A resolution to enable each newly constituted Senate to carry out its responsibility to determine the Rules of its Proceedings at the beginning of each Congress.

Mr. President, I rise today to urge my colleagues to support the Conrad-Gregg amendment. I believe the issues this amendment is designed to address--our national debt and deficits as far as the eye can see--are two of the most important issues Congress and our Nation face. Our failure to address these issues will damage our economy, our Nation's security, peace in the world, and the kind of future we leave to our children and grandchildren.

The greatness of the issue has resulted in the chairman and ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee, Senators Conrad and Gregg, coming together and introducing the Bipartisan Task Force for Responsible Fiscal Action Act, which is supported by 29 Senators--14 Democrats and 15 Republicans. I am pleased to say I am one of those 15 Republicans.

I think those who followed the recent operations of the Senate will appreciate that in this Balkanized Senate, where nothing seems to get done on a bipartisan basis, this commission has significant bipartisan support. The Conrad-Gregg proposal would create a statutorily based commission of 18 members, 16 of them Members of Congress, who would study the long-term fiscal imbalance of the Federal Government and submit recommendations as a legislative proposal that would receive expedited consideration by Congress resulting in an up-or-down vote. The commission would consider all options on both sides of the ledger and would require the approval of 14 of its 18 members, ensuring a bipartisan product.

I want to emphasize to my Republican colleagues who may be skeptical of this bipartisan commission, half of the congressionally appointed members will be appointed by the Senate minority leader and the House minority leader, which guarantees that the Conrad-Gregg commission will protect the concerns of my colleagues.

For example, large tax increases are unlikely, given the makeup and procedures of the commission. And, finally, three-fifths of the Senate and three-fifths of the House must vote for passage of the recommendations, ensuring strong bipartisan support from both Chambers.

The bipartisanship is the key to success because this is not a Democratic or Republican problem. It affects everyone. I believe this special process is the most practical and effective method to deal with the looming debt crisis that endangers the economic future of all of us.

A commission to address our Nation's fiscal issues has been recommended by outside budget experts from across the political spectrum. These experts have declared that the regular process is incapable of dealing with long-term fiscal issues. Just ask me. This is my 12th year in the Senate. The regular process does not work.

In February 2009, groups including Brookings, the Urban Institute, the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, the Concord Coalition, AEI, Progressive Policy Institute, and the Heritage Foundation issued a statement calling for the establishment of a commission to address our fiscal issues.

I ask unanimous consent to have this letter printed in the Record at the conclusion of my remarks.

Recently, on PBS's nightly business program, Maya MacGuineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, who has been working on this problem for a dozen years, made a strong statement in support of a commission. I ask unanimous consent to have printed her full statement in the Record at the conclusion of my remarks, and I would highlight that in her statement Ms. MacGuineas notes her early opposition to such a commission, but she has changed her mind based on the urgency of our Nation's fiscal situation.

David Walker, President and CEO of the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, former Comptroller General of the United States, has long advocated a special process to get our Nation's fiscal house in order. Mr. Walker has testified:

Clearly escalating Federal deficits and debt levels,

combined with our growing dependency on foreign lenders and

the deepening Federal financial hole, represents challenges

that must be addressed. A commission could make

recommendations in connection with needed statutory budget

control, social insurance program reforms, tax reform,

additional health care reforms, and other appropriate areas.

Importantly--

This is the most important thing--

everything must be on the table with the commission to be

credible and to have a real chance of success.

Recently, Mr. Walker released a book entitled ``Comeback America: Turning the Country Around and Restoring Fiscal Responsibility.'' In his book, Mr. Walker explains the nature of the crisis and why we must act now. Rather than describe all of the frightening statistics myself, and many people have heard those statistics, I would recommend this book to my colleagues if they have any doubts about the seriousness of this fiscal crisis facing our Nation.

Of course, throughout the debate on their amendment, Senators--and I heard them earlier today--Conrad and Gregg have described the dire fiscal future our Nation faces without action. We just heard another presentation from my distinguished colleague from the State of Maine. I have, in my prior floor speeches on this topic, which probably are dozens, described the significance of this fiscal crisis our Nation faces. For any of my colleagues or members of the public, you can access these speeches on my Web site.

I would note that the American people agree. This is important. The American people agree with Senators Conrad and Gregg. In fact, the latest bipartisan public opinion poll commissioned by the Peter G. Peterson Foundation this past November indicates that 80 percent--80 percent--of American voters are concerned about escalating debt and deficits.

Voter concern about debt and deficits exceeded concern about health care access and affordability by 24 percent--by 24 percent--and 70 percent of Americans believe the regular order in Washington is broken. They think the regular order is broken, and it is time for a fiscal reform commission to become a reality.

I was pleased last year that the distinguished minority leader, the senior Senator from Kentucky, spoke eloquently about the merits of the bipartisan Conrad-Gregg Commission. In a July statement on the Senate floor, Senator McConnell said:

This means that in order to face our problem head on, we

will have to address the problem of entitlement spending. And

the only serious option on the table is the Conrad-Gregg

proposal which would provide a clear pathway for fixing these

long-term challenges by forcing us to get debt and spending

under control.

He goes on to say:

I have had a number of good conversations about this

proposal with the President. Based on those conversations, I

am hopeful it will be given serious attention. For the safety

and security of our Nation, the Conrad-Gregg proposal

deserves broad bipartisan support.

That was the minority leader of the Senate. Senator Reid has been silent on his support, but based on conversations I have had with him, I believe he also appreciates the dire financial situation our Nation faces. Still I want to say that I have been disappointed there has not been more of a recent effort by leaders of both parties embracing the Conrad-Gregg Commission, which is one of the most bipartisan pieces of legislation we have seen in the Senate during this Congress--in fact, I believe the most bipartisan legislation that has come before this session of Congress.

My question to Senators Reid and McConnell is, If you are not in favor of the Conrad-Gregg Commission, what bipartisan proposal are you for? In other words, if you do not like the commission, then what bipartisan proposal are you for?

I was also disappointed that the President initially threw in the towel on the Conrad-Gregg Commission on the grounds that he understood the votes to pass this proposal were not there. Instead the President proposed issuing an Executive order establishing a debt commission. An Executive order commission, I believe, will be looked upon by many on my side of the aisle as nothing more than an exercise in political messaging. But I say to my colleagues on this side of the aisle: If you are not for the Conrad-Gregg proposal, what are you for? What are you for?

Thus, I am grateful that this Saturday the President has changed his position and stated:

The only way to solve our long-term fiscal challenge is to

solve it together, Democrats and Republicans. That's why I

strongly support legislation under consideration to create a

bipartisan fiscal commission to come up with a set of

solutions to tackle our nation's fiscal challenges, and call

on Senators from both parties to vote for the creation of a

statutory, bipartisan fiscal commission.

The President of the United States made it clear. He wants this bipartisan statutory commission to pass the Senate. The beauty of creating the commission through legislation is it would force Congress to deal with the Nation's looming fiscal catastrophe, rewarding the work of the commission's members by ensuring that if their proposal gets 14 out of 18 votes, the bill will not be placed on a shelf to gather dust.

I can tell you, as I watched this Senate during the last 11 years, if someone would ask me to sit on a commission and spend the time I would have to spend to deal with the problems that would be confronting the commission, I would want a guarantee. I would want a guarantee that if the majority, 14 out of 18 members were for it, it would get expedited procedure; that I would get a vote, up or down, on that labor of work in which I had participated.

I think the President understands if we are going to respond to the fiscal crisis facing our Nation, it has to be bipartisan. I am prayerful he will use his political capital with Senator Reid and Senator McConnell to secure the 60 votes needed for this landmark legislation and then urge our House colleagues to do the same.

Some of my colleagues have other proposals. Many of them are worthy of consideration. However, none of these proposals is bipartisan. In the end, such proposals might result in great messaging. Boy, we do a lot of messaging around here. For some it would provide a way to cover their behinds or, more tactfully, to provide a fig leaf to cover their unwillingness to support something that is bipartisan and ultimately good for the country. Moreover, of course, these folks would save themselves from heartburn, heartburn that they might suffer when special interests complain, and perhaps give ammunition to someone who might be running against them in a Republican or Democratic primary for the Senate.

Since the possible passage of this commission has become a reality, it is interesting how this starts to work. Special interest groups on both sides of the aisle have assailed it as terrible. The taxpayer organizations on the right warn that the commission will increase taxes. The liberal groups on the left warn it will result in cuts to Social Security, Medicare, and other government programs.

You know something. If the left and the right are so unhappy with this, this has to be good legislation. Others, frankly, want to use the debt limit issue to embarrass our friends on the other side of the aisle because of the large increases we have approved, particularly as a result of the recession and the collapse of our financial markets. Other members continue to blame President Bush and earlier Congresses.

The truth is, none of us, Republicans or Democrats, has clean hands. Since 2002 there have been nine votes, nine votes to increase the debt limit. They have occurred both under Democrats and Republicans when they controlled Congress. In that time, our debt has gone from $6.4 trillion to roughly $12.4 trillion. All of us, all of us have done it.

The American people know the chickens have come home to roost, and we better understand that. That is what I hear when I go back to Ohio. If one thing came out of Massachusetts, the people are tired of the--to put it in the vernacular--BS coming out of Congress. Congress's numbers continue to be among the worst they have ever been because the folks back home think we are more interested in protecting our political hide and who is going to control the next Congress than working in a bipartisan way to solve our Nation's problems.

They know when their elected representatives are scrapping, their interests are scraps falling off the table. They also know, as I know, that even when we work together, it is often difficult to get things done because many of us have sincere differences of opinion. I learned both of those lessons as mayor of the city of Cleveland and Governor of Ohio.

The eyes of the American people are focused on what we are doing. The American people will be watching to see if we got the wake-up call from Massachusetts. They are telling us they are mad as hell with business as usual and they are not going to take it anymore. The American people want us

to work together. They do. They want us to work together. They do not want messaging and back-room deals that favor one group or another.

Americans always hear from politicians about how they will work for bipartisan solutions to America's problems that will strengthen our future. How many times have they heard that on the floor of this Senate? Well, here is the opportunity for Members of the Senate, the House, and President Obama to show when they make such statements they are serious.

I came here in 1999, and one of the major reasons I came here was to deal with paying down our Nation's debt and balance budgets. I can remember back in 2000, I was the only Republican that voted against the Republican legislation to reduce taxes because I said that money should be used to pay down debt.

I am leaving the Senate at the end of this year, as is the Presiding Officer. I have three children and seven grandchildren. The wife of my youngest son Peter is expecting their first child. I have always believed it is my responsibility to try to leave this world and particularly our Nation in better shape than how I found it. It was something that was ingrained in my first-generation parents: George, you have a responsibility to leave this country a better place than that which you found. I am running out of time to do something. So is the country. On too many occasions, Congress has been unwilling to experience short-term pain to achieve long-term gain. We have been unwilling do without or pay for things that many folks have wanted us to do.

Our Nation has put the financial costs of the two wars on the credit card, even while the soldiers and their families continue to bear the human cost of these wars. To me, this lack of effective action is absolutely immoral. It is absolutely immoral. I recently talked with my oldest son George, the father of four beautiful girls, who genuinely feels there will be no Social Security for him, that Medicare may not be there either. He understands the global competition facing his generation and his daughters' generation is greater than at any other time in our Nation's history, that global competition is greater than at any other time in this Nation's history. The burden we have created because of our fiscal irresponsibility brings into question whether his children will enjoy the same opportunity for a standard of living that we have had.

I said in the beginning of my speech, I believe the issues this amendment is designed to address, our national debt and deficits as far as the eye can see, are two of the most important issues Congress and our Nation face. Our failure to address these issues will damage our economy, our Nation's security, peace in the world, and the kind of future we leave to our children and grandchildren.

The future of our Nation is in our hands. The future of our Nation is in the hands of these 100 Senators. I pray the Holy Spirit will come down and inspire us to make the right decision. My two mottos have been over the years: ``Together we can do it'' and, Ohio's motto, ``With God all things are possible.'' Working together on a bipartisan basis and with God's help, I am positive we can solve our problems, meet our challenges, and take advantage of the opportunities before us.

I yield the floor.

Exhibit 1

Statement on the Fiscal Responsibility Summit

February 19, 2009.

President Obama's intention to convene a fiscal

responsibility summit is a very welcome development. It

offers a valuable opportunity to focus public attention on

our nation's unsustainable budget outlook and to highlight

various approaches to meaningful action.

As a group of budget analysts and former senior budget

officials, we view this summit as the first step to

addressing the enormous long-term fiscal problem facing the

United States. Without decisive action this problem will lead

to serious harm to our economy and a huge financial burden on

our children and grandchildren.

Tackling these problems will require a degree of sacrifice

impossible under the existing policy process, which

discourages bipartisan compromise and encourages

procrastination and obstructionism. Unless those procedures

are modified, and the American people are engaged in the

process, future legislative attempts to address the looming

fiscal crisis will almost certainly fail.

In our view, the American people are ready to confront the

challenge. For the last three years several of us have

traveled around the country as a group, discussing these

issues with thousands of Americans in dozens of cities, in a

bipartisan effort known as the Fiscal Wake-Up Tour. We have

found that when Americans are given the facts and options in

a neutral and bipartisan way, they want action and are

willing to make difficult trade-offs.

We therefore urge the President to lead a major public

engagement effort--beyond a one-day summit--to inform

Americans of the scale and nature of the long-term fiscal

crisis, explain the consequences of inaction and discuss the

options for solving the problem. This should be bipartisan,

and involve a serious conversation with Americans to help

guide action in Washington. As a group with some experience

in this domain, we stand ready to assist if needed.

We also believe that for this policy commitment to produce

tangible results, the President and others who share the goal

of fiscal responsibility must address the fact that the

regular political process has been incapable of dealing with

long-term fiscal issues. We see no alternative but to create

an independent and truly bipartisan commission or other

mechanism capable of bringing about decisive action that has

broad public support. We therefore urge the President to

support such a commission. For this commission or some other

mechanism to break through the legislative logjam it will

need four key elements:

It must be truly bipartisan and develop solutions that

command wide support.

It must have a broad mandate to address all aspects of the

fiscal problem while fostering strong economic growth.

There must be no preconditions to the deliberations. All

options must be on the table for discussion. Nobody should be

required to agree in advance to any option.

Recommendations must go before Congress for an up-or-down

vote with few if any amendments. Such a game-changing process

is not without precedents; controversial military base

closings or the ratification of international trade

agreements, for example, have long been governed by special

rules along these lines, not by business as usual.

We are deeply worried about the long-term fiscal imbalance

and the dangers it carries for the economy and for our

children and grandchildren. We know the President is

concerned as well, as are many Members of Congress in both

political parties. We are ready to help in building public

understanding of the problem and the options, and in crafting

an approach that will enable the legislative process to deal

with the problem.

This statement is offered by members of the Brookings-

Heritage Fiscal Seminar. The views expressed are those of the

individuals involved and should not be interpreted as

representing the views of their respective institutions. For

purposes of identification, the affiliation of each signatory

is listed.

Signatories:

Joe Antos, American Enterprise Institute; Robert Bixby,

Concord Coalition; Stuart Butler, Heritage Foundation;

Alison Fraser, Heritage Foundation; William Galston,

Brookings Institution; Ron Haskins, Brookings

Institution; Julia Isaacs, Brookings Institution; Will

Marshall, Progressive Policy Institute; Pietro Nivola,

Brookings Institution; Rudolph Penner, Urban Institute;

Robert Reischauer, Urban Institute; Alice M. Rivlin,

Brookings Institution; Isabel Sawhill, Brookings

Institution; C. Eugene Steuerle, Peter G. Peterson

Foundation.

Exhibit 2

[PBS Nightly Business Report, Jan. 12, 2010]

``Commentary''--Budget Commission

SUSIE GHARIB: Tonight's commentator says with a budget deep

in red ink and a Congress that hasn't cut spending, she's

taking a fresh look at things. She's Maya MacGuineas,

president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.

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

Mr. President, this weekend there was some discussion and writing in the papers and elsewhere in journals about the nomination of Mr. Bernanke, the Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, for another term as chair on that Board. The Washington Post had an editorial entitled ``Scapegoat at the Fed.'' I don't normally come to the floor of the Senate to respond to the Washington Post editorials, but I do wish to respond to a portion of this editorial, and then in a broader way describe why I think this is an important moment for the Senate.

``Scapegoat at the Fed.'' The editorial begins:

There are many ways to interpret the election results in

Massachusetts last week . . . But one thing Massachusetts did

not represent was a mandate to make a national scapegoat out

of Ben Bernanke, the Federal Reserve Board chairman.

Yet two Democratic Senators seeking reelection in November

. . . plus another planning to retire . . . appear to read it

that way. They took the occasion of last week's political

upheaval to announce their opposition to another four-year

term for Mr. Bernanke, whose current one expires January 31.

These senators' attempt to burnish their populist credentials

by making Mr. Bernanke the fall guy for all the sins, real

and perceived, of Wall Street fuels the right-left anti-Fed

chorus in Congress that has already produced troubling

attempts to subject the Fed to intrusive and

counterproductive audits of its monetary policy.

Well, that is a partial recitation of the editorial.

I can just condense the editorial by saying the editorial board at the Washington Post, as is always the case, has taken the position that if anybody wants to know anything about what the Federal Reserve Board is doing, it is none of their business. It is none of Congress's business; it is none of the American people's business. Stay out of it. Keep your nose out of the Federal Reserve Board. That is kind of the position of the Washington Post.

It is not since the Massachusetts election, however, that I have expressed reservations about the Federal Reserve Board. In fact, on six occasions I have given speeches on the floor of the Senate just since December 10, 2008. That day, plus on five additional occasions, I came to the floor to talk about the issues that persuaded me to say, as I did last week, that I don't even believe we should vote on Mr. Bernanke's nomination until he has decided to provide the Senate and the American people with information that he is now withholding. Let me describe what that is.

This is a Bloomberg report. It says:

The U.S. has lent, spent, or guaranteed $11.6 trillion to

bolster banks and to fight the longest recession in 70 years.

I have not come to the floor of the Senate critical of the Fed's policies by which they have lent, spent, or guaranteed $11.6 trillion; although it is fair to say the $11.6 trillion is not theirs. That represents the risks of the American people. That is the full faith and credit of this great country of ours.

The Federal Reserve Board has taken a number of actions to try to address this economic crisis. However, I would

suggest this economic crisis was caused, at least in significant part, by the malfeasance of the Federal Reserve Board and its previous Chairman, and, in some respects, this Chairman, who were content to take a long slumber, a very long nap, while the predatory lending was going on, the housing bubble was growing, and a massive amount of bad securities were finding their way--along with the payment of a lot of generous bonuses and fees--into the financial background of a lot of financial institutions in this country.

It says:

The Federal last year began extending credit directly to

companies that aren't banks for the first time since it was

created in 1913 . . . it has refused to divulge the details

about the companies participating in the 10 lending programs.

For the first time in the history of this country, during this response to the economic crisis, the Federal Reserve Board did this, which previously has only lent money directly to FDIC-insured commercial banks. That is the only group of interests that can come to the Fed and get direct money from them. For the first time in history, the Fed said, during this crisis, we will open that window to allow investment banks to come and get money directly from us.

So I began coming to the floor of the Senate, and I didn't come criticizing the Fed at that point because I don't know if what they did was necessary, but they did it. I wasn't critical. We were in the middle of a crisis. Then I began coming to the floor and saying: All right. Now that we have some amount of stability, let's at least make certain the Federal Reserve Board tells the American people who got the money, who ended up with the money, and what were the terms of its being made available to these investment banks.

Well, a Federal court, as a result of a FOIA request and a lawsuit said this, and it was reported in Bloomberg:

The Federal Reserve must, for the first time, identify the

companies in its emergency lending programs after losing a

Freedom of Information Act lawsuit.

The judge said the central bank improperly withheld agency

records. He said you have to disclose who got the money.

The Federal Reserve Board said we are going to appeal the judge's ruling. We don't intend to comply with that. We are going to appeal it and get a stay. The Federal Reserve is refusing to identify the recipients of almost $2 trillion in emergency loans from the American taxpayers or the troubled assets the central bank is accepting as collateral.

The Federal court says you have to do it, and they appealed the court ruling and got a stay and they are saying we don't intend to do it. In the meantime, I and Senator Grassley authored a letter with eight of our colleagues to the Federal Reserve Board last July and said: We want you to disclose to the Congress and the American people who got the money and how much and what the terms were.

We got a letter back from the Federal Reserve Board, dated September 16. It has a lot of paragraphs in it, but you can summarize it this way: No.

It is interesting to me that the Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board has said: We believe one of the hallmarks of what we are doing is transparency. I don't understand, if transparency means you are going to disclose things and give people the opportunity to understand what happened, why is there no transparency? Even after a Federal court said you improperly withheld records, even after Members of the Senate said make this information available, even after the American people said we deserve to know who got our money, the Federal Reserve Board said: We don't intend to tell you a thing.

There are a couple trillion dollars out there that the Fed has made available. It was a risk to the American taxpayer, and $2 trillion is not a small amount; it is a very large amount. The Fed said: That is our business, not yours. That is the business of the Federal Reserve Board. We, in effect, have a right to operate in secret and we intend to continue to do that.

My problem with Mr. Bernanke--as I have said last week, I don't think his nomination should be voted on in the Senate until and unless he discloses to us and the American people the details about this $2 trillion and who got it. What were the terms? We now see some of the investment banks reporting the largest profits in their history, and they are preparing now to provide bonuses, we are told, of $120 billion to $140 billion. These are firms, by the way, that would no longer exist were it not for the Federal Government. These are firms perched on the edge of a financial cliff, ready to go under, except for the guarantee of the Federal Government in all kinds of ways. Of course, they are the first to get well. No, it is not a company back on Main Street, not a company back in my hometown. The first to get well in this new economy are the investment banks.

Did they get well because they were able to get a couple trillion dollars from the Federal Reserve Board, probably at zero interest rate--I don't know--and invest back into Treasury securities and get paid interest on it? Were they arbitraging money? I don't know. I think we ought to know. We have a right to know.

Mr. President, the issue, from my standpoint especially, is, we have a right to know, and the chairman of the Federal Reserve Board has a responsibility to tell us and the American people. I noticed last weekend, when these writers, including editorial writers and others, were having an apoplectic seizure over this issue: Oh, My God, somebody might vote against Bernanke. Then they say: You know what. More than that being what they call Fed bashing--it is not--it is also the case that this Congress is thinking of tightening the rules on financial regulations to prevent those who were doing what they did to create this crisis from ever doing it again. Shame on them. That is antibusiness.

Isn't it interesting how this has morphed into a situation where, if we want to close the gate and create rules that prevent the kind of nonsense that happened from ever happening again, which drove this country into the ditch, somehow that is antibusiness. I don't think so. I think what is antibusiness is this notion of Alan Greenspan--and I will put up his quote--came to Congress after the fact, after the collapse, and he said:

I made a mistake in presuming that the self-interests of

organizations, specifically banks and others, were best

capable of protecting their own shareholders and their own

equity in the firms.

His point was, we don't need to regulate or oversee anything. Self- regulation will work best. They will be fine. Leave them alone and they will come home. What an unbelievable, tragic mistake by the Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board.

I made a mistake in presuming that the self-interests . . .

were best capable--

It is a suggestion that somehow capitalism works and you don't need any regulatory oversight at all because the free market is best left to its own devices. The free market is the best allocator of goods and services I know of by far, and I support the free market. I also understand that, such as in any other area of competition, you need a referee, somebody with a striped shirt who blows the whistle when there is a foul. There are plenty of fouls in the free market system. That is why you need a referee. You need regulation. That is not a 4-letter word. It is called regulation. You need effective regulation to make sure the free market system works the way it was supposed to work.

There are a lot of interests in this free market system that want to clog the arteries of the free market and cause some sort of substantial problem in the free market, as long as it exists in their self- interests to do so. There are plenty of interests wanting to do it. That is why effective regulation is important. I am not talking about overregulation or underregulation; I am talking about effective regulation that is anticipated and which, for about 8 years, took a vacation by the hiring of regulators who actually boasted they were going to be willfully blind and say: You all do what you want to do in this system because we will not look.

I brought, again--and I know it is repeating--some of the things nobody looked at. The biggest mortgage company in the country that helped set up the subprime scandal that fed itself into the balance sheets of banks--commercial banks and investment banks--and caused a massive collapse and about $15 trillion of lost value to the American people. We all have seen Countrywide's advertisements:

Do you have less than perfect credit? Do you have late

mortgage payments? Have you been denied by other lenders?

Call us. . . .

That is unbelievable. You may think: How on Earth can that be a business model? They were advertising to say: Are you a bad credit risk? We want to do business with you. If you have missed payments or been bankrupt, come see us.

This is Zoom Credit. Here is their advertisement. We saw these on television and heard them on the radio and saw them in newspapers. We thought: How did this work? They said this:

Credit approval is just seconds away. Get on the fast track

at Zoom Credit. At the speed of light, Zoom Credit will

preapprove you for a car loan, a home loan, or a credit card.

Even if your credit's in the tank. Zoom Credit's like money

in the bank. Zoom Credit specializes in credit repair and

debt consolidation, too. Bankruptcy, slow credit, no credit--

who cares?

Can you imagine that? This is an advertisement from a mortgage company saying if you have been bankrupt or have slow or no credit, who cares.

Finally, this is Millennia Mortgage:

12 months, no mortgage payment. That's right. We will give

you the money to make your first 12 payments if you call

within the next 2 days. We pay it for you. Our loan program

may reduce your current monthly payments by 50 percent and

allow you no payments for the first 12 months.

We saw all these things as they were creating the rot at the bottom of this system from which the house of cards collapsed. By the way, all this put mortgages out there in the country and the result was those mortgages were wrapped into securities and those securities were then sold from mortgage companies to hedge funds and investment banks, selling the risk north so they didn't have the risk anymore. There is no underwriting at the bottom because you don't have to underwrite if you sell the risk ahead.

Then we saw the spectacle of very large commercial banks with their financial belly loaded with this rot--CDOs, credit default swaps, you name it. There were securities rated AAA that were worthless. Then we all stood around scratching our heads wondering: How did this happen? It was unbelievable, unprecedented greed. A lot of people at the top made massive amounts of money. The guy who ran Countrywide got away with about $200 million, I believe. That is now under investigation. A lot of them got away with a lot of money. Then this country and the American people got stuck with about a $15 trillion bill and an economy that has been limping ever since.

One asks the questions: Is it Fed bashing? Is it antibusiness? Is it Fed bashing to say the Fed owes the American people information about who got the $2 trillion and what the terms were? Is it antibusiness for those of us who are trying to put together rules and regulations that say this cannot happen again, we will not allow that?

I wish to close with one additional quote. This one is from me. It was almost 10\1/2\ years ago on the floor of the Senate when we passed legislation at the request of all those big financial institutions, the investment banks, you name it. They wanted to strip away protections that were put into place after the Great Depression, saying it was old- fashioned; let's compete with the Japanese and Asians and others in commercial finance--one-stop financial service centers, create big holding companies and put it together, commercial and investment and securities, all in one big tub and put up firewalls and we guarantee you will never be hurt and we will be able to better compete.

On the floor of the Senate I said this:

This bill will, in my judgment, raise the likelihood of

future massive taxpayer bailouts. It will fuel the

consolidation and mergers in the banking and financial

services industry at the expense of customers and others.

It certainly did that. For those of us who decide: You know what, let's begin to put some of these pieces back together, let's begin to provide some protection for this country's economy, let's get rid of this orgy of speculation, that unbelievable greed, this bubble of incompetence of people who were supposed to be regulating but didn't-- yes, that includes the Federal Reserve Board. Let's do this right and put it back together. That is not antibusiness; that is probusiness. The businesspeople in this country who go to work in the morning and put a key in the door and open are going to work all day, risking everything they have. They want an economy that is working, not in collapse but one that is providing opportunity. That certainly cannot happen, and it doesn't happen, when you allow this kind of unbelievable speculation and the rancid behavior and the things that happened at the bottom with the predatory lending and exotic things such as CDOs and credit default swaps, so complicated that those on both ends of them, in many cases, didn't understand them. Will Rogers once described, a long time ago, people who bought things they will never get from people who never had them and both smiled because both made money.

That is the sort of thing that was going on in this country, and that does not work. The real economic health and the real wealth of this country is what we produce, not trading paper and especially not trading paper as a matter of speculation to try to build the bubbles we saw in the last decade or so.

We have a lot to do to fix what is wrong. I say to those who wrote the Washington Post editorial, the smallest amount of effort could have avoided that mistake in terms of the six speeches I have given on the floor of the Senate on this subject. This is not a revelation since the Massachusetts election. I have been coming to the Senate floor for a long time to talk about these problems.

Let me finally say, I think as we move from here to the issue of financial reform, aside from the Bernanke nomination, the question is: Are we going to do that right? Are we going to allow the kind of pressures that have built on the outside to influence what we do?

We should certainly know by now that if you are too big to fail in the financial industry, then you are too big and we ought to do something about it. We ought to know by now that putting together commercial banks that are insured by the taxpayers with investment banks is a recipe for disaster, and there is a way to separate them. That ought to be our business as we turn to financial reform in the years ahead.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, it is with great humility and respect for the institution of the Senate, reverence for the many great men and women who have served here, and affection for my colleagues that I rise today to discuss what I believe is an issue of great importance.

Reflecting on my first year as a Member of this body, I have come to believe that we are failing to represent the best interests of the American people. We as elected representatives have a duty to our constituents. But partisan rancor and the Senate's own incapacitating rules often prevent us from fulfilling that duty.

While I am convinced that our inability to function is our own fault, we have the authority within the Constitution to act. Article I, section 5, of our Constitution states in clear language that ``Each House may determine the rules of its proceedings. . . .''

Yet at the beginning of the 111th Congress, we implicitly acquiesced to the rules adopted decades and sometimes more than a century ago, rules that most Members of this Senate have never voted to adopt.

Today these rules put in place generations ago make effective legislating nearly impossible. Specifically, under rule XXII, it is not possible to limit debate, end a filibuster, invoke cloture without 60 votes. Such cloture votes used to occur perhaps seven or eight times during a congressional session. But in the 110th Congress alone, there were 112 cloture votes, and most of these were occasioned simply by the threat of a filibuster.

The American people spoke loudly in the 2008 election. They clearly desired a President and a Congress that would set a new direction. It was not necessarily an endorsement of one ideology over another but instead a call for us to put partisanship aside and to take care of the country's business.

Although this Chamber was able to pass historic health care legislation last year, we are far from finished. More than anything, what the health care debate has demonstrated is how difficult the rules have made our legislative process. And it is not just health care. Other important pieces of legislation still languish, Federal judicial vacancies remain unfilled, and many of the President's appointees to key positions are still not confirmed. The American people deserve better.

I applaud Leader Reid for what he has been able to accomplish, given the way this Chamber's rules have been used to impede progress. Senate rules are designed to allow for substantive debate and to protect the views of the minority, as our Founders intended. But they have been used instead to prevent the Senate from beginning to even debate critical legislation.

Protecting the views of the minority makes sense, but not at the expense of the will of the majority. Indeed, as the rules are being used today, a single Senator can hold a bill hostage until his or her demands are met. This is not the spirit of compromise and collegiality our Founders envisioned for this body.

Even worse, the rules as they exist today make any effort to change them a daunting process. Under the current Standing Rules of the Senate, rule V states:

The Rules of the Senate shall continue from one Congress to

the next unless they are changed as provided in these rules.

As adopted in 1975, rule XXII requires two-thirds of Senators present and voting to agree to end debate on a change to the Senate rules, in most cases 67 votes. Taken together, these two rules effectively deny the Senate the opportunity to exercise its constitutional right to determine the rules of its proceedings and serve to bind this body to rules adopted by its predecessors.

Many of my colleagues will argue that the Senate is not designed to be efficient, that the use of filibusters and delay tactics was what the Founders intended. They will quote George Washington's comment to Thomas Jefferson that the Framers created the Senate to cool House legislation, just as a saucer was used to cool hot tea. While I understand their argument, I do not believe that the Framers envisioned the Senate as the graveyard for good ideas. We can have lengthy debate about the merits of legislation, but there should come a time when we actually vote on the bill. We can discuss the qualifications of a judicial nominee, but each nominee deserves an up-or-down vote. To quote one of this body's most esteemed Members, Senator Henry Cabot Lodge:

To vote without debating is perilous, but to debate and

never vote is imbecile.

This is a bipartisan issue. I express my opinions today as a member of the majority. But they will not change if I become a member of the minority party.

We are all too aware of the power of rule XXII, the filibuster rule, adopted in 1975. Yet except for the distinguished Senators Byrd, Inouye, and Leahy, none of us--Republicans or Democrats alike--has ever voted to adopt this rule.

Opponents of rules reform argue that the Senate is a continuing body and, therefore, the rules must remain in effect from one Congress to the next. I disagree with this assertion. Even if the Senate is deemed to have continued because two-thirds of its Members remain in office, there is no reason that the rules must remain in effect.

Many things change with a new Congress. It is given a new number. All of the pending bills and nominations from the previous Congress are dead, and each party may choose its leadership. If the party in the majority changes, the new Senate becomes substantially different from the last.

Senators of both parties have argued that the rules may change with a new Congress, as my esteemed colleague from Utah, Senator Hatch, stated in a National Review article in 2005:

The Senate has been called a ``continuing body.'' Yet

language reflecting this observation was included in Senate

rules only in 1959. The more important, and much older, sense

in which the Senate is a continuing body is its ongoing

constitutional authority to determine its rules. Rulings by

vice presidents of both parties, sitting as the President of

the Senate, confirm that each Senate may make that decision

for itself, either implicitly by acquiescence or explicitly

by amendment. Both conservative and liberal legal scholars,

including those who see no constitutional problems with the

current filibuster campaign, agree that a simple majority can

change Senate rules at the beginning of a new Congress.

I agree with Senator Hatch. And I agree with our good friend Senator Ted Kennedy who said:

The notion that a filibuster can be used to defeat an

attempt to change the filibuster rule cannot withstand

analysis. It would impose an unconstitutional prior restraint

on the parliamentary procedure in the Senate. It would turn

rule XXII into a Catch-XXII.

The early history of this body suggests that the use of unlimited debate as a tool of obstruction was not an issue.

The original Senate rules adopted under article I, section 5, of the Constitution included a provision allowing a Senator to make a motion ``for the previous question.'' If passed, the motion allowed a simple majority of Senators to halt debate on a pending issue. This simple rule for limiting debate was inadvertently dropped in 1806--perhaps for lack of need--and the Senate entered a period with no means to limit debate. It was not until the 1830s that the Senate saw the first filibusters, as Members recognized that the lack of any rule to limit debate could be used to effectively block legislation opposed by even a minority of the minority. It was not, however, until 1917 that the Senate adopted a formal cloture rule.

Woodrow Wilson's armed ships bill had just been filibustered by 11 Senators. The President was furious, demanding a change in Senate procedural rules. In response, Montana Senator Thomas Walsh, citing article I, section 5, of the Constitution introduced the constitutional option.

Walsh argued that a newly convened Senate was not bound by the rules of the previous Senate and could adopt its own rules, including a rule to limit debate. He reasoned that every new Senate had the right to adopt rules, saying that ``it is preposterous to assume that [the Senate] may deny future majorities the right to change'' the rules. In response to Walsh's proposal, the Senate reached a compromise and amended rule XXII. The compromise permitted cloture on any pending measure at the will of two-thirds of all Senators present and voting.

Back then, the toxic partisanship we face today had not yet poisoned the system, but the manipulative use of the filibuster had already taken hold. It was used to block some of the most important legislation of that time--anti-lynching bills in 1922, 1935, and 1938, and anti- race discrimination bills were blocked almost a dozen times starting in 1946.

By the 1950s, a bipartisan group of Senators had had enough. On behalf of himself and 18 other Senators, New Mexico's Clinton Anderson, my predecessor, attempted to limit debate and control the use of a filibuster by adopting the 1917 strategy of Thomas Walsh. Just as Senator Walsh did almost four decades earlier, Senator Anderson argued that each new Congress brings with it a new Senate entitled to consider and adopt its own rules. On January 3, 1953, Anderson moved that the Senate immediately consider the adoption of rules for the Senate of the 83rd Congress.

Anderson's motion was tabled, but he introduced it again at the beginning of the 85th Congress. In the course of that debate, Senator Hubert Humphrey presented a parliamentary inquiry to Vice President Nixon, who was presiding over the Senate. Nixon understood the inquiry to address the basic question, ``Do the rules of the Senate continue from one Congress to another?'' Noting that there had never been a direct ruling on this question from the Chair, Nixon stated that:

While the rules of the Senate have been continued from one

Congress to another, the right of a current majority of the

Senate at the beginning of a new Congress to adopt its own

rules, stemming as it does from the constitution itself,

cannot be restricted or limited by rules adopted by a

majority of a previous Congress. Any provision of Senate

rules adopted in a previous Congress which has the expressed

or practical effect of denying the majority of the Senate in

a new Congress the right to adopt the rules under which it

desires to proceed is, in the opinion of the Chair,

unconstitutional.

Nixon's opinion was consistent with the longstanding common law principle, upheld in Supreme Court decisions, that one legislature cannot bind subsequent legislatures.

Nixon went on to explain that under the Constitution, a new Senate had three options to deal with the rules at the beginning of a new Congress: No. 1, proceed under the rules of the previous Congress and ``thereby indicate by acquiescence that those rules continue in effect''; No. 2, vote down a motion to adopt new rules and thereby ``indicate approval of the previous rules''; and No. 3, ``vote affirmatively to proceed with the adoption of new rules.''

Despite Nixon's opinion from the chair, Anderson's motion was tabled. In 1959, Anderson raised the constitutional option again at the start of the 86th Congress, with the support of some 30 other Senators. This time, he raised the ire of then-Majority Leader Johnson, who realized that a majority of Senators might join Anderson's cause. To prevent Anderson's motion from receiving a vote, Johnson came forward

with his own compromise--changing rule XXII to reduce the required vote for cloture to ``two-thirds of Senators present and voting.'' And to appease a small group of Senators, Johnson also included new language that stated that the rules continued from one Congress to the next unless they were changed under the rules. It was a move that would effectively bind all future Senates.

Throughout his career, Clinton Anderson relied on the constitutional option as the basis to ease or at least reconsider the cloture requirements laid out in rule XXII. As he said in 1959:

My motion does not prejudge the nature of the rules which the Senate in its wisdom may adopt, but it does declare in effect that the Senate of the 85th Congress is responsible for and must bear the responsibility for the rules under which the Senate will operate. That responsibility cannot be shifted back upon the Senate of past Congresses.

In 1975, 2 years after Anderson left office, the Senate adopted the rule we operate under today: It takes the vote of ``three-fifths of all Senators duly chosen and sworn'' to cut off debate or the threat of unlimited debate.

As the junior Senator from New Mexico, I have the honor of serving in Senator Clinton Anderson's former seat, and I have the desire to take up his commitment to the Senate and his dedication to the principle that in each new Congress, the Senate should exercise its constitutional power to determine its own rules. Let me be very clear. I am not arguing for or against any specific changes to the rules, but I do believe each Senate has the right, according to the Constitution, to determine all of its rules by a simple majority vote.

As my distinguished colleague Senator Byrd, the longest serving Member in the history of Congress, once said:

The Constitution in article 1, section 5, says that each

House shall determine the rules of its proceedings. Now we

are at the beginning of Congress. This Congress is not

obliged to be bound by the dead hand of the past.

It is time for reform. There are many great traditions in this body that should be kept and respected, but stubbornly clinging to ineffective and unproductive procedures should not be one of them. There is another way.

The resolution I am introducing today is simple. It would enable the 112th Congress to carry out its responsibility to determine the rules of its proceedings in accordance with the Constitution. This is not to say that between now and the beginning of the 112th Congress we cannot use our political will to find a way to avoid the gridlock of 2009. It is to say that at the beginning of the 112th Congress, the Senate can exercise its constitutional right to adopt its rules of procedure by a simple majority vote. The Senate may choose to adopt new rules or it may choose to continue with some or all of the rules of the previous Congress. The point is, it is our choice. It is our responsibility.

As Clinton Anderson said:

It is a responsibility that cannot be shifted back upon the

Senate of past Congresses.

I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business for up to 8 minutes.

Mr. President, I rise to discuss a serious problem with the way Washington has done business for years. The problem is passing unfunded Federal mandates on to the States that throw State budgets into disarray. Everyone in Congress has to decide how to best look out for their State. A little over a month ago, I decided to look out for all their States and mine too. But the efforts I made to protect my State and all other States should not be the issue. The issue should be, why wasn't everyone taking steps to protect their States and why weren't the critics reacting to the real issue rather than coining names to describe this effort to protect State budgets from the effects of yet another unfunded Federal mandate?

The reason is, all along they wanted to derail health reform. Misrepresenting this issue would help that goal. So it was too easy, too convenient to come up with a catchy name and to impugn motives. It was too easy, too convenient to ignore the problem facing Nebraska and every other State--another mandate without money.

Unfunded Federal mandates are not just bad for Nebraska; they are bad for all States, from sea to shining sea. They are a fiscal injustice that I fought for two decades during my tenure as a Senator and through two terms as Governor. They are a burden on the States that I will keep fighting to eliminate as long as they continue.

Unfunded Federal mandates are pretty simple, but they appear in many unexpected and unwanted ways. They are orders that arrive from Washington on State Capitol doorsteps with too little or no money to carry them out. Unfunded Federal mandates force States all across the country into no-win choices: cut spending on State priorities or raise revenue with tax hikes. They are a fiscal injustice States have no option to avoid. Unfunded Federal mandates are both bad Federal policy and bad fiscal policy.

As a Senator, I have said I will put Nebraska first, Nebraska always but not Nebraska only. That remains the case with questions about how the Senate health care bill dealt with an underfunded mandate for expanding Medicaid. First, my goal has always been to draw attention to and fix, with one approach or another, any unfunded Federal mandate that would be passed on to every State through the Senate's health care bill. The bill sought to expand Medicaid to provide health insurance to millions of Americans who do not have it today. The Federal Government would pay 100 percent of the cost for the first 3 years through 2016. In 2017 and thereafter, States would have to pick up a portion of the cost. In other words, they would pay for a new unfunded Federal mandate.

I sought an opt-in or opt-out for all States to ease the Federal unfunded mandate. But because there was no Congressional Budget Office analysis for that approach, a provision was placed into the bill for Nebraska. It is not something I sought. It is something I accepted to launch the larger battle against the unfunded mandate affecting all States. I have taken criticism over this issue. If I have received it because I drew attention to unfunded Federal mandates, fine. But the larger question is: How do we in Congress eliminate this practice of passing these mandates on to the States? Rather than criticize me, others should join in fighting the war to stop all these burdens on the States. It is an effort I welcome the Governors to join in, too, for they have a direct interest in the success of this battle.

The Nebraska provision was a victory in the battle against unfunded mandates necessary to win the war. What otherwise had gone completely unaddressed is now part of the debate, not only in the Nation's Capital but in State capitals across America.

We only have to look back a few years to see what trouble unfunded mandates cause for States. When Congress passed the No Child Left Behind Act, it was hailed as a landmark that would improve education nationwide. It established new standards to measure educational achievement in our schools and required States to develop assessments in basic skills to be given to all students in certain grades. States had to make sure that happened for their schools to receive Federal aid. But the law provided far too little money to meet its requirements. This was a fact acknowledged by its chief sponsor, the late Senator Kennedy.

He said:

The tragedy is that these long overdue reforms are finally

in place, but the funds are not.

Was that ever a true statement. States have paid and paid and are still paying for that whopper of an unfunded mandate. In fact, No Child Left Behind, which I opposed largely because of its being an unfunded Federal mandate, has cost my State of Nebraska at least $382.7 million. Nationwide, it has cost all States a total of $70.9 billion from 2002 through 2008, according to U.S. Department of Education data. Those costs have kept piling up ever since, and that is not right.

I fought another unfunded Federal mandate in the 2003 major tax cut bill. At the time, cutting Federal taxes would also have forced cuts in State taxes. That, in turn, would have blown holes in State budgets. So I teamed up on a bipartisan basis with my colleagues, Senator Collins from Maine and Senator Rockefeller from West Virginia, to help the States. We won a provision that provided $20 billion in Federal funding to the States to make up for the lost money they needed to pay their ongoing Medicaid costs.

Today, here we are again hearing from financially strapped States across the country asking for additional Federal money to pay for other previous unfunded Medicaid mandates. I do not blame them for asking. The government tells them they have to pay a share of certain social services and medical expenses, and in tough economic times such as these they just do not have the money. Unfortunately, neither does Washington. Then, while States are currently seeking aid from Congress, we are busy creating this new unfunded mandate set to hit States beginning in 2017. When would that one be addressed? In 2018, 2019, sometime later? Talk about the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing.

I have been asking: Why not deal with that now in this health care reform legislation and change the paradigm from unfunded mandates and do it in a different way? Just last week, we learned how big this unfunded mandate would be. The Congressional Budget Office estimated that covering the Medicaid expansion costs for all States would cost the Federal Government $35 billion. That means Congress was about to pass a $35 billion unfunded Federal mandate on to the States--until I got wind of it. Let me say that again. Congress was about to send a $35 billion bill to the States, until I blew the whistle.

We need to stop this madness of passing these fiscal timebombs on to the States. I would hope my colleagues, on a bipartisan and a bicameral basis, would work with me to make sure Congress stops passing unfunded mandates of any kind on to the States and that the Governors would join in also. They certainly do not like Washington telling them how to spend State money.

I hope people put aside the spin, the partisan talking points, and misrepresentation they have heard on this issue, including the media. I hope people stop citing the inaccurate interpretation of it as an excuse to avoid working for health care reform that provides coverage to millions of Americans who today do not have insurance and lower costs to all other Americans who pay ever-rising costs for health care. I hope we can also stop the practice of Washington burdening the

States with unfunded Federal mandates which are truly bad for every single State--not just mine but every State--from sea to shining sea.

Mr. President, with that, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I want to speak for a few minutes about the upcoming confirmation vote on Chairman Bernanke of the Federal Reserve Board. I should begin by stating very clearly that there is no way to overestimate the severity of the economic downturn that began in this country in 2007. To date, our Nation has lost 7.2 million jobs. In my home State of New Mexico, unemployment is now 7.8 percent. That is more than twice the rate it was 2 years ago. But even at that it is considerably lower than the unemployment rate in many States--in fact, in a majority of States. American households have lost $12.6 trillion in wealth; more than 5 million American families have seen their homes foreclosed, many have lost their businesses, and many have lost their farms. In short, there are millions of families across our country who are and have been experiencing severe economic pain and dislocation. While indicators suggest the recession has officially ended, our economy is hardly out of the woods.

In the face of such pain, it is tempting to grasp for ways to demonstrate disapproval of the economic downturn or to put distance between ourselves as elected officials and the policies involved with the economic downturn. It is tempting, particularly in this political climate, to want to seize on a particular individual to take the brunt of the criticism.

I rise today to urge my colleagues not to use Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke's renomination for any such exercise. I rise to offer my strong support for his reconfirmation. With the benefit of hindsight, it now seems the Fed might have done more to prevent the economic downturn. Some have pointed to financial institution bailouts and have argued that the Fed should not have provided financial support or guarantees to vulnerable financial institutions. Some have argued that the Fed's support should have

been structured differently. Historians, with 20/20 hindsight, will be able to argue those issues for years to come. But hindsight also tells us that without the bold and aggressive actions Chairman Bernanke in fact took, the outcome of this economic downturn could have been considerably worse. I can imagine no Fed Chairman since the Great Depression who has faced such a Herculean task. If ever there were praise for averting a disaster, then in my view Chairman Bernanke deserves that praise. He deserves praise for working effectively with other domestic and foreign agencies to ensure the continuity of our global banking system, for taking significant steps to boost banks' access to funding, and for establishing targeted lending programs to restart the flow of credit in critical markets.

It is because of this skillfulness and aptitude that Chairman Bernanke demonstrated he has had the strong support of President Obama for reconfirmation to his position. President Obama said the Chairman's ``bold, persistent experimentation, has brought our economy back from the brink.''

Similarly, in nominating Chairman Bernanke to his first term, President George W. Bush said he was choosing Chairman Bernanke for his ``reputation for intellectual rigor and integrity'' and the ``deep respect he enjoyed in the global financial community.''

It would be shortsighted for this Congress to second-guess the judgment of our current and our former Presidents in this regard. President Obama's call for the reappointment of Chairman Bernanke is echoed by some of our Nation's most distinguished economic thinkers. Former Chairmen Alan Greenspan and Paul Volcker have both said it would be irresponsible not to extend Chairman Bernanke's term. Douglas Holtz- Eakin, who was Senator McCain's chief economic adviser in the 2008 election campaign, says ``it would be a disaster not to confirm'' Bernanke.

Warren Buffett has said if he could vote for Mr. Bernanke's confirmation he would--twice. As Mr. Buffett explained:

We talked about [the economic downturn] being an economic

Pearl Harbor, and he did what should have been done in

response to that Pearl Harbor.

These respected economic thinkers know that emerging from our Nation's deepest and most protracted economic downturn since the Great Depression will require continuity of policy. Financial conditions might now suggest that our economy is in fact turning around, but a complete turnaround will require that families and businesses, investors and financial markets see consistent policy actions. Central to that consistency and that continuity is leadership at the helm of the Federal Reserve Board. If we were to change chairmen now, we would add considerable uncertainty to our already fragile business and financial markets and almost certainly trigger a sell-off of the dollar and a sell-off of equities. This could have the unfortunate effect of prolonging the economic downturn we are now experiencing.

Finally, while I rise to support Chairman Bernanke's reconfirmation, I also renew my call for policymakers in all positions, ourselves included, to make job creation the centerpiece of any economic recovery agenda. We in the Congress must also press forward with the urgent task of reforming our financial regulatory infrastructure, the cracks and holes of which have been exposed by this recession.

Our Nation faces considerable and urgent challenges. In my view, that is why it is essential that Ben Bernanke be confirmed for another term as Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board.

I yield the floor.