An Anxious Nation

AN ANXIOUS NATION

    Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I say to my friend from Illinois I always appreciate his remarks both on the floor and when he is out meeting with people via the media. He puts his finger on a lot of important issues. He mentioned that I was going to speak about the environment. This afternoon, I will take on that issue. I will mention it this morning, but my idea this morning, in the few hours before the State of the Union, is to basically address the President of the United States from this Chamber in a way to urge him to address the anxiety of the American people because I think the state of the Union, if it can be summed up in one word, is anxious.

    I want to go through why I think that is the case. So as we get ready to take part in a wonderful ritual where the Members of the Senate will gather in this Chamber—and I know the Chair, as a new Member, will experience this amazing feeling of patriotism and excitement as we gather here to make that march across the Capitol to join our colleagues in the House—we think very seriously about the state of our Union and what we hope the President will say.

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    In the spirit of great respect, I want to tell the President, through this short talk of mine today, what I am hearing from my constituents about the state of our Nation.

    When I say "Mr. President" in my talk, it is directed at President Bush.

    Mr. President Bush, I must tell you that the state of the Union today is anxious—anxious about the twin threats of war and terrorism, about the health of our economy and our environment; anxious about our children's education and our family's health care; anxious about our basic civil rights, including our right to privacy and the right to make personal decisions without Government interference.

    Mr. President, the people are anxious and they are worried that you are leading us prematurely down a lonely path to war while ignoring other serious threats to peace and that you have lost your focus on terrorism.

    As Senator Durbin said, the people have not heard a word about Osama bin Laden, whom you placed at the top of your terrorist list. We have not heard a word about him in months.

    Many believe that you are heading down the wrong path on the economy; that you are leaving too many children behind; that you are sacrificing our environment at the altar of the special interests; and that you are failing to address the health care issue.

    People worry that you are actively seeking to reverse the constitutionally protected right to privacy. Two examples of this are your attacks on the right to choose and your selection of Admiral Poindexter, who was convicted of lying to Congress, to lead the Total Information Awareness Program, collecting vast amounts of personal information and intelligence about ordinary American citizens.

    I am very pleased there was an amendment which passed to essentially do away with that program, but we do not know what the House of Representatives will do in conference.

    Mr. President, you have not stated at all that you are for getting rid of this agency which will know everything there is to know about any citizen they decide to follow around via their use of computers.

    Here is the stark contrast to where we were a year ago, when the entire world stood with the President and with all the American people as we struggled to recover from the terrorist attacks and prevent their recurrence.

    I saw Senator Biden on a talk show yesterday. He reminded us that a headline in a French newspaper said: We are all Americans. What a moment that was in history; the world was united behind us. Somehow we have lost that leadership. We need to get it back. Today America stands far too alone when it comes to foreign policy challenges.

    Many thoughtful Californians of both political parties are saying U.N. inspectors must have more time to do their work. I hope the President will state that tonight. Three weeks ago, Colin Powell said the inspectors were gaining momentum. We also know we have yet to give the inspectors a lot of information we have about what has been going on in Iraq. Information is power. The inspectors need that information, first, to find out what happened to the weapons; second, so we can make a case that we do not have to deal with Saddam Hussein alone. I don't want to see us deal with Saddam Hussein alone. Could we beat him militarily? Absolutely. But what happens after when we are alone? What happens to sharing the costs of human life? We need our allies with us, and more than Great Britain.

    Yes, Iraq must disarm. After all, Saddam Hussein said he would; he has to. He agreed to the resolutions. We have to keep in mind more arms were destroyed by the weapons inspectors in Iraq after the first Persian Gulf war than we destroyed by our bombs. That is a very important point reiterated by Madeleine Albright and by others. We have a great deal of information to give the inspectors. Let's give it to them. As long as Iraq is the focus of worldwide attention, as long as the inspectors are there, as long as we are having the no-fly zones patrolled by our planes and our allies in the north and the south, this man is boxed in. He cannot put a big toe outside of that country. He cannot do anything to harm us.

    I believe, therefore, we have time to avoid the devastation of war and, once again, to build the case and keep the international community with us. I worry with this focus on Iraq that we have a foreign policy elsewhere in the world that is one of deliberate negligence. As a matter of fact, if I had to put a word or two to the Bush doctrine, it appears to be a policy of designed neglect, except for Iraq. We ignore the problems. We wait for the crisis to hit us. This modus operandi is causing serious trouble in North Korea because North Korea was ignored and now it has complicated a crisis that grew out of this neglect.

    Closer to home in Latin America we see unrest. I ask, why do we see unrest? We have ignored the countries in our own hemisphere. We ignored Mexico. You promised there would be a new day. Yet we see the Foreign Minister of Mexico resigning out of frustration that he cannot even get a meeting with anyone in America who has any power. To have control over what goes on, that is foreign policy.

    At home, people are anxious and worried. They are worried about terrorist attacks. I am introducing a bill that will enable us to have countermeasures placed on our commercial airlines so if someone held a shoulder-fired missile aimed at one of our commercial airlines, at a takeoff or landing period, when they are most vulnerable, there would be countermeasures on that plane. The President has been studying this issue. The President is spending tens of billions on missile defense for long-range intercontinental missiles. Perhaps it is up to $60 billion. A fraction of that would retrofit all of our planes.

    And, by the way, when we take care of homeland security in such a manner, we create jobs, good-paying jobs, as well. Yet we will be prepared for what will come.

    We have to fund homeland security. I know Senator Schumer is going to talk about that later today.

    Let me finish by discussing the economy. We have watched this economy spiral downward for 2 years. We have seen this economy in a free fall. We have seen the stock market in a free fall. We have seen people in the country say: My God, I cannot retire. I was planning to retire. I will have to work 5 or 6 years because my retirement nest egg is essentially gone or so greatly reduced people cannot imagine.

    The unemployment rate, which was 4.2 percent when President Bush took office, now stands at 6 percent nationwide. In my home State, it is at a 5-year high of 6.6 percent. This is bringing anxiety and angst to the people. More than 2.4 million private sector jobs have disappeared. Mortgage foreclosures have reached record levels. The stock market has lost trillions of dollars. We have gone from surpluses in our Federal budget to deficits as far as the eye can see. We are headed to a path of the worst economy in 50 long years.

    In California last month alone the State lost 25,800 jobs. That is real people. What is your answer? Give tax breaks to the people who have jobs, who have earned millions of dollars, who are earning $1 million a year? You want to give them back $87,000, while my middle-class people are going to get back $87 a year. Where is that fair?

    More than that, what kind of stimulus is that? Think about it. Someone who earns $1 million a year is going to take that $87,000-a-year tax cut. What are they going to do with it? They already have a new refrigerator in every home they own. They already have a new car or two parked at every home they own. They already have their vacations prepaid. What are they going to do? They are not going to do anything with that money that is going to stimulate the economy. The greatest secret of America is that our middle class is what makes the country great. It is our working families who will go out and spend that money in this economy, buying a new car. My friend from Michigan knows that is important. The millionaires have their cars. It is the middle-class working people, if they get a good deal on a car, who will go out, if they feel a little more economically secure, and purchase that car. More of the same of the trickle down to the rich, which never gets down to this country, will not get us out of the economic nightmare in which we find ourselves.

    What the President wants to do to Medicare sends shivers up and down my spine. My friend from Michigan will talk about health care. I hope she talks about the fact that the so-called Medicare reform is the end of having a chance to pick your own doctor. They are blackmailing Medicare patients into thinking if they stay in that plan where they can choose their own doctor, they will not get any prescription drugs. This President wants them all in the HMOs. I say to my friend, and to the President of the United States, if the HMOs did a good job, that would be one thing. If we could pass a Patients' Bill of Rights giving people rights in an HMO, giving them the treatment they need, giving them the preventive care they need, giving them the quality doctors they deserve, it would be a different story. But pushing people into HMOs before we have solved the HMO abuse problem, and then saying, well, if you do not do that you do not get your medicine, I hope people in this country will rise up against that plan.

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    Mr. President, you have another 9 hours. I hope you take that plan out of your speech. I hope you will take that tax cut plan out of your speech and rewrite it and give the tax cuts to the middle class and give the tax cuts to the working poor. That will stimulate this economy and make it a 1-year stimulus that doesn't drain the revenues of Government in the outyears so that we are in deficits for as far as the eye can see. Give those tax breaks to the small business people. They are going to spend it on plant equipment.

    Mr. President, go back to your speech and take a look at what you are doing on education. Fully fund the No Child Left Behind Act.

    Mr. President, if you continue with your "leave no millionaire behind" plan, you will have no money for your Leave No Child Behind plan. You can't have it both ways. You can't go to war, promise people education, promise them this, promise them that, promise them homeland security, and then give away all the money to the millionaires and have nothing to fulfill your promises.

    People are on to this. They see it. You are doing it over and over again—with homeland security, not spending the money we need. The burden is falling on the cities and the States and the localities. I met with the mayors. Do you know what they said? Senator, when something goes wrong and, God forbid, there is a terrorist attack, someone is going to call 911. They are not going to call the White House, with all due respect. And they are not going to call me either.

    I used to be in local government. I respect those people. We are hanging out local government to dry—the local police, the local fire departments, and the rest. That is wrong. It is all in the name of giving tax breaks to millionaires who don't need it and won't spend it. It is unfair and it is hurtful.

    I will close, because my friend, Senator Stabenow, is here, on one of the topics I will speak more about later, and that is the state of our environment. If you look back at the progress we have made in the last 50 years and more, you will see a wonderful story emerging on the environment. You will see Republican Presidents and Democratic Presidents who stood up and had great plans for this environment. Teddy Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower, Richard Nixon, Bill Clinton—they all made the environment stronger. Everywhere you turn, Mr. President, you are rolling back that progress.

    So the state of the Union is anxious. They are anxious on all of these issues. Millions of Americans are waiting to feel less anxious. I hope, Mr. President, you will think about that before delivering your speech tonight.

    I yield the floor.