of Veterans Affairs has admitted that a mistake was made and explored ways to permit payment under the law, including equitable relief, but has found no provisions authorizing the Department to release the remaining benefits that were unpaid to Mrs. Box at the time of her death. My bill would correct this injustice, and I urge my colleagues to support this measure.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of my bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, today I rise to introduce legislation which would amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to allow Cooperative Housing Corporations, co-ops, to convert to condominium forms of ownership.

Under current law, a conversion from a cooperative shareholding to condominium ownership is taxable at a corporate level as well as an individual level. The conversion is treated as a corporate liquidation, and therefore taxed accordingly. In addition, a capital gains tax is levied on any increase between the owner's basis in the co-op share pre-conversion and the market value of the condominium interest post- conversion. This double taxation dissuades condominium conversion because the owner is being taxed on the transaction which is nothing more than a change in the form of ownership. While the Internal Revenue Service concedes that there are no discernable advantages to society of the cooperative form of ownership, they do not view Federal tax statutes as providing sufficient flexibility with which to address the obstacles of conversion.

Cooperative housing organizes the ownership structure into a corporation, with shares of stock for each apartment unit, which are sold to buyers. The corporation then issues a proprietary lease entitling the owner of the stock to the use of the unit in perpetuity. Because the investment is in the form of a share of stock, investors sometimes lose their entire investment as a result of debt incurred by the corporation in construction and development. In addition, due to the structure of a cooperative housing corporation, a prospective purchaser of shares in the corporation from an existing tenant- stockholders has difficulty obtaining mortgage financing for the purchase. Furthermore, tenant-stockholders of cooperative housing also encounter difficulties in securing bank loans for the full value of their investment.

As a result, owners of cooperative housing are increasingly looking toward conversion to the condominium structure of ownership. Condominium ownership permits the owner of a unit to own the unit itself, eliminating the cooperative housing dilemma of corporate debt that supersedes the investment of cooperative housing share owners, and other financial concerns.

The legislation I introduce today will remove the penalty of double taxation from the conversion of cooperative housing to condominium ownership, and will greatly benefit co-op owners across the nation. The bill does not apply to cooperatives which have been or are now being financed by any Federal, State, or local programs for the purpose of assisting in the construction of affordable housing cooperatives or the conversion of rental units to affordable housing cooperatives. I urge my colleagues' consideration of and support for this measure.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of this bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, today I am reintroducing a bill which is of great importance to a group of patriotic Americans. This legislation is designed to extend space-available travel privileges on military aircraft to those who have been totally disabled in the service of our country.

Currently, retired members of the Armed Forces are permitted to travel

on a space-available basis on non-scheduled military flights within the continental United States, and on scheduled overseas flights operated by the Military Airlift Command. My bill would provide the same benefits for veterans with 100 percent service-connected disabilities.

We owe these heroic men and women who have given so much to our country a debt of gratitude. Of course, we can never repay them for the sacrifices they have made on behalf of our Nation, but we can surely try to make their lives more pleasant and fulfilling. One way in which we can help is to extend military travel privileges to these distinguished American veterans. I have received numerous letters from all over the country attesting to the importance attached to this issue by veterans. Therefore, I ask that my colleagues show their concern and join me in saying ``thank you'' by supporting this legislation.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of my bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, today I am reintroducing legislation to enable those former prisoners of war who have been separated honorably from their respective services and who have been rated as having a 30 percent service-connected disability to have the use of both the military commissary and post exchange privileges. While I realize it is impossible to adequately compensate one who has endured long periods of incarceration at the hands of our Nation's enemies, I do feel this gesture is both meaningful and important to those concerned because it serves as a reminder that our Nation has not forgotten their sacrifices.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of my bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, today I rise to introduce the Physical and Occupational Therapy Education Act of 2003. This legislation will increase educational opportunities for physical therapy and occupational therapy practitioners in order to meet the growing demand for the valuable services they provide in our communities.

Several factors contribute to the present need for federal support in this area. The rapid aging of our Nation's population, the demands of the AIDS crisis, increasing emphasis on health promotion and disease prevention, and the growth of home health care has increased the demand for physical and occupational therapy services. This demand has exceeded our ability to educate an adequate number of physical therapists and occupational therapists. In addition, technological advances are allowing injured and disabled individuals to survive conditions that would have proven fatal in past years.

An inadequate number of physical therapists has led to an increased reliance on foreign-educated, non-immigrant temporary workers who enter the U.S. as H-1B visa holders. The U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform has identified physical therapy and occupational therapy as having the highest number of H-1B visa holders in the United States, second only to computer specialists.

In addition to the shortage of practitioners, a shortage of faculty impedes the expansion of established education programs. The critical shortage of doctoral-prepared occupational therapists and physical therapists has resulted in a depleted pool of potential faculty. This bill would assist in the development of qualified faculty by giving preference to grant applicants seeking to develop and expand post- professional programs for the advanced training of physical and occupational therapists.

The legislation I introduce today would provide necessary assistance to physical and occupational therapy programs throughout the country. The investment we make will help reduce America's dependence on foreign labor and create highly-skilled, high-wage employment opportunities for American citizens.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of this bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, today I introduce legislation to authorize the autonomous functioning of clinical psychologists and clinical social workers within the Medicare comprehensive outpatient rehabilitation facility program.

In my judgment, it is unfortunate that Medicare requires clinical supervision of the services provided by certain health professionals and does not allow them to function to the full extent of their State practice licenses. Those who need the services of outpatient rehabilitation facilities should have access to a wide range of social and behavioral science expertise. Clinical psychologists and clinical social workers are recognized as independent providers of mental health care services under the Federal Employee Health Benefits Program, the Civilian Health and Medical Program of the Uniformed Services, the Medicare, Part B, Program, and numerous private insurance plans. This legislation will ensure that these qualified professionals achieve the same recognition under the Medicare comprehensive outpatient rehabilitation facility program.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of this bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, today I introduce the Nursing School Clinics Act of 2003. This measure builds on our concerted efforts to provide access to quality health care for all Americans by offering grants and incentives for nursing schools to establish primary care clinics in underserved areas where additional medical services are most needed. In addition, this measure provides the opportunity for nursing schools to enhance the scope of student training and education by providing firsthand clinical experience in primary care facilities.

Primary care clinics administered by nursing schools are university or nonprofit primary care centers developed mainly in collaboration with university schools of nursing and the communities they serve. These centers are staffed by faculty and staff who are nurse practitioners and public health nurses. Students supplement patient care while receiving preceptorships provided by college of nursing faculty and primary care physicians, often associated with academic institutions, who serve as collaborators with nurse practitioners. To date, the comprehensive models of care provided by nursing clinics have yielded excellent results, including significantly fewer emergency room visits, fewer hospital inpatient days, and less use of specialists, as compared to conventional primary health care.

This bill reinforces the principle of combining health care delivery in underserved areas with the education of advanced practices nurses. To accomplish these objectives, Title XIX of the Social Security Act would be amended to designate that the services provided in these nursing school clinics are reimbursable under Medicaid. The combination of grants and the provision of Medicaid reimbursement furnishes the financial incentives for clinic operators to establish the clinics.

In order to meet the increasing challenges of bringing cost-effective and quality health care to all Americans, we must consider a wide range of proposals, both large and small. Most importantly, we must approach the issue of health care with creativity and determination, ensuring that all reasonable avenues are pursued. Nurses have always been an integral part of health care delivery. The Nursing School Clinics Act of 2003 recognizes the central role nurses can perform as care givers to the medically underserved.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of this bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, today I am introducing legislation to amend Title XVIII of the Social Security Act to correct discrepancies in the reimbursement of clinical social workers covered through Medicare, Part B. The three proposed changes contained in this legislation clarify the current payment process for clinical social workers and establish a reimbursement methodology for the profession that is similar to other health care professionals reimbursed through the Medicare program.

First, this legislation sets payment for clinical social worker services according to a fee schedule established by the Secretary. Second, it explicitly states that services and supplies furnished by a clinical social worker are a covered Medicare expense, just as these services are covered for other mental health professionals in Medicare. Third, the bill allows clinical social workers to be reimbursed for services provided to a client who is hospitalized.

Clinical social workers are valued members of our health care provider network. They are legally regulated in every state of the nation and are recognized as independent providers of mental health care throughout the health care system. It is time to correct the disparate reimbursement treatment of this profession under Medicare.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of this bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I am introducing legislation today to amend Title VII of the Public Health Service Act to establish a psychology post-doctoral program.

Psychologists have made a unique contribution in reaching out to the Nation's medically underserved populations. Expertise in behavioral science is useful in addressing grave concerns such as violence, addiction, mental illness, adolescent and child behavioral disorders, and family disruption. Establishment of a psychology post-doctoral program could be an effective way to find solutions to these issues.

Similar programs supporting additional, specialized training in traditionally underserved settings have been successful in retaining participants to serve the same populations. For example, mental health professionals who have participated in these specialized federally funded programs have tended not only to meet their repayment obligations, but have continued to work in the public sector or with the underserved.

While a doctorate in psychology provides broad-based knowledge and mastery in a wide variety of clinical skills, specialized post-doctoral fellowship programs help to develop particular diagnostic and treatment skills required to respond effectively to underserved populations. For example, what appears to be poor academic motivation in a child recently relocated from Southeast Asia might actually reflect a cultural value of reserve rather than a disinterest in academic learning. Specialized assessment skills enable the clinician to initiate effective treatment.

Domestic violence poses a significant public health problem and is not just a problem for the criminal justice system. Violence against women results in thousands of hospitalizations a year. Rates of child and spouse abuse in rural areas are particularly high, as are the rates of alcohol abuse and depression in adolescents. A post-doctoral fellowship program in the psychology of the rural populations could be of special benefit in addressing these problems.

Given the demonstrated success and effectiveness of specialized training programs, it is incumbent upon us to encourage participation in post-doctoral fellowships that respond to the needs of the nation's underserved.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of this bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, all too often we find that our Nation's civilian employees of the Federal Government who have been forcibly detained or interred by a hostile government do not receive the recognition they deserve. My bill would correct this inequity and provide a prisoner of war medal for such citizens.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of my bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, today I am introducing a private relief bill on behalf of Jim K. Yoshida, to obtain recognition of his service with the U.S. military in Korea so that he may obtain veteran's status.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of my bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I rise to introduce the Filipino Veterans' Benefits Improvement Act of 2003 to give our country the opportunity to right a wrong committed decades ago by providing Philippine-born veterans of World War II, who served in the United States Armed Forces, their hard-earned, due compensation.

The Philippines became a United States possession in 1898, when it was ceded from Spain following the Spanish-American War. In 1934, the Congress enacted the Philippine Independence Act, Public Law 73-127, which provided a 10-year time frame for the independence of the Philippines. Between 1934 and final independence in 1946, the United States retained certain powers over the Philippines, including the right to call all military forces organized by the newly-formed Commonwealth government into the service of the United States Armed Forces.

On July 26, 1941, President Roosevelt issued an Executive Order calling members of the Philippine Commonwealth Army into the service of the United States Armed Forces of the Far East. Under this order, Filipinos were entitled to full veterans' benefits. More than 100,000 Filipinos volunteered for the Philippine Commonwealth Army and fought alongside the United States Armed Forces.

Shortly after Japan's surrender, Congress enacted the Armed Forces Voluntary Recruitment Act of 1945 for the purpose of sending American troops to occupy enemy lands, and to oversee military installations at various overseas locations.

A provision included in the Recruitment Act called for the enlistment of Philippine citizens to constitute a new body of scouts. The New Philippine Scouts were authorized to receive pay and allowances for services performed throughout the Western Pacific. Although hostilities had ceased, wartime service of the New Philippine Scouts continued as a matter of law until the end of 1946.

Despite their sacrifices, on February 18, 1946, Congress betrayed these veterans by enacting the Rescission Act of 1946 and declaring the service performed by the Philippine Commonwealth Army veterans as not ``active service,'' thus denying many benefits to which these veterans were entitled.

On May 27, 1946, the Congress enacted the Second Supplemental Surplus Appropriations Rescission Act, which included a provision to limit veterans' benefits provided to Filipinos. This provision duplicated the language that had eliminated veterans' benefits under the First Rescission Act, and placed similar restrictions on veterans of the New Philippine Scouts. Thus, the Filipino veterans who fought in the service of the United States during World War II were precluded from receiving most veterans' benefits that had been available to them before 1946, and that are available to all other veterans of our armed forces regardless of race, national origin, or citizenship status.

The Congress tried to rectify the wrong committed against the Filipino veterans of World War II by amending the Nationality Act of 1940, to grant the veterans the privilege of becoming United States citizens for having served in the United States Armed Forces of the Far East. The law expired at the end of 1946, but not before the United States had withdrawn its sole naturalization examiner from the Philippines for a nine-month period. This

effectively denied Filipino veterans the opportunity to become citizens during this nine-month window. Forty-five years later, under the Immigration Act of 1990, certain Filipino veterans who had served during World War II became eligible for United States citizenship. Between November, 1990, and February, 1995, approximately 24,000 veterans took advantage of this opportunity and became United States citizens.

Although progress has been made, we must, as a nation, correct fully the injustice caused by the Rescission Acts by providing equal treatment for the service and sacrifice by these brave men. The Filipino Veterans' Benefits Improvement Act of 2003 will compensate eligible veterans by providing a number of needed benefits: Dependency and Indeminity Compensation to surviving widows of service-connected veterans living in the United States; a payment increase to New Philippine Scouts and survivors residing in the United States from 50 percent to the full dollar amount for service-connected disability compensation; authorization of non-service connected disability pensions for veterans residing in the Philippines, but at a rate of $100 per month, which matches the amount of the veterans' pension received by them from the Philippine government; access to veterans hospitals for non-service connected disabled veterans in the same manner as United States veterans; and $500,000 per year to the Outpatient Clinic in Manila.

Heroes should never be forgotten or ignored, so let us not turn our backs on those who sacrificed so much. Many of the Filipinos who fought so hard for our nation have been honored with American citizenship, but let us now work to repay all of these brave men for their sacrifices by providing them the veterans' benefits they have earned.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I hope we can get things done here. There is so much to be done. I said last night, and I spoke from the heart, people in Nevada at our military bases, Fallon and Ellis, need this Military Construction bill passed. I don't know why we are not going to do it today. If it is brought up next Monday or Tuesday,

nothing is going to happen on it, so let's get that done.

The Syria Accountability bill--I understand what is going on here. There is an effort made so there will be a vote Monday night on Syria Accountability because there is a time limit on it. If that is the case, fine. Remember, this is an important piece of legislation that requires our immediate attention. I don't think we should be doing things that take away for 1 minute our going into Syria's accountability, supporting the Hezbollah, and all the other activities they do that simply are not appropriate.

We are in a situation where we have bills that need to be passed and conference reports that need to be approved. It is not going to happen for reasons I don't understand.

I will be happy to yield.

I will be happy to respond to my friend's question. As I indicated earlier, to my knowledge, no one works harder in the Senate than the Senator from North Dakota. He is an appropriator and authorizer, understanding from his long years in Congress, both in the House and the Senate, that the last few weeks and days of a legislative session can become very intense. That is why I am at a total, absolute loss to understand how we could do this. We have been told; we heard it on the news--I went home last night and my wife said it was on the news at 6 o'clock Wednesday night until 12 o'clock Thursday night, we are going to be on the Senate floor listening to a discussion of what bad legislators we are because we haven't approved 100 percent of the judges the President has requested--168 to 4--and we have been told they are going to bring up another failed nominee, Priscilla Owen, next week.

I understand they are also going to bring up a woman by the name of Kuhl from California and a woman by the name of Brown from California. I don't know if this is an effort to try to somehow embarrass the two Democratic--

--Senators from California or what the reason might be.

For a parliamentary inquiry? I will be happy to do that, without losing my right to the floor. Yes.

Mr. President, I appreciate that very much. I appreciate my friend from Arizona bringing that to my attention. What I am going to talk about for a while is the Internet tax problem. Internet tax is a difficult situation, of course. It is something with which we need to deal. We understand there is some confusion as to what we are really dealing with. Some believe it has something to do with sales tax. This legislation does not. It deals with access.

It is a very important issue, but it seems to me this matter could be resolved in a matter of minutes. I am told the Presiding Officer's amendment, in effect, would extend the present law for a couple years. It is my understanding the distinguished Senator from Alaska has suggested this be extended for 2 years and, if I am not mistaken, there are others who believe it should be extended for 2 years.

I believe that should happen. I hope we will extend this for a couple years and then during that period of time make a determination as to whether the legislation that is now before the Senate should be implemented. I understand that.

Also, one of the real problems we have is this schedule, which makes it very difficult to deal with this legislation. My friend from Arizona suggested we deal with relevant amendments. This is not going to happen in this present atmosphere. There will certainly be efforts made to offer not only relevant amendments, but, I would assume, maybe some nongermane amendments. I don't know that to be the case, but I assume so because we have so few opportunities to amend different pieces of legislation as they come through.

On appropriations bills, we have been cooperating the best we can. As I indicated last night, we have done everything we can to make sure we did not have amendments that were offered to appropriations bills that would slow down the process. We have worked very hard in doing that.

I am not going to talk for a long time this morning.

I have no intention of interfering this morning with people's schedules. I know there are a lot of schedules that we have to move along. I want to do that. People have airplane schedules to meet on Friday. We were told yesterday that there would not be anything after 12 today. At least people on our side made arrangements that that would, in fact, be the case. If there is some change, we need to know about that.

I am happy that we got the CR passed. I look forward at a later time today to cooperate and agree to bringing forth Commerce-State-Justice. We want to do that at the appropriate time. Until there is some decision made on how long we are going to be involved on the Internet tax situation, we are not going to be able to give that consent.

Finally, responding to my friend from North Dakota in a very brief way, what is taking place here is something that I have never seen in the many years--more than two decades--I have served in the Congress, that we would have in the late days of a legislative session this carnival, as the Senator from North Dakota referred to it--this circus, as I referred to it--and that is what the American people will think of it.

Let me say about this bill, no matter the merit of it, I know people feel very strongly about it. The Senator from Tennessee, who was here in the Chamber a few minutes ago, the Senator from Ohio, Mr. Voinovich, the Senator from Virginia, Mr. Allen, the distinguished Senator from Oregon, Mr. Wyden--they have strong feelings about this. Their views do not coincide. I know how strong their feelings are.

But this legislation, with all due respect to the distinguished chairman of the Commerce Committee, isn't going to go anywhere today or Monday or Tuesday. I think there should be some effort made to resolve the issue. I am a member of the Commerce Committee. I don't understand all the issues, but I understand the issues on this floor and nothing is going to happen.

I would say to the majority that if they are looking for votes today, they would be better off looking for votes to pass the most important piece of legislation that I see that we could vote on quickly, and that would be the vote on the conference report dealing with Military Construction. We could vote on that. We could have a vote with debate equally divided with 5 minutes each. We could pass it. We could go to the Syria Accountability Act. We agreed last night to reduce our time. There are 90 minutes. We have agreed to take one hour half each and divide it up, as we indicated last night, several different ways. It seems to me we could do that, and we could be out of here by 12 o'clock after 2 very important votes.

Let me tell you what the problem is. There is an effort made so we have something to do on Monday and Tuesday. I say to everyone that as a result of the carnival which is going to be started at 6 o'clock on Wednesday, nothing is going to happen Monday and Tuesday of any significance. There may be a vote on the Syria Accountability Act because it would be an easy vote to get up. They may bring up Military Construction, and they may say, Isn't it too bad that the minority, the Democrats, aren't allowing us to pass Military Construction. But remember: I have offered numerous times over several days to take this up by unanimous consent. So all the pleas of sorrow and concern next week about our not taking care of our military officers around the country certainly will speak volumes because it simply is without any foundation because we can do that right here.

We are on the Internet tax bill. One of the things we need to talk about on this Internet tax bill is the importance of judges. Judges enforce these laws. We have been involved in passing out of this Senate 168 judges. We have turned down four. If the Internet tax measure is worth talking about, why don't we just move a little bit to the 30 hours which is going to begin next Wednesday and start talking about judges today? That is fine. I don't see any reason why we should not do that.

We can talk about the record that was set and that we have the lowest vacancy rate in the judiciary in some 15 years. Is it necessary because we have the lowest rate in some 15 years to spend 30 hours--2 days of the Senate's time--talking about judges in the circus atmosphere that will be there? It is all planned. It is going to be quite a show. It has all been laid out in the press. They are going to have all 51 Republicans here, and that way it will be very easy to discern whether or not there is a quorum present.

I am gathering my thoughts.

We will have a lot of time to spend on Internet tax.

Thank you very much. I appreciate very much bringing the Senate to order.

Mr. President, the point is if there needs to be a discussion on judges, we don't have to wait until Wednesday at 6 o'clock. We can start talking right now on this legislation because judges have to enforce the law. It is a law we are talking about. They have to do it on a trial level and they have to do it on an appellate level.

We have given this President 98 percent of the judges he wants--98 percent of the judges he wants. People talk about the Constitution. We can talk about the Constitution also. The majority makes these statements that a filibuster is a brand new thing; it has never happened with judges; isn't it a terrible thing this is happening in the Senate. Of course, it is without foundation. There is no truth to it. Filibusters have taken place on previous occasions, and it will take place again long after we are gone.

To think we have to wait until Wednesday to talk about judges--we don't have to wait until Wednesday. We can talk now. This is a complicated piece of legislation. Don't you think we are going to need judges to interpret the law? Of course we are. The record we have is pretty good. Do you think the advise-and-consent clause of the Constitution meant every judge the President suggested to us we just approve them? Would the President be happy if we had 100 percent of his judges? How about 99 percent or 99.5 percent? Ninety-eight percent isn't good enough. It is not good enough, so now we are going to spend 30 hours talking about why it shouldn't be 98 percent, it should be 100 percent. I don't know what the proper ratio is the President wants.

I am just giving everyone a little idea that we don't have to wait until Wednesday at 6 o'clock to talk about judges. We will talk about them now. I am proud of what we have done here in the Senate dealing with judges.

I am glad Miguel Estrada was not confirmed. He wouldn't answer the questions. He wouldn't allow us to look at his memoranda when he was at the Solicitor's Office.

I am glad we did not approve Priscilla Owen who the President's own attorney, Mr. Gonzales, said was not a good judge when he served with her in the Texas Supreme Court.

I am glad that twice we did not approve William Pryor from Alabama who is an embarrassment to the State of Nevada and this country and shouldn't be a judge.

We have approved 168 judges. That is how many we have approved.

I would be happy to yield for a question.

In just a minute.

The Internet bill which we are talking about here on the Senate floor is an important piece of legislation. I was present last night and listened to the statements of the Senator from Oregon. The Senator from Oregon understands legislation. He understands the importance of this Internet tax bill. He understands the definition of access. He understands what unfunded mandates mean, which was talked about by the Senator from Tennessee at such great length. I think it is important we understand this Internet tax bill. It deals with some very important issues. It is a bill that seeks to protect the

Internet access from taxation. As the lines between the Internet and the media continue to blur, there is some concern the law could lead to States losing some of their existing tax base over time. For example, some long distance telephone traffic is now carried on the Internet. Movies, videos, and music programming can be downloaded onto the Internet as well as being viewed over cable and broadcast media.

I say to everyone within the sound of my voice someone needs to interpret this law. If we pass something here, we will need someone to interpret this law.

I know this is Friday morning and there is a lot to do. But I simply wanted everyone to know this sham, this scam, this circus, this carnival that is going to begin on Wednesday at 6 o'clock is just as I have described it. What we are going to do, as the Senator from North Dakota indicated, if you want to talk about 4 judges, or maybe add 2 more or 6, is we will talk about 168. We are happy to do that.

I know I could talk a lot longer. I understand the Pastore rule. I have a lot of stuff which I could talk about--the Internet tax, and weave in the judges, but as kind of a relief to everybody, I am going to sit down for the time being.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the letters which I have from cities around the State of California be printed in the Record.

Will the Senator yield for a question?

Is it true that you served in the House of Representatives before serving in the Senate?

During your tenure there, I am sure you had many occasions to send inquiries to the administration. Whether it was Veterans Affairs, the Social Security Administration, White House council, you have done that over the years; is that not true?

Over the years, it is true that you have received responses?

And there was never a question raised as to whether it was a

Democratic Congressman or Senator or Republican House Member or Senator asking the question; isn't that right?

Didn't you always feel that no matter what political party the Member of Congress was who asked the question, it had no bearing on the answer? Isn't that true?

I read that article to which you refer. It seems there is now new criteria established at the White House, that only if you are a Republican will they answer questions of a Member of Congress. Is that what that article said?

How many people live in the State of Michigan?

And Michigan is represented by two Democratic Senators.

The distinguished senior Senator, Carl Levin, who everyone acknowledges is one of the finest Senators ever to serve in this body.

He is an expert on issues relating to defense. I am sure on a weekly basis, if not more often, he makes inquiries at the Pentagon and other offices of the executive branch of Government as to questions he has in his role as the lead Democrat on the defense committee; is that right?

What that article says is a State of 9 million people, which has democratically elected Democratic Senators, these two Senators would not be able to ask questions of that administration; is that what it does?

I direct this to the Senator in a way that I can only say is as sincere as I can be. I very much appreciate the Senator bringing this to the attention of the American people through the Senate. It is our ability to bring matters to the floor that make this country better--there are other ways of showing how great this country is, but certainly one is being able to bring matters to the Senate floor without getting permission of the administration.

I applaud the Senator from Michigan for jumping on this issue very quickly, as the Senator has done on many other issues.

Madam President, will the Senator yield for a question?

Madam President, I say to my friend from Illinois, in relation to the amendment that is pending, I asked the White House by letter to give me the breakdown of the cost of all of these trips they take around the country campaigning for people. Who pays for that? Is it paid for by the taxpayers of this country? Is it paid for by the Republican National Committee? The President is a rich man. Does he pay for it personally?

It has been months and I have had no response. I think I am entitled to an answer to that most important question. People are concerned about that. The President goes to his ranch, he goes off on day trips campaigning only.

Would the Senator agree with me that that is the direction of this amendment, and that I am entitled, as a Member of the Senate, to an answer to the question as to who is paying for these junkets around the country?

Will the Senator yield for another question?

How many people live in the State of Illinois?

I say to the Senator from Illinois, I spoke through the Chair to the distinguished junior Senator from Michigan about the State of Michigan. There are 9 million people in Michigan, two Democratic Senators. Under the rule that we have just learned about that the White House is not going to answer questions of Democrats, 9 million people who live in the State of Michigan in effect cannot have their Senators asking questions of the White House.

The Senator from Illinois, who represents 12\1/2\ million people, there is a Democratic Senator and a Republican Senator who has announced his retirement, who is not going to run for reelection--the Senator who has announced his retirement and in effect is a lame duck, fine man that he is, can have his questions answered, but the Senator who was just reelected representing 12\1/2\ million people cannot have his questions answered. Does that seem fair?

Madam President, will the Senator from Michigan allow me to ask a question?

This amendment is offered by the Senator from Michigan, and it never took into consideration doing anything that was unconstitutional?

Everything the Senator does is within the framework of the Constitution. So I would hope that the matter could be disposed of as written because it goes without saying that we want this to be constitutional. We would never try to do anything that would be outside the parameters of the Constitution.

So I hope this amendment could be accepted. It appears to me it should be done by voice. If that is not the case, I know that a number of other people have more to talk about on this amendment. So I would hope the majority would make a decision quite soon as to what is to be done with this amendment.

Several Senators addressed the Chair.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I wish to join the comments of the Senator from Michigan. It is, I am sure, painful and distracting for the administration to receive inquiries from Congress. It sure would be a lot easier if Congress wasn't around to mess up their work. I mean, we ask all these hard questions about what they are doing with the taxpayers' dollars. What are you doing to make America a safer place? I am sure if they did not have to answer those questions and be held accountable, they would have a lot more time to do other things.

I think the reason for the questions gets down to a basic document called the Constitution. If I remember correctly from early lessons, we do have three coequal branches of Government and a system of checks and balances. This administration has decided that particular part of the Constitution is going to be ignored.

Frankly, I don't think that serves our Nation very well. Whether it is a Democratic administration or a Republican administration, the fact is they have to be held accountable. The way they are held accountable is not only through an election, but through the operations of Congress which appropriates moneys, passes laws, and asks hard questions.

Now we see the official policy of this administration is to say we are only going to answer Republican-approved questions. That, to me, is a sad commentary on this administration which has, frankly, written a record of concealment in the years they have been here.

You recall the lawsuit that was involved when we drew up the Energy bill. We asked the Vice President of the United States, who was one of the designers of the administration's Energy bill, which special interest groups were sitting in the room when they wrote the bill. He said to Congress: It is none of your business. We don't have to tell you. We brought a suit against the administration asking for that information and we were unsuccessful.

Today we know there were special interest groups present. We just don't know who they were. If you look at the bill, you can see who they likely were. They are the ones that were rewarded--oil companies and major energy companies. They are the ones who did very well with this Energy bill.

When the Senator from Michigan raises this question as to what this new administration policy means, I think she really hits the nail on the head. Congress has an important constitutional role of oversight on this administration and any administration, and for this administration to decide that certain Senators and Congressmen cannot ask questions that will be answered, I think is going to set us back.

I had the same experience with the Department of Justice. Attorney General John Ashcroft, who served in this Senate for years and asked many questions of previous administrations, really loathes to answer any questions that come particularly from Democratic Senators. That has caused a lot of, I guess, concern because some of us believe there are important questions that need to be asked and answered.

The PATRIOT Act, for example, was a new delegation of authority 2 years ago to the Government. It gave the Government more power than they had before, power that comes close to, if it doesn't, infringing on our rights and liberties. We asked some questions: How is this Department of Justice using the PATRIOT Act? Unfortunately, the Attorney General has not been responsive. One might say: Well, he comes to Congress, doesn't he? He submits himself to questions? If we look at the record, we will see this Attorney General's record of coming to Congress and being held accountable is a record that shows he doesn't care to do that either.

They don't answer written inquiries, and the Attorney General does not appear personally. Frankly, that leads to mistrust, and it doesn't speak well of a democracy where that is the hallmark of their policy.

It strikes me Congress has some important responsibilities here, and one of them is reflected in the issue raised by the Senator from Michigan. Another one is reflected in this so-called 30-hour debate, this one-sided debate which is to take place next week. It appears the Republican majority in the Senate, 51, believe they have been treated unfairly because the President has only had 168 of his judicial nominees approved while 4 have been held up. That is right, the score is 168 to 4, and they are arguing that is unfair, so unfair we need to tie up the Senate, we need to stop consideration of appropriations bills, we need to stop any consideration of bills that might help the men and women in uniform who are fighting for us in Iraq and Afghanistan. We don't have time for that, but we have to spend 30 straight hours in a one-sided debate on the Republican side arguing that holding up 4 judges out of 172--4 out of 172--is somehow unconstitutional or unfair or unjust.

It goes to the heart of this same document, our Constitution, which says the Senate is not a rubberstamp. The Senate has the power to not just consent to judges, but to advise and consent, and that advise-and- consent role includes asking hard questions of judicial nominees.

The four who have been held up so far from the Bush White House, I think, represent the most extreme of his nominees. But there are many others who have been approved who have philosophies entirely consistent with the President and his administration.

Make no mistake, out of the 168 nominees who have gone through this Senate, a record number for any President, 168 have been approved. Of those, we will find many conservative Republicans with views much different than my own. We accept that. But for these 4, we think they have crossed a line, a line which really calls on us in our capacity as Senators with responsibility of the advise-and-consent clause to say at some point we have to say no for 4 judges out of 172.

I might add on this bill that is before us, at a later moment I will be offering an amendment. It is an amendment which really doesn't appear to have much to do with the Internet tax question, but it is an amendment I am going to continue to offer on every available bill until the Senate goes on record and passes it again and enacts it into law. It is an amendment which passed this Senate about 2 weeks ago by a vote of 96 to 3. It is an amendment which says Federal employees who are members of our National Guard and Reserve units who are activated will have their Federal salaries protected while they are serving our country.

This is exactly what happens to State employees in dozens of States and city and county employees across America where their units of government have said: If you go off to serve our Nation in the Guard and Reserve, we will stand behind you. We will make up the difference in your salary. We will protect your families' income while you are serving our Nation and risking your lives.

Sadly, the same standard is not applied to Federal employees. Here we

are with 10 percent of the Guard and Reserve in Federal employment-- 120,000 of those who are in the Guard and Reserve are in Federal employment; 23,000 have been activated, and we do not make up the difference in their salaries while overseas.

For some, there is no difference, but for some there is a big disparity. I offered this amendment on the floor, and it was adopted 96 to 3.

Yes, without losing my right to the floor.

I will be happy to yield.

I, of course, thank the Senator from Oregon. I appreciate the hard work of the Senator from North Dakota, the Senator from Arizona, and the Senator from Oregon on this important legislation.

I mentioned earlier the reservist pay amendment which I will be offering at some point on this legislation, but there is another amendment which I will be offering which I would like to alert the sponsors of so it comes as no surprise. It is our understanding that if there is a tax moratorium on Internet operations, which I would support with carefully defined circumstances, it will result in a substantial savings to telecommunications companies across the United States. I am going to be offering an amendment during the course of consideration of this bill which says that the savings to these companies shall be passed on to the consumers in America.

It strikes me that at a point in time when we are in a recession, when families are struggling, some facing unemployment, others trying to make ends meet, that if we are going to relieve this industry of substantial taxation, millions if not billions of dollars over time, the savings ought to go to families, the customers. I think that would be a good move on our part.

So if we want to talk about invigorating the economy, then why not reduce the telephone bill or the tax bill that a family faces on a monthly basis?

I yield to the Senator for Nevada, without yielding the floor.

Reclaiming my time, I say to the Senator from Nevada that is a perfect illustration as to why the Stabenow amendment should be enacted, because what Senator Stabenow is trying to achieve is the right of the Senator from Nevada and any Senator, Democrat or Republican, to ask legitimate questions about the expenditure of public funds. If we decide that is going too far and perhaps inconveniencing the administration by forcing them to be held accountable, then we might as well pack up and go home.

As they say, if we are here in order to total up years for retirement, it is a pretty easy job; but if we want to come here and go to work to try to achieve good for this country and make certain that people who are misusing public resources are, in fact, held accountable for it, then it is hard work.

I would be happy to yield to the Senator from Nevada.

About 12\1/2\ million.

I say to the Senator from Nevada, it not only does not seem fair, it raises another question in my mind. Why would we on the Democratic side of the aisle approve any executive appointment of someone who is going in the executive branch and from that point forward will never speak to us again? Now, if we are being asked by this administration to approve people to hold offices within this administration who have not answered all the questions in committee and having been approved on the Senate floor will from that point forward never communicate with us again, then, frankly, I think we are derelict in our responsibility.

So I say to the administration, think this through. If they are saying that the people we appoint in the Senate are not going to answer the questions propounded by Democratic Senators, then, frankly, I think it is untoward of them to suggest that we should just approve all of these appointments.

I think it is fair game for the President to fill vacancies, and I have supported the overwhelming majority of the President's requests. But if the policy is once approved by the Senate, these executive appointments, these people working in these agencies, will refuse to take telephone calls or answer letters of inquiry from Members of the Senate, refuse to be held accountable for their actions as public officials, then I think we are derelict in

our responsibility to the people we represent.

I would be happy to yield to the Senator from Vermont.

In reply, I say the Senator from Vermont is absolutely correct. Allow me to use another illustration. Just last weekend, there was the downing of the Chinook helicopter in Iraq with 15 of our soldiers killed initially and another soldier who has died just last night, I understand, so 16 soldiers died and 20 more were seriously injured. The pilot of that helicopter was from my home State. It was a National Guard helicopter.

After that occurred, unsolicited I received communications from reliable military sources that suggested that the Guard helicopters in activated units were not adequately equipped and prepared to deal with shoulder-fired missiles. This is as serious a question as can be given to any Member of the Senate. Naturally, the families--the servicemen first and their families--wanted to know the answer. So what I did was to write a letter directly to the Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, saying please look into this immediately; see if the National Guard units that have been activated are sufficiently protected with equipment.

During the course of asking this question, more communications came my way. Now we have received a lot of communications suggesting that families all around Illinois, and even around the country, are telling us about deficiencies in the equipment available to our servicemen in Iraq and Afghanistan, and particularly to activated guardsmen and reserves.

Consider that just yesterday, the President signed an $87 billion appropriation for the effort in Iraq and Afghanistan which, as I understand it, about $67 billion was for our men and women in uniform, which I supported. As much as I disagree with the President's foreign policy, I am not going to shortchange our men and women in uniform for the resources they need to be successful in their mission and come home safely.

Having done that, having given the appropriation to the administration, now we have families and servicemen coming to me, as the Senator from Illinois, saying they do not think the money is being spent properly. I have a responsibility to their families and to my State to ask the hard questions of the administration. Are you doing all that you can to protect our servicemen? Frankly, I think that is why I was elected. If I am not given a chance to even ask that question or to have my inquiry answered, what, then, can I say to these families or to these servicemen who believe that I am their elected representative and have that responsibility?

Senator Stabenow, in her amendment, says this new policy of the administration, of refusing to answer letters from Democratic Senators and Democratic Congressmen, takes away from the voice of those families and those servicemen and people across the United States who rely on us to stand up and hold any administration accountable, whether it is Democratic or Republican.

I think, honestly, her amendment goes to the heart of why we are here doing business in the Chamber of the Senate. I support her very strongly. I urge my Republican colleagues who have been very loyal to their President, and that is understandable and admirable, to think long and hard about this policy. Things change in this town. The tide of politics can hit the shore and go back out to sea and come back again. You never know, a year, 2 years, 3 years from now, whether or not policies taken by this administration establish a precedent which is not healthy for our constitutional democracy. Certainly this decision by the administration to turn down inquiries and letters of request on matters as basic as the protection of our men and women in uniform and whether or not our helicopters are adequately protected-- their decision as a policy basis, which I understand has been included in an e-mail and sent across the administration--raises some important questions.

I see the ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee, Senator Conrad, has taken the floor. Again, he is a perfect illustration of why this new policy of the administration, refusing to answer inquiries from Democratic Senators about their spending policies and taxing policies, make it impossible for him to do his job on the Budget Committee to make certain that every administration is held accountable.

I am going to yield the floor and say to my friend and colleague from Michigan, thank you for bringing this issue up. This is not just a morning newspaper article. This is a serious constitutional question. I hope some of my colleagues on the Republican side of the aisle, after first reacting they want to stand by their administration, will think long and hard if this is a policy we in America should be asked to live with, when future Congresses and future Presidents are elected and we are all told we are trying to share a responsibility of accountability across our Government.

I yield the floor.