Executive Session

EXECUTIVE SESSION -- (Senate - December 07, 2006)

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Mr. DAYTON. Mr. President, it has been almost 6 years since I was sworn in as Minnesota's 33rd U.S. Senator with my friend and colleague Paul Wellstone at my side. I began my term hopeful and optimistic. The Senate was evenly divided, with 50 Democrats and 50 Republicans, and President-elect George W. Bush was promising to change the tone in Washington with a new era of bipartisan cooperation.

Our country enjoyed peace and relative prosperity. Outgoing President Bill Clinton, a Republican-controlled Congress, and over 6 years of economic expansion had combined to create the first annual surpluses in the Federal Government's on-budget account in 39 years, and they were projected by OMB to continue for at least the next decade.

The Social Security trust fund's annual surpluses were going to be saved in a lockbox for the upcoming retirements of a large baby boom generation. There was even discussion of paying down the national debt to further strengthen our financial position. Yet we still would be able to increase funding for such essential needs as public education, affordable health care, seniors' drug coverage, and infrastructure improvements.

Just 6 years later, our country's condition has changed drastically, and mostly for the worse. We are mired in a disastrous war in Iraq despite the heroic efforts and sacrifices by our Armed Forces. The fiscal integrity of the Federal budget has been destroyed, with record-high annual deficits continuing, despite budget gimmickry and a modest economic recovery. The Federal tax base has been decimated by huge tax giveaways to the rich and superrich that will burden our children and grandchildren. The Social Security trust fund's surpluses have been spent every year on what the nonpartisan Concord Coalition has called ``the most reckless fiscal policy'' in our Nation's history.

The Bible says if the leaders don't lead, the people perish. Unfortunately, the Bush administration and the Republican majority in Congress have not led this country well, and our people are suffering the consequences: lost jobs, businesses, and farms; lost incomes, standards of living, and security; and lost loved ones killed or maimed in Iraq.

We have lost the national unity which followed the terrible atrocities of September 11, 2001, and the Bush administration has lost the world's support which they had after that awful attack. The President's decision to invade Iraq unilaterally, the absence of weapons of mass destruction that had been the initial justification for that invasion, and his administration's disastrous mismanagement of Iraq following the overthrow of Saddam Hussein has squandered most of our national unity and international goodwill.

The Congressional Record will show that I opposed those failed policies and supported other and better alternatives. I was 1 of 23 Senators to vote against the Iraq war resolution. I opposed the large tax giveaways to the rich and superrich. In fact, during my 6 years in the Senate, I voted 29 times to raise my own taxes. Why? Because our country needs those tax revenues, and I can darn well afford to pay my fair share of them, as can all other Americans with my good fortune.

I tried seven times unsuccessfully to get the Senate to honor its 30-year promise to school districts and schoolchildren and fully fund special education. The Senate did pass my ``Taste of Our Own Medicine'' amendment limiting Members of Congress's prescription drug coverage to what they provided to senior citizens through Medicare. However, my amendment was discarded by the House-Senate conference committee.

It has pained me deeply to see the Senate's majority lead our country into what I consider the wrong direction. Our Nation's founding principle was ``we the people,'' and it remains so today. If we are not always united by the common cause, we are bound together by a shared destiny. If the laws this Senate passes are successful, ``we the people'' benefit together. If those laws fail, we suffer together. Some Americans will suffer more than others as unfair victims of social and economic injustices, but ultimately all Americans cannot escape our common national fate. United we stand and succeed; divided we fall and fail. I regretfully believe that during my Senate term this administration and its congressional followers have caused too many divisions, declines, and failures.

Thus, I leave the Senate with strong feelings of frustration and disappointment. I have been unable to pass most of what I believe was most important to Minnesota, to our country, and to the world. I remain convinced that those policies would improve the lives of most Americans far better than what the majority here enacted.

A cornerstone of democracy, which I honor, is that the majority prevails. Winning, however, does not make them right and, unfortunately, it does not make them wise. In those decisions with which I have disagreed, time will tell us and the American people who was right and who was wise.

I do want to thank my colleagues on both sides of the aisle for the privilege to serve these last 6 years with them. I am grateful for the friendships I have made, which I hope will continue after my departure.

I thank my excellent staff, those here in Washington and those in Minnesota, for their tremendous dedication and many hours of hard work. Most of the successes I have enjoyed here have been the result of their dedication and their abilities, and I thank them again for their support.

I especially want to thank the people of Minnesota who gave me this extraordinary opportunity to serve them in the Senate. Our democracy is, through all of human history, throughout the entire world, the most advanced and successful form of self-governance that human beings have ever devised. It is far from perfect, but it is far better than anything else. We who are elected as its leaders and its stewards have sacred duties to uphold its principles, to elevate its policies, and to improve its practices before we bequeath them to our successors. I have done my very best to fulfill those duties before I pass them on to my outstanding successor, Senator-elect Amy Klobuchar. We in the Senate and in the House of Representatives also have the

duty to serve the best interests of all Americans. To be successful and sustainable, our Government must improve the lives of all of our citizens.

Unfortunately, here in Washington, the people who already have the most keep getting more than anyone else. The excessive influences of their money and political power on the Federal Government are serious threats to our democracy. They skew decisions and laws in favor of the rich and powerful, often at the expense of other Americans: the hard-working people who pay their taxes and hope their elected representatives will look out for them in Washington. It isn't too much for them to expect. However, it is too often more than they are getting.

They are told repeatedly that new laws and policies will improve their lives. Yet their real lives become worse, not better. They experience a deep disconnect between what they are told will happen and what is actually happening to them.

In attempts to hide those disparities, the words used in Washington are often carefully selected by very clever people in order to disguise reality rather than to describe it. For example, legislation that stripped many Americans of their bankruptcy protections for major medical expenses was named the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act. Another bill that would have increased industrial pollution was entitled the Clear Skies Act. No Child Left Behind has knowingly underfunded Head Start, title I, and special education, which has left millions of schoolchildren behind.

These discrepancies and the disparities they create will be even more destructive to the American people's trust in their Government in the years ahead. That is because the choices facing Congress will become even more difficult as the needs of an aging population grow but revenues do not. In about a decade, the Social Security trust fund's large annual surpluses will be replaced by deficits, and its IOUs from the general fund will add to that fund's own chronic deficits. If combined with today's enormous and unsustainable balance of trade deficits and a continuing erosion of our manufacturing job base, the consequences could be catastrophic.

That somber forecast has replaced my hope and optimism of 6 years ago to my deep regret. Following the wisdom of ``speak truth to power,'' I present my truth to the world's most powerful legislative body, the U.S. Senate, and one of the two institutions that must act to keep our Nation strong. I hope that you will. I will pray for your wisdom to discern what is right, for your courage to act accordingly, and for your success on behalf of our great Nation and the world.

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