Court Security Improvement Act of 2007

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be set aside and that amendment No. 891 be called up for its consideration.

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

Mr. President, this is a very simple amendment. It says: it is the sense of the Senate that we should not create new spending programs when we have to borrow money to pay for them; that, in fact, we ought to create priorities, that the priorities ought to be the same type of priorities that everybody in this country has to face every day with their own personal budget, that they cannot go out and use their credit card without having a consequence.

This is a very simple amendment. I wish to read it thoroughly so everybody understands what the amendment says. It says the following:

The Senate finds that--

(1) the national debt of the United States of America now

exceeds $8,500,000,000,000;

(2) each United States citizen's share of this debt--

from the oldest to the youngest--

is approximately $29,183;

(3) every [penny] that the United States Government borrows

and adds to this debt is money [that will be borrowed] from

future generations of Americans and from important programs,

including Social Security and Medicare on which our senior

citizens depend for their retirement security;

It also states:

(4) the power of the purse belongs to Congress;

(5) Congress authorizes and appropriates all Federal

discretionary spending;

(6) for too long, Congress has simply borrowed more and

more money to pay for new spending, while Americans want

Congress to live within its means, using the same set of

common sense rules and restraints [every American faces]

everyday; because in the real world, families cannot follow

Congress's example and must make difficult decisions and set

priorities on how to spend their limited financial resources.

. . .

Mr. President, I am happy to yield for a question.

Absolutely. I agree with that.

This is a sense of the Senate. I would be happy for us not to borrow money. We had $200 billion a year in waste, fraud, abuse, and duplication outlined by the Federal Financial Management Subcommittee last year. Appropriators refused to look at that, ways to fund it. Mr. President, $200 billion--we could spend $100 billion on the war and $100 billion to lower the deficit. I would be very happy to apply this to everything we do. Every American has to do exactly the same thing with their own budget every day.

The Senator makes a great point. The realistic fact is, we decreased the Federal debt $2 billion under the entire Clinton administration. Mr. President, $2 billion. One year we had a true surplus--a true surplus. That was the extent of it. And since then, and before then, we have borrowed the future of our children away.

To continue, this resolution states:

(7) it is irresponsible for Congress to authorize new

spending for programs that will result in borrowing from

Social Security. . . .

I say to Social Security recipients, we borrowed $140 billion, last year, from Social Security to pay for things we were not willing to either trim down, make more efficient or eliminate in duplicative programs.

We also are borrowing from foreign governments. That is affecting our financial status. But most importantly, we are borrowing from future generations of Americans.

The amendment states:

(b) . . . It is the sense of the Senate that Congress has a

moral obligation to offset the cost of new government

programs, initiatives, and authorizations.

It is very simple. A resolution has no impact of law. It says: We agree, here are the rules under which we ought to operate. It does not bind anybody. It says, if we are going to create new programs, we either ought to find a way where we do not borrow to pay for them or we ought to offset them by eliminating ineffective programs.

In 2001, as the Senator rightly noted, the Federal debt per person in this country was $21,000. It has risen almost $10,000 since 2001. A lot of people are quick to dismiss that figure, say it does not matter, we only need to worry about the debt and the deficits as compared to the economic growth in the size of our economy. A better rule of thumb is how Government growth compares to the growth of wages and earnings. Last fiscal year alone, the real Federal deficit increased in excess of $300 billion--a debt our children and grandchildren will repay. So $7.2 billion was spent each day, or $84,000 was spent per second--per second. If regular Americans must tighten their belts to live within their means, the Federal Government should do the same instead of authorizing new spending without offsetting similar spending.

Last year's interest costs alone were 8 percent of the total Federal budget. In contrast, the average American spends about 5 percent of their income as a percentage of their interest costs. The Federal Government spent $226 billion on interest costs alone. According to the Government Accountability Office, by the year 2030, interest will consume 25 percent--25 percent--of the Federal debt.

So why do I bring this resolution to the floor? I bring the resolution to the floor to make the point that when we authorize new programs, we ought to find the money to pay for them and we ought to reduce programs that aren't effective. We ought to look at the programs that aren't accomplishing what we want them to, we ought to eliminate duplicate programs where one works well and one doesn't work quite so well and put the money into the one that works well so we get good value for our dollars, and we ought to change the habits under which we work so we can all accomplish what we would like to see.

I would like to see middle-income wages rise in this country at a rate faster than they rise for the wealthy

class. I would like to see opportunity enhanced in this country. I would like to see a balanced budget so we don't steal opportunity from our children and our grandchildren. I don't think most people disagree with that.

The reason we are out here debating this is I had a simple request: Let's just find some deauthorization amendments so that when we bring this new and very needed bill to the floor--and I agree and I think everybody on the Judiciary Committee agrees this is a good bill; it is going to pass--shouldn't we make some hard choices, just like every family makes? Instead, we choose not to. We decide we will pass a new bill. We will add $40 million a year to the cost to run the Government, but we won't deauthorize anything that is out there that is not working effectively. We won't fix the improper payments that are going on in this country to the tune of about $40 billion--that is billion with a ``b.'' That is a thousand times more in improper payments than this bill costs. We won't do the hard work that is necessary.

I am happy to yield to the Senator. By the way, I enjoyed the Senator's speech on Darfur, and as the Senator from Illinois knows, I agree with him very much. I thank him for his efforts on the genocide that is now occurring in Darfur.

None.

I am happy to answer it.

No, it is not.

Mr. President, reclaiming the floor, here is what it is about. The Senator from Illinois is a great advocate for those who are less fortunate in this country. That is what this is about. It is about changing the habits of the Senate.

I understand the appropriations process. I understand the authorization process. Changing the habits says we are not going to authorize new programs until we have done our homework on the programs that aren't effective. That is the whole purpose of this amendment.

I understand the Senator's consternation with my desire. I understand that most people inside Washington disagree. But I also understand that most people outside of Washington say that if you increase spending-- authorized spending, not appropriated spending but authorized spending--$40 million and never look at what you can deauthorize, whenever we get to a surplus or when we get to a balanced budget, we are going to spend more money. We are not going to make the hard choices. That is exactly what happens. We can disagree with that but, in fact, that is how we got an $8.9 trillion deficit. That is how we ran a $300 billion-plus deficit this year. It is the process. It is the process where we have decided that authorization has minimal power to influence in this body and that appropriations has all power.

My point in making us debate this resolution on this bill and bringing it up is to say: Let's start the process where we start looking, as our oath charges us to do, at what doesn't work. Let's bring a bill that authorizes something that is very good and bring a bill that deauthorizes something that might get funding even though it is not effective.

I will give an example: the COPS Program. It is a very good program. It helps a lot of cities. Why shouldn't it be competitively bid? Why shouldn't the cities with the most need get the help with their police force rather than the cities whose Members put an earmark in for the COPS Program, and any money that doesn't go to true need comes back to the Federal Treasury? Why wouldn't we do that? Because that is hard work. Because we might alienate one group as we do what is best for everybody in America.

I understand the resistance to my efforts in challenging the way we operate in the Senate, and I understand the opposition to my techniques and methods in trying to accomplish that. However, as the Senator from Illinois knows, if I am a champion for anything, I am a champion for making sure we don't waste one penny anywhere. The best way to do that is to start having good habits in how we arrange what we are going to spend.

The fact is, it is very easy to find offsets in authorization because we have three times as much authorized as we actually spend. So the Senator's point is exactly true, but it doesn't direct us down to the problem. If we get in the habit of making the decision we are going to look at the programs that don't work, we are going to deauthorize the programs that don't work, guess what we will do. We eventually might get rid of the one $1 of every $5 on the discretionary side today that is either waste, fraud, abuse, or duplication--$1 in $5. No one in this body blows 20 percent of their personal budget on stuff that doesn't mean anything or have any return. Yet in the discretionary budget, everything except Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security, that is exactly what we do. It is exactly what we do. So why would we not say: Let's change. Let's fulfill an obligation to two generations from us now. I know what I am doing today isn't going to have a great impact on the next appropriations bill or the next one after that or the one after that, but 5 years from now, it might have an impact.

The point is, let's live like everybody else out there. Let's not take the credit card and not look at the things we really should be looking at. Let's do some extra work. Let's try to accomplish what is best for everybody in this country, no matter what their economic station in life, no matter what their background, no matter what their position is. They all have a limited budget. They have to make choices. They have to make choices, and they have to prioritize things. The Senate doesn't; they just authorize another bill and never deauthorize anything else.

Mr. President, with that, I yield the floor and ask for the yeas and nays.

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

Under your premise, only bills that are authorized get funded, correct?

Except you are wrong. Last year, $220 billion of unauthorized programs were appropriated.

If I may--will the Senator yield to me? I am happy to yield back in a moment.

Let's carry your analogy a little further. What has really happened is you give your son $200, but the mandate is--you are going to spend $100 on a broken iPod or a used iPod, and you have $100 to buy down towards a good one, but you mandate that you spend $100 on the bad one. That is the analogy. That is why we ought to deauthorize programs that aren't working. That is why we ought to oversight aggressively every area of the Federal Government.

Let me take one other exception, and then I will be happy to yield back to the Senator.

I love it. I love to debate the Senator from Illinois.

I take a different tact, and the Senator knows that. I look at the oath I took when I came to the Senate. It didn't say ``Oklahoma'' in it; the Senator's didn't say ``Illinois.'' What the oath says is to defend the Constitution of the United States and do what is best for the country as a whole and in the long term.

Now, the Senator--and I admire him greatly--admitted that he plays the game the way it is played. I am telling him that the American people are ready for the game to be played a different way--a totally different way. Part of that is looking at the authority under which we allow money to be spent and recognizing that if we are going to authorize something new, given the jam we are in, all you have to do is talk to David Walker and look at what is going to happen in the next two generations. Don't we have an obligation to look at the programs that are not authorized?

Would the Senator answer this question: When was the last time he saw a program deauthorized in this body?

Mr. President, reclaiming the floor, if I might, the thing that strikes me is the Senator is a wonderful debater, except when he says the appropriators appropriating money on an authorized program--that is great, except the American public needs to know that 22 percent of what we appropriate has never been authorized. Never.

So the fact is, we say authorization means something, but it means nothing as far as the appropriations process goes. The real point of this debate is how do we grab hold of this problem, this behemoth of a problem that will face our children and grandchildren in the next 20 to 25 years, and do it in a way that will give us the greatest opportunity for them?

My idea--and obviously many people disagree with it--is I think we ought to start looking at every program. We ought to ask a couple of questions: Can we measure its effectiveness? Is there a metric on it that says this program is supposed to do this? Is there a metric there so we can measure it? I am of the mind to say that if you cannot measure something, you cannot manage it. Ninety percent of the programs have no metric in the Federal Government, so we don't know if they are working.

No. 2, is it a program that is still needed? We don't ever look at the authorizing level. The Senator would have us defer everything to appropriations, and that is what we actually do because 20 percent of what we appropriate is not authorized and everything we authorize isn't appropriated. So, obviously, authorizations are meaningless. So what we should do is eliminate authorizing committees and just have appropriations committees and we will all be on appropriations committees.

Third, we should ask, is this still a legitimate function of the Federal Government? When we ran a $300 billion-plus true deficit last year and every State, save one, had big surpluses, should we not ask the question: If we are doing things that really are not the Federal Government's role to do, and we have a deficit and the States have a surplus, should we not let them do it without our fingers taking 15 percent of the money as we send it back?

As a matter of fact, I did just that on the last 9/11 bill, and the Senator from Illinois voted against it. I voted to sunset it. I actually offered the amendment that said we should sunset it and look at it in 5 years, and the Senator from Illinois disagreed. He thought, no, we should not do that. This Senator must admit that he does have a constructive suggestion. I just wish he had voted that way when we had the amendment up.

My amendment did not sunset the whole Department of Homeland Security. It was the grants process.

It is made up of how we dole money out to the States rather than looking at the best interests of the country and looking at the risk base for national security and homeland security. I am basically for a true pay-go that says the options are two. One option said the only option is, if we won't cut spending, we will raise taxes. That is a pay-more, not a pay-go. It is pay more.

I am proud of those votes. I had consternation over it because I want to try to hold to those things. But the pay-go as outlined two times in the language was a vote for pay-more.

Will the Senator agree with me that there is waste, fraud, and abuse in the duplication of the Federal Government.

Will the Senator agree that since we had a $300 billion- plus deficit last year--$200 billion-plus if we weren't in the war in Iraq--if we took that off the table, would it not make sense for us to try to get rid of the waste, fraud, duplication, and abuse?

It doesn't include the war. Let me finish my point.

It was in there, but say we were not in the war and we were still down to $200 billion--let's take that off the table. Say we have a $200 billion deficit, and we can demonstrate from our subcommittee hearings $200 billion a year in waste, fraud, and abuse. Yet we did nothing about it. We did nothing.

I have enjoyed my debate with the Senator from Illinois. I ask that we vote on the question at hand. I thank him for his kindness.

As long as it is not a pay-more amendment.

Mr. President, I have an amendment in my hand by Senator John Ensign. I will send it to the desk. I ask unanimous consent to set aside the pending amendment and to have this called up.

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

Mr. President, I wish to speak in favor of S. 378, the Court Security Improvement Act. But before I do, I wish to address remarks made this morning by the majority whip, the distinguished Senator from Illinois, for whom I have a lot of respect, but I have to tell you, I disagree with those comments, and I wish to take a few moments to explain why.

Throughout his comments, the Senator repeated the theme that Republicans were stopping debate on the floor and not allowing bills to be debated. I disagree with him, and I believe nothing could be farther from the truth. The truth is, as I see it, the majority has tried to force things through the Senate, and they have done so in a way that has denied the minority an opportunity to offer amendments and to allow this body, the so-called world's greatest deliberative body, to

even have votes and make decisions on those important amendments.

This morning, the Democratic whip talked about our Founders' intent that ``minority rights would always be respected.'' In this body, minority rights are not being respected. That is the problem. So we have no choice but to assert the last protection against majority tyranny; that is, to object or vote against invoking cloture or closing off debate.

In the past, the majority has used cloture when necessary to move a bill forward, after debate has been exhausted, but the minority refuses to allow movement on the legislation. I think that is a perfectly legitimate use of the cloture motion.

By this date in the 109th Congress--the Congress just preceding the current Congress--Republicans, when they were in the majority, had filed cloture four times. In the 108th Congress--the immediately preceding Congress--at this point in time, when Republicans were in the majority, Republicans had filed cloture five times. In the 107th Congress, Republicans only filed cloture one time at this point in time.

By comparison, since the Democrats have now become the new majority in the Senate, Democrats have filed cloture 22 times. The question naturally arises: Why are Democrats using this divisive tactic so frequently to close off debate?

Well, I think my colleague from Illinois disclosed the reason this morning when he stated:

Ultimately, they will be held accountable for their

strategy. That is what elections are all about.

It is the view from this Senator, from my perspective, the Democrats are using this tactic to paint Republicans as obstructionists, when the exact opposite is true. The new Democratic majority in the Senate is refusing to allow full and fair debate on issue after issue and, more importantly, denying us an opportunity to offer amendments on important legislation and to simply have an up-or-down vote on those amendments.

I can tell you, from my perspective, Republicans do not enjoy the procedural clash any more than Democrats do. But it is necessary to protect this institution and, even more importantly, necessary to protect the rights afforded in the Senate to the minority.

We have been eager to engage in full debate, and we understand the rules that majorities will prevail when majorities have an opportunity to vote. But the rules do not permit the new majority, the Democrats, to unilaterally set the terms for the debate. Until the Democratic majority recognizes all Members of this body have the right to debate legislation, to offer amendments, and to have votes on those amendments, we will continue in this standoff.

It is true, I believe, that only the majority--the new Democratic majority--can fix this problem by simply allowing full debate to go forward and by allowing up-or-down votes on amendments on the Senate floor, which requires discussions, which requires negotiations, and, yes, it requires compromise.

Filing cloture--closing off debate--is an intensely aggressive move. It says: We do not want to hear your opinions. We do not want to hear your views. We do not want to consider your ideas on how to improve the legislation on the floor of the Senate. We want to shut down the debate, and we want to shove this legislation through the Senate. It is a ``my way or the highway'' approach to legislation. And do you know what. It does not work.

I would point out--and I guess it is fair to say if you have been in the Senate long enough--and I have not--but I have been told, if you have been in the Senate long enough, you will find yourself, at some points in your career, on the side of the majority, and at other times you will find yourself on the side of the minority. It is the way it works.

Last Congress, when Democrats were in the minority, they insisted that the filing of cloture turned the Senate into the House of Representatives--a refusal to allow open and broad debate, with hard majority rule. Here they are now, though, attempting to cut off debate at, it seems, almost every possible turn. It is the reason--and this is the consequence of it; it is not just complaining about it; this is the consequence that has a very real impact on the American people because the new majority, the Democratic majority, has refused an opportunity for full and fair debate and votes on amendments--that is the reason why Democrats have not sent any real legislation to the President for his signature after 3 months in power. They have chosen the hard edge of party politics instead of bipartisanship.

Our Democratic friends have chosen to pursue this agenda driven by campaign rhetoric instead of seeking the broad middle ground and trying to negotiate and to pass legislation on behalf of the American people. It is true that Democrats won the last election--and my congratulations to them--on a message of bipartisanship, on a message of, let's get things done. But their choices to date have not reflected any effort to seriously reach across the aisle to do that.

One example that comes to mind is on Iraq. My colleague from Illinois claimed:

We were stopped, stopped by the Republican minority. They

would not allow us to go to the substance of that debate.

They didn't want the Senate to spend its time on the floor

considering a resolution, going on record as to whether we

approve or disapprove of the President's action.

The fact is, completely the opposite occurred. Republicans on this incredibly important debate asked only that we be allowed to discuss the issue fully, and the Democratic majority repeatedly attempted to ram through their resolution without offering any alternatives or any opportunity for alternative resolutions to be considered and voted on. We explained this on the Senate floor over and over during that discussion, but our colleagues in the majority simply turned a deaf ear to our concerns. When they finally allowed several options to be considered, we were able to have a full debate we had been asking for all along, and then the process moved forward.

I would point out that was on the 20th iteration of the resolutions on Iraq before we had an opportunity to have that debate, a vote, and to move the process forward.

My colleague from Illinois repeated several times this morning his hope that we could ``find some ways to establish bipartisan cooperation.''

I say to my colleague, there is a way to do that. The majority must stop trying to ram legislation through and allow us to debate openly and to file relevant amendments and allow an up-or-down vote on those amendments.

My colleague from Illinois talked about the ``do-nothing Congress'' of last year--that was his phraseology--and placed sole blame for the current majority's lack of accomplishments on the minority's refusal to invoke cloture or close off debate. The Washington Post just this morning reported that only 26 percent of the public thinks the current Democratic majority in Congress has accomplished ``a great deal'' or ``a good amount.''

The fact is, this approach to legislating has not produced a single piece of significant legislation so far in this Congress due to the lack of bipartisanship and due to the lack of opportunity the minority has had to fully participate in the debate and shaping of legislation. Of the 17 laws enacted this Congress, 10 of those are naming of Federal properties. Let me say that again. Of the 17 pieces of legislation enacted in this Congress so far, 10 of them involve naming of Federal properties, Federal buildings, post offices and the like. Not one of the ``six for '06'' campaign promises has been passed by Congress.

The majority, to be sure, is blaming the minority for the lack of progress here based on the result of cloture votes, but let's look at the facts.

On the 9/11 bill, the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, the House and the Senate passed different bills. Democratic leadership in neither body has brought up the other's bill so that those might be resolved in a conference committee.

On the minimum wage bill, the House and the Senate passed different versions, but no conferees have been appointed by either body.

On the emergency war supplemental, perhaps the most urgent piece of legislation we could possibly pass and send to the President to support the troops who are in harm's way as I speak, the House and the Senate passed different versions of the bill. The House, fresh off of a 2-week recess, has yet to appoint conferees to start working out

the differences between the bills to get funding to our troops. This is especially damaging and reckless, considering the majority is insisting we send a bill to the President that has a timeline for withdrawal, a provision that has caused the President to promise to veto that legislation. That means before the troops can get the money they need-- in other words, to get them the equipment they need during this war-- before we can get them the money, we have to come up with a bill the President will sign. Yet the Democratic majority has continued to play politics and stall the bill.

On stem cell research, no conferees have been appointed. The same for the budget. The same for lobbying reform. The list goes on and on.

The distinguished Senator from Illinois, the Democratic whip, explained that due to the numbers in this body:

On any given day, if we're going to pass or consider

important legislation, it has to be bipartisan.

And that:

If we're going to be constructive in the United States

Senate, we need much more bipartisan cooperation.

He continued, saying:

We should come together, Democrats and Republicans, and

compromise and cooperate.

And asking,

Isn't it time we really start out on a new day in the

Congress trying to find bipartisan ways to cooperate and

solve the real problems that face our country?

To that I say amen. It is past time for the new majority in this body to stop acting like they are Members of the House of Representatives who are going to be able to force their will by a simple majority through the Senate because this is not the House. This is the Senate. The only way we are going to be able to get any legislation passed is through bipartisan cooperation. The only way we are going to get that cooperation is to meet in the middle somehow, to debate as our constituents would expect us to debate, to take positions--yes, firmly held positions--based on our convictions. But then ultimately we need to have votes on amendments and votes on legislation and let the majority prevail. Let's send the bills to the President for his signature. That is the way it is supposed to work. That is the way it has not been working, but we know the way forward.

I have to tell my colleagues that I and my Republican colleagues would welcome the opportunity to sit down on a bipartisan basis and to reach a consensus on important issues such as how to preserve our entitlement programs, including Social Security, Medicaid, and Medicare by protecting their long-term solvency. How do we avoid passing the bills incurred by the baby boomer generation on down to our children and grandchildren? How can we expand health care access to more Americans? How can we solve our broken immigration system, along with the broken borders that pose a national security risk to each and every American citizen? After all, I have to believe that is the reason we ran for public office. That is the reason we wanted to be elected to serve in the Senate--whether we are a Republican or a Democrat--to make a difference for the American people, to make our country a better place, and to make tomorrow better for our children and grandchildren than it is today. Instead, we spend day after day taking partisan votes that lead to nothing but gridlock. This is the choice of the majority, not the choice of the minority.

After the first 100 days, the Congress is, again, at a fork in the road. So far the new majority has taken the path of partisanship, but we know that will not get us down the road to progress. I hope during the second 100 days of this new Congress, the new majority will pause and decide to take the road less traveled--the road of cooperation and accomplishment.

Mr. President, I want to speak briefly on the Court Security Improvement Act, a bill of which I am proud to be a cosponsor. As we have already heard, this bill is designed to address the critical issue of the security of our judges and courthouse personnel. I have to add as a personal note, this is not a matter of just some academic interest to me. I believe I am correct in that I am the only current Member of the Senate who has served as a member of the judiciary, in my case for 13 years in our State court system in Texas, both at the trial bench and at the Texas Supreme Court level. So this is more than a matter of academic interest to me. Protecting our men and women who personify the rule of law and all that it means is very important.

The dedicated men and women who work in America's courthouses, from the judges to the court reporters to the bailiffs, preside each day over difficult, contentious, and sometimes very emotional disputes.

These public servants, just like our police, are placed in harm's way by the very nature of their jobs. They fulfill essential roles that keep our democracy running smoothly, and I have the greatest respect for the people who try to do this job and try to do it well.

Unfortunately, violence directed at public servants is on the rise, from escalating violence against police officers to courthouse attacks--including in my State of Texas--these despicable actions threaten the administration of justice and threaten our ability to invoke the rule of law.

This Congress has the power, and now we must exercise it, to ensure that certain and swift punishment awaits those who engage in these unconscionable acts of violence. The administration of justice--indeed, the health of our very democracy--depends on our ability to attract dedicated public servants to work at our courthouses. So we must do everything in our power to provide adequate security to these men and women who are too often targeted for violence or harassment simply because of the position they hold and the decisions they are called upon to make.

As a former attorney general in my State, I had the responsibility of defending sentences on appeal of certain defendants who had been found guilty of violent acts. So I am acutely aware of the devastating effects criminal acts of violence have on not only the victims themselves but also on their families. Because I also used to be a judge, I am fortunate to have a number of close personal friends who continue to serve on our benches and work at our courthouses. I personally know judges and their families who have been victims of violence, and I have grieved with those victims and their families.

Our judges are impartial umpires of the law. We know they cannot help but disappoint some people because that is what they do--they make decisions. They determine winners and losers. Judges, witnesses, and courthouse personnel must not face threats and violence for simply doing their job.

The protection of the men and women who compose our judicial system and serve the public and law enforcement is essential to the proper administration of justice in our country. This important bill takes big steps toward providing additional protections on these dedicated public servants. I urge my colleagues to give it their full support.

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

Mr. President, I thank the chairman of the Judiciary Committee for stating that the debate we are having on this bill isn't really about the bill. The debate is about the process.

We had an election in November, and one of the things outlined by that was that Americans are concerned with excessive spending. There are some big facts that face us. Our judiciary is not nearly as at risk as our children and grandchildren are from the lack of cogent and disciplined spending by this body.

The reason we are at the place we are today is because I believe, and the vast majority of Americans agree with me, that we have to have priorities in how we spend our money. For us to be good stewards of the American taxpayers' dollars, we ought to establish priorities. This bill is a priority. I support the concepts behind the bill, and I will go through them in a minute. But what should be a greater priority for us is that we offer our children and grandchildren the same opportunities, the same freedoms, and the same liberties we enjoy.

The way the Senate works is something I believe needs to be changed, and I am willing to stand out here on every bill that comes to this floor to do exactly the same thing as I am going to do today. Here is the little problem that nobody--or very few in the Senate--wants to address. We react and create a good piece of legislation. This is a good piece of legislation. But we don't do the other half of our job, and the other half of our job is to get rid of the things that aren't working well.

Assume for a minute that every bill we authorize every year is done in a manner that says everything else in the Federal Government is working well. First of all, you ask the average citizen, and they would say: No, that isn't quite right. You go down, and everybody has a different complaint. But the fact is, we continue to authorize, we continue to authorize, and we continue to authorize, but we never go back and look at what isn't working and deauthorize.

My complaint with this bill isn't with the Senator from Pennsylvania. He was very cooperative in trying to address my desires for us to deauthorize certain things that either have excess monies or programs that aren't efficient or aren't working as they were intended to. However, when approaching the chairman of the committee, he refused to even consider the idea that

we ought to deauthorize something that isn't working in order to create this thing we all know is needed. It is a good piece of legislation, and we ought to pass it, and we will pass it. But the point that needs to be made to the American people, a point they agree with, is that authorizing a new piece of legislation is only half of our job. As a matter of fact, it shouldn't even be half. We ought to spend three- quarters of our time looking at what we are doing already that is authorized and making sure it is working efficiently. I don't think anybody in their right mind would disagree with that.

We, in my subcommittee in the 109th Congress, along with Tom Carper, held 49 oversight hearings on the Federal Government. What we found is that of the discretionary budget, the non-Medicare, non-Social Security, non-Medicaid budget, $1 in every $5 we spend is either wasted, abused, defrauded, or duplicated. It hardly seems fair to a middle-income taxpayer out there, who only yesterday paid their taxes and got hit with an extra $1,500 or $2,000 under the AMT, that they would have to pay that extra money at a time when we are allowing $1 out of every $5 to be wastefully spent, misspent, abused, or defrauded.

So the idea behind what I sent to all of my fellow Senators at the beginning of the year--and the Senator from Vermont knows very well why I objected to coming to the floor without a motion to proceed, without a cloture on that; it is because he represents what I think has to be changed--that we have to be responsible stewards of the American taxpayers' dollars, and we are not.

The idea is to change the culture of how we work. How do we do that? Well, we don't do it by continuing to pass new authorizations without ever looking at what could be deauthorized to pay for what we are authorizing anew. What we do is we fail the test of being good stewards to the very people we represent. As I said, Senator Specter, the ranking member on the Judiciary Committee, was very cooperative in trying to find those offsets. I think he basically agrees with my contention that we ought to be about doing good things, but we also ought to be about getting rid of the things that aren't working.

It saddens me to think that all through this 110th Congress, I am going to be doing this on every new authorization that comes out here if my colleagues don't believe we ought to be changing the way we work. It is a simple request. It is easy to find the offsets. As the Senator from Pennsylvania knows, we had offsets for this bill in terms of deauthorizations. They weren't acceptable to the chairman because he disagrees with the underlying fundamental premise of what I believe is an absolute obligation for us in terms of being good stewards.

At the beginning of this Congress, I sent a letter to every Member of this body, and I outlined some principles under which I was going to work in this Congress. I am dedicated to those principles, and it doesn't have anything to do with me or anything to do with the parties. I don't care who is in the majority or who is in the minority.

It has to do with our future. That is what this is about. This is about fighting for our future and having a long- range vision rather than a short-term vision of putting out a fire somewhere.

The principles I outlined said that I would put a hold--and, by the way, the chairman this morning said there was an anonymous hold. That is not true. I very eloquently and directly communicated my hold on this bill. And the letter I sent to everybody in the Senate at the beginning of this Congress directed that I would be the one holding the bills. I said this:

If a bill creates or authorizes a new Federal program or activity, it must not duplicate an existing program or activity without deauthorizing the existing program. That is No. 1. And several bills I had last year were duplications.

No. 2 is, if a bill authorizes new spending, it must be offset by reductions in real authorized spending elsewhere. How are we ever going to control our deficit? And we do not have, as the administration said, a $170 billion deficit. Our real deficit, what we actually added to the debt last year, what we actually added to our children's debt, was about $340 billion. So when we are adding $340 billion every year to our kids' and grandkids' debt, isn't it incumbent upon us to do the necessary things to make sure that doesn't happen in the future? Well, one of the ways to do that is to look at programs which aren't working and are not effective and which do not need authorization.

What happens in the Senate is that the appropriators decide what will get spent and what won't get spent. But the authorizing committee, the committee that is charged with that area, never deauthorizes anything. So we have this continuing mounting of authorization, with limited dollars to go for it, which never forces real priorities or a debate over the priorities by the authorizing committees.

The third point I made is that if a program or activity currently receives funding from sources other than the Federal Government--i.e., a match--then we shouldn't increase the role of the Federal Government in terms of increasing the percentage the Federal Government pays. Take our $340 billion deficit. Every State, save one, has a surplus. They did last year, and they will this year. So if States have surpluses and we have a deficit, we shouldn't increase our role. We shouldn't be doing that.

Finally, if we create a new museum or some new cultural program, then we ought to endow it rather than set it up for its continuing cost. We should use the power of compound interest to help us save money in the future. If we really think something is important enough to invest in, we should endow that and use the power of compound interest with the idea that the endowment will earn enough money to take care of that program in the future rather than passing that new program off to our kids.

Four very simple things that I ask.

I also stated in that letter that if I thought something was unconstitutional, then I would object to it, also. However, that doesn't apply in this instance. There is a legitimate role for us here. This is a good piece of legislation. But it does lack one of the criteria under which I stated I would try to hold bills up. I have no intention of filibustering this bill. I have no intention of making it difficult to pass the bill. I have every intention to make it an issue with the American people that we are not doing our job and that we are better than that. We are better than that. The people in this body care. The question is, Do we care enough to put the elbow grease into doing what is necessary to preserve the future? I believe we do care. I believe we can, and I believe, with persistence--and the chairman and the ranking member know that if there is anything I am about, it is about being persistent--if it requires this type of structure in terms of bringing bills to the floor, then I am happy to oblige the Senate in that to continue to make the point.

Almost 2 years ago, maybe more than 2 years ago, the infamous bridge to nowhere was brought to light, which bought about the changes we are seeing in earmarks. It was one example, which really wasn't a fair example to the Senator who had that, but nevertheless it characterized and became the caricature for the bad habits we have in Congress.

My hope is that the American people will look at the commonsense approach I am trying to propose for us as we authorize new programs and say: That makes sense. Why would you continue funding things that don't work? Why would you continue authorizations for programs that aren't effective? Why would you continue authorizations for programs that are duplicative? Where one works good and one not so good, why shouldn't we put money into something that works good rather than not quite so good?

So the question is not whether we should have court security. Of course we should. The question is not whether this bill should pass. It should. The question is, How do we address this fact?

Every child who is born in this country today, every one of them, has a birth tax on them. It is now at $453,000 a child.

People say: How do you get that?

You take the $70 trillion in unfunded liabilities that we are going to transfer to this next 200 million children, and you can see what they are liable for.

Take 10 percent interest. If you took a 10-percent interest rate on $453,000,

simple interest, to pay the interest on the debt, to cover what we are leaving to our children and grandchildren, is $45,300 a year.

The greatest moral question in our country today is not the war in Iraq, it is not who marries whom, it is not abortion, it is not child abuse, it is stealing the opportunity and the heritage this country has given us and taking that away from our children and grandchildren.

I know the Senator from Vermont is not happy with me for doing this. He believes it is fruitless. But it is the very real difference between he and I. I believe there is plenty in the Federal Government that is not working right that we ought to be about fixing, and one of the ways we do that is by forcing ourselves, before we do a new program, to look at the old programs and see what is wrong with them and clean them up. You can debate that. You can object to it. But the fact is, the vast majority of Americans agree with that.

We are going to be going through this multiple times this year until we get to the fact that we are doing what our oath tells us to do. That oath is to the Constitution. We cannot fulfill that oath if we continue to waste money on ineffective programs and authorize programs that are not accomplishing their goals. It is an oath that we violate, an oath to the Constitution but, more important, it is an oath we violate to the very people who sent us here.

Every dollar we waste today is a dollar that is not going to reduce that $453,000 for our children and grandchildren. One of the greatest joys I have in life today is that I have four grandchildren, each one of them unique, and the great pleasure of seeing your children through your grandchildren and reliving memories. That is always couched in the idea of what can I do to make sure the future is fair and a great opportunity is made available to them and all their peers throughout this country, no matter where they come from, what family they come from. Shouldn't they all have the same opportunities?

If you read what David Walker, the Comptroller General of the United States, has to say--and all you have to do is go on the Web site of the Government Accountability Office--what you find is we are on an unsustainable course. It is not what Tom Coburn says, it is what the head of the Government Accountability Office says. Things have to change. Every day we wait to change them costs us money and makes it more painful when we get around to changing them.

I plan, in a moment, on offering to proceed to the bill. We are out here today because the vision that was created for us, and the heritage that was created for us, is at risk. It is at risk because we do not want to change our culture. We don't want to be responsible. We want to pass but not oversee. We want to do the easy but not the hard. The hard is the thing that is going to secure the future for our children and our grandchildren.

It is easy for us to pass a port security bill. It is bipartisan. It is hard for us to do the very real work of making sure every penny, of the American taxpayers' dollars is spent in an efficient way, that it is not wasted.

Mr. President, if you think $1 in $5 of the discretionary budget of this country should not be wasted, if you think the Congress ought to be about looking at everything and saying, is it working, ought to be about getting rid of the $200 billion of waste, fraud, abuse, and duplication that is in our Federal Government today, then there is no way you could disagree with the principles I outlined to all the Senators in this body. Yet we find ourselves here at this point in time because the chairman of the Judiciary Committee refuses to agree with the premise that we owe it to our children and grandchildren. That is basically it because I am not about to do that. We do not believe that is necessary.

Something has to change if we are going to give our children and our grandchildren the benefits and the opportunity we have all experienced. I think that is worth taking some time on the floor, pushing the envelope to raise the awareness of the American people. I know I can't change this body through persuasion, through words. But what does change this body is the American people. The American people are the ones who send us here. If they will act, if they will put pressure on, then we will do what we are supposed to do. It is a shame we have to work it that way, but this last election proved that. It proved when we are not doing what we are supposed to be doing, the American people awaken, and they change who has the power, who has the representation.

What I am calling for is let's do that for the American people. Let's do it ahead of time. Let's not make them force a change, let's do what we were sent up to do.

With that I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. President, I make a motion to proceed to the bill.

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

I ask consent to speak as in morning business.

Mr. President, we hear much from the Bush administration and our Republican friends, almost on a daily basis, about how wonderfully our economy is doing. I recall not so long ago being at a Budget Committee hearing when we heard the Secretary of the Treasury, Mr. Paulson, indicating in fact that the economy is doing ``just marvelous.''

Yet, for obvious reasons, the American people do not seem to agree with the Bush administration or with our Republican friends as to how well the economy is doing. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record segments of two polls that were recently released, one by CBS News and one by Gallup.

When the American people were asked by CBS News the question, ``Do you think the economy is getting better, getting worse or staying about the same?'' 11 percent of the American people said the economy is getting better, 44 percent thought it was getting worse, and 44 percent thought it was about the same.

Then, interestingly, in that same poll, when the American people were asked by CBS the question, ``Over the past 10 years, do you think life for middle class Americans has gotten better or worse?'' 30 percent said life has gotten better, 59 percent, almost a 2-to-1 margin, said life is getting worse, and 7 percent said the same.

Technology has exploded in recent years. Our workers are far more productive than used to be the case. Yet by a 2-to-1 margin the American people have said that life for the middle class is getting worse, not better.

In terms of the Gallup Poll, the Gallup people, from April 2 to April 5, asked some very interesting questions that we very often do not speak about here on the floor of the Senate. In my view, what we have seen since President Bush has been in office, in a general sense, is the shrinking of the middle class, an increase in poverty, and a growing gap between the rich and the poor--not something we talk about terribly often on the floor of the Senate, not something that is talked about terribly often in the corporate media. But here is the question, very interestingly, that Gallup asked the American people, between April 2 and April 5: ``Do you feel that the distribution of money and wealth in this country today is fair, or do you feel that the money and wealth in this country should be more evenly distributed among a larger percentage of the people?'' Answer: Distribution is fair, 29 percent; should be more evenly distributed, 66 percent.

Then the next question they asked, which was rather a clumsy question, I thought, and I was surprised by the answer, but this was the question. Question: ``People feel differently about how far a government should go. Here is a phrase which some people believe in and some don't. Do you think our Government should or should not redistribute wealth by heavy taxes on the rich?''

That is a pretty clumsy question. Do you know what the answer was to that rather clumsy question? Yes, should redistribute wealth, 49 percent; no, should not, 47 percent.

I mention this poll because it is important to understand that despite a lot of the rhetoric we hear from the White House and on the floor of the Senate, the American people understand that in terms of our economy, something is fundamentally wrong. They understand it because they are living the experience of working longer hours for lower wages; of working day after day, trying to pay the bills for their family, trying to send their kids to college, trying to take care of health care, trying to provide childcare for their kids. They know the reality of the economy because they are the economy.

Every single day the people of our country are seeing an economy which is forcing them in many instances to work longer hours for lower wages, an economy in which they wonder how their kids are going to be able to go to college, able to afford college; an economy in which they worry that for the first time in the modern history of our country, their children will see a lower standard of living than they do. That is the reality of the economy, in the eyes, I believe, of millions of American workers.

That perception that the American worker has of the economy is, in my view, the correct perception of what is going on. Since George W. Bush has been President, more than 5 million Americans have slipped into poverty, including 1 million children. This country now has the very dubious distinction of having by far the highest rate of childhood poverty of any major industrialized country on Earth. How do you have a great economy, a booming economy, when 5 million more Americans have slipped into poverty? Median income has declined in our country for 5 years in a row. Americans understand that the economy is not doing well when the personal savings rate is below zero, which has not happened since the Great Depression. How do we talk about a strong economy when 7 million Americans have lost their health insurance since President Bush has been in office, and when we now have, unbelievably, 47 million Americans who have no health insurance at all?

How can anybody come to the floor of the Senate, or anybody in the Bush administration talk about a strong economy, when we have 47 million Americans who have no health insurance at all; when 35 million Americans in our country, the richest country in the history of the world, struggled to put food on the table last year; and the number of the poorest, most hungry Americans keeps getting larger? The American people understand this is not an economy that is working for ordinary people. In this economy today, more and more of our brothers and sisters, our fellow Americans, are going hungry. Let's not talk about a booming economy when we have children in America who are hungry.

Mr. President, you and I have heard, over and over again, people talking about the importance of education for this country. Yet millions of working families do not know how they are going to be able to send their kids to college when the cost of college education is soaring, when the average person graduating a 4-year college leaves that school $20,000 in debt, when hundreds of thousands of young people are now giving up the dream of going to college because they don't want to come out deeply in debt? How do we talk about a booming economy when so many of our young people, some of the brightest, most able of our young people, are giving up the dream of going to college? How do you compete on the international and global economy if so many of our young people are not able to get the kind of education they need?

When we talk about a booming economy, how does that correlate with the fact that our manufacturing infrastructure is falling apart, that since President Bush has been in office we have lost over 3 million good manufacturing jobs, and when people go out to the store to shop, when they look at the product, they know where that product is manufactured today? It is not manufactured in the United States. Over and over again they see it is manufactured in China.

We have a trade deficit now of over $700 billion. In my small State of Vermont, not a manufacturing center, we lost 20 percent of our manufacturing jobs in the last 5 years and that phenomenon is going on all over this country. How do you have a booming economy when we are losing huge numbers of good-paying manufacturing jobs and we are on the cusp of losing millions of good-paying, white-collar information technology jobs?

Three million fewer American workers today have pension coverage than when President Bush took office. Half of private sector American workers have no pension coverage whatsoever. How does that speak to a strong economy? It was not so many years ago that workers understood that when they left their job, there would be a defined pension available to them. They knew what they were getting. Today, those days seem like ancient history. Fewer and fewer workers have solid pensions on which to depend.

What is important to understand is, while poverty is increasing, while the middle class is shrinking, while more and more people are losing their health insurance, while hunger is growing in America, while good-paying jobs are going to China, the truth is not all is bad in the American economy. We have to acknowledge that. Are there some people who in fact are doing well? The answer is yes. Today, the simple truth is the top 1 percent of the families in our country have not had it so good since the 1920s. When that poll I mentioned from Gallup talks about the American people wanting to seek an understanding of the unfair distribution of wealth, this is precisely what they are referring to.

Today in the United States we have by far the most unequal distribution of income and wealth of any major country on Earth. Let me highlight very briefly a recent study done by Professor Emmanuel Saez from the University of California-Berkeley and Professor Thomas Piketty from the Paris School of Economics. This is what they found. In 2005, while average incomes for the bottom 90 percent of Americans declined by $172, the wealthiest one one-hundredth of 1 percent reported an average income of $25.7 million, a 1-year increase of $4.4 million.

In other words, for the people at the very top, a huge increase in their income, while 90 percent of the American people saw a decline. The gap between the rich and the poor, the rich and the middle class, continues to grow wider.

The top 1 percent of Americans received, in 2005, the largest share of national income since 1928. And some people may remember what happened in 1929. The top 300,000 Americans now earn nearly as much income as the bottom 150 million Americans combined.

You and I have heard many of our friends here on the other side of the aisle talk about how much the wealthy are paying in taxes. My, my, my. Yet the reason for that is what we are seeing is, with the decline of the middle class, a huge increase in the percentage of the income being made by the people on top. Let me repeat it. The top 300,000 Americans now earn nearly as much income as the bottom 150 million Americans. Is that the kind of country we really want to become, with so few having so much and so many having so little? I do not think that is the America most people want to see us evolve into, an oligarchic form of society. That is wrong.

According to Forbes magazine, the collective net worth of the wealthiest 400 Americans increased by $120 billion last year to $1.25 trillion--$1.25 trillion for the wealthiest 400 Americans. That is an astounding number. The reality is that in America today, we have the people on the top who have more income, in some cases, than they are going to be able to spend in a thousand lifetimes, while people in Vermont, people in Ohio, people in Minnesota, people all over our country are struggling so hard to provide basic needs for their families.

One of the reasons the gap between the rich and the poor is growing wider and why we now have by far the most unequal distribution of income and wealth of any major country is due to the passage of massive tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires since President Bush has been in office.

Now, you stop and you take a look at the needs of the people of our country in the most basic sense.

Hunger is increasing. Well, what do we think? Should we eliminate hunger in America or do you give tax breaks to billionaires? I don't think too many people would disagree with what we should be doing.

We have a crisis in affordable childcare in America. We have single moms, working families, both parents going to work, trying to provide well for their 2-year-old, 3-year-old. They cannot provide affordable childcare. The Federal Government provides totally inadequate childcare. Do we increase funding for childcare or do we give tax breaks to millionaires?

We are all aware of the scandal at Walter Reed Hospital. We are all aware of the outrageously inadequate way we treat our veterans, men and women who put their lives on the line defending this country. Yet when they come home from Iraq, there is inadequate care at the hospital at Walter Reed and inadequate care and waiting lines at VA hospitals all over America. What is our priority? Do we take care of our veterans or do we give tax breaks to millionaires and billionaires?

In America, millions of children do not have any health insurance. What are our priorities?

People are paying 50 percent of their limited income for housing because we are not building affordable housing. What are our priorities?

We have a major crisis in global warming. We should be investing in sustainable energy, energy efficiency, not giving tax breaks to billionaires. What are our priorities?

Let me conclude by saying that I think the American people, on issue after issue, are far ahead of where we are in Congress. So we are going to have to work very hard to catch up to where the American people are. I think we should begin the process of doing that.

We need to fundamentally change our national priorities. We have to have the courage now to stand up to the wealthiest people and the largest corporations and say to those people: The free ride is over.

Our job is to represent the middle class, working families, the lower income people who are not getting justice from the Congress. When we stand and do the right thing for the middle class and working families of this country, I believe we are going to see a significant increase in the respect this body receives.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, today we mark the 100th day of the new Congress. We have much more to do on behalf of the American people, but we have already accomplished an awful lot.

We have heard the American people's call for accountability and competence in their Government, and we started making those goals a reality. We have returned the focus to the rights and interests of the American people.

As I have commended the members of the Judiciary Committee--and I commend the distinguished Presiding Officer as well as the other members for their help and active participation in the work of our committee--I come to the Senate today to thank the majority leader and those Senators who have been working so hard to restore balance to our Government, protect the liberties and rights of all Americans, and also to revive America's leadership in the world.

First and foremost, we are making progress restoring the Senate and Congress to their proper constitutional role. From the FBI's illegal and improper use of national security letters to the politically motivated dismissal of so many of the Nation's U.S. attorneys, there are concerns about the competence--but especially the independence--of the Department of Justice. This pattern of abuse of authority and mismanagement causes me, and I might say many Republicans as well as Democrats, to wonder whether the FBI and Department of Justice have been faithful stewards of the great trust the Congress and the American people have placed in them.

We need to keep our Nation safe, but we also have to respect the rights and the liberties of all Americans. In the previous Congress, the administration sought expanded powers in the PATRIOT Act to appoint U.S. attorneys without Senate confirmation and to more freely use national security letters. You know, the administration got those powers, and almost immediately they bungled them. They bungled them badly.

In the Judiciary Committee, early oversight efforts included our January 18 hearing with Attorney General Gonzales. There we examined the change in course of this administration, which had engaged in warrantless wiretapping of Americans, contrary to the law, for years. Under the watchful eye of the new Congress, the President's program for warrantless wiretaps on Americans has been revised, and now the Government has to seek approval for those wiretaps from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court--something we have always expected. If our Government is going to inspect our papers, our computers, our voices, they should get a court order first.

We must engage in all surveillance necessary to prevent acts of terrorism, but we can and should do so in ways that protect the basic rights of all Americans, including the right to privacy. The issue has never been whether to monitor suspected terrorists but doing it legally and with proper checks and balances to prevent abuses. The Administration's recent reversal of course was a good first step.

Last month we held oversight hearings with FBI Director Mueller, and we called him to task for the longstanding FBI abuses of national security letters. The inspector general's report we insisted be provided included troubling findings of widespread illegal and improper use of national security letters to obtain Americans' phone and financial and credit and other records.

Nobody would stand for it if you had somebody--agents--walk into your home in the middle of the night grabbing these records. It is the same thing when they grab them electronically.

Inspector General Glenn Fine testified there could be thousands of additional violations among the tens of thousands of national security letters the FBI is now using, willy-nilly, each year.

The inspector general also found widespread use by the FBI of so- called ``exigent letters.'' These letters, which are not authorized by any statute, were issued at least 739 times to obtain Americans' phone records when there was often no emergency and never a follow-up subpoena, as the FBI had promised. Despite these extensive abuses, the top leadership at the FBI sat idly by for years, doing nothing to stop this practice.

We questioned the FBI Director about these matters and reports that the FBI has repeatedly submitted inaccurate information to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court in its efforts to obtain secret warrants in terrorism and espionage cases. It severely undermines the Government's credibility in the eyes of the Chief Judge of that court.

If the people charged with law enforcement in this country don't follow the law themselves, it all breaks down. Every one of us, every one of the 100 Senators, every one of us are required to follow the law. None of us--no American--is above the law, but it becomes even worse if those who are supposed to enforce the law do not follow

the law. These abuses are unacceptable. Director Mueller now knows that and knows these abuses and violations can no longer be continued or repeated.

The Judiciary Committee is now in the midst of an investigation in which we are uncovering an abuse of power that threatens the independence of U.S. Attorneys' Offices around the country. It undermines the trust and confidence of all Americans in Federal law enforcement. We are examining the mass firing of U.S. attorneys. We are trying to get to the truth of what happened so these abuses do not happen again. I want the American people, all Americans, to have a Justice Department and U.S. Attorneys' Offices that enforce the law without regard to political influence and partisanship. I want the American people to have confidence in Federal law enforcement. I want our Federal law enforcement officers to have the independence they need to be effective and merit the trust of the American people.

Sadly, what we have heard from the administration has been a series of shifting explanations and excuses and a lack of accountability or acknowledgment of the seriousness of this matter. The women and men replaced and whose reputations were then stained by those seeking to justify these firings as ``performance related'' were appointees of President Bush. Several had significant achievements in office and glowing performance reviews.

As we learn more details about the ousters of these U.S. attorneys, the story grows more troubling. Had we believed and accepted the initial testimony of the Attorney General of the United States and the other Department officials, then we would not have gotten to the truth. The White House and the Attorney General dodged Congress's questions. They ducked real accountability for years. In the past, they counted on a rubberstamping Congress to avoid accountability. The American people have a new Congress, and this is a Congress that asks questions and wants the truth, and we will get the truth. The Attorney General has admitted ``mistakes were made,'' but somehow he doesn't say what those mistakes were.

He will have another chance, yet another chance to tell the truth and the whole truth and nothing but the truth next Tuesday at our Judiciary Committee oversight hearing. The days when he could come by once a year and not answer questions are over.

I made no secret during his confirmation hearing of my concern whether Mr. Gonzales could serve as an independent Attorney General of the United States on behalf of the American people and leave behind his role as counselor to President Bush.

The Department of Justice should serve the American people by making sure the law is enforced without fear or favor. It is an oath I took when I was a prosecutor. That is the oath all prosecutors take, but it is an oath the Attorney General has to remember. The Department of Justice cannot be turned into a political arm of the White House.

Accountability has been lacking in this administration because there has been a ``rubberstamp'' Congress. Loyalty to the President is rewarded over all else. That lack of accountability and the lack of the checks and balances that foster it must end, and I hope it has ended. We do not need another commendation for the ``heckuva job'' for those who failed in their essential duties to the American people. True accountability means being forthcoming, and it means there are consequences for improper actions.

The White House continues to stand by the firings of the U.S. attorneys and despite assurances by the President that we would receive cooperation, documents and access to witnesses, the White House has yet to produce a single document or make any witnesses available.

Now we are learning that people in the White House were having ``off- book'' communications by using Republican political e-mail addresses, and they say these e-mails have not been preserved. I don't believe that. I don't believe that. You can't erase e-mails, not today. These e-mails have gone through too many servers. They can't say they have been lost. That is akin to saying the dog ate my homework. It doesn't work that way. Those e-mails are there, the White House just doesn't want to produce them. It is similar to the famous 18-minute gap in the Nixon White House tapes. They say these e-mails have been erased or misplaced.

They are there. The White House knows they are there, and we will subpoena them, if necessary, and we will have them because now, when the administration suddenly is facing meaningful oversight, they say they cannot produce the information. They have the information. They have to bring it out and show it to the American people. The administration has worn out the benefit of the doubt. They have undermined whatever credibility they had left.

The American people are right that they are entitled to full and honest testimony of the White House staff responsible for this debacle.

We have asked for administration officials and now former officials to cooperate with the Judiciary Committee in its inquiry, and I hope that they will. Through the committee's oversight work so far, we know some of the answers to some of the questions we have been asking, and the answers are troubling. We have learned that most of the U.S. attorneys that were asked to resign were doing their jobs well and were fired for not bending to the political will of some in Washington. Apparently, their reward for their efforts at rooting out serious public corruption is a kick out the door.

Along with these oversight matters, the Judiciary Committee has taken up questions relating to the war in Iraq and congressional authority to condition funding, the plight of Iraqi refugees, the recommendation of the Iraq Study Group on policing and the administration of justice in Iraq, and contracting fraud and abuse in Iraq.

We have examined enforcing our antitrust laws, restoring open government by reinvigorating the Freedom of Information Act, ending antitrust immunity for insurers, increasing drug competition, strengthening protections against identity theft, and providing for fair and comprehensive immigration reform.

We have also moved legislative initiatives. Indeed, I think the first legislation passed by the Senate this year was our bill to restore the cost-of-living adjustment for Federal judges. We have passed a bill to amend the reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act to honor the contribution of Cesar Chavez and other outstanding Americans. We passed by a bipartisan vote of 94 to 2 a bill to repeal that part of the PATRIOT Act reauthorization that had contributed to the U.S. attorney firings and thereby moved decisively to repeal the Attorney General's unlimited authority to appoint so-called interim U.S. attorneys without Senate consideration. At long last, we have given final passage to the bill against animal fighting that has languished for so many years. And we have passed the Genocide Accountability Act, the first legislative result of the new subcommittee I worked with Senator Durbin to create within the Judiciary Committee on Human Rights and the Law.

I hope that the Senate will soon be considering a number of our other legislative initiatives. We have reported a court security bill, S. 378; a bill to increase drug competition by giving the FTC authority to stop drug companies from paying other companies not to compete, S. 316; a bill to establish a school loan program for those willing to serve as prosecutors and public defenders, S. 442; and legislation to reauthorize the successful Byrne grant program for law enforcement, S. 231. A number of additional items are not far behind, including a bill to reauthorize the COPS program, S. 368; and a bill that Senator Sessions and Senator Landrieu cosponsored attacking fraud in disaster and emergency relief funding. I hope to see action on our bill against war profiteering, S. 119, as well.

It is a new Congress. It is a new Congress that is off to a strong start in restoring accountability, revitalizing the checks and balances of our system, and earning back the public's trust in Government which was eroded during the rubberstamp Congress. Much remains to be done, but we have made meaningful progress in just 100 days.

Of course, I will yield.

Mr. President, I thank the distinguished Senator from New York. Of course, he is a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and one of the most active members we have. He has spent countless hours on this issue. We talk every single day. We have worked together. I have been so proud of what he has done on that committee. He made my job a lot easier.

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum, and I would ask that the time not be charged to either side.

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

Mr. President, when Congress passes a law, the American people have every right to expect that their elected representatives will do what is best for them. But the country did not get a fair deal in 2003 when Congress passed the Medicare Part D prescription drug program. Today, the Senate had the opportunity to remedy this problem, and politics won out over providing affordable prescription drugs to our seniors.

Providing prescription drug coverage to millions of seniors is a very important benefit, and I very much support it, but Part D got off to a very rocky start. Seniors were overwhelmed and confused. Many were not enrolled in a timely fashion. When they were enrolled, there were serious, even life-threatening delays in getting the medication they needed. A number of States, including my own, declared public health emergencies and had to step in to fill the gap. At the time, my mom, a former second grade teacher, told me that Medicare Part D got the grade it deserved from the beginning. Since then, many of these early problems with implementation have been remedied.

Even today, however, Medicare Part D remains needlessly complex and confusing, with dozens of insurance companies involved, hundreds of different plans, and countless benefit structures, pricing tiers, and drug formularies, not to mention the ``doughnut hole'' which each year eats deeper into the wallets and pocketbooks of millions of seniors.

However, by far, the most serious flaw in the original law is the noninterference clause that expressly prohibits Medicare from negotiating lower prices from pharmaceutical companies. This prohibition is contrary to how Medicare handles its purchases of other goods and services. It is contrary to how both Medicaid and Veterans Affairs purchase medications for their beneficiaries. It is contrary to good business practices and to good government.

This prohibition has imposed substantial and unnecessary costs on America's taxpayers and seniors who are paying excessive prices for prescription drugs. An analysis last year by Merrill Lynch found that after Part D took effect, prices on popular brand-name drugs increased by 8.6 percent. This week, there is a new analysis from Families USA. It finds that the prices charged by the largest Part D plans for the 15 most commonly prescribed medications increased by an average of 9.2 percent during the past year. This increase is almost four times the general inflation rate, and it is nearly three times the cost of living adjustment that seniors received this year for their Social Security income. By banning the Government from negotiating discounts, Congress saddled seniors with inflated prices for their medications, while handing a huge financial windfall to the pharmaceutical industry.

As I travel throughout my State, Minnesotans tell me they are mystified and frustrated that the Government has tied its own hands when it comes to achieving huge cost savings with prescription drugs. The people of my State repeatedly tell me they want Medicare to use every possible tool to get the best prices. It is a simple principle of economics that consumers strike better deals when they band together and exercise their bargaining power. The power of many has much more leverage than the power of the few. Congress rejected this commonsense principle when it barred Medicare from negotiating drug prices. This is just plain wrong. When appropriate, the Government should be empowered to harness the collective bargaining power of 43 million Americans on Medicare to deliver low-cost medication to seniors.

We are now poised to give the Government the power to negotiate. The House has already passed a measure to do so. Now it is our turn, and it is our responsibility. This is a matter of fairness for our seniors who deserve affordable prices for their drugs, and it is a matter of fairness for American taxpayers who pay 75 percent of the bill for Medicare Part D.

Under current law, only individual insurance companies can negotiate Medicare drug prices. The pharmaceutical industry has tried to reassure Americans that this will inevitably produce the lowest prices because of competition. This explanation is unconvincing. Evidence and experience shows us that the present system often does not produce the fairest prices.

The pharmaceutical companies like to say that Part D Program costs are lower than projected, but beating artificial projections has not resulted in lower prices. Numerous studies show that Part D prices are significantly higher than prices for drugs and programs where negotiation is permitted.

For example, a review of drug prices in Florida last October reported that the lowest retail price--the price you get by just shopping around--is usually cheaper than the Medicare price for popular drugs.

In January of this year, a study by Families USA found that the top five Medicare Part D insurance companies serving two out of three enrollees charged prices at a median rate that were 58 percent higher than the same drugs provided to veterans through the VA. The study compared the lowest price available under Part D and the lowest VA price for the 20 most common medications prescribed to seniors. Celebrex, for arthritis, was 50 percent more expensive under Medicare Part D; Lipitor, for cholesterol and heart disease, was 51 percent more expensive; Nexium, for heartburn and acid reflux disease, was 65 percent more expensive.

If these aren't bad enough, consider these:

Fosamax was 205 percent more expensive under Part D. That is for osteoporosis; Protonix, for heartburn and acid reflux disease, was 435 percent more expensive; and Zocor, for cholesterol and heart disease, was over 1,000 percent more expensive.

With this tremendous disparity in drug prices, it simply defies common sense to assume Medicare is giving our seniors a good deal. They should be negotiating for better prices.

Maybe the discounts would not be as great as the VA gets because of the differences in those two programs. But how can anybody be satisfied when Medicare is paying prices that are, on average, 58 percent higher? Can we not at least try to get a better deal? Can't we even allow the possibility of negotiation by our Government with the drug companies?

Yet this administration and its Secretary of Health and Human Services have shown absolutely no interest in the potential of negotiation. In fact, the Secretary has been aggressively defiant about even the idea of it. This needs to change.

There is another reason we should not trust the assurances of the pharmaceutical industry that America's seniors are already getting the lowest prices possible. The Government can often negotiate bigger discounts than insurance companies, which represent smaller numbers of seniors. There is no good reason to arbitrarily foreclose this opportunity for gaining a price cut.

By Medicare's own calculations, Part D private plans are negotiating prices that are 73 percent of the average wholesale prices. But Medicaid pays only 51 percent, and the VA pays only 42 percent.

The Congressional Budget Office also agrees that the Government could be more effective than private plans in negotiating prices for unique drugs that have no competition.

Even limited savings on popular drugs could translate into billions of dollars. Consider Zocor and Lipitor, two top-selling prescription medications. If Medicare could negotiate prices in line with what the VA gets, the savings from those two drugs alone could be more than $2.8 billion each year. Even a fraction of this amount would still represent substantial savings. That would mean cheaper drugs for seniors, a better deal for taxpayers, and less Government spending.

The only real winners from a prohibition on negotiation are the pharmaceutical companies. They vigorously lobbied for the ban, knowing it would boost their profits, while denying fair prices to seniors and taxpayers. They paid big money to make sure they got a Medicare drug program that prohibited price negotiation, and now they are spending big money to keep that profitable ban in place.

Since 1998, the pharmaceutical industry has spent over $650 million on lobbying. In the past year and a half, they

have spent a record $155 million. What are America's seniors supposed to think all that money goes for?

The drug industry employs some 1,100 lobbyists. That is two drug lobbyists for every Member of the Senate and House of Representatives. The pharmaceutical industry has fired up its lobbying machine again to oppose efforts to lift the ban.

The industry lobbying organization, PhRMA, has been running a massive advertising campaign in opposition to negotiating lower prices. It includes full-page ads in newspapers across the country. They have been buying these ads in my State, too. The most recent full-page ad appeared earlier this week in the Minneapolis Star Tribune. It tells Minnesotans how they are supposed to think. It uses quotes from USA Today and the Atlanta Journal Constitution.

With all due respect to these good newspapers, we Minnesotans know how to think for ourselves and how to reach our own conclusions. When it comes to Medicare Part D, the people of Minnesota have made up their minds. A statewide survey earlier this year found that fully 93 percent of Minnesotans want Medicare to have the power to bargain for lower prescription drug prices.

But the drug industry keeps using scare tactics, throwing around words such as ``rationing'' and ``price controls.'' It ignores promising negotiation approaches that don't limit the drugs available to seniors and that do not involve price setting.

I have dealt with this before. In the last few years, I was actually accused of trying to ration Lipitor. That simply isn't so. My mom takes Lipitor. If people think I would advance a proposal that would take my mom's drugs away, they don't know my mom.

Allowing negotiation would not mean rationing, but lifting the ban on negotiations would cut into the hugely profitable windfall the drug industry has enjoyed, thanks to Medicare Part D. In the first 6 months after Medicare Part D went into effect, the profit for the top 10 drug companies increased by over $8 billion, which is a 27-percent jump.

It should be no surprise. Medicaid Part D has provided the drug companies with a surge of new Government-subsidized customers. And Congress has allowed the drug companies to charge excessive prices.

This has been especially true with the more than 6 million Americans who were transferred from Medicaid to Medicare under the Part D law. They are known as dual beneficiaries or dual eligibles because they are eligible for both Medicaid and Medicare. They now account for more than 25 percent of all Part D enrollees.

Before the Part D law took effect, Medicaid was already buying prescription drugs for these individuals under a ``best price'' rule. This meant the price a drug company offered Medicaid could not exceed the lowest price it received for that same drug in the private market.

These dual-eligible individuals are now covered only under Medicare Part D, which has no ``best price'' rule and, of course, no negotiating power either.

Two economists have analyzed last year's financial filings from the top drug companies. In a study released earlier this month, the two economists concluded these companies have gained substantial new profits because they no longer had to provide the rebates and discounts previously demanded by Medicaid. That is great for the drug industry, but it is not so great for all of us.

I grew up believing every dollar, every quarter, every penny counts. I remember saving all my quarters from baby sitting in a box in my room. I also believe that is true for our Government, for our taxpayers, and especially for our seniors. The average income for a retiree is about $15,000, with most living on a fixed income. Seniors need medications more than any other age group. For those over age 75, they depend on an average of almost eight prescription medications.

So for seniors, money and medications are a very serious matter. It must be a serious matter for us, too. By lifting the ban on price negotiations, we will continue to give seniors access to the medications they need and the same broad range of plans. The difference is that the Federal Government, representing all 43 million Medicare beneficiaries, will also be at the bargaining table.

It is time to lift the ban. It is time to negotiate with the powerful drug companies. It is time to help our seniors get the lower, fairer prices they deserve for the life-saving and life-enhancing medications they need.

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

Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 897.

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

Mr. President, we are debating a bill about court security. The court security bill is about the administration of justice. Some would argue that the amendment I have offered, while relating to the courts, does not deal with court security. Both the underlying bill and my amendment deal with the administration of justice. There are provisions in the bill that are not strictly dealing with court security, and I believe this is an appropriate place to talk about this amendment and an appropriate time for the Senate to vote on my amendment. It is something we have been working on for a few years.

My amendment recognizes that the ninth circuit, by far being the largest circuit in the United States, is too large, the administration of justice is too slow, and that the ninth circuit needs to be broken up at this point. It needs to be split up so the people, such as the people who live in the State of Nevada, can receive justice in a way that is fair and that is also expeditious.

In the past, the United States has gotten to a point with other circuits where we have decided that they are too large and need to be split. Some have argued that splitting up the ninth circuit is for ideological reasons, but that is not why I have offered this amendment. Many who used to be opposed to splitting up the ninth circuit 5 or 10 years ago now understand that for the sake of the administration of justice, the ninth circuit needs to be split up. It is by far and away the largest circuit in the United States.

We have had testimony in front of the Judiciary Committee, and many articles have been written, on why so many of the ninth circuit decisions are overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court.

The Ninth Circuit, far and away, has more of its decisions overturned by the Supreme Court than any other circuit. Well, Mr. President, we had testimony that one of the reasons a lot of people believe that to be the case is not that the jurists on the Ninth Circuit may be less competent than those in other circuits, but that is because of the overwhelming caseload, the circuit doesn't have the time to consider the cases that other circuits do but the use of the en-banc panel, instead of the full circuit, contributes to this problem.

Mr. President, 20 percent of the country is in the Ninth Circuit. It is laden with immigration cases. It has too many cases per judge and, because of that, too many of the cases that need to be heard in a timely fashion are delayed. What our bill simply would do is to divide the Ninth Circuit up in a very fair manner. We have put this through judges and through studies and over the years we have modified it on exactly how to break it up. If people disagree with how we are deciding to break it up, we can talk about that. But the bottom line is that it is too large of a circuit, and the Ninth Circuit needs to be split up.

I think all but one of the judges in the State of Nevada--by the way, almost all these same judges used to be against splitting up the Ninth Circuit. Today, nearly all of them have come out in favor of splitting up the Ninth Circuit. The reason for that is we live in the fastest growing area in the country. Nevada, in 18 out of the last 19 years, is the fastest growing State. The other States in the Ninth Circuit, including Arizona, California, Washington, Oregon, Idaho, all of these States have booming populations. While we are the largest circuit in the United States, it is going to get increasingly worse in the future, as far as the size of the population, the number of cases per judge, while overwhelming now, it is only going to get worse in the future.

I believe this is an amendment that should be discussed as a separate bill on the floor. But we all know most bills cannot get time on the Senate floor. So you have to take the opportunity to offer amendments wherever you can. We have been trying to get this bill acted on for years and years and years. We now have a vehicle, dealing with the courts, where it is appropriate to offer this amendment. So that is why I am offering this amendment today.

Mr. President, again, amendment No. 897 would split the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Because my home State of Nevada is under the jurisdiction of the Ninth Circuit, I have taken particular interest in how the Ninth Circuit functions. As a Senator from Nevada, I represent people who are on both sides of this issue. I have heard arguments for, and against, splitting the Ninth Circuit but, having listened to the debate, have concluded that it is time for Congress to split the Ninth Circuit.

The Ninth Circuit really has become too large to function as efficiently as it should. The population of the States in the Ninth Circuit is growing too fast for the circuit to manage its caseload. Cases working their way through the Ninth Circuit take far too long to come to resolution. The circuit is becoming increasingly dependent on visiting judges, who are not as familiar with circuit precedent, to manage its caseload. The reversal rate of cases heard by the Supreme Court which on appeal from the Ninth Circuit is much higher than the average of all Federal circuits. These problems require some form of action by Congress and, having studied the issue, simply adding more judges is not the solution.

Last year, the Judiciary Committee held a hearing on the issue of splitting the Ninth Circuit. As several Federal judges who were witnesses testified, adding more judges, in a circuit so geographically large, is not going to adequately address the need for collegiality among judges.

Mr. President, my primary motivation is to ensure that my constituents, the people of Nevada, have equal access to justice. Equal access to justice requires not only fair, but also prompt, resolution of a case. From my perspective, the current backlog in cases and the fact that the resolution of appeals takes far longer in the Ninth Circuit than any other circuit demonstrates that Nevadans are not guaranteed the promise that their claims will be heard with the same timeliness as persons living in other circuits. The adage of ``justice delayed is justice denied'' is appropriate with respect to the Ninth Circuit delays.

I believe we should consider the cost that unreasonable delay causes to the parties in a case. The lawyers and the judges live in this system. To these people, delays are not only reasonable but they are expected. A delay to someone who is part of the legal community is just the way things are done. But that is not the case for litigants. Ask any litigant whose case is waiting for a hearing on appeal. They take being sued personally and would tell you that their lives are on hold. They may fear they will lose their business, or their job, or their livelihood. It really does not matter whether the case involves business litigation, an immigration appeal, or a criminal matter.

If you talk to the parties to a case, they will tell you stories of the economic, social, and psychological toll extended litigation has on them and their families. That is why I am concerned about delays in the process.

That is also why I believe that some groups have endorsed my bill. For example, the Western States Sheriff's Association, which includes Nevada, has endorsed splitting the Ninth Circuit. I believe that the Association understands that America's law enforcement agencies have been devoting scarce budget resources to monitoring and dealing with criminal appeals that would otherwise be better devoted to protecting America's families if only appeals cases were resolved sooner rather than later.

I believe that it is not only the duty of Congress but also our obligation to ensure that the Judicial branch is operating efficiently. That is why we are considering the current legislation, the court security bill, because we want to ensure that judicial branch operates efficiently. And we know that it cannot, if those who work in the system--our judges and our court officers--do not feel safe. That is also why my amendment is so important.

I do not believe that splitting the Ninth Circuit would infringe on the ``independence of the judiciary'' as some might suggest. The Constitution provides Congress with the power to ``constitute'' or establish ``tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court,'' and also gives Congress the power to ``ordain and establish'' the lower Federal courts. Acting in accordance with the Constitution, Congress has used its authority to establish the Federal appeals courts and the Federal district courts, as well as other Federal courts. Congress has the ability to create courts of special jurisdiction, such as military courts, bankruptcy courts, and tax courts, and to limit the appeals jurisdiction of all Federal courts, including the Supreme Court of the United States. The Constitution clearly provides that the people, acting through their respective Congressional representatives, can enact legislation to split the Ninth Circuit. The prerogative of Congress to enact legislation to split the Ninth Circuit is consistent with the role of Congress established by the Constitution. The idea of splitting the Ninth Circuit is a proper action for Congress to take.

Finally, Mr. President, I would hope that Members of the Senate could agree that, regardless of where each of us may be on this issue, we could engage in an honest discussion and avoid attacking each other's motives. I have read with great interest the statements of people on the other side of this issue suggesting that split supporters, like myself, are only ``politically motivated'' or that supporters of a split are ``trying to punish'' the Ninth Circuit because of the perception of the circuit's ideology. Nothing could be further from the truth. I am sure the people who do not favor a split have likewise had similar attacks directed at them. We should not condone that rhetoric or impugn each others motives. I do not believe that it is in the Senate's, or the Nation's, best interest to attack someone else's motives. I have met with people on both sides of this issue and respect their views.

Let me conclude by saying this. The saying is that justice delayed is justice denied. In the Ninth Circuit that is what happens ever single day. Nevadans experience justice delayed too often. We are putting more and more of a burden on our Federal courts by the actions of the Senate. We need to now take the responsibility to make sure our various circuits around the country are not even more overburdened simply because of population growth. That is what has happened, and will continue to happen, in the Ninth Circuit. We have added a judge here and there. But the overall size of the Ninth Circuit, even if you add more judges, would not take care of the problems we are now experiencing. Some have argued that adding more judges would fix the problem, but it still would not

allow the full Ninth Circuit to hear many of the most difficult, challenging cases. The judges of the ninth are not able to work together as a full circuit and collaborate on some of the most difficult, challenging judicial cases.

That is why it is better to split up this circuit, so that more thoughtful decisions can be made in the administration of justice.

With that, I will yield the floor and ask my colleagues to support this very important amendment.

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

Mr. President, last Wednesday, April 11, terrorists exploded two bombs in Algiers, Algeria, killing 33 people and wounding over 200. The terrorist organization al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb took credit for the attacks, which targeted the Algerian Prime Minister's office and a police station.

The attack occurred 1 day--1 day--after three would-be suicide bombers blew themselves up in Casablanca, Morocco, killing a police officer in the process. A fourth individual was shot before he could detonate his bomb. It also preceded, by only 3 days, attacks by two more would-be suicide bombers in Casablanca, Morocco, this time outside the American consulate and the American Language Center. The consulate subsequently closed.

While a link between the Algeria bombings and the terrorists in Morocco has not yet been established, the confluence of these events demonstrates an increasingly deadly and dangerous situation in North Africa, for the region, for the United States, and for our friends and our allies.

The bombings should also remind us of the need to be more globally focused in the fight against al-Qaida and its affiliates, which must be our national security priority. Yet the administration, fixated on Iraq, remains narrowminded in its focus and seemingly almost indifferent to last week's attacks in North Africa.

Until last fall, al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb was known as the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat, or GSPC. It has been described by the State Department as a regional terrorist organization which recruits and operates in Algeria, Morocco, Nigeria, Mauritania, and Tunisia, as well as in Europe.

In 2005, GSPC killed 15 people at a military outpost in Mauritania. Police in France, Italy, and Spain have arrested individuals suspected of providing support to the organization. GSPC has also called France ``public enemy number one.'' A French counterterrorism magistrate has described GSPC as the biggest terrorist threat facing his country today.

Last year, al-Qaida leadership announced its formal ties to the GSPC, raising concerns about the extension of al-Qaida's deadly reach. In testimony to the Senate Intelligence Committee this February, FBI Director Mueller warned of the possible consequences of

this alliance, including to the United States. According to Mueller's testimony:

Al-qaida has made efforts to align itself with established

regional terrorist groups such as the GSPC that may expand

the scope of the threat to the Homeland.

Despite this clear threat, our Nation barely took notice of the attacks last week. The State Department issued a brief statement. The White House said virtually nothing--or nothing. Vice President Cheney mentioned them during a radio interview on Friday and again on Sunday, but only in passing, as a part of his repeated efforts to try to link 9/11 to the war in Iraq and to support an endless and disastrous war that is emboldening the members of al-Qaida and other terrorist organizations.

Let me read exactly what the Vice President said:

We had--just this week there were attacks in Algeria and

Morocco by al-Qaida, bombings that were aimed at killing

innocent civilians. It is a global conflict, by anybody's

measure. And it is clearly against some of the world's worst

offenders, and Iraq is very much a part of that. It is, right

now, the central front on that global conflict.

Amazingly, the only comments by the White House on these horrific attacks in north Africa were to insist that a terrorist attack in Algeria somehow proved that Iraq, more than 2,000 miles away, is the central front in the war on terrorism. The Vice President's assertions are not just factually wrong, they are offensive to the people murdered in Algeria last week, as well as their families and all those working hard to capture these terrorists. It is also indicative of everything that is wrong with this administration's national security policies.

We should be directing our attention and resources to combating the threat posed by al-Qaida and its affiliates, wherever they may be. As we all know, this is not a conventional war. It requires better intelligence, better cooperation with friends and allies, stronger regional institutions, and diplomatic and economic policies designed to deny terrorists safe havens. It is not easy, and I have enormous respect for the men and women in our intelligence community, diplomatic corps, military, and other elements of our Government who are working hard to protect us from this threat. We should provide them our full support, not only in terms of resources but also with an effective global counterterrorism strategy rather than the current myopic and misguided focus on Iraq.

First, we must improve our intelligence with regard to threats in Africa. The Intelligence authorization bill we were considering in the Senate earlier this week includes an amendment I offered with Senator Rockefeller calling for more intelligence resources to be directed to Africa. If we are to protect our national interests on the continent, we must commit ourselves to understanding not only the terrorist organizations that operate there but regional conflicts, corruption, poor governance, endemic poverty, and the historic marginalization that has allowed terrorists and other threats to fester.

Second, we must expand and strengthen our diplomatic and foreign assistance activities in the continent. Our presence in far-flung parts of Africa, whether it be a new consulate or outpost or an expanded USAID development or public health program, exposes local populations to our Nation, linking us to parts of the world which, as we know, we can no longer afford to ignore. We need to help build strong governmental institutions that respect human rights and an equally vibrant civil society, while also strengthening the relationship between the two.

Third, we need military policies that place counterterrorism in the context of a larger, more comprehensive strategy. Policies such as the Trans-Sahara Counterterrorism Initiative are important, particularly in improving the capacities of local governments. But unless they are part of bilateral and multilateral policies that emphasize human rights and democratization and anticorruption, our military resources may be squandered or, worse, may be even directed in counterproductive ways. For this same reason, I have supported the establishment of an Africa Command within the Defense Department, while insisting that its mission be squarely within the broader strategic goals of the United States on the continent.

Fourth, we must develop effective policies for dealing with terrorist safe havens such as the one in the Sahel where al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb operates. According to the most recent State Department terrorism report, the organization not only trains, recruits, and operates in the region, it also raises money, including through smuggling. Clearly, confronting this organization requires addressing the root causes that have allowed it to develop and operate, whether they be poverty or corruption or the lack of government support to and presence in the region. We must develop comprehensive policies to confront these safe havens, including the settlement of regional conflicts and an adequate provision of economic and development assistance, so local populations can reject terrorist organizations.

Fifth, we must help governments in the region in their efforts to confront terrorist organizations. The most recent State Department terrorism report stated that, in Mali, the sheer size of the country and the limited resources of the Malian Government ``hamper the effectiveness of military patrols and Border Patrol measures.'' The report also indicated Mauritania, another country where al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb operates, lacks funding and resources to combat terrorism.

In order to combat international terrorist organizations such as the al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb, we need regional strategies that address the capabilities and policies of all affected countries on a bilateral and multilateral basis. We must expand our assistance to these and other countries while ensuring that their counterterrorism policies are consistent with ours and that corruption and human rights abuses do not undermine efforts to combat terrorist organizations.

Sixth, we must work closely with our European allies. Al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb is a direct threat to Europe; our allies have every incentive to work with us. By working to establish mutually agreed upon approaches to counterterrorism, we can develop a strong, coordinated strategy that helps keep all of us safer.

Seventh, we must encourage regional institutions to confront terrorism. For example, the African Union has established a Center for Study and Research on Terrorism to combat terrorism throughout the continent. This center and other regional initiatives are worthy of far more attention and support than we have thus far provided.

Finally, we must at last recognize that the fight against al-Qaida is being undermined by the endless war in Iraq. As the NIE of last April concluded, the war has become a ``cause celebre'' for international terrorists. Moreover, tactics from Iraq are now being used around the world, including by terrorists in Algeria. As the State Department terrorism report noted:

Using lessons from Iraq and wanting to reduce the level of

casualties sustained in direct confrontation with Algerian

security services, the GSPC carried out attacks using

roadside improvised explosive devices. In one act on

September 14, GSPC terrorists killed three Algerian soldiers

and wounded two others in a military vehicle near Boumerdes

by remotely detonating a roadside IED.

The horrific bombings last week in Algiers and the manifest threat in Morocco should remind us that our national security does not begin and end in Iraq. Indeed, Iraq remains a drain on our national attention to resources and an endless distraction from our real national security priorities, which is fighting al-Qaida and its affiliates. We cannot ignore the rest of the world to focus solely on Iraq. Al-Qaida is continuing and will continue to be a global terrorist organization. Contrary to what the administration has implied, al-Qaida is not abandoning its efforts to fight us globally so it can fight us in Iraq. No. Instead, it is forming alliances with groups like the GSPC, and it is seeking to attack us and our friends and allies around the world. By downplaying this threat, the administration is ignoring the lessons of September 11 and endangering our Nation.

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