Floor Statements

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Madam President, as we try to end the session today, I think I am looking for some silver lining in all we are doing here, with the panic I believe we here in Congress have created in our markets and credit industry and passing this conglomeration of bills without adequate debate. There is one silver lining for me that I think we need to mention to the American people. A number of families are suffering for a lot of reasons, but one of the greatest is the high cost of gasoline in this country--and now even shortages. But because of the anger of the American people, because of the e-mails that have come in, this continuing resolution we will be voting on today includes a huge victory for the American people because the moratorium on oil and gas leasing on most of the Outer Continental Shelf and on oil shale leasing on Federal lands will expire.

Many thought this was a law that we couldn't change, but the fact is this was a year-to-year rider on spending bills that had to be included every year or it would expire. But because Americans got engaged in this whole idea of making October 1 Energy Freedom Day, our Democratic colleagues have backed down and have not included an extension of this moratorium in this year's bill.

So at midnight on October 1, 2008, because it is a start of a new fiscal year, the current prohibitions on oil and gas leasing on most of the Outer Continental Shelf and on oil shale leasing on Federal lands will expire. That is something to celebrate here in America.

Estimates from the Minerals Management Service and the Bureau of Land Management indicate there are upwards of 18 billion barrels of recoverable crude oil on the currently off-limit areas of the Outer Continental Shelf, as well as more than 55 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.

Estimates of American oil shale vary widely but range from the hundreds of billions of barrels to trillions of barrels of oil. Many believe we have more oil in oil shale than Saudi Arabia has.

Taking advantage of America's resources will increase the worldwide supply of petroleum and bring down prices at the pump. The very access to these resources will send powerful price reduction signals to the futures market, providing immediate price relief, even if the actual leasing does not commence for months.

Everyone is familiar with the crisis on Wall Street. The coverage dominates every media outlet. But we also have a crisis on Main Street, where people are paying outrageously high prices for gasoline and having to wait in long lines to fill up their cars.

Here are only a few headlines we are starting to get from newspapers. The Associated Press headline: ``The Southeast Shortage Squeezes Small Retailers and One Gas Station Owner Says It's A Panic.''

CBS News reported in their headline in North Carolina: ``Gas Shortage Leaves People Panicked.''

Washington Post, ``Gas Shortage in the South Creates Panic and Long Lines.''

It goes on and on. This is very real. This is not something we are manufacturing and it is a direct result of bad policy here in Congress that has restricted the development of our own energy here in America.

Unfortunately, we are still having to wait for a number of Members of Congress to allow this to proceed. It was announced earlier this week that the Democrats had given up on their efforts to block energy exploration, and America celebrated. But then not more than 24 hours later we learned the majority leader here was making plans to rob Americans of this victory by extending the ban on oil shale. Fortunately, that effort was defeated yesterday. Now media reports indicate that Democrats also have a plan to delay any offshore drilling using environmental lawsuits until after the November elections, when the Democrats can reinstate the ban on deep sea energy exploration.

In fact, House Majority Leader Hoyer told cnnnews.com on Wednesday that restoring the ban on new offshore oil drilling leases will be a top priority for discussion next year. If the Democrats retain control of Congress, he said, I am sure it will be a top priority for discussion next year.

This is outrageous. The American people will not tolerate it. That is why I have written a bill that is called the Drill Now Act, which will guarantee access to offshore and oil shale reserves. It will expedite the leasing and production of these energy supplies and provide States with a 50-50 share of the revenues with the Federal Government and prevent frivolous lawsuits from delaying the will of the American people. This is very simple and it is what Americans want. I hope my colleagues on the other side of the aisle will set aside their desire to punish Americans for buying gas and side with the American people.

Yesterday I asked unanimous consent that we bring this bill up and pass it, but it was objected to by the majority leader. We will continue this effort, to try to pass this bill that will expedite energy production in our country.

I wish to mention a few things we will be voting on in an hour because this is, frankly, an embarrassment in a time we are running around here like Chicken Little saying `` the sky is falling.'' The credit markets are seizing up--this has been a self-fulfilling prophecy. We have created a crisis in our country. But while we are talking about a financial crisis and an economic crisis all around America and the world, it is business as usual here in the Senate. When the Democrats took control 2 years ago, they promised we would end this wasteful spending and cut earmarks dramatically, but the continuing resolution we are voting on today goes right back to where we were, and worse. This bill includes

$16.1 billion in earmarks--that is billion. There are over 2,620 earmarks in this bill. For all the appropriations bills last year, there were less than that, and this only includes three. There is more porkbarrel spending today than we did all of last year, at a time when we are saying the country is running out of money.

At this rate, for these three bills, the 2009 fiscal year budgets will see more earmarks than we have ever seen in history. Most Americans are beginning to understand how this wastes their money and corrupts the process. Let me mention a few of the earmarks that are in this bill.

There is $44 million for the National Drug Intelligence Center in John Murtha's district, a project the Defense Department has said repeatedly it does not want or need. But every year it comes back because it is in a Congressman's district.

There is $1.75 million for a heritage center that Speaker Nancy Pelosi put in for a museum that is negligible--it has no value to the men and women in uniform.

There is $1.28 million for a Navy museum included by Congressman Dicks. The military doesn't need another museum, they need the tools to fight the war. If we had billions of extra money sitting around, maybe we could talk about these extravagances, but when we are going into more and more debt, hundreds of billions of dollars a year, it makes absolutely no sense to be including over 2,000 earmarks, wasteful spending, in a bill that includes serious military needs.

Americans are angry. They are hearing we have to bail out Wall Street. They are angry at wasteful spending and they have every right to be. When the Democrats took control, the Congressional Budget Office projected an $800 billion surplus between 2008 and 2017. But after 2 years of Democratic control, that same budget office now projects a $2.6 trillion deficit over the same period. That is $3.4 trillion in deterioration of our budget situation. As I said, even worse; wasteful spending and secret earmarks are back in full force.

Americans have seen, over the last couple of years, this Congress do things and attempt to do things that they know are bad for our country. They saw a massive amnesty bill for illegal immigrants come through, but we were able to stop it because of the anger of the American people. They have seen this Congress for years stop the development of our own resources, our own energy, and now prices are through the roof and shortages are occurring.

But the anger of the American people is beginning to get the attention of Congress. We have stopped this moratorium, and we are making progress. Now we are talking about this massive bailout of Wall Street that was caused by bad policy here in Congress that we still refuse to change.

While this bailout may be necessary for reasons we have caused here in Congress, we need to do it in a way that protects the taxpayer and includes some free market principles. We need to do some things that actually solve the problems that caused what we are dealing with today. We need to do some things that support some free market principles and guarantee that the Government is not going to be a permanent player in our financial markets.

Americans are angry. I hope they will stay angry because the more they call and e-mail, the more we can get things done here that are right for American people. We stopped their amnesty bill, we have stopped the moratorium on drilling, and we have gotten their attention on this bailout. Now they are listening to some of the better solutions that have been brought up. So I thank the American people for being engaged. Because of their action, we have a chance now to make some major changes here in Congress.

I yield the floor.

The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Whitehouse.) The Senator from Alabama is recognized.

Reserving the right to object, I understand the majority leader has added into this so-called stimulus package an extension of the ban on oil shale development. I ask consent that his request be modified to include an amendment, which is at the desk, that would authorize and expedite offshore and oil shale exploration.

Mr. President, my colleague has made a case for more Government intervention into the problems on Wall Street and in our economy, basically blaming the free markets for our failures.

I would like to make it clear what I think most Americans already know, which is that many of the problems we are having today, particularly the problems with AIG, the failures on Wall Street, the mortgage industry, actually go back not to greed in the private market but political greed--the problems that were created when this Congress and this Government set up Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac as government- sponsored enterprises with

the implied and now very explicit backing of the American people. It provided so much cheap credit to the market, securities that were bought and sold by many companies. AIG is in trouble because of these bad mortgages that basically originated with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

My point is that the problems we are having are caused by the wrong kind of Government intervention. This is not a failure of free enterprise; this is a failure of Government solutions and the lack of Government oversight into enterprises such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that were started.

Now, in a situation where we already have debt as a nation, we are borrowing excessively and our economy is slowing down. We are in a situation where we have to continue to spend money to bail out these companies because of bad Government decisions decades ago. A lot of money is being spent and a lot is being wasted by this Congress.

We have had a debate over the last 2 years about wasteful spending and earmarks. There has been a lot of talk about creating more transparency and stopping this wasteful spending. We had an ethics bill that passed with a lot of fanfare where we talked about making these earmarks more transparent, putting them in the bills themselves so that the American people could see what we are spending, and that if we were going to have a ``bridge to nowhere,'' at least the American people knew we were spending that money.

We have talked about this for the past 2 years, and even the President has recognized that so much of this earmarking has resulted in wasteful spending in transportation, and especially in the military, that he has issued an Executive order that has made it clear that when we produce a bill, such as the Defense authorization bill, and then, as an aside, we produce what we call report language, with oftentimes thousands of earmarks, politically directed spending all over the country--few that the military asked for, most they did not.

A lot of these are meritorious projects. The fact is, if we want to look up the bill itself, the text, and search for different types of spending, it is not available because it is not in the bill itself. For many years in the Senate and the Congress as a whole we have produced spending and authorization bills and then did the report language on the side with hidden earmarks that people didn't know were there. The President said in his Executive order that when we send a bill over with report language on the side, he is going to direct his agencies not to honor these earmarks unless they are meritorious, unless they agree with the mission of the agency and the purpose of the legislation. It doesn't mean these are all taken out and lost, which is what has been presented on the Senate floor today. What it means is they have scrutiny; that the administration, if it sees wasteful projects, does not feel obligated to spend the money, which is a good thing.

In this Defense authorization bill, some Senators, my Democratic colleagues, have decided they want to go around the Executive order. They want all of these earmarks to have the force of law, which means whether they are meritorious or not the administration has to honor them. The way they have done this, which sets us back years as far as earmark reform in the Senate, is they have put a little section in this bill that references all of these earmarks and in effect makes them law. What I have offered is an amendment. I asked to have one amendment on this bill. There is a tradition in the Senate that Senators are allowed to offer an amendment. I have been waiting a week to offer the amendment. It strikes that section that tries to secretly attach all of the earmarks to the actual law. It is a simple amendment of three words: ``Strike section 1002.'' It does not eliminate all of the earmarks, but it gives the administration the right they should have not to spend money on projects in this green book that are not needed by the military or to defend this country and that the military considers wasteful. We should not allow Members of the Senate to pretend to have reformed the earmark process, to pretend to have a more ethical process, when, in fact, what they have done is the most unethical thing we have ever done with earmarks: to try to make something secret actually have the force of law with a little section written here.

My amendment would change that and put it back to the way it has been for years. I ask my colleagues not to go backwards as far as earmark reform, not to defy what the American people have told us increasingly about wasteful spending at a time of an economic downturn, a time of war, a time of heavy debt, when we have 5 billion dollars' worth of earmarks in this little green book that Americans won't see, and we can't bring it up, as we talked about in the ethics reform bill, in a searchable format where people can find all this wasteful spending. It is hidden, and it is not right.

I encourage my colleagues to appeal to the majority leader to give me this amendment so that we can at least have a vote. I encourage all colleagues to vote for it.

I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Will the Senator yield?

I appreciate having the opportunity to discuss our amendments. I ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be set aside and that I be permitted to call up amendment No. 5405.

Mr. President, I don't think I am able to tonight. But for clarification, this amendment is two words and a number: Strike section 1002. I hope we haven't come to the point in the Senate when a Senator would not be allowed one amendment on such an important bill that is to strike a section. I can talk more about it later. I know we are being encouraged to bring up our amendments. This amendment has been filed for a few days. I think at least the staff is well aware of what it is. I will certainly not hold up the other Senator. I appreciate the chairman's commitment to giving me an opportunity for a vote on this amendment before it is all over.

I yield the floor and thank the ranking member.

I will not be here tomorrow. Since we had understood that Monday was a no-vote day, I made other plans. But I can assure my colleague I can deputize my staff to work out any agreement that would be workable for the chairman and Senator Warner. It is not our intent to hold up this bill. There is a managers' package that we will not agree to until we have a commitment for this one vote. I want to expedite this, as Senator Warner does, and the chairman. But if the Senator would like to work with us, I am sure we can work this out tomorrow or Monday without my being present.

Yes.

If I may offer one clarification, this is not the same amendment that was offered in committee.

What my amendment does is restore basically the format of the Defense authorization bill to the same format it has always had. The way it is set up now, the language that references the report language and makes it, in effect, law is an unprecedented way to deal with report language. What we would do with this amendment is make it like every other Defense authorization bill that has ever been passed.

If the intent is to get around the Executive order, then obviously that is a matter for debate. It also gets around the many statements made on this floor about the transparency of earmarks and to disclose what we are doing.

Again, this is a very simple amendment. All I am asking for is an up- or-down vote. I am not asking for passage.

I thank the chairman. We will not abuse the time. I have the floor, and I would like to yield for one question to Mr. Coburn. Then I will yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that time on the Republican side be allocated as follows: 15 minutes for Senator DeMint, 10 minutes for Senator Gregg, 10 minutes for Senator Coburn, 10 minutes for Senator Inhofe.

Mr. President, I would like to address the issue of this highway bill and the charge that it has been held by me and a few others. The fact is, this $8 billion highway trust fund bailout has not been held up. The only request was that it come to the floor with some debate and the opportunity for amendment, which is the normal Senate process. The request was that this $8 billion be passed in secret essentially with no vote and no debate. Our only request as Senators was that we have a chance to bring to light why this happened.

A few years from now--maybe even a few months--many of my colleagues are going to wake up and look at our Nation's finances and wonder how we got in this mess. We are running this country into the ground, and we are actually on the verge of an economic crisis because of incredible overspending and a huge growing debt. One bill after another comes up, and we pass it almost without thinking and spend more and more borrowed money.

Today's votes are creating tomorrow's fiscal disaster. This $8 billion highway trust fund bailout is only one example among many I would like to mention over the next few minutes.

During the previous year, the Democratic-controlled Congress has produced a parade of fiscally irresponsible bills that have mortgaged our Nation's future and could ultimately bankrupt the Nation and harm the future for our children and grandchildren. If we look at the 2008 appropriations bills, at the end of 2007 Congress passed a bloated budget bill. Supposedly, they were going to get things under control, but this exploded with over 10,000 earmarks. On top of that, there were a number of budget tricks and gimmicks that hid at least $14 billion of extra spending.

Not too long after, we brought up the farm bill. This was reauthorizing an antiquated farm program that cost taxpayers billions and increased costs to consumers all across the country. This was a $600 billion bill over 10 years. It was all borrowed money. We don't have this money to spend. Yet we continue to spend it. It included numerous wasteful, unnecessary earmarks that had nothing to do with a solid farm bill. Just a few examples would be $257 million in tax earmarks for Plum Creek Timber Company. This is the Nation's largest private landowner, a multibillion-dollar company with over $7 billion in capitalization. Yet we believed we needed to give them $257 million.

The language in the farm bill also requires the Forest Service to sell portions of a certain mountain to a ski resort and over $1 million to the national sheep and goat industry--all worthy causes, I am sure, but not worthy of more borrowed money and more debt on the future of Americans.

The so-called stimulus package, over $100 billion was supposed to help solve our problems. Certainly, it didn't. We sent checks to all Americans but did little to fix the problem. Over $100 billion more in borrowed money that we didn't have, just sending checks to people to build up our political clout rather than do something for the country.

We need to have a predictable Tax Code, lower our corporate tax rate, make the current tax rates permanent so businesses and investors know what their tax rate will be in the future. But we don't debate that. We just send out checks with borrowed money.

Everyone knows more and more about the housing bill. The housing bill bailed out mortgage companies that had made bad loans and ultimately included a section that allowed the U.S. Government to essentially nationalize the mortgage industry. As part of that bill, we created a $4 billion deficit spending slush fund for community development block grants and millions that went to a very suspect group, the ACORN group. That seems to be more of a political group to get out the vote for some of our colleagues.

Now, we know we have taken over these two large companies of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Now the taxpayers are on the hook for what could be hundreds of billions of dollars because of the lack of congressional oversight over the last several years. As part of that bill, I had asked for one amendment that would stop the lobbying and the contributions to Congress by these two corporations that we are now bailing out. But instead of giving me that amendment, the majority leader kept the Senate here until Saturday to avoid that one vote that would have done what all of us know needs to be done and stopped the political influence from these companies for which we are supposed to be providing oversight.

Today we are talking about $8 billion that we are going to borrow and put in the highway trust fund. Supposedly back in the late 1990s, $8 billion was taken as part of an agreement to set up a separate trust fund. I will take them at their word for that. But we have had numerous opportunities this year to save more than that amount of money, if we knew we needed it. Frankly, the Department of Transportation says we probably only need about half of that right now. Yet we are going to take $8 billion from the general fund, borrow it, and put it in the trust fund.

Highway infrastructure is one of the most important things we can do as a Nation.

But much of this bill is not about roads and bridges. It is numerous, wasteful earmarks that I am afraid could end up as part of this $8 billion. The current bill includes $45 million for a magnetic levitation train project in Las Vegas; $2.5 million for landscaping enhancements along a freeway; $3.3 million for a bike trail in Laredo, TX. This list could go on page after page. These are not priority projects. They do not deserve us going into more debt as a nation to borrow this money.

We have had numerous opportunities to cut these projects so that the highway trust fund would not go broke. Only a few months ago, we had a transportation technical corrections bill. We had almost a billion dollars of projects

that were no longer needed or wanted by the States. Yet, instead of saving that $1 billion, we added back essentially the same amount of new projects.

Now we are here at the trough again, and we have a crisis, and we will put a lot of people out of work if we do not produce this bill. That is why we have agreed to forgo the opportunity to offer amendments, even though we should not pass an $8 billion bill without the opportunity to debate it in more detail.

I wish to remind my colleagues, we do not have this $8 billion. It is borrowed money, and we are going to move it from one account to another, and borrow it from who knows where--China or somewhere else-- because we do not have that money. But there are numerous problems with this, and we need to recognize that the earmarks, the wasteful earmarks, are taking priority national projects and putting them places they do not need to be. Our lack of an energy policy in this Nation that has run up the cost of gasoline has restricted the ability of Americans to travel, and that in itself has reduced the revenues to the trust fund. So we have caused this problem ourselves by congressional mismanagement, and now we want the taxpayers to bail us out again.

Again, this is a bill I think we need as far as funding projects. But the way it is done, and the fact that it is done with no more accountability on earmarks and the things that have caused the problems, makes it very difficult to support the bill, even though I see long-term highway funding being one of the most important things we can do.

I hope the chairman and ranking member of the committee will consider next year, as we go into reauthorizing a highway program, the fact that the Federal Government should no longer be involved in non-Federal projects around the country. We have an opportunity to devolve this program to the States, where the money would stay at home and be used for real priorities, not for things I decide or another colleague decides they want for somebody back home where the State does not necessarily want it to go.

Obviously, we have talked a lot about the ``bridge to nowhere'' and other projects such as that across the country. But I hope I will get the support of my colleagues to move this back to the States, give them the ability to manage their own programs over the years, and stop this wasteful spending at the Federal level.

Again, there are a number of amendments we would have liked to have had the opportunity to offer, and I wish to warn my colleagues, the pattern that is developing here is that we are passing bills by unanimous consent, with no debate, no amendments. This goes on bill after bill. We are passing very bad legislation with very little accountability to the American people.

But I appreciate the passion of Senator Inhofe and others who know we need to push this through, and it is not fair to the States or to the workers to blindside them with shortfalls as we have. But the shortfalls are of our own doing, and it is because of our own waste and incompetence here in Congress that we have ended up with this problem and more debt on the American people. I hope next year we will go about doing it in a much better way than we have done in the past.

With that, Mr. President, I yield back.

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

Mr. President, I rise today to invite my colleagues to join me in supporting American Energy Freedom Day on October 1, 2008.

On this day, the current prohibitions on oil and gas exploration off the Outer Continental shelf and in the oil shale fields of the West will expire, giving Americans the freedom to access their own energy reserves and providing them with relief from sky-high prices at the pump.

Estimates indicate there are upwards of 18 billion barrels of recoverable crude oil in the off-limit areas of the Outer Continental Shelf, as well as more than 55 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. In addition, estimates indicate that between 800 billion and 2 trillion barrels of oil can be drawn from American oil shale.

Taking advantage of American resources will increase the worldwide supply of petroleum and bring down prices at the pump. The very access to these resources will send powerful price-reducing signals to the futures market, providing immediate relief for all Americans.

For over 25 years, Democrats have denied Americans the freedom to access their own energy, making our Nation more and more dependent on foreign oil. Each year, they have continued the ban on American energy. Now it is time for them to get out of the way and open up American energy supplies.

I strongly encourage my colleagues to support Energy Freedom Day and allow the prohibitions on American energy exploration to expire once and for all. We must actively oppose any attempt to extend these bans on American prosperity and security. Now is not the time to deny Americans access to their own energy.

October 1 is going to be a great day for all Americans. I invite my colleagues to join me in supporting American Energy Freedom Day.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Oklahoma. I wish to publicly thank him for taking the time to read so many bills and to look at spending and to see if we can do something to curb wasteful spending.

I am disturbed that the Senator from Illinois thinks because we have to spend money in the battle against terror around the world that means we have to spend more at home without looking at real priorities, such as gas prices and dealing with those issues.

I wish to ask the Senator from Oklahoma a question because he has already mentioned it. I saw today that

under the Democratic leadership, even though in their last campaign they were going to be fiscally responsible, I saw in USA Today that we will have the largest deficit in our history next year, and that doesn't even include the $100 billion we are borrowing from Social Security.

Yet in the middle of this energy debate and how to get gas prices down, I was amazed we were coming back today on bills that were just gathered together----

Mr. President, I ask for 30 more seconds to finish the question--15 more seconds.

I wish to ask the Senator from Oklahoma, is it not true that all these bills were attempted to pass without any debate and without any vote and that the Senator from Oklahoma was asking questions and asking for some kind of openness on the floor? Instead of giving the Senator that, they balled them all up together?

Thank you, Mr. President. Good morning.

I have a parliamentary inquiry: Who in this Senate has the last word on when votes are scheduled?

But the majority leader has to agree. And further parliamentary inquiry: Is it not true that the majority leader scheduled two votes today by filing cloture earlier this week when these would ripen today?

Thank you, Mr. President.

I would like to proceed with my time, if I could. I thank you. Certainly, the majority whip will have his say again when we are through.

The Democratic majority leader announced to all of us about a month ago that we would be here this weekend because there were some bills he wanted to get through. And so those Americans looking in who are not that interested in all our procedures and carrying on here--the majority leader scheduled that there would be two final votes today, Saturday. He told us, as Republicans, we could have no amendments on these bills, and then he demanded that we give unanimous agreement that we move those votes he had scheduled back to Friday or even Thursday. Now, they are complaining about a Republican who has no authority when we schedule votes, complaining that somehow I scheduled these votes today. I guess a lot of Members are naive and believe that. But I do not think Americans buy it.

I know a number of folks are disappointed we are here on Saturday and not somewhere else. But I am not worried about how disappointed Members

of Congress are. I know Americans are very disappointed, not that we are here on Saturday but that we are not working every day of the week, 24 hours a day, to address the major issues in this country.

They are disappointed, and we know they are. In fact, Americans think less of this Democratic Congress than Americans ever have of any Congress in history. And it is not just the Democrats. I am very disappointed myself. I came here--I came to the House 10 years ago-- with great hopes that I could be a part of addressing major issues facing our country and create a generation of opportunity by helping Americans and helping freedom work for everyone.

I have been disappointed that it has been increasingly obvious that the Democrats are so controlled by a few interest groups--the union bosses, the plaintiffs' lawyers, environmental extremists--that they are afraid to allow their Members to take votes that would tell Americans where they stand because they do not want to offend these interest groups.

Now, I am equally critical of Republicans because I have been disappointed in them as well because many of them have lost sight of what we believe, what we came here for, and have lost the courage to fight for it. So many times the scenario of bills that are coming through here is: In order to check the box, Republicans agree to add Democratic policy that continues to expand Government.

The Senator from Illinois has complained about these filibusters. Again, it is these mysterious procedures that we have in the Senate that he remarkably calls filibusters: when they put a bill on the floor and then they file a motion to cut off debate; and when we do not agree to cut off debate, they call that a filibuster.

Americans should know, in this Congress, 855 bills have passed in secret--no vote, no amendment, no floor debate. Ninety-four percent of everything we have passed in the Senate has gone by what they call unanimous consent. Now, some of these are legitimate unanimous consent bills--naming a post office and other things.

Americans should also know this housing bill has major implications not only for spending but for government taking control of private sector businesses, taking ownership of private property, putting the taxpayer on the line for billions and possibly more. They wanted this bill passed in secret, by unanimous consent, without anyone knowing what is in it. I want to talk about what is in it.

Last week, we had a $50 billion foreign aid bill that they wanted passed by unanimous consent, in secret. When some of us step up and say: No, this is too important; we need to bring it to the floor and maybe have an open debate and allow a few amendments, that is what the Senator from Illinois calls a filibuster. This is no way to do business, but it is the way this Congress has gotten America in so much trouble today.

As I speak about a few issues, I wish to keep one issue in front of everyone, because as bills come through here, there is always justification: It is a farm bill; we have to vote with the farmers. It is a veterans bill; we have to vote for veterans. It is a housing bill; we have to vote for homeowners and homebuilders and realtors. We should consider what our own Congressional Budget Office and the administration is projecting. Beginning right now, in 2008, the expansion of debt in America is going to do more to hurt our economy and hurt everyday Americans than anything we are doing here. Yet we never even talk about things we could cut, wasteful programs we could fix. What we talk about is basically appealing to interest groups by passing one thing after another that is designed to attract constituencies and votes and campaign contributions from different groups.

Yes, I am disappointed, and I know Americans are too.

As we talk about the energy debate--and again, I will criticize Republicans and Democrats, but when it comes to this one, there is no issue clearer in terms of who has restricted the supply of American energy over the last 20 years. This has clearly been a partisan issue: the Democrats responding to extreme environmentalists, going back to President Carter's years when he cut off the development of nuclear energy, the recycling of nuclear waste. President Clinton vetoed, a little over 10 years ago, the development of oil reserves in Alaska. Democrats voted almost unanimously to stop us from developing our oil and natural gas reserves in this country. Like the old Steve Erkle of ``Family Matters,'' now they are standing here and saying: Did I do that? They are trying to blame big oil and speculators and George Bush and everyone but themselves, but on this issue there is probably nothing clearer of how this Congress has caused America a huge problem, and now they are saying we are going to save America.

The Democrats will not allow an open debate and open amendments, as is the tradition of this Senate. They will not allow their Members to take votes on drilling and deep sea exploration in America or a separate vote on developing the oil shale in this country or expediting the development of our nuclear capabilities. They won't allow these amendments to come to the floor for the reasons I have already mentioned. They don't want Americans to know where they stand, and they want to appease the extreme environmentalists. They are trying to have it both ways. That is why we are stuck in doing nothing here, because instead of doing what the Senate has done for literally centuries, we are here trying to protect Democrat Members so they don't have to take the tough votes.

I wish to use one quote from my distinguished colleague from Illinois, because he is suggesting that he wants an open debate when, in fact, we are not allowed to pick our own amendments. Please be clear. The Democrats are not allowing Republicans to offer our own amendments. They want to select one amendment for us and say that is our bill, and now that we want a full debate, they are saying we won't take their generous offer.

The Senator from Illinois said in March:

My good friend, the late Congressman from Oklahoma, Mike

Synar, used to say: If you don't want to fight fires, don't

be a firefighter. If you don't want to stop crime, don't be a

policeman, and if you don't want to vote on tough issues,

don't run for Congress.

I agree with him.

States Senator Durbin.

I don't like facing tough votes, but it is a part of the

job. You ought to at least have enough confidence in your

beliefs to cast that vote and go home and explain it.

The Senator has even indicated that the one vote I would like on my amendment to this housing bill he might support. Yet he won't allow me a vote--not this week, not next week, not in September. I offered to allow the majority to schedule this vote any time, not attach it to the Housing bill, not slow it up 1 minute. The housing bill could have gone to the President on Thursday, but they are so afraid of voting on an amendment that would cut off campaign contributions to Democratic colleagues and cut off the lobbying of the organization we are talking about bailing out that they will not allow a straight-up vote so America can see where they stand.

This Congress is the Steve Erkle Congress. If you go back during the Congress and see what we have done even before--well, think of the big amnesty bill that was pushed through here. Only a few of us looked at the bill. We discovered that how it was promoted was not true. It would not control our borders. It would not create a workable immigration system. Basically all it did is reward people who came here illegally. But by letting the American people know what was in the bill--putting it on the Internet, talking to bloggers, radio talk shows and holding the bill through a debate period--Americans rose up and said: No. We figured you out, Congress, and we are not going to do it. Millions of Americans stopped this Congress from passing that amnesty bill.

Millions of Americans are standing up as we make them more aware of the thousands of earmarks to special interests and friends back home that this Congress spends most of the year doing instead of addressing priorities. Americans are standing up. They are on to Congress, and we are going to keep pushing the Democratic majority to do something about this wasteful spending.

In a few years, the same people who had voted time after time to spend the

Social Security surplus on other things--and believe me, it has been 100 percent on the Democratic side. I have offered an amendment to stop the raid on Social Security and the Democrats have stood up every time and voted it down, so there is not one dime of money saved for Social Security because of Democratic spending. In a few years, those Democrats are going to be standing up blaming someone else. This time it might not be big oil or the speculators, but they will be calling for an investigation, because in less than 10 years, the money coming in for Social Security is not going to be enough to pay the benefits. My Democratic colleagues will be calling for an investigation: Who stole the money from the trust fund? They will be hoping the American people forget how they voted.

We see the same thing on health care every day. They complain about the uninsured Americans, but when I put a bill on the floor that would allow individual Americans to at least do what businesses do and deduct the cost of their health insurance as we allow businesses to do, every Democrat voted against that, because they don't want Americans to own health insurance. They want the Government to take over health care. So at every point we try to expand health insurance, they try to kill it.

I could go on and on about this dysfunctional, disappointing Congress, but I guess I should move to housing and talk a little bit about the bill that is on the floor today.

Could I inquire how much time I have remaining?

Well, I better move quickly here. Again, this is a bill they want to pass in secret with very little debate. I have asked for one amendment--one amendment to stop the lobbying.

This is not a good chart, but hopefully I can make the point. This is the taxpayer at the top. This is Congress. This is Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Years ago, Congress created Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac as private sector organizations that were supposed to help the mortgage industry and help people buy homes. Certainly it did, but Congress was supposed to watch them because we gave them monopoly status. They received huge tax breaks so no one in the private sector could compete with them, so they grew and grew. The idea was that this Congress would pass the reforms and provide the oversight so that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would not get out of control, because effectively when we formed them, we told the markets and the American people the taxpayer was going to guarantee they would not lose money.

What happened is they stopped these reforms of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and over the last 10 years they spent nearly $200 million in political contributions to Senators and Congressmen, spreading money all around Washington. A lot of think tanks that are supposed to be watchdogs are not watchdogs to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac because they have spread so much money around.

Now as we ask the American people to come in and put their money into the pot to hold up Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the one gesture of good faith as a Congress we could ask is: Hey, that is a conflict of interest. We can't have the people who are supposed to watch over these organizations getting money from these organizations. At least if we are going to ask the American taxpayer to be on the hook for billions, possibly trillions of dollars, let's stop this. So I said that is all I want, one amendment, 15 minutes of debate, and then you can have your housing bill, even though it is a terrible bill. They said no. They said no. We are going to keep Members here Saturday to keep you from having your amendment.

There are a lot of problems with this bill, but it doesn't matter. Here it is. It is almost 700 pages. Not one Senator has read it. There are lots of little goodies stuck in there. There is one we found, an earmark on page 616 that overturns an IRS ruling where low-income housing--which is supposed to be for the general public and not discriminate--that they can discriminate for social organizations such as art colonies. Then we find an organization, Artspace, that develops low-income housing and gives it to these artistic colonies, one of their board members happens to be the executive director of the Fannie Mae foundation.

Folks, this bill needs to be aired out for weeks, if not months. They want to rush it through. We kept them here on Saturday so the American people could find out a little bit more about what is in it. But no matter what is wrong with it, most of the Members of this Senate are going to come in and vote for it and check the box and go home and say they did something about housing. I am afraid they may compromise the future of America as they do it.

I am sure I am about to run out of time. I know this is a lost cause and I am not going to stop this bill, but I am disappointed, the American people are disappointed, and what we have done by keeping the Democrats and the Republicans here today is maybe give Americans a little more time to see what this Congress is doing to their future.

With that, Mr. President, I reserve the remainder of my time and yield the floor.

Mr. President, I advise the Senator from Illinois that I have been to the floor asking unanimous consent to offer this amendment, which has been available all week. It is in the cloakroom. The amendment is simple and available. I remind the Senator that when bills appear in the Congressional Record, it is after they have passed. As far as the hotlines that come through late at night, I get many calls at the airport from my staff, when we are leaving at the end of the week. That is when these bills go through, and they want to pass them by unanimous consent. Often a copy is only available in the cloakroom. Members have not read them. We are all used to doing business that way, and it is a problem when we start talking about major policies and billions of dollars of money that is spent-- certainly on a bill such as this. We may make it available for a few days, so it is not to say it wasn't available, but I know not one Member of the Senate has read it all and seen the special provisions that have been stuck in it.

I ask unanimous consent--to clear up what the Senator from Illinois has said--that next week, when we come back, we have a free and open debate and that the Republicans and all Members be allowed to offer their amendments, without restriction from the Democratic side.

That is what I thought. There is so much doublespeak here. They are saying one thing to the cameras and to America and another thing here. We are not allowed to offer our amendments.

Mr. President, I commend Senator Domenici on his passion for energy and what we need to do to preserve the future of our country. I have had a chance, as many Senators I am sure have, as well as Americans all over the country, to look in on the debate about energy this week. Frankly, if it were not so serious and perhaps sad, it would be entertaining. I have been entertained to see my Democratic colleagues bobbing and weaving and trying to change the subject and deflect the attention from the real needs, trying to obscure 20 years of obstruction on developing American energy and to shift the blame to big oil, to speculators or President Bush instead of talking about the real subject.

It is sad that this is probably the most important issue of this generation. We know it is hurting Americans every day, who are paying more and

more for gasoline, families who are just making ends meet, increasingly having to make the decision of whether to buy the gas they need to go to work or even buy the right food they need for their children.

This is a serious crisis. Yet we are playing games here on this very important issue. The Democratic majority will not even allow an open and honest debate. They will not allow Republicans to bring amendments down because they fear their Members will have to take a vote to show America where they stand on the issue.

If we had an open and honest debate, America would find out that Democrats would prefer the prices to be high; that based on the input from the environmental extremists who tell them the higher the price is, the less fossil fuels we will use, that is better for the environment.

The problem is, over the last 20 years, as the Democrats have obstructed the development of nuclear energy, they have obstructed the development of America's own oil and natural gas supplies. Our dependence on foreign oil has gone up. We have burned more coal than other countries that have developed clean alternatives such as nuclear.

The environmental extremists have actually hurt the environment. They have made our country hostage to other countries that would like to harm us. And when it comes to the point where we need to decide what we are going to do as a country, the majority leader will not even allow us amendments. He wants to ram it through and change the subject and go on to the next thing.

That is where we are today. We have put in the middle of this the housing bill, which, like the Energy bill, the majority leader will not allow any amendments to. This is a huge, unprecedented bill, putting on the line $300 billion that can be used for mortgage companies to unload bad loans onto the taxpayers, making the Federal Government the owner of mortgages in real estate for the first time, and crossing that line between freedom and socialism where we actually get so involved in the private sector and the managing of the financial markets that our country is moving more toward a European style of socialism than the America we know.

We have a bill here that on one side adds nearly $1 billion of taxes on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and then, on the other side, is asking America to bail them out because they are not making enough money. That is the kind of logic Congress is using.

And we do not want to debate it. We want to get this thing done immediately. The majority leader scheduled a vote that would come out on Saturday. He did not give us the courtesy of offering one amendment. Then he is demanding that we shorten the time period so he can have a Friday vote and let folks go home.

I have been entertained by the suggestion that I have actually scheduled votes tomorrow. As I understand it, and the Parliamentarian may want to correct me, there is only one person in this Senate who can schedule a vote. That is the majority leader on the Democratic side, and he scheduled a vote on Saturday and will not change it in order to give us an amendment.

There are a lot of amendments that could improve this bill. Setting up a slush fund so local communities and their agencies can buy real estate and rehab it and sell it is a bad idea. It is a slush fund that is not going to be accountable. It puts those governments in the real estate business.

I wish to have an amendment to remove that, and to remove the new taxes that are going to cost everybody who buys a home after we pass this bill. Everybody is going to pay more to get a mortgage because this bill adds taxes to it. The folks who are pushing it do not want you to know that. The President had threatened to veto it over this bad policy, but he decided to change his mind because he felt we so much needed to provide the backup for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. So because we cannot have the amendments that we need to improve the bill, I asked for one amendment that is basic and common sense.

We have seen in the Wall Street Journal and publications all over the country the growing suspicion that the fact that the reforms that were needed for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac over the last 10 years were not even talked about in Congress because of so many political contributions to Congressmen and Senators.

Now, we do not like to think that about ourselves, but there is a reason Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac spent over $200 million over the last 10 years on campaign contributions to those of us here in the House and the Senate, and they got something for it. They got left alone. They grew out of control. They grew into a big monster where now we say they are too big to fail. If we let them fail, they are going to bring down the whole American economy. So we have got to put the American taxpayer behind them with an open checkbook to write any check that is needed to keep them in business. That is what we are being told in this bill right now. If we are going to do that, if we are going to make the American taxpayer stand behind those companies, then there is one commonsense thing we can do to keep it more open and honest. These organizations that are now guaranteed by the American taxpayer should no longer be able to spend millions of dollars buying influence in Congress. That is a conflict of interest. My amendment would simply stop the political activity, the lobbying and the contributions of these organizations which are now a part of the Federal Government because of this explicit guarantee. That is the only amendment I asked for. We could have voted on it yesterday and finished the housing bill yesterday if the majority leader had wanted it. We could vote on it today and move straight to passage.

I have offered the majority leader several options. It does not even have to be a part of this bill if he thinks it is going to delay it. All I have asked for is a straight-up vote on this bill that would eliminate lobbying by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and we could do it sometime before the end of the session.

We could vote on housing immediately, right now, send it to the President unchanged, so there would be no delay. But the majority leader is so afraid of asking his Democratic colleagues to vote on this bill that would ban lobbying, that benefits us so much in our campaigns, he does not want them to take that vote in public view. So, instead, he is going to keep everyone here Saturday and try to say I am scheduling this vote when, in fact, he is scheduling that vote because he does not want the lobbying and the campaign contributions to stop from these organizations which are now basically being backed up by the full faith and credit of the American people.

That is what is going on here. It would be entertaining if it were not so sad. Again, the blame is trying to be deflected to someone else so the American people cannot see where people stand. Instead of having amendments we can vote on, and instead of seeing where people stand on the lobbying of these organizations the American people now have to stand behind, they are trying to blame it on the fact that we are going to have a Saturday vote.

Over half the American people do not want us to pass this bill. They deserve a voice in this Chamber. And if there is no one else who is going to stand up and speak against it, I will, because it is wrong to pass a bill of this magnitude so quickly, 700 pages that have not been read by one Senator here. It has so many flaws in it that they want to get it off the floor before people figure out what is in it. It is a mistake to pass this bill so quickly. I am not going to allow it to go through today. We are going to be here tomorrow for a vote because people are afraid to show the American people what they stand for.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for 15 minutes as in morning business.

Mr. President, I commend Senator Grassley for focusing again on the importance of lower taxes and promoting a better economy and higher standard of living in America.

It is disturbing, as we talk about energy and high gas prices, to hear from our Democratic colleagues in the House that they are actually considering raising taxes on gasoline 10 cents or more per gallon at a time when it is already a crushing cost to Americans on energy.

The energy debate has been very helpful. I think for years Americans have known, at least many Americans, that the Democratic Party has blocked the development of energy supplies, America's own energy supplies, from the time of Jimmy Carter stopping nuclear generation to President Clinton vetoing the legislation that would have opened some oil reserves in Alaska, to constant votes by our Democratic colleagues to stop the opening of oil and natural gas which is plentiful in America.

Americans do not trust Congress to fix this because they know it is the inaction by Congress that has caused the gas prices, and we see that the Democratic leadership is going to do everything they can to keep amendments and an open and honest debate about real energy development in America from happening.

Housing

The same thing has happened on another bill that is going to be interjected into this energy debate, this massive housing bill, this massive mortgage bailout that is going to come back to the Senate floor for a vote. This is another situation where the American people know that the mortgage crisis, the foreclosure crisis, the problems with Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae are caused by incompetence and gross negligence by this Congress and past administrations.

We suspect, and there is every evidence, that part of that negligence has come from the ability of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to lobby Members of Congress and other watchdog groups to keep them from focusing on the reforms that were needed.

When this housing bill comes back, I have proposed one amendment. I asked for one amendment in this process, that if the American taxpayers put their money on the line to back these private companies, that these private companies should no longer be able to spend millions of dollars lobbying Members of Congress to keep them from implementing the reforms that are so important.

Last night I made an offer to the majority leader. I suggested we could have one vote under a time agreement to allow my amendment to prohibit lobbying and political donations from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. We could have been done with the bill last night. If the majority leader tabled the amendment, the bill would have been passed and sent to the President last night. But I do not think he wanted his Members to have to vote on that.

If the amendment had been adopted, the bill would have been immediately sent to the House, passed and sent to the President, probably today. The only thing that prevented this from happening was the objection of the majority leader last night, because the majority leader was intent on blocking this amendment to prohibit Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac from lobbying.

The bill will likely pass the Senate on Saturday and will not reach the President until next week. So the argument that my one amendment is slowing this down is not true. Let me state again one more time, to be clear. This Senator was prepared to vote on the housing bill last night. I do not support the bill. I do not think it should become law. I simply wanted one amendment.

My constituents sent me here to Washington to clean up this place. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have spent hundreds of millions of dollars over the past decade to block commonsense reform, which could have been prevented. We could have prevented the debacle that we are faced with now if Congress had not been blind to the problem. But because the leader was intent on filibustering my amendment, blocking me from doing what my constituents sent me here to do, the housing bill will be delayed until next week. This is fine with me, because there is a lot wrong with the bill. But the decision to delay the bill was made by the majority leader and him alone.

I wish to offer one more opportunity here for the majority to expedite the housing bill and to give me the one vote on this amendment and then we can proceed to a final vote.

Unanimous Consent Request--H.R. 3221

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate resumes the consideration of the housing bill, the pending Reid amendment be withdrawn and the only amendment in order be a DeMint amendment which I will send to the desk. This is a measure to address lobbying by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Mr. President, the majority clearly will not permit this or any other amendment on the bill. He says he does not want anything to delay it. As I have already pointed out, however, I think his own obstruction is delaying the bill.

I wish to make one more proposal. I will explain it, and if the majority is willing, then I will read the technical language. But I am very willing to offer a unanimous consent request to move immediately to a final vote on the housing bill, and then once the energy debate is completed, that my amendment, then in bill form, be allowed a straight- up vote in the Senate.

This may be several weeks from now. But if the concern by the majority is that my amendment would slow the bill down, they should certainly agree that if we can move to housing and pass it straight up, and finish the energy debate, whatever time that is finished, then we could have a simple vote at the scheduling of the majority leader to vote on this lobbying amendment.

I would be glad to put this in unanimous consent form if the majority is interested in entertaining this. If I could get some indication from the speaker or the leader over there. Would you be interested in that unanimous consent request?

I thank the Senator. Clearly there is no need to continue to try to get this housing bill expedited. It is clear my Democratic colleagues do not support this reform, and apparently they are going to do everything they can to protect their relationship with these Government entities.

The majority leader suggested yesterday that he would be happy to join me in sending a letter to these two entities, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, to request that they be more transparent in their lobbying. Well, I am not interested in sending a letter to the management of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. That would be as effective as sending a letter, which has been suggested by my Democratic colleague, to Saudi Arabia demanding lower gas prices. I am not interested in transparency in their lobbying or political donations. The lobbying contracts need to be terminated and their PACs should be disbanded.

The majority leader disagrees. In fact, his staff sent out a blast e- mail to their lobbyist friends asking for help in defeating my amendment.

I want to protect taxpayers and end the culture of corruption in Washington, but I am afraid in this case, the majority clearly does not want to join me.

All I am requesting is one amendment on a 694-page bill that spends

anywhere from $25 billion to hundreds of billions of dollars of taxpayer money to bail out two companies, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

I believe my amendment is essential to considering the way Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have spread their wealth around Washington for years to buy Government influence and to cover up their problems. The housing legislation that will be before us authorizes the Secretary of the Treasury to use taxpayer money to rescue Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, but it does not include an immediate end to their lobbying and political activities.

If American taxpayers are forced to bail out or buy out Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, their lobbying and political activities should stop. Our Nation has a longstanding tradition of preventing American tax dollars from being used for lobbying and for soliciting and making campaign contributions. There is no doubt that this housing legislation crosses that line. Under current law, the Department of Treasury cannot retain high-powered lobbyists or make political contributions to candidates. This rule should apply to Fannie and Freddie. There may have been some doubt as to whether a government guarantee existed for Fannie and Freddie before, but now with this legislation, that guarantee is made very explicit. They are, in effect, government entities and should be treated as such.

The Politico newspaper recently reported on how Senators and Congressmen are benefiting politically from propping up these two mortgage giants. The article said:

If you want to know how Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have

survived scandal and crisis, consider this: Over the past

decade, they have spent nearly $200 million on lobbying and

campaign contributions. But the political tentacles of the

mortgage giants extend far beyond their checkbooks. The two

government-chartered companies run a highly sophisticated

lobbying operation with deep-pocketed lobbyists in Washington

and scores of local Fannie- and Freddie-sponsored homeowner

groups ready to pressure lawmakers back home.

One thing that should get our colleagues' attention, this chart is a copy of an invitation by Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae and other groups for a big party at the Democratic National Convention. There is one very similar to this for the Republicans. They will continue to lavish entertainment on those of us in Congress until we stop it.

National Public Radio reported that in the first 3 months of the year alone, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac spent a combined total of $3.5 million on lobbying and hired 42 outside firms.

According to the Center for Responsive Politics, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have been such prolific donors to political parties, candidates, and PACs that they are the No. 1 and No. 3 top contributors in the mortgage industry and rank in the top 100 political donors of all time.

May I inquire as to how much time I have remaining?

I thank the Chair. I can see I have more to say than I have time to say it.

Let me close by encouraging my colleagues. There is no need for this issue to be partisan. Clearly, if we are going to put hard-working taxpayer dollars behind our bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, we should not allow them to continue to throw millions of dollars around for political activities. It just makes good common sense.

On a bill that is this large and this important and that probably not one Senator has read even half of, the opportunity to have at least one amendment and a limited time for debate seems to be a small request. Unfortunately, the majority is not going to give us any amendments, and apparently they are going to turn a blind eye to this obvious problem on which the Wall Street Journal and news media all over the country have been focusing. The American people know about it. I think they would trust the Senate much more to make the proper reforms for housing and mortgages and Fannie and Freddie Mac if they could see that we were eliminating a conflict of interest that has clearly existed for a number of years.

I thank the Presiding Officer and encourage my colleagues to ask the majority leader to reconsider and give us the opportunity to have a vote on this one amendment, and then we could speed the housing bill through.

I yield the floor.

Reserving the right to object, if I might ask the leader a question, the filing of the cloture motion on the housing bill at this point means there will be a Saturday vote?

Friday, if all the time is used. I would like to make the Senator aware that I believe we could arrange a unanimous consent to shorten the time, if you would allow one amendment that would prohibit Fannie May and Freddie Mack or organizations from lobbying during this time of taxpayer-secured funding. So we are prepared to shorten the time, if you are willing to allow that unanimous consent.

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

Madam President, I rise to speak on the bill being considered at this time, the foreign aid bill we call PEPFAR. I would like to speak about it in relation to the overall condition of America, America's economy, so that we can put it in context.

These are very difficult times for our country, we all know. It seems the news keeps getting worse. Obviously, we are at war. As the situation improves in Iraq, Afghanistan seems to be deteriorating. We have to keep our focus on the terrorist problem around the world.

Our economy also seems to be failing or at least slowing at this time. The energy situation is crushing Americans. Just filling up their cars and trucks with gasoline every day becomes more burdensome. People are really hurting. It is very difficult to make ends meet paycheck to paycheck. The mortgage companies and banks are experiencing extreme difficulty, making it harder for people to buy homes and to stay in their homes. Now we hear that the government-sponsored enterprises we call Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which are the largest credit organizations in the world, are experiencing difficulty and that we may need to step in this year and bail them out to the tune of $40, $50 billion this year. Families are struggling. Any family that has debt and can't make ends meet, can't meet their expenses, would not consider going out and buying a new gas-guzzling SUV. We wouldn't do it.

Why, at a time when our country is in debt and, as far as we can see, expenses will be more than revenues, would we create the biggest foreign aid bill in history and borrow more money, $50 billion, and send it all around the world to some countries that are much better off than we are? We are doing this in the name of generosity and compassion, helping countries in Africa with the epidemic of AIDS. I supported the program in 2003, and it was a huge, expensive program at the time of $15 billion. Because it has been focused and somewhat accountable, it has been somewhat effective. But now we come back and increase that budget over 300 percent, expand it from countries it was originally designated for to the point where now money is going to the United Nations, to China, India, other countries. Some of these countries are much better off than we are as a nation.

This chart will help my colleagues focus on what we are dealing with and what we should consider as we talk about spending more money at a time when we are at war and our economy is in difficulty and the credit industry is in trouble.

Historically, we have been at about 20 percent of spending as the Federal Government in relation to our total economy, what we call GDP, or gross domestic product. Beginning now, projected spending is increasing dramatically because of retirees and those going on Social Security and Medicare and the fact that younger workers are not coming in at nearly the rate people are retiring. Our expenses as a country are increasing dramatically and will for the foreseeable future. We have no plans to meet this type of spending increase and no place to get the revenue. We are already in so much debt that some of the countries holding our debt are trying to get rid of it. Yet we continue to spend money. This doesn't even reflect all of the expenses we are going to have to continue the war on terror and supplemental emergency spending, such as floods. None of that is in here. So spending is going to increase dramatically. By 2050, which seems a long way off, it is going to go from around 20 to over 40. During that period, we continue to see astronomical increases in spending, with no plans to curtail it.

Perhaps even worse, we need to address our debt. That affects the value of our dollar, interest rates, and the money we have to spend on other priorities. We have never seen anything like this. This is not made up. This comes from the Committee on the Budget, as well as the Congressional Budget Office and the Office of Management and Budget from the administration. This is real.

In 2007, Government debt was 37 percent of our total economy. If we continue spending at the current rate, the U.S. Government's debt will be at 109 percent--larger than our total economy--in a little over 20 years. There is no way we can maintain a successful economy and be the leader of the world with this scenario.

Some of our colleagues have rightly said in private that this is a crisis; we could be close to a meltdown as a nation. Yet what we are doing here this week I consider obscene and completely unacceptable. It is almost unthinkable that we would come in here, at a time when we need to be addressing an energy problem or looking at how we are going to deal with Social Security and Medicare and stay more competitive as a nation and keep jobs here, and talk about expanding the

largest foreign aid program in history, with no thought of where we are.

The world has to look on us and wonder: What are they thinking? They are running out of energy. Yet their laws keep them from developing their own energy supplies. They are in huge debt. Yet they keep giving money away to other countries that are eating our lunch economically, such as China. What are we thinking?

The fact is, we are thinking about the next election instead of the next generation. We have heard comments such as: There is no need to go after any energy in America; it will take 5 or 10 years. That is what President Clinton said when he vetoed a bill that would have given us oil supplies from Alaska 10 years ago. We would today be getting as much oil from Alaska as we are having to buy from Venezuela if we didn't have a President who said we didn't need to be thinking 10 years in the future. I say we need to be thinking 50 years in the future. We don't need to be borrowing more and more money and charging it to our children and grandchildren.

This bill we are talking about this week is all with borrowed money. It is not our generosity. None of us are going to give a penny to help Africa or other nations.

We are going to charge it to our children and grandchildren and walk out of here and feel good about ourselves. And we should be ashamed of ourselves. We should be more accountable to the American people.

This is a devastating chart to look at, yet we ignore it every day. Every spending bill that is put on this floor passes with flying colors, and it seems to be an insult to this body to even suggest we might cut the budget to some realistic level.

I have an amendment we will vote on in a few minutes that takes the level of spending from $50 billion to $35 billion over 5 years. That is still way too much, and we should not be doing it. It is still more than the President asked for. He asked for $30 billion. What it is, is the amount of money that the Congressional Budget Office said that no matter how hard you tried with this PEPFAR Program, you can't spend more than $35 billion effectively in 5 years; without wasting money, you can't spend more than $35 billion.

There is no reason this Senate can't say: Wait a minute. We are in financial trouble as a country. We still want to help people around the world. Let's bring it back to a level that at least is reasonable in the sense that it is all we can spend without wasting it.

My amendment does not change anything about the bill except moves the level from $50 billion to $35 billion. This will not take one dime away from AIDS treatment in Africa because if we keep it at $50 billion or $60 billion or $100 billion, we cannot get any more money to the people we are trying to help. So if we are at $35 billion, we are at the level that is going to help the people we are intending. In fact, it is still more than twice what we started this program with only a few years ago.

I encourage my colleagues to take a moment to think about America and where we are. It is wonderful to be compassionate and generous. But this bill is not about compassion and generosity because none of this money is coming from us or our salaries, and we are not paying for one penny of it by cutting another program or making a sacrifice somewhere else.

We are not being honest about where the money is going because it is no longer an AIDS to Africa program, it is an ``anything anywhere in the world'' program. We at least need to say we have the discipline to bring it back to the level that is the maximum amount our own services tell us we can spend. If we cannot do this, if Members of this Senate cannot take that one, small step of responsibility, we should not be in this body. We certainly should not go out to the American people and pretend we have done something good for them around the world because we have not. We are doing business as usual here, spending like there is no tomorrow, and there might not be if these same folks stay in the Senate and the Congress and continue to spend our money here.

I plead with my colleagues to look at reality, to look at where we are as a country, in debt and spending. Please, let's demonstrate to the American people that we can trim in one place--this massive foreign aid bill, giving money, which we are borrowing, all over the world-- that we can, we have the self-discipline. We can walk out of here and say: We at least trimmed it back to the maximum amount they said we could spend.

I hope some of my colleagues are listening. I appeal to them to show one grain, one little bit of sanity here as we approach the future, to take this bill back down to a level that is at least vaguely responsible.

With that, Madam President, I yield back.

Mr. President, since the President introduced his bill to reauthorize the PEPFAR program several months ago, a lot has changed. Our economy has continued to slow. We have passed a housing bill that allows up to $300 billion of risky loans to be added to the Federal debt. We have now been told by Secretary Paulson that it is likely we will have to come up with $40 to $50 billion in the next year to prop up the Government-sponsored enterprises of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. I appeal to my colleagues to consider reducing the amount of authorization for this PEPFAR bill to $35

billion. The Congressional Budget Office tells us we cannot spend more than $35 billion over a 5-year period without wasting, that the mechanisms are not there. For us, in the face of what we are dealing with, to go beyond what the Congressional Budget Office tells us we can spend and authorize $50 billion at this time is irresponsible. I encourage my colleagues to vote for this amendment to reduce the authorization amount to $35 billion.

I retain the remainder of my time.

How much time do I have remaining?

Mr. President, with due respect to my colleague, apparently there is nothing magic about $50 billion, because today we arbitrarily cut $2 billion and sent it somewhere else. Again, the Congressional Budget Office says that nothing will be sacrificed. No aid will be taken away from Africans with AIDS and others we are trying to help, because within the 5-year period we cannot spend $50 billion effectively and efficiently. Let's show some restraint in this body and at least move it to the maximum figure we can do effectively.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for a few moments as in morning business on my amendment that will be voted on at 11.

Mr. President, I wish to take a few minutes to speak on the rather large foreign aid bill we are addressing this week in the Senate. I have already expressed my concern, and I will do it again.

As the Senator from Texas was just talking about, we have a serious energy problem in our country today. Americans are hurting, and it is probably not a very good time to be talking about sending billions of American dollars around the world, despite how good the cause may be. Nevertheless, we are going to be voting on various amendments related to what we call PEPFAR, which began as an aid to Africa bill, and that is one of the issues I wish to address this morning.

The PEPFAR Program that the President started in 2003, which I supported, took $15 billion over 5 years and focused it on the AIDS epidemic in Africa. Other countries were allowed to participate. The primary focus was on AIDS and malaria. There has been some success, so the President would like to reauthorize that program.

Unfortunately, as it has worked its way through Congress, it has gone from a $15 billion expenditure to a $50 billion expenditure, sending more money overseas than we spend ourselves on research for AIDS in America or breast cancer or juvenile diabetes and the problems we have here. We are sending the money overseas.

This bill does not go according to its label anymore. This is no longer an aid to Africa bill. It expands across three more continents, including China and other countries that might be better off financially than we are at this point.

I proposed an amendment to limit the scope of the PEPFAR bill to its original intent, which included Africa and other authorized countries in the original bill, so that we can focus these dollars in a way that would allow them to work rather than allow them to create a global fund that spreads the money so thin that we are no longer effective in any area.

The vote at 11 also includes a very important amendment that is attached to the amendment to keep the focus on the countries in the original bill. This amendment would prohibit PEPFAR funds from going to organizations that are involved with forced abortions and forced sterilization in countries such as China. Again, countries such as China don't need our money, particularly at a time when they are actually much better off financially than we are. American taxpayers should not be forced to send their money to organizations in China that force abortions.

We may have people who stand up and say this is not going to happen, but $2 billion in the first year of this program is designated to the U.N. Global Fund. It is indicated that such sums that would be spent over the next 4 years would be allocated to it, which means it is likely that there is going to be $10 billion over 5 years that goes to the U.N. Global Fund. All one has to do is go to the Global Fund Web site, go to China, and see that there is over $70 million in grants that has gone to the organization in China that actually enforces the one-child policy, enforces the forced abortion policy in China. The law of the land here in this country is that we don't use taxpayer dollars for forced abortions anywhere in the world. Actually, the PEPFAR bill itself prohibits those funds. Yet there is a loophole in that as funds from PEPFAR go to the U.N. Global Fund, they will go to organizations such as we have in China that are involved in forced abortions.

Some of my colleagues will say this is unnecessary; it is already the law. If it is, I hope they will go along with this amendment and support it and not vote to table it this morning. This is a very real and serious problem. The U.N. Global Fund is very well known for supporting organizations in China and elsewhere that promote forced abortions and forced sterilization on women. This is not only an abortion issue; it is a human rights issue that we all need to stand up and support.

So as we head to 11 o'clock, I wish to remind my colleagues again, because sometimes we confuse so many things together here that people don't know what we are voting on. The majority leader has moved to table my amendment--the amendment that says we can't add three new continents to this bill--because he knows that attached to it is this amendment that would prohibit funds from being used for forced abortions. The whole reason for the big debacle we had here in the Senate last Friday where people were brought back late is because the majority leader would not allow me to offer this amendment that would prohibit taxpayer dollars from being used for forced abortions in China and other places in the world.

So this is a very important vote at 11 o'clock. My colleagues need to know that if they vote to table my amendment, they are voting to do two things. First, they are voting to divert funds from this Africa fund and other countries that were authorized in the first bill--the countries that are suffering from widespread epidemics--they will be voting to divert these funds to countries where there are very isolated problems. The money will ultimately be spread around the world to organizations that waste this money instead of focusing it where we can really make a difference. Also, voting to table this amendment means you are supporting using PEPFAR funds, which are supposed to be for AIDS in Africa, you are supporting using those funds to promote forced abortions and forced sterilization in China and in other countries.

So I want my colleagues to be clear. I am not sure how the majority leader and others will present this motion to table, but the reason they are attempting to table it is because they want to stop the amendment that would not allow these funds to be used through the U.N. Global Fund to organizations in China that promote forced abortion. So I urge my colleagues to vote no--to vote no to table this amendment on these amendments so they can receive a fair vote in the Senate.

With that, I yield the floor, and I note the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, the motion to table involves two amendments. It is important my colleagues understand what is involved. The current PEPFAR Program focuses on 15 countries with epidemics of AIDS and malaria. The current authorization allows them to work in 110 countries in which they are working now, but the focus has been part of making this program successful.

My amendment would limit the focus of the current PEPFAR bill on the Senate floor to the authorized countries in the first bill so the money is not spread all over the world to countries that do not need it as much as Africa and the others.

But the other amendment, and the reason this is being tabled, is it proposes that we do not allow PEPFAR funds to be used through the U.N. Global Fund for forced abortions and forced sterilization in China and other countries. The law of the land in this country is that our taxpayer dollars are not used for forced abortion. All this does is make sure the money in PEPFAR does not end up with programs like they have in China that force abortions.

I encourage my colleagues to vote no against tabling these amendments so we would be sure that PEPFAR funds are being used where and the way that they are intended to be used.

I reserve the remainder of my time.