Madam President, I am. Madam President, what is the pending business? Madam President, I have an amendment at the desk, No. 568, and I ask for its immediate consideration. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the…
Madam President, I am.
Madam President, what is the pending business?
Madam President, I have an amendment at the desk, No. 568, and I ask for its immediate consideration.
Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.
Madam President, I thank my colleague from Oklahoma for his courtesy.
The highway bill we are currently debating is important, vitally important to building a strong economy for our Nation. It will create jobs today and raise productivity tomorrow, strengthening the American people in the global economic competition we face and, in so doing, offer better prosperity and security for our children.
This is only a small part of a bigger picture. It is only the beginning of what must be done if we are to ensure American prosperity and national security and a future for our children of which we can be proud.
The American people need a debate--a debate that starts today--about how to create that prosperity in a global economy, about what we must do and to what we must commit ourselves, and also about what we have a right to expect from others. It is a debate that will take time--time today, time this week, time repeatedly this year and for the foreseeable future. It is a debate that will define our generation and affect the American people for generations to come. It is a struggle from which our current leaders have all too often been missing, incoherent, naive, and shortsighted, and that must change.
As my colleagues know, I feel so strongly about this subject that I recently placed a hold--the first time I have done such a thing--on the prospective nomination of Ron Portman to be our next trade negotiator. I want to emphasize this action is not personal on my behalf. I met with Mr. Portman. He is a fine man. I have every reason to believe he is eminently qualified for the position for which he has been nominated. But our obligation in this Senate is not merely to confirm him in his new job but, in addition, to confirm that American workers and businesses can labor in a system where, through hard work, ingenuity, and sacrifice, they have a fair chance in the global ``economyplace'' to succeed. That, too often, is not the case, and the indifference and the inaction that has led to this must change.
Our amendment enjoys broad bipartisan support. I am proud to say Senators Collins, Graham, and others support this undertaking. They know it is essential. We have bicameral support. Representatives English, Davis, and many others support this amendment. They too know that something must be done.
Our approach enjoys support by both business and labor--the National Manufacturers Association, and many representatives of organized labor--because they have waited too long for justice, and the time for justice has arrived.
We have the broad support we enjoy because of a building consensus in our country. Even in a divided society, even in this divided institution, action is needed and can no longer be delayed or denied.
What is that consensus, Madam President? It is the American people must devote themselves to succeeding in a global competition, that we must provide for those who are adversely affected by that global competition, and that American workers and businesses have a right to expect that our competitors in this competition will play by the same set of rules as do we.
America must commit itself, we must commit ourselves--it is our obligation--to doing those things that are necessary to succeed in the global marketplace. Nothing else will do. We cannot wall up our country. We cannot shut out those with whom we would compete. We saw the consequences of that in Eastern Europe under communism. So when the walls come down, as they invariably do, they could produce nothing that the rest of the world could consume.
It reminds me, in some ways, of the siren song of protectionism of the Greek king who once sought to turn back the tide and stood on the beach commanding it not to come in, only to drown in the process. We must not follow that path. But to avoid following
that path, we must have a strategy for success in the global marketplace that involves a robust commitment to research and development in the new goods, the new services, the new technologies of the future that will command good wages in the global marketplace, particularly in the area of energy independence.
We have an opportunity, as a society, to create hundreds of thousands of good-paying jobs, to address our imbalance of payments, to strengthen our finances, our economy, our environment, and our Nation's security in the process. That commitment has been missing for too long.
It is penny-wise and pound-foolish when we cut back on our investment in research and development. It demonstrates a lack of national will when we do not commit ourselves to increased energy independence. That must change.
What also must change is an increased commitment to an education for every American child, particularly the less-fortunate third, so they can be economically relevant in the global marketplace of today and tomorrow with the skills and the talents and the abilities to be globally competitive.
For too many of our less fortunate children, that still is simply not the case. So we have to redouble our efforts in K-12 education, and we need to open up the doors of access to college opportunity for every American child who is willing to work hard, play right, and do right themselves to get there.
The growing gap between the haves and have nots in America today increasingly is defined by those who have a college education and those who do not. Over the last 20 years, those who dropped out of high school or got a high school diploma that did not mean very much because the grades were the result of social promotion rather than actual achievement have seen their standards of living decline precipitously. Those in our country who received a college degree have seen their standards of living increase marginally. Those who have gotten an advanced degree have seen a dramatic increase in their prosperity and standard of living. So if we want to be globally competitive, we need to invest in the talents and the skills of our children and ensure that every child can have a college opportunity. That is a debate for another day. More needs to be done. More must be done if we are going to win the battle of global economic competition.
We also must do our part by committing ourselves to a course of fiscal sanity. The current budget imbalances simply are not sustainable, and they exacerbate the trade imbalance and the borrowing we must undertake from abroad. When it comes to our own budget deficits and imbalance, we only have ourselves to blame. We have to summon the national will to restore our finances, to ensure that we have a strong financial, fiscal situation in this country, to ensure that our children will inherit from us something better than our unpaid bills that have to be paid with interest to foreign countries and increasingly foreign banks. That is not right. We need to correct that situation. We need to redouble our efforts to increase our national savings through incentives for Americans to save more in the private sector so that we will increasingly be able to finance our demands at home.
We need to look through the prism of innovation in all that we do to ensure that we can be more rapid, more nimble, in terms of bringing new goods and services to market, and when we do that we need to ensure there is robust protection for our intellectual property rights abroad. All too often, that is not the case. We cannot allow a situation to develop where, when we do our part through research and development, through education, through fiscal sanity, through increasing our own domestic savings, through becoming more competitive and innovative, the fruits of that labor of that American genius are stolen by those abroad through violating our intellectual property rights. That cannot be allowed to continue further.
In addition to having a positive strategy for economic success in a global marketplace, we also have a moral responsibility to those who may be dislocated through no fault of their own as a result of that global economic competition. We must reach out to those Americans who are displaced and ensure that they have an opportunity to get back on the ladder of success, that every American has the prospect of being upwardly mobile in the global marketplace and that we do not just say to them, well, if they grew up 30 or 40 years ago and did not get the education they need, if they happen to be employed in the wrong industry that is suffering dislocations, that is too bad for them; they are in the scrap heap of history; they are on the wrong side of history; tough luck. That is social Darwinism, and we cannot take that path either.
For those of us who will benefit from the fruits of the global marketplace, consumers and industries that are globally competitive and enjoy comparative advantage, we have to take some of that success, some of those benefits, and put it into training, retraining, job placement, pension and health care portability, so that every American has a chance to be upwardly mobile and successful in the global marketplace.
There is also a growing consensus that even when we have done our part, even when we have adopted a strategy to be successful, even when we have defined our comparative advantage, when we provided for those who will be dislocated through no fault of their own, even when we have done all of that, others must do their part, too. We cannot stand idly by and watch the ingenuity, hard work, and sacrifice of the American people undone by the premeditated cheating--and that is what it is--of other countries because of their own narrow self-interests.
American workers and businesses too often are getting the shaft today, and that is not right. It is not right when those of us in the Senate stand idly by. It is not right when those in the administration turn a blind eye to this. That must change. We must enforce the rules of open global competition, and that is what our amendment will do. That is our obligation to our fellow citizens and our children.
The cheating--and as I have said, that is what it is--comes in many forms, such as the theft of intellectual property. I am told that more than 80 percent of the business software in China today is pirated. Barriers to U.S. exports, some in the form of tariffs, some not tariff barriers, such as our beef exports to Japan today--more on that in a moment--through currency manipulation, which we voted on in this Senate not long ago, giving a built-in 25- to 30-percent advantage to countries that do that--in this case, China--not because our workers are not as smart, not because they do not work as hard, not because the products are not as competitive, are simply because of financial engineering. Tens of thousands of Americans, when they get up in the morning, before they get dressed and go to work, start off with that kind of disadvantage through no fault of their own. How can we possibly look them in the face and tell them they are getting an even shake in the global marketplace? How can we possibly call that free trade? It is not. We know it is not. And it has to change.
Illegal subsidies is another form of cheating. Free rent, free power, loans never intended to be repaid--that is not free trade. It is the opposite of free trade. It is economic engineering by other countries to the detriment of American workers and businesses, and that has to stop. It is well known.
In its recent report to the Congress, the congressionally mandated and bipartisan U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission stated:
There was a general consensus in the testimony that China
remains in violation of its WTO obligations in a number of
important areas.
In a hearing before the Ways and Means Committee 2 weeks ago, a representative of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce highlighted a number of concerns:
. . . China's post-WTO accession use of industrial policy--
Not free trade, industrial policy--
including the use of targeted lending, subsidies, mandated
technology standards rather than voluntary, industry-led
international standards, discriminatory procurement policies,
and potentially, antitrust policy--to structure the
development of strategic sectors is of mounting concern.
Industrial policy, not free trade. That is what we seek to change, a global competitive marketplace where the
laws of comparative advantage will rule, where citizens of every country will have a right to work hard, think smart, be nimble, bring goods and services to the marketplace, and let the best man and woman win. Too often that is not the case today. It is the case on the part of our workers but not on the part of their competitors, and that is what has to stop. That is what this amendment will do.
Our Government is well aware of this but too often chooses to turn a blind eye. The time for the Senate turning a blind eye has to stop. I think about the case of Batesville Tool and Die in Indiana and the fact that their competitor, in this case from China, sells their product in the United States of America for one-half of a penny above the cost of the raw materials, leaving nothing for labor, nothing for transportation, nothing for marketing. There has to be an illegal subsidy there. It is the laws of physics and the laws of economics. Currently there is nothing in our law that allows us to do anything about it. If the laws of economics are going to make sense, our law better insist that we have a right to end this kind of industrial policy and cheating. That is what our amendment will change.
I think about the National Association of Manufacturers, an organization that embraces free trade, and a pair of pliers they held up when we announced our amendment a few months ago, a pair of pliers sold at the cost of raw materials--the same thing, leaving nothing for anything else. Obviously an illegal subsidy violating the rules of the WTO is in place there, and that has to change.
I think about a foundry I visited in northeast Indiana where they stopped production so that I could address the workers several months ago. A foundry is a dirty business. These guys had soot on their faces and grime on their clothes, and they gathered around to hear me speak. I looked at them, and I in good conscience could no longer look them in the face, knowing the kind of burdens they labor under, the unlevel playing field, the kind of cheating that takes place, knowing they are willing to work hard for a living, and that too often that can be undone by those who are not willing to do the same or are willing to cheat to have their way. That is what has to stop, and that is what this amendment will change.
The time has come to take a stand. Our prosperity is at stake. The global marketplace, the global trading system, cannot work. When our global competitors have a comparative advantage, we buy their goods, but then when we have a comparative advantage, when American workers can produce something quicker, smarter, and cheaper than anybody else, they still do not get to sell their products abroad. They are still defeated at home because of cheating. It just will not work, and that is what this amendment will help to change. Our national sovereignty is at stake, our very sovereignty as a nation.
I do not know how many of my colleagues or the American people noticed several weeks ago that the President of the United States got on the phone and he called his colleague, the Prime Minister of Japan, and he said: You have been keeping our beef exports out of your country for too long. We are pretty good at producing beef in the United States, and you are using the excuse--and it is an excuse now--of the mad cow scare a couple of years ago as an informal trading barrier to keep our products out. You know what, we buy a lot from you. You ought to bring this nontariff barrier down. It is only the right thing to do.
So they had this exchange, and then shortly thereafter, whether by accident or not, the Prime Minister happened to say, well, maybe the time has come for Japan to start diversifying its financial holdings out of dollar-denominated assets, and for the next several hours the value of our currency, the value of our money, began to go into a free fall until some bureaucrat down in the bowels of the Finance Ministry came out and said the Prime Minister did not really know what he was talking about, it is not true.
Well, that is one thing. But a couple of weeks before that, there was a rumor going through Seoul, the same kind of thing--maybe the South Koreans would start diversifying out of dollar-denominated assets. That started a run on our currency, too.
It is not a sign of strength, it is not a sign of independence, it is not a sign of security when something as fundamental as the value of our money can be undermined by a slip of the tongue or a premeditated statement or a rumor sweeping a foreign capital. That is not the sign of a great nation; it is the sign of dependency, of weakness. It is something that can no longer be allowed to continue if we are going to have the kind of security for our children that we want them to have and that they deserve.
Make no mistake, our Nation's security is at stake. A strong military and the current financial imbalances we are running cannot be sustained indefinitely.
There was a book several years ago by Paul Kennedy called ``The Rise and Fall of Great Powers.'' It pointed out that the undoing of great nations had all too often been the result of their economic and financial weakness.
The percentage of GDP we are currently spending on national security and military expenditures substantially outstrips that of our economic competitors, freeing them to invest a substantially greater percentage of their wealth in productive assets.
As the only global superpower and the principal leader in the war against terror, we cannot afford to cut back on our investment in national security. At the very least, we can insist that those who benefit from our efforts in the fight against terror, who benefit from our efforts to provide for global security, play by the same set of economic rules so that we do not undercut the very prosperity that allows us to fight the war on terror and provide for global economic security. The two have to go hand in hand. For the last several years there has been a decoupling that cannot go on indefinitely. If we do not correct this situation, we not only undermine our prosperity and our financial strength, we undermine our very sovereignty and our Nation's security. The debate about leveling the field and enforcing the rules on global trade is very much, in the long run, a debate about national security as well.
Finally, let me sum up by saying two things. First, I know a lot of people want to talk about China. We had a debate on that and a vote with regard to currency manipulation a couple of weeks ago. Our relationship with China is one of the most important relationships over the next 50 to 100 years. They are a great nation with a great culture and a bright future. Our relationship with them will be at times complex and difficult. It is only going to work if the relationship is mutually beneficial in a number of ways, and in the economic arena as well.
The nation of China has its challenges and we want to see them successfully meet those challenges. But we have challenges, too, and they must be committed, equally committed to seeing us meet our challenges if this relationship is going to work as it must. It is simply not right that to ease the absorption of surplus workers in agriculture in China, we are asked artificially to throw out of work and put out of business American workers and businesses in our heartland. That is fundamentally not just. Stability and growth in China are important, and we should help them in that regard but not at the cost of our own. It is time that we insisted we achieve both.
Let me conclude by saying I am optimistic about our future. With the right kind of leadership there is little that the American people cannot accomplish. But as the old saying goes: If you don't know where you are going, well, any road will lead you there. We must have a strategy for success and prosperity. If we do, I am convinced we can get the job done because we have done it before.
If I had been addressing this Senate 100 years ago, more than half of our workers would have been employed in agriculture--more than half. Today it is about 3 or 4 percent. As we made the transition from an agricultural economy to a manufacturing-based economy, the United States of America did not dry up and blow away. There were difficulties but we met the challenge. We reinvented our economy and increased our prosperity and our standing in the world as a result.
If I had been addressing this Senate 50 years ago, more than 30 percent of
the American workers would have been employed in manufacturing. Today it is about 12 percent. Again, as the global economy began to change, as our domestic economy began to change, we did not dry up and blow away. There were difficulties. There were challenges. But we have been growing the service sector of the economy and the innovative and other parts of the economy.
So as we fight to save every kind of manufacturing job where we can be competitive in advanced manufacturing and other sections of the manufacturing sector, we have grown other parts of the American economy as well. We can continue to do that but only if we are willing to stand up for American interests and competitiveness and not allow the genius of our people to be stolen and undermined by the premeditated cheating and self-interest of other nations to which we turn a blind eye, or don't have the stomach to stand up to. That has to stop and that is what our amendment will do.
It will enable the American people to preserve our prosperity--when we are right, when we are competitive, when we have an advantage--and will enable us to go on and grow parts of our economy and grow good jobs at good wages where we have that advantage and allow our consumers to buy products from countries where they have the advantage. It will do right by our children. It will do justice to our workers. It will strengthen our national security, our sovereignty, our finances, and our prosperity. It is the right thing to do, and that is why I propose this amendment and that is why I ask for my colleagues' support.
I yield the floor.
That is correct.
Did my colleague have a question?