Floor Statements

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record my remarks of December 9, 2002, before the U.S. Capitol Historical Society.

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 President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, today the Senate takes up H.R. 2555, the Department of Homeland Security Appropriations bill. This is the first homeland security appropriations bill in the history of the Nation. The Senate Appropriations Homeland Security Subcommittee was created just 4 months ago. Under the able leadership of Chairman Cochran, the subcommittee held six hearings to review the operations of the Department of Homeland Security. I commend Chairman Cochran and his staff for their work on this important legislation.

The bill provides discretionary budget authority totaling $28.521 billion, a level that is $1.039 billion above the President's request. The bill is at the level available under the 302(b) allocation. Regrettably, the allocation for homeland security programs is inadequate. This is not a criticism of Chairman Cochran, nor is it a criticism of full Committee Chairman Ted Stevens. Unfortunately, the budget resolution that passed this Congress limited discretionary spending to levels below the President's already inadequate request. The budget resolution severely constrains our ability to address known threats to the safety of the American people.

With the Department of Homeland Security regularly changing the terrorist level from elevated to high and back, and with the Secretary saying publicly that another terrorist attack is inevitable, the demands for homeland security spending seem endless. Our job on the Appropriations Committee is to make careful choices. Unfortunately, the budget resolution has forced us to exclude from the bill some funding that both the Congress and the President have recognized as being real needs.

All Americans, whether they live in rural communities or major cities, want to know that if there is a terrorist attack close to their homes, their local doctors and nurses have the training to treat the injured. Americans want to know that their local firemen have the ability and the equipment to handle a chemical or biological attack. Americans want to know that their local police officers are trained in identifying and responding to the variety of terrorist attacks that we could now face.

Regrettably, this bill, while providing first responder funding at a level that is $303 million over the President's request, is $434 million below the level that the Congress approved for the current fiscal year. The Federal Government needs to remain a full partner in local homeland defense efforts and adequate funding is essential to that task.

According to the Secretary of Defense, the United States is spending $3.9 billion per month for the war in Iraq. Yet this bill includes only $3.9 billion for the entire year for equipping and training our first responders. Frankly, I believe that the President and the administration have lost their focus on what really matters to American citizens; namely, the combating of terrorism and securing the homeland.

One of the mysteries about the President's budget is the budget for the Transportation Security Administration or TSA. TSA was created by the Aviation and Transportation Security Act of 2001 and was supposed to focus on securing all modes of transportation. Yet the President's budget includes only $86 million or 2 percent of the TSA budget for maritime and land security.

Yet the President's budget includes only $86 million.

The rest of the President's budget request is for aviation security and for administration. What about securing our ports? What about securing our trains? What about securing our subways and our railway tunnels? What about securing our buses, or securing the trucks that carry hazardous materials? In fact, the President's budget requests 2.5 times more for administering the Transportation Security Administration bureaucracy than the President does for securing the Nation's ports, trains, trucks, and buses.

I commend Chairman Thad Cochran for recognizing this problem and for addressing some of these weaknesses. But he simply did not have the resources available to him to deal with several well-known vulnerabilities.

For example, in November of 2002, President Bush signed the Maritime Transportation Security Act which established new standards for securing our Nation's ports. Despite the fact that the Coast Guard had estimated it will cost the ports $5.4 billion over 10 years to implement those standards, including $1.1 billion the first year, the President did not request a dime for port security.

The bill that is before the Senate includes $150 million for port security grants, and I commend Chairman Cochran for finding the resources within the limited allocation for this important program. I hope we can do more to secure our ports.

In October of 2001, the President signed the Patriot Act, which called for tripling the number of Border Patrol agents and Customs and immigration inspectors on the northern border. In May of 2002, the President signed the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act, which authorized significant new investments in Border Patrol agents and facilities. The goals with regard to Customs inspectors and border facilities cannot be met with the limited funding that was made available for discretionary programs under the budget resolution.

Under the President's proposal for the Transportation Security Administration, there is a significant gap in securing commercial airlines. Under the proposal, each airline passenger is screened before he or she gets on a plane, and each passenger's baggage would be screened before being loaded on a plane. But commercial cargo on that same plane would be left unchecked. That is a dangerous security risk that needs to be addressed. This bill adds $30 million to the budget request to research, develop, and deploy air cargo security programs to enhance the secure transport of cargo on commercial airlines. I believe we need to do more to secure cargo on our commercial airlines.

However, with the funds that were made available to the subcommittee under our allocation, I believe Chairman Cochran has produced a good bill. It is balanced. It is fair. It addresses a number of weaknesses in the President's budget request that we identified during our committee hearing.

We increased funding over the President's request to equip and train our first responders. We continue to fund effective programs such as the Fire Grants Program and the All Hazards Emergency Management Performance Grants Program, which the President had proposed to consolidate into a single grant program. We increased funding for our airports to purchase explosives detection equipment and to install that equipment.

We increased funding over the President's request for the Coast Guard in order to keep the Deep Water Air and Sea Modernization Program on schedule. We recognize that not all transportation security vulnerabilities are at our airports. We also fund grants for port security, bus security, and for securing hazardous materials.

Additionally, this legislation takes an important step to protect personal privacy. The bill delays for 60 days the expenditure of funds on implementing the Department's proposed new Airline Passenger Profiling System--CAPPS II--until the General Accounting Office conducts a study and reports to the Congress on the privacy implications of the system. We must make sure that the privacy rights of individuals are protected and that individuals who are determined to pose a threat to security have an appeal mechanism.

This is a good bill, but we must address several critical shortfalls that result from the budget resolution that put tax cuts at the front of the line and left homeland security to compete with every other Federal program for limited dollars. The result, regrettably, is a homeland security budget that leaves gaps in our security by leaving priority programs underfunded.

After 9/11, Congress passed the Patriot Act, the Maritime Transportation Security Act, the Aviation and Transportation Security Act, and the Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act. And the President signed them with great fanfare. But the President has done little to fulfill the promise of those laws. Now the Senate has before it the funding legislation that would either fulfill the promise of those acts or continue to leave the Nation and its citizens vulnerable.

I urge all Members to be mindful of the solemn duty to ``provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare and secure the blessings of liberty for ourselves and our posterity'' as we debate this important appropriations bill.

Amendment No. 1317

(Purpose: Fulfilling Homeland Security Promises)

Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I send to the desk an amendment for discussion and action, not this afternoon but tomorrow or subsequently.

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that committee staff Alexa Sewell and Scott Nance and fellows on the staff of the Committee on Appropriations Peter Edge and Cynthia Stowe be granted the privileges of the floor during debate and rollcall votes on the fiscal year 2004 Homeland Security appropriations bill and the conference report thereon.

Mr. President, 216 years ago yesterday, in a sweltering room in Philadelphia, 55 men of extraordinary talents reached a most critical decision on the design of a new government for the United States. Days and weeks of acrimonious debate had failed to resolve disputes on the representation of each of the original 13 colonies. Men like Washington, Madison, Franklin, and Hamilton struggled over the issue of how the people of our Nation would be represented in their Government.

But then, on July 16, 1787, the Framers of what came to be our Constitution reached a breakthrough.

On that date, yesterday, 216 years ago, they struck a bargain that has come to be known as the Great Compromise. States with large populations would have the benefit of more numerous representation in the House of Representatives and States with small populations would be protected by equal representation in the Senate. Without that landmark agreement, work on a new constitution to replace the failed Articles of Confederation might have foundered.

Without the Great Compromise, we in this Chamber might never have met to debate the issues of the day. But as we debate the bill before us, one cannot help but recognize the perilous situation in which the United States finds itself with respect to our foreign commitments. We take up the fiscal year 2004 Defense appropriations bill at a time when nearly 150,000 of our troops are facing guerrilla attacks as they patrol Iraq.

While the administration had once predicted that our liberating forces would be greeted with smiles and covered with flowers, the Secretary of Defense is now warning that attacks on our troops may increase during the rest of July. In light of all of these facts, some may argue that we need to pass this bill soon in order to show support for our troops who remain under fire, nearly 17 weeks after the war in Iraq began and nearly 11 weeks after the President delivered his victory speech on the USS Abraham Lincoln where there was a banner over his head which proclaimed, ``Mission accomplished.'' There it was, that banner streaming above his head proclaiming, ``Mission accomplished.''

If we rush to pass this bill to show support for our troops in Iraq, we will be rushing for naught because not one thin dime, not one copper penny, contained in this Defense bill is for the additional cost of war in Afghanistan or Iraq.

There is not one red cent in this bill for the additional costs to support 150,000 troops in Iraq or the nearly 10,000 troops who remain in Afghanistan. Linking speedy action on this bill to support for our troops who are now standing in harm's way is what is known as a bait and switch routine. This is a bill that only funds our military as if we were in a time of peace, but we all know we are going to be hit with a massive bill for wartime costs in a couple of months.

Let there be no doubt, the amount of money we are spending in Iraq and Afghanistan is massive. Since September 11, 2001, Congress has appropriated $104.3 billion to the Defense Department for homeland security missions in pursuit of al-Qaida in Afghanistan and elsewhere, and the war in Iraq.

The total bill in Iraq so far, according to the Pentagon's comptroller, has reached $48 billion. The Secretary of Defense reported last week, I believe it was, to the Armed Services Committee that we are spending $3,921,000,000 each month for our occupation of Iraq, a figure nearly double that of its prewar estimates. Secretary Rumsfeld also reported that we are spending nearly $943 million each month for military operations in Afghanistan.

I opposed the war in the beginning. I opposed the war in Iraq. Contrary to White House charges of revisionist history--which I maintain, as far as the revisionist part is concerned, is on the side of the White House--I never believed that Iraq posed a clear and imminent threat to the United States, and I stood right on this floor and said that. I never believed, and so stated at the time, that Iraq posed a clear and imminent threat to the security of our country. But when the war in Iraq began, I stated I would do everything in my power to provide our troops with the funds needed to ensure their safety, even though I disagree with the policy that took them into Iraq.

GEN Tommy Franks said to the House Armed Services Committee on July 11 that our troops could be patrolling Iraq for the next 4 years, and the new commander in Iraq, GEN John Abizaid, acknowledged that our troops are facing guerrilla attacks. In today's papers he so stated.

We know our troops need money for food, fuel, ammunition and pay. There is no reason we must wait to provide for these needs until the administration requests its next stopgap spending measure. Congress should insist that these costs be included in the President's regular budget request.

I am sure it will come as a surprise to many Americans to know that the administration has not presented Congress with any request nor any explanatory detail regarding the costs that are racking up right now, this very minute, during our occupation of Iraq. The President has not requested any funding for the additional costs of the 150,000 troops who are expected to remain in Iraq for an extended period of time, nor has the President requested any additional funds for the cost of rooting out al-Qaida from Afghanistan.

The American people would be stunned to learn that the Senate is taking up a $368 billion appropriations bill for the Department of Defense that does not include one thin dime for the additional costs, the incremental costs, of the war in Iraq or the mission in Afghanistan.

When we start talking about appropriations, budget resolutions, and supplemental spending bills, the eyes of many Americans start to glaze over. While John Q. Public may not know the intricacies of Federal budgeting, he fully expects that somebody in Washington is watching over his taxpayer money and that somebody is making sure of its effective use, that somebody is asking questions about the expenditures of his monies. But when it comes to financing military missions overseas, the White House continues to try to turn the Constitution on its head. The White House wants to spend the money first and have Congress approve the funding later. When it comes to this war in Iraq and the aftermath of the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, the administration views Congress like an automatic teller machine: Just put the request into the machine, into the ATM, and the money slides out in seconds, no questions asked.

Last October, Congress approved a resolution authorizing military action in Iraq. I voted against that. I am proud I voted against it. As long as I stay in the Senate, I shall keep the tally sheet right in front of me, as I sit at my desk in my office, showing the votes on that matter.

At the time, the White House and the Department of Defense asserted that the cost of the mission was not knowable. That is what the administration witnesses said before our committee--that the costs were not knowable.

The message from the White House was basically, trust me, trust me. It is your money.

We have heard that. We have heard that old saying right here. But in this instance, it is your money, trust me. They said they would send the bill, the costs to Congress when they knew more about the details of the mission.

Well, when the President submitted his FY 2004 budget to the Congress in February, he continued to keep Congress in the dark. He requested no funding for the war in Iraq. Why? The House and the Senate needed to pass budget resolutions that the President hoped would include $1.5 trillion of additional tax cuts. Perhaps the White House feared that a $60 billion bill for Iraq, just for FY 2003, might worry some Members who are concerned about deficit spending when it came to voting on the bill to cut taxes. On March 13, 2003, the Senate Budget Committee approved the budget resolution with $1.3 trillion of additional tax cuts and assumed no additional costs for the war in Iraq. On March 21, 2003, the House passed their budget resolution, including $1.3 trillion of tax cuts and assumed nothing about the cost of the war in Iraq. On March 26, the Senate passed a budget resolution that assumed over $800 billion in tax cuts. What was curiously missing from the conference report was an amendment that had been offered by Senator Feingold and approved by the Senate to set aside $100 billion for the war in Iraq.

When did the White House finally send up their request for a supplemental for the costs of the war in Iraq? The White House waited until March 25, 2003, to submit a massive $62.6 billion request for the Department of Defense--6 months after the Congress considered the resolution to authorize military action in Iraq, 2 months after the President submitted his FY 2004 budget to Congress, and 1 week after the war in Iraq began.

Once the request was made to the Congress, the White House put its foot on the gas pedal and insisted that Congress move rapidly to pass the request in order to support the troops that were already deployed in the field. One hearing was held on March 27. As I recall, the hearing was so compressed for time that Members were not even allowed to make opening remarks. On April 1, the Senate Appropriations Committee approved the President's total funding request for DoD. On April 3, the Senate approved the request. Thirteen days later, the Iraq supplemental for FY 2003 was public law.

So the administration strategy worked. The strategy goes like this. Force the Congress to make difficult choices with either inadequate information or bad information. Deploy the forces. Get the funding hook in the nose of Congress by putting the troops in the field. Go to war. Spend the money. And insist that Congress move promptly to approve the funding again, after it is spent and more is needed to replenish accounts.

Now the Senate has before it the FY 2004 Defense Appropriations bill. Once again, the White House is hiding the ball when it comes to facing up to the true costs of the mission in Iraq. Apparently, there will be no request for the additional costs of this mission until next February--after the fact. In other words, it will be a replay of last year. Meanwhile, there are 150,000 troops in the field in Iraq and 10,000 in Afghanistan, but no dollars to support them; no submission to Congress for how the money will be used; no oversight to ensure accountability; no plan for when the troops might come home; no plan for how to manage troop strength so that we do not have to keep our reserves deployed overseas for years at a time; no plan for attracting troops from other countries; no plan for seeking contributions from other countries to help cover the costs of the war and the peace in Iraq.

No, this White House wants to simply dictate the decisions and have the congressional ATM machine spit out the money.

The administration's only proposal so far is to slap down the national credit card and stick Congress and the taxpayer with a huge bill for supplemental appropriations somewhere down the road.

This is not an acceptable way to pay for our overseas missions. This is a blatant attempt to mislead the American people about administration policies that are leading to fiscal disaster. That is why I offer an amendment that states the sense of the Senate that the President should include in the budgets that he submits to Congress a specific request for funds to pay for our incremental costs in Iraq and Afghanistan.

We should put an end to this financial shell game of allowing the administration to hide the cost of occupation by using supplemental appropriations bills. My amendment would stop allowing this administration to hide the costs of these foreign adventures from the public. My amendment calls on the President to be up front with the American people about how much money we will really need to support our ongoing military operations overseas.

Congress needs to start holding the administration accountable for the funds that it spends for our military. We need to scrutinize the President's budget to make sure that we are getting the best value for our taxpayer money. If the administration keeps secret how it is spending the money appropriated to it for Iraq and Afghanistan, there is no check on its activities.

In the weeks before the war, the chief U.N. weapons inspector lambasted Saddam Hussein for playing a game of ``catch as catch can.'' The chief U.N. weapons inspector excoriated the Iraqi regime for submitting misleading documents that did nothing to reveal what that secretive regime was up to.

Why in the world is the U.S. Congress settling for a game of ``catch as catch can'' when it comes to having this administration be honest about how we are going to pay for the huge costs of occupying Iraq?

Why would the Congress, which holds the power of the purse--the Constitution has not been amended but 27 times, but not once in this matter. Congress still holds the power of the purse. It rests here in the people's branch.

Why would the Congress, which holds the power of the purse, settle for misleading budgets from the President that are intended to disguise the enormous budget deficit by excluding the costs of occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan?

We have to plan for these huge costs. There ought to be some tough questions asked about some of these expenditures. For example, we are paying $3.9 billion per month to support 150,000 troops in Iraq, and $950 million per month to support nearly 10,000 troops in Afghanistan. Many Americans must wonder, why does it cost $26,000 a month to support one soldier in Iraq but $95,000 a month to support one soldier in Afghanistan?

By using supplemental appropriations bills to fund the costs of extensive military deployments, the administration has found a tactic to avoid elementary questions such as that one.

The folks at the Pentagon and the Office of Management and Budget only need to wait until the right moment to send a supplemental funding request to Congress, and use the old cattle prod that we must pass the bill immediately, no matter what its cost, or our troops will run short of supplies.

It works. It works like a charm. Yes, like a charm. In the end, it is a budget tactic that is deceitful, allows for abuse and misuse of the public treasure, and cynically uses the very real emotional attachment that all Americans have for our troops.

The American people are coming to grips with the dangers of postwar Iraq. They read about them every day. They have read the headlines of daily attacks on American soldiers and they understand that the stakes are very high. The American people want a plan for postwar Iraq, so that they can be assured their loved ones will stay in harm's way only as long as absolutely necessary.

Congress must come to grips with the costs of postwar Iraq, as well as those associated with our continuing mission in Afghanistan. Yet a look at this defense budget leaves one wondering how these costs are being covered. There is no additional money for Iraq or Afghanistan.

Yes. Yes, I do.

(Mr. ALEXANDER assumed the chair.)

The Senator is correct, with reference to incremental costs, additional costs. Of course, we will be paying salaries there that we would pay whether the personnel were there or whether they were back in West Virginia or in Maryland or wherever. The incremental costs for Iraq and Afghanistan, there is not one thin dime in this budget, not one.

Yes, I yield.

The Congress, apparently, is expected to just go along and hear all this talk about the ``Commander in Chief,'' and not dare to raise a head to ask a question. You are not supposed to ask questions. You are supposed to put the money down. And that is the way we did it last year. The troops are there and by the time we got around to considering the supplemental appropriation bill, they had already spent several billion dollars, between $30 and $40 billion or some such-- already spent. So we have to pay the bills. That is already spent. We have to do that.

Yes.

Yes.

No.

Oh, absolutely, I agree with that. That is what my amendment is about. Here we were, over in the Armed Services Committee. I asked the Secretary of Defense how much is our country spending per month in Iraq, on the war in Iraq, on the occupation of Iraq, and how much in Afghanistan? In both instances the Secretary said he didn't know. He would have to wait a while and get back to me.

Well, that is an old game.

If I may finish, and then I will be glad to.

That is an old game. You put it off. You don't want to answer on the record. You don't want to answer in public. And you don't want to answer that question lest there be a followup question. So you just put it off. Say, ``Senator, I am sorry, I don't have that figure. I will have to take a while. It may take me a while, take us a while to give you that figure.''

I said, Well, no, we want the figure now.

That is the way we are being handled. That is the way Congress is being handled, and I think it is wrong.

Then the answer came back, after a short recess of 20 or 30 minutes. The answer came back from the Secretary of Defense that the war in Iraq is costing about $3.9 billion per month, and almost $1 billion, $943 million, I believe, per month, in Afghanistan.

Those answers we needed, and with that kind of information. I am sure the Defense Department had this estimate long before I asked them the question in the committee. They had these estimates. They should have incorporated them into a request in the budget bill. That could have been done. They could have foreseen--well, we are spending on the average of $1 billion a week in Iraq. Let's put it in the budget. Let's put $52 billion in the budget. That would be the way they ought to deal with Congress. That is the way they ought to deal with the people's representatives in Congress. But they are not doing it. They didn't do it then.

I thank the distinguished Senator. I now yield to my friend from Alaska.

Yes, without losing my right to the floor.

Mr. President, I thank the distinguished Senator.

Does the distinguished Senator from Alaska have any further questions at the moment?

Questions of me?

Mr. President, since before this war began, I have asked repeatedly of this administration what their estimate of the cost of this war is. Do you have any estimate? We get a blank stare.

I cannot believe that an administration is going to lead a country into war without having some inside estimates by the very capable people who surround the President about what this war would cost. Of course, nobody--least of all me--would ever expect the administration to be able to say it is going to cost $2.785 trillion. But I, others, and the American people were seeking some kind of a realistic range-- and now more so than then.

Now we know that it has been testified to in the Armed Services Committee that the war in Afghanistan is costing $3.9 billion a month. We know that. That wasn't known just at the beginning of that day. I am sure the Defense Department had already run the estimate and had come out with the figures. Why couldn't the administration use those figures and say to the Congress, well, we estimate that it is costing in Iraq $3 billion, $3.5 billion, between $3.5 billion and $4.1 billion, or something like that?

We just get stonewalled when we ask questions of that kind. I think Congress is entitled to better than that.

Absolutely.

We approved it in the omnibus bill.

We approved it in the omnibus bill. That is the information I have.

What we are advocating is that funds would be provided in the Appropriations Act to specific accounts set forth in such act.

Yes. I yield for a question.

It does.

Yes.

Mr. President, my amendment reads as follows:

It is the sense of the Senate that--any request for funds

for a fiscal year for an ongoing overseas military

operation--

The word is ``ongoing''--

for an ongoing overseas military operation, including

operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, should be included in the

annual budget of the President for such fiscal year as

submitted to Congress under section 1105(a) of title 31

United States Code. . . .

These are ongoing--ongoing operations.

What is to keep this administration from sending up an amended budget request right today? The administration has already said we are spending $3.9 billion a month in Iraq and almost $1 billion a month in Afghanistan. Why doesn't the administration send up an amended budget request right now and let us include that money in this appropriations bill?

Now, the administration knows that is what it is spending. Why couldn't we at least include it in this bill that is before the Senate, rather than wait until next February when the administration will send up a request for that amount plus a great deal more? And why not anticipate the remaining months the administration expects to be in Iraq and Afghanistan and anticipate for the same amount on into the future?

It is this thing that I feel very strongly about: the Congress of the United States being held at bay when it comes to getting information from this administration. When it comes to appropriations, the Congress has control of the purse strings. And when we asked the administration witnesses, at least one of them said these figures are not knowable, this information is not knowable. Well, they have these estimates. They had them then, and they could have been included. So the Congress can exercise its constitutional oversight over these moneys that are being appropriated and spent.

I am glad the distinguished Senator from Alaska has indicated he intends to accept this amendment. But while we are on this subject, I have a chart here.

Now, the distinguished Senator from Alaska--and he is a distinguished Senator, a very distinguished Senator, my friend--time and time again he has said something about the moneys during the Clinton administration.

The supplementals for Kosovo and Bosnia were in the range of $2 billion to $3 billion for each mission. The Iraq supplemental that was passed this April was $62.6 billion. If we are to believe the cost estimates of Secretary Rumsfeld, that he testified to at a recent Armed Services hearing, the current cost of supporting 150,000 troops in Iraq and 10,000 troops in Afghanistan is $4.8 billion per month, or $58 billion if our troops are to remain in Iraq and Afghanistan for all of fiscal year 2004. The fiscal situation is completely different today than it was in 1998 and 2000 when supplementals were approved for Bosnia and Kosovo.

As one can see on this chart, in those years, we were running large surpluses: $69 billion in fiscal year 1998 and $236 billion in fiscal year 2000. The issue of how to finance a $2 billion supplemental was not and did not need to be a critical element of the debate.

Just this week, the White House released their Mid-Session Review. And the White House projections are on this chart.

The White House projects deficits of $455 billion for fiscal year 2003 and $475 billion for fiscal year 2004. The estimate of $475 billion for fiscal year 2004, the year of the Defense appropriations bill that is now pending before the Senate, does not include any cost, not one dime, for the incremental cost of the war in Iraq or the mission in Afghanistan. Therefore, if the President had requested a budget amendment or a supplemental for these missions, the deficit for fiscal year 2004 would likely be over $500 billion. And if you exclude the Social Security surplus, the deficit for fiscal year 2004 could exceed $650 billion.

Let me just finish briefly.

The cost of the war in Iraq and the mission in Afghanistan is over $1 billion per week. General Franks has said that it is likely we will need to retain significant numbers of troops in Iraq for years to come. We know that now. We should not hide the ball from the American people until next year.

If we want to talk about then, we were running huge surpluses back in those days. Yet the cost was small, talking about $2 billion, $3 billion, when surpluses were running $69 billion, $125 billion, $236 billion, $127 billion. Now we are talking in a deficit situation. We are running huge deficits, astronomical deficits, never to be heard of before deficits. The costs we are talking about hiding here and waiting until the supplemental comes before Congress are many, many times higher than they were during the Clinton administration. So it is a little like trying to equate apples and oranges.

Yes, I yield.

Nine hundred and forty-three million.

They should have. The President, I say, should send up a supplemental budget request today for $58 billion.

Yes. Well, I thank the distinguished Senator from Florida for his thoughtful observations. I would hope that the administration would send up a supplemental request. Otherwise, I think we ought to try to add to it this

bill. Why not? Why not? That is the anticipated cost. In any event, let me finish my statement. I am almost at the end.

The administration has reported to Congress that we are spending $4.8 billion each month in Iraq and Afghanistan. These costs can be anticipated, can be budgeted, and can be controlled. They are costs driven by policy emanating from the White House. There is absolutely no reason why they should not be included in the Defense appropriations bill that is now before the Senate.

If we truly want to support our troops, we should have truth in budgeting. My amendment calls on the President to be up front about the costs of our deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan. It would stop the practice of gimmicks and secrecy which hide the true cost of these foreign entanglements from the American people, the American taxpayer.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. President, I send the amendment to the desk.

Reserving the right to object, and I do not object, I wonder if the Senator would mind having the vote on my amendment as the first vote. It would occur 5 minutes after the Senator from Kentucky.

Mr. President, may I make an inquiry of the distinguished Senator from Alaska? The Senator is prepared to accept my amendment, and the Senate will vote on it. Does he think that amendment will have any impact on the procedures? Does he think that will result in any change in the procedures which we have been experiencing heretofore? It is a sense-of-the-senate resolution but, in his opinion, may we expect to see it carried out?

Mr. President, I will take 1 minute.

I thank the distinguished chairman of the committee for his courtesies and for the cooperation he has given. He has sought to get action by the Senate on various and sundry amendments. He has tried to move the bill forward, and he has lived up to what I think is the reputation of not only fairness but also of integrity. I am thankful to him for accepting this amendment.

I was interested in his response to my question a moment ago. I believe he means what he says, and I hope he will join me in urging the Office of Management and Budget and the White House to live up to the intent, the spirit of this amendment whether it is the current administration or a following administration, which may be Democratic or Republican.

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

Mr. President, I have an amendment which I shall send to the desk shortly.

This January, in his State of the Union Address, President Bush announced a 5-year, $15 billion global AIDS initiative. The President received a lot of praise for that announcement, as he should have. AIDS is a dreadful disease which is currently inflicting an almost unimaginable toll on the African continent, devastating entire populations.

Sub-Saharan Africa has been far more severely affected by AIDS than any other part of the world. According to UNAIDS--the Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS--in 2002, there were 29.4 million people living with HIV and AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa. Africa has about 10 percent of the world's population but more than 70 percent of the worldwide total of infected people. In fact, the infection rate among adults is about 8.8 percent in Africa, compared with 1.2 percent worldwide.

More than 17 million Africans have died from AIDS since its emergence, and UNAIDS estimates that by 2020, an additional 55 million Africans will lose their lives to the epidemic. The sheer brutality of these statistics is hard to fathom and must tug at the hearts and souls of all of us in this body.

AIDS' severe social and economic consequences are depriving Africa of skilled workers and teachers while reducing life expectancy by decades in some countries. An estimated 11 million children in Africa have been orphaned by AIDS--having literally watched their AIDS-inflicted parents slowly slip away before their eyes. These AIDS orphans are now facing increased risk of malnutrition and reduced prospects for education. AIDS is being blamed for declines in agricultural production in some nations, and is regarded as a major contributor to the famine threatening southern Africa. The United Nations Development Programme Annual Report for 2003 states that, ``HIV/AIDS is a catastrophe for economic stability and may be the world's most serious development crisis.''

For far too long, the world has turned a blind eye to the suffering on the African continent. Does the United States, as the wealthiest Nation on Earth, not have a special moral responsibility to act to alleviate some of the worldwide misery caused by AIDS? Americans have always been generous and caring people, and I have no doubt that they would expect their elected officials to rise to the occasion and take the lead in ridding the world of this horrid disease, wherever it takes root.

I am pleased by Congress' initial response to the President's call for action to combat the AIDS crisis in Africa--with passage of the United States Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria Act of 2003. And I was encouraged that our President publicly touted the legislation's passage as a moral triumph.

However, I have seen far too many fancy White House bill signing ceremonies and dressed-up press releases in the last 2\1/2\ years to be entirely confident that this Administration would simply keep its promise to fully fund this legislation. Once the cameras stop rolling and the headlines fade away, this administration seems to have established a troubling pattern of repeatedly making promises but failing to deliver the dollars needed to keep them. The drastically underfunded No Child Left Behind Act and the President's skimpy funding requests to meet our homeland security needs are perfect examples.

Last week, as President Bush visited five African countries, he again pledged that the United States would play a leading role in combating AIDS. The President repeatedly promised to do all in his power to make sure that Congress fully financed his proposed 5-year, $15 billion program to attack the disease in the world's poorest countries. I commend him for having gone to Africa, and for promoting greater efforts to fight AIDS.

He should be held to his commitment to those in Africa who are suffering from AIDS.

Clearly, an expectation has been created that the administration and Congress will provide $3 billion toward this noble initiative in fiscal year 2004, as language explicitly authorizing that amount for fiscal year 2004 is spelled out in the new Global AIDS law that the President proudly signed.

Unfortunately, despite all the recent headlines, photo-ops, and White House promises regarding the African AIDS crisis, the simple fact remains that the President did not put enough money behind his promises, as he failed to include $3 billion to fight AIDS in his fiscal year 2004 budget. That is right! He requested only $1.9 billion, not the $3 billion that the world now expects. That is $1.1 billion less than what he promised.

Just last Thursday, Members of this body went on record, by a vote of 78-to-18, in support of a Sense of the Congress Resolution that stated our intent to provide full appropriations for the $15 billion AIDS initiative touted by our President, including $3 billion in fiscal year 2004.

The lives of millions worldwide are at stake. Now is the time to honor the financial commitment made by Congress and the President to combat Global AIDS. My amendment to the Defense Appropriations bill would do just that by allocating $750 million in fiscal year 2004 to the Coordinator of United States Government Activities to Combat HIV/ AIDS Globally for the purpose of making a contribution to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria and $350 million for the Secretary of Health and Human Services for programs to combat AIDS overseas. This amendment would be completely offset by a $1.1 billion across-the-board cut in the amounts appropriated for the Department of Defense under Titles III and IV of this legislation for Procurement, as well as for Research, Development, Test and Evaluation.

The bill before the Senate includes $73,976,000,000 in procurement spending,

an amount that is $1,255,000,000 above the President's request. This bill also includes $63,565,000,000 for research and development programs, a level that is $1,738,000,000 above the President's request. Certainly, the Senate should be willing to reduce the current procurement and research funding by less than eight-tenths of 1 percent in order to fulfill the President's promise. It is his promise. He had pledged our Nation's help with one of the most dreaded and destructive scourges on the globe. But he is trying to shift the burden to Congress to make up the difference in the underfunded budget request. Congress should step up to this challenge and appropriate the money that we have already authorized by an overwhelming vote.

My amendment would allow us to fulfill the humanitarian promise made by our Government to fight the worst public health crisis that history has ever known with a total $3 billion appropriation in fiscal year 2004.

This amendment would help to alleviate some of the misery endured by millions of AIDS-inflicted families around the globe for roughly what we spend in a single day to fund the Department of Defense.

Mr. President, AIDS is a catastrophe for millions around the globe. What better message can we send than to reduce our behemoth military budget ever so slightly in order to keep our national word to help fight this dread disease. It is the right thing to do. It is the noble thing to do. Let's do it.

Mr. President, I send to the desk an amendment. I ask unanimous consent that the following cosponsors be added.

Mr. President, the cosponsors are Senators Clinton, Pryor, Lautenberg, Murray, and Corzine. I ask they be added.

Yes, I do, and there are other Senators who wish to speak on this.

Has the Senator yielded the floor?

Mr. President, there is ample precedent for across-the- board cuts in the Defense bill. In fact, the language is taken out of section 8135 of the fiscal year 2002 Defense Appropriations Act. Even with these cuts, the procurement, research, and development accounts remain $2 billion above the President's request and $6.7 billion above fiscal year 2003. So the procurement, research, and development accounts are robustly funded.

This amendment provides the funds called for in the 78-to-18 vote last week on the State Department authorization which called for $3 billion.

I understand Senator Harkin wishes to speak. I yield the floor.

Mr. President, let me reiterate a few things that have already been said. This is not an across-the-board cut on an entire bill. The language here is taken out of section 8135 of the fiscal year 2002 Defense Appropriations Act. In other words, there is ample precedent for the way we are providing the money. Even with these cuts, the procurement and research and development accounts remain $2 billion above the President's request and $6.7 billion above fiscal year 2003. These are real budget funds. Here we have a $368 billion Defense bill. We shouldn't hesitate to reduce it by $1.1 billion to pay for a program as important as global AIDS. I know the administration says it doesn't want that much money this year. The administration prefers doing the ramped-up approach.

People understand simple math. Fifteen billion dollars over 5 years is $3 billion a year. I think we should provide the full $3 billion. People understand that is certainly going to be $15 billion over a 5- year period if we do it $3 billion a year. It is easy to understand that. But by doing the ramped-up approach, it appears that the President is not fulfilling his commitment. I want to help him fulfill that commitment.

I remember, as well as the distinguished Senator from Alaska does, when we were trying to provide moneys for homeland security. We tried to provide moneys for our firemen, our policemen, and our health personnel. We were told by the then-Director of Homeland Security, former Governor Tom Ridge, in a letter that they didn't need that much. It seems that the administration doesn't need the money if some effort is being made on this side of the aisle to provide the money that the administration needs. They know they don't need that then and they come back later and ask for it themselves. They say they need it then.

This is an opportunity to show the world that we mean what we say. This is an opportunity to show the world that the President means what he says.

Here we are quibbling over eight-tenths of 1 percent. We are fiddling over that little measly amount of money when we could adopt the amendment. People of the world would understand what we are saying. They would believe the President is backing up his commitment. Why do we quibble over a few tenths of 1 percent here?

I have made the case.

I ask unanimous consent that certain letters I have received be printed in the Record. These are letters of support for the amendment. They come from the Global AIDS Alliance, the Episcopal Church Office of Government Relations located in Washington, DC, Physicians for Human Rights, the General Board of Church and Society of the United Methodist Church, and the Center for Health and Gender Equity.

I ask unanimous consent that these letters be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I also ask unanimous consent that the names of Senators Bingaman and Cantwell be included as cosponsors.

Mr. President, I yield the floor. I thank the distinguished Senator from Alaska for his patience and for waiting until we could finish our statements before he moves to table.

Mr. President, the facts are staggering. More than 5 million people are infected with HIV/AIDS each year. That is 15,000 people infected each day, 625 people infected every hour, more than 10 people every minute--people of virtually all ages, people in every corner of the world. Last year, more than 3 million people died from AIDS. The longer we wait to find a cure, the longer we wait to fulfill the pledge to the global HIV/AIDS trust fund, the longer we wait, the greater the tragedy.

The Byrd amendment would allow the Senate to fulfill the humanitarian promise made to fight HIV/AIDS. This amendment would help to alleviate some of the misery endured by millions of AIDS-inflicted families around the globe for roughly what we spend in a single day to fund the Department of Defense.

This amendment would make good on the Government's pledge to the world and the effort to combat the global HIV/AIDS epidemic. The President promised $15 billion in the next 5 years. Congress has authorized $3 billion for the next fiscal year. But the authorization without appropriation is a will-o'-the-wisp. The President's budget only provides $1.9 billion. This amendment would increase funding for the global AIDS/HIV initiative by $1.1 billion to $3 billion. The amendment would be offset by a $1.1 billion across-the-board cut in the amounts appropriated for the Defense Department procurement as well as for research, development, test, and evaluation. We are spending more than $1 billion a day for defense in this bill. Surely we can afford to spend $1 billion more in a year to combat AIDS and HIV.

I reiterate that a few days ago--last week it was, I believe-- President Bush visited five African countries. He again pledged that the United States would play a leading role in combating AIDS. The President repeatedly promised to do all in his power to make sure that Congress fully financed his proposed 5-year, $15 billion program to attack the disease in the world's poorest countries. This is the President's chance. Why wait? He may not be around here for 5 years. Who knows, right? The President may not be in power for 5 years. He may not be around here 5 years. Why not help him to fulfill his commitment today? Three billion dollars in 1 year--$3 billion--to attack this disease.

On July 10, 2003, the Senate voted in a sense-of-the-Senate resolution 78 to 18 to provide full appropriations for the $15 billion AIDS initiative touted by our President, including $3 billion in fiscal year 2004. Now is the time, Senators, to step up to the plate and honor your commitment. Now is the time to help the President to honor his commitment.

I urge all of my colleagues to support this amendment and to vote no on the motion to table.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, last year, Senator Grassley and I had an amendment included in the Fiscal Year 2003 Defense Appropriations Act to crack down on the abuse of credit cards that are issued to Pentagon employees. Today, we offer an amendment to extend those provisions through fiscal year 2004.

The General Accounting Office has completed numerous studies on Government-issued charge cards. These reports have highlighted the Department of Defense as one of the worst abusers of those cards. Defense Department employees have been caught red-handed using their Government-issued credit card to pay for personal expenses such as luxury cruises, concert tickets, Internet gambling, and even adult entertainment. Incredibly, these abusive charges are being underwritten by the U.S. taxpayer, to the tune of untold millions each year.

Based on this evidence, the GAO has recommended that DOD employees should undergo credit checks before they are issued a Government charge card. That is exactly what the amendment offered last year by Senator Grassley and me required.

The GAO recently reported to our staffs that despite progress in cracking down on some types of abuse, the Pentagon has not complied with last year's Byrd-Grassley amendment. That is why we offer an amendment to this Defense bill to extend last year's provision of the Defense Appropriations Act to apply in fiscal year 2004.

The Pentagon should be on notice that it has to straighten out its act with regard to charge card abuse, as well as a whole host of other accounting problems. Ignoring laws that require the Department of Defense to crack down on these problems is a serious mistake. Congress should send the message loud and clear that we expect them to comply with the Byrd-Grassley amendment on credit card abuse.

Mr. President, I thank the Chair for his consideration and courtesy.

Our National Guard and the Reserves of each of our military services have

become more than a source of manpower during times of national crisis. Members of the Reserve components have become an indispensable tool to carry out military operations and homeland security missions.

As of last week, there were 204,100 Guard and Reserve personnel on active duty. Some are stationed within the United States, performing homeland security missions. Many are deployed overseas, in foreign lands, thousands of miles from home, to places such as Iraq and Afghanistan.

Since September 11, 2001, we have activated more Guard and Reserve personnel than at any time since the Korean war but countless reservists, especially those who are now serving in Iraq, have not even been told when their deployment will end. Nobody knows when they will return home to their families, their friends, and their home communities.

Adding to the uncertainty, some Reserve units that are now being activated are simply being told to prepare to deploy for 1 to 2 years. This is no way to treat our National Guard and Reserve forces. How would Senators like to be treated like that? Are we keeping our citizen soldiers away from their jobs and their homes for too long? Are we? There are a growing number of West Virginians who say yes.

My office has received an increasing number of letters, phone calls, and e-mails from West Virginians asking when their loved ones who serve in the Reserve components will be coming home. How long? How long will that vacant chair be at the dinner table? How long will that husband, that father, be away from home, unable to carry that child to bed and tuck it under the cover at night? How long, Mr. Rumsfeld, I ask?

Some of the reports in these communications are very alarming. Senators read their mail as I read mine. Other Senators, I am sure, are getting the same question from those who are living there in the face of danger every second of every minute of every hour of every day, in the hot sands, 130 degrees, 120 degrees, 110 degrees. There they are. All of these letters express a deep frustration with the length of deployment of National Guard men and women and other Reserve units.

A number of troops and their families have expressed desperation at trying to get any sort of information about when their units will be returning to the United States, and it is about the same frustration that we as their elected representatives are getting when we ask questions of this administration to appear before our committee.

After reviewing what some of these units have gone through, I can see why people are frustrated. Let us take the case of one engineering unit from West Virginia. After shipping out in January 2003, this unit advanced deep into Iraq, along with front-line fighting forces. During the war, they bridged a river under heavy Iraqi fire. I have several reports that members of this unit are able to call home only once every several weeks, and that now they are only helping to haul Iraqi ammunition. This unit has not been given a date to return to the United States, and rumors are now circling that they will remain in Iraq until January 2004, until the snow falls in West Virginia.

Another National Guard unit has struggled through back-to-back-to- back deployments. This unit was mobilized for State duty in response to flooding in West Virginia in the summer of 2001. After September 11, this unit spent 1 year in Federal duty performing homeland security missions. After 3 months' rest, the unit was again called to duty and this time sent to the Persian Gulf region in February 2003, where they remain to this day. There has been no word, none, on when this unit will return home. Hear me, Senators.

One of my constituents wrote about her husband who was deployed to the Persian Gulf in December 2002, told he would return as soon as the war was over. After the President made his visit to the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln and gave his speech under the giant banner which read ``Mission Accomplished,'' this reservist still has not been sent home. In fact, he was given five different dates to return to West Virginia and then sent to another country in the region with the possibility of extending his deployment to September. To add insult to injury, this reservist had to pay for his own food and lodging while he was awaiting new orders after the war.

Hear me. Hear me, Mr. President. These stories should not come as a complete surprise to my colleagues. I am confident every Senator has been receiving mail with similar reports of deployments with no end, unclear missions, shortages in supplies, and countless other problems.

I have read similar problems in the newspaper about members of the Active-Duty Forces. This morning, there is an article in the Los Angeles Times about another delay in the homecoming of the war-weary 3rd Infantry Division. Less than a week after Secretary Rumsfeld announced to the Armed Services Committee that this division would be home by September, 10,000 of these soldiers have now been told to prepare to stay in Iraq indefinitely, an equal number of that army of Greeks which was led by Xenophon back home after the war, after the Battle of Cunaxa. Ten thousand have now been told to prepare to stay in Iraq indefinitely. These troops ought to have the chance to come home, too.

There are two reasons why I am particularly concerned about the long deployments of the Guard and Reserve. First, the National Guard has important responsibilities to their own States. Right now, this very minute, West Virginia has all of its Guard and Reserve engineer units deployed overseas, along with all of their earthmovers, their dump trucks, their equipment. If the summer storms cause more flooding and mudslides in the West Virginia hills, who is Governor Wise going to go to for help?

We have watched those storms sweep over the mountains of West Virginia and come down those rugged, ragged, steep slopes into the valleys and cause terrible floods to come rushing down, wiping out lives and property. Who is Governor Wise going to go to for help? The engineers of the West Virginia National Guard cannot answer the call from the hot sands of Iraq. My State would either have to rely on expensive contractors to recover from the storms or wait 2 or 3 days for National Guard units from neighboring States to respond. West Virginians need our National Guard in West Virginia.

Second, members of the Guard and Reserve are part-time soldiers. They are proud to serve their country but they did not sign up to serve full-time duty. We must exercise greater discretion when mobilizing the reserves just as we did decades ago.

According to the Congressional Research Service, from 1945 to 1989, there were only four involuntary callups of Reserve Forces. In 1945, I was in Florida, welding in the shipyard to the end of World War II. According to the Congressional Research Service, from that date 1945 to 1989, there were only four involuntary callups of reservists. Since then, there have been six involuntary deployments. It is unreasonable to dip into the Guard and Reserve so frequently, to pull those men and women away from their civilian careers and away from their families and expect them to serve overseas with no indication of when their mission will end.

There are serious defects from protracted deployments of the National Guard and the Reserve. There is growing frustration, I am telling you. It is growing. The frustration is there and it is growing.

Hear me, Mr. President, down at the other end of the avenue. Hear me, Mr. Rumsfeld. Hear me, Senators. That frustration is growing. Growing frustration among members of the Guard and Reserves mean that many troops may finally elect to take their hard-earned retirement. Many junior personnel are likely to decide they do not want to put their families through months or even years of hardship again and they will choose not to reenlist once their duty has been completed.

As we speak, unit commanders are bracing for a heavy loss of personnel once the deployed units are rotated home. The time has come for Congress to say: Enough is enough. Let us put an end to open-ended and back-to-back deployments of the National Guard and Reserve. Our part-time troops need to get back to their homes. They need to get back to their families.

They need to get back to their full-time jobs.

That is why I offer an amendment to limit the involuntary deployment of

National Guard and Reserve personnel to 6 months for any single overseas deployment and not more than 1 deployment in any 12-month period.

When we send the National Guard to peacekeeping missions in the Balkans, they are overseas for 6 months. Why should we ask our reservists to serve longer in Iraq or Afghanistan? Why should we ask our reservists to put up with back-to-back deployment?

Secretary Rumsfeld announced this week that he is seeking long-term changes to reduce dependence on the involuntary mobilization of National Guard and Reserves for not more than 1 year out of every 6 years. This is a commendable action, and we need to take a look at the long-term structure of our Armed Forces. But Secretary Rumsfeld's proposed changes do nothing to address the problems our reservists and their families are facing today.

My amendment will make an immediate impact on the problem of open- ended deployments for the National Guard and the Reserves. My amendment will make the Defense Department tell our reservists when they will be coming home because no funds in this bill may be spent to keep a Guard or Reserve unit overseas for more than 6 months.

We need to start rotating our Reserve Forces back home. Right now, there are 204,100 Reserve personnel who are not at their civilian jobs. These absences are leaving huge gaps in private businesses and essential government services.

In West Virginia, 10 percent of the State police have been called to active duty. Countless employers across the country are working shorthanded, waiting for the day that one of their employees will return home from their service to our country. Families are struggling to make up the income lost by having a provider receive modest paychecks from the Pentagon as opposed to the good pay of civilian careers, such as doctors, lawyers, coal miners, teachers, or even plumbers.

One can only wonder how much the endless cycle of deployments has affected our economy over the last 2 years. But it is clear that we need these part-time members of the military back in our communities.

My amendment would allow us to tell the members of the National Guard and the Reserve that they will return home within 6 months of being sent overseas. Congress should act in order to provide a measure of stability to the deployment our reservists are facing. We should give the same measure of stability to their families and their employers.

I urge my colleagues to support the amendment. I send it to the desk.

Mr. President, while the Senate is awaiting Mr. Stevens' amendment, let me read some excerpts from some of my constituents. I referred to letters from my constituents during my comments on the amendment which I offered. Here is a constituent who writes as follows:

I am writing to express some of my concerns with so many of

our West Virginia guardsmen and women deployed.

I am under the impression that the duty of the National

Guard and Air National Guard is to fill in and help the

active duty in times of need. Many of our West Virginia Guard

have been deployed for quite a while now, but it seems as

though very few have come home yet. The combat portion of the

war seems to be nearing an end, and a couple of months have

passed for supplies and human aid to reach the people of

Iraq. It seems to me that our Guards men and women have

fulfilled their duty and should be sent home soon. A recent

severe flooding in our State could use the help of service

men and women here at home. I feel that our West Virginia

Guards men and women have contributed their portion of duty

to this war for the time being and deserve to come home now

and begin rotations with other units to cover the needs of

our active duty overseas. I do not want to see our State

suffer during this time of need for their services here.

I am very proud of our service members within our State

because I believe they do an excellent job for us as a State

and for the Nation. They are always prepared to perform any

tasks they are called to do. I personally

believe that we can use their services here at home for the

time being and that they have accomplished their duties

overseas. I wanted to explain my concerns to you about the

need for our Guard men and women to return home soon.

From another letter I present these excerpts:

I am writing asking for your intervention and help in the

swift return to the United States for my son's unit serving

in Iraq. His unit has had no real mission since it was sent

to Iraq.

He mentions his unit, which I will not mention here. He says:

They have been pumping fuel which is not fit for use in

trucks or planes. Most of the time, they end up pumping it on

the ground just to settle the dust. They have been in the

very dangerous sections of Iraq, north and east of Baghdad.

At a family support meeting, we were told that the soldiers

are now being rationed water--one 20-ounce bottle a day. They

have no way of communicating with us back home. Their food is

limited and they are living in extremely miserable

conditions. We were urged to contact you for help. Mail is

not getting to them and we rarely receive mail from them.

They are not part of the rebuilding of the country. They are

not involved in any constructive activity--only the danger of

being in convoys and the sniper fire which has been

reportedly happening regularly.

This war is not over, as our President continuously tells

the Nation. Our soldiers are not home. Please help. My son

chose to serve his country and for this I am very proud. But

this mission has gone into some bizarre and impossible

conditions for our sons and daughters. Please help bring them

home soon.

Another letter is as follows, and I will excerpt certain paragraphs:

As you are aware from my last letter that these men have

been deployed for quite a long time, they were gone for a

year with the last deployment, as well as State duty for

floods and now this deployment. For this deployment, these

men have been deployed since February of this year, and here

we are already in the middle of May. They were sent overseas

without any real kind of indication as to when they will

return home. I have gotten some form of answer [from a

certain office in the service] that the current policy is

for the men to be deployed for 6 months overseas. However,

that is not any guarantee either. We are still looking at

2 years of deployment for these men. I just find it so

hard to believe that there is no one out there that can

help get these men home before that timeframe. I don't

understand why it can't be a total of 6 months.

There are many family members, including mothers and

fathers, of these soldiers who would be very grateful to you

if you can make this happen for us.

Another letter:

On December 1, 2002, my husband [she writes his name, which

I shall not divulge] was deployed for the war in Iraq, and he

was told that he would return to continue in his normal

career when the war was over. Since then, he has been

scheduled to return to the United States on five occasions.

She gives the dates.

He is still in Germany. He is having to pay for his meals

and a hotel room, while awaiting a flight somewhere in

Africa, as directed by his commander, although there are no

legal or valid orders to do so. As of today, my husband has

been deployed, mobilized, 200 days. His orders state his

deployment is not to exceed 179 days. . . . My husband is a

West Virginia National Guard soldier who has been deployed

over 6 months, who by regulation should have been redeployed

to his home station before being assigned to a new theater,

as stated in his orders. . . . Morale is at an all-time low

for my husband, myself, and our family, and all the soldiers

and families I have spoken to.

Anything you could do to make this situation right would be

so greatly appreciated than I could possibly let you know.

Please help me get my soldier home.

It was signed by his wife.

Mr. President, I will not go further in reading letters, but I have many of them.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, will the Senator yield?

The distinguished Senator speaks of our forces being deployed in various and sundry continents, countries, and climes. Are these guardsmen and reservists whom the Senator is talking about?

He speaks of Kosovo. Are those National Guardsmen and Reserve deployed there?

Are they limited to 6 months?

But the time there, are they limited to 6 months?

Then why shouldn't the people in the hot sands of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Iraq be likewise?

Is the Senator aware of any complaints from his National Guard in Alaska or other Reserve units there that they are being held longer than the 180 days and being redeployed for a longer period?

I am trying to get some predictability worked into the equation. That is the reason I have offered this amendment. I am getting these letters from the men and women from West Virginia who are in Iraq. They want to come home. They think they have served the time that was indicated to them they would serve and yet they are serving longer.

Do I have the floor, Mr. President?

I thank the Chair.

Yes, I am glad to yield to the Senator.

Right.

In essence, the Senator is precisely correct.

Yes.

They are entitled to know. They are employed and they are entitled to have their expectations met. Here we are with our men and women in Iraq. They are there like sitting ducks. It is like a shooting gallery. They are in an area I am sure we would find very difficult to live in. We will be talking more about reasons why they were told they were going and about the problems with certain intelligence that had an impression, I am sure, a persuasive impression on some of the Members of Congress who voted to give this President the power to send our men and women into harm's way, but we will save that for another day.

What I am trying to do is make it possible for these men and women who are in the Guard and Reserve units to return home to their children, their families, their wives, their mothers, their fathers, their jobs, their communities. Communities have been hit hard in this country. Communities have been hit hard in West Virginia. These men and women answered the call. They have served well. They have demonstrated great courage, bravery, and patriotism. Why should we not keep our word to these people? Why should we not be up front with them?

Yes.

I agree with that statement, and I think the administration ought to tell these people how long they are going to stay over there. They are not told they are going to be over there just 6 months. They are not told they will be there 9 months or a year. This administration has failed to tell our people, who are put in harm's way by this administration's policy of preemptive strikes, what this administration intends. Congress has not been told how long these people are going to be there, what are the costs.

We hear every day--the President spoke on the Abraham Lincoln with a sign, a banner, fluttering overhead, ``mission accomplished.'' The mission has not been accomplished. What was the mission? I am not sure we know what the mission was.

I appreciate the statements and the questions by the Senator from Nevada. I appreciate also the words of the distinguished Senator from Alaska. He is a very reasonable man and a reasonable legislator.

We talk about a study, but we study things to death around here. We need to act, and that is what I am trying to do. I am trying to bring some succor, comfort, relief, and satisfaction to the families of our Guard and reservists who are waiting the return of those men and women.

Will the Senator yield?

The distinguished Senator said the reservists should be deployed for 180 days.

That is what my amendment says.

Is there a final deadline for this commission to report?

I am afraid our guards men and women will have to serve a long time. Many of them have already been serving a long time, in their estimation. They will have to serve a much longer time if they wait the appointment of the commission and then the rendering by that commission. I see its first meeting will not be later than 30 days after the date on which all members of the commission have been appointed.

The Senator gave me this amendment, a 4-page amendment but page 3 is missing.

I thank the Senator. The third page which was missing is the page that had on it the provision:

Not later than 120 days after the date of enactment of this

Act, the Commission shall submit to the congressional defense

committees a report on the results of the examination and

analysis under subsection (c).

So that is 120 days, so that is 4 months, not later than 4 months, by the time this commission is created, is established and has its first meeting and then reports back to the appropriate committees. I hope surely our young men and women will be home by then without any such report. This is going to be a long time.

That is what I see with this. We need to act. We can study this to death. This is kind of like questioning Secretary Rumsfeld. When I asked him a question in the Armed Services Committee the other day, my question was, How much has our country been spending on the average per month in Iraq?

And he says to me: Well, I'm sorry, Senator, we don't have that information at hand. We will get it for you. We don't have that information at hand.

I asked, How much have we been spending per month in Afghanistan? I got the same answer. Senator, we don't have that information. We will be glad to get it for you.

In a moment, if I may.

I am referring to the cavalier treatment that we peons on the Armed Services Committee get from this great Secretary of Defense that we have downtown. He says, Well, Senator, we don't have that information.

Here we are with the top man--the man at the Pentagon, the greatest defense department in the world, the most expensive one, the one that handles more money than any other defense department in the world. As a matter of fact, we are spending more money each year than all of the other 18 NATO nations combined, plus the six remaining rogue nations, plus China, plus Russia. That is almost half of the total moneys that the world spends for defense. We are treated like children by this Secretary of Defense: Well, Senator we don't have that information.

It would seem to me that would be elemental. It would seem to me that a Secretary of Defense would know how much money we spend on national defense; that he would know how much money we are spending on average in Iraq per month. He would know that. He should know that would be one of the first questions he would be asked by the Armed Services Committee when he comes before it. I would think so. You are the Secretary of Defense. How much are we spending in Iraq monthly? Then to have to turn and say, Well, Senator, I don't have that information. It would take us a while to assemble it. That is the way it is here. It is going to take quite a while.

It is going to take quite a while to get this commission started, if we follow the recommendations of the distinguished Senator from Alaska. I ascribe to him a far greater degree of appreciation for what we are doing and a far greater degree of understanding of the need for us to act than I do some of the people downtown. But here we are being asked for a study.

What I am saying is that way of dealing with Members of Congress and committees, saying, Well, we don't have that information; we will get it for you--by the time we get that information, the time is long past for the committee to ask the next question, if we need the answer to the first question in order to ask the second question. We are going to have to wait to be able to ask the second question. That is a cavalier way of handling people. I have been around here 50 years. I am on to that kind of game.

Not yet. I am not talking about the Senator. I am talking about our distinguished Secretary of Defense and the way he handles us children on the Armed Services Committee.

The Senator can wait a minute.

Mr. President, I have the floor. I have the floor.

Now I yield to the Senator for whatever he wishes to say.

Mr. President, may I say to my distinguished friend, I don't worry. He can get excited as many times as he wishes. I have excited many people in my time around here, before the Senator from Alaska came here. He can get excited all he wishes. I will be glad to wait while he gets excited again, if he would like.

He reminds me of the pharisee and the publican who went up into the tower. The publican said, ``Oh, Lord, I don't do what this man does. I don't do as he does. I give my tithes. I give one-tenth of all I earn.'' And he went on to talk about his attributes. The other poor man in the tower said, ``Oh, Lord. Forgive me. I am a sinner.''

So don't point to Clinton, when the Senator talks to me--or to any other President. I am talking about this administration. We can't excuse this administration because of something some other administration may have done. The people on that side are good at that. Many of them are always pointing out what we did, what Clinton did, or what this one did, or what that one did. That time is past. We can't excuse our own sins on the basis of the sins of others.

I am talking about this President, this administration, your administration, your Secretary of Defense. You can stand up and defend him all you wish, my friend. And I shouldn't say ``you.'' I shouldn't speak in the second person under the Senate rules. Maybe I got a little excited also.

But the Senator isn't going to run that old fish along the side of me. He can get excited all he wants. He is noted for his temper. Temper is a good thing. We all have some of it.

But I am saying here that when we ask questions of his friend, the Senator from Alaska's friend, Mr. Rumsfeld, we get treated cavalierly, and many times get a lecture. It is about time we get rid of that kind of treatment. Secretary Rumsfeld, with all due respect to him, wasn't elected by the American people to that job he has today. He was appointed to it. He was confirmed in it by this Senate. I was not appointed to anything.

So let's don't attempt to respond to what I hope were sincere questions here by pointing to what a previous administration may have done. I did not agree with everything that happened in the previous administration. The supplemental requested by the Clinton administration is in no way appropriate to the cost of Iraq. Bosnia and Kosovo were minuscule in comparison to the cost of Iraq.

Let's talk about Iraq, and let's talk about this administration. We have to deal with the problems that confront the Senate today. I am not going to ask my constituents to settle for a study. We need to act. And we Senators have a duty to vote on my amendment. When we talk about a supplemental, that is a way to--and I speak always with great reverence to my friend, Senator Stevens; and he is my friend, he is going to be my friend, and I am his, but this is a way to hide costs from the American people, huge costs that can be anticipated, and that are driven by policy decisions made in this White House.

There is no reason for a supplemental request in this instance. Congress is not an ATM machine. This White House wants to be accountable to no one. We have a responsibility to the taxpayer to exercise oversight over these monies.

I have nothing else I wish to say at this point. I yield the floor.

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

Madam President, I thank the Senator from Massachusetts for his statement in support of the amendment and also for his overly gracious and charitable statement at the beginning of his remarks concerning my previous efforts in regard to the whole question of Iraq.

I am hoping other Senators will speak on the amendment, but in the meantime I say that soldiers whom we are using in our National Guard and Reserve are entitled to fairness. They are entitled to know how long their tour of duty will extend. After all, we were told that our men and women would be welcomed not as occupiers but as liberators. We were told that our men and women would be welcomed with flowers and smiles.

Our men and women in the Reserve components are beginning to wonder if they were misled. We are using our National Guard and Reserve in a way which is unfair to them and to their families. We cannot ask them to wait for some study now while they bide their time. It is not their fault that the White House decided to wage a war without considering the aftermath in Iraq. It is not their fault that a policy of preemption may demand many more troops than we can muster. We need to give our Guard and Reserve some relief from the turmoil of being constantly deployed. We owe them more than a study. We owe them action.

If this amendment were accepted, it would push the administration to internationalize the peacekeeping in Iraq. I hope other nations will join in keeping the peace in Iraq so that our own guardsmen and reservists will be relieved and will be able to come home.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

That is right. What the Senator has been quoting isn't

included either. They don't include the cost of the war.

The men and women are being paid their salaries, even if

they are from West Virginia. If they were all from West Virginia, they

would be paid their salaries. We are talking about the additional

costs, the incremental costs, and how much it costs this country to

wage war in Iraq per month. We are not talking about the salaries. They

get paid no matter where they are. We are talking about the additional

costs of Iraq. Let us be clear about that. Additional costs are almost

$1 billion a day for Iraq.

One billion dollars a week. That was a misstatement. I know

better than that--$1 billion a week.

Yes.

Absolutely. The American people are entitled to know that.

They are going to pay the bill.

Yes.

Will the Senator yield?

And it should not be based on unsubstantiated----

So-called evidence that is produced by the intelligence

agencies of another country, another state.

Yes.

Well, it suggests we are going down the wrong path when the

President of the United States leads our country into war, leads our

men and women into war, based on evidence that is supposed to have been

developed by another country's agencies, that evidence not being

substantiated by our own intelligence agencies.

So it is very evident we were just grasping for a straw to hang our

hats on. I happen to believe that this administration intended from the

beginning to go to war in Iraq, that this administration intended from

the beginning to invade Iraq.

How many times has the Senator from Florida heard the President say,

with reference to the U.N., ``If you don't do it, we will. If you don't

do it, we will''? They were not waiting on the U.N. to come along. We

already had our minds made up to go into Iraq.

And anybody who heard Karl Rove or read about Karl Rove's statement

to the National Republican Committee--in January of last year, I

believe it was, yes--when he indicated to the National Republican

Committee that: this homeland security horse was the one we could ride

to victory politically on, and that the national Republican efforts

should make, as its center strategy, the subject of homeland security--

it was evident to me they were going to ride that horse to the utmost

until the horse dropped or got across the victory goal line in the

election.

And I think it was a misuse. It is a misuse. It is just an

effort now, as they look back, to cover their skirts because it is

clear, so far as the evidence thus far is concerned, that there was no

such uranium coming from Africa. That was virtually a fictitious thing,

and our people knew it. They knew it in October of last year, as the

Senator has pointed out.

The administration misled the American people when it tried

to leave the impression that the war on terrorism is engaged in by--in

other words, that Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida could be linked. That has

not been shown to be a fact. And the American people, according to the

polls I read some time ago, seemed to be half of the belief that those

who took the planes into the Twin Towers were Iraqis. The truth is, not

one of those hijackers of planes flown into the Twin Towers on 9/11--

not one of those hijackers was an Iraqi, not one. Not one was from

Iraq.

So where is the link? Where is the link?

Will the Senator yield briefly for an inquiry?

Mr. President, how much time remains?

I ask unanimous consent that upon the conclusion of the remarks by Mr. Leahy I be recognized out of order, without the time being charged against either side, on another matter.

Not to exceed 20 minutes.

I thank the Chair and I thank the Senator.

Mr. President, on August 22, 1920, an article written by former LTC Thomas Edward Lawrence appeared in one of the great newspapers of London, the Sunday Times. This legendary British military officer--better known as Lawrence of Arabia--began his commentary with a sharp warning about his country's occupation of ancient lands in the Middle East:

The people of England have been led in Mesopotamia into a

trap from which it will be hard to escape with dignity and

honor. They have been tricked into it by a steady withholding

of information. The Baghdad communiques are belated,

insincere, incomplete. Things have been far worse than we

have been told, our administration more bloody and

inefficient than the public knows. It is a disgrace to our

imperial record, and may soon be too inflamed for any

ordinary cure. We are today not far from a disaster.

Colonel Lawrence concluded with an equally sharp question:

How long will we permit millions of pounds, thousands of

Imperial troops, and tens of thousands of Arabs to be

sacrificed on behalf of colonial administration which can

benefit nobody but its administrators?

Mr. President, it seems that history does have a way of repeating itself. These were the observations some 83 years ago of a British soldier who had studied the history of the Middle East, fought alongside Arabs in the Great War, and understood the anger of those who lived under the administration of a distant power. How prescient were those words--then and now.

His observations, which might have been considered academic in the months before U.S. and British troops began their recent advance into Iraq, now appear, as I say, prescient. As violence in the streets of Baghdad increases, as our troops are being killed and wounded by guerrilla attacks, as progress toward creating a new Iraqi Government stagnates, the American public is only just now beginning to come to grips with the enormity of the task that we have before us in Iraq.

A clear picture had never been painted for the American public by the ``powers that be.'' Oh, we heard rosy scenarios about instant liberty and flowers to the troops. The Vice President talked about flowers that would be bestowed upon our troops by those people in Iraq who would be liberated by us, the liberators. That was the talk of the day.

But now reality has emerged and it is harsh. And seeing the enormity--the enormity, I say--of the task before us and the increasing dangers to the loved ones who serve in uniform, the American people out there who are watching this Senate forum are beginning to ask, How long must our troops remain in those distant hot sands? How long? They are asking that in the mail I receive from the people back home. How long must they patrol the dangerous streets of Najaf and Fallujah? When will our troops be coming home?

Weeks ago, the President gave vague assurances about the timely withdrawal of our troops. He said:

We will stay as long as necessary to get the job done, and

then we will leave.

Those were his remarks at Santa Clara, CA, on May 2 of this year. But I say, Mr. President, such words are without substance; they are ``doublespeak.'' They do nothing but feed the hopes of the American people, as well as the people of Iraq, that our troops will soon return from Iraq,

while avoiding any real indication of when that might happen.

The fact is, the Bush administration has carefully avoided telling the American people when it expects our occupation of Iraq to conclude. So far, this administration has yet to even estimate how soon it will be able to hand over Iraq to the Iraqi people. In short, it appears that we have no exit strategy, and we have had none from the beginning.

The word ``quagmire'' is starting to be used by the media. Clearly, many people are very worried about our situation in Iraq. The death toll keeps mounting.

Last week, the President actually taunted those forces who are murdering our troops in the streets of Iraq. He dared the violent militants by saying: ``Bring 'em on.'' One can hardly think of a more inappropriate comment for a President to make when Americans are under siege in Iraq and being asked to deal with the treacheries of urban guerrilla warfare with no end in sight. Chest thumping should have no place in such a situation.

This was the same President who went to the trouble to put on a flight suit, land on an aircraft carrier, and with great fanfare tell the American people that major combat operations in Iraq have ended, while overhead there was a banner stream which said: ``Mission accomplished.'' But British and American soldiers are still dying in Iraq. Now the President is saying: ``Bring 'em on.'' What are we to believe?

The President has backed away from earlier suggestions of a foreseeable end to U.S. peacekeeping efforts in Iraq. He warns of the return of tyranny if our troops begin returning home.

Judging by the President's statements, our armed forces have become the thumb in the dike--the only obstacle that prevents the return of a repressive dictatorship in Iraq.

How did it come to this? Members of Congress were told that our forces would be greeted as liberators. We will be going in not as occupiers but as liberators. Iraqi citizens were supposed to eagerly embrace democracy and serve up Saddam Hussein on a silver platter the moment they sipped from the cup of freedom. We should have known that the burden of democratizing Iraq would be no easy task. The Administration should have been more forthcoming about the difficulty of that task, about the time it would take to execute it, and about the cost to the taxpayer.

To be sure, the Defense Department is now scrambling to scrape up as many as 20,000 foreign troops to join our forces in occupying Iraq by the end of September. I applaud these efforts. But it would be folly to believe that a deployment of 10,000, 20,000, or even 30,000 foreign troops would significantly reduce the dangers to the scores of thousands of Americans who are now in Iraq.

The failure of this Administration to adequately plan for postwar Iraq has become painfully evident. Before the war, I said: Where is the plan? What is the plan? At yesterday's Armed Services Committee hearing, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld said he did not know if the United States had made any formal request for assistance from NATO or the United Nations since the beginning of the war in Iraq. The deployment of experienced peacekeepers from our friends and allies would go a long way to relieving the strain on our troops. And, Mr. President, it is simply shocking that our Secretary of Defense would be unaware of efforts by the administration, if there are any, to make a formal request to NATO and the United Nations to provide these troops.

The tragic failure of the Administration's efforts to build international support before launching its impatient rush towards war against Iraq is now bearing its bitter, bitter fruit.

The Secretary of Defense tells the Senate Armed Services Committee to be patient. Well, the administration was not all that patient before launching its rush toward war against Iraq.

The difficulty in finding just 20,000 peacekeepers to patrol Iraq is evidence that White House efforts to assemble 49 nations into a ``coalition of the willing'' was merely an exercise in rhetoric, meant to cover the lack of significant military or financial contributions from dozens of nations, save for those of Britain, Australia, and Poland.

Has the lack of a plan for postwar Iraq needlessly cost American lives? If we had not been so convinced that Iraqis would greet our armies with flowers and smiles, could we have better anticipated the chaos and lawlessness that broke out in the days after the war?

If we had not been so cocksure about our ability to neatly decapitate the leadership of the Iraqi regime, could we have fashioned a better plan to deal with the collapse of civil order as our tanks rolled into Baghdad?

Perhaps this White House should have listened to the advice of some senior military leaders who foresaw the need for several hundred thousand troops to stabilize postwar Iraq. Perhaps it should have contemplated the consequences of a Saddam Hussein driven into hiding but still potent and dangerous. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.

The Administration appears quite ready now to dedicate our military to a long-term occupation of Iraq. War-weary soldiers will continue to patrol the areas around Baghdad. The citizen-soldiers of the National Guard and the Reserves will be kept from returning to their homes, their jobs, and their families.

Senators, read your correspondence from back home. See what those families of guardsmen are saying. Read your letters. You are receiving them. My office is not unique in that respect.

The citizen-soldiers of the National Guard and the Reserves will be kept from returning to their homes, their jobs, and their families. Thousands of American families will continue to worry about the fate of their loved ones.

Ah, the sleepless nights that are spent by mothers, by wives, by husbands of guardsmen who have already been in Iraq for weeks and weeks and who are not told when they will be coming home but were told we will be there for a long time. Think of the tears that are spilled by mothers and wives and children for the husbands, the sons, the fathers who are away and who are not told when they will be coming home.

And in spite of the heavy commitment that this Administration has made to the most ambitious policy of nation-building in more than half a century, it appears to be on the verge of sending unknown numbers of U.S. troops to yet another peacekeeping mission in Liberia.

In my home state, there is a growing sense of disenchantment with these foreign adventures. Every day, more letters come to my office from West Virginians asking when their family members will be coming home. How long will it be? How long must we wait? When will they be coming home? My letters contain details about National Guard and Army Reserve units with unclear missions and open-ended deployments. I have received word that some units are without mail service--we are not told that by this administration--others must wait weeks between phone calls home to their families. One unit had to ration water to just 20 ounces per day because of supply shortages. I suspect that other Senators are experiencing a similar phenomenon in the content of their mail from families of the Guard and Reserve.

These part-time soldiers are proud to serve in our nation's military, but they know that they are also full-time members of their communities. Our nation's reservists have important duties in their civilian lives, serving their cities and towns as police officers, business men and women, doctors, teachers, and laborers. Members of the Guard and Reserves proudly joined to serve their country in times of crisis, and they have demonstrated that pride and done well, but not to be a permanent constabulary force in the Middle East. Nobody told them that.

Our brave and professional fighting men and women are awesome on the battlefield, but they must not be expected to carry out the role of peacekeepers or nation-builders in an open-ended mission, whether it take place in Lebanon, Somalia, Bosnia, Afghanistan, Liberia, or Iraq. Our American soldiers are not Iraqi bureaucrats. Our Armed Forces are trained to win wars, not run countries. Putting our men and women in such an untenable situation is a misuse of our military and a disservice to our military personnel.

This Administration should think hard about whether we have the manpower--do we?--to sustain a large commitment of troops in Iraq for the long term. They better think about it. We currently have overseas commitments in South Korea, Japan, the Balkans, and Afghanistan. I have heard we have our military forces spread so thinly around the world, in 136 countries, I recently saw. Keeping tens or hundred of thousands of troops in Iraq for as many as ten years may demand more troops than our voluntary armed forces can muster. Think about it.

This Administration should think hard about whether we have the money to single-handedly pay for the occupation and reconstruction of Iraq. The Department of Defense has reported that we are spending $3.9 billion each month to occupy Iraq. That is a billion dollars a week. How much is a billion dollars? A billion dollars is $1 for every minute that has passed since Jesus Christ turned the water into wine in the city of Caanan.

So the Department of Defense has reported that we are spending $3.9 billion a week. They had not said that until yesterday. Pulling that information from the Secretary of Defense was like pulling teeth. It was hard to do.

How much time do I have remaining, Mr. President?

My time has expired.

Mr. President, my thanks to the senior Senator from Illinois who has added his voice and his vote in support of his conscience on this matter.

Mr. President, I thank the distinguished leader.

Amendment No. 1174

Mr. President, earlier today I spoke about the serious threat to U.S. forces that remain engaged in a volatile situation in Iraq. The same troops that fought and won the war against Iraq are now performing a peacemaking mission with no end in sight.

The United States entered this war virtually alone. But the United States, alone, cannot be expected to carry the burden of providing the vast majority of troops and the nearly endless amounts of funds that will be required to get Iraq back on its feet. We need the help of the international community, and we need it now.

The administration has the obligation to look out for the welfare of our troops by engaging NATO and the United Nations in order to raise a large peacekeeping force that will share the burdens of occupation with the other nations of the world. There are many countries that have the capability to assist in a peacekeeping mission in Iraq, but first the President must make the unambiguous call to NATO and the U.N. to appeal for foreign troops and financial contributions.

I compliment Senator Biden for his efforts in introducing the amendment, but the amendment only calls for the President to ``consider'' the issue of whether to appeal to NATO and the U.N. to raise an international peacekeeping force.

I have very strong reservations about another provision in this amendment. The amendment states the sense of Congress that ``it is the national security interests of the United States to remain engaged in Iraq in order to ensure a peaceful, stable, unified Iraq with a representative government.'' Engaged for how long? Surely it is not in the national security interests of the United States to retain a permanent presence as a peacekeeping force in Iraq. This particular statement could well lead us down the path to mission creep.

Moreover, contrary to the assertions by the President of the United States and others in his administration, I have never believed that it was in the ``national security interests'' to go to war with Iraq to begin with. Subsequent events thus far have not shown that Iraq constituted an imminent threat to the security of our country. Tragically, the American people were deceived into believing otherwise.

I voted for this sense of Congress amendment because it draws attention to a critical issue, but the Senate must not wash its hands of internationalizing the occupation of Iraq by passing a nonbinding resolution which does not actually call on the President to do anything.

Amendments Nos. 1193 through 1196, En Bloc, to Amendment No. 1136

I have none.

In West Virginia, torrential flooding is becoming an annual event--since 1993, the State has had 11 federally declared disasters. In this year alone, the State has had two federally declared disasters. In the latest round of devastating flooding in the State last month, 12 counties were declared Federal disaster areas. Homes were damaged or destroyed, and the severe impact on the infrastructure in the southern part of the State--from roads, bridges, water and sewer, to power sources--has brought a normal way of life to a screeching halt once again.

It is our hope that you and Senator Domenici, when drafting the Fiscal Year 04 Energy Water Development Act will be able to address these emergencies in these two States, as well as others that have experienced massive flooding in this exceptionally wet spring.

Madam President, on March 6, 2003, the Senate gave its advice and consent to ratification of the Moscow Treaty on strategic nuclear arms reductions. The 97 to 0 vote belied significant weaknesses in the treaty: it contains no verification procedures, it does not require the destruction of any warheads or missiles, and it expires on the same day that it goes into effect.

Those weaknesses should not be ignored. I joined with my colleagues in voting to approve a formal treaty on U.S. and Russian arms reductions in order to send a message that more work is needed to reduce, control, and secure the most dangerous weapons that mankind has created. The Moscow Treaty is a modest step away from the Cold War threat of nuclear holocaust, but more steps need to be taken.

The resolution that I offer represents the Senate's next step in pushing for more action in the control of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons. I am grateful to the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, Senator Lugar, for his support of the resolution as its principal cosponsor. The Byrd-Lugar resolution urges the administration and the Russian Federation to do more to implement nonproliferation programs.

The United States has a good record in working with the countries of the former Soviet Union on nonproliferation programs. The Cooperative Threat Reduction program, conceived by former Senator Sam Nunn and of Senator Richard Lugar, has an astounding record of success. That program has destroyed more than 6,000 Soviet-era nuclear weapons and more than 800 ballistic missiles. The program helped to remove all nuclear warheads from Belarus, Ukraine, and Kazakstan. It has made significant progress in securing nuclear materials, chemical weapons, and biological weapons.

The Byrd-Lugar resolution states the sense of the Senate on three important issues relating to U.S. non-proliferation programs.

First, the resolution states clearly the strong support of the Senate for non-proliferation programs that ``are intended to reduce the threat posed by

nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons that remain unsecured in the Russian Federation and elsewhere.''

Second, the resolution urges the Russian Federation to increase access to key weapons facilities and to share more information about its weapons programs. According to General Accounting Office testimony delivered to the House Armed Services Committee on March 5:

Russia will not allow DOD [Department of Defense] and DOE

[Department of Energy] the level of access they require to

design security improvements [at weapons storage sites],

verify their installation, and ensure their proper operation.

As a result, agencies have been unable to help protect

substantial portions of Russia's nuclear weapons. . . In

addition, many Russian biological sites that store dangerous

biological pathogens remain off-limits. (GAO testimony, 3/5/

03, GAO-03-526T)

Third, the resolution urges our country to redouble efforts to achieve full implementation of nonproliferation programs, under effective management, and with full use of the funds that Congress may appropriate for nonproliferation activities.

Critics have been active in pointing out that poor management of some nonproliferation projects has resulted in wasted money and lost time. Most recently, some have leveled criticism at two projects that were intended to eliminate Russian rocket fuel. The United States spent $200 million to build two facilities to eliminate fuel that was left over from destroyed Russian missiles, only to find that the fuel was diverted into the Russian civil space program. As a result, these facilities are left with no rocket fuel to destroy.

It is a very serious issue when such a great amount of money is devoted to an unsuccessful program. There is no excuse for poor planning and management. We should not lose sight of the importance of nonproliferation programs, and to ensure their success we must not ignore such examples of mismanagement. That is why the Byrd-Lugar resolution makes a point about the need for effective management in our nonproliferation programs.

But just as management improvements are needed, the Executive Branch has been slow to implement nonproliferation programs. There has been delay after delay in spending funds that Congress appropriates for these projects.

According to the administration's fiscal year 2004 budget, $543 million in DOD nonproliferation funds will remain unexpended this year. To put that figure in perspective, the White House has requested $439 million for these programs in its fiscal year 2004 budget. I support that request, but that money--like the half a billion dollars that remains in our coffers--will do nothing to improve our security unless it is spent by the administration. Whatever funds that Congress appropriates to nonproliferation programs should be used in a timely manner that recognizes the serious nature of the threat posed by loose nuclear weapons in Russia.

The Byrd-Lugar resolution underscores the important nonproliferation tasks ahead of us by spotlighting problems that need to be addressed by the United States and Russia. Just as this resolution follows up on the Moscow Treaty, there is much more work to do after this resolution. These are matters on which the Armed Services Committee, of which I am a member, and the Foreign Relations Committee, of which Senator Lugar is chairman, should continue to work together.

One issue that is particularly deserving of increased attention is expansion of non-proliferation programs to countries outside of the former Soviet Union. The supplemental appropriations bill passed by the Senate on April 3, 2003, included temporary authority for the President to spend up to $50 million in nonproliferation funds outside of the former Soviet Union during this fiscal year. Unfortunately, this provision was not included in the final version of that bill that was signed into law by the President on April 16, 2003.

The Director of the Central Intelligence Agency warned the Armed Services Committee on February 11 of a new nuclear arms race among smaller countries. Let us look beyond the borders of the former Soviet Union to address the heart of the growing menace of nuclear proliferation, and start thinking about how to leverage the success in Russia of the Nunn-Lugar programs into results in other countries.

The Nunn-Lugar programs have greatly reduced the chance that a poorly secured Russian military facility may serve as a one-stop shop for terrorists seeking a nuclear, chemical, or biological weapon. I count myself as a consistent and strong supporter of these programs.

But there is much more work to do. The Moscow Treaty, which requires that thousands of nuclear warheads be removed from deployment, but not necessarily destroyed, renews the need for a cooperative program to keep these weapons out of the hands of terrorists. The Byrd-Lugar resolution sends a message to the White House and to the Kremlin that we need to fix the problems that have surfaced in the nonproliferation programs between our countries and accelerate our work to secure and destroy unneeded and unwanted weapons of mass destruction.

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

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that I may speak out of order.

I thank the Chair.

(The remarks of Mr. BYRD are printed in today's Record under ``Morning Business.'')

Amendment No. 1095

Mr. President, I thank the distinguished Democratic whip for his thoughtfulness and courtesies.

Mr. President, just last month we celebrated Older Americans Month, a time of reflect on the contribution of older Americans to our society-- to their families, their communities, and their Nation. For many seniors, these ``golden years'' are the most valuable time in their lives, a time when they may no longer have the day-to-day aggravations of work, and can concentrate their time and efforts on something else-- grandchildren, lifelong passions, learning new skills, acquiring knowledge, or participating in creative endeavors.

But that is not the case for many seniors. In too many instances, seniors who have worked and saved a lifetime find that today's cost of living far exceeds the level they can afford. Despite planning and frugality, today's costs simply have exceeded the means of many older Americans, and they find that the visions of the secure life they had expected post-retirement are now more a nightmare than a dream.

A big part of the problem is the value that our society places on the elderly--it is much too low!

Age discrimination is all too prevalent in the workplace. Long-held stereotypes--that seniors are slow, forgetful, less competent than their younger counterparts--limit opportunities for older workers and prevent businesses from benefiting from well-honed talents. Those stereotypical images are just plain wrong.

To be 65 today is not like it was to be 65 when I was a young man. The idea of pushing senior citizens out of the door to make room for younger workers is, itself, antiquated.

I grew up during the Great Depression when one had to work hard just to get a job and then work even harder to keep it. People of my generation, the generation Tom Brokaw has referred to as ``The Greatest Generation''--I kind of like that term, ``The Greatest Generation,'' although I don't quite agree with it.

Seniors in the workforce can be a positive and inspiring force.

The reason I don't agree with it is that I think the greatest generation was that generation that produced the Constitution of the United States and produced this constitutional system of government that we have today. We will talk more about that on a later day.

I grew up during the Great Depression when one had to work hard, as I say, just to get a job and then work harder to keep it. People of my generation, coming from that experience, developed a work ethic which can inspire young people today. Seniors in the workforce can be a positive, inspiring force. Moreover, better health care and healthier lifestyles have extended lifespans and led to a senior population with vigor and vitality.

But when the health of seniors does decline, this Nation does an embarrassingly poor job of dealing with their needs. Child care has become a booming business in this Nation. Millions are spent on bigger, brighter, better child care centers--lively places, filled with happy activities and stimulation. That is as it should be. But when the elderly need daily care, too often they are relegated to dim, overcrowded centers, places that serve as little more than warehouses that provide busy work for the hands, and little to fill the heart and soul.

Inestimable numbers of scam artists focus on the elderly. The offices of Attorney Generals across the nation are besieged with complaints from seniors who were prey for some con artists and ended up losing their life savings. Newspapers carry stories about CEOs of big, once- profitable companies who are awarded big bonuses, while the pensions of loyal retirees are squeezed. When this is how we treat our seniors, something is wrong with America.

Older citizens should rejoice in their long lives, in their collected experiences, and in their accomplishments. But in America today, magazines showcase images of young, vibrant models. Movies and television shows feature youthful actors and actresses. No one wants to be ``old'' anymore. It has become a tarnished word.

Older citizens today are generally not appreciated as either experienced ``elders'' or possessors of special wisdom. Older people are respected only to the extent that they remain capable of working, exercising, and taking care of themselves. In American culture, increasing age seems to portend decreasing value as a human being. It should be just the opposite.

How did the American culture develop such blatant disregard and disrespect for the elderly? Well, however we got to such a point, we are definitely here.

Senior citizens need to rise up and make their voices heard or else they will be forgotten, especially when it comes to policy formation that directly affects them, such as Medicare legislation before us today. The Senate is in the midst of an important debate on a major restructuring of Medicare--a debate that will shape the health care choices of millions of our Nation's senior citizen for years to come.

The Medicare program is in desperate need of renovation to meet the needs of today'a older citizens living in a new era with dramatic advancements in the delivery of health care. Medicare was designed to provide health care benefits to the most vulnerable segments of the population, the elderly and the disabled.

When I voted, way back in 1965, to establish the Medicare program, pharmaceutical treatments, then more of footnote in health care, were not nearly as commonly available as they are now.

Today, they are a primary form of medical care and often substitute for more costly treatments like hospitalization and surgery.

Today, 40 million Americans rely on Medicare to help provide for their medical needs. With more than one-third of all Medicare beneficiaries lacking insurance coverage for the cost of needed medications, finding affordable prescription drug coverage is a critical issue for our Nation's seniors. Prescription drugs are an essential tool for treating and preventing many acute and chronic conditions, but Medicare fails to cover them on an outpatient basis. Too many seniors and disabled persons in this country, especially those living on fixed incomes, are forced to choose each month between paying for food and paying for shelter, or buying the essential medicines that their doctors have prescribed.

Our Nation's senior citizens are losing their patience. They are losing their dignity. And they are fed up with fast-rising drug costs that they cannot afford. Older citizens should not have to travel in bus loads to Canada and Mexico just to obtain the medications their doctors prescribe. What does it say about this country and its values when we fail to take care of our elderly citizens whose lifetime of work and sacrifice and dedication and industry helped to endow this country with the greatness it now enjoys?

Mr. President, I fear that the legislation before us today is a glaring example of how this Nation shortchanges our senior citizens. We are not taking care of our elderly citizens as they wrestle with the most serious issue in their lives. We are offering a partial fix to assuage senior anger. This bill fails to go far enough to meet the needs of our Nation's senior citizens. I am concerned that this measure would force Medicare beneficiaries to rely on a private, untried, untested, drug-only insurance market for their prescription drug coverage, rather than the traditional Medicare program that they know and trust. We split drug benefit off from Medicare?

I am concerned that this administration and some Members of Congress plan to phase out the traditional Medicare program as an option for new beneficiaries in the future. Some people have asserted that this legislation is merely a Trojan horse designed to get rid of Medicare. I sincerely hope that this is not the case, but there is something very suspicious about this particular horse.

I am worried that we may be endorsing the slow suicide of one of the most popular and effective Government programs in history. I have been down this tortured road before during my 50-year tenure in Congress. My constituents and others around the Nation are reeling from public programs that have been turned over to the so-called free market. Utility rates, cable rates, airline rates, you name it, the free market has ensured exorbitant prices with diminished service, especially for rural areas such as West Virginia. Pensions and retirement security have taken a similar beating.

The Medicare program, for which I voted in 1965, was originally created because the private sector did not offer affordable and reliable health insurance to the elderly and the disabled. Health care has certainly changed in the past 38 years, but what has not changed is the fact that the private market does not want to insure people who are old or disabled or likely to need care. Mr. President, what is the rationale for inventing some new hocus-pocus type of plan that exposes senior citizens to the whims of private insurance companies which may be more interested in profits than in providing comprehensive drug benefits?

Mr. President, this legislation, as currently designed, does not even provide sufficient prescription drug coverage. It would cover less than a quarter of Medicare beneficiaries' estimated drug costs over the next 10 years, and the complicated coverage formula has a large donut hole providing zero coverage just when seniors might need it most.

This legislation also includes copayments, premiums, and deductibles that may be unaffordable for man low- and middle-income seniors. The $35-per-month premium, the 50-percent copay, the $275 annual deductible, and the $5,800 stop-loss amount that we have heard so much about are only suggested amounts and certainly not a guarantee. A closer look at the fine print of this legislation reveals that private insurers could choose to charge senior citizens double or even triple these amounts.

Let's fact it, the kind of prescription drug benefit that we have repeatedly promised our Nation's elderly citizens, and that they now rightly expect, would cost at least $800 billion over the next decade. Yet the administration and congressional Republicans have only allocated $400 billion for the next 10 years for a Medicare prescription drug benefit. And during this same period, drug costs for senior citizens alone, according to the Congressional Budget Office, are expected to total almost $2 trillion.

One of the primary reasons this legislation contains such glaring deficiencies in the drug benefits being offered to seniors is not difficult to understand--this administration and Congress have chosen to make tax cuts a higher priority than prescription drugs for senior citizens. Since the Federal Treasury has already been raided, there is not enough money to adequately cover prescription drugs. Senior citizens ought to be outraged--outraged. Senior citizens ought to be outraged. I am a senior citizen, and I represent a State with a lot of senior citizens, and I am outraged! I am outraged!

What is the rationale for waiting until 2006--conveniently right after the next election cycle--to implement this legislation? Why wait? What are we so afraid of? We had Medicare up and running less than 12 months after creating it from scratch in 1965. So why can't we do it now? Mr. President, it seems that this Congress is trying to pull the wool over the eyes of our Nation's senior citizens--hoping to claim victory and keep senior citizens in the dark until they become painfully aware of the fine print--the fine print--of this legislation upon a visit to their local pharmacist in 2006.

Mr. President, this legislation, as it stands, does not provide the real, guaranteed, defined benefit that our senior citizens desperately need and does little to address the high cost of prescription drugs. I had hoped we could improve this legislation through the amendment process, but that does not appear to be the will of this Senate in the mad dash--the mad dash--to reach final passage before the recess. We should do better for our older citizens. We owe them so much.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Will the leader yield?

On the preceding rollcall vote, 28 minutes were required. On this rollcall vote, 22 or 23 minutes were required. So we have over 50 minutes on two rollcall votes. Now, time is worth a little something around here to many of us who don't have much time left. I wonder if we can't do better than that.

I think the Senate ought to treat itself better than that. Senators owe to it other Senators to not just lag and cause rollcall votes to last so long. Twenty-eight minutes on a rollcall vote? Why can't we go over to tomorrow? We are going to be here anyhow. Why can't we go over? Here it is 15 minutes after 10. Do I have the floor, Mr. President?

Very well.

Mr. President, will the Senator yield?

Mr. President, we are falling into this way of doing things. Three-day work weeks. I will tell you, Mr. Leader, one night I am going to get the floor and Senators will be planning on finishing and going home the next day. They won't get to do that. I have seen this happening over and over and over more recently. Three-day work weeks, and we don't come in on Friday and work and vote.

If the Senator will continue to yield, just briefly?

Mr. President, I don't want to overtax the leader at this point or overtax other Senators. Just suffice it to say, we had better get out of this habit of just having 3-day workweeks, staying here until 10, 11, 12 on Thursday night so that people can go out on Friday. I started this thing of having a week at home every 4 weeks, but we worked the 5 days. We worked 5 days in each of the 3 weeks in between, and we started voting early on Mondays and we voted a full day on Friday. I know things have changed. I am not majority leader. I don't mean to be a problem to the majority leader. But this is getting to be a problem with some of us.

I understand that.

I have a wife at home and she needs me there. I ought to be there. I have stopped early on two occasions lately just to go be with her and let the Senate run its course. There is going to come a time when this Senator is going to keep the Senate in session a while. He can still do it.

I say this in the very best of spirit to the leader--and he is doing the best he can--there comes a time when some of us have duties elsewhere and we would like to keep our rollcall records clean. Soon I will have cast 17,000 rollcall votes. So I have been here for my share of the votes. I am getting a little bit fed up staying around here. This last rollcall vote was 23 minutes and the one before that was 28 minutes. There is a lot of hooping and hollering. What do the American people think of us? It is time we went home if we don't work.

I hope, Mr. Leader, that those of you who are so good at working out these things can get people to have voice votes or maybe cut down the time on their amendments.

Madam President, the Senate is poised to adjourn, but before we adjourn, I want to call us away from the onrushing press of Senate business and impending airline schedules to pay tribute to Independence Day. Next Friday is the glorious Fourth of July, that most patriotic and star-spangled of holidays. With the Fourth of July holiday, summer is at its Halcyon best, with temperatures still enjoyable, skies richly blue, and trees and lawns still lush and green, and gardens coming into bewildering abundance. In fields and along the roadsides, wildflowers bloom in profusion, and wild blackberries earn our forgiveness for their thorns by offering the tender treasures of their glossy berries.

It is a golden period of enjoyment for students on summer holiday, the respite still feels luxuriously long, full of golden days of enjoyment.

The Fourth of July this year falls on a Friday, easily making a long weekend for summer pleasure. With luck, the Fourth will be clear and cooler, comfortable for marching bands and hometown parades, bathed in glorious sunshine for family picnics and perfect for evening symphonies and fireworks to compete with the glittering stars above.

If the weather is sweltering, however, then we might be better able to empathize with the Delegates to the Second Continental Congress, who met in Philadelphia in the spring and summer of 1776. In hot and muggy summer weather, clad in heavy styles that were designed for a cooler European summer, the Delegates debated and amended, reportedly fending off flies from a nearby stable that swarmed the Hall and bit the Delegates through the silk hose on their lower legs. But they persevered in their momentous task.

On June 7, 1776, Richard Henry Lee of Virginia offered a motion to declare independence from England. His resolution declared:

These United Colonies are and of right ought to be free and

independent States.

His resolution passed on July 2 by a 12-0 vote, with New York temporarily abstaining.

The next day, on July 3, John Adams wrote to his wife, Abigail, rejoicing over the decision to secede. To Abigail, he wrote:

The 2nd of July will be a memorable epoch in the history of

America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by

succeeding generations as the Great Anniversary Festival.

He further suggested that it ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty.

This is John Adams speaking. This is not some rustic boob like I was when I came to the House more than half a century ago. Listen to him again:

It ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance by

solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty.

It ought to be solemnized with pomp, shows, games, sports,

guns, bells, bonfires, illuminations, from one end of this

Continent to the other, from this time forward, forever.

How remarkably prescient. Adams was off on the date, as we celebrate the approval of the Declaration of Independence rather than of the adoption of the motion, but he certainly knew how Americans like to celebrate. As well, he accurately predicted the explosive growth of an embryonic nation into a continent-spanning colossus.

That vision took great courage, coming as it did on the eve of putting his signature to a document that could easily become his death warrant. Every signer of that Declaration of Independence committed treason against England, against the King of England, against the crown. Every signer could have been arrested, put in chains and sent by boat to England; tried, convicted, and hanged. The delegates to the Continental Congress had, with this act, committed treason against the crown and set their nascent nation-state on the road to war. After the failed Jacobite uprising against England in 1745 under Bonnie Prince Charles, only 31 years before the delegate met in Philadelphia, the Scottish leaders had been beheaded in public ceremonies.

One Delegate to the Congress, John Witherspoon, put it thus:

There is a tide in the affairs of men, a nick of time. We

perceive it now before us. To hesitate is to consent to our

own slavery. That noble instrument upon your table, that

insures immortality to its author, should be subscribed this

very morning by every pen in this house. He that will not

respond to its accents, and strain every nerve to carry into

effect its provisions, is unworthy of the name of free man.

For my own part, of property, I have some; of reputation,

more. That reputation is staked, that property is pledged on

the issue of this contest; and although these grey hairs must

soon descend into the sepulcher, I would infinitely rather

that they descend thither by the hand of the executioner than

desert at this crisis the sacred cause of my country.

What beautiful words. The signers knew full well what risks they were running.

The first anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence took place in a nation at war, with our battle fortunes at low ebb. But Americans still celebrated in Philadelphia, U.S. ships of war were decked in red, white, and blue. At 1 o'clock, each ship fired a salvo of 13 cannons to honor the 13 States. Members of Congress dined in state with other civil and military dignitaries and made toasts to liberty and to fallen patriots. After dinner, the Members and officers of the Army reviewed the troops, followed by a ringing of bells and a show of fireworks.

In 1788, Philadelphia was serving as the U.S. Capital. On that year, not only was the Declaration of Independence celebrated, but also the U.S. Constitution, which had recently been ratified by 10 States. This July Fourth celebration included another new feature--a parade with horse-drawn floats. One float, that of an enormous eagle, carried the Justices of the Supreme Court in lieu of today's beauty pageant queens.

In 1826, the Nation achieved a milestone when the 50th Independence Day celebration was being planned. The mayor of Washington wrote to invite the surviving ex-Presidents and Signers of the Declaration to attend the festivities. The five men, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, and Charles Carroll,

were unable to attend. Why? Because of age or infirmity, or other reasons. Indeed, at 10 minutes before 1 o'clock on July 4, 1826, Thomas Jefferson, principal drafter of the Declaration, passed away.

John Adams, too, breathed his last on the same day. In his 90s and gravely ill, he had determined to hold on until the 50th anniversary of independence. That morning, he roused long enough to confirm to a servant that he knew that ``it is the glorious Fourth of July. God bless it. God bless you all,'' before fading into unconsciousness. Rousing later that afternoon, he confided unknowingly as he passed on to that other shore that ``Thomas Jefferson still survives.'' He did not know that Jefferson had died earlier that day.

James Monroe, who fought in the Revolutionary War and became the fifth President of the United States, also died on July 4, in 1831. James Madison, the fourth President, died a week short of the 60th anniversary of Independence Day, on June 28, 1836.

The last living Signer of the Declaration of Independence, Charles Carroll, performed one of his last public acts on July 2, 1828. He participated in a ground breaking ceremony initiating construction of the Baltimore and Ohio Railway, the first important railroad in the Nation. He died in 1832, at the age of 95. Also in 1828, President John Quincy Adams led an unusual 4th of July parade, up the Potomac River and the old Washington Canal to the site where construction was to start on the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal. These two acts underscore the vital link between the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution which followed it, and the vibrant economy which has made and kept the United States economy vibrant and strong for so many years.

Our Nation is a union of disparate States, each of which has considerable power within its boundaries. But across those boundaries, linking the Union into a seamless web of bustling commerce and economic might, is the national infrastructure. Just as the Constitution provides for the common defense, so it promotes the common good by linking markets and people across States. Over the Years, Federal support for great infrastructure projects, from the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal to the National Highway System, have woven the Nation into a unified economic structure. Federal support for rural electrification and rural telephone and Internet access have spread opportunity and progress from border to border and coast to coast, just as John Adams foretold in 1776.

This 4th of July, as we all visit national parks, tour Federal monuments, drive on interstate highways, call friends and family around the country, and buy picnic goods grown all over the United States--as we celebrate a national Federal holiday under the protective watch of the U.S. military and Federal law enforcement agencies--we unconsciously enjoy the benefits of the Federal Government and of belonging to a union that is the United States.

Each star on the flag, the flag beside the Presiding Officer's desk, we salute so proudly represents a single state, but only when they are aligned together in the constellation of 50 do we feel the strength and the glory that were won for us, beginning on July 4, 1776. This Independence Day, we would all do well to read and cherish the Declaration of Independence. Even more, we would do well as a Nation to study and cherish our Constitution, by which our freedom, so dearly won and so costly held, lives on.

Too often in recent years and months have I seen unwise attempts to erode the checks and balances of the Constitution, unknowing or unthinking efforts to dissolve the institutions and practices established to make our Nation the free and representative government by our Founding Fathers. Attacks on the United States from without are met with instant, unhesitating defense by all Americans, but we are not so knowledgeable vigilant against the insidious weakening from within, even within this Chamber. We are all of us, with our voices and our votes, the last, best guardians of American freedom and independence. We lack only the weapons of knowledge and awareness.

I close with a poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, entitled ``O Ship of State.''

Thou, too, sail on, O Ship of State!

Sail on, O Union, strong and great!

Humanity with all its fears,

With all the hopes of future years,

Is hanging breathless on thy fate!

We know what Master laid thy keel!

What Workmen wrought thy ribs of steel,

Who made each mast, and sail, and rope,

What anvils rang, what hammers beat,

In what a forge and what a heat

Were shaped the anchors of thy hope!

Fear not each sudden sound and shock,

'Tis of the wave and not the rock;

'Tis but the flapping of the sail,

And not a rent made by the gale!

In spite of rock and tempest's roar,

In spite of false lights on the shore,

Sail on, nor fear to breast the sea!

Our hearts, our hopes, are all with thee.

Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, our tears,

Our faith triumphant o'er our fears,

Are all with thee--are all with thee!

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