Combat Illegal Logging Act of 2007

Mr. President, I know it is my turn to speak, but out of deference to Senator Baucus who is negotiating on the Children's Health Insurance Program, I ask unanimous consent that he go before me, and then I ask that Senator Tester would follow him, because I don't want Senator Tester to have to sit around and listen to me. Then I ask unanimous consent after those two, I be the next in line.

Mr. President, I rise to speak to the amendment that is before the Senate--the Dorgan-Grassley amendment--on payment limitations; in other words, limiting the amount of money that one farming operation can get from a farm program in a specific year.

The second reason I come to the floor is to address the issue of the President's suggested veto of the farm bill because it contains tax provisions that, presumably, the White House does not like.

I would like to give a justification for the provisions that are in this bill. I think everybody in this body would agree we need to provide an adequate safety net for our family farmers. In recent years, however, assistance to farmers has come under increased scrutiny. The largest corporate farms are reaping the majority of the benefits of the farm payment program. These payments were originally designed to benefit our small- and medium-sized farmers but instead have contributed to the demise of the small- and medium-sized family farmers. I believe we need to correct our course and modify the farm programs before those programs cause further concentration and consolidation in agriculture.

Today, most commodities are valued off demand, and the market dictates profitability. When farmers overproduce by planning for the farm program or expand rapidly because of the security of those programs, then the markets are not functioning. Unlimited farm payments have placed upward pressure on land prices and have contributed to overproduction and lower commodity prices.

I am going to refer to a series of charts that I have. Increased land prices and cash rents are driving family farmers and making it difficult, particularly for young farmers, to get into family farming-- something that is probably there because for generations families have been farming sometimes the same land.

For instance, in Iowa, you can see how the value of farmland has very dramatically increased, particularly very recently. Around my hometown of New Hartford, IA, land is selling somewhere between the poor land at $4,000 an acre and the very best land for $6,000 an acre. In my home county of Butler, the value of an acre is up 64 percent since 2000. Across the entire State of Iowa, the average land value per acre rose 72 percent just in the last 6 years.

You will see from the next chart that the average typical cash rent per acre in Iowa rose 25 percent in that same timeframe. So you can legitimately ask, how are family farmers, particularly young farmers who cannot buy land and who have to rent land, going to survive when they have had such a rapid increase in either the price of land, on the one hand, or cash rents on the other hand? How are they even going to be able to get into farming for the very first start?

I have been hearing directly from producers for years what former Secretary Johanns heard in the series of farm meetings. I think either the Secretary, or his staff, had well over 100 hearings on proposed farm legislation prior to--well, during the years 2005 and 2006. So I have heard what Secretary Johanns has heard in his farm bill forums: Young farmers cannot carry on the tradition of farming because they are financially unable to do so because of high land values and cash rents.

What does all this have to do with farm programs? I am going to quote a famous and well-known Midwestern agricultural economist, Dr. Neil Harl, now emeritus. He came out with a report on this subject. He is and was at Iowa State University. The report states:

The evidence is convincing that a significant portion of

the subsidies are being bid into cash rents and capitalized

into land values. If investors were to expect less Federal

funding--or none at all--land values would likely decline,

perhaps by as much as 25 percent.

So here we have an article from last year's Washington Post, when the Post did a series of articles on the disparity that farm program supports are causing. They reported:

The largest farms' share of agricultural production has

climbed from 32 percent to 45 percent, while the number of

small and medium-sized farms has tumbled from 42 percent to

27 percent.

I assume the printing on the chart is so small that you will have to take my word for it that is what it says. The law creates a system that is clearly out of balance.

If we look at the results posted here, we have a system where 10 percent of the biggest farmers get 73 percent of the benefits from the tax-supported farm programs. Worse yet--or more extraordinary, I should say--the top 1 percent get almost 30 percent of all of those payments. I tend to concentrate on the top 10 percent of the biggest farmers getting 73 percent. But I think this other top 1 percent of--how do you say it--the big farmers, the top 1 percent are getting 30 percent of all of the benefits out of the Treasury. So we are back where we were 5 years ago.

This body passed as part of the farm bill, by a vote of 66 to 31, putting limits on farm payments. Well, it didn't survive a House-Senate conference. Senator Dorgan and I were working together then, and here we are back 5 years later. The farm bill is up for reauthorization, and we are filing an amendment that, I believe, will help revitalize the farm economy for young people across this country.

This amendment that Senator Dorgan put before the Senate this morning--actually, Senator Reid did it for Senator Dorgan--will put a hard cap on farm payments at $250,000. No less important, it will close the loophole that has allowed large operations to avoid even the existing $360,000 limit and, as a result, receive benefits far exceeding the limit.

If I could say that another way, we have a situation where we do have caps in place, but there is legal subterfuge to get around those caps. One of them is the three-entity rule--split up your farming operation into three entities, and each one of those could qualify for that $360,000 limit.

The other one is where generic certificates are used. Those are not included in the limit. So that is why you read where some farmers are getting millions of dollars through the farm program.

We use the adjective, hard cap; $250,000 is the absolute limit. We do away with the legal subterfuge of getting around the cap to make it so it works and so it is effective.

I have another article by the Washington Post from last year outlining the ongoing abuse of farm support programs. It is entitled ``Farm Program Pays $1.3 Billion to People who Don't Farm.'' We are paying $1.3 billion to people who are not actively engaged in the business of farming. Senator Dorgan spoke better about this last night and this morning and gave better examples than I can on that point. We have examples of people who live on land collecting direct payments because a commodity was once grown on that land. Any agricultural use, including having a horse on that land, qualifies them for a direct payment, even though they are not even growing a crop.

Our bill addresses these problems by doing away with the loopholes people have abused over the years to continue to get the payments. I have already referred to the three-entity rule. We also put in place a system we call direct attribution. Most importantly, we tighten up what is already in the law but not enforced by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, that you have to be ``actively engaged'' in the business of farming.

I wish to make a very clear distinction. Some Members of the Senate have advocated that the Dorgan-Grassley amendment is not as tough as what is in the Senate Agriculture Committee bill before us. I wish to explain why that is not true.

I have another chart. We have to compare apples to apples. Saying the committee has a hard cap on payments at $200,000 is not accurate. They only have a hard cap on two categories of payments: direct payments and countercyclical payments. The Dorgan-Grassley amendment actually caps those at $100,000.

In addition, my amendment will cap marketing loan gains at $150,000, while the committee bill before us that the Dorgan-Grassley changes leaves the marketing loan unlimited in the amount of money you can get through the marketing loan.

This actually weakens current law, and if you can believe, after all the bad publicity about 10 percent of the biggest farmers getting 72 or 73 percent of the benefits out of the farm program, why, the Agriculture Committee might write a bill that actually weakens current law. But I wish to make clear our bill at $250,000 is a hard cap, and it is more effective in taking care of this issue of the biggest 10 percent getting 73 percent of the benefits.

I anticipate there will be other votes on other types of reforms, including even means testing, also known as the adjusted gross income limit. I wish to make sure my colleagues are aware

that an adjusted gross income cap and a hard cap on payments are two very different things and each should be looked at and considered individually.

Back in 2002--and I referred to this before, that Senator Dorgan and I have been working together--back in 2002, I voted against the farm bill out of conference committee. A lack of payment limits in that bill because it was lost in conference, the Senate position was lost to the House position, was one of my reasons for voting against the bill.

I have been fighting to reduce large-scale subsidies since I was a Member of the House of Representatives in the 1970s. Then we were, believe it or not, arguing over a $50,000 limitation.

Our amendment produces some considerable savings. Senator Dorgan and I have identified very critical and essential programs to help producers and farmers, small business owners, conservationists, and low-income people, including seniors and children. We support beginning farmer and rancher programs and the Rural Microenterprise Program. These programs are crucial to bolstering young farmers and to helping main streets across America.

It will also provide funds for the organic cost-share program and the farmers Market Promotion Program. These growing components of our food supply system will create new opportunities for farmers and increase healthy food options for our consumers.

A large priority of mine has always been seeing justice for Black farmers--discrimination cases brought against the USDA, but not everybody eligible got in on it. This amendment puts some money, double the amount provided by the committee, in for late filers under the Pigford consent decree for farmers who haven't gotten a chance for their claims to be heard. It is time to make it right for these farmers who were discriminated against in their attempts to get help from the Federal Government in farming.

We also support the Grasslands Reserve Program and the Farmland Protection Program with additional dollars. Conserving our natural resources is one of the most important components of agriculture, and this investment will make a substantial difference in the availability of these programs.

Finally, while the Agriculture Committee makes significant contributions to the nutrition and food assistance programs, they were not able to go far enough due to tight budget constraints. So Dorgan- Grassley adds money to this program so it can be adjusted for inflation and other nutrition priorities to assist low-income seniors, as well as children.

I worked with Senator Dorgan on a similar measure, as I have said for the third time, in 2002, and it passed with bipartisan support by a vote of 66 to 31. Unfortunately, it was stripped out of conference. My colleagues might remember the last time we had a vote on payment limits was on the budget resolution. Many of my colleagues said they agreed with what we were trying to do, but they voted against us at that particular time because they said doing it on the budget resolution in the middle of a farm bill authorization of 5 years was not the right time. Everybody said it needed to be done the next time the farm bill came up for debate.

Well, that time is right now, and I ask those who maybe thought it shouldn't be done on the budget resolution a couple years ago to remember what they said. They came up to us individually and said: We agree with what you are trying to do, but it shouldn't be in the middle of the farm bill reauthorization, and it shouldn't be done on the budget resolution. The inference was they will be with us at the right time. The time is right now, or within the next 24 hours, when we vote on this amendment.

I remind this body that in addition to what was said by our colleagues at that particular time, in the last farm bill, we set up, as supposedly a sop for those of us who didn't get what we wanted in payment limitations out of conference 5 years ago, a commission on the application of payment limitations for agriculture.

This commission was set up, and for a couple years they studied this issue. The purpose was to conduct a study on the potential need for further payment limitations on farm programs. The commission met. Farmers, agricultural economists--I can't think of everybody who was on it, but they knew the business of agriculture. This commission recommended the very same loophole-closing measures which we included in this amendment that is now before the Senate. Those people who thought they threw us a sop or some sort of a compromise that we ought to accept a commission instead of the real hard change in law to accomplish what we wanted to accomplish, that we would have people study it and then give some respectability to it, or maybe they thought we would forget about it and go away 5 years later, we haven't forgotten about it; we haven't gone away.

We are taking the recommendations of this commission that was set up to say what we ought to do in the area of payment limitations, and we are doing exactly what they said. We not only have the promise of those people who said it shouldn't be done on the budget resolution, we have the recommendations of all these experts of how it ought to be done, when it ought to be done, and why it ought to be done. It is for all those reasons that we have Dorgan and Grassley back again suggesting what we thought should have been done 5 years ago. If it had been done 5 years ago, we wouldn't have this problem of 10 percent of the biggest farmers getting 73 percent of the benefits out of the farm program.

There are several problems connected with that situation. One, when urban people read about this, they are going to say: Why do you need a farm safety net if all the help is going to biggest farmers? So we lose urban support. We lose support of a farm program in the House of Representatives controlled by urban people, and we don't have a farm safety net, and family farmers don't have the ability to withstand a lot of situations that are beyond their control. We also have a situation where we drive up the price of farmland so the next generation of farmers cannot get started. But also, we depart from the principle of a farm safety net of the last 70 years that was supposed to be directed to medium- and small-sized farmers, the very same people who produce the food we eat in a way so consumers spend less of their income on food than any other society anywhere on this globe, and to keep them strong when they cannot withstand natural disasters or the politics of agriculture or a war or energy problems. They don't have the staying power, but the larger farmers do.

For 70 years, we have directed the benefit of a farm program, until very recently, to small- and medium-sized farmers. How it gets out of whack so we get 10 percent of the biggest farmers getting 73 percent of the benefits of the program is hard to explain. But it has happened, and we are trying to get back to the original purpose of farm programs to help small- and medium-sized farmers over the hurdles they have to cross, through no fault of their own, situations they cannot control, that larger farmers have the ability to have a little more staying power.

So here we are. By voting in favor of the Dorgan-Grassley amendment, we can allow young people to get into farming and lessen dependence on Federal subsidies. This will help restore public respectability for Federal farm assistance by targeting this assistance to those who need it the most.

So let us quit dragging our feet and let us pass real reform with a real payment for real farmers. I call upon my colleagues to support this commonsense legislation that is referred to as Dorgan-Grassley.

I told you, Mr. President, in my opening remarks that I wished to address a second issue as well, directly related to the farm bill, but including some issues that are a little bit broader than the farm bill, and that deals with the tax policy.

Remember, a very significant part of this farm bill is tax policy that we in the Finance Committee--Senator Baucus, me, and the other 19 members of the committee--set up that are directly related to soil conservation and drought relief, and we raise revenue to pay for it. In the process of this broad policy, we have freed up money the Agriculture Committee would otherwise spend on a lot of programs, such as disaster relief and conservation, so the Agriculture Committee would have a little more leeway to do what needs to be done in farm policy, and that is directly related to the fact that under the budget adopted by this Congress,

we find the Agriculture Committee $15 billion under benchmark, and that is a big bite to swallow with the needs in American agriculture. So we have come up with, in the Finance Committee, a little bit of help for the Agriculture Committee.

As recently as yesterday, the President, or his people, have suggested because of the tax policy that is in this bill, they might veto the whole farm bill. I want to tell the President why that is a crazy idea--a crazy idea--so I will take the time to comment, then, on the revenue raisers that are in this farm bill.

The revenue raiser is a proposal to clarify a judicial doctrine in the tax law known as the economic substance doctrine. I am here not so much to justify revenue raising through this definition of economic substance, but I am here to say there are four circuit courts of appeal in different parts of the country that have had four different decisions on economic substance and each has said Congress ought to define economic substance. So as far as I am concerned, in putting economic substance in here, it is not just to raise revenue and to have an offset for the programs we have set up, it is for Congress to do the job of making the Tax Code on economic substance clear so the courts are not defining it, and most importantly so that four different courts aren't defining it in four different ways. We need to have some certainty, and this bill brings that certainty to the definition of economic substance.

But before I get into that, I have to be a little more general. For a lot of folks, this proposal may sound like an esoteric tax policy matter, and they might wonder why I am focusing on it today. The reason is the White House has indicated the President will veto the farm bill if this proposal is included in the bill sent to the President's desk.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the Washington Post article reporting on the President's suggested veto of the bill.

The title of that article is: ``Bush Vowed to Veto Senate's Farm Bill.''

Before I discuss the specifics of the economic substance doctrine, I wish to put this revenue raiser in context. We have heard a lot about pay-go. That is short for pay as you go. If you want to spend money, either raise taxes to offset it or cut someplace else to offset it. Or if you want to cut taxes, raise taxes someplace else to pay for it or cut spending someplace else to pay for the tax decrease. But around here we use the term pay-go for short.

Now, of course, pay-go was in place for many years before the current policy was put into place after a few years of absence. The difference is the old version of pay-go applied it as a backstop to a budget resolution. So if a proposal spent more than the budget permitted and added to the deficit, a pay-go point of order was possible. Likewise, if a proposal to cut taxes more than the amount of the revenue the budget assumed would come in, pay-go would apply.

This year Congress is struggling because a rigid notion of pay-go has hamstrung the committees--meaning every committee of the Congress that processes revenue or spending policies. The rubber has hit the road with pay-go here, more so at the end of the session than throughout the rest of 2007, and it has been a somewhat bumpy road for all of us. Of course, I think this road is even going to get bumpier as time goes on between now and Christmas.

As everyone knows, Congress has a lot of unfinished business. I am going to focus on the unfinished tax business. I have a chart here I want to point to. It is a chart I have used before. This chart shows the unfinished tax business that has got to come before the Congress between now and Christmas. It accounts for all the bills we passed out of the Finance Committee. It also accounts for the expiring provisions that are known as tax extenders. The biggest item of the revenue loss chart is the alternative minimum tax and the fix for that alternative minimum tax so 19 million additional middle-income taxpayers and their families are not paying the AMT. You see all of those various aspects listed there separately--the 2007 AMT fix, 2008 AMT fix, 2008 extenders, the Energy bill that has already passed the Senate, the airport reauthorization bill, and then eventually we will spend some time on the farm bill. But you can see they add up to a heck of a lot of money.

Since we are in the 2008 fiscal year, I have included then extenders for 2008 and also carrying a fix for AMT for not only 2007 but 2008.

This chart accounts for the revenue loss from the farm bill package that is there at $13 billion. My chart shows the revenue loss side as demands on the water well there. It is at the top of the well in the bucket what the shortfall is there. There are a lot of thirsty bills that have to be paid for. Those thirsty bills carry a revenue loss of $170 billion over 5 years.

I have accounted for the revenue offsets. This figure includes all revenue raisers proposed by Senate Democrats that are specified and scored by the nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation. That figure includes $32 billion from the Finance Committee-approved proposals and $29 billion in other proposals. That total is $61 billion. That is what we know for sure that has been thought up and probably has a great deal of support to accomplish.

This offset figure is calculated from the vantage point of the Senate Democratic leadership. In this total are proposals that House Democrats have opposed, such as shutting off the foreign subway leasing tax shelter, known as SILOS. In this total are proposals that most Senate Republicans have opposed, such as the reimposition of the Superfund taxes. In this total are many proposals that even the Bush administration has come out against.

Now with this favorable assumption to them, the pay-go advocates in the Senate need to know that as we stand here today, there is not enough known revenue to meet the pay-go requirements that are on this chart that obviously have to be dealt with between now and Christmas. In other words, the demands on the revenue well are $170 billion, and the available revenue raisers are only $61 billion. So that is a shortfall that is clear there, in the middle of the well--a shortfall of $109 billion. In other words, the revenue well is dry.

Now, $109 billion is a lot of money even here in Washington, DC. If the proposals are scored over 10 years, that shortfall does narrow slightly, from $109 billion down to $76 billion, and it is

possible that some of the revenue raisers in Chairman Rangel's bill may be pursued by the Senate Democratic leadership. But as it stands now, for unfinished tax business alone, by this accounting, we cannot meet the requirements that the Senate must meet that we call pay-go.

I point this out because everybody has to see this big picture. They seem to be missing the big picture on how we wrap up our overdue legislative business and meet the demands of the new pay-go rules. On the farm bill alone, my chart treats the farm bill as fully offset. My chart is created from the perspective of the Senate Democratic leadership, and so it shows the farm bill as offset. That is the way it is as it came out of the Senate Finance Committee.

The problem is that President Bush's opposition to the key revenue raiser is not accounted for in this chart. President Bush's position does matter. His opposition to any revenue raiser, but specifically this one, would have to be overcome with a veto override. As my friends and the Democratic leadership know, that happens to be a very tough hurdle, as we have found out, for instance, on the Children's Health Insurance Program recently before the House of Representatives.

My point is it is time to get practical around here. This chart of the water well shows that as we sit here today, looking at it from a Senate Democratic leadership perspective, the revenue well is dry. To insist on pay-go without a sense of realistically available offsets is trying to go up a blind alley. I say to my Democratic friends: At this late point in the legislative session, let us focus on what is practical. Let us apply the offsets we can agree to and in a manner we can agree on. We need to get to a posture of what can be agreed to by the House, by Senate Republicans, and by the White House. The AMT fix is the 800-pound gorilla in this discussion. It is $55 billion of the $109 billion shortfall. It affects 23 million families and could affect adversely another 27 million families. The AMT fix is long overdue. It needs to be completed expeditiously.

To address this important matter solely from a pay-go perspective is to ignore the realities that it needs to get done. Republicans are ready, Republicans are willing, and Republicans are able to help get this AMT fix done, and done very shortly, but for many reasons I have discussed all year, not at the price of offsets.

I will now go into the reasons why clarification of the economic substance doctrine is an appropriate revenue raiser and why it is basic to this farm bill before us, because it is a part of the farm bill; and why the President is crazy to use that as an excuse for vetoing the farm bill.

The provision made the Finance Committee package revenue neutral, raising $10 billion over 10 years. But I support codification of economic substance not just to raise revenue--although it does that, and it is important that it do that because otherwise we would not have our provisions offset, according to pay-go. As ranking member of the Finance Committee, and even when I was chairman in the last two Congresses, I have supported codification of economic substance because it is the right policy. This provision is an improved version of a provision that passed the Finance Committee and the full Senate in the last two Congresses.

The prior version was included in two bills passed by the full Senate in the 109th Congress, twice in the tax reconciliation bill, once in 2005 by a vote of 64 to 33, and again in 2006 by a vote of 66 to 31. It also passed the full Senate two times in the 108th Congress, once in the 2003 tax bill by a vote of 51 to 49 and again in the 2004 JOBS bill by a vote of 92 to 5.

This Senate is acquainted with the need to codify economic substance for us to do our job of making the Tax Code understandable so you do not get four different circuit courts of appeal giving four different definitions to economic substance. We ought to have one national policy on what is economic substance. Codifying it will clarify the test. It is a conjunctiva test requiring both a meaningful change in economic position and a business purpose, independent of Federal taxes. The courts are split on whether a transaction must have both economic substance as well as business purpose. This will give courts, then, a uniform doctrine to apply to noneconomic transactions that are inappropriately motivated solely to avoid Federal taxes--in other words, closing loopholes.

It will also ensure that a court will not overturn the doctrine, as a trial judge did in what is called the Coltec case, saying:

The use of the economic substance doctrine to trump the

mere compliance with the Code would violate the separation of

powers.

That judge--I don't have to say that judge was crazy because the court of appeals reversed that judge's decision. But I am still concerned that another strict constructionist judge might reach a similar conclusion. Most important, codifying the economic substance doctrine will provide an additional deterrent against taxpayers entering into transactions solely for tax purposes, in ways that are inconsistent with congressional intent.

As I said earlier, this provision is an improved version of what has already passed the Finance Committee and the full Senate more than once. So this Senate agrees with economic substance. But maybe Senators have forgotten how they voted 2 and 3 and maybe 5 years ago, so I am here to remind them this has been overwhelmingly accepted by the full Senate.

This improved version has modifications made in response to concerns of taxpayers that codification would throw legitimate tax planning into question and allow the IRS to substitute its business judgment for that of the taxpayers. I am going to talk about those modifications so people understand, and all these lawyers in this town who are concerned about our writing this, that they know we have taken some of their legitimate concerns into consideration.

For instance, the strict liability nature of the penalty has been retained in order to effectively deter taxpayers from entering into tax-motivated transactions in unintended ways. Indeed, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation, the bulk of the revenue score is attributable to this strict liability penalty--not because the IRS will collect the penalty but because people are going to start obeying the law and change their behavior. The penalty will alter taxpayer behavior. It will cause taxpayers to forego entering into noneconomic, tax-motivated transactions that Congress never intended.

We have heard complaints that a strict liability penalty will cause IRS field agents to overreach and courts to be reluctant to apply the doctrine. These are serious concerns, and we have addressed those concerns by requiring the IRS to nationally coordinate through the Chief Counsel's Office when the penalty is asserted and/or when it is compromised. This procedure is similar to a process currently used by the IRS to designate cases for litigation.

As a protective measure, taxpayers will be permitted to make their case to the IRS at the national level before a penalty is asserted. Of course, cases involving the economic substance doctrine should be going through Chief Counsel anyway, and taxpayers currently have the ability to persuade the IRS not to assert a penalty. But because of the strict liability nature of this penalty, it is important to formalize this process and move it to a higher level of review.

Getting the Chief Counsel's Office involved earlier in this controversy will help taxpayers and the IRS resolve or make litigation decisions regarding tax shelters earlier.

We have also lowered the penalty for undisclosed transactions from 40 percent to 30 percent to bring it in line with the penalty on undisclosed listed transactions.

The proposal to codify economic substance has been controversial, even though it has passed the Finance Committee and the full Senate in the last two Congresses. Taxpayers and practitioners expressed legitimate concerns about it. We have addressed those concerns--maybe not in the way everybody wants, but I think we have done it in a responsible way.

As a general matter, in my tenure as chairman of the Finance Committee before we went into the minority this year, I am proud to have kept taxes down. During my tenure, we enacted bipartisan tax relief bills that totaled over $2 trillion over 10 years. So for

critics who look at any change in the Tax Code, regardless of how legitimate it is, even regardless of not doing it for revenue-raising measures--they look at everything and say: You are changing the Tax Code; you are raising taxes--I am here to tell them on this issue of economic substance how ridiculous that is. So for the critics of this revenue raiser, I would refer them to my record of keeping taxes down.

By the way, for those on the liberal side of the political spectrum, I point out, as a percentage of GDP, the Federal Treasury is taking in a percentage that is above the post-World War II average.

Codifying the economic substance doctrine should be considered on its merits. It should not be dismissed because it scores as a revenue raiser. It should not be endorsed either because it scores as a revenue raiser. In my view, it should be enacted because it is the right tax policy. Folks need to take off the bean-counting green eyeshades and look at the tax policy.

The same goes for the long overdue AMT fix that I have talked about. It is not about maximizing Federal revenues. It is about fair taxation for 19 million middle-income families.

I am done, Mr. President, but I want to digress for one minute for the benefit of faceless bureaucrats down at the White House. I want to talk to those people who maybe were advising the President, and they put it in his veto message, that one of the reasons he was vetoing the Children's Health Insurance Program is because our bill allowed families earning up to $83,000 to have their children in a government program--when quite obviously most people making that kind of income can have health insurance. What I have said to those very same people who put that in the President's message is it was not in our bill; that States could do that. That has been in the law for 10 years. But nobody pointed that out to the President. Some stupid person said to the President: This bill allows people with $83,000 to get it. It didn't have anything to do with that. It was in the law for 10 years.

I want those faceless bureaucrats to read why we are doing economic substance. It is about time Congress does its job and the courts don't do the job we are supposed to do. Four circuit courts of appeal have defined and found fault with various aspects of economic substance. They said it is time for Congress to define it.

Yes, it is a revenue raiser, but it is not one of these changes in tax policy that is a change in rates of taxation that you can legitimately call tax increases. But somebody down there at the White House is telling the President this is a tax increase. What we are trying to do is do our job. This cannot be a reason for vetoing the farm bill.

If anybody down at the White House wants to discuss my rationale for this, come up and I will sit down and talk with them, or I will even go down there if they want to talk about it.

I yield the floor. I guess nobody else wants to speak, so I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. President, within the past few weeks a series of events has occurred that can help shed light on how tax relief enacted in the past 7 years has impacted the budget of the United States. On September 27, the Senate voted to increase the debt limit so the Treasury would be able to borrow enough to meet our Nation's obligations. At the time, I made a statement that this was necessary. The proper place to take a stand for fiscal responsibility is when we are considering bills that spend money and actually create our debt.

Unfortunately, some of my colleagues believe the only answer to our budget woes is to increase taxes. But I believe this point of view is misguided and would prove destructive to our budget in the long term. Especially over the past 7 years, discussion of an increase in debt limit has prompted excitable statements from my colleagues across the aisle on the current administration's fiscal record. I am sure I do not have to say these statements from across the aisle have not been positive.

Another event I want to mention is the release on October 5, 2007, of the Monthly Budget Review from the Congressional Budget Office. The Congressional Budget Office budget review forecasts that the deficit for fiscal year 2007 would be significantly smaller than the deficit for 2006, and then the Final Monthly Treasury Statement, published by the Treasury Financial Management Service, confirmed that. According to the U.S. Treasury, the Federal deficit for fiscal 2007 was $162.8 billion. The deficit for 2006, the year before, was considerably higher, at $248.2 billion. The deficit for 2007 then is around $85 billion less than it was last year.

The chart I am going to show you, taken from Treasury documents, shows how this decrease in the deficit has been driven by a 6.7-percent estimated increase in total receipts over fiscal year 2006.

If you are determined to show that tax relief has led to less revenue from the Federal Government, then this data is difficult to explain. Of course, the conventional criticism offered against tax relief was that it was going to be directly responsible for massive increases in the deficit. This argument implies that as a result of tax relief, the Federal Government would collect less money in taxes.

On May 23, 2003, the Senate voted to agree to a conference report to accompany the Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2003. The vote was close. The conference report was agreed to only because the Vice President cast the tie-breaking vote in favor of the report. Anyone who reviews the Congressional Record of that debate would see that the rollcall vote was preceded by a very contentious discussion. Many of my colleagues had very strong criticism of the bill which, among other things, reduced the rates for capital gains and dividends.

Tax policy generally is not seen as something that attracts a lot of excitement, but the floor debate of May 23, 2003, could have given a listener the impression the sky was falling.

This chart of Chicken Little reporting that the sky is falling illustrates the tone of some of the criticism made by my colleagues.

One Senator claimed:

The tax base of the Federal Government is being destroyed.

This same Senator referred to the bill as:

One of the most dangerous, destructive and dishonorable

acts of Government that I have ever seen.

Another one of my colleagues claimed that the bill:

Is about helping the elite few with large tax cuts while

burdening the majority of Americans with huge debt.

Here again, you see the implication that the 2003 tax relief was going to diminish revenues collected by the Federal Government.

A third colleague claimed:

This bill I call the policy of the three Ds. This is the

policy of debt, deficits and decline.

This comment is especially interesting when examining a statement made by this very same Senator on September 27 of this year during the discussion on increasing the statutory limit on the public debt. That same Senator said at that time that:

Revenue has been basically stagnant in this country for 6

years.

According to my colleagues in the Congressional Budget Office, revenues in 2000 were $2 trillion, just a hair over $2 trillion, while revenues in 2007 were calculated by the Treasury to be around $2.12 trillion, taking into consideration inflation.

First, I wish to point out that the word ``stagnant'' used by my colleague is a far cry from the debt, deficit, and decline that tax relief was supposed to inflict on this Nation. I am not saying we do not have a massive national debt fed by successive budget deficits, but the specific tax relief enacted in 2003 and again within the past 7 years is not the cause of that.

As my esteemed colleague pointed out, even accounting for inflation, the revenues of the Federal Government are projected to be greater in 2007 than they were in 2000. So this certainly shows that our tax base was not gutted by tax relief as was so profoundly asserted by my colleagues.

I also would like to say that I do not think that $90 billion is a trifling

amount of money. Maybe it is to some people in some places, but it is certainly not for us people, for the Iowa farmer.

To offer a different perspective, let's consider this year's appropriations bills. The Democratic leadership wants to spend $23 billion more than the President's budget on appropriations. That same group is preparing to force a showdown with the President over that $23 billion. That is one-fourth of the amount I am talking about here. So when it comes to spending, extra dollars do count, but extra revenue from lower levels of taxation is to be belittled no matter what the number might be. It just sounds so inconsistent.

My excitable colleagues here in the Senate are not the only ones who predicted gloom and doom that never came because of the tax relief in August of 2003. Even the Congressional Budget Office published a document titled ``The Budget and Economic Outlook: An Update.'' The bill reducing rates on capital gains and dividends had become law at the end of May, so the Congressional Budget Office was able to take tax relief into account as they conjured their budget projections. This chart right here illustrates the discrepancy between what was forecast by the Congressional Budget Office in the summer of 2003 and what actually transpired. You can see the red line actual figure is way above the blue line that was suggested by the Congressional Budget Office.

In August of 2003, the Congressional Budget Office projected that the Federal Government would collect about $1,770 billion in revenue. According to the historical budget data--also from the CBO--revenue in 2003 was actually about $1,783 billion. That difference is $13 billion. Now, $13 billion may be peanuts to some people, but I think it is a good start.

In August 2003, the Congressional Budget Office projected Federal revenues for 2003 to be $2,276 billion. Actually in 2003, Federal revenues were about $2,407 billion. The Federal Government collected, then, $131 billion more in 2006 than was originally forecast in the dark days of 2003, when several of my Democratic colleagues thought that tax relief was poised to destroy our tax base. Revenues actually collected were higher than projected when considered as a percentage of gross domestic product.

In August 2003, CBO projected that revenues in 2006 would be 18.2 percent of GDP. Actual revenues collected in 2006 were more than that-- at 18.4 percent compared to 18.2 percent of GDP. In 2005, they were 17.6 percent; in 2004, they were 16.3 percent; and in 2003, they were 16.5 percent. After a small downturn in 2004, Federal revenues, taken in proportion, increased faster than the GDP.

Speaking of its 2007 projection, in an October 2007 monthly budget revenue, CBO states:

Revenues rose to 18.8 percent of GDP, which is slightly

higher than the average of 18.2 percent over the past 40

years.

Even with lower taxes, the Federal Government is collecting, on average, a greater percentage of GDP in revenue year by year than it has over the past four decades.

Incidentally, in 2003, CBO projected that revenues would equal 18.3 percent of GDP in 2007.

Next, I want to compare the 4-year period after the 2003 tax relief plan went into effect with the 4-year period after the tax increases were enacted in the Clinton first year, 1993.

The Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1993, signed into law by the President in August of that year, increased taxes on corporations and individuals while increasing taxes on gasoline and raising the taxable portion of Social Security benefits.

I think this may be counterintuitive to some people, especially to those who believe that the well-being of our Nation is directly proportional to our ability to seize income from taxpayers, but as a percentage of GDP, Federal revenues increased faster after tax relief than they did after tax increases.

To set the stage, in 1993, Federal revenues were 17.5 percent of gross domestic product. In 2003, Federal revenues were a percent less at 16.5 percent of GDP.

By the way, all of these numbers are Congressional Budget Office numbers, and until I get to 2007, they are not projections.

If you look at this chart we are now putting up, you can see that as a percentage of GDP, Federal revenues increased faster in the 4 years after the 2003 tax relief than they did after the 1993 tax increase. Let me emphasize that. Revenues came in faster after we decreased taxes in 2003 than they did after 1993 when we increased the taxes.

For 1997, Federal revenues were 19.3 percent of GDP. Between 1993 and 1997, Federal revenues increased by 1.8 percent of GDP.

Now, in 2007, Federal revenues are projected by the Congressional Budget Office to be 18.8 percent of GDP. If this is the case, then over the past 4 years, Federal revenues will have increased by 2.3 percent, and 1.8 percent subtracted from that 2.3 percent leaves one-half of a percent. The tax relief enacted in 2003 grew Federal revenues by one- half of a percentage point more than the tax hikes of 1993 in the 4 years following each.

I like to emphasize this because I think that it just--too many people see it as common sense that if you raise tax rates, you are going to bring in more revenue; if you lower tax rates, you are going to bring in less revenue. But I just showed that tax increases under Clinton did not bring in as much revenue as tax decreases in this administration. They brought in more revenue. So I would like to disabuse people of the fact that increasing rates brings in more revenue and decreasing rates brings in less revenue.

What is also important is that as a percentage of GDP, revenues were higher in 1997 than they will be this year. In my opinion, they were too high.

The point that I am making is that the rate of change in revenues as a percentage of GDP has so far been greater after tax relief than after a tax hike. I think it is very important, especially for those who reflexively believe that the only way for the Federal Government to raise more money is to confiscate more income from taxpayers. Clearly, that view is false.

To conclude, let me summarize the current budget situation.

Right now, taxes are lower than they would have been under Democratic rule. I want to make it clear that I am not saying that no Democrats supported any tax relief. Some Democrats voted for the 2003 tax relief plan, and many more voted for the 2000 tax relief plan. However, I am skeptical that a Democratic Congress or White House would have allowed taxpayers to keep so much of their own money.

The budget deficit is shrinking, and Federal revenues are increasing. Anyone who finds fault with this situation is determined to do nothing but simply find fault. They would probably be unable to enjoy a sunny day because they would constantly be on the lookout for storm clouds regardless of what the forecast said. There is a problem with debt and with Federal budget deficits, but tax increases are the wrong way to approach that problem.

We have a Federal budget deficit because the Federal Government spends too much money, and the best way to get rid of deficits is to spend less. Consequently, raising taxes makes the situation worse by punishing the overall economy and making conditions more difficult for the economy--the source of Federal revenues--to function efficiently. We have to remember that our economy supports the Government and not the other way around. The budget data I have discussed today shows how we can increase revenues and reduce deficits by removing impediments to economic efficiency and allowing our economy to flourish.

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

The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Salazar.) The clerk will call the roll.

Mr. President, before my friend leaves the floor, I thank the distinguished Senator from Idaho for his leadership as we have worked together on specialty crop issues. This is an important bipartisan effort. We began focusing on it when we defined specialty crops in the Specialty Crop Competitiveness Act of 2004. We have now taken that definition and gone on to include, as he said, 50 percent of the cash receipts from the crops that had not been recognized fully in the farm bill. It has been my pleasure to work with him and see that we have been able to make this an important part of this farm bill for the future. I thank him and congratulate him.

I rise to speak about the farm bill in front of us. It is an effort that has taken a tremendous amount of time, debate, and negotiation, a 2-day markup. We ended up passing it unanimously out of the Agriculture Committee, which is no small feat. I am pleased to have played a role in that process. A major reason for our success was our chairman, the distinguished Senator from Iowa, who has been so diligent from the beginning. He has had a vision about the future for agriculture, where we needed to go in alternative energy, conservation, fruits and vegetables, nutrition, as well as our traditional support for agriculture. I thank Chairman Harkin and our distinguished ranking member for their efforts together. We have put into

place a farm bill for the future. I am very pleased we are doing that.

Our needs are different than when the first farm bills came about. Energy independence, preserving and protecting the environment, making sure we have a nutritious supply of products to keep communities and families healthy are all areas covered in this new farm bill.

I thank my dear friend and colleague, the chairman of the Budget Committee, Senator Conrad, for his incredible leadership, putting all the numbers together. We have only a relatively small increase above the baseline in this farm bill, $8 billion. Contrary to what we are hearing from the administration, we are seeing a relatively small increase, fully paid for under the budget. Thanks to the work of Senator Conrad, we have a farm bill that is done in a fiscally responsible way.

I thank the chairman of the Finance Committee, Senator Baucus, for his extraordinary leadership. Serving on the Budget, Finance, and Agriculture Committees, I have to say we would not be here with a successful farm bill if it were not for Senator Baucus and the work he has done in providing revenues as well as a permanent disaster relief program, which is incredibly important.

I also thank my staff for their hard work. We have been working for months and months on this farm bill, many late hours, some all- nighters. I thank Chris Adamo and Oliver Kim, who have done an extraordinary job on the nutrition pieces of this bill; Ilana Levinson; and my legislative director, Amanda Renteria.

This new farm bill represents a progressive agricultural policy and a vision of the future. It focuses on and expands many new policies, such as specialty crops and renewable energy, conservation, nutrition, and rural development. When people think of Michigan, most of the time people think of automobiles and manufacturing. But in fact, the second largest industry in Michigan is agriculture. We have more diversity of crops than any other State other than California. This is a very important part of public policy for Michigan. It is about supporting our growers, about communities, the schoolchildren, seniors, and others who benefit from nutrition programs. It is also about jobs. In real ways, this is a bill that will create jobs in my State.

We have everything from traditional commodities in Michigan, such as dairy and meat and pork and corn and sugar beets and soybeans. We are also proudly the national leaders in the production of numerous specialty crops--our fruits and vegetables, including blueberries, apples, cherries, asparagus, and celery. Michigan farmers are in need of a safety net for the crops they now grow, our program crops. But they also are asking us for a new set of policies, not payments, not direct payments, but a set of policies that will allow us to support fruit and vegetable growers who make up half of American agriculture.

In addition to diverse farms and commodities, we also have expansive urban areas with strong interests in conserving our national resources, our land, our Great Lakes, expanding as well in our inner-city areas access for fresh fruits and vegetables through farmers markets and community gardens and school nutrition programs. Literally, for me, every single part of the farm bill is important and impacts someone in my State, whether they be involved directly in farming or not. Of course, as we sometimes don't think about, the farm bill does impact everybody, whether you have any part of agricultural production in your State or not because of what this means in food security, nutrition, and now focusing on other important areas such as alternative energy.

I understand, as we debate this important farm bill, we will be continuing to talk about reforming farm policy. I know for many, the reforms that have passed in the Agriculture Committee--and we have put together very important reforms--as well as for me, do not go as far as I would like. But they do represent a very important first step in the right direction. There is a tremendous amount of reform in this legislation. It is important for us not to define reform as just changing direct payments. It is about changing the focus, expanding the focus toward the future, which is what this farm bill absolutely does. We have made progress on farm payment reform, but we have also put in place a new guide for the next 5 years in completely new farm policies, such as specialty crops, helping producers grow more and consumers to have more access to healthy foods.

Energy is a very exciting part of this bill, the next economic opportunity for rural America, for our farmers. These new policies will create new jobs and new, clean, renewable energies. Conservation, again, is a major focus for our chairman, and I commend him for that. His leadership has brought us more than $4 billion in new investments in conservation that will help producers be the great stewards of the land they want to be.

Again, the chairman, in his leadership on nutrition, has been extraordinary, expanding the food and nutrition program and providing more access to healthy foods. In fact, it is important to mention that roughly 66 percent of the farm bill is focused in some way on nutrition. That means this is truly a food security and nutrition bill for every American. It is also important to mention that we have included a focus on beginning and disadvantaged farmers, new policies in the conservation title, as our Presiding Officer has focused on in so many of the areas around conservation and supporting our farmers and family farmers. The credit title also helps new farmers and those sometimes wrongfully left out to provide for more conservation and more credit resources. We know we need a new generation of farmers to continue providing food security for our Nation.

Let me speak about each of these areas briefly. The area of the farm bill we call specialty crops, what does that mean? We are talking about fruits, vegetables, horticulture, floriculture, dried nuts. We had defined those areas in 2004 in the farm bill. This is something I have been working on since coming to the Congress after the 1996 election, 4 years in the U.S. House on the Agriculture Committee, and now in the Senate. I remember when we first started talking about specialty crops and trying to find something in the farm bill that would directly support the 50 percent of the crops that are fruits and vegetables and other specialty crops. It was difficult to find much. But finally, after working together on a bipartisan basis and having wonderful support from the Agriculture Committee, we can honestly say we have placed specialty crops as a permanent part of the farm bill.

This is incredibly important, particularly now when we look at the needs for nutrition, the needs of the future for our families, our children, our seniors, as we look at a world economy, where it is very important that we be supporting our own fruits and vegetable growers.

There are 36 Members of the Senate who have come together, because we grow specialty crops in our States, and have supported the efforts. I thank each Member who has lent their voice in support and strength to this effort. We have over 120 different organizations that have been working now for several years to come together to get to this point. I thank all of them for their efforts as well.

We have come a long way since the 2002 farm bill, when we were talking about trying to get some help with tree assistance or some basic nutrition programs. In 2004, we passed the Specialty Crop Competitiveness Act which defined specialty crops and for the first time gave us a policy from which to work. It laid the groundwork for the progress we have made in creating a specialty crop policy in the farm bill, including the centerpiece program such as specialty crop block grants. Today, for the first time, there is a significant package to help our growers who supply our healthy foods. This package is what I call a toolbox, not a direct payment. They have not asked for that, but they have asked for a variety of things to help them be successful and make fruits and vegetables available to our families.

The toolbox includes competitive grant programs, research funds, increased protections from pests and disease, trade export promotions, various nutrition programs to help those in need, as well as a focus on our schoolchildren, assistance for organic farmers, a very important, growing part of agriculture, as well as important conservation payments. This multitude of

policies offers real reform and is needed for a variety of reasons.

It is also important to note the new disaster assistance program that has been put together accommodates specialty crops as well. There is approximately $1 billion of disaster relief for specialty crops included in the disaster relief program. It will expedite aid to producers after natural disasters for which farmers cannot plan. A critical part of this is new mandatory funding for the Tree Assistance Program. This is absolutely critical to our farmers who have orchards because our orchards--such as cherries and peaches and apples--are basically the assets. The trees are the assets for those farmers, and they are expensive assets that take years to yield profits. So being able to support those growers who have orchards and to be able to help them in a disaster is very important.

It is important to note that specialty crop farmers are also very diverse. What is good for the Washington apple growers may not be the same for Michigan apple growers. Different diseases and challenges face different growers in different parts of the country. So policies such as the State-run block grants that we have included and competitive research grants are vital to help the over 200 different types of specialty crop farmers across the Nation be able to have assistance for their particular issue, their particular areas of concern.

Second, fruits and vegetables are more susceptible to different pests and diseases. We must have the best inspection and rapid-response policies in place. Currently, the costs borne by the fruit and vegetable industry due to invasive species reaches over $1 billion a year. Our disease and pest policy will help prevent new invasive species as well as help mitigate them. This will help not only specialty crop growers but all our farmers as well as our forests.

Third, just like our traditional row crops, such as corn and soybeans, we need a strong domestic supply of fruits and vegetables. Studies suggest that even if every person in this country tried to eat the five to nine servings of fruits and vegetables per day that are recommended by the Federal Government, our domestic growers would simply not be able to meet the demand.

Fourth--and while speaking of domestic fruit and vegetable farmers-- this Nation currently imports $2.7 billion more than it exports in fruits and vegetables. So we need to ensure our safety and health and help our growers as they export as well.

Finally, when we talk about specialty crops, we are really talking about eating in a healthier way. A better supply of fruits and vegetables means more access for more people to the things they need to be healthy and to prevent systemic disease in the future.

Along with our focus on specialty crops is a real partnership with the portion of the farm bill that focuses on nutrition. This farm bill makes important strides in reducing hunger in our Nation and improving the nutritional health of our children. It makes a key link between our commodities--our fruits and vegetables--and health by recognizing the importance of fruits and vegetables in the new specialty crops provisions.

The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine has applauded efforts to increase consumption of fruits and vegetables. They noted that HHS statistics have found that unhealthy eating and inactivity cause 310,000 to 580,000 deaths every year.

In addition, in this Congress we have made our children's health a legislative priority. In addition to our fight for the Children's Health Insurance Program, we have expanded the successful Fruit and Vegetable Snack Program so that schools nationwide will be able to give children a healthy snack. Again, my hat goes off to our chairman, who placed the Fruit and Vegetable Program in the farm bill in the past as a pilot project.

A lot of folks said: Well, even if you have a bowl of fruits--apples or other fresh fruits--and vegetables available in schools, the kids won't eat them; they will just go to the vending machine. Well, it turned out that was not true. It turned out that children loved having those apples and peaches and strawberries and plums and all of the other fruits available. Teachers across the country have been clamoring to expand this very successful Fruit and Vegetable Snack Program, and we have done that in this bill. In fact, with the passage of the farm bill, about 120,000 children in Michigan alone will have access to fresh fruits and vegetables through the snack program.

This is a very important policy in terms of the future for our children. Making sure children eat right and understand good nutrition is, of course, critical for their long-term health. According to the New America Foundation's child development and youth well-being index, health indicators for children are on the decline mainly due to children's poor nutritional health and obesity. By helping our schools purchase healthy snacks, we can not only give children better food but also help guide their nutritional choices throughout their entire lives. Maybe if they pick up an apple or dried cherries--grown in Michigan, of course--rather than junk food, we will give them an opportunity for a healthier future.

Additionally, the farm bill addresses hunger by making long overdue changes to the Food and Nutrition Program, formerly known as food stamps. Since 1996, the income standards for this program have been frozen--in other words, no increases. Food costs go up, inflation goes up, and there have been no increases. This has caused the purchasing power for families to decline as food costs and inflation have increased.

In just one example, a 32-year-old single mom named Sonya, who lives in Michigan near my hometown of Lansing, has two children ages 12 and 13. She works two jobs. One pays $10.40 an hour, where she works 24 hours a week. The other one pays her $76 a day. She is working hard to hold things together for her family. She spends nearly $650 a month in daycare expenses, right now, for her children. But under current law, she cannot count the full value of her childcare costs when she applies for the Food and Nutrition Program. This cap on childcare is a huge incentive against working.

The nutrition title will help Sonya and other families--and the vast majority of Food and Nutrition Program households are three-individual households like Sonya's--because it takes that cap off and will cover and count the costs of childcare for working moms. For example, a mother of three who works 35 hours a week at $9 an hour and pays $350 a month for childcare for a preschool-aged child would receive an additional $79 in food assistance for herself and her children. This is a huge difference. It may not sound like a lot of money, but it is a huge difference for families all across this country.

We should be very proud of the fact that on a bipartisan basis we have placed these improvements in the bill. However, we still need to do a lot more, and I certainly support other efforts to do that.

We still need to make improvements to the Commodity Supplemental Food Program. Unfortunately, our senior citizens, who make up the bulk of this program, the Commodity Supplemental Food Program, are eligible at a lower income threshold than are families. In other words, if you are a senior up to 130 percent of poverty, you can get help with food; for a family, it is 185 percent. There is really no reason to discriminate against senior citizens, and a number of organizations, including AARP, the National Commodity Supplemental Food Program Association, and America's Second Harvest, want to fix this program. I am working with the chairman to offer an amendment to do that.

I mentioned a little earlier that this bill is also a job creator. This farm bill is creating new jobs as well as a cleaner environment-- both very important goals.

The energy title will help bring forth a new rural economy. In Michigan's case, this is already happening, and we welcome the provisions of this bill. They are very important to us in Michigan.

First, there are loans and loan guarantees for cellulosic ethanol refineries. In Michigan, we have interest from multiple companies to set up new cellulosic refineries. We have corn, sugar beets, switchgrass, and wood byproducts--timber--opportunities that can all be a part of the cellulosic equation. Again, I know the distinguished Presiding Officer has worked diligently in

those areas. They are very important for the future of this country and certainly in my State will create jobs.

Financing is needed in the early development of these projects, as we know, and these new policies will provide that missing link, which is so critical. Perhaps by the next farm bill we will see the fruits of our labor when we can truly say: Buy fuel from Middle America instead of the Middle East.

Next, farmers need assistance to switch to these new energy crops and to produce renewable energies. New policies will provide technical assistance and resources to help producers convert to new crops that can produce ethanol and take advantage of their wastes by converting them into energy. An example of this is anaerobic digesters that our dairy farms can use to convert animal waste to energy. Not only is this a new source of income, but it also disposes of waste, therefore reducing pollution into the air and the water.

Finally, I would like to highlight another program important to Michigan that has the potential to spur economic development while alleviating our dependence on foreign oil. A Community Wood Energy Program will help invest in projects looking to use more wood products to produce energy. With a State that is more than one-third forested, and paper mills are in the decline, this is a very valuable addition, from my perspective in Michigan.

The energy title will go a long way toward a cleaner environment, but the conservation title in the farm bill is one of our most important environmental laws. Farmers are some of the best stewards of our land. We know that. They produce high-quality, safe, nutritious products while meeting strong environmental standards. Our addition of $4 billion in conservation funding this year is imperative to meet the growing demand of farmers who want to enroll in various conservation programs. These programs keep our air clean, farmland productive, spaces open, land open, wildlife thriving, and offer some of the best water quality protections.

The conservation title is especially vital to our Great Lakes, North America's largest source of fresh water. Farm bill conservation programs have ensured that once-marginal Great Lakes farmland now filters sediment and erosion while providing millions of acres of high- quality wildlife habitat, which supports the local $18 billion hunting, fishing, and wildlife-watching industry in Michigan. Programs such as the Wetlands Reserve Program improve water quality and are essential to the continued health of the Great Lakes. These programs protect and restore wetlands that serve to filter pesticides, fertilizers, and sediment out of the water that millions of Great Lakes residents depend on for their drinking water as well as for swimming and bathing and just plain fun. And we invite everyone to come and be a part of the Great Lakes experience.

I want to congratulate, again, Chairman Harkin and my colleagues on the committee for their commitment to a strong conservation title. In spite of the tight budget we have once again, conservation is a priority.

I would like to take a moment to recognize changes in a program that I was very pleased to author as a part of this conservation title. The Great Lakes Basin Program for Soil Erosion and Sediment Control will be reauthorized for another 5 years under the current bill. This program has a proven track record of efficiently providing grant funding to local organizations and governments to prevent soil erosion in the Great Lakes region.

I am pleased to have been able to add language to the farm bill to tie the Great Lakes Basin Program to the Great Lakes Regional Collaboration Strategy to Restore and Protect the Great Lakes. This will assist in accomplishing two of the Great Lakes Regional Collaboration Strategy's priority recommendations: first, targeting cleanup activities in severely polluted rural watersheds; secondly, restoring urban watersheds that have been degraded by development.

The Great Lakes restoration strategy is really a comprehensive blueprint for restoring the Great Lakes. It was initiated following an Executive order which recognized the Great Lakes as a national treasure. The strategy was produced by a broad cross-section of people representing our local communities, the State and Federal Government-- truly a bipartisan effort--NGOs, tribes, and various stakeholders that came together.

The strategy identifies reducing nonpoint source runoff from rural and urban areas as one of the top eight sets of priority recommendations necessary for restoring the health of the Great Lakes. This program will enable the region to initiate pilot projects consistent with these recommendations. I am very pleased this is part of the farm bill.

Restoring the Great Lakes must be a national priority. A recent Brookings Institute study clearly showed that Great Lakes restoration is about more than environmental restoration; it is about protecting our way of life. Reducing soil erosion, sediment, and pollutants helps maintain a clean source of drinking water for over 42 million Americans and Canadians who depend on the Great Lakes. Decreasing nonpoint pollution in the Great Lakes reduces the damage caused to fish and wildlife habitat and will help protect a sport fishery that generates $4 billion a year. Reducing nonpoint pollution will reduce the costs of maintaining stormwater systems and the costs of dredging the harbors and marinas that are the economic backbone to the Great Lakes region's shipping capacity, in addition to a $1 billion recreational boating industry. This program ties a Great Lakes program with a proven track record to the implementation of a comprehensive strategy that, when fully implemented, will protect an international treasure for the next generations.

I also want to acknowledge another important piece that I was pleased to author in the farm bill that is important to American producers. Current law clearly states that all purchases made--to the maximum extent practicable--with Federal funds for use in the National School Lunch and Breakfast programs should be domestic goods; in other words, American-made, American-grown. Congress has passed this law in multiple statutes and has repeatedly reinforced its support for the Buy American provision, and expects it to be implemented and enforced. Unfortunately, USDA has not adequately enforced the Buy American provisions in current law. This is another example of this administration's failure to enforce the laws on the books, and this time our growers and consumers are paying the price. The list of trade enforcement violations is growing, and today the United States has the weakest trade enforcement effort of any developed country. It is important we make sure that while the USDA buys only domestically grown food for schools, that we also make sure when the school programs themselves--the local programs--are purchasing, that they know this provision is in place.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for an additional 2 minutes.

Two.

Thank you very much.

There is so much in the farm bill that it is difficult to have a short presentation. I am only touching on a few of the major areas.

Let me conclude, though, by summarizing the Buy American provisions because, unfortunately, even this past July at a national school food conference, a food company marketed peaches that said ``peaches from China packed in Thailand,'' and I know we grow great peaches in the United States. So we want to make sure that as we are putting all of these provisions together to support American agriculture, that, in fact the USDA is doing everything possible not only to purchase themselves but to communicate with our school programs and other nutritional programs that we expect we will purchase from local growers, American growers first. We hope we will not have to say this again. We have put this in numerous bills. It is

vital that we take this very seriously if we are going to, in fact, be supporting American growers. This provision--the Buy American amendment--matches the House-passed language, and I am hoping they will join us in making sure it is truly enforced at this time.

As my statement shows, this farm bill is expansive. It is important to all parts of our country, our families, our communities. It is important in so many ways as we look for healthy foods and strong communities and jobs, preserving our land and our water. It has very important policies, traditional policies we have had for some time, coupled with new approaches for the future in alternative energy and other areas that are critical for the future of our country. I regret that the administration has indicated a possible veto of this bill. I hope, in fact, they will reconsider as we move along. This is an important bipartisan effort. A tremendous amount of work has gone into this. This is truly a farm bill for the future of the country. It is fiscally responsible. It is paid for. I am very hopeful that not only will we pass this with a strong bipartisan vote, but that the President will support this very important effort to support our growers, our farmers, our ranchers, as well as the food security of the United States.

Thank you, Mr. President.

Mr. President, I wish today to state my support of the Senate farm bill and urge my colleagues to vote in favor of this measure. While this bill is not perfect, I believe that it contains strong agriculture policy that will advance a number of initiatives important to Great Plains production agriculture and to farmers and ranchers across America.

I would like to first thank my good friend from Iowa, Tom Harkin, who, as chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee, shepherded this fine bill through the committee consideration process. Chairman Harkin has been considerate to the contribution of the Great Plains region to our nation's agriculture economy and national food security, and this product reflects that recognition.

I am also pleased that this bill reflects many of the priorities that were shared with me not only in roundtable discussions in South Dakota with interested stakeholders, but also through letters, e-mails and phone calls from people in my home State.

I would like to take this time to speak to some of the provisions contained in this legislation, and why these provisions will be good for South Dakota agriculture. To begin with title I, this measure offers strong commodity safety nets, which is arguably the anchor of the omnibus Federal Farm Bill that Congress reauthorizes every 5 years. Under this legislation, our commodity payment structure is retained, with modest, albeit important, increases made to the loan rates

and target prices for many commodities. Among those commodities seeing improvements under this bill are sorghum--target price increase to $2.63/bu.--barley--loan rate increase to $1.95/bu. as well as a target price increase to $2.63/bu.--oats--increase in loan rate to $1.39/bu. and increase in target price to $1.83/bu.--wheat--loan rate increase to $2.94/bu. and target price increase to $4.20/bu.--soybeans--target price increase to $6.00/bu.--oilseeds--loan rate increase to $10.09/ cwt. and target price increase to $12.74/cwt.--and wool and honey-- established loan rates are $1.20/lb. and $.72/lb., respectively--in addition to desirable target prices and loan rates for dry peas, lentils, and chickpeas.

Producers will also have a choice for participation in the Average Crop Revenue, ACR, program, under which payments will be made when the State revenue for a covered commodity is less than the average guarantee for that particular commodity. I do retain concerns for the implementation of this particular program because of the drastic disparity in county-based revenue in my home State of South Dakota. I am, however, pleased that the basic farm safety net from the 2002 measure remains intact, and that the ACR program was delinked from crop insurance during committee consideration.

Under this package, our farmers and ranchers across the nation will also benefit from a structured response to emergency agriculture disaster. This structured response program also will not, I am very pleased to say, function as a disincentive for investing in coverage under the Federal Crop Insurance Act, FCIA, and the Non-Insured Crop Disaster Assistance Program, NAP. The United States Department of Agriculture, USDA, and White House have been less than friendly toward our efforts to secure meaningful disaster assistance, going so far as to issue multiple veto threats against emergency spending initiatives because they contained meaningful relief for farmers and ranchers. The White House claimed that farmers and ranchers across America were generating remarkable revenue and enjoying tremendous profits, which clearly demonstrates this administration's disconnect with agricultural communities throughout the United States. Agriculture disaster is like any other natural disaster, and I am very proud to have pushed with my Senate colleagues for the proposal included in this bill.

As the author of the COOL provision included in the 2002 farm bill, I am pleased to see that this bill contains a very critically important compromise on mandatory Country of Origin Labeling, COOL, that will allow for streamlined, commonsense implementation, which is something that the USDA has been unable to accomplish in the 5-plus years since the enactment of the 2002 farm bill. The USDA has mercilessly botched the rulemaking process on this consumer right-to-know and producer marketing program, promulgating unworkable regulations that would burden farmers and ranchers as well as retailers.

The COOL compromise language included in the committee version of the farm bill, which was passed unanimously by that body, allows, for example, for the use of records for origin verification which are part of daily business, in addition to allowing State, region or locality of the United States information as being sufficient to identify the United States as the point of origin. These implementation guidelines are important to ensure that producers or retailers are not saddled with unnecessary costs or recordkeeping burdens that the USDA would have preferred, and that we can deliver a program that in excess of 91 percent of American consumers want.

The Senate version of the farm bill also contains another measure which I have championed for years, pertaining to the livestock sector. I am pleased that the ban on packer ownership of livestock was included in the en bloc amendments during committee consideration of the bill, which speaks to the significant support this measure retains within the Senate. The livestock industry is faced with ever-increasing horizontal concentration and vertical integration, and our independent farmers and ranchers are confronted with a shrinking number of opportunities for price discovery and product promotion. The packer ban would rectify this very negative and troubling transition in the livestock industry.

The packer ban adopted by the committee would ensure that packers cannot own livestock more than 14 days prior to slaughter. There are a number of reasonable exceptions to this prohibition, including packers that own only one slaughtering facility, packers that are not required to participate in the Mandatory Price Reporting, MPR, program, and for cooperatives. The packer ban would ensure that farmers and ranchers are materially engaged with the management of their livestock.

I offered the packer ban during consideration of the 2002 farm bill on the Senate floor, and it was adopted by the body of the Senate. It was, unfortunately, stripped out of the final bill during conference consideration, as was the ``competition title'' included in the Senate version of the bill. Our livestock producers have waited long enough for these provisions, and I will continue to work with the Chairman of the Agriculture Committee to see the packer ban passed into law. It is good policy.

In that same vein, I am pleased to see several other competition provisions that are included in this bill. This farm bill would ensure that contracts are fairer for growers, in that producers must agree and consent to arbitration before it may be used for dispute settlement. The bill also allows for the creation of a Special Counsel for Agricultural Competition within USDA. Both prosecutions and investigations will be combined within one office, and the counsel will oversee enforcement activities in coordinating with the Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission. It is my hope that this counsel will serve to offer a greater level of transparency and that we may, in fact, see justice served with respect to egregious misdeeds in our livestock sector.

I am, however, greatly disappointed about the exclusion of Dorgan- Grassley amendment No. 3695, of which I cosponsored, to enact commonsense, meaningful farm program payment limitations.

The current farm program payment structure has, quite simply, failed rural America. Approximately 71 percent of our farm benefits are absorbed by only 10 percent of the farming community. Our omnibus farm bill is intended to promote programs that function as a safety net for farmers, in contrast to the cash cow they have become for a few producers. I do not favor eliminating our farm program benefits, but rather prefer that they are targeted to small and medium sized producers instead of large agribusiness.

The farm bill also includes a forward-looking energy title to grow dedicated energy crops and capture the ingenuity of agriculture producers to use biomass for energy production. The title invests in the applied agriculture research already occurring at State universities and land-grant colleges. Importantly, the bill also balances the increasing demand to use working lands for energy production with safeguards for protecting air, land, and water quality.

The bill establishes a loan guarantee and competitive grant program to jump-start the construction of biorefineries producing renewable fuels from dedicated energy crops. To meet the ambitious goal of producing 36 billion gallons of renewable biofuels in 2022, the farm bill establishes a program to provide access to capital for the construction of pilot and demonstration-scale biorefineries to produce advanced biofuels. Up to 80 percent of the costs of eligible projects could be covered through a loan guarantee. Also, the programs intent is clear that eligible projects include the conversion of existing fossil- fuel biorefineries powered by natural gas for loan guarantees and competitive grants to repower these facilities using renewable energy resources. South Dakota is a leader in producing ethanol from grains, but there is the long-term promise of using biomass and dedicated energy crops for producing advanced biofuels at a fraction of the energy input requirement. I am glad that the program will include a focus on biorefineries converting fuel generation sources for producing advanced biofuels. This section in the bill is essential toward our ability to significantly expand renewable fuel production.

The farm bill also builds on the 2002 act by providing $345 million in mandatory funding to enable biorefineries to

make greater purchase of renewable biomass for advanced biofuel. These payments will increase the purchase of feedstocks for next generation biofuels, such as cellulosic ethanol.

I am glad that the bill harnesses the expertise of land grant Institutions by reauthorizing the Sun grant initiative and providing a modest amount of dedicated funding for carrying out program goals. Since 2005, the Sun grant Initiative has enhanced coordination between the Department of Energy and the United States Department of Agriculture to assess and improve resource availability and feedstock economics. The research and applications pursued through Sun grant is crucial toward the eventual commercialization of dedicated energy crops. Assessing the potential availability of energy feedstocks within geographic regions can target which energy crops are optimal for biofuel production. In the Midwest and Great Plains that might mean cultivation of switchgrass while in the Southeast, poplar trees or other fast-growing biomass may be optimal. Ultimately the research conducted by the regional Sun grant centers will go a long way in answering these regional questions and determining how best over the long-term to produce fuel from non-grain biomass.

The conservation title included in this bill will encourage sound land stewardship and land management practices. I requested, for example, that the Senate version of the farm bill extend the Conservation Reserve Program, CRP, and this program was extended with a 39.2 million acre cap through 2012. The Grasslands Reserve Program was also included in the chairman's mark and extended at a $240 million authorized level. I supported the payment limitations cap that would have increased the authorization for this program, and while it is unfortunate that this program wasn't expanded, I will continue to work with my colleagues to push for adequate funding.

The Wetlands Reserve Program was reauthorized in the bill at 250,000 through 2012, and the Environmental Quality Incentives Program was extended out with baseline funding. The program would provide for 75 percent cost-share, with the exception that beginning and young farmers or socially disadvantaged farmers would receive 90 percent cost-share or 15 percent above prevailing rates.

In several of my farm bill meetings, it was expressed to me that USDA local work groups should be exempted from the Federal Advisory Committee Act, FACA, by folding them into the State Technical Committees. USDA local work groups coordinate USDA programs with other Federal, State and tribal programs. FACA prohibits nongovernment individuals, including farmers, from the USDA working group formal decisionmaking process, whereas the State Technical Committee is exempted from FACA. The farm bill includes this change, allowing for farmers to be an integral and important part of the formal decisionmaking process.

The Senate version of the farm bill contains a Sodsaver program, to ensure that our nation's native grasslands remain intact. The program would prohibit crop insurance under the Federal Crop Insurance Act or Noninsured Crop Disaster Assistance Program payments on broken, native sod indefinitely, allowing for exceptions with plots under 5 acres and discretionary exemption by the Secretary of Agriculture for parcels between 5 and 20 acres.

When we talk about the farm bill, we naturally tend to focus on the provisions that affect our Nation's agricultural producers. I am pleased to note that we have crafted a farm bill that will also greatly improve Federal policy in the area of rural development, whose purpose is to improve the quality of life for citizens of rural areas who are not directly engaged in traditional agricultural production. With a bill that benefits our producers and as well as those who make a living off the farm, I believe citizens in the rural portions of our great Nation can look forward to many brighter days ahead.

Last year, I announced my Hometown Prosperity Plan, which is an economic development agenda that lays out my priorities for advancing South Dakota's economy from the Federal level. The strategies in my plan provided a framework for my priorities in the rural development title of the 2007 farm bill. These priorities include: (1) ``Promoting Partnerships,'' or encouraging greater regional economic cooperation to enhance competitiveness; (2) ``Emphasizing Entrepreneurship,'' or placing more emphasis on cultivating the creation of new businesses, as a supplement to the traditional strategy of luring existing businesses from elsewhere; (3) ``Investing in the Public Good'' by directing Federal funds to projects that yield a positive return in the form of higher standards of living, more jobs, and more prosperity; and (4) ``Protecting Pocketbooks'' by combating trends that sap economic strength, such as rising health care costs, rising fuel prices, and stagnant wages.

In the spring of this year, as Chairman Harkin was assembling his proposals for the rural development portion of the farm bill, I wrote to him to outline my rural development priorities. I was pleased to find a great deal of common ground in our respective priorities, which is not surprising, since our two States share a border and many common characteristics. Senator Harkin, the Agriculture Committee, and ultimately the full Senate, have produced a farm bill that would enact many of the proposals in my Hometown Prosperity Plan, and I would like to highlight a few of those.

One of the ways I proposed to act on the strategy of ``promoting partnerships'' was to relaunch the Northern Great Plains Regional Authority, which was created in the 2002 farm bill. The authority is a voluntary organization modeled after the successful Appalachian Regional Commission. Its mission is to enhance economic development by promoting greater interstate economic cooperation and collaboration across North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Iowa, and Minnesota. The organization was created by Congress with the blessing of the President, and is authorized to receive $30 million each year for 5 years to boost the competitiveness of our region. Unfortunately, the President inexplicably changed his mind about the organization, and has blocked its operation and most of its funding. The 2007 farm bill would modify the organization's governance structure to allow the organization to begin operating even without active support from the President.

In addition to promoting economic partnerships between states, we can also improve our economic performance through greater cooperation between rural communities within our respective states. The new farm bill would stimulate this kind of cooperation through the new Rural Collaborative Investment Program, RCIP. Under this program, communities within a region could receive Federal funds to leverage matching private contributions in support of regional economic planning and projects.

My strategy of ``investing in the public good'' means providing Federal investments in activities the pay themselves back with increased rural prosperity and quality of life. This farm bill would increase the volume and quality of our investments in the public good by extending, refining, and expanding several existing grant and loan programs operated by USDA rural development. These include community facilities grants and loans, water and wastewater infrastructure grants and loans, the rural business enterprise grants, rural business opportunity grants, value added agriculture development grants, intermediary relending, distance learning and telemedicine grants and loans, and the broadband access program, among others. These programs have proven their effectiveness in improving the quality of life for rural citizens across South Dakota, and they would have an even great impact if we enact the farm bill approved by the Senate.

A great deal of research now demonstrates that my strategy of ``emphasizing entrepreneurship'' is one of the most effective ways we can generate new private-sector job growth in our rural communities. One of the ways I proposed to act on this strategy was by providing incentives for greater private-sector equity investment in rural business through the Rural Business Investment Program, RBIP. Unfortunately, venture capital and other forms of equity are relatively scarce in rural States, and the RBIP was created in

the 2002 Farm Bill to address this scarcity. It was modeled on a similar program operated successfully by SBA. Unfortunately, overly complicated implementation rules have prevented this program from achieving its potential of luring more private investment to fast- growing companies in rural America. By modifying and streamlining the program, the new farm bill will catalyze more private investment and more rapid private-sector job creation in rural communities.

Another way to emphasize entrepreneurship is by stimulating more business startups through microlending. Many would-be entrepreneurs in local areas cannot get access to the small quantities of capital needed to implement sound concepts for new businesses. The delivery of ``microloans'' to these individuals is a proven way of creating more small businesses. Because microloan programs require small quantities of capital, and the loans are repaid, the programs are also highly cost-effective. The farm bill's new Rural Microenterprise Assistance Program would help to reverse the loss of rural population that results from inadequate economic opportunities.

Among other things, my strategy of ``protecting pocket books'' means taking action to address economic trends that sap our economic strength, such as exploding health care costs. One way we will do that in this farm bill is by providing federal funds for conversion to electronic records at rural hospitals. Keeping these hospitals viable helps rural citizens avoid lengthy trips to health care facilities in far-away cities. And computerizing medical records at those hospitals should increase their efficiency and reduce costs to consumers. Between this initiative, and our extension of the Distance Learning and Telemedicine grant and loan program, I believe we can help to reverse the rising healthcare costs that are especially hard on the pocketbooks of rural citizens.

In any piece of legislation as comprehensive and far-reaching as a farm bill, there are always components whose final form leaves room for improvement. Unfortunately, that maxim holds true in the case of the farm bill approved by my Senate colleagues and me. Nevertheless, on the whole I am pleased with this bill in general and its rural development components in particular. By enacting many proposals from my Hometown Prosperity Plan, this bill would improve the economy and quality of life in the rural communities that South Dakotans call home. I appreciate my Senate colleagues' support for these initiatives, and am hopeful that we can realize their promise by enacting this bill into law.

We live in a country of great abundance, yet millions of Americans go to bed hungry each night. With more than 39 million people in the United States participating in federally supported nutrition programs each year, it is crucial that the farm bill contains a nutrition title that not only feeds the hungry, but also works toward ending hunger, preventing obesity and improving diets. Given the budgetary constraints that our Senate Agriculture Committee faced in crafting this farm bill, I applaud them for writing a strong nutrition title, which will well serve America's nutrition needs for years to come.

I was extremely pleased that the Food Stamp Program has been modernized to meet the many needs that low-income families face every day. Roughly 58,000 South Dakotans currently receiving food stamp benefits each month will now be able to buy more food with their benefits and will be able to better afford child care. Families will also be able to save for their futures, while still remaining eligible for the program by exempting tax-preferred education and retirement accounts from counting against the asset limit.

As many of America's low-income seniors are being forced to choose between much-needed prescription drugs and paying their bills, sadly, many are left unable to afford an adequate and nutritious diet. The Commodity Supplemental Food Program, CSFP, helps to fill in the nutrition gaps in participants' diets by providing nutritious items that they might not otherwise be able to afford. I worked closely with members of the Senate Agriculture Committee to ensure that more seniors will be eligible to participate in this important program by changing the eligibility guidelines from 130 percent to 185 percent to reflect the poverty guidelines of all other Federal nutrition programs. Once the five new states that have applied to participate in CSFP receive funding, then all States can apply to go up to 185 percent Federal poverty level, FPL, if they so choose. In addition, the preference requirement for women, infants and children in the application process was eliminated, allowing senior citizens equal access to the program.

The Emergency Food Assistance Program, TEFAP, is another vital program in our Nation's fight against hunger. With food banks across the country experiencing critical food shortages and an increasing number of Americans in need of emergency food assistance, the increase in funding from $140 million to $250 million is especially crucial.

We must do all that we can to ensure our children grow up healthy, regardless of their family's income and I believe that expanding the Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Program, FFVP, in all 50 States works toward that goal. Since 2004, students on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota have received fresh fruits and vegetables through the FFVP pilot program. I am pleased that these students and others across the nation will now have regular access to fresh fruits and vegetables.

I was disappointed to see that the elimination of reduced price, ERP, category was not included in the nutrition title of the Farm Bill. The President's budget decisions have forced the Senate majority leadership to concentrate nutrition funding on existing programs, leaving little or no funding for new initiatives, such as eliminating the reduced price category from the school lunch program.

This farm bill also strengthens the Food Distribution Program on Indian Reservations, FDPIR, program by ensuring that tribes will be able to obtain traditional foods, such as bison, in their food packages. I have long fought for more traditional food options for our tribes and I am pleased that Chairman Harkin included my request in the chairman's mark.

This farm bill is a strong proposal for South Dakota, for the Great Plains region and for the American agricultural community. While reauthorization is a critically important prong of our farm bill policy, our Federal farm programs are only as strong as the dollars put behind them. As a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, and more specifically, the Senate Agriculture Appropriations Subcommittee, I am well positioned to fight for South Dakota priorities and to deliver promised farm bill programs into our rural communities. The dollars I work to obtain in this bill are vitally important, for example, to continuing agriculture research within my home State and at South Dakota State University, my home State's land grant university. As we work our way through the budgetary constraints with which Congress is faced, I will continue to promote our nation's farming and ranching agenda.

Mr. President, farmers and ranchers have been anxiously awaiting a new farm bill so they can make important management decisions in this coming year, and I am hopeful that the Senate and House can meet quickly in this next congressional session to iron out the differences between the two measures.

Mr. President, I rise in strong support of the 2007 farm bill. Before I go to the specifics of the bill, I wish to acknowledge those who have worked so hard in getting us where we are today.

This has been a huge undertaking spread out over several years, starting under the leadership of Senator Chambliss and his work in the Agriculture Committee. The hearings he held around the country, the hearings he held in the West and the Southeast, all over, contributed greatly to the bipartisan product that is before the Senate today. In addition, the leadership of our chairman, Senator Harkin, a man from farm country whose heart and soul are about making sure agriculture and rural America thrive--his leadership and the help of his staff in getting us to this point today is something we all must acknowledge and something for which I am grateful and something for which the farmers and ranchers in rural Colorado are grateful.

I also acknowledge both Senators Baucus and Grassley and their leadership on the Finance Committee. The energy and specialty crops and conservation pieces of the farm bill have been significantly enhanced by the actions taken by the members of the Finance Committee. Without the leadership and bipartisan example of Senator Baucus and Senator Grassley, we would not be where we are today.

It goes without saying that even though there are many laudatory comments given to the chairman and ranking member of both the Agriculture and Finance Committees, there are working on both of those committees many other Members of the Senate who have helped craft what I believe is one of the most historic pieces of legislation to come before this body. It will open a new chapter for agriculture and rural America, a product of which I am very proud.

I also thank the agricultural leaders in my State of Colorado who have been so helpful to me over the last 2\1/2\ years as we have helped craft the farm bill before the Senate: Commissioner John Stup, the commissioner of Colorado's Department of Agriculture; Kent Peppler and Lee Swensen with the Rocky Mountain Farmers Union; Alan Foutz and Troy Bredekamp, leaders of the Colorado Farm Bureau; Nick Midcap, Darrell Hannavan, and Dusty Tallman, who have labored so hard on this bill, who are with the Colorado Wheat Growers Association; Byron Weathers and Mark Sponslor, leaders of the Colorado Corn Growers Association; Terry Frankhauser with the Colorado Cattlemen's Association; Scott Johnson and Bill Hammerich with the Colorado Livestock Association; and from the Independent Cattlemen of Colorado, Doug Zalesky, John Reid, and Reid and Kathleen Kelly. I thank Gregg Yando with the Colorado Dairy Farmers of America, Jim Ehrlich with the Colorado Potato Administrative Council, and a host of other Colorado people who have been instrumental in our efforts in moving this bill forward.

This legislation is truly a bipartisan, forward-thinking, balanced package. It is truly the example of how this Senate ought to work, bringing Democrats and Republicans together on what is a major issue. The effort of Senator Reid, the majority leader, to get us to a point where we will reach conclusion on this bill is something I appreciate. This is, after all, the farm bill. We ought not be debating the great issues of our time, whether those be Iraq or immigration or issues having to do with Latin America, issues that are extraneous, on this legislation. Senator Reid's effort to make sure what we are doing is to keep the focus of this bill on agriculture and rural America and the substantive components of the farm bill is important. I hope my colleagues on both sides of the aisle, Republicans and Democrats, will say: Yes, we have to get a process that gets us to conclusion on the farm bill.

Today is a particularly proud day for me. The occupant of the chair was very involved in helping me understand the importance of becoming a Senator. For that, I will always be appreciative. I still remember that in my maiden speech on the floor more than 2 years ago, I spoke about the possibilities and the promise that America's small towns and rural communities offer for a country that is in need of clean renewable energy, a secure food supply, and responsible stewardship of our land and our water. Unfortunately, for too long Washington has overlooked the opportunities rural America can provide and, through a policy of neglect and disinterest, has allowed small towns and rural communities across the country to wither on the vine.

This legislation will change that course of neglect. The bill before us will bring new life and energy to rural America. It will do so in a number of different ways. It will do so through a set of smart investments that help farmers and ranchers and business men and women build a clean energy economy that has its roots in the fields of America's farmers and ranchers. It lays the infrastructure for rural broadband and microbusiness loans for accelerated economic development in rural areas. It creates incentives for the wise stewardship of land and water--practices from which we can all benefit. It puts money into nutrition programs that take on the scourge of hunger and allow low- income children to learn in our schools. It helps bring balance and certainty to the agricultural markets so that Americans can continue to enjoy a healthy and secure food supply. It does all of this while closing loopholes that have allowed Federal dollars to end up in the hands of people who should not have been eligible for assistance in the first place. It is a smart and fiscally responsible bill.

I grew up on a ranch in the San Luis Valley a few miles north of the Colorado-New Mexico border. My family has farmed and ranched that same land for five generations. For much of my life, I spent long days in the fields with my family tending to the cattle, baling hay, and fixing fences. It was hard work, and my hands are permanently calloused from nearly three decades of work on that ranch. But from that work, we always knew we loved our ranch, our land and water, and our way of life. To be a farmer or a rancher is a hard life, let there be no mistake about that. While the rest of the world might go home at 5 o'clock in the afternoon, for those who are working the farms and the ranches, you don't go home until probably half an hour after the sun sets at 9 o'clock. It is very hard work.

My parents always said that they could not give us--my seven brothers and sisters--material riches, but they could teach us values that come from work, family, and faith. These are the values one finds in rural communities across America. These are the priceless and timeless values that built this country. In 1787, Thomas Jefferson sent a letter to George Washington in which he talked about the role of the farmer in a young democracy. Thomas Jefferson said: ``Agriculture . . . is our wisest pursuit because it will in the end contribute most to real wealth, good morals and happiness.''

Those of us who have had the privilege of growing up on a farm or a ranch or of visiting some farms and spending time with America's producers can appreciate how important agriculture and our rural communities are. Unfortunately, in the coming days this bill will be criticized by some in the media, by some Members in this Chamber, and others for being too favorable to farmers, for putting too much money into conservation programs, for supporting rural development initiatives, or for making too many investments in biofuels production. In short, critics will ask why Federal dollars should go into programs that on the surface only appear to benefit rural communities. They are wrong. The answer is very simple: The health of our farms, ranches, and our rural communities is vital to American prosperity. Everyone benefits from a strong and smart farm bill. The farmer in eastern Colorado, the third grader eating fresh fruits and vegetables at lunch, and the mother who wants us to reduce our dependence on foreign oil all gain from a strong and balanced farm bill.

I wish to take a few moments to walk through the bill and explain why it is so important for farmers, for children, and for all Americans that the Senate pass this bill.

Since being elected to the Senate in 2004, I have often spoken about how Washington's policies in recent years have been blind to the needs of rural Americans. More than half of the counties in America are rural. In my State of Colorado, 44 of the 64 counties are rural. In my view, Washington's neglect of rural America has made rural America a forgotten America. Businesses on main streets in many towns and villages across my State have been boarded up. FSA offices have been closed or attempted to be closed, including the very recent actions of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Family farmers are having to sell their land after years of drought. To see Washington's neglect of our rural communities is disheartening, when we know how much possibility and promise rural America holds. With modest investments, rural America can be the engine of a clean energy economy, fueling an alternative energy revolution that capitalizes on the hard work, productivity, and entrepreneurship of farmers and ranchers.

This is why I am so pleased that the 2007 farm bill makes such wise investments in rural development. The bill provides $355 million for rural development. These investments will enable entrepreneurs in rural communities to leverage microenterprise loans to build their businesses. They will help health care providers provide access to underserved rural communities. They will help get broadband Internet access into small towns. Broadband access is to rural communities in the 21st century what highways were in the 20th century and railroads were in the 19th century. It is the infrastructure that is essential to economic development. The $26 million in this bill for broadband

will help close the digital divide that is preventing rural businesses and entrepreneurs from fully participating in the global economy.

Second, this bill includes an energy title that opens up a new chapter of opportunity for rural America. In the 2005 Energy Policy Act and in the Energy bill we passed earlier this year, we planted the seeds for a renewable energy revolution so that we can reduce our very dangerous dependence on foreign oil. The farm bill takes the next step, helping farmers and ranchers take advantage of new energy technologies that have been developed in places such as the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden, CO. With the $1.3 billion this bill devotes to energy programs, farmers will be able to apply for grants to develop biorefineries and to improve the handling, harvest, transport, and storage of feedstocks for biofuels. The bill includes tax credits for small wind turbines and cellulosic biofuel production. It stimulates research into the methods and technologies that will allow the most productive land in the world to provide more and more of our energy. Our farmers and ranchers want to be a part of the solution to our addiction to foreign oil. They want to help reduce the amount of oil we import while helping stimulate a clean energy economy that is built on innovation, technology, and taking advantage of the production capabilities of rural America.

This energy title is a win-win for our rural communities. It is my hope that with this energy title in the farm bill, together with the other energy legislation we have adopted in the Senate and in committee, the vision Senator Grassley and I had with respect to the 25 by 2025 resolution will help us grow our way to energy independence, because the 25 by 2025 resolution recognizes at its heart that we in America can grow 25 percent of our energy from renewable energy resources by the year 2025. This farm bill takes us a significant way down that road.

The third aspect of the legislation I want to emphasize is the conservation title. Farmers and ranchers are some of the best stewards of our land and water. We need a farm bill that recognizes and encourages the good stewardship practices from which we all benefit.

To understand why the conservation programs in the farm bill are so important--and to understand how we will all benefit from them--just visit one of the ranches along the Yampa River in northwest Colorado. You quickly see the ranchers there do not simply put high-quality, grassfed beef on our dinner table. They guard the open spaces that draw sightseers and recreationalists from all around the world. They protect the clean water that comes to our homes. They provide habitat for fish and game, bringing millions of dollars in revenue from fishing and hunting into our State.

Unfortunately, you cannot find a price on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange for these values in clean water, clean air, habitat, and open space dividends that ranchland and farmland provide to America. And if a ranch goes under or is developed, we lose the conservation value that farms and ranches provide.

So how do we address this challenge? How do we address this challenge in this bill? We do it through existing, effective programs that reward farmers and ranchers for the conservation practices from which we all benefit.

Thanks to Chairman Harkin's leadership, the 2007 farm bill is the greenest farm bill in the history of America. It reauthorizes highly successful conservation programs such as the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, EQIP, and the Conservation Reserve Program, CRP.

The bill reauthorizes EQIP, which provides cost-share funding and technical assistance to producers so they can address environmental issues on their lands. In Colorado, we receive around $30 million to $40 million a year for projects that, for example, reduce water waste, improve water quality or provide fencing that keeps livestock out of sensitive areas.

The bill also reauthorizes the Conservation Reserve Program, which helps producers retire and restore agricultural land that, if taken out of production, would provide significant environmental benefits. In Colorado alone, we have around 2.3 million acres enrolled in CRP for purposes ranging from erosion control and habitat preservation to improving water use. The reauthorization in this bill will allow us to continue to make these wise investments in stewardship.

Mr. President, a parliamentary inquiry: How much time do I have?

Mr. President, if my colleague from Tennessee will allow me, I ask unanimous consent for an additional 5 minutes to get through the conclusion of my speech.

Mr. President, I thank my colleague and friend and comrade from Tennessee.

Beyond the conservation programs which are so much at the heart of this legislation, we also know that at the heart of this legislation is the food security of our country and the nutrition title.

In addition to the rural development, energy production, and conservation practices in this bill, the 2007 farm bill helps ensure the continued production of safe, healthy food right here at home.

Since our founding, agriculture has been indispensable to our economy and our prosperity. Corn, tobacco, and cotton helped fund the Revolution and the organization of our young States. The promise of free land brought millions of new settlers to the West where they planted wheat, raised cattle, and cultivated the earth. The productivity of our farms sustained the war effort as we defeated the Fascists and Nazis, helped rebuild Europe and Japan, and liberated the world. Now, as we search for new ways to power our economy, our farms and ranches offer new promise for a new, clean energy economy.

Growing up on a ranch in the San Luis Valley taught me how tough it is to make a living off the land. You work sunup to sundown all year, 7 days a week, to raise a good crop or a healthy herd, and then, without anything you can do to prevent it, a hailstorm, disease, drought, or flooding can wipe it all away in a moment's notice. When you do have a bumper crop, you sometimes find everyone else has had a bumper crop that year too. As a result, prices fall and you actually sometimes do worse.

The bill that is before us helps producers and, therefore, helps all of us by bringing some level of certainty and structure to agricultural markets. We cannot and should not take the risk out of our farming and ranching--it is a tough business however you cut it--but we can help make the very bad years a little less painful in rural America. The little bit of uncertainty that favorable loan rates or a countercyclical program can provide is often the difference between whether a family loses the farm or keeps the farm.

Why, some may ask, should we care about whether a family is able to stay on their farm? Why should we care? For many years--from my days as attorney general to my days in the Senate--I have always had a sign on my desk that says: ``No Farms, No Food.'' To me, that statement tells the story about the importance of food security for our country.

The fresh fruits, grain, meats, and vegetables that come from our farms and ranches are essential to public health, reducing hunger, and ensuring that Americans can always find affordable, safe food at their grocery store.

A great example of how the bill benefits both producers and consumers is the Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Program, championed by Chairman Harkin, which provides fruits and vegetables to schoolchildren across all of America. We are expanding this program now so it covers all 50 States, up from the 14 States that have been covered by this program in the past. For me and my constituents in Colorado, it means that 80,000 children are going to get fresh fruits and vegetables in their school lunches. This will reduce childhood obesity, increase productivity in school, and teach habits for a healthy lifestyle.

I want to speak briefly about some farm bill reform measures that are included in the bill.

Although we all benefit from smart investments in programs that help provide stability and certainty for producers, we also must be wary of waste and abuse. The 2002 farm bill was not perfect, and I am pleased the Agriculture Committee took this year's reauthorization as an opportunity to address its shortcomings.

Our bill, for example, includes significant reforms on how we deal with payment limits. USDA payments must now be attributed to an actual person--a real live person, one who breathes and walks and works the soil--as opposed to some amorphous entity. Previously, individuals were finding ways to collect payments from up to three different operations under the so-called three-entity rule. We have abolished that in this farm bill.

The 2002 farm bill also left open several loopholes that have allowed farm bill dollars to go to nonfarmers for land that is no longer in agriculture. I am proud to have worked with my colleague from Nebraska, Senator Ben Nelson, on language incorporated into the legislation that stops this waste. Our language prohibits the distribution of commodity support payments for land that has been subdivided for houses or transferred to other nonagricultural uses. This is an important fix.

So is our reform to how Washington deals with agricultural disasters equally important. From time to time, farmers and ranchers get hit by droughts, floods, or tornadoes that wipe away their crop. It happened to us in Colorado last winter in the southeastern part of our State, where a blizzard buried whole herds of livestock. Our producers lost thousands of head of cattle out in southeastern Colorado.

How did Washington respond to that agricultural disaster? Washington responded in its own typical fashion: USDA declares it a disaster. Congress scrambles to find emergency funding. The bill gets stalled, and then farmers and ranchers have to wait 2, 3, 4 years before they get any kind of relief.

What is wrong with this picture? First, we are not delivering disaster assistance efficiently. Second, we should not be relying on emergency spending to provide disaster assistance. We need to put these expenditures back on the books.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have 3 more minutes to finish my statement.

On disaster assistance and the importance of us creating a permanent disaster assistance fund, first, we are not delivering disaster assistance efficiently to date. Secondly, we should not be relying on emergency spending to provide disaster assistance. We need to put these expenditures back on the books. Congress has passed 23-- 23--ad hoc disaster assistance bills since 1988. That is 23 since 1988. Although I am supportive of this emergency assistance and have helped push this emergency disaster assistance forward in the last 2\1/2\ years, I believe we need to create a system for disaster aid that will respond more efficiently and promptly to the needs of our ranchers and farmers.

What we have done on this bill--thanks to the leadership of Chairman Baucus and Ranking Member Grassley on the Finance Committee--is to create a permanent trust fund for disaster assistance. This will allow us to maintain discipline and high standards for determining when to pay out disaster funds, and it will allow producers to get help more quickly. It is a sensible and fiscally responsible solution.

The American farmer has always been an engine for prosperity and opportunity in America. Through revolution, western settlement, depression, and world wars, the men and women who work our lands have always been there to lead us through the next great challenge that faces our country. Today, we are faced with a new challenge--that of building a clean energy economy for the 21st century--and we need the help of our farmers and ranchers to get us there.

Our national security, our economic security, and our environmental security all demand that we grow our way toward energy independence. It is an imperative, but it is also a great opportunity for our Nation.

The country that successfully replaces its imports of foreign oil with clean, homegrown energy will reap competitive and technological advantages that will keep it out in front of the rest of the world for decades to come. We can play a part in this new economy, but the productivity and ingenuity of rural America is our greatest untapped resource in our quest to reduce our dependence on foreign oil.

I am excited about this bill, with its investments in rural development, energy technology, and wise stewardship. It taps the great resource of rural America while strengthening our ability to produce clean, safe, and affordable food.

This bill represents the best type of work we can do in the Senate-- cooperative, bipartisan work that is focused on creating new opportunities for our country.

I thank again the leadership of both the Agriculture and Finance Committees for allowing us to move forward with this legislation and to bring the legislation to the floor today.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, as I understand it, there will be 3 hours evenly divided.

I am sorry, an hour and a half--45 minutes on each side-- and then we will proceed to start voting on the farm bill.

We had a great debate last night. I appreciate all the Senators who came over and spoke so forcefully and favorably for this bill. There are a few more speakers who want to speak this morning, and then we will have a little bit of a wrap-up again.

Mr. President, I yield the floor for others who want to start speaking on the farm bill.

Mr. President, I yield 5 minutes--and maybe more if he needs it--to the Senator from North Dakota, who has been so instrumental in getting us to this point.

Mr. President, I am going to yield 10 minutes to the Senator from Montana, Senator Baucus. Before I do, let me publicly thank Senator Baucus, the chairman of the Finance Committee, who is also a very valuable member of our Agriculture Committee, for all his help on this farm bill. I can honestly say we wouldn't be here today had it not been for the effort and the work of Senator Baucus and of course his ranking member, my colleague from Iowa, Senator Grassley, to come up with the funds we needed not by raising taxes but by closing loopholes and thereby saving some money that they were able to give us so we could meet our needs in this farm bill. Senator Baucus and I came to Congress together in 1974. We were classmates. We have been friends throughout all these years.

I thank Senator Baucus for all of his diligence also in attending all of the meetings of our conferences which went on and on for hours at a time. He was always there as a valuable member giving his input into getting us to this point. The farmers and ranchers of Montana and the people who live in rural communities in Montana have no stronger voice, no better champion for them than the senior Senator from Montana. I publicly thank him for all of his help on this bill.

I yield 10 minutes to the Senator from Montana.

Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Montana, my good friend for all these years. We first came here in 1974. I thank him for working diligently to make sure we had funding for this bill and some tax provisions we had in this bill that help correct inequities we did in the past. I thank the Senator. I will have more to say.

I have other speakers we need to recognize. I yield 4 minutes to the Senator from New Mexico.

I yield 3 minutes to the Senator from Washington State, Senator Murray.

Mr. President, I yield up to 4 minutes to another great member of our Agriculture Committee, the Senator from Pennsylvania, Mr. Casey.

Mr. President, I yield 4 minutes to another valuable member of our committee, Senator Brown from Ohio, whose signature on this bill is the option that farmers have on the ACRE Program. I thank him for all of his efforts in making sure we had that in the bill.

How much time remains on this side?

I will let Senator Gregg go first, so I may finish debate on the bill.

Mr. President, let me bring to a close this debate on the farm bill. First, let me recap. This is not called the farm bill. It is called the Food, Conservation, and Energy Act for good reason--because 67 percent of all the new money in this bill goes to nutrition to help low-income Americans, to help our kids in school get a better diet of fresh fruits and vegetables. We also lifted the childcare cap that has been there since 1993. Right now it is $175 a month. The average cost of childcare is $631 dollars a month. We have lifted the cap on childcare deductibility for those low income Americans who need food assistance. Let me read this quote from Second Harvest, Vicki Escarra, president of America's Second Harvest:

On behalf of our nation's food banks, I urge Senators to

vote in favor of this hunger-fighting farm bill for the

millions of low-income Americans on the brink of catastrophe,

facing some of the most difficult economic times they have

had to endure in years. I urge Senators to support this

vitally important and necessary legislation.

On specialty crops, we have done more on specialty crops than any farm bill before. We put a new title in this bill, almost $3 billion going to fruits and vegetables, horticulture, all the things that, again, lend themselves to a healthier diet and a healthier America. There is also a quote from the organization supporting specialty crops that says in part: This farm bill represents a sea change in U.S. agriculture policy and a historic investment in the future of the fruit and vegetable producers across this country. We have taken a bold step to expand the fresh fruit and vegetable snack program to all 50 States, which makes certain this farm bill doesn't just help farmers but helps schoolchildren have greater access to fruits and vegetables. ``This is truly a win-win for both agriculture and the public.'' On livestock, we improved the protections for livestock producers when they make contracts. I wish to publicly thank my colleague from Iowa, Senator Grassley, for making sure we had those provisions in this bill. The country of origin labeling now will go into effect this fall so we will know where our meat products come from and, finally, we will have the interstate shipment of State-inspected meat after all these years. On conservation, we have done more for conservation in this bill than any farm bill ever passed, almost 41 percent of all the money that is paid to agricultural producers will be paid through conservation programs to protect our soil, wildlife habitats, and clean water.

Lastly, I showed this picture yesterday. I show it again. This is the countryside that we want where farmers can plant and grow crops, but they do it in an environmentally sound way, with clean water and clean streams, with buffer strips, wildlife habitat all across the country. That is what is so good about this bill because we have improved the conservation programs.

This is a bipartisan bill. In fact, I got a note this morning that our former Secretary of Agriculture, Mike Johanns, has now said he would vote for the bill. He would support it.

In all my years here--this is my seventh farm bill in 30-some years-- I have never seen so many groups come together to support a farm bill, over 500 groups. Farm groups, conservation groups, hunters and fishermen, energy groups for renewable energy, antihunger groups, religious groups--I have never seen such a broad coalition of over 500 groups in support of this bill. Now we have the former Secretary of Agriculture saying he would support it. All these groups support the farm bill. The President says he wants to veto it. Evidently, he is right and everybody else is wrong. I beg to differ. This is a great bipartisan bill.

We keep hearing from people: Why can't you people work together, quit bickering, get things done? We did that here. We worked together in a year and a half to produce this great product.

I wish to especially thank my ranking member, Senator Chambliss, for all his great work. Senator Chambliss reminds me a little bit of old Senator Sam Ervin, who used to say ``I am just a poor, little old country lawyer from the rural South.'' Senator Chambliss may say something like that, but I can tell you he is one smart, intelligent, good negotiator. He brought this farm bill forward when he was chairman. I couldn't have asked for a better partner and working relationship in getting this bill through. I can honestly say, without any fear of contradiction, had it not been for Senator Chambliss and all his hard work, we would not have gotten the 79 votes we got for this bill in December. The fact that I think we will have an overwhelming vote today is a tribute to Senator Chambliss's leadership and hard work on behalf of all agriculture. One thing I will say about Senator Chambliss, he is a proud conservative. The only thing he is liberal about is giving out those Georgia peanuts. I want him to know, I appreciate those peanuts.

Let me thank all the members of our committee. In particular, I thank the members of our conference committee. I mentioned Senator Grassley, who worked so hard on the Finance Committee portion of the bill; Senator Baucus, who as chairman of the Finance Committee got the money for us. I wish to especially thank Senator Conrad, our budget chairman, for his expertise, knowledge, diligence. Senator Conrad was there for every meeting. He hung in there on this farm bill from the beginning to the end. We could not have gotten where we are without the help, the support, the knowledge, the expertise of Senator Conrad. I wish to say, again, that the farmers and ranchers of North Dakota have no better fighter for them, no stronger advocate than they have in Senator Conrad. I can tell you nothing escapes his attention. When it comes to fighting for the farmers and ranchers of North Dakota, Kent Conrad is always in the lead.

I wish to publicly thank him and his staff for all the help on this bill.

Senator Leahy, the former chairman, who also fights for Vermont farmers, especially dairy producers. He had a great seat at this table. He made sure

we took care of dairy farmers and nutrition. There is no stronger fighter for our dairy farmers and nutrition than Senator Leahy. Senator Lincoln, who chairs our Subcommittee on Production, Income Protection, and Price Support, a strong advocate for Arkansas rice and grain and oilseed farmers. Senator Lincoln is a strong fighter for rural residents, people who live in small towns and communities. Senator Stabenow, another conferee I am now going to refer to as the Senator of specialty crops, because it was Senator Stabenow's strong advocacy that led to the first-ever inclusion of a specific title for specialty crops in this bill and nearly doubled the support for it.

Lastly, let me reach across to the other Chamber and thank Congressman Peterson from Minnesota. We have been working together on this over a year, Saturdays and Sundays, and weekdays and nights, on the phone. I also want to thank Congressman Bob Goodlatte. What a great companion he has been to fight for conservation and rural development, working hard to bring forth this bill.

Again, they say the art of good legislation is cooperation and compromise. We had good cooperation between parties, between the House and the Senate, and we have a farm bill we can all be proud of.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that a letter from over 500 organizations supporting the Food, Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008 be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I move to waive paragraph 8 of rule XLIV with respect to all provisions of the conference report to accompany H.R. 2419, the Food, Conservation, and Energy Act, and I ask for the yeas and nays.

I would be pleased to yield

The Senator is correct. Section 8107 of the bill contains a ``savings'' provision that explicitly states that nothing in this legislation ``alters, abridges, diminishes, repeals, or affects any agreement between the Forest Service and an Indian tribe''. Section 8105 of this bill does not in any way affect valid treaty rights of tribes to gather forest products from National Forest System lands.

Madam President, I move to reconsider the vote and I move to lay that motion on the table.

The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Madam President, we have had a very significant vote here on this farm bill. I will have to check the record, but this has to be one of the strongest votes for any farm bill in the history of farm bill legislation in the Senate.

It has truly been a team effort. It took a long time--about a year and a half; 2 years, actually. Senator Chambliss, when he was chairman of the committee, started the whole process, so it has been a couple of years in the making. It has been a great team effort. As I said, we have all worked together. It has been a very long road with a lot of tough negotiations. We did it in a manner in which the people of this country want us to operate around here.

We worked hard and got the bill through committee. We brought it to the floor. We had our amendments, we had good debates in December, passed it at that time, then we went to conference. We had a good number of conference meetings, frankly. But they were good conference meetings. That is the way we ought to do legislation around here. The proof of doing it in that manner--in an open, cooperative manner, having all sides being able to have their viewpoints heard and input made--is that we came up with good legislation as an end product.

I want to thank and congratulate all of the members of the Agriculture Committee, on both sides, for all of their hard work in bringing this bill to this vote today. I especially want to thank Senator Chambliss for his leadership in starting this off and then serving as the ranking member for the last year and a half and working so closely with me and others to get this bill done. I especially want to thank all the Senators who were conferees. There were some long sessions that went on for hours and hours and days and days. But we hung in there.

I will start with Senator Baucus and Senator Grassley from Iowa, the chairman and ranking member of the Finance Committee, for their help in coming up with the funds we needed to put this bill together. Especially I thanked my colleague from Iowa earlier, but I want to thank him also for his diligent work and effort to make sure we had a good livestock, poultry, and competition title.

I see my good friend, Kent Conrad. I said earlier, we certainly benefited from his expertise, his knowledge. It is wonderful having the budget chairman on the Agriculture Committee helps keep us on track so we know what we can and cannot do to stay within the bounds of the budget rules.

So I cannot thank Senator Conrad and his staff enough for helping us comply with the budget requirements. I say to the people of North Dakota, the farmers, the ranchers, the people who live in your small towns and communities, I can honestly say I know Kent Conrad well. And there is nothing that escapes his attention when it comes to the farmers and ranchers and rural people of North Dakota. They do not have a better fighter for their interests. I might even expand that further. Farmers and ranchers and rural people all over America have no greater a fighter for their interests than Kent Conrad.

I see Senator Stabenow. I said earlier I am going to start calling her the Senator of specialty crops. We would not have had a specialty crop title in this bill if it had not been for Senator Stabenow. She is unique, the only person, as far as I know, who has served on the Agriculture Committees of her State legislature, the Agriculture Committee of the House of Representatives, and the Agriculture Committee of the Senate. And that expertise shows through, believe me, in what she has accomplished in this farm bill.

I see my good friend, Senator Salazar, who did so much to make sure we had a good energy title; that we start focusing much more on ethanol from cellulose.

Senator Lincoln from Arkansas, a strong fighter for the rice farmers, her cotton, grain, and oilseed farmers. I might also say that Senator Lincoln is a very strong fighter for nutrition programs and rural development. I thank her for all of her help on this committee.

I am going to read a list and recognize all of the staff members who work for me on the committee. They deserve to have their names in this Record because as hard as we worked, they worked three or four times as hard. A lot of times we went home at night and they were still here. A lot of times we were gone on the weekends, they were here.

And, of course, first and foremost, I would thank Mark Halverson. Mark has been with me on this committee since 1988. And he has brought a wealth of experience as a farmer in Iowa, and also as a lawyer. So he brings together a lot of knowledge and expertise in guiding and directing the staff. He has done a wonderful job. I cannot thank Mark Halverson enough for his patience, his leadership, and in juggling all of the balls and keeping tabs on everything. Mark Halverson has performed above and beyond the call of duty.

Susan Keith, our general counsel in commodities; Stephanie Mercier, our chief economist, trade and international food assistance and crop insurance; Phil Buchan, who worked so hard on conservation, and especially the conservation stewardship program and the EQIP Program; Eldon Boes, who came to us from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. He has done so much work on the energy title.

Derek Miller--Derek came to us from the House side where he worked on the 2002 farm bill. He is probably the most knowledgeable person I have ever met on nutrition and how the nutrition programs work. And due in no small part to Derek Miller, we have a great nutrition title.

Richard Bender, a long-time member of my staff who handles rural development and the tax provisions; Todd Batta handled the forestry and credit titles; and John Ferrell, who did all of our livestock work and the programs for organic farmers.

Adela Ramos, who does a great job keeping track of all of the ag research and food safety; Dave White from Montana who as a detailee from the Natural Resources Conservation Service, was with us for a year and a half, and worked so hard on conservation; Dan Christenson, who did so much on specialty crops and helping with nutrition; Kerri Johannsen, who worked on energy; Tina May on conservation; Amy Lowenthal, who is our counsel providing legal advice on many issues.

Eric Juzenas, who came to us as a detailee from the CFTC for the reauthorization of the Commodities Exchange Act; Katharine Ferguson, who is a professional staff member who assists our staff director, Mark Halveson. We call her our ``utility player''. Whenever we need someone, Katharine is there. She can fill in for anybody and does it extremely well.

Kate Cyrul, our communications director; Bob Sturm, our chief clerk who retired last year. He was here for many of the hearings on this bill and came back to fill in periodically; Jessie Williams, our chief clerk who has done such a great job of succeeding Bob Sturm; Jacob Chaney, our systems administrator; Jonathan Urban, who did so much on the CFTC reauthorization, before he left the staff to head to law school. We wish him the best in law school. Peter Kelley, our assistant clerk and legislative correspondent, who sort of runs interference for all of us; Cory Claussen, our legislative correspondent; Micah Wortham, the Government Printing Office detailee who is here to make sure our documents are printed properly; Ellen Huntoon, who covers rural development and agricultural topics.

Now, again, I know that Senator Chambliss has thanked all of his staff. I do not know every single person there, but I do know Martha Scott Poindexter and Vernie Hubert. I particularly want to thank both of them for their great efforts, for their leadership, and for all the time and the efforts and the weekends, the nights. You ought to take a vacation too.

Also, I want to thank the Office of Legislative Counsel, the Congressional Budget Office, the Senate floor staff, the Department of Agriculture staff. Now, I know the administration has not agreed with us on everything in this bill. But I have to say, the technical assistance provided by the Department was very helpful in putting everything together.

Again, I thank and congratulate all of the staffs of the Senators on our committee--especially Senators Baucus, Grassley, Conrad. I feel very good about this bill and the overwhelming vote. I still remain hopeful the President will sign this bill. Hope springs eternal that he will sign it. If he does not, I guess we will have to face that down the road. I hope we have the votes to override. Team effort, cooperation, conciliation, bipartisanship, those are the keys to successful legislation. I am gratified to have played this role in getting this bill passed.