Floor Statements

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.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, it is the waning days of this Congress--the waning hours--and we depend so much on our staffs, our individual, personal staffs and the people who are in the Senate. I am going to direct some attention to David Tinsley, whom all of us know, the gentleman with glasses up here and who is here all the time. But in speaking about him, I am speaking about all these people who work these unbelievable hours. After we leave, they are still here. Before we get here, they are here. They make this place operate. We are the greatest legislative body in the history of the world, but it is not because of individual Senators, in my opinion. It is because of the support staff, such as David Tinsley.

David is going to leave the Senate after 31 years of service. He will retire within a couple months. He is a native of the Commonwealth of Virginia. He earned his undergraduate degree at Virginia Tech and completed his graduate studies at the University of Maryland. He came to the Office of the Secretary of the Senate in 1977, first, as a staff and reference assistant, and 4 years later, because of who he is and the tremendously nice person he is and his talent, generally, he was promoted to the job of assistant executive clerk.

In 1987, David started his floor work as assistant journal clerk. This doesn't mean much to most people, but it is one of the most important jobs we have here. From there, he moved to the other side of the desk as assistant legislative clerk, and in February of 1999, earned the role of legislative clerk, which is where he now sits.

What many of those who watch our proceedings on television or read about them in the newspaper may not see the tremendous amount of dedicated work that happens largely, as I have said, behind the scenes. For 31 years, David has been a critical part of everything we have been able to do in the Senate. David is part of our Senate family and has been for 31 years, and I have witnessed, especially in the last few years, with the job I have had, the good times in his life and the bad times. And unfortunately, he has had some very difficult times personally.

He is a wonderful human being, a caring person. His wife Jane, and the children, Joe, Dan, and Katie, are treasured members of our Senate family because it is an extended family.

So, David Tinsley, on behalf of all the Senators who are here tonight, who have been here during your tenure these 31 years, I send to you a very belated but heartfelt thanks for all you have done for us as Senators.

(Applause.)

Mr. President, as soon as we hear from the 2 minutes and 2 minutes, Senator McConnell is going to speak using leader time, and I will follow that, and then following my remarks, we will vote.

Mr. President, similar to all Senators, my office has been flooded in recent days with calls and letters from constituents who are deeply and rightfully concerned with the state of our economy and the security of their savings. Here is one such letter I received from a man in Henderson, NV, the second largest city in the State of Nevada. He wrote:

I am a homeowner and have a wife and two kids. I have been

employed in Nevada for 5-plus years as a salesman in the

southern Nevada area. This area has been hit like no other,

it seems. My salary has dropped nearly 35 percent and does

not look good for the next couple of years. My family and I

are fighting to stay afloat in this cutthroat market. We have

done and redone our budget and seem to have made additional

cuts every month just to keep up with my declining income.

Please keep everybody in mind when passing a bailout bill

for Wall Street. My home is down more than $100,000 from the

time I purchased it in August 2006. I am fighting to stay

current. I don't want to see the big corporations take the

bailout and move on with the middle class left to fight for

themselves. We need a real solution that is in the American

citizens' interests and not straight out of the pockets of

Wall Street.

Thanks, and my family and I look forward to seeing an end

to this economic tragedy here in Las Vegas and the United

States.

The rescue package we are on the verge of passing is not for the titans of Wall Street. It is not for those whose greed got us here, who chose this greed over prudence. It is not for the CEOs who failed their employees, then left town with multimillion-dollar golden parachutes. This plan is for the man from Henderson whose letter I read. It is for families in Las Vegas, Reno, Winnemucca, and Sparks, not statistics but real people with problems they did not cause and cannot solve themselves. It is for families across Nevada and across America who are struggling every day to keep their jobs, their homes, and find a way to make one paycheck last until another one.

Some Members in both Chambers of Congress ask how they can explain a vote in favor of this legislation to their constituents. Here is how: not with any sense of glee or satisfaction but with a sense of confidence that when called upon to choose between what is easy and what is right, we rejected the easy and chose the right.

There is not a Member of Congress who wouldn't rather use this money to reduce our record debt, to invest in roads, schools, hospitals, bridges, health care, education, or to provide our troops and veterans with the care they deserve. But given this situation, supporting this legislation is the only way to make the best of a crisis and return our country to a path of economic stability, prosperity, and growth.

If we do not act responsibly tonight, we risk the crisis in which senior citizens across America will lose their retirement savings, small businesses won't make payroll, students won't be able to obtain loans to go to college, and families won't be able to obtain mortgages for their homes or loans for their cars.

In the words of Ralph Waldo Emerson:

Thought is the blossom; language the bud; action the fruit

behind it.

My friends, it is time for action.

Last week, President Bush and Secretary Paulson sent to Congress a proposal that the Democrats and Republicans agreed was not the answer. We proceeded to put politics aside and, after long hours and sleepless nights, have come to a solution that the White House, the Treasury Department, and the leaders from both parties on Capitol Hill all believe will resolve this crisis by protecting taxpayers first.

On a bipartisan basis, we added oversight to safeguard any public funds spent. On a bipartisan basis, we stopped CEOs from receiving golden parachutes at our expense, taxpayers' expense. On a bipartisan basis, we made sure this taxpayer money would be an investment, not a giveaway, and that any future returns would go not to the corporations but to the taxpayers. On a bipartisan basis, we ensured that homeowners facing foreclosure would receive much needed help. And on a bipartisan basis, we added a provision to increase Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation insurance for bank deposits from $100,000 to $250,000 to renew the American people's confidence that the money they put in local banks will be protected.

In addition to these critical improvements, Democrats and Republicans on a bipartisan basis decided to include other important components that will lower taxes and create jobs. By fixing the alternative minimum tax, this legislation will save the middle class $60 billion in their taxes. That is what we are going to do tonight.

With new incentives for private sector entrepreneurs who are developing and producing clean, homegrown alternative energy from the Sun, the wind, the Earth--geothermal--we will create hundreds of thousands of new jobs. With tax breaks for small businesses and big businesses, we will encourage new investment in growth and new jobs.

In this bill is something called payment in lieu of taxes. The State of Nevada is 87 percent owned by the Federal Government. You can't fly over 40 percent of the State of Nevada; it is restricted military airspace. States that have Federal land, such as the State of Nevada-- no State has it like the State of Nevada--but States that have large Federal landholdings were told long ago that because the tax base was restricted because of these Federal land holdings, the Congress would provide money for these States to make up for the tax losses because of the Federal landholdings. That is what payment in lieu of taxes is all about. It has been in existence for decades, but we have never gotten the amount of money we should. This bill does it. For every State west of the Mississippi, this is big time stuff. This will allow especially rural America and the West to be able to take care of their schools, to do things that are so important.

There are so many good things in this bill. I was speaking earlier to the Senator from Texas. Texas does not have an income tax, but they have a large sales tax. This legislation will allow people in Texas and Nevada and other places who pay sales tax but no income tax to get the same benefit from States that have an income tax.

This is a fine piece of legislation, and we are finally on the verge of passing a bill that Senators Kennedy and Domenici and the late Senator Wellstone worked on for a long time to ensure those who suffer from mental illness have access to health care equal to those who suffer from physical illness. It would be a fitting tribute to Senator Pete Domenici if we are able to pass this legislation into law in honor of his 3\1/2\ decades of Senate service. That would be important, that we do that.

We, the Senate--each Senator--are facing this evening a critical test of leadership. So I ask all my colleagues, Democrats and Republicans, to send a clear and resounding message to America--to the homeowners, laborers, middle-class families, students, senior citizens who are struggling and really suffering--a clear, resounding message that we hear them and that help is on the way.

Mr. President, Senator McConnell, I would appreciate it if Senators would vote from their chairs.

The next vote is exactly the same as this vote. It is my understanding that there is a request for a rollcall vote. If that is, in fact, the case, we will do that. But people need not sit at their chairs because people, after they vote, can depart the Chamber.

We will be in session tomorrow. There will be minor business transacted. We will be in morning business. We will try to clear some bills if we can. We will see Friday--we will see what the House does. They are coming back in session tomorrow. So we are going to have to be in session until a decision is made when the House can take up the legislation.

Everyone should understand, the week of November 17 we are going to have an organizational meeting. We will be in session several days during that period of time. We will tell everyone all about this. One thing we are going to move to is a land package. We have talked to everybody about this. It is something that Senator Bingaman and Senator Salazar have talked to many of you about.

But to see what business will be conducted, we will wait and see what, if anything, the House does. If they do not do anything, we cannot do anything. So we will see what they do. So Members should keep that time open.

Senator McConnell said, and I want to parrot what he said, I so appreciate the cooperation we have had from everybody these past several weeks. This has been a very difficult time for our country, a difficult time for those of us who are elected to office. But I am very happy with this vote tonight. I think it shows that when we work together, we can accomplish good things. I think it speaks volumes.

Both of our Presidential candidates are here and voting and both supporting this legislation. So I say to everyone, thank you very much. This is a good vote we send to the House.

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, following the remarks of myself and Senator McConnell, we are going to move to continue on the consideration of H.R. 2095, the rail safety-Amtrak legislation. Cloture was invoked on the motion to concur in the House amendment yesterday, so we will continue to debate this today during the 30 hours. There will be no rollcall votes today in view of the Rosh Hashanah holiday, but we will have votes tomorrow evening after sundown. We are still working on an agreement to consider the United States-India nuclear agreement. I am quite certain we will finalize that so there can be a vote on that tomorrow.

Mr. President, on the financial crisis facing our country, the blame game needs to end and we need to move forward on doing what is right for our country. Yesterday's drop on Wall Street amounted to a loss of more than a trillion dollars--about $1.2 trillion, to be exact. Most of that money doesn't come from Wall Street titans but from the pensions of people who have retired and who have worked for city government, county government, State government, or in some business they worked at for many years, or people who have frugally worked during their lifetime to save a few dollars and put it into a retirement account. These people are rightfully worried that the security of their golden years will be compromised by what has happened with the irresponsibility in the financial sector. So the most important job we have as Members of Congress is to safeguard the physical and fiscal security of the American people. Despite yesterday's setback in the House of Representatives, this continues to be our No. 1 goal.

Last night, I spoke with the President's Chief of Staff, Josh Bolten. I talked to him again this morning and spent quite a long time with him on the telephone. I spoke to Senator Obama this morning, who had just completed a conversation with President Bush. I mention that not to be a name-dropper but to indicate that we are working together to try to resolve this important issue.

Senators Bennett, Corker, and Gregg on the Republican side, as well as Senators Dodd, Baucus, Conrad, Durbin, Schumer, and Jack Reed on

the Democratic side, have done an exceptionally good bipartisan job to move the rescue legislation forward here in the Senate. Their work continues as we speak. I will also continue to work closely with the minority leader, Senator McConnell, as well as our counterparts in the House of Representatives. We are all committed to keeping the progress on this rescue package moving forward. So in the coming days, I will continue doing everything possible to see that this dire and avoidable financial crisis moves to the best possible outcome and toward a future of stability and growth for our country. I am going to have a meeting within an hour with the Senators I have just spoken about on the Democratic side. They have extremely good contacts on the Republican side.

I wish to say, Mr. President, that I thought the statement made yesterday by Judd Gregg was an extremely good statement. Judd Gregg is the past chairman of the Budget Committee and someone both sides respect for his knowledge of finances. So I commend and applaud Senator Gregg for his statement.

I am hopeful and I am confident that all sides, House and Senate and White House, will work together to achieve a goal that will be good for the American people.

Mr. President, a lot of people think they know Senator Pete Domenici. They know him as a man who has been a leader in the Senate for decades on energy issues, and he was the chairman of that committee, and on budget issues, and he has been the chairman of that committee. He is a man who has been a leader on the Appropriations Committee. I have known Senator Domenici in that regard, as have the American people, but what I think is so interesting about Pete Domenici is a side that a lot of people don't know about him. Here is a man who can talk about Wall Street, he can talk about financial markets, he can talk about the budgetary problems facing this country, but in a personal, private conversation, he can talk about baseball.

Here is a man who was a star athlete. He was a great baseball player. As a young man, he played American Legion Baseball. I played American Legion Baseball, but Pete's team was good. Mine wasn't so good. Pete led his team to the regional championship.

American Legion Baseball used to be the baseball for young men.

They did not have all the State tournaments they had in high schools, so in the summer, the best athletes would get together, the best baseball players would get together and play American Legion ball, and the winter regional championship was significant.

Senator Domenici went on to letter all 4 years, of course, in high school. He was a standout pitcher for the University of New Mexico, and he was All Conference. His final year he had a record of 14 and 3. That is quite a record. In those days, when Senator Domenici was in high school and college, they would play a lot of games, as they do now. A record of 14 and 3 is a very significant record.

But that was not the end of his career. He went on to play professional baseball. After college he played for the hometown crowd as a left-handed pitcher for the Albuquerque Dukes. I know he must have had a great fastball and a great curveball to accomplish what he did in baseball. But in the Senate, Pete Domenici does not throw curveballs, it is the high hard one all the time. He is a person who tells people how he feels.

With my long-time relationship with Senator Domenici, I only had one problem my entire career with Pete Domenici. That was a time when--I, frankly, do not remember whether I was the ranking member of the subcommittee or the chairman of the subcommittee because we went back and forth often. That was the Energy and Water Subcommittee of Appropriations.

As a relatively young Senator, I had a position of power, and I thought what I would do is go and talk to members of that conference and get the votes. I did it very quietly. I did not say a word to Senator Domenici. I surprised everybody. I called for a vote unexpectedly and I won. Senator Domenici did not say a word to me there publicly. Well, when that was over, we had a little heart-to-heart talk. He said: We have to work together. If we are going to work together on this subcommittee, I want to tell you something about how we do things in the Senate. We do not surprise each other. If you had a problem with that issue, talk to me. If you have the votes, you do not need to try to embarrass me publicly, you go ahead and do what you need to do.

I learned a great lesson there. I learned a lesson that can only come by someone teaching you, such as when I practiced law. It is not pleasant to talk about, but you learn from your mistakes in the practice of law. When you make a mistake, you never do that again. As a result of the teaching moment I had with Senator Domenici, I never, ever did that again. So I appreciate, if for no other reason than that, that one experience with Pete Domenici. It made me a better Senator and a better person.

It was very clear that when Senator Domenici realized he would not be playing for the New York Yankees, even though he was a good athlete, he decided he would become a teacher. Then he went to law school, and after graduating, Pete Domenici entered politics. First, he was elected to the city commission in Albuquerque. Then he climbed up that ladder of local politics and became mayor of Albuquerque and was elected in 1972 as a young man to the Senate.

My relationship with Senator Domenici began, my first experience coming to the Senate, in 1986. I was very fortunate that year. I was a brand-new Senator. I got on the Appropriations Committee. As we now know, Senators wait a long time to get on that committee. I was so fortunate that Barbara Mikulski and Harry Reid, two brand-new Senators, were placed on that committee. From that day, I got to know Pete Domenici.

My experience on the Appropriations Committee goes back to the day that John Stennis, the Senator from Mississippi, was chairman of that committee. By the time I got to the Senate, he was in very frail health. He had been shot in a robbery, he had lost a leg, he had cancer. So he was very weak.

His chief of staff was a man by the name of John Sullivan. He had been chief of staff of the Judiciary Committee, Armed Services Committee, now the Appropriations Committee. And he called me. After I met Senator Stennis, he called me in his office and said to me: Senator Reid, you got on the best committee in the entire Senate. He said: You can do a lot of good things for your State, but do not be greedy.

That was a real good lesson for me. I have always tried to follow that. Senator Domenici has been someone I have worked with on that committee. I did not immediately get on the Energy and Water Subcommittee. It takes a while to get on that. That is one of the most

sought-after committees you can get on in the Appropriations process.

I worked with Pete Domenici since the first day I have been in the Senate but on a very close basis from the time I got on that subcommittee. So we worked together on that Energy and Water Subcommittee for 22 years. Some of these years Pete was the chairman, as I indicated, or I was the ranking member, and other years it was the reverse.

But, frankly, for the two of us, it did not matter which party controlled the Chamber. We continued to work for the people of Nevada and New Mexico and the country on a bipartisan basis. We have traveled the country. We have gone to some of the labs that are so necessary for our country's science--Livermore--and the great facilities we have in New Mexico--Sandia. I can remember going there so clearly. It was a wonderful experience. The two labs in New Mexico are among the best. We also traveled to a facility we fund in Missouri.

Anyway, we have done a lot of things together over the years. In addition to that, because of the relationship of the spouses, his wonderful wife Nancy and my wife Landra, have become very good friends. They are very small people physically but big people in other ways. They are both generous, thoughtful, kind wives, mothers and good people. They have done a great job of raising our children, and they have many conversations about the good and the bad, as all families have in raising their children.

Pete Domenici is now the longest serving U.S. Senator in the history of his State, New Mexico. But longevity does not tell the story of Domenici's legacy. He has established himself as one of America's premier leaders on energy policy, national security, scientific research. While I talk about national security, one of the things I am very satisfied--I do not want to use the word ``proud''--satisfied that Pete Domenici and I worked together on was the safety and security of our nuclear arsenal.

Now, you cannot put these nuclear weapons we have in some storage facility and leave them alone. There must be a way of making sure they are safe and reliable. We worked for years to accomplish that goal, and we have been successful.

Pete Domenici has been one of the leaders on scientific research because of his work on the national labs and fighting nuclear proliferation. He has been to the Nevada test site, 90 miles outside Las Vegas, on a number of occasions. He has worked hard to ensure the competitiveness of American workers in the global marketplace.

We hope within the next--before this year ends, that we can pass the legislation--we have done it here, it has not made it through the House--that we can pass the legislation he and Senator Wellstone started working on more than 10 years ago. It is no secret that these two great individuals, wonderful Senators, did it because they had experience in their own families, problems with mental illness.

As a result of that, they became the experts, the leading advocates to do something about mental health parity in our country. If we eliminate the work he has done on scientific research, national security proliferation, competitiveness, eliminate all that, if he had not done that and all he had done is lead us on the road to mental health parity, that would have been enough to have a very successful career.

But for the millions of Americans who suffer from mental illness, Pete Domenici is the hero. He has joined Senator Kennedy, as I have indicated, the late Senator Wellstone, as national champions on issues related to mental health.

So I would hope that one of the last things we do during the year, that will be the end of his great Senate career, is figure out a way to make sure we get this legislation passed. Senator Domenici made his farewell remarks this past Saturday. He described himself as nearly incapable of sitting still in a crisis. With these years of service to New Mexico and our country, that description fits him perfectly.

Pete and Nancy have eight wonderful children.

Now, how can I describe in my words how I feel about Pete Domenici leaving? I guess we should, as Dr. Seuss said: ``. . . not cry before it's over, smile because it happened.''

That certainly applies to our relationship: Don't cry before it is over, even though there are times when you would like to shed a tear, smile because it happened.

No distance or place or lapse of time can lessen the friendship of those who are thoroughly persuaded of his work. I am persuaded of the work of my friend, Pete Domenici.

I have described him as left-handed all the time I have known him because I did not think we had two right-handed pitchers. I thought Bunning was the only right-hander.

Mr. President, I am going to give a speech regarding Senator Warner in just a minute.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. President, it is very standard in the Senate, we say ``the distinguished gentleman,'' and we say that a lot, and we mean it. But it is never more meaningful than when you refer to John Warner as a distinguished gentleman because that says it all. If there were ever a distinguished gentleman, John Warner is that person.

I can remember when I first came to the Senate 22 years ago, I was so fortunate. I was placed on the Environment and Public Works Committee. John Warner, even though he had been here a while, was one of the relatively new members of that committee. Some people had been there for so long. John Chafee was the ranking Republican on that committee. What a wonderful man he was. But anyway, John Warner, he took such good care of me. He looked out for me. I sat on the other side of the dais, but he took good care of me. We were able to do some good things.

I was fortunate, I was subcommittee chairman my freshman year. Senator Warner will probably remember this. We worked on a number of things. One of the things we worked on was Alar. It was a product that people sprayed on cherries, apples, grapes to keep them from falling off the trees and vines more quickly. We legislated and legislated, and we were never able to get anything passed, but we accomplished what we set out to do because through the hearing process we focused so much attention on this that people stopped using it.

John Warner is a distinguished gentleman. There is no more distinguished gentleman than the man we refer to as John Warner--John William Warner. I love his stories. He talks about his dad who was a physician.

When John was 17, he had in his heart that it was important to wear the uniform of the American serviceman. He volunteered for the Navy so he could fight in World War II. He says he did not do any fighting, but he would have if he had been called upon to do so.

After his first tour of duty, he returned home to his native Virginia, where he attended Washington and Lee University on the GI bill, and then the University of Virginia Law School, which, by the way, then and is now a very difficult school to get in. It is always rated as one of the top 10 law schools in America. It is a great school.

His legal studies were interrupted again to be in the U.S. military, this time as an officer in the Marine Corps during the Korean war. His 10 years in the Marine Corps earned him the rank of captain, CAPT John Warner.

When he completed law school, he was selected as a law clerk by one of the outstanding and historic circuit court judges: E. Barrett Prettyman. What a name: E. Barrett Prettyman. But those of us who have been in the practice of law have always recognized that Prettyman wrote some pretty opinions. He was a renowned lawyer and, of course, now we have a Federal courthouse named after Judge Prettyman as a result of his being such an outstanding judge. John Warner worked for him.

After 4 years as an assistant U.S. attorney, John Warner was appointed and confirmed as Under Secretary of the Navy, then as Secretary of the Navy.

Then, one of my fond memories of John Warner is his telling a story. He was Under Secretary; John Chafee, whom I had the good fortune to serve with in the Senate, was the Secretary of the Navy. The Vietnam war was ongoing. They were asked by the Secretary of Defense, Melvin Laird, to come down and see what was going on at the Capitol Mall. So, as Senator Warner said, they left their Cadillacs someplace else that was supplied to the Secretary and the Under Secretary, and they took off their fancy clothes and came down to the Capitol Mall. And look around they did. There were tens of thousands of people here, tens of thousands--hundreds of thousands of people at the Mall. They were demonstrating against the war. Frankly, after listening to the speeches and watching the crowd and seeing the fervor of the crowd, both Secretary Chafee and Under Secretary Warner returned to the Pentagon and recommended to Melvin Laird that he better take a close look at this war, that things would have to change, based on their observation of what was happening on the Capitol Mall that day.

That is John Warner perfectly described: Someone who gathers the facts, and after having an understanding of the facts, issues his honest opinion as to what is going on. He and John Chafee, two wonderful human beings, two dedicated servants of the U.S. military returned back to the Secretary of Defense and said: Things have to change.

After serving in the Department of the Navy, he did a number of other things. But the story I try to tell is, I repeat, a real John Warner portrayal because he is always eager to listen to all sides of an issue. He is always willing to part from conventional wisdom in order to do the right thing, and then once he says he is going to do something, that is it. So after serving in the Department of the Navy, he decided he would accept the challenge of being the national coordinator for America's bicentennial celebration in 1976. As my colleagues know, there are a lot of things that happened during that period of time under his leadership. But as a little side story, there is a story about Virginia City, NV. Virginia City, NV, at one time was a thriving place of some 30,000 or 40,000. It was the reason Nevada became a State so far ahead of most Western territories. In 1864, we became a State. But as part of his going around the country, as you do when you have a job such as his, raising money and giving speeches, he was asked to go to Virginia City, this historic place in Nevada. He had never been there. It is a very winding road to get up there, and it is a dangerous road. But he was looking forward to being there because one of the patrons in the area--there are some people who are wealthy in Virginia City--decided to have dinner in honor of the bicentennial celebration. So John Warner and his entourage arrive in little Virginia City, which now, by the way, is not 30,000 or 40,000, it is a very small community of maybe, if we are lucky,

a thousand--but probably not. He goes to the assigned place. He knocks on the door. There is no answer. He looks in the window, and you can see the beautiful table, it is all set. It is a banquet in this beautiful home. So someone with John Warner goes to the local law enforcement and says: Could you help us? Because they thought maybe something was wrong. So the local deputy comes and looks in the window with everybody else, walks around the house, and he comes to Senator Warner and says: Mrs. So-and-so is in her vapors. The dinner will not go forward. In Nevada, rather than ``in her vapors,'' we would have said she is too drunk to a have a party. But anyway, John Warner, being the gentleman he is, responded that was okay. Although he came to Virginia City, he did not have dinner at that home that night. He went someplace else for dinner.

I heard Senator Dodd's remarks about him. John Warner is a unique individual. I see the Presiding Officer who is a brandnew Senator. During that time, we had something called the nuclear option, and I heard Senator Collins talk about this today. Senator Collins was talking about how John Warner silently was the leader of that situation that took place. I talked to John Warner during that period of time. John Warner told me what he was going to do. I never once told anyone publicly what he said he would do, but we all knew where he was. I knew where he was. He was on the right side of the issue. Because of his credibility, the issue, with the help of some new Senators such as the Presiding Officer from Colorado, was settled to the good of the country.

John Warner is a person who has class. He has clout and he has tremendous courage. John Warner was sitting as a Senator. A Democratic Senator was his colleague. A person was running as a Republican against his colleague in the Senate, somebody whom John Warner didn't agree with, and he said so. That takes courage. Think about that. You are a Republican from a Republican State. You are sitting with a Democrat. The person who is the nominee for the party is somebody whom you would think the senior Senator from Virginia would support. John Warner, as a matter of conscience, couldn't do that, and he didn't. Everybody said ``that is the end of John Warner. He will never get reelected.'' But, of course, it only caused his popularity to grow in the State of Virginia because they know John Warner is a person who supports people for whom they are, what they do, not any political party.

John Warner was elected in 1978 to the first of five terms representing the Commonwealth of Virginia. Three years ago, he became the second longest serving Senator in the history of the Commonwealth of Virginia. It is without any elaboration or fluff of any kind that now, in his 30th year as a Senator, John Warner has rightly earned the reputation as one of America's alltime great legislators. He is an expert in a number of different areas: national security. He is a champion for the men and women in the military, there is no question about that; he served as chairman and now the ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee; he is a leader on environmental issues; he served as long-time senior member of the Environment and Public Works Committee, where I had the pleasure of serving with him.

John Warner is going to return to private life at the end of the year. The family, our family, our Senate family will lose a tremendous leader and friend. In a place where one's integrity is paramount, I have not known anyone more honest and honorable than John William Warner. I have served throughout my career with lots of people at city level, county level, State level, in the House of Representatives, and in the Senate. I have served with hundreds and hundreds of men and women. There may be, John Warner, people who are as honest and as honorable as you, but never have I met anyone more honorable and more honest than you. Our country is grateful to you for your service. Even though the people of Nevada don't know you, if they did, they would be as grateful as I am for what you have done for our country: Dedicated service in the Senate, in the Armed Services Committee, for the cause of democracy.

He knows everybody. I was talking to him the day before yesterday when Paul Newman died. I said: Did you know Paul Newman? He said: Yes. My son went with his daughter for a couple years. I said to him: Was his daughter as pretty as Paul Newman was handsome? He said: More so. That kind of speaks to his son, too, doesn't it?

John Warner, a man who had an estate in Virginia, decided a number of years ago to no longer have that and moved into the city. I wish I had the words to express, to communicate, to tell him of my affection, my admiration. But even though I may not be able to express it very well, I want John Warner to know that John Warner will always be in my heart.

I say to my friend, now it is a big issue. We tried a long time ago.

Mr. President, could I interrupt my friend and say one thing? I wish to say this because I try not to be envious. Envy is not anything that is good, but I have to admit that I am so envious of your hair. I mean, for a man--I mean, I am envious. I have to acknowledge that. It is great. I wish I could get up in the morning and go to the mirror and have that.

So you will forgive me of my envy?

Thank you.

That is right.

Mr. President, today President Bush took time away from dealing with the Nation's economic crisis to direct his Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, to release a new standard for `acceptable' public radiation exposure from the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump. In other words, the agency decided just how much radiation you and I can live with. Let me be clear, there is no way this weak standard will breathe life into the Bush-McCain plan to dump nuclear waste in Nevada. Instead, it will breath life into more litigation against this terrible project.

The EPA has collaborated with the Department of Energy, DOE, to tweak a standard that a Federal court of appeals threw out in 2001 because it failed to comply with the Energy Policy Act of 1992 and would have left Nevadans dangerously unprotected against radioactive contamination. If the repository at Yucca Mountain was ever actually built, the DOE does not deny that water infiltration would eventually corrode nuclear waste packages and radioactivity will inevitably leak into Nevada's ground water. Instead of working to protect Nevadans from a public health catastrophe, this scandal-ridden EPA has chosen to simply make the rules more lenient so DOE can legally dump waste less than 100 miles outside of Las Vegas. This is unacceptable.

Instead of working to protect the health and safety of Nevadans, EPA and DOE are casting science aside in an attempt to get the nuclear waste dump approved. Instead of warring against science, I side with Nevadans and experts who support safe and attainable solutions to our Nation's nuclear waste. That is why I am working with Senator Ensign to keep nuclear waste on-site at the powerplants where it is produced in secure dry cask storage containers that are approved by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. This plan is safer, more cost effective, and will give us at least a century to find a more permanent solution to nuclear waste.

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that after the prayer and pledge and any remarks of the leaders on Wednesday, October 1, the Senate proceed to the consideration of H.R. 7081, which is at the desk; that the bill be considered under the following limitations: That there be 60 minutes of general debate on the bill, with the time equally divided and controlled between the leaders or their designees; that the only first-degree amendments in order be those listed in this agreement, with no other amendments in order, and debate time limited on each amendment to 60 minutes, with the time equally divided and controlled in the usual form; further, that an additional debate time of 15 minutes each be provided to Senators Feingold and Harkin; a Dorgan amendment re: clarify policy in event of Indian test, and a Bingaman amendment re: reporting requirement in event of Indian test; that the amendments in this agreement be subject to an affirmative 60- vote threshold, and that if the amendment achieves that threshold, then it be agreed to and the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table; that if the amendment does not achieve that threshold, then it be withdrawn; that upon the use or yielding back of time with respect to each amendment, the Senate then proceed to vote in relation to the amendment; that upon disposition of all amendments, the use or yielding back of general debate time, the bill be read a third time, and without further intervening action or debate, the Senate proceed to vote on passage of the bill, as amended, if amended; provided further that passage of the bill requires 60 votes.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that on Wednesday, October 1, following the debate with respect to H.R. 7081, the Senate proceed to the consideration of Calendar No. 610, H.R. 1424; that once the bill is reported, the Dodd, et al., amendment, which is at the desk, be considered; except that this agreement is only valid if both leaders are in concurrence with the provisions of the Dodd, et al., amendment and have so notified the Chair, and that there be general debate

on the amendment for 90 minutes, with the time equally divided and controlled between the leaders or their designees; that upon the use or yielding back of this time, the amendment be set aside, and the Senate then consider the only other amendment in order to the bill, a Sanders amendment re: tax on high-income individuals; that there be 60 minutes of debate with respect to that amendment, with the time equally divided and controlled in the usual form; that upon the use or yielding back of all time with respect to the bill and amendments, the measure be set aside to recur upon disposition of H.R. 7081; that with respect to the disposition of the amendments to H.R. 1424, the first vote occur with respect to the Sanders amendment; that upon disposition of that amendment, the Senate would then consider the Dodd, et al., amendment, that upon disposition of that amendment, the bill, as amended, if amended, be read a third time and the Senate proceed to vote on passage of the bill; that upon passage, with the above occurring without further intervening action or debate, the Dodd, et al., amendment and the bill be subject to a 60-vote threshold.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that all postcloture time be yielded except for 30 minutes, and that--this is in regard to H.R. 2095, the rail safety bill--at 7 p.m., Wednesday, October 1, the Senate resume consideration of the House message with respect to H.R. 2095 and that the time until 7:30 p.m. be equally divided and controlled between the leaders or their designees; that at 7:30 p.m. the motion to concur with the amendments be withdrawn, and the Senate then proceed to vote on the motion to concur in the House amendment to the Senate amendment to the bill; that upon disposition of the House message, the Senate resume consideration of H.R. 7081, the India-U.S. Cooperative Agreement, and then proceed to vote in relation to the amendments to the bill and passage and that the amendments be voted in the order offered; that on Wednesday, October 1, there be 2 minutes of debate prior to each vote, equally divided and controlled; and that after the first vote of any sequence, the succeeding votes be 10 minutes in duration.

Mr. President, let me say that after long discussions with Senator Dodd, the chairman of the Finance Committee, the chairman of the Budget Committee, and other Senators, including Jack Reed, and, of course, in constant contact with the Republican leader, with maybe eight or nine conversations today, and conversations with people in the House and with the White House, it has been determined in our judgment this is the best way to move forward. This is good for the country.

Mr. President, I do not want to sound like a stuck record, but I have known the distinguished Senator from Connecticut for 26 years. We have served in the Senate together for 22 years. We have worked together on many different issues but never as we have during the housing debate which concluded successfully and this financial crisis in which we find ourselves.

Each day that goes by I am more admiring of the work he has done. Today is an example. This has been very difficult, and words cannot express well enough how satisfied I am with the work he has done and what a good thing he has done for the State of Connecticut, the State of Nevada, the State of Kentucky, and our country.

Finally, Mr. President, if I could say this: One person has been with me now for the last 24 hours almost constantly: Senator Durbin from Illinois. He has helped me make dozens of phone calls today. He had a number of meetings. I want the Record to reflect his involvement in this has been important and essential.

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, following the remarks of the two leaders, we will proceed to a period of morning business until noon today. Senators are allowed to speak for up to 10 minutes each, and the time will be equally divided and controlled between the two leaders or their designees.

At noon, the Senate will consider the Amtrak and rail safety legislation. The Republican leader will control the time from 12 until 12:15, and I will control the time from 12:15 to 12:30. At 12:30, we will have a vote to concur in the House amendment to the Senate amendment to the rail safety legislation.

There will be a 1:30 Democratic caucus, and we are going to talk, of course, about the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act. So I ask unanimous consent that the Senate recess from 1:30 p.m. until 2:30 p.m. while I conduct that conference.

Mr. President, one of the issues we have to address this morning--I have talked here on the floor and I have talked in press conferences about this--is how difficult it has been to get the energy and business tax extenders. It has been very difficult. We have had nine votes to get where we are--nine votes spread over a period of months. Finally, with the work of a number of Senators--principally Senators Baucus and Grassley, and two other members of the Finance Committee, Senators Cantwell and Ensign--we have worked to put together a package, and it is delicately put together.

I have tried to explain to my House colleagues how difficult it is for me to accept what they have sent us. They have broken this up and said: Hey, look, this is what we want, and you should take it.

Mr. President, I am going to ask unanimous consent now--they sent us one part of the thing we sent over to them, and that is the tax extenders, both the energy tax extenders and the business tax extenders in one package, and that is what I am going to ask consent about; that this matter I have just acknowledged, H.R. 7060, which is just as I have explained it--the Renewable Energy and Job Creation Tax Act is what they call it--which was received from the House, that the bill be read

three times and passed and the motion to consider be laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate.

Remember, out of the package they sent, they broke this up and sent us the tax extenders--the energy and business tax. I ask unanimous consent that matter be accepted.

Mr. President, I have served in the House of Representatives. My friend, the distinguished Senator from Arizona, has served in the House of Representatives. I understand the House. I loved my experience in the House, but their rules of engagement are different than ours. And if it were up to me, I would accept this in a second. I think it is fine. But, Mr. President, I don't have that ability here. I do not have the strength and the power legislatively and procedurally that they have in the House.

The House is like the British Parliament. If you are in the majority there, you can get a lot of things done that we can't being in the majority here. And my majority is extremely slim; it is 51 to 49 when everybody is here. Many days, I am in the minority.

So I just beg my House colleagues to understand that this isn't something we are trying to surprise them with. It has taken me this long to get here. The ability to get here has been long and hard. And we are not trying to pull anything over on the House.

Mr. President, for us, as a congressional body, House and Senate, to approve this legislation would be historic--long-term tax credits for renewable energy, creating thousands and thousands of jobs. For the first time in a long time, we are extending the business tax credits for 2 years. The business community, small businesses and big businesses, is elated over that because we have given them 1-year extensions time and time again.

In this legislation, there is some really good stuff. There is mental health parity, there is something that every State west of the Mississippi will benefit from--the State of Nevada, as an example. We have been cheated for years because the law is, if you have Federal properties there to take away from your tax base, then the Federal Government should help. And they have helped but not very much. Eighty- seven percent of the State of Nevada is owned by the Federal Government. The legislation we have sent to the House removes some of the unfairness in that.

So I just tell my friends from the House of Representatives, we can't do this. We can't do it. You send us over these things piece by piece; we can't get it done. The reason we were able to get AMT done was because it was part of a package. So I say to my colleagues: I wish we had more votes and we could just run over you, like they do in the House, but we can't do that. I wish we could do what we thought was right on this side of the aisle and not worry about you, but we can't do that.

In the House of Representatives, this matter will get 250, 300 votes. This will pass overwhelmingly in the House. This is bipartisan legislation.

I hope my friends who are part of the Blue Dog caucus would understand. We are not trying to embarrass them or embarrass anyone else. We believe things should be paid for. We look forward to working with them in time to come.

I say, I wish we were not going to spend $700 billion. I wish we weren't going to spend $60 billion, unpaid for, on the AMT, but that is where we are. I hope my friends in the House will understand we are doing the best we can.

Senator Kyl said it twice, I said it three times, it took us nine votes to get where we are. If we leave this Congress without having done this, it doesn't speak well of this Congress.

Mr. President, while the chairman is here and the assistant Republican leader, the mark of the Blue Dogs is on what we have done in this Congress. We struggled because of the Blue Dogs insisting, and rightfully so, on paying for different things. The chairman of the Finance Committee will remember the difficult time we had on SCHIP, and that was because of the mark of the Blue Dogs, wanting to make sure we paid for what we did. It is not as if we ignored them; we tried to follow their lead because their cause is a righteous cause. They want this Government to start paying for things and stop running up the deficit. We look forward to working with them in the future.

Mr. President, I am going to use leader time. All other time has expired; is that right?

Mr. President, we now turn to legislation, thankfully, to improve the safety of America's railroads. This bipartisan, bicameral legislation will achieve something we can all agree on, I hope--the improved safety of our Nation's railroads.

The pictures Senator Lautenberg placed before us are, to say the least, descriptive.

Through new technology, updated regulations, and an expanded Federal agency that is up to the challenge of policing the railroads, the bill will save lives.

To reach this goal, Senators from both sides of the aisle have worked tirelessly, putting aside partisanship and overcoming obstacles that would derail the needed safety and infrastructure improvements we owe the American people. The picture we saw a few minutes ago, the tragic collision that occurred in southern California in Chatsworth on September 12, reminded us all it has been entirely too long--almost 15 years--since Congress last reauthorized a bill to set the route of the Federal rail safety programs.

The Senate took its first steps at rectifying this situation by passing, by unanimous consent, Senator Lautenberg's rail safety bill, just before the August recess. It is a bill he worked hard on with Kay Bailey Hutchison and which is now an important piece of legislation we must address.

Similar to myself, Senators Lautenberg and Hutchison believe we cannot wait another day to reauthorize and improve these lifesaving programs. I am glad we can finally move to consider this good piece of legislation today.

In addition to our rail safety programs, this legislation will also reauthorize Amtrak and improve the railroad safety operations infrastructure.

We last passed an Amtrak reauthorization bill more than 10 years ago. Our national railroad has been without

guiding legislation since 2002, and that was only temporary. With all the challenges facing the traveling public today--high gas prices, long delays at airports, and constant highway congestion--improving our Nation's intercity passenger rail system is an idea whose time has come.

Eight years ago, my wife and I decided we would travel from Washington to Chicago on an overnight train. What a good experience that was. Where I was raised, there was no railroad. But now, 8 years later, people would take the trains, such as we did, more often because of the jamming at our airports and our busy highways, but they simply are not available. Trains offer a fuel-efficient and environmentally sound way to quickly enhance our transportation system, and this bill will improve both the existing Amtrak system and help us develop new rail service in corridors across the country, such as in Nevada, where a high-speed rail corridor is being planned and would connect Las Vegas to southern California.

Despite this progress, some Senators took it upon themselves to prevent the House and Senate from going to conference on this bill in an attempt to kill the legislation. It is hard to comprehend, but that is true.

Thankfully, the sponsors of this bill did not give up when they faced these challenges. Senator Lautenberg and Senator Hutchison instead began working with the House to put together the combined rail safety and Amtrak legislation, and today we see the fruit of their labor.

This package has been approved by the House by voice vote, with near unanimous support, last Wednesday and is now ready to be sent to President Bush for his signature once the Senate passes it, which I hope we do.

It contains important new safety requirements for our railroads, such as the implementation of positive train control systems, known as PTC systems. These systems can prevent train collisions, such as the terrible crash in California less than a month ago.

This bill ensures the railroad industry adopts this vital technology wherever passenger trains and hazardous cargo shipments travel.

This legislation is supported by the railroads and their workers and was developed working closely with the administration.

Democrats and Republicans, in both the Senate and the House, have made a strong statement that we need to move our Federal rail safety programs and our passenger rail system into the 21st century. I hope we can move forward on this legislation quickly and get it to Senator Bush for his signature.

Cloture Motion