Floor Statements

Mr. President, first of all, I compliment my colleagues from Hawaii, Senator Inouye, and Senator Akaka especially, for sharing his time and for the incredible work they have done on behalf of the people they represent in the State of Hawaii. I wanted to take this opportunity to----

Yes. I ask unanimous consent to proceed for 5 minutes.

If there is an objection, I will certainly yield.

Mr. President, I want to take this opportunity to spend a few moments to talk about the 36 million Americans, including 13 million children, who live on the verge of hunger.

I want to divert our conversation a little bit. I have actually waited quite some time to be able to speak about it. I started yesterday trying to get just a few minutes on the floor to bring about an awareness because today is National Hunger Awareness Day.

I often think about the children and the working American families who struggle to make ends meet. But I focus my thoughts and prayers on them today because today is National Hunger Awareness Day, 1 day out of our year. I started yesterday trying to grab 5 minutes where we could bring our attention to something so incredibly important and something so easy to fix.

There is a time when Americans are called to remember the hungry children and adults living across our great Nation. Most importantly, it is a day when we are called to put our words into actions and to help end hunger in our communities and across America.

I guess the realization that I have come to in these last 24 hours is, I have searched just to capture 5 minutes on the floor of the Senate. I suppose I could have submitted my comments for the Record. And maybe I am foolish to think by coming to the floor I could spark just a little bit of interest in my colleagues or others across this Nation to think about an issue that affects all of us--an issue where our fellow man is hungry, or another mother has a child out there that is suffering from hunger, that we can't stop for just a moment and realize that hunger is a disease that has a cure. It has a cure--a cure that we can provide, a cure that we all know about. And, if we took the time to think about it, to address it, we could actually cure this disease.

It is hard to find 5 minutes, it is hard to come down here and really make the difference that we want to make, but I believe this day and this issue are far too important to miss again the opportunity to talk about 36 million Americans living in food insecurity.

Two years ago today, I joined with my friends and colleagues, Senator Smith, Senator Dole, and Senator Durbin to form the Senate Hunger Caucus. At that time, we pledged to raise awareness about the hunger experienced by millions of Americans, a majority of which are children and elderly, and to forge a bipartisan effort to end hunger in our Nation.

I am proud that we are working with local, State, and national antihunger organizations to raise awareness about hunger, to build partnership, and develop solutions to end hunger.

An example of a bipartisan initiative to end hunger is the Hunger Free Communities Act which I introduced along with Senators Durbin, Smith, and Lugar. This bill calls for a renewed national commitment to ending hunger in the United States by 2015. Yet we find it hard to find 5 minutes to focus our attention on such an incredible issue.

It reaffirms congressional commitment to protecting the funding and integrity of Federal food and nutrition programs, and creates a national grant program to support community-based antihunger efforts in fighting the disease on the battlefield, right there at the line of attack in our communities.

I am also proud to be a cosponsor of the FEED Act, the bill that would award grants to organizations that effectively combat hunger while creating opportunity by combining ``food rescue'' programs with job training--not just feeding a fish but teaching a man or a woman how to fish so that they do not just eat for a day, that they feed themselves for a lifetime.

Close to one-third of the food in this country that is processed and prepared goes to waste--one-third, whether it is in places such as Washington where there are multiple receptions going on at one time, banquets and other events that happen across the country. One-third of that food goes to waste.

This bill would help organizations safely recover unserved or unused food while providing culinary skills training to unemployed individuals. Two birds with one stone--using something that otherwise would be thrown away. How simple that seems and yet how hard it is to bring it forward into the light of day and talk about making that effort a reality.

I urge my colleagues to support these worthy and commonsense pieces of legislation.

If it is so hard to find 5 minutes just to talk about it, I wonder how long it is going to take us to pass these commonsense pieces of legislation.

Some people may ask: What can I do to help end hunger in America?

I want to talk about some of the ways Americans can help join the hunger relief effort. Acting on this call to feed the hungry is important, and I urge all Americans who are able to take part in ending this disease.

One critical component of this effort is the willingness of Congress and the American people to support the Federal food and nutrition programs. These programs provide an essential

safety net to working Americans, preventing the most vulnerable among us from suffering and even dying from malnutrition. Our continued investment in these programs is vital to the health of this Nation.

Why does it come to mind right now? Think about all of those children across this great country who have received the nutrition they need in school during the school year as school lets out for the summer. Where will they go for that nutritious breakfast? Where will they go for that lunch that they need to sustain them because there is no dinner waiting at home?

These are critical and important programs. Without spending the time and the effort to not only make them a reality but properly fund them in a way where they can actually meet the needs of the children across this country will take our attention.

The most significant of these programs is the Food Stamp Program. It provides nutritious food to over 23 million Americans a year. More Americans find themselves in need of this program every single year. As their wages are stagnant, as they have less and less opportunity to climb a ladder of opportunity because they may not be getting the education they need, they are finding more and more dependency on programs like this to be able to feed their families.

I understand our current budget constraints. I know we all do. Yet I didn't create this mess. The spending that has been freewheeling in this Congress over the last several years has been unbelievable. Yet as my colleagues mentioned, we failed to adequately support and fund issues such as our veterans' benefits; issues like educating our children and providing them with the skills they need to be competitive.

I come here to talk about the main sustenance of life. I understand these budget constraints, but I believe as one man to another, as one woman to another, one human being to another, food, simple nutrition, is something we cannot turn a blind eye to. Even in these tight fiscal times, I believe that we have to maintain our commitment to feed the hungry among us. We must first protect programs such as the Food Stamp Program, the National School Breakfast and School Lunch Program, the Summer Feeding Program, the WIC, and the Children and Adult Care Food Program. These are all critical programs that keep Americans who are on the verge of hunger and destitution from finding themselves there permanently.

Another important tool for local organizations is the Community Food and Nutrition Program, and with support from this program, the Arkansas Hunger Coalition has sponsored a Web site, a quarterly newsletter, an annual conference, a mini grant program, along with many civic, school, and community presentations on hunger which raise public awareness and promote innovative solutions.

Organizations such as the Arkansas Hunger Coalition operate on limited budgets. Yet they are a vital source of information for food pantries, soup kitchens, and shelters that together work to share the importance of food security to the people of our home State of Arkansas.

I urge Americans to contact their congressional representatives to voice their support for these nutritional programs. This critical issue of ending hunger, the unbelievable number of hungry Americans is something that we have to bring greater awareness to not just today but every day.

I urge my colleagues to protect them from cuts and structural changes that will undermine their ability to serve our Nation's most vulnerable citizens.

In addition to the Federal food programs, eliminating hunger in America requires the help of community organizations. Government programs provide a basis for support, but they cannot do the work alone. Community and faith-based organizations are essential to locating and rooting out hunger wherever it persists.

We rely on the work of local food banks and food pantries, soup kitchens, and community action centers across America to go where government cannot. The reason I have stayed so persistent in coming to the floor of this Senate to talk about this issue on a day that we have designated for awareness is because I tried so desperately to put myself in the shoes of other mothers who are not perhaps as lucky as I am. When a child looks into your eyes and says: Mommy, I am hungry, they have no response, whereas I do.

This is a critical issue for us as a nation. It shows where the fabric of our community and our country lies. It shows where our priorities are, and it shows who we are as Americans and what values we truly grasp for our fellow man.

Recently, I have been so proud as my twin boys have gotten invitations to birthday parties. There is a note at the bottom of the invitation. It says: Please don't bring a gift, but in lieu of a gift would you please give to a worthy organization, our local food bank or shelter.

My children with their birthday coming up soon said: Mom, we don't need those gifts again this year. Let's add something for those people who need it the most. Let's make sure that we have fun at our party but that we don't take the gift that we don't need and instead ask our friend to help us in feeding the hungry and sheltering the homeless.

I will try, and I know my colleagues will, too, to work as hard as we can to provide the resources these community organizations need to continue with the difficult but necessary work they perform, to encourage our neighbors, our children, our schools, and others to be as actively involved as they possibly can.

Private corporations and small businesses also have a role to play in eliminating hunger in our great Nation. Our corporations and small businesses generate most of our Nation's health and have throughout history supported many of our greatest endeavors. Many corporations and businesses already contribute to efforts to eliminate hunger. I hope others will begin to participate as opportunities to do so present themselves in the future.

A couple of great examples of how business and nonprofits can partner to feed hungry people occurred these past few months. Together with America's Second Harvest, Tyson Food, in my home State of Arkansas, donated 6 million pounds of protein--one of the more difficult elements of nutrition to get into food banks is protein--6 million pounds of protein from one corporate citizen. Wal-Mart raised $10 million to support food banks all across this country. I am so grateful to these companies and to nonprofit organizations for their leadership in this effort to feed those who have limited access to food and nutrition.

I have also seen some of the important work being done by organizations in the local Washington, DC, area. We see it all around us. All we have to do is open our eyes and make sure we are aware. The Arlington Food Assistance Center works to provide food to those in need in the Arlington, VA, area. I have supported some of their efforts through the local school drive. Not only is it important in terms of providing the needs of food assistance through the Arlington food bank system and the assistance center, but think what it does for our children. It gives them a learning experience of how they, too, can give back not just to their community or their school but to their fellow man, someone desperately in need of a nutritious meal, a family who needs a nutritious breakfast.

Think of what it teaches our children. Despite the fact that Arlington County is one of the wealthiest areas in the country, plenty of local residents do not have enough to eat. The Arlington Food Assistance Center seeks to remedy the problem by distributing bread and vegetables, meat, milk, eggs, and other food items. Our church group routinely goes for a ``gleaning'' program where local farmers allow us to get into the fields and collect part of their crops that have been left in order to provide fresh fruits and vegetables in our area food banks.

Lastly, this effort needs the commitment of individual Americans. Our greatest national strength is the power that comes from individual initiative and the collective will of the American people. I believe we are called by a higher power to care for our fellow man and our fellow women.

As a person of faith, I feel I am called to serve the poor and the hungry. I know many of my colleagues agree. If we believe in this call, we must live it every day in our schools and in our

homes, in our workplaces and our places of worship, in our volunteering and in our prayer. This personal responsibility is a great one, but it holds tremendous power. As we have seen throughout American history, when individuals in this Nation bind together to serve a common cause, they can achieve the greatest of accomplishments. By sharing the many blessings and resources our great Nation provides, I am confident we can alleviate hunger, a disease that we know there is a cure for, both at home and abroad.

I ask all of my colleagues to take a moment to honor on this day of awareness the very brave men and women and children who live in food insecurity and whom we have an opportunity to serve.

Absolutely, I yield to my good friend from Illinois who has done so much on the issue of hunger.

Mr. President, I was so excited when we came to work this week with the opportunity to focus our Nation and the debate of this body toward health, the health of our Nation, the health of our people, and the health of our businesses, the fabric of this country, the fabric of our Nation. It is such an important thing for so many of us--certainly, each of us in our own families. I have small children and aging parents.

All of us have responsibilities in our own lives and responsibilities to our constituencies. We have different constituencies such as the elderly who live in our communities and the small businesses that are striving hard to keep our economy going; children, and those with chronic diseases and illnesses who desperately need to make sure that the coverage they have is sufficient for what they may have or may not have, but want to make sure that they are protected against in case, unfortunately, something might happen.

So as we came to the Senate this week to talk about health and how we could make health a very real part of the discussion in this Nation, a real part of what it meant to our economy and to our people and the quality of life, the real value of who we are as Americans, I was excited. Yet I saw so much of it cut short. The discussion that started on Monday ended with a line in the sand that said: My way or the highway, not let's work a deal and let's figure out what will make health care real in this Nation and sustainable and that will make sense in our communities. Then we moved to talking about how we deal with small businesses. To me, the most important thing we can do for our small businesses is to make available to them affordable, accessible health care but quality health care, the same kind of benefits that we ourselves as Members of Congress are blessed enough to be able to experience for our families and for ourselves.

As we proceeded into this debate, way too much of the debate centered around not what we could work hard to do that was right but what people wanted. Then, all of a sudden, we leave abruptly this incredibly important debate.

We leave behind this incredibly important debate to talk about a tax bill for tax cuts that don't even expire until January of 2009, instead of looking at something real and new, such as a new tax cut for small businesses to engage in the health insurance marketplace for their employees and for themselves or looking at how we could extend tax cuts that had expired, such as research and development and for education and tuition and so many more things that have been productive in our economy and in our communities. We go through this debate, and we come back now to finalize debate on the health care of our Nation. And what have we done? We have missed an opportunity to say to our seniors they are important enough that we are going to extend a deadline, a deadline

that means so much for them to be able to take the time and the opportunity to understand this new prescription drug component of Medicare that we have passed.

I voted for it, Mr. President, and I want it desperately to work. I have been out in the field in Arkansas, and I have made sure I met with seniors. We have hosted meetings and tried to educate, but there simply has not been time enough to get to the complexity of what is offered out there. We look back at what efforts have been made. The GAO has reported that one-third of seniors' calls to Medicare operators resulted in flawed or no information. Think about that for a moment. One in three seniors who called CMS for help were given bad or no information. Now those seniors must make difficult, sound decisions about their health care by Monday of next week. I wish we had been given the opportunity to make a difference in that.

I wish we had the ability to make the difference for small businesses, offering them again the same opportunity we have, to enjoy quality health insurance at a low cost, with many choices for the variety of Federal employees who work in this great Nation. We can do the same. We could allow employers and small businesses and self- employed individuals--think about that, a one-man shop--to reap the benefits of group purchasing power and streamlined administrative costs as well as access to more plan choices.

The proposal we had looked to present would create all of that, without any new bureaucracy. How about not reinventing the wheel? For once, we in Government would use something that was time tested for 40 years, has a 1-percent administrative cost, that we could implement for small businesses and bring to them again the same quality of product we enjoy as Members of Congress.

On top of that, we could have incentivized it and brought them a new tax cut, a new tax benefit in order to be able to invest in themselves and in their employees and provide the kind of health care they deserve.

It is hard for me to believe that we have missed all of those opportunities: to be progressive, to be thoughtful, to invest in our country, to make sure we are taking care of the fabric of this Nation and who we are.

About 53 million Americans work for businesses with less than 100 employees. That pool is bigger than the Medicare population, which is about 42 million. Think of what we could do in offering those small businesses that type of a pool, to be able to bring down their costs, increase their choices, and maintain the quality they have demanded, the types of services they may need now or that they may need in the future, whether it is diabetes or cancer screening, making sure that immunization and child well care are all in there. We had an opportunity to do this and many things and we have missed that opportunity.

Working families and small businesses need help. Our seniors need help. Our community providers need help.

Mr. President, I ask for an additional minute.

Thank you, Mr. President. I encourage my colleagues to look at the missed opportunities and pull together to make a difference for the people of this country.

Madam President, I, too, would like to echo the Senator from North Carolina, that this is a debate which is extremely critical. It is an issue which is--particularly from my standpoint--one that I get most consistently when I return home to Arkansas. I don't think the debate is whether it is a critical issue for us to discuss and come up with a solution; the critical question here is, Are we really doing our best? Are we really working hard to produce the best product we possibly can for the constituency that really needs us the most?

Small businesses are our No. 1 employer in Arkansas. They are the engine of our economy all across this great Nation. There is no doubt that they deserve the same quality of health care we have here as Members of Congress.

The Senator mentioned that, as he left small business and came to Washington, his premiums went up. The statistics show us that the premiums for Federal employees rise at a disproportionately lower percentage rate than the premiums rise in the small business market. We have seen drastic increases in the premiums in the small business market over the last several years. However, while we also, as Federal employees, have seen increases in our premiums, they have not been anything compared to the increases that have been seen in the small business marketplace. So there may have been some changes, but the point is that we have a good product that we enjoy as Members of Congress. The quality control on what we have is tremendous because we adhere to the State mandates and what States have seen in their States to be important to their constituency.

All States are different, but most of the States are consistent when it comes to things such as diabetes, maternity care, well baby care, immunization, cancer screening--things that have really made a difference not only in people's quality of life but also in terms of the cost of health care. States such as Connecticut actually cover anything--or mandate the coverage of Lyme disease because in Connecticut you actually see a prevalence of that. States have the choice. It is the State's right to be able to make sure that what their constituency wants in that product is going to be there. I believe that has worked very well. It is something we want to maintain. It is a quality control we enjoy, and there is no reason small businesses should not, also.

Madam President, I wish to comment and lend my voice to the fact that this is a critical debate, one about making sure we are providing for every other American out there, particularly in small businesses, the same opportunities and the quality of health care we enjoy.

I wish to address some of the issues that have been brought up in this debate that I have heard about the bill that I have worked hard on over the last 3 or 4 years--a bill Senator Durbin and I helped each other put together after realizing what a great job the Federal Government had done in bringing the best of what Government can do in its oversight and the best of what private industry and competition in the marketplace can bring. It brings it to us as Federal employees and Members of Congress, and has for over 40 years, and it keeps down an administrative cost that is drastically lower than private plans out in the small business marketplace. At some point, it is somewhere around 25, or plus, percentage points lower in terms of administrative costs, which is practical in this day and age and something that is essential.

I applaud Senator Enzi in his effort and hard work at bringing about this issue and focusing on how important it is. I hope that the debate and our willingness to work to produce a good product is genuine and that we can actually do what is best for the American people and that we don't get caught up in a lot of the details of procedure here so that we miss the forest for the trees.

On the other side of the aisle, they have argued that our bill is just another costly Government program, which will cost taxpayers a ton of money. We are getting ready to spend a ton of money tomorrow in extending tax cuts that haven't even expired and don't expire for several years. We are going to spend a tremendous amount of money--$50 billion plus--on extending those tax cuts which don't even come up for expiration for another couple of years.

Here we have an opportunity to provide a tax cut to small business that could actually make an immediate impact on bringing down their cost of health insurance for themselves and their employees. This is kind of the first time I have ever noticed my colleagues on the other side, who all of a sudden don't want to provide a tax cut to small business because it costs. Yet we are going to have multiple tax cuts brought before us that come at a tremendous cost to the Government and to the deficit, and we don't even need them yet. Yet here is an opportunity to provide a direct tax cut, a credit, to small businesses to engage in the health care marketplace, encourage them to provide much needed health insurance for their employees, for themselves, and for the self-employed, and all of a sudden it is a cost that is just out of control. But if you look at that cost, it is amazing. It is maybe a third of the cost of the HSA that the President has been proposing. Yet we have the possibility and capacity under this plan to serve millions more Americans with health insurance--health insurance that is backed by the State mandate and the Office of Personnel Management, a proven negotiator, that negotiates for us, Members of Congress. So I just have a real problem with that argument.

The fact is that SEHBP won't create any new bureaucracy. Our plan will be run by the same agency that runs the health care program for all Federal employees and Members of Congress. The administrative costs are less than 1 percent. There is no new bureaucracy created. It already exists in the Office of Personnel Management. We might have to increase some of those people in that office, but we don't know what is going to happen at the Department of Labor, which is charged with implementing Senator Enzi's plan. There is no one in the Department of Labor who has ever done that. There is no part of that agency designed or created in order to do that. We would have to reinvent the wheel to provide a section of the Department of Labor that would be able to institute the Enzi bill.

In fact, most of the costs, as I have said, of our benefit plan for small businesses come in the form of a tax cut. So our costs are not administrative. We actually bring those down. Our costs are not an implementation. Our costs are providing the assistance to small business to actually get into the marketplace because we know that the more small businesses that get into the marketplace, the greater the pool.

I doubt there is anyone here who will argue with the fact that the real key to

providing good, quality, low-cost, consistent health insurance is in the volume of the pool because we all want to make sure that competition in the marketplace is what is driving the issue here. When you have a larger pool to negotiate with private industry, you are going to be able to negotiate a better deal. It is a better deal for everybody.

Forty-six million Americans are not getting health insurance now. Disproportionately, the largest percentage of those 46 million are working in small businesses. They are not getting health insurance. Health insurance companies should love the idea of being able to increase their market share with those numbers of people. In fact, we have worked hard over the last 2 or 3 years with the insurance industry to make sure that what we were creating was improvement on what was already in existence other than the Federal plan.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent for an additional 1 minute.

Madam President, I believe it is so important that we heed the words of most of our parents, I am sure, when we were growing up, and those are: If it is worth doing, it is worth doing right.

We enjoy, as Federal employees, an incredible opportunity to provide health insurance for ourselves and for our families which provides real, substantial quality. It is not something we buy into with the idea that we will never get sick; we buy into it knowing that maybe we are just one automobile accident or one chronic illness away from needing comprehensive health insurance.

The increases my colleague from North Carolina talked about in terms of the number of people who would be added, those are immediate and they are temporary. They are mostly young, healthy people. The fact is that if we don't include everybody and we don't make sure all of the different chronic illnesses that exist out there are going to be offered, those who are less healthy are going to be shut out, they will become more costly, and the first time one of those young individuals, healthy individuals, has an accident or reaches a chronic condition, they too are not going to be covered under this plan. So I hope we will heed the idea that it is important to do what is right.

We have an opportunity here, at no additional cost. We could eliminate it, if the other side doesn't want to provide a tax cut to small business, that is OK. But we should maintain the quality, and I hope my colleagues will join me in that.

Mr. President, I am so happy to come to the floor today because the Senate is finally debating how we can help small businesses across our country afford health care for their employees. Just as Senator Gregg has mentioned how important it is to provide benefits to groups who want to invest, and to individuals and companies who want to invest and grow the economy, so too it is critically important that we provide small businesses the ability to invest in themselves. That is what I want to talk about today.

Small businesses are critical to this country. They are critical to rural States such as mine in Arkansas, but they are the engine of our economy in this great Nation. They are the No. 1 employers. That is why it is so important that we get this right, that we provide them with a tool that will allow them to reinvest in themselves and their employees and their communities, so that we can keep that engine going.

I applaud my colleague from Wyoming, Senator Enzi, for all he has done in bringing about this debate. He has worked hard and genuinely on this issue, and I appreciate very much what he has put into this. He has helped us make sure this is not a debate about whether this is a critical issue.

This reminds me of something I was taught by my father who said: If it is worth doing, it is worth doing right. It is worth doing correctly. That is what we are here to talk about today.

I believe very strongly that our small businesses are so important to us--our self-employed individuals in this country have the greatest spirit in the world--and it is so important that we should not offer them a second-rate opportunity. We should offer them the same opportunity we have as Federal employees and Members of Congress: The opportunity to build a pool that will offer them greater access, greater choice at a lower cost, by pooling all of themselves together across this great country, while maintaining the quality, which is what we do for ourselves. We maintain the quality of the product of the health insurance we receive or have access to as Federal employees and Members of Congress, and we should do no less for the small businesses and the self-employed individuals in this great country.

So I hope, as we continue this debate, we will remember those hard- working American families who are depending on us not just to do something, but to do what is right and fair, and offering what we see as fair tax policy and offering what we see as fair access to the same quality product of health care and health insurance that we as Members of Congress get.

The small business health care crisis is undoubtedly one of the issues I hear the most about when I return home to Arkansas. In fact, in every community in our Nation, as well as millions of working families across this country, we are seeing the difficulty of having access to quality health care and health insurance and the ability to pay for that.

There are approximately 46 million Americans currently without health insurance, including 456,000 Arkansans whom I am responsible for in terms of producing a product that is worthy of those individuals. Small businesses are the No. 1 source of our jobs in Arkansas. Yet only 26 percent of the businesses with fewer than 50 employees offer health insurance coverage. Workers at these businesses, which again are the engine of our economy, are most likely to be uninsured. In fact, 20 percent of working-age adults are uninsured in Arkansas. This number is alarming, and addressing this problem should be a national priority, and we should approach it as if we are going to do the best job that we are capable of doing. That is why we are here today, to talk about that.

Mr. President, 224 major organizations are opposed to the proposal that

Senator Enzi has brought before us. Two hundred-and-twenty-four is a huge number: everywhere from diabetes to mental illness to hospital federations. These individuals understand how important the years have been in allowing State insurance commissioners to be able to set mandates in order to cover what is important to individuals in their States, and what is important to small businesses and everyone in those States. Those States have the right and the ability to figure out what is important to them, and the majority of them have agreed on many of these major issues.

Those who lack health insurance do not get access to timely and appropriate health care. We know that, and we see it. We see it in the cost of Medicare when people don't get health care for 20 or 25 years when they are in the working marketplace as a small business owner or employee, and then they become more costly to us when they hit Medicare age because they haven't received the screenings, the timely visits to the doctor, and they haven't been getting the kind of health care they truly need. They have less access to these important screenings. They don't have access to the state-of-the-art technology that exists or prescription drugs, which is another piece of what can help keep down the cost of health care.

Working families need help with this problem. The Institute of Medicine has reported that 18,000 people die each year because they are uninsured. The fact is, being insured does matter. It makes a big difference. It makes a difference in our health care costs. It makes a difference in whether you are going to survive--longevity, the ability to care for your family. It makes a big difference. We have reached a juncture where we are going to debate how we deal with those who are uninsured, whether we are going to give them substandard coverage or whether we are going to give them the coverage that we have.

Again, I commend my colleagues, Senator Enzi from Wyoming and Senator Nelson from Nebraska, for their leadership. I appreciate their hard work on this issue. But I do disagree, because I believe that the devil is in the details on this issue, and I am deeply concerned about the very harsh and unintended consequences that will occur if S. 1955 were to become law.

Senator Durbin and myself have been working together for several years to come up with what we believe is a better health care plan for America's small businesses. What we have done is looked to a 40-year- old tested delivery system, and it is the one that we ourselves use. It is a Federal plan that takes the best of what Government can do and combines it with the best of what private industry can do. The private marketplace and the competition that it can create allows the Government to pool all of its Federal employees and use that pool as a negotiating tool to bring us greater choice at a lower cost.

About 3 years ago, I suppose it was, my staff and I were discussing the way we could help small businesses, and I thought about the way my Senate office operates. It operates much like a small business in my home State and here. As I looked at my employees, I saw that I had two employees, one with 26 years with the Federal Government, another with 30 years with the Federal Government. I had two women who had delivered babies and were on maternity leave. I had some, such as myself, with small children and a husband that is on my plan, and then I had a host of young, healthy staffers who were single. But I had a whole array of different individuals who needed a tailor-made insurance plan for their needs. While there are similarities in our Senate office and small businesses, there are also some obvious differences. One of the most glaring contrasts is access to affordable and quality health care. I saw what my office went through and realized that is what small businesses are going through. I knew we could do better. I knew we could take the plan of what we have and apply it to small businesses.

Last year, more than 8 million people were banded together in the Federal employees purchasing pool, and that gave us choices among 10 national health insurance plans and a variety of local insurance plans, and a total of 278 private insurance plans from the private marketplace. Not government-run--not government-run health care at all--but health care from the private industry, health insurance from the private industry that was created by competition of the multiple Federal employees across the country. It offered us greater access, greater choices at a lower cost.

So I am here to ask this question: Why don't we try to give small businesses access to that same type of private health insurance option that Members of Congress and Federal employees enjoy today? Rather than reinvent the wheel, why don't we create a program for small businesses that is based on our Federal Employees Health Benefit Plan, through the FEHBP, by pooling them, the small businesses, together in one nationwide pool. That is exactly what Senator Durbin and I have proposed in our Small Employers Health Benefit Program. By pooling small businesses across America into one risk and purchasing pool similar to the FEHBP, our program will allow employers to reap the benefit of group purchasing power and streamline administrative costs as well as access to more plan choices. The SEHBP, as we have introduced, lowers costs for small businesses in two key ways: It pools them into one national pool across the country, therefore spreading the risk between the healthy and the sick, the young, the old, those who live and work in the remotest parts of this great land and those who work in the most urban areas. Second, our plan significantly lowers administrative costs for small businesses.

Two economists have estimated that SEHBP would save small businesses between 27 and 37 percent annually, even if they don't take advantage of the tax cut that we offset costs with by insuring lower income workers. We provide a tax cut to small businesses, and for the life of me, I can't figure out why those on the other side of the aisle, for the first time I have ever noticed, will fight a tax cut for small businesses. Providing small business a tax cut to be able to engage in what is such an important tool in getting themselves and their employees insured makes good sense. What a great investment.

Senator Gregg was talking about balancing all of that and the economy. What a great way to balance what corporate America gets and their ability to deduct health insurance costs that they have and small business getting a tax cut for investing in their employees and health benefits for them. Under our bill, employers will receive an annual tax credit for contributions made on behalf of their workers who make $25,000 per year or less. And if the employer contributes 60 percent or more to the health insurance premium of an employee making $25,000 or less, the employer will receive a 25-percent tax credit. And the tax credits increase with the number of people covered and the proportion of premium the employer chooses to cover. Also, the employer receives a bonus tax credit for signing up in the first year of the program, because we know from the example of the Federal employees that the more employees who are in the pool, the greater advantage to everyone concerned. Small businesses will save thousands of dollars--even more-- under our plan.

Segmenting the market into different association pools, as S. 1955 does under Senator Enzi's bill, will not achieve these savings that would be created by instituting one large pool with all of those small businesses and self-employed individuals. Each association will be administering to a separate group with a different administrative structure and different costs, obviously. More funds would be going to administrative costs as opposed to serving the people with a quality health plan. Our SEHBP would have one administrative structure and could pool approximately 53 million workers together, therefore balancing the risk of sick and healthy, young and old, rural and urban, for affordable rates for everybody. Why wouldn't we want to make our pool as big as it possibly could be, as we do with the Federal workers?

I believe our plan takes a real moderate and balanced approach that combines the best of what Government can do with the best of what the private sector can do, and preserving important coverage for preventive health

care treatment such as diabetes supplies, mammograms, prostate screening, maternity and well-baby care, immunization, things that States themselves have decided are important enough to mandate coverage for and ensure that the people of their State are going to get the safe and important coverage of illnesses that are critical to them in their State.

Like the FEHB Plan, our program does not promote Government-run health care, but it harnesses the power of market competition to bring down health insurance costs using a proven Government negotiator in the Office of Personnel Management, OPM, which is the negotiator for our plan. We, once a year, as Federal employees, can choose among 270-plus plans. We are able to actually benefit from that proven Government negotiator and the harnessing of that power.

Our legislation, S. 2510, has been endorsed by many organizations-- the National Association of Women Business Owners, Small Business Majority, the American Medical Society, the American Diabetes Association, the National Mental Health Association, the Cancer Society, and many more that have realized how important it is to use a proven example, a proven structure that maintains quality but helps by pooling and bringing down those costs.

The Mental Health Liaison Group, representing over 35 national mental health organizations, wrote to us and said about our bill:

S. 2510 does not sacrifice quality of coverage for

affordability or allow the offering of second class health

insurance to small businesses. Within the FEHBP program,

small business owners, employees and their family members

would be covered by all the consumer protections in their

home states--including hard-won state mental health parity

laws and mandated benefit laws.

The American Academy of Pediatrics, writing to us on behalf of over 60,000 primary care pediatricians and pediatric specialists, wrote:

Through the benefits of pooling small businesses and

providing tax cuts to small employers, small pediatric

practices will be assisted in the health insurance market

without sacrificing health care services for children.

The American Diabetes Association wrote to us and said:

While other proposals seeking to provide health benefits

for small businesses . . . have exempted or eliminated

coverage for important diabetes care protections, [our bill,]

S. 2510, will allow individuals with diabetes to receive the

important health care coverage they require to remain healthy

and productive members of the workforce.

This is not just about quality of life, although many of us believe that is very important. We as Members of Congress enjoy a quality of life because of the very healthy health insurance program we are offered. We want our small businesses that are vital to our economy to enjoy that same opportunity. But it is also about economics. It is about making sure we keep our workforce, particularly our small businesses and their workforce, healthy and thriving and productive and in the workplace. It is about making sure America's working individuals and working families get the health care they need before they reach 65. When they hit 65 in the Medicare Program, then they are going to be more costly to Government because they are not going to have gotten the health care they needed and deserved in their working years.

I believe our plan is better in so many ways. I am proud we are having this debate, and I hope so many people will realize we can do better. We can do better and make sure we truly elevate small businesses and self-employed people to the same level we hold ourselves, in providing them the access to the same quality type of health care.

Our SEHBP bill offers tax cuts for small employers. Senator Enzi's bill does not. SEHBP relies on a proven program. It is based on the successful Federal Employees Health Benefit Program which has efficiently and effectively provided extensive benefit choices at affordable prices to Members of Congress and Federal employees for decades. For decades, we have had a proven program out there that proves you can harness the competitive nature of the marketplace, and with the oversight of Government and the State mandates, you can actually provide that quality of health insurance at a lower cost. By pooling small businesses together and allowing OPM to negotiate with private health insurance companies on their behalf, they, too, could have access to this wide variety.

On the other hand, Senator Enzi and Senator Nelson's bill establishes a new set of responsibilities at the U.S. Department of Labor, to administer an untried and an untested program. We don't reinvent the wheel. What we do is use what already exists. To invent a new section of the Department of Labor to administer Senator Enzi's bill is going to take time and money. We are not going to know how it needs to be administered through the Department of Labor. They have never done it before. Even the Department of Labor employees currently enjoy benefits from the health insurance program that is negotiated by the Office of Personnel Management. So it is hard to believe they are going to want to go to another system.

SEHBP offers individual self-employed workers the same access to health insurance that is offered to group businesses. SEHBP defines small businesses as groups of 1 to 100, so an individual self-employed person will be treated exactly as a business with 2 or more people. Any business with 1 to 100 employees is eligible to participate in what we are trying to do.

Under Senator Enzi's bill, the self-employed people are not pooled with the small businesses, unless they are mandated by State law. And there are not that many State laws that actually mandate that. But the self-employed people in 36 States, including Arkansas, will not have access to the same negotiated rates of businesses with 2 or more people. They will be pulled out of that pool and rated on their own. That means, if they are younger women of childbearing years or perhaps they are older workers at 50 or 55 and are diabetic, they will be rated completely separate from the pool, which means they will be segregated and treated differently. They don't get to enjoy the benefit of a larger risk pool which could bring down their costs and offer them greater choice.

Our bill also ensures access to health care specialists. Many States have passed laws requiring insurers to cover certain health care providers, including dentists or psychologists or chiropractors. All three of these and many more are required by our State of Arkansas law. I know the people of my State enjoy the assurance they have of knowing that their State regulator, their State insurance commissioner, is looking out for their needs. They can do that better on a State level. That is why we have always left those types of regulatory issues up to our State--because they know and can work.

Can you imagine being a small business, or better yet an employee of a small business, having to call some big, huge, Federal bureaucratic office to request or to complain or to have your concerns heard about what is not covered under your insurance plan? No, they call the State insurance commissioner today, and that is the way it should be. The State insurance commissioner can then respond to the concerns of their constituency and has done so very well over many years.

The coverage for diabetes supplies, mammography, and other important screenings are mandated by State law which would be preempted by what Senator Enzi is trying to do. Many States have passed laws requiring health insurance companies to cover these benefits because insurers simply were not doing it. It did not happen because the insurance commissioners just decided on a whim to do it; it is because the insurers were not covering it. Why do we have to go back and relearn that lesson?

For 40 years, the Federal Government has used the effectiveness of the pool of the 8 million Federal employees and been able to enjoy the protections that are there, guided by State insurance commissioners.

Our bill also prevents unfair rating on gender and health status. Under our bill, health insurers will be prohibited from ratings based on health status--whether you happen to be diabetic, whether you happen to have eating disorders--your gender, or the type of industry in which the employees are working. Under Senator Enzi's rules, that will be all preempted, even for the 15 States that don't allow ratings on these factors.

Our bill also frees employers to focus on running their businesses. They don't

have to go and negotiate these plans through their association or with their association. They are going to get sent a booklet just as we do, once a year, to review all that is available to them, and choices, and then figure out what is best for them. My employees--each of them picks something different. I pick coverage for a family with children. Some of them pick a PPO or an HMO. Some of them pick all different kinds of State plans and others that are offered to them in that process.

Absolutely.

How about if I just go ahead and yield to the Senator from Delaware because as a former Governor, he has some incredible stories to tell, and I think they really add to this debate. I will simply say to my colleagues that I hope they follow this debate very closely and certainly appreciate how important this is to the working families of all of our States.

Mr. President, I thank my colleague from Delaware.

Thank you, Mr. President.

I ask unanimous consent to continue until other Members arrive.

Thank you, Mr. President.

I will be glad to yield the floor when others are ready to speak.

I would like to add that the experience of many of our colleagues, whether they are former insurance commissioners, former Governors and others, brings to this table the understanding what the American people want, what our working families want. I think the debate is that small businesses definitely want more affordable health care. They also want to make sure that what they are providing for themselves and their families and their employees is quality service, quality coverage. That is what they deserve. That is what they want.

Even for those who feel so young and invincible, we also know that they may be one car accident or one diagnosis away from needing more comprehensive health insurance for the rest of their lives.

That is why we want to make sure--as I said in the beginning--that whatever we do is right, that we don't move forward on something that is going to be less productive and in the long run, unfortunately, put more people at risk.

My goal is to help small businesses while not jeopardizing the quality of health care for the 68 million Americans in State-regulated group plans that are already out there. We don't want to do harm there.

The fact is if we move forward on what Senator Enzi wants to do, which is preempting those State regulations and State mandates, we could do tremendous harm for those who are currently insured and the 16.5 million Americans with individual health insurance coverage who would probably lose some quality of coverage which they have.

If it is good enough for Federal employees, and if it good enough for Members of Congress, I think it should be good enough for millions of small business employees who are the economic backbone of communities throughout this Nation.

I applaud my colleagues for coming to the floor for this debate, and I hope we will have a serious debate so we can

move forward and actually do what is right for the American people.

Yes, absolutely.

Mr. President, I rise today to introduce legislation that would extend the provisions of the 2002 Farm Bill until our trading partners in the WTO have at least matched our commitment to level disparities in global agriculture trade. I would like to thank Senator Talent for working with me on this important piece of legislation to farm families in my State of Arkansas and across the Nation.

This legislation would extend our current farm bill until one year after implementing legislation for a WTO Doha agreement is enacted. Then . . . and only then . . . will Congress know what to expect of our trading partners and what our trading partners expect from us.

Four years ago, President Bush, after some noted reluctance, signed into law the 2002 Farm Bill. As a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee and a farmer's daughter, I played an active role in that debate and was pleased with the outcome, which I view as a compromise between many different interests. Most importantly, I view it as a contract between the farmers in my State of Arkansas and their government. It is meant to offer what little certainty can exist for those who choose to make a living providing the safe and affordable food supply which we as Americans depend on. Unfortunately, certainty is something that's hard to come by in farm country these days.

This Administration has repeatedly asked Congress to cut funding or make structural changes to the 2002 Farm Bill, regardless of the fact that CBO estimates it has come in approximately $13 billion cheaper than anticipated.

This Administration has also refused to provide emergency assistance to agriculture producers, despite the fact that farmers across the Nation faced weather-related disasters of all kinds and record high fuel and fertilizer costs in 2005. A wet spring, followed by extreme drought and rising fuel prices, cost farmers in my State $923 million last year. In Arkansas, where one in five jobs is tied to agriculture, this impacts the entire State economy.

All the while, producers wait and watch as U.S. negotiators offer proposals in the WTO that would require drastic reductions and changes in our farm support, while our trading partners continue to protect their markets with tariffs and subsidies far higher than we have in the

Mr. President, I rise today to introduce legislation that would extend the provisions of the 2002 Farm Bill until our trading partners in the WTO have at least matched our commitment to level disparities in global agriculture trade. I would like to thank Senator Talent for working with me on this important piece of legislation to farm families in my State of Arkansas and across the Nation.

This legislation would extend our current farm bill until one year after implementing legislation for a WTO Doha agreement is enacted. Then . . . and only then . . . will Congress know what to expect of our trading partners and what our trading partners expect from us.

Four years ago, President Bush, after some noted reluctance, signed into law the 2002 Farm Bill. As a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee and a farmer's daughter, I played an active role in that debate and was pleased with the outcome, which I view as a compromise between many different interests. Most importantly, I view it as a contract between the farmers in my State of Arkansas and their government. It is meant to offer what little certainty can exist for those who choose to make a living providing the safe and affordable food supply which we as Americans depend on. Unfortunately, certainty is something that's hard to come by in farm country these days.

This Administration has repeatedly asked Congress to cut funding or make structural changes to the 2002 Farm Bill, regardless of the fact that CBO estimates it has come in approximately $13 billion cheaper than anticipated.

This Administration has also refused to provide emergency assistance to agriculture producers, despite the fact that farmers across the Nation faced weather-related disasters of all kinds and record high fuel and fertilizer costs in 2005. A wet spring, followed by extreme drought and rising fuel prices, cost farmers in my State $923 million last year. In Arkansas, where one in five jobs is tied to agriculture, this impacts the entire State economy.

All the while, producers wait and watch as U.S. negotiators offer proposals in the WTO that would require drastic reductions and changes in our farm support, while our trading partners continue to protect their markets with tariffs and subsidies far higher than we have in the

Mr. President, today I rise to pay tribute to SSG Kevin P. Jessen of Paragould, AR. To those who knew him best, he was a loving husband and proud father whose life was filled with love and laughter. To his fellow soldiers serving on the battlefields of Iraq, he was a hero who, in the course of saving countless American and Iraqi lives, sacrificed his own.

His lifelong interest in military history and explosives led him to a career as an explosive ordnance disposal technician. It came as no surprise to friends and family that the young Arkansan, who spent countless hours as a child playing with G.I. Joe toys and bottle rockets, would become a soldier. He joined the ROTC while in high school and upon graduation enlisted in the National Guard before ultimately joining the U.S. Army.

Staff Sergeant Jessen's first of three tours in Iraq occurred shortly after Operation Desert Storm when he helped dispose of explosives left over from the war. In 2004, he returned through service in Operation Iraqi Freedom, only to return for a third tour 6 months after his second was completed. While serving in a foreign land seemingly worlds away from home, his heart and thoughts were undoubtedly never far from his wife Carrie and his 2-year-old son, Cameron. Between tours of duty, this battle-hardened soldier was often found changing diapers or handling bottle feedings in the middle of the night. It was the proud duty of a man who loved his family so very much, and it was symbolic of his devotion to them.

Throughout his time in Iraq, Staff Sergeant Jessen's role as an explosives ordnance disposal technician ensured that he was often called upon to disarm roadside bombs. Although it continually placed him in the line of danger, he selflessly saw it as his duty to help protect the lives of his fellow soldiers as well as the lives of Iraqi civilians. Tragically, while serving on a postblast investigation on March 4, 2006, he was killed by a secondary explosion in Rawah, Iraq.

At Staff Sergeant Jessen's memorial service, he was laid to rest with full military honors. Hundreds of family, friends, and those wishing to pay their respects joined together to remember this young Arkansan and to honor the life he led. Along his funeral procession, members of a grateful community endured the cold weather to honor this fallen hero, many with hands held over the hearts and waving American flags. At the cemetery, the American flag that had draped Staff Sergeant Jessen's casket was folded and presented to Carrie and Cameron as a token of remembrance of the man they loved and the sacrifice he made on behalf of us all.

Although the 28 years that Kevin Jessen spent with us were far too short, I am hopeful that his friends, family, and loved ones find some solace knowing that he touched the lives so many. He set examples of devotion to family and country that we should all follow, and he led an honorable life of love and selflessness that will continue to serve as an inspiration to us all.

My thoughts and prayers are with Carrie, Cameron, and all those who knew and loved this fallen hero.

Staff Sgt. Brock A. Beery

Mr. President, I rise today with my colleague, Senator Craig Thomas, to introduce the Disabled Veterans Tax Fairness Act. This much-needed legislation would protect disabled veterans from being unfairly taxed on the benefits to which they are entitled, simply because their disability claims were not processed in a timely manner. This legislation is supported by the Military Coalition, a group representing more than 5.5 million members of the uniformed services and their families.

While the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) resolves most of its filed disability claims in less than a year, there are also instances of lost paperwork, administrative errors, and appeals of rejected claims that often delay thousands of disability awards for years on end. When this occurs, disability compensation is awarded retroactively and for tax purposes, a disabled veteran's previously received taxable military retiree pay is re-designated as nontaxable disability compensation. Thereby, the disabled veteran is entitled to a refund of taxes paid and must file an amended tax return for each applicable year.

Unfortunately, under current law the IRS Code bars the filing of amended returns beyond the last three tax years. As a result, many of our disabled veterans are denied the opportunity to file a claim for repayment of additional years of back taxes already paid--through no fault of their own--even though the IRS owes them a refund for the taxes that were originally paid on their retiree pay.

The Disabled Veterans Tax Fairness Act of 2006 would add an exception to the IRS statute of limitations for amending returns. This exception would allow disabled military retirees whose disability claims have been pending for more than 3 years to receive refunds on previous taxes paid for all the years their claim was pending. Specifically, the bill would extend the IRS three year period of limitation for amending returns to one year from the date a VA determination is issued.

My father and grandfather both served our Nation in uniform and they taught me from an early age about the sacrifices our troops and their families have made to keep our Nation free. This is particularly true for our disabled veterans. During a time when a grateful Nation should be doing everything it can to honor those who have sacrificed so greatly on our behalf, the very least it can do is ensure they and their families are not unjustly penalized simply because of bureaucratic inefficiencies or administrative delays which are beyond their control. This situation is unacceptable and our veterans deserve better.

That is why I am proud to introduce this legislation today to provide relief to our Nation's veterans. It is the least we can do for those whom we owe so much, and it is the least we can do to reassure future generations that a grateful Nation will not forget them when their military service is complete.

Mr. President, I rise today with my colleague, Senator Craig Thomas, to introduce the Disabled Veterans Tax Fairness Act. This much-needed legislation would protect disabled veterans from being unfairly taxed on the benefits to which they are entitled, simply because their disability claims were not processed in a timely manner. This legislation is supported by the Military Coalition, a group representing more than 5.5 million members of the uniformed services and their families.

While the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) resolves most of its filed disability claims in less than a year, there are also instances of lost paperwork, administrative errors, and appeals of rejected claims that often delay thousands of disability awards for years on end. When this occurs, disability compensation is awarded retroactively and for tax purposes, a disabled veteran's previously received taxable military retiree pay is re-designated as nontaxable disability compensation. Thereby, the disabled veteran is entitled to a refund of taxes paid and must file an amended tax return for each applicable year.

Unfortunately, under current law the IRS Code bars the filing of amended returns beyond the last three tax years. As a result, many of our disabled veterans are denied the opportunity to file a claim for repayment of additional years of back taxes already paid--through no fault of their own--even though the IRS owes them a refund for the taxes that were originally paid on their retiree pay.

The Disabled Veterans Tax Fairness Act of 2006 would add an exception to the IRS statute of limitations for amending returns. This exception would allow disabled military retirees whose disability claims have been pending for more than 3 years to receive refunds on previous taxes paid for all the years their claim was pending. Specifically, the bill would extend the IRS three year period of limitation for amending returns to one year from the date a VA determination is issued.

My father and grandfather both served our Nation in uniform and they taught me from an early age about the sacrifices our troops and their families have made to keep our Nation free. This is particularly true for our disabled veterans. During a time when a grateful Nation should be doing everything it can to honor those who have sacrificed so greatly on our behalf, the very least it can do is ensure they and their families are not unjustly penalized simply because of bureaucratic inefficiencies or administrative delays which are beyond their control. This situation is unacceptable and our veterans deserve better.

That is why I am proud to introduce this legislation today to provide relief to our Nation's veterans. It is the least we can do for those whom we owe so much, and it is the least we can do to reassure future generations that a grateful Nation will not forget them when their military service is complete.

Mr. President, I rise today to add my voice to this debate on reforming our immigration system. While many of us here may have our differences, I think one thing on which we all agree is that the current system is broken and something must be done now if we are ever to get this situation under control.

There does seem to be a consensus in this body, and I think it is appropriate, that we absolutely must strengthen our borders. I personally believe that securing our borders has to be a priority in what we achieve in this legislation. Our borders have been porous for years and we must take adequate steps to secure them, and we must do it now.

This is a homeland security issue, first and foremost, but it is also a good government issue. American taxpayers continue to see their tax dollars spent on securing our borders without the results they deserve. While traffic from areas where we have placed more enforcement has decreased, border crossings in total have risen by 43 percent, despite tripling patrol personnel. The cost of an arrest has increased from 1992, when it was $300, to the cost of $1,700 in 2002.

Americans cannot afford this type of performance from a security standpoint or an economic standpoint. At a time when America is facing its most serious threat and dealing with record deficits, having our borders remaining unsecured as we spend more on them is simply unacceptable. It is unacceptable to the American people in terms of security and economics.

But securing our borders without dealing with the over 12 million undocumented immigrants who are in this country is not the solution either. One without the other is not going to achieve the results we want in the cost-effective way we must do it.

Many in this body are probably somewhat unaware that my State of Arkansas had the largest per-capita increase of its Hispanic population of any State in the Nation during the last census. Arkansas has become what is referred to as an emerging Hispanic community, with largely first-generation immigrants. These immigrants have a dramatic impact on our communities and on our economies. They are hard working, they are active in the religious community, they are law abiding, and they are putting their children through school. Whether they came here legally or illegally, they are establishing roots and we cannot dispute that. The majority of immigrants in my State came to the United States because they wanted good work and a better way of life for their families. A good number of them are educated and wanted to take advantage of the opportunities afforded to them in the U.S. economy. This is why a plan based on ripping these roots out of the ground and deporting over 10 million people is simply not realistic.

First, we couldn't afford it. Second, I am not sure we could implement it. And then think of what it would do to our economy.

While these people may have come here illegally, many of them have been here long enough now to have become part of the fabric of our communities. Removing them will break up families and it will hurt our local economies.

I am not saying we should grant amnesty, and neither does the amendment Senator Specter has offered. It is critical to know that amnesty is not the answer. No reform should grant amnesty. Total and immediate forgiveness for past crimes--these are not things we believe in this country. The rule of law is critical. To do so would severely undermine the rule of law in this country.

As I stated, it is impractical to believe, though, that we can simply round up and deport all illegals in this country. It is also unlikely we can coax illegals out of the shadows by offering them a limited period to remain in this country before we eventually deport them. They will continue to hide and move around in the same networks that have protected them thus far.

I believe the solution is earned legalization, and that is why I have supported the McCain-Kennedy bill and the similar bill that was passed out of the committee, offered as a substitute by Senator Specter.

Some have characterized these bills as amnesty. Amnesty is a general pardon for a previous crime. By contrast, this reform plan includes serious consequences for those who remain in our country illegally.

Under the committee bill, an illegal immigrant faces an immediate $1,000 fine, a security background check, application for a work visa, and an 11-year path to citizenship. Most immigrants who apply for citizenship now achieve that in 5 to 6 years. After staying continuously employed for 6 years, paying all back taxes, learning English--as my colleague from Oklahoma has expressed as being a very important part of this--learning U.S. history and government, and paying another $1,000 fine in application costs, the worker could then apply for a green card and legalization.

That is not going to the front of the line, but it is going to the end of the line after those who have already chosen a legal path to begin with. Their green card application, as I said, will go to the back of the line behind all the legal applicants who are waiting for those green cards. Finally, this path is only available to the illegal immigrants who were here before January of 2004.

This does not sound like amnesty to me. It sounds like a challenge but a challenge that presents excellent rewards instead of the dire consequences

we would suffer if we took an irrational reaction to this enormous problem that is growing in our Nation.

The other path for an illegal immigrant would be to continue trying to hide. But now, under increased enforcement measures and stiffer penalties as we have seen that we would put into place under this bill, I believe the majority of the people who have come here illegally but came to make a better life for themselves, will emerge from those shadows to become legal residents of their communities, to engage in what we came here to seek, because we have provided for them a pathway to become legal.

It comes at cost. It comes at great cost to them, both financially as well as the time they have to spend to engage themselves in becoming legal residents of this great Nation. But it is worth it to them and it is worth it to us to set this issue straight, to begin to reform a problem that is growing desperately out of control.

Many of them already pay local taxes in the communities where they are. Some of them are paying into Medicare and Social Security with no promise of receiving any of the benefits. But think how we could strengthen those programs if we put them on a pathway to legalization. We know who these 12 million undocumented workers are and we put them into the system to strengthen Social Security and Medicare by assuring that their withholdings are coming out and going into the system as well.

I am reminded of an incident in my home State of Arkansas. Recently, we saw law enforcement officials who were acting on a tip from an informant. These were national law enforcement officials. They did not contact the local law enforcement in our small communities there in Arkansas, but the folks from Washington swooped into a poultry processing plant and they arrested approximately 120 workers who were carrying forged or illegal identification documents.

What occurred there does not make what those illegal immigrants did right. It doesn't make it right at all. They were there illegally. They were there with forged documents. Actually, it was a local U.S. citizen in the community who had helped produce those documents for them. But I want you for a moment to think about what occurred after these Washington law enforcement officials swooped into a community without notifying the local law enforcement and seized 120 workers.

Most of these workers were parents. They are parents who were not allowed to call home to tell their children what was happening. We had children who were left behind in the care of the Catholic Church, or friends, or anybody who would take care of these children. Some of them were as young as 12 months old--kids abandoned because the parents were not allowed to call.

It was a sudden and brutal act and it separated families and left a community divided. Not because people wanted to defend the illegals who were there, the undocumented, or those who were there with false documents, but because of the way it was handled. That is what we are here to debate. Not that we differ about that. I don't think anybody in this body wants amnesty. They don't. What they want to do is to make sure we handle this issue in the right way.

I would imagine most of my colleagues in this body learned, as I did, at an early age from their parents that there is a right way and a wrong way to do everything. We have an opportunity to come together, to figure out the right way that is consistent with the American values we all hold dear, to figure out a solution to this enormous problem that continues to grow. It reflects on who we are as Americans with respect for the rule of law, making sure that people know they have to follow the law and they have to act within the confines of the law, but with the kind of encouragement that every human being should be allowed to reach their potential.

You can pay those fines, you can take the initiative and learn English and learn about this great country. You can get back at the end of the line after having tried to break into the line in front and still have the ability to reach that potential if you are willing to pay for your mistakes. That is what this bill is about.

When I think of the calls for the arrest and the deportation of 10 to 20 million undocumented immigrants in this country, I think of that frightful night in Arkansas where children and parents were severed in an unruly way. Their families were destroyed. Children were left by themselves without anyone to care for them because law enforcement had not thought that out.

I think of that frightful night in Arkansas and then I see it multiplied thousands of times across this country. That is not the right way to handle this issue. As Americans, we can be smart. Yes, we can be diligent and we can even be tough. But we can be tough in a way that reflects the values of who we are and how this Nation was created--by giving people opportunity and requiring responsibility.

We stand at a crossroads in this country. Over the last decade and a half, the Latino population has expanded in every area of our country, many of them coming here legally but some illegally. We are faced with a decision that gets to the heart of what values we hold dear as Americans. We have always said: If you work hard and you play by the rules, there is a place for you in America to raise your children and contribute to our great melting pot, to strengthen our communities, to be a part of this great land.

We are faced now with what to do with some who have broken the rules to come here but have since worked hard to provide for their families. I hope the Senate will give this very difficult question the reasoned and thorough debate it deserves, but that we will not forget the balance, the very intricate balance of American values that brings out the rule of law and the importance of the rule of law but also the desire and the compassion we feel. That is what the American spirit is all about.

I believe the Senate will agree to welcome those who came here illegally if they are willing to show another American value, and that is sacrifice. We all know a great deal about sacrifice as we see incredible Americans, men and women in the Armed Forces and all over this country, whether it is our emergency responders or others. If we see those who have come here illegally showing that willingness to exhibit that American value of sacrifice, then I think we as a body will be able to produce something to welcome them into our great society and our great Nation.

I urge my colleagues, as we continue in this debate, that we keep our heads calm and our minds open.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I compliment our colleague from Maine for her conscientious efforts, as well as her fiscally responsible efforts. I ask unanimous consent to add my name to her list of cosponsors and again tell her how much we appreciate all of the many issues that have landed in her lap this year and what an incredible job she has done, working with Senator Lieberman to address those. I ask unanimous consent to add my name as a cosponsor, please.

Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 3047.

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

Mr. President, I cannot imagine that the rest of my colleagues in this body are not hearing the same thing I hear, as I travel back each week to Arkansas, from my constituents. Always in the top three issues they bring up in the most passionate of ways happens to be how in the world are we in this Nation going to deal with the number of uninsured in this country, particularly in the small business arena?

Those Americans who are working hard, those trying to provide for their families, those keeping the framework and the foundation of our small communities together, those working in small businesses, how are we going to do a better job in this body in helping to provide health insurance for those who are uninsured and their families?

I rise today with my good friend Senator Durbin to propose an amendment to the budget resolution to provide $7.8 billion over 2 years to fund refundable tax credits targeted to small businesses with up to 100 employees so they may help purchase group health insurance for their low-wage workers.

I ask unanimous consent to add Senators Clinton, Kohl, and Cantwell as cosponsors of my amendment, and to take this opportunity as well to note that our amendment is endorsed by the National Association of Business Owners and the Small Business Majority.

Mr. President, my amendment would dedicate funding to help small businesses that are struggling to provide health insurance to their employees, and would do so in a way that is fiscally responsible. My amendment is completely offset by closing corporate tax loopholes that have been agreed upon by the Finance Committee as well as by this entire body, the Senate. These are ways in which we can make fiscally responsible decisions in closing loopholes that exist and pay for something that is absolutely vital to working families.

Unfortunately, the budget resolution before us doesn't specify either an amount to promote expanding health insurance coverage for employees of small businesses or a way to pay for it, which leads me to believe-- as do other Americans out there listening to this debate--that this is simply a priority for us.

We cannot continue to act as if this issue doesn't exist. The President has mentioned it year upon year in his State of the Union Addresses, and yet we are seeing increases by the millions of individuals who are finding themselves uninsured. There are nearly 46 million Americans currently without health insurance, including 456,000 Arkansans in my home State of Arkansas. Twenty percent of working-age adults are uninsured. These are people who are working and playing by the rules to provide for their families. This number is so alarming to me that addressing this problem should be a national priority.

Those who lack health insurance don't get access to timely and appropriate health care. They have less access to important screenings and state-of-the-art technology and prescription drugs. Working families need our help with this problem--and they need it now.

Senator Durbin and I have a bill to help small businesses afford health insurance, and a refundable tax credit to employers as an integral part of our proposal. Our responsible tax credit is targeted to help those who need it the most.

Low-wage workers and small businesses are significantly more likely to be uninsured than high-wage workers, and firms with a high proportion of low-wage workers are much less likely to offer insurance. Our tax credits are targeted to the firms and employees who need the most incentives to purchase health insurance coverage. Our tax credit goes to the employer because small employers believe offering health insurance has a positive impact on recruitment, retention, employees' attitude, performance, and health status.

The budget resolution fails to address this huge problem in our country. The budget is a blueprint, and it should clearly represent America's working families' needs and priorities. It is supposed to reflect what our choices will be when it comes time to spending the tax dollars of this country. This amendment is about priorities.

We must make a priority this growing number of uninsured in our country. They are working families, playing by the rules, trying desperately to contribute to their great Nation. One of

the things we can do is provide the employers the incentive they need to provide the kind of health insurance working families can use and need.

The underlying proposal Senator Durbin and I have offered presents working families' ability to have the similar kind of health insurance that I and all of the Federal employees here have access to. What greater opportunity to provide greater choice at a lower cost. This is the tool that can make that happen. Providing a tax incentive to small businesses to be able to purchase and assist their employees--their low-wage workers--with the ability to engage in the insurance market and provide the ability to mitigate against their health care and their health care costs is absolutely essential, not just for the quality of life of working Americans but also think of what it does for our economy.

We have a great opportunity in this budget to set priorities that are important to the working families of this country. I urge my colleagues, let us come together and do something for our small businesses and working families--and do something now.

I ask my colleagues to support our amendment and look forward to the opportunity we have to do something about the escalating costs of health care and what it means to working families in this Nation.

I request the yeas and nays on my amendment.

Mr. President, I thank my colleague.

I come to the floor today to offer an amendment on behalf of rural America. If there is anything that has been consistent in this administration's budget, it has been that there has been more asked from rural America in terms of the burden of cuts that have happened and a disproportionate share of the labor-intensive ideas of how we are going to deal with incredible spending.

I offer this amendment on behalf of rural America. I thank Senators Salazar, Pryor, Harkin, and Kohl for joining me in this effort.

I am pleased to ask unanimous consent to add Senators Durbin and Schumer as cosponsors.

Mr. President, our amendment would restore approximately $2 billion in discretionary cuts proposed for programs administered by the U.S. Department of Agriculture in fiscal year 2007. To pay for these investments in rural America, our amendment would raise the discretionary cap by $2 billion and offset these expenditures by closing corporate tax loopholes which have passed the Senate on numerous occasions.

The proposed discretionary cuts for USDA impact a variety of conservation, rural development, nutrition, and forestry programs that are vitally important to our communities across this great Nation.

Mr. President, you and all other Members of this Senate have rural areas in your States and know the difficult times they are going through. They do not have the tax base. They may not have the corporate citizens in those areas that help them build this economy. These programs are vital to them in terms of developing the kind of economy they want and can have. They are not asking to be a major metropolitan area. They are simply asking to be the best they can possibly be.

The discretionary spending would decline $208 million in fiscal year 2007 in conservation. Rural development would see a decline of $421 million less than in fiscal year 2007, and research would see a 14.6 percent reduction from the fiscal year 2006 appropriations.

I ask all of my colleagues, whether you represent a major metropolitan area or rural America, you know the fabric of this country depends on all of us. Please do not ask for a disproportionate share of rural America, and do not devastate the incredible advances they have already been able to make. Let us help them grow with the rest of America in their great effort.

I urge my colleagues to support me in the WIC Program, the nutrition program, the conservation program, and all of the others that rural America depends on.

Amendment No. 3136, As Modified

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

Mr. President, I call up my amendment numbered 3106 which I described to my colleagues.

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

I appreciate my colleagues' attention on this and encourage their support in supporting rural America.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, in this administration's budget, time and time again rural America has been asked to give disproportionately, whether it is to deficit reduction, the war in Iraq, or anything else. Quite frankly, I think it is important for us to look seriously at the priorities of this budget but, more importantly, to look at rural America and what it means to the fabric of this country.

There are cuts in this budget to supplemental nutrition programs for women, infants, and children. USDA's rural housing program is cut by $259 million, resource conservation and development council, world business enterprise grant, telemedicine, State and private forestry programs, cooperative agriculture and food safety research units--all of these issues are critical to rural America. They don't have the corporate tax base or corporate citizenry out there that is going to support them.

If we want the way of life in this country to be maintained with both the fabric of this country being built by our urban areas and our rural areas, it is essential that we support the people and the working families in those areas.

I ask my colleagues to look at conservation, WIC, all of these programs and how important they are in your State.

Mr. President, I rise today in support of amendment No. 3048 proposed by Senators Specter and Harkin to restore funding for the Labor, Health and Human Services and Education appropriations bill to fiscal year 2005 levels.

This amendment would restore funding to many important programs, including one that is quite important to Arkansas as well as our Nation--the Geriatric Health Professions program. Title VII funding for geriatrics training is the only Federal program that specifically develops academic geriatricians at a time when more are needed. The fiscal year 2006 Labor-HHS bill eliminated several programs, including this program.

Geriatric health professions programs support geriatric education centers, faculty fellowships, and Academic Career Awards. The academic career award programs support the career development of geriatricians in junior faculty positions who are committed to teaching geriatrics in medical schools across the country. Geriatric Training programs train health professionals who plan to teach geriatric medicine, geriatric dentistry, or geriatric behavioral or mental health. Geriatric Education Centers train health professionals, faculty, students, and practitioners in diagnosis, treatment, disease prevention, disability, and other health problems of the aged.

In 2005, Geriatric Education Centers alone reported delivery of low- cost professional geriatric training interventions to over 50,000 health care providers who collectively reported over 8.6 million patient encounters and enhanced quality of care provided to older adults.

Since 2000, the Arkansas Geriatric Education Center has trained and educated 10,340 health professionals, most of whom practice in rural areas, and has awarded over 54,000 hours of continuing education. The center had been funded through a grant from the Bureau of Health Professions, Health Resources and Services Administration.

Yet at the end of 2005 all funding for title VII geriatric health professions programs was eliminated from the 2006 Federal budget. The elimination of this program runs counter to recommendations from the 1,200 delegates to the 2005 White House Conference on Aging where enhancing the geriatric workforce ranked as 2 of the top 10 list of recommendations. Furthermore, it ignores the well documented shortage of geriatricians and specialized care needs of the older portion of the baby boomer population. Congress must renew its commitment to geriatric health professions training if the nation is to avert a crisis in access to geriatric care for older Americans.

The elimination of title VII funding for geriatric health professions training programs is a grave threat to the health of geriatric medicine. As the number of new physicians going into geriatrics declines and those already in the field approach retirement age, incentives rather than cuts are needed in programs that enhance the training of health professionals in geriatrics. Eliminating these funds will result in decreased access for the growing number of older patients in our country in need of the specialized care provided by geriatric healthcare professionals.

I urge my colleagues to support this important amendment which would restore funding to the geriatric health professions program, among other programs critical to the health of our Nation.

Vote Explanation

Mr. President, today, I rise in support of an amendment to the budget resolution that would provide an additional $1.5 billion for our veterans. I am a cosponsor of this amendment because this budget's modest increase in veterans funding is only a small step toward addressing the needs of veterans in Arkansas and across the country. It does not go far enough.

I continue to hear from Arkansas veterans who have been subject to increasingly long waiting lists for VA hospital appointments and who have experienced unnecessary hardships because the VA does not have the resources to process their benefits applications in a timely manner. This situation is unacceptable and our veterans deserve better.

As we look to the VA to provide for our growing veterans population and to meet the evolving health care needs of our returning brave men and women in uniform, we must ensure that the VA is provided with the resources it desperately needs to meet these challenges.

This amendment, which I am proud to support and cosponsor, would enable the VA to better absorb the new veterans being added to the system and would provide much-needed funding for the growing mental health care needs of our veterans. Additionally, this amendment rejects the budget provisions proposed by the President that would impose a $250 enrollment fee and a doubling of the cost of prescription drug copayments from $8 to $15. These provisions would force thousands of middle-income veterans to pay substantially more for their care.

As the daughter of a Korean war veteran, I was taught from an early age about the sacrifices our troops have to make to keep our Nation free, and have been grateful for the service of so many of our brave men and women from the State of Arkansas. On behalf of them and their families, I will continue to fight to ensure they are provided with the benefits, pay, and health care that they have earned. It is the least we can do for those whom we owe so much and to reassure future generations that a grateful Nation will not forget them when their military service is complete. I urge my colleagues to support this amendment because it is our moral responsibility to do so. It is the right thing to do and it should be a priority for each and every one of us.

I thank my colleague from Montana, Senator Baucus, who, as always, does a tremendous job in helping the entire Senate stay focused on what is important, helping us to reflect on where our values lie as Americans, and certainly for us as leaders of this great Nation.

I come to the Senate today to once again discuss an issue that is near and dear to my heart, an issue that is of great importance to all working families across this country. As we look now at what working families are going through--astronomically high fuel prices, what it is costing them to heat their homes; the cost of health care; the cost of educating their children and saving for higher education, which is going to increase again this year and years to come; trying to be competitive in their jobs and the global economy--in looking at these issues, I and many other Senators have recognized how tough it is for working families across this country.

In 2001, and again in 2003, Senator Snowe of Maine and I worked together, with the help of our chairman on the Committee on Finance, Senator Grassley, and our ranking member, Senator Baucus, to ensure that low-income working families with children receive the benefit of the child tax credit. It is so important to remind ourselves: we know how near and dear our children are to us; other people's children are just as near and dear to them, regardless of their income level.

As the chairman said earlier today, I, too, feel a bit as though I am trapped in that movie ``Groundhog Day,'' although for a different reason. I feel that I am trapped in ``Groundhog Day'' life. I have been in this instance time and time again, and I come to the Senate today to again ask my colleagues to help me ensure that low-income working families are not forgotten as we discuss tax relief. It is absolutely essential we put ourselves in the shoes of other working Americans, the working families who are the fabric of this great Nation, and say: We believe your children are just as important as our children to the future of this country.

I applaud the action taken in the Senate the week before last. I was pleased we affirmed that the permanency of the child tax credit is a priority of the Senate and should be addressed during conference on this tax reconciliation bill. Even though I applaud that effort, I still say it is not enough. It is not enough to not look further and see those working Americans who are still not going to be helped. It is not enough because the credit in its current form does not work for all low-income working families.

We can and should take one additional step. As some may be aware, to be eligible for the refundable child tax credit, working families must meet an income threshold. If they do not earn enough, they do not qualify for the child credit. The problem is, some of our parents are working full time every week of the year. Yet they still do not earn enough to meet the income threshold to qualify for the credit, much less to receive a meaningful refund.

Heaven forbid we look at what they are making. Is it enough to safely and adequately raise their children? We have an obligation to make sure those people, those hard-working Americans who were willing to play by the rules to get a job, to work hard, to perform things that are important to our quality of life, too, that they have the same opportunity to love and nurture their children and work hard to provide their children a better opportunity than they may have had.

I will say this again because it is right and it is important people know. I will say it again to make sure the point is not missed. We have full-time working parents who do not qualify for the child tax credit because their incomes are simply too low. Again, people playing by the rules, working hard so our lives might be a little bit better, yet under minimum wage, they do not make enough.

If we are talking about American values, if we are talking about family values, if we want to reinforce the aspect of work instead of handouts, if we want to reinforce caring for all of America's children because we know all of America's children are part of our future, our future leaders, if what we want to do is reinforce working, caring for our children, taking the responsibility of our families--that does not mean just my children or just a few children; it means all children-- are we not then going to step up to the plate and say to those hard- working Americans that your children are just as important as my children?

In 2003, the income threshold was set at $10,500. The threshold is indexed for inflation and thus has increased the last 2 years. It was $10,750 in 2004 and $11,000 in 2005. And, yes, it will go up again in 2006.

Unfortunately, the low-income worker's wage is not increasing at the same pace, or even at all, for that matter, as we look at the low- income working wages that exist in this country. A single working mother or father in the State of Arkansas or across this Nation perhaps, who makes minimum wage, is going to get $5.15, working a 40- hour week, every week of the year. That is not taking a vacation, taking their family to the beach, going to Disney World or anything else. It is working a 40-hour week, every week of the year, 52 weeks out of the year, with an income of only $10,712 a year. That came

in under the threshold, both in 2004 and 2005; it will, most definitely, come in below the threshold this year, in 2006.

It is wrong--it is absolutely wrong--to provide this credit to some hard-working Americans while leaving others behind. The single, working parent who is stocking the shelves in your local grocery store is every bit as deserving as the teacher or accountant or insurance salesman who qualifies for the credit in its current form. And, yes, they love their children just as much as you and I love our children and want for them all of the great things that are available to young American children when they can be nurtured and cared for and encouraged and taken care of in their families.

We must address this inequity, and we must ensure our Tax Code works for all Americans, especially those working parents forced to get by on minimum wage.

Senator Snowe and I have proposed a solution to this horrible inequity. If we were to simply de-index the income threshold and set it at a reasonable level, such as $10,000, all full-time working parents, including those making minimum wage, would qualify.

We talk day in and day out about how important our children are. We talk about making them a priority in this country and recognizing how they weave the fabric of this great Nation and the future. We understand, as parents, it is not easy. It is not easy to raise children in this environment, with everything from Internet security to making sure education is available, and health care, including simple nutritional needs. We have 600,000 Arkansans living with food insecurity, the majority of which are children.

Why is it we cannot take the extra step to make sure that, again, those who are playing by the rules, those who are willing to work, to work to care for their children and their families--we are not going to give them the same benefit of that Tax Code?

This is a simple, easy solution Senator Snowe and I have offered to a very serious problem. I will not rest until we get it done. As we prepare to enter conference with the House on this tax reconciliation bill, I encourage my colleagues to support Senator Snowe and me in our efforts to fix this inequity.

As many of you may recall, the last time Senator Snowe and I went to work to improve the child tax credit, back during the debate of the President's tax package in 2003, tax relief for low-income families was left behind in the conference. I hope we have changed. I hope we have refocused ourselves and our priorities. I hope we do recognize all working American families are struggling today with high gas prices, the cost of health care, and higher education--education at all--that all working families are struggling to heat and cool their homes with high energy costs and are struggling to keep the jobs they have in their globally competitive companies.

Please, let's not repeat this mistake again. If the opportunity arises to take action on the child tax credit in this conference, we must not only extend it, we must ensure that it works for all of America's working families.

We should always remember that budgets reflect priorities, the priorities of those who put those budgets together. We know priorities create choices. The choices we make in budgets and in decisions on the floor of the Senate and in conferences over such critical issues--our choices--have real and substantive consequences, not just to those working families out there who so desperately want success for their child, but it has consequences for our Nation. If we set our priorities so low that we leave behind the children of hard-working American families, the consequences for our Nation will be great.

I thank you, Mr. President, and again encourage my colleagues to support the efforts not only of a child tax credit but also making sure it is fair to all working families of our Nation.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I rise today to honor a young man from Arkansas who recently lost his life while heroically serving our Nation in uniform. SPC Dustin Kendall will be remembered by those who knew him as a charming and charismatic young man, who was beloved by his friends and family and had a special gift for bringing smiles to the faces of everyone he met.

Growing up with a brother and four sisters, Specialist Kendall spent his childhood as many children do: playing sports, causing mischief, and enjoying the company of his family and friends. As the son of missionaries, he spent his childhood in a variety of places and wherever he ended up, his outgoing and friendly nature was sure to follow. These qualities allowed him to make friends quickly and adapt to new surroundings, and that was certainly the case when his family moved to Bryant, an Arkansas town just south of Little Rock, in 2002. In Bryant, Specialist Kendall worked at a local restaurant, where he became a favorite of the regular customers, while he finished his schooling. Later, when his parents moved to Europe to continue their missionary work, he stayed in Arkansas to continue classes at the University of Central Arkansas in nearby Conway. At UCA, he studied business but was considering following one of his passions and pursuing a career in golf, possibly in golf-course design.

As a student, Specialist Kendall joined the U.S. Army Reserve for primarily financial reasons but, over time, came to enjoy his military life and was ultimately considering a career in the Army. Upon signing up for active duty last summer, he was stationed at Fort Carson, CO, before being deployed with his unit to Iraq in November of 2005. In Iraq, Specialist Kendall served with the 68th Armor Regiment of the 3rd Heavy Brigade Combat Team, where he served with distinction, most recently as a bodyguard for an Army colonel. Tragically, he was killed on January 15 in Baqouba, Iraq, when his military humvee was accidentally struck by an American Abrams tank. He was 21 years old.

A memorial service was held for Specialist Kendall on January 21, in Summerville, SC. Many of his friends and his family gathered to remember the charming young man with the infectious smile and to honor the brave soldier who had given his life in the fight for freedom. Although words cannot convey the sorrow felt by his loved ones, I hope they may find some solace remembering the way he lived his life and knowing that he touched the lives of so many others. My thoughts and prayers go out to his parents, Brandi Lee and Penelope Jean, his brother and his sisters, and to all those who knew and loved him. His time with us was far too short but his spirit will live on in us forever.