approved a new medicare measure. and we hear about it in a call on lbj with house speaker john mccormack and majority leader carl albert, house ways and meancommitteeilbur mills and health education and welfare assistant secretary wilbur collins. mr. collins speaks first. spirit i think a great deal, mr. president. >> is that right? >> yes, sir i think you've not got only anything you want but we got a lot more on this thing. it is a real comprehensive bill. >> how much is this going to cost my budget over what we estimated? >> well, i think it would be around, but i would say 450 million more than what you estimated for the net cost of the supplemented program. >> what do they do under that -- how is that handled? explain it to me again over and above, the supplementary use

toll from bird? >> well, generally speaking, it is physician services. >> my doctor that i go out they pump some stomach as he if i have any ulcers. is that he physician? >> batra. >> any medical services? >> any in the service of. >> how do we know what does he charge what he wants to? >> no. he can't quite chart what he wants to, because this has been put in a separate part, and what the seetary of h.e.w. have to do is make some kind of agreement with somebody like ue shield, and it would be their responsibility under the way the chairman has provided, that they would regulate the use of effect of the doctor. because what he tried to do is be sure the government wasn't regulating the feast director. so theeal would be to the indivial doctor. button will provide something

the doctor could only charge a reasonable charges, but this intermediary, the blue shield, would have to do all the pleasing so that the government wouldn't have it longhand spirit that is good. what does it do to you what the patient. it says they can have docr bills paid up to whaextent or how much? any limit? >> the individual patient hs to pay the first $50, deductible. and he has to pay 20%. >> of everything after that. >> everything after that. so if you went to the doctor and had a thousand dollar bill, you would be the first $50 end of the other 950 you have to pay 20% of that. >> but that keeps you hypochondriacs out. >> keeps a hypochondriacs out and for most of the people, would provide overwhelming for the physician caused. >> and it's just about everybody ey could endure, nicobar that much, folks could get them that much to pay their part. if they didn't have any money.

now what does it get you on hospital and nursing home under the king anderson packed? >> on theing anderson park, the fit 60 days under hospital care with a $40 deductible. they find economize on $40. and in addition, it has three her benefits that were in your bill, namely t health services, the outpatient diagnostic, ey fixed that a minute up remember the way they talked about would be about. and then the only one change was for the home health services. that has to be after you get out of a hospital. >> that's good. all right. what about the interesof the are they still raising hell, matt? >> yes, i think he will go over the senate and raise hell on things he here because quite frankly there's a longer any vote for the private insurance companies to send policies were

65, you take a combination of hospital care and physician services. >> i think that's wonderful. now remember those, nine out of 10 things that i get in trouble on it because they lay around. and tell the speaker and wilbur to please get a rule just the moment they can. >> we want to bring it up next week, mr. president. >> you tell them not to lay around and do the. they want to but they might not. then that gets of the doctors organize and indicate the others organized and didn't they a education bill that they lay around. it stinks that it's just like a dead cat on a door when you better either bury that cat or get it some life. and the speaker is saying he is way ahead of you, mr. president is going to get this next week and get it gng. >> congratulations to. let me talk to carl if he is there. >> all right. >> how is little john? >> all right. i think he told you the whole story. >> as my good.

karl, get him to make you all talk to john, you all talk to smith and they cannot let this stuff lay around until they can generate our position to us. all right. just a metric wilbur wants to talk to you. >> mr. president, don't you worry one bit about these doctors and insurance companies organizing against this bill. we have written the insurance people and i must admit completely out, people 65, the ama is going in all directions. i have even had an confidence come to me athe last minute telling me they would accept the payroll tax, and we would use it to finance our program with the stated minister. when you couldn't have that. >> no. >> but they have come a long, long way to get going in all directions. the insurance people are going to oppose a. there is no doubt about the. they were going to oppose h.r. one. never going to oppose anything we do. but they have no more to oppose

with respect to what we've got in this bill today or anyway without what we have done. the only thing, the only thing i'm concerned about, very frank about, is that there are about $450 million in this bill out of the general fund of the treasury for which the budget could endure your situation. >> yeah, but i will take care that. i would've. you have seen what i have done. wilbur, see, this willot hold for the rest of the year. but the first eight months by constant cabinet pressure, by withholding and just threatening an ultimatum and being mean event, meaning that harry byrd. i am under this year the first eight months, a million 800 million under what you procreated and what i said i would spend. i think, i will at least get, i will be four or 5 million under the. number one.

number to my budget i sent you in january, is a million dollars under my deficit last year. and i have reduced the deficit. now i think that, when they ask me about lsa do you want to put for 500 million. what did i say about it? i tell them we had one judge in texas at one time, i will call him kelly, and he said when i talk to him one time i might use of the constitution. he said once the constitution between friends? and i said, tell wilbur that 400 million is not going to separate threads when it's for health, when it's forsaken us. because there is a greater demand and i know it. for this bill and allhem other programs put together. i know that. >> mr. president, they came to

see me and i too was concerned about the impact. >> we are worried about that. >> they revise our rates. more in keeping with their views and i think their siteo expect what they want me to do, most of the spenders, said that i would not put enough money in the country. i would have put three or 4 million in. now they comalong and they say well, you have taken a lot more out here that. and join up upping anything back. i said you all go see mills yourself and find some agreement or. >> we have agreed. we have changed the bill. >> i will get on statement and congratulated me and congratulate y. for god sake, don't let a dead cat stand on your porch. you say they stunk and they stunk and based on. when you get on that committee, you call that son of a up before

they g, can get their letters ready. >> you know that's the way i practiced. >> i know where you learned it. let me talk to the speaker not. >> iq, sir. >> well, that's my good. don't you let a dead cat anchorma make them give you a row because dead cat got out of the committee report and it starts taking every day and let's get it passed before they let get th letters in and wl have a damn good record because that sounds like a better bill, john, than we think you. >> yeah. >> doesn't get you? >> it does to me spec i told him 450 million. my philosophy and yours, you and i never argued about 450 million for people over 65, did we? >> no. >> okay, m friend. >> from march 23, 1965. president johnson and house ways and means committee chairman wilbur mills, house speaker hn n mccormack and majority leader carl albert and wilbur collins.

as we conclude our special lbj program about medicare, we get a few final thoughts from historian david shreve. please summarize what happened to the medicare legislation after march 23, 1965, the date of this lt call we heard. >> without getting tangled up into many other details, because there were a number of changes, the bill did emerge pretty much as it had emerged to this int out of the ways and means committee. however, it's probably worth noting that when they went to conference and the senate didn't ask for change and ended up having to go to a conference committee as well, they had to reconcile about 500 changes betwn the two houses. so there were a number of changes. typical of tse is the 60 days that they cited for hospital coverage was expanded to 90. that was one fairly prominent change. and they kept going back and forth with the taxate and how they were going to do that. it is worth pointing out that

some of this discussion here, there was one point where mills referred to a discussion he had with gartner ackley, chairman of the economic advisers a kermit gordon who was director of the bureau of budget. a former member of the council himself under kennedy. both academic economists. they were urging mills and the other contraries and anybody who would help determine the fate of this bill to consider the impact of both the spending on the economy but also the taxation that would be implemented to pay for it. and what they did in effect was to actually lower the tax rate, on the payroll tax hike, by increasing the cap, the salary, salary-cap to which tax would be suggested. and to this would be in keeping certainly with the progressive tax policy and administration, and its economic advisers, mills was happy to go along with that because again he is concerned about actuarial soundness. and this looks even better than

what he imagined. he would get at the very beginning of this process, he was afraid, for example, that the ultimate taxi would be over 10% combining the new health insurance payroll with the old social security and ended up actually being almost a point and a half, two points of the. the original health insurance payroll tax might be worth mentioning at this point. was appointed by persephone employee and employer. .7 altogether. the copayment under part b., the doctor's bills part was $3. and the subsidy from the government was $3. it was a 50/50 basis at the outset. that change over the years. is no more of a 75/25 approach with the federal government picking up that actually larger share. but it's also important maybe to wrap up a little bit by mentioning johnson's comments on the $450 million cost and how he saw the countryaying for that cookie sensually, he would have to read between the lines there

but what he was saying was that prosperity was going to pay for it. th revenues have been growing to such an extent that they would accrue more than amply enough to pay for this kind of a program and other things. and indeed, tha comes to pass. when johnson leaves office in 1969, the federal government budget is in surplus. for that very reason, it wasn't because he cut back. he talks about how he was meane than harry byrd or wilber himself, but that was showmanship. it wasn't about that. it was about the way in which prosperity led to increased revenues revenues, and he knew good and well that they could pick up this tab, $450 million had easy. and they also may be worth pointing out given the current debate that over the next 10 years while the goverent share of health care, pinafore health care, the nation's health care decreased dramatically because of medicare and medicaid, the

percentage of gdp that was represented by health care spending actually dropped over the next decade. and i think that's testimony to johnson's outloo here, and it is proof that what he saw likely to happen really did hpen. >> and finally, mr. shreve, what similarities do you see between the johnson administration's efforts oj medicare and the current administration's goals for health care legislation? >> well, maybe we ought to talk about that dead cat. [laughter] >> one thing thatou should know, and it's probably obvious from some of these discuions, is that this is legislation that has been bandied about and considered for many years in the current administration of course is moving as raply as they can. to rapidly perhaps for some, some folks. and when you put it in that context, it does look like this current struggle is perhaps more difficult than the one johnson

faced in 1964 and 1965. the other thing perhaps worth mentioning is that we don't have wilbur mills anymore, or people like him, sharing significant house committees. the power of the committee chairman has been diminished, mostly because of post-watergatethough democratic reforms. i mentioned earlier how mills ways and means committee always reported bills without a role. minutes allowed on the floor. that change in 1973. wasn'teally affected until 1975. i think ford tax cut bill that he was the first time in which amendment were actually drafted onto a ways and means bill. but now it's messier. you've got more moving pas. you've got more players, subcommittee chairman with influence. and i reckon that the conference committee debates, if we get to that point on current proposed legislation, would be even

uglier and messier and more volatile than the one we saw described here. >> david rivkin historian, editor and assistant editor of the six parties on the presidential recordings series. and rly working on a book called american promise, kennedy, johnson, xon and the forging of the modern economy. mr. shreve, thank you so much for your insight and information pics back it was a pleasure being here. thank you for inviting me. >> and we know that the state are provided by the lbj library and museum in austin, texas. and this program will be available on o website. you can go to c-span radio.org and click on lbj, white house tapes.

will. both gaveling in at 2 p.m.easte. in the house, members will start with a number of bills dealing with federal lands and historic sites. and later in the week a measure of continuing federal programs to protect and restore the chesapeake bay. as we mentioned, the senate also returns today at:00. lawmakers will begin with general speeches and later and they will return to legislation to promote u.s. tourism to people in other countes that create a nonprofit tourism corporation. to do so that would get its money from fees on foreign visitors. you can watch the house live on c-span. the senate is live right here on

c-span2. >> the supreme court has a rare ecial session tomorrow hearing or larger on a campaign finance case. it also marks the first appearance on the bench for justice sonia sotomayor. later today, her formal at investiture ceremony takes place. in the afternoon. here is chief justice roberts on what it is like for a new justice. >> to some eent it is unsettling. you quicklget to view the court asked the court as with these new memos and it comes hard to think of it as involving anyone else. this is a family. how can it be different? but you do get new arrivals in both of those situations. it is a tremendous. justice white always used to say when the court gets a new member, it changes everything. changes everybody. simple changes. we move the seats around in the

courtroom. seats are by order of seniority so there will be a shift there. say in a conference room. but more fundamentally, i think it can cause you to take a fresh look at how things are decided, the new member is going to have a particular view about how issues should be addressed. may be very different than what we have been following for some time. so it is an exciting part of life at the court. >> here from other justices during supreme court and weak a an c-span looks at the home to america's highest court starti october 4. >> the growing influence of hispanics inolitics was discussed at a conference organized by the steamboat institute. two executives and provision to mutations, spanish-language media company discussed hispanic politics. this is about 55 minutes. >> hello, everyone. my name is karen chambers based

in washington, d.c.. i am also an advisor to project new west summit, and we're all very excited to ve you here this afternoon. video friends who are in the back, we would love for you to bring in the them in. we have analyst joining us and a bit, and we are eager to share insights ide and potential strategies directly here at project new west. one of th interesting things over the last two years, project new west summit acted over 25 focus groups in both english and spanish across the west to understand nuances among hispanic voters. we did over 17 of them and just thpolitical season last year. and of course, we are all very aware that quantity is not necessarily the prime thing we're looking at the are also looking at quality. what made project new west summit at all of the focus groups exceptionally terrific and a great basis for reserc

was that we had a travelingand of merry nomads. we sort of went from city to city. we were all together as a group, up to 20 people in certain instances because we had a lot of subscribers rejoinders. what was interesting there was every night we would make sure that we debrief and we talked about the focus groups. if we made, if we needed to we would make minor changes to the guides, and also come up with ideas of how to irove it. and i think that it's the kind of come robbery identified hocus groups, and i've got to tell you that over 15 years of politics, that i've been involved in this is the first time that we actually had this mutual respect. and really wanted to get down to the deep and dirty about how to move hispanic voters. and so this was something that was very unique year for project new west. i thank joe for bringing me on this year as an advisor and to sort of continue all of those facets that we had last year. now, i know that we get our

share in helping get out 67% of the hispanic vote over to the progressive side last year. we were very thrilled about that. one of the things we can do is we tend to see raised and ethnicy with our unexpected. i would like to share some tidbits so you have a better understanding, other perspectives i have from where i come from. so a lot of folks rlly want to know about my last entry base date to chambers and lsa cannot beat mr. chambers? he doesn't exist except he is my dad. any idea here is is that my great-grdfher came from new england to work in a copper mines. so in fact, he married a mexican woman and had a big family, about five kids. and they all grew up in mexico. so my parents are mexican immigrants. they came in november of 1963. and the very first image that my mom had of the u.s. was the

fascination of president john f. kennedy. she didn't speak any english at the time, and so does the sort for searing image of this new country. so with that, what happened was i have a connection with one of our panelists, and that was as a historian, i am a trained historian, went back and did the research. and how my family in the 1910 census. and there they were in bisbee arizona. so you have a famy with all these mexicans, first names for all the kids, which included my grandfather, felix chambers. so the idea here is that it's a cross culture and by culture upbringing. it happens more often than we know. and it i also a good rean to not solely depd on banished voter names i continue as an example number one and other folks especially in the southwest to a very similar expenses. while mexican spanish, and latinos have been arriving in the u.s. for centuries, for

nturies. we are here today to find out what it is about this community that makes it so new. why do we feel that something new that we need to learn about? we are experiencing a major demographic shift that is taking place before our very eyes, and many of those result n be felt during our very own lifetime. and too many of us, that is sort of a simple fact that is well-known and quite obvious. so today, we're going to dig a little deeper to find out what does such a demographic change really mean and not just for each and every one of us in this room but also for long-term strategic planning. what is the viability of this electorate in the progressive state? this panel will give us an overview of the electorate. will discussed on whe they are now t where they are headed towards in the future. and more importaly, what is it that we can do to sort of create partnerships with the electora electote. i would like to share a premise with which we are starting here at project new west. and our understanding is that we are not in a post-racial america. we understand it so clearly that

we didn't even contemplate naming a panel called post-racial america. and trust me, we had a lot of conference calls. and we are just so passiolatewe know that we a so excited about the awards with a compass and 2008 and it opportuniti that are ahead of us that we are realists and we're pragmatist, and we really want to keep on winning. so here is a little bit of reality. we know that out of every 100 hispanic high school kids, only 50% graduate from high school. of those 50%, only 12% graduate from colle. of those 12%, probably the most disappointing, in that only 3% receive a postgraduate degree. so those of y who are very good at math, those numbers turn out to be out of every 100 high school cids, only six graduate from high school, anless than one to a postgraduate degree. so the elephant in the room, at least to me, which is a prism of my expernce, means basically

having been a recipient of affirmative action from the university of michigan. what we are doing is progressive is a change educated and skilled labor force that will grow dramatically in the next 25 years. these are our future workers upon which the u.s. will depend. these are the policeman, and women, nurses, teachers, government administered, small business owners how and to the list goes on and on. so to learn from mark lopez, his research shows that the more educated a person is, the more civic minded they become. and frankly, the more often that a vote. if we have ls of high school dropouts in this community, what does that mean politically? well, last minute gop programs that come up once every four years get us to where we need to be as we move forward, are we communicating to a distinct electorate in ways that are sustainable over the long-term?

so to start up a conversation, i uld like to share a graphic fr an article from u.s.a. today. i think you should come up behind me, and it is actually a map. as soon as it comes out. it is a map that shows the growth, a map by county and county that shows the growth in each county. so what we have here first of all is the majority minority. so we see sort of, we see the southwest. we see counties in florida. answered in what is interesting is that growth in the south. we are talking mississippi, alabama, georgia and the carolinas. not to mention up there in the decoders. so we go down to the asian population growth. you will see the graphic change. and there actually was -- one or more percentage points between 2002008 among the asian-american community. if we look at the black population growth, we will see if the growth in counties really sustain in the south and also in

parts of the mid-atlantic. now if we go to hispanic growth, that over the last eight years. and so essentially these are percentages of growth in every county, and it really, if you can see all the way from iowa, kansas, all the way up and down the midwest, clearly the south, the west and basically more than half of florida. there is a lot of opportunity here. and so with that, i would love to introduce to you our first panel is, which is doctor mark lopez. mark lopez is the associate rector of the hispanic center where he joined in january of 2008, he also serves as a research professor at the university of maryland school of public policy. he received his phd in economics from princeton university in 1996, and he specializes in labor economics, civic engagement, voting behavior and the economics of education. he has to do, which is really fascinating here, young peopl electoral participation, civic

engagement of immigrants, you people use for the first amendment and the link between college and civic engagemt. please help me welcoming mark lopez to the podium. [applause] >> hello. thank you very much. is great to be here. i want to say thank you for taking the time to come and listen to me, and i hope you find this brief engagement that i'm going to show you both informate and also useful. but first, before we start with that i want to give you se sense of the pew hispanic center who is my employer and where i've been working for the last year and have. that pew hispanic center is based in washington, d.c.. i will try to summertime. there we go. it is based in washington, d.c., and it is important to note that the pew hispanic center is a nonprofit organization. we call ourselves not a think tank. what we mean by we just provide information. we provide tax.

a lot of t work we do revolves around the demographics of the hispanic community. we do public opinion polling of the hispanic community but you'll notice that all of our reports, there is never, ever any policy recommendations or suggestions at the end of the report for how to change things. that is an important thing to remember because the pew hispanic center is really just a fact tank and not a think tank that kind of that is kind of a weird note. just a weird name. areas of study. we cover many different things related to the hispanic community. education, demography, immigration. one of our signature project is how many undocumented immigrants for examples are in the united states. . .

>> what's interesting about patterns of growth is a lot of growth has really been driven by immigration in the past.

in fact, the past couple of decades immigration has been an important driver. but moving forward, it's his -- hispanic birth in the united states. and hispanics while we see more an more hispanics participate and vote, they represent a much smaller share than the eligible than they do the general populati. the reason why is because many are immigrants and many are under 18. also as loretta pointed to, the hispanic population is becoming much more disbursed. here's a graphic that shows the hispanic population. here's what we think will happen in terms of growth. in terms of population shares, here's how we project the

population shares. we project that the united states will be an majority/minority society. in terms of the hispanic population, notice that it is a much younger population than the white nonhispanic population, but perhaps what'sost striking is when you look at hispacs and break it down, look at the age distribution for native born hispanics. a large share of native born are actually under the age of 18. and that has some real plications for the future. we're talking about political participation because every year we're going to b seeing more and me young latinos turn 18. and that's really been a large part of the driver in the growth of hispanic eligible voter population. to give i some sense of where youth has been coming, this graph shows you a lot of the growth has been driven by immigration. in this decade, however, hispanic birth became more

important than immigration. here's what we project to happen in the future. in fact, right now in the decade, the share of population is at its peak. now it's a mess. we just saw a great set of maps, here are a few others. this maps shows you the countries where the share of hispanic was 15% or more, the darker colored ones. you can see a large number are along the u.s./mexico boards and south florida. here's what's happened. here's the same graph for 1990, 2000, and for 2007. as you can see the hispanic population has become much more disbursed across the united states. in 2000 and 20073,000 of the

counties the hpanic pop plation is increasing. it's increasing in alaska, montana, everywhere in the united states. now a little bit about geography of hispanics. because we're talking about the mountain west. i want to give you some statistics for the mountain west. first half of all hispanics live in california and texas. however, in arizona there are 1.9 million representing 30% of the population of state of arizona. 37% of the areas on hispanic population is foreign born. for colorado, here's a similar figure. you'll see 20% of the states population is hispanic. just under 1 million overall, 29% are foreign born. look how high the share is in new mexico, and how low the share of foreign born is. for nevada, utah, idaho,

wyoming, and montana. so you can see the share of hispanic varies depending on which state we're talking about and the share in the states foreign born vary depending on the state. what about latino voters? they are about 18.5 who are eligible to vote means they are 18 or u.s. citizen. that's up by 2 million sense 2004. as you can see it's growing and that's translated into the voters out there. for the most part hispanic voters are more likely it shall young, naturalized citizens, more likely to have children, and less likely to be college graduates than general. further more when we talk about the geography of where the eligible voters. 65% are four states, california, texas, new york, and florida.

half are in california and texas. but in the mountain west, 10% of hispanic voters reside in the mountain west. and you can see 4% of all hispanic voters reside in arizona, 3% in new mexico, 2% in colorado, 1% in nevada. together 10% is in the mountain west. here's the map to show you where it is. the states that have the highest share of eligible voters who are hispanic is shown in this particular slide. you can see that new mexico stands out. 38% of eligible voters are of hispanic origin. that's followed by texas and california. and at the very bottom is illinois in the top test list. you can see in many of the states the hispanic share hoovers around 15%. how many hispanics are registered and how many vote? in 2008, 11.8 said they were

registered. 9.7 million said they voted. you'll notice the trend is upward. over the period of 1988 and 2008, the number of hispanic ters have almost tripled between 1998 and 2008. each and everybody election more and more hispanics participate. now we've also been doing a lot of polling of hispanic asking about political issues. we've also been asking this one question, which party do y think has more concern for hispanics. the republican party or the democrat party or is there no difference? when you take a look at this chart what you'll see here is that for the most part over this period over the last decade hispanics have said the democratic party has more than concern for hispanics than the republican party with a large share standards no difference. but in the last year or so we've really seen the change. that democratic number has gone

up to 55%. 55% of hispanics said the democrat has more concern than republican. the republican party has 6%. literally the number 6. 35% say there is no difference. now about the dilution of hispanic voting power. you think it should match their share. the difficulty is, because many of them are too young to vote, we take those folks out. they only really represent 13% of all adults over the age of 18. but also because many hispanic adults are not u.s. citizens and they can't vote. only 8.9% are actually hispanic. so hispanics when you think about it, their share, their

political vote is diluted because of demographic factors. we project that not until 2060 ll the share of hispanic look close to the eligible voters who e hispanic. so it's going to be a slow process. a lot of this is going to be driven by young people turning 18. now, i want to finish by talking a little bit about the electorate, and how it was in the last election. according to the analysis on the u.s. electorate in 2008, people that voted in the presidential elecon, much more diversed. almost a quarter were either black, hispanic, or asian. the numbers here are making me nervous. no, that's fine. that's why. how many votes are cast, you can

see for the most part whites still outnumber everybody. this makes a lot of sense in the terms of votes cast. you e bween 2004 and 2008 a lot has happened before blacks and hispani particularly in the terms of the number of votes. we talked about voter turnout rates. here's what the trends have looked like. in the last election african-american caught up to their white counterparts. there's been growth among hispanic even despite the fact that hispanic eligible population has been growing by leaps and bounds. that kind of dampens the voter turnout rate. as you can see, the growth in the hispanic voter turn out rate, which reached almost 50% in the last election. hispanics vote, how do other group votes? this is based that minority

voters voted differently than the white counterpart. particularly african-american, 95% supported obama and almost 2/3 hispanic and asia. clearly some differences in voting there. take a look at latino voters. you can see across the board support for obama was strong, whether we talk about young, older, men, women, no matter which you look at, you're seeing a lot of stong support for obama in this last election. in tms of the states, obama's margin of victory among hispanics was greatest in new jersey. you can see it ranks them for you. it's followed by nevada, california, nevada, illinois, and arizona. and last i'm going to stop here son. i know my time is running out. but i want to show you some key

states. here's what we saw in 2004 and 2008 in new mexico, here's what we saw in colorado, here's what we saw in arizona, and here's what we saw in nevada. now i want to end with florida. i know florida is an interesting state in many respects because of the change ofemographics in florida. but take a look at the hispanic vote in florida in 2004. the hispanic vote in 2004 went for george bush. 56% to 44%. look what happened in 2008, the hispanic vote in florida went for obama 57% to 42%. what's interesting is in the voter registration roles we saw the number of hpanics registered democrats actually surprised republicans for the

first timen a long time. florida represented some sort of change. all very, very interesting and be happy to talk more about this. i'm going to sort of stop here because my time is up. let me show you one last slide. hispanic priority. earlier this year we asked hispanic what are the top issues that the new administration should address? the economy is number one. i want to point out you'll noticed it's followed by education, health care, national security, environment, immigration, and energy policy at 20%. i'm going to end there. i want to say thank you for taking the time to listen me. i'd be happy to answer any questions after our panel is other. thank you. [applause] >> i'd love to have our two panelist join us. is join us today is general

attorney terry goddard and hector baldes from new mexico. [applause] >> now terry goddard is an arizona native. he comes fm a long line of public service. his father, sam, served as arizona governor in the 1960s. d mr. goddard received his law degree from arizona state university, and he served on active duty in the navy and retired as a commander after 27 years in the naval reserves. attorney general's career began as a prosecutor in the arizona attorney general office. he was elected mayorf phoenix not once, twice, not three, but four times. and he led the city from 1984 to 1990. he served as a arizona director

of urban development and in 2000 he was elected to the arizona conservation district which managed the central arizona project. thank you for your public service, and thank youor being with us here today. [applause] >> now at the age of 33,ector was elected to new mexico state auditor in november of 2006. it marked for both new mexico and a nation as it became the youngest hispanic statewide elected official in the country. at the age of 29 and with no prior political experience he ran for the seat of house of representatives and won. he graduated from new mexico highland united states and eaed it from the university of new mico. plse welcome him to the stage. [applause] >> think we're going to do a

little bit of q and a. we're going to swivel a little bit. we're going to start with some q and a. okay. so thank you for joining us here today. and i do have a few questions from the audience as well. we're going to try to get those as soon as we get through our panels here. one of the things that we learned in the research of project west was we found two key values that were shared by large majority in the west. one of them was that 92% are proud to be an american. we don't find that surprising, but we know a lot of people might. 72% consider them to be part of the middle class.

does the finding surprise you and how does it shape hispanic participation and politicians? >> no, it doesn't surprise me. my son is in the 5th grade in a school that's named after sylvester sivera. we have an extraordinary group of veterans who are hispanic, i believe significantly above the population in our state as a percentage, very large number. the pride in the country is clearly evident. the middle class part, i think we see in that the numbers that i've seen don't dramatically chan as a block, for example, an unfortunately and perhaps something we should think aut even more new registrants who are latino in background are becoming independents in our state that are becoming democrats are republicans.

so that tracks what the majority population is doing. they are n taking a different role. they are moving right with the economy and with the general population. >> not at all. i share the sentiments, the hispanic community is very diverse, very complicated in this country. however, as systemically across the board, you will see whether it's duty for our country or the new mexico we have a high proportion of veterans who many conflicts that the united states has faced. we have per capita, the highest concentration of veterans across the country. and so you saw the numbers where we have a high hispanic population but the level of patriotism and loyalty to the

american dream is high. the economic indicator is we have a poverty problem. but you will see that most families whether they are in poverty level or above the poverty level see the american dream as their kids going to school, their kids having publhc access to education. and i think that even if we're from a poor family we sense that we have a large steak in this country. i think we don't go by traditional economic indicators of whether we think we're poor or mide class. but i find it surprising that probably even a lge proportion of hispanics see themselves as middle class or right on the door step of becoming middle class through the youngsters which you saw the statistics. we are a young, very young population. so there's a lot of optimism through the educational

process. >> you broug up a great point. an ex has a large percent of hispanic veterans. where do you see the veterans, where do they stand? and also attorney general goddard brought up the idea of independence which i think is very fascinating. we see that happening in california quite a bit. does that mean ty are truly independent and can go through all of the issues and sort of make a decision in the voting booth, or they really don't feel akin to one party or another? >> well, let's talk aut independence. certainly in the lastew election cycles we've seen the share of hispanics who identify democrat or lead democrat increase. but there is a subantial share that do identify as independent, about 20 to 25% dependenting on the year. that might be a reflection of what you see happening among young people. generally speaking, among young

people, you see 1/p -- 1/3 saying they are independent. suggesting they aren't ready to identify, we don't know for sure. i don't know what the answer to that exactly is. i'm sure with young latino, we might be seeing a similar phenomenon as what we see nationally. this is something the veterans that we have looked at briefly, not as much as we probably would like to do. and it's something that's on our agenda to do is take a look at military participation among latinos today. i don't think i can provide a good answer. >> we will be waiting for that research. >> right >> okay. >> gentleman, please give us a snapshot of the iues happening in qour states, specificically issues that maybe are bubbling up in the latino community, but also issues that you find that arehaping and affecting latino

families in your state. what are the opportunities that might be inherent in those issues? what are the challenges? and i find it so fascinating because you're new mexico and arizona s one territory once. bubecause we wanted to separate the out hispanic voters from the rest, it became a separated state in 1912. it's interesting that they were the original territory, but they are so distinct in so many ways. you can start with the uniqueness of new mexico and the issues there. >> new mexico is a phenomenal place. we don't have the historic transformations that we see in california or florida where you have different generations in the hispanic populations changing so qckly. when i first ran for office it was the first campaign issue at i had coming out of the gate that it was not how much education i earned or what some of my issues were.

what's the first question i had to prove to voters in northern new mexico was whether it was truly northern new mexico or whether i had roots. and it was a very different political context than even i saw in albuquerque or urban areas that we are founded in rich traditions. we see new mexico as an old place where santa fe is the oldest state capitol in the country. there's a different lens. it doesn't surprise me that education, health care, and the economy are at the forefront. the state of new mexico is the same way, i would probably further break downs the top issue in new mexico beyond education, health care, and the economy, the subsr. a hispanic op out rate. than in a state of new mexico, we dominate politically, what we've achieved a certain

political participation level that's unheard of in the rt of the nation, we still have a dropout rate that exceeds 50%. and so on one hand, we think we're succeeding politically. but we still have the same social challenges in many other states. i would say our educational systems are very strange. anywhere looking for solutions. that's probably the top issue that new mexico is facing. >> okay. attorney general? >> i think the bubblin issue for us i hard times economically, the hospitality and construction trades, and industries. and that is where a great many of our latino workers are employed. i think on everybody's plate is do we have a job, will we have one in the future, and what the is prospect. and i know we lost many spanish speaking areas workers to other

states simply because the arizona economy has gotten so rough lately. as a law enforcement officer i also see a derivative of that. it's the number of scams that are targeted at new citizens and spanish speakers. we have in the area of lending with a micro, actually better than a microindustry. people who basically went after that population because they were not sophisticated in mortgage lending. and it look a long time. when you used toork for hud, we couldn't find a word for home mortgage. the people from mexico didn't have that for tir tradition. we have one now. but sometimes i think the word was invted because that's suddenly something that so many people are concerned about. now we have firsthe predatory lenders look advantage of folks,

sold them under arizona law, all the legal documents have to be english. many people signed mortgage that they could not understand or read. and so we had a significantly greater victimization of the spanish-speaking population because of that. unfortunately spanish speaking relators and lenders were trusted because they were speaking to the native language, but they lied and sold th bad loans. we're reaping that right now. the difference has never been more clear in the current discussion of immigration and what happens when people are here without documentation. when the former attornegeneral of new mexico, when i was discussing arizona turmoil in terms of some of the raids, she said, that would never happen in

new mexico. we will with that distinction now. >> okay. one of the things you brought up wit@ was the cultural framework in the united states and the ea that latin america countries you want to pay for the property yo have to purchase is in cash. there is no mortgage system. that's why there aren't a lot of homeowners. my question to you is how do these cultural mindsets affect folks when they get here to the u.s. and all kinds of system, the educational system that built into everywhere. the economy is different, mortgages, all of those. how are hispanics adapting? that an impediment or helping them to become voters? >> very, very good questions. let's talk about what it is what latinos have been doing to the deal with the recession first.

i think you'll see some interesting patterns of things that folks are doing. in a recent survey that we did we asked them how are you doing with the recession? d have you done any of the following things, cut back on eating out, 70% said yes, have you reduced your travels? 60% said yes. we also asked, have you lent money to a family member? and 25% said yes. and last year they have made a loan to family member. we also asked have you received a loan and 17% said they had from a family member. both of them being as a result of the recession. we don't know what sort of imformal lending is going on. we didn't ask the general population. we asked the questions because we wanted to look at how they

were interacted with their community. :

>> essentially this could be a latino thank? >> we don't know for sure. >> very good. okay. i would love to switch over to breaking down the potical numbers among hispanic voters in new mexico and arizona. i would love to hear what do they look like, and what do we needo do to keep voters engaged while bringing in new voters? understand that we have a very segmented audience, right? we have recently arrived, new growth in new mexico but we also have families that have been here for close to 500 years. so how do we bring in new voters even though they are coming from different perspectives and mindsets. so let's go and what do the hispanic numbers look like in your state? >> well, they are significant. i guess let me give you a snapshot of what arizona looks like. about 30% as the pew

presentation showed of our total population is hispanic. and about 17% of voter population so you have a huge drop off between the eligible population and the voters. then we have what i call the rule of 40. essentially of the eligible 40% -- 60 print arbiter. 40% are not. and those who are registered, 60% vote in the last election. that was a significant increase. president obama did a perfect job in arizona and elsewhere bringing hispanic voters to the polls. but that drop off is perhaps the biggest unknown about our entire political situation. and it's nothing new. we say that the more things change the more they stay the same tech as a teenager when i was working at my father's campaigns in the 1960s we were talking about when is the hispanic voter going to wake up and participate in what will

they go? now 50 years later, i hesitate to say that still the same biest question on the plate. so it's more important in our state entrance of the total numbers. i think perhaps the questioner now just much, much larger, and this large number of eligibles who are not registered and registered who are not voting, you put that together, you clearly have the balance of change in the state of arizona. dependent on which way it goes. >> drop off great. >> we have somewhat of a mixed bag. we have about 200, 292000 latino voters in new mexico we have not kept up in terms of our increase in population growth of latino spirit we have not kept up in terms of voter participation. there may be somewhat voter apathy, somewhat of hispanic voters in new mexico. however, i do know that

demographically, we controlled many seats in the new mexico legislature. would obviously have a hispanic governor who ran for president. we control to oer statewide elective offices. so we tend to think that voter turnout, we have to drive our voters out of their homes a little bit mor aggressively because 43% of our population is hispanic. and there is an assumption that there might always be a hispanic advantage in elections, if that's possible in this country. i think we have hispanic voters in new mexico may be a little too comfortable that they will always be hispanic representation in the upper ash on up political power. so regrettably we just hav not kept up in terms of our turnout. we have quite, quite impressive numbers in terms of 43% of the population hispanic.

>> okay. so we have, our time has gone. we will give you one last question and we will keep it hopefully a little short here. but if you have magical pers that came upon you, what would you do, what suggestions would you give yotr state parties in order to deal with the drop off right? dealing with new voters? hispanic voters. what would be words of wisdom that you would share with your state parties? >> i will start. the words of wisdom are pretty acme at this point because it is pay attention, make sure tha we have a personal connect with those individua. according to drop off numbers indicate a failure to mobilize, not just this year, not just like you, but certainly throughout my knowledge of arizona political history. this has been a 50 year injuring phenomenon, and i know goes much

longer than that. we had one dratic change in our voter patterns. when he ran for governor of arizona. all of a sudden all the numbers spiked. what was considered suddenly became vy much awake. and so that certainly a lesson. we need candidates who can speak specifically to the spanish speaking voter, to the hispanic voter, and we need to make sure that our registration gets into their living rms and make sure that they know what's in it for them, what the payoff is going to be if they become active voters. i don't think that pattern yet has been reestablished. it's not hereditary and it is not instinctual. >> thank you. i would lovto answer that question. i am good friends with the former chair of the democratic party in new mexico, and i would have to messages. one is young people, young people young people. recruit youn candidates. never underestimate what the

power of the young boys will do to immobilizing the young people of an electric because then the language changes. the issues change. secondly do not be afraid of our communities. i saw barack obama organizing hispanic or traditional communities where i never saw statewide hispanic candidates mobilize. and it was fun, hope to see young people and old people coming together because they were not afraid to engage in a community. and so they really broke those stereotypes and when it is some of the most rural hispanic communities, was amazing to see those communities mobilizing around a presidential candidate that was in the beginning so distant from their cultural attitudes and behaviors. but then they begin to see the similarities of what was happening in the african-american community and thanglo-american communities. and that did happen because they want to be one of the

communities. >> and ladies and gentlemen, let's keep in mind that every month more than 60000 u.s. latinos turn 18 every month. we need to find out who's communicate with them. doctor mark lopez, attorney general carr, state auditor thank you, thank you to much for joining us this afternn. thank you. [applause] >> now on c-span tomorrow about the growing influence of hispanics in politics from a conference organized by the steamboat institute. two executivesn mmunications, a danish language media company discuss hispanic politics. this is about 55 minutes. >> this is going to be our panel on changing demographic hispanic voting trends in the future as well as looking back and analyzing what happened in 2008. we are absolutely thrilled to have with us from denver this

afternoon marcelo gaete. univision the spanish version network that we're delighted to be with us bause they are true experts on the topic that we are about to hear about. mario carrera is a vice president and general manager of observation communications corporation which i said include univision denver. they are the second largest second line which media company in the united states reaching approximately 65% of all hispics in the united states. mario believes the main purpose of a radio and tv station is to enhance the lives and economic well being of its audience through education information and entertainment. while providing maximum return on investment to advertisers and shareholders. great, great mission statement. doing well by doing good is what mario believes. he lives it in his life every day as a denver citizen. he has served on the boards of

the denver area council, e boy scouts of america, the denver metro chamber of commerce, the denver hispanic chamber of commerce. and other organizations. mario are his bachelor degree in sociology from harvard university and credit his interest in media company as a step for the photojournalist for the harvard crimson. marcello down here at the other hand, marcelo gaete, is a vice president of public and government affairs for entravision. parts that he was with the national association of latino elected and appointed officials educational fund for nearly 10 years as senior direcr of programs. while with that organization, marcello created t voter mobilization initiative which reach millions of hispanic voters. once again, we had the hor of having tony, moderate our panel so now i will turn it over to tony. >> thank you. [applause] >> i have been going through briefly the data these gentlemen have put together.

and this is a tremendous opportunity for all of us. we all have strong feelings about voting, ethnic groups, immigration, all of these issues. and i think it would be useful to p all of that to thside andisten toheir objective analysis of how hispanics or latinos actually think and behave and respond to, you know, come back to applying that to whatever your concerns are. but this is a rare opportunity. i am in the public relations businss and we do a lot of market research. this is invalble. i can take that, yeah, if we want to get into this topic we could take a lot of money to have this kind of data. and so i'm going to turn it over to the gentleman for 15 or so minutes and it was sort of just give you a review of their data. and then turn it right over to you. we will talk back and forth. this is a real opportunity to

get an insight into the way people actually respond. this is not editorial. is not opinionat. it is n liberal or conservative. this is simply an understanding how people behave. and it is very useful. so i will turn it over to you gentlemen. >> thank you very much, to. if you don't mind i'm going to stand up just to be able to present to you we have a few slides to go over and couple minutes of video that we believe will be helpful in leaving you with what we hope is some useful information. but before, i have to tell you, you have a very dedicated staff working for you. there've been very kind and hospitable. and we owe a special thanks to jennifer, to courson and i'm sure i'm missing a lot of people, but i think that you should be pldased with everything they are doing. tony, thank you ramat for the introduction, and jennifer. there are four-point that we want to leave with you today. and in essence, they are very, very porton point that we

believe, one, we want to reinforce that hispanics are a critical mass, the cstituency of taxpayers, citizens, voters for future political success here theres also -- they are also very young and eager to engage. the majority can be reached in spanish, online radio and television. and the fourph point that i think is very critical, we all know this. it's a group that is underrepresented. it is underserved in public office, and public service, public campaigns, and by both the republican and democratic parties. think it is a establishing. this is a video which was presented and actually produced in 2007, late 2007 in early 2008 which captures the flavor of what was takinplace at the

time he. audio? thank you, paul. [laughter] >> i like the dog. >> generational time gap. this time will not come out of your presentation time. [laughter] >> there we go. thank you, paul.

abc steamboat, there we go. coming up? you can go straight to it if you like out of the presentation. one more try. if not we will just move onto the next one. there we go. not only is it the vote of today but it is the vote tomorrow. >> you work very hard toet as much of theispanic vote as possible. the thing about our hispanic

voters is tailor-made to the republican message. i am confident i will do very well. >> in the fall 2007ll major democratic and republican candiates came to the debate for the first time ever on a spanish language network. latinos can make a difference in this presidential election. >> i look forward to earn your support. >> and history was made. >> abc news headquarters in new york. >> tonight apolitical for. a presidential debate broadcast entirely in spanish. >> more than 4.5 million people turn into it last night. it shows how much america has been changing. >> with the latino vote already playing, all eyes were on austin, texas, for another first. >>nother 30 million people. >> there is no question, we are the fastest-growing segment of the electorate. >> it also embodies the death of

american aspirations. >> and i will be asking correctly for the vote. i am not going to concede a single one. >> it speaks to the growing clout of latinos in the u. >> that translates to some very serious political power. >> a power that on november 4 will helplect the next president of the united states. >> so indeed, this was historically unprecedented. you have both republicans and democratic parties coming to spanish-language television and actually proving that hispanics have a strong political appetite. there were 4.6 million viewers that watch this debate on univision, versus the avera reach that the other debates on nbc, cnn and msnbc and fox news had up for .3 million viewers. so you have a highly engaged population politically. coincidentally, i must correct jenifer, and i apologize. i would univision was a parent company. we are affiliate groups of

univision and we are right in the middle of the battleground. we are in colorado, nevada, new mexico and arizona in the fastest growing hispanic market right now. so it is a major point in terms of penetration in the marketplace. this may appear to do there are 414 counties with about 45 million people, 46 billion people and growing as a 2007 that have at least 15% or more that happen to be people have to be spanish origin. projections are actually into the future are pretty significant. this population will triple by the year 2050. one of the major points i think we wanted to make is that population is under two thirds of the populatiois under 35. it's a very young population and you are going to be continuing to see that this is a group that is going to be a major part in the economy, and the workforce, and it's going to be critical in terms of sustaining key

governments, government programs such abelieve it or not social security. so there is a gap in terms of the youth of about nine to 13 years between latino and non-latino. abou50000 each month are turning 18, and therefore eligible to vote. and once against the widespread myth, hispanics see the education as a gateway to economic advancement and the fulfillment of the amerin dream. that is a very, very important point. so how do you engage hispanics? this is something we probably want to spend more time with on the q&a, but it is our assertion and also that of many other successful marketers that you do it i the language that they prefer, and that's the land which they are most comfortable in and the media they prefer. this is spanish. spanish is here to stay. is going and it will continue to grow into time. so one of the common assumptions

is that you can only reach hispanics in english. ultimately, the majority, 76 to 78% are spanish dominant so you need to look at ways of speaking that language and making them feel comfortable with those messages that you want to reach out to them. and it doesn't matter the age, it doesn't matter if the education, it doesn't matter the income. and this is actually a third party research company defined by nielsen. so there is a study that actually is proven time and time again in terms of the value of spanish-language commercials and how they are very effective at increasing awareness, increasing coverage in, increing persuasiveness. and there is 61% more effective spanish-language commercials and increasing language, more effective at actually delivering an effective message, capri has a message. and ultimately, at perading,

four and a half times more persuasive. indicates a bilinguals, it is three times more effective. so you will see that. specifically in the case of hispanic voters, they agree with the statement that says it is important, 61% agreed that i seek elective representatives and political candidates on television. and the spanish dominant spanish, it is no surprise 75% actually agree with that statement. and in the case of the ads and programs, 52% which is actually a significant number when you are actually since they are reeing and saying that they like these commercials, they see them as informative, agree that they are encouraged by these messages to get involved politically, to register and get out and vote. at the speed through the rest of the presentation. spanish still resonates even in the case of hispanic sentiment in this country for over 20 years. so you see all the different

media that is represented here, print, internet, radio and online. you still have a significant amount of time spent there. there is no surprise sure you have seen headlines, univision is now in the top five networks, many times the pending on the demographic, it is number one. in 1849. at 67 nights out of the year rsus the entire spectrum of services. this happens because local stations such as the one i represent in denver are actually fairly strong. nielsen, the local people meter, actually measures all the television stations and you have powerstation being the number one station in prime time and also in the newscast. radios also the same. it is number one in denver right now. against all the other radio stations. you find that to be the case across major markets in the country. los angeles, miami, denver included now, san francisco.

number one or number two both in radio and television. the events are critical in touching market in introducing the message. that is huge. a lot of newscast all over the country and they are also perform at number one or number two in total delivery. same kind of political shows that we have on sunday mornings. agenda washington is there and our network show, much like meet the press, or this week. idle handed over it over to you. >> all right. i am just going to begin by giving you a snapshot at demographics changes are beginning to resonate inhe electoral sphere. and as you can see, in 1998, what the electorate looked like. like making almost 85% of the electorate. african-americs about 10%, and hispanics three-point. you fast forward that, 2008. like making 70 six-point rivers

and on the electorate. hispanics wellpoint one. that was african-american hispanics and then you see the rest. to the electorate is beginning to shift and if you overlay that with what mario said earlier, what you see is in the fute, the electorate will be changing fast. so ianted to show you how obama one. and if you can see that, the bottom is the white though, how it is split between mccain and obama. the second, the agreement is the african-american. the purple one is asian pacific, and the red one is hispanics so you can see how this changes demographics. some have argued that to win elections in the future, republicans are going to have to compete in the ethnic community. because otherwise, and especially in certain states they will be out of reach. this is the growth of the hispanic electorate. the bottom one is the actual

vote. so in 2008, you had about 9.7 million hispanics voting. the orange is the number of registered. you h about 12 million hispanics registered to vote. and citize voting age at about 18.5 million. for hispanics, you know, between registration and potential registration is getting bigger. this is just to give you a sense in terms of what's going on in terms of some of the states. new mexico, 38% of the electorate is hispanic. you have a state like texas, 25% of all registered voters in texas are hispanic. it going to be interesting, the role of the hispanics might plate and the governor's race coming up next year because hispanics played a crucial role in the republican primary in

2008 between mccain and governor romney at that time. but look at the swing states. florida, colorado, nevada. those are states where the growing influence of hispanics. some of argued that hispanic vote was the margin of victory in indiana for obama. this gives you a trend in terms of the presidential vote. so what's interesting to note is that look what happened from 2000, to 2008. and you see that president bush at that time when he first ran at 35% of the hispanic vote. he moved it up to 44 dierks of rj-45. anin the last time it dropped to 31%. so this is a community that could swing. about two weeks ago i was given a similar presentation at a democratic gathering, and they asked me would hispanics be there in 2010 and i told them

you are making an assumption that they will be voting for you. so you have to reach out and talk to them. this is wh happened in 2006 in terms of some of the u.s. senate race. this is so you can see that this is a community that wants to appeal, want toalk to, once reached, republican candidates resonate among the hispanic voters. i think somebody talked a little bit in the previous panel about what happened in 2004. what's interesting to know, if you look at what happened in 2004 in the senate race here in colorado, how narrow it was that ho that vote shifted in 2008. interesting about colorado. colorado is one of theew states in the 2000 election where e hispanic vote decreased for democrats as

opposed to what was going on nationwide. we had a brief conversation about a. tony asked me why. i don't know why, but it happened. this is an interesting take at the electorate. and what we did here is t red margin is the margin of victory. the yellow margin is the percent of latino registered voters. so you s in several states the latino registration is greater than the margin of victory. so to ignore this electorate, this growing electorate, you do it at your peril. because this electorate will be having an ineasingly stronger influence in elections as we move forward. this is i think my last slide. this is just to point out that

mac this is a survey that was done after the election to see what were the issues important to hispanics. and as you can see, the economy is number one, followed by education, health care, national security, the environment, immigration, and energy policy. this is the way hispanic voters rank the issues of importance to them. >> whe was that poll, approximately? was after -- >> january. >> so after the economic? >> yes. and before the economic collapse. it was education. that was a critical point and something that i think we need to really keep an ion because the hispanics are aspirational in nature and they are really looking forwarto that opportunity. >> thank you. i'm going to g back to that last slide. you don't have to show it, but because it is so revealing to

the economy, i did know the answer, but i assume because the economy had tanked everybody was more focus on the economy an normal. but, immigration, of seven issues, immigration was the sixth. so obviously a lot of republicans have been concerned that the way the immigration issue has played out over the last number of years has not been helpful for that side. but you can see in all the other issues, national security. health care and education sort might be predictable. the economy, sort of. national security, environment. there are zones of substance not related to being hispanic or being anglo, but just being related to the same issues we're dealing with that there is a tremendous amount of potential play. and it tells me at least, someone who has done politics for a long time, that we all

have to live across the spectrum up to our convictions and policies, and not try t pretend, belie things that we don't believe in or whatever. but that this is a vote that is open to the general debate that this country has on issues, and the effectiveness or the failure of conservative to explainur positions on national security where we tradationally have a strong one, whereby the way there was a very high hispanic predicament in the marine corps so the economy, you know, is not going to be this big but it will always be a substantial issue. we may have a strong pace. .

>> the purpose is turning it into a group that would vote like a block and might be vote democrat. that would have been about 1970, '71 right in there. over these new 35 years the term

has been embraced by the community. most people don't know the origins of the j. and in fact there probably has been. i think some of the data suggests that there has been some hher csciousness of being hispanic or mexican or some way there was some consequences to his decision. but justo know that i know i've been told that there were voting -- amongst people we call hispan. and they can differ. and some people know the differences based on what the country of origin. in the same way the italian, french, german, english, they are not just europeans. people that come from countries that speak spanish are not just hispanics. i thought one of the most

interesting statistics here, then i'll throw it over, was the spanish advertising. because i'm not an expt, what i know about the immigration history of america 100 years ago, the immigrants that came moly from southern and eastern rope that they quickly within a generation starting speaking primarily english. they started discarding their languages, many of us are among those groups. and most of them -- i lived in england, so i do speak the family language. but most people italian americans, they not speak italian. greeks may not speak greek. this group suggests that the size and geographic concentration that this may not track the way traditional immigrant groups do.

and may keep their spanish language speaking of something as a preference longer than other types of immigrants. that may have some implications. i'm no expert. but someone who is based on the questions, go ahead. >> no habla espanol. i don't have any problem with any of the objective criteria. however, i really do have a problem, and i think a lot of people do in saying this country shou b a bilingual country. and i would like to know your position on that. >> i can take that. it's not so much it should be a bilingual country. i think that's a long standing debate. we're right next to a population in a count that is spanish

speaking. and i think with tony was saying in terms of the differences of immigrants that game -- came across the atlantic and from this hemisphere of mexicond south americathere are some differences. i think we need to put them in perspective and put themn their own context. there are a lot of people that go back five, six generations. and they speak spanish still. secretary, he does. that has been present here for a long time. hispanics actually embrace english. it's find of important to recognize that. u have the best selling, even it beats proctor and gamble, the

best selling is from a company that called lexicom, and they spend a lo of money on advertising. they sell videos and dvds, and people embrace that. the more english classes you offer, you will see people go to those classes. because they know dominating, understanding, and being fluent in english is going to help them. and that includes me, be that much more marketable in the work foe and actually that much more engaged with the community that we live in. having said that, that doesn't say i can speak spanish too. that doesn't mean i need to negate the spanish that i carry and grew up with. that's just the difference.

>> i would like to add auick personal -- there was a study. i forget the name of the organization. that there is not enough english classes available to help immiant asemilate. my 34078 was born in chile. when she talked in english, it's usually to scold me or something he needs to do. when she tells me she loves me she tells me in spanish. i always say, talk spanish because it's said with more love. >> we'll go over there next. while you are walking over there. it's always been a great debate in political science where the politics trumps or not. no area is more significant. there is no direct answer. some people believe the cultural

instinct drives it. we come face to face with that. a lot of us would like to believe it should be a english speaking country, because the history of countries that have more than one langue, it's not a unifying factor. we have an objective fact, we have a lot of people who are voting who if you want to communicate with them, there are ways to communicate and ways not to communicate. and in the process of communicating, you can make the case it may be persuadive 37 look at the 20th century, there was a strong separation between those who wand to be accra mate and become americans and ose who didn't. i think it is going to be an ongoing debate. we have to be aware of the ols. one the tools is speaking in the language. >> thank you for the debate. thanks for the chance. you know i'm a son of

immigrants. and certainly many of us i suspect are with assimilateed and the famous ukrainian once said embrace all ctures but forget not your own. i thinkhat's important. it's very important yet when we take it to the next step. tony took some of my thunder. that's what happens historically to countries that are started to have langue infusion, different languaging becoming a daily part of their conversation. it does create some significant challenges. yet, i think it also creates some realpportunities for us. you know, we need toook at this little problem as an opportunity for conservates. we should be attempting to do what mr. nelson did in the black community and in the hispanic community, getting t those

classes so that they can learn. because we know that immigrants want to do one thing. and they want -- that is to prosper. and the only way tt you prosper is with your, you know, you're ability to be your own boss. and wn you do that, obviously, then you reach the american dream. i'd like to think that that's american dream would be us speaking officially in one language, b not forgetting our cultures from where we came. we'll go down here. but while you're walking down there, just make a brief historic point. >> my own boss new and stood up and said republican candidate ought to learn how to speech spanish so you can see the trends were doing. and then starting taking spanish classes and starting studying because he wanted to follow his own guidance. later on as issues and politics

involved, it got hit pretty hard by a lot of conservatives that said you're giving into a bilingual nation. and we're going to talk about that issue, recently, i don't know what the exchange is, but it is a powerful dividing issue amongst conservatives and nonrecently immigrant americans. and we've seen it already. the first issue and we feel passionate about it. it's just there. politics is there in our culture. but there's a rumor flowing. my view as a political player, i want to be stepping into a river. i don't want to just watch it go by. >> yes, have the microphone so i'm going to talk. >> yeah. go ahead. >> i have no prejudice against latino, and i guarantee you they have made a lot of money for me. i have served as a consultant on

taking sales from 29 million to 260 million with my strategy. i just came back from working in guatemala with five companies. i lived in nicaragua before the communist and after the communist. however, i am vy frightened of latinos, and i will tell you why. that is in the voting block. i am because today we have five nations in latin america that are led by communist. we only had one ten years ago. that was cuba. now we have five. maybe two more. the only one that has extracted itself is honduras, and our dear president is throwing all kinds of roadblocks to bring back the

communist president that the people rejected and threw out. now i feel that there is a difference in a latin voter and in one from this culture. they come out of a system in which the vote is there, they haveeen taught marxism for years, and we see they are voting that way. and i think they are going to continue. >> i understand. do you have a question? you made a power point. >> it's a point. i'd like to know if you agree or not agree. >> i'd like to begin the term latino as tony was saying is something that folks in latin america don't see themselves as latinos, they are mexicans,

guatemalaens. there's a debate as to what extent folks should have communications or dialogues with the countries of origin. and it's a discussion, and i think the usage of winning sides since americans we here. we have to contribute and be a part of it. so i would say that the gre majority of these voters are young. and that's driving the electorate, and their fertile ground for folks to communicate. >> state one point. we have a few minutes before we have to finish. and what you've said is a big part of american immigration history. the progressive movement that emerged at the beginning of the 20th century was after substantialart a reaction to the immigrants that had come over. and 1%, and the concern of the

existing population which was a real one more america of 100 years a. as a result we to the a lot of offices removed from voting. they became appointed offices. andhe reasons why in the teens and '20s we saw so many voted offices being appointed was an attempt to respond to that concern. it's a real concern then, and it's a real concern now. we've worked our way through that. but it's a legitate vote because you can't brush this stuff under the carpet. these powerful cultural issues ha always been part of a challenge of being american. are a nation of immigrants. and we belt with it. it's been a difficult decision. we've strengthened ourselves over the centuries of whye are capable of leading the world because we repsent the world

within our own political dna. but in the process of it, it is allood. i think there's a mistake made by the mainstream media to pretend it doesn't exist. these are legitimate conrns, and it's part of that debate. i think in discussion for that purpose i find it fascinating as you will at how you reach those particular voters. but the issue is a legitimate one. and i'm glad you raised it. i think we have time. >> let me just respond a little bito the premise. a professor of mine used to say latino are not from the other side of the moon. they are not. there's not this mistake that they happen to be just like you and me in many respects. the youth segment, 2/3 of the population being young is ripe fertile grounds from people that

come from a frame of mind of adapting working and using every tool that the united states and its principal has actually made available. if everything that we have, our form of government, our economy, capitalism, that is what attracted a lot of immigrants here. and building businesses, that is what is attracting immigrants here. and it's newfound in many ways ght now in our economy. and it's actuall there's a significant amount of business creation, not from hispanic malebut females. so there's anificant piece of that pie that's being built and created. proposing the comnts. >> would you like to make a comment? >> the issue is a disease -- >> that doesn't address the issue. ise is that [speaking in

spanish] the mentality is different. when you take a country like chile which brought in and l would still have communism if it wasn't for the cia, i'm telling you it is different. and the 67% of them voting for obama this time tells me we have big problems. and even though i know how to sell beans in this coury, i do not know -- i don't think i'm smart enough to figure outow to change that opinions of these people trained in communism to change them to our way of thinking. they haven't changed yet. >> okay. thank you. >> thank you. and i would like to present a bit of a different side, sir. one thing that is absolutely true. i think everybody in ts room

would le for the united stas to be a single-language country. but to get to some of the issues you're talking about, mr. gaete showed that many resonated on their language. if conservatives want to get their view across we cannot ignore that. that's what it is today. [applause] [speaking in spanish] >> translation please. >> uno mas? >> yup. thank you. to get at one the issues that you're going if you look at the

demographics of the hispanic popution agewise, i'm goingo quote winston churchill, if you have not a liber when you are 18, you do not have a heart. if you are not conservative by the time you are 30, youon't have a brain. look at how fast the russian changed their attitude when they grew up under communist. think what you are saying about you have obviously statistics that selling to hispanics in spanish works, i think that's a matter of respect. if this person is going to take the time to speak in the language that momma praises me in, i'm going to buy his protect. it's the came thing the politician has to sell himself. >> are the questions about the topics? other there. yes. blond lady.

>> my question is, was any of the studies that in context religion in any way, especially with mexico being predominantly catholic and wondering from that stand point. because the replicans have alwa focused more so on the christianity, the religious background, the hard-work ethic. i know the hispanic people are very, very hard working people. they are very hard family oriented people. and most importantedly, they fear god greatly. and from that end it seems like they would be a benefit where the conservative party as such if in fact was projected accordingedly. >> i'm going to give an example on the marriage amendment

proposition eight in california. the proposition advertised a very cultural sensitive message in spanish and the antis couldn't figure out how to speak to hispanics. and folks, this is the same here that a majority of them in lifornia voted for obama. targeted specificically religious message to resonate especially when the culture was. i wanted to see that one the pioneers inemples of marketing to hispanic voters was president reagan. >> let me just briefly respond to this. because this is another example of the question, the culture trump politics or politics trump culture.

republicans have thought voting for republicans continues to vote 7 democratic even though we look at the value set and they don't line up when they get to the ballot box i think because of cultural and historic perceptions. and so that deflects from this the rational place to vote. and the challenge, i think for any party, any group, is are you sending other blocks in other sort of cultural kinds of blocks to getting people to vote as they would agree with you. if the two lines are voting, they would vote together. they are not because of other stuff. and the other stuff is getting in the way of getting an actual constituency. i think that's part of the challenge any part, and conservatives have, not only to reach out on the issues that we share but to figure out how to communicate through the via

things that block. so we canet a meeting of the mind. >> there's a great marketplace of ideas and products or what have you. i'll go to my personal story. i came to the united states when my family when i was 9 years old. things like pizza, peanut butter, the basic things that you all are comfortable were new. there was a different list on the products ofhe shelf jus in terms what to eat. when you imagine when you think about of the ideas and the institutions that are present here, there's also a different concept and opportunity to learn what's available here and to work with it. so it's imdumb bent for the up and coming population to learn those ideas and work with them. >> thank you. >> yeah, i'll tryo be very

brief. i think mario spoke, maybe it was tony. but the ranking of the issues you have there don't surprise me at all. tony i it was you. you said they look like the general pulation. and i agree. education being as high as it is doesn't surprise me at all especially with the latino population, education-type opportunity. republicans and conservatives have historically been the chomp champions of choice in education. and the democrats are education supporters. and i've always found a conflict in that. i happen to always thi that actions have consequences. and mario, either o of you, tell me if in the latino community i think to me the democrats showed their true colors when they pulled the plug on the d.c. opportunity voucher program and the labor unions

were much more important to them than opportunity for the some of the most disadvantaged at-risk inner city kids, in this case in washington cc. you have aume they had the same position. did the -- >> absolutely, the public education system is failing a lot of young latin kids. there have been a lot of efforts over 30 to 40 years to help that. and i was actually very fortunate in actually going to college for the department of university there. but my brother that was coming in, and this is personal, but i think it magnified the problem. i did not want him to go through the public school education. he's 9 years behind me. and i had an opportunity to direct him to a private school.

because i knew he would get a lot more out of that kind of salesperson. and i think right now, i think tony said it best. there's a river going through. you dot have the luxury i have a 17 and 14 year old. you need to gto the best possible schools if they charter or public, you need to get your kids educated. people want results from the opportunity to go to school. ey are going to go to the best possible schools they can find at that time because the kids don't have the luxury of waiting for things it get better. >> let me me another point on the education. i agree with the gentleman in the front table. i wouldn't want french voters in america because they have a view -- because there is a presumption than we americans traditionally. and i don't doubt that that

maybe an element of the current thinking of some of the latino vote. and it is in that way not yet typical of american voting. if we had canadians have the same view, they have a higher level. so that is a factor that is a political reaty that when people come from another country, many other countries have a higher view of what social welfare aught to be provided than we americans have had. and therefore table the foundation is a lot like us. we have an even stronger obligation to the teach the value of the kind of policy that have made america the greatest nation in the world. >> we're going to leave the last few minutes of this recorded event now to go live to the u.s. senate. lawmakers are about to gather back in the session after a wk period. at 4:30 eastern, a bill

promoting tourism in the u.s. started with a vote to move that forward at 5:30. now live senate coverage here on c-an 2. the presiding officer: the senate will come to order.

our chaplain, dr. barry black, will lead us in prayer. dr. black. the chaplain: let us pray. o merciful lord, we thank you for the refreshme and accomplishments of our time away and for your clear, shining inward light that directs our steps. may the members of this body feel your peace and power today. restrain wandering thoughts and breaking pieces, those temptations that lead them away from your will. lord, join our senats to yourself withn inseparable bond of love.

for you alone truly satisfy. grant that their love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight so that they may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless when they stand before you. lord, this is the first time in nearly 50 years that the senate will convene without senator edward kennedy as one of its members. thank you for his life and legacy. we pray in your sovereign name. amen.

the presiding officer: please join me in reciting the pledge of allegiance. i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of ameri and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. the presiding officer: the clerk will read a communication to the senate. the clerk: washington, d.c, september 8, 2009, to the senate: under the provisions of rule 1, paragraph 3, of the standing rules of the senate, i hereby appoint the honorable tom carpe, a senator from the state of delaware, to perform the duties of the chair. signed: robert c. byrd, presidet pro tempore. mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: the senate are will be in perd of morning business until 40:30. senators per mid to -- permitted to speak up to 10 minutes each. following the morning business, the senate wl proceed to the s. 1073.

and, mr. president, i designate senator dorgan controlling the time on our side. at 5:30 the senate will proceed to a cloture vote on the dorgan amendment 1347 to the travel promotion act under an agreement reacd prior to the recess. if cloture is invoked upon the timeielding back, the dorgan amendment would b agreed to and senate will proceed to a vote. that vote is expected to occur tomorrow. mr. president, i welcome my colleagues back to senate after an august work period tha saw profou sadness across our country. we heard from our constituents over the past few weeks. in nevada, i heard from citizens across mytate who are ready for us to pick up where we left off. ready for us to get back to the hard work of legislating. ready for us to work forward on one of the most critical issues of our time and our life's cause of our late colleague senator

ted kennedy. i ask unanimous consent that the senate observe a moment of silence in memory of our friend and departed colleague, the late senator edward kennedy. the presiding officer: so ordered.

mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: thank you very much.

mr. president, i have to acknowledge that as i came into the chamber this afternoon, and came upon senator kennedy's desk, which is covered with the traditional black velvet covering with the vase of flowers and his favorite poem on the desk, one of robert frost's poems, a tear or two came toy eye. mr. president, i cherished the ti i had to -- i get to spend with the people in nevada whe i get to go home, listening to them, talking to them and learning from them. the people of nevada feel as acutely as anyone in america about the volatility our turbulent economy. the nevadans see as clearly as anyone in america that we're going forward. in fact, we're getting back on our feet after long years of negl they watched us as wall street went wild, foreclosures reached record highs and jobs vanished into thin air.

thanks to the leadership of president obama, the hard work of the congress, and the unwavering determination of our constituents, they now see the wounds beginning t heal. this senate has ris to the challenge we inherited in the face of unprecedented conditio, we responded with the most significant accompshments in our nation's history. we are proud of our important efforts to revive our economy, protect our environment, demand accountability, promote equality anand eure programs. in the first months of this year we passed an economic recovery plan that has creating jobs as we speak. strengthened the middle class and investing in our future. just last week "the wall street journal" acknowledged that the plan we passed is helping us recover from the recession faster tha expected. that's the "wall street journal". we also put people ahead of big business by protecting credit card use and routeing out

corporate fraud. we helped millions of children to stay healthy by making it easier to get the health care they need, that is the chip program by making it harder for tobacco companies to prey on our kids. we made it easier for americans to serve their country, like our heroes of generations past protecting our public lands for generations to come. we passed appropriation bills, new appropriation bills and an honest responsible budget that makes sound investments in every part of our economy. this congress mad history by pursuing justice a ensuring equality for every single american. we stood up for those who are victims of violence because of eir race, ethnicity, sexual orientation and stood up for the who are tarts of discrimination -- targets of discrimination because of their gender. and the senate confirmed president obama's outstanding

nominee for theupreme court. sonia sotomayor will become the first hispanic and third woman to sit on the highest bench in the land. today -- i think maybe tomorrow the first argument she'll participate in will take place. this is an iressive record for any congress, an impressive res. may for any -- resume for any congress. i'm particularly proud that we accomplished this in all of six months. how did we get here? we did each critical thing because we found ourselves in exptional circumstances. we faced dawbting paths. it is important to understand how we got here. i'm not interested, mr. president, in looking backwards or point fingers. it is important to learn from past mistakes so we don't repeat these mistakes. as i see it there are two primary reasons we found ourselves in a deep hole. for far too long we put off

today's problems until tomorrow. second, too many focus only on where we differ, not where we agree. we n lonr have the luxury of doing either. only by working together, not as democrats or republicans, but as americans, not as partisans, but as partners, can we put the jobless back to work, make sure everyone can afford to stay healthy and create a new clean-energy economy for this new century. health care, mr. president, learning these two lessons that we can no longer put off today's problems until tomorrow and that we cannot afford to focus only on where we disagree will be the difference between reforming alth insurance in a meaningful way or letting the status quote and scare tactics hold us back. thanks to chair baucus and senator dodd, we made progress toward passing comehensive health reform. there are reported bills that will soon seen the -- see the same from the finance committee. while many importan choes

remain, we're as committed as evero a plan that will protect what works, fix what doesn't and help the middle class get ahead. we'll stablize hick for those who have it -- health insurance for those who have it and help to secure for those who don't. we'll help to keep the insurance industry honest and lower costs to ensure that every american can stay hlthy and we're determined to pass a good bipartisan bill and do it this year. i listened to hard-working nevadans across the state. they know the difference between the misinformation spread by aopponents of progress and the reality that ourision of reform needs patience and oy doctors should make decisimns about their medical care. that belong to the people, not to the insurance industry. the american people knows that reform means keeping insurance companies honest and not letting them deny you care because of you are a preexisting condition.

if you have anything from heart disease to high cholesterol to hay fever, you may be out of luck. that is just not right. they know our vision rf reform means not allowing health insurance companies to drop your coverage if you're seriously ill. if you change or lose your job, you will havffordable options os to cover your family. they kw that we're fighting for reform that will make quality affordable care availableo every single american citizen. it is easy to focus on the part of the road we have yet to go. it is important to remember the common ground that we already share. we heard a lot from the proponents of progress. they think that we can't afford health insurance reform. my response is that we can't afford not to make it easier to live healthy in america. the american people have rejected those who pretend things are fine the way they are. they know unless we get this done, they could los their

health care and so much more along with the health care they lose. and they know that america is no place for those who hope for failure. inaction is not an optn. i've already seen what happens when we do nothing. over the past eight years of inaction the cost of health care rose to record levels. and the number of americans who can't afford insurance did the same. for the millions of families who filed for foreclosure because they can't afford both their house and the health care, not acting is not an option. for the millions of amerins who file for bankruptcy because their medical bills grow higher and higher, n acting is not an option. for the millions of americans o skip doctors' visits or the trpts they need to stay healthy or never fill a prescription that their doctors give them because health care is too expenve, not acting is not anption. our health care system is not healthy. america's fiscal health is at stake and not acting is not an

option much we have to work in good faith. this past april, mr. president, i sent my republican counterpart a letter outlining our priorities for the health care debate. i wrote, of course, that democrats are committedo lowering health care costs, expanding access and improving the puality of care. i said in that letter that we look forward to a dialogue of how to reduce disease and encourage early detection and effect treatments that save lives. in a letter of four month ago, i said to help struggling americans, we cannot drown in distractns and distorgses. i made clear that bipartisan means republicans demonstrating a sincere interest in legislatingffering constructive proposals and that working together is our common interest rather than against each other and against trillions interests of the american people. i stand by that assessment as strongly as i did this spring, four months ago. and it is painfully clear to

everyone who has seen this debate, disturbing turns and dishonest tactics, that now more than ever we need people willing to work together in good faith. today is the first day since january 2, 1953, that a man named kennedy does not have a desk on the floor of the united states senate or in theval office at the white house. when i think of all the groundbreaking progress we've made over those 56 1/2 years -- civil rights, ducation, health care, and america's global leadership -- i know we have no choice but to keep going. w is no time to let up. tomorrow night, the president of the united states will stand on the other side of the capitol and tell a joint session of congress his vision for the health care debate that's ensuing. he'll do that and then over the coming weeks and months, we will contemplate and think about what he said. it's not insignificant that president obama will speaking --

will be speaking to such a gathering we'l. we'll come together in joint session bec we share a joint future and a joint test a desti. we're all in this together: republicans, democrats and independents. every american citizen and each their representatives here, members of congress, senators, and the president of the united states. senator ted kennedy said last december, just months ago -- and i quote -- "we know the future will outlast all of us, but i believe that all of us will live on in the future we make." mr. president, this is a historic moment. this is our time to shape o future. we stand close to a real health insurance reform than ever before. we're closer than ever to tting this right. we will not give up, we will not bet on failure, we will not let the ocure facts, will not let fear, i'm sorry, obscure the facts, and we'll let the priorities of the partisan

overpower, we can't let that happen. we will not let the priorities of the partisan overpower the priorities of the people. th goal line's ahead of us, mrpresident. i say to the presiding officer, a member of the finance committee, we have to do everything that we can to join tother to do health care reform that's meaningful to this country. i think i sak for everyone in nevada and i think i speak for everyone on this side of the aisle, and i'm confident that my friend, the distinguished republican leader, agrees with memenme. it. mr. mcconnell: mr. president? the presiding officer: the republican leader. mr. mcconnell: mr. president, the senate grieves over the loss of one of its giants and one of our great friends. all of us were, of course, med by the many tributes that have poured in since senator kennedy's passing and we'll make time later in the week for

senators, including myself, to deliver tributes of our own here on the senate floor. mr. president, i previously had an opportuni to welcome my friend, the majority leader, ba and welcome all of our other colleagues from an active month in august. i kw we always enjoy spending this time with our constituents and hearing their particular concerns. this year, most of us really got an earful. and i hope the experience has an affect on our work here as we move forward. health care reform is clearly a critical issue f many americans and i think we have an o@lition to show them we've been listening closely to their concerns. at this point, there really should be no doubt about where the american people stand. the status quo is not acceptable but neither are any of the

proposals we've seen from the white house or e democrats in congress so far. the white house has attempted to retol its message on health care many times. it should be clear by now that the problem isn't the sales pitch. the problem is what they're selling. over the past several weeks, i visited a lot of doctors, nurses, seniors, hospital workers, small businessmen and women and a whole lot of other citizens across kentucky and, fo that matter, throughout the countr none of them would call our current health care system perfect. but all of them are worried about so-called reforms that would undermine the things they like about the american health care system. the american people are asking u to start over. they want reforms but they want the right reforms, not some grand scheme that increases the

national deb, expands the federal government, raises taxes, cuts seniors' benefits and forces americans off the plans they currently have and like. they want reforms that work thin the system we've got. we have a lot of work to do in the weeks ahead, but these past few weeks have given us all something valuable. they've given us real clarity about the directionmericans want us to take. and just as importantly, the direction they don't want us to take. now it's our turn to show them we've been listening and to act. mr. president, i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will cl the roll. quorum call:

the presiding officer: the senator from tennessee. mr. alexander: thank you, mr. president. the presiding officer: and we're in a quorum call. mr. alexander: thank you. thank you. without my even asking, the quorum calhas been vitiated. the presiding officer: without objection. the senator is recognized. mr. alexander: thank you very much. mr. president, i believe i have 15 minutes and i would ask the chair to let me know wn two is remaining. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. alexander: thankou, very much. mr. president, we have two speeches by the president of the united states today and tomorr tomorrow. th one today is to the schoolchildren of america. the one tomorrow night is to us, to a joi session of congress and to theountry. for the last several days, there's been a small uproar about t president's speech to schoolchildren and in some ways that's very understandable.

the country's very wary right now of more washington takeovers. we've seen takeovers of banks and insurance companies and -- and car companies and student loans and even farm ponds and health care and all of a sudden some people may have thought that the president was intending to take over the classrooms of america as well. and that was compounded by the fact tt the early lesson plans, probably drawn up by someone either in the white house or wan department of education, made the speech seem more about the president than about the children and inviting the children to help the president fulfill h goal the way he wants to transform america. well, all that's been changed. the lesson plan has been alter altered. the president's reased a copy of his speech. i read it this morning in tennessee on my way coming up. it's a good speech.

it's about the importance of studyingnd education. it's about how the president grew up, which is an inspiring story, as is the case with almost all of our presidents. and so i'm glad that the president has spoken to the schoolchildren of this country. of course the president of the united states ought to be able to speak to the schoolchildren of america. president reagan did it not long after he was elected, he talked about how our country was founded. when i was education secretary in 1991, the first president bush did it. he talked primarily about- about drugs and as a warping about the dangers of drug -- warning about the dangers o drug use. of course presidents should speak to our students. but, of course, parents and teachers should decide whether the children hear the speech and in what context they hear it. tomorrow night, when the president addresses the country, no one has to listen to him except those of us perhaps who

volunteered to serve in the unitedtates cgress. we'll be here. but milons will listen out of respect to the office, but some could turn off their televisions. some could jus read about it. some could listen to the many commentators talk about it. some could watch parts of it on the web. adults have those choic. children are in a different situation. they're captives i their classrooms and they're inexperience so we rely on parents and teachers to use thr good judgment to decide whether any speech is appropriate for children to hear d in what context. now, if i were a teacher, i'd jump at the chance to take advantage of this -- of this speech. i believe would put up a picture of reagan and one of f.d.r. and one of abraham lincoln. and i would talk about the presidency. and i'd talk about how he is the agenda setter and how -- how the

president's election, this president and other presidents, represen the unique american characteristic that anything is possible for any american of any backgrou. and i would point out that there's a congress as well, and the congress often disagrees with the president. and then i would put up a picture of the leader of north korea and i would say, there's the dear leader of north korea. if you criticize him, you go to jail. you criticize the president of the united states, you have a constitutional right to do that. i think we need more teaching of united states history andivics in our classrooms so our children can grow up learning what it mns to be an amerin. the lowest scores that high school seniors have in america are not in math. they're not in science. they're in united states history. and so we ought to take advantage of opportunities for children to learn about history and about civics. but parents and teachers ought

to be in charge of it. they should decide in what context it's done, and i hope a great many have takef advantage that have a will take advantage. there's a second speech, mr. president, tomorrow night which -- to which the country is looking forward to and that's about health care. here are my hopes for that speech. rs respectfully, i would say to the president, i hope he says, "my fellow americans, let's start over." it's obvious we need health care reform, but it's also obvious that most americans, or at least a majority, aren't comfortable with the direction in which we're going. so since this affects 17% o8% of our economy, since it affects the 250 million americans who have health insurance, let's start over. this has gone from being an issue to being something personal. or as we say in tennessee, they've gone from preaching to meddling. that why we've had at theown meedings that would normally

attract 30 people a thousand people, because their health is at issue and they want to know what's going on. so it's a very healthy thing for people to show up andsk questions, and i hope the american people -- the president has heard the american people and we will start over. next, i hope he says we'll start with the cost, the costs to you, mr. and miss american, and the cost to your government. health care costs too much for you to buy your policy and it's about to bankrup the government unless we do something about it and so that's where we will start. third, i hope the president will say, one of the lessons i think we've learned not just during the last several months while i have been president, if i were president obama, but in president bush's time and before that, is that we don't do comprehensive very well. we found that in immigration. we had a bipartisan effor here in immigration. we tried hard to solve a problem

that only the congress can solve and we failed. the time it came for a vote, it just fell around our next. wee tried it with health care. we've tried to bite off the whole thing at once and it's more than we can chew, i think. we've been trying it with economy-wide cap-and-trade for climate change and it looks like we're biting off more than we can chew there as well. that should be no big surprise. this is a huge country. 300 million people, an economy that produces 25% of all the wealth in the world, so diverse that if we were to put ourselves all in one room, it would supplied, which is why it's such a good reason we have such a big country. so i hope the president will say, we don't do comprehensive well. we've heard the american people. so let's see if we can agree on a few things. let's go step by step in the right direction, which is one good way to get where you want to go. step by step to reearn the trust

of the american people starting with health care. i can think of some things that i believe we have bipartisan agreement on in the senate which would make a difference. small business health insurance, allowing businesses -- small businesses to pool their resources. it's been estimated you could offer insurance to a million more workers at a lower cost. that's o thing. to make it possible for people no to le theirnsurance if they have -- to be able to buy insurance, to make it possible for them to buy insurance if they have a preexisting health conditioná we could probably do that to allow people to buy insurance across state lines. the presiding officer and i were both governor. we're very jealously prerogative of state responsibilities and rights, but maybe we need to allo insurance to be bought more often across state lines. neighbor would make it availab to more people and less expensive. junk lawsuits against doctors. that either increases the cost

of helth care from 1% to 1, depending upon who you believe, but we could take that step, it's an important step the right direction. and you as far as those who are uninsured, about 20% of those who are uninsured are already eligible for existing programs. we could see if we could find ways to them them sign up for prrams that already exist. step by step in the right direction to help us get where we need to go in health care. step by step to reearn the trust of the american people. fourth, i would hope the president would say, do this in a bipartisan way. there's some talk of just ramming this through the senate with a bare majority of votes. i hope that doesn't happen. it would be bad for the country t. would be bad for the majority party, if i may say. so the reason to would be bad for the country, it would be a bad bill. the way our rules work, the parliantarian, who's a very

wise individual, would end up writing the health care bill because he'd have to make all these decisions about what w germane, what fit in the bill. and for example he might have to say, well, you can't put a provision about preexisting conditions in the bill under senate rules but only whether to raise taxesr cut medicare. that would b an unappetizing vote for many members of the senate and it would be a very bad health care bill which would cause me to think that such an appetizing vote would be bad medicine for those who insisted on ramming it through. but it would be bad medicine for anotheanother reason, it wuld be thumbing our nose at the people of america who have been trying to say to you,ait, slow down. this is my health care you're talking about. let'sake sure we do this right. start over. and let's take it step by step. the health care is not the only issue. health ce is the entry into a

larger issue which is too many takeovers, too much debt, too many czars, and the american people would like for us to settle down and deal with this issue. some of the people have said over the last few weeks that the american people didn'tnow what they were talking about; ty thought there weren't any real issues. i'm afraid that's wrong, mr. president. weapon y have the mayo clinic and the democratic governors and the congressional budget office telling you you are headed in the wrong direction, maybe you are. when you read about a new $1 trilli debt added to, already, a debt that's going to double in the next four or five years maybe you are going in the wrong direction. when the "new york times" editorial says that the new program's going toe paid for, about half by cuts this medicare, that's a serious issue for the 40 million people on medicare. 177 million people have employer insurance and they worry tt they might lose that employer insurance. they might be dumped if they are

low income intoedicaid, that 40% of the doctors won't seven because they're undpaid or they might be dumped into a new government program of the middle income or they might want to be dumped into a government progm. there's worry that, eecially among older americans, someone might say, you are 70 years old and you can't have a hip replacement. and their employers who in a recession are not interested in paying more of an employer tax. and the democratic governors and the republican governors said, don't send us more costs for medicaid or we won't be able to afford it here. we'll have to raise taxes. and federal taxes would go up. those are real issues. those aren't made up issues. those are all parof the bills making their way through congress and that's why people areaying wait. finally, mr. president, i hope that president obama wil say, i'm the president, i am the agenda setter and i will take charge of this debate. the president and his team are very smart. we admire them very much.

but in some ways it reminds me of a harvard law review meeting th everyone sitting around thinking of the bright ideas and knowing getting anything don wh you are dealing with a great big complex issue like health care, the president needs to clear the decks, set the agenda, tell us what to do, and sit down with the democratic leader and the republican leader and say, what can we do." and then the president needs to say, as president eisenhower did, half a century ago, when he said, "i shallo to korea," president obama should say, i reectfully suggest, "health care is the issue; i'm the president; here's what i think we should do and ienl going to stay on this issue until it's done." now, a governor knows and most presidents know that if they say that and do that, and stick to it for as long as it takes they can usually wear everybody else. now he may not get exactly what he wants. of course, he probably won't. but there might be improvements

to the bill. when the democratic majorities in tennessee improved my proposal i could attack them or say, you have improved my proposal. and i usuly said you have increased my proposals and gave them credit and went on to the next issue. sox mr. president, all over america, people are alarmed, some are even scared about washington takeovers, about debt doubling and tripling. i south right course for us would be -- i would suggest the right course for us is to stoopo step by step. careful steps in the right direction are a go way to get where we want to go. i hope he tellss exactly what those steps should be. mr. president, i ask unanimous consent to include following my remarks, a statement i made on e 75th anniversary of the great smoky mountains national park last when, our most visited national park. secretary salazar was there and

did a beautiful job only exceeded by dolly par ton who made es all irrelevant by her performance there. but, to have that great park for 75 years in the east were united states where nine milli people visit, three times as many visiting our great western parks, i am grateful for our secretary to coming and i like to include for the record my remarks. i yield the floor. thpresiding officer: the senate will preed to a period of morning business until 4:30 p.m. with senors permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each. the senator from illinois. mr. durbin: mr. president? mr. president, about 45 minutes ago exactly history was made in america. just across the street not far from the steps of the united states senate. if you go to those steps at this moment and look directly to the east you will see thenited states sreme court building

and at 2:00 eastern time in that building the 111 justice appointed to the united states supreme court received her official investiture, a most of great historical significance because the elevation of sonya sotomayor to serve on the united states supreme court marks the rst time in our history that a pen of hispanic descent will -- decent were serve on the highest court of the land. in the course of our history with 111 supreme court jtices my memory sators only four have not been white males. two african-americans, two women. now jus justice sotayor. the care moafn was very short. the president of the united states was there, the vrntion a number of members of congress, and of course all other eight

supreme court justices and retiring justice souter. and it was a very stately, dignified, gcious presence as the considerate was convened. and after acre holder, the attorney general, read the commission, which authorizes the invest tour of justice sotomayor, the oath was administered to her by the comeef justice of the supreme court john roberts. the suire ceremony took four minutes. one of the senators standing neck to me, mel martinez, who will retire from the sene this week, said h it would have taken longer if they had television cameras here. those of us who serve in the senate and have served in the house know what he speaks of. the fact is, in that four-minute period of time, a pa was turned in american story. you're offering an opportunity now for a person to serve on the supreme court, immensely

qualified, a person with great background in her life and achievement, to serve on the highest court of the land. and across america in neighborhoods and towns, in communities and schonls, perhaps a child will look up and when they lerner of the ascension and appointment of son sotomayor to the supreme court, realize that the great promise of america continues. this still is a land of opportunity and that door to opportuny was opened a little wider just across the street at the united states supreme court about 45 minutes ago. 34r-mr. president, earlier todae president of the united states went back to school. he went to a local high school in the disk area to give a speech it turned out that this speech became controversial. i thought about that over the weekend because my wife and went down to mt. vernon in virginia.

it was a trip i promised my wife because the first trip we went down there when i was a college student and drove down dl in my v.w. bug in the 160's, i got there to find out i didn't have enough money fordmission. i always tol her we'd get back here someday. touring the grounds there, as well as the education and learning center, learning a little bit more about our first president, you realize what an opportunity he had. one of the first questions they asked ofeorge washington was, what do we call you? your excellency, your hineest? he said just call me mr. president. that created a tration. not just the formal tradition,

but more importantly a tradition of how we view the president of the united states. he had not royalty, nor is to be treated as royalty. he is to be treated as anoer american but one who at this moment in time serves in the high of the court of the land, the highest office in the land, i should say. and so george wag established a standard, a standard of respect but not all when it comes to the office of vice president. i thought that have over the years. he was aresident i generally admired. there were others i was more critical of. but i always felt that the office deserved respect, whoever occupies it. if youelieve in this form of government and nation, the election of a person to that office at least, at the least, should gather the respect that each reminder owes to the office

and so this president announced that he wanted to peek to the schoolchildren of america today on what is roughly the first day of school h. school across our nation. he wasn't e first president to make that suggestion. president ronald reaganffered a speech to the children of america. president george herbert walker bush the same. i can't recall any controvers controveyi with the addresses of either of those presidents. r reasons that i cannot understand, critics came forward criticizing president obama for wanting to speak to our schoolchildren. even in my home state of linois, the president's home state, some school dtricts made a conschuss decision that they would not broadcast or make available the president's speech. others allowed children to opt out ifheir parents didn't want toear the president's speech. its a unfortunate and i'm happy

to say the are those of both political parties who have said that senator lamar alexander, a republican, was just on the floor, our former secretary of education, hformer presidential candidate. he spoke out and said of course the president should being allowed to speak to schoolchildren across america. laura bush, former first lady, said that this morning. others have said the same. i think they understand two things: first, respect for the institution of the presidency, and, second, the fact that the president speaking may have some impact on people across america. well, the president may hav ge s speech and i hope his critics have been silenced because as a parent and now aa grandparent, as iead hispeech, aid like every kid in america to hear it as he explained his own background, the tough times that he went through growing up, the sacsacrificed made by his single mornlings the fact that his fath left at an early age, the fact that educaon became an important part of their lives even as they traveled around t

world and the president used to tell the story in the senate of his mother waking him up early when they lived overseas and saying, let's get ready for school. when he'd whine and cry at about 5:30 in the morning, his mom with a say, "it's no picnic for me either, buddy." as if a parent who cared, a mother who cared, and aon who profited from her caring. when i read his speech, i'm glad the president spoke these words to the students of america. in those chool districts that decide that their ildren should not hear this, they ought to stop and reflect whether that was the right decision. when the president says "but at the end of the day, the circumstances of your life, what you look like, where you come from, how much money you have, what you've the g.a.o. going on at home, those who excuse for neglecting your homework or having a bad attitude, that's no

excuse for ac talking back to their teacher or cutting class or dropping out of school, that's no excuse for not trying, where you are right now doesn't are to determine where you'll end up," the president said. "no one's written your destiny for you here in america you right your own destiny. you wi make yr hone future." he talked tohese students, not only about doing their homework and reading, getting involved in center curricular activities, volunteering in their community, deciding to stand up for kids being teased or bullied because of who they are or who they look, because he believe, "like i do, that all kids deserve a safe environment to study and lerner." the president went ton say, "no one is born being good at things. you become gooat things through hard work." then he said, "and even when you're struggle, discouraged, feel like other people have given up on you, don't ever give up on yourself because when you give up on on you are servings you give up on your country.

the story of america is not about people who quit when things got tough. it is about people who tried harder, who loved their country too much to do anything less an the best." mr. president, that speech by president obama to the schoolchildren of america was a positive thing, a good thing. some said it was a way to promote his socialist agenda. it was political propaganda. i findothing political about these comments. these are good advice to any child, any student across this country, and i'm glad the president took this opportunity to use whatever influence he has over these young people to guide them on roo the right path as ty start out in their school year. mr. president, the last issue i'd thriewk address for a moment is the aust recess. august is a blazing hot month in the midwest, with high temperatures and high humidity, though they were tempered a little bit this year, a little cooler than usual, a little

wetter than iewrks but we had our hot days. but the hottest days are reserved for the political scene because p in town meetings across the midwest and across the nati many times tempers flared, there was shoveling and ting going on at these town meetings. if you have been on the political scene, you know there are moments when the meigss are raised to higfeefredz pitch. fortunately for us, the reason for this interest was genuine. we are taking about an issue, e change of the health care system in america, which terally affects every person in our country. it's rare that we would tackle an issue that is that all-embracing, that touches everybody, and its and hable that people have legitimate questions about what if means to their lives, and i found the same thing in illinois. i aveled around the state. i met with doctors and nurses and hospital administrors, small businessesmall business pe

folks, patients, struggling with illness and disease,hose who had been turned down by health insurance companies, average people coming up to here in restaurants and folks at the airport talking to me about their life's experience when it came to health care. it's an issue we all share in common, an issue we all care about. but sadly there was an organized effort to disrupt many of these town hall meetings. these weren't people who wanted to express their opposition to any pending legislation so much as to end the meeting, to try to raise their voices above all others and to stop the dialogue that is so important as part of this. i don't think that that point of view reveiled at the end of the day. there are still legitimate tough questions about health care reform. questions that will have to be answered directly and honestly. as we proceed in this debate. but there is no question in my mind that the majority of the american people understand that

we need to make some need to make some changes. the cost of health care inurns is going up three times faster than the wages of working americans. it'll reach a point where and more of your take-home pay will pay for health insurance which sadly will not provide as much coverage next year it is a did this year. we also knowhat sometimes the people who have health insurance find out i it is not there bh ty need it. i ran into that. a gentleman in quiy, illinois, at one of my meetings the other day, he and his wife both had lost their jobs. 19 years he'd been with with the local bank with health insurance and he lost his job. because he and his wife had a special-need child, they paid the cobra premium, which, if you understand how this works, once you have a lost a job you can keep your health insurance if you will pay the employer and employee portions. even though wee made that more reasonable in cost, it's still very expensive. but becausof the special-needs

child, he decided he and his wife had to dip into their saves to keep the health insurance covering their kids and their family even while they're unemployed. sadly, during this period of time of unemployment, his son fell down the stairs and needed brain surry. they shipped him across the river into iowa where he was successfully operated on. that the god news here. and then the father dpept looking foa job only to lerner thathe insurance company was going to deny their claim for this brain surgery. well, it would have been extremely expensive. it would be -- if the insurance compy failed to pay. w this man, uneloyed look for a job, with son who does have those special needs and a wife who is trying to find substitute teaching jobs to help out, has to spend a good part of his day fighting with the insurance company over whether his son is going to be covered nor that emergency surry. it's not rare. in fact, its eats too commo

that the average person when ey need the coverage of health insurance finds out that they're in a battle. notith their doctor, a battle with someoneho works for a health insurance company who says no. that's got to change. i think one of the things i hope both sides agree on -- republicans and democrats -- is at people should not be denied health insance coverage because of a preexisting condition. you shouldn't be denied health insurance when it turns out you're sick and need it. you should be able to take your health insurance from one job to another. you shouldn't shah cap on the total amount of coverage in your lifetime. your children shouldn't be high and dry at age 23 and be completely unprotected. these are the things which most people agree should be part mf health insurance reform and i hope we can make it part of a coon bipartisan effort when we talk about this issue. there's another issue, and it's one that i'll address as i talk about this issue later in the week, and i think it's a

fundamental issue of social justice. that 47 million americans today have no healthnsurance. we have about 300 million people in our country. about 100 milon of them are under some sort of government health plan: medicaid for the poor and disabled, ledicare for those in advanced years, which i'moon approaching, people covered bivens health care and -- could have had by veterans health care and those could have had by cldren's health care programs. take those covered by government health care programs aside and the remaining in america have no health insurance. they are not the poorest people in america. they are not the fortute like ourselves who have health insurance. they are people who work every ngle day and have nhealth insurance. i met plenty of them as i traveled around the state of illinois. i don't understand -- i do understand but i certainly

sympathize with the situation where y wake up in the morning and look at those children in that bed as a father and realize they're one accident or one diagnosis away from a medical catastrophe that could threaten their lives and wipe out your savings. that's what people with health insurance face -- without health insurance face every single day. so in addition to t cost, in addition to whether the health insurance is there when we need it is the fundamental question out whether or not everybody in america should be drawn in under the protection of health insurance. i believe they should. the people without health insurance, when they reach a critical time in their lives and are desperate, show up at a hospital. and our hospitals treat them and then pass along the expense of treating themo everyo else. it would be far better in america for us to provide coverage and protection for everyonend to help those in the lowest-income categories pay for that protection. i think that is fundamentally just. it is american.

it is good, sound policy. so that this have and have-not situation wouldn't apply to circumstances of life or death, which is the way it does today. and finally, we have to find a way to change this health care system when it comes to the incentives. currently we have something called fee for service, which means that if a doctor or hospital comes up with a new procedure or a new service, they are paid more. it creates an economic incentive to do more than maybe necessary. we have to change that. and i think we can. we have to try to stress preventive car and wellness. we don't do enough of that. instead of just this rescue care and sickness, which is t hallmark of our current system. prevtive care and wellness means having access to clinics and primary care providers acro the united states. i want to salute association of family physicians. they join me in every town in me

state. they fully support this. they understand health care refo is essential to families who are going to have a fighting chance for good health care. those are the basics in the debate. there are all sorts of separate questions about public option and individual mandates and many other issues that we're going to have to wrestle with. senator alexander of tennessee, o i mentioned earlier in my comments, said a moment or two ago, it's time for us to start over when it comes to the health care debate and engage both sides of the ale in the debate. i would say to senator alexander, we've spent a lot of time learning a lot of things, about the health care challenges of america a how to reach a way to deal with them. we have kept the door open for those on the other side of t aisle who are willing to come forward and discuss it. some have said n they're not interested for a variety of reasons. and to date, only three have stepped in to bipartisan

conversation -- three republican senators. i hope more will. it will be healthy and positive. the worst thing we can do, mr. president, is to walkway from this issue, to say that because some town meetings were disrupted or some people have strong emotional feelings about this issue, that we need to walk away from it. because the current health care system in america is unsustainae. it is too expensive. we spend twice as much per person for health care in america as any nation on earth. and those there areositive things to point to terms of our health care in our country, some countries spending far less get much better results in many areas. we can do better. secondly, who would oppose health insurance reform? i would hope everyone understands that at the end of the day that needs to be done. we should do that on a bipartisan basis. i hope there are those who feel we should create opportunities for thoegs who are uninsured -- for those who are uninsured to

have basic insurance protection. ose who criticize the cost of health care reform overlook the obvious. if we don't help low-income families and individuals in america pay for health insurance, they won't have it. and if they don't have that coverage, we'll be right where we are today. with one-fourth of those not covered by governmentlans having no health insurance protection whatsoever. and we need to change the system to focus on prevention and wellness. that means encouraging more primary care physicians and health care professionals to reach out to families and communities across illinois and across the nation. if we don't do something about this, i'm not sure that we can sustain the system much longer. just a few years ago one out of three people filing for bankruptcy in america did so because of medical costs. one out of three. today it's two out of three. two out of every three personal bankptcies is over medical costs. and listen to this: 7 of the

people filing for bankruptcy because of medical costs, 78% of them have health insurance. it isn't very good. it doesn't protect them when they need it. it left them high and dry when major medical bills came through. so, those who are watching this debate saying, i'm sorry that people don't have health insurance and i'm sorry some people are complaining, but i'm okay. i'm covered. ould pause and reflect for a moment that many of the people in bankruptcy court today facing bankruptcy and the loss of virtually all tir assets were people who also had health insurance and who also, in the belief -- the presiding officer: the senator's time has expired. mr. durbin: we have a chance in the coming weeks to come together on a bipartisan basis. i hope that republicans and democrats who listen carefully at home understand that despite the anger, temper and emotions, that we cannot leave the current system as it is. if we don't make a positive

change, it is unstainable. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president? the presiding offir: the senator rom south carolina. mr. demint: mr. president, welcome back. thank you for the opportuty to speak. if you were like me, you probably had a number of town halls. i know a number of our colleagues over the holidays did. i saw a number of them on television and saw the many thousands of americans who came to town halls, as they did to mine, who were very concerned about the direction of our country. frankly, in south carolina, i had several thousand people com to different town hall meetings, all with a ver similar point of view. that thought this government had gotten too big, was spending too much money or were taxing too much and taking over too much of our economy. a lot of people were very concerned not just about health

care. i can agree with the senator. there are many things we need to do, but the las thing we should do is have this government take it over, and many things we can doo make sure people get more insured. people who came to our town halls and across the country, many, many other town halls were not concerned about one issue. they looked back over the last year, over republican and democratic president, to see two failed stimulusills, two bailouts which many believed were unconstitutional, the proposed takeover of the energy and health care industries, and the actual takeover of bank and insurance companies and carmakers. people are fed ep. the federal government is simply too big the debts we're looking at now for ourselves and our children and our grandchildren are truly unsustainable. people don't know where the money'soming from. they wonder what we're thinking

about. and the azing thing is after what weaw over the break, the genuine outrage and concern b the americ people, the very first item of business that we're going to vo on in this senate today, after the august break, is to vote to start another government program, to spend $400 million to increase taxes to get the federal government involved in another private-sector business. what did we lrn over our summer vacation? if we vote to pass this bill, we obviously learned very little. what i'm talking about is the travel promotion act. many of you here in the gallery and around the country think i'm probably making this up.

that after what we saw across america, that we would actually have the serve to bring u a bill that forms a new government-sponsored enterprise, a la fannie mae and freddie mac. and it's going to be a general -- a government-sponsorednterprise that promotes travel and tourism in america i guess we can call it fannie travel. let me tell you a little bit about the idea, because the idea is that travel and tourism in america is a very iortant industry -- which it is. it's the number-one industry in south carolina. it's actually one of the most prosperous. that's the main reason we don't want the federal government to get involved with it. but the idea is this: we're going to charg a $10 fee for everyone who comes to visit america in order to pay for this

advertising program that will promote american people all over the world. all these fees would be pooled, and th would be matched by some of the major tourism industries such as disney. and we would have a government-sponsored enterprise that's promoting tourism. but they're saying it really won't cost americans anything because this is a tax on foreigners coming to this country. but ve got a letter in my office from the european union and other allies of thisountry that says that th is violating agreements we had with them. and if we do this, they're going to add a rimilar fee to americans visitin their country. we're going to start a war with some of our friends thatill ultimately end up costing americans money. it will create another government entity. and,ks, it's not a crisis.

this is not one of those emergencies that we have to do this week. why, when we have all of this debt, would we create another program and another tax that this federal government is going to run? maybe it's fannieravel. maybe it's cash forrism. the problem -- cash for tourism. the problem with tourism in america is not people don't know we're here. the problem is we've got one of the most unfriendly immigration services in the world. we also are one of the most diicult countries to get a visa for. i have a major international employer back in my home state who regularly needs to bring people from other parts of the world to train american workers, but they can't get vis, so they send american workers to other countries to get the training they need because it's so much trouble to get the visas to get them in here.

major industries have trade shows outside of this country because you can't get the visas for customers coming in looking at our products. the problem is not that people don't know we're here. it's just that the government involvement that's already involved with tourism and travel in our country is not doing a good job. and when you have problems with the quality of your product, the last thing y do is raise your prices and increase advertising, which is what we're talking about doing with this bill. the first thing we need to do is make sure we have the most friendly and efficient custom system in the world, and that people who wan to come tour country can g a visa and a very quick background check so we knowhe people who come in here are safe. but 're not going to solve those problems with hundreds of millions of dollars of advertising and a new government agency that's run by major corporate sponsors in our

country. tourism is too importa to turn over to the government. when -- what a lot of people are concerned about when we look around the country and the level of debt that we are creating, they're concerned that we're ignoring the constitutional principles that we swear an oath to. they're going to ask us when we vote on this bill, wre in the constitution of the united states do we find the authority to run travel and promotion in this country? you know, major tourism companies like disney are not having trole. in fact, i tnk disney just reported a $4 billion profit from last year and they just bought marble comic fo for $4 billion. our economy has put a strain on tourism, but the federal government is the last entity that needs to try to bail them out. we don't have any money. we're going to have to borrow

money or tax someone to create this new government program. but this is a debate that gets back to what does the constitutionllow us to do? and are y can't read the constitution without seeing some very severe limits on what is expected of this federal government. d, certainly, the bailoutand the cash for clunkers and this new travel and tourism agency they're starting has nothing to do with our constitutional functions here. do with our constitutional functions here. folks, we've got ove already in this country. we're projecting to almost double that over the next 10 years with what we already have on the books. with social security and medicare alone, the unfunded liability that we have out many, many years is lik

like $100 trillion. we have no idea where we're going to get all of this money. howan we even discuss starting a new government entity when the ones that we've started are really at heart of our economic problems? you can't understand our economy without seeing fannie mae and freddie mac played a key role in bringing the worldwide economy its knees. you don't have to look back but one months toee what the last government program we created in cash for clunkers did. it was going to be a $1 billion six-month promotion and sell a lot of cars. we were out of money in one week and voted to pass another $2 billion and a couple of weeks later they canceled the program. we the can't run the travel and promotion industry from washington, d.c. folks, i have to draw a very difficult conclusion, that any ofy fellow senators who vote for this, either don't

understand the severity of our economic and fiscal problems or they just don't care. they certainly deny hear the millions of americans speing over the august break in telling us that we want -- they want us to get back to the business of a constitutional form of government and stop trying to win their votes by bringing home the bacon, wasteful spending and earmarks and new government programs and all of these false, empty promises based on government solutions. i would just encourage my colleagues, let's get the rest of the year started off in a reasonable way. let's talk about how to fix health care. let's talk about how to create jobs in america. but, for heaven's sakes, let's don't create a new government program as the first vote we take in the senate. i thank you, mr. president. i yield back.

the presiding officer: the senator from arizona. mr. mccain: mr. president, today, as we all know, congress frurns the august recess -- returns from t august recess, and perhaps one of the most importt issues of recent time affecting one-sixth of america's gross domestic product and sing to as much as one-fifth

is health care and healthare reform will be front and center, including a highly unusual appearance tomorrow night before a joint session of congress by the president of the united states. the last time, as i recall, that such a joint session of congress was called for, aside from the regular one, was by former president bush concerning the events surrounding the attacks on the united states of america of 9/11. during the recess i had, like all of my colleagues, a very busy schedule of meetings a addressing various issues, including travel to iraq and afghanistan. and that visit will be sub -- the subject of other statements on the floor. but in arizona, i hosted town hall meetings with my

constituents. i also attended meetings and forums with health care providers in missouri, nor carolina, and florida, so that i could -- along with my colleagues -- better understand america's thoughts and ideas on reforming our nation's health care system. mr. president, i haveo dbt that there is a peaceful revolution going on out in america. i have not seen in the years that i have been a member o congress such anger and dissatisfaction with the way that the congress and, w in washington, are doing business. we all know that the president's approv numbers continue to fall. and the unruly and sometimes disruptive behavior at town hall meetings has been an exhibit of the anger and dissatisfaction

that americans feel. i'd like to make it clear that i think the town all meetings should be conducted with respect. they should be conducted in a wayhat is an american tradition that all americans can be heard from as well as their elected represeatives. but there's no doubt that people attended town hall meetings that never before in their lives had been engaged in any debat i america. and there' something going on out there. i certainly got the message and i hope that the majority of my colleagues did as well. and it's more clear to me that we have to reform the way that health care's provided in this country,ut we have to do it in th rig way without a government takeover of the health care system in america. the problem with health care in america is not the quality of health care. the problem with health care in

america is the cost of health care that almost or net double digit inflation that takes pce annually which deprives more and more americans their abity to acquire and keep health insurance. now, among other places i visited recently, one of them was a place called m.d. anderson, a cancer treatment facility in houston, tas. there were patients from 90 countries all over the world. why? because it's the highest quality health care. so the fundamental differee that we have here between those of us who want to reform health care to reduce the costs and maintain the quality is the argument from the president and on the other side of the aisle that they want a -- quote -- "government option" that ty refuseo address the issue of medical malpractice refm, that they refuse to allow someone to go across state lines and

acquire the health insurance of their choice, that the continue to allow practices to go on that breed fraud, abuse and waste in medicare, which are well documented to the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars a year. we must reform health care. we can't do it with a government solution that is advocated by the other side. and that's why we've been unable toea an agreement because we have two fundamental philosophical differences between ourselves and those who want to have the government option, who want to have greater d greater intervention in the health care system, and i just on the way over from the a.p. read this -- that it says that up to $3,800 fine for failure to get health insurance. washington a.p., a top senator is calling for fines up t

to $3,800 on families who fail to get medical insurance after a health care overhaul goes into effect. my friends, do we want to do that to the american people? a $3,800 fine? and that'c why we also need to step back and examine the 600-page bill we passed through the "help" committee without the financing provision, the how many thousand page -- thousand page or so bill that was passed through the house just before they left and figure out what else we have added in this bill. so why are americans angry and upset? ey're angry and upset, mr. president, because of this -- because we spent $778 billn on the stimulus package, which i is $1.1 trillion with interest, $700 blion on tarp tarp, $410 billion with 9,000 earmarks in it in the omnibus

appropriations bill. $3.5 trillion in the budget resolution. $83 billion to bail out auto companies. $33 billion to expand the children's health insurance program. and a $1 trillion to $2 trillion cost associated with the "help" committee's plan that went through the "help" committee according to the congressional budget office, which would not bend the curve according to the congressional budget office. and what have we gotten for all of this? my friends,e've gone from 8% to 9.7% -- we've gone to 9.7% unployment in this country after the president and all of his economic advisers said if we pass the stimulus bill, unemployment wl be a maximum of 8%. as they say, you can look it up. it's now at 9.7%. the public debt i is $11.7 trillion and sometime inctober we are going to have

to increase the federal debt limit which is going to go beyond $12.1 trillion. and i would remind y that we're all responsible for what we say in 2006 the current president spoke in opposition to raising the debt limit t to $9 trillion saying -- quote -- "washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today on to the backs of our children and grandchildren. america has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. unquote. that was from a quote from the then senator from illinois, now president of the united states. so where did we go? where did we go from $11 -- 11 to 12 and a few weeks a a small rounding era, over a 10-year deficit was fro from $7 trillion to $9 trillion, just a $2 trlion rounding error.

so that, mr. president, what the american people are worried about. the commission of generational theft on our children and grandchildren. and no one -- no one has a plan in the admission for bringing a budget back into balance. no one. i think the american people at least deserve it. yesterday the president spoke in front of his union allies and a part -- in a partisan,ampaign style speech where the president questioned the motives of those whoaised concerns about too much government control over our health care economy and instead wrongly criticized our side for having no ideas of our own. we've got -- we've got plenty of ideas, mr. president. none of them have been considered in the "help" committee or by the united states senate or by the house of representatives. the "help" committee bill was written only by the democrats. there was no input from this side of the aisle.

every meaningful amendment that was proposed was rejected, including malpractice reform. how can you possibly -- how can you possibly look the american people in the -- in the face and say -- we're going to bring down the cost of health care without medical malpractice reform? ask any physician. ask any physician -- ask any physician and they'll tell you that physicians are required to practice defensive medicine because of the fear of being sued. unnecessary tests and procedures are performed time after time after time. mr. president, i was in miami at the palm medo hospital. i asked one of the surgeons, i said, how do you afford your health insurance premiums? he said, i don't. we don't. we don't keep insurance anymore cause we can't afford it. and we're probably not going to get sued because they know we only have so much in assets. so now we are -- we are putting

physicians and care provide in a position where they basically cannot afford nor can they get health -- mpractice insurance because the premiums are so high and they are targets for the trial lawyers. now, as i said, we have a number of alternatives, and most of them are market based. most of them have to do with preserving the quality of health care in arica yet bringing down the costs, which should be our goal. wh don't we have insurance reforms to improve access? that means someone can go across state lines. if i want to -- if a citizen of arizona wants to go to north dakota and get health insurance there, why can't he? why can't that family do that? why can't they? they can't today. why is it that we -- we have -- we can't reform medical malpractice? let's have tax reforms.

let's have incentives to purchase insurance, either in the form of the tax credits for families in america, or -- or -- why don't we just give the same tax treatmen to familieshat businesses give in provision of health insurance. why don't we have real competition in these united states senate why don't we set up the risk pools that are necessary to insure those who are previously uninsurable -- are uninsurable or -- quote -- "preexisting conditions." let's set up those risk pools. yes, that will take some taxpayer dollars, and why don't we allow the insurance companies to compete to so that they can -- so that they can provide insurance, so that we can provide affordable and available health care to all americans? why don't we look at cost reductions? why don't we look at incentives for wellness and fitness? one of the most famou corporations in america recently is safeway. we've heard from that c.e.o. they reward people financially

for wellness and fitness, and guess what? their costs of health care have gone down there are incentives to do so. why don't we jt -- you know, a small idea. why don't we see what the school lunch program is in your local school. why don't we see what the physical education requirements are in our local school district? why don't parents do that? i was appalled -- and i'm sure my cleagues and all earns were -- to see recently there's one senate america where one-third of the population has -- suffers from obesity. we know what obesity does to health care cos, not to mention the lives of individua individuals. so why don't we also look at what has been done and tried fore and outcome treatment of patients. a patient has diabetes, if you pay that provider a year or six months or two years and say, okay, here's the amoun of mone money, here's the amount of money, and if you keep that patient well, you will receive a

reward at the end of that treatment perd, rather than pay for every single test and procedure that is required. and, my friends, there are cases of abuse of medicare that stretch into the hundreds of billions of dollars we have to go after these people that abuse hlth care -- medicare and medicaid. and what -- and a practical question. suppose we adopted what could pass through the "help" committee and through the house, they increase dramatically medicaid payments to the states. what states can ford the additional burden of -- wh states can afford the additional burden of medicaid that is envisioned by this legislation? not many. not many. workable, doable, viable alternatives to the government option.

and when the president of the united state stands up and say we don't, he eithe is not paying attention what we're saying, which has been one of the big problems withhis debate, or he willfully ignores the fact tha there are solutions that we can move forward and reduce health care costs in america and preserve the quality. i'd like to just make a comment about the so-called co-op approach. my friends, you can call it the government option, you can call it the co-op, you can callt a banana, but the fact is, is it government intervention into the free marketplace which will lead to crowding out, which will over me -- over time will lead to government control of health re in america. a co-op can exist today. a co-op doesn't -- they don't have to wait for legislation. they can exist today. yet very few do. if the was a pressing need for more co-ops, woun't more of

them have been created? under the co-op approach, the federal government would design, fund and foster their creation, but don't kid ourselves. creating a new massive government plan designed in washington is still washington involvement in health care. and if we didn't learn any lessons from fannie mae and freddie mac, co- co-ops, nobodys been paying attenti. now, let me just talk about the trigger section -- a second. public optio -- the trigger in the bill would implement the public option only if private insurance companies failed to meet ctain benchmarks, such as lowering overall health spending or shrinking the jumber of the uninsured. the "wall street journal" stated yesterday, "liberals should love the idea" -- i quote. "liberals shouldove the idea because a trigger isn't a substantive concession. it merely ensures that the public option will aive eventually instead of immediely.

democrats will tweak the test so that the private insurers can't possibly meet them, mainly by imposing new regulations and other costly burdens. additionally, this trigger appears to blatantly and patently violate the constition's delegation of lawmaking powers to congress and not the executive branch. we must decide whether to implement equal government option or nottism vot not. vote to not do so and so not abdicate any of my duties as a lalawmaker and allows the executive branch to create a -- quote -- "government option" based on a trigger. mr. president, i ask unanimous consent the "wall street journal" column entitled "woah, trigger" -- good name -- be included in the record at this time. the presiding officer: without objection, so orderedment withot objection, so ordered. mr. mccain: so, mr. president, let me just summarize. i come back from this recess, and i see my colleague also from

arizona, both of us come -- as a lotf our colleagues do -- in the face of extreme unease, anger and frustration on the part of the american people. not just over the issue of health care but over the issue, as i pointed out, of this massive spending and debt and deficit that we have laid on future generations of americans. and they want us po act in their interest. soouldn't i be for the president tomorrow night, i i may b so bold, to say, my friends and colleagues, the citize have sken. they want us to sit down together and they want us to do what's doable. they want us to fix this cost escalation of health care in america which make -- which is making it less and less affordable to all americans but the message we've gotten is that they're very sceptal abou skeptt a -- quote -- "government-r

healthare" or -- quote -- "the government option." but, thoughhe president says, if you like your insurance presently, you can keep it. that's not true. that's not true either. because if you had a government expoption it looked more attract -- option and it looked more attractive to your employment and your employer decid to select the government option rather than the insurance policy that you now have, then you can't keep it. so it's simply not true that under the government option, thatou can -- if you like yourself heah insurance policy, you can keep it. but the point is -- the real point is, shy don't we sit down, which we didn't do --e dient dit do at the beginning of this process -- and sit down with the smartest people on both sides of the aisle and say, okay, what can we get done? what can we get done here together? and go to the american people and say, we're going to make significant progress in eliminating this problem of out-of-control costs of health

care in america. mr. president, i recall when i fit came to the congress of the united states, it was pretty partisan then. ronald reagan had only been elected a couple yearsefore and social security was about to go broke. social security was going broke and two old irishmen, tip o'neill, a liberal democrat from massachusetts, and the conservative from california, sat down together and said, ok okay, we're going to sit together, we're going t fix social security and they didme . and the american people were not only proud and grateful but they benefited. let's go back to sqre one. let's sit down together and get this issue resolved. mr. president, i yield the oor. mr. kyl: mr. president? the presiding officer: the reblican whip. mr. kyl: thank you, mr. president. i ask unanimous consent to speak in morning business for not to exceed 15 minutes. . dorgan:r. president, would the senator yield for a unanimous consent request? mr. kyl: yes. mr. dorgan: i wonder if the senator would yield for a

question? i would make a request that senator whitehouse be recognized following the presentation of the senator from arizona, and that i be recognized following senator whitehouse, and that senator inhofe be recognized following my presentation. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection, so ordered. mr. kyl: thank you, mr. president. i thank my colleague. mr. president, i want to speak to the same issue my colleague, senator mccn, just spoke to in a couple of minutes. but first i'd like to make some brief mments about two of our colleagues who will no longer be with us. of course, our friend and colleague, senator kennedy, and senator martinez. let me first of all speak to senator kennedy's departure from this body due to his untimely death. during h five decades of public service, senator kennedy served with diligence, tireless passion, and, of course, vigor. the word immediately evokes the kennedy speemplet bause of who he was -- kennedy spirit.

because of w he was, he could are gotten by without a lot of hard work, but that was not his way. he believed deem, so he worked hard, as hard as any senator i've known. one thing that's been commented on by many who worked with senator kennedy was his willingness to compromise. i've characterized senator kennedy as a legislator's legislator. often a result-oriented pragmatist whonew that clashes between the two parties are inevitable and, in fact, an integral part of our political system. and that it was important to reach across the aisle if you really wanted to get things done. he believed that people with dramatically different points of view could usually find some common ground. while senator kennedy and i did not share a perspective on very many issues and he was always ready to make an ideological or political point, my colleagues and i appreciated his efforts to actuallyegislate as well. his dedication, his hard work, humor, and high spirit will always be remembered.

my wife carol and i extend our thoughts and prayers to his family. mr. president, i also wanted to say a coee words about our colleague, mel martinez from florida, who will be leaving the senate on this coming thursday. he's been an admirable public servant, both in this body and as secretary of housing and urban development. to each position, he brought his considerable talent and devoted himself to solving problems in a practical, thoughtful, and bipartisan way. senator martinez never sought the limelight. he simply wante to make a difference. he was disappointed, i know, that he wa unable to move immigration reform forward, but we will try apply what he has taught us about that issue. his positive influence here in washington will be greatly missed. a fair twoal senator martinez wouldn't -- a farewell to senator martinez wouldn't be complete without a note about his compelling wife story and about his wife kitty. as a cuban emigre who came to america with few ties, senator

martinez represents one of the most inspiring aspects of american life. that talent and hard work unlock the door to great success. he's not forgotten those who helped him, just as all of us will not forget him. his wife kitty has likewise made many friends in washington and will also be missed. although i know he won't need it, i wish him all the best in his future endeavors, and i know that he will remain an important positive voice in our party and on issues important to all americans. mr. president, my colleague, senator mccain, has just spoken to the issue that is the minds of all americans today and which the senate and house ofepresentatives will again take up as we return from the august recess and that is how to deal with the issues that confront us in the delivery of health care today without doing damage to the care and to the coverage that most americans have and believe serves them well. the approach that i heard from colleagues -- from my constituents over the recess was

very similar to what senator mccain has just spoken about, which shouldn't be a big -- seem to be a big coincidence since we represent the same state. and on one occasion, we called about 50 thowp arizona -- about 50,000 arizonans, had them on the telephone for about an hour and a half, and asked for their views and gave our thoughts in response to their questions, and what i've been struck by is the consistency of the views that he been expressed in t various forums that i had around the state, consistent with the town hall meetings that senator mccain had right in the heart of the phoenix metropolitan area, views that people expressed to m every location, from the doctor's office that i went to,o people meeting with with me in my office, to vox at churn. -- to folks at church. the message seems to be pretty much the same. and i think senator mccain articulated it well when he characterized it as excite and

concern. one of -- as anxiety and concern. one of my colleagues said he noted in his constituentsn these town hall meetings real fear, and i think that's true. because even though we know there are some things that noted to be done to improve health care delivery in this country, most people, accorng to surveys, have insurance and believe that what they have serves them verx well or at ast well. our goal, therefore; to try to solve the specific problems that exist without doing harm to the system that treats the others. and as i said a lot ofur constituents were very fearful they were going to have to pay much more in taxes; that their debt burden will be increased significantly because of the costs of the health care reform that have been proposed; that ey won't be able to keep the insurance they hav even if they like it; that the way they receive care and the advicehey

get from their doctors about what their family needs are, will not necessarily be respected if the government has a large role i deciding what to pay for and what not to pay for; and, generally,hat the government's continued takeover, piece by piece, of the american economy will not sve individual americans will. well. to beure, they agreed that some health care costs are growing too fast and need to be controlled. that there are some americans who don't have health coverage and really dope have a way to get it without public help. those are the two key areas in which they recognize there is a role for government to play in reform. buthey also wonder whyertain problems are not being tackled. the problem, for example, of characterized as "jackpot justice," where trial lyers bring lawsuits and sometimes get big rewards but frequently settle the cases and the net

result is that the medical profession in this country, doctors primarily but hospitals and others, spend an enormous amountf mon estimated to be at lst $100 billion a year on what's called the practicef defensive micine. that is to say, doing things, ordering tests, referring patients to other physicians and so on, all of which are rlly unnecessary for the care and treatment of the paint but which will protect the doctor in the event that there's a claim of medical malpractice. this happens because the lawyers involved get scalled expert witnesses who come to court and tell the jury that the standard of care in the community is if the child falls down on the lay ground and gets a butch on the head y order a cat scan. it doesn't matter whether or not from the physician's objection he can see the child, really, if the paints just watched carefully, should be just fine.

no, to protect himself or hersel against medical liability or malpractice claims you order a cat scan. the net result is an expense of over $100 billion a year in unnecessary medical tts a procedures. the costs of those items, of course, are passed on to all of the rest of us. another esmate is that 10% of every health care dollar is spent on the preums that physicians spend for their malpractice insurance. some of us as lawyers know you have to pay some money for malpractice insurance before you can start work on january 1. that's fair. but how about $200,000 in medical malpractice premiums for a neurosurgeon, for example, or if you are an ob-gyn, for example. this estimate of 10% of health care dollars spent on premiums means that if we could reduce the incidce of malpractice

claims we couldeduce that premium cost the physicians wouldn't have to pass it on to the insurance companies, wouldn't have to pass it on to us. again, our health care could be cheaper. so, both because of the premium cost and because of the practice of defensive medicine, this "jackpot justice" system has not served us well. one would think if we're interested in controlling costs, if we're making insurance more affordable for small businesses -- for big businesses for that are matter -- and for us as individuals and we want to encourage more physicians to stay in practice, we would tackle this problem. is this one word about medical malpractice reform in any bill? a bill out of the "help" committee in the senate? the bill in the finance commite? or the bill that came out of the committee in the house of representatives? the answer to that is "no," not a wd about medical malpractice reform. howard doon, the former democratic governor of vermont and democratic national chairman, was very honest about this aust 17 in a town hall

meetg within representative moran was asked, and he said the reason is, you write a wig deal you don't want to take on too many special interests @nd the people who wrote this did not want to take on the trial lawyers. that's the truth. and it is the truth. but the reac reality is, if thes going to ask everyone else to sacrifice seniors taking a $4 billion to $5 billion cut in medicare -- less care for them -- if small businesses have to pay a tax on every employer to make sure they get cotered with iurance, if the pharmaceutical companies are goin to have to pony up i have forgotten how many hundred million force more drugs for seniors, if everyone else sacrifices why can't we ask the poor trial lawyers to give up a little bit? we are not saying malpractice claims couldn't be filed. that's the way that doctors and hospitals and others are kept

honest. you headache a mistake, you have to pay for it. but we can make sure the system works to prevent the kind of jackpot justice i talked about. there are five different kinds of medical malpractice reforms thatorked. one was offered in the "help" committee by senator enzi called "health courts." the state of texas and the state of arizona have both adopted certain kinds of medical malpractice reforms. in arizona it has begun to work and in texas something like 7,000 doctors have moved into the state; something like the premiums being reduced either by 21% or 23%. in other words, medical malpractice can reduce the cost to provide care. by reducing that cost, people's premiums can be cut. and that will make insurance more afford acknowledge. affordable. my point is to say this, what we found as we talked to our constituents was a fear that in order to solve two or three very

discreet problems, that there were people here in washington that wanted to remake the whole system, throw out what we have, and impose on it, a new regulatory regime. whether or not there is a government option or government insurance plan i only part of the issue. the problem is, there's government control of everybody irrespective of that. and people are concerned as a result that their care will be rastioned and their taxes and premiums will go up. how will that be? i give you an examp. i talked to people who are relatively young and relatively healthy. and they are senior aware that ifhey are putn the same pool with everybody else with the people who are sicker and older, and they're all put into one pot and you can't discriminate on the bis of health condition and we do believe people with preexisting conditions should be able to get insurance, then, naturally, the people who are

younger and healthier are going to be paying more for their insurance than they would if they were in a category by themselves. and that's wt the actuary data shows us. so it might make insurance more affordable for someone older and sicker but will raise it for someone younger and healthier. there has to be ways to work that out. there ought to be a way to ensure that much i everyone in s country can get affordable, quality healthnsurance without taxing all employers, especially small businesses, the very entities that we are counting on to bring us out of this recession. we know thatlmost all of the jobs created in this country in the last two or three years were created by small business. large businesses lost -- in fact, we lost about three million jobs in this country, in this recession. three million jobs have been

lost. how are those js going to come back? it's going to be through small business, that's where over 80% of the joshes created and that is where they will be re-created to get us out of the recession. why would we want to tax the peop to say if you wan to hire somebody it will cost you "x" amount more. why give them an incentive to hire more people, not give them an disincentive through taxation. and why raise the taxes of all businesses-including raises taxes on insance companies. yes, insurance companies are fun to pick on but do they pass on the cost of the tax to the premium holders? of course. we end up -- there is no free lunch. we pay t tes. the net result is that within people are concerned about the economy,umber one, about our rising debt, about the potential they will be taxed and about the need to re-create jobs, what

they're telling expus wha us, wy told me is, solve those problems first, and when you get that solved and you want to look at health care go ahead but in the process do not throw out the baby with the bath water. don't throw out a system that works for most peoe. if you have specific problem, work out solutions. you can cover the 12 million who need insurance, and you can buy them all insurance with the savings you get with malpractice reform. why don't we do that? there is a problem both this jack pot justice systeis a problem in and of itself and you have a problem because some people cannot afford skins we need to help them get it. the money saved from one can help save for the oers. you do not need to change the entire system of health care delivery in order to do that. since much knows that medicare is in trouble why would you get it in further trouble by cutting it by $500 billion and supply

that savings instead to make medicare solvent and apply that money. people are concerned about. they see it is too big, too much. people were trying to do it too fast. in fact, one asked, why were they trying to rush this bill through befobe the end of aust when it doesn't even take effect in most as expects until the ar 2013? if questio it has been a good thing that the american people have had a chaps to consider this and we have had a chance to read it and a chance to talk about it. here's the bottom line, mr. president: republicans have a lot of alternatives. senator mccai talked about malpractic reform, getting rid of waste, fraud and abuse; selling insunce across state lines; providing association health plans so small businesses can compete with the insurance companies in the same way the big businses compete.

these are ideas that can be put into plays to solve specific problems and 59 the end of the day -- and at the end of the day we will have reduced the costs of health care premiums and the cost of health care for everybody, and, at the same time, we will have been able to, with that sags savings, provide coverage for people who need it and cannot get it. it is not necessary to scrap everything we have and create a whole new system where the government takes over health ca as it has insurance, banking and automobiles and everything else. that's what i'm hearing to my constituents. and iope as we are reengaged in this debate we will do the one fundamental thing our founding fatrs had in mind when they set up the kind of system we have: we will listen to our constituents, never forgetting they are our bosses. we work for them. thank you, mr. president.

the presiding officer: the senator from rhode island. mr. whitehouse: mr.resident, the small northeast states can be hard to tell apart. the presiding officer: been there myself. mr. whitehouse: mr. president, may i speak for up to 15 minutes. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. whitehouse:r. president, why are we working so hard on health care reform? right now? because the present system is out-of-control a unsustainable. this is the cost curve of our natial health expenditures. in 2009 it hit $2.5 trillion and it will continue to go up to the point where right now it is estimated that in the year 2016 -- which is in the too far from where we are right now -- in the year 2016, a standard

family policy, on average, in rhode island, will cost that family $26,000 a year. mr. president, a middle-class family in rhode island cannot afford $26,000 a year just for health insurance. something urgent has to be done. now, in the eight yearsf the bush administration it probably increased by nearly $1 trillion and nothing got done. our frien on the other side of the aisle were happy as clams th that state of affairs. now, in the first year of the obama administration, with more progress made on health care than any time since back when the clintons tried it, w hear, once again, the cat calls and the criticisms from our colleagues. anything to standn the way of progress. but that is why it's so important. we simply can't afford not to.

and when we look at the risks that our country faces economically, well, there's been some criticism of the stimulus bill, the economic recovery and reinvestment act. this is it right here. .8 trillion and you would thi this dwarfed, shadowed the fiscal health of the republic. but, income, it's a tiny sliver compared to the debt run up during the bush administration: $8.9 trillion is the difference between what the nonpartisan c.b.o. projected when president bush took office if president clinton and what president bush left us when he was done $8.9 trillion and this doesn't even count the bush hangover of all the spending that president obama has had to do to help save

the banks, t help save the financial system and to help save the american auto industry. he campaigne -- he campaigned on none of that. northerns wanted to do that. whef catastrophesserted itself, we had to respond. the catastrophe took place not on obama's watch but beforehand phs he have the firefighter who hado help put out the fires. but the big risk her is $38 trillion in unfunded liability for just medicare alone. that is part of that climbing cost picture that is driving us out of control. now, of that, the lewin group -- the lewin group is pretty respected arod these parts for their onions on health car -- they say that the excess costs in the health care system add to about $1 trillion a year.

$1 15* 5billion for excess costs from incentives and overever yoafer use use services, for $$519 for excess costs for poor care management of and liftyle factor,, $135 foreclosure success costs due to competition and regulatory factors, $203 billion a year from excess costs due to transactional inefficiencies. we can reform this health care system ia way that improves the quality of care while addressing this trillion dollars in excess costs, which is according to george bush's former treasury secretary paul o'neill, who ran the pittsburgh regional health initiative and knows someing about health care, "the $1 trillion of annual waste is associated with process failures." process faires can be corrected. one of the ways you can correct them isith a competitive

public option. we have had a lock in the main middle market of health care by the private insurance market for all these years, and this is what we're left with, $1 trillion in waste from process failures. obviously they've failed at the job. they a catastrophically, ildisputably failed at the job. all we ask is to put a public option in side by side to compete with them. in the same way that a public option in workers' compensation insurance competes in senator mccain's home state of arizona,ith the private insurance providers in workers' compensation and i don't hear any complaints abou complaints t his workers community. in the home state of the ranking member on the "help" committee, senator enzi, there is actually a single-payer option.

and his employers seem absolutely fine with t so it is not as if it is some strange, bizarre idea out of the fringes. it is the waif doing business in some of the home states of its worst opponents. now, our colleagues and their predecessors in thishamber opposed medicare when it was first proposed, and now it's probably the most popular promise in the country. we've seen them in this chamber fighting against children's health insurance, and it was only thanks to our beloved colleague, senator kennedy, coming back here from his sick bed to cost e tie-breaking vote tt we actually were able to win that against republican opposition. the ideas that they have seem to me to be objectject failures. one is -seem to me to be abject failures.

look where it got us? that's clearly not aig of success. senator mccain indicated that it would be really good to cross state lines and buy insurance from out of state insurance companies. yeah, look how well th turned out for us with the credit card industry. we've just had to pass legislatn, path-breaking legislation, thanks to chairman dodd, to rein in the abusive practice of the credit card industry because you can go to, very unregulated states and get credit cards there that don't have basic conmer protections. we don't want t see that in health insurance. we want careful, thoughtful local regulation of health insurance. we have 100,000 people killed every year by medical errors. who knows how many injured. and the soluion that our friends across the aisle see is to take away the damages that the worst-injured americans are entitled to.

that's the way the reform that they proposed in the "help" committee works. it cuts damages, caps them, meaning it only would affect the people for whom the damagesre the highest, o are harmed the worst, who would disproportionately be women, because of the way it was org@nized, focusing on economic damages, noneconomic damages. so if you take a system where you kill 100,000 americans every year because of medical errors and injure, ho knows how many more, and your soluion to the problem is to put the cost of of it entirely on the back of the worst victims of that error and injury, i think that's a mistake. we would prefer, as democrats, and i think as rational people, to reduce the incidents of malpractice and error, reduce the incidence of malpractice claims by reducing the incidence of malpractice and error.

and we put enormous effort in this bill into putting structures in place to allow that to happen. and in terms of the real fear that people heard when they went home, well, it's a little disingenuous for our friends to talk about real fear when a lot of that real fear was imaginary, whipped up by their colleagues with totally false statements about death panels in the legislation, about how this was socialized medice, and about how a bureaucrat was going it jump in between you and your doctor if the bill passed. patently false, spread like wildfire, obviously generated fear -- who wouldn't be afraid of those things? -- and thousand they observe that there's real fear out there. well, i also had the opportunities to travel around my home state during this break, like many of my clerks and i sat down with my constituents and heard what they h to say about health care reform. with hospital executives, with pediatricians, with ob-gyn's, with family physicians, with critical care doctors, with the

state medical society, with health insurers, with c.v.s. -- the big pharmaceutical chain that makes its home in rhode island -- with the rhode island m.s. chapter, with business community leaders, with members of our rhode island quality institute, reforming health care athe state level, with great leadership for our country right now, with members of all sorts -- all walks of life who have come together and are working tirelessly to help build our states' health snftion technology infrastructure. these were helpful conversations to me, mr. president, and i lerner add great deal from awful those individuals and institutions. but i lernered a great deal also at two commuty dinners that i held in west warwick, rhode island and jnston, rhode island, where hundreds came out to join mend our senior senator jack read -- not only

for spaghetti and meatballs -- i think i may be the only senator to introduce meatballs into the town hall formula and it worked st fine. there was serious and civil debate on the state of our current health care system and it brought out some stories that i want to share this afternoon. the first story is christine's, a wife and mother from coventry, rhode island. her family struggled to maintain health insurance and left her and her husband with very difficult chgices and few options. in 2007, christine was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis and shortly after that she lost her job. she was shifting the family's coverage to her husband's employers when her husband was laid off as well. that left christine and her husband and their 6-year-old son with no healthnsurance. still reeling from those bits of

bad nurks chrisne and her husband were faced with decisions that no one should be forced to make. without medical insurance, with no affordable options for health coverage because of christine's preexisting condition, they faced the choice now of leang their home -- think about that. they have a 6-year-old son who might lose his home -- or thaig pour health insurance. at the moment they can't see a way to manage both. as christine told m "i don't want any handouts. unrtunately life has handed moo and my family a difficult path and right now my family needs a little help. we should not have 10 make a decision between our health and our financial stability." until her husband finds a job, christine says that every day they just hold their breath and pray that nothing will happen because that is all that our broken health care system now has to offer them.

i also met ann from johnston, rhode island, who sred the story of her sister tina. as is the story of so many american families today, tina's huand lost his job. their only option for health insurance was through cobra, but at $1,500 a month on top of mortgage payments, car payments and grows rirks tina knew that financially this coverage was unsustainable. finally she had to give it up. shortly after dropping conchts, teen into began to lose weight. anna explained that at first she thought that her sister's weight loss was a rctn to the stress of the family financial situation. but then the weight loss continued and they realized that something was seriously wrong. despite urging from her family, tina resisted going to the doctor because she was fra that the medical bills would make their difficult financial situation unbearable.

eventually teen into fell so sick that they called the ambulance a she was taken to the hospital. tinaied three days later of a heart attack complicated by both bone cancer and diabetes. when anna talked to the doctors who treated tina,hey asked the family whyina had avoided coming to the hospital for so long. because with proper early intervention, her sister's conditions wld have been treatable. anna told me that she understands that people get sick and die, but the manner in which her sister passed away was tragic because it didn't have to happen. over the august recess i also heard from rhode islanders through the health care story board i run on my web sievment two of these stories are pretty remarkable as well. the first is from ken, a recent rhode island college graduate from greenville, rhode island. ken worked hard, dreaming that

he would be e first in his family to achieve a college degree. now a year after graduation,en has that college degree, but he can't find a full-time job with health insurance benefits. in this difficult economy, he works two part-time jobs at minimum wage and he has no health benefits. ken wasn't looking to make a six-figure salary after graduation, but he was looking to be able to get by. on his current inbome, ken has difficulty making ends meet with his day-to-day expense and says at this rate it will take him years to pay off his student loans. the presiding officer: the senator's time has spyder. mr. whitehouse: may i have five minutes longer? the presiding officer: without objection. mr. whitehouse: on his current income he has difficulty mack ends meet day to day. and it'll take him years to pay off his student loans. on such a limited income and in his situation, health insurance is simply not an option for ken. he's discouraged and he's

frustrated, despite hard work d achievement, he knows that at any moment he is one sickness or one injury away from thousands of dollars in debt or ruined credit that wld affect his chances for a prosperous future. ken notes that he's worked for everythinge's earned, but health care costs are so high that he's scared about his future if nothing is done to fix our health care system. last is beth, a small business owner in trough dense. she and her husband have two full-time and two part-time employees and so they find themselves at the bhim of insurance companies, because they don't have the bargaining power to negotiator the terms of their heah insurance package. they've seen 41% increases in their insurance rates for two years in a row now. beth told me that the cost of health insurance is breaking the backs of small entrepreneurs, those critical drivers of innovation and building blocks of our nation's economy. she does not understand how or why an could start their own business under the deep

financial burdens imposed on small business by our current health insurance system. beth also can't afford health insurance coverage for her twin 3-yearld girls. she admits she is terrified about what might happen to them without the safety net health insurance offers. she urges uso work quickly towards reform so others don't have to struggle with the same fear and frustration as h family. mr. president, the senate has been working hard on health reform leglation since the very beginning of this year. the process is trying and tiring andxtmely complex. as we turn up the heat even more in the next few weeks and become mired in the intense process of drafting a final bill and getting it to the floor, i urge my colleagues to remember the health care reform is not about the interest groups, it's not about parliamentary procedures, it's not about secret meetings and it's not about c.b.o.

scores. reforming our health care system in america is about christine and tina and beth and ken and thousands like them in every one of our states across the country. and it means injecting some fairness and some reason into a system that has punished the sick, rewarded the greed kwraoerbgs and discouraged those who -- greedy, and discourag those who tried to do the right thing. for me, these stories reinforce the urgency of what we need t get done here in the senate. i'm fully committed to completing this task, as i know the presiding officer is, and i look forward to getting it done over the next few weeks. in closing, let me just say that this is the first time i've spok on the senate floor since our colleague, senator kennedy, has left us. his desk is three down from me.

i don't know if the camera shows it now, but there's a black drape over it and some flowers and copy of robert frost's, "the road less traveled." i know that this poem meant a lot to him, and he certainly meant a lot to me as a very gracious mentor, with vast experience, who could easily have ignored a new colleague. but he took an interest, and i will never forget his kindness to me. we all will miss his booming voice. he could fill this chamber with his voice. we will miss his roll -- his good humor. no one enjoyed life and his colleagues more than the senior senator from massachusetts. we will miss his legislative skills as we try to work our way through the obstructions the other side will be throwing up against progress on health care

reform. his counsel will be missed. finally, we will missis lion's heart. he knew when the fight was right. he knew when it was worth fighting for. and he was in it to win it. ted, god bless you. we miss you. i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from north dakota. mr. dorgan: mr. president, let me ask consent to speak in morning business for 15 minutes. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. dorgan: mr. president, let me follow my colleague's remarks, my colleague from rhode island has discussed briefly at the end of his remarks the loss of o colleague and friend, senator ted kennedy. the desk that is now cloaked in black and adorned with flowers is a desk once occupied by senato john f. kennedy, than

occupied by senator robert kennedy, and for many, many years occupied by senator ted kennedy. he was an extraordinaryriend to all of us, a remarkable legislative. this is not a case of the senate just losing one senator. he was such a much larger presence than that in the life -- public life of our country, and particularly in the workings of this congress. my thoughts and prayers have been with ted kennedy and his family over these many, many months as he has battled the brain cancer, and now since his death have all reflected on what he meant to us and to this country. again today, it seems inappropriate to take the floor of the senate without at least acknowledging the absence of our friend, ted kennedy, and to send our prayers to his family. mr. president, when he would come to the floor with a booming

voic fl of pason about an issue, it was an extraordina thing to watch and to listen to. he had that kind of passion. i do want to sayhat the are a lot of tngs for us to be passionate about, and one of the things that i have talked about on the floor of t senate is the waste and the fraud and the abuse in public spending. all of us believe in investing in programs that work to try to help make life better inhis country and advance the interests of this country. but it makes me furious to see the kinds of things that i see from time to time that represents waste and fud and abuse and unbelievable incompetence. let me descre just one. and we know this not because of some extraordinary work by this body. we know this because of some extraordinary work by c.j. chivers and eric submit at the "new york times" because they wrote a story about it.

i'm sure it makes every american as angry as it makes me. this is a picture of ephraim devroly, 22 years old, c.e. of a firm awarded millions of dollars in u.s. contracts to provide armaments and bullets and guns to the afghan fighters. yes, tt's right, a 22-year-old man using a company, a corporation, shell corporation established by his father working out of an unmarked door in miami, got $300 million in contracts from the department of defense. he was the c.e.o. by the way, there is n evidence ofny other employees except him and his vice president -- yes, his vice president vas older -- 25 years old and a massage therapist. let me say that again. the department of defense gave $300 million in contracts to a 22-year-old c.e.o. of a company,

a company that was run by a 22-year-old c.e.o. and a 25-year-old vice president massage therapist. now, why do i tell you this today? because a news story just recently described the fact that mr. devroly pled guilty to a fraud conspiracy charge relating to the $300 million in.s. government contracts. he faces up to five years in prison. i've spoken about this man and this circumstance probably three or four times on the floor of the united states senate. to ask the question: how on earth coul this have happened7 let me just show, if i might, what this was about. this was about products. not staplers or reams of paper. these we killerroducts, ammunition, ammunition that was supposed to be pvided to the afghan fighters, and it turns out ammunition that spills out of boxes.

and here are some other examples. these are bullets, by the way, of 40-year-old chinese-made cartridges. they were found somewhere in the world and sent them over to afghanistan and the afghan fighters. here you can see spilling out of boxes, 42-year-old chinese ammunition that was what was delivered in afghanistan from these two folks. now, the picture that i used the 22-year-old c.e.o. with whom both defense department and the state department did business, by the way. he had previous contr with the state department that we unsatisfactory. despite that, he got $300 million in contracts from the defense department. this photograph is from 2007. that's when he gothe $300 million defense contracts. this photograph happens to be a police photograph becau he was arrested for assaulting a parking lot attendant.

at the time he was found to have a forged dvers license which made him out to be four years older than he was. he said he forged the license and didn't need it any longer since he was 21 because he only wanted to buy aohol in the first place. this company called a.e.y., that a 22- and 25-year-old ran and got $3 hundred million in defense contracts after they got contracts with the state department and judged to have been unsatisctory. by the way, they ran this -- i don't have a photograph. i thought i did -- out of the building in miami, and it was an unmarked door. miami beach building, an unmarked door, that's all you could see. the only evidence that exist suggests that this was a company with two people. mr. packhouse, the 25-year-old masseur, has also pled guilty. so both have now pled guilty. i've shown you examples of the arms that they were supposed to have been procured for the poor

afghan fighter and when they were delivered, the afghan fighters called them junk -- junk -- stuff made in the 1960's in china. the way they purchased this so-called junk violated u.s. law in the first place. "the new york times" originally published this story. at's when i saw it. that's when i came to the floor of the united states senate and asked a very simple question: how could this happen? how on earth could this have happened? who's minding the store? ifhe army had made the slightest effort to look into the background of mr. diveroll and mr. packhouse, they never would have granted contracts to em. the award was made in 2007 -- january 2007 -- by the army sustainment command. on may 7 of 2008, i met with army lieutenant general william mortonson. i decide, if i could -- to find out why on earth they gave contracts in this circumstance. mr. mortonson was a three-star

general, general mortonson has since retired. he was completely una poll gentlemen particular about this. he -- unapologetic. he told me o paper the company looked fine. if they looked, they would have found out thi is nobody to contract with. heol me nobody in the army thought to look through the background of mr. diveroll and mr. packhouse, even though this was a company that consisted of just two people. he told me that under similar circumstances, the army would probably make the same decision again and give contracts to such people again. and thene told me tt if mr. diroll and mr. packhouse were acquitted, the army would go back to doing business with them. well, if general mortonson had wanted to know a little bit about with whom they were doing

business, to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars, he could have gone to myspace. mr. diveroll had a page on myspace. he describes himself as a super nice guy. he said on myspace -- he saii had problems in high school, so i was forced to work and probably grew up way too fast. he says basically i'm just chillin' with my boys. and he likes to go cluing and go s movies. so he could have checked, of course, more than myspace. he could have checked perhaps a criminal record and final found -- found he had been charged with domestic violence and drunk driving. he could have googled his name and found the vice president here, in addition to being a massage therapist, was a professional song writer. with these kinds of background, i'm just wondering, where is there accountability here for this? where is the accountability? i understand that because two enterprising reporters for "the new york times" brokehis story -- and we probably

wouldn't know it now because th didn't come from oversight hearings, didn't come from a truman committee that we should have in this chamber investigating these things. but it was enterising porting that did this; i understandt. because that, we've got a couple of people charged criminally. the question i ask is this: where's the accountability the department of defense for deciding they were going to move $300 million to the hands of these two? who did that? who's respoible? were they asked to account for it and to answer for it to the american taxpayer and to the government for which they worked? the nswer is no, and that's what's wrong. it why i've come to the floor to recite again, there's some good news here that finally we have criminal charges that have been adjudicated and the fact is two people have pled guilty. but will this be happening today somewhere in the pentago will it? did it happen wh water hat was sent by a contractor to all

the military bases in iraq, the nonpotable water that has more contamination than raw water from the euphrates river? the army said no. the inspector general at my request investigated and said yes, it did happen. i could go on at length about dozens and dozens of similar circumstances. the question is: who's accountable for the spending of this money? who's been madto be accountable? who had to answer for it? i asked the secretary of defense and others, is there somebody that's made accountable for this? i understand there's criminal accountability for these two people. but is there accountability for the people who decided to employ them, despite all of the idence that this made no sense for our country? i asked that question for a very important reason. we're goi to have a debate about afghanistan. i have very strong feelings about that as well w. but what we are -- as well. what we are seeing now is more contracting being done in afghanistan just as the ratcheting up of contracts

occurred in iraq. more and more and more contracting. who's minding the store? what kind of oversight can we expect? or will we a week from now, a month from now or a year from now read another story by a coup of good reporters who dug it out to say something happened here that was unbelievable, and the american people got defraudeto the tune of millions of dollars, or in this case hundreds of millions of dollars. all of us have responsibilities athis point to make accountable those this sort of thing to happen. and not just in this case. i've done 20 hearings now as chairman of the policy committee and i've produced virtually books of this -- of these issues for my colleagues. well, mr. president, i -- i know my colleague from oklahoma is patiently waiting, and i want to give him an opportunity to speak. i only want to say thi this is the conclusion with criminal charges and guilty pleas with respect to this

issue, which i think is a metaphor for a much larger set of problems that we in the congress and in the -- in the administtion have a responsibility to address and to address it soon. this issue ofig federal budt deficits ivery real. they're unsustainable and dangerous. one of the areas to deal with them is to tighten our belts and cut pending where spending is wasted. is was an unbelievabl waste to the taxpayers' money. my hat's off to the reporters who explored it. i'm at least able to say that guilty pleas have been received. mr. president, i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from oklahoma. mr. inhofe: mr. president, i've been here this afternoon hoping to get a little bit more time, but we're getting -- right now we're into the final debate on the vote that will take place at 5:30. the senator from nevada, senator ensign, has agreed to let me have 10 minutes, so i ask unanimous consent to speak for 10 mines as if in morning

business. mr. dorgan: mr. president, could we simply point out that we're to go to the bill at 4:30, and i discussed with my colleague that we have 30 minutes on each side on the bill, if we could go to the bill and have myolleague speak on his side's portion of the bill, i think that would be the right approach. mr. inhofe: all right. mr. president, i was going to -- the presiding officer: under the previous order the senate will resume consideration of s. -- the senator from oklahoma is recognized for 10 minutes. mr. inhofe: ok. thank you, mr.resident. first of all, i had a few stories that i was going to tell about my very good friend who's deceased now, senator kennedy. if there's time before my time expires, i will g into that. but i have a feeling this is going to take place tomorrow or later on tonight. let me jt mention one thing, i

think it is so fresh on our minds now having come back from a re s., the --ecess, the august recess. i did my town meetings in smaller communities in oklahoma, in stigler, grove, lawsuiten, and i did this because -- lauton, and i did this because so many timeshe smaller communities are left out. and i wanted to know at kind of response they had. i made a comment in groveton, oklahoma, the institutions that historically set aside america from the rest of the country, the rest of the world, are the ones that seem to be under attack by this admistration. i'm talking about free enterise, i'm talking about the fact that little government, big people, and all of these things. and as i had these hearings, since my junior senator, senator coburn, who is one of the two medical doctors in the united states senate, i decided to talk about the other issues. my fear is this, mr. president,

there was concern about socializ medicine, everybody's concerned about what this president wants to do with the heth issues in america. and we're forgetting there are other very serious issues, and so i covered these as opposed to the -- the health problems. because these are things that we're going to be dealing with that are very significant in the senate in the next -- in the next few days or weeks. one of them is the cap-and-trade. one of the them is the cap-and-trade issue that is -- we'v talked about at some length, and i will get into that in a minute. the other is the closing of guantanamo bay naval -- or gitmo, as it's known to most peep. and the other is whatas happened t our mitary. so let me real briefly get into these areas. these are the three areas that i will provide leadership. these are the areas of specialty that i have, and i'm very much concerned about. first of all, i position in afghanistan in february whe

secretary of defense gates came out with his announcement as to the -- the -- t -- the portion of the president's budget dealing with defense. because i knew i was going to be opposed to it and i thought that would give me a national forum, and it did. i was concerned about such things as the f-22. right now the only fifth generati fhter we have is an f-22. initially we're goingo have 750 of them. we now have 187, and the president in his budget stopped it right there. now, he didn't say terminate, but i will use the word termine, because you when you suspend something for an undetermined period of time, i think it is terminated. we know that china is now working on their j-12's, russi on their pac--fa's, and these are fifth generation fighters that they're going to use to export to countries that could be -- could be potential enemies

of ours. i looked at the c-17 program, stopping that program. the future combat system that we haven't it in -- had i america. the transition of ground capability in some time, about 60 years, so we have been working on the future combat system. that system has been terminated. i think the one that probably has the greatest danger on lives of americans could probably be the system that we had negotiated with the parliaments of poland and the czech republic. the czech republic, we asked them if they would agree to have a radar system to see if any kind of missile that mht have been coming from iran, and the -- and then -- and they agreed to do that and poland agreed to have an interception capability in poland that would knock down such a missile coming from iran. i don't think there's anyone in america that doesn't realize that iran will have their nuclear capability and

delivering system just as soon as they can. and for the sake of western europe and eastern united states, i think it's critical that we are -- put ourselves in a position to have that capability. stopped that. we'll be talking about that for quite some time. gitmo -i think that most people realize that guantanamo bay is something that we've -- an asset we've had since 1903. it has all kinds o capabilities. it's the only place in the world you can put terrorist detainees, where you can have a security built for them. seven degrees o security. a system for them to use military tribunals and i will never understand why president obama is obsessed with bringing these detainees somhere in the united states either for trial or incarceration. for trial it would be the worst thing in the world. because by definition a terrorist trains people to become terrorists. we don't need to have the terrorists in our prison system teaching other people how to

become terrorists. the -- some of the place that's he talked about sending them were included -- included in my state fort sill, and we'll talk aboqt that at length some other ti. i do think when we see a matter of days ago the release of muhammad jiad from gitmo, nobody knows and i shoul know being the second ranking member on the armed services committee, as to why he would be released. and we also know that this mullah zak he ir killingarines for some period of time was released is now bk. he went into gitmo and -- in 2006, they released him i 28. he's back now, we have evidence that is conclusive that he is fighting with on the side of the taliban. and so you can't turn these guys loose. and the third area that i was concentrating on is one -- i'll go back, mr. president, eight

years, redemption is kind of good for the soul. eight years ago when i was looking ahe science on the idea that the notion that manmade gases, co2, causing global warming was something that everyone believed and, frankly, once i looked into the science, i believed it t. now the science is not there. and i made the statement eight years ago that perhaps those libels, mostly from hollywood and that type of mentality, who want us to believe in the notion that manmade gases cause global warming is the most significant hope ever perpetrated on the american people. and i think now there are a lot fewer people upset with the statement i made eight years ago than made today. this is just something that is really -- really critical. i -- i wan to conclude with that. but, first of all, i mentioned that there is aocument that is too long to put inpo the record.

it is 60 some -- 65 pages. i will have it on my website. it is a brilliant writer talking about the energy crisis and what we can do in the united states to resolve the energy crisis. such commonsense things such as continue to serve and support the freearket, oppose the cap-and-trade taxes, which i will talk about in a second, oppose the alternative energy subsidies because we have to continue to develop -- to supply energy for america while we're deveping the technology, so we need to continue coal power generation, we need fast track oil gas exploration and use natural gas wisely. so it includes nuclear plants and i would suggest anyone inrested in geing into the best piece i have seen on this subject go to my website inhofe.senate.gov and we have a lot of information on there.

he does have one page,ebunking that global warming is caused by manmade gases, and i think it is done in a way that is very, very understandable by people who are not necessarily scientists or don't have a background in it. so i strongly recomnd this -- this document called "energy present and future" by robert p. smith, to the reading of the american people or anyone who is concerned about that issue. now, the last thing, i really believe -- and i sat as the -- prior to the republicans losing the majority in the united states senate, ias the chairman of the environmentnd public works committee. the that chairman is now senator barbara boxer, and she has, since she took over the committee from my leadership -- the presiding officer: the senator's 10 minutes have been used. mr. inhofe: i understand that i have an additional five minutes given from our side. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. inhofe: thank you very much.

so -- and i will conclude with this. but all of the hearings -- over 30 hearings thatenator boakseb has had on the subject -- boxer has had on the subject of global warming were taking place, and it was not really the republicans, but a total turnaround and the democrats starting to look into this and realizing that the democrats, as a party who always supported cap-and-trade systems, such as the 2001 bill and the 2005 bill and the 2008 bill are looking at it and cutting to the chase. ly give you quotes from democrats -- i will give you quotes. president obama said electricity prices would necessarily skyrocket. democrat representative john dingelrom michigan said that cap-and-trade i a tax and add grade big one. democratic representative pete defa rch sio said that cap-and-trade is speculation without guarantee of greenhouse gas emission reduction.

the best is my good friend from north dakota, byron dorgan when he s that cap-and-trade, the wall street crowd can't wait to sink their teeth into a new trillion dollar trading market where hedge funds would speculate on carbon credits and security. i agr with byron dorgan. senator cantwellings -- quote -- "a cap-and-trade program might allow wall street to distort trade for its own profits." and we learned that lisa jackson is the new administrator of the environmental agency. i asked her the question in the public hearing, i said if we should pass the markey bill in the united states senate and sign it into law, would this reduce carbon emissions in the world and she'd said, no. logically, obviously, she's right. if we drive our jobs overseas to -- to places like china and

india where they have no intention of having mission requirements, that would increa, not decrease the amount of emissions in the air. senator kerry said there's no way that the united states of america acng alone can solve this problem so we have to have china and we have to have india. we're not going to have, i say, china and india. senator mccaskill said if we go too far with this, this cap-and-trade,hen we're all going to do -- chase our jobs to china and iia where they've been putting up coal-fire plants every minutes. not quite true. i say to my good friend senator mccaskill, it is two coal-fire generation plants built every week in china. we the haven't done one in 12 years here. we know what their intentions are. we had all of these hearings, recognized that the time -- that things have changed now and you look at the groups now. you have the agriculture community and th american farm

bureau, a vast majority of the agriculture groups opposet, g.a.o. said that it wil send our jobs to china and the eloquent chairman did a great job of testifying before the choit said that it would destroy over two million jobs. the e.p.a. ae e.i.a. said that it would not redube our reliance on foreign oil and that it will not reduce global temperatures. when it is all said and done, i have to say this was a be agreed to of fsh air to listen to the american people, standing up in the town hall meetings around the country and in my 12 or 14 meetings i had in the state of oklahoma. people know the right thing is going to happen. we are here to make that happen. with that, i willhank the senator from nevada for allowing me to have 15 minutes of his time. i yield the floor.

the presiding officer: morning business is closed. up the previous order, the senate will resume consideration of s. 1023 which the clerk will report. the clerk: calendar number 71, s. 1023, a bill to establish a nonprofit corporation to communicate unite united statesy policies and otherwise promote leisure, business, and scholarly travel to the united states. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the time until 5:30 p.m. will be equally divided and controlled between the leaders or their designees. mr. dorgan: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from north dakota. mr. dorgan: mr. president, i want to begin the discussion and then i believe my colleague, senator ensign who has worked hard on this legislation, will follow, and then senator klobuchar, who also has quite a significant role in this will follow with comments. if others arrive, of cours we want them to involve themselves

in the debate. at a time when there is so much discussion about partisanship and how tngs don't work so well this legislation we will vote on, a cloture petition we voted on at 0:30 is bipartisan. unlike some other discussions about partisanshiphis is bipartisan. this legison is called t travel promotion act of 2009. it has 53 cosponsors. many republicans. many democrats. cosponsoring this piece of legislation. and, by the way, just today the united states chamber of commerce, has scientist a letter to all members of the senate saying they strongly suppo this legislation, the chamber urges members to support the legiation and to vote for cloture. let me talk just for a momt about what this is. first of all at a time when we need jobs, this about jobs. at a time when we need to find ways to address budget deficits this is one piece of legislation that is not beginning to cost money. in fact, the congresonal

office scores it as $425 million reduction in deficits over the ten-year-period. so, let me say again, pretty unusual, bipartisan. doesn't cost money, actually saved money. d dresses one of the most critical areas of our need and that is jobs. so what is the travel promise motion act? why the concern about this? let me describe it this way: we all know that travel and promoting travel and tourism is jo creating. it creates jobs in many, many areas. yes, hotels. and gas stations and restaurants and tourist attractions. but just traveling across our country means people are spending money and it creates a lot of jobs. and so let me talk about especially the issue of international or foreign travel to the united states. did you know that foreign travel is up very dramatically in this world. there's a good deal of foreign travel of 48 million more overseas trips taken in 2008

than were taken in 2000? so in eight yearsing the nber of overseas trip -- years, the number of oversea trips increased by 48 million but in the united states it decreases, it decreases in the united states. we had 633,000 fewer foreign visito to the united states. it mines ao -- means a lot of people are traveling but since the year 2000 we've had a loss in our share of international tourists. why is that important? because when an overseas travelers comes to this country on average they spend about $4,500 and thatupports a lot of diswrobs and a lot of businesses in thisountry. so why do we have 600,000-plus fewer foreign visitors to the united states? well, in001, with the terrorist attack against our cguntry, we tightened up visa requirements and so on and the iraq war occurred and a lot of

concern by people -- maybe the united states doesn't want us to come. they have tightened up visa requiremen. we are upset about this or that or the other thing a all of a sudden we discovered more people are traveling overseas but they are not traveling her and incidentally, theourism that is happening internationally is not accidental. most other countries are very aggressively after the international traveler. saying, come to our country. let me go thrgh a list of just a few of those. here's a travel promotion campaign that talks about "come to australia." "arrive looking n an spshes and departed with an adventure you wi never forget." big travel program for ireland saying "come to ireland, go wher ireland takes you." and the list goes on. virtually every country is saying, we want foreign tourists to come to our country.

sweet secrets from japan -- come and visit japan. we've all seenhese and all the countries are aggressive. "come to france." well, i can't read the french piece down here but i know what it says, it says come to france, e tower, come here a be part of what we're doing. and, belgium: the belgium approach. "where fun is in always in fashion, visit belgium." finally, india, one special reason to visit india, any time is a good time to visit the land of tag but no time like now." virtually everyone is saying "come visit us," but we're not. we propose we do. it will create a lot of jobs and when people come here and experience what this country is about, they leave with a wonderful imetion about what america is. a wonderful impression about

what ameri is. we have put together a bipartisan piece of legislation that is funded by and large with an ery exit fee imposed, imposed by most other countries, by the way, a $10 fee on visa waiver countries, people who come from those countries to visit our country. it is a minimal fee compared to what many are charging and we establish with that fee a corporation for travel promotion, an indepennt nonprofit corporation governed by an 11-member board of directors appointed by the secretarof commerce setting up the travel promotion fund, financed by public-private matching program. in short, this is a very simple proposition. it will not only create a lot of new jobs in this country at a time when we desperately need new jobs by saying to foreign travelers, come to our country; be part of what america has to offer. see our wonderful country. experience what america is

about. we know, we know when they lebanese this country they will have an unbelieve by good impressionf what theyave just seen. greatest democracy on the face of this planet, by far, and they experience the imaginic and the wonders -- the magic and the wonders of this country. we're saying to them at a time when travel around the world is up, that is, visitors to other countries, and ours is down, let's solve this problem, let's do it without breaking the bank. this will thought cost money. this will save money. do it by working in a bipartisan way on one of the significant problems we face in america and that is the loss of jobs. now, let me scwft say, in case case -- just say, i case someone thinks only a few of us think this is a good idea here are exale of others who think this is great. "dallas morning news," this is a sensible first s on putting

out the welcome map on america's doorstep. "los angeles times" "considering the u. spends hundreds of millions on public diplomacy with poor results and nothing on promoting tourism it could be to woo travelers." we need toeclaim our statuss a global country for travelers d we can do that by passing the act. "ideas to bolsterconomic recovery without plunging the nationnto deeper democrat is welcomed by taxpayers from coast to coast." "detroit free press," don't it "detroit free press," don't it visitors to leave us some of their money? there is no good rean not to pass this bl. well, i need not go on. this is not rocket science. this is something our country should do.

if, in fact, in a smaller and smaller world, more and more people are traveling, then why should fewer people travel to the united states of america? this ought to be one of the grea destination places on the entire planet. i would expect and hope that most people want to come to this cup. this -- this country and see what america has to offer but i think that post-september 11th, what we have done with visas which we are now correcting and have corrected, by and large, longer waiting times have been made shorter, there was a notion somehow that the welcome mat doesn't exist. we are changing that. republicans and democrats can work together to change that. this legislation is good legislation. and i hope my colleagues will join me today in voting for cloture and moving this bill as soon as possible through the senate, through the house, and to the president for signature. and when we do, those people who

have had to come home to say to their spouse, honey, i've lost my job, millions of people, some of them will be able to ce home and say i have a new job, there is new activity going on in our state and i have a new job that relates to the substantial increase in international tourism to the united states. now, that will be a good thing for o country. as the principal author along with senator ensign of this legislation,nd chairman of the subcommittee in the commerce department that works on tour im, senator klobuchar, i'm really pleased to be able to work together with my colleagues to get this legislation completed today. mr. president, i reserve the remainder of my time. mr. ensign: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from arizona. nevada. mr. ensign: first, mr. president, i thank the coauthor of this legislation, senator

dorgan, for his leadership on recognizing how important this legislatn is to our country especially a this critical time when we need jobs. all of us just went back to our home stes and realized that there are a lot people who are truly hurting out there and it's not just people who have already lost their jobs but there's lot of people who are afraid they're going to lose their jobs. there's people who are afraid to invest in creating jobs. i would say that the number one emotion i heard during the august recess was that of fear. it is fear of what's going to haen in this country. senator dorgan, i think, eloquent put that this bill is really about jobs. and it's about creating jobs without adding to the federal debt. another thing i heard throughout the state of nevada, people are very concerned about federal spending and the deficits, this year, that we're facing in this

looming federal debt that people really think is a threat to the future of the united states. well, this bill, in a bipartisan way, helps create jobs without adding to th defic. as a matter of fact, what it will do -- because it's paid for through contributions for the private sector plus an entry tee into the united states -- entry fee into the united states, small, $10, for those countries who participate in what's call a visa waiver program, andby the way, it's cheer fore those country whose have the visa waiver program so the little $10 is cheaper than if you got a full visa. the $10 that most countries charge much higher prices will not inhibt people from coming to the united states but the money will let people know that we are open for business. now, whenou look at -- i'm, obviously, from a tourist-driven state. we spend a lot of money

adverting whether las vegas or reno o lake tahoe we spend a lot advertising to other places including internationally to come to our city. we do it a lot of the las vegas convention visors authority, private businesses do that. it works. well, what we're saying with this bill is, let's do it as a country. let's say, we have so many amazing places to see let's tell the rest of the world about it. and if you do that, the old saying, if you build it they will com it's will not only if you build it, we have already built i or god built it with our natural resources you have to let them know they're welcome and that it's easy to come here and that's what we're saying with this legislation. plus, when you tell them about it it paints a mental picture in their mindhen they're thinking out where to spend their next holiday or vacation. they say, i