Floor Statements

Mr. President, today I recognize Hayden Mathias Fuchs, an intern in my Washington, DC, office, for all of the hard work he has done for me, my staff, and the State of South Dakota over the past several weeks.

Hayden is a graduate of Stevens High School in Rapid City, SD. Currently, he is attending the University of Kansas, where he is majoring in business-finance and business-management. He is a hard worker who has been dedicated to getting the most out of his internship experience.

I would like to extend my sincere thanks and appreciation to Hayden for all of the fine work he has done and wish him continued success in the years to come.

Mr. President, reserving the right to object, I offered an amendment a week ago during the debate on the extenders legislation that is still on the floor of the Senate that would have paid for all the things the Senator from Michigan would like to see paid for, and we have things we need to do, such as unemployment insurance, an extension of that. We need to deal with the issue of these expiring tax provisions.

What we would do is simply say we start paying for things around here. So I offered an amendment that would do that. It was defeated here in the Senate. But at 8:15, I intend to come back here and offer that again as an alternative because I think probably everybody in the Senate agrees we need to address the concern of people who are unemployed in this economy, but we should do it in a way that is fiscally responsible. That is what my amendment will do. So, Mr. President, I object.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of H.R. 4853; that all after the enacting clause be stricken and the text of the Thune amendment 4376 be inserted; that the bill, as amended, be read a third time and passed, and the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table.

Mr. President, I would like to speak to the amendment I just proffered to the other side which was objected to.

I think there is a consensus in the Senate that we need to fix some of these problems we are facing, one of which is the expiration of unemployment insurance for people who are unemployed. There are a lot of tax provisions that are expiring that need to be extended, things such as the research and development tax credit, which is critical to innovation and competitiveness in this country, and a whole range of other tax credits which affect a broad range of our economy.

Also, I believe it is important that we provide some certainty to people who depend upon Federal policy, and one of those groups would be the physicians in this country who rely upon

Medicare reimbursements for much of their survival because they treat so many Medicare patients. Much of the patient base for many of the physicians in my area of the country, where we have a high elderly population, is Medicare. Obviously, physicians have been facing--up until last week--a 21-percent cut. That was addressed for 6 months, so we have fixed that. We have dealt with it for 6 months. Obviously, that is an issue that will come up again. What my amendment would have done was to solve that issue not just for the next 6 months but to the end of the year 2012. So physicians in this country would have gotten an additional 2 years of relief, so to speak, with regard to their reimbursement.

So I would suggest that inasmuch as these are all things we agree need to be done, the real basic disagreement here revolves around how do we do that.

What the other side has put forward is a series of proposals, starting with the first one, that had $70 billion in tax increases and almost $80 billion added to the Federal debt. The last proposal that was put forward by the Democratic majority had $50 billion in tax increases and $55 billion added to the Federal debt. We hope that this week we are going to see that slim down even further, and I would suggest we are making progress in the right direction. But I think it is still fair to say these things need to be paid for.

As many of my colleagues have pointed out, we have $13 trillion in debt that we owe. That includes debt that is owed between governmental agencies--we call that intergovernmental debt--as well as debt held by the public. If you can find it, the debt held just by the public is about $8.6 trillion. But remember, we are talking about trillions and trillions of dollars.

As my colleague from Tennessee just pointed out, it took 43 Presidents 232 years to get to $5.8 trillion. The amount of debt we compiled and accumulated between 1776 and 2008--232 years of American history--was $5.8 trillion. Now, under this President's budget, we will equal that amount in the next 5 years and double it in 10. In other words, we will double the Federal debt today in 5 years and triple it in 10. That is an astounding number. If you think about all of American history up until the year 2008--232 years and 43 Presidents to get to $5.8 trillion--we are going to double that amount in 5 years and triple it in 10. Staggering.

Under this new administration, we have already racked up enormous amounts of new debt because we added $1 trillion to the debt to pay for a stimulus bill which has not shown any evidence of job creation other than jobs that have been created here in Washington, DC, at the Federal Government level. I think you could argue that Washington's economy has benefited because we have created some government jobs, most of which are temporary census jobs. But if you look at the overall job statistics, we have lost somewhere in the neighborhood of 3 million jobs since the passage of the stimulus bill.

We passed health care expansion, which was sold as health care reform but, frankly, does little to reform health care and certainly doesn't do anything consequential to reduce health care costs. I think most Americans now realize, as insurance premiums continue to go up and as the Actuary and the Congressional Budget Office and the Joint Tax Committee all attest to the fact, we are going to see the cost curve bend up, not down, as a result of the passage of health care reform. This is a $2\1/2\ trillion expansion over a 10-year period, when it is fully implemented.

That is a massive new entitlement program on top of the entitlement programs that are already bearing down on us and leading us toward a situation where, in a very few years if we don't take some serious steps, this country is going to be bankrupt. We are going to be belly- up. It is as simple as that. You cannot continue to sustain trillion- dollar deficits year after year after year, which is what we are facing for the foreseeable and long-term future, and expect that we are not going to completely drive this country into the ditch.

So the amendment I offer pays for things. It says: Let's change the way we do things around here. Let's quit handing the bill to our children and grandchildren. Let's quit putting it on the credit card and saying to the next generation: You pay this.

There is certainly nothing wrong with the things the other side is trying to accomplish. As I said, I think there is consensus about addressing these serious needs in our economy right now. But the difference of opinion exists here about, how do you do that? We are simply saying: Let's pay for things. Let's start doing something different here in Washington. Let's do what the American family has to do, what the American small businesses have to do. Let's pay for things, for crying out loud. That is what my amendment would do. It would say: Here are some ways we can shave some savings and we can cut spending here in Washington, DC, and do all these things we think we ought to do without adding to the debt and without raising taxes in the process.

A few months back, here in the Senate, we passed legislation which was labeled as historic and passed to great fanfare. It was called pay- go legislation, and it created pay-go rules that suggested that from now on we are going to start paying for things. What has happened since the passage of pay-go? The Senate has approved, if you count the not- paid-for portions of the bill that is on the floor right now--of course, that hasn't been approved yet, but assuming it were--nearly $200 billion of new debt. From the time we said we are going to start paying for things, which was a few short months ago, we have waived the very rules that were going to put us on a path to fiscal responsibility and fiscal discipline, declared everything an emergency, and added almost $200 billion to the Federal debt.

So here we are today debating yet again another measure that will add more to the Federal debt, that will impose taxes on small businesses in our economy at a time when they are trying to get some momentum to help churn us out of this recession, get us back to where we are creating jobs and to a period of economic growth. All we are doing is piling new taxes on them--taxes on investment, taxes on small businesses, and taxes, of course, with the recent passage of the health care bill, literally on everybody because all those tax increases are going to get passed on to the American consumer.

So where are we? Here is where we are. There are a number of things that can be done that would do what the other side wants to do--to pay for the extension of unemployment benefits. One of those things would be that we could save the necessary amount of money to pay for this now.

The cost of extending unemployment benefits in the Democratic proposal, by the way, is $33 billion. That is a substantial amount of money, but there are many ways in which that could be paid for, all of which were included in my amendment last week, but let me suggest a couple of discrete parts of that amendment that might be stripped out and used to pay just for the unemployment insurance.

We can pay for the extension of the unemployment benefits by returning unspent stimulus funds, which would save $34.5 billion. So the $33 billion in unemployment benefits that need to be extended to people who have lost jobs in the recession could be paid for by returning unspent stimulus funds to the tune of $34.5 billion. So there would be enough to pay for the unemployment benefits and some left over.

It could also be paid for through a 5-percent cut to the 2010 appropriations and an expansion of the affordability exemption to the individual mandate in the health care reform law, which together would save $33.5 billion. So that would give the $33 billion that would be necessary to pay for the extension of unemployment benefits.

Alternatively, it could be paid for with the rescission of other unspent Federal funds, which would pay for it by saving $56 billion. So you could take care of the unemployment benefits, you would have $33 billion that is necessary to pay for that and $23 billion left over, hopefully to be put toward the Federal debt, which would be the best thing we could do for our children and grandchildren.

Finally, it could also be paid for with the inclusion in this bill of medical malpractice reform, which was also included in my amendment last week. That would save about $50 billion. So you would have $50 billion to pay for

the $33 billion in unemployment benefits and have $17 billion left over to put toward the Federal debt, which again would be the best thing we could do for our children and grandchildren.

So all these arguments that are made by my Democratic colleagues that these things are Draconian just aren't true. These are commonsense things that would give us the necessary resources to take care of the problem that is in front of us today but do it in a way that doesn't add billions and billions of dollars to the Federal debt, exacerbating what is already a very serious circumstance facing our children and grandchildren, which the Senator from Tennessee did a very good job of outlining. If you are a child under 18 in America today, the amount of debt you own is about $85,000. By the year 2017, that is going to be $196,000. So if you are a young person in America today who is under the age of 18, your share of the Federal debt is $85,000. Ten years from now, that will be $196,000--in fact, less than 10 years from now; in the year 2017.

I think all that leaves us with a very clear choice when it comes to how we solve problems here in Congress, here in the Senate, and how we deal with the immediate question before us this evening: How do we extend unemployment benefits to those who have lost jobs in the recession?

The other side has come forward with a proposal, again with billions and billions and billions of dollars that are not paid for, and that does go on the debt and that does get passed on to our children and grandchildren.

What we are offering are some commonsense ways, which means the Congress and the Federal Government may have to live on a little bit less. They are things that would require the Federal Government to go on a diet, if you will, in the same way the American people are having to go on a diet. The American people are being asked, because of this tough economy, to make hard choices with regard to their family budgets, with regard to their individual and personal lifestyles, with regard to their businesses. Everybody in this country is having to make decisions about cutting back a little bit. We could address this issue by just asking the Federal Government to take a little bit of a haircut, put the Federal Government on a little bit of a diet. We can achieve the savings necessary to pay for the proposal that is before us.

Again, as I said, $33 billion fixes the unemployment benefit issue, and I have just named four ways that could be paid for, with money left over that could be put toward the Federal debts. That is what this is about. That is what the discussion here is. This is very straightforward.

My colleagues on the other side have come up here this evening and will continue to offer unanimous consent requests to go ahead and do this but not pay for it, and people on our side are getting up and saying: Wait a minute. No, I object, and here is why. And the reason is because we believe in a very straightforward way that we ought to start doing what I think the American people expect of us, and that is for us to live within our means in the same way they do.

Unfortunately, regrettably, today, that is not what is happening here in the Congress. Year over year over year, we continue to spend and spend and spend and borrow and borrow and borrow like there is no tomorrow. Well, the chickens are going to come home to roost. Someday, the bills have to be paid. People where I come from in South Dakota understand that. There is no free lunch. When you borrow money, it has to be paid back. You can't spend money you don't have.

Those are all things that are happening here in Washington, DC today. We are spending money we don't have and we are borrowing money we don't have any idea about how we are going to pay it back. All we are simply doing is giving it to the next generation so they will have a bill facing them and a future that will shackle them with debt that they will be dealing with for their lifetimes and probably the lives of their children and grandchildren as well.

By way of illustration, because I think it is important to put things into perspective--sometimes I think it is very difficult to come to grips with what is $1 billion, what is $1 million, what is $1 trillion. I tried to break that down, to put it in perspective for myself so I can understand a little better what we are talking about. The numbers, the number of zeros on the end of that number, can be almost mind boggling to the average person in this country. Most of us are not used to dealing with numbers that are in that ballpark of $1 trillion.

What a trillion seconds is--if you took a trillion seconds, what would that translate into, by way of illustration and example--a trillion seconds, if you broke that down into years, would be almost 31,000 years; 31,746 years is what a trillion second is. If you take $1 trillion and you make a second a dollar and try to put it into terms I think the average American can understand, a trillion seconds represents 31,746 years.

Since most of us here are probably not going to live much more than 80 years--hopefully if we are lucky, we will live beyond that. Most of us here are going to live under 100 years. When you talk about a trillion seconds, which in the last--we have seen about 15 seconds pass here, and you add that up to a trillion, that is 31,746 years. Think about what $1 trillion represents, how much that is, the scale, the dimension we are talking about and what we are doing to future generations of Americans if we do not start taking the steps that are necessary to pay the bills around here.

This amendment I offered and that was objected to by the other side would have done that. It would have fixed the physician fee issue, not just until November of this year but for another 2 years beyond that, to the end of the year 2012. It would have addressed the issue of the expiring tax provisions which we are all concerned about. It is an important tax policy that needs to be extended that has expired and needs to be addressed. Also, as I said earlier, there is of course the issue before us this evening of unemployment benefits which, at a cost of $33 billion, could easily be offset by any of a number of things I suggested this evening.

I see my colleague from Utah has arrived on the floor. I know he too has an amendment he wishes to offer that I think makes a lot of sense. When it comes to creating jobs, he is someone with a small business background and understands what job creation is about and I understand he will have a request he will make of our colleagues on the other side as well, so at this point I yield the remainder of my time.

Mr. President, today I pay tribute to Clarence Wolf Guts, of Wanblee, SD. Clarence passed away on June 16, 2010, at the age of 86.

The last surviving Oglala Lakota code talker, Clarence Wolf Guts was an American hero. Serving in World War II as a Native American code talker, Clarence helped win the war by transmitting critical military messages in his native language, which the Japanese and German militaries could not translate.

Clarence enlisted in the U.S. Army on June 17, 1942, at age 18. One of 11 South Dakotan Lakota, Nakota, and Dakota Native American code talkers, Clarence was recruited to help develop a phonetic alphabet based on the Lakota language. This alphabet was eventually used to develop the Lakota code.

Serving as a code talker, Clarence's primary job was transmitting coded messages from a general to his chief of staff in the field. Courageous and self-sacrificing, the efforts of Clarence and other code talkers were essential for the Allied victory.

Honorably discharged on January 13, 1946, Pfc. Wolf Guts was a man willing and able to serve his country. I have a great deal of respect for Clarence and for the extraordinary contributions Mr. Wolf Guts made to our country. The efforts of the Lakota Code Talkers saved the lives of many soldiers, and Clarence Wolf Guts was a true American hero.

Today I wish to celebrate the life of an extraordinary man. As we mourn the loss of this great South Dakotan, I extend my thoughts, prayers and best wishes to Clarence's family, friends, and loved ones.

Madam President, as provided for in the order, I now call up my amendment.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Madam President, this amendment is, in my view, probably the most important thing that we can do for the economy right now. The Senator from Montana talked about job creation. Everybody in this Chamber cares about that. I think Democrats and Republicans alike believe we have to create jobs in our economy. We need to get economic growth going again.

I think we have a fundamental difference about how best to do that, and what my amendment would do is address what I think are the two biggest problems we face--the sort of clouds, if you will, hanging over the economy in this country. One is debt. We have this spiraling Federal debt which is set to double in 5 years and triple in 10 years on the current path under the budget that has been proposed by the President.

If we include the debt that government agencies owe each other--in other words, intergovernmental debt--add that to the public debt, right now we are in debt $13 trillion. That is the total amount of debt we have today. That is going to balloon in the next 5 years and the next 10 years. The budget window we use to do our budgeting around here suggests it is going to be much higher than that.

So I think what the American people are saying, at least what I believe the American people are saying--and I think we have probably different interpretations of that, but what I believe the American people are saying and what I see in poll after poll after poll is people are concerned about the cloud this growing public debt imposes on our economy and the burden it places on future generations. They are also profoundly concerned about their jobs and about their economy. They want Congress to take steps that will help grow the economy and create jobs.

The best way to do that is for the government to get out of the way, so to speak, and incentivize small businesses to do what they do best; that is, create jobs. It is the small businesses in our economy that are the economic engine. They are job creators. We should not be imposing more burdens on them. We should try and keep taxes low. We should try and keep regulations and keep from imposing new governmental burdens on our small business sector and our economy.

So we have a piece of legislation before us today in which I think both sides, Republicans and Democrats, agree we need to do something to address unemployment insurance and extending the benefits of those who have lost their jobs in the recession.

We need to address the issue of physician reimbursement cuts which will occur if Congress does not take steps to address that. Of course, we need to extend the expiring tax provisions that many of us support-- for example, the tax credit for investment in research and development, which is one of the things companies use to keep us more competitive. Those are all things that have expired, are expiring. Those are issues that need to be addressed. I think both of us agree on that.

The question becomes, What is the best remedy, how best do we do that? What the Democratic majority has proposed is a solution which, at the end--and I think this is even under the best-case scenario, which I do not believe we have a CBO score on yet--but the more

recent version of their piece of legislation would still add about $50 billion to the debt. So it would increase the amount of debt I just mentioned earlier. It does raise taxes. It raises taxes on small business. It raises taxes on investment.

It puts more taxes on oil companies by raising taxes that would go into the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund. And, of course, because my amendment does not include that tax increase, somehow we are painted as being in defense of big oil. Well, let me point out one thing about that--this was true in health care; it has been true with many things that have happened here on the floor--and that is, it would be one thing if the revenues raised by increasing the tax from 8 cents to 49 cents per barrel of oil were actually going to be used to clean up oilspills. It is stated to go into the trust fund, the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund, but it will be used to fund other things. So, again, you get this double-counting. You get this practice we have seen employed here by the majority on a number of occasions where you are raising revenue that is supposedly for a specific purpose, the proceeds of which are going to be used for something entirely different. That, of course, is coupled with the fact that the tax, as we all know, is going to be passed on to the American consumers. So the American consumers are going to be burdened with higher taxes. At the same time, the other side can say: We are being tough on big oil. We are going to stick them with this big new tax. Ironically, it is not going to go to clean up oilspills; it is going to go to fund these things we are talking about funding here.

We have a better way. We can reduce government spending and do this. We can actually extend these expiring tax provisions by reducing taxes by about $26 billion under my amendment. We can cut spending by over $100 billion under my amendment. And we can actually make some progress toward reducing the Federal debt. We have about $68 billion, under my amendment, that can be used to pay down the Federal debt. So we reduce the debt, we cut taxes, we extend unemployment benefits, we address the physician reimbursement issue--and by the way, my amendment addresses that through the end of the year 2012. The amendment now offered by the Democratic majority extends it to the end of this year. So if you are a physician out there who is looking for some certainty and looking for something that is a long-term solution to this issue of cuts in reimbursement, then you get, under my amendment, an extension to the end of the year 2012. Under the Democratic majority option here today, you get something that extends it only until the end of this year. So you can do all those things and still cut the debt, cut taxes, and reduce Federal spending. So what we are offering is a different way.

It seems to me, when you are sitting on a $13 trillion debt and you are growing your debt at $1.5 trillion every year, which is what is happening--the deficit this year is going to be about $1.5 trillion. That is what it was last year. We are looking at trillion-dollar deficits as far as the eye can see, to the point where the interest on the debt at the end of the 10-year period we use for budgeting purposes in the Senate will exceed the amount we spend on defense. We will spend more on interest on the debt than we spend on national security in this country if we continue down this path. In fact, we will spend, at the end of the 10 years, 4.1 percent of our entire economy--our entire gross domestic product--on interest on the debt.

Madam President, $13 trillion in debt--the other day, I tried to put that in perspective so people can appreciate and understand it because I think sometimes it is hard for most of us, myself included, to wrap our heads around $1 trillion. It sounds like a lot in the abstract. But to try to put it into a perspective that perhaps we can understand, I used the analogy of, what is 1 trillion seconds? If you took 1 trillion seconds, what would that mean in terms of total number of years? Well, 1 trillion seconds represents 31,746 years. If you took 13 trillion seconds--which is what the debt now represents, the total debt our country owes--you are looking at over 412,000 years, if a dollar equals a second. So 1 trillion seconds: 31,746. Madam President, $13 trillion is what our total debt consists of today. Again, you are looking at over 412,000 years. I think that speaks to why we need to get the debt and the spending here under control.

Interestingly enough, a while back here in the Senate, to much fanfare, the majority passed pay-go rules. The assumption would be that somehow going forward new spending would be paid for and reductions in tax revenues would be offset somehow by increases in tax revenues and all that.

Well, since that time, since the passage of pay-go, the Senate has already approved well over $100 billion in new spending, not paid for that is added to the debt. If this legislation is enacted, that number will approach $200 billion since we passed pay-go--the much-touted, with much fanfare, as I said, solution that was going to solve the fiscal woes of our country and suggest a different way of doing things in the Congress.

Well, anything but that has happened. On the contrary, every time we have had a major piece of legislation, pay-go has been waived. We waive it. We declare everything an emergency. Now everything is an emergency and nothing gets paid for, and the debt continues to grow, and the debt-o-meter, the spend-o-meter around here continues to spin faster and faster and faster, and the credit card is handed to future generations who are going to have to deal with our inability to live within our means.

So the alternative we offer to the legislation before the Senate today that is being put forward by the Democratic majority is, as I said, very simple and very straightforward. It does a number of things. It does all the things we need to do in terms of extension of unemployment insurance, of the physician fee--making sure that cut does not occur, that the physician reimbursement issue is addressed, as I said, through the end of the year 2012--as well as extending these expiring tax provisions that are very important to our economy and to our economic growth.

But we do that in a different way. We take $37.5 billion of the $50 billion in unobligated stimulus funds and use those funds to extend existing tax and benefit provisions. We cut money from the government by reducing congressional budgets. I think it is fair that when the American family, the American business community, and people across this country are making hard decisions about their own personal budgets--their family budgets, their business budgets--having to figure out where they are going to cut back, the least we in Congress can do is to scrub our budgets and figure out what we can do to reduce spending.

So we cut money from the government by reducing congressional budgets. We rescind unspent Federal funds. There are lots of appropriated moneys out there that do not get spent that revert back or get spent later. What this amendment simply says is, if moneys that have been appropriated have not been spent, then let's use that money to pay down the Federal debt. Let's do these things we need to do here, and then let's make sure we are not continuing to spend and spend and spend, particularly dollars that are not needed. It requires the government to sell unused lands and to auction off unused equipment.

It also imposes a 1-year freeze on the salaries of Federal employees and eliminates their bonuses and caps the total number of Federal employees at current levels. I have a modification that would amend this legislation because there has been a concern raised that it would mean nobody could get a raise, even those who deserve it. What the modification would do is allow Federal agencies and managers flexibility to determine how they are going to work within their personnel budgets to provide, perhaps, raises for those who have been deserving. But, overall, their top-line number would be frozen. So it is not as if no Federal employee ever would have to go without any kind of a raise. But we think it is important that the Federal Government go on a diet, just as the family budget is having to do right now as well. We also collect $3 billion in unpaid taxes from Federal employees.

We encourage responsibility and prioritizing within the Federal budget by requiring a 5-percent across-the-board discretionary spending cut for all agencies, except at the VA and the Department of Defense.

Again, there has been a lot of suggestion that somehow this is going to wreck the economy and force--as I saw some things out yesterday-- that this is going to force a government shutdown. What this amounts to is a 2-percent reduction through the end of this fiscal year, which is September 30. I do not think, out of a $652 billion budget, that if you are a good manager at these Federal agencies, you could not find 2 percent to shave in order to achieve the savings we need to pay for this legislation. It encourages responsibility and prioritizing as well by saving $5 billion in eliminating what is nonessential government travel. And it eliminates bonuses for poor-performing government contractors.

Finally, it does create a new deficit reduction trust fund where rescinded balances and moneys saved through this amendment will be deposited for the purposes of paying down the Federal debt.

Now, I said this the other day, and I will say this again: I think this ought to be a no-brainer for us here. Irrespective of which side of the political aisle you are on, you undoubtedly are hearing from constituents across this country who are very concerned about the amounts of spending, the amounts of debt, who are concerned about increasing taxes, particularly businesses. We hear a lot about investment frozen on the sidelines because investors are concerned about the uncertainty that exists out there with regard to taxes and what they are going to do in the future.

Clearly, this bill, as I said earlier, raises taxes. It raises taxes by about $50 billion in the current version of it. What we would do is reduce the tax burden by extending these expiring tax provisions but do it in a way that does not require new taxes on investment, new taxes on small businesses, new taxes on our economy at a time when we can least afford it, when we ought to be looking at ways to keep taxes low and to make sure we are doing everything possible to lessen the burden on our small businesses, those job creators in our economy.

One of the things that was mentioned, and we do in our legislation, is we do address one of the issues with regard to health care. I think the Senator from Montana characterized that lowering the affordability threshold for the individual mandate will strike at the heart of health care reform.

Well, first off, let me just point out that this amendment was taken directly from an amendment that was filed by Senator Schumer during the Finance Committee markup of the health care reform bill. I do not think his intention was to strike at the heart of health care reform. I thought the heart of health care reform was to make sure people have access to affordable coverage. I do not think that was Senator Schumer's intent. I think he was thinking we ought to make sure low- income people were not forced to buy unaffordable coverage simply because of health care reform and because they needed a way to finance health care reform.

This amendment would make sure individuals and families are not subject to an intrusive and burdensome new Federal mandate if they cannot afford health insurance. So it is a fairly straightforward modification to the health care legislation which takes away some of the burden that is imposed on people at lower income levels. In fact, it makes a lot of sense to me. If you look at the current health care bill, under that bill low-income individuals--those under 300 percent of the Federal poverty level--are slated to pay about $1 billion in mandate penalties.

Now, the suggestion was that somehow, if we make this change, insurance premiums are going to go up. Well, I am telling you something. We tried to make this point many times during the course of the debate on health care reform. Insurance premiums are going up. In fact, PricewaterhouseCoopers predicted this week that health care costs are going to continue to rise at an unsustainable rate--next year by about 9 percent. So it is already clear that health care reform is not going to live up to many of its promises. It is going to continue to raise premiums for most Americans. And that has a lot more to do with the health care reform, the substance of that, than anything else. It does not have anything to do with what we are trying to accomplish here by, as I said, reducing the impact of the individual mandate on low- income individuals in this country.

So these are all fairly straightforward reforms. We do touch medical malpractice reform. We think that is something that should have been a part of health care reform and was not that would help reduce health care costs for people in this country and achieve some savings we can use to, again, help pay down the Federal debt, help address the concerns we need to address with this legislation.

But bottom line, as I said earlier, what we are looking at here is a very clear choice for U.S. Senators. U.S. Senators can choose to solve the problem before us in one of two ways. The first way is through $50 billion in tax increases, $50 billion in additional debt, and over $100 billion in additional spending--or about $100 billion in additional spending. The alternative I offer cuts taxes by $26 billion, reduces spending by $100 billion, and cuts the Federal debt, reduces the Federal debt by $68 billion, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

In my view, as I said at the beginning of my remarks, there is nothing more important to our economy than dealing with this cloud of debt, this huge burden that hangs over our economy of out-of-control Federal spending, out-of-control Federal debt, deficits that are over $1 trillion or at $1 trillion as far as the eye can see, the concern about tax increases on our economy and how those would impact our small businesses and their ability to create jobs. So this legislation, again, deals with the issue of the debt, deals with the issue of taxes, deals with the issue of spending, and accomplishes all of the underlying objectives we all have of extending unemployment benefits, of dealing with these expiring tax provisions, and dealing with the impending reduction in physician reimbursements.

So with that introduction, I reserve the remainder of my time. I think we have other speakers who want to come down, and I look forward to hearing from them as well.

Madam President, could I inquire how much time we have on our side.

I ask unanimous consent to add as cosponsors of this amendment Senators McConnell, McCain, Isakson, Bond, Enzi, Cornyn, Barrasso, Roberts, Coburn, Chambliss, Scott Brown, and Judd Gregg.

Madam President, I yield 10 minutes to the Senator from Arizona.

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

Madam President, in response to the comments of my colleague from Delaware, I do not think anybody is denigrating the quality of Federal employees. To the contrary. We are all Federal employees. We all know Federal employees. We are all friends of Federal employees. And we

have a lot of Federal employees who do a great job.

All we are simply saying is when you are in a tough economy, everybody ought to look at what they can do to live more within their means. When we are running a $1.5 trillion deficit this year and trillion-dollar deficits as far as the eye can see, Lord knows we ought to be looking within to figure out what we can do to try and find some savings that we can use to either pay for the things we need to do or perhaps pay down the Federal debt which, as I said, my amendment does.

Amendment No. 4376, as Modified

Also, because I think there is a concern that somehow every Federal employee is going to be frozen, I have a modification to my amendment that addresses that concern.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the changes at the desk be incorporated into my amendment. For the information of my colleagues, these are changes to section 403, and they address the criticisms.

The amendment would prohibit increases in salaries or bonuses for Federal civilian employees. The changes that are at the desk will allow such increases and bonuses to occur so long as agencies do not exceed their fiscal year 2009 budget for salaries.

This is a unanimous-consent request. This would address the concerns raised by some of my colleagues on the other side about making sure Federal agencies have adequate flexibility with salaries and bonuses to address those employees they think are deserving of pay raises. All they have to do is live under that top-line number that gives them flexibility as a Federal manager and to work within it.

Madam President, I simply offer that modification to my amendment to address the concern that every single Federal employee is going to be capped at some level for some foreseeable period of time. That is not the intention.

In fact, what the modification would do is ensure that within the overall budget--within the top line--a manager could make adjustments to individual employee salaries or bonuses if that is something they desire to do. It just means the Federal Government--the agency--is going to have to live within a certain number at the top line. They can work within that salary number beneath that top line. That is all it does.

Again, what I have said before, and I will reiterate for the benefit of my colleagues, is that I think we have a responsibility to be fiscally responsible in Washington, DC. As I said before, we have people all over the country making hard decisions with regard to their personal and family budgets, with regard to their small businesses, and they are having to reduce employee salaries, for example, and they are having to make reductions in force and let people go. Those are hard decisions to make. Surely in Washington, DC, where we have seen year- over-year increases in Federal spending, in discretionary domestic spending, that exceeds inflation by six times--look at the fiscal year 2010 and fiscal year 2009 appropriations bills and the increases that were allowed--21\1/2\ percent in those two appropriations bills, at a time when inflation was 3\1/2\ percent. How can we justify increasing spending over 20 percent in Washington, DC, when the rate of inflation in our economy is 3\1/2\ percent and people all over the country are having to make cuts? It is high time Washington, DC, and the Federal Government went on a diet.

That is not to say anything to denigrate or impugn the quality of Federal employees. As I said before, there are a lot of Federal employees who do a great job. All this is simply saying we in Washington, DC, ought to lead by example. There is great power in example, and we have not been providing the example for the American people. We are asking them to make these hard choices, but we are not willing to make those choices ourselves.

So I think this amendment gives Members of the Senate an opportunity to say yes to fiscal responsibility, yes to living within our means, yes to paying for what we spend money on, and yes to not handing the credit card to our children and grandchildren. These are not Draconian ideas; these are fairly straightforward savings that we would achieve simply by shaving a little bit from these Federal budgets--making sure we rescind those stimulus funds that haven't been spent or haven't been allocated to pay for this new spending. We use those funds that have been appropriated but not spent to finance some of what we are doing and then apply that to pay down the Federal debt and freeze some of the Federal agencies in terms of their budgets and ask for a 5-percent reduction in some of these agencies over the course of the next foreseeable years.

Those are all fairly straightforward steps I think anybody would take if they were trying to get back within a reasonable budget to address what are very serious concerns about the amount of spending and the amount of debt we are piling on future generations. So I am sorry the majority is resistant to accepting the amendment. It would address the concern that was raised by a couple of our colleagues on the other side.

It wasn't my intention to impose a very restrictive straitjacket-type approach on Federal managers. On the contrary, we think there should be a top line budget, that we ought to be able to live within it, and certainly managers can make decisions within that about how best to allocate those resources. Congress has actually blocked its own pay raise in the past 2 years, so it seems to me that is at least something we could apply to other areas of our Federal Government as well.

So, again, I think the whole purpose behind this amendment is simply to create an opportunity for Senators to vote for fiscal responsibility, to vote for paying for the things we spend money on in Washington, to vote for living within our means, and to vote for not adding billions and billions of dollars to the Federal debt, which is already at $13 trillion and growing by the day.

It seems, at least to me, this is an opportunity for us to demonstrate to the American people that we are serious about getting Washington's spending and debt under control. This amendment addresses the issue of unemployment insurance and extending that, addresses the issue of expiring tax provisions, reduces taxes by $26 billion, addresses the impending cut in physician reimbursements that would occur if Congress doesn't take action, but it does it for 2 years longer than what the legislation of the majority would do. We address that up to the end of the year 2012.

So it takes care of all those things, and it does it in a fiscally responsible way by reducing spending by over $100 billion, as I said before, by reducing taxes, by keeping taxes low on small businesses, which are the job creators in our economy. According to the Congressional Budget Office, it reduces the Federal debt by $68 billion. That is a win-win for the American people--the American taxpayer--and it should be a win-win for the Senate.

I hope my colleagues will support this amendment, and with that, Madam President, I reserve the remainder of my time.

Madam President, may I inquire as to how much time remains on each side?

Madam President, I will renew my request to so modify my amendment, and I appreciate the manager accepting that change.

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

Madam President, my understanding is that we are headed toward a noon vote, perhaps a little bit ahead of that. I ask unanimous consent to have about 3 minutes to close debate on our side.

I will proceed accordingly and try to conclude this in 2\1/2\ minutes. That, unfortunately, does not give me enough time to say favorable things about the substitute of the Senator from Montana.

But I do want to close the debate on this amendment by saying that I do think this presents to us a very clear choice about how to accomplish what this legislation strives to accomplish; that is, as we have all talked about--something I think both sides agree on, Democrats and Republicans--extending unemployment benefits to those who have lost jobs; extending expiring tax provisions that are currently in law, such as the research and development tax credit, that are important to our economy and to our competitiveness; and, finally, making sure the reduction or the cut in physician reimbursements under Medicare does not go into effect.

So those are basically the elements we are talking about today in terms of the things we are trying to get done. The difference occurs as to how we would propose paying for that. The Democratic majority has put forward their proposal which does include tax increases, about $50 billion now in the current version of it in tax increases. It does raise the debt by about $50 billion, adds more onto the Federal debt, notwithstanding the commitment to pay for things under the pay-go rules that were enacted in the Senate, and it does increase spending substantially.

What I am offering as an alternative for Senators to vote on is an approach that is very different. It reduces taxes. There are no tax increases in it. The tax reductions occur because of extending existing tax law, actually reducing taxes by $26 billion.

It reduces the Federal debt, according to the Congressional Budget Office, by $68 billion, and it reduces spending by $100 billion. As I said earlier, I think it is important the Federal Government go on a diet. We have all kinds of issues, and Americans across this country have lost jobs, unemployment is at a high rate, people are having to make decisions. There has been a loss of income. They are reducing their personal budgets, their family budgets, their business budgets.

Here in Washington, DC, we continue to spend and spend and spend like there is no tomorrow and hand the bill to future generations. So this is the debate. It is a clear difference in approach, and I hope my colleagues will vote in favor of fiscal responsibility, vote in favor of paying our way, vote in favor of living within our means, and vote in favor of reducing the debt on future generations.

So I would ask my colleagues in the Senate to support this amendment. I yield back the remainder of my time.

Madam President, pursuant to section 904 of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 and section 4(G)(3) of the Statutory Pay-As-You-Go Act of 2010, I move to waive all applicable sections of those acts and applicable budget resolutions for purposes of my amendment, and I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. President, today I pay honor to Robert Dean Moore of Mission, SD, who passed away on May 29, 2010, after a courageous battle with cancer. He is survived by his parents, Reverend and Doctor Marrles and Frances Moore, and his brother and sister-in- law, Reverend Jack and Nancy Moore.

Robert dedicated his life to improving the health and well being of all Native Americans, including members of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, of which Robert was an enrolled member. This mission led him into public service, where he was elected as a Rosebud Sioux tribal councilman as well as being a member of the Aberdeen Area Tribal Chairman's Health Board. Robert was not only a vocal supporter of enactment of the Indian Health Care Improvement Act earlier this year, he was also a strong advocate for better research, education, and prevention of tribal youth suicide.

In addition to his dedication to public service and the betterment of his people, Robert lived his life with a strong foundation in his faith. He was also blessed with an exceptional vocal talent that allowed him to touch many across the country through performance.

Robert Dean Moore's devoted service to the people of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe and the rest of Indian Country is an inspiration to us all.

Mr. President, today I recognize Jeanne Laurence, who will celebrate her retirement from Rapid City Area Schools this June after 23 years of service. In reaching her retirement milestone, Jeanne Laurence is finishing a career that pioneered computer usage within area schools in Rapid City, SD. Jeanne began her career in the real estate field in Wyoming, but after eight years moved to Rapid City and joined Stevens High School as a secretary. At Stevens she tracked student attendance, grades, and discipline issues. In 1985, the school district was not equipped with computers, so Jeanne performed all tracking and management functions by

hand. At the first opportunity to use a computer, Jeanne automated most of her tasks and encouraged administrators, teachers, and secretaries to take advantage of this new technology.

Over the next several years, Jeanne earned a reputation among co- workers for being an expert on technology solutions. The district quickly recognized Jeanne's expertise and asked her to develop computer classes for fellow staff members. Her knowledge of student management automation resulted in her appointment to the selection committee for the district's first student information system.

Jeanne's experience and reputation led to her selection for a district-wide position in the newly formed Department of Information Technology. In her new role, Jeanne became the sole trainer for over 1,500 employees. She developed technology training for new employees and introduced downloadable video clips to the training process. The groundwork provided by Jeanne Laurence in technical education and training has made a significant contribution to the professional development of the staff and to the educational success of the students in the Rapid City Area Schools. Her tireless efforts have brought great credit to her school district and to herself. Congratulations on a well deserved retirement.

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

I will be happy to yield to the leader.

Mr. President, I ask to call up amendment No. 4333, and ask it be made pending.

Mr. President, the amendment I offer is cosponsored by Senators McCain, McConnell, Bond, Coburn, Isakson, and Roberts. It is an alternative to the legislation that is under consideration by the Senate today. That is the tax extenders bill that was the subject of some debate last week, that we will continue to do this week, perhaps into next week. I am not sure exactly when it will conclude.

What my amendment does is present an alternative because the amendment under consideration that has been offered up by the Democratic majority here in the Senate adds almost $80 billion to the Federal debt, it raises taxes by $70 billion, and increases spending by $126 billion.

To put that into proper context, it is important to remember that we have a current $13 trillion debt. The amount of publicly held debt is $8.6 trillion, but if you include the amount of debt owed between intergovernmental agencies, intergovernmental debt is $13 trillion that our government owes and is in debt.

What has been proposed by the other side is in direct contradiction of some legislation that we passed here a few months ago that suggested everything we were going to do around here, or almost everything, was going to be paid for. It was called pay-go. We passed the pay-go rules. It was highly touted at the time. There was great fanfare associated with the passage of pay-go rules that would insist when there is new spending or tax cuts that those be offset by some spending cuts or some combination of tax increases that would make sure there was no net impact on the deficit.

What is happening here is the exact opposite of that because what we are seeing happen with the legislation that is before the Senate today is, if in fact this bill were enacted and became law, it ends up being about $200 billion in new debt, debt we have added to the public debt since pay-go has been enacted.

I appreciate the Senator from Nevada, the majority leader, yielding back time so I can continue to speak about this amendment. I understand the process for consideration of this legislation will now be somewhat truncated if in fact cloture is invoked. I suspect it will not be long now we will be having a vote on that. But I hope my colleagues will defeat the motion to invoke cloture until such time as we have had an opportunity to debate many of these important amendments.

Clearly I believe the amendment I am discussing right now is one we need to vote on. I suspect there will be others of my colleagues who will want to offer amendments that I hope we will be able to debate and vote on before this legislation moves forward.

The point I wanted to make is this. Since the enactment of the pay- as-you-go rules here in the Senate, about $200 billion, if the current legislation on the floor today is enacted, will have been added to the Federal debt. That is $200 billion which we hand to our children and grandchildren to pay, notwithstanding what we have said publicly here in the Senate a few months ago, that all these things are going to be paid for and we are now going to be serious here in the Senate and in the Congress about making sure we are not piling more and more debt on future generations. That is completely contradicted by the legislation we will be voting on here in the near future on this tax extenders bill because it does increase the debt by almost $80 billion and, as I said earlier, raises taxes by almost $70 billion.

What I offer is an alternative to that approach. What this alternative does is, rather than increasing and raising taxes, it reduces taxes by $26 billion, it cuts spending by $100 billion, and it reduces the debt by $55 billion. So instead of more spending, more taxes, and more debt in the middle of an economy that is trying to get back on its feet and create jobs, my alternative and the one I will offer on behalf of my colleagues--who, as I mentioned earlier, are cosponsors of this amendment--will in fact reduce spending, reduce taxes, and reduce debt.

I think that is a good deal for the American taxpayer. I think it strikes at the very heart of what we ought to be focused on, which is job creation. We hear the other side talk a lot about job creation, but when it comes time to create jobs, you cannot find many policies coming out of Washington, DC, today that actually are additive when it comes to job creation. In fact, as I said earlier, it is just the opposite. You have a massive new health care entitlement that, when it is fully implemented, will cost $2.5 trillion over 10 years, which in my view will add enormously to the Federal debt because of all the double counting that was used to understate the true cost of that legislation; you had a trillion-dollar stimulus bill passed a year ago which was totally put on the debt for America's future generations; you have now discussion of a new energy tax in the form

of some cap-and-trade legislation that could come before the Senate in the next few months--and you just go down the list. At every turn, what this Congress has done in the last several months, in the last year and a half since the new administration came to office, is to increase taxes, to increase spending, to increase debt, and to increase the size and the scope of government. We continue to see this effort to expand government. When we expand government, obviously it takes more revenues to fund that government, create new bureaucracies--which is what we will see with regard to the health care legislation--and in the end takes more and more of those dollars out of the private economy where the real permanent job creation should be occurring.

Instead, what we should be focused on is creating incentives for small businesses to create jobs. Rather than creating more government, expanding the size of government here in Washington, DC, we ought to be looking at what we can do to provide incentives for the economic engine in our economy--and that is our small businesses--to go out there and do what they do best, which is create jobs.

But what you hear from small businesses not only in South Dakota but all across the country is there is so much policy uncertainty coming out of Washington and there is so much concern about the spending and the debt and the taxes, that a lot of the small businesses that might be making investments that would create jobs--hire new personnel, hire new people, buy a new piece of equipment, make capital investment--are sitting on that investment for fear the next policy to come out of Washington, DC, could be a new energy tax, it could be higher taxes. We all know starting next year you are going to see higher taxes on dividends, higher taxes on capital gains, higher taxes on marginal income, unless Congress takes steps to extend some of these expiring tax provisions.

That being said, what we are doing here today is we are going to make matters that much worse. If you are a small business person in this country, if you are someone who is in this economy and is concerned about Federal debt, is concerned about Federal spending, is concerned about taxes, then the legislation that is before the Senate right now, if adopted, is going to add, as I said earlier, another almost $80 billion to the Federal debt, will raise taxes by $70 billion, and increase spending by $126 billion.

There is a better way. That is why I offer this amendment. This amendment does a number of things. It reduces spending in a number of areas. It deals with some of the provisions of expiring tax law that everybody here agrees needs to be fixed. There are things both sides agree on. Both Democrats and Republicans here in the Senate believe it is important that we extend unemployment insurance for those people who have lost jobs in the economy. Both Republicans and Democrats think it is important that there are certain expiring tax provisions that need to be extended--a research and development tax credit, for example, is one thing that comes to mind. But there is a whole list of these expiring tax provisions that need to be extended that both sides agree should be done.

The difference in how we go about doing that is I think what is going to be the difference in the amendment that I offered versus the underlying legislation. Again, what I will do is reduce Federal spending and address the expiring tax law, the need to extend unemployment insurance in a way that does not raise taxes, add to the debt, and increase dramatically Federal spending in this country.

What does the amendment essentially do? Very briefly, it includes all the major priorities that both parties want to accomplish but it drops the spending that has been rejected by the Senate. It would eliminate the $24 billion that is in the Senate bill that was not in the House bill that deals with the bailout for States around the country. It does offer, by the way, an additional year of the so-called doc fix. There has been a lot of discussion here about extending the doc fix into the future.

And the underlying bill the Democratic majority has put forward does extend the doc fix. The reimbursement physicians receive under Medicare would drop dramatically if nothing is done by Congress to address that, and both sides agree that needs to be addressed. Frankly, it should have been done during the health care debate, but it was not. So the underlying bill, the majority Democratic bill before the Senate, would extend the doc fix through the end of 2011.

What my alternative amendment would do is extend the doc fix through the end of the year 2012. So you get an additional year for the doc fix. That is something physicians around the country are interested in, and I know for a fact that it is because my physicians in South Dakota--and I am sure most of my colleagues hear on a regular basis from their physicians around the country.

It drops all the tax increases in the bill, including carried interest, the tax on professional service S corps, the international provisions, and the increase in the per-barrel tax that funds the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund that will raise gas prices for consumers around the country.

The alternative amendment I filed is fully paid for with spending cuts. It offers more than $100 billion in savings by actually doing what the American people want; that is, reducing spending. Every American is dealing with a tough economy. A lot of Americans have lost jobs. A lot of Americans certainly have lost income. A lot of Americans have seen their net worth plummet as a result of the economic circumstances in which the country finds itself. So they are all making hard decisions. They are sitting around the kitchen table and they are having these discussions with their family about what part of their budget to cut or what they are going to have to do without. The only place where that hasn't been true is here in Washington, DC. Why shouldn't we, as the leaders of this country, be willing to make the hard decisions that every American family is having to make?

Well, this legislation does that. It takes $37.5 billion of the $50 billion in unobligated stimulus funds and uses that to extend existing tax and benefit provisions. It cuts money from the government by reducing congressional budgets right here close to home. We ought to have to do what every American family and what every American business is having to do right now; that is, make some hard decisions and reduce our own spending. So it does reduce congressional budgets.

It rescinds unspent Federal funds, those funds that have been appropriated but not spent. It requires the government to sell unused land and auction off unused equipment. So it generates some additional revenue that way.

It imposes a 1-year freeze on the salaries of Federal employees and eliminates their bonuses, and it caps the total number of Federal employees at current levels. In other words, the Federal Government can't continue to grow and expand at a time when we see a lot of our businesses around this country having to lay workers off or cut back their hours. It collects $3 billion in unpaid taxes from Federal employees.

It encourages responsibility and prioritizing by requiring a 5- percent across-the-board discretionary spending cut for all agencies except the VA and the Department of Defense. So 5 percent across the board for all agencies except VA and DOD. And we think, again, that is an important step to take if we are serious about getting our own spending under control and addressing what is a very serious problem for the future of this country; that is, the ballooning Federal debt, the continual growth of government and spending and taxes.

It saves $5 billion by eliminating nonessential government travel, and it eliminates bonuses for poor-performing government contractors.

Finally, it adds a new deficit-reduction trust fund where rescinded balances and money saved through this amendment will be deposited for the purposes of paying down the Federal debt.

This amendment ought to be a no-brainer for all of our colleagues in the Senate because it reduces the deficit by over $50 billion; it cuts spending by over $100 billion; it extends the existing tax law, the provisions we have all talked about that both sides think are important; and it provides 6 more

months of stimulus unemployment benefits for those who have lost jobs in our economy.

As I said earlier, that is the exact opposite of the approach taken by the Democratic majority, which is, as I said before, the way they finance all of these things is through $70 billion in new taxes. Again, many of those taxes are going to hit squarely on our small businesses, which are the economic engine and the job creators in our economy and are going to hopefully lead us out of this economic malaise and get us on to times where we are growing and expanding and creating more and more jobs. And it adds $80 billion to the Federal debt, which, as I mentioned earlier, is at $13 trillion. If you include all of the Federal debt--that amount held by the public, held by foreign countries, held by people here in this country--and then you add in the government, the intergovernmental debt that is owed to various agencies of government, we are at $13 trillion and counting.

In fact, if you look at the trajectory going into the future, we are talking about doubling and tripling that debt, doubling it in 5 years and tripling it in 10. And we are going to get to the point where over 4 percent of our entire economy is spent just paying interest on the debt.

Think about that. Over 4 percent of our entire economy--we have a $14 trillion economy--would be spent just paying for interest on our Federal debt. There is going to come a point, 10 years out from now, when the amount of money we have to spend to finance our debt, to pay for the interest on the debt, exceeds the amount we spend on our military. Think about that. We would spend more financing the debt we owe, spend more on interest payments on the debt we owe, than we actually spend on our national security. That is a staggering thought, if you think about it. That is what we have to try to avoid. The only way we do that is by getting serious and starting here and starting now.

My colleagues on the Democratic majority side have said that because they passed pay-go, now we are on a different path; it is a different set of rules, a new sheriff in town; we are going to deal with these issues differently. But unfortunately what we are seeing is the same pattern, the same old way of doing things, which is to declare everything an emergency, borrow the money from China, and hand the bill to our children and grandchildren. It is time that stopped. This amendment gives us an opportunity to do that.

To put things into perspective because I think sometimes these numbers get to be very abstract, and you listen to politicians get up and talk about debt and spending and deficits and that sort of thing, and it is hard to kind of comprehend, if you will, the dimensions we are talking about--I mean, $13 trillion. It is hard to even contemplate what $1 trillion is. So just to put that into proper perspective, if you were to equate a dollar to a second, how much is 1 trillion seconds?

I spoke at Boys State a week ago or a little over a week ago now, and I asked the Boys Staters to sit down and do the arithmetic and to figure out how much 1 trillion seconds is because I think it helps put into perspective how much $1 trillion is. It is hard to even wrap your mind around what $1 trillion represents. But if you equate that to 1 trillion seconds, 1 trillion seconds is 31,746 years--31,746 years. That is what 1 trillion seconds represents.

Well, we are not $1 trillion in debt; we are $13 trillion in debt. How much is 13 trillion seconds? Over 412,000 years. Over 412,000 years. If you were to help people understand and put it in a certain perspective, that is the amount of money--the $13 trillion that we now owe, that is today. As I said before, if you look at the publicly held portion of that, we are expected to double that in 5 and triple it in 10 years.

It took us 200 years of American history to get to $1 trillion, and we have exploded that. If you look at the trendlines and where we are headed as a nation, it is a very, very scary thought. It should be scary to all Americans, and I know it is. It certainly should be scary to the Members of this Chamber. That is why, every time we deal with a major piece of legislation, foremost in our mind ought to be, how is this going to impact the fiscal balance sheet of this country? How is this going to make the next generation--how is it going to improve their standard of living, their quality of life? What is it going to do to them? Are we going to be the first generation to bequeath to the next generation a lower standard of living and a lower quality of life because we haven't been willing to make the hard choices and to make the hard decisions that are so essential if we are going to get our country on a fiscal path?

This amendment does address the issues on which both sides agree. It addresses the issue of extending expiring tax provisions that many people on both sides care about. It extends unemployment insurance until the end of the year. It does extend the doc fix beyond what the base bill does. The base bill extends it through the end of the year 2011. What this amendment would do would be to extend it to end of the year 2012.

So we have an opportunity for Senators to take a vote and to let everybody know, let their constituents know whether they are serious about getting spending under control; about making sure we are doing everything we can to create the right economic conditions for job creation, and by that I mean keeping taxes low on small businesses, not raising taxes by $70 billion, which is what this bill does; and whether we are serious here in Washington, DC, about listening to the American people and what they are saying with regard to spending. They want us to cut federal spending. They want us to do what they are having to do in their family budgets and in their small business budgets. What every American is now having to deal with is becoming more fiscally responsible, dealing with austere measures that will keep them from having to go deeply into hock or into bankruptcy. We are doing that here--we are going into bankruptcy. We just have the luxury here in Washington, DC, of being able to continue to borrow and borrow and put it on the credit card and hand the bill to our children and grandchildren. It is time for that to stop. It can stop with this amendment.

I hope that as we continue debate on the underlying bill and get votes on those amendments, my colleagues in the Senate will do the right thing for the future of this country and start to get spending under control and start to pay for what we continue to borrow for so that we are not piling more and more debt on future generations.

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

Madam President, today I recognize Agar, SD. Founded in 1910, the town of Agar will celebrate its 100th anniversary this year.

Located in Sully County, Agar possesses the strong sense of community that makes South Dakota an outstanding place to live and work. Agar is a little town with a big heart, and has continued to be a strong reflection of South Dakota's greatest values and traditions. The community of Agar has much to be proud of and I am confident that Agar's success will continue well into the future.

The town of Agar will commemorate the 100th anniversary of its founding with celebrations held June 11 through June 13. I would like to offer my congratulations to the citizens of Agar on this milestone anniversary and wish them continued prosperity in the years to come.

Mr. President, I wish to thank the Senator from Alaska for her leadership on this issue. This is an important debate to have, and I wish to remind my colleagues what this debate is about because I have heard lots of discussion on the floor today about how this is somehow about the science of climate change.

This isn't about the science of climate change. Maybe we ought to have that debate. Perhaps that is something we should debate, but that is not what this debate is about. This debate is also not about some of the other issues that have been thrown out here--that this is about big oil or this is about the Republicans wanting to delay or protect somehow the status quo. That is not what this debate is about. This is a very simple, straightforward question. That question is, Do we, the U.S. Senate, want to be on the record with regard to the issue of whether the EPA ought to move forward and try to regulate CO2 emissions under the Clean Air Act or should we wait until Congress takes up and deals with that issue?

What is ironic about what my colleagues on the other side are suggesting is that a lot of people have said

that Republicans just want to delay; they want to delay because they do not believe in the science. Well, we don't control the agenda; the Democratic leader controls the agenda. They have a climate change bill they could bring to the floor and we could debate it. They do not want to do that because they don't want to put a lot of their Democrats on record on that vote. So what do they do instead? We allow the EPA--a bunch of unelected bureaucrats--to move forward and do something that would have tremendous consequence to the American economy without hearing from the Congress.

I think that, in a very simple, straightforward manner, is what this debate is about. It is about, do we want the EPA to move forward with the regulation of greenhouse gas emissions absent direction from the Congress--the people's representatives--or do the voices of the people need to be heard through the debate we ought to be having here in the Congress?

I will say that irrespective of what you believe about the science behind climate change and whether or not human activity is contributing to it, one thing we know with great certainty is that it will have profound economic impacts on the American economy.

I will yield at the conclusion of my remarks to the Senator from Massachusetts, but I have some things to get to before that.

Mr. President, what is important is that everyone acknowledges, including the Obama administration, that moving forward with the EPA regulating CO2 emissions under the Clean Air Act would cause the economy to suffer.

I want to quote something the Office of Management and Budget put out last August in a document. It says:

Regulating CO2 under the Clean Air Act for the

time is likely to have serious economic consequences for

regulated entities throughout the U.S. economy, including

small businesses and small communities.

If you look at the impact on small businesses, farms, and ranches, the proponents are going to say: Well, the EPA is not intending to regulate smaller entities like that; we just want to get the big polluters. OK. We start at 100,000 tons. Well, in 2012, we move to 50,000 tons.

I would argue--and it is supported by statements made by folks in the administration--the EPA Administrator has indicated that by 2016, they intend to regulate smaller emitters, if we get to 2016, because what will happen is this so-called tailoring rule will get challenged in the courts and it will likely get overturned because the Clean Air Act said the threshold for regulation is 250 tons.

At 250 tons, you don't get just the big emitters. You don't get the large polluters. You get over 6 million entities, to include farms, ranches, small businesses, churches, hospitals, and you can go right down the list. That is what happens when you regulate at the 250-ton level. As I said, they are saying that is not going to happen, that we have this tailoring rule. Well, the law is very clear. If we are going to use the Clean Air Act as the authority to do this, the Clean Air Act stipulates 250 tons. That captures a whole lot of entities that strike at the very heart of the American economy.

The cap-and-trade legislation that was passed by the House last summer has yet to be voted on here in the Senate, but there has been a lot of analysis of that done in my State of South Dakota. The public utilities commission in my State suggested that, if passed, that would increase power rates in States such as South Dakota by 50 percent.

If you look at what the actual impacts are going to be on small businesses across this country--not only because of the cost of the original construction permits that would be included in this but also operating permits--the Wall Street Journal said in a May 2009 story that in 2007 the Clean Air Act cost those who had to apply for permits $125,000 per permit and 866 hours to obtain it.

So whether you subscribe to the notion that this is only going to apply to large entities or whether you subscribe, as I do, to the belief that this is ultimately going to cover a lot more smaller entities that are going to be adversely impacted and deal with much higher power rates, I think it is pretty clear that whoever is covered by these new regulations is going to be faced with a lot higher costs when it comes to permits, a lot higher costs when it comes to the implementation of best available technology, and therefore a lot higher cost to the American consumer who will deal with the burden of that when it is passed on by these various emitting entities.

My State of South Dakota, of course, is composed of a lot of farmers and ranchers. Agriculture is a 45-percent energy-intensive business, if you look at the inputs that are necessary to make a living in a farm or ranch operation. That means 45 percent of a farmer or rancher's costs are going to be increased by this backdoor energy tax imposed by the EPA. The fees and fines that are placed upon machinery manufacturers, energy companies, and fertilizer companies starting in 2011 and 2012 will be immediately passed down to the farm and ranch families who are going to be impacted by this.

If the EPA is forced to regulate at the statutory 250-ton threshold-- which, as I said, once this is litigated I believe that is what the courts are going to find--farms with as few as 25 dairy cattle would be forced to apply for a title 5 permit and pay a fee for each ton of greenhouse gases emitted by their cattle: the cow tax. That is what this is about. This is not, as I said, about the science of climate change. It is not about Republicans wanting to delay. We don't control the agenda around here. It is not about big oil. It is about small businesses, family farms, and ranches trying to make a living, trying to create jobs in the economy and constantly having Washington stand in the way and throw new hurdles and impediments and obstacles and barriers in their way.

What the Murkowski resolution does, very simply, is it forces us to answer a fundamental question and that is should Congress be acting on legislation that would direct these activities or do we allow a bunch of unelected bureaucrats at an agency downtown to move forward with regulations that would impose massive new costs on the American economy at a time when we are trying to create jobs and get this economy on its feet. That is the straightforward, simple question put forward by the resolution from the Senator from Alaska.

I hope my colleagues here realize, irrespective of what they think about the science of climate change, irrespective of all the other arguments that are being used as a distraction here on big oil and Republicans delaying this debate, when you get down to the fundamental question, that is what the issue is, whether this Senate wants to be on record about allowing a bunch of unelected bureaucrats to move forward with the regulations that would impose massive new costs on our economy, not just on big polluters, large polluters--who, by the way, are going to pass those costs on--but directly hitting the small businesses, farms, the ranches that are the very backbone of the American economy.

This is not, by the way, just a Republican issue. There are lots of Democrats who have weighed in on this and there are lots of Democrats I believe here in the Senate today who I hope will be willing to support this resolution. But I want to read for you very quickly here, because I know my time is running out, a couple of things that have been said by Democrats in the House of Representatives. Collin Peterson, a Congressman from Minnesota, has said:

The Clean Air Act was never meant to be used for this but

they're trying to do it anyway. . . . Most everyone I've

heard from about this thinks that elected officials--not EPA

bureaucrats--should decide how to address our energy

problems.

John Dingell called this a ``glorious mess,'' if the EPA moves forward with this. I have other statements from the Democratic Members of the House of Representatives which I will be happy to submit for the Record, as well as a letter from a bunch of Representatives in my State supporting the Murkowski resolution.

I yield my time and hope my colleagues will support this resolution.

Mr. President, today I wish to recognize Derek Johnson, son of Wayne and Nancy Johnson, of Aberdeen, SD. Derek will graduate from Aberdeen Central High School on May 23, 2010.

Derek has a very unique and touching story. He has overcome much adversity to become the positive role model and impressive young leader he is today. While playing for the Aberdeen Central Golden Eagles' high school football team in the fall of 2007, Derek suffered a serious injury that would change life as he knew it. After much contemplation and several extensive surgeries, Derek's lower left leg was amputated. Throughout his struggles, and the long painful recovery process, Derek maintained a positive attitude and steadfast work ethic that served as an inspiration to his teammates, classmates, the community, and entire State of South Dakota.

In March 2009, Derek's invincible attitude and courageous spirit were highlighted when he was selected as one of seven nationwide regional winners of the National High School Spirit of Sport Award. This award, selected by the National Federation of State High School Associations, is presented to high school athletes, coaches, administrators, managers and trainers that best exemplify the ideals of the positive spirit of sport.

Perhaps nothing embodied Derek's spirit more than when he returned to the athletic field this past school year. He returned to the football team to provide encouragement for his teammates. Through his hard work and determination, he was also able to compete as part of the Aberdeen Central Golden Eagles' varsity wrestling team. As a reflection of his athletic talent and perseverance, Derek earned eighth place in the South Dakota Class A Wrestling Championships.

Throughout his high school career, Derek has served as a shining example and genuine role model. I want to thank Derek for being such a positive influence on all of the lives he has touched and wish him the best of luck in his future endeavors. On behalf of the Aberdeen community, the entire State of South Dakota, and all of us here serving in the U.S. Congress, I am pleased to extend my sincere congratulations to Aberdeen Central's Derek Johnson. This young South Dakotan will continue to be a true hero and inspiration. He has made us all very proud. Congratulations.

Mr. President, I wish to speak for a few moments this morning about a subject that is on the minds of many Americans and I think should still be on the minds of everybody in this Chamber because the health care bill that was passed and signed into law recently is going to have impacts across this country for some time to come.

I am interested in the discussion that has occurred here on the floor of the Senate over the past several weeks, as Senator Barrasso from Wyoming--who also happens to be an orthopedic surgeon, a physician--has come to the floor to engage in a series of remarks, what he calls the ``second opinion.'' I think his second opinion series of remarks here on the floor has been extremely well pointed in illustrating, in many respects, what is wrong with the health care bill and why this is not something that is going to improve the lives of most Americans but, in fact, is going to worsen the lives of most Americans because they will be faced with higher health care costs, higher taxes, and probably higher deficits for years and years to come.

There is a lot of supporting data now, validation of those arguments we heard during the course of the health care debate. The Democrats, who were supporting it, as was the President, said this health care legislation was going to, No. 1, reduce health care costs for most Americans, and No. 2, reduce the deficit. Of course, they talked a lot about how it was going to extend the lifespan of Medicare as well, even though they were cutting Medicare and using those funds to create a new entitlement program. So all those promises made by the President and made by the Democrats here in the Senate when we were debating health care are now all being completely rebuffed by evidence that comes out all the time from those who study this issue closely.

Frankly, as we get more and more businesses trying to figure out how to interact with this new health care legislation, they are coming to the conclusion that it might be cheaper for them in the long run to drop their coverage and put everybody in the government plan, which is what we predicted would happen all along.

But I think probably the biggest bombshell--certainly the most damning piece of evidence--came out just a few weeks ago when the Actuary of Health and Human Services, HHS, came out with his analysis of the financial impacts the new law would have once it was passed and implemented. I wish to share a few things from that report because I think it is very important. It does, as I said before, illustrate exactly what Senator Barrasso and others said throughout the course of the debate in the Senate when health care was under consideration.

The Actuary of the Department of Health and Human Services--bear in mind, this agency is supposed to look at these things in a totally objective, nonpolitical way--the Actuary concluded that the Federal Government and the country will spend $310 billion more under the new law than we would have without it. The Actuary's report went on to say that national health expenditures would increase from 17 percent of GDP, which is what it is today, to 21 percent under the new law. But what is interesting about this is that the $310 billion increase in health care costs they now say will result from the passage and implementation of this legislation is more than what would have happened had we done nothing. Had this body done nothing in terms of health care reform, health care costs would have gone up less than they will with this legislation. As I said before, this completely refutes any argument made by the other side during the course of this debate that their legislation would, in fact, drive down health care costs.

The Actuary has now concluded the point that we made throughout the course of the debate; that is, that health care costs will go up, not down; the cost curve will be bent up, not down; and for most Americans, health insurance premiums are going to go up as a result of this legislation. That is what the Actuary is now saying.

What is even more interesting about that report is it goes on to say that health care shortages and price increases are ``plausible and even probable'' under the legislation. The report suggests there will be perhaps as many as 15 percent of Part A providers--Part A providers are hospitals--that will become unprofitable within the 10-year projection period absent further legislative action.

In other words, up to 15 percent of hospitals would have to close as a result of this legislation. Because of that, the report says the law will jeopardize ``access to care for seniors.'' So all these promises about greater access, lower cost--the promises that were made during the course of this debate--are being completely now rebutted by the report that the Actuary came out with just a couple of weeks ago.

The other thing I think is important--we emphasized this as well during the debate--the Actuary concluded that new taxes that are going to be imposed on medical devices, on prescription drugs and insurance plans, were generally passed on through to consumers in the form of higher drug and device prices and higher insurance premiums.

Remember, during the course of the debate we said all the new taxes that will be levied on medical device manufacturers, pharmaceuticals, health insurance plans, would be passed on. This is clearly what they are suggesting as well. So not only do we get the double whammy, we get the whammy of higher insurance premiums, but we get the double whammy of higher taxes that are going to be borne by a lot of people across the country. That also is being substantiated and supported by the Joint Tax Committee, which took a good look at the distribution of the impacts of the tax increases in this bill. A lot of Americans are going to see their tax burdens go up as well.

With respect to the issue of the deficit--which, again, is something I will

get to in just a moment--the Actuary notes the bill's Medicare provisions ``cannot be simultaneously used to finance other federal outlays--such as the coverage expansions--and to extend the [life of the Medicare] trust fund, despite the appearance of this result from the respective accounting conventions.''

Essentially what they have said is what they said in a letter in response to questions we posed about how this would impact the Medicare trust fund. Basically, the Actuary is saying what the CBO said; that is, you are double counting revenue, you are basically spending the same money twice. In other words, all the additional revenues that are supposed to become available because of reductions in Medicare benefits or reductions in Medicare payroll taxes that were going to extend the life of Medicare and also going to be used to finance the new health care entitlement program--that is what we said all along, and that is double counting. You can't spend the same money twice, and as a consequence of that you are going to see what they promised in terms of deficit reduction can be very different from what actually happens.

They went on to say that the CLASS Act, which is a long-term care entitlement program--described, believe it or not, by one of my Democratic colleagues as a Ponzi scheme of the highest order, the kind of thing Bernie Madoff would be proud of,--will result in net Federal cost in the longer term. The program is designed to someday down the road to pay long-term care benefits for people who pay premiums into that plan and will face significant risk of failure because of the way they are counting the revenue.

It says it is going to be ``a net Federal cost in the longer term'' because, obviously, when you take premiums today to pay for the unrelated provisions in the health care reform law, and then there is a demand for the CLASS Act benefits at some point in the future by the people who paid those premiums, you cannot use those revenues to pay for the benefits because they have already been spent. To assume otherwise is double counting that revenue.

So you have all this double counting that went on in the course of this bill which, again, as I said, understated the overall cost of the bill and also the deficit numbers I think were attached to it.

To me, this study, this analysis was absolutely a bombshell in terms of the impacts of the actual implementation of the health care bill. As I said, it completely refutes all the arguments that were made that it would lower costs, reduce deficits, and it would improve access. All three of those points are refuted by the analysis that was done by the Actuary at the Health and Human Services Department.

More recently, last week about this time, the Congressional Budget Office came out with a new report. They predicted that the health care overhaul will likely cost about $115 billion more in discretionary spending over 10 years than the original cost projections. So the promises that were made about deficit reduction as a result of this--it was going to somehow save $143 billion over a 10-year period--now are reduced by $115 billion because, as we said throughout the course of the debate, it is going to cost a lot to implement this bill both in the form of cost to HHS, as well as cost of the Internal Revenue Service, which is going to be required to now impose the individual mandate that will fall on a lot of people across this country and the penalties associated with that.

So we have all these implementation costs that are going to add an additional $115 billion in spending over the next 10 years which reduce dramatically any promises about deficit reduction, not to mention what I just stated in terms of the double counting that goes on.

My view on this is, not only is it not going to reduce the deficit, it is going to explode the deficit, particularly in the outyears when the demand for Medicare benefits comes and the demands of the trust fund for those people who paid into the fund and reached the retirement age--a lot of the baby boomers are going to require health care, the Medicare fund is going to be tapped for that, and there will not be any money there to pay for this program.

So you have the Actuary at HHS, you have the CBO coming out with new information which completely validates the argument we made during the course of this debate; that is, it is not only going to increase costs for most people across this country and increase taxes, but it is also going to have a detrimental impact on the budget and the deficit over the long term.

One of the promises that was made, the so-called good points in the health care bill, was that small businesses would benefit from a small business tax credit. That is something administration has been trying to sell to small businesses, putting out notices from the IRS that there are 4 million small businesses that could qualify for the small business tax credit. That kicks in in 2010. But, even there, as is now coming out, there is a lot of fine print I don't think people read very well.

The Chamber of Commerce said of all the small businesses in this country, about 78 percent of those small businesses are self-employed people. Self-employed people are not covered. Families are not covered under this. More important, there is a disincentive to hire people. We have an economy where we are trying to get jobs growing and come out of the recession and get people back to work.

This small business tax credit caps it. In other words, if you get up to 25 employees you are no longer eligible for it. If your average wage is $50,000 you are no longer eligible for it. So there is a real disincentive to pay people higher wages or hire more people because if you do, you are not going to be eligible anymore for the small business tax credit. A lot of those small businesses are saying: What benefit is there to me if I want to grow my business? Yes, I can take advantage of it for a short period of time--a very short period of time--but I am not going to be able, if I am at that threshold where I start hitting-- first, it says it is available for businesses with fewer than 10 employees, then it phases out at 25.

But if you get to 24 employees and you are thinking: My gosh, I would like to hire another person; I no longer will be eligible for the small business tax credit, or I want to pay my employees higher wages but then I hit the $50,000 threshold--it is a real disincentive to create jobs.

One of the things that is being touted as a positive about this legislation is it is, in fact, a disincentive for us to get people back to work and to create jobs.

The overall impacts of this, I think, that are still out there I don't think we are going to know for some time. In fact, I don't think CBO has any idea about what this is going to cost in the second decade. They have estimates of the cost in the second decade. They can make some predictions, but they will admit there is tremendous volatility about that, and unpredictability, when we get into the second decade.

But one thing we know in the first decade, one thing we are finding out now as we get more analysis being completed, is in the first decade, according to the HHS Actuary, this is going to increase the cost of health care more than if we did nothing.

In other words, if we had done nothing and we still had health insurance costs going up as they were about double the rate of inflation, if we had done nothing we would have locked that in. But now we are going to continue to have health insurance costs going up, not only at that rate but a significantly higher rate to the tune of $310 billion in more, higher health care costs over the course of the decade.

If we look at how that impacts individual people across the country, most Americans are going to see their health insurance premiums go up. In fact, some of the provisions of the bill also, as part of the--it was just reported last week that this provision that would allow people to keep their kids on their health insurance plans until they are 26 years old will, in fact, increase health insurance premiums by about 1 percent. That is something that was hailed as one of the benefits or virtues of this legislation.

My point is, contrary to the assertions that were made during the course of the debate with respect to lower costs, deficit reduction, greater access--none of that, according to these studies and analyses, is going to be the case. In fact, it will be the opposite. We will see higher health care costs for

most Americans. We will see higher taxes for a lot of Americans. We will see higher taxes for sure--for certain--for a lot of small businesses. And I think we are going to see a lot of businesses that are going to just say--and we have already seen reports of that, as a lot of these businesses look at the impact this would have on their bottom lines--it will cost them a lot to cover their employees. It might be cheaper to pay the penalty and to just shove them into one of the government-run exchanges. I think that is something we have yet to see the impact from.

My prediction would be we will see a lot of small businesses, and for that matter a lot of large businesses, that will come to that conclusion and say it makes absolutely no sense for them to continue to provide health coverage for their employees when they can have the government do it and save their companies a lot of money.

So I think the unintended consequences are something we have yet to see, but we do know for certain the consequences of this legislation, these analyses that have been completed, and studies that have been done by those who are supposed to know a lot about this subject--by that I mean the Actuary at the Health and Human Services Department, as well as the Congressional Budget Office--they are now seeing higher insurance costs, higher premiums, and a significant reduction in the so-called deficit reduction that was promised by the administration.

Furthermore, because of the double counting that is done and the way in which Medicare revenues are double counted--CLASS Act revenues are double counted--even for that matter Social Security revenues, payroll taxes are double counted in this--dramatically understate the deficit impact and the long-term debt implications of this legislation and what it will mean to the next generation of Americans who are going to be stuck paying our bills.

I say all that, not to be the Grim Reaper. We tried during the course of this debate to illustrate as much as we could these very points. We tried to offer amendments that we thought made more sense in terms of controlling costs; to actually address the actual underlying drivers of health care costs in this country as opposed to just expanding coverage, which is essentially what the legislation did. It will cover more people. In some ways it will cover more people by putting more people into Medicaid which will pass on more mandates and more costs to our States.

We have already seen a lot of Governors across the country reacting to that, talking about that, how we are going to pay for that. But there is an additional 34 million people, additional people, who are supposed to be covered in this legislation; about 16 million of those are already going into the Medicaid Program which already under- reimburses providers and also imposes huge new costs and new burdens on our State governments.

There is not a lot of good news to report about this. I think that is going to be the case. I think, regrettably, we could have gone a different direction. We should have gone a different direction. But that being said, we are where we are. I hope over time we will have an opportunity to revisit this issue. If we do not, it is going to have a dramatic impact on future generations, on our economy, both in the short term and long term, as a result of higher costs built into the cost structure for health insurance, higher taxes that will impact small businesses and families across this country, and higher deficits for which future generations are going to be assessed and have to pay.

With that, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I understand amendment No. 3987 has been called up by the manager of the bill, and I think it has been made pending, so I wish to speak to it. I hope at the appropriate time we will be able to get an agreement for a vote on it, and I will ask for the yeas and nays following my remarks.

This amendment is a very simple, straightforward one. It is one paragraph long. It is not complicated. What it essentially does is it sets a sunset date for the newly created bureau of consumer protection, allowing Congress to reevaluate the bureau after 4 years.

I think most Americans, if they knew we were creating a big new bureaucracy here in Washington, DC, would want us to have some oversight. They would want some accountability. They would want to make sure their tax dollars are being spent wisely and well.

This new consumer protection bureau will have lots of new Federal employees here in Washington, DC. It will spend hundreds of millions of dollars every single year. Yet Congress has literally no oversight or authority with regard to this new bureau.

It seems to me, at least, that when we have a fiscal situation as we have today in this country where we are running trillion dollar deficits literally every year, where our debts are continuing to pile up to the tune of doubling our Federal debt, publicly held debt in 5 years, tripling it in 10 years, we would want to do something to make sure that any new expenditure of taxpayer dollars is spent efficiently, effectively, and that we are being as frugal as we possibly can.

I, for one, would not like to see us go down this path. I don't think creating a huge new bureaucracy here in Washington, DC, is necessary. I think we can address the issue of consumer protection through existing agencies and authorities. Frankly, I wish to see this particular title in this legislation go away entirely, but it doesn't look as though that is going to happen. We offered an amendment earlier this week that would have been a substitute for this consumer protection title in the bill and addressed it in what we think is a more reasonable way, but that was voted down.

My amendment simply says that 4 years from now, once this bureau has been created, let's have it sunset, and then, if necessary, Congress can come back and reauthorize it. Congress then would have an opportunity to fine-tune it, perhaps. Congress would have an opportunity to look and see if it is performing the function it was intended to perform; whether it is doing it in an efficient and cost- effective way. Clearly, we have a responsibility to the American taxpayer to have some accountability with this new bureaucracy we are going to create as a result of this legislation.

It is straightforward. We have other agencies of government that we do this with--that we sunset, that we reauthorize. We just did that with the CFTC, which is an agency that was reauthorized during the farm bill last year. When we did that, we were able to fine-tune its mission. It also gives

the opportunity to reorganize an agency, if it has to go through a reauthorization process and a sunset process. I don't think it is asking too much, when we are talking about literally hundreds of millions of dollars annually and what would appear to be thousands of new Federal employees in this new agency, and what would also appear to be incredibly broad and vast new powers and authorities that will be unchecked because there isn't any accountability to the Congress-- Congress is not going to appropriate annually as we do with most agencies the power of the purse. This is all going to be run through the Federal Reserve. Yet it is taxpayer dollars that are at risk here. It is taxpayer dollars that are being used to finance this new bureaucracy.

I hope my colleagues will be able to find their way to support this amendment. I think it is a reasonable approach. Again, I don't think it is asking too much. The American taxpayers are paying the bills every year for this government and are having to deal with the burden of debt we are piling on them because of the spending going on in Washington. Of course, if you look at what we are spending this year and what we spent last year in the Federal Government, much of it was borrowed. Out of all the spending last year, about 43 cents out of every dollar was borrowed. This year it is about 39 cents out of every dollar. When we are running those kinds of deficits and piling up that kind of debt with this kind of spending going on in Washington and the fiscal problems we have as a Nation, it makes perfect sense to me. I think it makes perfect sense to the American taxpayer. If we are going to create a huge new bureaucracy--which I said I don't believe is necessary, but, nonetheless, if it is going to happen in this legislation--let's take a look at this again 4 years from now. Let's allow it to sunset and allow us to go through a process where we reauthorize, reevaluate and review and see if it is functioning the way it is intended, and whether these authorities and powers created by this new bureaucracy is what the American people want to see happen.

One final point I will make. There are lots of entities out there other than banks that are worried about this particular title of the bill because of the rulemaking authority that exists. We have auto dealers, jewelry businesses, furniture stores, orthodontists, and lots of small businesses that are concerned they are going to be covered by the reach of this new agency with these broad new authorities with very little accountability and oversight by the Congress. That is a concern to a lot of small businesses to whom we look to create the jobs and, hopefully, initiate an economic recovery in this country and get the economy growing and back on track. This, in fact, could put lots of new burdens, lots of new bandaid, lots of new costs on many of these small businesses. That is yet another reason why I believe this is a bad idea in the first place, but at a minimum we ought to allow it to sunset so we have an opportunity to review it and reevaluate it and make some decisions with regard to its future 4 years from now.

It is very straightforward. It is one paragraph long. Sunset the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection and allow Congress to reevaluate that bureau after 4 years.

I hope my colleagues will support this amendment. I ask for the yeas and nays and would hope at the appropriate time to be able to have a recorded vote.

I yield the floor.

Madam President, I thank my colleague from Arizona for yielding me time.

I would say Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac is a pox on all of us. But shame on us if we do not try to do something in this legislation to address this issue. What the McCain-Shelby-Gregg amendment does is responsible. It does allow for a wind-down of this conservatorship. But, as the Senator from Arizona has pointed out, it goes squarely at what I think most economists argue was a huge contributor to the meltdown we experienced a couple years ago: the runaway lending and irresponsible lending practices that were involved with the plight we now see with Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, where they have, up until, I think, this last quarter--or taking the last quarter combined, it is about $145 billion now that the taxpayers are on the hook for.

As the Senator from Arizona pointed out, last Christmas Eve the administration lifted the cap. There was a $400 billion cap on the amount of taxpayer assistance that could be provided to these two institutions. But now that cap has been lifted. Imagine the scale and dimension of what we are talking about, when we already have $145 billion of taxpayer exposure. We assume it could be as much as $400 billion. But just in case, the administration lifts the cap because it could go well beyond that, which suggests, if history is any indication, it will go well beyond that.

What this does is say we need to exercise some responsibility with regard to the regulation of all the financial institutions in this country. What the Senator from Connecticut, in his bill, does--with the financial services regulation reform bill--is to attempt to get at what contributed, in many respects, to the meltdown we experienced a couple years ago. But it ignores perhaps, as has been pointed out by the Senator from Arizona, one of the biggest contributors to that problem; that is, these two toxic institutions, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.

The administration has said they need time to come up with a plan. The side-by-side that is going to be offered by the Democrats is going to be a study. We are going to study this for about 6 months. I think their argument is, it would be dangerous to rush the process. I think the contrary is true. I believe it is dangerous to ignore this problem any longer. We cannot afford to wait so more taxpayer money can be lost, can be wasted in trying to keep these two entities afloat.

As I said before, last week we were informed that Freddie Mac needs an additional $10.6 billion in taxpayer funds due to an $8 billion loss in the first quarter of 2010. Since September of 2008, that brings the taxpayers' invoice for Freddie Mac to $61.3 billion.

Fannie Mae reported a first quarter loss of more than $13 billion, needing $8.4 billion from the government, putting their bill to the American taxpayers at $83.6 billion.

So the grand total of taxpayer loss from these two entities since their takeover in 2008 is a whopping $145 billion.

The losses racked up by Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae exceed--exceed-- the government's losses on AIG, General Motors, and Chrysler. Yet the current legislation in the Senate is completely silent on these two entities. That is outrageous. We cannot continue to funnel unlimited amounts of taxpayer money into Freddie and Fannie and have no plan to end this siphon.

In a time when we are faced with crushing debt and out-of-control deficits, we are willing to turn a blind eye to a $145 billion problem, which is going to only magnify over time. Last Christmas Eve, the administration lifted the cap of $400 billion, which is what initially was put in place that would limit the amount of taxpayer exposure. But what we are now saying is that may not be enough. Yet we do nothing-- nothing--in this legislation to remedy this problem.

Obviously, the administration knew there was more bad news ahead when they decided to lift the cap on government assistance on Christmas Eve of last year. The Obama administration decided that taxpayers could afford unlimited funding for Freddie and Fannie rather than keep a $400 billion cap on assistance in place. It is frightening they believe that $400 billion is not going to be enough--unlimited funding may not be enough. Who knows where this ends.

That is why I think it is important right now that we deal with this issue, and the McCain-Shelby-Gregg amendment does it in a responsible way by winding down and providing a timeline. It sets a 30-month date out there by which this conservatorship has to be wound down.

If you look at what the current exposure is in terms of Freddie and Fannie, they own or guarantee over 30 million home loans, worth about $5.5 trillion. The CBO estimates that Freddie and Fannie could cost the taxpayers as much as $380 billion through 2020. As I said before, my assumption is that because we lifted--``we,'' the administration lifted--the cap on the $400 billion of exposure, the assumption is, it is going to go much higher than that. So I think we have to ask ourselves this fundamental question: Is this the direction in which we want to continue heading or is it time to change course?

The time to change course is now while we are debating a bill that is designed to address the very problems we encountered a couple years ago. Freddie and Fannie, as the Senator from Arizona said, were at the very heart, the very core of that issue.

According to a recent Washington Post article, with the government's

conservatorship of Freddie and Fannie and the increase in FHA and VA loans, the government backed nearly 97 percent of home loans in the first quarter of 2010. Madam President, 97 percent of loans are backed by the U.S. Government. Is this where we want to end up? Is this where we want to head? Is this the best course for our housing market? Is this the role the Federal Government should be taking when it comes to housing in this country?

I firmly believe it is time we change course. I think there is great value--we all agree there is great value--in home ownership and helping families achieve the American dream of owning their own homes. But we have to bring personal responsibility back into the conversation. We need to go back to a time when families saved up money to make a downpayment on a house. They went to their banks. They provided the necessary documentation to prove they could pay back their loans, and they bought a house that was within their budgets. Buying and owning a home should be a goal people work to achieve, not a government mandate funded by the taxpayers. That essentially is what we have created.

So I believe it is about time to take responsibility for our actions. My constituents in my State who bought houses they could afford and paid their bills on time want to see Congress start taking some responsibility. I believe the McCain-Shelby-Gregg amendment does just that. It shows our commitment to getting our fiscal house in order in Washington, DC.

As I said, it is a sound plan for winding down the government backstop to Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. It mandates that conservatorship will end in 30 months or less. Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae will have to reduce their portfolios by 10 percent each year, and if they are not viable enough to exist after the 30 months they will be liquidated. If they are a viable company after the 30 months, they would only enjoy their Federal GSE status for another 3 years.

The amendment repeals the affordable housing goals that persuaded the two entities to enter into the subprime loan business in the first place, which I believe was the slippery slope that got us into all the problems, all the troubles we are facing today.

It creates new underwriting requirements on loans purchased by Freddie and Fannie. Freddie and Fannie will have to reduce their mortgage assets by more than 50 percent within 2 years and increase their capital reserves. It repeals the temporary increase in the conforming loan limit, returning it to $417,000. The two would have to pay State and local taxes, register with the SEC, and pay a fee to the government to repay their debts to the taxpayer.

These are all responsible reforms. Contrary to the assertions that have been made by the other side, this amendment is the correct way to proceed in dealing with these two giant institutions that have lost their way and are costing the taxpayers literally billions and billions and billions of dollars every quarter that passes that we do not take steps to fix this problem.

The amendment would reinstate the $400 billion cap that the administration lifted in December so the taxpayers know for certain they are not going to be on the hook for unlimited financial support.

The amendment establishes a new special inspector general at the GAO to investigate and report to Congress on these two entities. Freddie and Fannie would be included in the Federal budget until their conservatorship has ended, which is the fiscally responsible thing to do when we all know they do, in fact, have an impact on our budget and on our debt.

As I said, I have heard the arguments on the other side of the aisle, and I think they are ignoring the clear will of the American people. The American people get this. They know why we are where we are. They are sick and tired of subsidizing the mistakes of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. We need to put an end to the taxpayer bailout.

I think it is important to the credibility of our economy and our credibility with the American taxpayers--but it is important to the credibility of the markets and to our economy--that they understand we are serious about solving this problem. That is why the McCain-Shelby- Gregg amendment is the correct way to proceed. We are going to have a vote on that very soon, and I hope we will not leave this subject, that we will not dispose of this financial services regulation reform bill without addressing this very important topic.

To suggest for a minute, as the other side has, that somehow we can do a study, we can put this off for 6 months--and who knows. By the time they complete the study, they will have to think about the results of that study and formulate a plan, and that will take another 6 months or a year. Every single month, every single quarter that goes by, we continue to hemorrhage more and more money at the cost of billions and billions of dollars to the American taxpayers. They have had enough. We should say we have had enough and we are going to bring some discipline. This amendment does that, and I hope my colleagues will support it.

I yield the remainder of my time.

Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I compliment my colleague from Florida. He has addressed an issue which is an important part of this debate; that is, making sure loans that get made in this country, both on the borrower side and the lender side, are responsible loans.

I think the amendment he will offer is one on which we ought to have a debate and on which we ought to have a vote. I hope this body will act in a way that leads to more responsible practices, a higher level of responsibility, both with borrowers and lenders in this country, which was at the heart of why we ended up where we did.

It is interesting to me that we continue to watch the problems we are experiencing in our economy. Probably by far the most important one is the high level of unemployment. That has become sort of a chronic problem. Even though the economy appears to be recovering and growing again, we still continue to see these very high rates of unemployment, certainly worse in some parts of the country than in others, but, nonetheless, something that we cannot tolerate.

We ought to be attacking every single day. Everything we do ought to be focused on what we can do to eliminate this high level of unemployment, to provide incentives to small businesses to create jobs, to grow their businesses and expand, get the economy going again, and, obviously, in my view at least, the small businesses in this country are the economic engine of our economy. They are our job creators.

We ought to be focused on making it easier for them to create jobs rather than harder. That is why I think it is ironic that almost everything the Congress has been doing of late makes it even more difficult for small businesses to do that.

We passed a big, massive expansion of the health care entitlement in the Congress a while back. That is going to impose lots of new taxes, lots of new mandates on small businesses. It is going to raise their insurance premiums, which we are seeing now more and more. The CMS Actuary, with their recent report, suggests what we suggested all along; that is, this is going to drive up the cost of insurance and health care in this country. It is not going to drive it down, it is going to drive it up.

So I think what we are going to see with small businesses across this country is not only a higher tax burden associated with paying for that, and also

many of the new mandates that are associated with it, but you are also going to see them having to deal now with higher insurance costs that will be associated and come with this massive health care expansion that was passed, not to mention the fact that, in my view, this is going to end up in a tremendous amount of growth in the debt in the outyears when we realize this is going to cost way more than it was anticipated, and that many of the offsets or pay-fors are probably not going to come to fruition.

But that being said, it seems to me at least that having all of this uncertainty coming out of Washington, whether it is the implementation of the new health care bill, whether it is questions about a climate change bill that could impose a crushing new energy tax on our economy, questions about what is going to happen with tax rates with regard to dividends and capital gains and marginal income tax rates next year, what is going to happen with the death tax--all of this uncertainty is just hanging a cloud over this economy and making it very difficult for our small businesses to do what they do best; that is, to exercise that entrepreneurial spirit, to grow the economy, to create jobs.

It is very difficult to do that when you pile more and more burdens and more and more costs on top of the very small businesses that we are hoping will lead us out of this recession. That is why I think in all of our efforts we ought to have a very close eye on what impact they are going to have on the small business sector of our economy.

This is no exception. The debate on financial services reform is about some very critical issues, issues that need to be addressed, issues that we should be focused on: how to deal with the issue of systemic risk and make sure that systemically risky enterprises in this country, that that risk is constrained, that there is appropriate oversight, there is appropriate transparency.

I think there is an important issue to be debated in terms of derivatives, which is a $600 trillion economy in this country that has been operating in the shadows. The legislation that is before us, I think if it is amended the right way--and I hope it will be on the Senate floor--will bring all of that into the light. There will be transparency, something that I think is desperately needed in that area.

I hope this will be done in a way that does not impose new burdens on end users, those who are trying to legitimately hedge against higher commodity prices, currency rates, and interests rates and those sorts of things. But there is work to be done in this legislation to deal with the issue of systemic risk, to ensure that we take all of the steps we possibly can to avoid and prevent the type of economic collapse and meltdown we witnessed a couple of years ago.

I think it is ironic this legislation does not encompass something that was at the very heart of that economic meltdown; that is, the issue of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. It is ironic to me, at least, the focus of this legislation is to deal with the issues that lead to the economic malaise that we found ourselves in and the collapse that we experienced a couple of years ago that would attempt to accomplish the objective of preventing that in the future, absent dealing with Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, which was a huge contributing factor to what we witnessed a couple of years ago.

So it does not include that. It does get at derivatives; it does address, in some fashion, the issue of too big to fail. Then it also addresses this issue that we are debating right now, which is the issue of consumer protection. I would argue this is an important part of the debate when it comes to the regulation of our financial markets, perhaps even the most important part; that is, protecting consumers.

Having said that, I think what the recent financial crisis highlighted was the fact that there were a number of bad actors out there in the marketplace who were out for a quick profit, without concern for the consumer, and this consumer protection effort as part of this legislation is designed to correct that, or at least address and get at that problem.

I strongly support some of the consumer protection ideas that have been put forward. There is a Republican alternative amendment that has been offered to the base bill. But as is typically the case in the Congress, instead of just dealing with the issue that needs to be fixed, trying to fix the issue that needs to be fixed, it seems like the pattern is that we try to go beyond that and fix issues that do not need to be fixed; in fact, in this particular case, with a whole new bureaucracy, creating the whole new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau manned with lots of new Federal Government employees with lots of new powers, in my view, extending a reach way beyond what should ever have been contemplated to deal with the important issue of protecting consumers in this country.

Why do I say that? I had in my office last week a bunch of community bankers. I have met with credit unions. I have met with auto dealers. I have met with a lot of small businesses. I would argue these are not the types of entities that led to all of the problems we experienced. Those are not systemically risky entities or companies. These are hard- working, in most cases, small businesses.

When I sat down with my community bankers--I am not talking about big Wall Street banks; I am talking about Main Street banks, local banks, banks that are about their customers because they care about their customers; they are their neighbors; they are the folks they hang out with; their friends and their kids go to school together; these are people who are far removed from Wall Street--they told me about how this bill does not level the playing field and how they are going to be subject to a whole now layer of regulation they cannot afford. They told me stories about how they would make sure their customers are always satisfied and how they cannot afford to make bad loans. In these smaller banks in smaller communities where there is a tremendous amount of accountability, obviously these are not the types of banks at which this legislation should be targeted or directed.

These are banks that provide capital to our farmers, our small business owners. In my State of South Dakota, these are the people who--most of my constituents would rather bank with these big, large chain banks that we talk about when it comes to the issue of systemic risk. The Democrats' bill, in its current form, places new burdens on these banks, costly regulation on banks that are already heavily regulated, that have already proved to be sound financial entities.

I also recently sat down with some car dealers from my State, again small Main Street businesses in South Dakota, who have personal relationships with their customers. They told me how they may have to cut some of the services that they provide to their customers because of the broad authority that is granted to this brandnew agency, this Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

These business take great pride--when I say ``these,'' the auto dealers--in the service they provide to their friends and neighbors who come into their businesses to buy a car. To have bureaucrats in Washington, DC, looking over their shoulder does not seem like the right approach to me.

I have heard the arguments that these small banks are somehow not going to be affected because of the $10 billion exemption, but I think it is important that we point out here, and that we clear up some of the facts on this issue. That $10 billion exemption is from enforcement and examination authority by the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The new bureaucracy still has the ability to oversee every product and loan and transaction these small banks enter into with their customers.

I have also heard the argument that section 1027 excludes many of the small businesses that are calling me and e-mailing me and coming to my office because they are concerned. However, it seems to me, once a small business decides to give their customers an option to pay for their goods or services over time, this new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau can come knocking on their door. What Washington bureaucrats are going to tell them is what is in the best interest of their customers in South Dakota. So you can imagine the implications of this type of authority. Currently, the legislation provides very few checks on this new bureau's broad new authorities.

I want reforms to our current regulatory oversight structure. We need better protections for our consumers. But the bill that is before us creates a new bureaucracy that has a funding stream outside of congressional oversight with very few checks and balances, and that is not reform.

What I would like to see is this bureau removed from the bill. There are other ways to provide better protection for consumers without burdening small businesses, which, as I said earlier, are the engine of our economy.

Just to illustrate or to put a fine point on that, I have a letter from the National Federation of Independent Business, which represents businesses all across this country, has a very large membership, including many businesses in my State. They write to express their concerns with certain parts of the bill that are too far reaching and would impose major new costs on small business.

They go on to say:

The establishment of the Consumer Financial Protection

Bureau will cover many small businesses strictly because they

set up flexible payment arrangements with their customers.

According to a study they did a few years back on getting paid, approximately 50 percent of small businesses offer special terms or credit-type arrangements to allow customers to pay for goods or services. Then they go on to describe the nature of some of those arrangements. But I think it is fair to say a lot of small businesses-- and car dealers are probably the most notable example. But as was said earlier, that could extend to furniture stores, jewelers; that could extend to orthodontists and dentists. People who allow their customers to spread out the payments over time to pay on terms and have these flexible types of payment arrangements would be covered by this.

That makes no sense. At a time when we are trying to have our small businesses help lead us out of this recession, start creating jobs instead of dealing with the systemically risky entities that got us into this mess in the first place, we are talking about piling a whole new burden and lots of new costs on top of our small businesses at a time when they can least afford it.

So I would hope the amendment that is being offered, the alternative to the Consumer Protection Financial Bureau in this bill, will be adopted; that my colleagues in the Senate will take steps to improve the way this bill treats consumer protection and in the way it treats small businesses under this bill.

I, frankly, as I said earlier, would like to see this title removed entirely and us deal with this in a way that makes more sense; that does not create a whole new bureaucracy, with all kinds of new government employees with all kinds of new powers. There are certainly ways in which we can address the issue of consumer protection absent having to go to these great lengths and this great cost, expense to the taxpayer, and great new burdens imposed upon small businesses in this country.

So I am one who will be supporting not only the amendment that is before us but other amendments that address this title in the bill. I have one I am working on that would exempt many of the small businesses that would be covered by this bill, some of which I mentioned in my remarks earlier. But I think this is an issue that is incredibly consequential in this legislation and so far removed--so far removed-- from the purpose of this bill in the first place.

As I said earlier, we ought to fix the things that need to be fixed. But we should not try to fix things that do not need to be fixed, particularly when it calls for creating a whole new government bureaucracy in Washington, DC, with new government employees, at great additional cost and, of course, as I said earlier, at great additional expense to America's small businesses, which are the economic engine and job creators in our economy.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, today I wish to recognize Dorothy Clara Kralicek and Della Marie Goegen.

Dorothy and Della were born on April 8, 1920, at the family farm near Menominee, NE, where they learned about the true riches of family life. Today, they both live in Yankton, SD, continuing to pass along family values and faith as matriarchs of their vast families. Between them, they have 18 children and numerous grandchildren.

Dorothy and Della are both excellent homemakers and have recently enjoyed traveling together to several sites in Europe. On Mother's Day, May 9, 2010, both ladies will be honored by a gathering of family and friends in Sioux Falls, SD.

This honorable recognition is clearly well deserved. Dorothy and Della's dedication to their families is a shining example of the steadfast commitment, devotion, and inspiration they have freely given to everyone throughout their lives.

It gives me great pleasure to commemorate the 90th birthdays of Dorothy and Della and to wish them continued health and happiness in the years to come.