Floor Statements

Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Alaska (Ms. Murkowski), the Senator from Arizona (Mr. Kyl), and the Senator from Missouri (Mr. Bond).

Madam President, the American people have been speaking out for a year and a half. They have wanted Democrats in Washington to focus on the economy and on jobs. What they got instead was a budget

that explodes the national debt, a $1 trillion stimulus that failed to hold unemployment down to the levels we were told it would, a health spending bill that is already leading to higher costs, and a raft of other bills that expand Washington's role in people's lives.

With just 3 days left in the Democrat's 2-year experiment in expanded government, they want to make a good last impression with a bill they know has no chance of passing and which they have no interest in passing. So this is about as pure a political exercise as you can get. In my view, it is an insult to the millions of Americans who want us to focus on jobs.

Democrats made a very clear choice. They chose to ignore the concerns of the American people and to press ahead with their own agenda over the past year and a half. In the last 3 days of the session, they have decided they can at least pretend to be concerned. This is nothing short of patronizing. But in some ways it is the perfect way to end a session in which the American people have taken a backseat to the Democrats' big government agenda.

As for the specifics of this bill, even if this were a serious exercise, it is a bad idea. Even the Democratic chairman of the Finance Committee said this bill could hurt American competitiveness. As a number of my colleagues pointed out yesterday, the way to get U.S. businesses to produce more here isn't to tax them even further, it is to stop punishing them with our high corporate tax rate. If American businesses are going to compete with foreign corporations, we should have competitive tax rates. It is that simple.

Moreover, the companies this bill targets, by and large, are not opening overseas subsidiaries to make products for Americans. They are moving overseas to serve foreign markets in addition to the markets they already have in place, and that creates jobs right here in the United States. When these additional markets overseas are opened, it creates jobs right here in the United States.

This bill is not a serious attempt to address a problem. It is a purely political exercise aimed at making a good impression. Unfortunately for Democrats, the impression they have made over the past year and a half has stuck--and for good reason.

Madam President, at 1 o'clock this afternoon our dear friend, Ted Stevens, will be laid to rest, with honors, across the river at Arlington National Cemetery. So the Senate will be thinking of Ted Stevens today.

Ted was a legend in his own lifetime and the American people would have remembered him even if he had not gone on to serve as the longest serving Republican in Senate history. A recipient of the Air Medal and the Distinguished Flying Cross for his service in the Army Air Corps during World War II, Ted was, during his earliest days, an adventurer, a fighter, and a patriot. He lived an incredibly full life, most of it in service to his Nation and more specifically to his State.

His colleagues in the Senate admired and even sometimes feared him, but Alaskans loved him without any qualification. To them he was just ``Uncle Ted,'' a title I am sure will live on.

I have been to Alaska a number of times over the years at Ted's invitation and one of the things that becomes clear to anyone who goes up there, as I said at Ted's funeral last month, is that Alaska ironically is a pretty small place--in the sense that everybody seems to know each other, and everybody knew Ted Stevens. From the airport in Anchorage to the remotest villages, Ted is omnipresent up there. That is saying something in a State that is bigger than California, Texas, and Montana combined.

The reason is simple: In Ted's view, if it wasn't good for Alaska, it wasn't good. He devoted his entire adult life to a simple mission, to work tirelessly and unapologetically to transform Alaska into a modern State. He was faithful to that mission to the very end. It is hard to imagine that any one man ever meant more to any one State than Ted Stevens.

One of the stories I like about Ted is the one about his former chief of staff and his first trip to Alaska with Ted. When he showed up at Ted's house to pick him up at 6 o'clock in the morning, Ted had already gone through the briefing book he had been given the night before, read all the daily papers, and had already been on the phone to Washington for a couple hours. By the end of the trip, he said he needed a vacation after doing, for 2 weeks, what Ted had been doing for 39 years.

But Ted would always say he worked so hard because there was always so much work to do. Part of that, of course, was making sure that all of us knew about what Alaska and Alaskans needed. So everybody got invited up there--not necessarily because he liked you but because he wanted us to appreciate the unique challenges Alaskans faced day in and day out, and turning down an invitation from Ted Stevens was not recommended.

Ted poured himself into Alaska and he poured himself into the Senate. He mentored countless young men and women who worked for him over the years. He mentored countless new Members from both parties.

It was an honor to have known him, and it was a privilege to have served alongside him in the Senate for so long.

We have missed him the past 2 years, and we honor him again today.

I yield the floor.

I object.

Mr. President, the majority leader has generously consented to allow me to make a few observations before I must leave the Chamber.

My view is the majority has literally wasted months in the Chamber trying to tell the private sector what to do instead of providing certainty to help them make investment decisions. This bill we will be voting on cloture on Tuesday will do nothing to create jobs in our country. Most of the factories the Durbin bill is trying to prevent from moving overseas are not traveling overseas to sell back to the American market but are moving there to gain competitive advantage over foreign companies in foreign markets. In doing so, they create more jobs and more opportunity in the United States. The nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation has informed my staff that this bill, similar to so many others produced by the majority this year, will increase the deficit by nearly $1 billion, violating the majority's own pay-go rules.

It is my hope we will not decide to debate and pass this bill. I think it would be a step in the wrong direction.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I rise today to recognize the remarkable accomplishments of the Greater Owensboro Chamber of Commerce. They were selected as the winner, out of eight National finalists, in the 2010 Chamber of the Year competition sponsored by the American Chamber of Commerce Executives, ACCE. This is quite a feat, as the ACCE's Chamber of the Year is the Nation's only award that recognizes local chambers for their dual role in creating and leading businesses and communities.

Chambers wanting to apply for this award could do so if they had an exceptional year or if they had a program or initiative that went above and beyond expectations. With this in mind, the Greater Owensboro Chamber of Commerce highlighted their success in developing the Chamber Leadership Initiatives for Northwestern Kentucky, C-LINK, alliance and the Owensboro Buys It! program in the application process.

C-LINK includes 12 chambers in the region and has been a leading proponent of Interstate 69 in western Kentucky, one of the largest transportation projects in the region, which has seen significant progress in the past two years. Owensboro Buys It! was started in 2009 to create local commerce and to teach small business leaders how to initiate an ``elevator pitch'' and sharpen their ability to gain and retain customers. When the chamber board of directors mapped out a strategic plan in 2008, they made it their goal to earn this award by 2012. Because of their hard work, they managed to beat even that audacious goal.

Under the leadership of chamber president Jody Wassmer, the board of directors, staff, and members of the Greater Owensboro Chamber of Commerce made their hometown, their Commonwealth, and this Senator very proud. I ask my colleagues to rise and join me in congratulating them on this honor.

Madam President, we are now in day 2 of debate regarding the DISCLOSE Act--2 more days Senate Democrats have chosen to ignore the jobs of the American people in an effort to save their own job.

Americans are speaking out, but Democrats in Congress still aren't listening. At a time when Americans are clamoring for Democrats in Congress to do something about jobs and the economy, Democrats are not only turning a deaf ear, they are spending 2 full days here working to silence the voices of even more people with a bill that picks and chooses who has a right to political speech. This is precisely why Americans are speaking out loudly--loudly--about the excesses of this administration and this Congress. This is why Senate Republicans strongly support the efforts Republicans in the

House will unveil later this morning in Virginia.

The proposals House Republicans will put forward today are clear proof that, unlike Democrats in Washington, Republicans have been listening intently to Americans over the past year and a half. Americans have been telling us they want us to focus on jobs first, fight wasteful Washington spending, repeal and replace the health spending bill, and shrink an exploding deficit. They have been telling us they want a smaller, less costly, and more accountable government.

The House Republican plan is a clear and forceful response to these concerns, and, working together, House and Senate Republicans will continue to fight for the principles upon which it is based. Together, we will focus our efforts on making America more competitive, reducing the size and cost of government, keeping our Nation strong and secure, and reining in the massive health care costs and mandates imposed by the Democrats' health spending bill.

This is an appropriate statement to make on the sixth-month anniversary of the passage of the Democratic health spending bill, which--both in its contents and in the process used to enact it--so clearly undermined the principles House Republicans will discuss this morning.

Americans never wanted this massive government-driven intrusion into their health care, and virtually every day it seems we see that the concerns Americans had about this bill are being vindicated. Throughout the day, administration officials will tell people the things it wants Americans to believe about this bill. Based on the promises the administration made to pass it, Americans should be deeply skeptical.

They said: ``If you like your plan, you will be able to keep it.'' Now we know that wasn't true. As the Associated Press recently put it: ``This is a promise that is beyond the President's power to keep.''

They said it wouldn't raise taxes--not by one penny. Yet even the administration's own lawyers now acknowledge that it does. One report, from the Joint Committee on Taxation, says that 40 million individuals and families will get hit with a tax hike as a result of this health care bill.

They said it would slow the growth of health care costs and that it was essential for that reason. Yet now the government itself says costs will go up as a result of the bill.

What about premiums? Well, the administration now says it knew all along that insurance premiums would go up as a result of this bill. Less than a year after the President said Democrats had agreed to ``reforms'' that would enable families to save on their premiums, the Secretary of Health and Human Services now says rates will increase substantially as a result of the bill--exactly the opposite of what was said during the debate.

And in what may turn out to be the most thoroughly discredited pledge about this bill, the President and other Democratic leaders assured their colleagues that Americans would come to like the health spending bill once it passed--they would come to like it. As for that claim, well, I think Politico put it best this morning:

Rarely have so many strategists been so wrong about

something so big.

Rarely--rarely--have so many strategists been so wrong about something so big.

So Democrats were eager to listen to the strategists and the administration officials who told them what this bill would do and how it would be received, when what they should have been doing is listening to the American people, who never liked this bill--never liked it--and who knew it wouldn't deliver on the promises Democrats made. So this is no anniversary Democrats should be celebrating.

Americans have had it. The American people have had it. They have had it with Democrats focusing on their own pet issues at the exclusion of America's top priorities, and they are tired of being told that if only the Democrats pass their agenda these priorities will somehow be met. Well, the results are in. The results are in. The Democratic agenda has been a failure for the economy and for jobs. It is time to move on. It is time to start listening instead of dictating. Americans are speaking out. It is time Democrats in Congress start listening.

Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, I withhold the suggestion.

Will the Senator yield for a question?

If I recall correctly, this is not the first election under which independent groups have been extraordinarily active in advertising in political campaigns. In fact, I recall quite precisely that independent groups aligned with the other side of the aisle, according to those who keep the statistics on this, spent twice as much in 2006 and a similar amount in 2008 as outside groups that might be typically aligned with Senators such as Bennett and McConnell. Where was the outrage a couple cycles ago?

I would ask my friend, did Citizens United in any serious way change the landscape, in any event?

Mr. President, if I may, I do not need the Senator from New York to intervene. I am happy to use my leader time, which may be the solution to the time problem.

Mr. President, I am going to proceed under my leader time, and then Senator Schumer can ask his consent if it is necessary. He may have enough time to close.

Mr. President, for the past 2 days, Democratic leaders have demonstrated once again their total lack of interest in the priorities of the American people.

At a time of near double-digit unemployment and skyrocketing debt, Americans would like to see us focus on jobs and the economy. Yet for the past 2 days, Senate Democrats have forced us to return once again to a debate we have already had on a bill the Senate has already rejected--a bill that focuses not on creating jobs for the American people but with saving the jobs of Democratic politicians in Washington.

That is what this debate is about. Our friends on the other side would have the public believe this bill is about transparency. It is not. Here is a bill that was drafted behind closed doors, without hearings, without testimony, and without any markups--a bill that picks and chooses who gets the right to engage in the political process and who does not; a bill that seeks, in other words, to achieve an unlevel playing field; a bill that is back on the floor for no other reason than the fact that our friends on the other side have declared this week ``politics only'' week in the Senate.

The only thing transparent here is the effort this exercise represents to secure an electoral advantage for the Democrats. So this is a completely distasteful exercise.

At a time when Americans are clamoring for us to do something about the economy, Democrats are not only turning a deaf ear, they are spending 2 full days working to silence the voices of even more people with a bill that picks and chooses who has a full right to political speech.

Let's face it, what our friends on the other side want is what they have always seemed to want: more government control. They want the government to pick and choose who gets to speak in elections, and how much they speak. That is why they are also pressing at the same time for taxpayer-funded elections--something the assistant majority leader called for once again just yesterday.

So Democrats have spent the past year and a half taking over banks, car companies, insurance companies, the student loan business--you name it--and now they want the taxpayers to foot the bill for their campaign ads as well.

Earlier today, the House Committee on House Administration marked up a bill that would stick taxpayers with a bill for House elections nationwide. Think of that: taxpayer money for attack ads, for buttons, for balloons and bumper stickers.

Have they no shame? Have they no shame? Our cumulative debt now the size of our economy, and they want to spend tax dollars on political campaigns.

I mean, even if they do not agree with the principled arguments against this kind of an effort, I would submit that in a time of exploding deficits and record debt the last thing the American people want right now is to provide what amounts to welfare for politicians.

Think about it. One recent estimate puts the annual cost to taxpayers of funding every Federal election at about $1.8 billion each year. That is $1.8 billion more that taxpayers would have to shell out than they already are. For what? For what? For politicians to throw campaign events and run ads that taxpayers may not even agree with or which they find downright outrageous.

One of the groups that supports this scheme calls it ``an incredibly good deal for taxpayers.'' Well, I strongly suspect that most taxpayers would not share that view. Americans want us to stop the wasteful spending. Another $1.8 billion on balloons and bunting is not their idea of a step in the right direction.

So why are Democrats doing this? Why are they proposing taxpayer financing of political campaigns and the DISCLOSE Act right now, at a time when Americans want them to focus on jobs and the economy?

I think it is pretty obvious. This is pure politics--pure.

After spending the past year and a half enacting policies Americans do not like, Democrats want to prevent their opponents from being able to criticize what they have done. After spending a year and a half enacting policies the American people do not like, they want to silence the voices of critics of what they have done. They want to prevent their critics from speaking out.

So here we are, 2 days debating this partisan, political, dead end bill that does not do one thing to help the economy, reduce the deficit, or create a single job.

Americans deserve a lot better. Americans are speaking out. But focusing on this bill shows that Democrats in Washington still are not listening. So, once again, I will be voting no on this legislation, and I encourage my colleagues to do the same.

I yield the floor.

I am not sure what the parliamentary situation is, but I am going to proceed under my leader time.

Mr. President, here we go again, back to the DISCLOSE Act. Americans are speaking out. They want us to focus on the economy, on preventing tax hikes, on creating jobs. What do Democrats do? They turn to the so-called DISCLOSE Act, a bill they say is about transparency in elections but which was drafted behind closed doors, without hearings, without testimony, and without any markups; a bill which is supposed to be about free speech but which picks and chooses who gets the right to engage in political speech and who does not; a bill that is back on the floor for no other reason than the fact that our friends on the other side have decided this week is politics-only week in the Senate. Let's be clear from the outset. That is all this is--pure politics.

Over the past couple of elections, our friends on the other side have gotten a lot of help from their union allies and other outside groups-- so much so, in fact, that they were able to outspend their opponents 2 to 1 in 2006 and 3 to 1 in 2008. That is our friends on the other side of the aisle. But now, after spending the last year and a half enacting policies Americans don't like, they want to prevent their opponents from being able to criticize what they have done. They hear Americans speaking out, they see some energy on the other side, and they don't want to take the kind of criticism they have leveled at Republicans for the past 4 years, so they are trying to rig the system to their advantage. That is it. It is quite simple--just to rig the system to their advantage.

The only question here is why our friends on the other side would want to propose something like this when Americans are screaming at them to focus on the economy instead. Just look at the surveys. What are Americans most concerned about? It is no secret that Americans want Congress to focus on jobs and the economy. Yet, over the last 2 months, in the midst of what Democrats are remarkably calling ``recovery summer,'' the President has devoted two of his weekly radio addresses to the Nation to making a personal pitch for this bill.

Today in the Senate, in the middle of the worst recession in memory, the Democratic leadership has decided to spend the next 2 days on the same failed partisan campaign spending bill aimed at giving Democrats a political edge. It is truly astonishing. It seems as if the more Americans say they want Democrats to focus on jobs, the more determined they are to press ahead with some piece of legislation aimed either at killing private sector jobs or, in the case of this bill, preserving their own jobs.

Here we are, in the middle of a recession, with 27 States yesterday reporting increases in unemployment, 14 million Americans looking for work, and a national debt that is putting the very future of the American dream in jeopardy, here we are voting on a bill that amounts to little more than an incumbency protection act for Democrats in Congress. If Americans are looking for one final piece of evidence in this Congress that Democrats have lost perspective and lost touch with Americans, then this is it.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, it is no secret that Americans are unhappy with the way our friends on the other side have handled things over the past few years, and especially the last year and a half. Americans have been speaking out across the country about the need to return to a smaller, more competent, more accountable government that lives within its means. Instead, Democrats in Congress have given them more government, more spending, more debt--and now they are threatening a massive tax hike to top it all off.

What has been most remarkable to me in watching this all play out is the way our friends on the other side have doubled down on their plans in the teeth of public outrage. Yesterday, we saw a CNBC survey showing most Americans don't like the idea of seeing taxes raised on anybody at this point. CNN says that most of the economists it surveyed said the best thing we can do for businesses is to assure them their taxes won't go up at the end of the year.

Yet Democratic leaders are still clinging to the discredited idea that government needs more power, more money for more Washington programs. Maybe the reason is that the Democratic vision of recovery-- their idea of success, according to the assistant majority leader--is 9 percent unemployment. That is right. Yesterday, the No. 2 Democrat in the Senate said that Congress could ``breathe a sigh of relief'' at 9 percent unemployment or less. That is their idea of success.

Well, our idea of success is for businesses to start hiring again and to get this country back on track. It seems the more Americans say they want Democrats to stop what they are doing and focus on jobs and the economy, the more determined they are to press ahead with their various liberal agenda items while they have still got the chance.

That is basically what today's vote on the Defense authorization bill is all about. The Defense authorization bill requires 4 or 5 weeks to debate. But instead of having that debate or turning to the Defense appropriations bill, which funds the military, they want to use this week for a political exercise. They want to weigh this bill down with controversy in a transparent attempt to show their special interest groups ahead of the election that they haven't forgotten them.

It is quite astonishing. Democrats have called up this bill not to have a vote on it or to consider amendments to help our troops in the field but to put on a show--to use it as an opportunity to cast votes for things Americans either don't want or aren't interested in seeing attached to a bill that is supposed to be about defense.

My friend, the majority leader, has already said this bill isn't going to pass with these items attached to it before the election. But he is keeping them on there anyway. So this is not a serious exercise, it is a show. And it is because of shows such as this our friends have lost credibility with the public.

Americans want us to take care of the basics and do it competently-- take care of the basics and do it competently. This isn't too much to ask. But evidently it is too much to ask of Democratic leaders in Congress right before the election.

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

I withhold my request.

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. President, I indicated to the majority leader that I was going to propound a unanimous consent request at this time.

I ask unanimous consent that the Senate now proceed to the consideration of the Defense authorization bill; provided further that amendments be offered in an alternating fashion between this aisle and that; that the first 20 amendments offered be Defense-related amendments within the jurisdiction of the Armed Services Committee, with no amendment related to immigration in order during the first 20 amendments.

Before the Chair rules, this is an important bill and the Senate should consider the way we have done it every year. There are many controversial issues related to the underlying bill that need to be debated and voted on by the Senate. Our view is we should start work on the bill and tackle the relevant Defense issues before we divert into unrelated measures.

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

Mr. President, sometime today the majority leader will file cloture on the motion to proceed to the Defense authorization bill, setting up a vote for next week on this important legislation. Under ordinary circumstances, this would be a straightforward, noncontroversial vote that could unite the two parties on a matter related to our common defense. But not this year.

This year, Democrats would rather use this bill to manufacture controversy. Worse still, in their determination to meet their own campaign promises ahead of the upcoming election, Democrats have decided to put their own political interests ahead of

the collective judgment of our military service chiefs who are still in the midst of a study about whether don't ask, don't tell can be repealed without hurting combat readiness. But this should not surprise anyone. For nearly 2 years now, Democrats have done their own thing. Americans have been asking Democrats for nearly 2 years to focus on the economy and jobs, and what they have gotten instead is one costly government-driven job after another that kills jobs and hurts the economy.

When it comes to matters of national defense, Democrats in Washington have established a clear pattern of making political decisions first and then analyzing the problem later. Whether it was the decision to close Gitmo before figuring out what to do with the terrorists who were housed there, to deny our intelligence community the ability to interrogate terrorists, an artificial timeline for withdrawal in Afghanistan or this latest decision to use a Defense authorization bill to move ahead with repeal of don't ask, don't tell before hearing back from the service chiefs, Democrats have shot first and asked questions later. In other words, they put their own ideological goals ahead of everything else.

I remind my colleagues we are fighting two wars and that our volunteer force doesn't ask for much. They ask that they be well trained, well equipped, that their families be cared for, and that we meet their selfless sacrifice with dignity and respect. This bill should be an easy one. We should be united and give our troops a responsible defense policy they need and then the Defense appropriations bill they need--without strings, without games, and save the politics for the campaign trail.

Another bill the Democrats have made needlessly political is the small business bill which we will also be voting on later today. Senator Hatch has offered an amendment that would fully extend the R&D tax credit, an amendment the Democrats blocked just before the August recess but which the President now appears to support. We will also have a chance to extend the biodiesel tax credit through the Grassley amendment. This amendment is essential to keeping producers competitive, but because of the majority's partisan tactics this credit has expired.

It is my hope our friends on the other side will now join the President and the Republicans in supporting these two important pieces of job-creating legislation. Unfortunately, the Democrats whole game plan over the last year and a half and through today is to tick as many items as possible off the liberal wish list while they still have a chance.

The American people think our friends on the other side should have spent a little more time worrying about 10 percent unemployment rather than legislative sideshows. If Senate Democrats truly want to do something for the private sector jobs in this country, they should support the bipartisan R&D tax credit of Senator Hatch and the biodiesel tax credit of Senator Grassley and then work with Republicans after that on preventing the looming $1 trillion tax hike Democratic leaders have so far ignored.

It is time our friends on the other side got serious about jobs and the economy. It is time they put the liberal wish list on the shelf and focused on the priorities of the American people.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I expect the majority leader momentarily. I am going to go ahead and make my opening statement first, since he is not here this morning yet. I am sure he will be here shortly.

Mr. President, over the past year and a half, I have tried to highlight some of the things the Democratic health spending bill does to undermine the health care system in this country. But one of the things the American people might not realize is that the consequences of this bill reach far beyond health care.

As a way of helping fund their health spending bill, Democrats inserted a backdoor tax known as a 1099 mandate that forces small businesses to bear the burden of their plan. It mandates that every business and charity in the country submit 1099 forms for transactions totaling $600 or more, including routine business expenses such as phones, office products, and shipping costs. It could increase businesses' reporting requirement by as much as 2,000 percent.

Even the White House now admits they went too far and that their health spending bill hurts small businesses. Predictably, however, their remedy is to raise taxes. This is one more way Democrats are holding back the economic recovery--by socking businesses with another mandate that costs them thousands of dollars a year in the middle of a recession.

Ironically, the IRS says they will not even be able to handle the paperwork this mandate would generate. They also say it is likely they will improperly assess penalties they will have to abate later.

The Democratic Senator from Florida has put forth an amendment we will be voting on later today that aims to help small businesses get around this reporting requirement. The problem is the Nelson amendment only covers some small businesses and fails to address the root of the problem.

Under this amendment, for example, businesses with 26 or more employees would still be subject to mandates for transactions totaling $5,000 or more. Not only would hundreds of thousands of businesses still have to deal with this costly and burdensome new mandate, many others would presumably stop hiring once they reach the magic number of 26 employees in order to avoid paying the new expense. Moreover, the Nelson amendment does nothing to alleviate the paperwork nightmare, and it is paid for with yet another major tax increase.

Senator Johanns has proposed a better approach. Unlike the Nelson amendment, the Johanns amendment fully repeals the 1099 mandate and would halt the Democrats' backdoor attempt to further place the costs of their health care plan on the backs of small businesses. It eliminates the paperwork for all businesses instead of picking winners and losers.

The Johanns amendment also has broad support. It has been endorsed by the Coalition for Fairness in Tax Compliance, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Federation of Independent Business, the American Farm Bureau Federation, and the Americans for Tax Reform. It has bipartisan support in the Senate as well.

This is a strong amendment that will actually help small businesses without

hurting others. I will be voting for the Johanns amendment and against the continuing costs and mandates of the Nelson amendment. I urge my colleagues to do the same.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, for the last 19 months, the American people have waited patiently for the Obama administration and Democrats in Congress to help them turn the economy around. And time and time again, the administration and its allies in Congress have turned a deaf ear. Rather than implement the policies that would free up capital, lead to investment, and create good, lasting, private sector jobs, Democrats in Congress have passed one sweeping government-driven scheme after another and then asked taxpayers to put it on their tab.

A stimulus bill that was supposed to be timely, targeted, and temporary turned out to be a liberal wish list instead. Instead of stimulating the economy and keeping unemployment below 8 percent, as promised, we stand here today with nearly 10 percent unemployment nationwide and many more Americans struggling to find full-time work. A health care bill that was supposed to lower costs is doing the opposite. As I have repeatedly said in the past and as a new government report confirmed just last week, the President's health care plan will bend the cost curve up, not down. A financial regulatory bill that was supposed to protect Main Street is being embraced by some of the biggest players on Wall Street, while smalltown bankers and retailers brace themselves for the costly and burdensome rules and regulations it will impose on them. Every one of these bills came at a steep price to the taxpayer, and until now, Democrats have been content to borrow the money, to simply pile it onto the debt.

Now comes the second half of the story, the final piece of their agenda--the part where they point to all that spending and demand payment for it, where they try to make it all permanent. Democrats spent the last 2 years putting government in charge of health care, the financial sector, car companies, insurance companies, student loans-- you name it. Now they want the tax hike to pay for it all. Americans asked the administration to fix the sink, and they remodeled the house instead. Now they are sending us the bill.

That was the plan all along: force these massive programs through, drive up the debt, call it a crisis, and then demand that people pay their ``fair share'' to dig us out. It starts with small business owners, but I assure you it will not stop there because if Democrats spend this much money in the middle of a recession, they will borrow and spend even more once we are out of it. The President admitted as much just last week on national television when he said the tax hike he is asking for will not be used to pay for any of the things he has already done. He will use the money from these tax hikes to spend on other things, on ``better things,'' as he put it. We have seen the so- called better things Democrats want to spend tax money on--a stimulus bill that is funding research on interpretive dance and monkeys, a health care bill that cut Medicare and increased premiums, and a financial regulatory bill that hires more of the same kinds of Washington bureaucrats who missed the last crisis. Americans have had it. They are tired of Democratic leaders in Washington pursuing the same government-driven programs that have done nothing but add to the debt and the burden of government.

We cannot allow this administration to demand that small business owners in this country pay for its own fiscal recklessness. That is why I am introducing legislation today that ensures no one in this country will pay higher income taxes next year than they are right now. We cannot let the people who have been hit the hardest by this recession and who need to create the jobs that will get us out of it foot the bill for the Democrats' 2-year adventure in expanded government. We can't allow America's job creators to pay for Democrats' out-of-control spending over the past 2 years any more than we can allow Main Street to pay for the greed of Wall Street. Wall Street should pay for its own excesses. So should the administration and Democratic leaders in Washington.

The good news is there is a growing chorus of Democrats, at least five right here in the Senate, who are coming around on this issue. They oppose the tax hikes the administration is proposing. As Senator Lieberman put it earlier today:

I don't think it makes sense to raise any Federal taxes

during the uncertain economy we are struggling through. The

more money we leave in private hands, the quicker our

economic recovery will be.

That was Senator Lieberman today. I couldn't agree more. Only in Washington could someone propose a tax hike as an antidote to a recession.

This is no small tax hike. The tax hike the administration is proposing, according to the IRS, would apply to half of all small business income in this country. An analysis by the National Federation of Independent Business shows that businesses that employ 20 to 250 people would be the hardest hit. All told, according to the nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation, right at 750,000 small businesses would be impacted by this tax increase.

Here is the bottom line: No recovery will take place until the government stops overspending. No recovery will take place until government stops imposing new regulations and costs on business. No recovery will take place if we impose new taxes on the people we need to create jobs. Democratic leaders need to listen to what the American people have been shouting at us for the last 19 months: The reckless spending has to stop. So far, they have made no concrete concessions, but now it is time they join Republicans, stand up to the administration, and declare that the spending spree is over. That is the first step on the road to recovery.

As for the next step, Republicans stood together before the August recess and put together a plan that would save taxpayers $300 billion over the next 10 years. That is a good place to start.

So Democrats have a choice. They can stand with us on this proposal and show they finally realize we cannot spend our way out of the recession or they can continue to stand with an administration whose policies--real and threatened--represent the greatest obstacle to our Nation's economic recovery.

Let's face it. The Democratic agenda has been disastrous for the economy: 2\1/2\ million jobs lost, $2.5 trillion more in debt, more job-stifling regulations, mandates, and redtape, and now they want to drive another nail in the coffin--a massive tax hike on the very people who will dig us out of this recession by expanding their businesses and creating jobs.

Republicans are offering a choice: more of the same or the new direction the American people are asking for.

I yield the floor.