Floor Statements

Mr. President, I believe there are no more speakers on the farm bill tonight, or I should say the food, conservation and energy bill. I will close by thanking all of the speakers tonight who spoke so eloquently and strongly for this bill. I thank them for their diligence and interest in and so many of them for their efforts in bringing us to this point. It truly is a bipartisan bill.

A lot of times while I am traveling around Iowa and other States, people will come up to me and say: Can't you people get together and quit your bickering and get something done? I am sure the Presiding Officer has heard that, too. We have all heard that. Well, this is a time when we did that. We did get together in a bipartisan fashion on our committee and we worked hard. We got it through our committee in a day and a half. In December, we had the vote here and we had 79 votes for the farm bill. You cannot get much more bipartisan than that. So we did it. We worked together.

Tomorrow, we will have another hour and a half of debate, evenly divided, on the bill. There will be at least one motion, which has already been made, on a point of order. I don't know if there will be any others tomorrow morning. Then we will proceed to final passage. I will have more to say tomorrow morning.

Again, I thank all of the members of the Agriculture Committee on both sides of the aisle. I can honestly say each member of our committee had a hand in this bill in one way or the other, or on certain parts of it--some more than others in different parts. The Presiding Officer, my good friend from Colorado, Senator Salazar--if he had one fingerprint on this bill, it would be the energy title and all the great work he did to help focus us on getting more in the bill for biomass energy, that is, energy from cellulose--to begin the process of moving us toward more clean, renewable energy in this country. I thank the Senator from Colorado for all of his hard work in that area. However, the Senator also had a lot to do with the nutrition title, to make sure that was a good title to help low-income Americans.

Everybody on our committee had a hand in this. I am privileged to chair a great committee.

This is a committee of caring people. I know each of them. I can say that characterization applies on both sides of the aisle. These are people who care very deeply about fighting hard to represent the minority of Americans who live on our farms and our ranches and in our small towns and communities. But for, I think, the interest and involvement of the members of this Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee, the legislation that is passed here would leave a lot of our rural people on the sidelines.

Let's face it, we don't have the votes here on farm and rural issues like we used to in the old days. So it falls on the shoulders of those of us on our Agriculture Committee who represent agriculture and people who live in rural America, it falls on us to make sure their voices are heard and their concerns are addressed.

That is why I say I am privileged to chair a committee of caring people, who care very deeply about those minority of Americans who work out there on farms and ranches every day, get up, feed the livestock, plant the crops, harvest the crops, who never know from one day to the next what the weather is going to bring or what foreign involvement may mean to markets or what effect a crop failure or abundant crop in another country has on this country and on our markets and prices. Agriculture is different. A lot of people say: Why do we have farm programs? We don't have a program for this business or that business. It is because agriculture is so unique. It is sort of the wellspring of everything else in our society--the production of our food and fiber, for the health of our country, and for our exports.

I was listening to the President of the United States give his State of the Union Address earlier this year. I heard him say, there was one passage--I will never forget--he reminded us that last year our trade deficit had shrunk. I had hoped to hear him say in the next sentence, thanks to our nation's farmers because were it not for the exports of our agricultural commodities, our trade deficit would be much worse than it is.

Again, I thank everyone for all of their statements. I thank all the members of our committee. We will be here tomorrow morning, and we will have a final vote. I hope we will have a strong vote. I hope we can beat our 79 votes that we had in December. The House today had 318 votes. So I hope we have an equally strong vote in the Senate tomorrow.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it stand adjourned until 9:30 a.m. tomorrow, Thursday, May 15; that following the prayer and pledge, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour be deemed expired, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, and the Senate resume consideration of the conference report to accompany H.R. 2419, the Food, Conservation, and Energy Act, as under the previous order; I further ask unanimous consent that the mandatory quorum under rule XXII with respect to the cloture motions filed be waived.

Mr. President, under the previous order, tomorrow there will be 90 minutes for debate on the conference report prior to votes. Senators should expect at least two rollcall votes beginning as early as 11 a.m.

As a reminder, under rule XXII, there is a 1 p.m. filing deadline for first-degree amendments to H.R. 980, the collective bargaining legislation.

Tomorrow, Senators should also be prepared for votes in relation to appointing conferees to the budget resolution conference.

Mr. President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask unanimous consent that it stand adjourned under the previous order.

Mr. President, there is an old saying that no exercise is better for the human heart than reaching down to lift up a child. Whenever I think about Linda Nelson, that saying comes to mind because she had devoted her life to nurturing and educating and lifting up children.

Likewise, for the past 4 years, as president of the Iowa State Education Association, Linda Nelson has devoted herself to lifting up the teaching profession in the State of Iowa. She has fought for better pay and professional development, for more generous funding for public education, and for commonsense reforms to the No Child Left Behind Act. She has done an exceptional job for Iowa's teachers and education support professionals. However, I know that she is looking forward to returning next fall to her real love, which is the classroom at Carter Lake Elementary School and the students she has missed so much.

Linda Nelson has led and served ISEA with true distinction. Under her leadership, membership has increased and local associations have been strengthened. She tirelessly crisscrossed the State of Iowa to visit schools and to consult with teachers and support professionals. I am told that she has been away from home so much that her cats no longer recognize her.

Mr. President, I have always loved what Lee Iacocca said about teachers. ``In a completely rational society,'' he said, ``the best of us would be teachers, and the rest would have to settle for something less.'' Fortunately, in Iowa, so many of our best do go into teaching. And Linda is one of those truly outstanding classroom professionals.

She graduated from the University of Nebraska at Lincoln and has taught for more than 30 years. She has been an active member of ISEA throughout her career. She has held leadership positions at the local, State, regional, and national levels. In 1992, the National Education Association recognized her outstanding contributions to public education with the Charles F. Martin Award.

As I said, Linda's first love is the classroom. But she is committed to securing a quality education for every child, not just those in her classroom, and this has led her to activism in the broader public and political arenas. She was elected to the Iowa House of Representatives in 1992 and served for 4 years as an outspoken champion of quality public schools for all of Iowa's children.

As a teacher, Linda Nelson is a consummate professional, and she speaks with that special authority that can only come from decades of classroom experience. She has been an association president, a mentor, a leader, a legislator. But of the many titles she has worn during her long and distinguished career, she prizes none more highly than the simple title of ``teacher.''

Linda Nelson is one of the many reasons why Iowa public schools are among the most respected and highest achieving in the Nation. We are blessed with an extraordinary cadre of talented teachers, and this is a real point of pride among Iowans. We honor our teachers. We are grateful for their keen minds and generous hearts. We appreciate the long hours they devote to their work--their service above and beyond the call of duty.

Linda Nelson has made a very real difference for the good as president of the Iowa State Education Association. As she returns to Carter Lake, I join with educators across Iowa in thanking Linda for her service, and wishing her the very best in the years ahead.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order of speakers be the following: Senator Harkin, myself, for 20 minutes; Senator Sessions for 15 minutes; Senator Bingaman, 30 minutes; Senator Allard, 10 minutes; Senator Levin, 20 minutes; Senator Murkowski, 30 minutes; Senators Burr and Dole, 15 minutes together; Senator Dorgan, 25 minutes; Senator Kyl, 10 minutes; Senator Cardin, 10 minutes; Senator Cornyn, 15 minutes; Senator Menendez, 10 minutes; Senator Bond, 10 minutes; Senator Kennedy, 10 minutes; Senator Alexander, 20 minutes; Senator Cantwell, 20 minutes; and Senator Collins, 7 minutes.

Mr. President, I understand I have 20 minutes, and I wish to cover two topics during that period of time.

First of all, the topic of this week and the topic for me for the last year and a half has been the molding, shaping, putting together, and finally passing, going to conference, and having in conference for about 3 months the farm bill, or what is presently called the farm bill. Later this week, hopefully on Wednesday, the Senate will take up and hopefully pass by a wide margin the final farm bill conference report, which we have called the Food, Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008. I wish to briefly go over why this bill is so critically important to farming families, to rural communities, and to the Nation as a whole.

This is a strong, bipartisan farm bill. It benefits every American from my hometown of Cumming, IA, population 162, to New York City, population 8 million. This bill provides a strong farm income safety net, so it is good for our farmers, ranchers, and producers. Consumers will like it because it will increase the number of farmers' markets and ensure a safe, dependable supply of high-quality, affordable food. It expands the initiative providing fresh fruits and vegetables to America's schoolchildren, while reforming and expanding other Federal nutrition programs. As production increases, the farm bill will ensure that our precious land and water resources are protected.

The final farm bill conference report significantly reforms traditional farm income support programs.

First, it eliminates the direct payments to producers with high adjusted gross farm incomes and it eliminates all payments to those with high nonfarming incomes.

On Wednesday, when we get to debating this bill, we will probably get into more, but I wish to point out that we have come a long way on this farm bill, although maybe not as far as some people want. In fact, I initially voted for the Grassley-Dorgan and Klobuchar amendments on the Senate floor, but they didn't win. These amendments would have cut the level of support to high-income farmers even more. So we had to work in a spirit of compromise with the House, and I believe we have come up with a good compromise.

Think of it this way: Prior to this farm bill, if you had $2.5 million in income, but 75 percent of that income was from farming, you would still qualify for farm programs. It was only after you had over $2.5 million that you wouldn't qualify. This bill reduces that to $500,000 of nonfarm income. That is a substantial cut, I would submit to anyone. In previous years, if you had farm income, there was no limit. You could have $5 million, $10 million, $20 million in farm income or whatever, and you would still get payments. This bill reduces that to $750,000. So if you get over $750,000 of farm income, you don't get any more direct payments. I submit that is significant, significant reform.

It also improves transparency and accountability. We directly attribute each farm program payment to an individual--direct attribution. That means no more hiding behind shields or any kind of partnerships, multiple entity rules, that type of thing. We have done away with the three-entity rule. No more three-entity rule, which has been in existence for 20 or 25 years. So again, direct attribution, plus we put some pretty tight payment caps in there.

The conference report also includes a new option for farmers, beginning with the 2009 crop year, to choose to participate in a State- level revenue protection system. This is a new option for farmers. If you want to get in it, participants will take a 20-percent cut in direct payments and a 30-percent cut in loan rates. In return, they will be eligible for a State-based revenue guarantee equal to 90 percent of the State average yield times the national average price. Now, this was an ingenious proposal that was first brought to us by the National Corn Growers Association. We worked it over in our committee in the Senate. We took it to conference. I believe we have a good option here for farmers. I also add that Senator Brown from Ohio, a valuable member of our Agriculture Committee, proposed this in our committee. It was at his urging--and I know also Senator Durbin's. Although not a member of the Committee, he was also instrumental in proposing and pushing for this option.

The farm bill also strengthens the Milk Income Loss Contract Program and continues it for the duration of the farm bill. Again, here I have to thank the former chairman of our committee, Senator Leahy, who has been on this Agriculture Committee since before I came to the Senate-- now over 25 years ago. Senator Leahy has been the point person in making sure our family dairy farmers are protected and to make sure they have a seat at this table. In the previous farm bill, in 2002, we had set the percentage of support under the Milk Income Loss Contract Program at 45 percent--45 percent of what, I can tell you later. That was knocked down to 34 percent. We have brought it back up to the 45- percent level in this bill, where it was, by the way, 6 years ago. We didn't increase it; we just brought it back up to that level it had been. We also used an existing formulation the Department of Agriculture uses for the average monthly cost of dairy rations, to adjust this in the future, so we won't have to have these erosions in the future, so if the price of feed goes up, that support for dairy producers will go up. It makes eminently good sense. I think it is reasonable in terms of economics, and also I think it is supportable in terms of having a reasonable price when the feed prices are low. So it is, in a way, kind of a counter-cyclical program for dairy farmers. I thank Senator Leahy for making sure we included that.

The new farm bill includes two new titles focusing on livestock and specialty crops. In the last farm bill--which I was privileged to chair in 2002--we added a new title on energy. We added two new titles this time, livestock and specialty crops. This bill provides $1 billion for specialty crops in this title, and much more for specialty crops throughout the rest of the bill, investing more in the promotion of specialty crops than any previous farm bills, including funding for market research as well as supports for producers who transition from conventional production into organics. Organic agriculture is one of the fastest growing sectors of American agriculture. We have recognized that by putting more funds in there for transition support for farmers' markets, and for aggregation of commodities from small farmers. The new livestock title promotes animal health, market opportunities, contracting fairness, and stepped-up enforcement and oversight under the Packers and Stockyards Act. So it is good for our livestock producers.

In a time of economic downturn and rapidly rising prices for food staples, millions of low-income Americans have joined the ranks of the hungry and ``food insecure.'' For that reason, basically, all of the money we added on this goes to the nutrition title, bringing the new money into nutrition, which is nearly $10.4 billion in this bill. We are $10 billion over baseline.

The new money we basically got through the Finance Committee--$10 billion--basically was all put into the nutrition program. We took another $400 million from inside the farm bill and added to it. I can honestly say all the new money we put in the bill went into nutrition.

This new funding will reform and strengthen nutrition assistance. We raised the standard deduction. Keep in mind the standard deduction was frozen in 1996, and has wreaked havoc on

our low-income people since then. So the standard deduction in 1996 was $134 a month. If it had not been frozen in 1996, the standard deduction today would be $188 a month, not $134 a month. We could not go to $188. We didn't have enough money. So we raised it to $144 a month, but we indexed it for the future so we won't have this benefit erosion in the future. It gives you some idea of what is happening to low-income families.

Think about this. If we had not frozen that benefit level in 1996 at $134, it would be $188 a month right now. Yet, we could only raise it to $144. We did our job with the money we had. We also provide more money to families with childcare expenses by removing entirely the cap on childcare deductions. We also raised the minimum benefit by almost 50 percent and indexed that also to future inflation, and the asset level is indexed forward. We were unable to raise it because of money concerns, but we did index it for the future. No longer will erosion take place because of inflation.

We increased the food bank supplies by adding some $1.2 billion to the Emergency Food Assistance Program. We provide $1 billion in new funding over the next 10 years for the Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Program for kids in schools. This program, which I started in the 2002 farm bill, when fully implemented, will serve nearly all children in our poorest elementary schools--that is, the schools that have at least 90 percent of their kids eligible for free and reduced-price meals. In those schools that would fully implement this, almost every poor kid will get free fresh fruits and vegetables during the day.

To meet the soaring worldwide demand for food and energy crops, millions of acres of land are being brought into production. A lot of this land is environmentally fragile. To address that challenge, we authorize nearly $4.5 billion in additional funds for the Environmental Quality Incentives Program and the Conservation Stewardship Program over the next 10 years. Again, these are payments to farmers, to incentivize and encourage them to be even better stewards of our soil, water, air, and wildlife habitats on working lands--rather than taking land out of production. Combined spending for these two programs, the EQIP program and the CSP program, will total more than $27.7 billion in the next 10 years.

With this support, the Conservation Stewardship Program will enroll nearly 13 million acres each year. To participate, producers will have to maintain and expand environmental benefits by adopting rigorous conservation and management practices.

The Wetlands Reserve Program also gets a number of improvements, with an additional $1.3 billion to implement those improvements. We have simplified and streamlined the process of valuing property and getting into the Wetlands Reserve Program. Over the next 5 years, this money will provide for a total enrollment in the Wetlands Reserve Program of over 3 million acres.

This bill also creates a new and interesting focus on restoring the Chesapeake Bay. This money covers the Chesapeake Bay watershed. This is very important to Members of Congress and the Senators from Virginia, Delaware, Maryland, and Pennsylvania. We put $438 million of new money into the environmental and conservation needs of the Chesapeake Bay Initiative.

On the energy side, all-time gasoline prices, as we know, are wreaking havoc with family budgets. But as studies have shown, without the inputs of ethanol, prices at the pump would be as much as 40 cents a gallon higher. Well, this new farm bill will dramatically ramp up the agricultural sector's capacity to produce clean, renewable energy. We provide more than $1 billion to expand the supply of biofuels made from biomass and crop byproducts other than grain. We also provide new assistance to farmers who would grow energy crops, and to entrepreneurs who will build biorefineries to convert the biomass into biofuel.

Like any compromise bill resulting from hard bargaining among regional and other interests, this farm bill, I suppose, is far from perfect--perfection being in the eye of the beholder, of course. I don't think anyone, on either the Democratic or Republican sides, would say they love every little thing in this bill. As the chair of this conference committee, I can tell you it has been a long and difficult road, but the end product is a bill with significant reforms, urgent new investments in nutrition, conservation, energy, and the health of our school kids.

That is why I was disappointed last week when Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer held a news conference to say the President would veto the bill. The administration said we didn't cut payments to farmers in times of high farm income. But this administration itself actually proposed increasing direct payments, which are least responsive to high prices in income.

By contrast, Congress determined that it makes more sense to ensure the programs that help producers manage risk are as effective as possible if farm revenue is disrupted because of price or production shortfalls. We have only added to the income support if prices or revenue declines. That is the right approach. The administration said, no, we will put more money in there even if you have high prices. We said that is the wrong approach. The right approach is counter- cyclical. That is what we do. We have the support in place so it is available if needed.

What the administration and USDA proposed would have increased payments regardless of the prices. Congress correctly rejected the administration's proposal.

Finally, when the Senate passed the farm bill in December on the Senate floor, the bill was approved with 79 votes--the largest majority vote any farm bill has received since 1949. I was proud of that vote, being chairman of the committee. The bill was further strengthened in the conference process. And we went, I believe, over halfway to accommodate the President's wishes and concerns. He said the income limits weren't low enough. The administration proposed $200,000. As I said earlier, for nonfarm income it used to be $2.5 million. We brought it to $500,000. That is way over halfway in meeting what the President had proposed. So, again, like any compromise bill, this bill has things in it that I suppose any one of us could say is not quite right. But as a compromise bill, it includes real reforms, major advances in conservation, renewable energy, rural economic development, nutrition, and help for our kids in schools.

I am proud of this bill. I hope we have a strong vote in the Senate. I still hope the President will sign it. If he doesn't, I am hopeful we will have the votes to override the veto and put the bill in place for the future of our country.

How much time do I have remaining?

Mr. President, I wish to discuss briefly the matter of the collective bargaining for our firefighters and public safety employees. I am an original cosponsor of S. 2123. Decker Ploehn, the city administrator in Bettendorf, Iowa, wrote me:

I have represented both sides of the table [he was police

chief at one time] and for the last 18 years have

successfully negotiated 5 contracts with our police union

because of strong good collective bargaining laws in Iowa.

This system has great checks and balances with binding

arbitration and a ``no strike'' clause. It causes both sides

to come to the table and to make meaningful concessions. We

have done so in Bettendorf quite successfully. That is all

we're asking for with this legislation--to give public safety

officers elsewhere this kind of opportunity.

Many of our Federal workers, such as Capitol Police, Border Patrol agents, Customs agents, immigration enforcement officers, have the right of collective bargaining. It helps them to serve our Nation's security interests.

Again, it is time that we provide this now to the 21 States where our public safety people are not allowed to bargain collectively. This bill passed the House by 314 to 97. Hopefully, it will pass the Senate with an equally large vote.

If you ask any safety officer, they will tell you that they want the tools to do the best job that they can do. These are not the kinds of jobs that people take to get rich. Public safety workers have a different calling--they want to serve their communities. These are the kind of people who showed up from all over the country to help the victims of the attacks on September 11, 2001. Without concern for

their personal safety or compensation, our Nation's first responders are always there for us. That is why they need a seat at the table to discuss their equipment, training, and staffing needs in order to do the best possible job.

That is why I am an original cosponsor of S. 2123, Public Safety Employer-Employee Cooperation Act. Not only will this legislation allow police officers and firefighters to band together and share their ideas about how to improve their workplace and therefore our safety, but when they can negotiate for good pay and benefits, we are able to attract the best possible workforce to most ably serve its citizens. This bill would only affect the 21 states that don't already provide their public safety officers with the right to bargain collectively. States that do not currently provide these protections can choose to establish their own collective bargaining systems, or may ask the assistance of the Federal Labor Relations Authority in doing so.

As I mentioned, Decker Ploehn is the city administrator in Bettendorf, IA. I followed him around on a work day back when he was the chief of police there. He contacted my office last week to talk about this bill. He said:

I have represented both sides of the table and for the last

18 years have successfully negotiated 5 contracts with our

police union because of strong good collective bargaining

laws in Iowa. This system has great checks and balances with

binding arbitration and a ``no strike'' clause. It causes

both sides to come to the table and to make meaningful

concessions. We have done so in Bettendorf quite

successfully.

That's all we are asking for with this legislation--to give public safety officers elsewhere this kind of opportunity.

I would also like to point out that this bill doesn't create a new right to strike. I know there will be some vehement antiunion forces out there scaring people into thinking that somehow this legislation will reduce public safety by creating a situation where police and firefighters will be leaving their posts in labor disputes. It is simply not true.

We must ensure that we have seasoned, dedicated officers by giving them a voice in the workplace. The best way to do that is to uphold their freedom of association, which will enhance the safety of millions of Americans who rely on their services every day. As I said, similar legislation has passed the House by a vote of 314 to 97, and I am hopeful that Congress will soon approve this issue of basic fairness and freedom.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, first, I wish to ask unanimous consent that Julia Ann Frudden and Shannon Sanders of my staff be granted floor privileges for the duration of today's session.

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of S. 2903 introduced earlier today by myself.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to modify the bill at the desk to insert the date May 9, 2008, in both paragraph 1 and paragraph 2, in lieu of May 2.

Mr. President, I say to my colleague from Idaho that in 1996 when that farm bill came up, it was 6 months late. It was signed into law April 4, 6 months past due. I do not recall the Senator from Idaho raising any objections. He was here at that time. And that was an easy farm bill. This is a very tough one. It is tough because there are tax measures that have come into it--not of my doing, not of the doing of my ranking member. But the Finance Committee and others got involved in this, so we have tax measures that have been a long, drawn-out process. This has sort of been out of our jurisdiction.

Senator Chambliss and I have been dogged in getting the work done on the Agriculture bill, and we have. I say to my friend from Idaho, if this were only the Agriculture bill, we would have had this done a long time ago. This has to do with tax measures. As such, neither Senator Chambliss nor I have control of that; we are not chairman or ranking member of the Finance Committee or Ways and Means.

I say to my friend from Idaho, so they were 6 months overdue in 1996. So we are over 6 months overdue right now. We are very close to getting this agreement done. We worked today, worked yesterday, and things are coming together. We made real progress. It has been slow, but it has been real. We have reached a number of agreements, and we are very close to putting this together.

Why would we want a 2-week extension? The House is not even in tomorrow, for one thing. Then we have to finish this. We have to go back into full conference. There are some items that are going to require a little bit of debate and some votes. Even if we were to finish this bill by next Wednesday, which I think is possible, it is going to take another week just to do the paperwork and get everything together. It is humanly impossible--humanly impossible--legislatively impossible to get everything done in 1 week. That is why I asked for 2 weeks, because that is realistic. It is unrealistic, at this point in time, on Thursday, to say we can get everything done by next Thursday. It is just impossible. I want to be realistic.

I do not want to play any games around here. Frankly, we could finish our work, we can get the stuff done, but we can't get it all nailed down, the paperwork done, all that stuff that has to be done to clean up everything to get it to this body and get it to the House for a vote by next week--legislatively impossible.

I say to my friend from Idaho, you can either be realistic or unrealistic, you can help us out and be supportive of a process that has taken a lot of time and effort by both Senator Chambliss and me, by Republicans and Democrats. We have been working very hard on this, and we are very close to getting it done. To put on just a 1-week extension is just unrealistic.

I yield to my friend from Idaho.

We just have a disagreement on this issue. I guess, due to the objection--I guess we will be back here probably again next week asking for another extension.

Mr. President, I wish to echo a little bit what my friend from Georgia just said. I will say in all candor to my friend from Idaho that his action last week had an effect. I will be very frank about that. It did not go unnoticed in our deliberations. Frankly, I think it caused us to do a lot of things in the last week. So I give that to my friend from Idaho.

I guess the only reason I was a little upset, I think sometimes when we try to do some things that are unrealistic--I think the specter of what you said last week was pretty realistic, and that caused us to do some things. I guess my only problem with this is that I think everyone recognizes that even though we are very close, we can get this done before next week, it cannot get done legislatively, the paperwork. Sometimes if you hold something out that is unrealistic, people tend to pooh-pooh it and say: Oh well, we will get another extension and we can dribble along. But if you know the curtain is coming down, then things happen. That is why I asked for 2 weeks. People know that is realistic. We have to get it done. It has to be done. But if it is 1 week, then, well, we will come back next week, and hopefully we can get whatever extension is necessary to get the paperwork done and everything.

I want to say again, Senator Chambliss and I--all of us on the Agriculture Committee worked very hard. The groundwork was laid when Senator Chambliss was chairman of the committee. When it changed hands after the last election and I was privileged to take over as chairman, we worked together. We passed a great farm bill in the Senate, something I was very proud of, and I think Senator Chambliss--all of us were. We passed a farm bill with 79 votes.

Now, a lot of times people around the country--you hear them say: Can't you people quit your bickering and get things done? Well, I thought we did that on the farm bill. You can't get much better than 79 votes. That is the most votes the farm bill has ever had on the Senate floor. So Republicans, Democrats, East, West, North, South--different regions all were supporting it. So you would think the administration might have said: Well, gee, with that, maybe we ought to work with them and get it done. But we got a veto threat right away.

So, again, I thought we had a good product here when we passed it in the Senate. But, understanding that the House did not have the same views as we did, we had to go to conference. But I can say this again, that I hope in another farm bill that will come up 5 years from now, this is not going to happen again, that this is not going to happen again with the Finance Committee and the Ways and Means Committee basically controlling our agenda. They are good people. I do not want to cast aspersions on any committee or anything like that. But they have their agenda, they have what they want to do.

The Agriculture Committee did its work. As Senator Chambliss said, if it had been just our bill, the Agriculture bill, we would have been done with this a long time ago. Our differences, whatever they are, are minor. We had basic agreements on different parameters and things such as that. So we had a good bill, and we have made good progress.

The other thing I wanted to say as long as I have the floor is that the President is not doing us any favors by the White House issuing the statement that we should have a 1-year extension. For some of the reasons that I think the Senator from Idaho pointed out, prices going up and things like that, people expect us to do something. And one of the big parts of this whole farm

bill--in fact, the biggest part of this farm bill is nutrition. Over 60 percent of this farm bill is nutrition; it is food stamps, it is the TEFAP program, the Temporary Emergency Food Assistance Program, WIC, it is all of these programs that help low-income people put food on their table. Yet we know, with the increasing prices of food, people are hurting, low-income people are hurting in this country.

Well, with a 1-year extension, we give no relief at all to low-income families. In this bill, what we have agreed upon so far is roughly about $10 billion more--not base--$10 billion more in nutrition programs. Now, if we have a 1-year extension, that is gone. So I think we have an obligation here to help people who are low-income, who maybe had a job and lost it, who need to go on food stamps for a short period of time to be able to help their families. Well, if we have an extension, that will not happen.

Energy. We hear a lot of talk--I think it is misguided--about some of the food going for ethanol and that is causing a lot of problems. That is not it at all. That is not it at all. A lot of people have the mistaken idea that the corn that is being made into ethanol is the corn people eat. That is not so. People do not eat that. It is not the kind of corn you buy and you eat on your plate at night. This is the corn which is fed to chickens and cows and hogs. Most of the hungry people in the world are not hungry because they are not getting meat; they are hungry because of subsistence diets. So the ethanol thing is kind of a bugaboo; that is a phony issue out there. But we recognize the limits, and we recognized that in the Energy bill we passed where we mandated a renewable fuels standard, but we said that, of that, no more than 15 billion gallons a year from present sources, corn. So therefore we want to move aggressively into cellulosic ethanol, using wood products and waste products and things such as those for making ethanol. This bill pushes us in that direction, moves us aggressively in that direction. Well, if we have a 1-year extension, we will lose yet another year or two on that.

Lastly, let me mention conservation. Millions and millions of acres are coming out to be used for crop production. You cannot stop it. These are contracts that farmers had to set aside land. The contracts are up. Because of the high prices of wheat and corn and beans and other commodities, farmers now see they can make money by planting row crops. That is fine. That is good. That will help keep the prices of food down. We need that productive capacity.

That is what was so good about the Conservation Reserve Program. It was like a reservoir, that if we needed it at some time, we could use it. Well, now is the time. We are going to use it. And more crops will be planted on this land. But some of these lands are fragile, they are hilly, they are highly erodable. So therefore we need to put some incentives in there for farmers to do it right, to put in grass waterways, to put in buffer strips, to do minimum tillage, to do all that is necessary to conserve our soil and clean up our water. We can have production, and we can have good conservation. This bill puts a lot more money into the very conservation programs that will allow farmers to go out and plant and grow and yet be good conservationists. Yet, if we have a 1-year extension, we do not have that.

So for that and for a lot of other reasons, I wish the White House would quit talking about that and say: Look, you have a good bill. You have done a lot of work. We will work with you. We will get this bill done, and the President will sign it into law. That is the kind of cooperation we need from the White House right now and not the veiled threats of a year extension, things like that.

I think the Senator from Idaho is right, we have been so locked up in meetings on this that perhaps Senators and their staffs and others have not really been brought up to speed on what we are doing. I want to take this opportunity to bring them up to speed as to where we are in all of these negotiations.

We are very close. We are meeting right now again at 10:30 and will proceed on today, tomorrow, through the weekend if necessary to get this done.

I ask unanimous consent that the bill be read three times and passed, the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate, and any statements related to the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Jeryle Greene and Mindy Van Woerkom of my staff be granted the privilege of the floor for the duration of today's session.

Mr. President, tomorrow is Equal Pay Day. What is Equal Pay Day? That is the day that symbolizes how far into the year a woman must work from the previous year on average to earn as much as a man earned by December 31 of last year. It is unbelievable to me that more than four decades after passage of the Equal Pay Act and the Civil Rights Act, women are still making only 77 cents on the dollar to what a man makes. In Iowa, it is even worse. The Iowa Workforce Development Agency found that across all industries, women in my State make less than 62 percent of what men make.

Discrimination takes many forms. Sometimes it is brazen and in your face, like Jim Crow and apartheid. Sometimes discrimination is silent and insidious. That is what is happening in workplaces across America today. Millions of female-dominated jobs--social workers, teachers, childcare workers, nurses, so many more--are equivalent to male- dominated jobs, but they pay dramatically less. The Census Bureau has compiled data on hundreds of job categories, but it found only five job categories where women typically earn as much as a man. Defenders of this status quo offer all manner of bogus explanations on why women make less. How many times have you heard the fairy tale that women work for fulfillment and men work to support their families? Of course, this ignores the great majority of single women who work to support themselves and married women whose paycheck is all that allows their families to make ends meet, to put a little bit of money away for a rainy day or perhaps to send a child to college.

It ignores the harsh reality that so many women face in the workplace where they have to work twice as hard to be taken seriously or, say, get pushed into being a cashier when they had applied for a better paying sales job. These pervasive acts of discrimination deny women fair pay and they also deny women basic dignity.

Let me cite one example of the discrimination I am talking about. Last year in a hearing in our Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, we heard remarkable testimony from Dr. Philip Cohen of the University of North Carolina. Dr. Cohen compared nurses' aides, who are overwhelmingly women, and truck drivers who are overwhelmingly men. In both groups, the average age is 43. Both require ``medium'' amounts of strength. Nurses' aides on average have more education and training. But nurses' aides make less than 60 percent of what truck drivers make.

Given that this discrimination is so obvious and pervasive, you would expect that women would have no trouble at all obtaining simple justice in our court system. But in a major decision last June, in the case of Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company, the Supreme Court actually took us backward. In a 5-to-4 ruling, the Court made it extremely difficult for women to go to court to pursue claims of pay discrimination, even in cases where the discrimination is flagrant.

A jury acknowledged that Lilly Ledbetter, a former supervisor at Goodyear, had been paid $6,000 less than her lowest paid male counterpart. But the Supreme Court rejected her discrimination claim. Why? The Court held that women workers must file a discrimination claim within 180 days of their pay being set, even if they were not aware at the time that their pay was significantly lower than their male counterparts.

Justice Ginsburg said, in a forceful dissent, this is totally out of touch with the real world of the workplace. In the real world, pay scales are often kept secret and employees are in the dark about their coworkers' salaries. Lacking such information, it is difficult to determine when pay discrimination begins. Furthermore, vast discrepancies are often a function of time. If your original pay was a little bit lower than your colleague's pay, and then over 20 years you get smaller raises every year, you end up with a huge gap after 20 years. But if you can only sue for the most recent pay determination, this misses 20 years of discrimination. As a result, in Ms. Ledbetter's case, she is going to get a dramatically smaller pension for the rest of her life based upon that lower pay level.

Ms. Ledbetter, who testified before our committee last year, is injured twice: Over 20 years of flagrant discrimination in the workplace and getting paid less, and now for the remainder of her life, as a retired person, she will get less pension because of that discrimination. Twice she is injured.

What the Ledbetter decision means is that once the 180-day window for bringing a lawsuit is passed, the discrimination gets grandfathered in. This creates a free harbor for employers who have paid female workers less than men over a long period of time. Basically it gives the worst offenders a free pass to continue their gender discrimination.

Ledbetter was a bad decision, but there is one thing we can do with Supreme Court decisions. We can pass legislation to fix them. So I have joined with Senator Kennedy and others to reverse the damage done by that decision. Our bill would establish that the ``unlawful employment practice'' under the Civil Rights Act is the payment of a discriminatory salary, not the original setting of the pay level.

Well, this is a good start, but it is not enough. It is not good enough to go back to the way the law worked last year because women, as I said, are still making less than 77 cents on the dollar as compared to men. That is intolerable. Moreover, if pay scales are still kept secret, if there is not transparency, how can women know if they are being discriminated against?

That is why we need to pass my Fair Pay Act, a bill which I have introduced in every Congress going back to 1996. I just keep introducing it every Congress. Here is what it does. It is very simple. In addition to requiring that employers provide equal pay for equivalent jobs, my bill would require disclosure of pay scales and rates for all job categories in a given company. Now, I did not say they had to disclose every single person's pay, I said pay scales for categories of jobs. Now, this would give women the information they need to identify discriminatory pay practices, and this could reduce the need for costly litigation in the first place.

When Lilly Ledbetter testified before our committee last year, I asked her--I told her about the bill; I told her what kind of information it would provide--I asked her if she had that information, could she have, 20 years ago, negotiated for better pay and avoided litigation? She answered: Of course.

Well, there are countless more Lilly Ledbetters out there who are paid less

than their male coworkers, but they will never know about it unless we get them this information.

My Fair Pay Act amends the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 to prohibit discrimination in the payment of wages on the basis of sex, race, or national origin. Most importantly, it requires each individual employer to provide equal pay for jobs that are comparable in skill, effort, responsibility, and working conditions--skill, effort, responsibility, and working conditions.

Now, you might say: Haven't we already passed the Equal Pay Act? Yes, but the Equal Pay Act only says you have to be paid the same if you are doing exactly the same job. Well, what about if you are doing a job like a nurse's aide, in which you require medium strength, in which you require training, and you compare it to what a truckdriver does? Why should a truckdriver get 60 percent more than someone who is taking care of you when you are ill or your mother or your grandmother or grandparents in assisted living or in a nursing home or in hospice care or a number of other things where nurses' aides are vitally important?

You might say: Well, has this ever been done? The fact is, 20 States--20 State governments--right now have fair pay laws and policies in place for their employees, including my State of Iowa. I point out that Iowa had a Republican legislature and Republican Governor in 1985 when this bill was passed into law. So ending wage discrimination against women should not be a partisan issue.

I am just saying let's take what 20 State governments have done and let's extend it to the private sector. Well, some would say we do not need any more laws; market forces will take care of the wage gap. Well, maybe so, but we all know from basic economics 101 that for a free market to work there has to be not only a number of players where they have equivalent purchasing power--not an employer-employee situation-- secondly, what else is most important for a market to work? Transparency, knowledge, knowing what the game is, openness. But when pay scales are kept secret and you do not know what they are, how can market forces ever, ever close this wage gap?

Experience also shows there are some injustices market forces cannot rectify. That is why we passed the Equal Pay Act, the Civil Rights Acts, the Family Medical Leave Act, and here, in 1990, the Americans with Disabilities Act. Market forces did not break down the barriers of discrimination against people with disabilities in our country. But that is what we did with the Americans with Disabilities Act. We broke the barriers down and let people with disabilities not only get educated, not only travel--go out to restaurants and things--but also get jobs in which we can look not at their disabilities but at their abilities.

Mr. President, I would like to close with a story of a woman from my State named Angie. She was employed as a field office manager at a temp firm. The employees there were not allowed to talk about pay with their coworkers. Only inadvertently did she discover that a male office manager at a similar branch, who had less education and less experience, was earning more than she was. In this case, the story did end happily. She cited this information in negotiations with her employer, and she was able to get a raise.

But I think there is a twofold lesson in this story. The first lesson is that if we give women information about what their male colleagues are getting, they can negotiate a better deal for themselves in the workplace. The second lesson is that pay discrimination is a harsh reality in the workplace. It is not only unfair, but it is demeaning, it is demoralizing, and it is pervasive--pervasive--throughout our society. Individual women should not have to do battle in order to win equal pay. We need more inclusive national laws to make equal pay for equal work--equal pay for equivalent work--a basic standard and a legal right in the American workplace.

So it is time, after all these years, to pass the Fair Pay Act. Do not confuse it with the Paycheck Protection Act. I am also a cosponsor of the Paycheck Protection Act. That legislation will improve the enforcement of the laws we already have on the books. But we already know those laws are not sufficient, as the Ledbetter case shows us. So in order to really open the marketplace for women to earn what they should be earning and to make the equivalent of what their male counterparts are making, we need to pass the Fair Pay Act.

Tomorrow, when we recognize Equal Pay Day--just think about it: Equal Pay Day tomorrow, April 22. So it took women all the way from January, February, March, and April, on average, to earn as much as a man did by December 31 of last year. That is just grossly unfair. It is also time to start paying women equivalent pay to what their male counterparts are making, when their job requires the same skill, effort, responsibility, and working conditions.

When you take all those factors into account, there is no reason why we should not pass the Fair Pay Act. Let's do for the private sector what 20 States have already done in their governments. With that, maybe we will start getting some justice in the workplace for American women.

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Chase Nordengren and Brittany Clement of my staff be granted the privileges of the floor for the duration of today's session.

Mr. President, today I recognize the National Week of the Young Child. This week provides all of us here in Washington the opportunity to reflect on the ways in which we can better care for children in our communities and more effectively cooperate with teachers, parents, and other caregivers.

Critical to the success of many disadvantaged Iowa children is the Head Start program. If we really want to get kids ready for school, we must focus on early intervention. This means improving access to education and developmental services to help provide kids with a good start in life. Since 1965, Head Start has served more than 24 million low-income children and their families.

Head Start programs help Iowa families to meet young children's basic educational, health, nutritional and social needs with a goal of having these kids ready for the first day of kindergarten. I was pleased to recently help modernize and update Head Start by passing The Head Start for School Readiness Act, which allows more families access to programs, improves early childhood training for Head Start educators, and updates learning standards to reflect the latest research in child development. I also made sure that early learning programs do not ignore the importance of wellness and healthy behaviors by requiring training to integrate physical activity and good nutrition in the classroom.

I have heard tremendous stories from my State of children whose lives were improved through the social services Head Start provides. These children received eye glasses or necessary dental work thanks to the early intervention of our Head Start programs. Head Start educators and employees often connect parents in need to the outreach services which help give children safe and comfortable homes.

I was particularly touched by the story of Rebecca Navarro. She writes that her youngest son, Anthony, received help learning his letters and colors, and improved his social skills, through their local Head Start agency. At the same time, a Head Start social worker helped Ms. Navarro go back to school and receive her degree, pay for food and utilities and provide a better quality of life for Anthony and his four siblings. Anthony has now successfully graduated the 6th grade with math skills above his grade level, and plans on going to college and getting his master's degree in engineering and math.

Providing our Nation's youngest learners with the tools they need to succeed benefits not only those children and their families, but our Nation as well. While celebrating the victories of Head Start this week, we should also continue to work hard to ensure every child has the opportunity to reach his or her full potential.