Alternative Minimum Tax Relief Act of 2008

Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 7005) to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to provide alternative minimum tax relief for individuals for 2008.

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and to insert extraneous material in the Record.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

The provisions of H.R. 7005, the Alternative Minimum Tax Relief Act of 2008, as scheduled for floor action today, provides alternative minimum tax relief.

Ways and Means Committee Chairman Rangel and the ranking member, Mr. McCrery, have asked the nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation to make available to the public a technical explanation of the bill. The technical explanation expresses the committee's understanding and legislative intent behind this important legislation. It is available on the joint committee's Web site at www.jct.gov. I want to thank Mr. Rangel for his diligent work on a flurry of last minute bills here. There is some urgency to the bill we are debating today. I also want to acknowledge, to his everlasting relief, that this is the last time Mr. Reynolds will have a chance to speak on the issue of the alternative minimum tax.

If we do not pass this legislation today, 25 million families will pay higher taxes this year. That is right, this tax relief is for this year. I might add to this conversation that one of the nice things about this bill, despite how tumultuous these days have been for Members of Congress and for the American citizens watching what has happened to their 401(k) plans, this legislation actually provides middle class tax relief. The current patch expired at the end of the last year, and it is urgent that we pass this relief now.

Of those 25 million families facing higher taxes, 84 percent of them earn less than $200,000. In my constituency alone, families paying alternative minimum tax will rise from 8,000 to 69,000 if we do not enact this patch, and only 500 of those unlucky 69,000 people earn more than half a million dollars annually. Clearly, the alternative minimum tax is not the millionaire's tax it was designed to be.

For the last decade I have sought to repeal or radically reform the AMT because of the unfairness it wreaks on our progressive tax system. The AMT patch we are considering today costs more than $60 billion, and a reminder to all, next year, $70 billion. But unlike the version we considered earlier this year, we should acknowledge, this one is not offset. Despite partisan efforts in outreach to the other side on the issue of fiscal responsibility, we have, unfortunately, been unable to find common ground. We have run up against the reality of the closing days of Congress, and this legislation simply must be accomplished.

Again, I want to congratulate Chairman Rangel on crafting a responsible bill and one which picks up on the good work of our colleagues, Mr. Van Hollen of Maryland and Mr. Johnson of Texas, on the issue of incentive stock options. For a decade, Mr. Johnson and I have tried to find relief for those taxpayers unfortunately caught with a massive AMT bill on phantom stock gains, and today's bill provides relief by abating penalties and interest on underpayments and by allowing quicker recovery of AMT credits.

The bill we are considering today is a true hold-harmless patch because it not only extends but increases the AMT exemption level. It also extends protection from AMT for taxpayers with personal, nonrefundable credits, such as education credits and the dependent care credits. Otherwise, taxpayers might lose these essential credits to

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Kind).

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pascrell), a fine member of the Ways and Means Committee.

I yield 1 additional minute to the gentleman.

Madam Speaker, I appreciate my friend, Mr. Dreier's, comments, about the alternative minimum tax and how we are going to proceed today, but, let me be blunt, over my objections for the last 8 years, what we talked about today is simply this for the American people that might be viewing this discussion, we are going to borrow the money. I object to it, but I have tried time and again to find concurrence on the other side with a common way forward and have been unsuccessful.

Madam Speaker, I would like to yield 2 minutes to the gentlelady from Nevada, a very valued member of the Ways and Means Committee, Ms. Berkley.

Madam Speaker, I want to agree with some of what Mr. Reynolds said, but I also want to remind the American citizenry today, we have now borrowed hundreds of billions of dollars to fix the alternative minimum tax, only to discover that a temporary patch is hardly a fix.

Think of what we might have done had we adhered to some fiscal rectitude and actually paid for this legislation as opposed to borrowing the money.

The reality is, in a legislative body, that there are some days that you can't get the votes to do what you would like, and this is one of those days.

But be mindful as we proceed to the next session of the Congress that the request for fixing the alternative minimum tax, or patching the alternative minimum tax, you will be out $70 billion, the following year $80 billion, maybe more. Then when you calculate the interest that attends to the issue, we quickly find that we will be at $500 billion to have temporarily patched alternative minimum tax, when we have offered a remedy here to do away with it?

We can argue about percentage of GDP that results in taxation to administer the Federal Government. I have heard that argument. The difficulty with that argument is that it doesn't take into consideration the reality of what we might have done in the intervening time to address the issue.

We have put very thoughtful pieces of legislation to permanently repeal it, to put it behind us once and for all, alternative minimum tax, only to discover that we have had difficulty securing the necessary cooperation to get it done. So, I will be standing here next year, talking about alternative minimum tax, asking for a permanent repeal. I hope, in the atmosphere of tax reform, that we might accomplish that task.

Madam Speaker, I would like to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New York, a classmate of mine from 1988, my friend, Mr. Engel.

I would be prepared to close upon listening to the eloquence of the gentleman from New York.

Madam Speaker, let me, as I close, acknowledge the work of Chairman Rangel. He has given me considerable latitude not only on this issue but on a range of other issues within the jurisdiction of the committee. We have come up with some pretty good pieces of legislation during the last couple of years.

What is striking about this debate is we find ourselves in the same predicament where we will once again convene next year to discuss it. Mr. Rangel's legislation that I helped to author actually repealed the alternative minimum tax and did it in a responsible manner. The fact that we are here today because we couldn't find enough numbers in the House to move forward on the proposal, I think, demonstrates the frustration that we all feel with what has now become a very onerous position for the Congress to entertain.

But I do want to thank my friend, Tom Reynolds. And he is my friend. We probably on tax policy disagree on where the sun rises and the sun sets, but it is an example of a friendship

that has been able to supersede any of those differences because after the debate of this House is over, socially he has been a good pal for a long time. And I have the impression that he is not going to miss debating alternative minimum tax when he is back in New York. His position has been steadfast in this arena on the issue of AMT, and we have really worked hand in glove with one minor difference: I think rather than borrow the money, I think we should pay for it. And at the same time, I must tell you, he has been a good and humorous friend along the way, and we will miss his presence in the House and on the Ways and Means Committee.

Madam Speaker, I urge adoption of the resolution.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

(Mr. REYNOLDS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Madam Speaker, I thank the chairman of the Select Revenue Measures Subcommittee of Ways and Means. Mr. Neal has been a true leader in the goal of trying to get permanent repeal of AMT, and while it is something that we share, we have not yet reached a solution.

So I find myself rising today on behalf of middle class families all across America in strong support of this bill. As my colleagues well know, I have fought year in and year out for the AMT patch, and I am disappointed that Congress has not addressed a permanent solution. Absent a long-term proposal, I think we have no choice but to once again pass a temporary 1-year fix.

Without patch legislation, more than 25 million families will be hit by this stealth tax. This includes more than 21 million taxpayers who didn't owe AMT in 2007. If Congress does not act, each American affected by AMT will, on average, face a tax increase of almost $2,500. We delayed action for so long last year that 13.5 million taxpayers were forced to delay filing their returns. Because we did not act earlier this year, millions more have been hanging in the balance.

We have an opportunity to end the uncertainty of the middle class that they have been facing all year long. Each Member of this House has the opportunity to live up to their responsibility and truly help the middle class trapped in this stealth tax that was so unintended for the middle class.

Yesterday the other body passed their bipartisan tax extenders package. The Senate majority leader was as candid as I have ever heard him when he bluntly told the House, ``Don't send us back something else. We can't get it passed.'' He went on to make it clear that if we do, the important extenders we have all been working so hard to accomplish will die and we will have ``snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.''

In these difficult and uncertain economic times, we have an obligation to pass a bill that can be signed into law as quickly as possible to protect middle class Americans. While I believe our time today would be better spent moving a comprehensive tax extenders package, I am nonetheless pleased to see the majority put up a clean AMT bill before this House.

I thank Chairman Rangel for his leadership on this legislation and Chairman Neal for his additional leadership as the Chair of the Subcommittee of Select Revenues.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Texas (Mr. Brady), a member of the Ways and Means Committee.

Madam Speaker, it is now my pleasure to yield 2 minutes to the ranking member of the Rules Committee, who has long been an expert on trade as well as tax issues that affect this body and the country, the gentleman from California, David Dreier.

(Mr. DREIER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

I yield the gentleman 1 additional minute.

Madam Speaker, today is solution day. There have been times where I have come to the floor and indicated I was sad over the circumstances we were in. Today I am not sad. We are moving the result of legislation I have introduced since probably 2005, a 1-year patch that protects anyone else from getting trapped in the middle class of AMT and make sure that we do this patch.

I don't believe, and most of the Members on my side of the aisle don't believe you need to raise taxes in order to pay for a tax cut on middle class Americans here.

But I am bringing concern, not sadness, but concern, because Chairman Rangel and Chairman Neal have moved this legislation to the floor and that we, I hope, will pass this legislation, as we have in the past, with very strong bipartisan measure. But I don't take lightly a message from the leader of the other body on the closing days of this session that we make sure that we don't fall through the cracks, our

version versus the Senate--the other body--version that could cause this to fall through the cracks and 25 million middle class Americans are trapped.

So while we are looking to move this in the spirit of strong bipartisan support, it's indicative that the leadership of this body make sure that they full well know how we can get the mechanics with the other body to make this law as the President gets it to his desk.

So the caution is we are not quite there yet because we have taken action today. While I like the version of the bill, we have taken our legislative prerogative and advanced it to have just this free-standing AMT bill.

I support however we get the law signed, but I bring the caution that leadership in this House will have to work very closely with the Senate leadership of the other body to match a solution that's law so we don't put our 25 million Americans in the same harm's way of inaction that we have seen in other years past.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, if I might inquire to the chairman if he has any other speakers, I am prepared to close.

Madam Speaker, it's interesting in the debate, and many of us who spoke today and so many others that have come forward in years past have presented the history or the finger pointing or the direction of how we got to where we are.

The important thing is that we know that we must produce a result, even if it's a 1-year patch. It has been admirable, as Chairman Rangel took over Ways and Means, a goal he had was to rid the AMT tax from the books. We need to work in a bipartisan fashion, I suspect, to reach that permanent goal.

But as we banter some on PAYGO or pay not, or whether they are in or they are not, it reminds me to think as a Member who will not be going home to campaign, maybe I should spend a little time to see how many times we have waived PAYGO on this bill after we beat up the fact that we should do it, it's the right thing, it must happen. And then at the end of the day, we take the Republican version of not raising taxes. Quite frankly, I don't think we are borrowing money for the bill, we are just not raising taxes in order to prevent a tax increase, particularly one to the middle class which both parties so dearly want to preserve.

So as we look to the reality of this year, I remind my colleagues, we have caution to get this bill matched with the other body so that we make law in order to send it to the President's desk to protect our middle class taxpayers.

Last year 352 bipartisan Members of the House voted for the AMT extension that was not offset by devastating tax increases, just like this bill coming before us today.

I urge my colleagues to do the same today by supporting this bill so it may be included in a comprehensive tax extenders package equal to the Senate version, or that the other body relinquishes their very clear, strong warning from their leader. Ignoring the other body's warning will not get this across the finish line. So I urge adoption of the resolution, and I thank Chairman Rangel and Chairman Neal for their efforts and work to get this before us today as we are in the final days of this legislative session.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. President, let me begin by thanking the distinguished majority leader and my colleagues. This has been a long ordeal. I know many of the conversations I have had over the last several days have been wondering when, if ever, we might come to a conclusion of what has been a lengthy process over the last 2 weeks

now since this matter emerged. Prior to the Thanksgiving recess, the majority leader and others invited the automobile industry to present plans by December 2 to the Congress on how they might restructure their industry in a way that would allow us to step forward and try to preserve them and allow them to exist for a few more weeks while a broader plan could be devised that would allow them to possibly survive.

As my colleagues may know, over the last several weeks we have had a number of hearings on the matter. The Presiding Officer at this point is a member of my committee, along with others who have been very diligent in sitting through long hearings, on an average of 5 or 6 hours apiece, to listen to all of the various ideas.

As the Republican leader pointed out, it is a very complex subject matter to be asking this institution, in a matter of days, to try to understand with all of the ramifications of it. Given the precarious nature of it, I think we all appreciate at this juncture that we are looking at least one, maybe two, of the three automobile manufacturers that have existed for almost a century in our country--at a time of great economic peril, when the confidence and optimism in our country is at risk--we run the risk over these days of watching this industry disappear. The blow to the American conscience and confidence and capability is beyond economic terms, if that occurs.

I pray this evening that will not happen. No one can say with absolute certainty it will. But we have been warned. We have been cautioned by those whose jobs it is to analyze this industry who have told us that could happen.

Tonight we will go home for the holiday recesses, but for the literally hundreds of thousands of people whose jobs depend upon this industry, this will not be a joyous season, wondering whether their jobs, their livelihoods, their homes, their children's futures are at risk because we were incapable of coming up with an answer to provide a period of time here to allow intelligent, solid, good, hard-working people to put together a plan to save the American automobile industry. It is disheartening to me, to put it mildly, that we were unable to come to that agreement.

Let me say very candidly, Bob Corker is someone I have come to appreciate immensely. He is a member of my committee. We have worked very well together over this last year on many complicated issues, and I appreciate immensely his effort, as he did again this evening, to try to come to a conclusion where we could at least agree on something to move forward.

There were three major issues my friend from Tennessee brought to me. I will not go into great detail in this limited time. I will wait until tomorrow, if time permits, to go into a longer discussion. Of the three issues, we agreed on two almost immediately. On the third, involving the parity with compensation of the domestic automobile industry and those of the foreign competitors doing business here, we could not come to closure. The issue simply came down to this. There was no debate, by the way, from the United Auto Workers or anyone else that we ought to achieve parity in those wages or benefits. The question was the timing of it.

We are in a deep recession. People are being laid off. The Bank of America announced today 35,000 people will be laid off. Industry after industry is dropping its employees. The idea that you are going to have new hires replace the active employees in a time such as this is difficult, to put it mildly. So the notion somehow that within days or weeks after March 31 of this year that this would mandate--mandate parity between those wages of domestic companies and foreign companies was the stumbling block.

The President of the United States, the other body, Democrats and Republicans as well as the autoworkers, the heads of these companies, came together and for 8 days we negotiated an agreement. It was painful. It is not perfect by a long shot. But it allowed us to get to next year to begin to work on this in a way that might make it possible for this industry to survive.

Tonight, regretfully, despite the efforts of the White House, people here, people in the other body obviously, workers as well as managers, we have stumbled this evening, unable to make this closure on this issue to allow us to go forward.

I am deeply saddened, but more than saddened I am worried this evening of what we are doing with an iconic industry. None of us here was going to write a check without conditionality. This bill I have drafted along with others is some 36 pages long and filled with conditions, establishing a czar--chosen by this President of the United States, not the coming one--to oversee this and say you must meet these obligations if you are going to survive. His determination will determine whether the industry can go forward. If the czar were to say you have not complied, bankruptcy would entail, chapter 11 and, candidly, chapter 7. It would be nothing more than a liquidation of this industry.

But we ought to try to avoid that. I thought most of us felt that was a bad outcome. I know my friend from Tennessee believes that, as I do. The outcome of that will cost the American taxpayers billions of dollars, by the way, and that is very well where we may end up this evening. I regret it deeply. I am saddened by it, worried about it, that in the midst of deep and troubling times we are now going to add to that substantially by walking away from an issue of whether we could agree that parity between these wages and benefits could be achieved without slamming it down in such a way as to make it difficult for us to achieve the result.

Out of the three issues, we agreed on two and three-quarters but were unable to come to closure on this one which, frankly, in my view, was not an economic issue but a political one, because we are not demanding this of dealers, of suppliers, of anyone else. The only group we have asked this of is the workforce. No one else in this bill is required on a date certain to meet any other obligations, only this one. Yet we fully understand economically how hard that could be, to demand that kind of accountability and not trust a czar or a leader working with the industry and others to reach that agreement.

To the majority leader I say thank you, and to your staff, the Banking Committee staff, my friend Bob Corker, the Members of the House, Republicans and Democrats, to the White House, which has been tremendously helpful in these last few days on trying to put this together without all of us agreeing. Yet, despite all of that, this evening we will not get cloture. This will fail. We will go home. I am afraid our country is going to be in deeper trouble because of this issue. I regret that deeply.

I thank the majority leader.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, to all those within the sound of my voice, we have tried very hard to arrive at a point where we can legislate for the automobile industry. People have worked very hard. I believe everyone is working in good faith. I am terribly disappointed that we are not able to arrive at a conclusion, but I want to say in the most emphatic manner how much I appreciate Senator Chris Dodd. He has worked going into months now.

We had the housing crisis, we had the bailout of the financial industry, and now the automobile industry. This man has worked day and night for months. Chris Dodd is one of America's great legislators. He has been here a long time. He is a veteran of the House and the Senate, and so I admire his patience and perseverance.

His counterpart, Senator Shelby, and I served together in the House, and he hasn't been heavily involved in these negotiations, but I like Richard Shelby very much. One thing about Senator Shelby, you never have to guess where he stands on an issue.

In the last several days--and maybe I will be criticized by some on my side, but I doubt that--I have been extremely impressed with Bob Corker of Tennessee. Now, we weren't able, based on his good work, to arrive at something on which we could get enough Republicans to agree, but he did some wonderful work, and I think the work he did is going to pay dividends next year because even though this is a real loss--my personal feeling--for the country, that we are not going to be able to do something, I think the manner in which we have proceeded, led by Senator Corker on the Republican side, has been extremely good. I repeat, I think it is going to work well next year.

We have a lot of work to do. We have issues like this we will be dealing with next year, and I think we have come to a point in the legislative process in the Senate that we have to start working together and not have one side say yes and one side say no. So I hope my friends on the other side of the aisle also recognize what Senator Corker has tried to do.

I certainly have no problem with others who disagreed with the approach we have taken, with the White House. This is not our proposal. We have worked with President Bush. President Bush is President of the United States--and everyone knows, you can read my book as to how I felt about the White House and what has happened--the White House has been extremely available. Josh Bolten and others in the White House have worked very hard with us to come up with an agreement, and we did, working with the House Banking Committee, the Senate Banking Committee, as I have indicated, led by Senator Dodd. But we have not been able to get this over the finish line.

So although we have worked and worked--and we could spend all night tonight, tomorrow, Saturday, and Sunday--we are not going to get to the finish line. That is just the way it is. There is too much difference between the two sides. All of us on this side of the aisle are in favor of the proposal that has been negotiated with the White House and the two banking committees, but we are not going to be able to vote on that more than likely.

The procedure now that we have in the Senate is that 1 hour after we come in tomorrow morning, we can vote on cloture. And what are we voting on? It is a bill that we took from the calendar to be an instrument--it is a tax instrument because a lot of what we are doing with this banking matter involves the Finance Committee--and we would take that and move to proceed on that--cloture on that--and then as soon as we got cloture on that, we would amend it with our proposal.

As I have indicated, we know we don't have 60 votes. There is no need to play around with that and cause undo hardship. So I have spoken to my friend, the distinguished Republican leader, and what we propose is that at about 10:30 or so tonight we will vote on cloture, just to show everybody where we are. Everybody should understand when this vote is over tonight--and I don't think we are going to get 60 votes--it is over with.

Mr. President, I dread looking at Wall Street tomorrow. It is not going to be a pleasant sight. Millions of Americans, not only the auto workers but people who sell cars, car dealerships, and people who work on cars, are going to be directly impacted and affected.

As I mentioned earlier today, Christmas is approaching. This will be a very bad Christmas for a lot of people as a result of what takes place tonight.

I want my colleagues to know that I have expressed my opinion as to what I think should happen. There are many people who have been involved in this on the other side of the aisle who in good faith disagree with what I said, and I accept that and appreciate that. But I think the time for talking is over. We should vote and move on to something else.

I am happy to yield to my distinguished colleague, Senator McConnell.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the cloture vote on the motion to proceed to H.R. 7005 occur at 10:40. I ask consent that Senator Dodd, who has spent so much time on this, be given 10 minutes.

If there is anyone who wishes to respond to that, they would have 10 minutes to do so.

So we don't lose any time, let's move to Senator Dodd, and when you come back we will move forward.

Thanks for everyone's patience.

Senator Dodd.

I ask unanimous consent the cloture vote vote on the motion to proceed to H.R. 7005 occur--Senator Stabenow wants the last 5 minutes before the vote.

Senator Shelby, 5 minutes?

Mr. President, Senator Corker will be recognized for 5 minutes, Senator Shelby for 3 minutes. I said a lot of nice things about you so that is about the right length of time for the speech. The final 5 minutes will be Senator Stabenow. Then we will vote on H.R. 7005 as soon as their speeches are finished.

Mr. President, first let me say that this is not a bailout this evening, this is a bridge loan of $14 billion to stop us potentially, if one of the companies goes under, from over $150 billion in taxpayer funds that we will be spending, including assuming the taxpayers' cost for 775,000 pensions in a bankruptcy that will go into the pension guarantee fund. So we are talking about a small bridge loan in a global credit crisis where every other country in the world has stepped up to help their auto industry because they understand it is critical to their national defense, they understand it is critical to their economy, and they are trying to create the middle class we have had in America. In America, if this goes down tonight, we are saying we do not care about the backbone of the economy which has been and will continue to be manufacturing. Somebody has to make something in this country. We cannot all push paper on Wall Street. Somebody has to make something.

The reality is, this is a tough bill. I wish to thank our leaders, Senator Reid for his patience and diligence and leadership, and Senator Dodd for his incredible patience, his staff being involved. It placed one more crisis on the doorstep of Senator Dodd to have to deal with. I appreciate Senator Corker stepping up to try to work this out and certainly Senator Voinovich and Senator Bond. Senator Levin and I have worked closely with them. But the reality is this: If we walk away this evening and do not vote to proceed with this bill, we are saying it is okay for a major auto company in America to go bankrupt, for 2.5 million people in this economy to lose their jobs. Over what? We have a tough bill that creates a restructuring mechanism where everybody comes to the table to restructure. We give them until March 31. If they are not moving in good faith, the $14 billion can be rescinded. If they do not have a viable plan by March 31, there is no more assistance.

Unfortunately, what my Republican colleagues have said is that the only way we are going to do this, the only way we are going to do this, is the workers have to negotiate first with the Republican Party, with the Republicans. As long as the workers were willing to take all of the cuts the Republican Party thinks they should before the negotiation, they would be willing to step up and save the backbone of manufacturing in this country and 2.5 million jobs.

We have tried everything. We have negotiated with the White House in good faith. I appreciate that. They have kept their deal. We have negotiated with every party that wanted to come forward, including today, all day, focusing with Senator Corker. But the reality is, we are in a position where evidently the only thing that matters to the majority of those on the other side of the aisle is that workers get paid too much in this country--somehow, workers get paid too much in this country--and unless we sock it to the workers, they are not willing to allow a $14 billion bridge loan to be able to save an industry and save an--

Mr. President, there are those who think they can play games with this and there are no consequences. This is not, tonight, about Democrats and Republicans. It is not about auto executives versus workers. This is about the economy of this country. We are in serious trouble, ladies and gentlemen. If one of our auto companies goes down, we are going to pick up the paper and begin to see the suppliers of this country go down. And they supply not only the folks in my State, they supply Toyota, Nissan, and Honda. They supply the Army. The same folks who make the axles for the trucks that our brave men and women are driving in Iraq and Afghanistan today make the axles put on our trucks and our cars.

The reality is, our national defense and our economy and the middle class of this country are hanging in the balance by this vote. Shame on us if we walk away cavalierly thinking that we can do this another time. Now is the time. People are watching, not just in Michigan but all across the country, businesses large and small, families in their homes, retirees who have done nothing but work hard their whole lives and now want to know their pensions or their health care, as part of something they worked for all of their lives, is protected. This is about whether we are going to make a commitment to the middle class and a commitment to American manufacturing. You cannot walk away from the American auto industry and not affect every part of manufacturing in this country.

It is not too late. I know we assume the votes are not there, but the votes can be there. There are enough votes in this room. There are enough votes in this room to give them the chance, just the chance to restructure. And if folks do not believe in the end that what they have come up with, 3 months from now, is good enough, then that is it. But don't 2.5 million people and the major auto presence and manufacturing in this country deserve 3 months, 3 months of time to be able to restructure, for advanced manufacturing in the future? If we do not do that, we are going to change our dependence on foreign oil for a dependence on foreign automobiles. We will be asking other countries to send us their tanks, send us their automobiles, send us their trucks for our defense. That

makes no sense. People of good will know better.

I would ask my colleagues to join with us in voting for the future and the economy of this country.