i strongly disagree with, that the president and the republican leadership agreed to, if we are going to save the middle class and i think that agreement significantly helps the upper income people by lowering the tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires, by lowering the interest rates on estate tax, by providing business loans which are not the best investments to create jobs, one of the best things we can do to protect the middle class today is to have a cap on interest rates because otherwise all the people are doing is getting a paycheck, going into debt and paying 25% or 30% on interest rates, money going to a handful of bankson wall street. now, i have introduced legislation to put a cap on interest rates and it ain't a radical idea. right now credit unions in this

country, by law, are not allowed to charge more than 15% except under extraordinary circumstances. and by and large that's worked for about 30 years. so if you get a credit card through a credit union, you're not going to be paying, in almost every case, no more than 15%. and that was developed by federal law. and you know what? i talked to the credit union people in the state of vermont and all over the country, credit unions are doing pretty good. they're doing just fine. they're not the ones who came begging the american taxpayer for a huge bailout. so for 30 years they have survived just fine on a 15% cap. but our friends on wall street who caused this recession, our friends on wall street who needed a welfare check from the american people in order to survive, our friends on wall

street today are earning more money than they did before the bailout, we don't have any cap on the interest rates that they can charge. in my view, if the credit unions have survived and survived well with a 15% max interest rate cap, the most they can charge, work -- it worked for credit unions, it can work for provide banks as well and that is what we have got to do. according to a recent article -- this is not so recent, this is a year ago. in the "l.a. times", an analyst for the credit union league said that a rate cap hasn't hurt business for the nearly 400 credit unions represented by his organization. it hasn't been an issue, he said, credit unions are still able to thrive. here's my point, mr. president, middle class is hurting,

unemployment outrageously high, poverty increasing, 50 million people, no health insurance, gap between the very rich, everybody else, manufacturing collapsing, jobs going all over the world, china, mexico, india, we have got to start protecting the middle class of this country. a number of things we've got to do. but i think one simple thing that we've got to do is tell the crooks on wall street -- and i use that word advisely -- history will prove they knew what they were doing. their business model was fraudulent. there are occasionally people who make mistakes. it happens all the time. but there are are other businesses which are based on fraud and assume that they are never going to get caught or when they do get caught, the penalty they have to pay is so little that it's worth it. because you end up getting caught one out of 10 times, you

make a whole lot of money, you pay a fine, somebody goes to jail, maybe, for a year, and that's what you're seeing on wall street. so i think if it's worked very well for the credit unions, i think it can work for the private banks as well. mr. president, you know, in the financial reform bill, did we address this issue? yeah, we did and no, we didn't. what we said is that we -- the credit card companies have got to be clearer and more honest about their interest rates and how much borrowing money will actually cost. because before what they did is they simply lied. they would say zero interest rates, 2% interest rates, but most people didn't read the small print on page 4 which said they could raise their interest

rates at any time and we've made some progress with being honest with the american people about what their credit card costs will be. but that ain't enough. that's not uf. what we've got -- that's not enough. what we've got to do is put a cap on interest rates. it has worked for the credit unions and i believe it can and should work for the -- for the big banks as well. mr. president, what i wanted to do now is just give you some examples about -- you know, sometimes here, and i'm guilty of that as well, we talk in big numbers, you know, a billion here and a trillion there and it adds up.

but i think it's also important to look at the flesh and the blood that's out there, the real suffering that people are experiencing. and a while back what i did was i sent an e-mail out to people in the state of vermont and it was a very simple e-mail. it said, you know, tell me, in your own words, what's going on in your family, what's going on -- what's going on in your lives in the midst of this terrible recession? because, again, it's -- it's important to get beyond, yeah, we know that unemployment is 9.8%, we know that real unemployment is 16%. we know that 50 million people don't have any health insurance. we know the median family income has gone down, poverty has gone up, 25% of our kids are on food stamps. we know that stuff and it's important to know all that stuff but behind all those statistics are flesh and blood and good

people who are doing everything they can to survive with a shred of dignity in their lives. so what i did in this last year, i sent an e-mail out to my constituents in the state of vermont and i said very simply, write back to me. tell me in your own words what is going on in your lives -- and i promised them -- i can't remember how many we received, but there were just hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of responses. it really quite amazed me. and, frankly, mr. president, it was hard to read these letters from decent, good people, about what was happening to their lives. and what i said to them -- if it's okay with you, what we'll do is publish what you have written to me, we won't use your names, of course, i don't want to embarrass anybody, and we will read some of these stories right here on the floor of the senate. that's what i did. i didn't read them all. but i read some of them. because it's important for us sitting here inside the beltway not to forget what's going on in

the real world. whether it's hawaii, vermont, california or any place. an here's a letter from two mothers in vermont. the first is from a mother in a rural area and the second is from a single mother in a small city. and in vermont, frankly, we don't have too many big cities. my very, very beautiful state, where i expect weather is very, very cold today, our largest city is all of 40,000 people. that was burlington vermont and i was honored to be the mayor of that city for eight years. we have the vast majority of our people living in towns of less than 1,000. i lived in a town in stanon, vermont, which has about 150 people in it. that's not uncommon in vermont. here are the two letters we

received. one from a woman in a rural area. she says, "my husband and i have lived in vermont our whole lives. we have two small children, a baby and a toddler, and felt fortunate to own our own house and land. but due to the increasing fuel prices, we have at times had to choose between baby food and diapers and heating fuel." now, in vermont, i don't know about hawaii, but in vermont heating fuel gets up there when the weather gets below 20 below and you're buying oil. we've run out of heeling fuel so -- heating fuel four times and the baby ended up in the hospital with pneumonia two of the times. we try to keep the kids warm with an electric space heater on those nights, but that doesn't do the trick. my husband does what he can to scrape enough money for car fuel each week and we've gone from two vehicles to one just to try

to get by without going further into debt. we were going to sell the house and rent, but the rent around here is higher than what we pay for our mortgage and property taxes combined. please help. that was what she asked of me and her government, "please help." she didn't ask me to lower taxes for billionaires. she is speaking for tens of millions of people in this country who are in desperate need of help. here's another letter that comes from a woman who lives in a larger town. "i'm a single mother with a 9-year-old boy. we lived this past winter without any heat at all. " and that is not a good position to be in in vermont in the winter. "fortunately someone gave me an old wood stove. i had to hook it up to an old, unused chimney we had in the ine

kitchen. to stay warm at night my son and i would pull off all the pillos from the couch and pile them on the kitchen floor. i hang a blanket from the kitchen doorway and we sleep right there on the floor. by february we ran out of wood and i burned my mother's dining room furniture. i have no oil for hot water. we boil our water on the stove an pour it into the tub. i'd like to order one of your flags and hang it upside down at the capitol building. we are certainly a country in distress." mr. president, what i will without a doubt assure you is that those stories in different forms, i know it's different in a bigger city than in a rural state like vermont, i know it's different in hawaii where you come from than in boston or massachusetts -- boston, massachusetts, i'm sure that millions of people in one way or

another are telling these same stories. these are great americans. people who want to work and do the best they can by their kids and they're simply not making it right now. this is the united states of america, year 2010. people are going cold. people are going cold. people don't have enough food. people are homeless and my friends here are talking about huge tax breaks for billionaires. my friends here are talking about lowering rates on the estate tax for the top .3% of 1% of the american people. what are we talking about? what kind of priorities are those? here's another letter -- here's another letter that comes to me from vermont. "as a couple -- and this is not a woman who is in desperation. those folks i just read are in desperation. she says, as a couple, a married couple with one child, earning

about $55,000 a year, which in vermont is fairly decent wages, we have been able to eat out a bit, contribute to our retirement funds and live a relatively comfortable life financially. we've never accumulated a lot of savings, but our bills were always paid on time and we never had any interest on our credit card. over the last year, even though we've tightened our belts, not eating out much, watching purchases at the grocery store, not buying extras, like repairing the tv, doing all those things, we find ourselves with over $7,000 of credit card debt and trying to figure out how to pay for braces for our son. i work 50 hours per week to help earn extra money to catch up. but that also takes a toll on the family life. not spending those 10 hours at home with my husband and son makes a big difference for all of us. my husband hasn't had a raise in

three years and his employer is looking to cut out any extra benefits they can to lower their expenses. expenses, which will increase ours. how many millions of americans do you think are saying exactly the same thing? let me read another story that comes from vermont. my 90-year-old father in connecticut has recently become ill and asked me to visit him. i want to drop everything i am doing rap go visit him, -- doing and go visit him, however i am finding it difficult to save enough money to get the extra gas i need to get there. i'm self-employed with my only commercial cleaning business and money is tight. i make more than i did a year ago and i don't have enough to pay my property taxes this quarter for the first time in years. they're due tomorrow.

here's another letter i think deserves to be read. and, frankly, you know, mr. president, i think it wouldn't hurt this body if every member of the senate -- and i know we all get letters like this -- if every member of the senate came down here and we spent a couple of days talking about what's really going on for working families in this country. sprouting spouting statistics is good. dealing with tax deals with with $900 billion is fine, but i think we should reacquaint ourselves with the reality of life in america today. this is what another constituent of mine writes. "my husband and i are retired at 65 years of age. we would have liked to work longer, but because of injuries caused at work and the closing of our factory to go to canada, we chose to retire early. now with oil prices the way they are, we cannot afford to heat our home unless my husband cuts

and splits wood, which is a real hardship as he had had his back fused and should not be working most of the day to keep up with the wood. not only that, he has to get up two or three times each night to keep the fire going." so, yerdz, what she is talking about in vermont, a lot of people heat with woods, increasingly with pellets. it's an important source of fuel in the state of vermont. what she is talking about is her husband, who is 65, with a bad back, has to go out and cut wood, and in their cases, being old, has to get up two or three times in the middle of the night, stoke the furnace and keep the house warm. again, i would remind people that in vermont it occasionally gets 20 or 30 below zero. she continues -- "we also have a 2003 car that we only get to drive to get groceries or go to the doctor or to visit my mother in the nursing home three miles away. it now costs us $80 a month to

go nowhere. we have 42,000 miles on a five-year-old car. they can't afford to even use the car. i don't know what the price of gas is in hawaii, mr. president. in vermont, it is now over $3 a gallon. a lot of the people in my state have to travel long distances to get to work. their car needs repairs. cars break down. cars require vermont insurance, compulsory insurance. you have got to spend a whole lot of money just getting to work. i think we forget about that here. we don't need tax breaks for billionaires. we need to pay attention to these people. and she continues and concludes -- "i have medicare, but i can't afford prescription drug -- prescription coverage unless i take my money out of an annuity, which is supposed to cover the house payment when my husband's pension is gone. we only eat two meals a day to

conserve." this is not some third-world country. this is the united states of vermont -- the united states of america, this is my state of vermont. vermont is better off today than a number of states around this country. you have these stories and multiply them by ten in every area of this country. here's another story. "yesterday, i paid for our latest home heating fuel delivery." i'm focusing now on the cost of fuel in vermont. where i come from, it is a big deal. "yesterday i paid for our home heating fuel delivery $1,100. i also paid my $2,000-plus credit card balance, much of which bought gas and grocery for the month." the point here, then i will continue her letter, is a lot of people use their credit cards, not isn't it nice and

convenient, i don't have to use cash when i go shopping, i will use my credit card, i will pay it off at the end of the month. what a nice thing. people are using their credit cards to buy food, to buy gas, to buy the basic necessities of life. it is their only line of credit open. and then, as i mentioned earlier, they are charged 25% to 30% interest rates on what they owe. she continues -- "my husband and i are very nervous about what will happen to us when we are old. although we have three jobs between us and participate in 403-b retirement plans, we have not saved enough for realistic post work life if we survive to our life expectancy. as we approach the traditional retirement age, we are slowly paying off our daughter's college tuition loan and trying to keep our heads above water. we have always lived frugally. we buy used cars and store brand

groceries, recycle everything, walk or car-pool when possible, and plastic our windows each fall." what that means is in vermont, if you don't have good storm windows, you put plastic up there. it's a way of keeping the wind out, keeping your home warm. i know that because that's what i used to do." even so, if and when our son decides to attend college, we will be in deep debt at age 65. here she ends this. p.s., please don't use my name. i live in a small town, and this is so embarrassing, so embarrassing. we should be embarrassed, mr. president, not her. we should be embarrassed that we are for one second talking about a proposal which gives tax breaks to billionaires while we are ignoring the needs of working families, low-income people and the middle class. we should be embarrassed that we are not investing in our

infrastructure, that we're not breaking up these large financial institutions, that we're not putting a cap on interest rates, that we are the only country in the world that does not have health care for all of their people in the country. we should be embarrassed, not this wonderful woman who is trying to maintain her dignity. another level from the state of vermont." i, too, have been struggling to overcome the increasing costs of gas, heating oil, food, taxes, et cetera. i have to say that this is the toughest year financially that i have ever experienced in my 41 years on this earth. i have what used to be considered a decent job. i work hard, pinch my pennies, but the pennies have all but dried up. i am thankful that my employer understands that many of us cannot afford to drive to work five days a week.

instead, i work three 15-hour days. i have taken odd jobs to try to make ends meet." that was last winter, not this winter. "after keeping the heat just high enough to keep my pipes from bursting --" one of the problems you have when you live in a rural state and it gets cold is your pipes can burst, and then you have got to spend a fortune getting them repaired. "this winter, after keeping the heat just high enough to keep my pipes from bursting, the bedrooms are not heated and never go above 30 degrees." what happens in vermont, if you have a home in the wintertime you don't have a whole lot of money, you kind of close off rooms in the house. you can't afford to feed the -- to heat the whole house so people live in a smaller area. she said -- this is what she said. she continues -- "i began selling off my woodworking tools , snowblower, pennies on the dollar, and furniture that had been handed down in my

family from the early 1800's just to keep the heat on. today i am sad, broken, and very discouraged. i am thankful that the winter cold is behind us for a while, but now gas prices are rising yet again. i just can't keep up." now, that's the story of -- from one person in vermont, but, mr. president, that is a story for millions and millions of americans. another story -- and the reason i'm reading these stories -- and i appreciate my staff bringing this booklet down here -- is this puts flesh and blood and real life into statistics. the statistics are frightening enough, but this tells us what happens when the middle class of this country collapses, it tells us what happens when people lose decent-paying jobs, it tells us what happens when the government is not providing the kind of basic support system that it should for people in need.

here's another letter. "as a single parent, i am struggling every day to put food on the table. "it's the united states of america, and people are talking in my state of vermont and all over this country about struggling to put food on the table. you know, mr. president, what comes to my mind, there have been -- i don't know if you saw them, some articles in the paper that because of the bailing out of wall street and the fact that wall street is now again profitable and the fact that the executives there are now making more money than they made before the bailout, these guys are going to restaurants, they pay thousands of dollars for a bolt of wine, pay hundreds and hundreds of dollars for some fancy dinner, and in my state and all over this country, there are people who are wondering where their next meal is coming from. then she continues, she says "our clothes, our clothing all

comes from thrift stores. i have a 5-year-old car that needs work. my son is gifted and talented. i tried to sell my house to enroll him in a school that had curriculum for his special needs. after two years on the market, my house never sold. the property taxes have nearly doubled in ten years." and by the way, let me pick up on that point. you know, mr. president, we don't deal with property taxes here. i did when i was a mayor. but if we are not adequately funding education, if we do not adequately help cities and towns all over this country in terms of fire protection, in terms of police protection, in terms of housing, a lot of that burden falls on the very, very regressive property tax, which in my state of vermont is very high. and you find it referred to time and time again, property taxes are going up. property taxes have nearly doubled in ten years, she writes, and the oil to heat is prohibitive. to meet the needs of my son, i have left the house sit and moved into an apartment near his high school. i don't go to church many

sundays because the gasoline is too expensive to drive there. she writes i don't go to church many sundays because the gasoline is too expensive for me to drive there. every thought of an activity is dependent on the cost. i can only purchase food from dented canned stores. does anybody in congress know what a dented canned store is? do you know that many, many people buy their groceries and they get them cheaper because the cans are dented? most members of the senate and the house, most governors do not get their meals from dented cans, but huge numbers of americans do. and then she concludes, "i am stretched to the breaking point with no help in sight."

and by the way, the letters that i received when i asked for letters came not just from the state. most of them came from vermont. some came from other areas. i will read one from vermont and one from rural pennsylvania. from vermont, due to illness, my ability to work has been severely limited. i am making $10 an hour, and if i am lucky, i get 35 hours a week of work. let me just pull away from the letter. that is not an unusual wage in the state of vermont. that is not an unusual wage all over america. that's what people earn, $10 an hour times 40 hours. he doesn't get 40 hours. he makes $350 a week. ten times $400, times 50, 50, $21,000 a year. shock of all shocks, that's reality. that's what people are trying to live on. those are the people that we should be helping, not the c.e.o.'s on wall street who will get a million a year in a tax

break if this deal goes through, not the people -- the top .3% that our republican friends want to help by repealing the estate tax which will cost us us $1 trillion in ten years. maybe we should concentrate on helping people who are trying to get by, eating food from dented cans or people who can't afford to drive to church on sunday because they can't afford the price of a gallon of gas. maybe we should remember who sent us here and who made this country. she writes, "i am making $10 an hour, and if i'm lucky, i get 35 hours a week of work. at this time, i am only getting 20 hours as it is off season in stowe." stowe, vermont, is a beautiful, beautiful town, i hope everybody comes to visit us up there, great skiing, but it's a resort town. big time in the winter, we're

doing better in the summer there. but it's a resort town. resorts get more business in the winter than summer, less time elsewhere. what she is talking about is it's off season up there and she is only getting 20 hours a week of work at ten bucks an hour." it does not take a mathematician to do the figures." i'm sorry. this is a man, not a woman. "how are my wife and i supposed to live on a monthly take-home income of less than $800 a month? we do it by spending our hard-earned retirement savings. i am 50 and my wife is 49. at the rate we are going, we will be destitute in just a few years. the situation is so dire, it is all that i can think about. soon -- this is from a 50-year-old gentleman -- soon i will have to start walking to work, an eight-mile round trip because the price of energy is so high that it's either that or going without heat." a 50-year-old guy, ten bucks an

hour, 20 or 30 hours a week. his choice is either walking eight miles to and from his job in stowe or else not heating his home. then he concludes, and this happens in vermont all the time. quite unbelievable. he says "as bad as our situation is, i know many in worse shape. we tried to donate food when we do our weekly shopping, but now we are not able to even afford to help our neighbors eat. what has this country come to?" i don't know about other parts of the country. in vermont if you go to a grocery store, there's often a bin out front where people buy food and drop a can of peas or corn into it. here is a family, here is a guy who is now faced with the reality of having to walk eight miles to and from work, and he's

upset at himself that he doesn't have the money to buy food for his neighbors whoepbgz are even worse -- who he thinks are even worse off than he is. that's the good people of vermont and america. they're all over this country, good and decent people who do worry about their neighbors. then you've got the lobbyists here representing the largest corporations in the world where the c.e.o.'s make tens of millions of dollars a year, and their job is to squeeze the middle class and these families harder and harder, cut back on their benefits in order to give tax breaks to the richest people in this country. what a difference in attitude. a poor man, a poor man faced with the choice of either walking eight miles to and from his job or losing his heat, worried about his neighbors, and you've got the lobbyists here worrying about the richest people in the world. and winning. and winning.

i got one, a letter that comes not from vermont. it comes from rural pennsylvania. "i am 5 years old and worse off than -- i am 55 years old and worse off than my adult children. i have worked since age 16. i don't live from paycheck to paycheck. i live day to day. i can only afford to fill my gas tank on my payday. thereafter i put $5, $10, whatever i can. i cannot afford to buy the food items that i would. i am riding around daily to and from work with a quarter of a tank of gas. this is very scary. i can see myself working until the day that i die." and trust me, the gentleman is talking about getting older, worried about working until the day that he dies. we're already seeing this. you go to grocery stores in vermont, you see old people who

should be sitting home with their grandchildren. you know what they're doing? they're packing groceries. then we have geniuses on this deficit-reduction commission, people who made their money on wall street, they got a brilliant idea. let's raise the social security age to 68, *69 years old so that people like this will have to work in fact until the day they die. he continues -- this is not from vermont. this is from pennsylvania. "i do not have a savings, no credit cards, and my only resources are through my employment. i have to drive to work as there are no buses for my r.e.s. -- from my residence to work. i don't know how much longer i can do this. i am concerned as gas prices climb daily. i am just tired. the harder that i work, the harder it gets. i work 12 to 14 hours daily, and it just doesn't help."

i'm not saying, mr. president, that every person in america is experiencing these stories. they're not. a lot of people are doing fine. they have good jobs. their kids are doing well. they're taking care of their parents. a lot of people are doing just fine. but we would be fools and dishonest not to understand the reality of what is going on in this country. and it breaks my heart, and i know that it breaks the hearts of millions of people in this country to see what is going on in this great nation of ours. that so many people are hurting, that so many parents -- i don't know if i have that letter here or if it's in another book let, but i'll never forget one letter that i received, and that is these people -- you know, my parents never went to college. my father never graduated high school. and they wanted their kids to get an education, and we did. and it was very important, and how proud my mother was of that. and we get letters from people

who say, you know, i dreamed that my kid, my daughter would go to college. she's not going to go college now. not going to go to college. and, you know, it's just -- it's just painful to even talk about and to think about what this country, the direction in which this country is moving. so, mr. president, i want to now take a break from reading these letters. actually the truth is that when these letters came in a year ago, i couldn't read more than half a dozen at a time. they really just took too much out of me. they really take something out of you to hear people that you know; good people, honest people. i hear some of my colleagues here that these people are lazy. my god, people work so hard in the state of vermont. we have i don't know how many thousands of people who are not working two jobs, three jobs, but are working four jobs. it is not just vermont, it is all over this country. whatever you say about the united states of america, the people of our country are not lazy. that is one thing you can say

about it. in fact, according to all the bloodless statistics, our people today work more hours than do the people of any other major country on earth. i don't know that a lot of americans know that. it used to be japan. the japanese are hardworking people. now it turns out our people work harder, longer hours than the people of any other industrialized country in the world. when you think about that, when i think about the books that i read when i was in elementary school. mr. president, i don't know if you remember these pictures. there were pictures up there where working were demonstrating and they said, we want a 40-hour workweek. you remember seeing those pick censures we want a 40-hour workweek. that was back in the early 1900's. today, 100 years later, people still want a 40-hour workweek because they're forced to work 50, 60 hours a week, they're

working two jobs, they're working three jobs. so, mr. president, what i want to do now before i get back to why i'm on the floor today and why i've been here for a few hours, which is to say that the agreement negotiated by the president and the republican leadership is not a good agreement. it's an agreement that we can improve upon. it's an agreement that the american people can improve upon. and what i'm asking the american people is to stand up, let your senators, let your congressmen know how you feel. do you really believe that millionaires and billionaires who have done phenomenally well in recent years need an extended tax cut at a time when their taxes have been lowered substantially in recent years? do we really need to give tax breaks to the rich in order to drive up the national debt so that our kids and grandchildren will pay higher taxes in order

to pay off that national debt caused by tax breaks for the rich? if you don't believe that, you don't think that's right, let the president of the united states know about it. let your senator know about it. let your congressman know about it. we need a handful, seven or eight members of the united states senate to hear from their people to say wait a minute, don't hold my kids hostage. don't force them to pay higher taxes in order to give tax breaks to the very, very rich. if the american people stand up and by the millions let their senators and congressmen and the president know, we can win this thing. we can win this battle. it's not too late yet. and that's what i hope will happen. mr. president, you know, when we talk about why things go on the way they are here in washington

and why so many people back home whr-rbgs they're -- whether they're democrats, republicans, whether they're conservatives, moderates, whatever they are, there is a huge feeling of anger and frustration, in fact disgust at what goes on in washington. i just read some letters from people and you can multiply those letters by a million, and people are saying don't you hear us? don't you know what's going on in our stphraoeufs don't you know the worries we have for our kids, our parents? aren't you listening to us? in many ways i'm afraid the united states senate is not listening to them, nor is the house, nor is the government. one of the reasons why and what worries me so much about this growing concentration of wealth and income in this country is that when the rich get richer, they don't simply put their money under the mattress, they don't go out and buy yachts and planes and all the things rich people do. they do that, but they do

something else. what they say is "i'm not rich enough. i need to be richer." what motivates some of these people is greed and greed and more greed. there is no end to this. so what they do is they do things like higher-up lobbyists, who are all -- is like hire up lobbyists, who are all over capitol hill, former leaders of the republican party, former leaders of the democratic party, bright people, and their job is to make sure the legislation we passed such as this major tax bill, that this legislation benefits not ordinary americans, not the people whose letters i have just read; not those people, but the wealthiest people in this country and the largest corporations. i want to mention something, a very good friend of mine, and i do a radio show with him every friday afternoon -- i'm afraid i missed it today, and that's tom

hartman. he is the author of wonderful books. his latest book which is called rebooting the american dream: 11 ways to rebuild our country. tom writes, he talks about lobbying, which is an issue we've got to deal with in this country. he says, page 104, "given how lucrative lobbying is as an investment, it's become a huge business." in other words, what he is talking about is if you got a good lobbyist and that lobbyist changes a few words in a bill, your company or you as an individual can end up with huge amounts of money, just changing a few words. in this case, language we're working on now is whether or not we extend the bush tax breaks for the top 2% for many millionaires and billionaires. some lobbyists representing the rich and the powerful are determined to keep that language in there.

so it's an investment. so you spend a few millions, an organization spends a few million dollars on a lobbyist. but if you end up getting back hundreds of millions of dollars in tax breaks and corporate loopholes or other benefits, it's a very good investment. that's what tom heartman is writing about. he said given how lucrative lobbying is as an investment, it's become a huge business. in february 2010, the center for responsive politics laid out which industries had invested how much in congress the previous year. overall, overall he found that in 2009 the number of registered lobbyists who actively lobby congress was 13,694, and the total lobbying spending -- get this -- total lobbying spending in 2009 was $3.47 billion.

a 240% increase since 1999, ten years more than tripling, i guess. in 2009, companies spent $3.47 billion in lobbying. mr. president, we have 100 members of the united states senate. you have 435 members of the house. and listeners or viewers can get out their calculating machine and figure out how much money the big investors are spending trying to influence senator inouye or myself or the other 98 members of the senate or 435 members of the house. they are flooding this institution with money. let me give you just a breakdown of where that money is coming from. what they call miscellaneous

business -- that's retail and manufacturing, et cetera, $558 million in one year -- 2009. health care, $543 million. now, by the way, that was before health care reform. my strong guess -- i will be very surprised if that number did not double. if you are a health care lobbyist, this year, trust me, you are doing very, very well. they are all over this place making sure that we did not pass a really strong health care bill; for example, a medicare for all single-payer program which i support. on top of that, you've got the finance shaourpbs and -- finance insurance and real estate industries combine. i suppose, mr. president, the recent legislation we dealt with, health care reform and financial reform was a real boom to the lobbyists around here, because they really could go out

and earn their money. but that was before that. finance, insurance and real estate only spent $465 million in one year, influence 100 members of the senate and 435 members of the house. energy and natural resources, as i mentioned earlier today, exxonmobil last year made $19 billion, paid nothing in taxes, got $156 million refund. exxonmobil and other companies are putting all kinds of money into phony organizations telling us that global warming isn't real and we don't have to transform our energy system. it costs a lot of known do that. the energy and natural resources companies spend $408 million in 2009 alone. this is one year, folks, one year. communications electron iraq, right now i'm work on an issue which deals with the merger of comcast and nbc. i think it is a bad idea.

comcast is the largest provider of cable services in america, a huge role in the internet. nbc is one of the largest media conglomerates in america, and what they're trying to do right now is to merge these two huge companies. i think the problem in america is we have too few companies controlling what goes on. we have too much of a concentration of ownership, and that merger is bad. well, i can assure you, know for a fact, that you got all these lobbyists from the media industry, from communications. they're right here rallying, trying to do their best to make sure this merger, other type mergers take place. $360 million from the communications electronics industry. then we have other types of organizations as well.

bottom line: in the year 2009, we spent -- they spent $3.47 billion, almost $3.5 billion, on lobbying. and you know what? you get what you pay for. and that's just lobbying. we're not talking about campaign contributions. we're not talking about the huge sums of money it now takes to run for office in the united states. and we're not talking about where that money comes from. and we're not talking about the citizens united horrendous decision reached by the supreme court, which allows billionaires and all of these companies and their executives to put money into campaigns and not even have to be identified. we're not even talking about it. this is just lobbying, just

lobbying. so if you wonder why we are having a serious discussion about whether or not we should give tax breaks to millionaires and billionaires while the middle class is collapsing and tens of millions of people have no health insurance, and we have the highest rate of childhood poverty, and we have the most unequal distribution of wealth and income of any country, if you wonder how we were consider for one minute talking about more tax breaks for the rich, then you don't know much about what goes on here in washington? and you don't know about campaign contributions and the degree to which big money buys and sells politicians. mr. president, while i want to review again -- because the reason i'm down here today -- i have a been here -- and i have

been here for a few hours, is to voice my very strong opposition to the agreement that was reached between the republican leadership and president obama. i think that the american people don't like this agreement. all i can tell you, and i don't know what's going on in your office coming from alaska, mr. president, but i can tell you that in the last three days between phone calls and e-mails, we've probably gotten 5,000 -- we've heard from about 5,000 people, many from vermont and some from out of state as well. the opposition to this agreement is probably 99%. people cannot understand why in a million years, with a $1.7 trillion national debt and a $1.4 trillion yearly deficit, we would be thinking for one second , for one second, about giving tax breaks to the richest

people in this country who are already doing fap us willly well. so, mr. president, i'm down here today and have been for a few hours to urge my colleagues, and more importantly, the american people to say "no" to this agreement. if we stand together, if the american people write or e-mail or call their senators and can their congress people, i think we can turn this thing around. i think we can come up with an agreement that makes us all proud rather than one that we have to be ashamed of. i know there was an editorial back in the state of vermont that i saw -- i don't remember the exact title -- but something to the effect, "this agreement stinks, it's odious, but it's better than nothing." well, i don't think that has to be the choice. i think the choice can actually be a good agreement. i think if the american people stand with those who are opposing this agreement, we can pull this off.

we can defeat this agreement and come up with a much better one, one that does not force our kids and grandchildren to pay higher taxes in order to provide huge tax breaks for the richest people in this country. so, mr. president, in talking about the reasons that i am opposed to this agreement, one of the other reasons is that while the president and the republican leadership say, well, you know, this is just a temporary extension, just going to be for two years, just temporary, you know and i know that when you talk about temporary here, it becomes long term and then perhaps becomes permanent. if we extend these tax breaks for the top 2% now, my strongest

-- and i hope i'm wrong, and i certainly hope that this proposal is dwelt defeated -- but if we extend them for two years, my strong guess is they will be two years from now extended again. depending on the politics of what goes on here, they could be extended permanently. our republican colleagues, as you well know, wanted to extend them for ten years, at a cost of $700 billion. increase in our national debt. our republican friends are fighting hard to completely repeal the estate tax, which would cost us $1 trillion -- $1 trillion in ten years in increased national debt. so the point that i've got to make -- i want to emphasize this point -- is that when people talk about these things being short-term, being temporary, take those thoughts with a grain

of salt. maybe -- maybe that's the case. i don't think it is. once you move over the cliff and make that decision to extend these tax breaks, they're going to be extended long term. and here's the reason why: i mean, you have right now the dynamic here is the president campaigned against these tax breaks. the president does not believe in extending these tax breaks to the rich. but he felt he had to make the compromise. i thought he made a bad compromise. what our republican friends are saying over and over again is that if you rescind, end these tax breaks to the rich, you are raising taxes. two years from now in the midst of a presidential campaign, when president obama, if he is the democratic candidate, says, don't workers i'm going to extend these extensions of tax breaks for the rich, his credibility has been severely damaged. and the american people know it. can they trust him? that's what he told them then and that's what he'll tell them

in two years. is he going to be believed? i don't think so. so these tax breaks, while ostensibly for two years, are -- may in fact be for a lot longer than that. mr. president, i would also say that while we have talked about primarily the discussion has centered around extending tax breaks, personal income tax breaks for the very rich, there are other tac tax breaks in this proposal equally odious. what this proposal, this agreement between the president and the republican leadership does, it is is it tend -- it extends the push-era 15% tax rates on capital gains and dividends, meaning that those people who make their living off of their investments will continue to pay a substantially

lower tax rate than firemen, teachers, and nurses. so think about that. you are a big-time investor. you make most of your income off of capital gains or dividends. and you're paying 15% tax rate. but if you are a worker doing something with your hands, or you are a teacher, or you you aa fire man or a cop, doctor, you're paying tax rates that are higher than that. we are extending those 15% tax rates on capital gains and dividends. and then on top of that, mr. president, this agreement includes an horrendous proposal regarding the estate tax, and the estate tax was initiated, neablghted in 1916. and it was a proposal strongly

supported by teddy roosevelt, who believed very strongly that it was not healthy for america to have an ongoing and evolving concentration of ownership. and here's whatted itly roosevelt said in 1910, 100 years. "the absence of executive state and especially national restraint upon unfair money-getting has tended to create a small class of enormously wealthy and economically powerful men, whose chief object is to hold and increase their power." how's that? 100 years ago, that's what he said. i would say that he got it right, that when he said then is even more true today. then he says, "no man should receive a dollar unless that dollar's worth of service -- unless that dollar represents a dollar's worth of service rendered, not gambling in stocks, but service rendered.

the really big fortune, the swollen fortune, by the mere fact of its size acquires qualities which differentiate it in kind as well as in degree from what is passed by men of relatively small means. therefore, i believe in ... a graduated inheritance tax on big fortunes, properly safeguarded against the evasion and increasingly rapidly in amount with the size of the estate." end of quote, hence the estate tasm tax. unfortunately, under the agreement -- unfortunately, under the agreement reached by the president and the republicans, the estate tax rate, which was 55% under president clinton, when the economy, by the way, was a health care -- was a heck of a

lot stronger than it is today -- will dlien to 35% with an exemption on the first $5 million of an individual's estate, $10 million for couples. now, mr. president, i made this point earlier. but i think it has got to be made over and over again. our republican friends have renamed the estate tax into "the death tax." and the implication of what they are saying -- and what many americans believe -- is that if i have $100,000 in the bank or $50,000 in the bank and i die, that my kids are going to have to pay a hefty estate tax on what i left them. but that is absolutely and categorically not the case. the estate tax applies only to the top .3%.

this is not a tax on the rich. this is a tax on the very, very, very rich. and under this proposal, which benefits only the top .3%, the president and the republicans agreed to lower the tax rate on the estate tax to 35% with an exemption on the first $5 million. that is just wrong. and, mr. president, let me give you an example. let me give you an example of who the folks are who will benefit from this -- from doing this. many of my republican colleagues have been poring very hard, not just to lower -- have been

pushing very harksd not just to lower the estate tax. by the way, this 35% is lower than they ever dreamed they would get with a $5 million exemption. but they really want and you wouldly i suspect they will continue to fight for a complete repeal of the estate tax. so just to give you one example -- i don't mean to pick on the walton family, but just as a flesh-and-blood example. salt walton's family -- and the waltons, of course, are the heirs to the wal-mart fortune. they are worth -- and this may be wrong because it's a couple of years old -- but give and take, $86 billion. that's one family, $86 billion. the walton family would receive an estimated $32.7 billion tax break if the estate tax was completely repealed. does anybody in their right mind

believe that when this country has a national debt of $13.7 trillion and when we have the highest rate of childhood poverty in the industrialized world and our unemployment rate is 9.8%, can anybody for one second faith only member of the united states -- fathom members of the united states senate saying we want to give a $32 billion tax break to one family? so in terms of the estate tax, what we have done is made it even more regressive. we have given substantial help to exactly the people who need it the least. and that, to me, is not what we should be doing. our job here -- i know it's a radical idea, i admit it -- should be to represent the vast majority of the people in this country, the middle class, the working families of this country, and not just the top 1% or 2%. so under this proposal, this

lowering of the estate tax, which will cost our government substantial sums of money because the revenue's not going to come in, this will benefit only the top .3%. and again, if some of my republican colleagues are successful in their desire -- and they're moving down the pa path -- if we repeal the estate tax entirely which is what they want to do -- i know it's hard to believe and some of the listeners out there think that i am kidding, but i am deadly serious, they want to completely remove the estate tax, which would drive up the national debt by a trillion dollars over a ten-year period. so, mr. president, that is this lowering of estate tax rates and raising the exemption is clearly an onerous -- clearly an onerous

provision. and it is not just the walton family of wal-mart who benefits. according to "forbes" magazine, there are 403 billionaires living in this country with a combined net worth of $1.3 trillion. that's not shabby. that's pretty good. 403 billionaires are worth $1.3 trillion. anyone lucky enough to inherit this extraordinary wealth would benefit the most from repealing the estate tax. as robert frank wrote in his book, the wealthiest people in this country accumulated so much wealth that they have been competing to see who could own the largest private yacht, who could own the most private jets, who could own the most expensive cars, jewelry, art work, et

cetera. in 1997, for example, leslie wexler, the chairman and c.e.o. of limited brands, the company that owns victoria's secret -- and none of us know what victoria's secret is, i know that -- paid a german ship maker to build what was then the largest private yacht in the united states. it's called the limitless. and there is a photo -- i guess this is the photo. it's a nice boat. it stretches 315 feet and has 3,000 square feet of teak wood and a gym. it's got a gym. according to "forbes" magazine, mr. wexler is one of the 400 richest people in this country worth an estimated $3.2 billion. permanently repealing the estate tax would allow mr. wexler's two children to inherit all of his wealth without paying a nickel to help this country deal with the enormous problems that we have. so i wish mr. wexler -- and i

don't know him. i hope he is alive and well and i wish him a long life. but i believe very strongly that in this country, if we are going to see the middle class survive and our kids do well, we cannot repeal the estate tax and we cannot lower estate tax rates. mr. president, i want to get to another issue which i talked about earlier which i think there is some misunderstanding. and i know, mr. president, you raised this issue and i'm glad you did, at a recent meeting that we had. you know, all over the country, people say, isn't it great, we are going to lower the payroll tax on workers? we're going to go from 6.2%, which workers now pay, down 4. 4.2%. people are going to have more money in their pocket, which certainly is a good thing. it's going to cost us

$120 billion in social security payroll tax. here's the point. yes, we do want to put more money in workers' pockets. that's why many of us in the stimulus -- in the stimulus package supported a $500 -- it was a $400-a-year tax break for every worker -- virtually every worker in america. that's what we said. we want people in these difficult times to be able to have the money to take care of their families. and when they have that money, to go out spending it. and when they spend it, they create other jobs because people have got to provide goods and services for them. it has a good stimulus impact. yes, we do want workers to have more money in their pockets. but while this idea of lowering the payroll tax sounds like a good idea, in truth, it really is not a good idea. and, mr. president, i don't know if you know this, but this idea originated from very

conservative republicans whose intention from the very beginning was to destroy social security by choking off the funds that go to it. and this is not just bernie sanders' analysis. mr. president, there was recently -- and i distributed it recently at a meeting that we held -- a news release that came from the national committee to preserve social security and medicare. and the headline on their press release is, "cutting contributions to social security signals the beginning of the e end: payroll tax holiday is anything but." and what the national committee to preserve social security and medicare, which is one of the largest senior groups in ameri america, well understands is that there are people out there who want to destroy social

security and one way you do that is you divert funds into the social security trust fund and they don't get there. now, what the president and others have said is, not to worry, this is just -- this is just a one-year program, just one year. and, in fact, they say, the general treasury -- the general treasury will pay the difference. so the social security trust fund is not going to lose funding. here's the problem. the problem is that historical historically, and the reason we have a $2.6 trillion surplus today in social security, the reason why social security is good for the next 29 years to pay out all benefits, is because it comes from the payroll tax, it is not dependent upon the whims of congress and the treasury. now, the president, republicans say well, this is just a one-year program, don't worry.

i do worry. i worry that once you establish this one-year payroll tax holiday that next year our republican friends will say, oh, you want to end that? you're going to be raising taxes on workers. and enough people will support that concept. and this one-year payroll tax holiday will become permanent. and when you do that, you're going to be choking off over a period of years trillions of dollars that we need to make sure that social security is viable and is there for our kids and our grandchildren. but don't listen to me, listen to somebody who knows a lot more about this issue than i do. barbara kennelly is the -- a former congresswoman from connecticut. she's the president and c.e.o. of the national committee to preserve social security and medicare. and this is what barbara

kennelly says. she is -- quote -- "even though social security contributed nothing to the current economic crisis, it has been bartered in a deal that provides deficit-busting tax cuts for the wealthy. diverting $120 billion in social security contributions for a so-called tax holiday may sound like a good deal for workers now but it's bad business for the program that a majority of middle-class seniors will rely upon in the future." end of quote, barbara kennelly. the headline: "cutting contributions to social security signals the beginning of the end." this is not a good approach. providing and figuring out a way that we can get more money into the hands of working people, as we did in the stimulus package, does make a lot of sense. going forward with a payroll tax

holiday is a backdoor method to end up breaking social security, and it's not anything that we should support. mr. president, let me just mention and quote from a gentleman who understands this issue very, very well and he understands the politics of what's going on here. his name is bruce bartlett. he is a former top advisor for presidents reagan and george h.w. bush. and he recently wrote the following in opposition to this payroll tax cut. and this is what mr. bartlett wrote: "what are the odds that republicans will ever allow" -- ever allow -- "this one-year tax holiday to expire? they wrote the bush tax cuts

with explicit expiration dates and then when it came time" -- right now -- "for the law they wrote to take effect exactly as they wrote it, they said any failure to extend them permanently would constitute the biggest tax increase in history. if allowing the bush tax cuts to expire is the biggest tax cut in history, one that republicans claim would decimate a still fragile economy, then surely expiration of a payroll tax holiday would also constitute a massive tax increase on the working people of america. republicans" -- this is brute bartlett who i'm -- bruce bartlett who i'm quoting, a former advisor to president reagan and the first president bush -- "republicans who would wish to destroy social

security's finances or permanently fund it with general revenues switch the revenue base from the payroll tax to general revenues than allow a once suspended payroll tax to be imposed. arch social security hater peter ferraro once told me --" and again, this is bruce bartlett, former advisor to president reagan and bush one -- "peter ferraro once told me that funding it with general revenues was part of his plan to destroy it by converting social security into a welfare program rather than an earned benefit. he was right." in other words, what this issue is about is breaking the bonds that we've had since the inception of social security, where social security was paid for -- paid for -- by workers, you pay for it when you're working and you get the benefits when you're old. that's the deal. there is no federal money coming

in from the general treasury. and this gentleman, mr. bartlett, thinks, and i suspect he is quite right, tha that -- that this is the beginning of an effort to destroy social security. and i would say that social security -- you know, the real debate about social security, mr. president, is not one about finances. there has been a lot of misinformation and disinformation out there. i hear from some of my friends on the republican side that social security is going bankrupt, it's not going to be there for our kids, and that is absolutely not true. social security today has a $2.6 trillion surplus. social security can pay out every benefit owe owed to every eligible american, if we don't start diverting funds for the next 29 years, at which point it

pays out about 79% of benefits. so our challenge in 29 years is to fill that 22% gap. that's it. can we do it? sure, we can. president obama, when he was campaigning -- and i think has repeated since -- a very good suggestion that instead of having a cap in terms of which people contribute into the fund at $106,000, what we should do is do a bubble, go up to $250,000, and people -- $people who make $250,000 or more should contribute into the social security trust fund. if you did that and nothing else, you have essentially solved the social security problem for the next 75 years. very easy, it is done. so what this payroll tax holiday is doing in my view is pretty dangerous. i don't think enough people understand that, and i think that is one of the strong reasons why this agreement should be opposed.

now, mr. president, another reason that i believe that this agreement is not as good an agreement as we can get is that it provides tens and tens of billions of dollars in tax cuts for various types of businesses. and i'm not here to say that these tax cuts cannot do some good. i suspect that they can. but i think there is a lot better way to create the jobs that we need than providing these particular business tax cuts. frankly, i think economists from almost all political spectrums, conservative to progressive, understand that if we are serious about creating the kinds of jobs that this economy desperately needs, and if we want to do that as rapidly and as cost-effectively as we

possibly can, the way to do that is not to provide business tax cuts, because right now, right now corporate america is sitting on close to $2 trillion cash on hand. they have a ton of money. the problem is that the products that they are creating are not being bought by the american people because the american people don't have the money to buy those goods and services. so if we are serious, mr. president, in creating the jobs that we need, i think that what we have got to do is start making significant investments in our crumbling infrastructure, and that is -- that is rebuilding our bridges, our roads, our water systems, broadband, cell phone service,

public transportation, our rail system, dams in every single one of these areas. we are seeing our infrastructure crumbling, and the point is that if you simply ignore a crumbling infrastructure -- and i say this as a former mayor who dealt with this issue -- if you simply ignore a crumbling infrastructure, you know what? it doesn't get better all by itself. and i know many mayors and governors would very much like to think that they can turn their backs on the infrastructure. it's not a sexy investment. it's not a sexy investment. but the reality is that if you don't pay attention to it today, it only gets worse and it costs you more money. it's like having a cavity. you can get your cavity filled. you neglect it, as i have, and you end up doing root canal, far more painful, far more expensive. that's what it's about.

do we maintain our infrastructure? clearly, we are not. according to the american society of civil engineers, we should be spending about about $2.2 trillion in the next five years in order to maintain our infrastructure. i don't know about alaska, i don't know. i spent a very brief time in your beautiful state, but i do know that in vermont, we have bridges all over our state that are in desperate need of repair. it is fair to say the stimulus package has been very, very positive in my state. we spent a lot of money on roads and bridges, but we have a long, long way to go. we're putting money into roads and bridges, we're hiring people to do that work, that's what we should be doing all over the country. but, mr. president, it is not just roads and bridges. it is water systems. i told the story i guess a few hours ago now about a mayor, the

mayor of rutland, vermont, which is the second largest city in the state, and i was in his office and he showed me a pipe. and the pipe was in pretty bad shape. he said, you know, this pipe was laid by an engineer, who then after he did this went off to war. he said what war do you think he went off to fight? he said it was the civil war, the civil war. so this was pipe laid in rutland, vermont, which is still being used which was laid i'm guessing in the 1950's, maybe -- in the 1850's, maybe 1860's. we have to spend $50 million, 20 years ago, rebuilding our waste water plant and making sure that a lot of pollution and filthy water didn't get into our beautiful lake, lake champlain. it's an expensive proposition. but right now we are going to

have to invest in that. it's our water systems, our dams, our levees, our roads, our bridges. i mentioned earlier -- i mentioned earlier and contrasted what was going on in infrastructure in the united states as opposed to china, and i quote interested a book called third world america written by arianna huffington who tells us, essentially, that if we don't get our act together, that's what we will become, a third world. and she points out that compared to countries like china, our investments in rail is absolutely pathetic and inadequate. in china right now, that country is investing billions and billions of dollars in

high-speed rail, building thousands and thousands of miles of high-speed rail. they are building over 100 new airports, and what are we doing? so, mr. president, one of my many objections to the proposal struck between the president and the republican leadership is i think we can do better in job creation than in business tax cuts. there is a time and a place for business tax cuts, and i am not against them, but i would say that at this particular moment in american history, in this particular moment, it makes a lot more sense to create over a period of years millions of jobs rebuilding our rail system, our subways, our roads, our bridges and our water systems and many other aspects of our infrastructure. there are places in vermont and throughout this country where people cannot today get decent quality broadband service, can't

get cell phone service. in that area, we are behind many other countries, not wealthy countries around the world. when we make those investments in infrastructure, we not only create jobs, but we make our country stronger and more productive, and we enable ourselves to compete effectively in the international economy. mr. president, another one of my objections to this proposal, and why i think we can do a lot better is that i was really quite disturbed to hear that the president and others who would defend this proposal talk about one of the --quote, unquote -- compromises that was struck was to extend unemployment benefits for 13 months. now, to my mind, as i've said

earlier, at a time of deep recession, at a time of horribly high unemployment, it would be absolutely wrong and immoral for us to turn our backs on the millions of workers who are about to lose their unemployment benefits. if we do that, it's hard to imagine what happened to those families, for many of whom this is their only source of income. what do they do? do they lose their homes? do they move out onto the streets? do they -- how do they take care of their kids? i don't know. there are parts of this country where it is very, very hard to get a job. extended unemployment is at the highest level we have ever seen. you can't turn your backs on those families. but i get upset when i hear that the republicans' willingness to support an extension of unemployment benefits for 13 months is a major compromise. i would tell you, mr. president,

i think a lot of the american people don't know this, that for the past 40 years, 40 years, four decades, under both democratic and republican administrations, whenever the unemployment rate has been above 7.2%, above 7.2% unemployment -- and today we're at 9.8%, always, whether the democrats were in control or the republicans were in control, the president was democrat, the president was republican, what people did is say we have got to extend unemployment benefits. it's kind of common sense, it's not partisan. so when you have a program that has existed for 40 years in a bipartisan effort, it sounds to me that it is not much of a compromise for the republicans to say okay, we will do what democrats and republicans have done for 40 years. what a major compromise. it is not a compromise. it is just continuing existing

bipartisan policy which is sensible. it's sensible from a moral perspective. you can't leave fellow american families out high and dry, and it is good economics because what the economists tell us is the people who will spend that money quickest are people who receive unemployment compensation because that's all they have got. they're going to go out and they are going to buy, and when they buy from the neighborhood store, they create jobs. so it's good economics and it is the moral thing to do, but frankly, mr. president, in my view, this is not much of a compromise. this is just continuing four decades of existing policies. mr. president, as i've said earlier, there are very clearly

positive parts of this agreement. no question about it. i think almost every american will tell you that it would be totally absurd -- i know there are some who disagree, but i think the vast majority of americans believe that in the time when the middle class is collapsing, when median family income has gone down, when unemployment is high, that it would be a real horror show if we did not extend the bush tax breaks for the middle class who are 98% of the american people. 98%. that's what we want. you know, we could have crafted it much tighter, couldn't we? we could have said nobody above above $100,000, nobody above above $150,000. that's pretty generous. we said a family earning earning $250,000 should get an extension of these tax breaks.

that is 98% of the american people. that's not good enough for our republican friends. they are fighting tooth and nail to make sure that the top 2%, the millionaires and billionaires, the c.e.o.'s earn tens of millions a year. they are fighting. it's like they're at war. they are so engaged to make sure that these fabulously wealthy people receive at least a million dollars -- in some cases for people who are making a million a year, they are going to receive on average, on average, $100,000 a year in taxx breaks. for the very, very wealthiest, it could be over a million dollars a year. mr. president, i know you joined me just two days ago in saying that at a time when senior citizens in this country and disabled vets for two years in a row have not received any cola, that maybe it was the right

thing to do because we know that health care costs and prescription drug costs are soaring, that maybe we provide a a $250 check to those seniors and disabled veterans one time, one time. i could not get one republican vote in support of that proposition. we won 53-45, but around here it doesn't take 50 votes to win -- it doesn't take a majority to win, it takes 60 votes, we couldn't get one republican vote. so here you have every republican voting against a $250 check for a disabled vet or a senior citizen who is living on on $15,000, $16,000 a year. can't afford it, but we can afford a $1 million a year tax break for somebody who is worth hundreds of millions of dollars. now, somebody may understand

that rationale. i don't, i really don't. i can't understand that. i can't understand asking our kids and grandchildren to pay more in taxes as the national debt goes up in order to provide tax breaks for the richest people in this country. so, mr. president, while there are some good provisions in this bill, and certainly extending the tax breaks for 98% of our people, for the broad, very broad middle class, i think if the american people demand it in our democracy, we can do better. now i don't know if you or i alone will be able to convince some of our republican friends or maybe some of our democratic friends to make this into the kind of proposal we need for the

working families and for our children, for our next generation. i don't know if we can do it inside this beltway. as i said earlier, i think that the way we win this battle, the way we defeat this proposal and come back with a much better proposal is when millions of americans start writing and e-mailing and calling their senators, their congress people and say, wait a second, are you nuts? do you really think that millionaires and billionaires need a huge tax break at a time when this country has a $13.7 trillion national debt? what are you smoking? how could you for one second think that makes any sense whatsoever. i tell you, mr. president -- i don't know what my phones are doing in my office right now, but in the last three days i'm guessing 5,000 phone calls and

e-mails, and about 99% of them are in disagreement with that -- with this proposal. i'm looking at a chart here, and we've got 2,100 calls that just came in, i'm informed today. i don't know what kind of calls other members of the senate are getting, but certainly those are the calls that i am getting. now, also, mr. president, and this point cannot be made strongly enough. what our republican friends want to do -- and they have been pretty honest and upfront, especially the extreme right-wing people who have been running for office and in some cases have won. they have been honest enough to say that they want to bring this country back to where we were in the 1920's, that their ultimate

aim is the basic repeal of almost all the provisions that have been passed in the last 70 years to protect working people, the elderly and the children. they believe in a darwinan style society in which you have the survival of the fittest, that we are not a society which comes together to take care of all of us. you take care of me in need and i take care of you in need and your family in that we are one people. and their strategy is pretty clear, i think. they want to ultimately destroy social security. and what we are beginning to hear more and more of is why don't we raise the retirement age to 68 or 69. that deficit-reduction commission which i thought the people on that commission were bad appointees by the president.

you could have put together some good economists to say how do we in a fair way -- in a fair way -- address the deficit and national debt crisis. that wasn't what that commission did. these folks are talking about major cuts in social security, medicare, medicaid. they want, at a time when it is so hard for young people to afford to go to college, they want to raise the cost by asking our young people while they're in college to be accruing the interest on their loans. so i think that if the president believes that if this agreement is passed, that the republicans are going to come to the table and we're all going to live happily in the future. we're going to all work together in a nonpartisan way. i think he's not understanding the reality. these people are going to come back, and they're going to come back very aggressively for major

cuts in social security, medicare, medicaid, education, child care, pell grants, you name it, because their belief is -- i don't quite understand it -- that it is somehow good public policy to give tax breaks for the wealthiest people in this country who in many ways have never had it so good while you cut programs that the middle class and working families of this country desperately depend upon. so i would suggest that this big debate we're having right now on whether or not we should accept the proposal agreed to by the president and the republicans is just the beginning, just the beginning of what's coming down the pike. and if we surrender now on this issue, we can expect next month and the following month another governmental crisis, another threat of a shutdown unless they get their way. so i think rather than asking the working families of this

country to have to compromise, instead of asking our kids to pay more taxs to bail out billionaires, maybe -- i know this is a radical idea, but maybe we should ask a handful of our republican friends to join us. maybe a handful of honest conservatives over there who have been telling us for years their great concerns about deficit spending and a huge national debt. maybe they should be prepared to vote against a proposal which raises the national debt and our deficit by giving tax breaks to some of the richest people in the world. now, i, quite frankly, don't think that i'm going to be able to convince them. i don't know that you're going to be able to convince. but you know who i think can convince them? inch their constituents can convince them. i think the american people can

convince them. i said earlier that if the american people stand up that we can defeat this proposal and that we can create a much, much better proposal. clearly we must extend tax breaks for the middle class. clearly we must make sure that unemployed workers continue to get the benefits that they desperately need. but equally clearly, we must make sure that we are not raising the national debt, which as shaopb as i'm standing -- as sure as i'm standing here will result in cuts, social security, medicaid, medicare, education, other programs by passing -- if this proposal is passed. mr. president, this is not only an important proposal unto

itself -- $900 billion-plus even in washington is nothing to sneeze at -- but it is an important proposal in terms of the direction in which our country goes into the future. if we accept this proposal of a two-year extension for the richest people in america, i believe that will evenly become either a long-term extension or a permanent extension. if we accept the proposal that lowers the rates on the estate tax which benefits only the top .3%, 99% of americans get nothing. but if we give them what they want, i believe that over a period of years it will lead to the complete abolition and ending of the estate tax which will cost us $1 trillion over a ten-year period. so i would hope that this issue

is not one that just progresses. i would hope that honest conservatives who in their heart of hearts believe that this country is seriously in danger when we have unsustainable deficits and a huge national debt that they will tell their officials here in washington not to pass a piece of legislation which increases the national debt significantly and in fact will allow for the permanent over years, in my view, extension of these tax breaks. that is what this debate is about. it is about, fundamentally whether we continue the process by which the richest people in this country become richer at a time when we have the most

unequal distribution of income and wealth of any major country on earth. as i said earlier, mr. president, this is not an issue that is discussed. i don't know -- well, i do know why. it is just not an issue that people feel comfortable about because they don't want to give a front to wealthy campaign contributions. contributors will take on the lobbyists that are out there. that is the reality. throughout the entire world the united states has the most unequal distribution of income. top 1% earning 23.5% of all income. that, mr. president, is more than the bottom 50%. and that is not just immoral. it is bad economics. because if the middle-class gets crushed entirely, who is going to be buying the tkpwaopdz and services pro -- the goods and services produced in this

economy. this piece of legislation, as important as it is unto itself -- and it is very, very important -- is equally important in terms of what it says about where we are going into the future. are we going to protect the middle class and working families of our country? are we going to make sure that every young native american america, regardless of -- every young person in america regardless of income has the ability to go to college or are we going to allow college to become unaffordable for young people or else force them to leave school deeply in debt? are we going to create a health care system which guarantees health care to all of our people -- high-quality health care -- or are we going to continue a situation where 45,000 americans die each year

because they don't have access to a doctor? are we going to invest in our energy system so that we break our dependence on foreign oil? we spend about $350 million a year importing oil from saudi arabia and other foreign countries. almost $1 billion a day which should be used to make this country energy independent, which should be used to transform our energy system away from fossil fuel into energy efficiency and technology such as wind solar, geothermal and biomass. mr. president, by the way, none of that has been addressed, as i understand it, in this proposal. so my point here is not just that this proposal is a bad proposal as it stands before us now. but it is going to move us in

the future in a direction that i do not believe this country should be going. i mentioned earlier that my own personal family's history is the history of millions and millions of americans. my father, as it happened, came to this country at the age of 17 without a nickel in his pocket, worked hard his whole life, never made very much money. but he and my mom -- my mom graduated high school, she never went to college. but they had the satisfaction, a very significant satisfaction knowing their kids got a college education. my older brother larry went to law school and i graduated from the university of chicago. i think what's going on in this country and why the anxiety level is so high is not just that people are worrying about themselves. parents worry more about their kids than they do about

themselves. and what parents are sitting around and worrying about now is they're saying will for the first time in the modern history of this country, my kids have a lower standard of living than their parents? will my kids earn less income? will me kids not have the opportunity to travel and learn and grow as i have done? are the best days of america behind us? that's really what the question is about. and i don't think that has to be the case. but i will tell you as i mentioned earlier, if we were going to change the national priorities in this country, if we're going to start devoting our energy and attention to the needs of working families and the middle class, we've got to defeat this proposal, we've got to defeat similar types of proposals which come down the pike. when this country has a $13.7 trillion national debt, it is

insane to be talking about huge tax breaks for people who don't need them. as i mentioned earlier, ironically you've got a lot of these millionaires out there who apparently love their country more than some of the people in this chamber. you have some of the richest people in america -- bill gates and all the charitable work he does; warren buffet, and many others who say you know what? i'm doing fine. i'm a billionaire, i'm a multibillionaire, i don't need your tax break. i'm worried about the high rate of childhood pforts, a.m. worried about the infrastructure crumb manying, i am worried bel americans dying this year without access to health care. i'm about global warming. invest in transforming our energy system. these are patriotic americans. they're rich. they love their country. and now what they are saying to us is we don't even want it.

we are giving people money who in some cases don't even want it. and i know -- i do know that there are others out there who do. and i think, mr. president, if there is one issue that we as a congress and as a government have got to address, and that is the administered level of greed in this country. we have got to stand tall and draw a line in the sand and simply say, enough is enough. how much do you want? how much do you need? how many yachts can you own? how many homes can you have? isn't it enough that the top 1% now earns 23.5% of the income in this country? how much more do they want? do they want 30%, 35%? isn't it enough that the top 1%

owns more wealth than the bottom 90%? how much more do they need? mr. president, i mentioned earlier when i talked about the situation that got us into this horrendous recession, and that is the collapse of wall street, and i talked about what i think most americans understand very well, and that is the incredible greed and recklessness and dishonesty that exists on wall street. we must not allow ourselves to encourage and continue the kinds of greed that we have seen in recent years. it is an abomination that the people who caused this economic crisis, the worst recession since the great depression, that the people who caused it on wall

street are now earning more money, more money than they did before we bailed them out. earlier today, i was reading some e-mails that came to my office from vermonters who are struggling to keep their heads above water. and they were just terribly painful and poignant stories about honest and good and decent people who are now choosing about whether or not they should put gas in their car or buy thed into they need or buy the prescription drugs they need, not just a vermont story; it is an american story. and that is the reality out there for tens of millions of americans. so in my view, we can negotiate a much better agreement than the one that president obama and the republican leader did. there are some good parts of

that agreement which obviously should be retained and perhaps even strengthened. and those include, of course, making sure that we extend unemployment benefits to those who need it and of course that we extend tax breaks for the middle class. and there are other -- some other very good provision flz there that i think are very worthwhile. but i think if the american people stand up and agree with those of us who say, no more tax breaks for the very wealthiest people in this country, we can defeat this proposal and we can come up with a much better one that is fairer to the middle class of this country and is fairer to our young children. i do not want to see our young kids -- my children, my grandchildren -- have a lower standard of living than their parents. that's not what america is b so,

madam president, what i think we've got to do is defeat this proposal. i think we have got to urge our fellow americans to stand up and say "no" to tax breaks for those who don't need it. i think we have got to work in a very serious way about creating the millions and millions of good-paying jobs that this country desperately needs. i personally believe that far more effective approach than giving the variety of business taxes that were in this proposal at a time when corporate america is sitting on $2 million of unused cash -- they've got the money -- i think a much better approach, as i said earlier, is investing in our crumbling infrastructure. i think that makes us healthier and stronger as a nation for the future and in the global economy, and i think it creates jobs quicker and in a more

cost-effective way than these tax cuts. i think also, madam president, that it is high time -- high time that the american people move -- they want us to move in an entirely new direction in terms of trade. i am always amazed how republicans and democrats alike -- i speak as the longest-serving independent in congress -- come election time i see these ads on television, oh, we've got to do something about outsourcing, we've got to do something about our trade policy. but somehow the day after that election when corporate america continues to throw american workers out on the street and moves to china, moves to other low-wage countries, somehow that discussion seases to competents -- ceases to exist and that legislation never seems to appear.

so it seems to me, madam president, that we have got to defeat this proposal that in defeating this proposal we're going to tell the american people that there are at least some of us here, some of us here, who understand what our jobs and our obligations are, and that is that we are supposed to represent them, the middle class of this country, and not just wealthy campaign contributors or bow to the interests of the lobbyistists wo are all over this place. madam president, when i talked a moment ago about the need to invest in our infrastructure as a way to create jobs being more cost-effective than some of these business tax breaks, i'm looking right now at a "wall street journal" article, december 9, 2010, and here's

what the article says. "companies" -- headlined: "companies cling to cash." the headline: "companies cling to carchlt" "coffers swell to 51-year high as cautious firms put off investing in growth." a story by justin laheart. here les the story. he makes the point that i have been trying to express her. "corporate america's cash pile has hit its highest level in half a century. rather than pouring their money into building plants or hiring workers, nonfinancial companies in the united states were sitting on $1.93 trillion in cash" -- i said $2 trillion. i stand corrected. $1.93 trillion in cash and other

assets at the end of the september, up from $1.8 trillion at the end ever june, the federal reserve said thursday. cash accounted fo 7.4% of the companies' total assetted, the largest share since 1959. the cash buildup shows the deep caution many companies feel about investing in expansion while the economic recovery remains painfully slow and high unemployment and household finances continue to limit consumers' ability to spend." well what have we been talking about all afternoon? this is the "wall street journal," frankly not my favorite paper. but that's what they are saismg the way you are going to get the economy moving again is to put money in the hand of working people who will then go out and buy the goods and services that these companies produce. i have my doubts about whether

or not these tax breaks will in fact have the desired result, but, as i said earlier and will say again, i think the most effective way to create jobs, the most important way to create jobs, is to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure. and that is our roads, our bridges, our rail systems, our water systems, our waste water plants, our dams, our leaf vies visas, the need to -- our leaf veerks the need to improve broadband, to make sure every community in america has access to good-quality broadband, has access to cell phone service. unfortunately, as best as i can understand, there has not been one nickel -- one nickel appropriated in this piece of legislation, this proposed legislation, which would go to

infrastructure improvements. so, madam president, i think that this proposal should be defeated because it is not a strong proposal for the middle class. it is a proposal which gives much too much to people who don't need it. and it is a proposal which i think sets the stage for similar type proposals down the pike. and i apologize to anyone who has been listening for any length of time -- and i know that i've been, to say the least, a by the repetitious, but the concern here is that when the president and some of my republican colleagues talk about some of these tsm breaks being "temporary," we're just going to extend hem for two years, talking about this payroll tax holiday being just one year, i've been in washington long enough to know that that

assertion just doesn't fly. that what is temporary today is long-term tomorrow and is permanent the next day. so i fear very much that this proposal is bad on the surface. i fear very much that this proposal will lead us down a very bad track in terms of more trickle-down economics, which benefits the tricklers and not the ordinary americans. i think that it is a proposal which should be defeated. but, madam president, the point that i want to make is that it is not just my poifnlt i think it should be defeated. i think we can do a lot better. but i've got to tell you that the calls that are coming in to my office are -- hears wha we got today, i guess.

2k,122 calls oppose the deal. and i think 100 calls are supportive of the deal. so you can do the arithmetic on it. but that is at least 95% of the calls that i got today are saying this is not a good deal. we can do better. i note that in the last three or four days we have gotten probably now 6,000 or 7,000 calls that say this. and this is not just vermont. and some -- many of those calls come from out of state, by the way, not just from vermont. but i think that is true all over this country. so, madam president, let me conclude -- and it has been a long day. let me simply say that i believe the proposal that was developed by the president and the republicans are nowhere near as good as we can achieve. i don't know that we are able

ourselves to get the handful of republicans that we need to say "no" to this agreement. but i do believe that if the american people stand uppedz -- and by the way, it may not be just republicans, there may be some democrats as well -- if the american people stand up and say, we can do better than this, that we don't need to drive up the national debt by giving tax breaks to millionaires and billionaires, that if the american people are prepared to stand -- and we're prepared to follow them -- i think we can defeat this proposal, i think we can come up with a better proposal which better reflects the needs of the middle-class and working families of our country and to me, most importantly, the children of our country. and with that, madam president, i would yield the floor.