To restore sums to the Highway Trust Fund, and for other purposes.

Mr. President, we are waiting to proceed on the legislation that has come from the Appropriations Subcommittee on Energy and Water, which I chair. We are on the bill, but we are waiting for amendments and discussion.

But I want to make a point. We have had people coming to the floor of the Senate yesterday, now this morning, incessantly over a long period of time, talking about health care. Health care is, obviously, very important; no question about that. The relentless increase in the cost of health care hurts families. It hurts business. It hurts government programs that provide for health care. So we need to do something about that.

But it is interesting. What I hear on the floor of the Senate from the critics of these issues is: What is wrong? What is wrong? Well, it does not take a lot of energy or a lot of time to determine what is wrong and be a critic. I understand that.

I have often told the story of Mark Twain, who was asked to debate once, and he said: Of course I will be engaged in that debate, as long as I can take the negative side.

They said: Well, we have not even told you the subject of the debate.

He said: Oh, it doesn't matter. The negative side will take no preparation.

So it is with these discussions on the floor that I have just heard a moment ago and heard all day yesterday as I sat here on the floor, talking about what is wrong. Well, do you know what, we know what is wrong. What is wrong is that we have this relentless rise of health care costs. We spend more on health care than anybody else in the world, by far, and we rank somewhere around 41st in life expectancy. We spend twice as much per person than almost everybody else in the world spends on health care.

I notice that all those critics who come out here talking about what is wrong with this plan or that plan never talk about prescription drugs because most of those who have been out here criticizing the various plans are people who vote against legislation to put downward pressure on prescription drugs. Yet one of the fastest rising areas of health care costs is prescription drugs.

Let me, if I might, ask unanimous consent to show on the floor of the Senate two bottles that would contain prescription drugs.

These two bottles I hold in my hand, which I have shown many times, contain Lipitor. It is medicine produced in Ireland and then shipped all around the world. This Lipitor, as you can see, comes from identical bottles. The same tablet, the same medicine, produced in the same plant by the same company, FDA-approved by our Food and Drug administration in our country, is put in two different bottles. One is shipped to the United States, this one, and the other is shipped to Canada. What is the difference? Well, there is no difference in the medicine. It came from the same place, produced by the same company. The difference is price. The Canadians get to pay half the price the Americans pay.

It is not just Lipitor, the most popular cholesterol-lowering drug that exists out there. It is not just Lipitor. It is prescription drug after prescription drug. The American people get to pay the highest prices in the world. You want to talk about how you cut health care costs? How about taking a whack at this and saying it is not fair that the American people should pay the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs. Why are they required to pay the highest price in the world? Because there is kind of a sweetheart deal in law that says the only entity that can reimport prescription drugs is the drug manufacturer itself.

Much of the ingredients in these drugs come from all around the world--China, just as an example. The manufacturers can produce these drugs in Ireland, using ingredients from all around the world, and then bring them in to sell to the American consumer. But the American consumer cannot access the same FDA-approved drug sold in virtually every other industrial country at a fraction of the price the American consumer is charged.

Why, when we hear these critics come to the floor on health care issues, do we not hear them suggest: Here is an area where we could substantially cut costs and give the American consumer the opportunity everybody else has; that is, to shop for these FDA-approved drugs in areas where you see much lower prices?

The pharmaceutical industry will say: Well, if you allow the American people to do that and if we can't charge the highest prices to the American people for prescription drugs, we will not have the money to do our research to find new drugs. Well, that is not true. The fact is, the pharmaceutical industry spends more money on research in Europe than they do in the United States and in virtually every European country, the European consumers get to pay less money for the same drugs that American consumers are now charged.

A bipartisan group of us has offered legislation to give the American consumer the right to access these lower cost prescription drugs from areas where you can pay a fraction of the price for the identical drug the American consumer pays the highest price in the world for. But we have a staunch bunch of folks in this Chamber who support the pharmaceutical industry and who decide that the American people shouldn't have this right. I would say to those who are the critics of virtually anything anybody talks about in health care: Maybe you ought to decide to support those of us who have introduced bipartisan legislation to deal with the issue of the prescription drug prices in which the American people are charged the highest prices in the world. It is not fair; it has gone on too long; and it needs to be changed.

With respect to health care, generally, this issue is one of those issues that is very important. We are in the middle of a very deep recession. I think job one in this country, by far, is to put the country back on track so people can get back on payrolls, get back to work, and have jobs. That makes almost everything else possible. This is the deepest recession since the Great Depression, and we have a lot of work to do. This President inherited a mess, no question about that. He inherited a $1.3 trillion deficit this year. It is now going to be $1.9 trillion because the President advanced and the Congress passed an economic recovery program to try to stimulate the economy. But we need to get this economy back on track and then we need to begin trimming back these budget deficits. We cannot, for any length of time, continue to provide a level of government the American people are either unable or unwilling to pay for. That is not a path that is sustainable. It is not a path that works. But the President, when he took office, said there are a number of other things we need to do--one of which is to try to get some control over these escalating health care costs.

I don't know exactly how this is going to end up. I don't know what plan might or might not exist at the end of the day, but I think Congress is going to find a way through this. I think it is useful and important and productive for us to be working and working hard to see: What are the solutions? How do we put downward pressure on prices? How do we try to provide broader coverage for those who don't now have health care coverage? I think we can do this. It might well be it has to be done in a couple phases, the first of which is to put downward pressure on the pricing and the second of which is to extend coverage. However we do it, we need to decide that health care costs are rising far more rapidly than is sustainable. They blow a hole in the federal budget deficit because the Federal Government, through Medicare and through Medicaid, is the largest consumer of health care, so we don't have much choice but to find a way to do this.

I understand there is a lot in this health care system that wants to protect what is, one of which is prescription drugs. I mentioned this prescription drug called Lipitor. Most people would know the name of this. Why? Because when they leaf through Newsweek or Time magazine, they will see a full-page ad for Lipitor. When they shave in the morning or brush their teeth in the morning, if they have a television near their bathroom, they will understand about Lipitor. They will understand about the purple pill. They will understand about prescription drugs because relentless advertising is driven toward the consumer to say: Go ask your doctor if you shouldn't be taking this drug. Go check with your doctor. Isn't the purple pill right for you? There is relentless consumer advertising for something you can't buy unless a doctor believes you need it and a doctor prescribes it for you. Is that something we ought to take care of maybe? I think so.

There are a whole range of areas that I think are very important in health care that we need to try to do something about. I think we can. It is horribly complicated, very difficult, a very heavy lift, and we need to do it in a way that first and foremost puts downward pressure on health care pricing. The fact is we cannot and should not be spending twice as much as anybody else in the world per capita on health care only to find out that we rank 41st in life expectancy. That means we are spending much more than anybody else and not getting the outcome or the results.

So I would say to the people--including this morning, the first thing out of the box is the critics of health care, once again, relentlessly on the floor telling us what is wrong. As I have said, Mark Twain knew the negative side requires no preparation. So I am not sure these are well-prepared arguments, but they are certainly relentless. It is nice to hear what is wrong. Maybe as 100 Senators who dress up in suits in the morning, we could come and spend the entire day talking about what is right. This is a great country, one of which we have the privilege to live in freedom, we have the privilege to be engaged in public debate. Maybe let's spend a little more time trying to figure out what is right about this country and find out what kinds of solutions can unite us rather than divide us and find out how we get the best of each rather than the worst of both when we talk about the political parties.

If we can do that, maybe we will advance this country's interests.

The fact is we all stand in the same hole. It is a very deep economic hole, the deepest since the Great Depression, and we will all be well advised, it seems to me, to find ways to begin working together to address these issues.

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

Mr. President, reserving the right to object, and I will not object, let me further ask unanimous consent that following the presentation of this amendment, we have a unanimous consent agreement to set aside this amendment for a Democratic amendment that is about to be offered.

Mr. President, I make a point of order that a quorum is not present.

If the Senator will yield, let me say that I happen to be a cosponsor of the amendment. It is being offered to the Energy and Water appropriations bill. There may well be a rule XVI against it. It appears to be legislating on an appropriations bill.

Before the Senator expands on his remarks, I think he and Senator Warner have offered a constructive idea, one that I support and have cosponsored prior to it being on the floor. I think it is useful for Senators to hear a complete description of the proposal. If it is not resolved on this bill--and it probably will not be--my hope is it will be resolved on another piece of legislation.

Mr. President, let me make a point because we have heard a lot of discussion about health care. My colleague from Oregon and my colleague from Utah talked about this yesterday and today and I think it is important to point out.

When people talk about the choices Members of Congress have, I think it is giving the impression that somehow Members of Congress have some gold-plated health care system that other Federal employees do not have. In fact, I believe the choices available to Members of Congress are the choices available in the Federal Employees Health Benefit system for millions of other Federal employees.

The reason I make that point is we have had a lot of people talk about the choices Members of Congress have with their health plan. This Federal Employees Health Benefit Plan is available to all Federal employees. All Federal employees have the same choices, by and large, and those are the choices Members of Congress have.

Last weekend, I had several people talk to me about the extraordinary health insurance Members of Congress have, and I think part of that comes from this discussion about Members of Congress have all these choices. It is very important for people to understand that we have the same health care plan other Federal employees have--millions of them-- and the same choices they have. I just wanted to make sure the Record shows that because I think it is important.

Mr. President, we are ready to clear several cleared amendments, so I ask unanimous consent to immediately consider amendment No. 1846, which is already pending.

My understanding is the amendment is cleared on both sides. I believe there is no further debate, and I ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to call up amendments Nos. 1844 and 1845, en bloc; further, I ask unanimous consent to dispense with the reading of the amendments.

I believe there is no further debate. These are technical amendments that have been cleared by both sides, and I ask for their immediate consideration.

Mr. President, I believe we will have an amendment by the Senator from Nebraska in a few minutes. But let me say, with the Senator from Utah, we need to have Senators come over and offer amendments. If you have amendments you want to add to this bill, offer, and debate, we expect you to be here. Ultimately, those who have amendments and don't come to offer them are probably going to be precluded at some point because we will move to complete this bill.

We have sat here the day before yesterday, yesterday, and now today. This is a very important piece of legislation that deals with the energy and water projects across the country, and we want to complete this bill, preferably this evening, if we can. In order to do that, we need to at least have some semblance of cooperation, which has been little evident, at least in the past couple days.

I would say to the Senator from Utah there is a 1 p.m. filing deadline today. But the fact is we already have amendments filed but aren't offered. So I expect we will get additional amendments filed. The key is to get people down here to offer their amendments, but there is a 1 p.m. filing deadline.

The cloture motion was filed last evening, and I understand why the Senator from Nevada, the majority leader, filed it. I don't think he had much choice. We bring an appropriations bill to the floor that has very widespread support and then it largely comes to a standstill. It would not make much sense for us to be here in this position all week.

I think Senator Reid had very little choice but to file a cloture motion. My hope is we would not need it. If people will come and offer their amendments, we will work with them. Senator Bennett and I will work to accept the amendments we can and get the votes and perhaps this evening get this bill completed.

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

Mr. President, we are awaiting some word from Senator Alexander. He was here earlier this morning to offer an amendment. We indicated we would very much like to have a vote at 11:30 this morning. We are trying to contact Senator Alexander and his staff. There will be a budget point of order against the amendment offered by Senator Alexander, so the vote would be on the point of order that will be made with respect to the budget.

Senator Bennett and I hope we can get this vote so we can get people to the floor and determine which amendments are going to be offered and when. The majority leader has been extraordinarily patient. He is trying to schedule bills to the floor of the Senate. We bring an Energy and Water appropriations bill to the floor of the Senate, people say they have amendments but they do not come to the floor to offer them, so the majority leader filed cloture last evening, a cloture motion that will ripen tomorrow.

He did not have much choice but to do that, and I think what is happening today demonstrates the requirement that the majority leader had to file a cloture motion. It would be far better for everybody if we can dispose of the amendments.

I think we have three amendments dealing with TARP funds. I think we can dispose of the three of them. If we can have Senator Alexander come and reach an agreement on time and have a vote at 11:30, at least we would at that point get Senators to the floor, dispose of that amendment on a budget point of order. There will be points of order against the other two TARP amendments as well--different points of order, I might add.

Mr. President, we appreciate the cooperation of Senator Alexander. I know he cares a lot about his amendment. As I indicated, there will be a budget point of order that lies against the amendment. I will make that point of order, but then we will have a recorded vote on that point of order. My hope would be that we can do that at 11:30 this morning, for the information of other Senators and their staffs, and we will determine that when Senator Alexander arrives on the floor momentarily.

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 Senate now resume consideration of the Alexander amendment No. 1862 and that Senator Dorgan be recognized to raise a Budget Act 302(f) point of order against the amendment; that once Senator Alexander has moved to waive the relevant point of order, debate on the waiver extend to 11:25 a.m., with the time equally divided and controlled between Senators Dorgan and Alexander or their designees; that at 11:25 a.m., the Senate proceed to vote on the motion to waive, with no amendments in order to the amendment during its pendency.

Mr. President, I make a point of order that the pending amendment violates section 302(f) of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974.

How much time remains?

I understand what Senator Alexander wants to do. I have some of the same instincts. The President does as well. I don't want the Federal Government running America's corporations. We want to divest as quickly as we can. We want the companies to recover. But whatever we do here, we need to do it in a way that protects the interests of the taxpayers. Theirs are the interests that are at risk. To set a date within 1 year does not protect the interests of the taxpayers.

I happen to support a Corker amendment. I was a cosponsor of the Corker amendment that talks about the establishment of trustees, three trustees to actually be engaged in running these companies so the government is not running them. It talks about liquidating that trust by December 2011. But they would submit a report to Congress. That liquidation would not happen unless it maximizes the profitability of the company and the return to the shareholder. That is one thing missing in the Alexander amendment, the question of what maximizes the return to the American taxpayer. They are the ones who are at risk. What do we do to maximize the return, or are we going to leave tens of billions of dollars on the table because somebody simply wants to pass a piece of legislation with an artificial end date?

I don't disagree with the intent of wanting to get out from under this issue of the Federal Government being engaged in these corporations. That is why I cosponsored the Corker amendment.

Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.

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

Mr. President, what is the pending business?

Mr. President, pursuant to the Lott precedent, I make a point of order that the amendment is not germane.

I make a point of order that the amendment is legislation on appropriations.

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

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to set aside the pending business and call up amendment No. 1855.

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

Madam President, this amendment has been cleared on both sides. I believe there is no further debate. I ask for its immediate consideration.

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

While Senator Bennett and I await our colleagues to offer amendments on the underlying appropriations bill, I ask unanimous consent to speak in morning business for 10 minutes.

Madam President, our country is in a very deep economic hole, the most significant economic decline since the Great Depression. Much of it is attributable to the fact that we have created an economy in recent years, especially the last two decades, in which we have responsible business men and women engaged in casino-like gambling. They do it under the rubric of business.

In 1994, I wrote a cover story for the Washington Monthly magazine titled ``Very Risky Business.'' The subtitle of that article was about the banks trading very risky derivatives, which I said I believed could lead to taxpayers being on the hook for a bailout. That was 15 years ago. At that point, there was $16 trillion of notional value in derivatives. And banks, even then, which prompted me to write the article, were trading very risky derivatives on their own proprietary accounts, which I believed was unbelievably ignorant of the risk involved.

The $16 trillion in notional value of derivatives exploded way beyond anyone's expectation. Then at the same time that the trading of derivatives was exploding, new instruments were being developed, credit default swaps and CDOs and all kinds of exotic instruments to be traded back and forth, creating a dramatic amount of additional risk.

Even as that was occurring, we saw the development of a subprime loan scandal in which we were watching brokers and mortgage banks provide entreaties to those who had homes or those who wished to buy homes: Come and get a mortgage from us. You have bad credit, slow pay, no pay, you have been bankrupt, come to us. We would like to give you a loan. Subprime home loans--some called liars loans--you don't even have to tell the person giving you the loan what your income is. By the way, you don't have to pay any principle. We will wrap that around the backside, just pay interest. Can't pay interest, then name your own payment. Don't want to do that, then don't pay any principle and don't pay all your interest. We will wrap it around the backside, and you don't even have to describe what your income is. By the way, when you get a mortgage from us, we will not tell you it is going to reset in 2- 3 years because we are giving you a 2-percent teaser rate right now, which means your home loan payment will be way down here, and it is going to look good. But the reset that will happen in 24 or 36 months, you will never be able to make the payments.

Everybody was fat and happy, making a lot of money putting out bad loans and then slicing them up into mortgage-backed securities and then trading them up to the hedge funds and investment banks, and everybody was making a lot of money, not asking any questions. Then the whole thing collapsed. And it is derivatives, it is swaps, it is mortgage- backed securities. It all collapsed in a sea of greed with unbelievable risk, and it brought down with it some of America's largest financial institutions.

I describe all of that gambling and all of that risk because something else happened last year that has the American people concerned and worried--and they should be wondering: What was the cause of it?

Here is what happened last year. I have this chart in the Chamber that shows the price of crude oil. It actually went from $60 a barrel, in October of 2006, up to $147 a barrel in July of 2008. It went up like a Roman candle, and then came right back down. By the way, the same folks who made the money on the upside made the money going back the other way, starting last July. It was unbelievable speculation in a market called the oil futures market.

This is not an abstract graph. This means right up here someplace, as shown on the chart, every American who went to the gas pump to fill up their vehicle with gasoline was paying through the nose--$4, $4.50 a gallon.

So the question for them, and the question for other users--airlines, for example, were hemorrhaging in red ink, unable to pay the cost of this kind of oil price--the question was: What has caused all of this? What has resulted in this unbelievable spike in oil prices?

The answer? An orgy of speculation in the oil futures market by interests that were never before--at that point--manipulating that marketplace. Investment banks, for the first time, were actually buying oil storage and holding it off the marketplace until the price rose, as an example.

The oil futures market, it is estimated, was populated in terms of the trades by somewhere between two-thirds to three-fourths of the trades coming from speculators--not people who were moving the physical commodity back and forth, at least people who would want to sell the physical commodity to somebody who wanted to buy the physical commodity because they want oil. Instead, it was speculators who were simply betting on this. They could have gone to Las Vegas. They did not need to. They were able to go to the oil futures market and make a lot of money going up and a lot of money going down; and, meanwhile, the victims were the American drivers who had to fill their gas tanks with gasoline.

I am describing this because yesterday there was a hearing in this town by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, a commission that has largely been dead from the neck up for some while, uninterested in regulating--despite the fact that is their charge--sitting on their hands, doing nothing. And all of last year while this was going on, while the price of oil was going up, up, up, the CFTC largely explained it away as saying: Well, this is supply and demand. That is what is going on.

There is another agency other than the Commodity Futures Trading Commission that did not do its job. This is an agency we are actually funding. Senator Bennett and I are actually funding it in this bill. It is called EIA, the Energy Information Administration. It has several hundred people working there. It is a very important agency. It provides substantial amounts of information to our country, to policymakers, about what is happening with energy.

I want to show you what has happened with the EIA. We spend about $110 million a year on this agency with several hundred people. They are good people, smart people, the best in the business, we assume. Here is what happened. In May of 2007, they had to make an estimate. That is what they do. They make an estimate: What is the price of oil going to be? Well, they started here, as shown on the graph, and they said: Here is where we think the price of oil is going, right that way. So in May of 2007--I do not know what they had to eat back then, but something was affecting the brain. Here is what happened to the price of oil. Here is where they estimated the price of oil would be.

These are smart people. These are the best. We are spending a lot of money getting their advice. So let's pick January of 2008. They made a new estimate: Here is where we think the price of oil is going to go. Well, the price of oil did not do this. The price of oil went like this--almost straight up. So what did they get wrong? In April of 2008: Here is what we think the price of oil will be. Here is what it was.

My point is, this agency, along with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, would come to our committee at a hearing, and I would say: What is it that you get it so unbelievably wrong? They said: Well, it is supply and demand.

That is total rubbish. The fact is, even while this was happening, the supply was going up and demand was going down, which meant that the price of oil would not be going up like a Roman candle. In fact, the price would be moderating. Instead, speculators captured that market. That is why EIA got it so wrong. They did not have the foggiest idea what they were doing. Supply and demand--total nonsense. But we know what happened to these prices.

The reason I want to discuss this for a moment is because yesterday the Wall Street Journal had a story. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission--this is the commission that last year spent all of their time telling us this was just supply and demand. We knew better. But either they knew better as well and would not admit it or they did not know better. That agency was insisting it was supply and demand. Well, the very same agency now, with a new head, is going to issue a report next month, according to the Wall Street Journal, ``suggesting speculators played a significant role in driving wild swings in oil prices.''

Three people in my hometown cafe--I come from a small town of 300 people--3 people, over a strong cup of coffee, knew that last year. Wild swings in oil prices as a result of speculators.

Last year, the same U.S. futures market agency pinned oil price swings primarily on supply and demand. But the new report will say that analysis was based on ``deeply flawed data.''

So the question is, What does all this mean? It means if we are going to have some impact on an economy where we put it back on some solid foundation, we have to have markets that work, and we have to have regulators who are not blind.

I happen to think the free market system is the best system of allocating goods and services that I know of. I taught economics ever so briefly in college, and I always say I was able to overcome that, nonetheless, and lead a productive life. But the field of economics is something that is so important in terms of understanding how markets work. I believe the free market system is an incredibly good system-- not perfect. The free market system needs effective oversight and regulation from time to time. That means we have regulators who are supposed to be wearing the striped shirts, blowing the whistle, and calling the fouls because, yes, there are fouls in the free market system.

Go back and ask Teddy Roosevelt, when he was a big trust buster. What was he doing? He was busting those interests that were trying to subvert the free market system. The same thing happens today. We have interests--and I described it earlier--that want to subvert the system by getting engaged in substantial risk and establishing mechanisms by which they can control a market at the expense of the rest of the American people.

That is what I believe has happened in the oil futures market. The oil futures market is very important, and we need to make it work the right way. It ought to work responding to the urges of supply and demand. But, regrettably, that has not been the case. My hope is now the Commodity Futures Trading Commission will be able to take the kind of action necessary to straighten this market out.

Every market needs liquidity. That means some speculators will play a role in the market. But when speculators capture the market, and begin to play the kind of games that were played last year, that has a profound impact on this country's economy. We should expect the agencies that are hired to do the regulatory oversight do their jobs, and do it properly. That has not been the case for some while.

So my hope will be--with the new report coming out that will finally assign the responsibility of excess speculation in this perversion of the marketplace--my hope will be we will have effective regulators who will take action. What should that action be? My own view is the Commodity Futures Trading Commission should designate a distinction between the traders in this marketplace: those who are truly trading a physical commodity because they are engaged in the marketplace because that is the business they are in and those who are just speculators. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission could at that point determine what kind of margin requirements, what kind of speculative limits should exist so that activity does not subvert the marketplace.

Let me be quick to say there are people who will listen to me, and who hear what I say, and they will say: Do you know what. You don't have the foggiest idea what you are talking about. All of this system works. None of that which you describe existed. All of that risk by the smartest people in the room, the top investment banks that took on this massive amount of risk, the investment banks that were buying oil storage, to buy oil and take it off the market until it goes up in price--all of that is just business.

It is not just business. Just business is running a business the right way. Does anybody believe it was just business to have the biggest financial enterprises in the country run into the ditch because of bad behavior by those who were running the companies--by the way, some of whom are still running the same companies?

By the way, with respect to solutions, does anybody think it is just business to decide we had institutions in this country that were too big to fail--that loaded up with risk and then failed--and the taxpayer is told they cannot be allowed to fail, they are too big, and you have to bail them out? And now we say to those same businesses: We are not going to get rid of ``too big to fail.'' In fact, we are going to allow you to merge with other firms, which makes you much too big to fail-- too much bigger to fail.

We have a lot of work to do this year to address these issues and address some of the causes that caused the economic collapse last year. I want us to put this economy back on track. First and foremost, it starts with jobs and restoring confidence. Confidence is everything about this economy. When people have confidence, they will do the things that are expansive to this economy: buy clothes, buy a car, take a trip, buy a house. That expands the economy. When they are not confident, they do exactly the opposite.

I want the American people to have confidence. I want them to have confidence in believing that Federal agencies that hire regulators are going to look over the shoulder and provide the oversight to make sure this is not going to happen again, to make sure someone is not going tp subvert a marketplace that makes the rest of the American people victims.

All of this, in my judgment, with good government, can be done. But it will not be done if we have regulators who boast about being willfully blind. It will be done if we understand our responsibility to make sure the free market system is indeed free.

Madam President, I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Madam President, it is nearly 2 o'clock on Wednesday. We have been on this bill since Monday. Senator Bennett and I have spent a lot of time on the floor waiting for amendments to be offered. We have had several and we appreciate that, but we have many filed but not offered.

I know the majority leader has filed a cloture motion which would ripen tomorrow, so we would have a cloture vote tomorrow. Our hope has been we would not get to that point.

Inasmuch as we have waited and waited very patiently for Senators who do have amendments that they wish to offer but have not come to offer them, Senator Bennett and I have talked about perhaps going to third reading this afternoon at 5 o'clock. So I ask, if there are those Senators and/or staff who have amendments they wish to have considered on this legislation they would keep that in mind.

We have a couple of hours here. Senator Bennett and I have talked about going to third reading by 5 o'clock. I would ask people to come and offer

amendments, let's have debates on the amendments and have votes and see if we can resolve this legislation this afternoon.

I make a point of order that a quorum is not present.

Mr. President, I would have no objection. We are limiting morning statement business up to 10 minutes. We are on the business of the energy and water appropriations bill, waiting for amendments to be filed. So we have a general order on this bill that morning business speeches will be 10 minutes.

I have no objection if the Senator wishes to take a few minutes extra, but I did want both Senators to understand that we are on the energy and water appropriations bill, and morning business is done under the consideration of that legislation. So I have no objection.

Mr. President, the 1 o'clock time has passed for the filing of amendments as a result of the cloture motion being filed last evening. I believe we now have about 90 amendments filed to this bill. Not all of them will be offered, certainly, but 90 amendments represent the determination of people who wish to alter this bill, who wish, presumably, to come and offer amendments, have a debate on amendments, and perhaps have a vote on their amendments. Yet no one arrives.

I indicated earlier that Senator Bennett and I have talked about a third reading on this legislation to move it through the Senate. The fact is, the majority leader will not have the patience to allow us to sit here with nothing to do and people saying they want to offer amendments but not being willing to show up to offer amendments. We have been here since Monday afternoon, and very little has been done.

I again say to the staff that may be watching or Senators who are watching, I think we ought to conclude this bill. If people are not interested in offering amendments--filing amendments is not offering them. If they do not have the interest in coming to the floor of the Senate to offer them, I am going to push very hard with the majority leader to go to third reading and finish this legislation this afternoon.

Mr. President, I am prepared to accept the amendment. My colleague, Senator Bennett, is as well. The amendment has been cleared. We have reviewed it. We think it has merit, and we have approved it on both sides. I suggest we ask for consideration and have a vote on the amendment at this point.

I thank the Senator from Vermont. I know he cares passionately about this issue. The description he has given demonstrates the merit of this proposal. Frankly, I am happy to be supportive.

Might I ask the Senator to yield for a question?

Senator Coburn and I and Senator Bennett talked about the order of his amendments. I believe he has three amendments. We intend to accept one. I had indicated to him on the contracting amendment he intends to offer, I will offer an amendment as well, and we will have side-by-side votes. I wonder if I might offer my amendment to have it pending. The Senator would then offer his amendment and discuss it and I would offer my amendment on behalf of myself and Senator Bennett. If that is acceptable to the Senator from Oklahoma, I believe my amendment is filed. I ask unanimous consent that that amendment be called up. It is amendment No. 1895. I ask that on behalf of myself and Senator Bennett.

Mr. President, I will respond, of course, to the comments of the Senator from Oklahoma. If he would wish, it might be sensible for him to proceed to offer his other amendments, calling them up, setting aside this amendment, and we will have them all in front of us. Then we can discuss them and develop an order by which we might vote.

Amendment No. 1878 as Modified to Amendment No. 1813

Mr. President, Senator Bennett and I have reviewed this amendment and think it has merit and support it and hope we could vote on this by voice vote and that we might do so immediately. So, Mr. President, if the Senator from Oklahoma is ready, I will suggest that we dispose of this amendment by consent.

It has been cleared by both the Republican side and Democratic side.

Mr. President, as always, the Senator from Oklahoma is thoughtful and courteous, and we appreciate--Senator Bennett and I appreciate--him coming to the floor and offering his amendments.

Let me say to the Senator from Oklahoma, we cut the administration budget in the Department of Energy by $8 million as we brought it to the floor. But even more important than that, we have cut $643 million from the Department of Energy from the President's budget. So as CBO recalculates the President's request to the Congress, we have cut $643 million. And we have cut $8 million in the administration budget in the Department of Energy.

So I sympathize with his notion. I certainly strongly support what he is suggesting to the Department of Energy they should do. I just say to him, we have already made those cuts and far, far more in terms of what the President wanted for the Department of Energy. We are $643 million below the President's request and $8 million below in the administration accounts in the Department of Energy.

Mr. President, I will be happy to yield to the Senator.

That is correct.

Mr. President, again, I agree that what we ought to be doing is encouraging the Department of Energy--all Departments--to be engaged in energy savings and efficiencies and so on. I will be glad to visit the Senator about cuts. But, as I said, we already made substantial cuts. I think the Senator from Oklahoma knows that the President's request, in the context of the broad range of budget requests for a broad group of Federal agencies, was what he felt he wanted and needed in order to have some sort of transformational energy future.

We are working on a wide range of new and innovative energy approaches: decarbonizing coal, additional production in wind and solar and biomass, additional production offshore in the gulf. We are working on a lot of issues, and some of that requires substantial research and development. So the President had a pretty good appetite for what he felt was needed. We cut that by $643 million.

The reason I am emphasizing that to the Senator is Senator Bennett and I did not just saddle up and say: Well, whatever you want, here it is. We cut it, and we cut it because we felt those cuts were deserved.

I certainly appreciate the Senator from Oklahoma coming to the floor wanting additional cuts. But $643 million is a pretty substantial walk away from what the President had originally requested for that agency.

My hope is that we can include--we will include--certainly I will be the chairman of the conference--we will include very strong and assertive language of the type the Senator is requiring of the Department of Energy. I would insist, as well, that the Department of Energy--all agencies--demonstrate efficiencies and conservation and the kinds of things that can and should be done to address the overusage of energy.

Mr. President, let me just make a comment.

I know the Senator feels strongly about contract reform, and on the two amendments in front of us, the Senator from Oklahoma talked a lot about earmarks. But, of course, he is well aware that his amendment deals with far more than just earmarks. The issue of formula awards to State and local governments which are carried in this legislation, the issue of competitive grants, the contract competition model that the Senator seems to suggest the Senator believes is appropriate for the competition and research and development, many of which are very exotic and interesting and cutting-edge, world-class research projects in the Department of Energy--I do not know that--I guess the people who do know suggest that the contract competition model for some of those kinds of things does not work very well because you are looking at things that go well beyond just who is going to bid the lowest on the kind of research and very high-tech, exotic research we are doing in a wide range of energy fields.

I generally have always supported contract competition. There is nobody who has been tougher on the Department of Defense, for example, on some of these contracts, particularly no-bid contracts to those who are contracting in Iraq. Next Monday will be my 20th hearing on issues like that. I strongly support competition in contracting.

I think this amendment that has been offered is not an amendment that very well fits this bill and addresses, in a very broad-stroke way, some things that should not be addressed that way. So that is the reason I have offered an alternative to it. My hope is that the Senate will agree with the alternative.

I might say, I believe this exact debate was held 2 weeks ago on the Homeland Security bill and has already been resolved by the Senate.

Mr. President, the Senator from Oklahoma is not going to win a debate we are not having.

I agree with most of what the Senator from Oklahoma said. I support contract--but the Senator from Oklahoma himself suggested maybe we should have a different model for the highly exotic research contracts. By the way, they are not just a few. You go to the labs and take a look at the contracts that are going on around the country in very exotic, high-tech research; cutting-edge, world-class research. If, in fact, there should be perhaps a different model for that, it is not in this amendment. That is my point.

I would be happy to sit down with the Senator from Oklahoma to bring an amendment to the floor that does address things in the right way, but to bring an amendment to the floor that has a very broad brush that covers everything when the Senator himself acknowledges that probably something other than that should be done with respect to these kinds of exotic research programs--he didn't respond to the issue of State formula grants and so on--but again, we are not having a debate about the merits of what you aspire to achieve.

I want us to have contracting rules that give the American people the best value for their dollar, that advance this country in the most significant, capable way. We want the same things. But my point is, when one offers an amendment such as this that says, All right, do it all this way, and even--I would say to the Senator from Oklahoma, even the Senator acknowledges there are areas that perhaps shouldn't be handled that way. So let's do it in a way that resolves it in the right way.

I know he is frustrated that we likely won't pass this amendment, but if he is going to bring it up time and time again, the next time or the time after, let's do it in a way that gets closer to that which we believe will address all of these issues the right way for the American taxpayer, and I will be on his side.

Mr. President, without prolonging this debate, let me say to the Senator from Oklahoma there are other ways to get things done as well. I mean, look, some of the most significant contracts that have gone out of this town recently in the last 10 years or so--the LOGCAP contract which provides services by contractors in Iraq--sole-source contract, billions and billions and billions of dollars--most of it went to Halliburton and KBR, by the way; not all of it but the fact is massive amounts of money.

I have held 20 hearings as of Monday on these issues. You know what. Finally, they are bidding all of those contracts. Finally, they are bidding them. When you hold up some of the abuses, you can actually require change, in my judgment. Yesterday the inspector general said those who were providing electrical services to the military bases in Iraq were responsible for the electrocution of soldiers because they were hiring third-country nationals who didn't know how to ground electrical wires, didn't know how to speak English. You know what. Those contracts are now going in other directions. There was a contract to provide water to military bases and the nonpotable water was more contaminated than raw water from the Euphrates River, paid for by our taxpayers to contractors who didn't have the foggiest idea what they were doing and got billions of dollars of contracts they didn't have to bid on.

The fact is this sort of thing is despicable and needs to change. I take no backseat to any Member of the Senate about trying to change these things. I have held 20 hearings on these contract issues in recent years. The Senator from Oklahoma comes and raises important questions, always. I understand that. My point to him was simple: This amendment, in my judgment, doesn't respond to all of the issues the Senator needs to respond to if the Senator is going to do an amendment that does reform contracting. I am very interested in working with him. He is on the right subject, in my judgment, just the wrong amendment.

I wanted to say, there are a lot of ways to change things. Yes, with an amendment here on the floor of the Senate; in committees; and I am sure the Senator from Oklahoma does that as well; pressing Federal agencies. You can get change by putting all of the spotlights on the same spot in a Federal agency to say, How do you justify this? We demand you change.

So there is a lot of good work that goes on by people who care about forcing change, and many of us have done it.

I wanted to say there are a lot of ways to do this and I encourage the Senator from Oklahoma to continue. I want to be a part of constructive change on contracting. I have been in the past and will be in the future.

Madam President, before he departs from the floor, I commend our colleague from Delaware, our new colleague from Delaware, Senator Kaufman.

Senator Kaufman was appointed to fill the seat of my great friend and colleague and seatmate for many years, Joe Biden. And while he has only been here about 6 months as a new Member of the Senate, what a wonderful contribution he has made. I have watched him over the last number of weeks, with his focus and attention on people who work for our country every single day but who probably will never get much credit for showing up every day and doing a wonderful job on behalf of the American people. Whether they be civil servants, police officers or others--the military--the fact he has taken as much time--almost on a daily basis, I say to my colleagues and others who may be watching these proceedings--Senator Ted Kaufman of Delaware has made it his business to express our collective gratitude to these people who serve our country every single day to keep us safe and secure and to keep us functioning as a society.

It may not seem like much to some, but I will guarantee there are thousands of people today who are at work who appreciate it. And there are millions more, I suspect, whose family members, whose neighbors, whose coworkers, and others appreciate the recognition he has given them, as well as some ideas he has brought to the table legislatively to make a difference for people.

So I commend my fellow colleague. For a relative newcomer and a short timer, he has made a substantial contribution to our country, and I thank him for it.

I thank the Senator. I did not intend to turn this into a recipient compliment, but I thank him tremendously, and if he wants to talk a little longer, that is fine.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business.

Madam President, I have been on the floor every day and speaking about health care, for a few minutes anyway, although I know there are other matters of business before this body.

I am privileged to work with the Presiding Officer on the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee--a new member who has made a tremendous contribution as well to our efforts--and as she knows, back a few weeks ago, we went through that marathon session to try to at least fulfill our obligation on the health care debate and to deal with the matters over which we have jurisdiction--things such as prevention and the quality of health care, the workforce issues, the fraud and abuse questions, as well as other matters. Obviously, the Finance Committee has to grapple with these as well. So I thought it would be worthwhile, over these last number of days, to talk about things we have done in our bill. It will be a part, I hope, of a combination of efforts when we meet hopefully in the next few weeks, depending upon the outcome of the efforts in the Finance Committee, which we are all waiting for with anticipation, and confidence, I might add, as well.

I have a lot of confidence in Kent Conrad, and Max Baucus, Chuck Grassley, and Jeff Bingaman, and others involved in these negotiations to try to reach some understanding that will allow us to move forward. But I thought in the meantime it would be helpful to talk about various constituencies in the country and what this means to them. Because I think we all want to know how does this affect me and my family--what we are doing here. People are saying: I know you are talking about access, and you are talking about quality of health care, talking about the cost of health care, but I wish to get some idea of what are you doing and how it affects me and my family, and where is this all heading.

So while we are only in the first stages of developing what we hope will be a comprehensive proposal on health care reform, it is important that we at least communicate with people where we are coming from and how we look at these issues.

We have all heard the numbers, that 47 million Americans have lost or do not have health care today--a statistic I bring up every day, because I think it is important to point out. We completed our work about 2 weeks ago on the Affordable Health Choices Act. Since we completed our work 2 weeks ago, 196,000 fellow citizens have lost their health insurance. About 14,000 a day lose their health care coverage. About 100 people in Connecticut lose their health coverage, for one reason or another--they lose their jobs or their employers decide to drop their coverage; all sorts of reasons that can cause someone to lose their health care. Overall, it is about 14,000 a day.

These are people who have health insurance but are losing it. These are not people who have no insurance. They are just added to the rolls. And some people get health insurance as well and come off the rolls. So it is important to point out that happens as well.

But it is worthwhile to note that every single day we go forward in this process--and it is an important and deliberative process. I am not in favor of rushing something through. We need to get this thing right. It is a terribly complex matter. We have all noted that almost every single Congress over the last 70 years, along with almost every administration over the last 70 years, has tried to solve this issue. Some have succeeded in part. But there is a reason this has not happened up to now. It is because it is not easy. I commend our colleagues for trying as well as commend the Obama administration for insisting this issue be such a high priority.

Why is that the case? It is not just because it would be nice to get it done. It is because if we do not get something done, the status quo is debilitating, to put it mildly--first, in macroeconomic terms of what it does to our country, in terms of consuming such a large part of our gross domestic product, that easily could jump to 35 percent. What does that mean to the average family? That gross domestic product number, which may not mean much to many people--what does that mean? It means the average family could, in 8 to 10 years, if we did nothing and let the status quo continue, that about 50 percent of your gross income would be consumed in paying for health care premiums if you wish to have your family covered. Obviously, that is unacceptable and unsustainable. If we were to end up consuming that much of our gross domestic product and our incomes each year, families could not survive.

Today I would like to speak for a few minutes about a group of Americans who are being cheated by the current system. Those are the very people who are affected by this number, people who have health coverage but lose it every day because of various economic circumstances or other problems they face and for whom I would also say the status quo is unacceptable. These are Americans who have insurance but are underinsured. Their numbers are roughly 25 to 30 million of our fellow citizens. Obviously, it changes every day as many lose their coverage. These are about 25 to 30 million people who cannot get the care they need. These people paid good money for health insurance, and they think in exchange they are going to receive at least some guarantee that if things go wrong--if someone in their family gets a cancer diagnosis or is hit by an automobile or some other injury occurs--at least they will not have to be concerned about whether they can afford to pay for the care they need.

They worry, obviously, about getting better, getting back on their feet. But there is that sense of stability and certainty that I have a health care plan. I am not going to get wiped out. I am not going to get ruined economically. I have insurance. It may not be great, but I am in pretty good shape. I feel pretty confident, if something tragic happens, I will be OK. That is what insurance literally is supposed to mean.

Life is uncertain. Unfortunately, things happen to all of us. People get ill, injured, people get hurt. While you expect to get better, you want to be sure you are not going to get wiped out. But in our Nation, the wealthiest in the world, of course, nobody should lose their home or their economic security because of an illness or injury, in my view. We write checks to insurance companies every month or see premiums deducted from our paycheck and what do we expect in return? We expect that if something happens, we at least will not have to worry about anything but getting better, getting back on our feet again.

Unfortunately, for tens of millions of our fellow citizens, that is not how it works at all. These are people who have insurance, but they cannot be sure about anything. There is the uncertainty of what will happen. Some find out the hard way that their insurance does not cover what they thought it covered. That fine print you kind of glazed over when you signed onto that contract, I know we all wish we had read it better, understood it better, but the reality is, when you finally are in some situation and you go to this company and say I think I am covered, they say: I am sorry, but if you had read this more carefully you would have understood that fact situation is not covered, that your preexisting condition that you didn't properly let us know about excludes you from the kind of coverage in these situations. You may have high deductibles and copays. You may have an injury that can be taken care of for $5,000 or $10,000, but your insurance doesn't kick in until after that.

Five or ten thousand dollars may not seem like much for some, but for a working family, that can also be a major economic crisis.

Some who suffer from serious illnesses, such as cancer, hit an annual or lifetime benefit cap; thus, the sickest Americans find themselves cut off entirely.

Our legislation, by the way, that we adopted, the Presiding Officer, myself, and 21 other Members of the Senate, we eliminate preexisting conditions so you never again have to be excluded from coverage because of that preexisting condition. We will not exclude you because of portability. Today if you moved you could lose your coverage. And we will not allow these caps either. Today you could find out that while you have a serious illness, your coverage will take care of you for a week or two, or three or four or five visits, but that is it. Our legislation eliminates those kinds of concerns that people have worried about for a long time.

Many of our fellow citizens, of course, have children. Children have different health care needs than adults. For millions of children who fall under insurance provided by their parents' employer, those needs are not covered. Some have that coverage taken way by a profit-hungry bureaucrat at the moment when they need it the most, and many of our fellow citizens watch as skyrocketing premiums slowly consume more and more of their family budget until they have to choose between having their kids uninsured or having them receive the kind of benefits they ought to be receiving as children.

When we talk about health care reform, we are not talking about a free gift for the American people. We are talking about keeping a promise to our fellow citizens. We are talking about guaranteeing that insurance actually insures against economic ruin for working families. As it stands today, millions of our fellow citizens with health insurance are spending their life savings on care; 50.7 million insured Americans spent more than a dime out of every $1 they earned on health care last year. That is, more than 10 percent of their income today is spent on health care; last year, more than 50 million of our fellow citizens. For almost 14 million of our fellow insured Americans it was more than 25 cents out of every $1 of their income that was spent on health care. As it stands, millions of our fellow citizens, not just the uninsured, are unable to get the care they need when they need it.

Let me share some numbers, if I can. I am always reluctant to do this because numbers can glaze over the eyes of people, but people can find themselves in these situations. These numbers affect people with insurance primarily. Some here are without insurance but primarily with insurance. Today I wish to focus on the underinsured--not the people, the 47 million without insurance, I am talking about the 30 million now underinsured or those who have insurance but have high deductibles and expect out-of-pocket expenses.

Thirty-seven percent of people insured in our country took home remedies or over-the-counter drugs instead of seeing a doctor. They decide to go that route rather than getting the kind of care that would reduce their health care problems; or 31 percent postponed getting health care they need because of cost; or they skipped a recommended test or treatment, 27 percent; or they did not get a prescription filled, around 25 percent; and close to 20 percent cut pills in half or skipped doses altogether in order to try to meet their health care obligations. Obviously, in doing so they put themselves at greater risk for even more problems medically, thus raising the cost for care when they end up going back in to treat a problem that could have been contained if, in fact, they were taking the medication as prescribed.

This gives you some idea of the kind of choices people make who are insured. These are not the uninsured now, these are insured. This is in terms of what they need in order to provide for themselves.

When we talk about health care reform, I think it is very important we talk about the many people in this country who believe they are in good shape and are not worried they are going to lack coverage if, in fact, a health care crisis confronts them. The reality is, this constituency of our fellow citizens with insurance has much to worry about with the status quo; thus, the necessity for reforming a system in areas where it is broken and leaving alone those areas where it works pretty well.

This is not just people, again, who do not have insurance. These numbers include people, obviously, who have insurance. Americans with health insurance are forced into bankruptcy, as we know, as well. The numbers are not ones I make up; 62 percent of the bankruptcies in our country over the last several years occur because of a health care crisis in that family. That statistic is alarming. The next statistic is even more alarming to me--75 percent of that 62 percent are people with insurance. Here are people with insurance who ended up in bankruptcy because of a health care crisis. That is the last thing you would assume to have happen to you. If you have health insurance and you run into a major health care problem, you are assuming because you paid those premiums you are not going to be put into bankruptcy or financial ruin. Three out of four people in that 62-percent number had health insurance and still ended up being bankrupt or put into a bankruptcy situation.

Fifty percent of foreclosures--there are 10,000 foreclosure notices every day in the country, roughly. Those have been rather static for a long time. But 50 percent of those notices went out to families who are losing their homes because of a health care crisis.

I don't know the number of how many of that 50 percent had insurance or not. I don't have the same statistic as I did for the numbers of bankruptcies. We ought to try to get that number if we can, to find out what percentage of the 50 percent actually had insurance at the time they got the foreclosure notice.

Americans with health insurance give up the financial foundation they have worked a lifetime to build because we have not taken the action to fix the system that too often is designed to deprive them of the coverage they thought they bought at the very critical moment they need it. What I discovered over the years is there are sort of two groups of people within the insured category. Everyone in that category has insurance. As long as you have never had to deal with it, then you feel pretty secure about it--and you should--because you think you are covered. If all of a sudden you find yourself dealing with it and you thought you had the coverage, that is when it drives you to frustration, to put it mildly, when you discover that condition was a preexisting condition; there were caps on how much you could get for that; that, in fact, the very illness you have was never covered under the insurance policy.

That is where an awful lot of people discover, despite that sense of security they had, that the present system is more designed to deprive them of the coverage they need rather than to help out during those crises. That is why this issue is so important.

Again, this is a complicated one. There are no simple answers to it. We are not going to resolve all those problems even with one bill. It will be a perpetual struggle for us to get this right in the years ahead, but we need to from an economic standpoint, as well as serving the needs of individual people.

This debate is not just about the uninsured. I think we make a huge mistake if we leave that impression with our fellow citizens. This is not just about the 47 million without insurance. We would all like to do something to see to it that people who are uninsured get coverage, but it is about the millions of people who have insurance, the 30 million underinsured, and the many more who have insurance but could find themselves without the kind of coverage they anticipate having.

Each one of us, of course, insured or not, is hurt by inaction. Premiums are rising faster than wages. One insurance company in my State of Connecticut the other day announced they were raising their rates by 32 percent. Imagine that, a 32-percent increase in premium cost for health insurance coverage.

The average family writes a check for $1,100 in our country, $1,100 to cover the uninsured because we in this country take care of people. If you are uninsured in Connecticut or North Carolina and something terrible happens to you and you show up in a hospital in Charlotte or Hartford, we take care of people. That is because of who we are. If you walk into the emergency room, we do not throw you out, we take care of you. I am proud I live in a country that does that. But Americans need to know it is not free when people show up without insurance, with no ability to pay for the care they get in North Carolina, Connecticut or anywhere else. That bill gets passed on.

To whom does it get passed on? To the insured who get added costs in premiums to get covered. That is a tax you are paying each year, about $1,100 to pay because of uncompensated care. We try to address that because we ought to.

That is one way to bring down the costs for the insured in our country. There are other ideas as well that our committee worked on: prevention; the quality of care; reducing some of the problems with the five chronic illnesses that consume 75 cents of every $1 in our Nation for health care. These are measures we take to try to move that curve, if you will, downward when it comes to affordability and cost, as well as, of course, improving the quality of health for all our fellow citizens.

Of course, in this body, we all have health insurance--I made that point over and over again, every Member of Congress, every Member of this body. I never had to go to bed at night with one eye open, wondering whether, if something happened to my 4-year-old or 7-year-old daughters, I would be able to pay for it in the morning with the policies we have. I am glad we do have good health insurance. I just think it is important, as we are here, to remember a lot of the people we represent are not in that situation, to remember the uncertainty and lack of stability they live with. When a crisis happens--and it happens every single day to people--when that happens, they ought not to have a sense of free-fall: I will get wiped out; I can't possibly take care of this; I can't even provide the care my child needs.

I will never forget Senator Kennedy--who is the chairman of the committee I have been asked to help, to temporarily step in and write this legislation because of his own illness. Senator Kennedy has told the story over the years of when his 11- or 12-year-old son, Teddy Kennedy, Jr., developed cancer, and it was a serious form of cancer, one that was very dangerous and could take his life. He had to have his leg amputated. But there were some protocols to determine whether they could treat that cancer. They let Senator Kennedy's son be part of that protocol because during that kind of test they welcome you into it. It doesn't cost anything.

Halfway through that test, that protocol, it was determined that treatment actually worked. It could save Senator Kennedy's son's life, as it could the lives of the other children who were utilizing that drug. The difference was, of course, once the protocol was determined to be successful, it no longer was free, and it was very expensive-- thousands and thousands of dollars.

Senator Kennedy, obviously, as he tells the story, comes from a family who had the resources to be able to write that check to continue to make sure his son would get the treatment that allowed Teddy, Jr. to recover, to lead a very healthy life. Today he lives in my State of Connecticut with his wife Kiki and their children, and he got that kind of medicine.

But he tells the story of other families at that time, years ago now, who did not have the money and begged the hospitals and doctors: Could they get a quarter of the treatment, could they get a half of it, to see that their child may have the same chance to succeed and recover as Senator Kennedy's son did.

It was that moment that Senator Kennedy, some 40 years ago, 35 years ago, decided this would be the cause of his life, when his child, because they had the resources to get the treatment, could get back on his feet but some other child, through economic circumstances, could not.

In the United States of America, no child ought to be deprived the opportunity--or that family--to get back on his or her feet again. I think that is what joins us here together. I think this is hard. We realize that. It is difficult. But I believe it demands our attention and time.

So for those who are insured today, and while they are feeling pretty secure--and I hope you do--understand that these moments can happen. If you are uninsured, obviously it is a frightening feeling of what can happen in your family. I know these are difficult questions and there are not going to be easy answers. There is going to be some shared responsibility in all of this. But I believe we have an obligation, as U.S. Senators, at this moment in our history, to rise to that challenge and not to fail, as others have in years past because it is too hard.

There was a great line Edward R. Murrow once used when talking about another subject matter. He said: The one excuse history will never forgive you for is that the problem was too difficult.

I do not think history will forgive us if the answer we give is: It was just too hard. We just could not figure out how to come together. I think history will judge us harshly if that is the excuse we use for not rising to the moment and dealing with this issue in a comprehensive and thoughtful manner. It can never be too difficult. It is hard. We ought to have the ability to resolve this issue. That is my plea today.

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business.

Mr. President, I rise today to address one of the defining challenges of our time--the restructuring of our Nation's energy supply. Reforming our energy policy is critical for multiple reasons: to improve our national security, to create jobs and rebuild our economy, and to protect our children and our communities from the damaging effects of carbon pollution. Today I want to focus on just the first of these--improving our national security.

It has been said before and it will be said again, but it deserves repeating until we in Congress act to change it: Our Nation is addicted to foreign oil. This dependence makes us vulnerable to the whims of nations that do not have our best interests at heart.

This afternoon, I will examine this problem in some detail and consider the implications for a national energy policy that will strengthen our national security and end our addiction to imported oil. I emphasize that there is a cure. If we as a nation focus on smarter, wiser use of energy and aggressive development of homegrown renewable energy sources, we can indeed greatly reduce or eliminate dependence on imported oil, improve our national security, and strengthen our national economy, all at the same time.

Well, let's talk about dependence on foreign oil. Our dependence on foreign oil comes from two intertwined factors: First, our economy depends upon oil for transportation. Cars, trucks, trains, planes, boats that we use to move ourselves and our goods around the country are entirely dependent on oil. Indeed, 95 percent of the energy used in our transportation sector comes from oil. Second, our oil addiction relies on foreign imports: 58 percent of the oil we consume is imported. Thus, access to foreign oil is essential to the vitality of our economy. The result is that maintaining access to this oil becomes a very high priority for our national security.

Exactly whom do we depend on? The good news is, nearly 30 percent of our imported oil comes from our democratic neighbors to the north and south in North America. But that is where the good news ends. Take a look at this chart. Seventy percent of our imported oil comes from outside North America, and this chart shows the top four nations outside North America from which we import oil.

All four of these countries represent security challenges for the United States. Saudi Arabia is No. 1 on the list. It is the source of one in nine barrels of imported oil. Before addressing the fact that it presents national security challenges, it should be noted Saudi Arabia has often been a significant ally to the United States in our interests, in a relationship going back decades. Nevertheless, the dependency on their oil creates two national security issues:

First, the oil infrastructure and delivery systems of Saudi Arabia are vulnerable to terrorist attack or to manipulation by governments in the region. Consider the Strait of Hormuz. The Strait of Hormuz is a vulnerability for all Persian Gulf oil, 90 percent of which moves through the Strait. The Strait is 21 miles wide, with a narrow shipping channel. So, geographically, it is vulnerable to disruption, and Iran has explicitly threatened to put pressure on traffic going through the Strait or attempt to control it outright.

Second, the wealth we send to Saudi Arabia in exchange for petroleum has not always served us well. Former CIA Director James Woolsey testified in the Senate a few years ago that over the last three decades the Saudis have spent between $70 billion and $100 billion to support conservative institutions that often promulgate viewpoints and actions hostile to the United States. The wealth dispensed in this manner has, in some cases, migrated into terrorist organizations such as al-Qaida to recruit and build institutional capacity. This has led former CIA Director Woolsey to say of our current military conflicts: This is the first time since the Civil War that we have financed both sides of a conflict.

Venezuela is No. 2 on the list. It is, of course, led by President Hugo Chavez, a vocal critic of our country who has expressly threatened to cut off U.S. oil supplies. He told an Argentine newspaper that Venezuela has:

A strong oil card to play on the geopolitical stage . . . a

card that we are going to play with toughness against the

toughest country in the world, the United States.

The third nation on this list is Nigeria. Nigeria has had a series of disruptions just this year due to civil unrest. In February, oil companies reported to Reuters that 17 percent of the country's oil capacity was cut off from export because of attacks and sabotage by militants. According to testimony given to our Senate Foreign Relations Committee by the National Defense Council Foundation in 2006, Nigeria loses 135,000 barrels per day to theft.

Iraq, No. 4 on our list, has gone through enormous upheavals. Saddam Hussein's forces destroyed much of the nation's oil infrastructure when President Bush launched the Iraq war in 2003. That infrastructure has been subject to ongoing sabotage over the last 6 years. A significant share of Iraqi oil, similar to its neighbors, moves through the Strait of Hormuz, an additional point of vulnerability. Moreover, Iraq has not succeeded yet in passing a national law to share oil wealth among the ethnic groups in the nation, and the friction that comes from this continues to allow the possibility of factional conflict and disruptions in supply.

Iran isn't on this list. We have an embargo against Iran. We don't import oil from there, but it is still worth mentioning. Many of our allies get oil from Iran and their oil supplies are large enough to affect the world markets and thereby the stability and cost of our own supply. Again, turning to former CIA Director Woolsey testifying in the Senate, he noted that Iran derives 40 percent of its government budget from oil exports. According to the RAND Corporation, higher oil revenues have not just emboldened the Iranian Government to defy the United Nations regarding their nuclear program but also helped Iran to finance the activities of Hezbollah and Hamas.

Our dependence on foreign oil makes us vulnerable to a disrupted energy supply, and the risk is heightened because most of the world's proven reserves are controlled by just a few governments. State control means countries can and do manipulate energy supply. We had a case this last year when Russia manipulated gas markets to dominate new democracies in Eastern Europe.

The Energy Modeling Forum at Stanford University brought together a group of leading experts to assess the chances of a major oil supply disruption. They identified major areas of the globe where oil disruptions are most likely due to geopolitical, military or terrorist threats. Those areas include Saudi Arabia, the rest of the Persian Gulf, Russia, the Caspian states, and a group of nations in Africa and South America--which account for 60 percent of world oil production.

So the threat of disrupted supply is a serious one for our economy, as we found out during the oil shocks of the 1970s, which cost our economy about $2.5 trillion. If repeated today, such a crisis would cost our American economy about $8 trillion. We were reminded of the threat of supply disruption again when Hurricanes Katrina and Rita disrupted supplies and caused price spikes here in our Nation.

These don't supply the United States, but they do supply our allies, and in a global oil market these supplies are interdependent. A disruption of European oil supplies would have effects on our economy.

We also expend extraordinary resources to maintain our access to foreign oil because it is so important. It is important to the success of our economy. While estimates vary, according to a study produced by the National Defense Council Foundation, the indirect security and military costs relating to securing our access to oil amount to about $825 billion. That equates to more than $5 a gallon, on top of the price we pay at the pump. So we cannot allow our Nation's security and the health of the American economy to rely on the whims of unstable, unreliable, even hostile governments.

If we refuse to address our single greatest point of vulnerability, we fail in our most fundamental duty to protect this Nation. It is clear we need to end this addiction. We need to be energy self- sufficient. But how are we going to get there? One answer, which we heard chanted in rallies across America last year, was: Drill, baby, drill.

It is true we could increase production from American reserves in the short term with an aggressive drilling strategy. In fact, I support changing leases on hundreds of thousands of acres already approved for petroleum drilling and converting those into ``use it or lose it'' leases because major oil companies have secured those leases, and they are sitting on them without doing a thing.

Nevertheless, drilling is not, and cannot be, a long-term strategy for the security of our Nation for one simple reason: America uses a lot of oil but has, globally speaking, limited reserves. In fact, the United States has just 2 percent of the world's oil reserves, as this chart shows right here. Here we are, down here at the small end, with Mexico and Europe. Then, we see Eurasia, with 7 percent; Africa, with 9 percent; Central and South America, with a little bit more; then Canada; and then the whopper, the Middle East, which makes my point about security for our supplies.

I thank the Chair.

I thank the Senator for that offer. I think that would be a period of about 5 or 6 more minutes, if that would be acceptable.

I would certainly defer to the Senator from North Dakota, if he feels there is other business he wishes to conduct. But I will proceed if he feels that is acceptable.

I thank my colleague.

Mr. President, we have looked at the reserves side of this, but now let's look at the consumption side. As this chart shows, America, which has only 2 percent of the reserves, consumes 24 percent of the world's oil. So we only have one-fifth of the supply but we consume one-fourth of the output. That is a formula for trouble. A nation would be in a strong position if it had very high reserves and very low consumption, but it is vulnerable if it has very low reserves and high consumption. Unfortunately, that is right where America is.

To make things worse, the price of petroleum is going to continue to rise as the thirst from China and India increases. Because of the position we are in, our addiction to imported oil will only grow if we don't significantly change our energy strategy.

So what about other fossil fuels? In my home State, energy speculators are looking to build terminals to import LNG or liquefied natural gas. There are vulnerabilities there as well. Where does LNG come from? Top producers include Qatar, Indonesia, Malaysia, United Arab Emirates, and Oman.

Other folks argue we can extract more oil from Canadian tar sands or turn our abundant oil into transportation fuel. But it is worth observing that these strategies require extraordinary energy to produce fuel and emit extraordinary amounts of pollution in the process. So we have to look elsewhere to find a solution, and the place to look is energy efficiency and renewable energy.

Energy efficiency is the fastest and cheapest way out of our dependence, and we know it works. In response to the 1970s oil crisis, the Nation doubled the required gas mileage performance of our cars and trucks and saw per capita oil consumption plummet, even as our economy grew. Our progress in this area has not been steady, however. It has stagnated over the last two decades.

Progress resumed this year, when President Obama made the announcement that we would increase gas mileage standards to more than 35 miles per gallon 5 years ahead of the date scheduled. But we can do better. China will beat us to 35 miles per gallon, and 35 miles per gallon is not sufficient. We could aggressively develop and employ plug-in hybrid technology--cars with highly regenerative braking that can go at least 30 miles on a charge, enough to cover the daily commute, with no petroleum at all.

We need to deploy efficient strategies for the trucks that carry out our commerce--similar strategies with efficient body design. We need to move goods by rail and barge. A barge can move a ton of cargo 576 miles on a gallon of fuel, and a train can move a ton of cargo 413 miles on a gallon of fuel.

We should give our families and workers better transportation options, better access to rail and bus lines. We know from experience that with the right policy choices, we can use far less energy to power our economic activity.

We use a fraction of the energy today for gross domestic product that we did 30 years ago. If we give American scientists, engineers, and businesses the right incentives, tomorrow's economy will be orders of magnitude more efficient.

The other half of the equation is renewable energy, produced right here in America. It is the second major weapon in the war against oil addiction. Renewable electric energy can replace oil by providing power for plug-in electric vehicles.

I have heard Senator Reid describe Nevada as the Saudi Arabia of solar power renewable electric energy, and I have heard the good Senator from North Dakota describe North Dakota as the Saudi Arabia of wind power renewable electric energy. We need to seize this Nation's potential for renewable electric in wind, solar, wave, and geothermal.

We can also transition to homegrown renewable liquid fuels in the form of biofuels. In my State of Oregon, as one example, we have lots of fiber that can be converted, forced biomass that can be converted into fuel. We can produce biobutanol, biodiesel, and bioethanol. Producing biofuels from agricultural and forestry waste and waste from cellulosic nonfood crops raised on marginal lands, we can produce significant quantities of energy and create jobs and wealth for America's farmers and timber workers.

If an American car can go 30 miles with renewable electricity and then, if needed, switch over to a 50-mile-per-gallon engine burning cellulosic biofuels derived from forest biomass, that car is not using a single drop of imported foreign oil. It is running on 100 percent red, white, and blue energy.

In energy efficiency and renewable energy, we have twin elements that can break our addiction to foreign oil, but to achieve that self- sufficiency we need a comprehensive energy policy, a comprehensive strategy for saving energy and producing our energy here at home. That is what President Obama called for and what the Senate Committee on Environment and Public

Works is developing--drafting a comprehensive system of incentives and investment that, in combination with energy policies crafted by the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, will reduce our fossil fuel dependence and put us on the track to energy self- sufficiency.

Some say that energy conservation and renewable energy are too expensive. They could not be more wrong. Every economist will tell you that the cheapest energy is the energy you never use. Even today, renewable solar, wind, and geothermal are cheaper than imported oil when you factor in the huge price we pay to maintain our access to that oil.

Let me add, when we stop spending $2 billion a day on imported oil and spend that money on renewable fuels here in the United States, we are going to create a lot of good-paying jobs for America's families.

Depending on a few foreign nations for imported oil is a colossal mistake. We need to change course, improve our national security, and spend our energy dollars here in America to create jobs. That is why I hope every Member of the Senate will join me in supporting our 2009 clean energy and jobs bill when it comes to the Senate floor this fall.

I yield the floor.

I ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be set aside and Coburn amendment No. 1879 be called up.

I am happy to yield.

Let me first discuss the amendment No. 1895. The American people need to know what this is.

This is a way to say we are following the law on everything in terms of contracting except if it is an earmark. That is what this amendment does. It says we will follow all the laws on contracting except if we have an earmark that we want some company to get that might be a political friend or political donor or might be something we think is better than somebody else might think. Dorgan 1895 essentially guts transparency for this country in terms of when we buy, what we buy, and how we buy.

My amendment says anything we buy is going to be competitively bid. Senator Dorgan may have something he believes in strongly and believes should be done. There is nothing wrong with that, especially if it is authorized. But there is plenty wrong with saying who is going to get the benefit from that being done, which company, which firm, which special interest group. Most often earmarks are for the well heeled, the well connected in this body. When I bring an amendment to the floor that says we will have transparency, the American people will get value. Even if we do an earmark, at least we know we will buy that earmark at a competitive price compared to what we could have bought it for otherwise.

What the Dorgan amendment does is guts that. It says we will follow the law all the time, the Federal contracting statutes, except when we have earmarked something. So what it does, it allows them to vote to say they are following the law with the exclusion of all earmarks. Whereas my amendment says if you are going to earmark something, at least in these times of trillions of dollars of deficit, maybe the American taxpayer ought to get the benefit of having it competitively bid so that we get real value for it. It is not any more complicated than that.

What we say in my amendment is if it is out there, get good value for the American people, competitively bid it. Make sure it is online. Make sure we follow all the rules and regs. Today it is much more important than ever because government purchasing is more important to those people whose businesses are down-sliding. So we are having many more people interested in competing for the dollars on government work. Yet we have an amendment that is going to be voted on side by side for political cover only that sounds good. It sounds good. It says:

None of the funds appropriated or otherwise made available

by this Act may be used by the Department of Energy to enter

into any Federal contract unless such contract is entered

into in accordance with the requirements of the Federal

Property and Administrative Services Act . . . or Chapter 137

of title 10, United States Code, and the Federal Acquisition

Regulation, unless such contract is otherwise authorized by

statute . . .

That is code word for earmark, ``unless such contract is otherwise authorized by statute.''

If you vote for the Dorgan amendment, you want to continue to connect the well heeled, the well connected and you don't want transparency and you don't want competitive bid prices on what we as Americans pay through our tax dollars for what the government buys. It is as simple as that. What my amendment says is, each time, every time, unless it is in the interest of national security, we will, in fact, competitively bid. We may not all agree

where Senator Dorgan or I may want something done, but at least when we are doing it, we will buy it in a more efficient, more effective way and save money for the American taxpayer.

I ask for the yeas and nays on my amendment.

Is the order that we will pool votes for a later time?

I ask that the pending amendment be set aside and I call up amendment 1878; further, that it be in order to modify the amendment with the change I send to the desk. I understand Senator Dorgan has approved this change.

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

Mr. President, throughout this appropriations bill, we have a lot of reports we are asking agencies to come up with. This is another amendment about transparency. I appreciate the fact that the chairman and ranking member will accept this amendment.

What this says is, if we get a report, the agency has to report it to the American people. In other words, they have to publish it. We get to see what the results of that report are. There are exceptions for national intelligence and the military, but in those areas where there is not a reason for the American people not to see it in terms of national defense or our own security, what this amendment says is the agencies have to release the reports and put them online and make them available to the American people. You paid for the report; you ought to be able to see the results. Far to often around here, we get reports but only certain people get the reports. Some of us never get reports. So what this says is, the reports that come out of here that are not related to national security or defense and otherwise are appropriate will be made available by the agency to the American public.

With that, I yield to the chairman.

Mr. President, it is fine for us to accept it.

So I understand, Mr. President, we have accepted amendment No. 1878. I also understand that amendment No. 1884, which requires contracts, has a side-by-side with Dorgan amendment No. 1895.

Amendment No. 1879

Mr. President, is amendment No. 1879 pending?

At the Department of Energy, one of its tasks in this country is to help us with energy efficiency, to help us with a lot of what we would expect to be within the Department of Energy. It is peculiar, however, when the Department of Energy has looked at themselves, they are highly inefficient, according to their own inspector general, with the utilization of energy.

They have 9,000 buildings. The inspector general said last year they wasted at least $13.8 million in energy costs--$13.8 million. There is $13.8 million they could have saved had they done some small, simple, straightforward things like they request every other agency in the Federal Government to do. Isn't it ironic that the very agency that is telling all the rest of the agencies to save money by becoming efficient with their computers, by becoming efficient with their heating and cooling systems, by becoming efficient with their utilization of lighting, does not even follow their rules they ask the rest of the agencies to follow.

This is a very simple amendment. We know at least $13.8 million was wasted last year. That is probably just the tip of the iceberg. This amendment says we are going to reduce their funds by $13.8 million. And I can tell them the steps tomorrow as to how they can save $13.8 million so it will have no net effect on the agency. So with what we do, the American taxpayers get $13.8 million, as a minimum, of energy savings out of the Department of Energy. That is as straightforward as I can say it.

Here is another one of those reports that nobody reads except our staff, and you see the IG is doing their actual work, and now we are bringing an amendment to the floor. It has not been agreed to. It has not been accepted. But it is absolute common sense. I do not understand why it is not accepted, when the IG has plainly listed out where you can save the money and how you can do it. Why would we not reduce their funding to force them to do that?

So it is a no-net-revenue-loss for them because they are going to save the $13.8 million as they reconfigure computers, as they follow their own regulations within the Department of Energy. I will not go on in detail. But this is the kind of commonsense amendment we need to be doing in the Senate to hold the agencies accountable to follow their own rules, as they force everybody else to follow the same set of rules. This is not ``do as I do.'' This is ``do what you see us doing.'' That is the model, and that is the example.

Amendment No. 1884 to Amendment No. 1813

Mr. President, it is my understanding that amendment No. 1884 still needs to be called up. So at this time, I ask unanimous consent to set aside the pending amendment, call up amendment No. 1884, and then following its calling up, to set it aside and resume the present amendment.

Mr. President, it is my understanding we are back on the previous amendment.

One last point I would like to make is that the Department of Energy is responsible for numerous private sector energy- efficient programs and for the enforcement of those programs. It makes sense that if they are going to be the enforcer and be responsible, they ought to follow those same energy efficiencies to regain the confidence of the very people they are saying they want change from. It is pretty hard to expect people to swallow making changes for energy efficiency in all the rest of the government agencies when the very agency that is telling you to do it does not follow its own rules. So this is straightforward.

I know the appropriators do not like somebody coming and cutting money, but this is a no-net-cost to the agency. All they have to do is about 15 small steps--very inconsequential in terms of cost--and they can save almost $14 million next year. Probably they will save $20 million or $25 million, and that is just based on the two IG reports we have from the fall of last year and the spring of this year. So this is not old data. This is brandnew data. These are brandnew reports from the IG.

I hope my colleagues would reconsider and accept this amendment because it is one of the ways we can save $13.8 million. It is an easy deal.

With that, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, the Senator would admit, would he not, that the President's request is what he requested, it is not what was actually spent last year? That is No. 1. What you have done is cut $8 million from actual expenditures in administration last year.

So therefore would the Senator agree to accept my amendment to just adding $5.5 million to the $8 million you have already cut, because you are going to get it back in energy savings?

Mr. President, I enjoy my debates with the appropriators. I love you guys. I think it is great.

The one thing that was not mentioned is that in the stimulus bill the Department of Energy got an additional billion dollars. So there has been no net cut. There has actually been a massive increase in the Department of Energy when you count the stimulus bill.

No. 2 is, you have ramped up the FEMP the Federal Energy Management Program, by 50 percent, going from $22 million to $33 million, the very program that they are enforcing on everybody else. Yet they won't comply with it.

I also would say the Senate is going to get to decide this every time we have an appropriations bill as far as transparency in contracting. I may get smarter at the way I write it, but the American people deserve to have great value.

If you want to change the contracting law to say there are certain times we shouldn't do that in terms of highly specific scientific things, that is fine with me; but the fact is billions and billions and billions of dollars are well placed directly to businesses in this country at higher rates than they would have been otherwise had we had competitive bidding and open contracting. Nobody can deny that fact. Nobody can deny that fact. I am talking about all across the government.

So we are going to get a vote on competitive bidding on every appropriations bill that comes before the Senate. The American people get it. It is a great defense you are offering, but it isn't going to pass the smell test with the American people. They deserve the best value they can get on every penny we spend of their money, not our money.

I understand we think we have decided it. We are going to keep voting it; we are going to keep voting against it, and we are going to keep telling the American people we are still going to connect up with our buddies, we are still going to make sure these people who are well heeled and well connected are going to get the contracts.

I will grant to the chairman there are certain things that should be outside of this that are highly scientific, that are limited to very few potential bidders, and maybe even only one. But, remember, we have FutureGen going in Chicago now, a $2 billion earmark that is going to be a $4 billion earmark that is going to be a $6 billion earmark that we said only one person can do, and MIT says nobody can do it because the technology isn't finished. We have that going. That is a Department of Energy earmark. So it is not just hundreds of thousands of dollars; it is billions and billions and billions of dollars.

America should hear that what we are going to see is we have all the reasons in the world why we are not going to be competitively bid. We are going to give you all the reasons why we are not going to be efficient with your dollars, why now is not the time, why we shouldn't do this now. But the fact is that while we shouldn't be doing it, we are cutting the legs off of our children and grandchildren.

The Senator from Utah mischaracterizes both the intent and the function of the amendment. If something is already contracted that has already been appropriated for, it won't be affected. It is new contracts and new bids. That is the intent.

The reason I come with this is because nothing ever changes here. If, in fact, we pass my amendment, you know what. We will have to change the contracting. How do we change contracting with everything that is coming across the floor? How do we get it through committee? We will never move it until we are forced to move it.

That is why this amendment is written this way, because all of us know the great deal of difficulty to get anything done in this body.

So if, in fact--we are going to do three bills in the next 2 weeks: one on the transportation trust fund, one on unemployment insurance, and one on HUD that has to be done. They will get done. So the reason it is written this way is because it will have to get done and we will do it. We will never get it done the other way, and both of my colleagues recognize that there is truth in that statement.

I am going to insist we have a vote on the amendment. I thank the chairman and ranking member for their debate. I remind the American people that there is always an excuse in Washington not to have transparency, not to be efficient, and not to be effective. We will always find a way not to get good value for your money.

With that, I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, I wish to spend a few minutes this morning talking about some of the positive developments that are taking place right now on this issue of health care reform. For example, this morning, the President is out talking to workers who already have insurance about how health care reform will work for them. He is spending his political capital. He is using the bully pulpit that is the White House. It is clear that this is a priority for the President of the United States.

A second positive development is in the Senate Finance Committee. We have a bipartisan group of six Senators. They are putting in killer hours at this point. I have been kidding them that I suspect they are being fed intravenously, but they are trying to put together a bipartisan health reform effort, and I appreciate what they are doing.

Third, I note my good friend from Utah on the floor of the Senate this morning. He and I have made it clear that the sponsors of the Healthy Americans Act, a bipartisan group of 15 of senators, are very open to working with Chairman Baucus, Chairman Dodd, and the President of the United States in a bipartisan fashion to fix health care.

So the question that is front and center in all of these discussions with the President, with the bipartisan group in the Finance Committee, with the bipartisan group of Healthy Americans Act sponsors that Senator Bennett and I are part of, is how we control costs in health care. What are we going to do to make health care more affordable?

It is our judgment that the key to making health care more affordable is to make sure people have bargaining power and people have choice-- the same choice that Members of Congress have. The distinguished Senator from New Mexico, the Senator from Utah, and myself actually belong to something that is pretty much an exchange, which is like a farmers market for health insurance. But essentially what we in the Senate have is the opportunity to choose from a menu of private health policies. We get rewarded for making an economical selection to save on our premiums, and we get rewarded when we choose a program that puts more emphasis on prevention and health. So when Senators shop wisely, they end up being wealthier and healthier as a result of being able to participate in a big exchange.

What Senator Bennett and I wish to do today is extend that kind of bargaining power to everybody in our country. After a period of time, a phase-in over a few years, everybody in our country ought to have a chance to have the kind of bargaining power and the kind of clout that Members of Congress have. Everybody in our country ought to be in a position to choose a policy that works for them. And when they make a good choice, when they

shop wisely, the extra money should go into their own pockets. That is the kind of approach Senator Bennett and I have advocated. It is a way to focus on these exchanges, these farmers markets which, in my view, are the key to getting health reform right.

What these exchanges do, if we set it up right, is they give all the middle-class people who are insured today in New Mexico, Utah, and Oregon a chance to come out winners under health reform at the get-go. And if you are already insured, the President has said he is going to let you keep the coverage you have. Now that makes a lot of sense. We senators hear that at every meeting back in our states.

But if, for example, in Utah, Oregon, or New Mexico, you don't like the coverage you have and you can get a better deal at the exchange, something that puts more money in your pocket, something that helps you and your family, let's let people do that under Free Choice.

Under the Free Choice proposal Senator Bennett and I have advocated, that we have presented to Chairman Baucus, Chairman Dodd, and the President of the United States, this is something we can do for the insured that helps them save money right at the get-go.

Regrettably, a number of the bills that have been considered in the Congress do not give people those kinds of choices. And when we look at how these bills are set up, there are what are called ``firewalls'' that restrict people from getting these choices. A lot of the people who are advocating for a public option are not even going to get the choice to enroll in one.

The key to helping people who already have insurance, the 160 million who get coverage through their employer today, is to get these exchanges right and to make sure that everybody has bargaining power within these exchanges as part of a big group.

I have a private policy as a Member of Congress. The people in Oregon, in effect, are my employer. They pay a portion of it. We have a million people in our group. That is the way to spread a lot of cost and risk through a group so you can get real value. Let's set these exchanges up at least so they contain big groups through a regional approach. Senator Bennett and I said we are open to a variety of ways of doing this. But let's make sure that everybody has some clout in the marketplace. If you are a small business in New Mexico today, you get strangled by the administrative costs of health care. You don't have much clout in the marketplace. As a small employer, you may be paying 30 percent of your health care dollar for administration. It should not be that way. We should be giving those small businesses relief.

What Senator Bennett and I have said with our free choice proposal is if you are an employer in New Mexico or elsewhere in this country, you may want to take your workers to the exchange. This is employer- sponsored insurance. This is an employer taking their workers to the exchange. As an employer, you can go to the exchange in New Mexico and say you want a discount because you are taking your group of workers to the exchange. That is playing hard ball with the private insurance business. That is saying to the insurers in New Mexico you are not doing good enough; you are not giving me a good enough deal, so I am going to have a chance to go to the insurance exchange and get a better one. We call it Free Choice: more options for employers and more options for workers. Options that look like what Members of Congress have.

I fear if we do not set up a system that gets this exchange right so that people have bargaining power--employers and employees--we are not going to be able to get the kind of cost containment the President of the United States has identified correctly as the heart of health care reform. It is about holding down costs. It is about making coverage more affordable.

I urge colleagues to look at the article that was written in this morning's Washington Post by Ezra Klein talking about the importance of the exchange and what it can mean for the bargaining power of middle- class people and businesses if it is set up right.

We know how to set it up right because it resembles the system that all of us enjoy in the Senate. At the beginning of the year, senators have a choice, a menu of options. If you make a good one, the money goes right into your pocket.

One last point with respect to Free Choice. Sometimes the best choices are not the most expensive choices. Senator Bennett knows a lot about this because in Utah they have a system, intermountain, that has illustrated that the best choices are not always the expensive choices. Let's make it easier for people to choose an Intermountain program or a Mayo program or any of the other integrated systems that are regarded as the gold standard in terms of quality.

One of the concerns I have about all of these firewalls in the legislation that is being considered is that Americans around this country, after a big push in the Congress to choose quality, are not even going to have the opportunity to choose a program like Mayo or Intermountain that gets more value for the health care dollar.

There are some positive developments in the health care debate going on today. To highlight some of these developments, the President is out talking to workers; negotiations are going on in the Senate Finance Committee; and there is the very gracious approach that Senator Bennett and a number of Republicans are taking in terms of saying: Look, we want this to be bipartisan, we want to meet the President halfway.

Each of those developments, it seems to me, is very positive. Fixing health care is absolutely key to fixing the economy.

As Ezra Klein pointed out this morning in the Washington Post, the reason people's take-home pay isn't going up is because medical costs are gobbling up everything in sight. So the key to fixing health care is promoting free choice; getting these exchanges right so employers and employees have more opportunities to hold costs down.

I think, in view of these positive developments I have highlighted, there is reason for Senators to stay at it and keep working in a bipartisan way, and real progress is going to be made before this body leaves for the August break.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, let me pick up on the point made by the Senator from North Dakota because he is very accurate in his assessment.

One of the reasons they like so much this idea of trying to set up a model as we have in the Congress, with our exchanges, is because, for example, somebody who is working for the Forest Service in the State of Oregon has essentially the same kinds of choices I have for the Wyden family.

I think Senator Dorgan's point about trying to make clear to the American people that these choices Members of Congress have, somebody, for example, who works for the Forest Service in Oregon, has essentially the same choices, which involve basic health care--what we think of as preventive care, primary care, being able to go see a doctor, being able to get hospital coverage, and a reasonable catastrophic benefit. That is what Members of Congress can essentially choose from, and that is what somebody has an opportunity to get if they work at the Forest Service.

I think Senator Dorgan's point is very valid. The reason I have come back to this is because, under our free choice proposal, people in this country would, in effect, be able to go to one of these exchanges, which is similar to a farmer's market, and choose from a menu of private policies, not unlike what a Member of Congress has and somebody who works for the Forest Service. So I think the Senator from North Dakota has made a good point.

We, of course, have a lot of bargaining power because we go into these big groups, and that bargaining power can hold down administrative costs and get a better deal for somebody who has insurance. I would like to see, as we go forward with this legislation, that these exchanges are set up around a lot of the same principles Members of Congress have. Because if you do that, that is going to hold costs down for people who have insurance, and it is going to make their coverage more affordable. For example, the workers the President is going to see today would have additional choices in the future and save money when they are purchasing quality health care.

With that, I thank the Senator from North Dakota for making an important point.