Floor Statements

Mr. President, I wish to say a few words about an issue of enormous importance to the people of the State of Vermont and people all over this country; that is, the issue of making sure that in America this winter nobody goes cold, that nobody freezes to death, that children do not become ill because the thermostats in their homes are turned down so low.

The issue I am talking about is to ask for support for legislation that is being introduced by Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island and Senator Olympia Snowe of Maine which would level fund the LIHEAP program at $4.7 billion. As most of my colleagues know, LIHEAP is the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program.

Here is the problem we face. We are in the midst of a horrendous recession. Unemployment is sky high. In many cases, wages are in decline, poverty is increasing, and at the same time the price for home heating oil and propane gas is going up. According to the Energy Information Administration, average expenditures for households that heat with oil or propane are forecast to be higher than in any previous winter. Heating oil prices are currently averaging about $3.90 a gallon. So what people in the Northeast and people all over this country are looking at are the highest home heating oil prices we have ever seen, coming in the midst of a terrible recession, with unemployment high and wages in decline.

In Vermont, heating oil prices are already 34 percent higher than they were at the same time last year. It is currently $3.82 a gallon, compared to $2.85 a gallon last year. What is happening is that because of cuts--significant cuts--in LIHEAP funding, the average LIHEAP benefit in Vermont is 45 percent less this year than it was last year, and that is $474 per family as opposed to $866 last year.

One thing that has to be understood about LIHEAP is that nearly 80 percent of funding from this program goes to our citizens who are elderly, families with preschool kids, and the disabled. So the people who benefit from this program are some of the most vulnerable people in our country. Eighty percent of the funding, once again, goes to senior citizens, families with preschool children, young children, and people who are dealing with disabilities.

It is not uncommon in the State of Vermont and in other States for the temperatures to drop to 10 below zero or 20 below zero in the wintertime. When people do not have enough funds to heat their homes or their apartments, serious problems arise.

What I want to do is take a moment to read some comments my office has received from Vermonters all over the State who are trying desperately to stay warm this winter.

Josie Crosby, 81 years of age, of Brattleboro, VT, said this:

We will have money for one more tank. After that, I don't

know.

That is a woman who is 81 years of age who has money for one more tank of oil. After that, she is not sure how they will stay warm in the winter.

A 48-year-old from Orleans County in the northern part of our State wrote this:

I was able to get 100 gallons of fuel last week, and for

that I am grateful. The struggle begins now on how to stretch

that fuel as long as possible. I had to buy a portable

electric heater to keep halfway warm while waiting for fuel

assistance. I don't even want to see how high my electric

bill will be. I am an honorably discharged disabled veteran

and have limited funds. I have already slashed my food bill,

so what goes next? My meds, my electric service, my home?

That is from a disabled vet in the northern part of Vermont.

A 59-year-old woman in central Vermont writes:

I have been keeping my thermostat as low as I can

``almost'' tolerate. I bundle up in the house with several

sweaters, and even a coat and hat at times. When company

arrives, I am embarrassed at how ridiculous I probably

appear. I am just barely squeaking through each month. I have

made cuts everywhere possible, including food.

Wendy Raven, 62, from Whitingham, VT, writes:

I had to drag my bed out of my bedroom and put it in the

living room, then close off the bedroom for the winter. I

will have to eat even less than I do now in order to pay my

fuel bills. I have done everything I can to button up the

place, but now all I can do is pray I get through the winter

without a bill so large it will again take me until next fall

to pay it off.

Is that where we are in the United States of America--that we force people to live under those conditions?

A 31-year-old woman from Bennington, VT, writes:

We are now trying to stay warm by scraping up enough for a

gallon or two of heating oil a week, and keeping the

thermostat down very low. I turn the furnace off during the

day when my child is in school and turn it on an hour before

she gets home so that the house gets warm. We are hoping to

qualify for crisis fuel assistance or we are in trouble,

because there is nowhere to get the extra money needed to pay

for the fuel, especially considering its continuously

increasing cost. We have to choose what bills to pay each

month and what ones not in order to put food on the table.

In this great Nation, in the midst of a recession, in the midst of high unemployment, in the midst of growing poverty, we as the Senate must be very clear that nobody in this country is going to go cold this winter; that we are not going to pick up a paper in Maine or Rhode Island or Vermont or North Dakota and read that some senior citizen was found frozen to death. That is not what we are going to allow. That is why Senators Jack Reed, Olympia Snowe, I, and many others are working hard so that at the very least we can level fund LIHEAP so that nobody in our country goes cold this winter.

Mr. President, I want to say a word about two amendments I have offered, both of which I think are important and both of which should be agreed to.

As I think you know, this country has a recordbreaking deficit and a $15 trillion national debt. What many people do not know is that one of the reasons our deficit is as high as it is is because there is a significant amount of fraud from defense contractors who sell their products to the Department of Defense.

I think the American people are very clear that when we pay one dollar for a product that goes to our military, we want to get one dollar's worth of value; that we do not want to see the taxpayers of this country or the Department of Defense ripped off because of fraudulent contractors. Unfortunately, fraud within the DOD in terms of private contractors is widespread.

During the last number of years, we have seen company after company engaged in fraud, including some of the largest defense contractors in the United States. For example, Lockheed Martin, the largest defense contractor in our country, in 2008 paid $10.5 million to settle charges that it defrauded the government by submitting false invoices on a multibillion-dollar contract connected to the Titan IV space-launch vehicle program. That did not seem to sour the relationship between Lockheed and the DOD, which gave Lockheed $30.2 billion in contracts in fiscal year 2009--more than ever before. One of the patterns we see is that a company gets convicted or reaches a settlement with regard to charges of fraud, but next year they continue to get very significant contracts.

In another case regarding one of the very large defense contractors, Northrop Grumman paid $62 million in 2005

to settle charges that ``it engaged in a fraud scheme by routinely submitting false contract proposals'' and ``concealed basic problems in its handling of inventory, scrap and attrition.'' Despite that serious charge of pervasive and repeated fraud, Northrop Grumman received $12.9 billion in contracts the following year, 16 percent more than the year before.

It seems clear to me that we need to do a much better job in terms of attacking fraud within the Department of Defense. Several years ago, I offered an amendment--which was passed--which provided that the DOD list virtually all of the fraud committed within the DOD. We have that report, and it is rather astounding. People should read it. Right now what this amendment does is it says to the DOD: Get your act together, hire the necessary well-trained staff so they are monitoring the contracts and making sure we do not continue to see the pervasive amount of fraud committed against the taxpayers of this country or the Defense Department. I would hope very much that amendment gets widespread support and that we see it passed.

There is another amendment we have offered, which I think is equally important, and that deals with making sure the Department of Defense-- which turns out to be the largest single consumer of energy in the United States of America. Obviously, the Department of Defense has huge resources, controls huge numbers of buildings, has enormous aircraft, and so forth and so on. It is by far the single largest consumer of energy in the United States, accounting for approximately 90 percent of Federal energy consumption, with an annual energy cost of up to $18 billion. So the Department of Defense spends $18 billion on energy costs alone. I think, in recent years, the Department of Defense has understood the importance of trying to move toward energy efficiency in terms of saving energy, but we have a long way to go.

The major program to help cut energy consumption and costs at our military bases is called the Energy Conservation Investment Program. This is a very important program, although a relatively small program. This program has operated for more than 10 years, helping to invest in programs for more energy-efficient lighting, for example, at an Air Force base in Alaska, geothermal heating at Fort Knox Army Base in Kentucky, wind turbines for an Army base in Arizona, and solar power for the Air Force in Colorado.

Historically, according to the Department of Defense, every $1 used by the Energy Conservation Investment Program yields $2 in savings. We invest in energy efficiency; we invest in sustainable energy. For every $1 invested, we save $2. This makes it a very positive program for the DOD. Some projects, such as energy efficiency improvements at a Navy base in California, achieve greater than $15 in savings for every $1 invested.

The Department itself, the DOD, has stated this program achieves ``long-term public benefits by investing in technologies that increase economic efficiency and health benefits, build new sources of renewable energy, enhance job creation/retention, improve military facilities, and improve the quality of life for our troops and their families.''

Unfortunately, the authorization for this program in the current Defense authorization bill is $135 million, a relatively small amount of money for a Department of Defense which spends about $18 billion every year on energy. I think what we want to see is, A, the DOD save money through energy efficiency and sustainable energy and, secondly, become a model for the country as we attempt to break our dependence on fossil fuel, foreign oil, and we attempt to cut back on greenhouse gas emissions.

I can tell you that in the State of Vermont, we have our National Guard base, where we have worked with them to install a major solar installation which will pay a significant part of their electric bill. Frankly, I would like to see this done on National Guard bases all over the country and to the Active-Duty structures as well.

The bottom line is, we are currently spending about $135 million, a relatively small amount of money compared to the $18 billion energy bill run up by the DOD. What this amendment would do is increase the authorization for the Energy Conservation Investment Program to $200 million, up from $135 million--not anywhere near as much as I think we should be doing, but it is a step forward in helping the Department of Defense save money on their energy bill, break our dependence on foreign oil, and help us cut greenhouse gas emissions.

We know there remain many worthy projects at our military bases that have not yet been funded at today's funding levels that could be funded if my amendment were to pass. The amendment is fully offset and paid for by reducing expenditures on construction at overseas' bases, while still leaving nearly $300 million in funding for that purpose. I think that is a decent offset.

I applaud the Department of Defense and the military for the strides they have made so far in investing in energy efficiency and renewable energy. There are some wonderful projects going on all over this country--in fact, all over the world--under the DOD, and they deserve credit for that. They can and should be a leader for our country, but we still have a very long way to go.

I would ask for support from my colleagues for this amendment, which will save the Department of Defense money, will help break our dependency on foreign oil, move us to energy independence, and cut greenhouse gas emissions.

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

Madam President, there are two issues I would like to touch upon this afternoon which I think are significantly important to the people of our country.

On Sunday, 2 days ago, I held a town meeting in Montpelier, VT, on the issue of saving the Postal Service. Frankly, I was stunned by the number of people who came. As you know, Vermont is not the largest State in the Nation, and yet we had about 350 people crowding into the cafeteria at Montpelier High School to say very clearly that they do not want to see the Postal Service dismembered. They do not want to see policies develop that will create a death spiral for the post offices of America.

We heard a lot of testimony from many people, and the bottom line is that everybody in that room thought it

was terribly wrong that in the midst of a recession the post office is talking about cutting 120,000 good-paying jobs in our country. It didn't make sense to anybody in that room.

I find it ironic that at a moment when, appropriately enough--and I strongly support the effort--we are talking about creating jobs for veterans who are coming home from Iraq and Afghanistan, with high unemployment rates, many of the people who work in the post office are, in fact, veterans. On one hand, we are trying to create jobs for veterans; on the other hand, if the Postal Service does what it wants, we may end up losing 120,000 jobs, including many veterans.

I wanted to touch on some of the important issues that I think we have to deal with regarding the Postal Service. I want to just go over a letter that Senators Leahy, Gillibrand, Wyden, and myself sent to the chairpeople and ranking members of the Committee on Homeland Security and the subcommittee as well; that is, Senators Lieberman, Collins, Carper, and Scott Brown. These are the points we made in the letter. These are points that will be incorporated into legislation that I will be introducing this week--legislation that I think is commonsense legislation, legislation that will help us create a business model so the Postal Service can be successful, legislation that will save 120,000 jobs.

This is what we wrote in the letter to the Homeland Security Committee. A lot of people don't know this. They say correctly that the Postal Service is having problems because we are in a digital age, and first class mail is going down because people are e-mailing. That is true.

Second, we are in the midst of a recession and many businesses are facing problems. But the most important financial problems facing the post office today are not those issues; they are the issues of accounting approaches that have done great disservice to the Postal Service.

The U.S. Postal Service uniquely has been forced to prefund 75 years' worth of future retiree health benefits in just 10 years. There is no other agency of government that comes close to that onerous requirement, nor do we believe there are any companies in the private sector that have been asked to do that. We are asking the Postal Service to come up with a huge amount of money and put it into a fund in a way that no other agency of government--and we think no other private company--has been forced to do.

This mandate costs the Postal Service between $5.4 billion and $5.8 billion per year, and it accounts for 100 percent of the Postal Service's $20 billion debt. Without that onerous requirement, the USPS would still have significant borrowing authority with the U.S. Treasury to ride out the tough economic times we are seeing in the recession.

Furthermore, it is not only future retiree health benefits they are being asked to come up with and fund, but the USPS needs to recoup the overpayments it has made to the CSRS and FERS, the Federal retirement system. According to studies by the Hay Group and the Segal Company, USPS has overpaid the CSRS by between $50 billion and $75 billion. If we look at those two issues, if we can deal with those issues and treat the Postal Service fairly, we will have gone a very long way toward addressing the immediate financial crisis the Postal Service is facing.

Second, what we want to be very careful about as we develop business models for the future is to not start cutting, cutting, cutting, and creating a Postal Service that will no longer have customer support and lay the groundwork for literally a death spiral and the destruction and demise of the Postal Service in years to come.

I come from a rural State. Post Offices are extremely important to the people of small towns above and beyond getting mail. They become, in a sense, in some ways, the identifying feature of a small town. It is where people come together and talk. It is very important, in my mind, that we not start cutting pell-mell hundreds and hundreds of small post offices in rural America. I think the legislation we will be offering this week addresses that problem in a sensible and reasonable way.

Second of all, the Postal Service can never be competitive if when you drop a letter into a postal box it takes 5 days for that letter to get to its destination. One of the ideas that the Postal Service is talking about is making very significant cuts in what they call processing centers. That is where the mail is gathered and forwarded. If we cut those centers--in my State, we have two that are on the line, Essex Junction and Wright River Junction. If we cut those and other processing centers all over the country, what will happen is that when we drop that letter into a mailbox, it could take up to 5 days for that letter to reach its destination. When we have that poor service, people are simply going to stop using the post office, and that continues the death spiral. People are not going to want to use the service.

Thirdly, and in the same vein, the Postal Service is now talking about cutting Saturday delivery. Again, that means there are a whole lot of folks who get prescription drugs on Saturday, and a whole lot of people who get a magazine or newspapers on Saturday--if we cut that back, people are going to say: No, I don't want to deal with the post office anymore. It is not worth it.

So it seems to me the choice we have is to do what the Postal Service is now talking about; that is, cut and eliminate rural post offices, end Saturday mail delivery, cut and eliminate significant numbers of processing centers, which will slow down the delivery of mail--that is one approach--and lay off, by the way, some 120,000 American workers, including many veterans. That is a very bad idea.

The other approach is to come up with a business model that recognizes that we are in the 21st century; that the post office has to evolve and change and give the post office the freedom to compete in a way that addresses the needs of its customers. I will give an example.

The Presiding Officer comes from a rural State, as I do. A lot of people in our States want to get fishing licenses or hunting licenses. If they walked into a post office in rural New Hampshire or rural Vermont and said: Hey, can I fill out an application to get a fishing or hunting license, the post office would say they we don't do that, they are not permitted to do that.

If an individual literally wants to walk into a post office--and postmasters tell me this happens every day--and say: I have a letter, and I want it notarized, they may be a notary public, but they are not allowed by law to notarize that.

The issue of the digital revolution is obviously impacting post offices not only in the United States but around the world. Other countries are looking at these challenges in a way that we are not. I will give one more example.

For a lot of reasons--legal and otherwise--there are people who would like to see a document delivered to somebody in writing and not simply in e-mail. There are post offices now in other countries where one can send an e-mail, say, from Vermont to California, it gets printed, and on the same day that document gets delivered to a business or a home. The post office in America is not allowed to do that. So by law our post office is restricted from entering the 21st century.

If somebody walks into a post office now and says they want to print up 10 copies of a document, so where is the copying machine, the postmaster would say they don't have one, that they are not allowed to have a copy machine.

There are a lot of ideas out there that people are talking about as to how the Postal Service can address the needs of customers in the 21st century.

Last, but not least, on this issue, one of the people at the town meeting on Sunday got up and said: I want to say this. In our town, we know our letter carrier very well. Our letter carrier noticed that mail remained in the mail box of an elderly person, and the mailman got on the phone and called the police department because he suspected that something was wrong.

It turns out that something was wrong and that person's life was saved. I expect that happens all over this country. We have hundreds of thousands of letter carriers who know people, interact with people. They do play and can more so play an important role in providing services.

Bottom line, Madam President, I think it is a bad idea in the midst of a

recession to slash 120,000 jobs, including jobs of many of our veterans. Second, I do believe if we use our brains and entrepreneurial spirit, we can create a post office that is very relevant and can be profitable in the 21st century.

We will be introducing legislation addressing all of these issues, and I hope very much that my colleagues will cosponsor that legislation.

Tax Fairness

Madam President, there is another issue I want to talk about, and that is the work of the supercommittee. This country has a recordbreaking deficit. It has a $14-plus trillion national debt, and I think all of the American people--or virtually all--want to see the supercommittee come up with a proposal which makes sense and which helps us address our deficit crisis. My suggestion to the supercommittee is that they, in fact, can do that by simply doing what the American people want them to do.

I have heard some of the ideas out there, where members of the supercommittee are talking about cutting Social Security, which has not contributed one nickel to our deficit and has a $2\1/2\ trillion surplus, and another idea being that we have to cut Medicare and Medicaid. Well, we have 50 million people without any health insurance. I don't think it is a brilliant idea to throw more and more people off health insurance. So I think those are bad ideas, and every single poll I have seen tells me the American people agree those are dumb ideas.

Meanwhile, I have seen and talked to a whole lot of people who are asking me this question: How is it, when the wealthiest people in this country are becoming much wealthier, when the effective tax rates of the top 2 percent are the lowest in decades, that we are not asking those people who are doing phenomenally well to start paying their fair share of taxes?

This is not just a progressive idea and it is not just a Democratic idea. The polls suggest that all across the political spectrum, the American people are saying: Yes, it is right and appropriate that the wealthiest people in this country start paying their fair share of taxes.

I will just mention an ABC News-Washington Post October 5, 2011, poll reflecting that 75 percent of Independents support raising taxes on millionaires. In that same poll, 57 percent of Republicans support raising taxes on millionaires. In that same poll, 55 percent of tea party supporters--supposedly the extreme rightwing who want to abolish Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid, which turns out not to be the case at all--agree with raising taxes on millionaires. According to a June 2011 Washington Post poll, 72 percent of Americans support raising taxes on incomes over $250,000.

So I think we know what the American people want. They do not want, in poll after poll, to cut Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid because they know how vitally important those programs are to the well- being of tens of millions of Americans. For example, according to a February 2011 NBC News-Wall Street Journal poll, 77 percent of Americans are opposed to cutting Social Security to reduce the deficit.

So where are we as a country? We are pretty united. We are in agreement. What the American people are saying is that the rich are getting richer, their effective real tax rates have gone down, and they have to pay more in taxes to help us through deficit reduction and to create jobs.

The American people also understand there are huge corporate loopholes out there, with oil companies making money hand over fist and getting huge tax breaks and Wall Street getting huge tax breaks. We lose $100 billion a year because large companies and the wealthy put their money into tax havens in the Cayman Islands, in Bermuda, and in Panama. The people of this country know that is wrong.

I hope very much that the supercommittee will do nothing more than listen to the American people. That is all. If they do that, they will do the right thing. They will not suggest that we cut Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, but they will suggest that the wealthiest people in this country start paying their fair share of taxes. They will recommend that we do away with these outrageous loopholes large profitable corporations enjoy. If they do that, we will, in fact, come up with an agreement that will help us reduce the deficit, and we will win the support of Democrats, Republicans, and Independents.

With that, Madam President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Madam President, there has been a lot of discussion in the Senate, in the House, and in the media about what the supercommittee is doing and what they should be doing. The American people understand their responsibility in terms of trying to reduce our national debt and our deficit is difficult. I wish them the best of luck in coming up with a solution.

My hope, simply stated, is that the supercommittee will do what the American people want them to do. The American people, through demonstrations all over this country and in poll after poll, have made it pretty clear what they want to see happen. The American people are becoming more and more aware that there is something very wrong in this country when we have the most unequal distribution of income and wealth of any major country on Earth; when the top 1 percent earns more income than the bottom 50 percent; when in a recent 25-year period, 80 percent of all new income went to the top 1 percent; and when the gap between the very rich and everybody else is wider today than it has ever been since 1928, the year before the Great Depression.

If anyone thinks distribution of income in this country is unfair, then they should look at distribution of wealth, which is much more unfair. Today the wealthiest 400 Americans own more wealth than the bottom half of America, 150 million people--400 people, 150 million Americans. That unbelievable inequality in terms of wealth, in my view, is not only morally wrong, it is very bad economics, and it is not sustainable.

When the supercommittee deliberates as to where they should go, I think one direction is very clear. The American people of all political spectrums have made their point of view known very strongly on this issue. Whether Democrat, Independent, or Republican, poll after poll shows when the wealthiest people in this country are becoming wealthier; when, as Warren Buffett reminds us, their effective tax rate--i.e. real tax rate--is the lowest it has been in decades; yes, the wealthiest people in this country are going to have to pay more in taxes to enable us to go forward on deficit reduction.

So any serious plan brought forth by the supercommittee must ask the wealthiest people in this country to pay more in taxes. Furthermore, as I think everybody knows, we have corporation after corporation that benefits from huge tax loopholes.

A study just came out today that shows one out of four major corporations pays nothing in taxes. Recently, there are examples that major corporations made billions of dollars in profit and not only paid nothing in taxes but got rebates from the IRS. Many of these corporations stash their profits in tax havens in the Cayman Islands and elsewhere to avoid U.S. taxes.

I think the American people are very clear; if we are going to go forward with deficit reduction, large corporations are also going to have to start paying their fair share of taxes. This is across the political spectrum.

I hope the supercommittee is hearing and understands that any agreement must contain significant revenue from the wealthiest people in this country and from the largest corporations.

Furthermore, at a time when military spending has tripled since 1997, I hope as part of their agreement that the supercommittee takes a hard look at our defense budget and asks whether it is necessary that the United States of America spends more on defense than the entire rest of the world combined.

Those are some of the areas I hope the supercommittee will explore: asking the wealthy to start paying their fair share of taxes, ending tax loopholes for large corporations, and taking a hard look at military spending which has tripled since 1997.

Then there is another area the supercommittee must also look at; that is, to understand that in the midst of the worst recession since the Great Depression, a recession caused by the greed and recklessness and illegal behavior on Wall Street, the supercommittee must not cut Social Security, cut Medicare, or cut Medicaid. Social Security is the most successful Federal program in the history of our country. It has a $2.5 trillion surplus. It can pay out all benefits for the next 25 years because it is funded by the payroll tax. It has not contributed one nickel to our deficit. The supercommittee must not cut Social Security.

Madam President, 50 million Americans have no health insurance and many others are underinsured. According to a study at Harvard University, 45,000 Americans die each year because they do not get to the doctor when they should. Under those conditions it

would be immoral, it would be wrong for the supercommittee to cut Medicare and to cut Medicaid.

I hope the supercommittee does what the American people have said very loudly and clearly--they have said it in demonstrations, they have said it in polls, they have said it in communications with their Members in the House and the Senate--we have an opportunity to make significant progress in terms of deficit reduction, but that deficit reduction should not take place on the backs of the elderly, the children, the sick, and the poor. Those populations, the most vulnerable people in this country, are hurting enough right now.

I hope the supercommittee has the courage to do what is right. I hope they have the courage to do what the American people want them to do.

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

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

Mr. President, I want to congratulate the members of the Senate who, by a very large vote today, passed the minibus legislation which, among many other important things, will provide $1.9 billion for the Department of Transportation's emergency relief fund. What that will do is help the Department deal with the backlog of disaster situations around the country that they previously were not able to deal with; and, from the perspective of the State of Vermont, it will help us deal with the devastation we experienced in terms of our roads and our bridges and our infrastructure as a result of Hurricane Irene.

In many communities around the State, we saw washouts, we saw bridges destroyed or damaged, and roads disappear. While Vermont is certainly prepared to do everything it can to come up with funds to help, there is no question but that the Federal Government needs to be there, as it has always been in the past when disaster strikes a community in America.

The name of our country is the United--U-N-I-T-E-D--States of America. What that means is if a disaster

hits Minnesota or California, the people of Vermont are there to help. That is what we do as a nation. And when disaster hits Vermont or New Jersey, people in other parts of the country are there.

We made good progress today. I want to congratulate Senator Leahy and the other members of the Appropriations Committee for coming up with this funding. Now the ball goes to our colleagues in the House, and now is the time for the House to stand tall, to support what we have done here in the Senate, and make sure that communities all over this country get the emergency funding they need in transportation in order to rebuild their communities.

I want to say a word on another interesting issue which took place today. You may have noticed that Bank of America has decided to withdraw its $5 fee for debit transfers. Let me tell you, the Bank of America, like the other banks that were going to go forward in imposing these fees, did not withdraw them because they were nice guys. They withdrew them because the American people said ``enough is enough'' in terms of the greed of Wall Street.

Let us never forget that it was the Bank of America and the other huge financial institutions on Wall Street that caused the recession we are in, resulting in millions of people losing their jobs, their homes, their life savings. Let us never forget that when Wall Street was on the verge of collapse, it was the American people and the Fed who bailed them out. And now that Wall Street and the large banks are making very handsome profits, paying their CEOs some of the largest compensation packages they have ever received, their thank you to the American people was to charge them a $5 a month debit fee.

But do you know what happened? The American people said thanks but no thanks. It wasn't the Senate that turned this around. It wasn't the House that turned this around. It was the American people. I applaud the people on the Occupying Wall Street campaign who focused attention on the greed of Wall Street, and the millions of other Americans who have said enough is enough.

The point here, which is a very profound point--which is ultimately what politics is all about--is that if the American people at the grassroots level begin to stand up and fight back, profound and positive changes can take place in this country. If the American people stand up and say: No, we are not going to cut Social Security, we are not going to cut Medicare, we are not going to cut Medicaid, or education, but we are going to move toward a balanced budget by asking the wealthiest people in this country, whose effective tax rate is the lowest in decades, to start paying their fair share of taxes, we can do that. We don't have to cut Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid.

If the American people say maybe we have got to end these outrageous tax loopholes that allow oil companies--which are making huge profits right now--in some years to pay nothing in Federal income taxes, we can end those loopholes as well.

If the American people say, well, maybe before we cut programs for the elderly, the sick, the children, and the poor, maybe we want to make sure those companies and individuals who stash their money in tax havens such as the Cayman Islands, where we lose $100 billion a year because of the tax havens--when we rally the American people and they stand up and say enough is enough, we can change that too.

So today I congratulate the American people. You did it. You took on the largest financial institution in the United States of America and you beat it. And that should be step one. We should go on from there. The American grassroots has to continue to speak out in the fight for social justice in this country.

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to set aside the pending amendment and call up my amendment No. 816.

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

Let me begin by concurring with much of what the Senator from Pennsylvania has said. I think he is right-on. Like him, I rise today in strong opposition to the unfettered free-trade agreements with Korea, Colombia, and Panama. Let's be clear. One of the major reasons why the middle class in America is disappearing and why poverty is increasing and why the gap between the very wealthy and everybody else is growing wider is directly related to our disastrous, unfettered free-trade policy. If the United States is to remain a major industrial power, producing real products and creating good-paying jobs, we cannot continue the failed, unfettered free-trade policies that have been in existence for the last 30 years.

We need to develop trade policies--I know this is a radical idea-- that work for working people and not just the CEOs of large corporations. What we must do is rebuild our manufacturing sector and once again create millions of good-paying jobs where workers are producing real products made in the United States of America.

Over the last decade, more than 50,000 manufacturing plants in this country have shut down. Let me repeat that. In the last decade, more than 50,000 factories in this country have shut down. Over 5.5 million factory jobs have disappeared.

Back in 1970, 25 percent of all jobs in the United States were manufacturing jobs, often paying workers a living wage, decent benefits, pensions. Today, that figure is down to just 9 percent.

In July of 2000, there were 17.3 million manufacturing workers in this country. Today, there are only 11.7 million.

According to a recent study conducted by a well-respected economist at the Economic Policy Institute, permanent normal trade relations with China has led to the loss of 2.8 million jobs. In fact, the United States has lost an average of about 50,000 manufacturing jobs per month since China joined the World Trade Organization in 2001.

I was in the House of Representatives when PNTR with China was passed. I can remember all of the fine speeches from the President on down, Republicans, Democrats: Permanent normal trade relations with China is going to open up that great market, going to create millions of jobs in America. It was not true. Free trade with China ended up costing us 2.8 million jobs. You don't have to be an economist to understand that; all you have to do is walk into any department store in America and buy a product. Do you know where that product is made? It is not made in the United States of America, it is made in China.

We all now understand what that trade agreement was about. It was not to open markets in China for American products, it was to open China so corporations in this country could shut down here, throw American workers out on the street, and move there in order to pay workers pennies an hour. That is what those trade agreements are about. There is no doubt in my mind that--certainly to a much lesser degree because they are smaller trade agreements--trade agreements with Korea, Panama, and Colombia will continue that same process.

The U.S. Department of Commerce has reported that over the last decade, U.S. multinational corporations slashed 2.9 million jobs. Now the biggest advocate of unfettered free trade, of NAFTA with Mexico, of PNTR with China, of these trade agreements, is corporate America. It is the chamber of commerce, it is the National Association of Manufacturing. They spend huge sums of money on lobbying and campaign contributions in order to make Congress vote for these great trade agreements.

Let me repeat. Over the last decade, these very same corporations that want us to pass these disastrous trade agreements slashed 2.9 million American jobs. Furthermore, what we have learned is that during that same period of time--and here is the kicker--these same corporations have created 2.4 million jobs. The only problem is that those jobs were created in China, Mexico, and other low-wage countries.

What we have here is that key advocates for continuing this disastrous trade policy are precisely the people who have been slashing jobs in America, closing down factories, and hiring people abroad. And I would suggest that Members of the Senate might want to think twice about listening to the advice of people who have been laying off millions of American workers.

Oddly enough, again we have one of the leading advocates for these disastrous trade agreements--it is the chamber of commerce. Well, some years ago, the chamber of commerce, to its credit, was pretty up front. They said outsourcing is a good idea. They recommended to American corporations: Shut down in America and move abroad. It is good for your stockholders.

Do you really want to take the advice of people who believe that outsourcing and throwing American workers out on the street is a good idea? I do not think so.

Today we are hearing all of this talk about how these trade agreements are going to create new jobs. We heard it before. It is the same old movie. The American people understand it is a bad movie. It is an unfactual movie.

During the Clinton administration, we were told by Republicans and Democrats and then-President Clinton that NAFTA would create 100,000 American jobs over a 2-year period. That is what we were told about NAFTA. Well, results are in on NAFTA. Instead of creating 100,000 American jobs, the Economic Policy Institute has found that NAFTA destroyed more than 682,000 American jobs, including the loss of 150,000 computer and electronic jobs.

I do not understand why, when you have a policy that has failed and failed, you want to continue that policy. Football teams that have coaches with losing records get rid of those coaches. When you have a trade policy that has

resulted in millions of American workers losing their jobs, you do not continue that same philosophy.

The issue here is not just Mexico and NAFTA, it is not just PNTR with China, it is obviously what is going to happen with the trade agreements that are before us today, Korea, Panama, and Colombia.

The Economic Policy Institute has estimated that the Korea Free Trade Agreement will lead to the loss of 159,000 American jobs and will increase the trade deficit by nearly $14 billion over a 7-year period. Why would you want to go forward with those ideas? Why would you want to go forward with a trade agreement that will increase our trade deficit?

President Obama has estimated that the Korea Free Trade Agreement will support at least 70,000 American jobs. But the headline of a December 7, 2010, article in the New York Times says it all: ``Few New Jobs Expected Soon From Free-Trade Agreement With South Korea.'' According to this article, the Korea Free Trade Agreement ``is likely to result in little if any net job creation in the short run, according to the government's own analysis.''

Let me touch on one particular aspect of the Korea Free Trade Agreement that I find especially troubling and that I think the American people, to the degree they understand this and learn about it, will also find troubling; that is, this particular free-trade agreement will force American workers to compete not just against the low-wage workers in China or Vietnam or Mexico, they are going to be forced to compete against the virtual slave labor that exists in North Korea, the most undemocratic country in the world and a country itself whose government will financially benefit from this, with the dictatorship of Kim Jong Il.

We all know that under current law the United States has an embargo on all North Korean goods--for a very good reason. Workers in North Korea are the most brutalized in the world, have virtually no democratic rights, and are at the mercy of the most vicious dictator in the world. But after the South Korea Free Trade Agreement is signed into law, the United States would have a new obligation to allow South Korean products to come into our country tariff-free that contain major parts made by North Korean workers who make pennies an hour.

According to a January 2011 report from the Congressional Research Service, ``There is nothing to prevent South Korean firms from performing intermediate manufacturing operations in North Korea and then performing final manufacturing processes in South Korea.'' In other words, there is a huge industrial park in North Korea. South Korean companies own that park. Workers there are paid horrendously low wages, and some of those wages go right to the North Korean Government. Products made in that industrial park in North Korea will go to South Korea and then will come back into the United States as part of that so-called free-trade agreement.

Today, over 47,000 North Korean workers currently are employed by more than 120 South Korean firms, including Hyundai, at the Kaesong Industrial Complex in North Korea.

This facility is located just 6 miles north of the demilitarized zone, with direct road and rail access to South Korea and just an hour's drive away from Seoul.

These North Korean workers officially make a minimum wage of 35 cents an hour, but they actually make less than that.

Instead of paying these workers directly, Hyundai and the other South Korean firms pay the North Korean Government. How is that? South Korean companies--major companies--pay the North Korean Government. They take a piece of the action, which is going to the most undemocratic, vicious dictatorship in the world. The products then go to South Korea, and they are part of the free-trade agreement with South Korea.

In 2007, Han Duck-soo, who was then the Prime Minister of South Korea and is the current South Korean Ambassador to the United States, said this:

The planned ratification of the South Korea-U.S. free trade

agreement will pave the way for the export of products built

in Kaesong [North Korea] to the U.S. market.

So what we have now is American workers being forced to compete against desperate people all over the world, who are making a tiny fraction of the wages that are paid in America, and forced to compete against countries where there are no environmental standards, where worker unions are not recognized or respected.

But now it gets even worse. American workers are now being forced to compete against the virtual slave labor in North Korea as part of this trade agreement.

What about the Colombia Free Trade Agreement? It is understandable why the CEOs of multinational corporations would like this free-trade agreement. After all, Colombia is one of the most anti-union countries on the planet.

Since 1986, over 2,800 trade unionists have been assassinated in Colombia--more than the rest of the world combined. Think about it for a moment. If we found out that 50 CEOs had been assassinated in Colombia last year instead of trade leaders, do you think we would be on the verge of approving a free-trade agreement with that country? Frankly, I don't think so.

Lastly, let me say a brief word about Panama and the Panama free- trade agreement. Panama's entire economic output is only $26.7 billion a year or about two-tenths of 1 percent of the U.S. economy. Nobody can legitimately claim that approving this free-trade agreement will significantly increase American jobs.

Then why would we be considering a stand-alone free trade agreement with Panama? It turns out that Panama is a world leader when it comes to allowing wealthy Americans and large corporations to evade U.S. taxes by stashing their cash in offshore tax havens. The Panama Free Trade Agreement will make this bad situation much worse.

Each and every year, the wealthiest people in our country and the largest corporations evade about $100 billion in U.S. taxes through abusive and illegal offshore tax havens in Panama and other countries.

According to Citizens for Tax Justice:

A tax haven . . . has one of three characteristics: it has

no income tax or a very low rate income tax; it has bank

secrecy laws; and it has a history of non-cooperation with

other countries on exchanging information about tax matters.

Panama has all three of those. . . . They're probably the

worst.

Let me conclude--and I will be back on the floor later to amplify on these remarks. I will conclude by saying this: If you go out to any community in America and you ask the people in those communities-- especially working people--do you think our current free-trade agreements, such as NAFTA and permanent normal trade relations with China, have worked, and have they been creating jobs in your community or have you seen factories shut down, I suspect that in almost every instance people will say these free-trade agreements are not working for American workers. They are costing us jobs.

That is what the American people understand to be true because it is true. So it seems to me that when you have a history of failed trade policies--policies that have enabled and encouraged large corporations to shut down in this country and move abroad, it is insane to continue that policy if you are serious about creating jobs in America, rebuilding our manufacturing sector, and trying to address the crises facing the middle class today.

We need new trade policies. Trade unto itself is a good idea. Everybody believes in trade. But you need trade policies that are designed to help ordinary working people and not just wealthy CEOs.

I feel very strongly that the policies we are debating today--trade policies with Korea, Panama, and Colombia--are nothing more than extensions of disastrous trade policies of the past. They should be defeated. We should come together and develop new approaches to trade, which will benefit all our people and not just CEOs or multinational corporations.

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

Mr. President, I always enjoy the Senator's remarks. However, I cannot quite agree with the thrust of his statement.

In my view, the current trade policies in this country are a disaster. The evidence is very clear that they have cost us many millions of jobs and to continue that same unfettered free-trade philosophy, in terms of trade agreements with Korea, Panama and Colombia, makes absolutely no sense at all. When we have a policy that is failing, we change it; we don't continue it.

Let us be very clear. I think most Americans understand that our economy today is in disastrous shape. Our middle class is disappearing. Recent statistics have told us poverty levels are at an alltime high, and the gap between the very rich and everybody else is growing wider.

In my view, one of the reasons--not the only reason--for the collapse of the middle class has to do with the loss of millions of good manufacturing jobs, attributable to these disastrous trade policies. If we are serious as a nation in wanting to rebuild the middle class, lower our poverty rate, what we have to do is move forward in a new direction in trade, based on fair trade principles, and end this unfettered free trade, which has been such a disaster for American workers.

Over the last decade, we as a nation have lost 50,000 manufacturing plants in our country. I will repeat that because that is such a staggering number that it needs to be said over and over. Fifty thousand manufacturing plants in this country have shut down over the last 10 years alone. We have lost, during that same period, 5.5 million factory jobs. Many of those jobs were good-paying jobs. They were jobs that provided people with good wages and good benefits. Those jobs are gone and, in many cases, have been replaced by Walmart and McDonald's- type jobs, with low wages and minimal benefits.

To give us a sense about how significant the decline of manufacturing in this country is, the reality is, in 1970, 25 percent of all jobs in the United States were manufacturing jobs. Today, that number is just 9 percent. In July of 2000, there were 17.3 million manufacturing workers in this country. Today, there are only 11 million manufacturing workers. In my small State of Vermont--which is not as big as Ohio or Michigan and has never been one of the great manufacturing centers in the country, but even in a small State such as Vermont, what we have seen is a huge decline in good-paying manufacturing jobs, which have certainly impacted our middle class.

Mr. President, 10 years ago, we had approximately 45,000 manufacturing jobs in Vermont. Last year, we had 31,000 manufacturing jobs in Vermont. We have lost about one-third of our manufacturing jobs. I should tell everyone that 7,800 of those jobs were lost as a result of the trade agreement with China and another 1,300 were lost as a result of NAFTA.

The key issue is whether we continue our disastrous trade policy, which includes NAFTA, permanent normal trade relations with China, and CAFTA. Do we add on to trade policies that have failed? For the love of me, I cannot understand why anybody would want to do that.

The facts are very clear: Our current trade policies have failed, have been a disaster for working families. According to a recent study conducted by well-respected economists at the Economic Policy Institute, permanent normal trade relations with China led to the loss of 2.8 million American jobs--2.8 million American jobs. I remember because I was in the House when that debate took place. I heard the same thing then as I hear now--Members of Congress getting up and talking about all the new jobs that were going to be created. It wasn't true then and it is not true now.

How could we defend a trade policy based on the same principles as

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

Mr. President, this country faces many problems. But I think if we go out on Main Street, if we go out to rural America, if we go to my State of Vermont, what people will tell us is, the major crisis we face is we have a massive problem with unemployment.

Some people will suggest that unemployment is 9 percent in this country.

That is not quite accurate. If we look at the numbers for those people who have given up looking for work, if we look at the numbers for those people who are working part time when they want to work full time, we are looking at a situation where 16 percent of the American people are unemployed or underemployed. That is 25 million Americans.

The job of the Congress now is to start putting those people back to work. That is what we have to do. There is an enormous amount of work that needs to be done. Virtually every American who gets into his or her car understands that our infrastructure is crumbling; that is, roads and bridges. Talk to mayors all over Vermont and in the United States of America, and they will say they are having major problems with their water systems. If we look at our rail system in this country, it is way behind Europe, Japan, and China. We need to rebuild public transportation and have a 21st-century rail system.

So if you put people to work rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure, rebuilding our transportation system, you are going to make the United States of America more productive, you are going to make us more competitive internationally, and you are going to create the millions of jobs we desperately need. It is stunning to me that we have not moved aggressively in terms of job creation. That is exactly what we have to do.

If we put $400 billion into infrastructure, we can create millions and millions of good-paying jobs, we can make our country more productive and more internationally competitive. Every single year we are importing and spending about $350 billion on foreign oil, bringing that oil in from Saudi Arabia and other foreign countries. As we move to energy independence, as we break our dependence on fossil fuels, moving to energy efficiency and sustainable energy such as solar, wind, geothermal, biomass, we can create millions more jobs.

It seems to me at a time when the middle class is disappearing, at a time when poverty is increasing to a record-breaking level, at a time when people in every section of the country are saying we need to put our people back to work, now is the time to do that.

Last year I introduced the concept which said, let's have a surtax on millionaires. The reason I said that is the wealthiest people in this country are becoming wealthier. Their real effective tax rate is the lowest in decades. I am very pleased to see that the Democratic leadership is moving forward in that direction.

As we create the jobs we need by rebuilding our infrastructure, by transforming our energy system, it is absolutely appropriate that at a time when the gap between the very wealthy and everybody else is getting wider that we ask the wealthiest people in this country to help us fund job creation so we can pull the middle class out of the terrible recession they are suffering.

I think the job is a major jobs program now for our country, rebuild our infrastructure, transform our energy system, ask the wealthiest people in this country to start paying their fair share of taxes. Let's end many of these tax loopholes and breaks that large corporations have. We can fund a serious jobs program and put millions of our people back to work, which is something we absolutely have to do.

I yield the floor.

The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Hagan.) The Senator from Missouri.

Jobs Creation

Mr. President, my State of Vermont has been hit very hard by Hurricane Irene. Widespread flooding caused a number of deaths, the loss of many homes and businesses, and hundreds of millions-- perhaps $1 billion--in damage to property and infrastructure. I have visited many of the most hard-hit towns, and I have been shocked and moved by the extent of the damage I saw. Irene will go down in history as one of the very worst natural disasters ever to hit the State of

Vermont. Let me share a few facts with you about the extent of the damage.

Already, more than 5,200 Vermonters have registered with FEMA. Remember, we are a State of only 630,000 people and approximately 200,000 households, and yet more than 5,200 Vermonters have already registered with FEMA.

More than 700 homes were severely damaged or completely destroyed-- 700 in a State which has about 200,000 households.

Between 1,500 and 2,000 families have been displaced, their housing uncertain as we approach Vermont's brutally cold winter season. It is beginning to get cold in Vermont.

More than 73,000 homes were left without electricity--one-third of all of the homes in our State. Tens of thousands of Vermonters lost their phone service, and in some areas these services still have not been fully restored.

More than 2,000 roads were badly damaged--2,000 roads--including 135 segments of State highways. More than 300 bridges--300 bridges--were damaged. Hundreds of roads and bridges remain closed, while many others are only open to emergency vehicles today. Some towns still have limited access because the roads and bridges that link them to the outside world were destroyed.

Further, dozens of town libraries, townhalls, and municipal and volunteer fire departments have been damaged or destroyed. Ninety public schools could not open on time. The last one is just now opening for the year.

Hundreds of businesses and more than 360 farms with more than 15,000 acres of farmland have been damaged, tearing at the fabric of our rural economy.

Our Amtrak and freight services were completely suspended, as railbeds literally washed into rivers. One Amtrak line is still down today.

The largest State office complex was completely flooded and is closed until further notice. Mr. President, 1,600 State employees cannot go to work in that building. Important files and computer systems have been ruined, disrupting the ability of the State to deliver critical State functions.

I know that, as in times past, we will pick up the pieces in Vermont and restore our homes and businesses. And I have to tell you that if there is any silver lining out of that disaster, it is the fact that in community after community, people came out, worked together, and participated in cleanup efforts, supported each other. People from the northern part of the State, which was hit less severely, came down to the southern part of the State to help. Strangers helped strangers. It was an extraordinary effort of people coming together. But the simple fact is, if a State such as Vermont has communities that are devastated, a State such as New Jersey has communities that are devastated, we cannot do it alone. The scale of this disaster is too overwhelming for a State of the size of Vermont.

The Federal Government has long played an important role in disaster recovery. That is something we have known for many years and we have seen time after time after time. When our fellow citizens in Louisiana and the gulf coast suffered the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, people in Vermont were there for them, and I can tell you how many people told me we have to do everything we can to protect the people who were devastated by Katrina. When the citizens of Joplin, MO, were hit by deadly tornadoes, people on the west coast were there for them. And, of course, when terrorists attacked the United States on 9/11, we were all there for New York City. That is what being a nation is about.

The name of our country is the United States of America--``united,'' u-n-i-t-e-d--and if that name means anything, it means when disaster strikes one part of the country and communities are devastated, people are hurt, bridges and roads are out, farmers cannot produce the food, we as a nation rally together to support those communities. That is what States impacted by Irene expect from Congress because that is what being a nation is about. Disaster relief, funded on an emergency basis, is what Congress has done for decades, and it is what Congress must do now.

The Senate did the right thing in quickly passing a $6.9 billion disaster relief supplemental appropriations bill, and I wish to thank all of the people active in that, from Senator Reid, to Senator Landrieu, to Senator Leahy--all of the people who made that happen. They did a great job.

Does that bill have everything I would like to see in a disaster relief bill for the State of Vermont? No, it does not, quite frankly. But it is a very good bill. It is an urgently needed bill. It is an important step forward in the right direction. I commend, again, all of those Senators who played an active role in moving that bill along, including 10 Senate Republicans.

Disaster aid should not be a partisan issue, but it seems the House Republicans are intent on making it one. The disaster funding the House is likely to pass this week is totally inadequate and will not address the magnitude of the damages inflicted by Hurricane Irene or the backlog in FEMA funding that existed before it.

To my mind, it is an outrage that for the first time in modern American history House Republicans want to have a budget debate over disaster assistance. They threaten to block urgently needed aid unless the cost of that help is offset by cuts in other needed programs. They want to use Hurricane Irene as another excuse for a budget fight. And think about the precedent that sets. What happens if tomorrow there is, God forbid, a disaster in New Mexico or a disaster in Colorado? Does that mean we should be cutting education or environmental protection in order to pay for help to New Mexico or Colorado or California? If there is a major earthquake someplace in this country and communities are devastated, do we cut back on the needs of the children? Do we cut back on Medicare and have that huge debate in order to pay for disaster relief?

Historically, the U.S. Congress has said--and what they said was right--that when disaster strikes, we as a nation come together and we provide the support to those communities which have been hurt to get them back on their feet. That is what we have done in this great country, and I am offended that some of my Republican colleagues in the House suddenly start thinking we need a major budget debate for every disaster that is hitting this country. That is wrong. That is extraordinarily bad public policy. That is, frankly, unpatriotic and not what the United States is about. Yes, of course, we must continue to address our deficit problem but not on the backs of communities in Vermont, New Jersey, North Carolina, or other States that have been devastated by Hurricane Irene. For those States and communities, we must get them emergency help, and we must get it to them as quickly as possible.

Amazingly--I must say this--this talk about budget offsets for disaster relief comes from some of the same people who repeatedly and conveniently ignore their own actions when it suits them. Congress provided $800 billion to bail out Wall Street banks. I did not hear any discussion about offsets when it came to bailing out Wall Street. Congress extended huge tax breaks and loopholes for the wealthiest people in this country, driving up the deficit. I did not hear any call for offsets when we gave tax breaks to billionaires and large corporations. The United States is spending today $10 billion a year on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, including billions to rebuild those countries. I did not hear any call for offsets when it came to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Let me conclude by saying this: This country has its share of problems. We all know that. But if we forsake the essence of what we are as a nation; that is, we stand together when disaster strikes, if we forgo that, if we no longer live up to that ideal, I worry very much about the future of our great Nation.

Thank you, Mr. President.

Mr. President, as you no doubt know, the State of Vermont has been hit very hard by Hurricane Irene. The storm caused widespread flooding, resulting in a number of deaths, the loss of many homes and businesses, and hundreds of millions of dollars in damage to our property and our infrastructure. I have visited many of the most hard hit towns, and I was shocked and moved by the extent of the damage. Many of these towns still today have very limited access because the roads and bridges that link them to the outside world have been destroyed. Irene will go down in history as one of the very worst natural disasters ever to hit the State of Vermont.

Let me take this opportunity again to thank everybody who has lent a hand to help their friends and neighbors stricken by this disaster. I especially wish to commend and thank our emergency responders--they did a fantastic job--the Vermont National Guard and our local officials for all they are doing to assist communities and individuals in getting back on their feet.

We still do not know the cost of this disaster, but let me share with you just a few preliminary figures, and really this is quite remarkable, remembering that Vermont is a State of about 630,000 people, with approximately 200,000 households.

Today, already more than 4,200 Vermonters--and by and large, those are households--have registered with FEMA. With 200,000 households, we have over 4,000 that have already registered with FEMA.

To date, there have been more than 700 homes confirmed as severely damaged or totally destroyed. Again, we have about 200,000 households and 700 homes have been confirmed as severely damaged or completely destroyed.

More than 72,000 homes across the State were left without electricity.

That is about one-third of the total. Thousands lost phone service. And in some areas, these services have still not been restored.

The storm knocked out 135 segments of the State highway system as well as 33 State bridges. Thirteen communities were completely isolated for days. Thirty-five roads and bridges are still shut down, while many others are only open for emergency services.

Hundreds of farms and businesses have been destroyed, undermining the fabric of our rural economy.

Our Amtrak and freight rail services were completely suspended, as tracks literally washed into rivers. One of our two Amtrak lines is still down today.

The State's largest office complex--we have a very large office complex in Waterbury, VT, near our State capital, in which 1,600 State employees go to work every day. It is the nerve center of the entire State. That complex was flooded. Those 1,600 workers have not been able to return to their offices, disrupting the ability of the State to deliver critical State functions.

At least 90 public schools were either directly damaged or inaccessible because roads washed out and could not be opened on time. Five public schools remain closed until further notice.

This is but a short list of the devastation experienced by the State of Vermont as a result of Hurricane Irene. I know that, as in times past, we will pick up the pieces and restore our homes and businesses. That is what Vermonters will do. Vermont communities stick together in hard times, and it has been absolutely amazing to see the volunteer efforts taking place from one end of the State to the other. What comes to mind now: police officers from the northern part of the State relieving their brothers and sisters in the southern part of the State who are under stress. We are seeing that in almost every area-- strangers coming to help people whose homes and businesses were flooded. But the simple fact is, Vermont can not do it alone, nor can any other State hard hit by disasters. The scale of what Hurricane Irene did is overwhelming for a State of our size. The Federal Government has an important role to play in disaster relief and recovery. Historically it has, and today it has.

When our fellow citizens in Louisiana--and I see the Senator from Louisiana here--suffered the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, people in Vermont, in a very deep sense, were there for them. When the citizens of Joplin, MO, were hit by the deadly tornadoes, people on the west coast were there for them. When terrorists attacked on 9/11, everybody in America was there for New York City. That is what being a nation is about.

The name of our country is the United--U-n-i-t-e-d--States of America, and if that name means anything, it means that when disaster strikes one part of the country, we rally as a nation to support our brothers and sisters.

I would like to thank, in that context, Majority Leader Reid and Senator Landrieu for their commitment to drafting a disaster relief supplemental appropriations bill to provide $6.9 billion in disaster relief funding.

At a time when funding is tight and every appropriation is subjected to even more intense scrutiny, the majority leader and Senator Landrieu are doing exactly the right thing in addressing these needs now. Senator Reid has my full support.

While it is imperative for Congress to adequately fund FEMA's Disaster Relief Fund, the Federal response, in my view, should be more comprehensive, as it has been for past disasters of this scale.

In particular, it is imperative to address the severe damage to roads and bridges by providing funding for the Federal Highway Administration's Emergency Relief Program. In Vermont alone, preliminary estimates to the federal-aid highway system are well in excess of $500 million and likely will be much more. That is an incredible amount of money for a small State such as Vermont. For a State that receives a total Federal apportionment of $210 million annually, the scale of damage relative to our State's ability to pay for it cannot be overstated.

Similarly, it is important to provide sufficient emergency funding for programs such as community development block grants, the Economic Development Administration, the Emergency Conservation and Emergency Watershed Protection Programs at the Department of Agriculture, and the Disaster Loan Program at the Small Business Administration.

Additionally, given the significant impact of the floods on the stock of affordable housing, it is very important to include an appropriation for the HOME program, as well as an additional disaster allocation of low-income housing tax credits. In Vermont, more than 350 mobile homes were destroyed or severely damaged, and many trailer parks will never reopen. In other words, we are going to have to make up for a lot of lost affordable and lower income housing.

Let me conclude by saying this country has its problems. We all know that. But if we forsake the essence of what we are as a nation--and that is standing together when disaster strikes--if we forgo that and no longer live up to that, I worry very much about the future of America as a great nation.

With that, I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, I wish to pick up on a point the senior Senator from Vermont made earlier today. Both he and I have had the opportunity to travel throughout the State of Vermont to visit many of our towns which have been devastated by one of the worst natural disasters in our State's history.

We have seen in the southern part of the State--in Wilmington, for example--the entire business district severely damaged. I have seen in central Vermont a mobile home park almost completely wiped out, with people who are in their eighties and are now having to look to find new places in which to live. I have seen a public housing project for seniors in Brattleboro severely damaged. A lot of seniors there are now having to find new places to live. We have seen the State office complex in Waterbury--the largest State office building in the State, housing 1,700 Vermont workers, the nerve center of the State-- devastated. Nobody is at work there today.

We have seen hundreds of bridges and roads destroyed, and right now, as we speak, there are rains coming in the southern part of the State, causing more flooding, more damage. We have seen a wonderful gentleman from Rutland lose his life because he was doing his job to make sure the people of that area were protected. So we have seen damage the likes of which we have never seen in our lifetime.

What I would say--and I know I speak for the senior Senator from Vermont as well--is that our country is the United States of America-- the United States of America. What that means is we are a nation such that when disaster strikes in Louisiana or Mississippi in terms of Hurricane Katrina--I know the Presiding Officer remembers the outpouring of support from Vermont for the people in that region. All of our hearts went out to the people in Joplin, MO, when that community suffered an incredible tornado that took 150 or so lives and devastated that city. What America is about and what a nation is about is that when disaster hits one part of the country, we unite as a nation to give support to

help those communities, those businesses, those homeowners who have been hurt get back on their feet.

I know the senior Senator from Vermont has made this point many times: Right now we are spending billions of dollars rebuilding communities in Afghanistan and Iraq. Well, I think I speak for the vast majority of the people in this country and in my State of Vermont that if we can spend billions rebuilding communities in Iraq and Afghanistan, we surely can rebuild communities in Vermont, New Jersey, North Carolina, and other parts of the United States of America that have been devastated by Hurricane Irene.

I think as a body, as a Congress, the House and Senate have to work as expeditiously as we can to come up with the funds to help rebuild all of the communities that have been so severely damaged by this terrible flood. I look forward to working with my colleagues to make that happen.

With that, I yield the floor and note the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I wish to pay tribute to an authentic hero, Michael Garafano, who died tragically in Rutland, VT on August 28, 2011, during Tropical Storm Irene.

Michael Garafano was the water treatment and resource manager in the Rutland City Department of Public Works, a position he held since 1981. He was known by his coworkers as someone who always went above and beyond the call of duty, and his work ethic was second to none. He took his responsibilities of protecting the Rutland water supply very seriously. He was a model of a dedicated public servant.

So it was not unusual that the night of August 28, as the heavy rains from Tropical Storm Irene started assaulting Rutland, Mr. Garafano, went to check on the city reservoir one more time, looking out for his fellow citizens as he had done so often, and so well, and with such dedication, over three decades. Tragically, his life was taken by the raging storm. Compounding his tragedy is another: Michael Garafano took his son Michael Jr. to check the city reservoir when he went out that night. Michael Garafano Jr. never returned from that journey and is still missing.

Alan Shelvey, Rutland Commissioner of Public Works, said of Michael Garafano, ``He was doing what he always did--trying to make sure everything was right and the water supply was protected. We're going to miss him tremendously. He can't be replaced. People say that about people--in this case that's true.''

Michael Garafano represented what is best about Vermont and about America: he worked hard and with great dedication, he loved his work, he cared about those who lived in the community where he lived. When there was a job to be done, a responsibility to be met, he responded with generosity and directness. He was the epitome of public service, and lost his life doing the job he cared so deeply about.

Michael Garafano was devoted to his family, and he was a friend to many who knew they could count on him when they were most in need.

It is people like Michael Garafano who make our communities and our entire Nation work and prosper, who make our cities and towns into communities and not just random groups of people. The State of Vermont grieves the loss of one of its unsung heroes.

He will be sorely missed by his family, by the city of Rutland, and by the many people whose lives he touched and enriched.