A joint resolution proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States relative to balancing the budget.

Mr. President, I have been listening very carefully to the remarks of my friend about what we have to do, what is in front of us. Of course, he is speaking for the Republican Party for a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution.

Let me say this: I want a balanced budget. That is what I want. I don't need an amendment to the Constitution to get me to vote for a balanced budget. What I want is for all sides to come together--that is what I want--and write a balanced budget. I want us to do it in a way that is responsible and do it in a way that is fair and do it in a way that protects our middle class, protects our kids, and stimulates economic growth by making smart investments and cutting out spending in areas we don't need it.

So all this yak about a balanced budget amendment--and I call it that, and I apologize if it sounds as though it is a derogatory term-- it is just so much talk. Let's get to it.

I think we ought to go back to the people and the party that was the only party and the only people to balance the budget in 40 years. I hate to break it to my Republican friends, but that is the Democratic Party. We are the ones who did it. We did it when Bill Clinton came into office. We did it after hard work. We did it after painful cuts. We did it with smart investments. We did it with everybody paying their fair share, and we didn't need a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution to do it. It is a gimmick. We need a balanced budget, not a balanced budget amendment.

Let's look at what we did the last time this country ever had a balanced budget. Lucky for us, it wasn't that long ago. Lucky for us, a lot of us are still here who made that fateful vote. We didn't have one Republican voting for that budget, and when they came to the floor--I have all the quotes, chapter and verse--they said: This is horrible. It will never balance the budget. This is going to lead to a depression. This is the worst thing. But we know what happened. We not only balanced the budget, but we had a surplus. We not only had a surplus, but the debt

was going down so fast we thought we would never have to have Treasury bonds again. On top of that, we created 23 million jobs.

So I hope the public understands, when they hear Republican colleague after Republican colleague come to the floor saying we need to stay in all through July--fine with me. I will stay here through August. I will spend the night in the cloakroom, I don't care. Let's not talk about a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution. Let's talk about doing the hard work of balancing the budget. The way we do it, again, is to follow the lead of the plan that was laid out by President Clinton and which worked in the most amazing way beyond our greatest expectations.

What did we do? We looked at this deficit and we said: This is unacceptable. We went after programs that made no sense and we cut them. We either eliminated them or we cut them back. Then we asked: What are some investments we could make that would actually stimulate the growth of the private sector? I thought my friend, Senator Blunt, was right. That is what we need to do. We need to stimulate growth in the private sector. At that time, the investments were on the high-tech side--high tech, biotech. Today, clearly, it is clean energy. That is what the whole world wants. That is where we ought to be leading. That is what our President knows. So we cut out programs that don't make sense. We invest where it makes sense to create jobs and then guess what we do. We make sure we have enough revenues coming in to pay for the priorities.

I have news for my Republican friends. It is not that hard. Go after the billionaires. They can't get themselves to do it, can they? Go after the billionaires and the millionaires, the people who aren't paying what they should be paying. But when the House had its chance, what did it do? It allowed the biggest tax breaks ever to continue for the billionaires and the millionaires and they killed Medicare. Medicare is gone. It is becoming some kind of a voucher program, where we can imagine some 90-year-old woman who is suffering from disease has to now go out and try to find out where she can buy an insurance plan. Tell me who is going to cover her, A; and, B, tell me if she has the strength to do that; and, C, her Medicare benefit no longer goes to her. Who does it go to? It goes to the insurance company. That is the plan the Republicans passed in the House, and they cut everything that is near and dear to the hearts of the American people. In addition to Medicare, they cut education. They cut funding for clean air, clean water. Highways they cut by a third, and here they talk about jobs on the other side, private sector jobs. The highway bill creates thousands and thousands and thousands of jobs in the private sector. They cut that bill by 36 percent.

So when I hear my Republican friends talk about the importance of balancing the budget and they are talking about a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution--why don't they show us their balanced budget? Because the one they showed us from the House was such a disaster that they lost a congressional seat they held for eternity. It is easy to talk about a balanced budget amendment. It is harder to balance the budget the fair way, and that is what we have to do.

My friend, Senator Blunt, also talked about the importance of jobs. He is so right. I just ran for reelection. Jobs, jobs, jobs, the top three issues. Guess what. My Republican friends have filibustered every single jobs bill we brought to the floor. The last jobs bill is one I am very familiar with because it is a bill that came out of my committee. The whole committee voted, with one dissenting vote, for the Economic Development Administration to give seed money to areas in the country that need job creation and attract $7 of funds for every $1 of Federal money. It would have created 1 million jobs over 5 years. They filibustered it. They added amendments about the prairie chicken. They added amendments about things that had nothing to do with it, just to bring it down. They didn't even have--what is the word I am looking for? They didn't even speak against it when they voted against it at the end of the day. They didn't even come to the floor because they had nothing to say because it is a jobs bill, because it has passed every Congress since the 1960s. The last time it passed, it passed without a dissenting vote in the Senate in 2004 because the last President who signed it was George W. Bush. It is a jobs bill. They said no. Why? I go back to what their leader said. His top priority? Beating President Barack Obama. So we have to figure they are bringing every jobs bill down so this economy gets worse.

Let me tell my colleagues, it is not going to go down easy at home. It is not going to go down easy at home.

They killed a bill that Mary Landrieu brought out of her committee unanimously, a small business bill. It would have created thousands of small businesses. They voted it down. That bill was written by Warren Rudman, a Republican Senator. They voted it down. They filibustered it and voted it down. Why? They say jobs are their top priority. Why would they vote down a bill that was written by a Republican, that is passed without objection year after year after year? Why would they vote down another bill that was last signed by George W. Bush without a dissenting vote in the Senate? Why? Two jobs bills. Why? We have to ask ourselves why. Maybe they are willing to sacrifice jobs for political reasons. That is all I can come up with. I put that together with what Mitch McConnell said.

Now their big push is a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution--a lot of talk. Balance the budget, folks. We know how to do it. End the wars. That is $1 trillion over 10 years. Go after the millionaires and the billionaires who don't pay their fair share. That is another $1 trillion over 10 years. That is $2 trillion, right there. Go after the people who never pay their taxes. Go after the oil companies that are ripping us off at the pump and taking the highest profits ever. It is not hard to do. Yes, we are willing to cut some things that don't make sense. We could have a $4 trillion package pretty easily if we are willing to look at it in a fair way.

I heard our President today speaking to the Nation through a press conference, and he was very sweet about this issue. I was saying to Senator Durbin, as I watched him, he is explaining it to the people. Everybody has to give up something. If we want bipartisanship, that doesn't mean we all get what we want and somebody gets nothing. It means I give up some of the things I want and they give up some of the things they want. But we have declarations by the Republicans: We will never ever agree to any new revenues. Why? They just voted to eliminate the ethanol subsidy. That brings revenues. So why would they not take that to the table? How can they believe it is fair that billionaires sometimes pay less in terms of the effective tax rate than a secretary or a teacher or a nurse?

Come on. Come to the table. Don't come to the table with a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution. That doesn't do anything to balance the budget. It is a lot of talk. Balance the budget. Put a little faith in the people who know how to do it who did it before.

I was proud to vote to balance the budget. I was proud to vote for a fair budget. I was proud to be here when we saw 23 million jobs come. That didn't happen because we just said: Cut, cut, cut, cut, cut. End Medicare as we know it. It came because we were willing to look at what was working, what wasn't working, where to make the investments, where to make the cuts. We have to come to the table with everything on it. We have to say we are willing to listen to the other side. We need a fair plan. We have that as Democrats. We are not going to end Medicare. We are not going to hurt working people. We are going to do this in a fair way.

I hope the American people will put this together and connect all the dots. We have a Republican leader who has said on more than one occasion the most important thing is to defeat Barack Obama. We have a Republican Party that says it is for jobs and filibusters every single jobs bill that in the past they have broadly supported. We have Republicans walking out on the Vice President, taking their little teddy bear and their blankies and walking out of the negotiations because they didn't like the way the discussions were going. They walked out. Then, my friends on the other side--

and I thought Senator Blunt was very eloquent on the point. He said we need two things. We need to work on job creation in the private sector--and I just showed that despite the language, they voted everything down--and then we have to take uncertainty out of the equation. That was his big point. He is so right. How do we take uncertainty out of the equation? Do not play politics with the debt ceiling. Do not play politics with it. Because I have read what economists say, that if we do not do this right, and we do not agree, and the debt ceiling becomes a victim of this partisanship, Treasury bonds of the United States of America will be junk bonds--will be junk bonds.

So you want to play games? Go home, go on the corner, and I will play you a game. But do not bring it in here. It is too serious. This is the greatest country there ever was.

My parents, one of whom was born outside of this country, told me that I should kiss the ground of America. And how proud I am that I am here. But I will tell you, if I see people who are willing to turn U.S. Treasury bonds into junk bonds, I am going to do everything I can in my life to make sure those who have done this will not be nameless or faceless. It is too important.

The fact that we are even playing these games is ridiculous. The fact that we cannot come together and shake hands and say this budget deficit is terrible, we are going to deal with it, we are going to deal with the debt, we are going to do what we did under Bill Clinton, we are going to balance the budget, we are going to create a surplus--we can do this. You shake hands on it. You have the parameters of the deal. You pass a debt ceiling that is clean. You send a message to the market.

I used to be a stockbroker. When the President would sneeze, the market would go down 200 points. That is how the market responds to these things. We do not have to be playing with the stock market, with the full faith and credit of the United States of America.

It is pretty simple if everything is on the table. If all you want to do is destroy Social Security and Medicare, it is not simple. But if you are willing to talk to us, to have a fair taxation system, where the Warren Buffetts of the world are at least paying as much in an effective tax rate as a nurse, there is something to talk about here. But do not go walking out of discussions and going home because you did not get 100 percent of what you want. Life does not work that way.

I speak as a mother, a grandmother, a Senator from the largest State in the Union when I say this: You do not get everything you want in a negotiation. The Republicans control the House. The Democrats control the Senate. The Democrats control the White House. Correct me if I am wrong: two-thirds Democratic. In a fair world, we would get two-thirds of what we want. But we are going to give up more. It ought to be a 50- 50 deal. That is how you negotiate.

This is a tough time. If the other side thinks a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution balances the budget, it does not. You have to do the hard work of balancing the budget. You have to sit down in this tough time, in a tough, fragile economic recovery.

Remember when President Obama took over, we were bleeding 800,000 jobs a month. He had to handle two wars, unpaid for by George W. and his friends; a tax cut, unpaid for, to the richest people in America. He had to deal with a banking system that was frozen solid. He had to deal with an automobile industry that was going out of business. We had to work, and a few brave souls from the other side of the aisle worked with us, thank God, or who knows where we would be today.

And now, when we are finally moving out of this nightmarish economy-- not quickly enough--we have Republicans filibustering jobs bill, then coming down here and saying how important jobs are, and saying how important it is there is certainty, when they are playing games with the debt ceiling.

I am an optimist. That is why I stay in this world I am in, and I thank the people of California for giving me the chance so many times. But there is a saying back home: Are you on the level? Are you on the level when you are in negotiations? Do you want to have a deal? Do you want to fix it? Do you want to work with us? I do not know when I see them filibustering jobs bills, when I see them walking out on the Vice President, when I see them saying: Oh, that is off the table, and this is off the table, and that is off the table, when they do not run this country. They run the House. I wonder: Where are we going?

When I hear people saying: What is the big deal if we do not pay our bills, if we do not lift the debt ceiling and we cannot pay our bills, what people have to understand is, lifting up the debt ceiling is not about the future payments, it is about payments due.

I said we had a balanced budget under Bill Clinton--and a surplus. We went into deficit mode when George Bush took over and did the tax cuts for the wealthiest among us, and did not pay for it, and did a prescription drug benefit and never paid for it, did two wars and never paid for them, and we got into big trouble.

What is the solution of my friends on the other side? We are walking out of the negotiations because we cannot talk about taxing billionaires or taking away corporate welfare from oil companies. God forbid. It makes me wonder, really, who is on the level.

We can do this. We did it before. It is not that hard. We just need people of good will. I will say to my friends on the other side: Forget the reelection of Barack Obama. Forget the next Presidential race. You will have your candidate and we will have ours, and that is for another day. Right now we are in this Chamber. We are talking about how to have a credible plan to get this deficit down, to get this debt down, to strengthen our economy, to strengthen job creation, to keep the middle class vibrant.

I hear some Republicans now on the Presidential trail talking about doing away with the minimum wage. Can you imagine going back to the days when the minimum wage was $4 an hour? I remember when it was 50 cents an hour. It dates me a bit. That is what we hear from the other side. Their vision is not a good vision for the young people of this country who are looking forward to a life at least as good as that of their parents.

In conclusion, this is not a time to play games or reach for a political advantage. This is not a time to hold the future of this country hostage to some ideological agenda or some pledge that somebody signed to some political person outside of this Chamber. Pledges signed--it is not about that. It is about putting America first. It is about putting our families first. It is not about amending the Constitution with a balanced budget amendment. It is about balancing the budget in a fair way.

The Republican plan that passed the House that started with Paul Ryan did not balance the budget for 40 years. That is not a plan. We have to do better. But when you are willing, as they are, to say to millionaires and billionaires and trillionaires: You do not have pay your fair share, the revenues do not come in. What happens as a result, they have to kill Medicare--which they did in the House budget--they have to hurt education, make the Environmental Protection Agency a shadow of its former self.

I go out and look at polls. Eighty percent of the people want the EPA to stay out there and clean up the air and make sure we have safe drinking water. They want food inspections. They want air traffic controllers on the job. They want a next-generation air system.

This is the greatest country in the world. We do not have to walk away from our dreams. We just have to have everybody paying their fair share. If that happens, we can do this. And we need to end those wars that are so costly in so many ways. If we do those two things, we are on our way to a balanced budget. We are on our way to surpluses.

We can do this. The only thing standing in our way is politics. That is what it seems to me. If people think that more important than fixing this budget crisis is bringing down a President politically, we have a problem.

We take the oath of office, and we raise our right hand, we put our hand on the Bible, to be loyal to this country, to do right by this country. That is what we should be doing now.

If people want to stay in July, August, September, October, through Christmas, that is fine with me. But we have to have a plan that is fair. If we have a plan that is fair, we balance the

budget. We do it over time. We do it wisely. We create jobs. Interest rates remain low. We can do it because we did it before. The only people who have ever balanced the budget in the last 40 years have been the Democrats. That is a fact in evidence.

We have the path lights showing the way. It is fairness on spending; cut the things that do not work; fairness on taxation; make sure billionaires pay their fair share. We follow that path. We bring home our troops. We are golden. I think that is a pathway I would like to support.

I yield the floor.

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

Madam President, first, I want to comment on the Cordray appointment that was attempted a little bit ago, and then I want to bring up some more good news on the economic front.

First, I was somewhat disappointed in the vote of 54 to 45, garnering only 1 Republican from the other side--only 1--and on such an important agency that ensures the protection of consumers in a variety of areas. It seems illogical to me that we would not find compromise in a vote to appoint someone to run an agency that this body, in a 60-vote margin, approved to help protect consumers, particularly considering what has happened over the last several years and the glaring problems and challenges consumers have had to endure with the financial institutions of this country as well as from other entrepreneurs, such as pawnshops and payroll check cashers. All of these institutions would have firm regulations and provide the consumer an opportunity to respond, or those who get abused by those programs.

I am a little disappointed. I wasn't intending to come and speak on that issue, but I wanted to have my voice on the floor that I was disappointed that an appointment could not happen, which I believe is raw politics. It has nothing to do with the individual's ability to make this agency run properly. They didn't want to appoint him because they didn't like the agency--the 45 or so who didn't vote for it. And I think it all boils down to one very simple thing: Consumers are now, once again, left without someone running an agency that will help protect them against these people who prey on individuals in the financial arena.

The Economy

Again, Madam President, I am somewhat disappointed, but let me get to the real reason I came to the floor. I came down yesterday and had a lot to say about the economy and where we are and the headlines that were reported yesterday. And in less than 48 hours--27 hours--there are more good news headlines.

These are some of the headlines I talked about yesterday: ``Jobless Rate Dips to Lowest Level in More Than 2 Years.'' New York Times. CNN: ``Dow Closes With the Largest Gain Since March 2009.'' ``Private Sector Jobs Soar. Payroll Forecasts Rise.'' That is Reuters. The Wall Street Journal: ``Online Sales Reached Record $1.25 Billion on Cyber Monday.''

On top of that, we had record sales for Thanksgiving weekend--Black Friday they call it, and Small Business Saturday. Again, an incredible impact for our economy.

What this tells me--even though we get a lot of criticism from the other side and others who complain maybe we are not doing our job and are frustrated that Washington isn't working as well as it could--and I agree there are a lot of areas where we are not able to move forward, such as the appointment I mentioned a few minutes ago--is there are good examples of policies we have worked through over the last 3 years during this great recession. We have fought kind of a lonely war to get these policies in place.

Once again, more good news, and let me read off a couple. This week's Time magazine has a whole article entitled ``How America Started Selling Cars Again.'' Why is this important? Because this is a manufacturing base for our country. It employs people not only in jobs in the automobile industry but it trickles all the way through the economy of the country. It doesn't matter if they are at a port, for example.

I remember meeting recently with the folks from the Detroit Port Authority talking about ships and the movement of product from the automobile industry across this country, but also manufacturing and other activities throughout the country that support the automobile industry. It is moving forward. It is growing.

We took a dramatic step and got a lot of criticism for it. As a matter of fact, no one wants to even mention the words, because everyone is so nervous about it. Some call it an auto bailout. And, yes, we did do that. That result is a healthy, strong, profitable industry that is bringing jobs to America and creating jobs in America. As a matter of fact, there was an article in the Wall Street Journal not long ago talking about how we are importing jobs from Japan and China back to the United States, to the automobile industry, because it is successful.

And, oh, by the way, they are paying back all those loans they got from the Federal Government with interest. So the taxpayers are getting their money back in full. The net result is, because we helped at the right time, we have ensured we are still a player in the automobile industry not only in this country but in the world market. So for those who want to continue to complain and to demonize that action, the net result is we are bringing jobs back to the United States in this industry.

The Cash for Clunkers Program was another piece of legislation that barely passed. Again, many of us on this side of the aisle took that lonely road because we thought it was the right thing to help move this economy forward. Again, the net result is this industry is profiting more in the last several years. They are producing more jobs not only in their industry directly but indirectly. And the naysayers on the other side rarely bring this up anymore, because in less than 3 years-- really, less than 2 years--this industry has turned itself around because of American ingenuity and with the help and support from the U.S. Government, and that help and support is being paid back with interest in the good old American way.

So from my perspective, once again, this is a great story, and I commend Time magazine for talking about the future.

Let me also talk about another one. This is from CNBC. I pulled this off because I like looking at all the business magazines and Web sites every morning. I glance through quickly to see what is happening, what the markets are doing, what the industry is doing, who is investing, what are the new businesses, and what is happening out there. Here is this one: ``U.S. Mortgage Applications Jumped Last Week.''

This is the industry that fell apart in the beginning of the great recession--the housing industry. A lot of people say that was the main reason the economy collapsed. It was a significant portion of it, no question about it. But let me read this.

The Mortgage Bankers Association said its seasonally

adjusted index of mortgage application activity, which

includes both refinancing and home purchase demand, spiked

12.8 percent in the week December 2. The MBA's seasonally

adjusted index of refinancing applications also jumped,

gaining 15.3 percent, while the gauge of loan requests for

home purchases rose 8.3 percent.

By loan requests, these are people who are now saying, I want to think about buying a home. I want to purchase today. I want to start examining what is out there.

Here is what the Mortgage Bankers Association's vice president of research and economics said. These are his words:

Applications increased significantly as mortgage rates

dropped to their lowest levels in about 2 months.

Actually, overall, it is the lowest level in decades. But we now measure things by an eighth of a point. So when you are at 4.125 or 4.25, we are now measuring which is lower overall, but it is lower for the last several decades. Incredible.

Let me read another one. This is from Politico, but it is reporting on the Bloomberg Global Poll--which they started doing in 2009 to sort of see where foreign investors will put their money. Where will they invest? Where will they take the dollars they have accumulated or will gather through investors and shareholders and so forth? Where are they going to put their money?

More than . . . 41 percent, said they expect the U.S. will

have one of the strongest performing economies in the world

in the coming year--the highest percentage the country has

seen since the Bloomberg Global Poll began in October 2009.

Here is another one. Today, again MSNBC. ``Jobless claims drop to 9- month low.''

. . . jobless claims dropped 23,000 to adjusted 381,000--

That is actually below the magical threshold of 400,000, which people watch. The question is, Will it be consistently under 400,000? We have received more of these under 400,000 recently than in the last 3 years. That is a good signal that the economy is moving.

I know some will say it is not enough. Well, when I came here, half a million people were losing their jobs every single month. So we have now had 21 consecutive months of job growth in the private sector. That is a great statement for us as an economy, this 21 consecutive months of job growth. It is an indication our economy is moving.

Do we want it to move faster? Of course we do. That is what America is about. We want to see things happen right now--today. But this has been called a great recession. Yet we are pulling ourselves out of it. It takes time and it takes good policy. And, yes, it takes some opportunity and taking a little risk, and we did some of that here. We made some decisions that were tough and were not necessarily very popular at times.

I remember many of the calls I received on some of these issues. But what is the end result? That is what we have to measure by. Leadership is not about waiting for a poll to tell us what is right or wrong or waiting for someone to say, here is the right move because your constituency will vote for you if you do this thing this way. It is about leadership. Sometimes the leadership role is tough. It means getting a few trucks running over you a little bit, leaving some tire tracks on your back, but the end result is what we look for.

Today, where we are, we have job growth--not as significant as we want but job growth. Where were we? Half a million jobs a month disappearing.

Let me cite another one. This is a big issue people are concerned about. As a former mayor, managing a city, you are always looking at the revenues because the revenues tell you how your local economy or, if it is State revenue, how your State is doing. If you remember, at the end of 2008, 2009, and beginning of 2010, there was incredible concern about local governments collapsing under the debt and deficit spending and unable to manage.

As a matter of fact, the markets were concerned about municipal and State debt and what that might mean. Oddly enough--and I wish I had brought that article--it hasn't panned out as people thought. Local governments, State governments are doing better than people anticipated. It is still a tough road, no question about it. We still have firefighters, police officers, and teachers who have been laid off. We tried to pass a bill here to help that out, but that didn't happen because too many on the other side opposed it.

But for State and local governments, here is the latest State revenue report by the Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government, University at Albany, NY: ``Overall Tax Revenues Show Strong Growth in Second Quarter.'' The article speaks to State tax revenues growing by 10.8 percent in the second quarter of 2011.

As a matter of fact, the year ending June 2011--which is the end of a lot of fiscal years for State and local governments--the period corresponding to 46 States--almost all of the States' fiscal years-- total State collections increased by $58 billion in that year, or 8.4 percent, from the previous year, the strongest annual gain since 2005.

What does that mean? That means local economies, State governments, are starting to recover. It is still a rough road but starting to recover. Good signs. That means there is more economic activity within their communities. It means businesses are replanting and redesigning their opportunities in those communities. People are buying homes, as I mentioned, which means they are paying property taxes, which means those local governments can hire police and fire and paramedics and teachers.

Again, I could probably come here every day and give this kind of good news. Because what we all hear--today, the market is down. I forget what it is--70, 80 points, maybe 100 today--but the headlines will be: market crashes or market dips significantly.

Here is the reality. Since March of 2009, the market is up, even with today's activity, 81 percent. That means my son's 529 account is better today than it was 3 years ago. That is good because that means my wife and I can afford to make sure he can go to college someday. But it also means retirement accounts have more resources in them today than they did 2\1/2\ or 3 years ago. It means public pension programs and investment retirement programs that invest in these kinds of markets also are doing better. But, again, the headline will be that the sky is falling because that is what people like to do. They like to prey on fear rather than opportunity.

I think a lot of us on this side believed in the opportunity, in the future of this great country 3 years ago when we sat here and made some tough decisions over the first 18 months in my term. Tough decisions. But we believed in what was possible. We believed that this economy would turn around with a little help from the people who live here, work here, and see the future.

We also knew we had to do a little bit. We had to do something extraordinary to create the opportunities for the future of this great country. As I mentioned, private sector jobs increased, the automobile industry better than ever before, home sales doing better than they were 2\1/2\ years ago, the market is up by 80 percent--all good news. But we don't hear a lot of those as the front-page, above-the-fold, big, bold headlines because they are not sexy. They are not controversial. But that is what is happening. If a lot of us around here had more belief in the potential, it would be incredible what could happen.

Let me end on this note; that is, we are in the middle of the debate on continuing tax relief for the folks who are working every day, the people I just talked about who are buying homes, buying cars, paying taxes. We are saying to them: We want to make sure you

continue to receive the dollars in your pocket.

In my State, that is $300 million--just in my State, $300 million with the payroll tax deduction that they get to keep for 400,000 Alaskans instead of the IRS taking it. I don't know about you, but I think that is a good thing.

I know some will say: We have no proof this works. Well, I just gave proof. I will give proof every day if necessary. Yes, we can't say this certain industry came back because of this one little item. But I will tell you, if we put $300 million in my State into the hands of 400,000, Alaskans, a little over $1,000 per person, the net result is they are going to spend that money in the economy. They are going to buy that car, that washing machine, or go on that vacation. They are going to spend that money in this economy. Yes, there is no fancy report that said this business succeeded because we gave them this special tax break--which we shouldn't do. We gave to the people of this country an incredible opportunity to take their money and put it to work.

Mr. President, 160 million families will benefit--160 million families will benefit by this action today. People making $50,000 or less will put back about $1,000 into their pockets again--not in the IRS's pocket but into the consumers' pockets that they will spend.

Again, I will hear from the other side how bad it is, that there is no proof, that this may not work. It is working. They can deny it all they want, but I will continue to lay all the facts down. It is not me producing this out of some government document. It is mostly some very conservative publications reporting on the good news.

I hope the folks on the other side--and I know we picked up a Republican from when we had this before. This is a modified, compromised version that didn't pass last week to say: OK, we are trying to compromise. But we are keeping it simple and trying to do it in a way that ensures that middle-class Americans, and Alaskans whom I represent, put more money in their pockets, people who are working every day, making a difference in the economy--not people who are just on the top end of the cycle. I know that is the great debate, and we differ and I differ with several people on the other side.

I do believe people who make $1 million or more should pay a little bit more. I don't have any heartburn over that. It is 235,000 people we are talking about versus 160 million. That is who I want to put my investment in because I know those people, who are individuals, families, and a significant portion of small businesspeople who will continue to build this economy.

As a matter of fact, the best growth period and growth pattern right now is small business. They are the ones that are the backbone of this economy. Those are the ones that we need to help. That is what this bill does. I hope we find the magical success.

I wish we would have 50 majority votes like the rest of this world operates under. For some reason, this place has to have special rules and make it complicated and hard for anything to get done. But maybe there will be some people who join and want to support the American people and support giving them tax relief and making sure their lives are better, especially at this time of year with Christmas around the corner. I would love to give them a good Christmas gift. I think all of us would. Let's do it. Let's do it today. Let's do it for the American people. Let's do it for my constituency in Alaska, for your constituency, Mr. President, and all the rest in this room.

Mr. President, if there is one thing I look for, if it makes a difference for Alaska, if it is about Alaska, I am there. This is not only about Alaska, it is about this country. It is about the middle class. Not only am I there, I am double there, and I hope we find opportunity in this Chamber to do the right thing.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that any time spent during a quorum call between now and 2:30 p.m. be equally divided.

I ask unanimous consent to enter into a colloquy with my Republican colleagues for up to 30 minutes.

Mr. President, I stand today to urge my colleagues to support efforts to bring forward a balanced budget amendment, one that can be passed out of both Houses of Congress and submitted to the States for ratification.

Article V of the Constitution gives us the power to change the Constitution from time to time, to modify our laws, that 224-year-old document that has fostered the development of the greatest civilization the world has ever known.

We have done this 27 times. We have done it at times in order to protect and preserve the Nation our ancestors fought so valiantly to create and later again to defend. We have to modify our government, the manner in which we do business, in order to preserve that system, in order to make it strong, in order to ensure that it will continue to be strong for future generations.

We made it stronger when, for example, we added the Bill of Rights shortly after the ratification of the Constitution. We made it stronger again when, for example, we added the so-called Civil War amendments, amendments XIII, XIV, and XV, ending slavery and the badges and incidents thereof. We made it stronger when we made clear that women must always be given the right to vote. We have made it stronger a number of times. And the time to make it stronger has come yet again.

It is time to modify the Constitution to limit--to restrict-- Congress's current power granted by article I, section 8, clause 2 of the Constitution to borrow money on credit of the United States. The reason we need to do this is because this power has been so severely abused over such a prolonged period of time that it is causing devastating consequences for our economy and for our ability to fund the operations of the government.

We have now accumulated over $15 trillion in debt as a country. That works out to about $50,000 for every man, woman, and child in America. It works out, arguably, to about $120,000 to $150,000 for every taxpayer in America. This is lot of money. It also represents between 90 and 100 percent of our gross domestic product annually, depending on whose statistics you follow. This is troubling, given that there is an abundant amount of research indicating that once a country's sovereign debt-to-GDP ratio crosses the significant 90-percent threshold--which we have now done--economic growth tends to slow, tends to slow to a point that an economy as large as ours can expect to lose as many as 1 million jobs a year. We can't afford to lose jobs, especially when we know one of the major causes is our national debt. It is time we change the way we do business. It is time to change the manner in which Congress acquires new debt.

This is no longer an issue that is either Republican or Democrat, that is either liberal or conservative. It is simply American. I remind my colleagues, whether you are concerned on the one hand about preserving America's leading edge, its ability to fund its national defense program or, on the other hand, if you are most concerned about funding our entitlement programs, you should want a balanced budget amendment because this is what we need to do, this is what we have to do in order to protect our ability to fund both of those things and everything else we do, you see, because by the end of this decade, according to the White House's own numbers, we will be paying close to $1 trillion every year to pay the interest on our national debt. Just the interest alone. We are currently spending a little over $200 billion a year on interest--still a lot of money but about $800 billion lower than what we are likely to be spending by the end of this decade.

Where will that additional $800 billion every single year come from? This isn't a discretionary sum. This is money we have to pay. It is the first thing we have to pay. Where will that $800 billion difference be made up? At that point, we can't expect simply to raise taxes to make up that difference. I am not aware of any tax increase plan that could bring in that much additional revenue every year, without stagnating our economy to the point that we might, within 1 year or 2 years, bring in less revenue rather than more--certainly not $800 billion more. Nor am I aware of any plan whereby we could simply borrow an additional $800 billion to pay that interest, because doing so, of course, would cause our interest rates to skyrocket, grow out of control, and our interest payments would be even more significant at that point, thus further impairing our ability to fund everything from defense to entitlements. So at that point, the only option on the table would be dramatic, severe, abrupt, even Draconian cuts to everything from defense to entitlements and everything in between. We don't want this. There is a better way. And the better way forward consists of a severe permanent structural spending reform that can be achieved only through a balanced budget amendment.

Let me explain what I mean by that. And, more importantly, let me explain what I don't mean by that.

We have to be aware of things that masquerade as balanced budget amendments, things that will actually do the job instead of purporting to do the job, distracting the public's attention away from the need to do this while in effect doing nothing. We need to be aware of what I sometimes call the Trojan horse balanced budget amendment proposal.

There are a few hallmarks of what a real, effective balanced budget amendment would accomplish. First and foremost, it has to apply to all spending in requiring Congress to provide a supermajority vote for any borrowing authority. There are some who have suggested we should have a balanced budget amendment that exempts certain categories of entitlement spending. But, of course, as we all know, it is entitlement spending that continues to

consume a larger and larger share of our national budget each and every year. It is entitlement spending that is anticipated to have shortfalls for sums that will have to be expended for Americans alive today. It could range anywhere from $50- to $60- to $110 trillion in unfunded entitlement liabilities. So simply exempting entire categories of entitlements is one of these hallmarks of a Trojan horse balanced budget amendment. We can't do that. We need it to apply to all Federal outlays, all Federal spending.

Second, an effective balanced budget amendment must cap spending at the average historic level of Federal revenue. Over the last 40 years, our average take, our average income as a percentage of GDP, has been about 18 to 18.5 percent of our gross domestic product. We need to make sure we are not spending more than that; that Congress can't, without a supermajority vote, spend more than 18 percent of GDP in any given year. Otherwise, we run the risk that Congress will find a way through tricky accounting schemes to circumvent the restrictions to make sure it is not spending more than it takes in.

Third, the supermajority requirement must apply to the folks in both Houses of Congress every time Congress wants to spend more than it takes in. Any balanced budget amendment proposal that allows for a simple majority to bring about an exception to these spending limitations is one that Congress can and will use to circumvent the amendment entirely. Let me explain what I mean.

We have had in the past certain statutory legislative limitations on Congress's spending and borrowing power. Some of these have been known as the Graham-Rudman-Hollings legislation, and also the pay-go rules. But because Congress makes those laws and because they haven't been reduced to a constitutional amendment, just as Congress giveth, Congress taketh away, and Congress has seen fit to exempt itself of those rules. A balanced budget amendment, even while enshrined in our Constitution, becomes no more effective than those statutory or internal rules unless every time Congress wants to get around those limitations Congress is required to cast a supermajority vote to justify that excess.

Finally, an effective balanced budget amendment must require that Congress cast a supermajority vote anytime we raise the debt limit. This will give us an additional guarantee that tricky accounting mechanisms will not be used to circumvent some of these most important restrictions. Without these restrictions, Congress will continue to spend out of control, because Members of Congress tend to be rewarded when they spend and they tend to be criticized when they cut, and political pressures are such that I fear this spending will continue out of control in perpetuity until that moment in which we reach our natural mathematical borrowing limit--not our statutory debt limit, our natural mathematical borrowing limit. It is at that point when the most abrupt, the most painful, the most Draconian cuts will have to be made. We can do this in a way that makes sense. We can do this in a way that is sensitive to the needs of the most vulnerable Americans, those who have become the most dependent upon our entitlement State, most dependent for their day-to-day existence on these very programs. Those programs will have to be cut abruptly and in a most painful manner unless we take the necessary steps right now and start moving onto a smooth glidepath toward a balanced budget amendment.

We may not be able to balance our budget overnight, but we can do it over the course of a few years. That is exactly what this would allow us to do.

I have worked closely with a number of my Republican colleagues in supporting S.J. Res. 10, a balanced budget amendment proposal that has the support of all 47 Republicans. One of my close allies in this endeavor has been my friend and colleague, the junior Senator from Kentucky. I would like to ask him to share his perspective on why this is necessary.

So I ask Senator Paul why does he think this is so important for us to have this amendment right now.

If the Congress is consisting of a Senate and House, and the Members of the Senate and House are elected representatives of the people who stand for reelection at regular intervals, and if the American voting public overwhelmingly supports a balanced budget amendment, why haven't we then passed it and given the States an opportunity to ratify such an amendment?

What is my colleague's sense as to how the various State legislatures are likely to respond to a constitutional amendment proposed by both Houses of Congress? Does he think they would likely ratify such an amendment by the necessary three-fourths margin?

So they are paying for Washington's fiscal irresponsibility in the form of job losses and in the form of increased prices for goods and services and in the form of inflation.

It is likewise my experience with my State legislature that they seem to be very supportive of it. In fact, I have a document here signed by the legislative leaders of my State: by Governor Gary Herbert, by Utah house of representatives speaker Rebecca

Lockhart, and by Utah State senate president Michael Waddoups. It concludes essentially as follows:

We urge the United States Senate and House of

Representatives to pass a balanced budget amendment and send

it to the states for ratification. Additionally, we urge

Congress to make Utah's current resolution part of the

Congressional Record.

They also proceed to explain why they feel so strongly about this. They say:

Not only for our own sake, but for future generations as

well, the states must now combine in an unwavering resolve

with convincing action to put the nation's financial house in

order. Passage of your own state's resolution urging the

support for a balanced budget amendment can help make this

happen. Please join with Utah to call upon Congress to

immediately pass a balanced budget amendment. We respectfully

encourage you to urge your congressional delegation to act in

your behalf.

They are calling not only on Congress but also their fellow State legislators throughout the country to urge this same action from Congress. In the same breath, they also adopt it, and they supported wholeheartedly the specific balanced budget amendment proposal that is found in S.J. Res. 10.

I thank them for doing that. I think they reflect the views of so many of our State legislatures which balance their budgets every single year. Most of them do. It is not news when they do it. It is not news because it is what is expected. It is expected because that is what they do.

I look forward to the day and age when it is no longer news when Congress balances its budget.

I would like to ask Senator Paul another question. Why is it that so many are fond of saying, as our President has recently said, ``We don't need a balanced budget amendment; what we need is for Congress to just do its job''? Why isn't that enough to carry the day?

I think most Members of Congress would acknowledge that their constituents want the Federal budget balanced. Why is it not enough for us just to tell Members of Congress: Please balance it. We don't want to have to restrict your authority. We don't want to have to take the keys away from the irresponsible driver. We just want you to be responsible. Why doesn't that work?

Perhaps it is inherent in the institution itself, in the forces at play, that have made Congress uniquely vulnerable to this kind of massive deficit spending. Whatever the reason, we know Congress is not willing, is not able, or at least in recent years has not been inclined except in rare, unusual circumstances to balance its own budget.

That being the case, we cannot assume that Congress will all of a sudden start doing its job, as those who have used this argument have insisted. Part of Congress's job, as Congress has come to perceive it, is to engage in deficit spending. One of Congress's powers, as Members of Congress who read the Constitution will point out, is to borrow money on the credit of the United States. So it is not enough to simply tell Congress to do its job because it has regarded this kind of massive deficit as consistent with that mandate, consistent with that injunction.

Meanwhile, Congress is continuing to occupy a larger and larger share of the American economy. We have to remember that for the first 150 years or so of our Republic's existence, we were spending between 1 percent and 4 percent of gross domestic product at the Federal national level, with only two brief exceptions--once during the Civil War and once during and then the immediate aftermath of World War I. But that all started to change in the 1930s when we broke into double digits for the first time ever during peacetime. We have never really gone back.

Now the Federal Government is spending about 25 percent of GDP annually. Roughly a quarter out of every dollar that moves through the American economy every year is taken out of the real economy by Washington. It is absorbed within the Federal morass that is our government. That is a problem. That needs to change.

I fear, I suspect, I firmly believe that it will not change until we take this power away, until we at least impose severe restrictions on Congress's borrowing power because it has become part of Congress's nature to engage in this kind of out-of-control deficit spending.

I would like to ask Senator Paul another question. How does he think it would impact the lives of Americans, of Kentuckians, on a day-to-day basis, if we were to pass a amendment such as this and have it ratified by the States?

I could not agree more with that assessment. It is important for us to remind our colleagues of that because according to a recent CNN poll, the American people overwhelmingly support this by a margin of about 75 percent. Those who oppose it, those who are Members of this body, those who are Members of our sister body--the House of Representatives--who choose not to support it, will cast their ``no'' vote at their own political peril because the American people are standing and they are demanding more. They understand that, in the words of Benjamin Franklin: ``He'll cheat without scruple who can without fear.''

When Congress is free to spend more than it takes in every single year without political consequence, bad things happen. When Congress starts to manipulate more and more of the economy, that is something the American people understand is hurtful rather than helpful to them, to the people on the ground, to the person who is unemployed and looking for a job, to the person who is underemployed or underpaid for the work he does, to the single mother who is just worried about taking care of her children, to the grandparents who are worried about the future of their grandchildren, worried about the fact that for the first time in American history, Americans fear their posterity will enjoy a lower standard of living than what they have enjoyed.

All this is due to the fact that Congress has no real boundaries to its authority and recognizes no real limits on its ability to spend our hard-earned money. This has real consequences. We can forestall those negative consequences right now if we will act to restrict, on a permanent and structural basis, Congress's ability to engage in deficit spending.

Accept no imitations, beware of the Trojan horse balanced budget amendment, the one that can be circumvented easily by a simple majority vote. Beware of the balanced budget amendment that limits, as a percentage of GDP, Congress's ability to spend money. Look out for these principles. If we get this balanced budget amendment passed, submit it to the States for ratification. They will ratify it, and we will find our best days, as Americans, are yet ahead of us.

I urge my colleagues to cast a vote in favor of S.J. Res. 10.

I thank the Chair.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, on behalf of the majority leader, I ask unanimous consent that the time until 2:30 p.m. be equally divided between the two leaders or their designees for debate on the Reid motion to proceed to Calendar No. 251, S. 1944; that at 2:30 p.m., the Senate vote on the motion to proceed to S. 1944; that upon disposition of the Reid motion to proceed, it be in order for the Republican leader or his designee to move to proceed to Calendar No. 244, S. 1931; that there be 2 minutes of debate equally divided between the two leaders or their designees prior to the vote; that both motions to proceed be subject to a 60-vote threshold; finally, that the cloture motion relative to the motion to proceed to S. 1944 be vitiated.

Mr. President, a little earlier today the junior Senator from Utah, Mr. Lee, came to the floor to discuss the balanced budget amendment. Under the budget agreement agreed to in Congress in August, both the House and Senate were required to vote on a constitutional amendment to balance the budget before the end of this calendar year. The House has already taken the vote. The measure failed. The Senate still has a responsibility to take it up, which we will do in the closing hours of the session this calendar year.

There are at least two proposals before us for a constitutional amendment, and my subcommittee, the Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Human Rights of the Committee on the Judiciary, held a hearing last week asking questions about these approaches to the Constitution.

The leading approach on the Republican side comes from both Senators Hatch and McConnell. I am not certain which they will offer or whether the language might change at the last minute, but it would enshrine in our Constitution a disciplinary mechanism to reduce the budget deficit. This has been brought before the Senate and the House before many times. This particular proposed constitutional amendment would:

Require that in each fiscal year Federal outlays shall not exceed receipts unless two-thirds of each House votes to waive.

It caps outlays at 18 percent of gross domestic product each year unless two-thirds of each House votes to waive.

It requires a two-thirds vote in each House for any tax or revenue- raising measure.

It requires a three-fifths vote in each House for raising the debt limit.

It allows for waiver of the amendment in times of declared war or serious military conflict.

It prohibits courts from ordering any increase in revenue to enforce the amendment.

It directs Congress to enforce the amendment through appropriate legislation.

It takes effect 5 years after ratification.

This is far more extreme than the clean House balanced budget amendment, which failed to pass in that Chamber on November 18.

The testimony before our subcommittee from experts in the field said that this amendment, proposed by Senators Hatch and McConnell, will require Draconian cuts in Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, our military retirement system, and many programs important to working families.

It will make Republican fiscal policies the constitutional law of the land, giving protection to those in higher income categories from any tax increase forever, without an extraordinary vote in either House.

It would delegate the task of resolving budget disputes to our court system.

It would make recessions worse by requiring cuts in countercyclical safety-net programs such as food stamps and unemployment just at the time when those expenditures are most needed.

It would increase the likelihood of debt limit standoffs each year.

It would lead to increased burdens on our States.

During the course of the hearings, several people came forward to testify. I recommend to my colleagues that they carefully read these testimonies, which are available on the Senate Judiciary Committee website.

The first was Robert Greenstein, president of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Mr. Greenstein, who is well recognized and respected on Capitol Hill, spoke about the countercyclical aspect and said that if you cut spending in the midst of a recession, you will not have the resources you need to provide unemployment benefits, food stamps, and the things that save families when they are out of work or making very little money.

I ask unanimous consent that Mr. Greenstein's statement be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, another testimony that I thought was extremely compelling came from Alan Morrison. Alan Morrison is an accomplished attorney and has argued many cases before the U.S. Supreme Court. He is the Lerner Family Associate Dean for Public Interest & Public Service Law at George Washington University Law School.

Professor Morrison really asked us to think through what we are doing. In fact, he asked us the most important question: If you put an amendment to the Constitution that requires a balanced budget, who will enforce it? Who will make it work? Who will decide if you have lived up to its terms? He concluded, based on his background in constitutional law and arguing before the Supreme Court, not the President. The President is not in that position to do it. The President, of course, with his budget, has his own favorites when it comes to spending and revenue.

Professor Morrison said this case ultimately has to find its way to our court system. But he made it clear that any constitutional balanced budget amendment must expressly give to the Federal courts the standing to decide the question. He raised a question that without that expressed language, he really was doubtful that the courts would take it up. They might view it as just a political question to be resolved by Congress itself.

Now, Senator Lee, who spoke on the floor earlier, has a version of the balanced budget amendment that expressly gives standing to Members of Congress, if I am not mistaken. But the point made by Professor Morrison is that any balanced budget amendment has to expressly give to our Federal court system the power of judicial review. In other words, who is going to call the fouls, the balls, the strikes, and the outs? It is going to have to be the court system when it comes to whether the balanced budget amendment is being complied with.

That is the first question but certainly not the last question.

Professor Morrison then went on to say: Now, put this in the real world. In the real world, where Congress has passed a budget, appropriations bills, and now someone is arguing that what Congress did does not comply with the new provision of the Constitution requiring a balanced budget--arguing that, in fact, Congress is overspending the amount it is allowed to spend, for example--then, of course, that case has to find its way from the Capitol Building to the President, who signed the bill, and then over to the court system.

Keep in mind, while we are in doubt about the outcome on appropriations bills and the budget, there is a serious question about how we will continue to fund our government, whether we can continue to make important payments to military retirees, Social Security recipients, Medicare recipients. All of it is in doubt while there is a question raised as to whether the budget passed by the Congress is unconstitutional.

This is the thicket we are being led into by those who very glibly say: All we need to do is mandate in the Constitution a balanced budget, and it will just flow naturally from that mandate.

Well, listen to what Professor Morrison said:

The federal courts will (rightly) be extremely reluctant to

wade into these budget battles and thus will want to be sure

that there is likely to be a violation before agreeing to

decide the merits. But budgets are inherently uncertain in

their impact, depending on such factors as whether revenue

targets are met, whether the demand for entitlements is

higher or lower than anticipated, whether discretionary

spending is fully realized, and whether an existing war winds

down or a new one starts, each with great uncertainties

accompanying them. Thus, it will be far from clear on October

1st of a given fiscal year whether a duly enacted budget will

or will not be in balance, assuming that the question is

reasonably close, as it is likely to be in at least some

years. Unless Congress makes it clear, either in the

[constitutional] amendment or perhaps by subsequent

legislation, that the courts should resolve all doubts in

favor of finding claims ripe, the courts are likely to be

very reluctant to reach the merits even for those persons who

are expressly given standing in the amendment.

Then, of course, is the question of a remedy. What if Congress passes a budget and appropriations bills, the President signs them, and they are challenged in court, and the court says: Yes, in fact, Congress has overspent beyond the requirements of the Constitution. What is next? What remedy would the courts order? What can the court do?

Can they order the recipients (of salaries, social security

benefits, Medicare payments, payments under Government

contracts etc) to ``pay back'' [a certain percentage]? Or can

it order Congress to rectify the balance in the next year's

budget, which would almost certainly trigger a new lawsuit?

To be sure, the courts will not dismiss as moot claims that

are capable of repetition, yet evade review because the

duration of the violation is so limited that the courts

cannot decide its legality before it has ceased.

Professor Morrison asks us to get beyond the bumper stickers and to think twice before we amend our Constitution.

In the 220 years since the enactment of the Bill of Rights, we have amended this Constitution precious few times. We have done it for compelling national reasons. We have done it to extend the right to vote to women. We have done it to make it clear that African Americans treated as slaves will be treated as citizens in the United States. We have done it to deal with questions of Presidential disability and succession. These are things which were compelling, major, national issues which could be resolved in a clear, definitive way by our Congress, working with the States for ratification.

Now comes the flavor of the day. In the midst of the deficit crisis debate, there are those who are arguing that we should not accept our responsibility in the Senate and the House to balance the budget. No, we should just put in the Constitution that we are required to do it. And then they go further. If we are going to address it, they say, we are going to draw certain lines that future Congresses, forever, as long as this constitutional amendment applies, will be bound by--to make it more difficult to raise taxes on anyone in the United States; to make it imperative, if not mandatory, that cuts be made in programs such as Social Security and Medicare. These are questions that should be decided by Congress and the President on a timely basis.

I have been involved in the past 2 years with a lot of debate about our national budget deficit, both on the Bowles-Simpson Commission and with the voluntary effort by six Democratic and Republican Senators. It is not easy. It is very hard. But it can be done if the political will is there.

I think we need to summon the courage, the political courage and the will to do it. But we should reject--summarily reject these efforts to amend our Constitution. They are not well thought out. The Constitution is too important a document, a historical guidepost for our Nation, and an inspiration for nations around the world to put in a fatally flawed constitutional balanced budget amendment in the heat of the moment.

This is a significant vote. Those of us--and that includes every single Member of the Senate--who have sworn to uphold and defend the Constitution need to take that document very, very seriously. Those who want to amend it in quick fashion, changing their amendment language by the day, should be dismissed. If they do not show the reverence for this document that it deserves, if they do not take the time to make certain their proposals are consistent with the sanctity and importance of this document, they should not be taken seriously.

I do not believe any of my colleagues can go home having voted for that amendment and expect wild applause from audiences across America. They will understand that this was just a political reaction to a very important issue. Let's not amend the Constitution with a balanced budget amendment.

(Mrs. HAGAN assumed the chair.)

Madam President, I would like to make one additional brief statement. I see the Senator from Ohio in the Chamber.

The holiday season is upon us, and a lot of us are thinking about our families, and we are thinking about being with them as quickly as we can. It is a time of year that has a special significance for so many of us. But what was made clear by President Obama yesterday--and my colleagues should take note--we are not going home for

Christmas, Hanukkah, or any holiday season until we have done our job for the people of this country.

Millions of people in Illinois and across America are counting on Congress to extend the payroll tax cut. What does it mean in my State? With an average income of $50,000 a year, it is worth more than $1,000 a year to those families. It is worth about $125 to $150 a month to have a payroll tax cut--money that working families, struggling from paycheck to paycheck, desperately need to fill the gas tank, to pay the utility bills, to provide clothing for their kids, to make sure they can stay in their home. These are the basics.

No Member of Congress is going to be allowed to go home and ignore the imposition of such a new payroll tax on America. President Obama met with the Democratic leaders of the Senate yesterday, and he said point-blank--he has told the First Lady, Michelle, and his girls that, if necessary, they can have their Christmas vacation in Hawaii, which they go to each year, by themselves, and he will wait here until this job is done. I hope that does not happen for the sake of his family or for the sake of any family of any Member of Congress, but in order to avoid that, we have to do the right and responsible thing.

This afternoon, there will be a vote on the payroll tax cut offered by Senator Casey of Pennsylvania. It is a payroll tax cut that would help millions of America's working families have more to spend and help the economy to recover. And he pays for it. He does not add to the deficit. He pays for it by imposing a surtax--listen closely--on the second million dollars earned by a person in a year, not the first million. You do not pay a penny on the first million you earn. On the second million, you will pay a surtax, and I think it is 2 percent, maybe less.

The Republicans have said: Absolutely unacceptable. We will not allow you to impose this onerous tax on these people.

People who are already making $20,000 a week, we cannot ask them to pay 2 percent more on the next dollar they make? I do not think it is unreasonable. And if it leads to a payroll tax cut that helps families across this country, if the economy continues to recover even at a faster pace, if we see more business activity and business life and more people working, do you know what is going to happen? Those same wealthy people will prosper again, as they always do. It is in their best interests for this economy to get well. For our Republican friends to fold their arms and say: We are just not going to let you touch the wealthiest people in America, is an irresponsible position.

Senator Casey has led this effort. It is the second effort we have made. We had one last week. The Republicans offered their alternative last week. It had 20 votes on the floor of the Senate--20 out of 47 Republican Senators. Twenty voted for it. They want to bring it up again today. They will probably get more than 20 votes this time, but it is pretty clear that the Republican Senators are halfhearted in their support of this Republican alternative.

One Republican Senator from Maine had the courage to step across the aisle last week and join us. We salute Senator Collins for doing that. We hope others will do it today.

We can bring this challenge to a close the right way by extending the payroll tax cut, paying for it with a tax on the wealthiest people in America. We can do our job and go home and be with our families. If Republicans will not come to the table to work with us on a reasonable compromise, I am afraid the American people will know very clearly who is to blame for continuing a tax on working families across America.

The facts are that we want working Americans to have a good year, get through a difficult time, and the economy to recover.

We should be doing this on a bipartisan basis. The President said: Roll out your Christmas trees and blankets here in the Senate because you are going to stay here, even through the holidays if necessary. We are not going to go home to celebrate until we can celebrate with American families who are counting on us across America.

I yield the floor.

I announce that the Senator from Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry) and the Senator from Wisconsin (Mr. Kohl) are necessarily absent.

Mr. President, I congratulate the Senator from Oklahoma on his remarks and participation in this debate.

Before long, we should have--whenever the majority leader decides--a vote on the Coburn amendment. We are in a position on this resolution that relevant amendments are in order. At the moment, we don't have any others. If we don't have others, then we will proceed to the final bill later this afternoon when the majority leader decides we should do that. We passed the bill this morning with 79 votes. I will have more to say about this resolution in a moment.

I wish to say something that is directly relevant to what the Senator from Oklahoma talked about. We keep

talking about duplication, which is an important part of our oversight responsibilities. Sometimes that leads to the elimination of government bureaucracies, which is a rare event.

Ronald Reagan once said a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life that we will ever see on this Earth. I had an example of that this morning, I say to the Senator from Oklahoma, in a Rules Committee hearing. The purpose of the hearing was to review the qualifications of three excellent men and women who were nominated by the President to serve on the Election Assistance Commission. But what I said at the hearing and what I would like to say on the floor--with all due respect to those excellent nominees--instead of considering the nominees, we should be abolishing the Commission because it doesn't have anything to do. It has finished its work and it ought to be abolished.

The Election Assistance Commission was commissioned in 2003. Since then, the Rules Committee didn't have one single oversight hearing on the Commission. My predecessor asked for an oversight hearing, but we didn't have one. I asked for one earlier this spring, and we didn't have one. At a time when we are borrowing 40 cents out of every $1 that Washington spends, we should not have been there this morning considering new appointments to a commission that is out of work. We should have been there considering recommending to this body that the Commission cease to exist.

This is why. It was created by the Help America Vote Act in 2002. It was authorized for 3 years and given certain tasks. The primary task was to distribute Federal payments to the States to help them upgrade their voting systems. We appropriated $3.2 billion for these payments. That has been distributed. Given our current financial situation, it is very unlikely that any more Federal payments will be forthcoming. We don't have any more money for that purpose. President Obama seems to agree with this, since in his last two budgets he has requested no funds for this purpose.

The Commission was also directed to develop voluntary voting system guidelines and a testing and certification program for voting machines. The actual work involved in this process is performed by another agency, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, which develops the guidelines, and the independent laboratories that conduct that testing. So in the spirit of Senator Coburn's comments, we don't need two agencies assigned the same responsibility.

Finally, the Commission was to act as a clearinghouse to collect and distribute information on best practices in election administration. Yet the intended beneficiaries of this service don't seem to have much use for it. The National Association of Secretaries of State--every State has one--a bipartisan organization made up of our country's chief State elections officials, has twice voted in favor of a resolution calling for abolition of this agency, the Election Assistance Commission.

So here we have a classic example of: I am the government. I am here to give you help you don't want. As a former State official myself--I was Governor of Tennessee--I have a little bit of a bias. I don't see the need for a Federal clearinghouse of best practices for secretaries of state. I don't know why the secretaries of state themselves can't do that. When I was a Governor, I didn't need a Federal agency telling me the best practices of the Governor of Oklahoma so I could use them in Tennessee. We had regular Governors' conferences, and we got to know each other pretty well. If Governor Graham of Florida had a good idea about education, I borrowed that. If I had a good idea on education, Governor Clinton borrowed that, and it worked pretty well. We didn't have to fly to Washington to have a clearinghouse.

So the tasks of this Commission have either been completed or can be performed by more appropriate entities. This is in the spirit of Senator Coburn's amendment. The Commission did its job. We should thank the Commission and their staff for their service.

But if the completion of their appointed task isn't enough of a reason to close it down, the Commission also appears to have a serious management problem or two. Though its mission has dwindled, its staff has grown. It has less to do but has more people doing it. The Commission had a staff of 20 in 2004. Last year, it had three times that many. It had 64 people--more staff needed for less work.

I am sure there are some very good people there. There must be, because the average salary--according to Congressman Gregg Harper of the House of Representatives--for all the members of the Election Assistance Commission is over $100,000 a year. This year's budget submission from the Commission proposes spending $5.4 million to manage $3.4 million worth of programs. Does that make any sense, when the cost of overhead and staff salaries exceeds the programs they have to administer? Clearly, something is wrong.

That is precisely the kind of small thing in the big picture we are dealing with that adds up and up and up and creates an environment in which we seem to be content in spending more and more and borrowing 40 cents of every $1 we spend.

Finally, the Commission has an unfortunate history of hiring discrimination. The Office of Special Counsel found they engaged in illegal discrimination when, during the search for a general counsel, an employment offer was made and then withdrawn when the Democratic Commissioners discovered the applicant was a Republican. This resulted in a substantial financial settlement being awarded to the applicant; thereby forcing taxpayers to bear the cost of the illegal acts of Commissioners. Amazingly, it has been reported that in a subsequent interview with another applicant for the same position, one of these Commissioners again tainted the hiring process by asking the applicant what the Department of Labor has termed ``inappropriate questions about his military service.''

Apparently, the Commissioner didn't want Republicans or members of the military working at the Commission. The Department of Labor has reportedly found the applicant's claim of discrimination to be meritorious and, if not resolved, this case may be referred to the Office of Special Counsel.

I said this morning that the three men and women whom President Obama nominated seem to have exceptional backgrounds, and they are not to blame for any of these incidents. But what I also said was, since they seem to be exceptionally good nominees, maybe we should find a commission where there is something for them to do, instead of a commission that has finished its job and where we are just perpetuating it with employees who, on average, make $100,000 a year in salary, according to Congressman Harper.

Even if we were to assume these nominees before us could right the ship and correct the problems, the question remains: Where would the ship sail, and why would they make the trip? Do we need the Commission, with its main job completed? Couldn't any remaining duties be better performed somewhere else? Can a government program ever be terminated?

As I said at the beginning of these remarks, Ronald Reagan once said: A government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life that we will ever see. Shouldn't we try to use this opportunity to prove that Ronald Reagan was, in that case, wrong?

I congratulate the Senator from Oklahoma for his work on duplication. This isn't the first time. This is one of the many times he has spoken and acted on the subject. I offer this example of the Election Assistance Commission as one small step we could take in the right direction by, in the appropriate way, canceling the Commission instead of confirming three new nominees to it.

I thank the Chair and I yield the floor.

Madam President, I believe Senator Harkin is coming in the next few minutes. In the meantime, I thought I would comment on the legislation that has been before the body since late last week--to reduce the number of Senate confirmations of Presidential nominations, so the Senate can exercise its constitutional duty of advice and consent more effectively.

This all goes back to our U.S. Constitution, article II, section 2, which says that one of the most important duties of the Senate is ``its advice and consent responsibility.'' That is one of the well-known functions of the Senate. Many have written about advice and consent.

The Constitution says the President shall nominate, with the advice and consent of the Senate, ambassadors, ministers, judges, and other officers of the United States. Today, there are about 1,400 of those officers. When President Kennedy was President, there were about 286, more or less. Under President Clinton, there were about 914, more or less. It continually goes up. This includes a large number of part-time advisory positions, such as the Library Advisory Board and a variety of other boards. That is why the Founders put into the Constitution another provision, which says Congress may, by law, vest the appointment of such inferior officers as they think proper in the President alone, in the courts of law, and heads of departments.

It is up to us to make sure we don't trivialize the constitutional responsibility we have, so we define the number of men and women whom the President nominates, who require advice and consent, and we define the ones who don't. We have not done a good job deciding which ones did not. Over the last few days, the Senate has decided to remove 169 of the 1,400 nominations from the advise and consent requirement. It is debating, right now, removing another 272 full-time or part-time positions and putting them in an expedited process, so we will have affected 450 or so of the 1,400 nominations, either by removing them from advice and consent or speeding up the process. This will permit us to focus more attention on the job we are sent to do, which is to do a good job of evaluating the most important offices.

Just one indication of how we have been trivializing the responsibility to decide who does deserve advice and consent and who doesn't is that only about 3 percent of all the Presidential nominations in the last Congress actually were deemed important enough to have a rollcall vote on the floor of the Senate. Ninety-seven percent were deemed not important enough. Of course, they were not. They were valuable people, but they were part-time advisory board members who were part of a board where an executive director, for example, already reported to someone who was confirmed by the President.

We had examples of positions being confirmed by the Senate who reported to someone, who reported to someone, who reported to someone, who reported to someone else--all of them confirmed by advice and consent. So we made a modest step in the direction of helping us execute and exercise our Constitutional duty under article II, section 2, in a more effective way.

This resolution we are debating, unlike the bill this morning, does not remove one single person from the right of advice and consent. It expedites it in the following way: The President's nomination would come to the desk here--and this is after the President has done all his vetting--and then the relevant committee, say, the Finance Committee or the Judiciary Committee, would go through its usual exercise of asking the nominee to answer questions and provide all that information. When that nomination first comes here, that information is listed on the Senate Executive Calendar that we Senators and staffers read. Then, when the information is all gathered by the relevant committee, that is indicated. Then there is a full 10 days for all of us to look at that. If a single Senator says he or she would like for this nominee to go on to the committee for a hearing and then for the traditional markup, that happens. But if all 100 Senators say they looked at the information and it is not necessary to go to that extra time, expense, and delay, then it moves to the Executive Calendar, and the majority leader can bring it up whenever he or she wishes.

What we have done is, in approximately 450 cases, we have affected the 1,400 nominations that are subject to advice and consent. We have either eliminated the requirement or we have expedited the process and made it possible for us to focus more attention on those deserving the most important attention.

One other aspect--and I see the Senator from Oregon here and perhaps he wishes to speak, so I will conclude my remarks with this. There is one other important aspect that we deal with here. It may be the most important thing we can do. The first one I discussed was slowing down the trivialization of the Senate's advice and consent constitutional duty. That is what the first part of what we are doing does. The bill did that, which we have already passed. The resolution does that, which we are now debating.

The second aspect that was dealt with in the bill this morning is dealing with the phenomenon of what I call innocent until nominated. We have developed a practice in this town of making or having the President select an otherwise unsuspecting distinguished citizen from Sioux City or Nashville or Bangor or Sacramento and after going through an FBI check and other things, nominated that person for some position deserving of advice and consent. By the time that person makes his or her way through all the executive vetting process, by the time people pore over the tax returns and answer multiple questions--often the same question asked in different ways--they have likely got an inaccuracy in there somewhere. Then their name is sent up here and the committee investigates them and asks them many of the same questions and they might have an inconsistency. Then they show up for a publicized hearing with their family and, all of a sudden, they are made out to be a common criminal because they made a mistake trying to decipher these forms.

A former majority leader of the Senate, Howard Baker, and his wife,

former Senator Nancy Kassebaum, went to Japan a few years ago as President George H.W. Bush's nominee as Ambassador to Japan--Senator Baker was. All of us knew Senator Baker. He was voted by the Senate the most admired Senator by the Democrats as well as the Republicans when he was here. All the Senators who were here at the time knew Senator Kassebaum, his wife. Yet Senator Baker told me he had to spend $250,000 in legal and accounting fees just to make his way carefully through the nomination process, with all the executive vetting and all the vetting the committees did, just so he would not make a mistake and just so he would not be subject to this ``innocent until nominated'' syndrome.

The bill we passed this morning simply establishes a process. If the bill should pass the House and be signed by the President, then we would have a working group of people appointed by the Senate--people appointed by the executive branch--and we would work together to try to simplify the executive forms and the congressional forms that we use to see if we can have a smart form, a simple form that perhaps we could all use; and then at least, for the most part, a nominee, when nominated by the President, could fill out a single form, which could then be used by all of us who need to know basic information, such as what was their income last year. We can ask the question: Do we need to know every single residence address they ever had in their life if they are going to be on an advisory board, for example, for the United States?

That practice will have to be done with respect to the constitutional separation of powers. The executive branch will have to create its own documents. The Senate will have to create its own. If we work together and create a smart form--and Senator Collins and Senator Lieberman have made important contributions to the process of how candidates are vetted, and the forms--we will not only have slowed down the trivialization of the Senate's duty of advice and consent by doing a better job deciding who not to confirm, we will also have reduced the phenomenon of innocent until nominated, which has not only made it difficult for Presidents to staff the government, delayed their ability to form a government, but unnecessarily harassed otherwise honorable men and women who are asked to serve their government.

I yield the floor.