encourage should make. is it $180,000 per hour, $40,000 per hour, how many people will the employee. from the sure we can do that. but instead of non-binding ..

massachusetts. good morning. >> caller: five gough mabey one solution. why don't we just nationalize everybody and make sure when the corporations foreign and domestic come in that they pay the tax payers when they may go for a certain amount or the destroy our environment, or put tax on international goods we have to live on this planet, giving money to the oligarchies we are basically going to be tackled, and like i heard our vice president say that the supreme court is going to have to make a decision on those ships they are going to implant people here and how they are going to pay everybody.

>> host: what about tax rate for ceos? >> of the tax rate for ceo shouldn't be different than for other people of high income. i don't think we should discriminate between ceos and bald leaders and so on. there's a couple of ways in which the tax system discriminates rich people one in particular which is the so-called interest for people who manage hedge funds and private equity partnerships and without getting too into detail they get to pay the lower rate of capital gains which is 15 per cent instead of 35% of the earned income rate for money they earn. but we had a pretty good thing in this country in the 1990's before the tax cuts that were enacted in 01 and an 02.

we have a balanced budget towards the end of the year and a growing economy. so why the taxes were rolled back i'm not sure, and i would be in favor of reinstating those on every brackett. >> host: the financial times this morning has this had line move over the come hedge fund crown from the veterans investor coming in about $55.8 billion seeking out george soros for the top hedge fund investor to a space, west virginia. good morning. >> caller: good morning. i want to know that for paid 4 billion of taxpayer dollars goes to the oil industry each year and subsidies. can you tell me if you would be willing to investigate including all subsidies and tax loopholes how much money do we give out each year in the subsidies and to whom the subsidies go?

>> guest: that's a big investigation but i think what obama just proposed which is to lower the corporate tax rate and to do away with breaks that lower rates for certain corporations even lower has the right idea, in other words right now we have one state could rate for corporations for 35%, and then we have, you know, virtually no corporation pays that because there are so many ways of getting under that or around it, and the idea of lowering the nominal rate but enforcing phenomenal rate is a very good idea and by the way a lot harder than it sounds because a lot of the people want to do that. everybody has their favorite industry. manufacturing the favorite industry shouldn't we give them a break. the the constituency of you do something like that you have to say no, i mean it, and by the way you might even say the interest deduction why should we give people who owned a home a break over people that rent a

home? there are all sorts of breaks that feel awfully good at least the people that get them but i'm certainly in favor of doing away with them. cost cutters positive psychological effect that if you pay your ceo lots of money the company is more likely to be successful. >> guest: it seems like a real stretch. maybe it lasts for a while. chop prince earned a whole lot f. city until he was fired and the company, the bailout i think that is a very expensive form of therapy. >> host: ceos get paid a lot for providing service of sorts and the corporate system, corporatist system paid for schmoozing politicians and bureaucrats. the connections to the powerful people in government count more than satisfying customers and

that is a major part of the problem. >> guest: i think a lot of ceos were card satisfying their customers and certainly apple computer's does. so i don't think the solution is to demonize the ceo. i think it's to get them to rationalize how they are paid says that there's a long-term relationship with a real lives and what they are paid and the long term results, not just for surpassing some short-term hurdles any time the stock falls and so they are sort of accountable and that means when they come in one of the big problems they didn't mention is when they come and they cut the severance agreements where the ceo says if anything happens if you don't want me anymore, i would become a 120 million, and the board in the first flush of the new law ready to give the

ceo anything in it than people want to know why when the ceo is fired three years later because the relationship didn't work out its of the contract the ceo had these severance agreements and these are terrible things when the ceos don't perform and they are dismissed they should get a year salary or something like everybody else and should be sent on their way. >> host: there are no rules over severance packages? >> guest: there are no rules, and what happens is one company looks at the last company did and that's why you see these truly outrageous settlements where ceos will get 60 committee, $100 million when they were dismissed when the board had this idea whatever it is to dismiss, chuck prince, we're never going to get rid of steno kneal before it was bailed out and when it turns out the ceo had failed it's too late. these so should be subject at a

minimum to which they can go to a shareholder vote. >> we are leaving this program to take you live to the east room at the white house where the president and first lady are hosting a dinner to honor the armed forces who serve in iraq. the dinner and expression of the nation's gratitude include 200 veterans and their families from all 50 states and the district of columbia and from all five branches of the military. live coverage here on c-span2. >> we are likely not to be invited back again for the next four years. and she said -- she said besides the president has a better place. [applause] i don't agree with that assessment personally. but we will see. i am particularly honored tonight to be joined by the

joint chiefs who are scattered through the audience with the general george tce, general rick sanchez and floyd austin who honestly have done some incredible heavy lifting for the nation over the past decade. you know, you all stand tall in an exceptionally long list of dedicated leaders who put their heart and soul in to see more difficult mission in iraq through to completion. for more than two decades that's the thing to remember, for more than two decades, iraq was a dominant part of our lives. in a sense it was a family affair, and what i mean by that is some of us send our own sons and daughters into this conflict of the past 20 years. all of us left our families behind come and toured after a tour they serve and supported every bit as much as we did. the road we traveled together was very tough.

every day required us to balance conflict and compassion, context and consequence. we learn the power of relationships. relationships rooted in trust and respect within ourselves, but also with our iraqi brothers and sisters and we saw just how profoundly impressive america's fighting force, the armed forces of the united states soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines and coast guardsmen and family members like all of you here tonight and those that i've known through the years probably represent because you and those who didn't come home with us, and those who turned forever changed really made possible with able to accomplish in iraq. it was your courage, your missoulians and/or resolve to take care of each other to

defend our nation and to provide the iraqi people with a choice for their own future. even in and maybe i would say especially in the toughest of times your character and of those you represent here tonight shine through, and it matters. mr. president, mrs. obama thank you for recognizing the service and sacrifice of military family in this very special way. i really appreciate, we really appreciate the service that you and vice president and dr. biden and those that they found together in joining forces initiative and the nation provide us as men and women in uniform and the families that would represent, and i know that we share a commitment to keep faith with them and the thousands that have returned

with wounds both seen and unseen fear is no one with more will be in the person that i now have the opportunity and the privilege to introduce. ladies and gentlemen, our secretary of defense, the honorable leon panetta. [applause] thank you very much, general dempsey coming and he does have one hell of a voice. thank you for your duty and dedication and service to this great nation that we all represent here this evening. tonight we are truly in the company of heroes. the honor that we present to all

of you is because we care about those that have fought and sacrificed in iraq. mr. president, mrs. obama, we think you deeply for honoring those heroes and welcoming them into your home. to all who fought in iraq, we thank you for your service. you have heard our nation's everlasting gratitude. we are indebted to you for your willingness to fight, your willingness to sacrifice for your country. we are indebted to your families and to your loved ones for the sacrifices that they made so that their loved ones could help defend this nation.

again and again and again left the comfort of the family and friends and the comfort of this great country and confronted the brutal reality what in places like baghdad, ramadi, fallujah, sadr city, the opportunity to be part of a democracy. you are part of the generation

of americans responding to the call of duty by your nation, deployment after deployment you have been willing to serve this nation, willing to put your lives on the line who come in and you've been willing to die in order to protect this country you have done everything this country asked you to do. you'd returned to a grateful nation, and you can stand proud of all that you have accomplished. we owe it to all of you to honor that your service is deserving, and we owe it to you the assurance that we will never forget the sacrifices of those who are not with us this

evening. those who gave their lives for this country. we pledge to their memory and to all of you that we will never forget, and we will never retreat from what you have accomplished. last december in baghdad we chased the color of the united states forces iraq and i had the chance to be at that ceremony, and at the time i noted this is not the end. this is truly the beginning. for america tonight, this is not the end. it is the beginning of a long lasting tribute to you and to all who served in iraq. this country was built upon the service and sacrifice of men and women like you. our very democracy depends on people like you who are willing to step forward and defend this

country to sell lewd and yes, to fight to give each of us a chance to pursue the american dream come giving our children a better life. just as you have recognized and fulfilled your responsibility to the nation, we must do the same for you. it is now our responsibility, the responsibility of communities every corner of this country to embrace your return to welcome you back and to ensure that you and your families have the support you deserve. secretary of defense, i can't tell you how proud i am of you and how proud i am of every american who served this country in uniform, and now it is my honor to introduce someone who believes deeply in the american dream. you are both products of that as the children of those who came from other countries. and he has dedicated to

defending and preserving that dream. i'm grateful to vice president biden and dr. jul jill biden. they have a son, boe deployed to iraq so they know what the war is all about and the sacrifices that are required of military families. over the past three years, vice president and joe biden has traveled to the region extensively and has played a tremendous role in steering the iraq policy. he probably deserves a combat badge for the political battle that he has been involved in coming and jill has led the effort along with mrs. obama to support our military families. on behalf of all of us at the department of defense, we think the president, mrs. obama, the vice president and dr. jill

biden for their leadership come for their support, for their dedication for the strong america, strong in mind, strong in body and strong in spirit. ladies and gentlemen, the vice president of the united states. [applause] >> i came because i was expecting a duet tonight. [laughter] i thought maybe we were going to hear you and my irish friend actually sing, mr. president. i'm betting on new. look, let me begin by saying that special thanks to general casey, sanchez, odierno and austin. the good news for kec and

sanchez, they only had to see me three or four times. general odierno had to see me close to a dozen times and general austin put up with me at the end, and i want to say to all in here the joint chiefs we owe you a debt of gratitude because you have trained the finest generation of warriors and this is not hyperbole, the finest generation of warriors in the history of this country, and i would argue in a literal sense the finest generation and all of history. you know, i get frustrated as the president does when i hear him talk about generation x and how generation x isn't ready for all of the travails the other generations have been through. most of you in this room are made up of i would call the 9/11

generation. you are the most incredible generation this country has produced. since 9/11, over 2.8 million of your generation, men and women have joined the military knowing and in many cases hoping you would be sent into harm's way. more than a million of you strap on boots and walked across the sands of iraq with temperatures up to 135 to 40 average in 117 in the summer. over a million of you. the journey began nine years ago when the rumble across the border of kuwait and into one of the most challenging missions that american military has ever undertaken. all of you sitting at our table tonight, you know better than anyone it was something sometimes an impossible mission,

sometimes to determine who the enemy was. i was just a few short years ago. a few years ago there were literally hundreds of bodies a day piled up in the baghdad board. the highways became mine fields. it was one of the most dangerous places in the world. every convoy was a test of fate. you saddled up every single day after seeing some of your buddies blown up, after cleaning up the vehicles and you saddled up the next day and a double its foot in an envelope under the family store and became an unmistakable warning they had to leave the house and the neighborhood or they would die. while you may have been steeped in the military doctrine coming and you have been, you were also made the vagaries of the local iraqi politics come issues ranging from electricity and unemployment from currency exchange to tax collection.

you're incredible, you adopt it, you succeeded and you defeated. you defeated a tyrant, you beat back violent extremists and the most remarkable thing you did because of the breadth of your capability coming to enable the country that hadn't been governed in any reasonable way for over four decades. you actually helped them set up institutions and train a military and a civilian court that gives them a real fighting chance. today because of you rather than a giant vacuum in the strategically vital region there's a prospect of stability and prosperity and that wasn't luck. it wasn't an accident. it was your sacrifice and hard work that made it possible, and it will never be forgotten pitted president truman once described the end of a war as a

fall of glorious honor, excuse me, a psalm of glorious hours. i believe it is presumptuous of me to interpret what he meant, but i believe that he meant honoring those who fall also requires remembering those who were lost. 4,475 and the exact number is important. 447,541 angels to get more than 30,000 wounded. some of you in this room. others barras leon said the invisible scars of their experience. the president will speak and i can tell you we are both awed by the said device but not just those of you that deployed, but your brothers and sisters and

husbands and wives, your mom, your data. john milton, the english poet once said they also serve only stand and wait. they also serve to only stand and wait. we owe to you your family members almost as much as we know it to you. every morning i walk in and jill would be getting her cup of coffee over the sink mouthing a prayer. wives and husbands of the deployed, brothers and sisters, there wasn't an hour a day that didn't go by that didn't flash across your mind wandering is my husband, my wife, my son, my daughter, or the okay. it's an incredible thing to ask so many people. and now in the finest american tradition having carried out your mission, you come home as i

said when i was with general austin and the taliban and a couple of you were there, it's good to see you here instead of in baghdad. but like every american before you come every warrior before you, left iraq taking nothing with you but your experience, your achievements and the pride associated with knowing that you did an incredible job. that's an american tradition, too, taking nothing but your pride back home. so on behalf of a grateful nation, there's never going to be a way we can truly reap a you. there is no way to fully pay you so let me simply say thank you, thank you and your families for the heroic work that you've done. you've made a difference, and i think that you have helped chart a different course for the history of the 21st century.

but ladies and gentlemen, a man i sat with every day for the past three years or so, i've watched him make the decisions he had to make about the war in conflict, i've watched him how he's done at come and i know presumptuous of me to say, i know every one of those decisions had to be made hang heavy in his mind and his heart. there is no one i've encountered and i've been here for eight who care more about you and all of you that continue to serve them this man. ladies and gentlemen, i am proud to introduce to you your commander in chief and my friend, barack obama. [applause] [applause]

thank you so much everyone. please come everyone have a seat. thank you, joe biden, for not only outstanding remarks that the extraordinary leadership that you have shown it in helping to guide our policies. secretary leon panetta, general dempsey, to all of the commanders who are here and did so much under such extraordinary circumstances to arrive at an outcome in which the iraqi people have an opportunity to chart their own destiny, thank you for the great work that you've done. i do have to say that despite the advice, i thought dempsey was going to burst into song. you have not lived until you hear him built out an irish

than mine and never profit in your own land so your life so dear to cut you down a peg. distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, this house has stood for more than two centuries to the war and peace, hardship and prosperity. these rooms have toasted presidents and prime ministers and kings and queens. but in the history of this house, there's never been a might quite like this. because this evening welcome not a statesman who decide great questions of war and peace, but citizens, men and women from every corner of the country for every rank of our military, every branch of our service who answer the call who go to the

war, defended the peace. in the culture that celebrates fame and fortune, yours are not necessarily household names. there's something more. the patriots to serve in our name and after nearly nine years in iraq to might there is an opportunity for us to express our gratitude. this is not the first time that we pay tribute to those that serve courageously in iraq this will not be the last and history reminds us of our obligation as a nation at moments like this. this will mark the 50th anniversary of the imam war. the time our veterans didn't always receive the respect for

the thanks they so richly deserve. that is a mistake we must never be pete. the good news is already we have seen americans come together in small towns and big cities all across the country to honor your service in iraq. tonight on behalf of michelle and myself and on behalf of over 300 americans, 303 million americans who want to express those simple words that we can never say enough and that's thank you. in your heart each of you carry your own story, the pride of the job well done, the pain of losing a friend, a comrade, ernie pyle said your world could never be known to the rest of

us. tonight what we can do is convey what you've meant to the rest of us because through the dust and the fault of the war and the glory of your service has always shown through to make in your example we see the virtues and the values that sustain america that keep the country great. you taught us about the duties to live in the land of the free you could have offered for an easier path, but you know that freedom is not free, so you volunteered and stepped forward and raise your hand and took an oath to protect and defend and serve a cause greater than yourself building in a time of war you could be sent into harm's way. you taught us about result and innovation turned to the insurgency and sectarian strike

but he persevered tour after a tour, year after year. we are mindful even as we gather here, the iraq veterans continue to risk their lives in afghanistan and our prayers are with them all tonight. in one of the nation's longest, you wrote one of the most extraordinary chapters in american military history. now the iraqi people have a chance to forge their own destiny and everyone that serve their can take pride in knowing you gave them the stuff opportunities that succeeded in your mission. you told us about devotion, the country and comrades most of all, the family. i know some of the hardest days of the war for the moment yunis back home, the birthdays,

anniversaries, when your little boy or little girl took their first steps, and behind every one of you was a parent, spouse, son or daughter trying to stay strong and praying for the days that you come home safe. that's why michelle and dr. baden have made it their mission to make sure that america takes care of your families because they inspire us as much as you do and they deserve the honor as much as you do and that's why i would ask all of the spouses and the partners and families to stand up and accept our gratitude for your remarkable service especially because you look so good tonight. [applause]

the taught us about sacrifice, a love of country so deep, so profound you are willing to give your lives for it. tonight we've a solemn tribute to all who did. we remember the first, the first day of the war. major jade thomas, captain ryan anthony, corporal kanaby, staff sergeant kendal de mant. and we remember the last specialist david emanu-el, november 14th, 2011. separated by nearly nine years, they are bound for all time alone with a nearly 4500 american patriots who gave all they had to give. to their families including the gold star families here tonight, know that we will never forget

their sacrifice and that your loved ones live on in the nation now and forever. you taught us about strength, the kind that comes from within, the kind that we see in our wounded warriors. for you, coming home was the start of another battle, the battle to recover come to stand, to block, to serve again and in your resilience we see the absence of america because we do not give up no matter the hardship we push on. as the wound of the war can last a lifetime so does america's commitment to you and all who served to give you the care that you learned and the opportunity you need to get the next proud chapter in your lives. finally come all of you taught us a lesson about the character

of our country. as we look across the room tonight, we look at our military regional strength from every part of our american family, every color, every creed, every background come every believe, and everyday use succeed together as one american thing to it as your commander in chief i couldn't be more proud of you to read as an american come as a husband and father of two daughters, i couldn't be more grateful for your example of the kind of country we can be, of what we can achieve when we stick together. so i will leave you the picture that captures the spirit from that day in december when the last convoy rolled out. the american soldiers standing beside their vehicle marked with the words last vehicle out of

iraq, and they are young men and women, shoulder to shoulder, proud, heads held high, finally going home, and they were asked what it was like to be the really the last troops out of iraq. and one of them gave a simple reply, we completed the mission, we completed the mission. we did our jobs. so i propose a toast. it to the country we love comes to the men and women who defend her come to that faith, that fundamental american faith that says no mission is too hard, new challenges to great to test and three trials we don't simply endure we emerge stronger as before knowing that america's

greatest days are still to come and they are great because of you. cheers. god bless you and your family and me got a continue to bless those in a uniform and the united states of america. thank you very much everybody. [applause]

when the senate this week is considering the transportation bill but some of today's debate centered on the amendment by republican senator roy blunt of misery dealing with insurance coverage for contraception. the amendment would allow providers to decline to offer the coverage if they are morally

against it. a vote on the amendment is scheduled for tomorrow. without this portion of today's debate is two hours. oftt >> i want to talk about an i amendment that said lots of attention tthat might offer on the floor a couple of weeks ago, and we were not able -- the leader didn't want to get to it at the time that the majority im leader brought up for mealk yesterday and i am glad he did.t i'm glad we are able to talk about it. this is the amendment out what o allow religious belief or moral conviction to be an important factor whether or not peoples. comply with new health caremr. r mandates. now we have long had thisand, ic exemption for hiring mandates and when i served in the house, of representatives - theortanc president of the southern baptist university in by understood the importance of these institutions.

i thought maintaining theirhey distinctiveness as part of whyn they provide education and health care and day care and other things and so i've long been an advocate of thejust a principal the supreme court hela up just a few weeks ago nine to zero that there is a difference in the state based institutionss and now that we have health carn mandates that could apply to these institutions all this amendment does is extend theothv same privilege to them andlief others that have a religious tht belief or moral conviction the would be able to defend their moral conviction. we don't do anything about the mandate itself it's important to understand the administration aa that the affordable health care act is still in forced to issue all the mandates that the act yt

will allow and in fact if you don't comply with those mandates he would have the penalties thei actf would allow the the difference is if the government would recognize your religious belief or moral conviction as i think they would likely do, for the extent of the archdiocese oa washington, d.c. saying this is something we have long held as a tenet of our faith that we don'd believe should happen and we shouldn't be part of and wehe don't want it to be part of the insurance policy of our schools or hospitals my guess is if we pass this amendment without anyd question, the justice department would say you were going to be able to defend that because that's been your believe for ame some trace. procedu of this amendment doesn't mention epy procedure of any kind. r just this morning we had a reporter called the office and say we can't find the wordacept contraception in this amendment

how anywhere. how is this a vote on contraception and of course weoe were able to say as we had said the word contraception isn't in there because it's not about a specific procedure, it's about t principle but the first amendment guarantees.s and mr. president, this language, this exact language of religious belief or moral conviction was first used in 1973 in the public health services act brought to thedahow senateho floor by senator church from idaho who i believe was considered one of the liberals of the senate at the time havine protecting health care providers from having to be involved in. procedures they didn't agree with. it's part of the legal service corporation limitation and 1986n the refusal to participate in execution and prosecution and4 capital crimes in 1994, thethate

vaccination bill that if you come taso this country as a nonresident and you don't wantev to have vaccinations that were otherwise required you don't have to have them if you have a religious belief or moral conviction against them.medica and the list goes on and on.eral nhe medicare and medicaid pla counseling act that the employees' health benefits planc of 1998 the contraception from 1999 to d.c. contraception mandate in 2000 the united states leadership against aids act in 2003 and then even mr. president, this exact same language even more specifically has been w in bills that were nr passed.ht fl 1994, senator moynihan from new yooork brought a bill to the floor that mrs. clinton laterse senator clinton nowna secretarys clinton was vecery involved in,

this 1994 health discussion andn that bill said nothing in the c title should be construed toloym prevent any employer from s contributing to the purchase ofu a standard benefits package which excludes coverage for abortion or other services if bs the employer objects toelief or self-service on the basis of religious belief or moral conviction. this is senator moynihan less than 20 years ago in what was considered a liberal piece ofbef legislation putting what the country fought since the beginning of government paid part o healthf care was just a naturall part of every health care bill t and the bill we are talking the about that this amendment woulde impact is the first time the't s federal government passed a health care bill that didn't include this language. the first time it didn't includf heis language. t

and if you're not offended by the current mandate that some religions are i think it'sff important to think of enwhat you would be that in your faith would be an offensive thing to be told you have to be a part of and then imagine the government sayingand you have to ebe part of that ad even if you don't do it yourself you have to pay for it or you have to beha sure that the employees and the associates arc part of this thing that is m offensive to you because ofconv. religious belief or moralfriendr conviction.an before i go tons my friend senar johanns who understands this say issue so well, let me also say that as i said, mr. president, we didn't eliminate t the mandae so you can still have theou're t mandate.offeri these the federal government can still ty you're not offering theand service is so you have to pay the penalty and then you have to be able to go to court and prove that you have a long-held belief

that this is wrong. this the court in 1965 when thisaw particular phrase became the boilerplate phrase for the law y the court said it can't become a conscientious objector when youa get your draft notice in essenco that you have to have theseong l tinciples, gaffe to haved you e religious belief come strong moral conviction and you have to be able to go to court and prove that. all of the fiction writers outrd there and fund-raising letterswo and otherwise say things likeldt women that have contraceptive eouldn't have them. of course that's not true. of course that's not true.e the women that have the services ther have them because they found a way to pay for theg themselves, or they have been employed to that's providing them as a part emp of health ca. that employer won't be able to turn around and say i'm not for that anymore because i reject de religious reason that i don't

already have all the time i was providing. it's an issue group after group after group violates the religious freedom act bill lawsuits already i suspect theye have a good chance of prevailing because it does exactly what ths religious freedoms as you can do it needlessly forces people to r participate in activities that arein against their moral principles and religious principles. the circumstance in the country as we have 220 years of history of this, we have almost 50 years of history of government paid gd health care for one group or another that always included inn the exemption like this

exemption and assumes the government can make people do things, thomas jefferson andhe george washington and othershatd specifically said were among the rights that we should defend the most vigorously, we should hold the most your, we shouldn't lets a government interfere in thesec wsic rights ofe conscience, an term of thomas jefferson when he rode the new london refasten 89 these rights of conscience are in the area that we should not let the government to get between the american people and their religious beliefs, and our laws since then whether it's for hiring or in the case of any health care discussion havehe always anticipated the. protection of this first amendment right, not a specifice thing, but again if you are not offended by the things somertant people are concerned about today it's important to think of whate

you would be offended by. what you're a religious belief leads you to believe would beea wrong and how you'd feel if the government says now you have to be a part of that activity andom i'd like to turn to my good has friend from nebraska who has been a real of the king of a understanding the importance of the firstit amendment and the re it plays in our society.. presil mr. president? thi >> mr. president, let me start y this afternoon thinking my colleague from missouri taking on this issue putting thislet legislation together, let meelle also thank my colleague foris telling boe real story of this legislation. it is critically important that we understand the history that brings us here this afternoon, and ultimately to a vote on this

legislation i am proud to jus co-sponsor.bly my colleague just so ably pointed out what has changed administration working with our, colleagues on the other side of the ogle took this importantf language out of the health care. legislation for decades, for decades this important upotection was in the s legislation, and it was co liberals, conservatives and the was the history of our countrysc until all the sudden this change came about where the conscience protection was taken out of the health care legislation that was passed a couple of years ago.ook

but let's look back even further in our history. the first freedom in our bill of rights is the liberty to rxercise any religion that youte might choose, or for that matter and that is what this united states of america is based upone this concept that you have theo freedom to choose what faith will belong to, what teaching's he will follow, and as i said,pl you have the choice to not participate at all if you choose to in this country. fro yet the president and myisle colleagues from across the aisle want to force someone to force religious institutions for the

first time in the history of oug country to violate their strong moral convictions coming and they go even further. they want to somehow shroud this, unveil it as a women's health issue. let me set the record straight. this debate is not about that as some would have you believe, and it's certainly not about contraceptives. contrace what tpthis debate is about is fundamental to our freedom as citizens of this great country. its religious liberty that we are talking about. it's an american issue that dates back to our very founderst who looked at the war that theyd just thought and said to themselves we are never going tr allow our country to force us th

attend a certain church or to participate in a certain fifa,rn not at all coming into was written in one of our most sacred of documents, the bill of rights, and yet the president of the united states is trampling on this religious freedom in fem attempting to convince americans that it's something else. forcig its power grab is forcing religious institutions to go against their deeply heldto ther beliefs, and if they stay true to their beliefs, the congressional research service reports these religious insurerd and employers may face federal fines of $100 per de per plan. let me give you an example of how that will work in my state. for the self insured institutios

like creighton university in uny nebraska, judge wood institution , they have about 6,000 6,000 health care plans.on so the cost to the university in omaha nebraska to exercise their new purchase liberty will be an annual price tag of t $246 million. that's the price of exercising o theirus religious liberty in the unbelievable. iernet well, i went on the internet,one and i would ask unanimous on consent to put into the record in open letter to the presidentd that it's being signed by women all over this country. >> no objection.en >> women have signed, and one oe the things they say is that they are proud to work fornstitutis t

their community. f let me quote from that letter the value of a shared sense of c purpose found among the colleagues who choose their jobs because in a religious institution a job is also a w vocation. of these women are americans who believe this mandate about federal government interfering with religious liberty is wrongp i will wrap up my piece of thiss the jim demint from mazzetti ar. for his leadership in this area the president has said he offered an accommodation, the accommodation is that lo and to behold this is going to be freeo now why would like to know what

legal authority he relies uponvr the president could ever orderer anyone to offer a service or an item of free. he has no such authority.tes this is in the soviet union, this is the united states of america we don't believe that fornt a moment. of course you are going to be paying for this for yourwell, m insurance premiums.we well, my hope is that we willwil read our constitution and we holding religious freedom which is being violated by this thank mandate. for >> i thank my friend for this t snd i would say also that evenei if there is some accountingbeome thing that makes this appear ine that maybe someone you're hiring is paying for it instead of you if this is something you areboue

opposed to for religious groundt it isn't abhaout the cost, it'su the fact that this is something pue don't believe you should by part of. faith, in my particular faith, the contraception part of this is not troublesome for me but it be doesn't mean that i should be less trouble that it bothersca others or that i should care less about their religious freedom than i do mind or that i should care about the governmene using the heavy hand to force you to do something and the other point i would like to make s fore i go to my friend from i idaho is if the governmentch chooses to fine you you actuallt have to go to court and prove you had a deep religious belieft and i don't think that would be hard for creighton university.te the hentire history of the f universityou is founded on thesa principles of faith that what to say this is something we don'tif want to be part of. if that's the case may be thatn'

justice department wouldn't make you to go to court rather than t to pay the fine but they could.s we are not saying that anyone ay usuld do anything they want towj do. we are creating a way that youtu can exert your first amendment rights if you choose to do that and as the governor of idahof pe senator risch said was state responsible for lots of people that o work for the state of idt he knows about this from the fifth perspective and the persp employer perspective and i'me ce glad he came down to the floor.y mr. senator. i want to speak briefly on this issue, and i want to thank those who have put this on the table for us to talk about. every single american should watch the debate on this issue. this debate strikes to the heart of the freedoms that we as americans enjoy. why do we have these freedoms? because in 1776, the people

decided they were sick and tired of the king telling them that they had to do this and that they had to do that and had totally wiped out a number of freedoms that they had, not the freedoms that they had, not the not the least of which was speech and religion. remember these people operated under someone who is so powerful a monarchy was so powerful it established a religion and said you must belong to this religion if you are a citizen of this country. and when we fought to be free of that, when we fought to be a free people, the founding fathers put together a document that specified vary clearly freedom that we would have. c we have come many many years since then, but we will lose these freedoms if we don't guard them when even a little chip and comes out of it and that is whag

they are doing here. think about this for a t minutep we have gotten to the point where this government has gotten so good and so powerful that they say look, we don't care in about what you believe in your t religion because what we are doing here is a good thing. and therefore, you must do what we are telling you because the ends justify the means, and that means is to chip away at the we religious freedoms that we as americans enjoy. it's wrong, it's the way you lose your freedoms if you turn your back and let a government,s lose to you.ose this is how you lose your freedoms. this government is getting bigger by the day. mor it is getting more powerful byrt the day. when they sat around the table

in 1776, they had just fought with the government that had been terribly oppressive and t they argued amongst themselves. what are we going to do here?'ri we are going to create arnme. government. they knew from a historical perspective and they knew from their recent experience that any government that they create needed to be destructive, needed to be watched, needed to have shackles on it because if they d didn't, the government would abuse them just as every government has throughout history. says that is why we drew theive document that we live underha today, the constitution constitution that we g have.e u theys never gave us one government. they gave us a a legislative rah and executive branch in judicial branch each with a duty to watch the other and beat the other over the head of the got out of

line. they werego so afraid of the government that they did everything they possibly could to see that government did notwe abuse them. well we learneed frequently that it is well-founded and today wef see once again that their fears wereer well-founded, and what yu have here is a government who is saying we don't care what youro religious beliefs are. you must do what we are telling you to do because we think it's the right thing to do.us regardless of your religious beliefs. it's wrong, it has's got to be fought, it must be reversed and i want to thank you senator forf bringing this to the attention and i yield to the floor. mr.re >> there'll waivers on thisedm mr. president.en the administration has given over 70 million waivers to a 4 million people.n if you have got a plan that is better than the government plant if you have a plan that might be taxed under the law because it'e been negotiated as part ofou

collective'r bargaining, if youn are in a fast food institution that has insurance but apparently with high deductibles, those were all reasons to create a waiver. you would think that a b faith-based belief would also be the reason that a waiver could have been granted. thisyo amendment just assures tt you can have the same kind ofy opportunity to exercise your religious beliefs going forward as every american has in healthg care, in labor and in hiring and other areas.iend, t i've been told right now and i would like to turnhe to my fried the senator from texas. >> mr. president i want toy express my gratitude to thei senator from missouri for histhu leadership on this issue. the seas this used to be a topic that was a bipartisan issue dating back to the passage ofct the religious freedom restoration act of 1993. p

just so people can refresh theiy memory, there has, been a number of deletions made to the language of the constitution buf let t me just read the first amendment to the united statesg, constitution,he part of our bill of rights. can the fundamental law of the land cannot m be abridged or a change by a mere act of congress which is i what we are concerned abou. the president's health careare bill, the affordable care act,ti so-calledon reports to change te constitutional, which he cannot do and when there's a conflict between the constitution andd tw law passed by congress, that law falls as unconstitutional.ta but thtee first amendment to the united states constitution says congress shall make no lawment o respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exerciseex thereof.cong let me repeat that. congress shall make no law

respecting an establishment ofce religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. fre that is what we are talking about is the free exercise of religion. i agree with senator risch that one of this legislation the president's health care bill, the so-calleds affordable care act which we have come to learn is not so affordable is that it forces each individual in this country to buy a government approved product according to the tapesiu of congress, and that is one of the issues the united states supreme court willve be ruling c whether that is even withingr te scope of congressional power under the commerce clause. but senator risch makes a very good point. that is the basic problem with this legislation generally, is it is too big, it's too expensive and it's too intrusive on the individual freedoms and

choices of american citizens. and like t i said, it used to be that religious freedom was ai bipartisan issue and that is why i am so concerned that this isus turned into a purely partisan issue. our it's very obvious to me that some of our colleagues on the floor believe they c can make political hay by scaring people, by misleading people that this isow somehow about denying women access to contraception and that is not the issue here. this is about protecting ourut sacred constitutional freedoms.l when i say religious freedom iss to be a bipartisan issue, i was referring to the religious freedom restoration act of 1993, and i think it's interesting to see who the sponsors and people who were some of the principlewa proponents of the bill. that it was so chuck bipartisan. the lead sponsor in the house with senatorch chuck schumer, nw a member of the united states

senate. co-sponsors included then representative maria cantwellen now in the senate, then representative ben cardin who if presidingor today and former speaker nancy pelosi.cosponso in thers senate it had 60 co-sponsors, ted kennedy was the lead sponsor.rom we we we have heard senator o brownlow senator from massachusetts say the position he is taking on this issue of religious freedom is exactly thk same position that senator kennedy took during his lifetime. i 60 other members of the senate cosponsored including senator boxer, senator feinstein, senator kerry, senator lautenberg, senator levin andhee senator read the majority leader of the united states senate today. it was signed into law by thennn president clinton, demonstratina it was clearly religious freedom was not a partisan issue. it was a bipartisan concern ofhi congress ands the reason why ths bipartisan legislation passedom.

the protect religious freedom.ou so just likerc members of the catholic church church who today are concerned about being forcel to provide coverage for surgical sterilization or drugs that induce abortions or other forms of contraception. members of the muslim faith neeo not be concerned about restrictions on their ability ta wear, their desire to wear headscarves in public buildings orpu dietary rules practice byht observant or the christians would not be somehow interfered with when it came to wearing religious symbols like crosses or rosaries. this is not about those, those pieces of, those rules or thoses items ofbo clothing or religious symbols. this is about religious freedom over which congress shall pass no law under the words of ourm constitution. so, i am somewhat disappointed

that we now find ourselves and the lines seem to have been in drawn so sharply in a partisanhs way over issues that used to enjoy such broad bipartisan support. it's my hope that our colleagues will reconsider because it's not good fort' the country and it'sf not good for our constitution. it's not good for the preservation of our liberties for the very fundamental law of our land, the bill of rights. if there is a fight, if there is a disagreement i believe it is our responsibility to speak upom for the defense of religious freedom and to say and remind our colleagues that congress shall pass no law restrictinge religious freedom and that is. what we are here talking about.f so i thank my colleague from missouri for being the leader on this important amendment and i'm pleased to have the opportunity to voice the reasons for my support and i hope our colleagues who are opposed to

the amendment who have publicly stated their opposition will reconsider. >> i i do too senator and i hopv we find that is the casee now.s' we don't have as much bipartisan support as we would like to have that a clue that we love some an fd senator ben nelson from ws nebraska, along with senator ayotte from new hampshire andfr senator rubioom from florida ann introduced this bill in augustet of last year. this is not just something that we came up with recently. members who were in the senate when the health care act, the bd affordable health care act passed, said they believed to fit it passed in a more normal way, that this would have been in the final bill. that would have been in w understanding just like it was in the patient's billie of righs draft and legislation that was introduced in 1994 or the health care bill in 1999. this same language was an

accepted and bipartisan part of who we are as a country,st enforcing the first amendment and in fact in the religious freedom restoration act, it saye government shall not substantially burden a person's exercise of religion even if the burden results from a a rule of general applicability, even a rule that would generally applied, the government should not burden a person's exercise of religion unless it demonstrates a burden that is in the furtherance of compelling government interest and i can'ti imagine. nobody has ever had to do this before. why would suddenly the finding insurance policies be onbelis o individuals and groups that were long-held? why is that a sudden compelling' government interest where it is the least restrictive means of burdening that government interest? certainly not.

i am going to repeat form what may bein the third or fourth ti. we don't do anything in this amendment that would end the mandate. that is fothr another debate atd another time. the government could still have a mandate. a the government could say this is what we are telling you a health care plan has to look like that this allows people who have a faith-based first amendment right to object to that do have a way to do it in one of the original co-sponsors of the bill that is the amendment we are debating today u has joined us d that a senator and a half from new hampshire and she is an advocate of the first amendment as a former attorney general. i'm glad she is here. >> thank you so much senator blunt.op mr. president i appreciate the opportunity to be here to rise in support of the pending amendment that is based upon as senator blunt mentioned a piece of legislation that was introduced on a bipartisan basis

earlier in the year called the w respect for rights of conscious act which i was proud toks co-sponsor. during the past few weeks we heard certainly impassioned arguments fromai both sides of e aisle about this issue, and certainly itcet' has been a rob, and important exchange of views, which i have appreciated. however i think it is regrettabl else that happens around here, this issue has been used as an election-year tactic to support political points and in some have been the facts of what this amendment and our bill hope to accomplish have been supplanted by mischaracterizations andmi distortions.sc that is unfortunate because what we are here to talk about is to incredibly important. this is a fundamental matter ofr religious freedom and the proper role of our federal government.s

it's about who we are ashe americans and renewing our commitment to the principles upon which this nation was founded.es the this today comes down to the legacy left behind by our founding fathers and over two years of american history.e we have a choice between being responsible stewards of their legacy in the first amendment to the constitution are allowing the federal government to interfere in religious life in an unprecedented way. the first amendment to the constitution starts with congress shall n make no law respecting religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. just last month, we saw our united statesem supreme court unanimously uphold under the establishment and free exercise clauses of our constitution a ruling in the the lozano taber case that the federal government may not infringe on the rights

of religious institutions in their hiring practices. to do so they ruled on ainrf unanimouser basis, would interfe with the internal governance of the i church. protecting religious freedom har in the paste, been as was bip mentioned here a bipartisanar issue. no less than ted kennedy himself, a lteiberal icon of the senate, wrote in 2009 to the pope, i believe in a conscious protectionhe for catholics in te health care field and willt. continue to advocate for it. senator kennedy had previouslycs pushed for the inclusion ofropod conscience protections in legislation proposed in 1997 as well as an affordable health care for all americans actthesee proposed in 1995. s these are the same protections our amendment seeks to restore. in 1994, provisions protecting

conscience rights were included in the recommendations made by the task force on national health care reform led by then first first lady hillary in clinton. 1 and in 1993 when president bill clinton signed the bipartisan religious freedom restoration act into law, he said, the government should be held to a veryve high level of proof befoe it interferes with someone's free exercise of religion. protectingpr religious freedom s once an issue that brought americans together and ite certainly is a very important issue as we take the oath of office here to uphold the constitution of the united states. wch and i believe this effort, which is so fundamental to our national character, must bring us together once more on a bipartisan basis. i would like to make one very important point about thisaveri amendment.ractize

unfortunately, many have tried to characterize this amendment as denying women access to herri contraception.ng that is a red herring and it is false. we are talking about government mandates that are interfering with conscious protection heren that have long been ingrained in our law and just to be clear, women had access to these services before the president past the affordable care act and after this amendment would be to passed we still have access to these important services. o what some of mye h friends on the other side of the asserted, this a measure simply allows health care providers and companies to have the same conscience rights they had before the president's healthth care bill took effect.d we are not embracing any new w ground here.e in fact we are respecting what is within our first amendment to

the constitution and what has long been a bipartisan effort to respect the conscience rights of all americans, whatever their religious views are. this goes to the heart of who we are.ernmt if we allow the government to dictate the coverage and plans paid for by religious institutions that is the first s step down a slippery slope. when religious liberty has been threatened in the past members of those sides of the aisle of congress have taken action to preserve our country's cherishes freedoms. we must do so again now or risk compromising a foundational american principle. i hope that my colleagues on both sides of the aisle will give this amendment carefulrecie consideration and appreciate that it is an amendment that will respect the conscience rights ofel all religions and wl certainly not deny women accessd to services that they need and deserve. i appreciate your having me today senator blunt and i hope

that my colleagues this important amendment.leadsh thank you. >> thank you for your leadership on the senator a ayotte and from the beginning of this discussion backan in august when senator he ayotte ian senator rubio and senator nelson from nebraska anj i filed this bill we have been joined in this amendmentne by 30 or more other sponsors, one of whom actually i mentioned as piece of legislation that he wan involved in the first time he was in the senate.igio r it protected the religious rights of people who were temporarily in the country with exactly the same language, whois might have some religious belief or moral conviction that meant that they did not want to get the vaccines that we would require a visitor to have.1996 senator coates in 1996 put thisa into law that virtually every p member of the senate on bothoted parties serving that they voted

for as they have time after time after time when this issue, thip language was understood to be ar important defense to the first a amendment and inti a health care piece of legislation.ed senator coates i am glad you r joined today and whenever i have looked into research this saw that you have used this very language 15 years ago in a piece of legislation and i know you are an important advocate of religious freedom. >> mr. president i thank the senator from missouri and senator blunt i thank him also for his willingness to engage with this amendment to put it in play here for us to debate and discuss. it t is one of the very fundamental principles of our constitution.eb it deserves this debate and it deserves this body putting theid

yeas ordinates on the line relative to how we are going tor go forward with us.ip. anyway i commend him for his leadership and i'm pleased to join him along with others ont this. we are all blessed by the wisdom of our founding fathers.t, the and in guaranteeing our rights. in fact the very first rights to beat guaranteed under the constitution is the right of religious freedom. so many of our early settlers sl came here because of that veryco right, because of their desire religious beliefs and tenets ans principles would be respectedan and honored and where they would not be dictated by the government which they lived here butore they came would be protected and preserved as a basic fundamental right. it was a transformational idea at the time and yet we are now

well more than 220 years or so it has been maintained throughout the history of this country. it stands against government interference withnc personal beliefs in a government trying to dig tate how we exercise the religious freedoms that we are also privileged to have. it has been said and i want to just repeated. the debate today is not about access contraception. this is not about whether or not it's appropriate to use contraception. it's not about a woman's right to contraception. as a pro-life christian and protestant i am not against als contraception but i also believe it's a decision that individuals must make by their own faith and beliefs, not a decision made for them by their federallly government.ongress so what this debate is really about is whether congress is going to sit by and idly of lao

this administration to trample this freedom of religion, or whether we stand up to protecton what our founding fathers put their lives on the line for and what millions of americans today will defend. we cannot pick and choose whenat to adhere to the constitutionder and went to cast it aside in order to achieve politicales. prerogatives. we musten consistently stand for our timeless constitutional principles. in the debate that is taking place, to protect inalienable right, right of consciencendin d established inay our nationsnedr founding days and sustained for over 200 years. i regret that this issue hasramd been reframed for political purposes into a women's, a woman's right to choose and to denying women the opportunity to exercise their right to make

their choice. that is not what this is about at all and yet some of this has been so successfully reframe that politically those who defend it as a matter of religious conscience and freedom are on the losing side of the political argument. not well, we may be or we may not up need. i think it's up to this body t t decide that. a thorough debate and a vote as i say that posts are yeas and a nays on the line. nevertheless whether it's a winner or a loser politically is irrelevant to the argument. it's should be irrelevant to ths debate because this clearly is t fundamental religious freedom that needs to be protected regardless of the political consequences of those of us who are standing up toar debate this are setting aside any kind of clinical risk and setting aside

any advice that says you don't want to touch this because it's been reframed in a way that the american people don't understand.y so we are here today to basically say, here we stand, here we stand t to protect thes liberties that are granted to us by our constitution and regardless of the political consequences we will continue to dol that. mr. president, i again want tons thanks senator blunt and all those who are willing to address this issue and trust that our colleagues will see this as a fundamental breach of the constitutional provision provided to us by people who sacrifice their lives to do so and with thank the senator daniel bakhtin. >> i thank the gentleman for coming in and i want to go nextk to my neighbor in the congress and now my neighbor in the senate, and my neighbor in real life from northwest arkansas and

i am from southwest missouri and glad senator boseman came down to discuss this issue. >> thank you.man:ha mr. president i want to thank the senator. from missouri and appreciate his hard work inbrint bringing his leadership inorwa bringing this amendment forward. president obama's accommodationl of religious liberty is revised health care mandate coveringcove contraceptives, sterilizations, medicines causing abortion, s than itre question ques answers. perhaps the mostti troublesome part is even with this revision, the president's mandate refuses tode of knowledge that the constitution guarantees conscious protection. instead he tries to run around n it. you don't accommodate religiouse liberty. you respected. that is why they are enshrined in the constitution. those constitutional protections should prevent the president from trampling the conscious rights of americans and

religious institutions, whose held a strong belief that contraceptives, sterilizations, drugs causing abortion areer wrong.co clearly however these constitutional provisions are not enough. present obama's accommodation shows he considers conscience rights to be an inconvenience andto effort to remake american decision. that is why we need to be -- thf respect for rights of conscious act,nc there will respect for rights of conscious act is introduced by my colleague from my neighboring state, senator blunt who seeks to restore conscious protections thatheal existed before president obama's health care law. these are the same protections and i think this is reallye t s important, these are the same t protections that have existed ys for more than 220 years since the first amendment was ratified. the senator from missouri spello has been an amendment to the

surface transportation act and we expect to vote on it as early as tomorrow.w.comm theen amendment's goal is commendable and i look forward tord supporting it. it is simply asking the president to respect the ma americans. many long-standing federal health care conscience laws protect conscientiousio objectis to certain types of medical services.ose .. sterilizeizations, contraceptives, including emergency contraceptives at no cost to policyholders. but he did not. now congress must step up and protect the religious liberties of all americans. we can do this by passing senator blunt's amendment, and i certainly encourage all of my colleagues to take a close look at this. this is so important, and

restore the conscience protections that we as a nation have always stood for. again, i commend the gentleman from missouri and look forward to supporting his amendment. a senator: thank you, senator for coming down. mr. blunt: let me conclude here by saying a growing list of group support this amendment. the home school appeal defense association family research council, the southern baptist americans united for life,ist the american center for law and justice. the susan b. anthony list. beckett fund for religious liberty. u.s. congress of catholic bishops. chris medical association. national right to life. national association of evangelicals orthodox union of jewish con a divisions. osh congregations. jewish women for american. american family association. catholic advocate. a trace additional values

coalition. alliance defense fund. christian coalition. advance usa. american association of christian schools. american principals project. wall builders. let freedom ring. liberty council action. free congress foundation. council for christian colleges and universities. student for life of america. heritage action and others are supporting this amendment. we go back to 1965 in a supreme court case where the determination of how a conscious, conscientious objector would be defined was clearly established in ways that led to this religious belief and moral conviction becoming the standard. not just, it is not just something that we came up with for this amendment. it's been the standard since,

since that 1965 case. these are the elements that you have to have. you can't just suddenly decide that you have got a religious conviction. this is a conviction that has to be a proveable part of who you are. the public health service act in 1973 where senator church brought this language into the public health arena. this is really the first major legislation after medicare and, in the medicaid discussion. the legal services corporation limitation. the foreign aid funding limitation. the, refusal to participate in executions or capital crimes limitation. this language was plenty good for those things and almost every member of the current senate, if they were there then voted for these things and since, including the action that senator

coates talked about earlier. the medicare and medicaid counseling and referral act. the federal employees health benefits plan. contraceptive coverage for federal employees in 1999. the d.c. contraceptive mandate in 2000. the united states leadership against hiv-aids tuberculosis and malaria act in 2003. all included this language. we had to get to the affordable health care act, which passed the senate and then suddenly it wasn't possible to go through the final process of legislating here. there was no conference committee. there was no house bill. my belief is that almost nobody who voted for that act originally thought that would be the final bill. frankly i think if we had ever had a more normal process, this normal element of protecting the first amendment would have been added as it was added every other time.

and this is, this is about the first amendment. i understand the fund-raising ability to make it about something else. i understand the pr ability to make it about something else but it's not about anything else. it's, a minute ago we had three protestants on the floor here who actually on the contraception issue have probably no religious problem at all. there may be other elements of this health care later i would have problems with but doesn't matter if i have a problem with it. what matters is that i represent lots of people and we represent lots of people who do and the constitution is specifically designed to protect those strongly-hell, those religious views. as senator coates said, it was the first thing in the first amendment. the first thing in the first amendment. it was exact in its duplication in 1994 in the

great health care, in the health care effort that was made in 1994. whether it was the religious protection of religious freedom or the patients' bill of rights or the effort that first lady clinton worked hard to do, this wasn't even a really debatable item because everybody understood this was a necessary part of protecting the first amendment to the constitution. again, i would say, if these two or three things that are most objectionable to the, catholic community right now, and many of the people who are opposed to this, are opposed to this because they wonder, well what they could be for that the government would decide, what they could be opposed to that the government would decide that they had to participate in? they had to be a provider of. they had to pay the bill

for. and i would ask my colleagues to think of, of something in their religious view that they wouldn't want to be forced by the government to be part of. let's just give all americans that same capacity who have the strongly-held religious beliefs. so i would encourage my colleagues to support the first amendment. i am grateful for those groups around the country who have rallied around the first amendment. freedom of religion defines who we are and has defined who we are since the very beginning of constitutional government. we're the first thing added to the constitution was the bill of rights. and the first thing in the bill of rights is the, is this, is respect for religion and we need to not give that away just to prove that everybody has to do what the government says because the government knows best rather than your conscience and your personal

views and this is not about, in whether people provide health care or not. it's about whether they're required to provide elements of health care that they believe are fundamentally wrong. and how could the government force people to do things that they believe and have a proveable religious conviction are fundamentally wrong? so, mr. president, i would, yield back, i think i have, we have used the hour we had but this debate will go on. there will be a vote tomorrow but this debate will go on until this important freedom is soundly protected and health care, in hiring, in all of the elements that create that faith distinctive in our individuals and institutions that make us uniquely who they are and i, i'm going to yield the floor. >> mr. president?

>> the senator from maryland. >> mr. president, i had the opportunity to listen to my colleague from missouri as he talked about his amendment. i know that he is very sincere in his efforts to protect the first amendment. if that is what this amendment was about he would have my support but let me try to go over the amendment and put it in context to how it is drafted. because this amendment goes well beyond, and i would agree with my colleague, the issue of contraceptive services. although the genesis of this amendment was because of contraceptive services and the request from religious institutions not to having to provide the coverage for those services. the amendment that we have before us would allow an employer, any employer, or any insurance company to deny essential medical service coverage based upon

a religious or moral objection. so the concern with this amendment is that it would allow any employer in this country to deny coverage of essential medical services in the plan that employer provides. now, yes, it could cover women's health care issues. it could cover contraceptive issues, mammography screenings, prenate it will screenings, cancer, cervical cancer screenings. an employer could very well say i'm against the moral issue concerning providing that coverage. i don't believe that the historical interpretations that my colleague went through apply to that type of circumstances. this amendment would go well beyond one particular service and would cover any medical service. in fact, it says that if an employer or insurance plan had any religious or moral objection to a service, that it can choose to exclude that service from the

essential benefit package or the preventative services provisions of the affordable care act. yes, it would affect women's health care. there is no question about that. it would affect health care of men and of children. affordable care act guaranties that all plans offered in the individual small group market must cover a minimum set of essential health benefits including, maternity and newborn care, pediatric services including oral and vision care. rehabilitative services and devices and mental health and substance use disorder services including behavioral health treatment. now, under the blunt amendment any employer could say look, i don't want to cover rehabilitative services for whatever reason. i have a moral objection to it. and they could exclude that service. preventative care would be at risk.

prenatal care would be at risk. life-saving immunization could be at risk. developmental screening, mental health assessments, hearing and vision tests. any employer could make a judgment not to cover anyone of those services. any insurance company could, based upon a quote, moral objection. that is a very broad standard. that's were pediatricians oppose it. american academy of pediatrics. american congress of obstetricians. association of maternal and child health programs. the children's dental health project. easter seals, genetic alliance. march of dimes. national association of pediatric nurse practitioners. these are not political groups. these are health care groups. because they know this amendment could put at risk what we were attempting to

achieve in the affordable care act. that is to make sure we had coverage for essential health services for the all of people of this country. well, an employer could say i don't want to cover preventative services. i have a moral objection. that could happen. this amendment would allow employers to decline to offer life-saving screening for prostate cancer screening by simply citing a moral objection even though one in six men in the united states will be diagnosed with prostate cancer during their life time. last year 33,000 americans died from prostate cancer. and an employer who claims a moral objection to cigarette smoking to under the blunt amendment deny employees coverage for smoking cessation programs or treatment for lung cancer. i have a moral objection to smoking. i'm not going to cover in my health care plan treatment for lung cancer. more people die from lung cancer than any other type of cancer. more than 200,000 people are

diagnosed with lung cancer each year. more than 150,000 die from it. last year 85,000 were men. an employer who claims a moral objection to alcohol consumption could, under the blunt amendment, deny coverage for substance abuse or rehabilitation or for medical treatment for liver disease if it is found to be the result of alcohol abuse. nowhere in affordable care act does it stipulate any american must take advantage of the expanded preventative health services. here's where we have agreement. we have an agreement. we're not trying to tell anyone what they have to do. we, i am, i've been a defender of the first amendment my entire legislative career. if you have a religious objection to this, don't use the services. nowhere in the affordable care act does it require a woman to use contraception or a man to have cancer screening or a child to receive well baby visits. what the affordable care act

requires that every american have access to these services so that they can decide for themselves with the advice of their physician whether or not they're appropriate and healthy to utilize. if the blunt amendment were used by employers to deny access to care, we're denying the people in this country, the right to make that choice themselves. and i agree. it is not just contraceptive services. it is the choice to be able to have preventive services. to take care of your children. have screenings for early detection of cancer or to have treatment for serious diseases. all that could be put at risk. the affordable care act uses health care as a right, not a privilege. it expand freedoms to american workers and their families rather than limit them. i understand the intentions may be very pure but and we want to have a resolution saying that we support the first amendment. you will have all of us in

agreement on that. but when you say you're using that to remove from the affordable care act the essential health coverage for services i think all of us agree should be available to every person in this country, to make a decision whether he or she wants that health care, this amendment could be used to deny them that ability to get that health care. whether it is women's health care issues, which was the genesis of this amendment originally, debate we had a couple weeks ago, or whether it's the care of our children or the care of each american, this amendment puts that at risk by allowing an individual employer or insurance company to make a decision to eliminate essential health service coverage. i don't believe we want to do that. i urge my colleagues to reject the blunt amendment. with that, mr. president, i would suggest the absence of a quorum. >> mr. president, i just am

on the floor here today as i was earlier, to talk about the dangers of this blunt amendment and senator blunt says that it has nothing to do with providing health care to women. it has nothing to do with that. it is just about freedom of religion he says. well as many people say when someone comes up to you and says, you know it is not about the money, it is about the money. and when someone says it's not about access to women's health, it is about religious freedom, it is about access to women's health. why do i say that? because that's what this debate is all about. and we see it all over the country with right-wing republicans trying to take away women's health care. why are they trying to do this? you would have to ask them. but we are here to say no. and the thing about the blunt amendment, it would not only say that any insurers or any employer for any reason could stop women

from getting access to contraception, it could also stop all of our families from getting access to essential health care services and preventative health care services. why do i say that? let's take a look at the blunt amendment. enough of this chatter. let's take a look at it. here's what it says. a health care plan shall not be considered to have failed to provide the essential health care benefits package described in our law or preventative health care services described in our law if they exercise what they call, a moral objection. so say someone has a moral objection to someone who has smoked and the person wants to give up smoking and they want to get a smoking cessation program as part of their insurance. if the insurance says, that's your fault. you're not getting it.

or someone who may have diabetes and the employer or the insurer says, you know what? that was your problem. you ate too much sugar as a kid. too bad. that is what the blunt amendment does. and that is a fact. here it is. i have this here. this is the amendment. that's what it says. i want to show you this list of preventative services and essential health care service that is the blunt amendment threatens. remember, the blunt amendment says there is a new clause, that now says, any insurer or any employer can deny anyone of these benefits. emergency services. hospitalizations. maternity and newborn care. mental health treatment. pediatric services. rehabilitative services. that is just some. hear is the list of the preventative health care

benefits that any insurer or any employer could deny. breast cancer screenings. cervical cans are screenings. much hepatitis-a and b vaccines. yes, contraception. hiv screening. autism screening. hearing screening for newborns and this is the list. why do i show you this list, mr. president, particularly because i know you served on the health committee and help put this together. this is the list of services that was put together by the expert physicians in the institute of medicine. this list, preventative health care, and this list, essential health benefits. now i was stunned to come on the floor and hear senator ayotte invoke the name of our dear colleague, and our dearly-missed colleague, ted kennedy. and she tried to infer that he would support the blunt

amendment. now she is not the first republican to do i. and i'm calling on my republican friend to stop right now because there are several reasons why they are wrong to do that. first of all, ted kennedy in one of his last acts here, voted for the health care bill. and he voted for the health care bill, that came out of the health committee. he helped to write the preventative section. he helped to write the essential health benefits section. and he would never, ever, as his son has said, ever support the blunt amendment that would say to every employer in this country, if you don't feel like offering any of these, you don't have to. he fought hard for these. he wouldn't give an exception to an insurance company or a nonreligious employer. never. how else do i know that to be the case?

i asked unanimous consent to place in the record a series of bills. >> without objection. >> what are these bills? these are bills that called for equity for women to get contraceptive coverage if they were given other coverage. they had the right to get contraceptive coverage. ted kennedy was a leader. he is the cosponsor on all of these bills. you know for how many years, mr. president? 12 years. 12 years ted kennedy fought for women to get access to contraceptive coverage in their insurance. so i just say to my republican friends, don't come to the floor and invoke the name of our dear colleague. i was so proud the first thing i did when i came to the senate, he asked me if i would help him work on a bill to protect people who were going to clinics.

women's clinics that were being harassed at the clinic door. and you know what? i worked for him. i helped him on the floor. and i was so proud that we won that. and now there is a safety zone for women when they go to a clinic for their health care. their reproductive health care. that was ted kennedy. yes, ted kennedy, supported a conscience clause. we all do. and president obama has taken care of that. he has stated clearly in his compromise that if you are a religious institution, you don't have to offer birth control coverage. and if you are a religious affiliated institution, you don't have to cover it directly but you do indirectly. that was a solomon-like decision by our president. but that is not enough for my republican colleagues. they have to fight about everything. so i have to say, and i would like to it this in the record also, the letter that

patrick kennedy wrote, to senator brown in which he said, you are entitled to your own opinions but i ask that moving forward you do not confuse my father's position with your own. and he said, i appreciate the past respect you expressed for his legacy but misstating his positions is no way to honor his life's work. so i ask my colleagues here in this debate, come here and state your own views but don't misstate the views of a dear departed colleague who for 12 years supported the women's right to have access to contraception. mr. president, i think that the people watching this today have to be a bit confused because when they look up at the screen, it says that we're on a transportation bill and indeed we are. and indeed we've been on it for almost three weeks now. i say to my colleagues who know the importance of this bill, please let us get to

it. let us get to the heart of the matter. we have a huge unemployment rate among construction workers. the unemployed construction workers, they could fill 15 super bowl stadiums. that is how many are unemployed. we need to get to this bill. it's important to our businesses. it's important to our workers. it's important to our communities. it's important for our safety. it's important to fix the bridges and the highways. it is important to carry out the vision of a republican president, dwight eisenhower who said, it was key that we be able to move people and goods through our great nation. you know, when olympia snowe, our very respected colleague from maine told us yesterday that she would not seek re-election, she said it was because there is so much polarization here. and i said this morning, this bill is exhibit one. here we have an underlying bill that came out of four

committees in a bipartisan way. and it means that we can save $1.8 million jobs, create up to a million new jobs and guess what? the first amendment, birth control. women's health and an attack on women's health and we have to come here to the floor and stand on our feet and fight back. you know what? i'm proud to do it. i'm proud to do it. i'm proud of the men and women who have stood on this floor and have come to press conferences and been on conference calls fighting for women's rights. but this issue was decided a long time ago. we know that access to contraception is critical for people. a full 15% of women who -- [inaudible] fight debilitating monthly pain or make sure that tumors don't grow any larger or for severe skin conditions and the rest use it to plan their families and when families are

planned, you know what happens, mr. president? the babies are healthier, the families are ready, abortions go down in number. it is a win-win. and we all know that. we really all know that. i always thought we could reach across the aisle and work together to make sure that there was family planning but today just proves the opposite. that our colleagues on the other side, republicans, are really bound and determined to go after women's health. i stand here today opposing the blunt amendment. thanking my colleagues for their eloquence and hoping we can dispose of it, defeat it and get back to our transportation bill. thank you very much and i yield the floor. >> the senator from new jersey. >> mr. president, i rise to oppose the blunt amendment but simply goes way too far. the president has struck the right balance in his decision to address

religious institutions concerns when it comes to providing women's health services but this amendment gives all employers shockingly broad discretion to make moral decisions for their employees. fundamental decisions about some of the most personal issues and individual faces. the health care need of themselves and their families. a woman's decision about contraception and family planning. decisions about whether their child get as blood transfusion for a deadly disease. decisions regarding the use of prescription drugs. decisions on who to treat and how to treat them based entirely on an employer's moral views, not an individual's moral beliefs. the bottom line is, health services should not be provided at the moral discretion of an employer but on the medical determination of the employee and their doctor. according to the department of health and human services,

1.7 million new jersey anns, almost 500,000 children, 600,000 women, 600,000 men benefit from the expanded benefit coverage from private insures we created under law. screenings for kolan cancer. mammograms for women. well child visits. a flu shots, a whole host of other routine procedures, all of this could be taken away under this proposed amendment should their employer determine it is against their personal beliefs or convictions. every day millions of americans who are worried about a health condition go to see their doctor. millions of women go for necessary screening and access to legal medical procedures. their doctor evaluates their condition and recommends a course of treatment and that can range from simple preventative measures such as exercise and diet to a prescription drug regimen to major surgery. the last thing that a woman or her doctor should have to

concern themselves with is whether their employer will deem their medical treatment to be immoral based on their employer's personal believes, regardless of their own beliefs or needs. the last thing they need is to be denied coverage by an employer who would be allowed under this amendment to effectively practice a form of morality medicine that has nothing to do with accepted medical science, or the effected individual's personal beliefs. under the language of this amendment that's exactly what would happen. it would allow employers simply to deny coverage based on a particular religious doctrine or moral belief regardless of the science, medical evidence or the legality of the prescribed treatment. put simply, we expect our health insurers, to matter where we work, no matter what our faith to cover basic benefits and necessary

medical procedures recommended by our doctor. that we as individuals should have the right to decide which of those benefits we use based on our own personal beliefs, our medical diagnosis, and our treatment options. . . doesn't mean someone else will do the same. that's what freedom is all based on anything other than good science and rational medical therapy was the driving force behind the need for health care reforms that ensure that if you paid your premiums, you would be covered. freeing families from having to choose between putting food on the table, paying their mortgage or using their savings to pay for medical treatment because an insurer, based on their rules, refused to cover them. with this amendment, we are turning back our clock and allowing the arbitrary denial of coverage based on someone else's

sense of morality. that, mr. president, is not what america is about. it is not what freedom of religion is about. in a system predicated on rsorkeystem predicated on on employer based health insurance coverage in which benefits such as wage increases and change for coverage it is vitally important to ensure families can count on their coverage to provide the treatments and benefits theye need and we can continue doingr so as we have for any years while respecting people's bel supporters of this amendment claim that it's about protectinf religious freedom. they are wrong.guarteei supporters claim recentess to regulations guaranteeing aprevei woman'sve access to preventative health care services is aoverrec governmental ever reach. they are wrong.ually what supporters of thiswi

amendment are actually trying tf accomplish has nothing to doit s with either of those. trying it has to do with trying to di dismantlesm health care reform p score cheap political points and throw america's mothers, daughters and sisters under the bus in the process. about this amendment is not aboutsidet religious freedom. addressed the president rightly addressed that with the recent compromise. he announced for the religiousog institutions. it's about allowing the morality ge based medicine to deny coveraged for the neonatal care for the li unwed women in the deny access to lifesaving vaccines for erildren who refuse to cover anh medications for hiv/aids andtram deny csexuallyit transmitted diseases oovr even deny coverage for diabetes or hypertensiono because of an ethical objection to an unhealthy lifestyle. amene the scope ofnt this amendment ia unlimited. if it were true the about religious freedom or contraceptives, then why have st many nationally respected do organizations that have nothing

to do with birth control,such ae such arcs the easter seals, the march of dimes, the spina bifida association come up in such strong opposition? ame the answer is simple. it the amendment isn't about birth control and it isn't about fu the amendment is about of system of patient protections, a especially for women and the the subject a time when insurance companies and employers could gw play life or deitath games with insurance coverage. supporters of this amendment pre will stop at nothing toth care undermine the progress made thanks to health care reform.y progress that says insurance companies can no longer denyeexg coverage because of a pre-existing condition can no venger in pos caps on the recei coverage you can receive or cancel a policy because of a diagnosis they gain toomr. prt,i expensive tno cover.ful that

mr. president, in my view it is shameful they are using women'sa nti-th and access to provide tha services as a scapegoat for thes agenda. simply mrwrong. let me close by saying mr. president by allowing anyere eoployer to deny any service fop any reason we are doing a disservice to the people we its represent. constitution on its head to b favor the morality based medicar decision over good science and over the relationship between ai patient and theirnc doctor.ng ah iis is an incredibly overonseqd reaching amendment with radical consequences and i urge my progr evlleagues to oppose it ando l preserve the progress we've mada on trying to level the playingsc field for workers and patients in this country. with that mr. president on a yield the floor.einstein: thanko

>> mr. president,t. >> the senator from california. >> thank you, mr. president. i rise to thank the distinguished senator from new jersey for his remarks and mosts particularly for my friend andi. colleague from california. thist she has fought this fight alongr with the dean of the womennd tim senator mikulski year after year and time after time. amendment, i just want to express that to their retiremenc or announced perspective senatoa retirement of senator olympia ha snowe is for me a heartbreak. mt i have regarded her as one of the most impressive centers in y she still has many good years ahead of her. o i have the pleasure of working with her on a number of bills. t most importantly, we did really the only fuel economyears improvement that had been done in 20 years and that hand over ten bill. a and what's interesting about it

is it was a bipartisan bill and it got past thanks to senatoraie ted stevens who was chairman oft the commerce committee at the bl time and put it in his bill. see this happen. mr. president, i've been here this is my 20th year along withr my friend and colleague, senatot boxer. over the last ten years, what might seem is more and more attacks on women, women's health, stemming largely from the abortion business but not ad only that, we have fought and senator mikulski has led the way against equal pay discrimination.title attacks on title tan family planning grants and programs,ed attempt to defund plannedit parenthood, to limit access to preventiveea health care such at these attacks to limit a woman's

right to make her own reproductive health care choicey unprecedented level. i'm not going to go into thee, specifics of some of them, butpe trust me, i never thought i would see people in publicls office before word some of the forwardme. have i believe strongly that all women should have access to to d comprehensive reproductive cares should be able to decide fort themselves how to use that care regardless of where they were oa what insurance they have. the other side of the bottle hac tried to take away access not ao only to contraception, but also that ay and preventive screenings for the lower incomee women that are provided by the title tenet family planning program and by plannedvices parenthood. these programs provide a servicn toat almost 8 million americans. nationwide. they are not minor, they are

major, and for many individualsc ng is still their only source oi care. and now here we are, defending not just women's rights, but the right of all americans to acces. to essential and preventive health care benefits. so i strongly oppose this latest attack in the form of the blunte amendment, and i join my colleagues on the floor to speal about the harm that this amendment will do. i think it was stated by senatot menendez that the amendment is they did but what it does in its vagaries it becomes a predicate for any provider, employer or to insurer to decline to provide te cover a myriad of health care of benefits simply on the basis of conv religious beliefs or moralleslan conviction. there's no statement in thegiouf legislation as to what the religious belief has to be or what the moral conviction has tt

be or when it begins, or when it ends. adis really they do not want to dons in something. what does this mean? what it means in reality isould 20 million women could be denied iy preventive health carecontc, benefits including inclu contraception, including screening, ncincluding cervical cancer screenings. in addition, 14 million children, and this is right, wos could be denied according to thn access to recommended preventive services, including routineeenir immunizations, necessary preventive health screenings foa instance and developmental alon, screening is. in my state alone an estimated 6.2 million individuals,omen, 1n 2.3 million women, 1.62 milliono

men could be denied access forfd the preventive services afforde, to them by the health reform law which incidentally is for typewritten pages, single space to read avi list of preventive t services.reedom. this debate is not about provi it's about allowing providers and em cployers the right to dey access to care for autism screening. st and cancer screening and wily be the exams for any reason. thy all they have to say is they have a moral concern with it, that their conscience bothers them. for instance, any employer could refuse to cover screening for ta type ii diabetes because of the moral of ejections to it received on healthy lifestyle. a health plan could refuse to an

cover maternity coverage for an interracial couple because they have a religious or moral objection to such a relationship the only thing this amendment to does is protect the right to alw deny, doesn't get anything, it e allows it does nothing to protect theo rights of employees to access fundamental health care.repu the blradical wing of the the w republican party does not speak for most of the women in this hd country. about 100 organizationstheationa amendment. the national partnership for thl physicians alliance, human rights campaign and the american public health association. earlier we heard from an worked i for 37 years in intense care in a boston hospital best singing when people got the best care is essentially when the aw,

politicians and stay away, and i really believe that. tay -- i have heard today, and i amheam sure senator boxer has most likely heard from a similar number from 11,500 constituentsx in my state, senator boxer's state that opposes this about amendment and had grave concerns i don't need to tell the womene in this body that we have had to fight for our rights.nything no one has given women anything without a fight. we had to fight for our right to inherit property, our right to go to colleges, our right to vote, and for the last ten years the right to control of our owne reproductive system. we will continue to fight the bk one amendment and other attempts to roll back the clock. so i urge my colleagues to thing

carefully about the wrong reaching implications of this amendment and oppose it. i want to -- senator boxert of sherrard with me and indicatedtt she had read one part of it.this i'd like to read another part oo it. this is a letter from patrick kennedy to scott brown, and i want to read this because it involves someone thatsat everybody on r this floor thosew issac rightas over there at thao desk for years was known as the lion of the senate command when he stood on his feet, everyone listened coming and here's whatd he said. my father believed that health care providers should be allowet a conscience exemption from faih performing in the service that conflicted with their faith. and what he referenced to thetht pope. that is completely different

than the broad language of the any blunt amendment that will allow any employer or even an insurance company to use the moral law objections as an pvidh excuse to refuse to provide care coverage. my fath supported this extreme patrick legislation, and it's signed patrick kennedy, and i believe senator boxer, you put the letter in the record, so anyone that would like to see the wholi letter has access to it. this but i really hope that this is defeated on the floor coming and now i see the distinguished senator from the neighboring won state of maryland, the dean of the women on the floor, so i will yield the floor. >> thank you very much. >> the senator from maryland. >> mr. president, what is the

parliamentary situation? >> the majority as one and a half minutes remaining. ut i asked and must consent tofo extend this for 15 minutes.i wt >> without objection. >> thank you very much. s i want to thank my colleagues who have spoken on this the amendment, particularly those who oppose the amendment. sadne mr. president, i come to the floor today with sadness in my heart. i come because yesterday over the weekend one of our maryland national guard was killed in w he was one of two men working in a building in which he was trusd attacked by someone he trusted appears that he was w assassinated. i talked to his widow. defend freedom and was killed in

such a terrible way.ht i am sad because last night i me spoke to a dear friend of mineey whose husband is very ill from the ravages of brain cancer and we remembered so many good times we had to cover, but those good times now don't seem possible in the future, and i want so much a that she be with her husband and and so not think about the consequences of the cost and so on, and todar or last night we learned that hour very dear friend and retire colleague, senator olympia snowe was going to retire not because she's tired, but because she is sick and tired of the not partisanship.s sick and senator snowe is not tired, she. .s sick and tired of the i partisanship, and you know whate come so and i pity we have the highway bill here.merica's

ee have an unemployment problemw inside of america's problems to get it growing again and if we pass the highway bill would we appropriate amendments to remain to the bill we could do it.ave t so i'mo really sad.the i am sad that i have to come too the floor to debate an amendment that has no relevance to the are highway bill, and i am sad in because we are so tied up in tht partisan politics and scoringur political points that we don't look at how we can get our troops out of afghanistan, how can we make sure we have a budget that can fund the cureny for cancer and at the same timed that dreaded word doesn't gor bankrupt during care, and i'mann devastated that a dear friend fd and an extraordinary public how servant is so fed up with how s not to run for office again. so i want to be serious and youw

need to know i'm really sad about this, but i'm also reallyy very frustrated about this. bluntwant to talk about this amendment because we have had nothing but lithology, smokescreens and politics as masquerading as morality all day long. so let me tell you what the blunt amendment is not. it is not about religiousre a organizations providing healtheu care and government saying with the benefit should become it isl not aboutia affiliated religioug organizations and the governmene saying with the service isnd to be, this amendment is about nonreligious insurance companies and non-religious employers, itr is about secular insurance about companies, and it's about secular employers. t the blunt amendment allows that any health insurer or employer can deny coverage for any health

on something called religiouss. beliefs and moral convictions. o not as a body of knowledge that defines religious beliefs. but wh cat is the moral conviction? that is your personal opinion.v, a moral conviction, no matter how heartfelt, no matter how sincere, no matter from the the, pontifical principles is stilll your personal opinion.pe so we are going to allow the ies personal opinions of insurance o companies and the personal determine what health care you get. what happened to doctors? e?at happened to the definitionr of essential health care?eedom. so this is not about religiousut freedom. this is not about religious eve governing because it isn't about even religious institutions.men.

but it clear on this blunt polic amendment. this amendment is politics masquerading as morality and is make no mistake the public is rooted in wanting to derail andt dismembered the affordable caree act in the amendment. so, what the blunt amendment does come as i said, allowed in the insurer or any employer toy deny coverage based on religious beliefs or moral convictions. well, what that essentially means is this, let's go to the of samples. has if an employer has a conviction, a personal opinion against smoking, they can be used to emphysema. if an employer has a personal opinion that he calls the morala conviction that doesn't approveg

of drinking alcohol, they can refuse to cover any program for alcohol treatment or substance t abuse. an let's say that there is an employer who doesn't believe int divorce and says i won't cover health care in my bill for anybody who is divorced because i think i have a moral conviction against that. suppose you say in some schoolsi of thought that says i have as moral conviction that says a woman can only see a woman doctor, and i will cover by anything where she's seen by meal physicians.i where are we heading here? i can take this down.th these are not ridiculous examples. it puts the personal opinion ofa practice of medicine. this is outrageous, this is

vague, it's going to end up with all kinds of lawsuits. let's speak about lawsuits. so while we have all been -- some have been pounding their chests and talking aboutconstit, religious freedom in the constitution what is also on the blunt amendment is this whole thing that gives employers access to federal ports under the blunt amendment if they feel they can exercise that amendment. this is a new school employmentc bill. i'm shocked because the other a party over there is always the trashing lawyers, the trial lawyers association, and now they've created a whole new cred light an opportunity for federao court action, causing the courts on this particular issue, youed fed up. they want us to be focusing onog

health care, they want us to be focusing on how to lead better v lives, so let me talk about howe place.mb remember why we w had the health reform legislation?rm i remember because it said theri 42 million americans are uninsured. 42 million americans are on a this is the fifth anniversary of not prince george county who died because he did not have accesshi to dental care. s his infection was so bad, so see severe there was nobody to see him. p his mother was too poor to be able to pay for its. that little boy in the shadow of we capitol the united states to die.ork for that's why we work for the you can affordable care act and you can call it obamacare.i don' i don't catre what you call it,p call it an opportunity for theht american people to get what a d great space societemy should ony provide, and then we also not ws only looked at what was on

injured, we also looked at thetl issues around women, senator stabenow and i held a hearing and i held a hearing and guess what we found, women pay more for their health insurance thana men did of equal age and equald, health status.s nobody said that is a social mot justice issue. that. i have a moral conviction aboutd that.ee i have a really deeply felt wom moral conviction that if you are a woman you shouldn't beour discriminated against by youre insurance company. we also found that women weref denied health care because of pre-existing conditions.tates, we found that in eight statesf that if he were a victim of domestic violence, you were doubly abused not only by your spouse, but you couldn't get insurance coverage because they said the cost of the fiscal and mental health care would be too. much. i had a moral conviction. i have a moral conviction that i you are a victim of domesticed h violence you shouldn't be deniel

health care. i have a real strong moral conviction about that then it my during my hearing on heard a bone chilling story it wasn't just me but those attending. shd there was a woman who testifiedm that she had a medicallyas told mandated see section. then she was told by herng insurance company in writing that she had to get sterilized i in order to receive health insurance from them. the insurance company was mandating sterilization to get g coverage. off i nearly went off my chair. at the hearing there was acompa. representative of the insurance company. they had no moral reaction too they haatd no moral reaction to that i had a reaction to it i had a big one. amendments that's why we offered the amendments that we did where do couldn't be my health care on the basis of pre-existingoral conditions. so i have a lot of moral

convictions are not as that inee the united states of america no child should die because the actions of healthcare common no woman should be discriminated against in the health care system, and at the same time you need to be able to have the ne that you're doctor says you need.i but the other thing is i would v not only to save lives but to ney, save money and we knew that to go.ion was the way the and i can to the floor andntive offered the preventive health amendment. enteand women spoke for it and i was primarily oriented to cover men as well.ly es's going to make sure that liv early detection and early screenings can t save lives ande spoke about the necessity for ha screening and diabetes and heart disease and the kind of thingsdc that have detected early could save those lives. that bipartisan amendment

pssed. then after it was passed and tha bill passed, the secretary of health and human services said preventive benefits should be defined not by politicians come and not by a bureaucratic hhs, e but by the medical community, so she requested the institute of medicine to define the preventive health care benefit. the preventive benefits that we are talking about that bluntr dn says an employer doesn't have tu provide came from the institutet of medicine. com it didn't come from theidn't congress, it didn't come from the bureaucracy at hhs. it came from a learnedn prestigious society that we turn to, the institute of medicine. these are what they said were the essentials preventive l services that wouldiv save lives and also save money so this is . where this came from.

now, we are on the floor saying if you have a moral conviction of what is the institute of medicine says is the central e benefit, you can go ahead and dd it coming and again, we are notg talking about religious institutions who are employers, we are not talking aboutated religious affiliatedutions. institutions, we are talking about long religious institutions. ordinily i madam president, ordinarily imet would call this amendment folly that this is really a master made, and i think it is just ono more excuse to opt out of the it's one more excuse to opt out of obamacare, and i don't think ou it is an opt out, i think it is a cop-out and we have to stop masquerading thraat this is abos morality. and someone's religios

beliefs. so, madam president, most of all talking of the serious issues affecting the american people to which i want to bring those troops home and find the cure for cancer and helping come upeh with the resources that we can do it. i want to be sure that no littlo isy ever goes through he had toh suffer even to the end. so madame president let's defeat lunt amendment and get backs get to the highway bill. let's get american rolling andao on its civility and finding the sensible center that america is her y known for in other years that we had our ability to govern. on a yield the floor. mad >> madam president.ing offir: >> the senator from californiaro is recognized. >> thank you.esident, before the t madame president, before the senatohir from maryland leaves e

floor, i think it's an opportunity to thank her so much for really speaking the truthjut today on the floor of the senate. just the fact, and with the blunt amendment is about and as isn't about, and also as i watched her recite really the history of trying to bring to preventive care and is essential health care benefits and to our people realizing that she was in that pivotal position in thee. health committee, and i remember her looking at me one dayclos because we are very close on friends, we are not on that particular committee, and she said senator kennedy asked me i just get the chills when i thins prevention and work with tom harkin and chris dodd and step up to the plate on these essentials benefits and

preventive benefits, and shey oe literally raised this issuedon't particularly on the prevention side, and i don't know if you remember in the caucuses on thet floor, in the committee, and press conferences that we could have a new day in health care ie this a country because althought spend more than any country in e th the same results because we pree haven't invested in prevention litici and as she said it's not wha politicians to decide what's prevention should look like, it's up to the doctors, and's under the center's leadership hr and that as senator harkin and a brought it all the members of the health committee and financn committee and yes, ted kennedy in the background because he was quite, quite ill.messagesnd but he said his messages and hif staff helped. they came up with a list of ever essential health care services

that nobody could ever quarrel t with. of and they came up with a list ofr preventive health care services that was so critical to all of us and in particular to women and the great news proving that when you invest in prevention using so much down the line. we all know this is a fact.the and access to contraception byt the way was put on the list note by politicians, but by the institute of medicine because io is known that if the individuale chooses that route to plan theil families, that means we will abt have fewer abortions, we will have healthier families, babie healthier babies, and many people take the birth control pill as medicine to prevent debilitating monthly pain its prescribed for skin diseases and

prescribed to make sure that the ovaries, tumors on the overseas don't keep growing and growing p and you could possibly lose and over a but what happens. and i want to ask one question to my friend before she leaves.y the blunt amendment would say that anybody for any reason anyf day could cancel out the wholese list of prevention and essential health care services that she f. sought so hard for.about regiou so when they say this is about religious freedom, no, no, no. r that's been taken care of by oua president in terms of any rel provider that is religious or religiously affiliated. they don't have to provideand ee contraception directly.onse wass and even catholic charities response this is a good health compromise, the catholic health, association.

so i want to ask my friend is she aware when congressman fisa held a hearing on the women'swon health care and there wasn't onf woman on the panel on the first panel that did she see those photographs of that panel? >> i sure did and was déjà vu all over again i would say to mf colleague from californiaill because it was like the anita hill hearing. whe remember during that time wheret there wasn't one woman on the happened there, the but youdiscf know, this isn't new. the discrimination of women has been around a long time. of i've considered the discrimination against women when of the great social justica issues whether you are a secular humanist or whether you have in core beliefs in an organized religion, and i found not onlyo the picture, but i want to

reiterate what we have been a s saying here. there is a systematic war for against women.qual we don't get equal pay for equal work. e we are often devaluated in the s workplace, we worry more abou parking lots for the cars andn d child care and for our children. and then when it comes to health care what was so great about the preventive that first of all we talk not only about family planning where you could haveust the children you know that you could care for, but we talked we about the prenatal care, w talked about making sure thattuy our children had the opportunitd for viability and survivability so yes, it was both the pictures of us not being included, but ib shows that we need to be able to fight to be heard. d the issue is women's places are not being heard, and i am sayind that today the voices of the women are being hurt and the

voices of good men who support us, and i'm telling you and iayo used senator boxer but i'm saying out loud if this amendment passes, i believe the voices of women will be heard, they will be heard on the internet, they will be heard ine the streets and communities, and most of all, they will be heard in the voting booth. [ >> just want to thank my colleague for her eloquence and fighting spirit. of the year that i came here was falling on the anita hill when n the world salles and this country saw that we have nohat women on the judiciaryiary committee. and now the president sits on that committee. senator feinstein and senator moseley draw on the two women to serve on that committee after w- saw that there were no women and pave the way for my good friend to bring her fabulous backgrouna angud expertise toe the table.

but when congressmen i said, the chairman of the committee that had no women on the paneltomen's talking about women's health, tt imagine, know when in committee we have that photograph here, we have the photograph of the man t testifying about women's health, talking about women's access to contraception, talking about m birth control not one of those men ever gave birth as far as il know one less thing or a medicak miracle and this photograph i think is changing the countryre this year because a picture is worth thousands and you look nat this and you ss that over on the house side and republican side that is who a ncey want to hear from him andue when a woman in the audience said to the chair of themm i think i have some important no quali information?

he said she was not qualified. , i suppose if you want to be qualified to speak about women's health, you have to be a man,ted and her story that she wanted tw share is ofho her friend who was unable to get access to birth control because her employer didn't offer at and she was to get financially strapped to use it and assist on her over a became so large and complicated she lost her 03.ere, now i just want to say to my colleagues we are on a highway bill. you have got to be kidding that because you are so consumed with attacking women's health. get over it. we are not going to go back. the women in this country won't allow it.they wereoing look what happened in virginia.e a plan they were going to get an

procedure, humiliatingunneceary procedure, medically unnecessarn procedure to the women come and in virginia the women said what? some ambitions to do more thani this, i better change. colleagues here vote this down, table this amendment, this blunt amendment.is this isn't going to get us u anywhere.at what does it do to create one jb job except new job for attorneys because it sets up a whole new right of action. i'm sure the trial lawyers are l going to love the republicans for this bill. b it sets up a new right of actioe because somebody is going to saa i have a moral objection against giving cancer treatment to apras child because i think thatsomebl prayer is the answer somebody will pursue and that an employe

will sue and there will be monet going to lawyers. what does that do to help one to child? what does that do to make bette dy feel better? to what does that do to create onen job? s now, i know the leaders on both sides are trying to figure of a pathway for word on this highway bill did and i just saying wee i better have a pathway forward because i want to say to thewh president sitting in the chair a who was a proud member of thevib environment committee and public works committee and i hated to lose that everybody one on the e committee. s she knows what is. she lives in the state where tho bridge collapsed. she fought hard to get that bridge rebuild in record time. s she knows how important it is ts protect people by making sure r the bridges are safe, we have safe roads and schools, we have a good chance of alternatives, es fix our roads and highwaysrig

that yeah, 70% of our bridges i'm sorry, 70,000,0 of our bridd stand deficient. 50% of the roads are not up to come on. whole what's next?with the highway egypt?l. the the whole list of things that have nothing to do with the highway bill. let the people see who's stopping progress, who ishopping stopping this bill because at the end of march, madame president, you know what on happens? we've run out on theay bil authorization of the highway a bill.ut we've run out on the authorization of the r transportation bill. we run out. and we will lose 630,000 jobs right then and there. instead, we can get this bill done. it's terrifically bipartisan.e it came out of the kennedy 18-nothing. it can out of other g committee,

with the bipartisan votes. we can get on with it, protectth s.8 million jobs and create up b to another million jobs. 2.8 million jobs are at stakent. and we are debating birth control.in t c and i think this is resonating e in the country to read all of aa sudden people wake up and they say what are we doing there? what's happening there? b and when they see this it's going to be very clear. we have a bill that a has been u stuck on the floor for three weeks because the republicansde arema demanding votes on matters that have nothing to do with tht highway bill and the first one g is birth control, talking abouts something on egypt, talking about something on this is ath s good one, repelling an environmental wall that is kidding arsenic and mercury outw of the air. real

they want to repeal that. that's great.at there will be something to makeu us safe. so i'm ready for these a amendments. come on to the floor to give us an agreement, let's get on withe it and lets them allow the be germane amendments to be offereu the last thing i will close with haun because it itisng haunting me, s picture of 15 stadiums, footbala stadiums filled, every seat is r filled with equal the number of constr unemployed construction workers we have out there today.beca t wellhe over a million suffering because they can't find construction o work, and so i cn only say it's time to get thisst birth control amendment behind a us. let's beat the blunt amendment.s it's a disaster. it's dangerous, it's hurtful. is irrelevant to this bill and y

it is dangerous for the countryf stop invoking the name of the departed colleague.s mory. respect his family. respect his memory. let's get this vote over with. let's get to the business ate ae hand and create the jobs that the american people are crying for i will yield the floor rick santorum delivered a full defense of religion in public life sunday appealing to the social conservatives who revived his presidential campaign. on the talk shows this weekend and in speeches, mr. santorum

responded to comments made by president john f. kennedy. >> i believe in an america with a separation of church and state is absolute. where no one would tell the president that he catholic and no protestant minister would tell his parishioners for whom to vote and no church or church school was granted any public funds or political preference, and where no man is denied public office merely because his religion differs from the president who might appoint him or the people who might elect him. >> you can watch more of president kennedy's speech on the web site on the video library, go to c-span.org and you can find that in our archives there.

veterans affairs secretary erich shinseki told senators on wednesday that the president is requesting more than a 10% increase that his agency's budget for next year. with additional funds to care for veterans returning from iraq and afghanistan and to help them find jobs. this is two and a half hours

>> good morning and welcome to this morning's hearing on the fiscal year 2013 budget and fiscal year 2014 advance appropriations request from the boreman of veterans affairs. i want to welcome all of our panelists today and really appreciate your coming in helping us work our way through these critical issues for our veterans. you know, as i do most weeks when i'm home last week i convened a roundtable discussion of the veterans from across my home state of washington i heard from the very men and women whose lives this budget is actually going to touch. while some of the veterans create the carey they were receiving from the va many of them did leave out concerns that must be addressed in this budget and in future budgets. i heard from the veterans who still face unacceptably long

wait times for mental health care or are still not getting the type of mental health care that they need in their own community. i heard from the women's veterans who were struggling to receive specialized care, and from veterans who were just fed up with the dysfunction of the claims system. i also heard from the veterans who still find themselves confronted by obstacles to employment and who told me they are even afraid to write the word federal and on their job application because of the stigma they believe employers today attached to that. last year's passage about the act was a great first step in taxing the problems in the high rate of the butter in unemployment but there is a lot of work left to be done as ensure secretary shinseki will talk about now is the time to take it vantage of the public-private partnerships and the sea of good will that exists in corporate america towards our veterans today. doing so also requires reading back misinformation about the invisible world of the war.

i'm pleased that the administration hasn't shown real leadership in engaging private partners in this area, and i will continue to highlight the tremendous skills and leadership ability and a discipline that our veterans bring to the table. i also look forward to learning more today about dva involvement with the president's proposed veteran's job score anyway that we can get our veterans both employed and more involved in bettering our community is a program worthy of investment. as everyone on this committee knows, with the end of the war mechem iraq and the upcoming with all of the troops in afghanistan, the of the budget challenges will only continue through the va. last year the committee held a hearing to explode the long-term cost of war and what is 100% clear is we have an obligation of will continue long after the fighting is over. today as we've reviewed the budget fulfiling the nation's obligation to the veterans not only today but throughout the course of their lives, must be our most pressing consideration. now that we see that as a

longtime member of the senate budget committee and someone who has seen just how difficult this year's budget is for many other agencies when this budget are right on my desk i was very encouraged. given the current fiscal environment the va has done a good job putting together a budget that reflects a very real commitment to provide veterans the care and benefits the firm casa think you, secretary shinseki for your efforts in doing that. i also want to applaud the commitment to end homelessness. this is an area where you are making strides and i am encouraged to see that the administration has again requested an increase of funding for homeless programs to but i'm hopeful we will continue to see an effort to reduce the number of homeless veterans and prevent those who are at risk from becoming homeless, but i also believe the va has work to do in the area of serving female homeless veterans. while the va has done a good job putting together a budget that works to tackle the challenges that our veterans face, there is

also clearly room for improvement. for the food here in a row the va has proposed cuts in spending for major construction and nonrecurring maintenance. the continued cuts are deeply troubling given that last year was the first time the budget even outlined the departments vision for the tenure construction plan with a price tag that approached $65 billion. despite the plan for the past two years dea has requested only a fraction of the amount that it needs. i'm disappointed that the size of the gap between funding needs to bring facilities up-to-date and the funding requested from the congress. in addition to this budget request proposes a series of initiatives intended to save money including better control on the contract healthcare, better strategies for contracting and cutting administrative overhead people buying pleased to see them recognize the importance of the efficiency, but i have concerns with those proposals. the gao report released on monday showed many of these initiatives and initiatives from

last year's budget did not in fact generate the savings that the va predicted. on will review each of these initiatives in the budget with an open mind, but i want to be our first priority, our obligation must be to ensure that we are fulfilling in honoring our commitment to our veterans. if they fail to meet the proposed cost-saving estimates they will have to find a way to make the difference of the veterans don't end up paying the price. medical care collections is another area where the va has to do a better job at both predicting the targets and collecting the funds. it's impossible to build the button on the funding that isn't collected to read another area of concern to me is mental health care. at the hearing last year the va witnesses acknowledged they may in fact need more resources to meet the high demand from the mental health care. and the department's proposed 5% increase is enough to read last year i asked the va to conduct a survey of mental health providers which revealed

significant shortcomings. the proposed plan to fix the problems and they must complete those steps as scheduled but they cannot stop with what was outlined in that initial plan. they must continue to work to find ways to make a real and substantial improvement. this year we will continue to be aggressive in our oversight if the of mental health care. not every veteran will be affected by the visible wones but when a veteran has the courage to stand up and ask for help the va must be there every single time and must be there with not only timely access to care but also the right type of care. it alleges that ptsd or depression or natural responses to some of the most stressful experiences a person can have and we will do everything possible to make sure those affected by the illnesses can get the help and get better and get back to their lives. finally, like german mother and senator tester and others i remain concerned about the question surrounding the effect of the sequestration on veterans' health care.

throughout the budget control act process established the sequestration i made it clear among the agencies and would receive automatic cuts is unacceptable and repeatedly made clear this should not be the case and although i am confident all of the veterans' programs including health care would be protected in the event of sequestration i want to make sure you know i will not accept anything else. i believe governments the clear on this issue and if they cannot be provided today i will continue to work to get it in fact i've already asked the government accountability office to offer a legal opinion that will provide some resolution to this issue. secretary shinseki as you know the budget are the reflection of our values and things to your work this demonstrates a strong commitment to our veterans. while we are in the position to make sure the of the increased funding it needs, we shall also be mindful the demand for services is the and to continue to increase no matter the number

of troops deployed to do i look forward to working with my colleagues on this committee and on the budget appropriations committee which i also sit and of course with secretary shinseki and his entire team and the leaders from the veterans committee to make sure that we keep this long term commitment. i think all of you for being here today and my committee members and with that i will turn to my ranking member for the fifth opening statement. >> thank you, madam chairman. secretary, welcome, welcome to your leadership team. to the organizations here this morning we are here today to review the president's budget request for the department of veterans affairs for fiscal year 13. which includes a four and a half percent increase in discretionary spending. i continue to believe that it's important that we provide adequate funding so that veterans of all generations will be able to receive the benefits and services they earned and deserved without hassles or

delays. we also need to analyze the budget request to ensure we spend the taxpayers' moneys wisely and more importantly that the funding will likely lead to better outcomes for veterans, their families and their survivors. as we will discuss today. i have questions about whether that is the case for several areas of today's budget hearing. for the budget for mental health care includes an advanced appropriations request for fiscal year $1,415.4 billion. if adopted would represented 4% increase over the fiscal year 13 and 66% increase over the fiscal year 08 level. the hearings last year the committee heard about the devastating, devastation struggle some veterans face when

trying to get mental health treatment from the va. in fact that via a survey of its mental health providers last year is pretty clear on the problem, 70% of the survey respondents indicated they did not have enough mental health staff to meet the current demand for care. 45% indicated the lack of off hours appointments is a barrier to care. it took 30 days or more for a veteran to be seen for a specialty appointment such as post-traumatic stress disorder. this is an instance where increased funding hasn't translated for the services veterans. i hope we will get a better understanding of how the v.a. plans to address these issues, how they requested funding would be used and whether it made the time for the va to start looking outside of the box to