Floor Statements

Mr. President, it is only Tuesday, and already we have a laundry list this week of reasons why we need a new direction for trade policy in our country.

First, we learned that Halliburton, the beneficiary of more than $20 billion in no-bid Government contracts, is going to, in a sense, take the money and run by moving its headquarters out of the United States and to Dubai in the United Arab Emirates. Then we learned the United States is again discussing trade deals with the United Arab Emirates. These trade talks first fell apart last year during the Dubai Ports World scandal.

Because of our fundamentally flawed trade policy, our Government nearly sold our port security to state-owned companies in the Middle East, and because of our fundamentally flawed trade policy, our Government continued to award no-bid contracts to Halliburton despite the fact that its subsidiaries have come under fire for doing business with the Government of Iran and for potential contract fraud in Iraq. It is time for a trade policy that rewards good corporate citizens, not one that allows our Nation's security assets to be sold to the highest bidder.

Last November, in my home State of Ohio, voters from Toledo to Steubenville, from Chillicothe to Lorain, from Dayton to Youngstown spoke out for change in our Nation's trade policy.

For too long, our Government has stood idly by as U.S. companies that benefit from our tax policy, that get Government contracts, that benefit from community support move their operations overseas. For too long, our Government has pursued fundamentally flawed trade agreements that fail to secure labor and other standards, fail to establish a policy to support business development at home, and fail to provide for national security reviews.

But in this Congress, a new direction has begun. Thirty Members, last week, of a fair trade coalition, that began with the Central American Free Trade Agreement, gathered on Capitol Hill to reaffirm that we need a new direction for trade. Senator Dorgan, Senator Graham, and I have introduced legislation that would ban sweatshop imports and address concerns with China.

What is more distressing than Halliburton's news to abandon the United States for the Mideast is that it owes the Government at least $2.7 billion as a result of bad, possibly even illegal business practices in Iraq--practices which allowed for contaminated water to be served to our troops, which hired unauthorized security forces, and which shamelessly overcharged our Government. Will Halliburton pay their debt before leaving town or will they try to leave American taxpayers--who have already afforded them billions in profits--holding the bag? Congress must do all it can to assess the debt and ensure that Halliburton, before they leave town, pays their debt to our country.

It is unclear whether the administration will take any action to safeguard our Nation's interests when it comes to Halliburton, but it is clear they are not yet ready for a new direction on trade. The latest attempt at another flawed trade agreement is not even inked, and the first corporation is moving offshore.

That is why we need a new direction for trade. That is why we need a trade policy that rewards companies that keep production, and headquarters, in the United States, investing at home as well as in opportunities abroad. That is why, as we learned during the Dubai Ports scandal, we need a national security review of all future trade agreements.

Halliburton's decision to relocate its headquarters also underscores the critical importance of freeing our Nation from its addiction to oil.

Government should foster a climate where companies are rewarded for being good patriot corporations. It is time our Government stop rewarding the Halliburtons of the world and start investing in those businesses that want to help build our Nation, not cheat us and then leave us.

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business for up to 10 minutes.

Mr. President, last November, voters in my State of Ohio spoke out for change. Their call echoed across this country, as middle- class, working, and low-income families claimed ownership of their Government.

For too long, our Government betrayed their values. The drug companies wrote the Medicare law, the oil companies dictated energy policy, and large multinational corporations pushed job-killing trade agreements through the House and the Senate.

In my home State of Ohio, trade in particular was the focus for change in last year's election. Years of job-killing trade agreements are taking their toll on workers and small businesses alike. Two years ago, the largest ever bipartisan fair trade coalition was formed to oppose the Central American Free Trade Agreement--the dysfunctional cousin of the fundamentally flawed North American Free Trade Agreement.

Forced through the House in the middle of the night by one vote, CAFTA did not pass on its merits. So flawed is CAFTA that to this day, nearly 2 years later, it has still not been fully implemented.

The question is not if we trade but how we trade and who benefits from trade. Unfettered free trade has afforded multinational corporations and morally bankrupt countries windfall profits on the backs of often slave, sweatshop, or even child labor. Proponents of unfettered free trade use words such as ``protectionism'' to hide their shameful practices, to mask agreements that trade in human suffering and economic destruction, and to simply try to push away their opponents' arguments.

I am pleased to say this Congress is not only committed to build on the efforts of the fair trade coalition, we are already at work changing trade policy. Earlier this year, Senator Dorgan, Senator Graham, and I introduced legislation that would ban sweatshop labor. We shed light on the injustice of allowing China to enjoy permanent normal trade relations in the WTO while allowing the degradation of environmental and labor standards on massive scales.

In the coming months, Congress will debate fast-track negotiations due to expire this summer. It is clear this administration has little desire--has little desire--to change direction on trade, so it is up to Congress to chart a new course for the future of U.S. trade policy.

Fair trade is not just about doing the right thing for small business, doing the right thing for manufacturing, doing the right thing for workers; it means investing in entire communities.

Our middle class is shrinking. Our policies in Washington have betrayed the values of working families across this country--in Ohio and Rhode Island, all over this country--which is why we must revamp our economic trade policies and invest in our middle class. We must shrink income inequality, grow our business community, and create good- paying jobs. We must establish trade policy that builds on our economic security.

Job loss does not just affect the worker who has lost her job or that worker's family. Job loss, especially job loss in the thousands, devastates communities. It hurts the local business owner--the drugstore, the grocery store, the neighborhood restaurant. When people are out of work, they cannot support their local economy, which forces owners to close their small businesses. That means lost revenues to the community, which hurts schools, fire departments, and police departments.

The trade policies we set here and negotiated across the globe have a direct impact on places such as Toledo and

Steubenville and Cleveland and Middletown. We hear the word ``protectionist'' thrown around by those who insist on more of the same failed trade models. It is considered ``protectionist'' by them when they characterize those of us who are fighting for labor and environmental standards, but they call it ``free trade'' to protect drug company patents and Hollywood films.

If we can protect intellectual property rights, as we should, with enforceable provisions in trade agreements, we absolutely can do the same for labor, the environment, and food safety.

In my home State of Ohio, we have a talented and hard-working labor force and an entrepreneurial spirit that needs only the investment dollars and commitment from Government to realize their economic potential.

Oberlin College, near Cleveland, has the largest building on any university campus in the United States fully powered by solar energy. However, Oberlin College had to buy the solar panels for their building from Germany and Japan because we do not make enough solar panels in the United States.

Through investment in alternative energy, and through biomedical research and development, we cannot only create jobs, we can grow small business, we can help our environment.

Now is the time for our Government to do its part and redirect our priorities from favoring the wealthiest 1 percent in our Nation to, instead, growing our Nation's middle class. It is not a matter of if we revamp our trade policy but when we do it.

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

Madam President, I understand that S.J. Res. 9 is at the desk and due for a second reading.

I now object to any further proceeding with respect to this joint resolution.

Mr. President, there are 43,000 men and women working as transportation security officers, or TSOs, for the Transportation Security Administration. They deserve our respect, not our indifference.

The McCaskill amendment is straightforward. It provides TSOs basic rights and protections in the workplace.

The DeMint amendment, however, strips away those rights and protections. Proponents have raised specious arguments about the consequences of providing worker protections to people whose job it is to protect us. In fact, the opposite is true.

The McCaskill amendment helps ensure that a screening system intended to prevent acts of terrorism actually prevents acts of terrorism. If we want TSOs to protect our health and safety, we should protect theirs. For the sake of screeners and travelers both, TSOs should not be overworked.

For the sake of screeners and travelers both, TSOs should not fear retaliation if they report security breaches.

For the sake of screeners and travelers both, TSOs should have somewhere to turn if they are being harassed or bullied at the workplace or if there are health and safety issues in the workplace.

Basic rights, basic common sense. That is what the McCaskill amendment is about. It doesn't give TSOs the right to strike. It does not compromise the public safety. Actually, it promotes the public safety.

I urge every Member of this body to allow TSOs the same basic rights and privileges and protections as other Federal employees. Vote yes on the McCaskill amendment because you care about these workers, and vote yes because you care about all of us, the people they are protecting.

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

Mr. President, I yield myself 8 minutes of the Democratic time.

Mr. President, every year, 450,000 Americans die from smoking-related illnesses. That means tobacco companies have to find 450,000 new customers every year. Here is how they do it.

There is a new ad campaign from Camel that targets young girls. This is part of a mailer that Camel sent to young women around the country, especially aimed at young women, calling Camel cigarettes ``light and luscious.'' You will notice the resemblance of this mailing to a popular perfume. This is Camel No. 9. Inside this box--this is inside the mailing--is something that looks like a cigarette box. These are not actually cigarettes. They are not allowed to do that under law. But if you open this, you will see Camel is offering two for one, two packs of cigarettes for the price of one.

In Ohio, 20 percent or 134,000 high school students smoke, and each year more than 18,000 children under the age of 18 become daily smokers. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that almost 300,000 Ohio children under the age of 18 who start smoking now will die prematurely as a result. Almost 300,000 children who start smoking now will die prematurely as a result.

Our Nation's youth, frankly, are almost certainly not aware of these staggering statistics when they try their first cigarette, but we are aware of it. If we are not, we should be. It is our responsibility to make sure our children are safe and don't fall victim to these unhealthy addictions--addictions with deadly outcomes. It is our responsibility to make sure our children are safe and don't fall victim to unhealthy addictions.

FDA regulation of tobacco products, legislation introduced by Senator Kennedy, is not only necessary to protect our kids, it will improve the overall health of our Nation and save countless lives. FDA regulation is necessary because most cigarette manufacturers have proved time and again they have no desire to take the course of responsible action. Instead, in an act of morally reprehensible profiteering that contravenes a multistate tobacco agreement struck in 1998, cigarette manufacturers are once again using advertising campaigns to lure teenagers into a deadly habit.

These unscrupulous business practices especially prey on girls in particular. As a father of three daughters, I take personal offense to this kind of advertising that glamorizes cigarettes. Their latest gimmick, again, as I said, is a mailing of a takeoff on a popular perfume. They are sending these out, I presume, to hundreds of thousands of young women.

It strains the imagination that this ad campaign and these kinds of two-for-one coupons--it strains the imagination to think that this is aimed at anyone other than 15- and 16- and 17-year-old girls. These images make their way into millions of homes across the country through these mailers, and they reveal, as I said, a prize of two-for-one coupons, even though cigarettes are legal only for 18-year-olds and older. Cigarette manufacturers are literally investing in the premature deaths of our daughters.

It is up to Congress to put a stop to it. Lung-related cancers are the fastest growing and now the leading cause of cancer death among women. As elected officials, we have an obligation to ensure the health and safety of those who sent us to the Senate. As parents, we have a moral imperative to ensure our children are afforded the best chance for a bright start. There is nothing ``light'' or ``luscious'' about dying from lung cancer.

Every year, smoking costs our Nation more than $96 billion in health care costs. The real costs, of course, are the 450,000 lives lost every single year to smoking-related illnesses.

In my home State of Ohio, health care costs directly caused by smoking topped $4.3 billion, $1.5 billion of which is covered by our State Medicaid Program--the taxpayers. This is a drain on our health care system. It is a drain on our local communities. It is a drain on our Federal and State budgets. Congress must grant, under the Kennedy proposal, the FDA authority to regulate tobacco products.

We have a responsibility to our Nation to ensure that children are safer and they are not the victims of suggestive marketing by tobacco companies. Congress has debated the issue of FDA authority over tobacco for nearly a decade. It is time to finish the debate and take action to protect children, protect young women, girls, from this kind of advertising, from these kinds of campaigns because if we take the right kinds of action, it will save literally hundreds of thousands of lives.

Mr. President, March is National Eye Donor Month, an opportunity to celebrate the gift of sight, to honor past donors and their families, and to raise public awareness regarding the importance of eye donation. We in the Senate can help ensure a sufficient supply of precious corneas by educating the public about the importance of eye donation and encouraging more Americans to become organ donors.

Last year, more than 46,000 Americans had their lives renewed and reinvigorated through the miracle of corneal transplantation. This surgical procedure gives those people who have lost, or are losing, their vision the life-changing gift of restored sight.

For more than 30 years, Teresa Walton, an Ohio resident, lived without depth perception and with the stigma of an altered appearance, because a viral infection stole the vision in her left eye. At the age of 15, while most other children were enjoying high school sports and anxiously awaiting the day they could earn their driver's license, Teresa was unable to recognize when someone approached her from the left, nor could she easily navigate a set of stairs.

Finally, in her forties, Teresa decided it was time for a transplant. Because of the transplant she received in Springfield, OH, the vision in Teresa's left eye was restored. With the return of her depth perception, Teresa can now easily light the candles on her three daughters' birthday cakes. She is no longer self-conscious about the appearance of her left eye. And as a teacher, she can now recognize when one of her students is standing next to her.

Through the tireless efforts of the eye banks located throughout the country, and the coordinated efforts of the Eye Bank Association of America, Teresa Walton and thousands upon thousands of Americans like her have rediscovered the many joys full vision affords.

The power of cornea transplantation is evident in Teresa's story, but it is

only possible if concerned Americans register as an organ donor and, subsequently, inform their family members and loved ones of their intention to donate.

That is why, as National Eye Donation Month approaches, I encourage my colleagues to work with their local eye banks, and the Eye Bank Association of America, to promote eye donation and provide more people, like Teresa Walton, with the miracle cornea transplantation provides. There is no gift more meaningful, or more profoundly important, than the gift of sight.

Mr. President, today before the Senate Banking Committee, the Federal Reserve Chairman testified that the economy is doing well. I was joined by my friend, the Senator from New Jersey, Mr. Menendez, who is in the chair. He told us that consumer spending is up, productivity is up, and that the labor market will stay healthy. At the very moment that the Chairman delivered a rosy prediction for our Nation's economy, an AP story broke that Chrysler is cutting 13,000 jobs. One hundred of those jobs are in Cleveland. Those aren't just numbers; those are 100 families.

Two weeks ago, before the same Senate Banking Committee, the Treasury Secretary testified that the economy was doing well. He repeated many times that the GDP had grown in excess of 3 percent. Earlier that same morning, at the Senate Agriculture Committee, Rhonda Stewart, a single mother from Hamilton, OH, testified that despite working full time, caring for her 9-year-old son Wyatt, and even serving as president of the PTA and a leader in the Boy Scouts, she and her son must rely on food stamps to survive. At the end of each month, she told us, she must forgo dinner so her son can eat because the food stamps just don't go far enough.

Worker productivity is up, profits are up, the stock market is doing well, and millionaires are enjoying exorbitant tax breaks. Thirteen thousand more workers are about to lose their jobs, and a single mother working full time, involved in her community, doing her best, can't afford to eat dinner. There is a clear disconnect between the corporate-driven myopia of this administration on our Nation's economy and the real-world economic conditions working families in Ohio struggle through every day.

Our middle class is shrinking in large part because our policies in Washington have betrayed the values of working families across our country, which is why we must revamp our economic and trade policies so that we invest in our middle class. We must shrink income inequality, grow our business community, and create good-paying jobs. We must establish trade policy that builds our economic security. That is not what we have now.

Job loss does not just affect the worker or even just the worker's family; job loss, especially job loss in the thousands, devastates communities. It hurts the local business owners--the drugstore, the grocery store, the neighborhood restaurant. When people are out of work, they can't support their local economy, which forces owners to close, in too many cases, their small businesses. That means lost revenues to the community, which hurts schools, which hurts fire departments, which hurts police departments. The trade policies we set in Washington and negotiated across the globe have a direct impact on places such as Toledo and Steubenville, Cleveland and Lima, Zanesville and Portsmouth.

We hear the word ``protectionist'' thrown around by those who insist on more of the same failed trade policies. It is considered ``protectionist'' by some of them to fight for labor and environmental standards, but they call it free trade when we pass trade agreements to protect drug company patents and Hollywood DVDs. If we can protect intellectual property, as we should, if we can protect intellectual property rights with enforceable provisions in trade agreements, we can certainly do the same for labor and environmental and food safety standards. It is not a question of if we trade, it is how we trade and who benefits from that trade.

While it is unclear whether the administration will ever acknowledge that our trade policy has failed, it is very clear that this Congress is already at work. Republicans and Democrats are working cooperatively to revamp our trade policy. We are working cooperatively to raise the minimum wage. We will work cooperatively to make education more affordable for middle-class families and to lower the cost of prescription drugs for our Nation's seniors, and we will work cooperatively to invest in new technology and new industry.

In my State of Ohio, we have a talented and hard-working labor force and an entrepreneurial spirit second to none that needs only the investment dollars, predictable tax policy, and commitment from our Government to realize our economic potential.

Oberlin College, in the county in which I live, Lorain County, has the largest building on any university campus in the country fully powered by solar energy. However, the builder had to buy the solar panels from Germany and Japan because we do not make enough of them in our country.

Through investment and alternative energy, we can not only create jobs, we can grow industry, and we can grow industry through biomedical research and development. Now is the time for Government to do its part and direct our priorities from favoring the wealthiest 1 percent to growing our Nation's middle class.

Mr. President, on a personal note, I would like to take this opportunity to wish my wife Connie, who is home in Ohio under several feet of snow, a happy Valentines Day.

Connie, I am blessed to have you as my wife.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent Senator Cardin be recognized at 3 p.m., and when Senator Sanders is recognized today, he be permitted to speak up to 20 minutes.

I yield the floor.

If the Senator will yield?

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business.

Madam President, earlier this week the President traveled to Peoria, IL, and yesterday to Wall Street and delivered speeches that painted a remarkably rosy picture of our economy. He praised current U.S. trade policy, applauding his evidence of success, the increase in global free-trade agreements since taking office. I have to say that I, along with millions of middle-class families in Ohio, in Missouri, all over this country, had to wonder what part of the country he was talking about. In my State of Ohio, in Steubenville, in Youngstown, Toledo, Columbus, and Dayton, more than 180,000 manufacturing workers lost their jobs in the time the President has been in the White House.

The President was right about one thing: Productivity is up, and that is a testament to our Nation's hard-working and skilled labor force. Far too

often, our Nation's workers do not share in the wealth they create. Our small businesses can't compete against the multinational corporations that exploit cheap labor abroad. Our Nation's history is all about workers. As their productivity increases, they share in the wealth they create for their employers, creating a middle class, creating a rising standard of living.

The President also talked about wage increases for workers, but I am afraid that is where he lost us again. I would invite the President to sit down with a steelworker in Steubenville or a machinist in Toledo or a small tool-and-die shop owner in Dayton. Workers are not seeing their wages increase, nor are they seeing new job opportunities. Employers are not seeing trade policies that level the playing field. Our economic values are skewed toward a very select few in this country.

While it is true the President has pushed 10 free-trade agreements through the negotiation process, he has done so using a fundamentally flawed trade model. More of the same in this case is not such a good thing.

What the President did not say during his speech was that trade negotiations are falling apart. The Central American Free Trade Agreement pushed through the House of Representatives by one vote in the middle of the night still has not been fully implemented. The subsequent Andean Free Trade Agreement fell apart before it even began. Two years ago, thousands of workers in Central America took to the streets protesting this failed trade policy. Last week, tens of thousands of workers in Korea took to the streets protesting a pending free-trade agreement with our country. Why? Again, because the administration continues to use a failed trade model for these agreements. Revamping U.S. trade policy is not just about taking better hold of our economic health; it is about establishing priorities in Washington that reflect family values at home and building strong relationships with trading partners abroad.

While the administration continues to be out of touch with Main Street, I am pleased to say that finally in this Congress there is a bipartisan fair trade effort underway. I am working with Democratic Senator Byron Dorgan of North Dakota and Republican Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina on a new direction for trade policy. It is not a question of if we trade but how we trade and who, in fact, benefits from trade.

While discussing the minimum wage this week, Senator Kennedy used these charts to illustrate the development over time of drastic economic inequality in our country. From 1946 to 1973, economic opportunities for poor and working families grew. The lowest 20 percent actually had higher growth, percentagewise, than the top 20 percent in this country. The families who worked hard and played by the rules had a real chance of getting ahead.

From 1973 to 2000, things began to change dramatically. From 1973 to 2000, the lowest 20 percent had the lowest growth in their incomes; the top 20 percent had the fastest growth. It so happened in the year 1973, two things happened: the oil embargo, with the price of oil shooting up; second, 1973 was the year when the United States, historically with trade surpluses, fell into trade deficits, and we have been in trade deficit ever since 1973.

If we look again at this chart, from 1946 to 1973, for 26 years, economic growth was shared equally, with the lowest 20 percent actually growing at the fastest rate and the top 20 percent at the lowest rate. Since 1973, when our country went from persistent trade surpluses to persistent trade deficits, growing more and more and more every year, the lowest 20 percent now have the lowest growth rate, by far. The highest top 20 percent have the fastest growth rate, by far.

We should also look at what has happened to the trade deficit. In 1972, the year I first ran for Congress, our country had a $38 billion trade deficit. In 2006, when the numbers are finalized, our trade deficit will exceed $800 billion. We went from a $38 billion to a $800 billion trade deficit. As President Bush first pointed out, back in 1989-1990, $1 billion in trade deficit or trade surplus translates into 13,000 jobs. So do the math: $1 billion in trade deficit translates into 13,000 lost jobs. Our trade deficit is now $800 billion for the year 2006. Our trade deficit with China in 1992, the year I first ran for the House of Representatives, our trade deficit with China was barely into the double digits. Today our trade deficit with China has reached about $250 billion.

It is clear our trade policy has failed. We have given countries such as China, countries that exploit sweatshop labor and manipulate their currency, an unfair and unnecessary advantage.

If trade agreements can be crafted to protect drug patents and drug companies, those same trade agreements can protect the environment. If trade agreements can be crafted to protect international property rights and Hollywood films, the same trade agreements can protect workers, small American businesses and our communities.

Current U.S. trade policy allows for the inhumane exploitation of foreign workers; it exacerbates job losses in places such as Lima and Zanesville, OH. It puts local businesses--particularly small tool and die, machine shops, small manufacturers--at an unfair disadvantage, forcing thousands of them to close, as large corporations move to Mexico, China, and elsewhere overseas.

In my home State of Ohio, more than 40,000 jobs have been lost to China in the last decade, allowing foreign companies to pay slave wages, to abuse their workers, and to lie about their business practices hurts Americans. It hurts American workers. It hurts American businesses.

This country is already hard at work to change our trade policy to promote fair trade that works for U.S. businesses. We want trade defined differently. We want different trade practices. We want trade that will help small business, that will help workers, and that will stem the exploitation of workers in developing nations.

No longer are Democrats and Republicans in Congress going to stand idly by while businesses and workers in Ohio, businesses and workers in places such as Gallipolis and Springfield and Lima are penalized for playing by the rules.

In the last Congress, we changed the debate on trade. In this Congress, we will change the face of trade.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, earlier this week the President traveled to Peoria, IL, and yesterday to Wall Street and delivered speeches that painted a remarkably rosy picture of our economy. He praised current U.S. trade policy, applauding his evidence of success, the increase in global free-trade agreements since taking office. I have to say that I, along with millions of middle-class families in Ohio, in Missouri, all over this country, had to wonder what part of the country he was talking about. In my State of Ohio, in Steubenville, in Youngstown, Toledo, Columbus, and Dayton, more than 180,000 manufacturing workers lost their jobs in the time the President has been in the White House.

The President was right about one thing: Productivity is up, and that is a testament to our Nation's hard-working and skilled labor force. Far too

often, our Nation's workers do not share in the wealth they create. Our small businesses can't compete against the multinational corporations that exploit cheap labor abroad. Our Nation's history is all about workers. As their productivity increases, they share in the wealth they create for their employers, creating a middle class, creating a rising standard of living.

The President also talked about wage increases for workers, but I am afraid that is where he lost us again. I would invite the President to sit down with a steelworker in Steubenville or a machinist in Toledo or a small tool-and-die shop owner in Dayton. Workers are not seeing their wages increase, nor are they seeing new job opportunities. Employers are not seeing trade policies that level the playing field. Our economic values are skewed toward a very select few in this country.

While it is true the President has pushed 10 free-trade agreements through the negotiation process, he has done so using a fundamentally flawed trade model. More of the same in this case is not such a good thing.

What the President did not say during his speech was that trade negotiations are falling apart. The Central American Free Trade Agreement pushed through the House of Representatives by one vote in the middle of the night still has not been fully implemented. The subsequent Andean Free Trade Agreement fell apart before it even began. Two years ago, thousands of workers in Central America took to the streets protesting this failed trade policy. Last week, tens of thousands of workers in Korea took to the streets protesting a pending free-trade agreement with our country. Why? Again, because the administration continues to use a failed trade model for these agreements. Revamping U.S. trade policy is not just about taking better hold of our economic health; it is about establishing priorities in Washington that reflect family values at home and building strong relationships with trading partners abroad.

While the administration continues to be out of touch with Main Street, I am pleased to say that finally in this Congress there is a bipartisan fair trade effort underway. I am working with Democratic Senator Byron Dorgan of North Dakota and Republican Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina on a new direction for trade policy. It is not a question of if we trade but how we trade and who, in fact, benefits from trade.

While discussing the minimum wage this week, Senator Kennedy used these charts to illustrate the development over time of drastic economic inequality in our country. From 1946 to 1973, economic opportunities for poor and working families grew. The lowest 20 percent actually had higher growth, percentagewise, than the top 20 percent in this country. The families who worked hard and played by the rules had a real chance of getting ahead.

From 1973 to 2000, things began to change dramatically. From 1973 to 2000, the lowest 20 percent had the lowest growth in their incomes; the top 20 percent had the fastest growth. It so happened in the year 1973, two things happened: the oil embargo, with the price of oil shooting up; second, 1973 was the year when the United States, historically with trade surpluses, fell into trade deficits, and we have been in trade deficit ever since 1973.

If we look again at this chart, from 1946 to 1973, for 26 years, economic growth was shared equally, with the lowest 20 percent actually growing at the fastest rate and the top 20 percent at the lowest rate. Since 1973, when our country went from persistent trade surpluses to persistent trade deficits, growing more and more and more every year, the lowest 20 percent now have the lowest growth rate, by far. The highest top 20 percent have the fastest growth rate, by far.

We should also look at what has happened to the trade deficit. In 1972, the year I first ran for Congress, our country had a $38 billion trade deficit. In 2006, when the numbers are finalized, our trade deficit will exceed $800 billion. We went from a $38 billion to a $800 billion trade deficit. As President Bush first pointed out, back in 1989-1990, $1 billion in trade deficit or trade surplus translates into 13,000 jobs. So do the math: $1 billion in trade deficit translates into 13,000 lost jobs. Our trade deficit is now $800 billion for the year 2006. Our trade deficit with China in 1992, the year I first ran for the House of Representatives, our trade deficit with China was barely into the double digits. Today our trade deficit with China has reached about $250 billion.

It is clear our trade policy has failed. We have given countries such as China, countries that exploit sweatshop labor and manipulate their currency, an unfair and unnecessary advantage.

If trade agreements can be crafted to protect drug patents and drug companies, those same trade agreements can protect the environment. If trade agreements can be crafted to protect international property rights and Hollywood films, the same trade agreements can protect workers, small American businesses and our communities.

Current U.S. trade policy allows for the inhumane exploitation of foreign workers; it exacerbates job losses in places such as Lima and Zanesville, OH. It puts local businesses--particularly small tool and die, machine shops, small manufacturers--at an unfair disadvantage, forcing thousands of them to close, as large corporations move to Mexico, China, and elsewhere overseas.

In my home State of Ohio, more than 40,000 jobs have been lost to China in the last decade, allowing foreign companies to pay slave wages, to abuse their workers, and to lie about their business practices hurts Americans. It hurts American workers. It hurts American businesses.

This country is already hard at work to change our trade policy to promote fair trade that works for U.S. businesses. We want trade defined differently. We want different trade practices. We want trade that will help small business, that will help workers, and that will stem the exploitation of workers in developing nations.

No longer are Democrats and Republicans in Congress going to stand idly by while businesses and workers in Ohio, businesses and workers in places such as Gallipolis and Springfield and Lima are penalized for playing by the rules.

In the last Congress, we changed the debate on trade. In this Congress, we will change the face of trade.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I yield myself 5 minutes to speak on the minimum wage.

Mr. President, a little more than 2 years ago, Rev. Jim Wallis and Rev. Bob Griswold--who was then-head of the Episcopal Church--presented to Congress a document that

proved to be both prophetic and practical.

The basic tenets were that budgets are moral documents--these are coming from two people of faith, religious leaders in our country--and our values are represented by how we craft those documents.

The same can be said for legislation, and the same values represented in the fight, for example, to raise the minimum wage.

As wages have stagnated in States such as Ohio, CEO salaries have skyrocketed. And while Congress voted time and again to raise its own pay--six times in the 10 years since the minimum wage has been raised-- it left behind millions of Americans who work hard, who play by the rules, and who too often have so little to show for their hard work.

In my home State of Ohio, voters in November echoed the national cry for social and economic justice by voting in favor of a ballot initiative to raise our State's minimum wage.

In 1963, Dr. Martin Luther King said:

Equality means dignity. And dignity means a job and a

paycheck that lasts through the week.

It is unacceptable that someone can work full time--and work hard-- and not be able to lift her family out of poverty or even pay her bills. For too long Government priorities rewarded a system that allowed a minimum wage worker to earn less than $11,000 a year. Yet some CEOs in our great country make more than $11,000 an hour.

Those who vote against the minimum wage this week--those who have blocked a minimum wage increase in the House of Representatives and in this Senate for a decade--are saying to minimum wage workers such as the single mother working as a chambermaid in Cleveland and a farm worker outside Toledo and a janitor in Zanesville that they do not deserve a fraction--not a fraction--of what we get.

While the cost of living has gone up, the investment in workers has slowly declined. Family budgets are strained because of stagnant wages but pushed to the breaking point when you factor in soaring tuition costs, health care costs, and energy costs.

Yet while wages have stayed stagnant or gone down, worker productivity in this country, as Senator Kennedy showed a moment ago, continues to go up. Those workers are not sharing in the wealth they are creating for their employers. It is time Congress stood on the side of the working men and women in this country.

This issue is not just about workers. Raising the minimum wage affects entire families and communities. In my State, the minimum wage increase will mean an increase for 500,000 wage earners, with 200,000 children living in those homes.

When workers earn a livable wage--and especially if we can expand the earned-income tax credit, a tax break for those workers--those families, who are working hard and playing by the rules, will spend that money locally, which supports small business and helps strengthen the community.

When workers earn a livable wage, stress and burdens that often cripple families struggling to survive are eased.

When workers earn a livable wage, they are more productive at work, which means thriving companies that can compete in the global economy.

Raising the minimum wage means so much more than a few extra dollars on Friday. It means a path out of poverty.

Raising the minimum wage is an affirmation that this Congress-- finally--values American workers. It is about the right family values, and it is about time.

Thank you, Mr. President.

Mr. President, how much time is left on the majority side?

Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Massachusetts. I appreciate especially his discussion about honoring work in this country. We hear talk of family values. We hear talk of honoring people who work hard and play by the rules. Yet, as the Senator recounted, the minimum wage hasn't been increased for 10 years. There has been almost a hostility to workers in this body and down the hall in the House of Representatives, where 6 million workers, as Senator Kennedy pointed out, have lost their overtime or have had their overtime limited. There were attempts to cut the prevailing wage in Louisiana when the average wage of workers in Louisiana in the building trades was only $29,000.

When you look at the charts Senator Kennedy pointed out, you see there is an absolute stagnation or decline in wages in the last 5 years for most Americans--for the 80 percent lowest paid Americans, if you will. But the top 20 percent have seen their wages, their salaries, just skyrocket. That is coupled with the fact that 1 percent, the wealthiest 1 percent of the people in this country possess more of the wealth of this country than the 90 percent lowest of the rest of us.

I will be happy to yield.

Absolutely. The real strength of our middle-class economy over the years, the opportunity through education, through hard work that has built a very prosperous country, really has operated under the assumption that if you are more productive, you share in the wealth you create--whether you are a minimum wage worker, whether you are an engineer, whether you are a schoolteacher--whoever you are. You are adding to the wealth of your employer, the wealth of our country, making our country better off. Clearly, when you talk about a higher minimum wage, when the minimum wage has declined and wages have declined overall, these workers are creating wealth for their employer, but simply are not sharing in that wealth. That is why one of the best selling books out there now is a book called ``War Against The Middle Class.''

As Senator Kennedy has said, it is clear that as productivity has gone up, as workers are working harder than ever before, only a relatively small number of people are sharing in the wealth they create or sharing in the productivity gains that have always marked the success of our country and of our economy.

Absolutely. One of our friends from the other side of the aisle said this whole idea of raising the minimum wage is a less than honest effort to help working families. I am nonplussed by that.

Senator Kennedy uses the term ``hostility'' toward workers. We are seeing more productivity and lower wages, except higher salaries for a relatively small number of people. That is not the American way. It is not the way we were taught in this country to honor work. It is not the way we were taught--to work hard and play by the rules.

Then, on top of that, we are now building more and more tax systems that give the greatest tax benefits to the wealthiest, that 20 percent squeezed out of that 1 percent who are absolutely doing the best, and we do no significant tax relief for working families, no significant tax relief for minimum wage workers. We are not willing to address the earned income tax credit, we are not willing to address helping those middle-class workers who are playing by the rules.

No, I don't buy that argument. I came from the House of Representatives where I was for 14 years. I saw the minimum wage increase basically in 1 day in the House of Representatives a couple of weeks ago. We are now on the eighth day of delaying this minimum wage vote. The people who oppose this minimum wage don't think minimum wage workers should get a fraction of what we get in this body--the salary and benefits; they shouldn't even get a fraction of what we get. They are still unwilling to raise the minimum wage, just standing pure and simple.

The elections last year showed how many voters feel this Government has betrayed the middle class--betrayed them. They wanted to increase the minimum wage straightforwardly. We should have been able to pass on an up-or-down vote quickly the minimum wage. We can deal with tax issues later as this body always does. This should have been done more quickly. But there is, as Senator Kennedy said, that hostility toward workers, whether it is overtime, whether it is Katrina workers, whether it is the refusal to raise the earned income tax credit, or whether it is their reluctance over 10 years, their digging-in reluctance against raising the minimum wage.

Mr. President, let's look at the kind of work the minimum wage workers are doing. They are hotel workers in Cincinnati. They are farm workers in western Ohio. They are people who are working every bit as hard, and many would argue much harder, at much more difficult jobs in many ways while, as Senator Kennedy said, we have made more in a week than they have made in 2 or 3 months. That is what makes for this Chamber's inability or unwillingness to pass this minimum wage increase more quickly--rather than continued delay, continued delay, continued delay, rather than having to do these tax breaks for some of their contributors, rather than do a straight up-or-down vote on whether we should increase the minimum wage for these workers who have worked hard and played by the rules. Don't they deserve a straight up-or-down vote?

Let's pass the minimum wage. Let's give them a chance, to bring up the minimum wage, to make up for the decline in the real value of the minimum wage over the last 10 years.

Again, as Senator Kennedy has said, 6 times in the last 10 years while the House and Senate have refused to increase the minimum wage, 6 different times, these 2 bodies increased our own pay. That is shameful. That is reprehensible, when I hear my friends in this body or in Government talk about family values. Let's talk about real family values. Let's talk about making it possible for families to take care of their children, give their children a chance, an opportunity for education, an opportunity to find a decent job in the greatest country in the world.

I found overwhelming support for the minimum wage. In Ohio, 500,000 people got a raise because of what the voters in Ohio did in November, with overwhelming support of the minimum wage. Two hundred thousand children live in those 500,000 homes. Those are still families who often don't have health insurance, who often have great problems finding daycare for their children when they

are holding their minimum wage jobs. Those are families who are struggling to provide the opportunity for their children to go to school. We know all that. At least one thing we can do here is increase the minimum wage to give those families--not just in Youngstown and in Ravenna, and not just in Springfield and in Xenia--a real chance to raise their children.

Mr. President, I grew up in Mansfield, OH, a small, blue- collar city in the middle of America, a town of famous names--junior highs named after U.S. Secretary of State John Sherman and the legendary Johnny Appleseed; factories called Westinghouse and Tappan Stove and Fisher Body. Like many of our country's greatest cities and our Nation's most comfortable small towns, Mansfield has a Park Avenue and a Main Street, a Central Park and a town square, a Carnegie Library and a corner drugstore.

In those days, people who worked hard, who paid their taxes, who played by the rules just about always had something to show for it. Almost everyone--virtually almost everyone--in my hometown believed that their children would enjoy a better life than they did. The more productive they were--insurance salesmen and factory worker, clerk and farmer--the better off they would be. The harder they worked, the more opportunity for their children. The middle class and all that it meant was much closer to them and for them than a distant aspiration.

One-third of this body, 32 of my colleagues, came off the campaign trail victorious last November. Ten of us joined the Senate earlier this month. We are here for a reason. We are here because for too long Government betrayed the middle class.

In recent years, Ohioans have watched the drug companies write the Medicare law, the oil industry dictate our Nation's energy policy, the insurance companies shape our health care. And perhaps worst of all, many of our largest corporations, untethered to any community, have forced through a willing and compliant Congress job-killing trade agreements which outsource our jobs, divide our families, and hurt our communities.

We are here because Ohioans and people across our land understand the words of Pope John Paul II:

We judge any economic system by what it does for and to

ordinary people and by how it permits all to participate in

it. The economy should serve the people, not the other way

around.

We are here because we have heard from people who have worked hard and played by the rules all their lives, yet have so little to show for it. I met a man at the free clinic in Youngstown who had all but given up because of his diabetes. He came to the free clinic, his blue eyes tearing up, because his daughter insisted, he told me, that she simply wanted him to live. The number of free clinics in Ohio--a rich State in a rich country, a State known for some of the best medical facilities in the world--has doubled in the last decade. In rural Appalachia, the small community of Lottridge in Athens County is suffering from such staggering job loss that the local food bank now serves more than 200 local families. And to maintain their sense of community pride and togetherness, the food bank workers put up curtains and decorations to resemble a general store, not a place of charity.

A worker in Jackson, locked out of his factory because the company refused to negotiate with the union and now without health care, told me his doctor advised him he needed heart surgery. ``I take aspirin every day instead,'' he said, hoping his heart lasts longer than the lockout.

A woman in Cincinnati suffering from hypertension, high blood pressure, and diabetes told me, with fear in her voice, that she was about to fall in the doughnut hole in the new Medicare prescription drug law. She needs help, but she was hiding it from her family. ``I'm so ashamed,'' she sobbed, as if it were her fault.

Last fall, my wife Connie was waiting in line at the local drugstore in the affluent community of Shaker Heights. The woman in front of her was, for all intents and purposes, negotiating prices with the pharmacist to save money. ``What if I cut my pill in half and then take it twice a day,'' she asked. The very understanding pharmacist told her the doctor wants her to take her full medication twice a day. ``But isn't it better, since I can't afford this, to take half a pill twice a day than the whole pill just once?'' she asked. My wife asked the pharmacist: How often does this happen? ``Every day,'' the pharmacist shrugged, ``Every day, all day long.''

At one time, our Government looked out for its people. I wear on my lapel a pin depicting a canary in a birdcage. A mine worker, 100 years ago, used to take a canary down in the mines. The mine worker had no government that cared enough to help him and no union strong enough to help him. He was on his own. In those days, a child born in this country had a life expectancy of about 46 or 47 years. Today we live three decades longer because of what this Government has done. People of faith, people in their union halls, advocates for children and for women and for the poor have pushed this Government to pass clean air and safe drinking water laws, to pass Medicare and Medicaid and workers' compensation and mine safety laws to protect the elderly and the disabled and women and children. Today it seems to be a different story.

Will and Ariel Durant, who probably have documented a wider sweep of history than any writers of the 20th century, warned us:

No society has survived without a middle class.

Something is profoundly wrong with our economy. The CEO of a major retail company recently was awarded a $210 million severance package after the company's stock value dropped. Yet our Nation's working families, Ohio's middle-class families, often cannot afford to send their sons and daughters to school. The Nation's wealthiest 1 percent control as much wealth as 90 percent of the rest of us combined, yet 47 million of us do not have health insurance. That class difference is a threat to our democratic system. A minimum wage worker earns less than $11,000 a year, yet some CEOs in our country make more than $11,000 an hour.

Today we consider legislation to raise the minimum wage from $5.15 to $7.25 an hour. In the last decade, our Government has failed to raise the minimum wage but given ourselves six pay increases. Those who plan to vote against the minimum wage in this Chamber, those who for 10 years have blocked a minimum wage increase in the House of Representatives and in this body, are saying to the single mother working as a chambermaid in a Cleveland hotel, to a farm worker outside Toledo, to a janitor in Zanesville, those who plan to vote against the minimum wage are telling those minimum wage workers that they don't deserve a fraction of what we get, not even a fraction.

There have been failures, to be sure, in this institution. And there have been great moments.

Today, I am joined on the floor of the Senate by Senator Byrd of West Virginia. Three weeks ago, I stood next to him as I was sworn in for my first term and he was sworn in for his ninth term. More than 4 years ago, in October of 2002, Senator Byrd stood in this Chamber and spoke with prophetic wisdom about the pending war with Iraq. He instructed and taught millions of Americans, and he, with Senator Kennedy, inspired and emboldened many of us in the House of Representatives. I was a House Member then. More than 130 of us voted against that war. He warned us then that authorizing war in Iraq was ``both blind and improvident.''

``We are rushing into war,'' he said, ``without fully discussing why, without

thoroughly considering the consequences, or without making any attempt to explore what steps we might take to avert conflict.''

I thank the senior Senator from my neighboring State of West Virginia.

The 110th Congress brings with it the breath of bipartisanship too long absent from our discourse. Democrats and Republicans alike are already working toward rebuilding our Nation's middle class. Earlier this week, I stood with Senator Dorgan of North Dakota and Senator Graham of South Carolina as we called for a new direction in our trade policy. I look forward to more of the same. Our Government needs to stand up for the middle class. We know why our constituents sent us here. We need to get to work. Raising the minimum wage is a very important first step.

We must also work to create an alternative energy industry that not only fosters development of renewable fuels but also creates solid middle-class jobs and new businesses. We must invest in education at all levels. We must provide for our veterans. We must lower the cost of prescription drugs and make health care more affordable. And we must finally bring our troops home from Iraq.

There is much work to do in this Congress. The people of this Nation have placed great trust in our ability to transcend partisanship. We cannot, we must not violate that trust.

I thank the Chair.