I suggest the absence of a quorum. Mr. President, I want to spend a minute talking about some remarks I made this morning, especially in light of how they are being irresponsibly mischaracterized by those seeking to score political points.…
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
Mr. President, I want to spend a minute talking about some remarks I made this morning, especially in light of how they are being irresponsibly mischaracterized by those seeking to score political points.
Today, we learned that 36,000 Americans lost their jobs in February. Those families don't need today's Department of Labor report or anyone else in Washington to tell them what that means for putting food on the table or making car payments or utility payments or affording their health care. It is devastating news. If we are going to discuss the state of our economy and the direction in which it is going, if we are going to talk about it like adults, let us take a step back and put the number into context.
Economists, as reported by the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg News Wire, and other publications believed that 75,000 to 80,000 Americans were going to lose their jobs last month. That is more than double what the actual number turned out to be. That number, of course, is still too high. But I was glad this morning when I heard the unemployment number proved the pundits wrong by some 50 percent. Those economists thought the employment rate was going to go up. Well, it didn't. But the unemployment rate is still too high, and anyone from Nevada can tell anyone who wants to listen about that fact.
We could ask the 40,000 Americans who economists thought were in the line of fire but who still had a job to go to this morning, and they will tell you that they were relieved February wasn't as bad as expected. And remember, if you compare where we were last year and where we are today, if you compare where we were before the Recovery Act and where we are now, there is no question we stopped a terrible situation from getting even worse.
In the 3 months before the Recovery Act, 750,000 to 800,000 people lost their jobs--in those 3 months alone. Then the Recovery Act kicked in, and in the last 3 months, that number is down from 750,000 to 36,000. That is not all. In the quarter before the Recovery Act, the economy shrank by more than 6 percent. In the last quarter, the economy grew by 6 percent. Expert after expert has said as many as 2\1/2\ million people who have jobs today would not have them had we not had the Recovery Act. Expert after expert has said our recession would have become another depression if we had done nothing, as some urged. Going from 750,000 to 800,000 job losses to 36,000 is not the end, but it is a step in the right direction. Taking our economy from a 6-percent contraction to 6 percent growth is not the end, but it is a step in the right direction.
People should start looking literally at the glass being half full rather than half empty. People should start betting on the success of this country, not the failure, as some have done.
The President said this morning that the 6-percent growth we had last quarter is not the end, but it is a step in the right direction. And as he said this morning, it is still more than we should tolerate. We don't pretend for a minute it is enough. I know Nevada's families and businesses are hurting, and that is why we are doing even more to put people back to work and why we worked so hard to pass a jobs bill last month that the House passed yesterday. That is so important.
The jobs bill is going to be great for small businesses. It will save a million highway jobs, allow small businesses to hire people who have been off work for 60 days, give small businesses an incentive to buy things and write them off for up to $250,000. They do not have to depreciate it. And the Buy America Bonds, one of the premier successful issues in our Recovery Act that Governors and local officials wanted, is in the bill we passed. I was at the White House, along with others, yesterday where the President signed a bill that rewards businesses with tax cuts for keeping jobs here at home and not sending them overseas.
But again, let us put this in context. What was the response from my friends on the other side of the aisle? It is incredible. We have been told that the bill will create more than 200,000 jobs--the Travel Promotion Act. What did my friends on the other side say? They agreed with some of the ideas in the bill, but they decided to play politics and they voted against it anyway, with rare exception.
It is why we fought so hard to extend unemployment health benefits for those thrown out in the streets by the Republican recession. What was the response of our Republican colleagues to preserve unemployment compensation with unemployment health benefits? The response from my Republican colleagues, even though they said they agreed with helping those who had lost their jobs through no fault of their own, was they delayed and delayed and let the benefits expire. And when thousands were told to go home from their jobs without pay, and with many more at risk, they sat silently by.
That is why we passed the Travel Promotion Act, which the President signed yesterday--a bill that would create jobs and cut the deficit by $\1/2\ billion. It is a bill that will bring foreign tourists to the United States so they can spend their money all across our country. But how did the Republicans react? They delayed it for months and months and months and months, only to vote for it in the end.
We will keep going. We will pass a long-term extension of unemployment insurance, health benefits for the unemployed and tax cuts for small businesses. We will create incentives for companies to invest in renewable energy--projects that will make States
such as Nevada the leaders of the new clean energy economy, with green jobs from coast to coast that can never be outsourced. It is why we will finish the job on health care reform, which both bodies of Congress have already passed--a plan with contents my State and the country overwhelmingly support.
Fixing our broken health care system will save lives, save money, and save Medicaid and Medicare, but it will also save jobs--as many as 34 million over the next decade. The reason each of these steps is important--the Recovery Act, our jobs bill, extension of unemployment and health benefits, promoting tourism, tax cuts and incentives, and health care reform--is because they each add certainty and security to our businesses, our States, and our country. They each represent a strong new brick along the road to recovery that we need to build.
Yet for some reason, those on the other side simply can't bring themselves to admit what we are doing is working. We are nowhere finished with that work, but the people of Nevada and the rest of the American people know that the emergency steps we took and the ones we will take have turned us around and now we are facing in the right direction. We have a long way to go, as the President said, and we will move past this.
So I encourage my Republican friends to remember this critical context before their political reflections lead them to make claims they know to be false. I warn them once again that this country has no place and no patience for those who root for failure.
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 send a cloture motion to the desk.
Mr. President, I send another cloture motion to the desk.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that on Tuesday, March 9, after the Senate resumes consideration of H.R. 4213, it proceed to vote in relation to the following amendments, in the order listed, and with no amendments in order to the amendments; and that prior to each vote there be 4 minutes of debate, equally divided and controlled in the usual form, and after the first vote in this sequence, the succeeding votes be limited to 10 minutes:
Baucus amendment No. 3429 on the subject matter of the Coburn amendment No. 3358; the Coburn amendment No. 3358; the Murray amendment No. 3356, as modified; the Republican leader, or designee, amendment on the same subject matter as the Murray amendment No. 3356; that at 2:30 p.m., Tuesday, March 9, the Senate proceed to vote on the motion to invoke cloture on the Baucus substitute amendment No. 3336, with the mandatory quorum being waived.