District of Columbia Appropriations Act, 2004-Resumed

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2004—RESUMED

Mr. KENNEDY. In a matter of minutes. Since this involves an education issue, and we on our side believe it is an extremely important education issue, that it is appropriate we have a full discussion about what exactly are going to be the educational implications of a voucher program, I wonder if the Senator remembers that in 1996, the Senate voted four times on the motion to invoke cloture on the DC appropriations conference report, and all four times the motion and the effort to impose vouchers on the District of Columbia failed?

We have never tried to have a voucher program in any other city of the country since 1996. It is only the District of Columbia.

All four of those attempts in 1996 failed, and since 1996 have failed. It is 2003 now. In 1997, the Senate voted 58 to 41 to reject the motion to invoke cloture on the Coats amendment. Four times in 1996, all imposing vouchers on the District of Columbia. In 1997, another vote.

In the time from 1996 to 2001, not one of our colleagues—and this is my question—not one of our colleagues who have been out speaking in favor of vouchers have ever asked any city in their State to impose vouchers. Does the Senator find that this is somewhat peculiar? We have these voices that are on the floor of the Senate: Let's rush this thing for the District of Columbia. And yet over the last 7 years that we have been voting on this, not one of them has asked to impose vouchers on any one of the cities in any one of their States?

Mr. REID. I respond to my friend from Massachusetts, it is no wonder that people who live in the District of Columbia have bumper stickers that say, "No Taxation Without Representation." It is no wonder that the people, hundreds of thousands of people who are American citizens, who live in the District of Columbia, are treated like second-class citizens.
They do not even have a Senator. They have a nonvoting delegate.

I say to my friend from Massachusetts, it is no wonder that people of the District of Columbia believe they are being treated like a stepchild. Are they part of this great country? People who live in the Nation's Capital can't do things that every other citizen in this country can do.

Mr. KENNEDY. Madam President, this gets to the point. I don't know whether he will agree with me. We don't try to impose this voucher program on the State of Nevada. We don't try to impose it on the State of New Hampshire or the State of Ohio or the State of Massachusetts. Does the Senator not find—I think he will—it extraordinary that we are prepared to try to impose it on the almost 600,000 people who live in the District of Columbia, who do not have any representation here to speak for them? Why aren't our friends on the other side of the aisle—mostly on the other side of the aisle—who oppose vouchers trying to impose them on the State of California or Massachusetts or Nevada? They don't ask for that.
They take the District of Columbia, that doesn't have a spokesperson out here to speak for them on this issue—though it has been considered by the people of the District. It has been thoroughly and completely rejected by the majority of the school board, the school council, and the majority of parents.

What is it about our friends asking my good friends tonight, Why are we holding this up? Are they willing to accept the voucher program for the State of Ohio or for some other State, rather than imposing it on the District? I find this extraordinary.

I don't want to delay the Senator. I know he has other business. I know he will have some difficulty reading this chart. But it shows that the majority of elected officials, community leaders, and organizations in DC oppose vouchers. This is the list of the elected officials. Obviously, ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON. And it goes down to the council members, the board of education, the local organizations, various church groups, parents groups, and all the rest.

It troubles me that so many of our colleagues are willing to try to impose something on a particular community that doesn't have representation here in the U.S. Senate, where so many are against it, and when it has such broad educational implications.

I know the Senator has responsibilities. If he has a moment, the Senator remembers our long and extensive battle to try to bring reform to our public schools. We understood that we needed two elements: Reform and resources. We had the reform and the resources. Then the administration backed out.

But this chart shows public schools are held accountable when students fail. Private schools are not held accountable. Public schools are required to see that every child is taught by highly qualified teachers. In the No Child Left Behind Act, that was the requirement for 4 years. There has to be a highly qualified teacher in each classroom. There is no such requirement here, in private schools. Public schools must provide parents with report cards. Private schools don't have to provide public report cards.

I ask unanimous consent this chart be printed in the RECORD.

Mr. KENNEDY. Finally, the public schools are required to accept and serve all students. Private schools are not required. As we understand, many of the private schools can't do this because they don't have either the facilities for special needs children, or the trained personnel. We understand that.

But, nonetheless, the Senator would agree with me that public school systems have served our Nation well. They are taking all children. And they would serve much better if we had an administration that would fulfill its commitment, in terms of supporting them and No Child Left Behind.

Mr. REID. My friend has been a longstanding Member of this most important committee where we have dealt with matters of education for decades in the Senate. We know that private schools, most of the time, give kids more attention. We have all heard these reports. But as the Senator from Massachusetts pointed out, they do not have to accept children who are physically or emotionally or mentally handicapped. Public schools have to take all the kids. It makes it more difficult.

We should be devoting our attention to helping the District of Columbia have the resources so they can take care of all the problems they have in public schools.

Mr. KENNEDY. May I ask the Senator a question on this? It is very interesting. We will have a chance to get into this in more detail.

They say, yes. They say, well, Senator, kids will have some kind of lottery in terms of the selection, in terms of who will attend. But there is nothing in here that requires the school to accept what the outcomes are. People run around saying: Oh, yes, we have a better system. But nothing requires them to take the children who go through this process, unlike the public school system.

Mr. REID. Private schools can pick and choose who they want. They can pick and choose the voucher kids who would be submitted to them from the school district here in the District of Columbia. Of course, who would not be accepted? A kid would not be accepted, of course, if the kid had a physical disability or a mental or emotional disability or has maybe been unruly in the past.

I appreciate very much the Senator in effect assisting the debate today. It is not as simple as going to third reading and passing the bill. If we really care about the District of Columbia, let us give them the resources they need, strip this voucher stuff off of it and come back and take a look at it again some other time.

But I would resent this Senate forcing down the throat of the people of the State of Nevada a program dealing with vouchers in the State of Nevada which the State of Nevada did not approve first. The voucher program for the District of
Columbia has not been approved by the authorities in the District of Columbia. You have an elected official or a mayor walk out and say: I like it. But if he looks at it, he has gotten a few other goodies for the District. You have to ask him. But it appears to me that a few other goodies are enticing him to go along with this.

Regardless of that, he is in the minority because largely everyone in the District opposes what he wants.

I deeply appreciate the Senator from Massachusetts joining with me on the floor this afternoon.

Mr. KENNEDY. I thank the Senator.

Just to continue the observation, of course, if the District of Columbia wanted to go ahead with the program, there is nothing prohibiting them from going ahead and developing this program on their own. That is the extraordinary irony. That is what I say to those who suggest we are holding this legislation up. We cannot pass this part if it has this mandated program in terms of vouchers which has very important educational implications, not only in terms of this bill, but in the broader sense in terms of our country.

If the District of Columbia wanted to develop a program, they could do it themselves. They haven't, as has been pointed out. Effectively, we are requiring them to do so.

I am going to have more of a chance to speak on this issue, but I want to draw to the attention of the Senate the progress that has been made in what we call the transformation schools in the District of Columbia. I will take time to go through the bill in detail when we get a chance to return to it.

Some things just come out at you when you look at the District of Columbia schools. And I have had the opportunity to look. I have the good opportunity to read at the Brent School. I will read there weekly, starting in October again for this year. I have been doing that now for 7 years—this will be my seventh year. I have also taken the opportunity to speak at graduations in the District of Columbia. I did this this year. I look for that opportunity when I can, and will continue to do so.

The fact is, just a few years ago we passed the No Child Left Behind Act, with some rather basic and fundamental principles on this idea of developing the curriculum that was going to be appropriate for these children, and which was going to require well-qualified teachers to teach the curriculum. We are going to examine the child as he or she goes through the year, to find out what the child does not know. We are going to have support services for that child so they can keep up, and well-trained teachers. We have accountability for the parents so they will have information for accountability of the schools, and accountability for everyone, including the Federal Government. We are the ones who failed in terms of providing the resources to which we committed, but the transformation schools in the District of Columbia have followed many of these same principles as in No Child Left Behind.

We have made very important progress in these transformation schools. They are demonstrating the essential elements of what was in the No Child Left Behind Act. We know what works. We don't have to rediscover and find out what works.
That is what is so tragic because we know the progress that has been made in these transformation schools. We know the needs. We know the struggle those parents have keeping their children in the transformation schools. We know the pressures the teachers face.

Although my chart is small, it shows the transformation schools. It compares their scores in reading and math for 2002, and reading and math for 2003. The progress is dramatic. We know what works.

We will have a chance to review this. I ask unanimous consent that the progress of a number of these transformation school be printed in the RECORD. One school is Simon Elementary School located in Ward 8, one of the poorest wards in the city. It serves 400 students, almost entirely African Americans, with 10 percent special education. Last year they raised assessment by 30 points in reading and math combined. Reading scores rose 10 points and math scores rose 20 points. Noyes Elementary School is another transformation school which is showing significant improvement.

With the resources we have available, invest in what we are doing rather than trying to superimpose another system on the District of Columbia.

I will elaborate later in the debate.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

IRAQ

Mr. KENNEDY. Madam President, as Congress continues to debate President Bush's request for the massive sum of $87 billion as the next installment to pay for its flawed and failed policy in Iraq, the administration frequently compares it to the Marshall plan,which was so successful in rebuilding Europe after World War II and transforming them into new democracies.

Sadly, the most obvious area in which the administration's proposal on Iraq corresponds to the Marshall plan is its cost to the American taxpayer. And the comparison here is hardly to the administration's advantage. Under the Marshall plan, $88 million—in today's dollars—was spent over 4 years. The Bush administration is now asking for $87 billion for Iraq for next year alone.

There are many differences between the Marshall plan and the President's unprecedented $87 billion request on Iraq. The most important is that the Marshall plan deserved to be called a plan.

The Marshall plan was formally proposed in 1947 at Harvard in a commencement address by George C. Marshall, the famous World War II General who had become Secretary of State earlier that year in the Truman administration. His proposal was discussed at an international conference in Paris that include 16 nations. More than a full month of congressional hearings were held in which over 90 witnesses testified.

At the conclusion of the extensive congressional debate, Senate Arthur C. Vandenberg, who had been a leading critic of the Truman administration's foreign policy, described the plan as "the final product of eight months of more intensive study by more devoted minds than I have ever known to concentrate upon any one objective in all my twenty years in Congress."

Compare that to what is happening today. Instead of a well-deliberated and well thought-out plan, the Bush administration has given the Congress a 2-month-old, 28-page "working document" and asked us to write a blank check for $87 billion for Iraq. That request came to Congress just 6 months after we had earlier provided $78 billion for the war.

I doubt that at the end of this debate, any Senator would be willing to describe a 2 month old "working document" as glowingly as Senator Vandenberg characterized the Marshall plan.

In the 13 days since the administration presented this proposal to Congress, we still have not been able to obtain answers to critically important questions. How will the administration involve the international community in a genuine way in the rebuilding of Iraq? Can we count on additional foreign troops to share the burden or not? How long will American troops and foreign troops remain in Iraq?

It has become increasingly clear that the President and the Pentagon never had any idea about the cost of what they wanted to do in Iraq. In this arrogant go-it-alone attitude toward other nations, they thought they could plan Lone Ranger in the world, and instead they have become a very lonesome cowboy.

Now our troops are paying for it with their lives.

In its rush to war, the administration failed to recognize the danger and complexity of the occupation. They repeatedly underestimated the likely cost of their enormous undertaking.

Opposing voices in the administration were ignored. Last September, chief presidential economic advisor Lawrence Lindsey said that the total cost of the Iraqi war might be as much as $200 billion. His estimate was quickly refuted by White House Budget Director Mitch Daniels, who said Lindsey's estimate was "very, very high" and suggested the cost would be a more manageable $50 to $60 billion.

Independent analyses at that time indicated that the cost might approach $300 billion. Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld called them "baloney."

Last spring, as part of a broader effort to win the support of the American people for the military operation, the administration began to argue that "Iraq can pay for its own reconstruction." The war might be costly, we were told, but it would be quick and decisive. The financial obligation of the United States would be limited, because the liberated Iraqi people would use their extraordinary wealth from the world's second largest reserves of oil to finance the reconstruction.

In a February 2003 White House briefing, Ari Fleischer argued that "Iraq, unlike Afghanistan, is a rather wealthy country. Iraq has tremendous resources that belong to the Iraqi people. And so there are a variety of means that Iraq has to be able to shoulder much of the burden for their own reconstruction.

In March, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld told the House Appropriations Committee, "I don't believe the United States has a responsibility for reconstruction, in a sense .    .    . [Reconstruction] funds can come from those various sources I mentioned: frozen assets, oil revenues, and a variety of other things, including the Oil for Food program, which has a very substantial number of billions of dollars in it."

At the same hearing, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz said, "The oil revenues could bring in between $50 and $100 billion over the course of the next 2 years .    .    . We're dealing with a country that can really finance its own reconstruction, and relatively soon."

Also, at that same hearing, Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage said, "This is not Afghanistan .    .    . When we approach the question of Iraq, we realize there is a country which has a resource. And it's oil. And it can bring in and does bring in a certain amount of revenue each year .    .    . $10, $15, even $18 billion .    .    . this is not a broke country."

What the Nation heard was clear: Don't worry about the cost. Iraq can finance its own reconstruction.

In fact last March, the administration was so confident of this that it put a $1.7 billion price tag on the reconstruction effort in Iraq. Shortly after the war began that month, Administrator Andrew Natsios of the Agency for International Development confidently proclaimed:

The rest of the rebuilding in Iraq will be done by other countries who have already made pledges—Britain, Germany, Norway, Japan, Canada, and Iraqi oil revenues .    .    . The American part of this will be $1.7 billion. We have no plans for any further-on funding of this.

The administration embraced the Iraqi self-sufficiency argument as recently as the end of July, when OMB Director Josh Bolten testified that the administration did not "anticipate requesting anything additional for the balance of this year" with regard to Iraq operations or reconstruction.

Just 5 weeks later, President Bush stunned the Nation by saying that $87 billion in additional funding—including $20 billion for reconstruction—was needed.

Why the change? Ambassador Bremer says Iraq has an unsustainable level of foreign debt—nearly $200 billion—left over from Saddam which would prevent use of Iraq's oil wealth to pay for the reconstruction.
Iraq's enormous debt was already well-known. But the administration chose to ignore it in order to convince the public that the costs of reconstruction would be low.

The architect of much of the Iraqi war plan, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, is now saying that we knew all along the war would be expensive. Despite earlier claims that Iraq could pay for its reconstruction and relatively soon,
Secretary Wolfowitz told the Senate Armed Services Committee on September 10: "No one said we would know anything other than this would be very bloody, it could be very long, and by implication, it could be very expensive."

Secretary Wolfowitz never told the American people it could be very expensive. Until this month, no one in the administration—other then Larry Lindsey—said it would be expensive.

This is worse than fuzzy math, and the American people have a right to be furious about it.

And they will be even more furious about it as they learn what we are being asked to fund: $400 million for maximum-security prisons. That's $50,000 a bed; $800 million for international police training for 1,500 officers, that's $530,000 an officer; Consultants at $200,000 a year. That's double normal pay. It is double their profit margin too? And $164 million to develop a curriculum for training Iraqi soldiers. Why does it cost that much to develop a curriculum? And $1.4 billion to reimburse cooperating nations for logistical, military and other support provided to U.S. military operations; $100 million for the "United States Emergency Fund for Complex Foreign Crisis"; $15.5 million to the European Command for countries directly supporting the war on terror.

Before Congress rubber-stamps the administration's $87 billion request, we need answers. We need accountability. We need the truth. The amount of money is huge. It is more than the combined budget deficits of all 50 States for 2004. It is 87 times what the Federal Government spends annually on afterschool programs. It is 2 years worth of unemployment benefits. It is enough to pay each of the 3.3 million people who have lost their jobs in the past 3 years more than $25,000.

It it seven times what President Bush proposed to spend on education for low-income schools in 2004—seven times the amount. It is nine times what the Federal Government spends on special education each year. It it eight times what the Government spends on Pell Grants to help middle and low-income students go to College. And it is larger than the total economy of 166 nations.

Clearly, we need to require competitive bidding for Iraqi contracts. Left to its own devices, the administration will continue to make sweetheart deals with American contractors at the taxpayer's expense.

A third of the $3.9 billion monthly cost of the operations in Iraq is quietly flowing to private contractors. Halliburton alone has already received more than $2 billion in contract awards—an amount that exceeds Administrator Natsios' original $1.7 billion estimate for the total U.S. cost of the reconstruction of Iraq. More than $1.2 billion was awarded in noncompetitive bidding. The Iraqi people deserve the benefits of peace, but instead, the administration's friends in corporate America are divvying up the spoils of war.

Is Halliburton the company best able to get the job done efficiently for the U.S. in Iraq?

In 1997, the General Accounting Office found that Halliburton's construction subsidiary in the Balkans had billed the Army $85 a sheet for plywood that actually cost $14 a sheet; In 2000, the agency found that the company was charging the Pentagon four times what it should have been charging for office cleaning; In 2002, the company paid the U.S. "$2 million to settle fraud claims at Fort Ord." At a minimum, all contracts should be provided on a competitive basis—no exceptions.

Why not scale back the lavish resources being provided to contractors and consultants and provide larger sums directly to the Iraqi people? It is their country. They have the greatest stake in the success of their reconstruction, and involving them will enhance the prospects for success.

In some areas of Iraq, military officials have already been able to achieve impressive results with small amounts of money.
One former military official told me that the U.S. military funded the building of a cement factory for just $100,000. The bid by an American contractor for the same project was in the millions.

Iraq has many of the best trained oil engineers in the world. Why not give them—rather than large American companies—a larger role in rebuilding the industry?

As the Congress debates this funding, we will be looking for answers from the administration to these questions. We will be insisting on accountability. The administration cannot continue to low ball the cost and make up its plan day by day. It can no longer cook the books.

The administration's failure to have a plan is costing too many lives and too many dollars. It would be irresponsible for the Congress to write an $87 billion blank check for the administration, without demanding an honest plan to achieve stability in Iraq, involving the international community in the rebuilding, and preventing the disaster in the making we have caused.

Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.