Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2004-Conference Report

AGRICULTURE, RURAL DEVELOPMENT, FOOD AND DRUG ADMINISTRATION, AND RELATED AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2004-CONFERENCE REPORT

Mr. BYRD. I thank the very distinguished Democratic whip for his gracious comments. He has been an inspiration to me. I once served as the majority whip in the Senate. I counted myself a good whip, but remember those lines: You are a better man than I am, Gunga Din.

Well, this whip from Nevada is the best whip that I can recall in my long service in this Senate, and I am a former whip.

The distinguished Senator from Nevada mentioned ball games. No ball game ever changed the course of history. With all due respect to those who like football, basketball, and baseball-and I like them, too. I used to enjoy playing baseball in the sandlot back in the days when Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig were in that great murderous lineup, the New York Yankees. I can remember September 1927 when the sultan of swat, Babe Ruth, broke the record with 60 home runs that year.

The Senator's mention of the line-item veto is of interest. I was right in what I had to say about the line-item veto. I know certain Senators whom I personally asked to vote against that line-item veto, and they did not. They did not heed my admonishments, but the Supreme Court of the United States called that law invalid. Thank God for the Supreme Court of the United States in that instance.

I thank the distinguished Senator.

Mr. President, this afternoon I want to talk about the 2004 omnibus conference report on those bills. The Senate opened the second session to the 108th Congress not many hours ago. While the year on the calendar has changed from the last time we met in this Chamber, the Senate finds itself handcuffed by the same authoritarian dictates from the same Bush administration that last year led to some of the most fierce partisan passions that this Senate has seen in decades. Gone is the traditional spirit of cooperation. Yes, the man in the White House who said that he was going to change the tone in Washington, he changed that tone all right. It is the worst that I have seen in my more than 51 years in Congress. Gone is that traditional spirit of cooperation. Gone is the belief that the needs of the Nation are above the needs of any political party. In their place is an agenda driven by pure rank, raw partisanship. This is a tragic turn for this historic Chamber, a tragic turn for these United States of America.

Hope for a bipartisan Medicare prescription drug benefit was bright at the start of this Congress, but by the time the conference report returned to the Senate for final passage, all that was left was a prescription for protecting the pharmaceutical industry and a drug benefit that is a sham for American seniors.

Progress on an energy strategy for the country began in a cooperative effort but quickly the Democrats were locked out while industry lobbyists were welcomed in to write the conference report with the executive branch.

The fiscal year 2004 appropriations bills have suffered a similar fate. Between June 26 and September 4 of last year, the Senate Appropriations Committee reported all 13 appropriations bills, bills that were the result of bipartisan cooperation between the chairman and the ranking member of each subcommittee and those subcommittee members. The bills were tight and lean because of unrealistic budget limits, but Senators worked in tandem to craft balanced legislation. Despite the efforts of the chairman of the committee, the senior Senator from State of Alaska, progress on the bills waned, and as a result we faced the grim Frankenstein aberration of an Omnibus appropriations conference report.

I warned the Senate that such an Omnibus appropriations bill could grow limbs like trees, limbs like an octopus, limbs that never were contemplated by the Senate. I warned Members on both sides of the aisle that they could not control the outcome when the seed of an omnibus bill was planted in a closed conference. I warned that a Senator's right to debate controversial legislation would be lost. Finally, I warned that such an omnibus bill would invite the White House to the table.

Never was the White House invited to the table when I was chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee-never. It is all right for them to be in an outside room but not at the table, no. I warned that such an omnibus bill would invite the White House to the table and that the Congress would once again forfeit its constitutional right to write legislation. Negotiations on that legislation started well enough. The House and Senate Appropriations Subcommittees worked on their respective pieces of this mammoth bill. The conferees held an open session under the able leadership of Senate Chairman TED STEVENS and House Chairman BILL YOUNG, and several of the chapters of this behemoth bill were settled. But this tale does not have a happy ending. No, this chariot, drawn by tall horses, quickly turned into a pumpkin. Have you heard that before? It quickly turned into a pumpkin, pulled by rats before the clock struck midnight.

The White House decided-the White House-the White House decided that bipartisan negotiations were unacceptable. The White House pulled the plug on the conference and took it behind closed doors. The Republican congressional leadership bowed, bowed down to White House pressure. Suddenly, Democratic Members of Congress had no voice in the legislation. Senator Graham, the Democrats had no voice, suddenly, in the legislation they had only days before helped to move to the verge of passage.

In the back rooms of the Capitol, the White House sat down with the Republican leadership and with fat-cat lobbyists representing big corporations and produced an unamendable 1,182-page, $328 billion conference report. They produced a conference report that turned the legislative process on its head.

You think Speaker Joe Martin, Republican Speaker of the House-Joe Martin of Massachusetts-would have stood for that when he was Speaker of the House? Do you think John Taber of New York, Chairman of the Senate-House Appropriations Committee, would have stood for that in his day? No.

Four of the bills contained in this omnibus did not have a recorded vote in the Senate. That is all right. A voice vote or a vote by division are just as legal and legitimate as is a rollcall vote. But one of the bills, the Commerce-Justice-State bill, was never even debated, never even debated in the Senate, let alone adopted by a vote of the Senate.

Shame. Shame on us for letting that happen.

So there you have it. The Commerce-Justice-State bill was never even debated in the Senate, let alone adopted. Scores of provisions were included in the so-called Miscellaneous Appropriations Act portion of the conference report that were never debated, never debated in this Senate. What has happened to the legislative process here under the leadership of the Republican administration, the Bush administration? Under pressure from the White House, provisions that were approved by both the House and Senate have been dropped. Get that. Under pressure from the White House, provisions that have been included, that were provisions included in both the House and Senate, have been dropped.

A point of order could be made under rule XXVIII that would kill this conference report. Under pressure from the White House, controversial provisions that were written as 1-year limitations when they were before the House or Senate have been mutated into permanent changes in authorization law. This conference report includes an across-the-board cut never debated here in this Senate, an arbitrary cut that would apply to legislation already signed into law. It would cut homeland security. It would cut counterterrorism efforts. It would cut education and health care. This across-the-board cut would reach back into laws that agencies have been operating under for 4 months.

In the view of the White House, the United States can afford $1.7 trillion in tax cuts. When it comes to the Medicare bill, we can afford $12 billion for subsidies for private insurance companies. When it comes to the Energy bill, we can afford over $25 billion of tax cuts and $5 billion of mandatory spending for big energy corporations. But when it comes to initiatives funded in these appropriations bills, initiatives that help ordinary Americans every day, the President insists on cuts.

He didn't say anything like that in his big speech last night. No, he didn't say anything about that, a cut of 0.59 percent would reduce funding for No Child Left Behind programs by more than $73 million, resulting in 24,000 fewer children being served by title I. The across-the-board cut would reduce veterans medical care funding by $159 million, resulting in 26,500 fewer veterans receiving medical care.

The President lauds the military, as he should. He applauds the soldier, the sailor, the airman, the marine. But when it comes to veterans, 26,500 fewer veterans will receive medical care, or 198,000 veterans not getting the prescription drugs they need. Was anything said about that in the speech last evening? Not a word.

The across-the-board cut will chop funding for homeland security initiatives. How many more baggage screeners will be laid off, resulting in longer lines and less security at the airports? How many fewer flights will have air marshals on board? Nothing said about that in the State of the Union speech. No, no, no. How many more containers will come into this country uninspected? How many more illegal aliens will be able to remain in this country or how many more will be able to sneak into this country? Not a word said. How many potential terrorists will never be investigated because of cuts in the FBI? The Bush tax cuts will cost $293 billion in the calendar year 2004. More than $1 out of every $4 being spent on those tax cuts is going to the top 1 percent of taxpayers in this country. They didn't put me in office. No, those on that side of the track didn't put me in office. The Bush tax cuts-let me say it again-the Bush tax cuts will cost $293 billion in the calendar year 2004.

More than one out of every four dollars being spent on those tax cuts is going to the top 1 percent of taxpayers in this country. Are you in that category? Are you, Senators, in that category? I don't know. But I know a lot of people who sent me here who are not in that category.

Taxpayers with incomes that average about $1 million per year will receive an average tax cut of $85,000 in the year 2010, while those taxpayers earning less than $73,000 will receive at best 1 percent of what a millionaire will receive and at worst a paltry $98 in the year 2010.

How will we pay for this? Oh, that will be somebody else's problem. This President will be back on his ranch in Crawford, TX, living it up and having it good. What about your children and my children? They are going to be left to pay for this.

How will we pay for it? With cuts in education, cuts in veterans' programs, and cuts in homeland security.

In the dark of night, behind closed doors, the White House filled this conference report with favors for big corporations. Everywhere you look, you find the interests of corporate America coming first and the needs of working Americans coming in last.

The Senate approved a provision to block for 1 year the administration's plan to take away the rights of as many as 8 million employees to earn time and a half for extra hours worked. This administration produced a rule so biased toward industry that it even included advice to corporations on how to avoid additional wages.

Yet the Senate provision-what happened to it? What happened to that Senate provision? It is gone, obliterated under the darkness of night, taken out.

At the request of the food marketing industry, rules to allow Americans to know where their food, such as beef and vegetables, is grown are delayed for 2 years, breaking the balance crafted as part of the 2002 farm bill.

During the consideration of the 2002 farm bill, the Senate included a provision-the Senate; that is, us-included a provision to ensure that American consumers were provided with information about where their food originates-where it comes from. This so-called country-of-origin requirement became law and was immediately attacked by industry forces. When the smoke of the agriculture conference cleared, we found that industry forces had worked overtime to slip out of their statutory requirements. The country-of-origin issue was not even allowed to be discussed at the conference. The decision whether to keep or whether to kill the country-of-origin requirement was made behind closed doors after the conference was adjourned subject to the call of the Chair. I was in that conference. It was adjourned subject to the call of the Chair. They didn't have any use for me anymore. I was locked out. Senator Byrd can go home now. He will not be in on the decision. We don't need you there. You can go home now subject to the call of the Chair. Of course, the call never come.

Roy Acuff used to sing, "I called and I called but nobody answered. I called and I called but nobody answered."

Democrats of either the House or the Senate were not in the room.

I wonder how many of our listeners remember the first question that was ever asked in the history of man. What was the first question that was ever asked? It was asked in the cool of the day when God walked through that garden of paradise, the Garden of Eden, which we think was located somewhere between the two great rivers in old Mesopotamia, the Tigris and the Euphrates Rivers. God walked in that garden looking for Adam and Eve. But he couldn't find Adam. So he asked the question: Adam, Adam, where art thou? That is the first question ever recorded. Adam, where art thou? Well, Adam and Eve were hiding behind bushes and figleaves. Adam, where art thou?

Well, Democrats in either the House or the Senate were not in that room. So when their constituents ask, where were you, where were you, Senator Graham? Where were you, Senator Byrd, you who has been in Congress 51 years, where were you then? Where were you on that day?The Democrats were locked out. We were locked out. We weren't included.

I will tell you one thing. That was never done when I was chairman.

Now we find that the delay in implementing the country-of-origin law is not just for 1 year, as the House provided and the Senate opposed, but 2 years. And that is not all. The House provision only placed a limitation on the labeling requirement for meat products. Now the agreement coming out of conference expands the limitation to all the other commodities covered by the law such as fruits and vegetables. American consumers may have thought they were going to know where their food came from, but the majority has made sure that those facts will remain a hidden secret in the deep freeze.

Also, the 1-year limitation on the FCC media ownership rule was turned into a permanent cap at 39 percent. The practical effect of changes demanded by the White House is to protect Rupert Murdoch's FOX television network and CBS-Viacom from having to comply with the lower 35 percent ownership caps, the congressional version of the bill that was put in place.

The White House is boosting special corporate interests. Why not? Look at the millions that are poured into political coffers by those special corporate interests. The White House is boosting special corporate interests at the expense of the people's interest for balanced news and information. Protections for Federal workers that were agreed to on a bipartisan basis in the public conference that would ensure fair competition with the private sector disappeared in the backroom.

The White House sent its troops to the Hill last week to press the Republican leadership to reject entreaties from Members on both sides of the aisle to make any changes to this Frankenstein of a bill.

This "my way or the highway" roughshod politics over the principled approach to Congress is incredible, especially from a White House that has done so much to undermine the credibility of this Nation and its Government.

One year ago, the President used the State of the Union Address before this Congress, this Nation, and the world to make his best case for taking the Nation to war in Iraq under the doctrine of preemptive strikes, under the doctrine of preemption.

In the State of the Union Address and in other speeches, he and others in the administration told Congress and the Nation that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction that were an imminent threat to this Nation. We were told that Saddam Hussein was trying to develop nuclear weapons. We were told that American troops would be received as liberators. We were told that Saddam Hussein was aiding terrorists, such as the al-Qaida. What an incredible tale. What an incredible squandering of the credibility of our Government in the eyes of the world.

For this President, there seems to be no limit to his appetite for rhetoric, no recognition that there is a difference between his rhetoric and reality.

Yes, he promised Americans to leave no child behind, but this omnibus bill would cut funding by $6 billion below the level authorized for title I in the No Child Left Behind Act which this President signed with such promise in January of 2002. This omnibus bill would leave behind 2.1 million children who are eligible for title I educational services.

The President promised to secure our homeland and yet this bill would cut funding for port security and border security. On November 14, 2002, the Senate passed the Maritime Transportation Security Act without a dissenting vote. The vote was 95 to 0. The bill was signed into law by President Bush on November 25, 2002, during a celebratory White House ceremony. On that day, the President said: We will strengthen security at our Nation's 361 seaports, adding port security agents, requiring ships to provide more information about the cargo, crew, and passengers that they carry.

Despite these requirements, the President has requested no funding for port security grants and this omnibus bill would cut the funding that Congress added last fall. Sixteen million cargo containers arrive in the United States by ship, truck, and rail each year. One hundred forty million passengers travel annually by ship each year. Thousands of employees work at our ports each day. Millions of citizens live in and around our port community. A terrorist attack through our ports would produce billions of dollars of losses to our economy.

Was a thin dime requested by this President? No. No, the President did not request a dime.

On November 19, 2001, the President signed into law the Aviation and Transportation Security Act. The act created the Transportation Security Administration and mandated that all cargo on passenger aircraft be screened. The administration has never requested sufficient funding to meet the goals of the law. In order to bridge a $900 million funding shortfall that it created for fiscal year 2003, the administration proposed delaying advanced firearms training for Federal air marshals at the same time that intelligence reports indicated an enhanced threat to aviation and the potential for hijacking planes transiting the United States.

Regarding air cargo security, the administration has met the requirement of screening air cargo by expanding a program referred to as the Known Shipper Program. This program does not actually physically screen cargo going into the bellies of jumbo passenger aircraft but relies on paperwork to protect our citizens. Congress added $35 million above the President's request to enhance the deployment of detection equipment, research other methods to screen cargo and otherwise expand air cargo security. This omnibus bill would reduce that funding.

The Enhanced Border Security and Visa Entry Reform Act of 2002, Public Law 101-173, was signed into law by President Bush on May 14, 2002. The act authorized funding for enhanced hiring of immigration inspectors and agents as well as for improvements to immigration facilities. The President did not request the authorized funds to hire additional immigration personnel, nor did he request funds to make the authorized improvements to immigration facilities or to hire the required number of Border Patrol agents. The omnibus bill would reduce funding for Border Patrol efforts.

Just last month, 4 days before Christmas, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge announced that the Nation's terror alert level was being raised to orange. He said the strategic indicator, including al-Qaida's continued desire to carry out attacks against our homeland, was perhaps greater than at any time since September 11. He went on to say that information indicates that extremists abroad are anticipating near-term attacks that they believe will rival or exceed the scope and impact of those we experienced in New York.

The President promised a safer nation when he created the new Homeland Security Department. But his Secretary says we are in greater danger than at any time since September 11, 2001. At the same time, the administration urged Congress to cut funding for Homeland Security.

In May of this year the President signed into law a bill authorizing $15 billion over 5 years for international programs to combat HIV/AIDS. On July 12, while in Nigeria, the President said: The House of Representatives and the Senate must fully fund this initiative, for the good of the people on this continent of Africa.

To "fully fund this initiative" requires $3 billion. The authorization bill, which the President explicitly referenced in his speech, authorized $3 billion in fiscal year 2004. Yet the President only requested that the Congress provide $2 billion for the program. This omnibus bill, after the across-the-board cut, would provide less than $2.4 billion for the Global AIDS Program, over $600 million below the level promised.

Democratic Senators, including myself, on three separate occasions offered amendments that would have ensured that HIV/AIDS funding reached the $3 billion level. All three of these amendments were defeated by the Republican leadership working with the Bush administration.

Rhetoric and reality are two different things. Now we understand that the President will be promising to put a man on Mars. Somewhere along the way the tail has begun to wag the dog.

The legislative process is being steered from the Oval Office. The legislative branch is being used not as the Framers envisioned, to serve as a check on the executive branch, but instead as a tool to check off accomplishments on the President's political agenda.

Whose fault is that? Shame on us for letting ourselves be used. Shame on us for letting ourselves be used. Shame on us for putting political party against the best interests of the Nation. Shame on us for putting political party above the Constitution of the United States. This is not the way the Senate should operate.

I fault no individual Senator for bringing us to this point, but I do fault the system that places meaningless message votes and staged photo-op debates before the business of the Nation. I fault politicians for their weakness, for their failure to uphold their oaths to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic.

Shame on us. In my 50 years in this Congress, I have never, never before seen such a Milquetoast Congress, a Congress that would cede power.

This Constitution says Congress shall have power to declare war. Yet this Senate stood speechless-speechless-when we voted in 2002 to shift this power to determine when, where, and what military forces should invade a sovereign Nation. The Senate had little to say.

That was not the Senate that was here when I came here. No, not the Senate that was here when I came here. Everett Dirksen stood at that place. Lyndon Johnson stood at that desk. There was Norris Cotton, George Aiken, Jacob Javits. Those were men. There was Senator Russell of Georgia, who stood at this place, right here at this desk, Richard Russell. Lister Hill stood there. John Pastore of Rhode Island stood here. No, not those men. They are gone.

But the Constitution is not gone. The Constitution is still with us. And many times have I stood at that desk where the Presiding Officer sits today, put my hand on the Bible, as it were, and swore to support and defend the Constitution of the United States-not to support this President or that President, this party or that party. I did not have any oath of that kind. I did not take any oath of that kind. I never will take an oath of that kind.

How many of us can say we have stood by that Constitution? How many of us would have to say: Oh, I have bent-I have bent, when my party, when my President-the President is the President for all of us. He is not just my President.

But I say that we have become far too deferential to all Presidents, too deferential to all Presidents. Presidents are just hired hands like the rest of us. They are here only for a while. Then they go. I have seen 11 administrations go, and I hope I get to see another one. But we act, when we come here, as though we swear to support this President or that President, a President from the Republican party or a President from the Democratic party. Why? They are mere hired hands who are here for a little while, like the rest of us.

No President sends the Presiding Officer here. No President can send that Presiding Officer home. Why so deferential to Presidents?

Under the Constitution, we have three separate but equal branches of Government. How many of us know that? How many of us know that the executive branch is but the equal of the legislative branch-not above it, not below it, but equal? Why do we treat Presidents as though they were kings, clothed in royal purple?

The real losers in this scenario are the American people. They are not well served by a Congress that fritters away opportunity after opportunity to probe, to analyze, to exercise its independent judgment on the urgent issues of the day in favor of rushing to do the bidding of the executive branch. Shame on us. Fie on us.

The people of West Virginia and this Constitution that I hold in my hand have made me a U.S. Senator. No President made me a U.S. Senator. I came to Congress when Harry Truman was President. He did not make me a Member of Congress. Of course, I was indebted to him for coming to West Virginia and speaking on my behalf and on behalf of my colleague, Jennings Randolph, at that time. But I did not expect that to make him my boss. I admired Harry Truman. I did not like him for some of the language that he used in public, but I still admired him, and admire him to this day as a President who had courage. But he was just a President.

So I have served with 11 Presidents-not under any of them. No, no President sends me here. And by what right do the people of West Virginia send me here if I am going to bow and scrape to a President? They expect me to speak up, and that is what I have tried to do, in the presence of Presidents, yes, but they put their pants on just like I put mine on; the same old way, no different.

Under our Constitution, our Founding Fathers had the wisdom to establish three separate, equal, coordinate branches of Government. That is under this Constitution. This Constitution-perhaps one does not think about it often, but when one stops to think about it, this Constitution has something to do with every minute, every hour, every day of every life in this country in one place or another, and in some instances more than one place.

This Constitution impacts your life, your life, and your life. Every day that you are here on this planet, this Constitution has a bearing on it. And then some would treat this as a piece of paper and put political party above the Constitution of the United States. When I do that, send me home and say: Good riddance.

This is the Constitution of the United States. Many times I have sworn by oath before God and man, with my hand on the Bible, the King James version of the Holy Bible, to support and defend this Constitution. Yet we treat it as a piece of paper. We use it only when it is of a particular benefit to us. But every day, in some way or in some ways, this Constitution bears upon your life. It may be in the delivery of your mail. It may be in the hard surfacing of the roads upon which you drive. It may have something to do with the flights that you are about to depart upon. Yes, it is this Constitution.

In this country, we don't say: God save the King. God save the King. God save the President of the United States. No. We say: God save the Constitution of the United States. This Constitution saved Congress from its error when it passed the Line-Item Veto Act. This Constitution did that.

Under the Constitution, Congress writes the laws. The President executes the laws. Under the Constitution, the power of the purse rests here, right here-not downtown, not down at the other end of the avenue, but here.

Most of the people who were in the Thirteen Colonies, in the 13 States, when the Constitution became a constitution, were British subjects. It took hundreds of years and blood spilled at the tip of the sword for Englishmen in 1688 to write that meetings of Parliament that should be held often, that there would be freedom of speech in the Parliament and in the House of Commons. Those were the men who placed the powers of the purse in the hands of the elected representatives of the people of England in Parliament. That is where the power of the purse rests, here in the legislative branch. We ought never to let the executive branch forget it. Yet we cower. We act like poodles when it comes to standing up against the Chief Executive of the United States.

Who is he? With all due respect, whether he is Republican or Democrat, this is the Congress of the United States. This is the people's branch, this body and the other. Under the Constitution, the Congress determines how to write our laws, how to protect Members' rights to debate the important issues of the day. This omnibus bill leaves those pillars of our constitutional system in shambles. It is our duty as the people's representatives to protect those pillars of our constitutional system of government.

In 1999 and in the year 2000, when President Clinton, a Democratic President, a President of my own party, supported efforts by the Republican Congress to produce Omnibus appropriations bills, I came to this floor to decry our loss of our right and our duty to write legislation. I came to this floor to stand up for Congress's power of the purse. It made no matter to me-not any, no matter-that this was a Democratic President calling for omnibus spending legislation. I stood up for the rights of this Senate as I do today.

In 1993, there was a great effort to include President Clinton's comprehensive health care reform plan in a reconciliation bill. Proponents of the President's proposal hoped that such an approach would shelter the proposal from extended debate in the Senate. My own majority leader, George Mitchell, came to me. I said, no. My own colleague from West Virginia in the Senate pleaded with me. I said, no. President Clinton, a Democratic President, called on the telephone, called on me to support this effort. I said, no. I said, no. Without regard to party, I felt compelled to protect Members' rights to a full debate.

I said: This is a comprehensive health bill. The people need to know what is in it. We Members of the Senate need to know what is in it. That is why we have the Senate, to debate and to amend. No.

And so I turned my face like flint to the request of my own friend and the President of my own party. No.

Did he think less of me? I doubt it. He thanked me. He understood what I was saying. I will say it again. How many on that side would say that to a President of their party? But with President Bush, he insists that members of his party march with him step by step. I can remember a great Republican Senator who refused to march step by step. That was Senator Mark Hatfield. He was scorned by many on that side of the aisle because he stood alone against a political party, his party. He was no coward for doing that. He was a man.

President Bush insists that members of his party march with him step by step. Today, on the other side of the aisle, voices for a strong and equal Congress fall silent.

Last week Senator Frist wrote to Senators and urged them to vote for the omnibus conference report because if the omnibus fails, then the only alternative, he said, is a full-year continuing resolution that would force the agencies for the seven outstanding appropriations bills to operate at last year's level. He argued that such a continuing resolution would produce deep cuts for food safety, veterans medical care, highway funding, and the Global AIDS Programs.

However, the Senator presents the Senate with a false choice. If the omnibus is not approved, the Senate has other options to move forward. If the only alternative is a full-year continuing resolution, then that is the choice of the Republican leadership. It would be another example of putting political posturing before the needs of the American people.

There is a clear alternative, and that is to sit down and work out a compromise that can overwhelmingly pass the Senate. If our distinguished and illustrious majority leader, Mr. Frist, had the will to do so, such negotiations could be completed, who knows, maybe even in 1 day. However, in its current form, I cannot vote for this bill. I cannot vote for this conference report that so ravages our constitutional process and puts corporate interests ahead of the people's interests. I cannot vote for a bill that undermines our credibility, undermines the credibility of the United States Senate with the American people. I urge Members to vote no when the Senate votes on the adoption of the conference report.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.