Floor Statements

Mr. President, I rise today to join my colleagues, Senator Kennedy, Senator Enzi, and Senator Alexander in introducing the Head Start for School Readiness Act. I am pleased that we are beginning the process of reauthorizing this important legislation early in the 110th Congress.

Since 1965, Head Start has provided comprehensive early childhood development services to low-income children. The evidence is clear: Head Start works for the more than 900,000 children enrolled in centers throughout the country. As we reauthorize this bill, we have the opportunity to refine and improve the program to make it work even better.

This reauthorization bill maintains the important characteristics of Head Start that have made it such an important program, aiding in the social, emotional, physical and cognitive development of low-income preschool children. The program is successful because each center addresses the needs of the local community. It is more than just a school readiness program; it addresses the comprehensive needs of children and their families by providing health and other services to the enrolled children. Families play the most important role in ensuring the success of their children, and our bill maintains an integral role for parents in the decision-making and day to day operations of the program. Parent involvement is a centerpiece of Head Start and I believe this bill strengthens that component.

This reauthorization bill expands eligibility, improves accountability by clarifying program governance, strengthens school readiness for children and enhances teacher quality. In addition, collaboration and coordination with other early childhood development programs and outreach to underserved populations is greatly improved.

The bill we're introducing enables more low-income children to get a head start by allowing programs to serve families with incomes up to 130 percent of the poverty level, while ensuring that the most vulnerable families below the poverty level are served first. This is important for Connecticut and other States where the cost of living is especially high and many working poor families aren't able to access services because they earn just above the poverty level. In addition, the bill expands access to services for infants and toddlers in Early Head Start by increasing the set-aside from 10 percent to 20 percent over the next 5 years. Programs are also provided more discretion to serve eligible individuals based on the needs of the each community.

Although we do not go as far as I would personally like to see in funding for Head Start, we do authorize additional resources in this bill. Despite the tight budget situation, we authorize an increase of six percent from $6.9 billion to $7.35 billion in Fiscal Year 2008, to $7.65 billion in Fiscal Year 2009 and to $7.995 billion in Fiscal Year 2009. I continue to be gravely concerned about the lack of resources for Head Start--funding levels have been essentially flat since 2002. Currently, only half of eligible children are served in Head Start and fewer than 5 percent are served in Early Head Start.

Across the country, Head Start providers are reporting rising costs in transportation, some more than 15 percent due to fuel prices. Other budget concerns include higher unemployment and health care premiums, facilities maintenance and training for staff. Rising operating costs are coinciding with State, local and private funding partners cutting back their contributions to local Head Start programs. This terrible budget crunch has caused providers to make deep cuts in already tight budgets, as they try desperately to not remove children from their enrollments. I understand the challenges facing the Federal budget and look forward to continuing to work with my colleagues on the budget and appropriations committees to increase vital resources for Head Start.

Research shows that child outcomes are directly related to the quality of the teachers and professionals who work with them on a daily basis. I am pleased that we establish goals in this Head Start bill for improving educational standards for Head Start teachers, curriculum specialists and teacher assistants. Understanding that dedicated Head Start teachers and staff work hard for relatively low wages, there will not be penalties associated with programs not meeting the goal we have established. I would hope that we could offer funding to help teachers meet these goals, but that is not possible at this juncture. I will continue to work toward increased funding to assist teachers in pursuing additional educational goals.

When Head Start began more than 40 years ago, it was the only preschool program available for low-income children; now there are many approaches. Collaboration and coordination with other early childhood programs is also an essential piece of this Head Start bill, reducing duplication and encouraging opportunities for shared information and resources.

I look forward to working with my colleagues as we move this bill through the Senate.

Mr. President, I rise today to join my colleagues, Senator Kennedy, Senator Enzi, and Senator Alexander in introducing the Head Start for School Readiness Act. I am pleased that we are beginning the process of reauthorizing this important legislation early in the 110th Congress.

Since 1965, Head Start has provided comprehensive early childhood development services to low-income children. The evidence is clear: Head Start works for the more than 900,000 children enrolled in centers throughout the country. As we reauthorize this bill, we have the opportunity to refine and improve the program to make it work even better.

This reauthorization bill maintains the important characteristics of Head Start that have made it such an important program, aiding in the social, emotional, physical and cognitive development of low-income preschool children. The program is successful because each center addresses the needs of the local community. It is more than just a school readiness program; it addresses the comprehensive needs of children and their families by providing health and other services to the enrolled children. Families play the most important role in ensuring the success of their children, and our bill maintains an integral role for parents in the decision-making and day to day operations of the program. Parent involvement is a centerpiece of Head Start and I believe this bill strengthens that component.

This reauthorization bill expands eligibility, improves accountability by clarifying program governance, strengthens school readiness for children and enhances teacher quality. In addition, collaboration and coordination with other early childhood development programs and outreach to underserved populations is greatly improved.

The bill we're introducing enables more low-income children to get a head start by allowing programs to serve families with incomes up to 130 percent of the poverty level, while ensuring that the most vulnerable families below the poverty level are served first. This is important for Connecticut and other States where the cost of living is especially high and many working poor families aren't able to access services because they earn just above the poverty level. In addition, the bill expands access to services for infants and toddlers in Early Head Start by increasing the set-aside from 10 percent to 20 percent over the next 5 years. Programs are also provided more discretion to serve eligible individuals based on the needs of the each community.

Although we do not go as far as I would personally like to see in funding for Head Start, we do authorize additional resources in this bill. Despite the tight budget situation, we authorize an increase of six percent from $6.9 billion to $7.35 billion in Fiscal Year 2008, to $7.65 billion in Fiscal Year 2009 and to $7.995 billion in Fiscal Year 2009. I continue to be gravely concerned about the lack of resources for Head Start--funding levels have been essentially flat since 2002. Currently, only half of eligible children are served in Head Start and fewer than 5 percent are served in Early Head Start.

Across the country, Head Start providers are reporting rising costs in transportation, some more than 15 percent due to fuel prices. Other budget concerns include higher unemployment and health care premiums, facilities maintenance and training for staff. Rising operating costs are coinciding with State, local and private funding partners cutting back their contributions to local Head Start programs. This terrible budget crunch has caused providers to make deep cuts in already tight budgets, as they try desperately to not remove children from their enrollments. I understand the challenges facing the Federal budget and look forward to continuing to work with my colleagues on the budget and appropriations committees to increase vital resources for Head Start.

Research shows that child outcomes are directly related to the quality of the teachers and professionals who work with them on a daily basis. I am pleased that we establish goals in this Head Start bill for improving educational standards for Head Start teachers, curriculum specialists and teacher assistants. Understanding that dedicated Head Start teachers and staff work hard for relatively low wages, there will not be penalties associated with programs not meeting the goal we have established. I would hope that we could offer funding to help teachers meet these goals, but that is not possible at this juncture. I will continue to work toward increased funding to assist teachers in pursuing additional educational goals.

When Head Start began more than 40 years ago, it was the only preschool program available for low-income children; now there are many approaches. Collaboration and coordination with other early childhood programs is also an essential piece of this Head Start bill, reducing duplication and encouraging opportunities for shared information and resources.

I look forward to working with my colleagues as we move this bill through the Senate.

Mr. President, I rise today to express my support for the confirmation of General George Casey to become the next Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army.

Let us be clear. Our soldiers are fighting a grueling and dangerous war. They need to know that their leaders will have no higher priority than their safety and well-being. I believe that General Casey will do just that.

He has been on the frontlines of the war in Iraq. As commander of U.S. forces there, he has overseen operations on the ground; he understands our soldiers' basic needs and will take action to keep them fighting safely and effectively.

I believe that in this new position, like GEN Peter Schoomaker before him, he will work hard to ensure that our soldiers have the equipment and support they need to get the job done.

Regrettably, I am concerned that some in this administration and in this Congress have decided to blame General Casey for the worsening situation on the ground. To them I would say that it is simply wrong, and frankly un-American, to hold one soldier responsible for the administration's policy failures in Iraq.

In his book, ``Deriliction of Duty,'' H.R. McMasters put the blame for Vietnam on our military leaders. To McMasters, it was our generals who were at fault for not speaking out when they disagreed with the civilians at the Pentagon and White House.

As a result of their silence, America became further entrenched in Vietnam. Nine years ago, then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff GEN Hugh Shelton took this message to heart; requiring all 17 four-star general commanders to read Major McMasters' book. The book had an impact. As the situation in Iraq has deteriorated, we have seen our generals stand up to civilian leaders--putting their country before their careers--and courageously advocating for alternative, more sensible policies.

Unfortunately, the same arrogance and incompetence that has blinded U.S. foreign policy for the past 6 years has also allowed the dire warnings from these generals to fall on deaf ears. The candor from the likes of Generals Shinseki and Riggs, and now Abizaid, Casey, and Schoomaker, has been rewarded with dismissal, transfer or demotion.

In my private meeting with General Casey in Iraq 2 months ago, he explained his concern over proposals to ``surge'' additional troops into Iraq if Iraqis are unable to meet their own responsibilities to unite politically and contribute more meaningfully to their own security.

He echoed these objections along with then-Central Command's top general, GEN John Abizaid, in a Washington Post report on December 21, 2006.

Obviously, General Casey is uniquely qualified to make these statements. He has been thoroughly immersed in our Iraq operations. And it is for this reason that he is uniquely prepared to assume the Army Chief of Staff post.

But there is another quality of his that I believe will also serve our Nation and our Army well during his tenure as Chief of Staff. It his is loyalty to our soldiers--from the newly enlisted private to the career officer.

I observed this quality firsthand 3 years ago on a visit to Walter Reed Medical Center. I met with soldiers recuperating from injuries they had suffered in Iraq and Afghanistan, and expressed my gratitude for their brave service.

General Casey happened to be at Walter Reed that day as well. I knew he was there for the same reason I was: to thank these soldiers for their service and to assure them that their sacrifices will never be forgotten.

The Chief of Staff must constantly exhibit such loyalty to his troops. He must be their strongest advocate and continue to address their needs, even when doing so is in direct conflict with the orders being handed down from civilian leadership. General Schoomaker, the outgoing Chief of Staff, has been faced with this situation time and again as the administration proposed inadequate budgets to carry out their deeply flawed Iraq strategy. And he has performed superbly.

As Chief of Staff for the last few years, General Schoomaker, has long voiced concern that the administration failed to budget for the replacement and repair of thousands of war-battered trucks, aircraft, and vehicles. In fact, it was General Schoomaker's testimony last year that compelled me to offer an amendment to fund these priorities and help begin restoring Army readiness. I regret that the White House decided to reward General Schoomaker's candor by replacing him at the Pentagon.

At his recent confirmation hearing the other day, I was pleased to hear that General Casey will resume General Schoomaker's mission to ensure that our forces are outfitted with the equipment they need to get the job done.

Mr. President, there are no easy answers in Iraq. But, when it comes to discerning tactics on the ground, our civilian leaders must defer to our generals. In this case, it is my sincere hope that the President takes heed of the advice of his newly installed Army Chief of Staff, to make the safety and well-being of our soldiers a top priority and not an afterthought. I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting this nominee for confirmation.

Mr. President, I thank my seatmate and colleague from West Virginia. I just want to add my voice to those who have spoken and those who are about to speak in saying that--just to repeat what Senator Leahy said well--we use the words ``Senator's Senator'' with some frequency here, but if I were to ask the question of which Senators reflected that expression more so than anyone else, it would have to be my colleague from West Virginia and my colleague from Mississippi. It is a pleasure to serve with him. I admire him immensely. He is exactly what a Senator ought to be: a good legislator and a good person who cares about his country, and I am proud to serve with him.

Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act, legislation to provide for the investigation and prosecution of unsolved civil rights crimes. In this effort, I am proud to be joined by Senator Leahy.

There are those who would say this bill is a case of ``too little, too late.'' In some ways they would be right. Where is the justice, I suppose, when a monster such as Edgar Ray Killen roamed free for literally decades after killing young civil rights workers in this country? That fact alone speaks to the inexcusable failures of our legal system to bring to justice those who committed brutal crimes based solely on racial prejudice.

Not that many years ago, crimes of this type were rarely investigated in parts of our country. There was often little or no effort made whatsoever to determine who engaged in these brutal violent acts. In more recent history, of course, we have seen much stronger efforts and I applaud this work. However, I believe there remains good justification for dedicating an adequate amount of resources to go back and reopen the books on those tragic unsolved crimes. Those who engaged in these activities, who think they never have to worry another day in their lives about being pursued, take note--take note that you may never and should never have a sleep-filled night again, that we will pursue you as long as you live, that we will do everything in our power to apprehend you and bring you to the bar of justice.

That is the message we want to convey to the families, the friends, and others who lost loved ones, who put their lives on the line by advocating for greater justice, helping our Nation achieve that ``more perfect union'' that our Founders spoke about, that Abraham Lincoln articulated brilliantly more than a century and a half ago.

That is at the heart of this effort--to try to level this field. We will never be a perfect union, but each generation bears the responsibility for getting us closer to that ideal.

America stands for the principle of equal justice for all. Yet for far too long, many Americans have been denied that equal justice, and many despicable criminals have not been held accountable for what they have done to deprive people of those equal opportunities. This is a failure we can never forget.

So this Senate, in this Congress, on this date, early in the 21st century, is saying that we will not forget. This bill is on record. This bill seeks to right the wrongs of the past and to bring justice to people who perpetrated these heinous crimes because of racial hatred. We are saying that we want to create the mechanism to allow us to pursue these wrongdoers in the coming years. It cannot bring back and make whole those who have suffered and were murdered by a racist criminal hand. But it can reaffirm our Nation's commitment to seek the truth and to make equal justice a reality.

To do this, we propose the creation of two new offices. The Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Investigative Office will be a division of the Federal Bureau of Investigation devoted to the aggressive investigation of pre-1970 cases in coordination with local law enforcement officials. The Unsolved Crimes Section will be an office within the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice and will focus specifically on prosecuting those cases investigated by the new FBI office.

The hour is, obviously, very late. Memories are dimming. Those who can bring some important information to the legal authorities are passing away. This bill may be the last and best chance we have as a nation to write a hopeful postscript in the struggle for racial equality in our Nation.

We are pleased to be working with our friends in the House to help right these wrongs done in our past, especially Representative John Lewis, who has worked throughout his distinguished life to make sure that the promise of America can be realized for all our citizens.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that a copy of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Act, legislation to provide for the investigation and prosecution of unsolved civil rights crimes. In this effort, I am proud to be joined by Senator Leahy.

There are those who would say this bill is a case of ``too little, too late.'' In some ways they would be right. Where is the justice, I suppose, when a monster such as Edgar Ray Killen roamed free for literally decades after killing young civil rights workers in this country? That fact alone speaks to the inexcusable failures of our legal system to bring to justice those who committed brutal crimes based solely on racial prejudice.

Not that many years ago, crimes of this type were rarely investigated in parts of our country. There was often little or no effort made whatsoever to determine who engaged in these brutal violent acts. In more recent history, of course, we have seen much stronger efforts and I applaud this work. However, I believe there remains good justification for dedicating an adequate amount of resources to go back and reopen the books on those tragic unsolved crimes. Those who engaged in these activities, who think they never have to worry another day in their lives about being pursued, take note--take note that you may never and should never have a sleep-filled night again, that we will pursue you as long as you live, that we will do everything in our power to apprehend you and bring you to the bar of justice.

That is the message we want to convey to the families, the friends, and others who lost loved ones, who put their lives on the line by advocating for greater justice, helping our Nation achieve that ``more perfect union'' that our Founders spoke about, that Abraham Lincoln articulated brilliantly more than a century and a half ago.

That is at the heart of this effort--to try to level this field. We will never be a perfect union, but each generation bears the responsibility for getting us closer to that ideal.

America stands for the principle of equal justice for all. Yet for far too long, many Americans have been denied that equal justice, and many despicable criminals have not been held accountable for what they have done to deprive people of those equal opportunities. This is a failure we can never forget.

So this Senate, in this Congress, on this date, early in the 21st century, is saying that we will not forget. This bill is on record. This bill seeks to right the wrongs of the past and to bring justice to people who perpetrated these heinous crimes because of racial hatred. We are saying that we want to create the mechanism to allow us to pursue these wrongdoers in the coming years. It cannot bring back and make whole those who have suffered and were murdered by a racist criminal hand. But it can reaffirm our Nation's commitment to seek the truth and to make equal justice a reality.

To do this, we propose the creation of two new offices. The Unsolved Civil Rights Crime Investigative Office will be a division of the Federal Bureau of Investigation devoted to the aggressive investigation of pre-1970 cases in coordination with local law enforcement officials. The Unsolved Crimes Section will be an office within the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice and will focus specifically on prosecuting those cases investigated by the new FBI office.

The hour is, obviously, very late. Memories are dimming. Those who can bring some important information to the legal authorities are passing away. This bill may be the last and best chance we have as a nation to write a hopeful postscript in the struggle for racial equality in our Nation.

We are pleased to be working with our friends in the House to help right these wrongs done in our past, especially Representative John Lewis, who has worked throughout his distinguished life to make sure that the promise of America can be realized for all our citizens.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that a copy of the bill be printed in the Record.

Madam President, how much time remains?

Madam President, let me commend my colleague from the State of Washington for her comments and her views. I associate myself with many of the things she expressed in the Senate. I congratulate her for her words, her passion, and her strong feelings about where we stand today on this issue.

Let me also commend the Democratic leader for his efforts to engage in what is probably the single most important debate this Senate could possibly be engaged in. There are other very important matters at home and around the globe--but everyone would agree, regardless of your views on policy, that the issue of Iraq and where we stand and the effort by the President to increase the number of troops on the ground in Iraq, particularly to place them in the large, highly densely populated urban areas of Iraq, is one of the most serious issues facing our country.

We have had a series of serious and thought-provoking hearings conducted by Chairman Biden of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee over the last number of weeks on this issue, with people who represent a variety of ideological perspectives. Yet without fear of contradiction, I believe the overwhelming majority of the witnesses who have appeared before that committee have expressed serious reservations about this escalation, this surge, placing some 21,000 of our young men and women into Baghdad to try and act as a referee in what we all admit today is clearly a civil war.

Having this debate is important. I wish to take, if I can, the few minutes allotted to me to express my concerns about the process, my concerns about the surge, and my concerns about the overall direction of the policy in Iraq. There is not a lot of time to do that, but let me share some thoughts.

First of all, I believe that every Member in this Chamber, regardless of his or her view on the issue before the Senate regarding Iraq, would do everything he or she could to make sure that our brave men and women in uniform, serving in harm's way, would receive everything they could possibly need to defend themselves. That ought not to be a debating point. I know of no one in this Senate who feels otherwise. And the fact that we have to have some discussion about this very point is a reflection, I think, of what has gone wrong in this debate already.

In fact, I point out that over the last 4 years or so, there have been amendments offered by those of us here to provide different additional resources, such as for body armor, because we felt our troops were not getting what they needed. There has been significant discussion here in the wake of testimony offered by our senior military leaders about what has happened to the combat readiness of our troops as a result of our failure to continue to provide the kind of equipment and support they deserved over the years. Certainly what has happened to veterans coming back has also been the subject of debate. But, nonetheless, I believe most Members here, if not all Members here, believe our troops deserve the kind of support they ought to have when they are serving in harm's way.

And so, the debate is not whether you support our troops. The debate is whether the policy direction the President wishes to lead us in is the right one. That is a debate which ought to occur in this Chamber. Frankly, in my view, it ought to be a debate that resolves around at least a legislative vehicle that might have some meaning to it, some bite, some teeth, some reality, some accountability.

My leaders know I have strong reservations about a sense-of-the- Senate debate. Now, normally, we have sense-of-the-Senate resolutions when there is a consensus that develops. Normally, sense-of-the-Senate resolutions are offered around matters that are noncontroversial and we wish to express ourselves regarding these matters, so we all sign on or virtually everyone signs on.

I would say if, in fact, the goal here was to get 70 or 80 Members of this Chamber--Republicans and Democrats--to sign on to a proposition that said we think the surge and escalation is the wrong thing to be doing, then the vehicle of a sense-of-the-Senate resolution would have value. But I would suggest here we are into the second day of this debate and we cannot even decide what sense-of-the-Senate resolution we want to debate.

So if you are sitting out there watching this Chamber at this moment, in terms of where we ought to be going and what the effect of what we are about to do is, it is rather confusing, to put it mildly, as to where we stand in all of this. We cannot even decide what sense-of-the- Senate resolutions to bring up. If we are going to have a debate around here that is meaningful, why not debate something that is meaningful?

So my concerns are, in many ways, that given this moment in time, before these young men and women are placed in harm's way--because I know full well, after a quarter of a century here, once they are on the ground, once they are in place, the debate changes. The debate changes. So if we are truly concerned about dealing with the surge and escalation, then I believe we ought to be engaging in a debate that has some meaningful outcomes when it comes to the decision of whether we go forward.

I, for one, would like to see a new authorization come to this body to be debated. The resolution on which we are operating today is one that was crafted 5 years ago. It was fundamentally linked to weapons of mass destruction and the conduct of Saddam Hussein. The first argument was, of course, a fiction. There were no weapons of mass destruction. And the second argument is no longer viable. Saddam Hussein is gone.

Today, we are being asked to place men and women in uniform in the middle of a civil war. It seems to me that if the President of the United States wants that to be a policy endorsed by the American people through the actions of this body, then we ought to be voting on a matter that says this is something we agree with and go forward. That would have some meaning to it, it seems to me. If we rejected it, then the President would have a strong answer from the Congress about whether we are about to continue to finance

and support that activity--again, not undercutting the needs of our troops in harm's way but a legitimate debate about a real issue that requires Members to stand up and vote yes or no.

I realize I am in sort of a minority of one or two here who believes the vehicles we are choosing to debate over the next several days, if, in fact, the debate goes on, are ones that in the final analysis are nothing more than really message proposals. If we are highly divided over which one to bring up, what is the message, in effect, if we cannot even decide which vehicles we want to choose to discuss?

Regarding the surge itself and regarding the Warner-Levin or Levin- Warner proposal, I have some problems with the language of that proposal. It essentially abdicates the power of the purse. It calls for selective diplomacy in the region instead of engaging all of Iraq's neighbors. The language opposing the surge is weak to the point of being nonexistent. And there is language that suggests that nothing in this resolution ought to imply a call for redeployment--something I wholeheartedly believe we should be pursuing in a phased manner.

But those are my concerns about it, both in terms of the process and the language under consideration. I realize other Members do not have those problems. I respect that. But those are my concerns.

Now, regarding the surge itself, again this has been stated by others who have examined this proposal in great detail, including our senior military people and senior diplomats. As I said a moment ago, in testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, they have spoken eloquently about their concerns that this proposal does nothing but contribute to the chaos that reins in Iraq.

There are some 6 million people who live in the city of Baghdad. To suggest we are going to send 17,000 or 18,000 service men and women into a city of 6 million, where there are at least 23 militias along with insurgents, Baathists, hardened criminals, and possibly some al- Qaida elements, and that we are going to sort this out in a way that is going to move us toward a political settlement in the country is I believe, frankly, beyond dreaming. I do not think it has any viability whatsoever. In fact, I think it contributes to a further escalation of the conflict in the country and delays even further what everyone agrees must occur: some sort of political accommodation between Shias and Sunnis and Kurds--between Shias and Shias, for that matter. The idea that placing our troops as a referee in the middle of this civil conflict is going to get us closer to that result, I think, has been successfully argued against by those whom we respect and admire in these debates.

Secondly, may I say that, in fact, if you are trying to encourage those elements to get together and you are also trying to encourage regional diplomacy to play a role here, then it seems to me we ought to be talking about how best we can achieve that. When you have an administration that refuses to even engage in any kind of conversation or negotiations with governments in the region with which we have serious disagreements, then I think we get even further away from the suggestions made by the Baker-Hamilton study group on Iraq that proposed what I thought were very commonsense, sober, and sound recommendations that would allow us to have a greater likelihood of achieving the success we ought to be pursuing. I see little likelihood of that occurring if, in fact, we are talking about a further military escalation of the conflict here. Every single person who has looked at the situation in Iraq has drawn the following conclusion: There is no military solution--no military solution--in Iraq. So continuing to pursue that option, continuing to pursue that particular goal in the face of all the evidence to the contrary, I believe is a major, major mistake for this country.

I think this body--the Senate--ought to be on record expressing its opinion about it and that we ought to go forward in a meaningful, real, accountable way. Unfortunately, that is not likely to happen. In fact, we may end this debate without voting on anything at all regarding Iraq, as we need to move on to other items that the leadership clearly must address in the coming weeks. So we are missing an opportunity, other than to express our views, which most people have done. I know of no Member in this Chamber who has not spoken out publicly about whether they think the surge is the right direction to go in, what alternatives they would offer in terms of how we might begin to talk about redeployment, and the need for the Iraqis to assume responsibility for their own country.

The American people have also publicly spoken out. They voted for a change of course in Iraq last November and according to recent polls, a majority of Americans oppose a surge. Now I do not believe polling data ought to be the way you conduct foreign policy, but the fact is that the American public is exhausted and fed up, to put it mildly, with our Iraq policy. And let's consider the following data out of Iraq: Over 80 percent of the people in that country believe that our continued presence in that country contributes to the chaos they are facing, and over 60 percent of Iraqis believe it is appropriate to attack American service men and women. Over 60 percent of the people in Iraq believe that.

How do you justify supporting an escalation, a surge in our military presence, when the very people whom we are told we are trying to help in this case believe that, one, we contribute to the chaos, and only a slightly smaller number believe it is appropriate to attack our service men and women? For the life of me, I do not understand how an American President could possibly support a policy that takes us further down that road.

Now we are not just talking about only two options here of escalating or leaving. There are policies that come in far between these two. For example, there have been suggestions about redeployment, with our service men and women filling other roles like training the Iraqi military, which was suggested by Baker-Hamilton. I think we should do this. We could engage in counterterrorism activities. Border security; we could play a very meaningful role in that as well. So there are those of us here who believe we ought to be redeploying, bring down those numbers, but none of us whom I know of have suggested we ought to be just packing our bags over the next 6 months and leaving Iraq. We are talking about other roles we can perform, as the 300,000 Iraqi soldiers and police take over the responsibility of their country.

Madam President, I am telling you as I stand before you today, if we continue to provide the kind of level of support militarily we are engaging in, there is less and less likelihood that the Iraqis are going to assume the responsibility, both politically and militarily, to take over leadership of their country.

For those reasons, I urge that we find a means and a vehicle, sooner rather than later, for this body--the Senate, this coequal branch of Government--to say to the administration and to others: We believe in a different direction. We would like a new authorization. We would like debate on a meaningful proposal that would allow us to be accounted for, yes or no, as to whether you want to move forward.

Again, with all due respect to those who crafted this, I have no greater admiration for any two Members than I do for Carl Levin and John Warner, people I have served with here for many years. I respect immensely the effort they have engaged in here to try to build a proposal that would attract a substantial majority of our colleagues to support. If you could do that, then sense-of-the-Senate resolutions have value. But I rest my case on what is occurring at the very moment I stand before you this afternoon. We are divided here. We have some four or five different resolutions. All of them are sense-of-the-Senate resolutions. None of them have any meaning in law at all. And we cannot seem to come around a single debate. We ought to be having one about whether we believe our resources and our young men's and women's lives ought to be placed in harm's way. That is the debate which ought to be occurring here. It is not occurring yet. I think that is unfortunate. It is tragic. My hope is we will find a means to address that in short order.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, today I honor a dedicated public servant, Marvin Farbman, who is retiring after 30 years of tireless work at Connecticut Legal Services, CLS, on behalf of the people of Connecticut.

Mr. Farbman came to Connecticut Legal Services in 1977 with an impressive academic record. He received his undergraduate degree in biology at Boston University, his M.A. in Philosophy from the University of Western Ontario, and finally his law degree at the University of Connecticut, where he graduated with honors. Connecticut Legal Services hired him as a staff attorney, where he quickly took on more than 100 client cases per year, serving as counsel for low-income Connecticut families.

Over the past 30 years, Marvin Farbman worked tirelessly to provide better housing for low-income residents of Connecticut. Only a year after joining the staff of Connecticut Legal Services, he created Equity in Housing, a ground-breaking housing cooperative that continues serving low-income households today. Within 2 years, Mr. Farbman was promoted to the position of managing attorney of the Middletown office of Connecticut Legal Services.

During his years as managing attorney, Mr. Farbman continued to lead the fight for low-income housing improvements both in and out of the courtroom. He served as lead counsel in several influential court cases, including Korsko v. Harris, which stopped the conversion of a federally-subsidized 200-unit housing project into private condominiums with no assistance for low-income residents, Nelson v. Heintz, a successful lawsuit against the City of Bridgeport to obtain more reasonable shelter payment levels for low-income citizens, and Father Panik Village Tenants Assoc. v. Cisneros, which obtained a preliminary court settlement requiring the Bridgeport Housing Authority to replace more than 1,000 demolished public housing units.

Mr. Farbman's dedication and continued success in court was matched by the success of his other efforts to improve the community. In 1985, he led the effort to create the Middlesex Red Cross homeless shelter, the first apartment-based family shelter in Connecticut. He also organized a local coalition to renovate Arriwani Hotel, a single room flophouse, into a nonprofit apartment building with support services for residents.

When he was promoted to executive director of CLS in 1995, Mr. Farbman successfully guided the agency in the establishment of an operating plan to begin rebuilding its service capacity. Over his tenure as executive director, Connecticut Legal Services handled approximately 50,000 client cases, improving the lives of countless Connecticut residents and the communities where they live.

Millions of Americans live in poverty, and many must depend on people like Marvin Farbman to fight for their basic needs in court. Mr. Farbman has dedicated his life to improving the lives of low-income families, and his influence can be seen throughout Connecticut. For his dedicated service, Connecticut, and indeed, the whole nation owe him a tremendous debt of gratitude.

On February 8, a dinner will be held in honor of Marvin Farbman's many contributions to Connecticut Legal Services and the field of legal representation for low-income families. This dinner will be a wonderful tribute to Marvin's dedication to serving underprivileged residents of Connecticut.

Once again, I extend my deep thanks to Marvin Farbman for his long legacy of service to his community, to the people of Connecticut, and to our Nation. I wish to congratulate him, his wife Evelyn, and his sons Daniel and Herschel on this wonderful occasion, and I wish him well as he embarks on this new chapter in his life.

Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the Fair Access to Clinical Trials (FACT) Act. I want to begin by thanking Senators Grassley, Wyden, Bingaman, Durbin, and Harkin for joining me in introducing this legislation. I also would like to recognize the leadership of Senator Johnson who was involved in the crafting of this legislation from the beginning and who has been a long-standing supporter of the FACT Act.

Our bill will create an electronic databank for clinical trials of drugs, biological products, and medical devices. Such a databank will ensure that physicians, researchers, the general public, and patients seeking to enroll in clinical trials have access to basic information about those trials. It will require manufacturers and other researchers to reveal the results of clinical trials so that clinically important information will be available to all Americans, and physicians will have all the information necessary to make appropriate treatment decisions for their patients.

Events of the past few years have made it clear that such a databank is needed. For example, serious questions were raised about the effectiveness and safety of antidepressants when used in children and youth. It has now become clear that the existing data indicates that these drugs may very well put children at risk. However, because the data from antidepressant clinical trials was not publicly available, it took years for this risk to be realized. In the meantime, millions of children have been prescribed antidepressants by well-meaning physicians. While these drugs undoubtedly helped many of these children, they also led to greater suffering for others.

The news is similarly disturbing for a popular class of painkillers known as Cox-2 inhibitors. These medicines, taken by millions of Americans, have been associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular adverse events, such as heart attack and stroke. It has been suggested that one of these medicines, which has since been pulled from the market, may have been responsible for tens of thousands of deaths.

Most recently, a drug manufacturer acknowledged that it did not inform the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) or the public about the results of a 67,000 person study it conducted of an FDA-approved drug used commonly during heart surgery to reduce the need for a transfusion. The study revealed the drug may increase patients' risk of death, serious kidney damage, congestive heart failure, and stroke.

Unfortunately, these are just a few examples of stories that have become all too common. It has been suggested that negative data might actually have been suppressed; and if this is discovered to be the case, those responsible should be dealt with harshly. However, because of what is known as ``publication bias,'' the information available to the public and physicians can be misleading even without nefarious motives. The simple fact is that studies with a positive result are far more likely to be published, and thus publicly available, than a study with a negative result. Physicians and patients hear the good news. Rarely do they hear the bad news. In the end, the imbalance of available information hurts patients.

Our bill would correct this imbalance in information, and prevent manufacturers from suppressing negative data. It would do so by creating a two-part databank, consisting of an expansion of clinicaltrials.gov--an existing registry that is operated by the National Library of Medicine (NLM)--and a new database for clinical trial results.

Under the FACT Act, the registry would continue to operate as a resource for patients seeking to enroll in clinical trials for drugs and biological products intended to treat serious or life-threatening conditions--and for the first time, it would also include medical device trials. The new results database would include all trials (except for preliminary safety trials), and would require the submission of clinical trial results data.

Our legislation would enforce the requirement to submit information to the databank in two ways. First, by requiring registration as a condition of Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval, no trial could begin without submitting preliminary information to the registry and database. This information would include the purpose of the trial, the estimated date of trial completion, as well as all of the information necessary to help patients to enroll in the trial.

Once the trial is completed, the researcher or manufacturer is required to submit the results to the database. If they refuse to do so, they are subject to monetary penalties or, in the case of federally-funded research, a restriction on future federal funding. It is my belief that these enforcement mechanisms will ensure broad compliance. However, in the rare case where a manufacturer does not comply, this legislation also gives the FDA the authority to publicize the required information.

Let me also say that any time you are collecting large amounts of data and making it public, protecting patient privacy and confidentiality is

paramount. Our legislation would in no way threaten patient privacy. The simple fact is that under this bill, no individually-identifiable information would be available to the public.

I believe that the establishment of a clinical trials databank is absolutely necessary for the health and well-being of the American public. But I would also like to highlight two other benefits that such a databank will have. First, it has the potential to reduce health care costs. Studies have shown that publication bias also leads to a bias toward new and more expensive treatment options. A databank could help make it clear that in some cases less expensive treatments are just as effective for patients.

In addition, a databank will ensure that the sacrifice made by patients who enroll in clinical trials is not squandered. We owe it to patients to make sure that their participation in a trial will benefit other individuals suffering from the same illness or condition by making the results of the trial public, no matter the outcome of the trial.

The problems associated with publication bias have recently drawn more attention from the medical community, and there is broad consensus that a clinical trials registry is one of the best ways to address the issue. Accordingly, the American Medical Association (AMA) has recommended creating such a databank. Additionally, the major medical journals have established a policy that they will only publish the results of trials that were registered in a public database before the trial began. Our legislation meets all of the minimum criteria for a trial registry set out by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors. In fact, our bill closely follows recommendations issued by the Institute of Medicine (IOM) in its recent report on drug safety.

To its credit, the pharmaceutical industry has also acknowledged the problem, and has created a database where manufacturers can voluntarily submit clinical trials data. I applaud this step. However, if our objective is to provide the public with a complete and consistent supply of information, a voluntary database is unlikely to achieve that goal. Some companies will provide information, but others may decide not to participate. We need a clinical trials framework that is not just fair to all companies, but provides patients with the peace of mind that they will receive complete information about the medicines they rely on.

The American drug industry is an extraordinary success story. As a result of the innovations that this industry has spawned, millions of lives have been improved and saved in our country and around the globe. Due to the importance of these medicines to our health and well-being, I have consistently supported sound public policies to help the industry succeed in protecting the public's health and well-being. This legislation aims to build upon the successes of this industry, and help ensure that the positive changes to our health care system that prescription drugs have brought are not undermined by controversies such as the ones surrounding antidepressants and Cox-2 inhibitors, which are at least in part based on a lack of public information. This bill will help ensure that well-informed patients will use new and innovative medicines.

Creating a clinical trials databank is a critical step toward ensuring the safety of drugs, biological products, and medical devices in this country--but it should not be the end of our efforts. However, other steps are necessary to fully restore patient confidence in the safety of the medicines they rely on.

That is why today I am also introducing the Food and Drug Administration Safety Act (FDASA) with Senator Grassley. We are joined by Senators Mikulski and Bingaman in introducing this legislation and thank them for their support for reforming our nation's system to ensure that FDA-approved drugs being used by millions are safe and effective.

Our legislation would enhance the FDA's drug-safety monitoring system by setting up an independent center within the FDA called the Center for Postmarket Evaluation and Research for Drugs and Biologics (CPER). This Center would be responsible for monitoring the safety of drugs and biologics once they are on the market, in consultation with other existing Centers at the FDA, and would have the authority to take corrective action if a drug or biologic presents a risk to patients. Under the bill, the Center Director is authorized to require manufacturers to conduct post-market clinical or observational studies if there are questions about the safety or efficacy of a drug or biologic once it is already on the market. The Center Director can take corrective actions to include labeling changes, restricted distribution, and other risk management tools if an unreasonable risk is found to exist. The bill also gives the Center Director the authority to review drug advertisements before they are disseminated, and to require certain disclosures about increased risk, and in extreme cases, the authority to pull the product off the market. Our bill authorizes $500 million over the next 5 years to provide the new center with the resources necessary to carry out the critically important provisions of this legislation.

Under our legislation, the Director of CPER will report directly to the FDA Commissioner. Our bill will ensure that CPER consults with the other Centers at FDA as it conducts risk assessments, benefiting from their knowledge and expertise, but not being beholden to them if corrective action is needed.

These new authorities will allow the FDA to act quickly to get answers when there are questions about the safety of a drug, and to act decisively to mitigate the risks when the evidence shows that a drug presents a safety issue. With these authorities, we will never again have a situation where a critical labeling change takes 2 years to complete, as was the case with Vioxx. When we are talking about drugs that are already on the market and in widespread use, any delay can put millions of patients in harm's way.

By creating CPER we hope to restore confidence in the medicines that so many Americans rely on to safeguard their health and well-being. Patients should have the peace of mind that the drugs they take to help them will not hurt them instead. We must restore public confidence in the words ``FDA-Approved.'' Unfortunately, events of the past few years have seriously tarnished the FDA's image and put millions of patients at undue risk. Recent developments have cast into doubt the FDA's ability to ensure that the drugs that it approves are safe--especially once they are on the market. These concerns are bad for patients, bad for physicians, and bad for the pharmaceutical industry.

Like many Americans, I have been deeply disturbed by the revelations of the significant risk associated with widely-used medications to treat pain and depression. These revelations raise legitimate questions about the safety of drugs that have already been approved. It would be one thing if these drugs were in a trial phase, but safety issues are being identified in drugs once they are on the market and in widespread use. Health risks significant enough to remove drugs from the market or significantly restrict their use are becoming clear only after millions of Americans have been exposed to real or potential harm.

It has been estimated that more than 100,000 Americans might have been seriously injured or killed by a popular pain medication, while millions of children have been prescribed antidepressants that could put them at risk. This recent spate of popular medicines being identified as unsafe underscores the need to take additional steps to monitor and protect patient safety after a drug has been approved. Allowing the status quo on drug safety at the FDA is unacceptable. Real reform is needed now.

An internal study conducted by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office of the Inspector General in 2002 revealed that approximately one-fifth of drug reviewers were pressured to approve a drug despite concerns about safety, efficacy, or quality. In addition, more than one-third said they were ``not at all'' or only ``somewhat'' confident that final decisions of the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER) adequately assessed safety. A more recent survey of 997 FDA scientists conducted by the Union of Concerned Scientists and the Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility found that 420

FDA scientists reported that they knew of cases in which HHS or FDA political appointees inappropriately injected themselves into FDA determinations or actions.

I look forward to working with industry, physicians, medical journals, patient groups, and my colleagues--including the Chairman and Ranking Member of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, Senator Kennedy and Senator Enzi--to move this legislation forward. These bills have already been endorsed by Consumers Union, the U.S. Public Interest Research Group (PIRG), the National Women's Health Network, and Public Citizen. I thank these organizations for lending their expertise as we crafted these bills. I also want to recognize the New England Journal of Medicine and the American Psychiatric Association for their support in the crafting of the FACT Act.

Clinical trials are critically important to protecting the safety and health of the American public. For this reason, clinical trial results must not be treated as information that can be hidden from scrutiny. Recent events have made it clear that a clinical trials databank is needed. Patients and physicians agree that such a databank is important to our public health. At the same time, there have been disturbing reports that suggest the FDA does not place enough emphasis on drug safety, and that concerns raised by those in the Office of Surveillance and Epidemiology (formerly the Office of Drug Safety) at CDER are sometimes ignored and even suppressed. Our legislation will ensure that those who are responsible for monitoring the safety of drugs already on the market at the FDA will have the independence, resources, and authority to ensure medicines intended to help patients won't instead end up causing them harm. I urge my colleagues to support these bills, and I am hopeful that they will become law as soon as possible.

I ask unanimous consent that a letter from the American Psychiatric Association supporting the FACT Act be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the Fair Access to Clinical Trials (FACT) Act. I want to begin by thanking Senators Grassley, Wyden, Bingaman, Durbin, and Harkin for joining me in introducing this legislation. I also would like to recognize the leadership of Senator Johnson who was involved in the crafting of this legislation from the beginning and who has been a long-standing supporter of the FACT Act.

Our bill will create an electronic databank for clinical trials of drugs, biological products, and medical devices. Such a databank will ensure that physicians, researchers, the general public, and patients seeking to enroll in clinical trials have access to basic information about those trials. It will require manufacturers and other researchers to reveal the results of clinical trials so that clinically important information will be available to all Americans, and physicians will have all the information necessary to make appropriate treatment decisions for their patients.

Events of the past few years have made it clear that such a databank is needed. For example, serious questions were raised about the effectiveness and safety of antidepressants when used in children and youth. It has now become clear that the existing data indicates that these drugs may very well put children at risk. However, because the data from antidepressant clinical trials was not publicly available, it took years for this risk to be realized. In the meantime, millions of children have been prescribed antidepressants by well-meaning physicians. While these drugs undoubtedly helped many of these children, they also led to greater suffering for others.

The news is similarly disturbing for a popular class of painkillers known as Cox-2 inhibitors. These medicines, taken by millions of Americans, have been associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular adverse events, such as heart attack and stroke. It has been suggested that one of these medicines, which has since been pulled from the market, may have been responsible for tens of thousands of deaths.

Most recently, a drug manufacturer acknowledged that it did not inform the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) or the public about the results of a 67,000 person study it conducted of an FDA-approved drug used commonly during heart surgery to reduce the need for a transfusion. The study revealed the drug may increase patients' risk of death, serious kidney damage, congestive heart failure, and stroke.

Unfortunately, these are just a few examples of stories that have become all too common. It has been suggested that negative data might actually have been suppressed; and if this is discovered to be the case, those responsible should be dealt with harshly. However, because of what is known as ``publication bias,'' the information available to the public and physicians can be misleading even without nefarious motives. The simple fact is that studies with a positive result are far more likely to be published, and thus publicly available, than a study with a negative result. Physicians and patients hear the good news. Rarely do they hear the bad news. In the end, the imbalance of available information hurts patients.

Our bill would correct this imbalance in information, and prevent manufacturers from suppressing negative data. It would do so by creating a two-part databank, consisting of an expansion of clinicaltrials.gov--an existing registry that is operated by the National Library of Medicine (NLM)--and a new database for clinical trial results.

Under the FACT Act, the registry would continue to operate as a resource for patients seeking to enroll in clinical trials for drugs and biological products intended to treat serious or life-threatening conditions--and for the first time, it would also include medical device trials. The new results database would include all trials (except for preliminary safety trials), and would require the submission of clinical trial results data.

Our legislation would enforce the requirement to submit information to the databank in two ways. First, by requiring registration as a condition of Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval, no trial could begin without submitting preliminary information to the registry and database. This information would include the purpose of the trial, the estimated date of trial completion, as well as all of the information necessary to help patients to enroll in the trial.

Once the trial is completed, the researcher or manufacturer is required to submit the results to the database. If they refuse to do so, they are subject to monetary penalties or, in the case of federally-funded research, a restriction on future federal funding. It is my belief that these enforcement mechanisms will ensure broad compliance. However, in the rare case where a manufacturer does not comply, this legislation also gives the FDA the authority to publicize the required information.

Let me also say that any time you are collecting large amounts of data and making it public, protecting patient privacy and confidentiality is

paramount. Our legislation would in no way threaten patient privacy. The simple fact is that under this bill, no individually-identifiable information would be available to the public.

I believe that the establishment of a clinical trials databank is absolutely necessary for the health and well-being of the American public. But I would also like to highlight two other benefits that such a databank will have. First, it has the potential to reduce health care costs. Studies have shown that publication bias also leads to a bias toward new and more expensive treatment options. A databank could help make it clear that in some cases less expensive treatments are just as effective for patients.

In addition, a databank will ensure that the sacrifice made by patients who enroll in clinical trials is not squandered. We owe it to patients to make sure that their participation in a trial will benefit other individuals suffering from the same illness or condition by making the results of the trial public, no matter the outcome of the trial.

The problems associated with publication bias have recently drawn more attention from the medical community, and there is broad consensus that a clinical trials registry is one of the best ways to address the issue. Accordingly, the American Medical Association (AMA) has recommended creating such a databank. Additionally, the major medical journals have established a policy that they will only publish the results of trials that were registered in a public database before the trial began. Our legislation meets all of the minimum criteria for a trial registry set out by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors. In fact, our bill closely follows recommendations issued by the Institute of Medicine (IOM) in its recent report on drug safety.

To its credit, the pharmaceutical industry has also acknowledged the problem, and has created a database where manufacturers can voluntarily submit clinical trials data. I applaud this step. However, if our objective is to provide the public with a complete and consistent supply of information, a voluntary database is unlikely to achieve that goal. Some companies will provide information, but others may decide not to participate. We need a clinical trials framework that is not just fair to all companies, but provides patients with the peace of mind that they will receive complete information about the medicines they rely on.

The American drug industry is an extraordinary success story. As a result of the innovations that this industry has spawned, millions of lives have been improved and saved in our country and around the globe. Due to the importance of these medicines to our health and well-being, I have consistently supported sound public policies to help the industry succeed in protecting the public's health and well-being. This legislation aims to build upon the successes of this industry, and help ensure that the positive changes to our health care system that prescription drugs have brought are not undermined by controversies such as the ones surrounding antidepressants and Cox-2 inhibitors, which are at least in part based on a lack of public information. This bill will help ensure that well-informed patients will use new and innovative medicines.

Creating a clinical trials databank is a critical step toward ensuring the safety of drugs, biological products, and medical devices in this country--but it should not be the end of our efforts. However, other steps are necessary to fully restore patient confidence in the safety of the medicines they rely on.

That is why today I am also introducing the Food and Drug Administration Safety Act (FDASA) with Senator Grassley. We are joined by Senators Mikulski and Bingaman in introducing this legislation and thank them for their support for reforming our nation's system to ensure that FDA-approved drugs being used by millions are safe and effective.

Our legislation would enhance the FDA's drug-safety monitoring system by setting up an independent center within the FDA called the Center for Postmarket Evaluation and Research for Drugs and Biologics (CPER). This Center would be responsible for monitoring the safety of drugs and biologics once they are on the market, in consultation with other existing Centers at the FDA, and would have the authority to take corrective action if a drug or biologic presents a risk to patients. Under the bill, the Center Director is authorized to require manufacturers to conduct post-market clinical or observational studies if there are questions about the safety or efficacy of a drug or biologic once it is already on the market. The Center Director can take corrective actions to include labeling changes, restricted distribution, and other risk management tools if an unreasonable risk is found to exist. The bill also gives the Center Director the authority to review drug advertisements before they are disseminated, and to require certain disclosures about increased risk, and in extreme cases, the authority to pull the product off the market. Our bill authorizes $500 million over the next 5 years to provide the new center with the resources necessary to carry out the critically important provisions of this legislation.

Under our legislation, the Director of CPER will report directly to the FDA Commissioner. Our bill will ensure that CPER consults with the other Centers at FDA as it conducts risk assessments, benefiting from their knowledge and expertise, but not being beholden to them if corrective action is needed.

These new authorities will allow the FDA to act quickly to get answers when there are questions about the safety of a drug, and to act decisively to mitigate the risks when the evidence shows that a drug presents a safety issue. With these authorities, we will never again have a situation where a critical labeling change takes 2 years to complete, as was the case with Vioxx. When we are talking about drugs that are already on the market and in widespread use, any delay can put millions of patients in harm's way.

By creating CPER we hope to restore confidence in the medicines that so many Americans rely on to safeguard their health and well-being. Patients should have the peace of mind that the drugs they take to help them will not hurt them instead. We must restore public confidence in the words ``FDA-Approved.'' Unfortunately, events of the past few years have seriously tarnished the FDA's image and put millions of patients at undue risk. Recent developments have cast into doubt the FDA's ability to ensure that the drugs that it approves are safe--especially once they are on the market. These concerns are bad for patients, bad for physicians, and bad for the pharmaceutical industry.

Like many Americans, I have been deeply disturbed by the revelations of the significant risk associated with widely-used medications to treat pain and depression. These revelations raise legitimate questions about the safety of drugs that have already been approved. It would be one thing if these drugs were in a trial phase, but safety issues are being identified in drugs once they are on the market and in widespread use. Health risks significant enough to remove drugs from the market or significantly restrict their use are becoming clear only after millions of Americans have been exposed to real or potential harm.

It has been estimated that more than 100,000 Americans might have been seriously injured or killed by a popular pain medication, while millions of children have been prescribed antidepressants that could put them at risk. This recent spate of popular medicines being identified as unsafe underscores the need to take additional steps to monitor and protect patient safety after a drug has been approved. Allowing the status quo on drug safety at the FDA is unacceptable. Real reform is needed now.

An internal study conducted by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office of the Inspector General in 2002 revealed that approximately one-fifth of drug reviewers were pressured to approve a drug despite concerns about safety, efficacy, or quality. In addition, more than one-third said they were ``not at all'' or only ``somewhat'' confident that final decisions of the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER) adequately assessed safety. A more recent survey of 997 FDA scientists conducted by the Union of Concerned Scientists and the Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility found that 420

FDA scientists reported that they knew of cases in which HHS or FDA political appointees inappropriately injected themselves into FDA determinations or actions.

I look forward to working with industry, physicians, medical journals, patient groups, and my colleagues--including the Chairman and Ranking Member of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, Senator Kennedy and Senator Enzi--to move this legislation forward. These bills have already been endorsed by Consumers Union, the U.S. Public Interest Research Group (PIRG), the National Women's Health Network, and Public Citizen. I thank these organizations for lending their expertise as we crafted these bills. I also want to recognize the New England Journal of Medicine and the American Psychiatric Association for their support in the crafting of the FACT Act.

Clinical trials are critically important to protecting the safety and health of the American public. For this reason, clinical trial results must not be treated as information that can be hidden from scrutiny. Recent events have made it clear that a clinical trials databank is needed. Patients and physicians agree that such a databank is important to our public health. At the same time, there have been disturbing reports that suggest the FDA does not place enough emphasis on drug safety, and that concerns raised by those in the Office of Surveillance and Epidemiology (formerly the Office of Drug Safety) at CDER are sometimes ignored and even suppressed. Our legislation will ensure that those who are responsible for monitoring the safety of drugs already on the market at the FDA will have the independence, resources, and authority to ensure medicines intended to help patients won't instead end up causing them harm. I urge my colleagues to support these bills, and I am hopeful that they will become law as soon as possible.

I ask unanimous consent that a letter from the American Psychiatric Association supporting the FACT Act be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, about a month ago, Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts and I were in the Middle East, and at sundown on an evening in Baghdad, as we landed in our helicopter in the Green Zone, a young man walked up to Senator Kerry and me. I could hardly see him. He was about 6 feet 2 inches, 6 feet 3 inches, a captain, and a West Point graduate. He talked to us about his concerns and what was going on in Iraq. This was back in the mid part of December before the Christmas holidays. His name was Brian Freeman.

The conversation did not last very long. It was not one of those long conversations. It may have lasted 15, 20 minutes, at best. I do not even have a clear picture in my mind of what he looked like because it was dark, as the conversation went on for 15 or 20 minutes. But it is one of those meetings all of us have had in our lives, where you do not forget a person, an individual. For whatever reason, he was compelling, he was sincere. He sought us out. He wanted us to know how he felt about what was happening in Iraq.

I mentioned him on ``Meet the Press'' a few weeks later in talking about Iraq. I did not mention his name. I did not wish to put him in that position. But I talked about this young Army captain, a West Point graduate, whom I met. He apparently saw the program in Baghdad and e- mailed me, and we began this conversation between my office and himself over the last month or so, in which we talked about the surge, and he talked about the problems associated with it, the jobs he was being asked to do.

He said to me--I am quoting him now--

Senator, it's nuts over here. Soldiers are being asked to

do work we're not trained to do. I'm doing work that the

State Department people are far more prepared to do in

fostering democracy, but they're not allowed to come off the

bases because it's too dangerous here. It doesn't make any

sense.

CPT Brian Freeman, a West Point graduate, was killed in Iraq last Saturday.

I have spoken to his family over the last number of days, his wife Charlotte, his two young children, his parents and his in-laws, trying to express on behalf,

I am sure, of all us the sense of grief we feel about this young man's loss of life and his contribution to our country.

I cannot tell you how exciting it was for me to meet him. This young man had nothing but potential and a great interest in seeing his country do better and grow stronger. And he wanted to be a part of it and make a contribution to our land.

Today, I am here to say enough is enough. I think all of us feel this way. We are coming to a point next week when we will have a debate about this. We are going to discuss various resolutions before us. I firmly believe we have to do everything we possibly can to ensure that the tragedy of Brian Freeman does not continue to be replicated over and over again. That is why we must say no, in my view, to the decision by the President of the United States to send thousands more of our brave young men and women in uniform to the streets of Baghdad to risk their lives for a plan which just ``doesn't make any sense,'' to quote Brian Freeman.

I, as one Senator, intend to speak loudly, as I have already, against this ill-conceived policy. But more than just speak out, I intend, at every available opportunity, to ask this body and the other body to go on record in a meaningful way against the President's specific decision to send more than 20,000 additional troops to Iraq and against the continuation of our failed military strategy in Iraq.

This administration's Iraq policy has been a total failure. And this ``escalation'' or ``surge''--call it whatever you will--of 21,500 more Americans is not going to work. I think all of us in this Chamber know it. General Powell, General Abizaid, and General Casey know it. The British and the rest of our allies know it. Nearly every expert who has come before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, regardless of their political persuasion or ideology, over the last several weeks of hearings Senator Biden has held, knows it as well.

That was their testimony. But most importantly, two-thirds of the American people flatout oppose it, according to a recent survey done in our country--not that surveys ought to determine policy. But you cannot sustain a policy when the American people no longer feel you are on the right track. And they are right about it.

As my good friend from Nebraska, Senator Hagel, so eloquently and passionately said:

[W]e owe the military and their families a policy worthy of

their sacrifices . . . and I don't believe we have that

policy today.

I could not agree with him more.

As we all know, we have lost more than 3,000 young men and women. More than 20,000 American troops have been grievously injured. According to many estimates, several hundred thousand Iraqi civilians have been killed or maimed over the last 4 years. And now estimates suggest this war will end up costing the American people over $1.2 trillion.

We have stretched our military to the breaking point. As Congressman Murtha testified before the Foreign Relations Committee last week:

At the beginning of the Iraq war, 80 percent of all Army

units and almost 100 percent of active combat units were

rated at the highest state of readiness. Today, virtually all

of our active-duty combat units at home and all of our guard

units are at the lowest state of readiness--

``the lowest state of readiness''--

primarily due to equipment shortages resulting from repeated

and extended deployments to Iraq.

I strongly believe we must demonstrate to the American public that we share their deep concerns and doubts about the President's proposed plans to escalate our involvement in Iraq. I think we need to demonstrate we are prepared to lead on this issue--not simply sit back, fearful of taking positions most of us believe are in the interests of our country.

Earlier this week in committee, I offered an amendment to the Foreign Relations Committee proposal that was offered by my friend, the chairman of the committee, Senator Biden, and Senator Hagel and the chairman of the Armed Services Committee, Senator Levin. My amendment called for capping the number of troops in Iraq and required the President to seek a new authorization--after 5 years, a new authorization; it has been 5 years since we voted on the justification to go into Iraq--but to get that new authorization from Congress immediately prior to any future troop increases in Iraq--an authorization, I would quickly add, I would vigorously oppose, but it would be an opportunity to debate on the floor of the Senate.

My amendment was not about setting a floor, as some have suggested. It was about exactly the opposite. It was about the first step in fundamentally altering the status quo in Iraq and forcing the President to listen to the recommendations of the Baker-Hamilton Study Group to fundamentally change our mission in Iraq and begin the phased redeployment of U.S. combat troops.

It was also about preventing more troops from being put in harm's way for a flawed tactic to a failed strategy.

Although my amendment failed, I voted in support of the Biden resolution. But I believe it is absolutely essential that the final resolution the Senate adopts next week be one with more clarity than is currently to be found in the words of this resolution or the competing Warner-Collins resolution, which was introduced by our good friend, the Senator from Virginia, Mr. John Warner.

Regardless of how effective I and others are in bringing more clarity to the resolution through the amendment process, we need to also take, at some point in the very near future, concrete legislative action such as was attempted last week in the committee on Wednesday but which is not possible in the context of the concurrent resolution we will consider next week.

We need to face the hard facts. The President of the United States has already said he will ignore Congress when it comes to his recent proposals on Iraq. He has said loudly he will ignore what we do. So it is all the more important we do something that is meaningful.

Sense-of-the-Senate resolutions are the easiest things to ignore. They require absolutely no Presidential recognition whatsoever. They are merely opportunities for us to express our views on various important matters. I recognize it has a value, to some degree. But there are people out there wondering whether we are actually going to take advantage of this time to do something more than send a message, which all of us have sent, either privately or publicly, that this policy must change. We are beyond the message-sending time. We all know what the message is.

Now the question is whether this body, this historic body, that has an obligation beyond the roles and the opportunities or the obligations of the other body, will take a clear and strong position when it comes to this most recent decision.

The Vice President has recently said that the nonbinding resolution passed by this coequal branch of Government ``won't stop us,'' to quote him. Mr. Cheney went on to say: ``I think it would be detrimental from the standpoint of the troops'' to pass this.

``Detrimental from the standpoint of the troops''?

Refereeing a civil war is detrimental from the standpoint of the troops. Surging into the streets of Baghdad with no clear mission is not detrimental to our troops? Sending Americans into combat with insufficient body armor is not detrimental to our troops? But stopping the President from sending more young men and women into Baghdad is most certainly not detrimental to our troops.

Two-thirds of the American public and two-thirds of our troops oppose a surge, according to a recent survey done by the Military Times--two- thirds of the American public and two-thirds of our troops.

But it is not public opinion polls that shape my conclusions that our policies in Iraq are terribly flawed. It is the facts on the ground, which I have learned, as I know others have as well in our recent visits to Iraq, as well as the judgments of former and current military and foreign policy experts.

What is it going to take to make this administration change course?

It is going to take a Congress, in my view, that does not allow the blank checks over the last 5 years to continue. It is going to take a Congress--and I am confident this one will be one--that has the courage to stand up and clearly say we will not support

more troops nor the current failed policy. And if the President refuses to listen, it is going to take a Congress that is prepared to legislatively force the President to change this disastrous course.

So next week we will begin the process of attempting to make it crystal clear in the language of whatever concurrent resolution we adopt that this Congress is opposed to more troops, opposed to a policy that makes our troops remain referees in a civil war, and in favor of a changed policy which begins the process of the phased redeployment of our troops, which last year the Congress had anticipated would begin in 2006.

There are those who say we should not try to tinker with the wording of carefully crafted Iraq resolutions because they are delicate compromises and to propose anything more forceful would be politically divisive and that Congress ought to speak with one voice.

Well, I wish we could speak with one voice. But to them I would say, I believe in consensus. I believe in bipartisanship. My 25-year record in this body has amply demonstrated the value of that. But when the quest for consensus paralyzes our ability and prevents us from taking real action to stop the senseless death of young Americans, then I do not think consensus ought to be the goal.

Stopping this insanity ought to be the goal. If you can do it 51 to 49, then do it. If you can do it 100 to nothing, obviously, that is preferable. But waiting around for consensus on this issue worries me deeply, that we are going to miss an opportunity to fulfill our obligations to stand up and say: Enough of this stuff. Stop it now.

There are those who say that opposing the surge betrays our troops. Quite the contrary is true. I say to them, what truly betrays our troops is sending them into a civil war they cannot and should not have to stop. More than 60 percent of the Iraqi people do not want us in their country. How do you send people into harm's way when the people you are trying to help do not want you to stay?

Of course, stopping the escalation of U.S. forces is only the first step as part of a broader policy to stabilize Iraq and bring our troops home.

There must also be meaningful deescalation of U.S. combat activities in Iraq. We must begin the redeployment of U.S. forces away from the urban areas where the sectarian conflict is greatest, to enclaves within Iraq and to elsewhere within the region--Afghanistan, of course, being the principal place where our troops could be used.

This will enable U.S. forces to concentrate on training Iraqi forces, securing Iraq's borders, and conducting counterterrorism operations to protect U.S. vital security interests in the region.

In the coming days, every American should be able to know whether his or her Senator is prepared to go further and attempt to legally bind the President from continuing this policy of folly. That is why I will not be satisfied if the resolution we adopt next week is the last step this Congress takes to right the wrong that the President is perpetrating on our brave young men and women in uniform and on the American people as a whole. That is why I will find opportunities, if I can, to bring binding legislation to a vote in this body so that every American can know where we stand on this issue.

The American people want this Congress to live up to its responsibilities. I am confident we can and will under our leadership. The time has come for us to weigh in and change the course of U.S. involvement in Iraq, something we all know in our hearts needs to be done. If we were able to authorize the President to go to war in 2002-- a vote that I deeply regret having cast in favor of--5 years ago on grounds of weapons of mass destruction and the behavior of Saddam Hussein--one of which was not true, and the other doesn't exist anymore--it is time for us to debate this new argument for our involvement in Iraq and decide, up or down, whether we believe it is the right course of action.

This Nation of ours is at a critical crossroads. The President wants to deepen our involvement in the war. I think most of us here want to responsibly end our involvement after 4 painful years that have taken a tragic toll on our country.

I have met with countless families, in my own State and in others, who have been through the tragedy of losing loved ones in Iraq. Talking to Brian Freeman's family in Utah the other night was painful. His 14- month-old and his 3-year-old don't have a father any longer. Our country lost a wonderful young man whom Senator Kerry and I had the privilege of meeting for such a brief time. But both of us were profoundly affected by his courage and commitment. I say to them and others that in this body we will stand up in the coming days and bring an end to this insanity.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, a month ago, I traveled to Iraq to meet there with our men and women in uniform. One soldier in particular stood out to me, a bright young West Point graduate, CPT Brian Freeman. Our conversation lasted for no more than 5 minutes, and yet I was immediately struck by his outspoken intelligence. ``Senator, it is nuts over here. Soldiers are being asked to do work we're not trained to do,'' he told me. ``I'm doing work that State Department people are far more prepared to do in fostering democracy, but they're not allowed to come off the bases because it's too dangerous here. It doesn't make any sense.''

Now those words have taken on a tragic resonance. Four days ago, according to media accounts, 30 gunmen disguised as U.S. officials penetrated an Iraqi checkpoint in Karbala. Once inside the Army compound, the reports say, they opened fire and mortally wounded five American soldiers.

On Sunday, Charlotte Freeman was visiting her family in Utah when she found a message on her cell phone. Army chaplains had been to her house in California. The daily e-mails from her husband Brian had stopped. I imagine that few things have more anguish in them than waiting, in suspended fear, for the news of a loved one's death. Late that afternoon, the news came.

So I rise to honor Captain Freeman and to add my voice to his family's prayers. His giving spirit and his self-sacrifice embodied all the best of our Armed Forces, whether he was working to take the son of a Karbala policeman to America for heart surgery or fighting to secure death benefits for the family of his murdered interpreter or organizing a charity to fund medical care for Iraqi children. In his duty as a liaison between the Army and the Government of Karbala Province, he proved every day his dedication to the Iraqi people; the Governor of Karbala praised him as ``a soldier and a statesman.''

But the virtues we saw in Brian shone through even clearer to those who loved him: Charlotte, his wife; his 3-year-old son Gunnar and his 14-month-old daughter Ingrid; his father Randy and his stepmother Kathy; his mother and his stepfather, Kathleen and Albert Snyder. ``Brian is a beautiful man,'' his mother-in-law, Ginny Mills, wrote to me shortly after his death.

``He is loving, funny, and intelligent. He had a spirit in him that saw the good in life. A man who put his life on the line to help those less fortunate than himself. A man who was a loving husband and a devoted father. A man whose daughter will never know him first-hand.''

In the place of a husband and father who will never see his children grow up, Brian Freeman's young family will have to live on with the warm memories of the man who loved them and who risked his life in the service of his country. Memories and words of comfort are so insufficient, so small, next to the flesh and blood. But there is nothing else to put in their place.

I have nothing else to add--except to note that the scenes of grief and comfort in the home of Charlotte Freeman have played themselves out, in some form or another, 3,000 times, in 3,000 families, for 3,000 lives. ``Each story is the same,'' wrote Ginny Mills. ``A wonderful, beautiful soul sacrificed.''

``I cannot understand that this war goes on and on,'' she wrote. ``It has to stop. It has to stop now and I need to know how to do that.''

May God send comfort to her and to all of Captain Freeman's family and to every family that is bereaved. And may we remember, in every hour of our deliberations, the young lives that bear the burden of the choices we make in this Chamber.

Madam President, I rise to thank the Senator from Kansas for offering this amendment. Back about 20 years ago, the Senator from Utah and I, along with Senator Kennedy and others, authored the first childcare development block grant ever to be proposed by the Congress. We had hoped in those days that we would be able to expand the availability, affordability, and quality of childcare to millions of Americans and their children who are lacking those resources.

Over the years, we have provided some good assistance. I am grateful to my colleagues over the years who have been supportive.

We have gone stale on the commitment over the last 5 or 6 years. The funding has not gone up at all and demand continues to grow. We have done a fairly good job in serving some of the working poor. We must do better, however. We have not done a good job, in my view, on the most critical issue most parents and others care about, and that is the quality of childcare. This amendment gets to the quality of child care by providing small businesses the opportunity to use the grant for facilities and to create partnerships with local organizations such as health departments.

What is happening with our colleague's amendment is that it is trying to expand opportunities for families, and I am grateful to him for proposing it. Everyday I hear about the communities in which the demand for child care for exceeds the supply. This amendment would increase the supply and allow more parents to go to work knowing that their children are safe.

I am supporting it. I think it is worthwhile, and it will help make a difference of expanding quality and access.

It is good for everyone involved. A lot of times we offer legislation with winners and losers. Here, everybody wins. From a business standpoint, they are retaining good employees, allowing parents' minds to be focused on their jobs. In no small measure, this depends on how you feel, where your children are, who is caring for them, and what the conditions are. In terms of productivity and retention, all the elements businesses desire for employees, childcare is a major component. For the parents, obviously, not to be worried or concerned about the quality of the care their children receive and whether they can afford it is a major issue. I am preaching to the choir for those who understand what I am talking about. Obviously, from the child's perspective, it's essential to be able to have that good, nurturing environment. There is not a guarantee they will get it in every case, but it is more likely if this amendment passes.

The difficult area is with smaller businesses. Many larger corporations have installed childcare facilities onsite. In fact, in some cases they have offered less in salaries and wages in exchange for providing better childcare; I am not saying that is great, but people are so hungry to have a good, safe, childcare environment, they will opt for lesser wage or salary in exchange for the assurance their children are in a safe place. Smaller businesses cannot do that. Some of them are at shopping malls, and they develop consortiums and set aside space. There are a lot of creative ideas. But it is the hardest thing in the world for smaller business to provide child care. It is not that they do not recognize the need for it. They understand the value of it. This amendment, from a child's perspective, from a parent's perspective, and from a business perspective is a win for all. I commend my colleague. We have talked of this in the past and agreed on its importance. I thank Senator Enzi.

While I am here, I would like to talk about the underlying bill, to raise the minimum wage. Exactly because of what the Senator from Kansas has offered, it is important to know that his amendment is a related matter when it comes to children. The increase in the minimum wage has a huge impact on children.

So I am taking advantage of a couple of minutes on his amendment to highlight this point. In the last 5 years, we have watched child poverty in this country increase by 1.3 million children. This figure is from the U.S. Census Bureau, not a private think tank making this up. Nearly 12.9 million children in this country live in poverty.

Obviously, that is a matter of great concern, I hope to all of us. What is bothersome to me and should be to every single one of us--I don't care what your politics are or your political persuasion--the fact that the United

States of America, at the outset of the 21st century, has one of the highest rate of child poverty among all the industrialized nations. That is something that ought to concern each and every one of us, not just because of what a shameful statistic that is. As we look to the 21st century, watching our country grow, meeting the challenges in front of us, we have to do a better job if we are going to have a well- prepared generation to meet the challenges.

Aside from providing decent child care, we know by increasing the earning capacity of parents we make a difference. In fact, nearly 6 million children will benefit from a minimum wage increase.

Children whose parents are economically secure--and this increase is not going to guarantee security, but it moves a family closer to it-- have better attendance in school and have a higher concentration on the work they are asked to do. Performance levels go up, test scores go up, and graduation rates increase when a family's economic circumstances are far more stable. In addition, children have stronger immune systems, better health, fewer expensive hospital visits and fewer run- ins with the juvenile justice system. Those are facts when you have a family doing better economically. For the families who have the greatest economic stability at home, these statistics improve in almost every category.

Because of what the Senator from Kansas has offered, focusing on childcare, combined with what the Senator from Massachusetts, Senator Kennedy, is leading today on the minimum wage, we can make a difference for these children. That is the point I wanted to make to my colleagues.

I commend them both. It is long overdue. My hope is that the amendment from my friend from Kansas will be a forerunner this year for increasing our commitments to child care. My colleague from Maine, Senator Snowe, has been terrific on this issue over the years. Senator Hatch was my principal cosponsor on this many years ago. It was courageous of him then. A lot of people did not realize the value of it. I am remiss not mentioning those who played a significant role. And let me add my colleague, Senator Roberts, for his leadership on this issue. I thank him immensely. I thank Senator Kennedy for his leadership on minimum wage. We can make a difference for children with both of these proposals.

Mr. President, last week President Bush announced a plan to escalate U.S. military involvement in Iraq, the continuation of his failed policy in Iraq. I am strongly opposed to this course.

That is why I have introduced legislation today that will prohibit the number of troops in Iraq from exceeding the current force levels without an explicit authorization from Congress. As of January 16, 2007, United States Central Command reports 130,500 American service- members operating within the borders of Iraq.

It is my hope that Congress can begin debate on my proposal and others that may be forthcoming before the week is out. It is imperative that we in Congress act swiftly on this crucial issue.

Let's be very clear, my bill does not prohibit additional funding for American troops who are currently in harms way. I will continue to do everything that I can to support our troops so long as they are stationed in Iraq. My bill would prohibit President Bush from increasing the number of U.S. service-members in Iraq without prior authorization from Congress.

The President's decision to escalate U.S. military involvement is a true disservice to American troops who have shown nothing but professionalism and courage, and who should not be asked to risk their lives to become cannon fodder in a civil war rife with ethnic cleansing.

Moreover, I do not believe that the authorization provided by Congress in 2002 gives the President unlimited authority to send additional troops to Iraq for a mission which is completely different from the one the President himself articulated in March 2002, shortly after committing U.S. forces to Iraq. On March 22, 2002, the President of the United States said that our goal in invading Iraq was ``to disarm Iraq of weapons of mass destruction, to end Saddam Hussein's support for terrorism, and to free the Iraqi people.''

We all now know that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq to be disarmed. So we can no longer justify an additional troop presence on the grounds of WMDs. Saddam Hussein is no longer in a position to support terrorism, or anything else for that matter. As for freeing the Iraqi people--Iraq's dictator is dead and the Iraqi people have duly elected their own leaders to govern them.

Nothing in the 2002 resolution, or in the President's articulation of his goals for Iraq prior to that resolution suggested that the United States would, could, or should be engaged in trying to referee a civil war.

So Congress is confronted with two choices--do nothing; or respond decisively in opposition to staying the course--a course that is sure to produce an even more violent, less stable political and security climate in Iraq.

To me, that choice is clear. Leadership demands that those of us who think the President is on the wrong track, not simply stand up and say so, but act to stop this escalation from going forward.

I know that enacting legislation to stop the President from the course he has chosen will not be easy. But that doesn't mean that the Congress shouldn't debate it and vote on it--that is exactly what the American people sent us to Congress to do.

We have arrived at a moment of choice. The President and this Administration have chosen escalation--more bloodshed, more chaos, and more violence. If the President wants to escalate our military commitment to Iraq, and if the President wants to send more troops into the center of a civil war, then the President must make that case to the United States Congress and let the full Congress vote on the merits of such a plan.

The President has stated that he believes that as Commander-in-Chief he has the authority to order troops to Iraq in the face of Congressional opposition. We are a Nation of laws. The President is not above those laws. If Congress passes legislation to limit the deployment of troops to Iraq, the President will no longer have the luxury of ignoring the views of the Congress, a co-equal branch of government. And the time for a blank check is over.