Floor Statements

The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

The following Senator is necessarily. absent: the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Colorado (Mr. Allard), the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Brownback), the Senator from Oklahoma (Mr. Coburn), the Senator from Oklahoma (Mr. Inhofe), and the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Missouri (Mr. Bond) and the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

Mr. President, I rise today to speak in favor of the passage of the FISA Amendments Act of 2008. This is a law that our Nation needs. The most important change made by the pending

bill is to allow immediate and real-time surveillance of overseas targets as soon as they become apparent in the course of a foreign- intelligence investigation. FISA had never been intended to block surveillance of such targets, but a 2007 FISA court decision interpreted FISA to apply to even foreign-to-foreign communications that are routed through the United States. Because of changes in technology and U.S. dominance in the telecommunications industry, even phone calls from Afghanistan to Pakistan could be routed through the United States. As a result, a FISA order could be required before communications between two suspected al-Qaida members outside the United States could be monitored.

This system made overseas surveillance a practical impossibility in many cases and caused valuable intelligence to be lost. Our best tool against al-Qaida and other terrorists is intelligence; it is absolutely critical that we gather whatever intelligence is available.

In the summer of 2007, Congress enacted a 6-month restoration of U.S. agents' surveillance capabilities with the Protect America Act. Today-- over 4 months after the PAA expired--Congress finally acts to extend this surveillance authority for another 4\1/2\ years. I am heartened to note that the Attorney General and the Director of National Intelligence both strongly support this bill and believe that it provides them with the tools they need to gather intelligence about America's foreign enemies.

Critically, this bill allows immediate and real-time surveillance of foreign targets located overseas whenever the Justice Department and the intelligence community find that, without immediate surveillance, ``intelligence important to the national security of the United States may be lost or not timely acquired and time does not permit the issuance'' of a court order prior to such surveillance. This provision, in a new section 702(c)(2) of FISA, addresses the exact problem that intelligence agencies faced in 2007. Congress expects our intelligence agents to use every tool that is technologically available to monitor al-Qaida and those associated with it. With this reform, we make such surveillance possible.

I also think that it is important that, in new section 702(i), the FISA Amendments Act allows pending surveillance certifications to be immediately amended to allow surveillance of new targets related to or growing out of previous surveillance. This should help to reduce the paperwork burden of FISA, allowing our agents to focus more time on monitoring the enemy and less on filling out forms. Also, the judicial review authorized by this section is appropriately limited and recognizes the intelligence community's primary role in deciding what foreign targets to monitor. The court's role is limited to reviewing whether certifications are procedurally proper and are accompanied by reasonable procedures to limit potential impact on U.S. persons. Thus, courts could block any obviously bad faith or improper use of foreign surveillance that might affect U.S. persons, but courts will not be second-guessing intelligence judgments, and should not be imposing procedures or making demands that will consume intelligence resources and divert agents from their primary mission. This limited role should also allow the FISA Court to decide these cases very quickly, minimizing the burden on both the intelligence community and on those judges who are assigned to the FISA Court.

I should also note that this bill contains important provisions that will allow all of the lawsuits against telecommunications companies to be dismissed upon certification by the Attorney General. Foreign intelligence surveillance is a matter that our Constitution entrusts to the executive in consultation with Congress, not to private litigants and the judiciary. These lawsuits all should have been dismissed immediately; this bill will finally produce that result. Title II is a critical part of this bill that should have been enacted long ago. Frankly, I find it odd that much of the early criticism of this bill has been directed at this of all provisions. Those who are opposed to the President's efforts to monitor al-Qaida's communications after 9/11 should take their argument to the President, not to the private companies that patriotically complied with government requests to help this country. Monitoring of al-Qaida's electronic communications cannot be conducted without the cooperation of private companies. The general rule that private citizens acting in good faith to assist law enforcement are immune from suit has deep roots and serves important public policies. As Justice Cardozo noted in the 1928 case of Babbington v. Yellow Taxi Corporation, the rule ensures that ``the citizenry may be called upon to enforce the justice of the State, not faintly and with lagging steps, but honestly and bravely and with whatever implements and facilities are convenient and at hand.''

Finally, I should note that this bill's so-called ``exclusive means'' provision, like the similar provision in the 1978 FISA, is hortatory verbiage that obviously yields the Constitutional authority of the President. The FISA Court of Review, in its 2002 decision in In re Sealed Cases, made the point:

The [Fourth Circuit in the Truong case], as did all the

other courts to have decided the issue, held that the

President did have inherent authority to conduct warrantless

searches to obtain foreign intelligence information. . . . We

take for granted that the President does have that authority

and, assuming that is so, FISA could not encroach on the

President's constitutional power.

Indeed, every administration since FISA was enacted--including the Carter administration--has concluded that Congress cannot take away the President's power to monitor foreign enemies of the United States without a warrant, and that to the extent that FISA purports to do so, it is unconstitutional. The Constitution's framers vested the executive with primary responsibility and authority to protect the United States from foreign attack. Section 102 repeats FISA's ``exclusive-means'' claims, yet provides in the same section of the bill, at subsection (c), an amendment to the immunity provisions for electronic communications service providers in 18 U.S.C. 2511(2) to require that certifications conferring immunity identify the ``specific statutory provision'' that allows the surveillance, but only if the certification ``for assistance to obtain foreign intelligence information is based on statutory authority.'' This provision, in the same section making claims of exclusive means, acknowledges that not all surveillance is based on statutory authority, but may, instead, be based on the executive's constitutional authority. If this nation again finds itself under attack as it did on September 11, those in charge of our security should not conclude from the exclusive-means language in section 102 that they may not act in any constitutionally appropriate way to protect this country.

Finally, the ``sunset'' provision in section 403, which will repeal the authorities in the bill at the end of 2012, is problematic. As the Attorney General and the Director of National Intelligence have said: ``[t]he Intelligence Community operates more effectively when the rules governing our intelligence professionals' ability to track our enemies are firmly established.'' The need to modernize FISA has been extensively debated since 2006, including numerous hearings, briefings, and floor debates that ``involved the discussion in open settings of extraordinary information dealing with sensitive intelligence operations.'' As the Attorney General and the Director of National Intelligence have pointed out, ``[e]very time we repeat this process it risks exposing our intelligence sources and methods to our adversaries.''

Despite these flaws, the bill before us is needed. It is very similar to the bill that the Senate passed earlier this Congress and on which the House refused to act. It has passed the House by a 3-to-1 margin, and I expect that we will see a similar margin in the Senate, as the bill already appears to have gained the support of some Senators who opposed last year's bill. I look forward to the passage of this bill.

Madam President, reluctantly, on behalf of Senator DeMint, I will object at this time. I expect--I know the majority leader has talked with our staff, as well--the issues that are relating to this can be worked out in a relatively--obviously, before the end of this week, we hope.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that at the conclusion of my remarks and potential remarks from the Democratic side that the Senator from Alabama, Mr. Sessions, be recognized.

Over the last week on our side, we have listened to some of our colleagues suggest that Republicans have obstructed action on important matters here. I want to ensure that with respect to protecting our seniors through the service of the Medicare physicians who take care of them, that we are able to meet a deadline on the statute which expires at the end of this month to ensure they continue to be paid.

One of my colleagues yesterday said Senate Republicans had refused to give Senate Democrats the opportunity to ensure quality health care for American seniors. Yet following those remarks, the minority leader propounded two unanimous consent agreements which would have permitted us to move forward to consider two bills that would preserve Medicare beneficiaries' access to care.

I am just about done propounding my request, but I am happy to yield.

Mr. President, I am happy to respond to my colleague that our proposal is to move forward with a bipartisan approach rather than the partisan approach which, of course, I opposed. In that regard, I, therefore, suggest that we simply extend existing law, which this Senate overwhelmingly supported just 6 months ago, for another 18 months, a proposal that had been made by the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee that would allow us to solve this problem not in a partisan way but in a bipartisan way.

Therefore, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of a Senate bill which I will send to the desk. It is a clean 18-month extension of the December Medicare bill. I ask unanimous consent that the bill be read a third time and passed, and the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table.

Mr. President, might I conclude with a brief remark?

I wish to express disappointment. Again, we are trying to simply allow the Senate to move forward, in a bipartisan way, to resolve a problem we all need to resolve. This would extend the existing law for another 18 months, something that had been, in fact, proposed by the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee. I am disappointed we are not able to do this.

Madam President, as we began this day, the Senate had pending before it a very important piece of legislation addressing the necessity of extending some provisions in our current Tax Code that enable our businesses to compete with others abroad. There were tax provisions, for example, that provide tax credits for businesses that invest in research and development. I think everyone in this Chamber supports extending those important provisions of the Tax Code, yet we cannot consider the legislation and get it done.

In addition, we have soon-to-be-pending important legislation on housing to deal with the crisis that has gripped this country in the last year or so. But instead of taking those matters up and debating them and getting the people's business done, we have taken some time out, pursuant to the Democratic leader's change in schedule here, to talk about change the Democrats would bring.

It is important to note that Republicans are not in charge of the Congress. Democrats have a majority in both the House and Senate and have had for the last year and a half. I submit if Republicans were in charge today, we would be using this time on the Senate floor to be working on the people's business--at least the two items I mentioned before--rather than taking time out to have a debate about partisan political matters.

But as long as we are talking about change that the Democrats would bring, I suggest we have no better place to turn to, to see exactly what that would be, than what the Democrats did do when they were in charge this year. It is the one piece of legislation they have succeeded in passing. It is a budget.

What does the Democratic budget show us about what they would do if they were in charge for another 2 years? The first thing that is notable about this budget is it calls for the largest tax increase in the history of the world; in the entire history of this country. American families and the economy cannot afford this kind of change. The last thing you want to do in time of economic downturn is to raise taxes. Yet that is exactly what the Democratic budget would do.

Every single taxpayer would face a tax increase in a little more than 2 years, unless Congress acted to affirmatively stop it. It would hit 116 million American households. This is not just a tax on the rich; every single American household. The child tax credit would be cut from $1,000 to $500 per child. The marriage penalty would be reimposed, so that many married couples would again pay higher taxes than they would have they had remained single.

When Republicans were in charge, we created a 10-percent lower tax bracket to help those with lower incomes, reducing it from 15 percent down to 10 percent. That would be repealed. The bottom rate would once again go up to 15 percent, a 50-percent increase for our lowest income taxpayers. Every tax bracket above the 15-percent bracket would also be raised.

A family of four with $50,000 in income would pay $2,300 more in taxes, according to the Senate Budget Committee. That is a lot of money if you are trying to save for your family or if you are worried about gas prices.

The investment taxes we have in this country--it used to be, years ago, that was mostly for people who made more money. Now we know that American families saving for the future--seniors living on retirement incomes, people who have pension plans, the teachers' pension, whoever it might be--all would see dramatic tax hikes under the Democratic budget because these proposals hit investors, and over half of Americans are now investors. The capital gains rate would increase by a third, a 33-percent increase in the rate, and the dividends rate would jump an unbelievable 164 percent under the majority's plan.

Let's talk about seniors who report dividend income. That is where a lot of their income comes from. Nationwide,

according to the Joint Committee on Taxation, 67.6 percent of seniors reporting dividend income had adjusted gross incomes of less than $50,000. These are not rich people--people who make less than $50,000. That is who gets hit. How about capital gains? Same source--40.5 percent of all seniors reporting capital gains had adjusted gross incomes of $50,000 or less. We are not hitting the rich. We are hitting folks with incomes of less than $50,000 a year.

How about the engine of the economy, the small businesses, the entities that create almost all of the new jobs in our country, half of which are women owned? More than 75 percent of all filers in the top tax bracket report small business income. So you increase that tax bracket and you are increasing the taxes on small businesses. You are not increasing the taxes on corporations. Small businesses would have a higher tax rate than corporations. It would go from 35 percent to 39.6 percent. Is that change we want in America? I think not.

Raising taxes on small businesses will hurt their ability to grow and create good-paying jobs. They create 70 percent of all new jobs in America and it would make it impossible for them to provide health insurance and other benefits to their employees.

Let's look to Senator Obama's tax plan. A look at his Web site reveals some interesting things. First, he has no plans to prevent these tax increases I talked about from going into effect. His proposal is to give a $500 tax credit per worker. So rather than preventing these increases in taxes I talked about, he would promise a $500 tax credit--up to $1,000 per family--only if you had an income of less than $75,000.

We believe the first order of business ought to be to prevent this massive tax increase called for in the Democratic budget. Senator Obama would allow this $2,000 per family tax hike to go into place and in exchange would give each worker $500. Obviously, the Government picks up the other $1,500 and the reason is because of the spending that Senator Obama and the Democratic majority would engage in. The budget I talked about before, interestingly enough, has almost to the dollar an increase in spending equaling the increase in taxes, so you know precisely what the plans are here if Democrats have another 2 years in power. I think most Americans would prefer the $2,000 in tax savings under the Republican proposal to the $500 tax credit under Senator Obama's proposal. Again, change that I do not think the American public would benefit from.

How about the capital gains tax increase that Senator Obama proposes? I talked about capital gains before. It affects seniors. It affects people with incomes of less than $50,000 a year. He says he might allow that rate to go back up to 28 percent and--increasingly he said this-- even if it were proven that it would not collect $1 more in revenue for the Federal Government. He said, instead, he would do it--this was during the April ABC debate--for fairness. But I am asking here, is it fair to punish investment? Our tax system treats capital gains at a lower rate because they have already been taxed once before. They have been taxed when the business earned the money and they are taxed again when the investor in that business has an asset and has to pay the taxes on it. This lower rate mitigates that taxation. That is fair. What is not fair would be to take that rate up to 28 percent. That is not change that would help the American people.

I think most Americans understand that to help business we need to help those who invest in business. That is what helps the economy grow. That is what creates jobs. It is what increases our standard of living.

Then there is one other proposal that Senator Obama proposes, perhaps as a result of the negative reaction to the increase in capital gains even if it produces less revenue. He says he ``would propose to eliminate all capital gains taxes on startup businesses to encourage innovation and job creation,'' according to his Web site. That I can agree with. But if the policy is good for startup businesses to encourage innovation and job creation, why wouldn't it be good for all of the other small businesses too? My wife had a small business. She is not just starting one up; she used to have one. She wouldn't be able to take advantage of that, but somebody just starting one would? What is the fairness in that? If it is good enough for those who are starting up, it ought to be good enough for those who can create more jobs and improve our economy.

Finally, he has a proposal on the payroll tax to increase taxes, which money would presumably go into the Social Security trust fund to be spent by the Congress, since there is no way to protect the money in a lockbox. We tried that before. So since Social Security taxes are not needed today, not all of them, to pay for Social Security benefits, the difference between what we collect and what we have to pay out to seniors is simply spent by Congress. This would be another tax increase, not for seniors in retirement, but for Congress to spend. It would increase on all incomes above $250,000. It is capped right now at $102,000 in income. The reason is because Social Security taxes are capped relative to the level of benefits. Benefits are also capped. If you ever break that tie, then you are going to have a welfare program rather than the Social Security program. That would not be change that is good for America.

I yield the floor.

The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from New Mexico (Mr. Domenici) and the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

Mr. President, I do object. I wonder if I may make one brief comment.

Mr. President, I wish to make the point that when we do extend unemployment benefits, if we do, the Senate needs to weigh in on its ideas about how it ought to be done, for one thing. The House- passed bill, which I don't think we want to consider, eliminates the 20-week work requirement which has been the law now since 1981. So theoretically someone could work a very short period of time and be entitled to this 13-week extension, something I don't think we want to change. As a result, we would like the Senate to weigh in and get it done the right way. For that reason, I have to object to bringing the House bill up at this time.

Mr. President, if I might further address the majority leader

then, I have several concerns. I highlighted one.

I appreciate that. I think there are some issues the Senate wishes to modify in the proposal. The offer to work together is a fair one, and that is how we ought to proceed.

The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain).

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

Mr. President, in a couple of hours we are going to be voting again on cloture and we will be making a choice between two different points of view. We did this 2 weeks ago, a week ago last Thursday, and the result was that cloture was not invoked on the House- passed so-called tax extenders package, and I think the same result will end up being the case this evening.

It is essentially a choice between the Democratic leadership trying to do this in a partisan way by simply bringing up the House bill and trying to push that through, or getting together, as we have done in the past, in a bipartisan way, to ensure that the tax provisions we all support and we all want extended into law are done in a way that does not require that taxes be increased in some other part of the Tax Code.

Republicans do not believe it makes sense to keep existing tax policy right where it is by having to raise taxes in another part of our economy, sometimes on the very same people who are paying the tax we are extending. Extending current tax policy is not a tax cut. Extending current tax policy is just that, it is maintaining the status quo, and we don't believe we should have some rule, in effect, that says when we continue exactly what we have in tax rates, somehow or other we have to raise other taxes in order to pay for that. That doesn't make any sense.

It is basically the difference between two philosophies. The Republican philosophy starts with the proposition that money belongs to the people--we the people--and we send a certain amount of that back to Washington and to our States to help run a government that we all understand we need to pay for. But originally the money belongs to the people. And the question is, How much can the people afford to give up? In times of economic downturn, such as we are facing today, it is not wise policy to take a lot of money from the private sector. In fact, we made a decision, the President and the Congress, to actually give back some of that money to the taxpayers. It was the tax rebate, the so- called stimulus package. Some people have already received their $300 or $600 checks. The idea is when we have an economic situation such as we do today, you don't take more money from the people. If anything, you try to help them keep what they have.

There are those on the other side, however, the Democratic side, who have a different view. They start with the premise that the Federal Government and how much money it has and how much money presumably it needs--and if the Federal Government needs more money because Congress is spending more money--then where else are we going to get it? Well, we have to take it from the people. If the Federal Government has a tax rate or a tax policy, such as a research and development tax credit that expired last year and we want to continue to provide that for this year, these people believe we need to tax the private sector. We need to tax taxpayers more money in order to, in effect, make up for the extension of that research and development tax credit.

Now, we don't think you have to make up for anything. You are keeping it exactly where it is today. You are not cutting taxes, you are keeping taxes right where they are. The other side says, no, we have a rule called pay-go, and it means even if we keep taxes exactly where they are today, we have to raise taxes to, in effect, pay for that. It is a nonsense policy. It hurts the private sector, it hurts businesses, it hurts American families, and it is the last thing you want to do in a time of economic downturn. That is why we have two different philosophies here. Our philosophy tonight says vote no on this cloture petition, because at the end of the day we all understand we are going to extend the current tax policy, we are going to extend the research and development tax credit and all of the other similar policies, but we don't have to raise taxes to do that. So we are not going to do that. There is an easy way and a hard way, in other words, to get this done.

There are some other things wrong with the House bill. Even if that were the basic debate, there are some other reasons why we wouldn't want to take up the bill that is coming to us from the House in the first place. For one thing, it doesn't do something very important, and that is to extend the relief from the alternative minimum tax, or the so-called AMT. This was a tax originally designed to hit millionaires and it ended up, in effect, hitting everybody else.

In fact, this year there are something like 23 million people--23 million filers--who would be affected by the alternative minimum tax if we did not once again relieve them from that liability. So each year we pass a bill that says you don't have to worry about paying the AMT this year. Actually, last year it was 23 million and this year it is 25 million more taxpayers who will face an unwelcome tax increase, averaging about $2,000 of tax liability. That, again, is absolutely the wrong policy in a time of economic downturn. Frankly, it is the wrong policy anytime.

There is another thing wrong with the House bill. It includes a $45 billion tax increase on certain businesses. We want people to be able to do business overseas as well as here in the United States. It is good for us when we have businesses competing abroad. About $45 billion of new tax increases will be piled on those businesses with two particular provisions of the House bill, in effect amounting to double taxation of the people working for those businesses when they are working abroad.

Without getting into the details of that, we all understand what those two provisions are. They deal with deferred compensation from certain employers who would be treated less favorably than other employers in the United States, and delaying the implementation of some new tax rules that would allow worldwide interest for foreign tax credit purposes.

Again, given the fact that we are in an economic downturn right now, why would we want to raise taxes, particularly on those industries we are encouraging to do business abroad to help bring more revenues into the United States? Again, these two provisions would make the United States less competitive, not more competitive.

Incidentally, the administration has indicated it would veto the bill if these tax increases are in there. Obviously, we want to get these tax extenders done, and therefore don't need the delay of a Presidential veto, Congress sustaining the veto, and having to start all over again.

Another thing wrong with the House tax package is it only extended the expiring provisions, such as the research and experimentation tax credit, for 1 year, notwithstanding that we prefer that be done for 2 years--for the year in which they have already expired and for next year as well.

It also included some new tax earmarks. What are some of these tax earmarks? One is it requires that projects financed with the so-called new clean renewable energy bonds be subject to the prevailing wages requirement of the Davis-Bacon Act. What this, in effect, says is if you have a Federal project here, you are going to have to pay a much higher wage rate to the people doing the work. The net result of the construction project is it is far more expensive than it would be if you could simply bid it out under normal bidding processes.

Many reputable studies have estimated that Davis-Bacon inflates Federal construction costs by anywhere from 5 percent to 39 percent. I have seen that right in my own home State of Arizona. Rather than paying the Davis-Bacon wage rate for a small Federal facility in southern Arizona, they decided to use existing mobile homes--which was totally inadequate, but at least it saved money from having to do the Davis-Bacon construction add-ons. So if we are going to create an incentive to build more renewable energy production, I am not sure why at the very time you would want to intentionally increase the project's costs by subjecting it to Davis-Bacon.

Another problem with the bill--a new tax earmark, in effect--is it creates a new standard deduction for property taxes, but it is essentially an indirect transfer because it does not prohibit local governments from raising their taxes, entirely offsetting any benefit to local taxpayers. In other words, it says you can offset certain State taxes. It doesn't prevent the States from increasing those taxes, so that in effect all of the taxpayers around the country are subsidizing the State that raised its taxes. The CBO suggests that, in general, the deduction for State and local taxes is a subsidy to wealthier communities. It deters States from financing local services with nondeductible things like user fees that are much more efficient.

Another thing the House bill does, another one of its tax earmarks, is to include an unprecedented tax earmark for New York. Tax credits are, by design, intended for individuals and businesses that actually pay taxes, not cities that do not pay taxes. But in this bill, there is an explicit tax credit for the city of New York, which does not pay taxes. How does it work? What they propose to do is give a tax credit of $2 billion to build a new rail line from Lower Manhattan, even though New York has no Federal income tax liability. What they would do in effect

is relieve the State from its payroll tax liability. All employers have to pay a payroll tax. What this would do is, when the city of New York pays payroll taxes for people on its payroll, the Federal Government would pay back the city. That is a very bad precedent, and it should not be included in this legislation.

But my favorite of all--we have not done enough for trial lawyers. It seems we need to help the poor, struggling trial lawyers, whose faces we have seen frequently, recently, in publications such as the Wall Street Journal, because they have been indicted and are going off to jail. But we need to help these trial lawyers because it seems it costs them a lot of money when they prosecute these class actions, on which they make hundreds of millions of dollars. They have to hire witnesses. They have to put out other money as expenses. That used to be a violation of ethics. When I went to law school, it was called champerty and maintenance. You couldn't do it. It was unethical for lawyers to pay the upfront expenses of these lawsuits because lawyers were explicitly not deemed to be businesses but, rather, professions. I do not know when the law profession failed to be a profession, but apparently it has because now the trial lawyers want a usual and ordinary business expense deduction for the expenses of these contingent-fee lawsuits. It is $1.6 billion. I don't think the American taxpayers need to be subsidizing trial lawyers to the extent of $1.6 billion, but it is in this bill, and it is another reason we should not agree to take up this bill--that is to say we should deny cloture on this bill.

There is a perfectly good alternative here; that is, bipartisan negotiation that would do similar to what we did last year, to provide the expiring tax relief here another year or two of extension, to extend the alternative minimum tax, to do these things without raising taxes either on the same taxpayers or on other taxpayers. We could provide tax relief for members of the military and veterans, incentives for charitable giving, a deduction for higher education expenditures and teacher classroom expenses, do the subpart F active financing and look-through exceptions. These are provisions that are very important for American businesses to be competitive.

All these things are in the Republican alternative. I believe that because they represent good tax policy, they would be agreed to on a bipartisan basis. Certainly, the chairman of the Finance Committee has been supportive of, I think, all of these provisions as well. It would also extend and improve the expiring energy tax incentives for alternative energy production and solar power that Senators Cantwell and Ensign added to the housing bill. It would do all of these things without raising taxes.

These are provisions that I suggest we could negotiate as soon as cloture is rejected on this bill.

Let me conclude by making the point that delaying further is costly to taxpayers. Enacting the bill solely last year prevented more than 13 million taxpayers from being able to file their returns and delayed their refunds for several weeks into the filing session. We need to get on with this. We need to get to the bipartisan discussions. We can negotiate a bill, and we can get it passed in a matter of days if we do that.

Businesses need to be able to tell those with whom they do business, their stockholders and the people they get money from, whether they can take advantage of these important tax benefits such as the R&D tax credit. The fact that this tax credit has already expired should be enough to convince us that we need to do this as soon as possible. This helps keep American businesses competitive. It is one of the key things we can do. For example, France has a 50-percent R&D tax credit, and China offers a 150-percent deduction for R&D expenditures. Clearly, the United States needs to get back in this game.

As I said before, we need to provide the AMT relief. The bickering between the two Houses on this is doing nothing but hurting American taxpayers. I think we should recognize right now it is not going to be subjected to pay-go. There are not going to be new taxes raised in order to provide relief from the AMT. I think everybody knows that.

We might as well get to the job of negotiating a bill and getting it done. We have already voted three times in support of this policy, once at the end of last year--that vote was 88 to 5. Last month, we extended the energy tax extenders, 88 to 8. And last week in the cloture vote that I indicated, that failed 50 to 46. I think it is clear we can get to the end of this. Everybody agrees we need to do so. It is just a question of how and a question of time. We can do it the easy way. We can do it the hard way. We can either get it done now or we can take a lot of time. I think most of us and most of our taxpaying constituents agree it would be better if we can get it done now, if we can do it the easy way, and they can begin planning for their futures.

I urge all our colleagues at our 5:30 vote to vote no again. We took this vote before. The vote should not be any different. Once that is done, we can get down to the bipartisan negotiations that will actually result in legislation that we can pass and the President can sign and that will be to the advantage of American taxpayers.

Mr. President, I suggest the absence a quorum.

The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Arizona (Mr. McCain) and the Senator from New Hampshire (Mr. Sununu).

Mr. President, today I am pleased to introduce the White Mountain Apache Tribe Rural Water System Loan Authorization Act. This legislation would authorize a Federal loan to the White Mountain Apache Tribe for the planning, engineering, and design of a dam and reservoir, which will be used to provide drinking water to the tribe.

The White Mountain Apache Tribe, which is located on the Fort Apache Indian Reservation in eastern Arizona, has approximately 15,000 members. The majority of the reservation's residents are currently served by a relative small well field. According to the tribe, well production has significantly decreased over the last few years, leading to summer drinking water shortages.

A small rural development funded diversion project on the North Fork of the White River on the tribe's reservation is planned for construction this year. The tribe indicates that when the project is completed it will replace most of the lost production from the existing well field, but will not produce enough water to meet the demand of the tribe's growing population. Consequently, in order to meet the basic drinking water needs of the tribe, a longer-term solution is needed. The most likely and best solution is a relatively small dam and reservoir located on the tribe's reservation--the Miner Flat Dam.

The legislation I am introducing today would authorize the Secretary of the Interior to provide a Federal loan to the tribe for the planning, engineering, and design of the Miner Flat Dam. A portion of the funds set aside in the Arizona Water Settlements Act for future Arizona Indian water settlements would be used to repay the loan. Although Congress specifically set aside money in the Arizona Water Settlements Act for this purpose, the money will not be available until 2013. If the tribe were to wait until then to access these funds, the cost of Miner Flat Dam would increase $5 million to $7 million a year. Therefore, providing a loan to the tribe to expedite the planning of the dam would ultimately decrease the project's costs.

Any Federal funding for the actual construction of the project would be conditioned on the settlement of the tribe's water rights claims, which would have to be confirmed by Congress. The tribe is in the process of settling its water claims in the State of Arizona, and it is my understanding that the parties involved in negotiating the tribe's water claims will likely reach a settlement with the tribe this summer. Once the parties reach an agreement, I intend to introduce legislation confirming their settlement.

The legislation I am introducing today would bring the tribe one step closer to having a reliable source of drinking water. Consequently, I urge my colleagues to support this legislation.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.