Floor Statements

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that we now proceed to a period for morning business, with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each. There will be no more votes tonight.

Mr. President, following leader remarks, the Senate will be in a period of morning business until 11 a.m. this morning. The majority will control the first half and the Republicans the second half. Following morning business, the Senate will resume consideration of the STOCK Act. We worked very hard until late in the evening last night to try to come up with an agreement to complete action on this bill. We will notify Senators when those votes are scheduled. We hope that can be done.

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the following amendments listed below be the only amendments remaining in order to the bill before the Senate, S. 2038:

Lieberman No. 1482; Paul No. 1484; Paul No. 1487; Lieberman side-by- side to Shelby amendment No. 1491; Shelby No. 1491, as modified; Lieberman side-by-side to Paul No. 1485; Paul No. 1485, as modified; Collins side-by-side to Boxer No. 1489; Boxer-Isakson No. 1489; Portman No. 1505; Enzi No. 1510; Blumenthal No. 1498; Toomey-McCaskill No. 1472; Inhofe No. 1500; McCain No. 1471; Leahy-Cornyn No. 1483; Coburn No. 1473; DeMint No. 1488; Grassley No. 1493; Brown of Ohio No. 1481, as modified; that all other pending amendments be withdrawn, with the exception of the substitute amendment; that the time until 2 p.m. be for debate on the bill and amendments, with the time equally divided between the two leaders or their designees; that at 2 p.m., the Senate proceed to votes in relation to the amendments in the order listed; that there be no amendments or points of order to any of the amendments prior to the votes other than budget points of order; that the following be subject to a 60-vote affirmative threshold: Paul No. 1487; Collins side-by-side to Boxer No. 1489; Boxer No. 1489, as modified; Blumenthal No. 1498; Toomey-McCaskill No. 1472; Inhofe No. 1500; McCain No. 1471; Leahy No. 1483; DeMint No. 1488; Grassley No. 1493; and Brown No. 1481; further, that Coburn amendment No. 1473 be subject to a two- thirds affirmative vote threshold; that there be two minutes equally divided in between the votes; that all after the first vote be 10 minutes in duration; that upon disposition of the amendments listed, the substitute amendment, as amended, if amended, be agreed to, and the Senate then proceed to vote on passage of the bill, as amended.

Mr. President, the mere fact that we now have the right to vote doesn't mean people have to have recorded votes. There are other ways of rejecting or approving amendments. I hope people will talk to Senators Lieberman and Collins and find out if there needs to be a recorded vote on these matters. I appreciate the cooperation of both sides.

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

I ask unanimous consent notwithstanding adjournment of the Senate, the Committee on Environment and Public Works be authorized to report legislation tomorrow, February 3, from 12 noon to 2 p.m.

Madam President, I now ask unanimous consent that at 3 p.m., Monday, February 6, the Chair lay before the body the conference report to accompany H.R. 658, the FAA Reauthorization Reform Act; that there be up to 2\1/2\ hours of debate on the conference report, equally divided between the conferees or their designees, prior to the vote on adoption of the conference report; that the vote on adoption be subject to a 60-vote threshold.

I ask unanimous consent we now proceed to S. Res. 367.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, the motions to reconsider be laid on the table, with no intervening action or debate, and any statements be printed in the Record.

I now ask that we have the first reading of a bill which is at the desk.

I ask for a second reading in order to place this bill on the calendar, but I object to my own request.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate adjourn until 2 p.m., on Monday, February 6, 2012; that following the prayer and pledge, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour be deemed expired, and the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day; that following any leader remarks, the Senate be in a period of morning business until 3 p.m., with Senators permitted to speak up to 10 minutes each; and that following

morning business, the Senate proceed to consideration of the conference report to accompany H.R. 658, the FAA Reauthorization Act, under the previous order.

Madam President, I appreciate the cooperation of Senators this week. This important piece of legislation is something the American people believe is extremely important for the Congress to not put itself above the law. There was a dispute as to whether we were above the law. After this passage, there will be no dispute whatsoever.

I appreciate the fact that we will now move to the FAA bill, which is going to be completed in the form of a conference report. It is very hard to do. People worked extremely hard. Is it a perfect piece of legislation? No, it is not. But we have not had an FAA bill since 2003. We have had 23 temporary extensions. During this period of time the FAA basically shut down because we could not agree on what should move forward.

I repeat, this bill is not perfect, but it is something that is extremely important for job creation and for making our airports safer.

There will be a rollcall vote at 5:30 p.m. on the adoption of the FAA conference report.

Madam President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask unanimous consent that it adjourn under the previous order.

Mr. President, as the Presiding Officer and all Senators should understand, we have a new sheriff in the Senate now. And we wish Elizabeth MacDonough well. She is certainly well qualified for this job. She has proven that in the decade she has been here, her fairness and astuteness of Senate rules. Let everyone understand that a new boss is in the Senate now.

This morning, following any leader remarks, the Senate will be in a period of morning business for 1 hour. The Republicans will control the first half and the majority will control the final half. Following morning business, we will resume consideration of the STOCK Act.

The STOCK Act

Mr. President, it is my understanding that the Republicans are going to have a luncheon today. I hope they discuss what they want to do here on the Senate floor. Last night we had a situation where two of our fine Senators, Mr. Lieberman and Ms. Collins, who have a reputation of being fair and bipartisan, did their best to work through some amendments, to set up votes on them, and they couldn't do it because we had Senators who offered amendments that had nothing to do with this bill--nothing. But Republican Senators said they would not allow a vote on germane and relevant amendments until they were guaranteed a vote on their nongermane amendments. So that is not a good situation, and we cannot legislate in that fashion. It is one thing to offer an amendment that is not germane, but to demand a vote on it out of order before any other amendments? So the minority has to make a decision whether they want to legislate or have people give speeches all day that have nothing to do with the legislation.

I hope the leadership and the Senators generally on the other side of the aisle will work together to help us move this piece of legislation out of here. It is an important piece of legislation. We were told it is bipartisan. Only two Senators voted against breaking the filibusters so we could start debating this bill.

Spending

The Republicans in Congress often claim they are the only thing standing against a wave of deficit spending. But where were these Republicans when President Bush pushed for trillions in unpaid tax cuts for the rich? Where were they? They were right here in Congress, that is where. So instead of pointing the finger at us, Republicans should examine their own track record of extravagant spending: a prescription drug plan, unpaid for; two unpaid wars; tax breaks for the rich, unpaid for. And they were paid for--borrowed money, money borrowed from American taxpayers. Trillions of dollars. In fact, President Bush's tax cuts were the single largest contributor to the ballooning budget deficits during his administration. There were plenty of others, but that was No. 1. And no one benefited from these tax breaks more than billionaires and millionaires. Tax breaks for the richest Americans piled nearly $1 trillion on our debt over the last decade. The tax bill was far more than that, but that is just people making more than $1 million a year.

Yesterday the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released a report showing that these tax cuts will continue to push deficits to unsafe levels. We know that, but in addition to doing that, what it does is it makes the poor

poorer, the rich richer, and squeezes the middle class every day. Extending the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans--people making more than $1 million a year--would add another $1 trillion to the deficit over the next decade. We can no longer afford to bankrupt our Nation to give more tax breaks to people who do not need them. People are putting up accounts in the Cayman Islands, stashing money in Switzerland.

Republicans are right about one thing: We do have a deficit problem in this country. And there are two ways to ease this crisis. We could cut more jobs for teachers, firefighters, police, and Federal employees. We could cut Social Security and Medicare benefits for seniors after a lifetime of hard work. We could put off repairing our crumbling roads, bridges, and schools. We could continue to let our schools fall into disrepair and our students fall further behind. We could continue talking about what really does not matter.

The House keeps talking about bills they have passed that create jobs. Everyone, every pundit who has looked at those knows it is just a subterfuge. They want to cut regulations, and that would make people sicker, that would make our air dirtier and our water less pure and our food less safe. That is what they are doing to create jobs.

The other way to cut spending would be to take care of those unnecessary tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires.

So this is the choice we face: cutting the heart out of America or having the richest of the rich contribute just a little bit to the problems we have in America today as it relates to spending. The choice we face should not be a very difficult choice.

This country has limited resources, and we must use those resources wisely. Investing in the middle class is a wise use of those resources. When you put money back in the pockets of the middle class, they spend it. They spend it on groceries and gas and buying new cars, paying their mortgages, paying their rent, maybe repairing their family car, or spending it to fix the roof on their house that has become dilapidated. That spending boosts business, spurs hiring, and helps the economy. Rigging the tax system to favor the richest of the rich does not do that. Rigging the system does not create jobs. It does not spur growth. It is not a wise use of our resources.

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

Mr. President, I apologize to the Presiding Officer and staff and Senators, but we have not been able to reach an agreement yet on how to move forward on this simple bill. Remember, everybody loved the bill? We should have been able to finish it quickly. It has not worked out that way, but we are close. I hope in the morning we can do this and finish the bill tomorrow afternoon. That would be preferable. I hope we can do that.

Everyone has worked in good faith and there are a number of amendments we will vote on, and if that is the case, we can finish this hopefully tomorrow, late in the afternoon or early evening. We are not there yet, but we are very close.

Mr. President, it is Senator Gillibrand's fault we are in all of this trouble.

Mr. President, to Senator Lieberman, we did a lot more generalized work than the distinguished junior Senator from New York. She is an absolute expert in this area where we are dealing with corporate law, all the stuff we did with derivatives and all that, and I was certainly joking when I said she was the cause of trouble for this legislation. It was her idea. We appreciate her good work. Senator Lieberman and I have been through a number of battles together and this is one of the minor skirmishes.

I note the absence of a quorum.