Floor Statements

Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the School Building Fairness Act of 2009. I offer this legislation to meet the urgent need for Federal support to repair crumbling schools in disadvantaged and rural school districts.

This bill would authorize up to $6 billion annually to fund a new program of Federal grants to States for the repair, renovation, and construction of public schools. States would award the grants competitively, with priority given to high-poverty and rural school districts, as well as school districts that plan to make their facilities more energy efficient and environmentally friendly. Districts receiving this federal funding would then be required to provide a local match.

I know this approach to school construction and repair can work because this bill is modeled on the success of the Iowa Demonstration and Construction Grant Program in my home State. Over the last decade, I have secured $121 million in Federal funds that more than 300 school districts across Iowa have used for school construction and repair. This modest Federal investment has leveraged more than $600 million in additional local funding.

In addition to improving the learning environment for students, the School Building Fairness Act will provide a stimulus to the economy by creating jobs in thousands of communities all across the country for workers in the construction industry, as well as architects and engineers.

It will also spur school districts to make their facilities more environmentally friendly and energy-efficient. According to the 2006 report ``Greening America's Schools: Costs and Benefits,'' green schools use an average of 33 percent less energy than conventionally built schools, and generate financial savings of about $70 per square foot.

Safe, modern, healthy school buildings are essential to creating an environment where students can reach their academic potential. Yet too many students in the U.S., particularly those most at risk of being left behind, attend school in facilities that are old, overcrowded and run-down.

We all agree that school infrastructure requires constant maintenance. Unfortunately, far too many schools have been forced to neglect ongoing issues, most likely due to lack of funds, which can lead to health and safety problems for students, educators and staff. The most recent Infrastructure Report Card issued by the American Society of Civil Engineers gives public schools a D grade. Now, I do not know many parents who would find D grades acceptable for their children. So why on Earth would we stand by while the state of the buildings in which our children learn are assigned such a grade?

Despite the declining condition of many public schools, federal grant funding is generally not available to leverage local spending. In fiscal year 2001, in the Senate Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education Appropriations Subcommittee, which I then chaired, I was able to secure $1.2 billion for school repair and renovation. I continue to hear nothing but positive feedback from educators across the country about that funding.

But that one-time investment amounted to nothing more than a drop in the bucket compared to the estimated national need. At the beginning of this decade, the National Center for Education Statistics estimated that the nation's K-12 public schools needed $127 billion in repairs and upgrades. A 2008 analysis by the American Federation of Teachers found that the Nation's school infrastructure needs total an estimated $254.6 billion.

This bill is called the School Building Fairness Act because, as I said, States will give preference in awarding grants to high-poverty and rural districts. Currently, spending on school facilities is almost twice as high in affluent districts as in disadvantaged districts. This is one of those ``savage inequalities'' that Jonathan Kozol writes about--inequalities that largely explain the learning gap between affluent and poor children.

Something is seriously wrong when children go to modern, gleaming shopping malls and sports arenas, but attend public schools with crumbling walls and leaking roofs. This sends exactly the wrong message to children about our priorities as adults.

With the School Building Fairness Act, we have a chance to get our priorities right, and to provide a desperately needed boost to school districts all across America.

I hope that my colleagues will join me to help create safe, modern, and healthy school environments so all of our children can grow to be the leaders of tomorrow.

Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the School Building Fairness Act of 2009. I offer this legislation to meet the urgent need for Federal support to repair crumbling schools in disadvantaged and rural school districts.

This bill would authorize up to $6 billion annually to fund a new program of Federal grants to States for the repair, renovation, and construction of public schools. States would award the grants competitively, with priority given to high-poverty and rural school districts, as well as school districts that plan to make their facilities more energy efficient and environmentally friendly. Districts receiving this federal funding would then be required to provide a local match.

I know this approach to school construction and repair can work because this bill is modeled on the success of the Iowa Demonstration and Construction Grant Program in my home State. Over the last decade, I have secured $121 million in Federal funds that more than 300 school districts across Iowa have used for school construction and repair. This modest Federal investment has leveraged more than $600 million in additional local funding.

In addition to improving the learning environment for students, the School Building Fairness Act will provide a stimulus to the economy by creating jobs in thousands of communities all across the country for workers in the construction industry, as well as architects and engineers.

It will also spur school districts to make their facilities more environmentally friendly and energy-efficient. According to the 2006 report ``Greening America's Schools: Costs and Benefits,'' green schools use an average of 33 percent less energy than conventionally built schools, and generate financial savings of about $70 per square foot.

Safe, modern, healthy school buildings are essential to creating an environment where students can reach their academic potential. Yet too many students in the U.S., particularly those most at risk of being left behind, attend school in facilities that are old, overcrowded and run-down.

We all agree that school infrastructure requires constant maintenance. Unfortunately, far too many schools have been forced to neglect ongoing issues, most likely due to lack of funds, which can lead to health and safety problems for students, educators and staff. The most recent Infrastructure Report Card issued by the American Society of Civil Engineers gives public schools a D grade. Now, I do not know many parents who would find D grades acceptable for their children. So why on Earth would we stand by while the state of the buildings in which our children learn are assigned such a grade?

Despite the declining condition of many public schools, federal grant funding is generally not available to leverage local spending. In fiscal year 2001, in the Senate Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education Appropriations Subcommittee, which I then chaired, I was able to secure $1.2 billion for school repair and renovation. I continue to hear nothing but positive feedback from educators across the country about that funding.

But that one-time investment amounted to nothing more than a drop in the bucket compared to the estimated national need. At the beginning of this decade, the National Center for Education Statistics estimated that the nation's K-12 public schools needed $127 billion in repairs and upgrades. A 2008 analysis by the American Federation of Teachers found that the Nation's school infrastructure needs total an estimated $254.6 billion.

This bill is called the School Building Fairness Act because, as I said, States will give preference in awarding grants to high-poverty and rural districts. Currently, spending on school facilities is almost twice as high in affluent districts as in disadvantaged districts. This is one of those ``savage inequalities'' that Jonathan Kozol writes about--inequalities that largely explain the learning gap between affluent and poor children.

Something is seriously wrong when children go to modern, gleaming shopping malls and sports arenas, but attend public schools with crumbling walls and leaking roofs. This sends exactly the wrong message to children about our priorities as adults.

With the School Building Fairness Act, we have a chance to get our priorities right, and to provide a desperately needed boost to school districts all across America.

I hope that my colleagues will join me to help create safe, modern, and healthy school environments so all of our children can grow to be the leaders of tomorrow.

Madam President, I wish to speak about the effort that seems to be underway here now--and I guess we will be having some more amendments this afternoon from the other side of the aisle--to prevent the President from addressing a serious national security problem: the continued operation of the detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

It is long past time we close this facility. On May 23, 2007, almost exactly 2 years ago, I introduced legislation to close that detention center. Since that time, unfortunately, it has only become more imperative that we act. It remains the case that there is simply no compelling reason to keep the facility open and not to bring the detainees to maximum-security facilities here in the United States.

This Nation has long been a beacon of democracy, a champion of human rights throughout the world. Over the past 8 years, however, we have repeatedly betrayed our highest principles. Torture was authorized in direct violation of the law, and we intentionally put detainees beyond the most basic rules of law, including secret tribunals where detainees lacked opportunities to challenge their confinement and lacked sufficient due process.

These errors are manifest in the detention center at Guantanamo Bay, where the very purpose was to avoid providing legal safeguards that are enshrined in our Constitution and the Geneva Conventions to detainees and to prevent independent courts from reviewing the legality of the administration's actions. That was the purpose of Guantanamo as a detention center. Now that the Supreme Court has definitively ruled that constitutional protections apply at Guantanamo, it truly serves no purpose.

Closing the facility, however, does not just follow from a commitment to our most cherished values and constitutional principles; rather, closure is essential for our national security. As long as the detention center at Guantanamo Bay is open, it remains a recruiting tool for those who wish to do us harm and provides ammunition for our enemies.

This is not just my view but is the view of military and foreign policy officials. The Director of National Intelligence, Dennis Blair, has said:

The detention center has become a damaging symbol for the

world . . . it is a rallying cry for terrorist recruitment

and harmful to our national security, so closing it is

important for our national security.

That is from Dennis Blair, our Director of National Intelligence.

Former Navy general counsel Alberto Mora has said:

There are serving U.S. flag-rank officers who maintain that

the first and second identifiable causes of U.S. combat

deaths in Iraq--as judged by their effectiveness in

recruiting insurgent fighters into combat--are, respectively,

the symbols of Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo.

Retired Air Force MAJ Matthew Alexander, who led the interrogation team that tracked down Abu Mus'ab al-Zarqawi, the leader of al-Qaida in Iraq, said:

I listened time and time again to foreign fighters, and

Sunni Iraqis, state that the number one reason they had

decided to pick arms and join al-Qaida was the abuses at Abu

Ghraib and the authorized torture and abuse at Guantanamo

Bay.

Let me repeat that. Matthew Alexander, a retired Air Force major who led the interrogation team who tracked down the leader of al-Qaida in Iraq said this.

I listened time and time again to foreign fighters, and

Sunni Iraqis, state that the number one reason that they had

picked up arms and joined al-Qaida was the abuse at Abu

Ghraib and the authorized torture and abuse at Guantanamo

Bay.

It cannot get much clearer than that. Colin Powell, Henry Kissinger, Madeline Albright, James Baker, Warren Christopher have all called for Guantanamo to be closed, as has Secretary of Defense Gates and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Admiral Mullen.

As former Secretary of State Colin Powell said:

Guantanamo has become a major, major problem . . . if it

were up to me, I would close Guantanamo not tomorrow but this

afternoon.

That was Colin Powell.

Indeed, even President Bush repeated time and time again his desire to shut down Guantanamo, I am sure because of all the information that was given to him by his Joint Chiefs of Staff and by his intelligence services. So President Obama should be applauded for taking a step that military and foreign policy officials insist will directly and immediately improve our national security.

The President has set up a special task force to review the status of the detainees remaining at Guantanamo and to make recommendations on what to do with these individuals. The administration faces some difficult decisions it inherited from the previous administration.

Guantanamo was conceived--Guantanamo as a detention center, I should say, was conceived outside the law. And bringing detainees back into our legal system, as the Supreme Court has rightly found necessary, involves some very difficult policy issues.

I, myself, greatly look forward to the President's plan, and I will judge it carefully. Closing Guantanamo and simply replicating the same deficient legal process in the United States would be purely symbolic and meaningless.

As the administration undertakes its review of the detainees at Guantanamo and considers the most appropriate way to close the facility, the last thing Congress should do is handcuff the President.

What I am hearing are some arguments on the other side of the aisle basically saying, through these amendments they are offering, Guantanamo Bay should remain open. That is the thrust of the amendments: Guantanamo should remain open.

Make no mistake, if these amendments become law, the President's ability to take the step that military and foreign policy officials-- Republicans and Democrats and Independents alike--have all said is needed will be very difficult. It will be difficult for the President to take the steps necessary to close Guantanamo Bay. Al-Qaida and those who wish to cause us harm will continue to have a major recruiting tool at their disposal.

I would not say this is the intention of the people offering those amendments, but listen to what our intelligence officers have said and what our military officers have said, that the biggest recruiting tool for those in Afghanistan and the Taliban and al-Qaida is a continued detention center at Guantanamo Bay.

So while it may not be the intention of those people offering the amendments to have this as a recruiting tool for al-Qaida and the Taliban, those who have been in our intelligence service tell us that is, in fact, what is happening. It is the biggest recruiting tool for those who wish to do us harm. While it may not be the intention of those offering the amendments, that is what is going to be the practical effect, if those amendments are adopted.

One other thing. President Obama's decision to close Guantanamo Bay is already starting to pay some dividends. Countries such as Portugal and Ireland have made offers to join Albania in accepting detainees who cannot be returned to their home countries.

Just last week, France accepted Lakhdar Boumediene, an Algerian suspected in a bomb plot against the Embassy of the United States in Sarajevo. The assistance of our allies is critical. Yet to obtain that assistance will only be more difficult if we, ourselves, are unwilling to do what we ask our allies to do; that is, to accept detainees on our own soil in secure detention facilities.

We say: Oh, no, we cannot take them here but, France, you can take them and, Ireland, you can take them, and Portugal. They will say what kind of fairness is there in that?

Indeed, I feel the statements and the arguments of many on the other side of the aisle are simply to scare the American people, unduly scare the American people, and spread this kind of fear and misinformation by suggesting that closing the facility at Guantanamo Bay will somehow mean the terrorists will be walking Main Street or, as the junior Senator from Arizona claimed: Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and his partners will be our neighbors--will be our neighbors if they are in secure detention facilities.

This is the kind of language that rightfully gets Americans fearful that they are going to be our neighbors. Well, the fact is, those individuals who can be tried in Federal court can and will be vigorously prosecuted. Federal courts have successfully prosecuted terrorists in the past. In fact, between September 12, 2001, and the end of 2007, 145 terrorists were convicted in American courts. How many American people know that, that 145 were convicted in American courts.

Likewise, U.S. prisons are already holding some of the world's most dangerous terrorists in the United States. Ramzi Yousef, the mastermind of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, is in jail in the United States.

Zacarias Moussaoui, the 9/11 coconspirator, is in jail in the United States; Richard Reid, the ``shoe bomber,'' in jail in the United States. Several al-Qaida terrorists responsible for bombing Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania are in jail in the United States.

The men, women, and military officials who run these facilities have a proven track record. I ask those who are saying that Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and his partners will be our neighbors, I ask them: Can you point to any prisoner who has escaped from a Federal maximum security facility? Point to one. Just point to one.

Well, we have no greater duty than to protect the American people. That is the oath we all take. National security is our first job. In this regard, the President is undertaking a process that will result in the closing of a national stain on our character and a recruiting tool for those who wish to do us harm.

He is taking a step our military and foreign policy officials make clear will make us safer. The President should not be handcuffed and should not be prevented from improving our national security, as the other side in those amendments wish to do.

Finally, we must never forget that people around the world know we are right and the terrorists are wrong. Of the 5 or 6 billion people who live in the world, only a handful think the terrorists are right. All the rest are on our side. They know we are right and the terrorists are wrong.

If we wish to defeat the terrorists, therefore, we should remain faithful to our ideals and our values. We will not win this war with secret prisons, with torture chambers, with degrading treatment, with individuals denied basic human rights.

Rather, we will win this by upholding our values and insisting on legal safeguards that are the very basis of our system of Government and democracy. It is time to close Guantanamo Bay. There is no reason to keep it open and every reason, for our national security, to shut its doors.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, again, to recap what was said, we have voted twice, once to approve Mr. Gensler as a Commissioner of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and another vote to approve him as the Chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. I voted yes on both measures. Let me share my reasoning on the nomination of Mr. Gensler.

Honestly, I have had some reservations about this nominee, though certainly not about him as a person. Based upon my meetings with him and our committee hearing, I believe Mr. Gensler is a good and decent man with a strong personal story, and he has certainly shown his intellectual capability and his knowledge of the subject.

I simply had concerns with elements of his background and philosophy, concerning the regulation of over-the-counter derivatives transactions and other financial transactions, and his views on regulations in general.

Mr. President, I chaired a nomination hearing that lasted some time. It was a hearing of substance. Mr. Gensler answered some very tough questions straightforwardly.

It is not possible to know how Mr. Gensler will decide any given question, but he has expressed support for much stronger, more effective reform in the oversight and regulation of derivatives. Of all the things we are doing around here, in terms of banking and bailouts and pronouncements coming from the Secretary of the Treasury, perhaps the construction of the whole thing is centered around how are we finally going to regulate derivatives and swaps. These are over the counter, hidden from view and, quite frankly, they have led to the debacle we have now.

Let me read some excerpts from Mr. Gensler's testimony before the Senate Agriculture Committee, which gives me, again, some positive feelings toward his future chairmanship of the CFTC.

Here is what he said:

I firmly believe that strong, intelligent regulation with

aggressive enforcement benefits our economy and the public.

We must urgently move to enact a broad regulatory regime

that covers the entire over-the-counter derivatives markets.

Right on target, Mr. Gensler. He also said:

The CFTC should be provided with authority to set position

limits on all over-the-counter derivatives to prevent

manipulation and excessive speculation.

A transparent and consistent playing field for all physical

commodity futures should be the foundation of our

regulations.

I agree with that.

Lastly, Mr. Gensler said this:

I believe that the CFTC must work with Congress, with other

regulators, and with our global financial partners to ensure

that the failures of our regulatory and financial systems,

failures which have already taken a toll on every American,

never happen again.

Those are all excerpts from the extensive testimony and question-and- answer period of Mr. Gensler before our committee. So now I am prepared to entrust momentous decisions to Mr. Gensler, and I am, of course, supporting the President's choice. Given the fragile state of the economy and financial markets, having a confirmed chairman at the CFTC is of critical importance.

As I said at Mr. Gensler's nomination hearing, these are challenging times, particularly for regulators like the CFTC. Since the Commodity Futures Trading Commission was established 35 years ago, it has never faced more daunting market challenges than those that exist now. The unprecedented price volatility of our markets for physical commodities, such as energy and grains, has hurt our economy. The lack of sufficient regulatory authority and oversight over the derivatives and financial markets has proven disastrous to the entire global economy.

Derivatives that were touted as managing or reducing risk turned out in practice to magnify risk--or certainly at least to allow banks, insurance companies, and investors to take on totally unsustainable and reckless levels of risk and leverage. If these financial markets and derivatives markets are not properly regulated, we won't have a strong economy. The CFTC plays a vital role in providing oversight in keeping these markets healthy and in keeping the players honest.

It is imperative that we pass strong financial regulatory reform in the Congress, and not just piecemeal, patchwork reform, but comprehensive and fundamental reform that brings full transparency and accountability back to the markets. Earlier this year, I introduced the Derivatives Trading Integrity Act. Our committee will be having a hearing on this early next month. That bill would require all derivatives and swaps to be traded on a regulated exchange. Exchange- traded contracts are subject to a level of transparency and oversight that is not possible in over-the-counter markets. For 60 years, futures contracts traded very efficiently on regulated exchanges.

I believe the burden of proof is on those who say there must be exceptions and loopholes to allow derivatives and futures trading off- exchange to continue. These are touted as customized swaps or customized derivatives. I have asked Mr. Gensler and others to please define for me what a custom swap is. No matter how you define it, it leaves a loophole big enough to drive a Mack truck through. Once there is a derivative that is off the trading boards, that no one knows about, that is shrouded in secrecy, what is to keep someone else from doing another custom derivative on that derivative, and then a derivative on that derivative? That is what got us into this mess in the first place--derivatives on derivatives on derivatives on derivatives, ad infinitum, with nobody knowing what was going on, without anybody knowing the value of each of those.

To this day, Treasury has never been able to tell us how they came up with the value of those derivatives. It is a kind of voodoo. It is some kind of mathematical calculation that they put into a computer somehow. Well, I am sorry; I just don't buy that. I believe they all ought to be on a regulated exchange, open and above board, so anybody can look and see who is trading what. If it is a custom derivative, fine; put it on a trading exchange, a regulated exchange. Let the market decide whether it is customized or not, and then if somebody wants to sell a derivative on that, put it right back on the exchange. To me, that is the only way we will ever get around this.

I keep hearing noises out of Treasury that they want to keep this loophole for some kinds of customized swaps. I know the swaps and futures industry would like to have that. I understand that. But that is what got us into this trouble in the first place. As I said, the burden of proof is on them, I believe, to show why we need this loophole and to somehow define a custom swap, what it really is, and why we don't need to put it on a regulated exchange.

Some suggest that reforming regulations of these markets, like I am suggesting, will limit flexibility and inhibit the incentives of market participants to develop and introduce new financial products, and thus harm the market. Again, I reject that notion. To the extent that financial innovation can be shown to benefit all participants in the market by providing some new hedging opportunities or risk management capabilities, without putting other parties at undue risk, then that is all to the good. However, if these new products are used to obscure risk in the market, or elude or evade accounting rules placed on market participants, then they clearly don't serve the public good and should be prohibited.

That is why I say no more of this behind-the-scenes, over-the-counter trading of derivatives. Put them on a regulated exchange. If it is custom, so what; put it on the exchange. Then a regulated exchange can put margin requirements on the buyers, clearing the floor every day. Other investors can look and see what is going on. It provides for the best transparency possible.

Some are talking about having some kind of a clearinghouse. Again, I don't know about clearinghouses. There are some functions for clearinghouses, I am aware of that. But, again, they just don't function like a regulated exchange, on which we have set regulations, an exchange that can provide for margin calls, and which is open and above board to everyone. Again, these financial innovations we hear about, like credit default swaps, collateralized mortgage obligations, collateralized debt obligations--I did a little history on this. None of those existed prior to 20 years ago. Most of them are within the last dozen years or so.

So I asked the question of a number of people at the Treasury Department, and others--I asked what was the demand for these financial instruments? They didn't exist before, especially credit default swaps. They literally didn't exist before about 10 years ago. What was the public demand or public need for these? There wasn't any. Someone described it to me. It is sort of like Honey Nut Cheerios. I have been eating Cheerios since I was a kid. Did I demand that they put a honey nut inside each of those Cheerios? General Mills had a new idea, and they came up with Honey Nut Cheerios and marketed them with good advertising, and they thought everybody would like Honey Nut Cheerios now.

Fine, but that is what they did with credit default swaps. Some brainiacs up there at MIT--the mathematicians who went to work for the investment houses--said we know how to slice and dice derivatives to the nth degree--these credit default swaps--and we can make a lot of money on that.

But there was no need for that. There was no outcry by banks or insurance companies saying they needed this kind of financial instrument. But they came up with it and marketed it and sold it as a way of better hedging risk when, in fact, it increased and magnified risk. Again, if someone comes up with a financial instrument--a new product, as they say--let's get it out there in the open. If you want it out there, put it in the open and get it on the regulated exchange and let everybody look at it and see what it is. That is why we need better regulation and openness and transparency.

I reject the idea that somehow this regulation of which I speak is somehow going to thwart financial instruments. If we thwart the development of other credit default swaps or collateralized mortgages or debt obligations, wonderful; we should. We should get back to sensible dealings in the marketplace.

Again, no more obscuring of the risk, eluding accounting rules--get them out in the public.

The free-wheeling derivatives markets contributed to a financial crisis from which our economy is only beginning to recover. We are at work in the Agriculture Committee on legislation that will ensure stronger regulation in order to bring transparency and integrity to the derivatives market.

I want to make it clear at the outset that I am not against all derivatives. Certain derivatives have a functional value in hedging and reducing risk. But, again, they should be in the open.

We are at work in the Agriculture Committee to do that--bring transparency and integrity to the derivatives markets. In the meanwhile, the CFTC must be at full capacity to keep watch over the markets. We are counting on Mr. Gensler to be a strong voice at the helm of this important agency.

With that, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I rise to introduce a bill, the Menu Education and Labeling Act, on behalf of myself and my colleagues, Senator Kennedy of Massachusetts, Senator Reed of Rhode Island, and Senator Gillibrand of New York.

It is by now well established that poor diet and obesity, as well as related conditions such as heart disease, have reached epidemic levels. The majority of the U.S. population is either overweight or obese. The incidence of type II diabetes has reached levels not even imaginable 20 years ago, with some research suggesting that one in three children will develop the disease by adulthood.

There is no single solution to this complex issue of poor nutrition and diet related diseases. Policymakers looking for a silver bullet will be disappointed. But inaction is not an option. We must start taking meaningful steps to address this growing problem by giving people the tools necessary to live healthier lifestyles. That is why my colleagues and I are introducing this bill today to extend nutrition labeling beyond packaged foods to include foods at chain restaurants with 20 or more locations, as well as food in vending machines. This common-sense idea will give consumers a needed tool to make wiser choices and achieve a healthier lifestyle. It is a positive step toward addressing the obesity epidemic.

In 1990, Congress passed the Nutrition Labeling and Education Act, NLEA, requiring food manufacturers to provide nutrition information on nearly all packaged foods. The impact has been tremendous. Not only do nearly three-quarters of adults use the food labels on packaged foods, but studies indicate that consumers who read labels have healthier diets.

Unfortunately, when Congress first passed the NLEA, it excluded restaurants from any labeling requirements. Since that time, restaurants have become more and more important to Americans' diet and health. Americans consume a third of their calories and spend half of their food dollars at restaurants at the very time when nutrition and health experts say that rising caloric consumption and growing portion sizes are causes of obesity. We also know that when children eat in restaurants, they consume twice as many calories as when they eat at home. Consumers say that they would like nutrition information provided when they order their food at restaurants, yet, while they have good nutrition information in supermarkets, at restaurants they can only guess.

In recent years, some states and cities have led the way on menu labeling. New York City has already implemented a menu labeling initiative that requires the disclosure of calories on menus and menu boards at chain restaurants. Consumer surveys show that

the residents of New York are enthusiastic about the initiative. The experience in New York has also underscored the feasibility and practicality of the endeavor. Despite earlier concerns about implementation, the vast majority of restaurants in New York City complied with the law quickly and without incident. Those with particular challenges were assisted by the New York City Health Department to enable them to comply with the law.

But New York City is not the only such initiative. Other cities such as Philadelphia, Seattle, Portland, and San Francisco have followed suit. Just last fall, the State of California became the first State in the Nation to enact a statewide menu labeling law, and Massachusetts became the second yesterday. Clearly there is not only a public health rationale for menu labeling, but consumer demand as well.

As I already stated, I harbor no illusions that any one policy will turn the tide on obesity and poor diet in our country, but if we are ever to reorient our society and our health care system in the U.S. away from treatment and towards a stronger focus on prevention, we must build prevention into the very fabric of society. We must provide consumers with the tools and the support that they need to make the healthy choice the right choice. The MEAL Act is one means by which to accomplish that goal, and I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting this important legislation.

Mr. President, I rise to introduce a bill, the Menu Education and Labeling Act, on behalf of myself and my colleagues, Senator Kennedy of Massachusetts, Senator Reed of Rhode Island, and Senator Gillibrand of New York.

It is by now well established that poor diet and obesity, as well as related conditions such as heart disease, have reached epidemic levels. The majority of the U.S. population is either overweight or obese. The incidence of type II diabetes has reached levels not even imaginable 20 years ago, with some research suggesting that one in three children will develop the disease by adulthood.

There is no single solution to this complex issue of poor nutrition and diet related diseases. Policymakers looking for a silver bullet will be disappointed. But inaction is not an option. We must start taking meaningful steps to address this growing problem by giving people the tools necessary to live healthier lifestyles. That is why my colleagues and I are introducing this bill today to extend nutrition labeling beyond packaged foods to include foods at chain restaurants with 20 or more locations, as well as food in vending machines. This common-sense idea will give consumers a needed tool to make wiser choices and achieve a healthier lifestyle. It is a positive step toward addressing the obesity epidemic.

In 1990, Congress passed the Nutrition Labeling and Education Act, NLEA, requiring food manufacturers to provide nutrition information on nearly all packaged foods. The impact has been tremendous. Not only do nearly three-quarters of adults use the food labels on packaged foods, but studies indicate that consumers who read labels have healthier diets.

Unfortunately, when Congress first passed the NLEA, it excluded restaurants from any labeling requirements. Since that time, restaurants have become more and more important to Americans' diet and health. Americans consume a third of their calories and spend half of their food dollars at restaurants at the very time when nutrition and health experts say that rising caloric consumption and growing portion sizes are causes of obesity. We also know that when children eat in restaurants, they consume twice as many calories as when they eat at home. Consumers say that they would like nutrition information provided when they order their food at restaurants, yet, while they have good nutrition information in supermarkets, at restaurants they can only guess.

In recent years, some states and cities have led the way on menu labeling. New York City has already implemented a menu labeling initiative that requires the disclosure of calories on menus and menu boards at chain restaurants. Consumer surveys show that

the residents of New York are enthusiastic about the initiative. The experience in New York has also underscored the feasibility and practicality of the endeavor. Despite earlier concerns about implementation, the vast majority of restaurants in New York City complied with the law quickly and without incident. Those with particular challenges were assisted by the New York City Health Department to enable them to comply with the law.

But New York City is not the only such initiative. Other cities such as Philadelphia, Seattle, Portland, and San Francisco have followed suit. Just last fall, the State of California became the first State in the Nation to enact a statewide menu labeling law, and Massachusetts became the second yesterday. Clearly there is not only a public health rationale for menu labeling, but consumer demand as well.

As I already stated, I harbor no illusions that any one policy will turn the tide on obesity and poor diet in our country, but if we are ever to reorient our society and our health care system in the U.S. away from treatment and towards a stronger focus on prevention, we must build prevention into the very fabric of society. We must provide consumers with the tools and the support that they need to make the healthy choice the right choice. The MEAL Act is one means by which to accomplish that goal, and I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting this important legislation.

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

Madam President, I fully support the bill offered by the distinguished chairman of the Banking Committee, Senator Dodd. It would create a long overdue reform of the credit card industry whose practices have been increasingly predatory and abusive. I have heard from many hundreds of Iowans who have been victimized by credit card companies. These are good people who, in the current economic downturn, have had no choice but to resort to their credit cards in order to put food on the table or to make a car payment or even help pay for college tuition. As a result, they have found themselves on the receiving end of a whole array of unfair and often outright abusive practices; things such as double billing, unwanted fees, and arbitrary interest rate increases. I applaud the Dodd-Shelby legislation for cracking down on some of these abuses. I think the legislation is a good first step.

However, this bill still allows credit card companies to charge excessive and, for millions of Americans, ruinous interest rates. Currently one-third of all credit cardholders in the United States are being forced to pay interest rates above 20 percent, sometimes as high as 41 percent. These interest rates are grossly excessive. It is time to set a reasonable limit on what credit card companies can charge.

In times past, an interest rate of 20 percent, 30 percent, or 40 percent would have been condemned by religious leaders of all faiths as being the sin of usury. People daring to charge these interest rates would have been prosecuted for loan sharking. But today the credit card industry tells us that charging people these grossly excessive interest rates is both fair and necessary. I totally disagree. It is not fair, and it is not necessary. What is more, many Iowans have pointed out to me the very financial institutions that are victimizing and squeezing ordinary hard-working Americans have already received billions of dollars from the taxpayers. Now these institutions are lending money that came from taxpayers to people at interest rates as high as 41 percent. Someone tell me, what is the logic of that? No wonder people are upset all over this country. We take their hard-earned tax dollars, give it to the big institutions. They have a credit card and in hard times they have to use that credit card for some necessities. Now they are being charged 20, 25, 30 percent interest. It is a sweet deal for the financial institution. It is nothing more than an old-fashioned rip-off of consumers.

For these reasons, I have joined with Senators Sanders, Whitehouse, Leahy, Durbin, and Levin to offer an amendment to cap credit card interest rates at 15 percent. Yes, that is exactly what I am saying. No credit card could charge more than 15 percent interest rates. Why did we pick 15 percent as an appropriate top rate? Thanks to a law passed by this Congress 30 years ago--I was here at the time--we put a cap of 15 percent on the maximum interest charges a credit union could charge their customers. That was 30 years ago. We left a safety valve for special circumstances. This rate cap of 15 percent has protected millions of consumers at credit unions. I belong to a credit union right here in the Senate. I have always belonged to a credit union. I belonged to one in the House when I was there, and before that, in the Navy, I belonged to the Navy Federal Credit Union. These credit unions have performed a viable, good service for millions of Americans without harming the safety or soundness of the institutions and without negatively impacting access to credit for credit union members. I have been a member of a credit union all my adult life. I have never once seen them constrict the amount of credit involved to borrowers. If you need a car, you have been able to get consumer loans from credit unions.

I would also point out, not one single credit union--not one--had to line up with the big banks begging for a bailout. Not one credit union. Yet they are capped at 15-percent interest rates. Interesting, isn't it?

Credit unions have remained strong and stable despite the meltdown in much of our financial system.

Chris Coliver, a regulatory analyst for the California Credit Union League, was recently asked about the effect of the interest rate cap on his institutions--the 15-percent cap. He answered:

It hasn't been an issue. Credit unions are still able to

thrive.

Of course, there may be some special circumstances under which an interest rate above 15 percent is temporarily necessary. Currently, credit unions are allowed to charge higher interest rates if their regulator--which is the National Credit Union Administration-- determines this is necessary to maintain the safety and soundness of the institutions. At the present time, the NCUA, the National Credit Union Administration, allows credit unions to charge interest rates as high as--get this--as high as 18 percent, though most credit unions continue to have a top rate that is actually much lower than that, and some of them lower than 15 percent, some as low as 12 percent, 11 percent. Well, our amendment includes a similar, reasonable exception. It would allow credit card companies to charge interest rates higher than 15 percent in circumstances where Federal regulators determine that higher rates are necessary to protect the safety and soundness of financial institutions.

It seems as if this is deja vu all over again for me. I have been advocating

for a 15-percent cap since I was an attorney for the Iowa Consumer League in 1973, fresh out of law school. I was a lawyer for the Iowa Consumer League, and we were trying to get the Iowa Legislature at that time to put a cap of 15 percent on credit cards. So this issue has been around for a long time. As a legal aid lawyer at that time, I saw firsthand the devastation and hardship caused to Iowa families by excessive interest rates charged by credit card companies and others. Again, many of these Iowans turned to their credit cards in a time of crisis--a medical emergency, for example--but because of the prohibitive interest rates, they found themselves falling further and further behind in their payments. Some were forced into bankruptcy.

Well, it is no different today. As I said, I have received many hundreds of letters and e-mails from Iowans who have been victimized by credit card companies' abusive practices. For example, Madam President, let me share an all-too-common story from one of my Iowa constituents, and I will read it verbatim as she wrote it:

I am a single mom with a pretty good job, [for] which I am

very thankful. I have 3 credit cards. Recently, I received

notices from 2 of them that they were raising my interest

rate due to the ``economic conditions.'' I don't mean a

little, I mean a LOT.

She capitalized ``LOT.''

Capital One--

We all know who Capital One is, and their credit cards--

Capital One sent me a notice that they were raising my rate

from 13.9 percent to 23.99 percent. I had the option of

cancelling my card and paying off the existing balance at my

current rate of 13.9 percent, which I did. The other one is

Washington Mutual. They were recently purchased by JP Morgan

Chase. I received a notice from them a couple of weeks ago

that my rate was going from--

Get this--

10.4 percent to 23.99 percent.

Now, you wonder: Here is JPMorgan Chase, operating through Washington Mutual, increasing their interest rate to 23.99 percent. Capital One increasing their interest rate to 23.99 percent. Why weren't they off just 1 percent? Why are they both exactly the same? Well, it looks as if they are all ganging up to charge the same high interest rate.

Anyway, let me continue to read from her letter. The rate was going from 10.4 percent to 23.99 percent.

I have never missed a payment or been late on either one of

these. Tonight I called JP Morgan Chase and they told me I

missed the deadline to say I wanted to decline the changes in

my cardholder agreement. I said I wanted to close my account

and pay off the existing balance at the 10.4 percent. They

refused! . . . I could see it if I had missed any payments or

even paid a day late, but I have NOT. This is just WRONG.

End of her letter.

Imagine that. She actually had the wherewithal to pay it off at 10.4 percent, and JPMorgan said: No. You missed the deadline.

We all get this mail. We all get this junk mail and all that stuff from credit card companies. I just throw them away. Well, maybe there is some notice in there that, oh, if it is not a bill, maybe they have sent you a notice that maybe you have to do something. Who reads all that junk mail? Nine times out of ten, it is some kind of promotion they are promoting: You can get a free airline pass or you can get a cut rate on going to Cancun or something like that. You get all that junk. Then they slip in there another little letter that says: Oh, by the way, if you do not cancel your previous agreement, we are going to do this, this, and this. Good luck in finding that out.

This constituent who wrote me would clearly benefit from the provisions in the Dodd-Shelby bill that would prohibit retroactive rate increases on existing balances in accounts with no late payments. But the larger issue remains: Why should any bank be allowed to charge an interest rate of 24 percent under any circumstances--under any circumstances? Why should banks be allowed to charge other customers interest rates as high as 41 percent--41 percent?

As I said, I support the underlying bill, but the bill will continue to let them charge those kinds of interest rates. The bill does clean up some of the other stuff, and that is why I am supporting it. But this does not get really to the nub of the problem; that is, we are allowing usurious interest rates to be charged for credit cards. We know why they are charging these interest rates. They can get by with it. It is legal. Well, the credit unions can survive and provide credit and issue credit cards to their holders and survive on 15 percent. Are you telling me these big companies cannot? Of course they can. But guess what. They probably would not be able to pay their executives $50 million a year in salaries and bonuses or--$50 million; I am being a piker--try $200 million or $300 million a year. That is what they are paid. So to keep up this lavish lifestyle for their executives, for their corporate offices, they charge 20, 30, 40 percent.

Well, as I said, take a lesson from the credit unions. Take a lesson. That is what we have to put a limit on. That is why I cannot emphasize enough that unless and until we cap interest rates, we are still going to have these problems because people will get credit cards, they will get into dire straits. This is their only way of paying a bill--to use their credit card--and something else happens, and all of a sudden they are racked up with these high interest rates.

The other thing credit card companies are doing is they are charging these high interest rates in order to be able to give credit cards to just about anyone. People get credit cards sent to them without any kind of credit checks, whether they are really creditworthy. They get all these kinds of credit cards out there. People who are like my constituent, who are responsible and who pay their bills on time and who have credit cards which they do pay on time and never get behind, are penalized because credit card companies are so lax and so loose with whom they give these credit cards to. So we all pay for it. Well, the credit card companies ought to be a little bit more circumspect about whom they give their credit cards to. Again, they should take a lesson from the credit unions.

So, Madam President, as I said, I support the underlying bill. But we must seize this opportunity to address the single most widespread and destructive abuse in this industry; that is, grossly excessively high interest rates. That is why I support this amendment. I urge my colleagues to vote for the Sanders-Harkin-Leahy-Whitehouse-Durbin-Levin amendment on this bill.

With that, Madam President, I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

I ask unanimous consent that Sharon Lee and Conor O'Brien of my staff be granted the privileges of the floor for the duration of today's session.

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

I thank the Chair.

(The remarks of Senator Harkin in pertaining to the introduction of S. 953 are printed in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')

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

Mr. President, I am introducing the Seasonal Influenza and Pandemic Preparation Act of 2009. The bill was given the number S. 953. This bill would establish a nationwide free, voluntary influenza vaccination program, under which any individual in this country may receive an annual influenza vaccine shot free of charge.

I offered this bill 3 years ago because at that time we started the process of building up our vaccine capacity. I will have more to say about that. What is happening currently with H1N1 being almost at a pandemic stage now, it brings home again what we need to do in this country to be prepared, and that is what this bill is about. Offering free flu shots to everyone in the United States is a good idea in and of itself.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says an average of more than 40,000 Americans die each year from flu-related diseases and causes. Think about that: 40,000 Americans die every year due to flu- related causes. Seasonal flu is responsible for more than 31 million outpatient visits and more than 3 million days annually in the hospital. Seasonal flu costs the U.S. economy nearly $90 billion annually, including $10 billion in direct medical costs--$10 billion a year just in direct medical costs. Think about that: 40,000 people dying every year, $10 billion in direct medical costs, $90 billion annually in lost productivity to our economy, over 3 million days in the hospital every year, and this is seasonal flu.

We can significantly reduce all those numbers. In addition, there is some evidence that people who are vaccinated each year against seasonal flu viruses actually build up a limited degree of resistance to pandemic viruses. So strictly as a matter of prudent prevention, it is desirable to maximize the number of Americans who are vaccinated against flu each year. By offering the vaccinations for free and making them conveniently available, we would remove major barriers to more widespread participation.

There is precedence for this. Medicare, right now, will pay for one seasonal flu shot for everybody on Medicare every year. So we already have that out there. We just need to get it to the rest of the population.

There are other compelling reasons for establishing a nationwide voluntary free flu vaccination program. Let me explain.

As chairman of the appropriations subcommittee that funds health programs, I have taken the lead in the past in providing funding to prepare for a future flu pandemic. Since 2006, my subcommittee has provided more than $6 billion to these activities.

As a consequence, while public health authorities in the United States may have been surprised by the H1N1 virus outbreak, they have not been caught unprepared. To the contrary, since 2006 we have undertaken very robust measures to prepare for exactly this kind of outbreak and potential pandemic.

First, we have made major investments in antivirals that can be given to a person once exposed and shows signs of the illness. We have made major investments in medical equipment, which are right now, as we speak, being distributed nationally to our local public health authorities across the country. Many of them are now in place. Many started going out earlier this week. I daresay that probably most, if not all, of them are probably out there right now--from the stockpiles that we built up. There are over 50 million doses of Tamiflu and Relenza that we built up in our stockpile. Well, not all of that, but most of it, has gone out around the country to be prepared.

Second, we have stepped up our public health and surveillance activities, which helped us to detect the H1N1 virus earlier than we otherwise might have.

Third, we have increased the capacity of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to identify viruses and respond aggressively and very immediately, including producing what is called a ``seed'' virus, necessary for the development of a vaccine. That is being done right now.

Fourth, we have also made major investments in building up our vaccine production capacity in the United States. Mr. President, when we started on this in 2005, there was at that time only one plant in the entire United States of America that could produce flu vaccines-- one. I believe it is located in Pennsylvania, and that was making vaccines based upon an old methodology of using eggs. We had to use millions of eggs every year to produce that vaccine, and that takes a long time.

There have been, in the research and development, processes by which we can make cell-based vaccines. We can shorten the timeframe. That is nice, but we don't have any cell-based plants in the United States. In the fiscal 2006 bill, we put over $3 billion out there to build these plants. They are being built now. So we are building up our vaccine production capacity and doing it in a way in which we can get the vaccines produced more rapidly.

Fifth, we have funded research into adjuvants. These are agents that increase the vaccine's effectiveness. Let me put it this way. If we have one dose of a vaccine, we might actually be able to cut that dose down and give that one dose to four or five people by adding the adjuvant to it.

Lastly, we have worked with State and local public health agencies to boost their capacity to respond to a flu pandemic. We have done that, but because of the economic downturn many of our State budgets have been slashed. In our States around the country, we were told at our hearing the other day, over 60,000 people have been laid off from our public health agencies. That makes it more difficult to get the antivirals out to people who may come down with H1N1 or any other kind of flu virus.

Because of all these things we did, I think I can safely say there is no reason for anyone anywhere in the United States to panic because of the H1N1 flu virus. As I said, one of the most important things we have done is to build up our vaccine manufacturing capacity.

Here is the problem. This really is the crux of this bill I have introduced today. Say we build up the vaccine manufacturing capacity and we build these plants that can respond aggressively and immediately to a pandemic outbreak. What happens the rest of the time? What happens? Do they sit there idle, not being utilized? We cannot have that.

What we need to do is to use these plants, then, to make more of the seasonal flu vaccines every year. Well, if we have the plants out there, and they make more of the seasonal flu viruses but not everybody is using them, what do we do, just throw it away? We want the plant capacity to prepare for any

pandemic in the future, but they need to be active and they need to produce annually. If they are going to produce annually, then we have to find something to do with these vaccines.

By offering annual free vaccines to every single person in America, we will keep our vaccine production capacity up and running. It will be ready to shift at a moment's notice, when necessary, from producing seasonal flu vaccines to a mass production of vaccines to fight any future outbreak or pandemic.

There is another reason for this bill. If we are faced with a flu virus pandemic, we are going to have to mobilize people. We are going to have to get the vaccines out in a hurry and get the vaccines right down to the individual people all over this country--people in small towns and communities, in rural areas, and in cities. Well, by having an annual free flu vaccination, we will give public health agencies across America valuable experience in administering vaccines to masses of people, local agencies that will have a reason to develop trained cadres of people who are capable of administering vaccines.

We will also develop an established network of sites that might include grocery stores, shopping malls, schools, places of worship, and senior centers where people can conveniently go to get vaccinated in case of an outbreak. These annual activities will significantly increase State and local public health readiness to fight a pandemic. Not all these people are going to be employed by the Government. These will be volunteers, but they will be trained. They will know where to go and how to administer a vaccine because they will be doing it on an annual basis, free of charge, to people. We will build up a network of sites and a cadre of people who can be relied upon in case we face a pandemic.

On Tuesday, in response to the H1N1 outbreak, I chaired an emergency hearing on the Health Appropriations Subcommittee. We heard assessments of the outbreak from top medical experts, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, the renowned and remarkable Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at NIH.

Years ago, when we first started this, back in 2005, Dr. Fauci warned us that it is not a matter of ``whether'' there will be a flu pandemic but rather ``when'' it will happen. It is not a matter of whether but when.

When the Senate drafted its version of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act this year--the stimulus bill--I included an additional $870 million for pandemic preparedness. Most of that funding was to be used to complete the work of building up our vaccine production capacity; in other words, to get these plants built more rapidly. Unfortunately, it was taken out in the final bill. Again, what we are trying to do is shift from egg-based production to cell-based production, so we can get these vaccines developed more rapidly. Taking it out of the stimulus bill was the typical shortsighted resistance that I have often encountered when I talk about this.

Some accused me a couple years ago of crying wolf. The wolf is here. One day in the future we can encounter an even worse wolf, such as the flu pandemic of 1918, which was the Spanish flu. It infected one out of three people worldwide and killed more than 50 million people. It would be the height of folly not to do what we can to prepare for such a possibility. The harsh reality is that we have repeatedly experienced flu pandemics. I mentioned the one of 1918 and 1919.

There was the Asian flu pandemic of 1957 and 1958 that killed over 1.5 million people.

The Hong Kong flu pandemic of 1968 and 1969 killed over 1 million people. Not only did it kill over 1 million people, it caused hundreds of millions of illnesses and hospital stays all across the globe.

We cannot predict the future course or severity of the current H1N1 outbreak, but clearly it is one more wake-up call.

Again, I am reintroducing the Seasonal Influenza and Pandemic Preparation Act today as a stand-alone bill. I first introduced it in 2005, as I said. It is now a stand-alone bill. We either pass it that way or, if not, I plan to incorporate it into the prevention and public health title of comprehensive health reform legislation that we will hopefully pass this year. A program offering annual free flu shots to every American is exactly the kind of smart, cost-effective, prevention-focused public health that must be at the center of our reformed health care system in America. It will save lives and money. When--when not whether--a pandemic flu strikes the U.S. in the future, we will be ready.

I encourage Senators to cosponsor the legislation. I think this is one more wake-up call and we have to move ahead aggressively in preparing for these pandemics. As Dr. Fauci said, it is not a question of whether, it is only a question of when and how severe it will be. We don't know.

I remind people that a few years ago when we started this, back in 2005, we were confronting the possible pandemic of an avian flu or H5N1 flu, which started in Southeast Asia. Thanks to surveillance, to the CDC, and to a lot of people working on it, we were able to contain it. That H5N1 avian flu is one of the most deadly we have confronted, with over a 50-percent mortality. One out of every two persons who contracted it died. Now we have contained it and tamped it down. That H5N1 virus is still out there and, periodically, we pick it up in places such as Southeast Asia.

There was a thought that because of migratory birds, it may be spread to other places, but we don't know that.

But because it has reared its ugly head, because we know that virus is out here someplace, it behooves us to do everything we can to protect the people of this country and in doing so to prepare. I hope it doesn't happen. I hope when there is a pandemic flu, it will be just a mild one and will not kill people. But we don't know. The best way to prepare for it is to build up our vaccine-manufacturing capacity as rapidly as possible; secondly, make sure our public health agencies on the State and local levels are ready to go, that they are trained, that they are equipped; and thirdly, that we have some experience, that we know how to do this.

One of the best ways is to give everyone a free flu shot every year-- everyone, a voluntary free flu shot every year. To me, that will set us up well to prepare for and to protect the American people against any flu pandemic that may come our way in the future.

Mr. President, I am introducing the Seasonal Influenza and Pandemic Preparation Act of 2009. The bill was given the number S. 953. This bill would establish a nationwide free, voluntary influenza vaccination program, under which any individual in this country may receive an annual influenza vaccine shot free of charge.

I offered this bill 3 years ago because at that time we started the process of building up our vaccine capacity. I will have more to say about that. What is happening currently with H1N1 being almost at a pandemic stage now, it brings home again what we need to do in this country to be prepared, and that is what this bill is about. Offering free flu shots to everyone in the United States is a good idea in and of itself.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says an average of more than 40,000 Americans die each year from flu-related diseases and causes. Think about that: 40,000 Americans die every year due to flu- related causes. Seasonal flu is responsible for more than 31 million outpatient visits and more than 3 million days annually in the hospital. Seasonal flu costs the U.S. economy nearly $90 billion annually, including $10 billion in direct medical costs--$10 billion a year just in direct medical costs. Think about that: 40,000 people dying every year, $10 billion in direct medical costs, $90 billion annually in lost productivity to our economy, over 3 million days in the hospital every year, and this is seasonal flu.

We can significantly reduce all those numbers. In addition, there is some evidence that people who are vaccinated each year against seasonal flu viruses actually build up a limited degree of resistance to pandemic viruses. So strictly as a matter of prudent prevention, it is desirable to maximize the number of Americans who are vaccinated against flu each year. By offering the vaccinations for free and making them conveniently available, we would remove major barriers to more widespread participation.

There is precedence for this. Medicare, right now, will pay for one seasonal flu shot for everybody on Medicare every year. So we already have that out there. We just need to get it to the rest of the population.

There are other compelling reasons for establishing a nationwide voluntary free flu vaccination program. Let me explain.

As chairman of the appropriations subcommittee that funds health programs, I have taken the lead in the past in providing funding to prepare for a future flu pandemic. Since 2006, my subcommittee has provided more than $6 billion to these activities.

As a consequence, while public health authorities in the United States may have been surprised by the H1N1 virus outbreak, they have not been caught unprepared. To the contrary, since 2006 we have undertaken very robust measures to prepare for exactly this kind of outbreak and potential pandemic.

First, we have made major investments in antivirals that can be given to a person once exposed and shows signs of the illness. We have made major investments in medical equipment, which are right now, as we speak, being distributed nationally to our local public health authorities across the country. Many of them are now in place. Many started going out earlier this week. I daresay that probably most, if not all, of them are probably out there right now--from the stockpiles that we built up. There are over 50 million doses of Tamiflu and Relenza that we built up in our stockpile. Well, not all of that, but most of it, has gone out around the country to be prepared.

Second, we have stepped up our public health and surveillance activities, which helped us to detect the H1N1 virus earlier than we otherwise might have.

Third, we have increased the capacity of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to identify viruses and respond aggressively and very immediately, including producing what is called a ``seed'' virus, necessary for the development of a vaccine. That is being done right now.

Fourth, we have also made major investments in building up our vaccine production capacity in the United States. Mr. President, when we started on this in 2005, there was at that time only one plant in the entire United States of America that could produce flu vaccines-- one. I believe it is located in Pennsylvania, and that was making vaccines based upon an old methodology of using eggs. We had to use millions of eggs every year to produce that vaccine, and that takes a long time.

There have been, in the research and development, processes by which we can make cell-based vaccines. We can shorten the timeframe. That is nice, but we don't have any cell-based plants in the United States. In the fiscal 2006 bill, we put over $3 billion out there to build these plants. They are being built now. So we are building up our vaccine production capacity and doing it in a way in which we can get the vaccines produced more rapidly.

Fifth, we have funded research into adjuvants. These are agents that increase the vaccine's effectiveness. Let me put it this way. If we have one dose of a vaccine, we might actually be able to cut that dose down and give that one dose to four or five people by adding the adjuvant to it.

Lastly, we have worked with State and local public health agencies to boost their capacity to respond to a flu pandemic. We have done that, but because of the economic downturn many of our State budgets have been slashed. In our States around the country, we were told at our hearing the other day, over 60,000 people have been laid off from our public health agencies. That makes it more difficult to get the antivirals out to people who may come down with H1N1 or any other kind of flu virus.

Because of all these things we did, I think I can safely say there is no reason for anyone anywhere in the United States to panic because of the H1N1 flu virus. As I said, one of the most important things we have done is to build up our vaccine manufacturing capacity.

Here is the problem. This really is the crux of this bill I have introduced today. Say we build up the vaccine manufacturing capacity and we build these plants that can respond aggressively and immediately to a pandemic outbreak. What happens the rest of the time? What happens? Do they sit there idle, not being utilized? We cannot have that.

What we need to do is to use these plants, then, to make more of the seasonal flu vaccines every year. Well, if we have the plants out there, and they make more of the seasonal flu viruses but not everybody is using them, what do we do, just throw it away? We want the plant capacity to prepare for any

pandemic in the future, but they need to be active and they need to produce annually. If they are going to produce annually, then we have to find something to do with these vaccines.

By offering annual free vaccines to every single person in America, we will keep our vaccine production capacity up and running. It will be ready to shift at a moment's notice, when necessary, from producing seasonal flu vaccines to a mass production of vaccines to fight any future outbreak or pandemic.

There is another reason for this bill. If we are faced with a flu virus pandemic, we are going to have to mobilize people. We are going to have to get the vaccines out in a hurry and get the vaccines right down to the individual people all over this country--people in small towns and communities, in rural areas, and in cities. Well, by having an annual free flu vaccination, we will give public health agencies across America valuable experience in administering vaccines to masses of people, local agencies that will have a reason to develop trained cadres of people who are capable of administering vaccines.

We will also develop an established network of sites that might include grocery stores, shopping malls, schools, places of worship, and senior centers where people can conveniently go to get vaccinated in case of an outbreak. These annual activities will significantly increase State and local public health readiness to fight a pandemic. Not all these people are going to be employed by the Government. These will be volunteers, but they will be trained. They will know where to go and how to administer a vaccine because they will be doing it on an annual basis, free of charge, to people. We will build up a network of sites and a cadre of people who can be relied upon in case we face a pandemic.

On Tuesday, in response to the H1N1 outbreak, I chaired an emergency hearing on the Health Appropriations Subcommittee. We heard assessments of the outbreak from top medical experts, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, the renowned and remarkable Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at NIH.

Years ago, when we first started this, back in 2005, Dr. Fauci warned us that it is not a matter of ``whether'' there will be a flu pandemic but rather ``when'' it will happen. It is not a matter of whether but when.

When the Senate drafted its version of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act this year--the stimulus bill--I included an additional $870 million for pandemic preparedness. Most of that funding was to be used to complete the work of building up our vaccine production capacity; in other words, to get these plants built more rapidly. Unfortunately, it was taken out in the final bill. Again, what we are trying to do is shift from egg-based production to cell-based production, so we can get these vaccines developed more rapidly. Taking it out of the stimulus bill was the typical shortsighted resistance that I have often encountered when I talk about this.

Some accused me a couple years ago of crying wolf. The wolf is here. One day in the future we can encounter an even worse wolf, such as the flu pandemic of 1918, which was the Spanish flu. It infected one out of three people worldwide and killed more than 50 million people. It would be the height of folly not to do what we can to prepare for such a possibility. The harsh reality is that we have repeatedly experienced flu pandemics. I mentioned the one of 1918 and 1919.

There was the Asian flu pandemic of 1957 and 1958 that killed over 1.5 million people.

The Hong Kong flu pandemic of 1968 and 1969 killed over 1 million people. Not only did it kill over 1 million people, it caused hundreds of millions of illnesses and hospital stays all across the globe.

We cannot predict the future course or severity of the current H1N1 outbreak, but clearly it is one more wake-up call.

Again, I am reintroducing the Seasonal Influenza and Pandemic Preparation Act today as a stand-alone bill. I first introduced it in 2005, as I said. It is now a stand-alone bill. We either pass it that way or, if not, I plan to incorporate it into the prevention and public health title of comprehensive health reform legislation that we will hopefully pass this year. A program offering annual free flu shots to every American is exactly the kind of smart, cost-effective, prevention-focused public health that must be at the center of our reformed health care system in America. It will save lives and money. When--when not whether--a pandemic flu strikes the U.S. in the future, we will be ready.

I encourage Senators to cosponsor the legislation. I think this is one more wake-up call and we have to move ahead aggressively in preparing for these pandemics. As Dr. Fauci said, it is not a question of whether, it is only a question of when and how severe it will be. We don't know.

I remind people that a few years ago when we started this, back in 2005, we were confronting the possible pandemic of an avian flu or H5N1 flu, which started in Southeast Asia. Thanks to surveillance, to the CDC, and to a lot of people working on it, we were able to contain it. That H5N1 avian flu is one of the most deadly we have confronted, with over a 50-percent mortality. One out of every two persons who contracted it died. Now we have contained it and tamped it down. That H5N1 virus is still out there and, periodically, we pick it up in places such as Southeast Asia.

There was a thought that because of migratory birds, it may be spread to other places, but we don't know that.

But because it has reared its ugly head, because we know that virus is out here someplace, it behooves us to do everything we can to protect the people of this country and in doing so to prepare. I hope it doesn't happen. I hope when there is a pandemic flu, it will be just a mild one and will not kill people. But we don't know. The best way to prepare for it is to build up our vaccine-manufacturing capacity as rapidly as possible; secondly, make sure our public health agencies on the State and local levels are ready to go, that they are trained, that they are equipped; and thirdly, that we have some experience, that we know how to do this.

One of the best ways is to give everyone a free flu shot every year-- everyone, a voluntary free flu shot every year. To me, that will set us up well to prepare for and to protect the American people against any flu pandemic that may come our way in the future.

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for up to 15 minutes on the Republican time.

Mr. President, I strongly support Senator Durbin's amendment. It will facilitate and promote negotiation and restructuring of mortgage debt on primary residences, which is a sensible and preferable alternative to foreclosure and all the negative consequences that process involves. I cosponsored earlier versions of this measure introduced in the last Congress by Senator Durbin as well as this one. I am proud to cosponsor the current amendment.

Including this provision in the housing bill is absolutely critical to helping an estimated 1.7 million homeowners facing foreclosure to obtain modifications of their loans so they can return to making payments and stay in their homes. This, in turn, would contribute powerfully to stabilizing the housing market and the entire financial sector, allowing our economy to recover.

For nearly 2 years now we have seen a devastating wave of home mortgage foreclosures all across America. Foreclosure exacts a painful toll on borrowers who cannot keep up with their payments. Let's not avoid the harsh realities: foreclosure means families--many oftentimes with young children--are forced out of their homes. It is a wrenching and emotionally devastating process.

But we also need to appreciate that the broader economic consequences of all of these foreclosures are overwhelmingly negative. The lender still loses money. The value of houses in the surrounding neighborhoods declines further. So-called toxic assets held by financial institutions and investors become even more toxic. The financial system and the broader economy suffer further damage. This is totally counterproductive, as we have seen vividly over the last year. It simply makes no sense to continue down this failed path of massive home mortgage foreclosures.

The Durbin amendment offers a far more promising and productive approach. Keep in mind that ``foreclosure'' is a legal shorthand for a process that cuts off or extinguishes the ability of a borrower to pay debt and remain in the home. It literally, as the word is used, forecloses any other options. The Durbin amendment, by contrast, encourages debtors and creditors to seek and negotiate sensible, workable, and economically feasible options or alternatives. What Senator Durbin is proposing very faithfully applies the hard lessons learned as borrowers, lenders, and our Nation worked their way out of the agricultural credit crisis of the 1980s.

There are a lot of similarities between the farm crisis in the 1980s and the home mortgage and foreclosure crisis of today. In both instances, the value of the underlying assets--farmland in one case, houses in another--rose very steeply. In both cases, debts secured by those underlying assets rose very rapidly also. In both situations income available to pay off debt fell--in the farm crisis because of lower commodity prices, in the housing crisis because of unemployment and lower wages and salaries. In both instances the asset bubble burst. It was not only a matter of being unable to make payments; the asset values could no longer support the loan. With many farms, as now with many houses, the borrower owes much more than the real estate is mortgaged for.

So for a while in the farm crisis, both borrowers and lenders tried to ignore and deny what was totally an unsustainable situation. Eventually,

some lenders relented and started working out new loan terms that would reschedule payments, modify interest rates, and, in some cases, write down the debt a little bit. However, not all lenders would engage in that type of negotiation. For whatever reason, they did not want to recognize the economic reality: that not all of the debt could be repaid and that there was not enough collateral value left to pay off the loan, even if they went through foreclosure.

So what happened is, Congress had to step in and bring a dose of reality to resolving the farm debt. It did so by enacting chapter 12 to the Bankruptcy Code in 1986. I was here, a member of the Agriculture Committee at that time, working very diligently in trying to get through this farm credit crisis. But when we did that, Congress gave to family farms and ranches the debt restructuring remedy that had been available to other business enterprises. Chapter 12 bankruptcy permits the courts--permits the court--to modify loans to family farmers, including those secured by a principal residence.

Professor Neil Harl of Iowa State University, one of the most respected agricultural economists in the Nation, conducted authoritative studies of the impacts of chapter 12 bankruptcy. One of the more significant findings by Professor Harl was that some 84 percent of the original filers for chapter 12 bankruptcy were still farming or owning agricultural land 7 years later. So this was an astonishingly successful outcome, exceeding the expectations of even the most enthusiastic supporters of chapter 12 bankruptcy legislation. Professor Harl also concluded that chapter 12 provisions did not--did not--have a significant effect on interest rates. Again, this was contrary to the dire predictions by many lenders at that time--the same dire predictions that we are hearing from lenders today.

As Professor Harl pointed out, both in the 1980s during the agricultural sector, and in the 2007-2008 housing sector, the losses have already occurred because the borrowers who received relief would otherwise have been unable to repay their loan. So, again, we heard all of these dire predictions of why we can't let the bankruptcy court come in and do something other than foreclosure--to modify, to write down the debt a little bit, stretch out the payment times. What we did for many farmers at that time--they may have had high-interest loans for 7 years, 10 years. What we did, the courts came in, reduced the interest rates and strung out the payments for 20 years, 30 years. That is why so many years later farmers were still farming because they knew the underlying asset was still valuable. It was still productive. They just had to get through a bad rough spot. So there are a lot of farmers today still very much engaged in agriculture or ranching. That would not be so today had we not enacted that chapter 12 for agriculture in the mid-1980s.

So the provisions of the Durbin amendment give powerful incentives to financial institutions to work constructively with those in financial difficulty. Indeed, by giving the bankruptcy judge authority to force modification to mortgages on primary residences, as is the case with other assets, there is a real incentive to come to terms. I have never understood why a bankruptcy judge can force modifications to other assets but not on the primary residence. Well, we had the same situation in the 1980s, and we extended it to farms and, as I said, as Professor Harl showed, the rest is history. It succeeded beyond anyone's wildest expectations.

By giving this authority, again, to the bankruptcy judges, as I said, there is an incentive for both the financial institution and the borrower to come to some terms. This is very helpful for a person in difficulty, and it is very often in the interests of the owner of the mortgage, though it admittedly is not always in the interests of the mortgage servicer. We want to give relief to homeowners facing foreclosure not just for their benefit but for our benefit--the benefit of our economy.

So I urge my colleagues to support the Durbin amendment. Again, as we saw during the chapter 12 bankruptcy proceedings during the farm crisis in the 1980s, these provisions will allow many people to retain their homes and to weather this terrible economic downturn. Generally speaking, lenders will not lose any money they would not already stand to lose if they were to force foreclosure.

As I said, I believe there is a very correct and almost similar parallel to what we did in the 1980s with farms. People who are in financial difficulty today because of the downturn in the economy are going to be productive workers in the future. Why force them out of their homes when a modification such as stretching out payments, reduction of interest rates, could keep them in their homes, keep up the value of the surrounding property around them so they don't get in this downward spiral in their communities. To me, this makes eminently good sense.

Also, the positive consequences for our economy would be profound. An estimated 1.7 million families would be able to avoid foreclosure and keep their homes. The housing crisis, as I said, would receive much needed support. The housing market would be able to stabilize. All of this would be a much needed tonic for our economy.

So I commend Senator Durbin for always being on the leading edge, as he has been in the past. This is an amendment that I don't know why it isn't just accepted. It should be adopted overwhelmingly. As I said, we have a precedent for it. We know what happened in the past, and we know the same thing applies today.

So I urge my colleagues to wholeheartedly support the Durbin amendment for individual homeowners, for communities, but for our overall economy.

With that, Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Jamie Corey and Joel Carron of my staff be granted floor privileges for the duration of today's session.

Mr. President, I strongly support the nomination of Christopher Hill, one of America's most distinguished and accomplished career diplomats, to serve as Ambassador to Iraq.

Our Bagdad Embassy is, obviously, a post of critical importance to United States interests. Our Armed Servicemembers and diplomats serving in Iraq need and deserve an ambassador without further delay. President Obama has set forth a sound strategy for ending our combat role in Iraq and allowing the Iraqi Government to take full responsibility for that Nation's affairs. We will be extremely fortunate to have an ambassador of Christopher Hill's skills, stature, and experience, to oversee this important new phase in our relations with Iraq.

Ambassador Hill's career in the Foreign Service spans more than three decades. He has extraordinary expertise and experience in the fields of national security, peacebuilding, and postconflict reconstruction. He is exactly the right person to have in this critical post at this pivotal time in Iraq.

While serving in the former Yugoslavia from 1996 to 1999, Ambassador Hill was at the center of negotiations for the Bosnia peace settlement, serving as deputy to chief negotiator Richard Holbrooke. He fought to ensure the protection of those who had been made refugees by the war. In one instance, he personally intervened at the Stenkovac refugee camp to prevent a rioting mob from beating to death an ethnic Roma family.

As America's first Ambassador to Macedonia, he worked with local authorities to quell ethno-religious violence and build institutions of democratic governance and civil society.

As Ambassador to South Korea, Hill strengthened a key bilateral alliance, partnering with Korean authorities and the commander of U.S. Forces in Korea to develop and implement the most significant realignment of our military posture in the region since the Korean war.

Most recently, as Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs, Ambassador Hill led extremely complex negotiations to counter North Korea's nuclear ambitions, working with a diverse and powerful group of countries, including China, South Korea, Japan, and Russia.

Ambassador Hill has a master's degree from the Naval War College, and has extensive experience working with our U.S. military on counterterrorism and counterinsurgency. Ambassador Hill has worked with some of the best military commanders of this generation, addressing some of our Nation's toughest challenges GEN Eric Shinseki in the Balkans, GEN Leon LaPorte in Korea, ADM Tim Keating of Pacific Command, to name just a few.

Ambassador Hill's nomination has been endorsed enthusiastically by our last three Ambassadors to Iraq: Ambassador Ryan Crocker, Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, and Ambassador John D. Negroponte. We need his experience and seasoned judgment during this crucial time of transition in Iraq. Ambassador Hill's nomination has been vetted through the normal process. It is now time for the Senate to vote on his confirmation, and allow Ambassador Hill to get to work on the significant challenges ahead.

Mr. President, I join with the entire Senate family in congratulating my colleague, my good friend, and the senior Senator from Iowa, on casting his 10,000th vote in the Senate. This is a truly remarkable milestone, but even more remarkable is the fact that Senator Grassley has cast nearly 6,000 votes without missing a vote. It has been 16 years since Senator Grassley has missed a vote. The last time he missed a vote, he had to be

in Iowa during that terrible flooding we had in 1993. So he has not missed a vote since. It has been 16 years that Senator Grassley has not missed a vote.

I note for the record that Cal Ripken, the great shortstop and third baseman for the Baltimore Orioles, went 16 years without missing a game, and they called him the Iron Man. So now Senator Grassley has gone 16 years without missing a vote, so I guess now we can call him the Iron Man of the U.S. Senate.

But the measure of a Senator is not just how many votes he or she casts, it also includes what he or she accomplishes off the floor of the Senate. That is also where Senator Grassley has truly distinguished himself in this body over the last 28 years.

Count me as one of those who believes the executive branch of this Government has gotten too powerful, has arrogated too much power to themselves in relation to the legislative branch.

And it is a power they flaunt. I do not care whether it is a Democratic administration or a Republican administration. I daresay no Senator is more dedicated to providing rigourous, relentless oversight of executive branch agencies--whether during Republican administrations or Democratic administrations--than Senator Grassley. Senator Grassley's dedication to the oversight function has been exemplary, a model every Senator ought to strive to emulate.

Chuck Grassley and I have served together in the Congress since we were both elected the same year in 1974. We took our oaths of office on the same day in the House in 1975. Of course, he preceded me to the Senate. He came to the Senate in 1981. I followed him here in 1985. Well, we belong to different parties, but I like to think we share a down-to-earth, commonsense Iowa way of looking at the world. I value his friendship and his counsel. I have the highest respect for his work here in the Senate and his work in Iowa on behalf of all Iowans.

So, again, I join my colleagues in congratulating my colleague, my friend, and the senior Senator from Iowa on this remarkable milestone.

(Applause, Senators rising.)