Floor Statements

Five or ten minutes. Go ahead.

Mr. President, our trade policy is fundamentally flawed. Years of wrongheaded trade pacts have sent millions of jobs overseas, devastated our communities, and opened our Nation too often to serious homeland security concerns.

When we open our borders to trade, as we should, we open them to national security threats. Congress must assure the American people we have done everything within our power to protect their safety and their health and their welfare and to promote fair trade.

It is estimated that less than 10 percent of foreign cargo is inspected before entering our country. We must both ensure that our ports are operated securely and with clear lines of accountability, unlike the deal to transfer operation of six U.S. ports to a state- owned company controlled by the United Arab Emirates that this administration approved just last year.

The decision to allow a UAE-controlled company to run our ports had significant national security implications. The UAE was, and still may be, a financial and travel outlet for known terrorists. It was not until leaders in both parties in the Senate and in the House of Representatives called attention to this enormous blunder that this deal was stopped.

It is imperative Congress take steps to ensure our homeland security needs are secured every bit as much as our economic well-being.

Today, I am introducing, with Senator Byron Dorgan of North Dakota, the Trade-Related American National Security Enhancement and Accountability, TRANSEA, Act.

This act requires the Office of the United States Trade Representative, in collaboration with the Departments of State, Homeland Security, and Justice, to submit a report to Congress detailing the national security considerations of proposed trade agreements prior to commencing and after concluding those trade negotiations.

The bill also requires future trade agreements negotiated by the administration to include a national security waiver that allows the President to suspend any terms of the agreement should it be required in the interests of U.S. national security.

Lastly, as a final safeguard, the legislation creates a new Congressional Executive Commission on Trade Security, requiring the appointment of Commissioners by both political parties in both Chambers of Congress.

The Commissioners will be charged with annually certifying that the terms of the free-trade agreement do not pose a threat to our Nation's national security interests. Should the Commission find that compliance with the agreement would pose a threat, the President will be obligated to exercise his or her waiver to the extent necessary to ensure the safety and the security of the United States of America.

In a post-9/11 world, U.S. economic policy can simply no longer be viewed in the narrow scopes of bottom lines and profit margins. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said, in 2006:

We have to balance the paramount urgency of security

against the fact that we still want to have a robust global

trading system.

We can do both. It is the responsibility of our Government to ensure that while opening markets for our exporters, as we should, our first priority remains the safety and the security of the American people.

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

Mr. President, I thank Senator Kennedy, and I want to join my colleagues, and I will precede Senator Dodd and join him and Senator Kennedy and others in urging a ``no'' vote on the amendment offered by the Senator from Colorado.

Drugmakers, as we know, have exclusive rights to market a prescription drug under a patent. That means no generic drugs are allowed on the market. There is no price competition and nothing to prevent drugmakers from charging top dollar for their products. Top dollar, as many of our constituents know all too well, for a prescription drug can be breathtaking. A 30-day supply of Nexium, the little purple pill, costs about $193; a 30-day supply of Exelon, an Alzheimer's drug, is $214; a 30-day supply of Pravachol, a statin drug, is $168. Under current law--under current law--drugmakers are rewarded an additional 6 months of competition-

free time on the market when they agree to evaluate a prescription drug for use in children--6 months.

That is a tradeoff. It is a tradeoff the House and Senate agreed to, where adult consumers of this drug--adult consumers of the drug--are denied a less costly generic version of, for example, Prilosec, for an additional 6 months. This means their out-of-pocket health care costs-- or their employer, or their insurance company, or the government--are significantly higher than they otherwise would be. That is the tradeoff.

At the same time, drugmakers agree to conduct pediatric testing they wouldn't have done voluntarily, sometimes for reasons all their own, and those tests provide invaluable information to pediatricians for the proper use and dose of medicines prescribed to children. That was the agreement--the 6-month exclusivity agreement. That incentive has worked to increase, we all agree, the number of pediatric tests drugmakers conduct. That is important. Pediatricians now have access to new information that has enabled them to make better use of prescription drugs to help our Nation's children.

My colleague, Senator Dodd, championed the 6-month exclusivity law in his efforts in this area, as did my predecessor in the Senate, and so many others, and their work has improved the lives of children. Needless to say, the Senator from Connecticut would not arbitrarily or recklessly make changes to the pediatric exclusivity law. It was his idea and his work. He clearly isn't going to compromise it. But he is recommending one change, and this amendment, the Allard amendment, undoes that change, which is included in S. 1082.

He is recommending if a drug generates more than $1 billion in revenues--that is, it is a blockbuster drug--if the drug generates more than $1 billion in revenue, that drug should receive an additional 3 months of market exclusivity instead of 6 months. The reason is both simple and compelling.

It costs about $13 million--think about these numbers--it costs about $13 million to conduct pediatric testing on a new drug. If a drugmaker is taking in $1 billion a year on that drug, $13 million is about 1 percent of their revenues on that drug. Giving that drugmaker an additional 6 months of market exclusivity on a $1 billion drug costs health care consumers and taxpayers--the taxpayers who cover the cost of public health programs such as Medicare, Medicaid, and the VA--it costs them millions of dollars each day.

This is not, as Senator Allard said, a provision to punish the drug companies. It is a provision to help people with their out-of-pocket drug costs. It is a provision to help taxpayers who fund Medicare, Medicaid, and the VA. It is a provision to help those businesses that are funding health care and drug plans for their employees.

The Federal Government could do it another away. The Federal Government could reimburse drugmakers for the cost of pediatric tests. It could reward them with a 600-percent profit on conducting those tests, and it would still cost appreciably less than rewarding them an additional 6 months of exclusivity. That is why we made the decision not to do it that way. But in light of the astounding imbalance between the cost of conducting a pediatric test--$13 million--and the reward that 6 months of exclusivity provides when it comes to a $1 billion drug, Senator Dodd recommended we cut that in half. We provide 3 months of exclusivity for billion-dollar drugs instead.

It is still a breathtaking reward: A $1 billion drug gets a 3-month exclusivity instead of a 6-month exclusivity for a $13 million test--a breathtaking reward for one pediatric test, but it is measurably more justifiable than the 6-month moratorium on price competition.

Common sense, fiscal responsibility, and the fact that all of us in this Chamber report to U.S. taxpayers dictate that we support Senator Dodd on this modest change in his own program. The Allard amendment gives $1 billion drugs a 6-month exclusivity instead of 3. The logic is, if 6 months of market exclusivity is working to prompt drugmakers to conduct pediatric testing, we shouldn't change it. By that logic, we might as well give drugmakers 100 years of market exclusivity. I am sure that would work, too.

The point is, we have to draw the line to encourage pediatric testing, which this will, and to save money for our employers, for our taxpayers, and for senior citizens' out-of-pocket costs. When a drugmaker earns hundreds of millions of dollars, in many cases out of the pockets of U.S. taxpayers, for a pediatric test that costs about $10 million, that is unnecessary, it is unjustifiable, and it is outright wrong.

Please vote for common sense, for protecting our children, for U.S. taxpayers, for consumers, and against the Allard amendment.

Mr. President, I understand there is no further debate with respect to the pending amendment No.

1018, so I ask that the amendment be agreed to and the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table.

Mr. President, amendment No. 1018 is the DeMint amendment.

Mr. President, I thank Senator Coburn for his always innovative approach and his support of this and for all he does in working on health care issues generally and especially on prescription drugs.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be set aside, and on behalf of Senator Brownback and myself, I call up amendment No. 985.

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

Mr. President, I rise today to offer the Brownback-Brown amendment, No. 985, which provides incentives for pharmaceutical companies to develop and manufacture treatments for neglected tropical diseases. According to the World Health Organization, more than 1 billion people--that is one of every six people worldwide--are affected by at least one neglected tropical disease. In addition, neglected tropical diseases claim roughly 500,000 lives every year. However, less than 1 percent of the roughly 1,400 drugs registered between 1975 and 1999 treated such diseases.

This disparity is obviously due to the lack of financial incentives for pharmaceutical companies to bring neglected tropical disease treatments to market because these diseases disproportionately affect low-income countries, mainly in Africa. Creating incentives for companies to invest in treatments for these diseases is not only in our country's national interest, but it is consistent with the longstanding tradition of this country of caring for those less fortunate around the world.

This amendment would award a priority review voucher to any company that brings a neglected tropical disease treatment to market. Priority review is an existing FDA process by which drugs are reviewed in 6 months as opposed to the average time of 18 months. This priority review voucher would be transferable and could be applied to any drug in a company's pipeline.

This voucher, which would be worth hundreds of millions of dollars for a company with a new blockbuster drug, would also benefit consumers. That is because it would give consumers earlier access to a new prescription drug. Most importantly, creating incentives for pharmaceutical companies to develop and manufacture neglected tropical disease treatments will obviously save lives.

I commend Senator Brownback for his hard work on behalf of impoverished populations who desperately need our attention. He is offering Members of this body the opportunity to simultaneously save lives in developing nations, get U.S. consumers access to new medicines more quickly, and engage the drug industry in a win-win proposition. It is a rare opportunity, and I urge Members on both sides of the aisle to support the Brownback-Brown amendment.

Amendment No. 1011

Mr. President, I would like to make a few comments on two other amendments, the first being the Stabenow amendment, which I have also cosponsored, along with Senators Lott and Thune. That amendment will save U.S. taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars while restoring the integrity of the citizen petition process. That is important because the citizen petition process is fundamental to our Nation's democratic system.

Under U.S. law, individuals and organizations have the right and should have the right to petition the Federal Government, which is another way of saying they have a right to communicate their views and have their views heard. The Federal Government is, after all, an employee of the American people. Americans absolutely should have the right to weigh in on Government policies and actions.

Unfortunately, some brand-name pharmaceutical companies have regularly exploited the citizen petition process, filing frivolous petitions solely for the purpose of delaying the approval of generic drugs. They have been quite successful at it. Since 2003, brand drug companies have filed dozens and dozens of citizen petitions trying to stop or delay FDA approval of competing generic products. Ninety-five percent--roughly 19 in 20--of these petitions have been denied outright. What about the other 5 percent? FDA either hasn't acted on them or has approved them in whole or in part because they had no other choice--the brand companies had simply reiterated a factual issue that had already been addressed by FDA. In other words, even the approved petitions, the approved 5 percent, were frivolous.

While drugmakers waste FDA's time and taxpayers' money, American patients are forced to continue paying top dollar--the name-brand price--for the medicines they need. Frivolous citizen petitions have created delays that often range from 11 to 15 months, preventing price competition for drugs that generate millions of dollars in revenue each day. American consumers--American taxpayers, who help finance Medicare, Medicaid, and VA health care--can't afford it. These costs are borne not just by consumers and taxpayers but also employers.

I have worked closely with Senator Stabenow to make sure this amendment doesn't interfere with the right of individuals or companies to petition FDA and that the amendment ensures these individuals that the concerns raised in their petitions will still be taken seriously by FDA. What this amendment does do is fight back against the unjustifiable and costly delays caused by frivolous petitions submitted for the express purpose of blocking price competition in the marketplace.

No one, not the drug industry or any other industry, should be allowed to make a mockery of one of our democratic rights--the right to petition our Government--particularly at the expense of patients and taxpayers. Ms. Stabenow's amendment, cosponsored by Senator Thune and Senator Lott, will put a stop to a tactic which is as costly as it is unethical. I urge every Member of this body to support it.

Amendment No. 990

Mr. President, I also would briefly speak out on the Dorgan reimportation amendment, joining Senators Grassley and Stabenow and so many others in both parties in supporting the reimportation amendment.

Some time ago, about 10 years ago, from my northeast Ohio congressional district when I served in the House of Representatives, along with the Presiding Officer, I used to sponsor bus trips to Canada where we would take mostly senior citizens to a Canadian drugstore right across the river from Detroit--Windsor--which was about a 3- or 4-hour bus drive from Lorain County, where I lived. We would take a busload of 40 seniors and others--mostly seniors, as I said. We would buy prescription drugs in Canada--same dosage, same package, same drug manufacturer, for half or even sometimes a third the cost because the Canadian Government directly negotiated on behalf of 30 million Canadians, negotiated directly with the drug company for specifically less expensive drugs. It was clear to me then that reimportation was legislation we needed so seniors did not have to go to Canada; instead, that wholesalers, the Drug Marts and the CVS's of the world and the mom-and-pop drugstores can negotiate, could get those prices wholesale from Canadian drugmakers or companies and bring those prices significantly down for American consumers.

As Senator Coburn said, when we were House Members we passed legislation 8 or 9 years ago. That legislation was never implemented the way it should have been. The Dorgan amendment will save money for America's seniors, for America's drug consumers, for prescription drug users. It is an important amendment, and I ask for support for the Stabenow amendment, the

Dorgan amendment, and the Brownback-Brown amendment.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation be authorized to hold a hearing during the session of the Senate on Wednesday, May 2, 2007, at 4 p.m., in room 253 of the Russell Senate Office Building. The purpose of the hearing is to hear the views of the five most recent U.S. Nobel Laureates on the state of the country's scientific enterprise and the importance of scientific investment.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources be authorized to hold a business meeting during the session of the Senate on Wednesday, May 2, 2007, at 10 a.m. in room SD-366 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.

The purpose of the business meeting is to consider the nomination of Stephen J. Isakowitz to be the Chief Financial Officer of the Department of Energy, and the draft of an original bill, which is drawn from the text of the following bills:

S. 731--A bill to develop a methodology for, and complete, a national assessment of geological storage capacity for carbon dioxide, and for other purposes.

S. 962--A bill to amend the Energy Policy Act of 2005 to reauthorize and improve the carbon capture and storage research, development, and demonstration program of the Department of Energy and for other purposes.

S. 987--A bill to enhance the energy security of the United States by promoting biofuels, and for other purposes.

S. 1115--A bill to promote the efficient use of oil, natural gas, and electricity, reduce oil consumption, and heighten energy efficiency standards for consumer products and industrial equipment, and for other purposes.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Finance be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Wednesday, May 2, 2007, at 10 a.m., in 215 Dirksen Senate Office Building, to hear testimony on ``The Medicare Prescription Drug Benefit: Monitoring Early Experiences.''

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate Committee on the Judiciary Subcommittee on Terrorism, Technology and Homeland Security be authorized to meet to conduct a hearing on ``Interrupting Terrorist Travel: Strengthening the Security of International Travel Documents'' for Wednesday, May 2, 2007 at 10 a.m. in Dirksen Senate Office Building Room 226.

Panel I: Andrew Simkin, Director of Fraud Prevention Programs, Bureau of Consular Affairs, Department of State, Washington, DC; Patrick Donovan, Assistant Director for Domestic Operations and Acting Director of Diplomatic Security for Counter Measures, Diplomatic Security, Department of State, Washington, DC; Michael P. Everitt, Unit Chief, Forensic Documents Laboratory, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Department of Homeland Security, Washington, DC; Paul Morris, Executive Director. Admissibility Requirements and Migration Control Office of Field Operations, U.S. Customs and Border Protection Washington, DC.

Panel II: The Honorable Ronald K. Noble, Secretary General of Interpol, Lyon, France; Clark Kent Ervin, Director of Homeland Security, Aspen Institute, Former Inspector General of Department of Homeland Defense and Author of ``Open Target: Where America is Vulnerable to Attack,'' Washington, DC; Brian Zimmer, Senior Associate, Kelly, Anderson & Associates Inc., Former Senior Investigator, Committee on the Judiciary, U.S. House of Representatives, Washington,

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate for a roundtable entitled ``SBA Reauthorization: Small Business Loan Programs,'' on Wednesday, May 2, 2007, beginning at 10 a.m. in room 428A of the Russell Senate Office Building.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Special Committee on Aging be authorized to meet on Wednesday, May 2, 2007 from 10:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. in Dirksen 628 for the purpose of conducting a hearing concerning Nursing Home Reform.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Subcommittee on Strategic Forces of the Committee on Armed Services be authorized to meet in open session during the session of the Senate on Wednesday, May 2, 2007, at 2:30 p.m., to receive testimony on Department of Energy Atomic Energy Defense programs in review of the defense authorization request for fiscal year 2008.

Mr. President, 4 years ago today, as Senator Menendez said, the President landed on an aircraft carrier, amid a flurry of pomp and circumstance, and declared, ``Mission accomplished.''

Since that day, much has happened. Since that day, 3,000 brave American soldiers and marines have died in Iraq. This war has gone on, since that day, longer than World War II. Since that day, the United Nations has estimated that 35,000 Iraqi civilians have been killed. Since that day, U.S. taxpayers have spent $450 billion on the war in Iraq.

To get an understanding of what $450 billion is, if we spent $500 every second of every minute of every hour of every day, it would take 29 years to spend the $450 billion we have spent in Iraq.

Now, 4 years later, our troops in Iraq are stuck in the middle of a civil war. Too many of our brave soldiers do not have the body armor they need, in spite of the imploring of so many of us to the administration to do what they need to do to protect our soldiers. Now thousands of Guard men and women face early and extended redeployment.

Four years later, the will of the people resonates in townhalls and in

churches, in back yards and in living rooms across this country. Their message is clear: Mr. President, redeploy our troops out of Iraq.

Up to now, however, the President has refused to hear the calls of millions of Americans. He has refused to listen to voters last fall who demanded a different course in Iraq. He has refused to listen to the Iraq Study Group, which recommended the redeployment of our troops out of Iraq. He has refused to listen to his own generals who have implored him, in many cases, to disengage from this civil war. He has refused to listen to Congress.

The supplemental on its way to the White House echoes what many of us in Congress and military families across this great country have been saying: We need a new direction for Iraq.

We take a backseat to no one in supporting the brave men and women fighting in Iraq. That is why so many of us have pushed this administration, pushed the civilian leadership in the Pentagon and in the White House to equip our soldiers with proper body armor.

We take a backseat to no one in supporting the families of our soldiers overseas. That is why so many of us in this Chamber have pushed to help these support groups that have formed all over the country for soldiers and helping them reintegrate back into their jobs, back with their families and their society when they return home from Iraq.

But more of the same is not a plan for our troops and will not end the war in Iraq. This war has made our country and our world less safe. Congress will continue to fight for our Nation's military by working to see that they have the resources and the support they need and the leadership they deserve.

This legislation fully funds and supports our troops, while establishing conditions that will bring our troops home. It provides desperately needed funding to the Veterans' Administration, something this administration and previous Republican Congresses have woefully underfunded. It provides desperately needed funding to the Veterans' Administration to help care for the hundreds of thousands of new veterans created by this war.

If the President will not take responsibility for his failures in his conduct of this war, then Congress will. If the President will not lead our troops home, then Congress will. We owe it to our soldiers, to our sailors, to our airmen, airwomen, and to our marines, and we owe it to their families.

Instead of threatening a veto, the President should listen to the military leaders, listen to the American people, and work with Congress to change the course in Iraq.

Vetoing this legislation would deny funding our military and our veterans desperately need: $99 billion in emergency Department of Defense spending, more than the President's budget; $3 billion for Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles; $4.8 billion in military construction for BRAC, the Base Closing Commission; and the VA, which has been underfunded by $2 billion in the President's budget, under this bill would get $1.7 billion immediately, more than the President's VA proposal, and will do better in the next budget. It includes $100 million for VA mental health services.

It is absolutely outrageous that this Congress--the House and Senate--and this President send our men and women off to war, not equipping them with the right body armor, not giving them the Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles we know how to build in this country, and then when they return home, not giving tens of thousands of soldiers and marines the health care they deserve.

In addition to what we do to restore that spending and take care of our veterans when they return home, this emergency legislation has over $1 billion for Katrina relief, $13 million for mine safety because of the increase in deaths in mines in places such as Pennsylvania and West Virginia, $625 million for the pandemic flu response, something we absolutely need to be prepared for, and $400 million for energy assistance for the low-income elderly.

Please, Mr. President, before you decide to veto this bill, read this legislation. Don't turn your back on millions of Americans, don't turn your back on your military advisers and the military experts, don't turn your back on our soldiers. Sign this legislation.

Madam President, I appreciate the words of my colleague, the Senator from Wyoming, Mr. Enzi. S. 1082 is a major piece of legislation that aims to--and will--achieve a profoundly important goal. It will improve the public health.

When it is riskier to take a drug than to skip it, the public health is compromised. When a lifesaving prescription drug or medical device languishes at the FDA because of backlogs in the approval process, the public health is compromised.

When pediatricians are forced to fly by the seat of their pants because there is no data to guide the use of a drug or medical device in children specifically, the public health is compromised.

When FDA has the responsibility but lacks the tools to assess the safety or effectiveness of a new drug or device, the public health is compromised.

S. 1082 tackles each of these problems. It gives FDA more authority and drugmakers a greater incentive to assure the safety of medicines before and after drug approval.

It reauthorizes user fees, an additional source of funding that enables FDA to speed up the approval of new prescription drugs and medical devices.

It reauthorizes financial incentives to encourage drugmakers to test their products for use in children, and it establishes similar incentives for medical device manufacturers.

At the same time, it puts more teeth in FDA's authority to require studies when the health or safety of children is clearly at risk.

S. 1082 creates a new institute charged with developing up-to-date methods of assessing the safety and effectiveness of cutting-edge medical interventions.

You are no doubt going to hear complaints about this bill. Some Members will tell you that it is overly bureaucratic. Coincidentally, that is exactly what the brand-name drug industry says about it.

Nobody can accuse the drugmakers of inconsistency. They consistently place their own self-interest ahead of health care safety, access, and affordability.

The drug industry doesn't want FDA to take additional steps to prevent prescription-drug-related injury or death, although the drug industry is open to being shielded from liability when those tragedies happen. When Members of this body stand up and claim this bill is too bureaucratic, don't buy into it.

This is a carefully crafted bipartisan bill. It is less stringent than consumer groups want and more stringent than the drug industry wants. In other words, it is a compromise--a compromise that will improve the public health. There will be amendments to this bill. As Members on both sides of the aisle review them, I urge them to remember this: Amendments that improve drug safety will benefit consumers and reduce health care costs. Amendments that increase price competition in the prescription drug market will benefit consumers and reduce health care costs. And amendments that weaken this bill or block price competition in the marketplace will benefit--who else--the brand-name drug industry.

The drug industry has more than 3,000 lobbyists here and in the House of Representatives. Last year alone, the drug industry spent more than $150 million lobbying at the Federal level. That is quite a home court advantage. As one might imagine, people who have lost loved ones to unsafe drugs and people who cannot afford to fill their prescriptions don't have quite as deep pockets as the drug industry. Still, this is a drug safety bill, this is a drug access bill, this is not a drug industry bill.

I hope every Member will consider the bill and every amendment in that

context because in that context, when we vote on the final bill, if we vote yes, we will be voting to improve the public health.

Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, recently we learned the Ohio National Guard could face early redeployment. We learned the National Guard is being asked to train without the proper equipment. Our Guard will do the job well regardless of the circumstances, but it is wrong to send them to Iraq with incomplete training and inadequate equipment and with insufficient downtime.

The supplemental passed today echoes what many of us in Congress and military families across the country have been saying: We need a new direction for Iraq. Make no mistake, we take a backseat to no one in supporting the brave men and women fighting in Iraq. We absolutely support their families. However, more of the same is not a plan for our troops and will not end this war in Iraq. This war has made our world and our country less safe. The Iraq war has cost 142 Ohioans their lives. It has wounded another 1,000 Ohioans.

Congress will continue to fight for our Nation's military by working to see they have the resources and support they need and leadership they deserve. The supplemental did that today. The supplemental fully funds and fully supports our troops, while establishing conditions that will bring our troops home. It provides desperately needed funding to the VA, something the President simply has not asked for, to help care for the hundreds of thousands of new veterans created by this war.

In the Veterans' Committee yesterday, we heard from families about tragedy after tragedy, from families who have lost loved ones in this war, who didn't get the proper care from the VA because of underfunding, who didn't get the proper direction when they returned home from Iraq because the White House simply did not schedule in the way they should have the kind of help for returning Iraqi veterans. If the President won't take responsibility for those failures and lead our troops home, then Congress must. We owe it to our soldiers, sailors, air men and women, our marines, and especially to their families.

The President should listen to the military leaders and listen to the American people and work with Congress to change course in Iraq instead of threatening vetoes. I hope the President reads this legislation before he makes his final determination whether to sign it or whether to veto it. Vetoing this legislation would deny funding that our military needs and that our veterans desperately need, such as $99 billion in emergency Department of Defense spending--$4 billion more than the President requested; $3 billion for mine-resistant, ambush- protected vehicles; $4.8 billion in military construction in part to fund BRAC--$3.1 billion will go to funding the BRAC 2005 account, and we know all over the country how important that is; and $1.6 billion for individual body armor.

The President and the Pentagon and civilian leaders of this country have fallen shamefully short in their failures to provide the body armor for our troops. We have all heard too many stories. I have heard them in Steubenville and Toledo and Dayton about soldiers' families telling us they didn't have the proper body armor they needed.

The VA would get $1.7 billion more than the President's VA proposal. We know the VA is underfunded at least that much. They have increased only about 10 percent in terms of employees but have a workload of returning Iraqi war veterans of at least 2.5 times that number. There is $39 million in our supplemental budget for polytrauma-related funding. There is $10 million for blind veterans programs. There is $100 million--and this is essential--for VA mental health services and $25 million for prosthetics. None of those did the President include in his request, and none of those have we prepared for properly in the previous Congress and in the White House.

When we add up the numbers and we see 3,300 soldiers and marines in our country have lost their lives in the Iraq war, when you understand the tens of thousands of injuries, we see that our VA is simply not prepared. They are not prepared for this year and next year, let alone for the 50 years down the road when taxpayers are going to be taking care of these deserving veterans, giving the kind of care that we should be providing. We are going to see we are not prepared over the next 50 years to do that, either for health treatment or for treatment of mental health injuries.

In addition to the Iraq spending and the spending for our Nation's returning veterans, there are other things in this emergency spending bill, as there were in Republican bills in the past, drafted by the White House, passed by the Republican House and Senate. There is other crucial emergency spending that needs to be dealt with: $1.3 billion for Katrina relief, $100 million for FEMA and emergency management performance grants, $425 million for securing rural schools, $13 million for mine safety. We have seen some of the most dangerous times in our Nation's mines in the last couple of years. There is $625 million for pandemic flu response, something public health authorities warn us about every week or so here. There is $400 million for LIHEAP to take care of deserving elderly and indigent who simply cannot afford their heating and cooling bills and another $683 million for emergency relief grants--all that this Congress needs to do.

The President has set our Nation on a path that leads in the wrong direction in Iraq and fails to meet the needs of our returning veterans. It is time to change paths. I ask again that the President of the United States read this bill, understand this bill, and understand how the supplemental bill addresses the needs our country faces in the years ahead.

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

Mr. President, last week our colleague, Senator Byron Dorgan, chairman of the Commerce

Committee's Subcommittee on Interstate Commerce, Trade, and Tourism, held the first in a series of hearings on our U.S. trade policy. I was proud to join Chairman Dorgan as we asked the pivotal question on the minds of workers and small business owners across the country: Is free trade working? Is it working for American communities? Is it working for our families? Is it working for our workers?

For the majority of Americans and people worldwide, the answer is a resounding no. For a privileged few, yes, this model of trade has increased the bottom lines. But the economic values embodied by this free-trade model are skewed toward a very select few in our Nation. Not only is our trade policy not working, it is worsening the problem of income equality across the Nation.

From 1946 to 1973, economic opportunities for poor and working families in this country grew. As you can see, that income, people's income--they are divided into five groups--the lowest income, 20 percent, the middle groups, and then the wealthiest 20 percent.

Between 1947 and 1973 in this country, the 20 percent lowest income workers actually saw their income rise the fastest. From 1947 to 1973, that was a time of strong economic growth. It was a time of actual trade surpluses during those years. It was a time of fairly stable energy prices--all of that.

The lesson here: Families that worked hard, that played by the rules, had a real chance of getting ahead.

Then the next, from 1973 to 2000, that economic opportunity began to flatten out for those families. We saw, in those years, from 1973 to 2000--1973 was the year we went from a trade surplus to a trade deficit. That was only one of the reasons. The lowest income workers saw their income grow by the least. People whose income was in the top 20 percent saw their income grow the fastest.

If we had a third chart here, income since 2000, since 2000, income has gone up only for the wealthiest 20 percent in this country.

When Secretary Paulson came to the Banking Committee and spoke to us, he bragged about 3\1/2\ percent economic growth for this country--a good thing. The problem is, profits are up, productivity is up, but workers are not sharing in the wealth they create. Profits are up, executive salaries are up, and almost everybody else's income in this country has been pretty stagnant.

Our economic house is not in order. It is not in order nationally, and it is not anywhere where it needs to be in my State of Ohio. When I first ran for Congress in 1992, our trade deficit was $38 billion. Our trade deficit figures for 2006 topped $800 billion. That is from $38 billion to $200 billion from 1992 to 2006. Our trade deficit with China went from low double figures in 1992 to well over $200 billion--an increase of almost 20 times in those 15 years or so. In fact, since 1982, we have accumulated trade deficits of $4.3 trillion. The aggregate trade deficit from 1982 to the present day is $4.3 trillion. That is money which eventually will have to be paid. Put another way, we have produced 4.3 trillion fewer manufactured goods, in most cases, than we have purchased. Put another way, to understand what $4.3 trillion of wealth transferred out of our country means, if you had $4.3 trillion and you spent $1,000 every second of every minute of every hour of every day, to spend that $4.3 trillion trade debt, it would take you 131 years.

We have lost more than 3 million manufacturing jobs across the country. Those are jobs which pay an average of 31 percent more than service sector jobs. Service sector jobs, the ones that NAFTA and the World Trade Organization proponents said would replace manufacturing jobs, they also are tradable and they are also moving offshore at a swift pace.

The trade policies we have set in Washington and negotiated across the globe have a direct impact on places such as Toledo and Hamilton, OH, Cleveland and Steubenville, and Lime, OH, as well as in Mexico and Korea and Bangladesh.

We must shrink income equality, grow our business community, and create good-paying jobs. We must establish trade policy that builds our economic security, not undermines it. Job loss does not just affect the worker or even just the worker's family. Job loss, especially job loss in the thousands, obviously devastates communities, layoffs of police and fire and teachers and all of that. It hurts local business owners, the drugstore, the grocery store, the neighborhood restaurant.

This model of trade is also not winning us more friends abroad. Last month, tens of thousands of workers in Korea took to the streets protesting a pending free-trade agreement with the United States, similar to the tens of thousands of protesters against the Central American Free Trade Agreement in our country and in the six countries in Central America.

Much has been written and said about the waning enthusiasm for the free trade area of the Americas, throughout Latin America, most notably because of what NAFTA has done to Mexico's rural population, with a million and a half small farmers' livelihoods devastated. It almost toppled the favored Presidential candidate in Mexico last year, as the challenger talked about NAFTA's negative impact on Mexico and who came within a hair of winning. In Brazil, in Bolivia, in Ecuador, and elsewhere, leaders are responding to the demand for a very different, more equitable trading system, not one modeled after the North American Free Trade Agreement.

A few years ago, I traveled to McAllen, TX, where I crossed the border with a couple of friends into Reynosa, Mexico. I met a husband and wife who worked for General Electric Mexico, 3 miles from the United States, and lived in a shack about 15 feet by 15 feet, no running water, no electricity, dirt floors. When it rained hard, the floors turned to mud. Behind their little shack was a ditch maybe 4 feet wide, human and industrial waste flowing through that ditch. The American Medical Association said it is the most toxic place in the Western Hemisphere.

As you walked through their neighborhood, you could tell where the people living in each of those shacks worked because their homes were constructed from the packing material, the boxes and the wooden crates and the pieces of cardboard and all, the packing material from the company for which they worked.

You could go nearby to an auto plant, nearby to these homes in this neighborhood, 3, 4 miles from the United States of America. The auto plant looked just like an auto plant in Lordstown, OH, or just like the auto plant in Avon Lake or just like the auto plant at Twinsburg, OH. The auto plant was modern, the technology was up to date, the floors were clean, the workers were productive, and the workers were working hard. The only difference between the Mexican auto plant and the American auto plant is the Mexican auto plant did not have a parking lot because the workers are not paid enough to buy the cars they make.

You could go halfway around the world to a Motorola plant in Malaysia, and the workers are not paid enough to buy the cell phones they make, or come back to our hemisphere, to Costa Rica, to a Disney plant, and the workers are not making enough at the Disney plant to buy the toys for their children. You can go back halfway around the world to a Nike plant in China, and the workers are not making enough to buy the shoes they make in their jobs.

Only when workers share in the wealth they create will we know our trade policy is working. American workers are more and more productive every year, an explosion in productivity in this country, yet workers' wages are flat, as we see, especially the bottom 60 or 80 percent, and especially since 2000, where our trade policy is having a depressing impact on wages.

Two years ago, thousands of workers in Central America took to the streets protesting that failed trade policy. CAFTA still has not been implemented in Coast Rica because it is so controversial. In fact, this week in Costa Rica, there will be a public referendum on the Central American Free Trade Agreement.

This shift in thinking about free trade, both in the Senate and the House, in this country among the public and abroad, presents all of us today with an opportunity, the challenge we face, which grows in urgency as to how we trade and take part in our global economy without continuing to destroy, to undermine the middle class. The current system is not sustainable.

Those of us who support free trade--not fair trade but support free trade--we want trade, we want plenty of it, but under new rules. We want legitimate fair trade. It is considered protectionist by some to fight for labor and environmental standards, but they consider it free trade to protect drug company patents and Hollywood DVDs. If we can protect intellectual property rights with enforceable provisions in trade agreements, as we should, we absolutely can do the same for labor standards and environmental protections and food safety standards.

I am pleased to say this Congress is already hard at work in building a better trade policy. Senator Dorgan and I have introduced antisweatshop legislation. We need more fair trade to build the middle class and lift up American workers. There will be more of those proposals in the future. It is not a matter of if we trade but how we trade and who benefits from that trade. Thank you, Mr. President.

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

Mr. President, I rise in support of the Kohl amendment. I, first of all, appreciate the terrific work he has done in the Manufacturing Extension Partnership.

I come from a State with many of the same problems the Senator from Wisconsin faces, including a decline in our industrial base. In too many cases, many of the 3 million manufacturing jobs our country has lost are in my State, and it especially hurts those small manufacturing companies, those small tool and dye makers, those small machine shops in Steubenville and Akron and Toledo. The work he has done on the Manufacturing Extension Partnership has already helped turn around some of those businesses in my State, in Ohio, in the Miami Valley, and the Mahoney Valley and everything in between.

The MEP allows small companies--the big companies don't need the help so much--similar to the Agriculture

Extension Service, which is so important throughout the world and America--the Manufacturing Extension Partnership has really mattered in helping these small companies, whether it is cutting energy costs, whether it is learning how to export, working with the U.S. Export Assistance Center, whether it is dealing with some kind of trade policy, perhaps, or tax policy, helping those small companies learn how to compete in this increasingly difficult and competitive global environment. The MEP has had strong support from both parties, so I strongly urge my colleagues in both parties to support this amendment.

There is simply no reason the administration every year comes and tries to cut this, and every year we fight back and restore the funding. I will be discussing later, either in this bill or sometime later, legislation I have introduced to allow a revolving fund through the Manufacturing Extension Program done locally. In Ohio I believe there are 11 or 12 regions of the State under MEP that can help, that really can help, help form MEP programs in working with these small businesses, these small manufacturers. In Cleveland there is a program called Magna, and in Kyoga County specifically they have had this revolving loan program--sort of a pilot program--that has helped with innovation and with the manufacturing, marketing, and with the development of new products. I think the Kohl amendment will go a long way in helping MEP help small businesses and help us compete globally. So I ask my colleagues for support of the Kohl amendment.

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

Sure.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent there now be a period of morning business with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. President, recently we learned that the Ohio National Guard could face early redeployment. We learned the National Guard is being asked to train without the proper equipment. Our Guard will do the job well, General Wade and others in Ohio assure me, and their past history shows they will. Our Guard will do the job well regardless of the circumstances, but it is wrong to send them to Iraq with incomplete training, with inadequate equipment, with insufficient downtime.

The conference report released last night echoes what many of us in Congress and what so many military families across our great country have been saying: We need a new direction for Iraq.

Make no mistake, we take a back seat to no one in supporting the brave men and women fighting in Iraq, and we absolutely support their families. But more of the same is not a plan for our troops. More of the same, more involvement in this civil war, will not end the war in Iraq. This war has made our country, and our world, less safe. The Iraq war has cost 142 Ohioans their lives and wounded another 1,000.

GEN Colin Powell, talking about the President's surge, the President's escalation of this war, has said:

I am not persuaded that another surge of troops into

Baghdad for the purposes of suppressing this communitarian

violence, this civil war, will work.

Colin Powell, General Powell, recognizes this is a civil war, recognizes that the surge, the President's escalation will not result in a different outcome in Iraq.

Congress will continue, of course, to fight for our Nation's military by working to see that they have the resources and the support they need and the leadership they deserve. The conference report fully funds and fully supports our troops while establishing conditions that will bring our troops home. It provides desperately needed funding to the Veterans' Administration to help care for the hundreds of thousands of new veterans created by this war.

When we think of the carnage brought about by this war, when we think of the literally tens of thousands of men and women who serve this country and who are back from Iraq and who are in the Veterans' Administration health care system, we understand why we need from our Government literally a 50-year plan. What are we going to do for the next five decades for these injured men and women who have suffered psychological injury and physical injury? Yet this administration is not even funding our troops, the health care of our returning troops well this year, let alone planning into the future. This supplemental bill we will send to the President in the next few days begins the process of what we need to do to take care of the health and the welfare of these returning troops, these injured, psychologically and physically injured soldiers.

If the President won't take responsibility for his failures and lead our troops home, then Congress needs to and Congress will. We owe it to our soldiers, to our sailors, to our airmen and women and to our marines, and we owe it to their families.

The President should listen to military leaders and the American people and work with Congress to change course in Iraq instead of threatening vetoes. Vetoing this legislation would deny funding that our military needs in Iraq. It would deny funding our veterans desperately need who have returned home.

The President says there is too much pork, too much spending in this bill, as if every other supplemental bill that previous Republican Congresses, the House and Senate, have sent to the President every time with other supplemental emergency spending has not. Mr. President: Please read this bill. Don't dismiss it out of hand because you don't like some of the language about Iraq, even though it protects our soldiers, even though it takes care of our veterans, even though it does things such as spend $3 billion for the mine-resistant ambush- protected vehicles, vehicles that will make our troops considerably safer than the flat-bottomed vehicles where far too many of our troops have been killed or badly injured.

This supplemental bill we are sending to the President includes billions of dollars for BRAC, billions of dollars for military construction, the kind of work we need to do to make our military even more efficient, even more productive. It spends $1.6 billion for individual body armor, something the military and the civilian leadership in the White House and the civilian leadership in the Pentagon have fallen short on, providing the kind of body armor for our troops and the kind of up-armor for our humvee vehicles that is needed.

I ask again, Mr. President: Please read this bill before you decide what you are going to do, and then sign this bill. The VA would get $1.7 billion more than the VA proposal from the President, which was zero; it would have $39 million in polytrauma-related funding; it would have $10 million for blind veterans programs. It has $100 million for VA mental services. It has $25 million for prosthetics.

This legislation we are sending to the President--again we ask him to read it before making his decision instead of dismissing it out of hand--has all kinds of support for our troops, for their health care, for their supplies, for supplying them in the field. It has way more money for our troops in Iraq, in Afghanistan, and for those troops returning home in our VA system, way more resources than the President has allowed in his budget.

The President has set our Nation on a path that leads nowhere. He did not listen to the voters last fall. He has not listened to the Iraq Study Group, the bipartisan panel of very distinguished Americans. He has not listened to many of the military advisers, free to speak freely, and he has not listened to the House and the Senate majorities about this legislation.

In addition, this legislation provides for help for mine safety. It provides for emergency spending for the LIHEAP program, for elderly indigent people who have had their heating or air-conditioning cut off because they simply can't afford to pay for their energy use at home. It has support for the pandemic flu. It has pandemic flu protections. As Senator Stabenow from Michigan said a few moments ago, it has a minimum wage increase, something this Senate or House has not done for 10 years.

Mr. President: Please read this bill before you decide whether you are going to sign it or veto it, and please listen again to General Powell, who said:

I am not persuaded that another surge of troops into

Baghdad for the purposes of suppressing this communitarian

violence, this civil war, will work.

We are on the wrong course in Iraq. If the President signs this bill, it will help us redeploy our troops more quickly out of Iraq in the most orderly and safest way possible. It will also equally and importantly provide for health care for our troops, for the tens of thousands of injured troops who have returned home from this war.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, I understand the Senator from Nevada has an amendment he wishes to offer.

Amendment No. 897.

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

Mr. President, I rise in support of this crucial legislation. I want to read into the record a statement from the Bush administration in support of the bill. It is from the Executive Office of the President, Statement of Administration Policy:

The Administration supports Senate passage of S. 378 to

strengthen judicial security. The legislation would enhance

the ability of the Federal government to prosecute

individuals who attack or threaten participants in the

Nation's judicial system, including judges, lawyers,

witnesses, and law enforcement officers. A Nation founded on

the rule of law must protect the integrity of its judicial

system, which must apply the law without fear or favor. The

Administration also supports the provision to prohibit the

filing of false liens against judges, prosecutors, and other

government officials to retaliate against them for the

performance of their official duties.

Another of the most important provisions of this bill was brought to our attention by Judge Carr of the Northern District Court in Toledo, OH. Judge Carr pointed out the importance of section 101 that ``enhances the ability of the Judicial Conference of the United States to participate in determining the security needs of the judicial branch by requiring the Director of the U.S. Marshals Service . . . to consult with the Judicial Conference on an ongoing basis regarding the security requirements of the judicial branch.''

This legislation makes sense for a variety of reasons. Not only must our judges be protected, but they must have a seat at the table in determining

the safety of our Federal courthouses and the personal safety of the employees of the Federal judiciary and the participants who come in front of the Federal bench.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business for only 5 minutes or so.

Mr. President, I wish to echo much of what Senator Dorgan has said and thank him for his leadership on trade issues. I came to the House of Representatives in 1993, elected in 1992. Our trade deficit was fairly large in those days, we thought: $38 billion. Today, as the Senator said, depending on whether you count services in addition to manufactured products, it exceeds $800 billion.

Interestingly, if you add the aggregate trade deficit from 1992 through 2006--that means the amount of imports we have brought into our country versus the amount of exports we have going out of our country-- we have had a $4 trillion trade deficit in the aggregate. That is $4 trillion of wealth having gone out of our country.

To understand what $4 trillion is, because nobody can really understand that, if you spent $1,000 every second of every minute of every hour of every day--if you spent $1,000 of every second of every minute of every hour of every day--to spend $4 trillion, it would take you 135 years. That is the kind of wealth we have seen go out of our country. But to understand that in more human terms, let me just share a story, if I could, for a moment.

About 7 or 8 years ago, after the North American Free Trade Agreement, unfortunately, passed the House and Senate--Senator Dorgan voted against it in the Senate; I voted against it in the House, a dozen or so years ago--I flew to McAllen, TX, at my own expense and rented a car and went across the border with a couple of friends and visited Reynosa, Mexico, to see what NAFTA had brought to the border areas and to the country of Mexico--at least that part of Mexico.

I went to the home of two General Electric workers--General Electric, Mexico. Both made about 90 cents an hour. Both worked pretty much 60 hours a week, 10 hours a day, 6 days a week. They lived in a home maybe 20 feet by 15 feet, with no running water, no electricity. They had dirt floors. When it rained hard, the floors turned to mud.

When you went outside their home--these are people who worked 60 hours a week each for an American company, a Mexican subsidiary of an American company, 3 miles from the United States of America in Reynosa, Mexico--if you went outside their home, there was a ditch behind their house, maybe 4 feet wide, with 2 by 4s across the ditch. Children would be playing in this ditch with human waste, industrial waste--who knows what was going through it. The American Medical Association said the Mexican-U.S. border is the most toxic place in the Western Hemisphere. And these children were playing in whatever this human and industrial effluent waste was in this neighborhood.

As you walked through this neighborhood, you could tell where the workers worked by the construction materials from which their homes were built--packing materials and cardboard boxes from the companies for which they worked or from the suppliers to the companies for which they worked. They used that as roofs and walls to build their shacks.

Again, these are people who hold full-time jobs for General Electric, Mexico, 3 miles from the United States of America.

Then, nearby, within a mile, I visited an auto plant--an auto plant that looked just like an auto plant in Lordstown, OH, Avon Lake, OH, with modern technology, even more modern than what we have often in auto plants in Ohio, unfortunately. They had clean floors and hard- working workers who were very productive.

There was one difference between the Mexican auto plant and the auto plant you would see in Cleveland. The difference was there was no parking lot in the Mexican auto plant because, simply put, the workers have not shared in the wealth they produce for their company.

You could go halfway around the world. You could go to a Motorola plant in Malaysia, and the workers are not paid enough to buy the phones they make. You could come back halfway around the world to Costa Rica to a Disney plant, and the workers do not make enough money to buy the toys they make for their children. You could go back halfway around the world to China, and the workers at the Nike plant are not paid enough to buy the shoes they make. The difference in their economy and ours, and these trading partners where we have huge trade deficits, is the workers are not sharing in the wealth they create.

But that is starting to happen in the United States. In the last 30 years, the wealthiest 20 percent in our country, the wealthiest 5 percent, the wealthiest 1 percent are seeing their wealth go up while wages are stagnant for the rest of the country. That is why the middle class is shrinking, because people who are working hard and playing by the rules simply are not sharing in the wealth they create.

They are more productive than they have ever been. We are setting productivity records in this country. Yet wages are stagnant or worse. Companies are outsourcing, companies are going overseas. Senator Dorgan said those same companies are getting tax breaks and all kinds of advantages, as this body and, across the Capitol, the House of Representatives continue to pass these job-killing trade agreements that outsource our jobs, that betray our middle class, that mean layoffs of police and fire and teachers and people who make our communities healthier, as families are hurt by these layoffs or as families are hurt by stagnant wages.

That is why we need a very different trade policy--whether it is with Japan, whether it is with Mexico--a trade policy that lifts up the middle class and helps to strengthen the middle class, a trade policy that will help workers in the developing world instead of this trade policy that outsources our jobs, betrays our communities, and hurts our families.

Yes.

Mr. President, I reemphasize what Senator Dorgan says so often; that is, we want trade--plenty of it--we just want it with different rules. We want fair trade. Plenty of countries around the world practice trade, as South Korea does, for their own national interests. We practice trade according to some economics textbooks some days, and other days we practice trade according to what is in the interests of these large corporations that outsource. But these companies--again I use the word ``betray''--they betray our families, they betray our communities when they do what Huffy Bicycles did because those jobs were good-paying union jobs in Shelby County OH, in western Ohio. As Senator Dorgan said, they have been there for hundreds of years.

In the far corner of northwest Ohio there is a company called the Ohio Art Company. The Ohio Art Company makes something that almost everyone who grew up in this country knows about: they make the Etch A Sketch. Some years ago, Wal-Mart went to the Ohio Art Company and said: We want to sell Etch A Sketch in our stores for under $10, and the Ohio Art Company couldn't make them for that price, so they pretty much moved most or all of their production to China.

It is that kind of betrayal by these corporations, with the concurrence of our Government, because our Government writes the rules for these trade agreements--our Government has consistently practiced trade and allowed our largest companies to practice trade not according--unlike other countries that don't practice it according to our national interests, and it is time that we do.

Mr. President, in the next decade our Nation needs to--our Government needs to come up with a manufacturing policy. If our trade laws and our tax laws continue to encourage outsourcing, continue to contribute to this erosion of the middle class, we will be a country with less and less manufacturing, fewer and fewer manufacturing jobs, less and less of an ability to protect our national interests. It is a question of national security, to be able to have a strong manufacturing component to our economy, and it is a question of economic security for families in places such as Dayton, in places such as Steubenville and Painesville and Cleveland, OH, places where people have built middle-class lifestyles, bought their homes, sent their children to college, worked for a decent retirement because they have worked hard and played by the rules and manufactured goods that people in our country use.

I think it is important as we move forward with Senator Dorgan and people like Senator Whitehouse from Rhode Island, who is also very interested in this, that we move forward on developing this manufacturing policy on trade, on tax law, and on helping particularly our small manufacturers compete in this global economy.

I thank the President, and I yield the floor.