benefiting from this a lot, and i guess i'll set that principle aside and not argue for disclosure after all. and so we had two votes this week in which the vote did not reach a supermajority because we had individuals in this body who objected to a simple-majority vote to get to the bill, so we had to have a supermajority under the arcane rules of this body, and we didn't get that supermajority because we didn't have bipartisan support for debating this issue. and i must say to my colleagues whoest haved againsvoted againsu believe in the debate in this society, you should at least say, yes, let's debate the bill. maybe you don't like the bill at the end, maybe you want to filibuster the bill at the end, but at least we should be discussing it. it is such a huge, huge factor in this nation. there is a time -- there was a

time not so long ago when we had the muckraker era, and there were a series of articles written about how senators in this body -- i believe it was 20 articles 60 months -- were around this land. and those articles helped the american people understand what was going on in this body and around chamber. and the result was a constitutional amendment. a constitutional amendment that shifted from indirect election of senators to direct election to try to free the system in favor of "we, the people." now, when we came to this country, when our ancestors came to this country from overseas, they'd come from a system where wealth and power made all the decisions. they didn't have a voissments and they came to america -- they didn't have a voice. and they came to america and said, we want to do it differently, we want to have a voice. and the first three words of the constitution captured that -- "we, the people." not, "we, the rich and powerful

who write the rules," but "we, the people" will decide how we're governed. well, the citizens united decision of the supreme court which allows unlimited secret oceans of money being spent with no identification goes completely against "we, the people." it's so going to be up to this chamber to wrestle with this idea. this is why we should be on the disclose act right now. it's why we should be debating the impact, we should be debating the history of montana. a hundred years ago, folks in montana said, our state is ruled by the copper kings and we're tired of, "we, the rich and powerful" setting the rules and we're going to take it back, because we believe in "we, the people," we believe in our constitution. and so they changed the rules in their state. and our supreme court just a couple weeks ago gave them a hundred anniversary present, which was to strike down "we,

the people" in montana with no debate. the supreme court, five justices, said, we don't want to have any of the information about how montana politics were corrupted by vast pools of mon money. we don't want to know that history. we don't want to know how the people of that state, exercising their power as a state, reclaimed their democracy for the ordinary person. they put their hands over their eyes, they put their hands over their ears and they said, we summarily decide against this case, against montana, taking no evidence. that is a dark moment for our supreme court. it follows on from the dramatically terrible decision of citizens united. and we must debate those issues on the floor of this -- this senate. there are folks here who like to say in the tradition that the senate is the world's greatest

deliberative body. well, then let's deliberate. let's not vote against even having a conversation about some of the most monumental issues of our age. so this is a conversation that must continue. we must wrestle with how to honor the very premise at the heart of our constitution, at the heart of our republic and not have "we, the people" crossed off out of the constitution. mr. -- madam president, turn to another issue and that is the bill that's on the floor right now, the bring jobs home act. we have a manufacturing sector in crisis in america. since the year 2000, america has lost about 5 million manufacturing jobs, according to the bureau of labor statistics, and more than 42,000 factories.

today america has only about the same number of workers employed in manufacturing as we did in 1941 or more than 70 years ago. and my home state of oregon has been hit particularly hard by this. this trend, the loss of manufacturing jobs, strikes at the heart of the middle class because are often living-wage jobs, these are full-time jobs. these are jobs with benefits. these provide a foundation for our families to succeed, a foundation for families to raise their children so their children will have opportunity and promise. put simply, if we do not make things in america, we will not have a middle class in america. and you can see the middle class shrinking year by year right now as we lose our manufacturing base. now, madam president, these jobs are not disappearing into thin

air. yes, some factories shut down because of consolidation and some jobs are eliminated due to automation or streamlining. but in most cases, those jobs are still there but they're just not in america. not in oregon. indeed, those jobs have gone overseas. and china has a four-tier industrial policy that says we are going to put people work here even if we violate the w.t.o. agreement we have with the united states of america, and that is a huge, huge problem that we should, in a bipartisan effort, fully address. but today i'd like to share a couple letters of people who are on the front line of the disappearance of manufacturing jobs. virginia from the city of hillsborough in my state wrote, "in february 2010, my department at my company was advised we'd

be laid off after transitioning our job duties to a replacement staff in india. it felt like quite a blow. i'd been thereto shortest time at ten years, the longest person there was 35 years. half of our department was laid off within a few months. the rest of us sweated every friday wondering when we would receive our layoff dates. we were finally all let go on march 11, 2011. four months after my layoff," she continues, "my husband was advised the rest of his department is being laid off after the job duties were transitioned to an offshore si site. my daughter, myself and my husband are all looking for work. we have four generations," virginia says, "living in our home. i have no idea what will hatch to all of us -- happen to all of us if none of us can find work. my husband served his time in the army and he and i have always worked full-time steady jobs. it feels like we're being

punished for spending our lives working to take care of our family and keep a roof over our heads." and she continues, "america needs jobs. we want to work and need to work." and she points exclamation points in. "we are not lazy. instead, we are innovators and always have been. we need to regain our pride in our country, help each other and quit focusing on greed." virginia says, "my mother reminded me that just 25 years ago, it would have been considered un-american to take a job from an american and send it to another person in another country. people would stop doing business with a company that did not -- that did choose to do so. i'm mentioning this to state that there's been a definite change of the way businesses are run, which isn't all bad. technology in business process change. the problem is," virginia says, "the bottom line has become much more important than the health of america and its citizens and that i believe is the cause of our current woes." and she closes by saying, "i

love my country and i want it back. i admit i'm tired of giving our money, resources and jobs to other countries while americans lose their jobs, their homes, and their security. please help." duane wriets from st. helens -- duane wriets from st. helens, duane says, "i worked at an oregon high-tech company for 15 years until i was laid off in the middle of the bush depression. when i joined, the company had over 18,000 employees, most of them in oregon. they were high-paid professionals and assembly workers with family-wage jobs. when i was laid off, the company employed only about 4,500 people, still mostly in the u.s. and mostly in oregon. but today, the company has moved virtually all its manufacturing to china and their software engineering to india. even though the company payroll is growing," says duane, "the number of employees in the u.s. continues to shrink. almost all the new jobs are in

foreign countries. you want to know where all the jobs went? i'll tell you. they went to mexico and china. and that's because our government policies have little regard for american workers. companies like these need to be penalized for moving jobs overseas but instead they are rewarded and american workers pay the price." madam president, the policies that we're talking about on the floor today are all about the issues that virginia and duane are talking about. the bill ends rewards for outsourcing jobs overseas. currently a company can deduct the moving expenses of offshoring and actually save money on their taxes that way. that would end. if a company wants to move a factory overseas, we cannot stop them, but we shouldn't give them tax breaks to do so. i would love to be in a -- in a

forum of hundreds of people and i would ask this question, "do any of you love the idea that under the bush administration, we started subsidizing the shipment of jobs overseas?" and i can tell you, virtually no one would say they love that policy, because the jobs near america mean so much to our families. the second thing that this bill does is it creates new tax credits to reward businesses that bring jobs home. if a company wants to take a production line that's located overseas and move it back to the united states, let's help them pay for the moving expenses. this spring, i went on a tour called "made in oregon," a tour of manufacturing in my home state, and it was spectacular to see how many cool things were being made in bend, oregon, a solar injury is building

inverters for solar energy on roofs and putting that into the electrical grid. bike friday in eugene is doing specialty made-to-order, the best folding bikes. and ordering over the internet, they're shipping the best bikes over the wind. kindrow r.v. windows in pendleton and pendleton wool len mills had two -- woolen mills had two different types of manufacturing. woolen mills that go back a century and then an r.v. window manufacturer that's playing a key role in our recreational business and providing these windows to manufacturers throughout the r.v. world, the recreational vehicle world. and then there's oregon ironworks. oregon ironworks is building trolley cars. we're building streetcars in america again so the cities putting in streetcars can buy an american-made product. they're building a prototype of a wave buoy that will generate

energy as it bobs up and down in the waves off the oregon coast. that is going up and down the river and being installed later this year. and perhaps it will lead the way for a new source of clean, renewable energy. big industrial is building barges. greenbriar is building railroad cars. these are the jobs and the companies that are at the heart of living-wage jobs and making things in america, and we must do all we can to support them. so let's end the subsidies for shipping jobs overseas and let's instead provide incentives and support for moving jobs back to the united states of america, to the benefit of our economy and the benefit of our families. i strongly urge my colleagues to support this bill and help bring jobs back to oregon and back to america. thank you, madam president. a senator: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from utah.

a senator: madam president, i rise today to honor an extraordinary american from the great state of utah. mr. lee: the world-renown author and speaker, steven r r. covey, who passed away on monday, july 16, 2012. he was regarded as a legendary thought leader throughout the global business community and yet showed over the course of his 79 years that the true measure of life is not in making a dollar but in making a difference. steven leaves behind a legacy filled with meaningful words and memorable deeds. his prolific and powerful writing contained the kind of personal insight and inspiration that transformed hearts, minds and lives of countedless individuals. -- countless individuals. he's best remembered perhaps for his 1989 "new york times" best-seller, "the seven habits of highly effective people." the book sold more than 20 million copies worldwide and has been translated into 38 different languages.

sevelanguages. "seven habits" served to prove steve hsteven's bag at beliefs t talking about principles changing behavior talking about how changin change changing behr changes behavior. steven followed his pursuit of life-changing principles in subsequent books, including "first things first," "behave habit," and "the leader in me." covey's words, ideas, principles and practices have been used in a variety of educational settings, from college management classes to corporate business seminars. in 2011, "time" magazine listed "seven habits" as one of the 25 most influential business management books of all time. while kofi's words -- covey's words propelled him to become a global titan of business strategies and tactics, it was

his deeds, often in family settings, which provided the notably personal touch found in his teachings and his training. his poignant examples and anecdotes from his personal life showed how to actually live the principles that he taught. covey often shared a humorous experience he had had with one of his sons while taking a business call at home. his son one day felt that steven covey had been on the phone for far too long, so he took out a jar of peanut butter and began spreading it on covey's balding head. covey pretended to ignore it, so the son added a layer of jam and eventually a piece of bread. steven covey used this experience to teach the principles of proper priorities, life balance and building rils rils -- relationships, he demonstrated that it was possible to complete an important phone call and indulge his son's mischievous antics and

create a meaningful memory, all at the same time. one of his best-known principles, sharpen the saw, focused on the need for rest and renewal. covey stressed the important impact of family dinners, family vacations, family service in the community and families working together in the home. he recalled work parties in which his whole family would tackle a project. instead of just laboring for hours, they would laugh and talk and eat snacks while they worked, and then they would go to a movie once they had finished. steven continually showed that when you put your family first, you can create a legacy that will truly last. his deeds as a father, husband, neighbor and friend are the kind that communities, states and nations would do well to promote and emulate. covey's contributions to the leadership community extend far beyond his literary works. he revolutionized the field of

leadership and management development with the creation of the covey leadership center in utah. the covey leadership center eventually merged with franklin quest to form franklin covey, a worldwide management firm specializing in training and consulting services for individuals, teams and businesses. his extensive client list includes a vast majority of the fortune 500 companies, as well as world leaders, celebrities, national governments and numerous charitable organizations. in 1996, "time" magazine named him one of the 25 most influential americans, and in 2011, thinkers 50 named him one of the top 50 business leaders in the world. he was an inspiration to millions of revolutionary problem solvers and an icon for business managers everywhere. it's impossible to calculate the immense amount of good that steven covey did for so many people. his insight helped to shape the

future of an untold number of businesses, resulting in better jobs and indeed better lives for people around the world. steven covey's life mission is reflected in the mission of franklin covey. we engage greatness in people and organizations everywhere. steven covey's words and deeds helped people discover and deploy the principles that would ultimately enable them to achieve greatness in life and in business. my wife sharon and i extend our thoughts and our prayers to the family and friends of steven covey, his wife sandra, his nine children, 52 grandchildren and six great grandchildren have a tremendous legacy to cherish and to follow. steven taught his family and indeed the world that to live, to love, to learn and to leave a legacy is what life is all about. we honor his memory, celebrate

his service and recognize that while his presence will be missed, his principles and practices will live on for generations to come. no words of tribute to steven covey could be complete without a challenge to do something, to produce personal deeds that match the words and the principles he loved and lived, so i conclude this tribute with a challenge for each of us to remember. we honor best those who have gone before by living our lives with excellence today. thank you, madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from ohio. mr. brown: thank you, madam president. i ask unanimous consent that following my remarks, the senator from nevada be recognized, senator heller. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. heller: thank you, madam president. i ask unanimous consent that jennifer parsons, a member of my staff, be granted floor privileges during the duration of today's session of the united states senate. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. brown: thank you, madam president. i rise today because too many elected officials, too many

pundits and editorial writers, too many elite economists and too many leaders of big orpgz have simply gotten too comfortable, too used to sending american jobs overseas. we have seen outsourcing time and again, for the united states olympic committee's decision to crown our nation's top athletes with a made in china beret to american companies far too eager to wash in and shutter u.s. manufacturing plants and open doors to cheaper labor in foreign countries who don't just have a cheap labor advantage, also have weak environmental rules, nonexistent or nonenforced labor laws, subsidies for currency, subsidies for energy, subsidies for land, subsidies for capital. in other words, in some sense, this whole olympic debacle where american athletes, hundreds of american athletes at the opening ceremonies in london will -- the

united states olympic committee in some sense has simply said we'll give the gold medal to china for cheating. in far too many cases, u.s. investors and executives have gotten richer at the largest companies while u.s. workers in places like hamilton and youngstown and places like lorain and lina and solon, ohio, struggle to make ends meet. that's why, madam president, i am here with the simple message -- let's replace outsourcingsourcing with insour. let's see the made in america label sewn into the blazers that athletes wear and football helmets worn by our student athletes. mr. president, i'm wearing a suit made by union labor in cleveland, ohio, today, for instance. let's see the letters u.s.a. stamped in every steel beam used in our country and the armored steel purchased by our u.s. armed forces. we must encourage companies to return to the united states, we must discourage them from ever

leaving, but right now, madam president, we have it backwards. our tax code is upside-down. as it stands, businesses can classify moving personnel and company components to a foreign company as a business expense and therefore deduct the cost of offshoring from their taxes. so when a plant moves from youngstown to beijing, when a plant moves from free montana to sheehan, when a plant moves from toledo to wuhan, that company can deduct those moving expenses on its taxes and get a tax break for moving overseas. combined with our outdated trade policy, from pntr with china, with no real reporting requirements and even fewer, madam president, even fewer enforcement rules and mechanisms, the current american tax law encourages companies to move jobs offshore where labor is cheap and environmental and health standards are weak.

we saw a decade of manufacturing job loss. from 2000-2010, we lost more than 5 million manufacturing jobs in our country. one-third of our manufacturing jobs disappeared from 2000 to 2010. fortunately, in part, because of the auto rescue, such a resounding success in ohio, for instance, we have seen some 500,000 manufacturing job increase in these last two years. but we know what happens with manufacturing job loss. it can destroy a family which has a decent wage and then can't find a job with any kind of decent wage. it weakens communities, it undermines the tax base. it means police and firefighters and librarians and mental health counselors and teachers get laid off. but now the manufacturing sector is turning around. as i said, over the last two years, our country led by the revitalization of the auto industry is beginning to add manufacturing jobs. it's clear why our country and why my state of ohio are good

place toss do business. we have a first-class work force, a strong network of colleges and universities, manufacturing knowhow that's second to none. not only that, but companies returning to the u.s. because of higher costs associated with doing business abroad, whether that be transportation costs, higher wages in places like china, and the legal difficulties of doing business overseas, we're seeing some return but it's unfortunately more anecdotal and not extensive enough that we -- we obviously have to keep looking ahead and making more of it happen. that's the good news. in ohio, we see more and more evidence that demonstrates how companies are beginning to move operations back to the u.s. for instance, apex sports based in zanesville in eastern ohio produces softballs with an engineered foam core. once made in china, apex sports now makes its softballs in the u.s. they got their start at the

business incubator where i visited not too long ago. rosewell products is a small extruder in columbus now making its products in ohio instead of china. columbus-based priorities designs manufactures compostable netting bag system for yard waste. its product is now made in the u.s., previously produced in asia. we can do more to help americans get back to work. it just makes plain sense to put u.s. tax dollars back into the u.s. economy. when u.s. tax dollars pay for something, like american flags that fly over our post offices, like clothing out fits at a federal agency, like any kinds of products bought by taxpayers, bought by the government, it makes sense, it makes sense on every level that those products be made in the u.s. let me tell you about a 22-year-old family-owned company in akron called american made bags. they are making bags for olympians and the army national guard. they are making them here in america. why shouldn't our national policies support american

companies that support american workers? the bring jobs home act sponsored by senator stabenow and many others with her makes two commonsense changes in our tax laws. it's a carrot and a stick approach. it gives a tax credit that any business can use against their overall tax liability for costs associated with moving a production line trade or business located outside the country back into the united states. the opposite of what we do now. and providing this tax credit, we give incentives to companies to reshore, bring back jobs that might have been modified abroad earlier to places like china and mexico and india. in 2006 alone, u.s. manufacturers claimed $45 billion of foreign tax credit, a huge financial advantage to companies that have sent jobs to china and new mexico and india. but instead of promoting job growth, u.s. tax policy rewards those companies for outsourcing. that's why we need to end the backwards practice that allows businesses to deduct from their taxes the cost of shipping jobs

overseas. we need to turn our tax code right side up when it comes to u.s. jobs, promoting their creation, discouraging their elimination. that's what the business bill does. it's about time. i close, madam president, before yielding to senator heller. one of the things that happened out of the auto rescue that's a bit of an untold story. in toledo, ohio, at the jeep plant, an assembly plant where the wrangler and the liberty are put together for purchase, prior to the auto rescue, only 50% of the components at the jeep plant, the chrysler jeep plant in toledo, ohio, only 50% of those components were made in the u.s. today 75% of those components are made in the u.s. the class comes out of crestline and the seats come out of northwood, and much of the rest of the jeep, of the wrangler comes from suppliers in ohio and michigan. those are american jobs, a huge increase in american jobs, when you consider 3/4 of those

components are u.s. made, when only three years ago, half of those components. those jeeps are selling, as the chevy cruz is made in youngstown, ohio. the components come from ohio and michigan and other states' manufacturing plants and makes a huge difference in building a middle-class society. madam president, i yield the floor. mr. heller: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from nevada. mr. heller: thank you, madam president. i thank the gentleman from ohio for yielding. last month was yet another disappointing month of job growth. over 12 million americans are unemployed. close to six million have been unemployed for over 27 weeks and eight million have been forced to work part time because they have been unable to find full-time work. to put this in context, since this administration came into office, a number of americans that are unemployed has increased by 700,000. this is a 5% increase in our national unemployment rate. home values and middle-class income have decreased, and

america has dropped from being the most competitive nation in the world to the fourth most competitive nation in the world. now, after this administration's failed policies of bailouts after bailouts, senate democrats are endorsing the idea of letting america go off the so-called fiscal cliff at the end of this year instead of letting businesses maintain their existing tax rates. this would effectively raise taxes on every american during one of the slowest economic recoveries in modern times. while i support extending these taxes and giving our nation's job creators certainty, i believe that we need tax reform. our code is too complex. we need to close loopholes, broaden the base and lower rates. as a member of the ways and means committee in the house, i worked on this issue and will continue to advocate for comprehensive reform while here in the senate. while i recognize that sometimes

comprehensive policies may be difficult to move forward, especially in an election year, i believe that we can find consensus on commonsense solutions. since coming to the senate, i've advocated for policies that create jobs for nevadans and for all americans. my state has been one of the hardest-hit in this current economic climate. nevada has had the distinction of leading the nation in unemployment for over two years as well as foreclosures and bankruptcies. one part of our population that's been especially hit hard is veterans. over 13% of the nation's bravest, who put their lives on the line, are unable to find a job in this economy. they come home from overseas to find their homes under water or chronic unemployment in their communities. while a number of veterans have fallen on tough itself, -- on th

times, some have had trouble adjusting to everyday life. we must not forget the families of our veterans, particularly those who have lost loved ones in combat. so today i'm proud to join with senator burr to introduce the veterans small business act which simply ensures that surviving spouses and children are eligible for small business benefits. congress has provided numerous benefits to our nation's veterans who own small businesses. so-sourcsource contracting and low-interest loans. however, should a spouse or a child of a veteran lose a loved one in combat, they can no longer receive these benefits or enroll in these programs. my legislation closes this large gap in federal law that does little for those who own

businesses before their activation and were killed in the line of duty. as a member of congress, we must honor our nation's fallen as well as ensuring that the loved ones that they leave behind have the same economic opportunities afforded to that veteran. we should be doing all we can to provide all of our nation's small businesses with the tools needed to survive in this current economic climate. congress needs to stop worrying about the next election and put in place policies that will not only ignite economic growth but also get our country back to work. while there are larger issues that we must address, such as tax refollow, there are smaller commonsense measures like this bill that we can pass right now if i have goin' the opportunity. measures such as this would make a gig difference in our -- a big difference in our nation's veterans and job creators. if there is any indication how important these issues are, i

had a constituent, dan lyons, who worked from reno, nevada, to washington, d.c., because he didn't think washington was doing enough for veterans. this was a six-month walk from reno, nevada, to washington, d.c. he felt he was not getting through to his elected officials via phone or e-mails, so dan, with a tent, a map, and a plan, started walking across america to see his elected officials face to face. he walked 25 miles a day battling treacherous weather, snakes, long, lonely miles, probably a few blisters just for the chance to sit down and ask that we do more to help struggling veterans. i was proud to meet with dan, and he is a reminder of what's right with society. he reminds us that we must honor our obligation to our veterans. when they have sacrificed so much to preserve and protect our

freedoms, we should at least ensure that their needs are met when they and their surviving families fall on hard economic times. thank you, madam president. i yield the floor. i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

mrs. shaheen: madam president in. the presiding officer: the senator from new hampshire. she is the senate in a quorum call? the presiding officer: yes, it is. mrs. shaheen: i ask that the quorum call be lifted. the presiding officer: without

objection. mrs. shaheen: today the senate is considering legislation to end tax breaks included in our own internal revenue code that actually help companies that want to ship jobs overseas. the bring the jobs home act provides not only a tax credit to encourage companies to move jobs back to the united states, but it would end those tax breaks that help companies ship jobs overseas. offshoring of american jobs has hurt the middle class and it continues to be a real problem. there's no good reason we should continue giving companies an incentive to offshore good american jobs. we can address high unemployment by encouraging companies to bring jobs back to the united states, and the tax credit in this bill will help to reverse the trend and put americans back to work. in fact, this incentive could help bring 2 million to 3 million jobs back to the united

states, according to some economic estimates. so i hope that all of our colleagues will support this bill, but i also want to take a few minutes to talk about another way that i think we in the senate and in congress could work together in a bipartisan way to create jobs and help the economy. today i filed an amendment, along with senator portman from ohio, that provides us with a great opportunity to create jobs in america. this amendment is the text of s. is 00 1000, the energy savins industrial and competitive act, that will create a national energy efficiency standard for the united states. energy efficiency is the cheapest, fastest way to improve our nation's energy infrastructure and our economy's energy independence.

it's also something that we can all agree on, whether we're from the northeast, as i am in new hampshire; from the south; from the west. all of us can benefit from energy efficiency. what our bill would do, the amendment that we filed today, is create jobs for our workers, lower energy costs for consumers, and make businesses more competitive. in fact, a recent study by the american council for an energy-efficient economy, concluded that our bill would create almost 80,000 jobs and save consumers $4 billion by 2020. s. i 1000 has brought support on both sides of the aisle. it passed out of the senate energy and natural resources committee with an 18-3 vote, and in addition there is a large and diverse group of industry, energy efficiency, and environmental stakeholders who have endorsed the bill.

that list includes the chamber of commerce, the national association of manufacturers, the alliance to save energy, the national resources defense council, bestbuy, the environmental defense fund, just to name a few of the organizations on the list. anytime we can get organizations as diverse as the ones i just listed to all endorse one piece of legislation, it is clear that there is broad bipartisan support for the effort. this legislation contains a broad package of low-cost and effective tools to reduce barriers for businesses, homeowners anhomeowners and con. it is all offthe shelf technology, so we don't have to wait for something to happen to make iodines. and they're all things that will

help consumers, businesses and homeowners save money. this is an easy first step to make our economy more competitive and our nation more secure and still meet the pent-up demand for energy-savings technologies for individuals and businesses alike. the american public is desperately looking for congress to work in a bipartisan way on policies to spur growth and create jobs. energy efficiency legislation represents our best chance to achieve both of those goals this year. we need to get some energy legislation to the floor. i've had the great opportunities to work for the last four years with senator jeff bingaman and senator lisa murkowski, the chair and rank members of the energy committee. we've done some great work in our committee, passed significant pieces of bipartisan legislation out of the committee. in fact, there are 15 pieces of

legislation that have been passed. all but one of those with strong bipartisan votesment and those pieces of legislation are just sitting in committee because we've not on able to get an agreement to bring those to the floor. we can get an energy efficiency policy in place. we can pass this legislation. that kind of an energy efficiency policy would be one that enhances our national security, that addresses our energy needs, and that puts americans back to worth and we can do it in this congress, if we can bring the shaheen-portman energy bill to the senate floor for a vote. that's what this amendment would do. i hope we have that opportunity. thank you very much, madam president. i yield the floor and note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

mr. hatch: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from utah. mr. hatch: i ask unanimous consent that the quorum call be rescinded. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. hatch: madam president,, today we are debating a bill called the bring jobs home act. now, we live in serious times. we have a debt fast approaching $16 trillion, millions remain out of work, and economic and job growth has slowed to a

crawl. times like these demand serious economic answers, so it is important that we all understand the utter lack of seriousness of this proposal. the only thing serious about bringing jobs home act are its flaws. the bring jobs home act would deny deduction for ordinary and necessary business expenses to the extent that such expenses were incurred for outsourcing. that is, to the extent an employer incurred costs in relocating a business unit from the united states to outside the united states, the employer would be disallowed a deduction for any of the business expenses associated with such outsourcing. the bring jobs home act would also create a new tax credit for insourcing. that is, if a company relocated a business unit from outside the united states to inside the united states, the business would be allowed a tax credit equal to 20% of the costs

associated with such insourcing. on the surface, this proposal might sound reasonable. as sound bites go, the president's reelection campaign and the senate democratic leadership have apparently decided that they can make some political hay with this propos proposal. but as substantive tax policy goes, this proposal is a joke. first of all, the amount of money involved is trifling. according to the nonpartisan joint committee on taxation, this bill's deduction disallowance provision will only raise about $14 million per ye year. that's $14 million, not billion with a "b." it's million with an "m." let's put that in perspective. this bill is supposedly a critical tax incentive to create jobs here in the united states, yet according to the joint committee on taxation, a nonprofit -- a nonpartisan committee, it will only raise about $14 million per year in

this multitrillion-dollar economy. meanwhile, president obama's campaign has now spent $24 million on ads attacking his opponent and attacking what he considers to be outsourcing. which his opponent hasn't done. the american people want us to address our fiscal situation and to create the conditions for robust economic and job growth. and how are the president and senate democrats spending their time? advancing a proposal that raises less money in one year than the amount the president's campaign has spent attacking republicans on the topic -- on this topic on television. if democrats meant this as a serious revenue raiser for the government, we would all be better off if the obama campaign had simply sent its $24 million to the treasury department for disbursement to insourcers rather than spend it on ads

attacking american global businesses. and i think the president might get more credit for that. simply put, this bill is misleading. its supporters would have you believe that under current law, there is some special deduction that exists for moving jobs outside of the united states of america. that is simply false. rather, there has always been a deduction allowed for a business's ordinary and necessary expenses, and expenses associated with moving have always been regarded as deductible business expenses. so allowing a deduction for these expenses is not a special thing. it is the rule. disallowing this deduction would be the exception, an extraordinary deviation from current tax policy. yesterday i heard my friends from the other side say, "we need to end a tax deduction for jobs that a business sends overseas." i have a letter from the joint committee on taxation addressed to the bill's authors that

includes an analysis of their bill and a score. i ask unanimous consent to enter a copy of the letter in the record. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. hatch: i thank the chair. paragraph 2 of the letter says -- and i quote -- "under present law, there are no specific tax credits or disallowances of deductions solely for locating jobs in the united states or overseas. deductions generally are allowed for all ordinary and necessary expenses paid or incurred by the taxpayer during the taxable year in carrying on any trade or business, which includes the relocation of business units." now, perhaps my friends on the other side take issue with the description of tax policy from congress' nonpart official score keeper. well -- nonpartisan official score keeper. if they do, i invite the president to show me the provision in the internal revenue code which contains a

deduction for shipping jobs overseas. let me just mention, this is the internal revenue code. it's getting so big you can hardly handle it. maybe joint tax and i are wrong, so i will keep the tax code right at my desk. and if one of my friends wants to leap through -- leaf through the code and show me the section that provides a deduction for shipping jobs overseas, i will stand corrected. they can't. it's not in here. this huge, conglomerated mess that we'd like to reform and won't be reformed until there's a change in administration. this administration is in the habit of pointing fingers every which way, blaming everyone but themselves for our weak economy and pathetic job growth. just the other day, the treasury secretary blamed europe and rising oil prices for our economic slowdown, yet he did not discuss the pall of

uncertainty that democratic politicians, including his boss, are putting over the economy with their refusal to extend the 2001 and 2003 tax relief unless they get their way on tax increases for small businesses. according to animals by the american action forum, the fiscal cliff facing american taxpayers is now twice the size of total g.d.p. growth this year. if we drive over this fiscal cliff, as the president and senate democratic leadership are now threatening, the likelihood that small business will hire will decrease by 18%, and the effective marginal tax rate for many workers and small businesses will go over 50%. at least in part -- and i would say in significant part -- is the complete failure to provide certainty and pro-growth tax

policies to america's families and businesses that is really dragging our economy down. and proposals such as the one before the senate today are not helping either. they increase uncertainty for the businesses that will grow our economy and hire new workers. it is another example of the obama administration's washington knows best philosophy. disallowing the business expense deduction means that income will now be measured less accurately. gross receipts minus business expenses equals income. that's what both accountants and economists tell us, but even though economists, accountants and businesses all measure income one way, washington will now measure it another way. not only is this bad for business but by disallowing deductions for certain business expenses, this proposal would measure income less accurately. and when the government's main source of revenue is the income

tax, it is rather important to measure income accurately. ultimately, we know that this bill is devoid of serious content because it is the product of political, not economic necessity. this bill is a sound bite, not sound tax policy. there really aren't a lot of dots to connect here. really, the genesis of this bill's politicization -- or prioritization can be traced in a straight line from 1600 pennsylvania avenue to the president's re-election headquarters in chicago. this bill is called the bring jobs home act, but its democratic proponents have not presented any evidence of the number of jobs, if any, that will return to america if the proposal becomes law.

during comments in support of the bill, the sponsor referred to a chart that said, and i quote -- "in the last decade, 2.4 million jobs were shipped overseas," but the sponsor tellingly did not say that the bill will bring 2.4 million jobs back to america. the proponents of this bill have not even told us that jobs will return to america if this bill becomes law, much less how many jobs. the answer is probably none, but that is exactly the sort of question we would have explored had this bill been produced by the senate finance committee rather than by some campaign consultant in chicago. the senate finance committee would have held hearings, we would have talked to experts, we would have looked at people's comments on both sides of the issue. then we would probably have had a markup that could have been brought to the floor with full finance committee support except we would never pass a bill like this in the finance committee in

my eyes. well, not with any real good intent. it is disappointing that even though the sponsor of this bill is a member of the senate finance committee, the bill's sponsor chose to bypass that committee. this bill comes straight to the senate floor without being vetted by the committee. her colleagues on the committee would likely have some valuable feedback for her. both staffs on the committee would likely have valuable expertise that they could bring to bear on this proposal. that is why i anticipate moving to commit this bill to the senate finance committee. and how does this bill fit with tax reform? many on the other side say they want tax reform. i think it is fair to say that there is a consensus that tax reform means getting rid of tax expenditures so as to decrease tax rates. the mantra is broaden the base and lower the rates, but this

proposal would create new tax expenditures. it would narrow the base. another measure of tax reform is simplification, but this proposal would make the tax laws even more complicated. this proposal is the antithesis of true tax reform. rather than coming up with more sticks to punish american businesses that compete globally, as this proposal does, we should be coming up with more carrots to encourage american businesses as well as foreign businesses to make america more attractive place to expand, hire and invest. and of course, the best way to do that consistent with free market principles would be to lower the corporate tax rate. but by creating new tax expenditures as this act would do, it becomes all the more difficult to lower the corporate tax rate. if we really want businesses to locate and hire in the united states, then we need to do what we can to make sure that they

are glad they are incorporated in the united states and that their headquarters are in the united states. as it stands right now, because of our worldwide tax regime, many global corporations have their parent company in the u.s. as a matter of historical accident. if they -- if they had to do it all over again, they very well might decide to incorporate elsewhere in the world. the way to address that, the way to make sure that the u.s. is a place global businesses want to incorporate is to transition our current worldwide system of taxation to a territorial tax system. a territorial tax system would only tax businesses on the profits they make in the u.s. this way, businesses would not be discouraged from incorporating in the u.s. now, if a business incorporates in the u.s., all of its worldwide profits are subject to u.s. tax. it is certainly true that a territorial tax regime must be

done right and that the devil is in the details, but it is also clear the territorial tax regime proposals could lead to greater investment in the u.s. and more headquarters jobs in the u.s. a territorial tax regime would put american businesses in a more competitive position when competing internationally. a territorial tax system would make us more consistent with major developed countries. so it is amazing that president obama's decided to demagogue this issue as well, undermining the future jobs prospects of millions of americans for years to come in order to secure his own job for another four years. not content to grossly misrepresent the issue of outsourcing, he's now doing the same with territorial taxation. that's in spite of the fact that his own agencies have been for it. for a person who claimed last week that he just cares so much about policy, he has an odd way of showing it when he campaigns. in the 2008 election, he

fundamentally misled the american people about key aspects of the health care proposal put forward by my friend and colleague from arizona, senator mccain. in doing so, he kicked the legs out from a reasonable and growing consensus about how best to reform the nation's health care system, and he did so only for his own political gain. his selfish acts on a territorial tax system have a similar flavor, and they promised to make tax reform much more difficult in the future. now, it's hard to see how this president could lead the country on tax reform. he attacks territorial tax regimes with a $4.5 trillion tax increase looming at the end of the year, essentially freezing job creation and economic growth. his allies in the senate are debating this effectively useless bill on outsourcing. his administration called for the so-called buffett tax, essentially creating a new alternative minimum tax that would provide trivial revenues

and tax capital gains at higher rates than even president carter wanted. some say it would have given us maybe eight days of spending here in washington. after waiting years for a corporate tax reform proposal, this past february, president obama's administration put out a series of bullet points. their so-called framework for corporate tax reform. all fluff and no details. tax reform is critical if we want our economy to grow, and if we are going to get out of our current jobs deficit, but given this mediocre track record, i just do not think that the president can be relied upon to lead this nation on this issue. not in 2012 and not in a second term either. to the extent that the president's tax agenda is not attributable to politics, it can be blamed on his odd view of our economy and the businesses that grow it. i think it is fair to say that the president's world view is fundamentally out of step with that of ordinary american

taxpayers. just the other day, while campaigning in virginia, the president laid out his economic vision. channeling the economic knowhow of harvard law's faculty lounge, he told the crowd if you've got a business, you didn't build that. somebody else made that happen. as charles krauthammer put it, spoken by a man who never created or ran so much as a candy store. now, i don't want to demean candy stores, but that's a fact. the president made clear for all to see just what he thinks of all the hard-working, risk-taking entrepreneurs who sacrifice daily to build their businesses. his perception is that hard work and sacrifice of those business owners and their families has nothing to do with their success. any success they have is owing to good luck and big government. the fact that we could build some roads and so forth. my guess is that not only

business owners but most americans disagree fundamentally with this assessment. the president clearly does not understand or deliberately ignores economic incentives, and the way that they lead to business growth and job creation. this is certainly on display on policy -- in the policy that will forever define this president, obamacare. good intentions are not enough, and obamacare's small business tax credit is a case in point. this credit was designed to encourage small employers to offer health insurance. the promise was that over 4 million employers would claim $2 billion in tax credits to help pay for health insurance. the reality -- only 309,000 taxpayers claimed the credit for a total of less than $416 million. why was the credit such a failure at achieving its

well-intentioned goal? well, a picture is worth a thousand years, so please look at this chart. can you imagine what a business owner must think when they encounter an administrative nightmare like all of this? the obamacare tax credit for small businesses gives red tape a body name. talk about a bureaucratic straitjacket. no wonder the business community has failed to embrace obamacare. mr. president, this issue of obamacare's manipulation of the tax code and its historic tax increases are deserving of extended remarks. for now, let me just say that we should be pursuing laws that will help, not harm, businesses and middle-class taxpayers. the bill we are discussing on the floor today, like obamacare, is not going to help. madam president, i suggest the absence of a quorum.

the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from michigan. mr. levin: madam president, a week ago yesterday -- the presiding officer: the senate is in a quorum call. mr. levin: i thank the presiding officer. i ask unanimous consent that the quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. the senator from michigan is recognized. mr. levin: madam president, a week ago yesterday was a fairly typical day in the senate. the "congressional record" shows that senators used the word "jobs" more than 150 times. the following day, a week ago today, the word jobs appears in the record 131 times. just this monday, a few days ago

when the senate came in at 2:00, jobs appears in the record 36 times. so we're talking and we're talking a lot about jobs. today, senator stabenow's bill offers a chance to do more than talk. we can act. the legislation addresses a fundamental flaw in our tax law. at a time when americans desperately want us to defend american jobs to give employers the incentives and support they need to hire new workers, our tax law perversely rewards employers for moving jobs to other countries. today an american corporation can decide to close a factory in this country, build a new one in another country, claim a tax break for the expenses of moving those jobs out of our country and pay no u.s. taxes on the income that factory earns, as long as they leave the income

overseas. our tax code in effect tells employers, quote, here's a tax deduction to tell you cut your american work force and move those jobs offslower, close quote. that's the effect of our tax code. american employers have responded unhappily. statistics released by the bureau of labor statistics show since 1999 u.s.-based multinational corporations have reduced employment here in the united states by about a million workers. but but they have added more than three million workers overseas. a recent gallup poll found only 1% of americans believe this trend of -- 13% of americans believe this trend is good for our economy. almost eight of every ten americans believe it does harm. in a poll for the alliance for american manufacturing, 83% of respondents say they disapprove of companies that move jobs to

countries such as china. the people of michigan and every state can no longer afford to watch their tax dollars subsidize shipping their jobs overseas. now, earlier this spring along with senator conrad, i introduced the cut unjustified tax loopholes act or the cut loopholes act. our legislation would cut several loopholes that enable tax avoid answer which adds to the deficit and to the tax burden of those who pay the taxes that they owe. our bill would cut offshore tax loopholes that allow corporations and individuals to avoid paying taxes by concealing their income and assets in offshore tax havens. one provision of the cut loopholes act would ensure that companies aren't taking a tax deduction for the expense of moving jobs overseas. under our bill, companies couldn't take a deduction for the expense, for instance, of moving a u.s. factory to another country until that company pays

u.s. taxes on the income generated by that foreign factory. senator stabenow's bring jobs home act takes a similar approach. ending the taxpayer subsidy that helps firms to move american jobs overseas. in addition, it would offer a 20% tax credit to companies that move production back to the united states. surely it makes sense for us to offer employers a tax cut if they bring jobs back to the united states. surely it makes sense to reform a law that adds insult to injury which forces our taxpayers to watch companies move their jobs abroad with the assistance of our taxpayers' dollars. madam president, we've already seen the enormous benefits to our economy and to our workers when american companies make the decision to return jobs to our shores. ford motor company is returning

thousands of jobs to michigan and other states. companies such as whirlpool are making the decision to hire american workers for work they once did abroad. americans manufacturing has built up agreement momentum in the last tee years adding thousands of jobs. we should add to that momentum. we should adopt the bring jobs home act. we should end existing tax incentives to export american jobs. we should provide a tax break for companies that bring back jobs to these shores. and, madam president, i yield the floor and note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

a senator: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from kentucky. mr. paul: i ask unanimous consent that we dispense with the quorum call. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. paul: there is a doctor in pakistan by the name of shakil afridi. he has been put in prison for 30 years. i think this is an abomination. while we can't tell countries what they must do with their internal affairs, we don't have to reward them with taxpayer money when they put someone in prison who is attempting to help america. my point and my message to

pakistan, if you want to be an ally, act like it. putting this man in prison for 33 years for helping america get bin laden, which pakistan was ostensibly supposed to be doing, is a real travesty of justice. bin laden lived for nearly a decade in pakistan in a city, living comfortably a mile or two from one of their military academies. we finally got him, but it doesn't appear as if we got him with much help from the pakistani government. so now this doctor is in prison for 33 years, and how does president obama respond? president obama this week gave them $1 billion, an additional $1 billion. we're rewarding bad behavior with more money, with more of your money, money we don't have have. we have a $1 trillion deficit and we're giving them an extra $1 billion. so yesterday we were supposed to have an appeal.

dr. afridi, the doctor who helped us, was supposed to get a chance to try to prove his innocence and his trial has been indefinitely delayed. we have requested the pakistani embassy. we have requested, is there going to be a trial? when's the date been set for his appeal? we got no answer. we requested this information from president obama's administration, from his state pwept. -- department. will dr. afridi get a trial? when will the trial be? we've gotten no answer. if we can't get an answer, i see no money to send taxpayer money to pakistan. i have the votes and the ability to force a vote on this issue. my plan is next week to force a vote on this issue. the vote will be on ending all aid to pakistan. ending the aid until this doctor is free. this is not a question i take lightly. this doctor's life is now being threatened.

the information minister from that particular province in pakistan says that they want him transferred because they have death threats on a daily basis to him. they're worried about other prisoners killing him. i would hate to have this on the conscience of the obama administration if this doctor who helped us get bin laden is killed in prison. i would hate to have this on my conscience in pakistan if they have an innocent man behind bars whose crime is helping america if he were to be killed in prison. at the very least, the pakistani government ought to immediately get him into a safe prison in one of the larger cities outside the tribal regions. we're concerned about dr. afridi's safety. we're concerned about imprisoning him for life, for helping america. we're also concerned about american taxpayers' money being taken from hardworking americans and sent to a country that seems to disrespect us.

i'm all for cooperation with pakistan. i hope they will continue to work with us, but you shouldn't have to buy your friends. we just gave them an extra $1 billion, and yet they continue to disrespect us by holding this man in prison. i'm very concerned about his safety. i'm concerned that his appeal was not heard today, that his trial was canceled. and next week, if we don't have answers on his trial, we will be here on the floor until i get a vote on whether or not we should continue sending money to pakistan while they owed him. it is a very important issue for americans, and i hope all across america people are going to ask themselves and call their senators and say, you know what, i'm not so sure we should send our hard-earned dollars to pakistan when they treat us this way. thank you, madam president, and i yield back my time. a senator: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from maryland. mr. cardin: thank you,

madam president. i have taken the floor of the senate on previous occasions to talk about our aging water infrastructure and the need for financing. i talked about the state revolving funds which is the principal funding source for our local governments being able to upgrade their water infrastructure. i've talked about the need for safe drinking water and how that is being compromised. i've also talked about the fact, the way we treat our wastewater and the health risks involved in an aging infrastructure. and i've taken the floor on different occasions to talk about the consequences of our failure to act. i made it clear that if we move forward with water infrastructure projects, it will not only provide the type of infrastructure we need for public health, but we'll also create jobs and opportunity in our community. i have the honor of representing the state of maryland in the united states senate, and we have some very aging communities

in maryland. one of those, of course, is my home city of baltimore, where the water infrastructure is historic as some of its buildings, well over 100 years old. we've talked about this issue, but, madam president, i just want to bring to your attention that this past monday in baltimore, 120-year-old water main broke creating a massive crater in downtown baltimore on one of the busiest streets in our city. i've been told it's going to take a couple of weeks before that can be fixed. i've also been told that as a result, downtown baltimore was flooded and sending thousands of workers home, costing businesses countless loss of revenue. now, okay, you say these things happen. well, in baltimore we have a water main break at the rate of about two or three a day, causing a lot of cost, because

our city workers have to go out and dig it up and have to cut off water service, homes are inconvenienced by not having the ability to get their water. and we go through this again and again. what we need to do is upgrade our water infrastructure. we all understand that. we need to make that investment. and these major water main breaks are becoming more a reality. in 2008, we saw river road in bethesda turned into literally a river, where we had to use helicopters in order to rescue people because of a water main break. in october of 2009, we saw in dundalk, maryland, outside of baltimore a major break that flooded thousands of homes causing incredible inconvenience to that community. just a year ago, not far from where we are right here, we saw a major water main break in prince george's county, closing the washington beltway, causing a lot of homeowners to be without water for an extended period of time.

the water infrastructure in this country is in desperate need of new attention and greater investment. that's true in our wastewater treatment facility plants. it's true in the way that we transport our clean water. water treatment plants are critically important to prevent billions of tons of pollutants from reaching america's rivers, lakes and coastlines, in so doing to help prevent water-borne disease and make water safe for fishing and swimming. some 54,000 community drinking water systems provide drinking water to more than 250 million americans, keeping water supplies free of contaminant that cause disease. there is an ongoing dead tkaeugs of these systems -- degree tkaeugs -- de gradion of these systems. many are outdated. some components across the country over a century old. this aging infrastructure

contributes to the 75,000 sanitary sewer overtphraous -- overflows that occur in the united states over he a kwraourpblg. 675,000 sewage overflows a year in the united states of america causing an estimated 5,500 annual illnesses due to these contaminations which occur on our beaches, streams and lakes where american families vacation. the environmental protection agency has estimated that more than $630 billion will be needed over the next 20 years to meet the nation's drinking water and wastewater infrastructure needs. as chair of the wildlife and water subcommittee we had a hearing and brought in officials to talk about these needs. they told us they can't possibly do this with the resources they currently have available, that they need a federal partner. they need a stronger federal

partner. they need a federal government that will give them new innovative tools in order to deal with these needs. mayor blake of baltimore testified that she would like to see some for form of a trust fud established so we can leverage money and make the type of investment. she pointed out, which we know, for the money we spent more money infrastructure, we're going to cause a multiplier effect that creates more money in our economy, it po a three to one. you put $1 billion in water infrastructure improvement it creates $3 billion in our community allowing us to create more jobs at the time we also improve our water infrastructure for public health and for economic development. this makes sense. we need to do this. i don't know how many more times i'm going to have to come to the floor of the united states senate and point out these horrible water main breaks that are occurring all over.

what's happening in baltimore, what's happening in maryland is happening in every one of our states. this is not a one-state problem. this is a national problem. i can tell you people are outraged. they are going to be more outraged when they realize their public health is at risk and the availability of safe drinking water is at risk as well as the convenience that is caused when their basement is flooded or they can't get to their businesses or they have to leave their businesses early or they pay additional taxes in order to repair for the damage that has been done as a result of the failure to replace aged infrastructure. i urge my colleagues to work together on this issue. let's make sure we have a budget that makes sense for this country but that allows us to invest in the types of investments that are important for america's future. we have talked about that with transportation infrastructure. we've talked about that with energy infrastructure. the same thing is true with water infrastructure. and i look forward to working with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle so that we can

provide the tools and resources to allow our economy to grow and our local governments to be able to upgrade their water infrastructure systems. with that, madam president, i would suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

the presiding officer: the senator from mississippi. mr. wicker: thank you, madam president. i ask unanimous consent that the quorum call be lifted. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. wicker: and i come to the floor today to call members' attention to recent action taken at the parliamentary assembly of the organization for security and cooperation in europe which convened in monaco earlier this month. the osce considered and passed with overwhelming support a resolution on the rule of law in russia in the case of sergei

magnitsky. this is a resounding and much-welcome rebuke of russia's deplorable human rights record and systematic corruption. the osce reaffirms the widespread calls for justice and rule of law with this ruling. the international group has sent a clear signal to human rights violators that they will be held accountable. the osce resolution supports government efforts to ban visas, freeze assets, and employ other financial sanctions against those connected to the illegal detention and tragic death of sergei magnitsky. the young lawyer was beaten and denied medical care in a russian prison after uncovering a vast

conspiracy by russian officials involving $230 million in tax fraud. sergei magnitsky died as a result of this treatment, and no one has ever been held responsible for his death. i've been a member of the helsinki commission for the last several years, and i have seen firsthand the contributions that the osce has made to advance democratic economic security and human rights issues. i was unable to attend the parliamentary assembly meeting, but i'm grateful that our colleague, senator john mccain, was able to be there to highlight the importance of this particular issue. the magnitsky case is just one example of the gross human rights abuses and official impunity in russia, but as senator mccain noted in his statement before the osce meeting in monaco, the demand

for justice for sergei is what mass mobilized the world in his memory. senator mccain is right to point out that the osce resolution as well as national initiatives to punish those implicated in sergei magnitsky's death is not anti-russia. in deed, a return to the rule of law would be of great benefit to the russian people. to quote my colleague, senator mccain, defending the innocent and punishing the guilty is pro-russia. the virtues that sergei magnitsky embodied -- integrity, fair dealings, fidelity to truth and justice, and the deepest love to country that does not turn a blind eye to the fail us of one's government but seeks to remedy them by insignificance on the highest standards -- this, too, is pro-russia. and i would submit that it

represents the future that most russians want for themselves and their country" -- to end the quote from senator mccain. he then goes on to encourage the assembly to align with the highest aspirations of the russian people. for the i indomitable freedom. like the osce, members of this senate will also have an opportunity to lend our voices to the call for justice and accountability. the sergei magnitsky rule of law accountability act would impose travel and financial sanctions on those associated with human rights crimes. i urge my colleagues to support this bill and to uphold this country's commitment to the protection of human rights.

i salute the leadership of my colleague and friend, senator ben cardin of maryland, for his leadership in this regard, and i'm pleased to note that the magnitsky act was included during consideration of extending normal trade relations to russia in yesterday's senate finance committee markup. we're making great progress on this issue, and i look forward to a vote here on the senate floor, madam president. in conclusion, madam president, i ask unanimous consent that senator mccain's full remarks at the osce parliamentary assembly be entered into the record at this point. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. wicker: and, at this point, i note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll.

quorum call:

quorum call:

ms. stabenow: mr. president, i would ask suspension of the quorum call. the presiding officer: without objection. ms. stabenow: thank you, mr. president. in just a couple of minutes, we're going to be voting on a

very important policy, a very important bill i'm proud to cosponsor -- sponsor with a number of cosponsors, a number of colleagues, called the bring jobs home act. and it goes to the heart of what has been happening in a global economy when we haven't been paying attention to our tax code or other things we ought to be doing to be able to bring jobs home and other countries are aggressively working to take our manufacturing base, to take our middle class because they know that when they look at our country, you have a middle class because we make things and grow things. and so they're rushing to be able to make things and to innovate and so on and to create incentives for our jobs to be shipped overseas. now, we know we're in a global economy. we know our companies are competing with countries and we have a whole range of things that we've been working to do to

be able to able to support, incentivize and help manufacturers and other businesses here to innovate, expand advanced manufacturing, i.t. services, other things. but what we haven't been paying attention to is how our own tax code actually is incentivizing or supporting, at the very least supporting and helping companies ship jobs overseas. and there's a very important, very basic policy we'll be voting on today. if a company decides to pack up and move overseas, should they be able to write that off their taxes, and you and i, all of us as american taxpayers, pay for it? i don't think there are too many people in the country that would say yes to that. in fact, i can't imagine why anybody would say yes to that. the reality is that if somebody

loses their job at a plant and then they find out that they get the privilege as an american taxpayer to help pay for the move in folks say, "are you kidding me?" or they say a whole lot of other things. this bill, the bring jobs home act, is very straightforward. simply says we're not -- we're not going to pay for that anymore. that loophole will be gone. however, if you want to bring jobs back, we'll be happy to let you deduct those costs as a business expense for bringing a job home and, in fact, we'll give you another 20% tax credit or 20% of your costs on top of it. so we're happy to incentivize coming home and to support your efforts to come home, but we're not paying for you to leave. and that's very basically what

this is about. now, we're going to have a vote on whether or not to proceed to this bill. as we know around here, unfortunately, we've seen the process become one -- the process that used to be used rarely is now used on every bi bill, where we can't even get to the bill to vote on it with a majority vote without going through a super majority to -- to be able to stop a filibuster, which is what right now basically has been happening. there's an objection. we have to get 60 votes to overcome it. otherwise, the filibuster continues. and so we will need to do that today. we will need bipartisan support to do that. i hope we will have that. a couple of weeks ago, we came together in strong, bipartisan support, worked together very, very hard, long hours to pass a farm bill. that's about growing things in america. and now we have an opportunity to work together, come together in a bipartisan basis to support making things in america.

we don't have a middle class unless we make things and grow things. and it's not going to make any sense if we continue to have a tax policy that actually encourages or helps you to leave america. what we've seen now is that we are actually losing jobs we know that in the last decade, 2.4 million jobs were shipped overseas, and that's just the ones that they were able to count at this point. and so 2.4 million jobs have been shipped overseas, at minimum, and we helped to pay for it. now, the good news is, is we have a lot of companies now for a lot of reasons, the fact we have the most productive, the smartest, most talented work force in the world. we have high productivity in our country. we have companies now bringing jobs back and we want to

accelerate that bs to support, t effort. i'm proud that in our automobile industry we're seeing jobs come back. with support and help from policies that have allowed retooling loans to retool older plants. ford motor company has taken their largest plant in wayne, michigan, retooled it, along with investments in advanced batteries, jobs are coming back from mexico and they're bringing jobs back from other countries as well. g.m. is doing the same kind of thing. chrysler, i'm sure other companies as well. we know many, many companies, large and small, are looking at this. yesterday i had the opportunity to have a businessman from michigan who is the c.e.o. of a company called galaxy solutions. he actually lives in new jersey but is now having a major presence in michigan and detroit, hiring 500 people in

i.t., information technology. those are jobs coming back from india, brazil, china. and one of the things that i heard as he was talking yesterday is that, you know, when you look at the bottom line that costs matter and if we have a tax code that helps him bring jobs back rather than supporting him to take jobs away, to ship them overseas, it -- it makes a difference, it matters. it matters not only for the cost but for the signal it sends about how serious we are about creating jobs in america. i can't imagine anybody that doesn't want to see "made in america" again on everything. we're not going to get there if we don't start with the basics. and, mr. president, that's what this is. and i know you have talked about this so many times as well. i mean, this -- this is about the basic premise of saying we

are going to stop loopholes in the tax code that reward companies that are shipping jobs overseas and we're instead going to support and enscene activize jobs coming back. now, we know there are many other things in addition to this that we need to do. we need comprehensive tax reform in a global economy. no question about that. and that is something i'm confident that we will be doing in the months ahead and into the next year. we need to do that and we need to do it on a bipartisan basis. but that is not a reason not to close this loophole, to this -- to stop this policy that makes no sense. we have a lot more to do. we know that. we need to come together around policies that focus on innovation and education and

rebuilding america and supporting the great entrepreneurs of the country, small businesses, large businesses. we know that. there's much, much to do. but today we have a chance to do something. we have a chance to do something that is very, very straightforward. we have a chance to simply say, the tax code in america is not going to reward or pay for the costs of american jobs being shipped overseas. it's as basic as that. no other country in the world would do this. they'd think we were veaz to have this kind a policy in place. so today's a chance to say no, we're not crazy, we get it, we know there's a lot to do.

but let's come together on one thing and then we can come together on the next thing and the next thing and the next thing and continue to build and rebuild our economy for the future. but today is very simple. today is the day to say no to american taxpayers helping to pay the costs for american jobs being shipped overseas. it's a day to say yes to suppo supporting through tax deductions jobs coming back and additional incentives on top of that for them to do that. i hope my colleagues will come together and very strongly vote "yes" on this measure so that we can proceed to debate and to pass something that i know is strongly supported across our country. thank you, mr. president. the presiding officer: the clerk will report the motion to invoke

cotour. the clerk: we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate, hereby move to bring to a close the debate on the motion to proceed to calendar number 442, s. 3364, a bill to provide an incentive for businesses to bring back jobs to america. the presiding officer: by unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum call has been waived. the question is: is it the sense of the senate that debate on the motion to proceed to s. 3364, a bill to provide an incentive for businesses to bring jobs back to america, shall be brought to a close? the yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule. the clerk will call the roll. vote:

vote:

the presiding officer: on this vote are there any senators who have not yet voted over wish to change their votes? if not, on this vote the yeas are 56, the nays are 42. three-fifths of the senators duly chosen and sworn not having voted in the affirmative, the motion is not agreed to.

the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: i'm not in a position now to announce no more votes today. i hope we can be there just a little bit but we're trying to work through some procedural matters now and hopefully we can do that in the next half hour or so. the presiding officer: the senator from michigan. ms. stabenow: thank you, mr. president. i just want to take a moment to speak about what just happened in my -- and my deep concern about just what happened now with this vote. on the one hand, we had 56 members, a majority, substantial majority, of members who voted yes, that they want to bring jobs home, that they want to stop paying for jobs being shipped overseas, and that we want to support and provide assistance through the tax code to bring jobs home. 56 members. it's a majority. what we didn't have is a

supermajority to stop a filibuster so that's basically what has been happening here, is that we have a situation where despite the will of the majority of the people here, the majority of senators, to want to move forward to this legislation and pass it because we have 56 votes to pass it, we don't have a supermajority. this is what has been happening over and over and over again in the united states senate despite the fact that people want us to work together and get things done. what we are trying to do -- and we're going to continue to push forward on this -- is to very clearly say to a business sphur if you are -- if you are going to close up shop it's on your dime, not the american taxpayers' dime. we're not going to help pay for it. you want to bring jobs back, we're happy to have our tax code

allow to you write out those costs and, in fact, we'll give you an extra 20% towards those costs. it's deeply concerning to me today. i think that those watching around the country are probably scratching their heads or doing much -- or saying things that we probably can't say on the senate floor about what in the world is going on when we can't come together on the simple premise that americans should not be paying for jobs shipped overseas. so we're going to keep at it until we get it done. what we ought to be unified around is having the words "made in america" on everything again in this country. and we're going to keep fighting until we can get that done. thank you, mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from vermont. mr. leahy: mr. president, the distinguished senator from michigan is still here on the floor, she's done such commendable work here, somebody who brought together the senate

agriculture committee on a very, very complex farm bill and in a record amount of time got it passed with a heavy bipartisan majority. i think he she would agree with me that's the way we used to and should do legislation. for the life of me, i cannot understand why any senator would not be supporting the senator from michigan on this bill. we want jobs here in the united states. everybody will say we want jobs in the united states. everybody says that they want to have tax laws that actually help this country. so what they do is they vote by refusing to allow us to go forward, they vote to allow jobs to go overseas. but worse than that, give special tax breaks. it's almost like saying this

company of yours, these jobs you have, come on, i know a great place for you to go overseas. by the way, here's the airplane ticket. here's a special deal. we're not going to give that to a small business owner in vermont or michigan, but we'll give that to you to ship your job -- come on. let's get real. the american people, you take a poll of this do we want to close loopholes for shipping jobs overseas, do we want to give encouragement to have jobs here in the united states, i guarantee you it would be overwhelmingly passed. the united states senate better wake up and say we passed it, too. i thank the senator from michigan. and, mr. president, one thing we all agree on and the distinguished presiding officer and i both from vermont where we have open and available

government. he did in his role as major of our larges -- mayor of our largest city. we know the right to know is a cornerstone of our democracy. during my three decades in the senate i've urged democratic and republican administrations alike be open, be transparent to the american people. that's why in march i joined a bipartisan group of members of congress, senator grassley, senator burr, senator hagan, senator bill nelson, senator rubio, in writing to the secretary secretary of defense panetta to request the release of government records regarding the contamination of drinking water that occurred over several decades at camp lejeune marine base. the the drinking water contamine anything at camp lejeune was one of the worst environmental disasters in american history to occur in the domestic department

of defense installation. unfortunately, the department of defense initially refused to provide the support and information to the congress. but i'm pleased to report that i've pursued it further with secretary panetta, the department finally provided more than 8,500 files about this issue to the judiciary committee on july 9. i commend secretary panetta for accommodating the committee's request for this information. while i believe that much more transparency is needed, i believe it as a united states senator, i believe it as one who believes in transparency. i also believe it as a father of a marine. today, thousands of active and retired marines who lived on or near camp lejeune prior to 1987 and their family members are extremely interested in learning more about what occurred and w

why. my own state of vermont, 402 vermonters have signed in saying they're looking to their government to provide more information about this calamity. now, open government is either a democratic issue or a republican issue. it's an american value. it's a virtue that we all have to uphold. and it is in this bipartisan spirit that i announce i will make all the documents the department of defense has provided to the judiciary committee about what happened at camp lejeune available to the public. the documents can be seen on the judiciary committee's web site. go to www.judiciary.senate.gov. find out what the documents say about what happened at camp lejeune. to protect the personal privacy

of our service members and other private information, the information will be subject to the privacy act and has obviously been redacted from these files. but the marines and the other americans who have been touched by this environmental disaster deserve complete candor from their government. a uniquely american tradition of a government that's open and accountable and accessible to its people demand nothing less. and again, i thank senator grassley, the committee's distinguished ranking member, and senators burr, hagan, nelson and rubio for working closely with me on this important transparency issue. and i say to those marines, we will find out what happened. and i ask that a copy of my full remarks be placed in the record. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. leahy: mr. president, i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll.

quorum call:

mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid reid: ask con scene thl of the quom be terminated. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. reid: mr. president, we've been able to work things out. we are not going to have to be in session -- thought we had it all worked out but now we don't, so note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

the presiding officer: the senator from arizona. mr. mccain: i ask that proposed, the quorum call being suspended and that senator lieberman and the senator from south carolina, senator graham, if he ever shows up, be allowed toughen gauge in a colloquy. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mccain: i thank you, madam president. i join my friend, senator lieberman, again on the floor on the issue that has -- that is,

in my view, tran sended consequences -- tran sensed consequences national -- transcended consequences not just for the people being massacred in libya but also for a definition of what the united states of america is all about. yesterday's attack in syria killed key leaders of the assad regime including one of its notorious and brutal henchmen, a sign of progress and a sign that assad is losing his hold on power. it is hardly time to celebrate or claim credit. i see in the various organs in the administration, like "the new york times," well, now the administration's hands-off policy has been successful. successful? 17,000 syrians have been massacred while this

administration has done nothing, and the president of the united states has refused to even speak up. the president of the united states talks about bain capital all the time. why doesn't he talk about the capital of syria, where thousands of innocent people have been tortured, raped, and murdered? so, assad will fall, as the senator from connecticut and i have said time and time again. but how many more will die before the united states of america first speaks up for them? second, helps with other countries provide them with arms and ability to defend themselves and a sanctuary, a no-fly, no-drive sanctuary? and working with other countries in the region accelerate the

departure of bashar assad? i'd like to make another point before i ask my friend from connecticut. it seems now that the united states national security rests not with the decisions that should be made here in the halls of congress and at the white house; that the decisions concerning what actions the united states of america may take is now dictated by russia and china in the united nations. how many times have we heard the administration say, well, we'd like to do more. we'd like to have more happen. but russia vetoes the united nations security council. does that mean that when these people are being massacred, cry out for our help and our moral support, that because russia vetoes a resolution as they did today again, supported by china, a resolution the united nations

security council, therefore, we can do nothing? former president clinton went to kosovo without a united nations -- without a united nations security council resolution because he knew that the russians would veto any resolution concerning kosovo. and he went, and we saved muslims' lives. so the administration continues to assume what they call a yemen solution is possible in syria. they believe with russia backing, we can compel assad and his top lieutenants to leave power and the apparatus of the syrian state will continue to function under new management. i wish this could be so. let me also point out, and i'd ask my friend from connecticut, isn't it true that the predictions that the longer that this conflict lasts, the more likely it is that extremists come in and take over this revolution which began peacefully? isn't it true that our concern

about weapons of mass destruction and a stockpile become more valid every day this goes on? isn't it a valid assumption that bashar assad in his desperation may use these weapons against his own people and the whole stockpile of those weapons become more and more tenuous by the day? isn't it true that the likelihood of further chaos, further inability to put that country and its people back together after this conflict is over and as we agree bashar assad will leave, but isn't it true that every day that goes by that he remains in power, the situation becomes worse in all respects as far as american national security interests are concerned, whether it be weapons of mass destruction, whether it be islamic extremists taking

over that country? and, by the way, including continued iranian presence in syria, propping up hezbollah in lebanon and all of the ramifications of their continued presence there. so, i would ask my friend finally, doesn't this argue, doesn't this cry out rather than saying well, what happened yesterday that was good and it shows bashar assad is on his way out, doesn't this indicate that it's now even more in our interest to accelerate his departure not with american boots on the ground, but through moral support, physical support, logistic support and working with our allies? mr. lieberman: madam president, i say to my friend from arizona, of course i agree with you. the reality is that premature

judgments about the victory of the syrian freedom fighters over the dictator assad are exactly that. they're premature. the murder/assassination, the elimination of these critical leaders of this dictatorial government yesterday by the syrian opposition was a very significant development, and apparently the fighting continues in damascus in a way that may bring exactly what my friend from arizona says, more chaos in damascus, the capital city. but this fight's not over. this regime has a devastating inventory of weapons, including weapons of mass destruction. and as the senator from arizona said, bashar assad's father used those weapons, in that case

chemical weapons, against his own people decades ago, killing thousands of them on a single day. no, this fight's not over. and the danger is that, as you said, it does get worse the more it goes on without the involvement of the civilized nations of the world who have to be led by the united states of america. i want to put in juxtaposition these two significant events of the last 24 hours that my friend from arizona has described. one is the suicide bombing apparently or death of these leaders of the assad government. the second is the vote in new york at the united nations today. this, after months in which too much of the civilized world has been pleading with russia and depending on russia to change its mind and come in and get

bashar assad out of there. this veto today shows that they're just not going to do it. i'm going to yield in a moment because i note the presence of the majority leader. but just to finish this thought. the reality is now that the fig leaf has been taken off the annan plan which since it went into effect and since it allegedly brought a cease-fire to syria, thousands more syrians have been killed. the reality is that russia will not join in trying to stop the slaughter in syria, that the slaughter will only be stopped by facts on the ground. and those facts are military. and it will not get better until the united states leads a coalition of the willing to support the opposition and bring about the early end of this

horrific regime that now rules syria. with that, i yield the floor to the majority leader. mr. reid: mr. president, i appreciate my friend yielding. the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: there will be no further roll call votes today. the next vote will be monday in relation to the nomination of michael shipp. mr. mccain: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from arizona. mr. mccain: i thank the distinguished majority leader and urge him however possible to bring up the defense authorization bill, which i hope we can do sooner rather than later, as we have done for the last 50 years. i thank the majority leader. mr. reid: madam president, if i can respond to my friend, i had a long conversation yesterday with the chairman of the committee who we're working with and the ranking member is senator mccain. i understand the importance of

the legislation. i know senator mccain is working on that to try to narrow the focus of what we will do when we get on that bill. we will get on it. it's only a question of when. mr. mccain: i thank the majority leader. i would just like to mention to my friend from connecticut as we continue this colloquy. there is another aspect of this i would appreciate comments on. we all agree that bashar assad will go. we know that. now, the question is, how many die? how many wounded? how many killed? what happens to weapons of mass destruction? i think we have established the longer it goes on, the more those threats increase and the more dangerous the situation becomes, and the harder it will be to resolve once bashar assad he leaves. but also i would ask my friend from connecticut, how will the syrian people feel about the

united states of america if we continue to sit by and really provide them not even moral assistance, much less the physical and logistics assistance that you and i just discussed is necessary? senator lieberman and i have been to libya on numerous occasions. i was there at an exhilarating moment, at the time of their elections. and i can tell you firsthand tpr-rbgs -- from seeing a couple hundred thousand people celebrating, they're grateful to the united states of america for what we did. i wonder what the attitude of the new people who will emerge as leaders of syria, whoever they are, what will their attitude be to the united states of america i would ask my colleague. and taking into consideration that the challenges that whoever takes over power in libya will

face are myriad. they are really incredible obstacles and a path to a free and democratic nation. and that would cry out for american assistance and help. how willing and how eager will they have for the united states to be engaged in any way in assisting them as they try to achieve the goal that they've already sacrificed 17,000 lives for. mr. lieberman: i say to my friend from arizona, he makes a very important here. let me relate it back to one of the excuses that's been given for the united states not to have become more involved on the side of the opposition to assad, which is the side of freedom, which is where our national values call us to be. one of the excuses for not getting involved is this argument: we don't know who's going to follow assad.

it could be islamist extremists. well, my reaction to that would be that the longer we sit back, the more likely it will be people who are not friendly to the united states because in their hour of need, unlike the situation in libya that the senator just described, we were not with them. you and i have been to turkey together. i made a trip to lebanon. in each case we've talked to the leaders. in one case in turkey we spoke to the leaders of the syrian opposition, syrian national council. we met with the heads of the free syrian army. we met with individual refugees. my own judgment is that these people are not extremists or radicals. these are patriots. these are nationalists. these are people who want a better life than they were

living under assad. and now increasingly they are people whose relatives or friends have been killed by assad's military, and so they have a fury in them, an anger that they didn't have before, because now they have been victims. but if we -- can i say that there are no islamist extremists who are now fighting in syria against assad? i can't say that. and i think the longer we stand back and don't partner openly, strongly with the syrian freedom fighters, the greater is the danger, one, that he can traoeplists will -- that extremists will be what follows assad. and, two, even if we're lucky enough and it's not extremists, it will be a leadership group that will not feel any

particular sense of gratitude to the united states because we were not with them when they needed us. mr. mccain: could i also point out that i wish -- first of all, i understand and i know my friend from connecticut does, that the focus of the american people is on our economy, jobs, and the severe recession that we're in. but, you know, i would say to my friend from connecticut, i just wish that every american could have either been with us or have had seen on film a recording of our visit to a refugee camp in the turkish-syrian border. 25,000 refugees. i understand now that's up to 35,000 or 40,000 refugees from syria. people have been driven out of their homes, living not in squalid conditions but certainly

very crowded and unpleasant conditions, certainly not the same conditions which they enjoyed in syria. i wish that the american people could have seen it when we met those young children who have been displaced from their homes, when we met a group of men who told us of watching their children being murdered in front of their eyes, of the young women who had been gang raped, of the defectors from the syrian military who told us, told us that that's their instructions, their instructions are in order to try to subdue the people of for due, murder, rape. we know from human rights organizations that now there are torture centers set up around syria by the assad military where people are taken and obviously tortured.

the american people are the most generous people in the world, and the american people where we can will try to stop these kinds of atrocities and offenses to everything that we stand for and believe in, so i wish more americans would know how terrible and dire this situation is for the average citizen, not just those who are demonstrating but anybody who happens to be in one of these areas where the tanks roll in, the artillery starts firing and the helicopter gunships start slaughtering people in the streets. and i hope that i'm not saying this in a partisan fashion, but i wish the president of the united states would speak up for these people. that's the job of the president of the united states, and that's to lead, and i wish we here in congress would do more in order to try to help these people

because that is a long, long american tara digs. and yes, it may require some -- tradition. and yes, it may require some financial sacrifice and maybe some material sacrifice on the part of the american people, but i think the cause is one of transcendent importance. i want to major my friend from connecticut for his compassion and his concern and his commitment to these people who live far away. mr. lieberman: madam president, i thank senator mccain for his leadership here. this is one of those cases where we had the opportunity, and it's painful that we haven't taken it over these many, many months of the uprising in syria. we have the opportunity not only to do what's right but to do what's best for our country diplomatically.

in other words, what's right is to be on the side of freedom, to be with the people fighting against a brutal dictator. that's the right thing -- what's right is to enter this fight to stop the slaughter of innocent men, women and literally children, but there also happens to be the strategic opportunity, and i asked my friend from arizona about this, do you agree that sear yeah -- that syria assad is not only the best friend but the only friend and ally that iran has in the middle east. iran is our number-one strategic threat in the world today, number-one state sponsor of terrorism, head-long effort to build nuclear weapons that will totally change the peace of the world if they get them. so here we have an opportunity not only to do what's morally

right but to over -- to help overthrow the best friend of our worst enemy, iran. as you remember, we were there together. general jim mathis, a great american military leader, head of the central command overseeing the middle east, said that if assad is overthrown, it will be the worst setback that iran has suffered in more than a quarter of a century. now -- and that will in turn, i think, open up tremendous new possibilities in lebanon, which has been under the syrian-iranian influence, and even in iraq where the new iraqi government has felt, i think, pressured on both sides from iran and iran's allies syria on the other side. if syria is not controlled by an iranian puppet, i think we may see some more independents from

iraq that we'd like to see. so i ask the senator from arizona if he agrees that there is not just a moral imperative but an extraordinary strategic opportunity here to get in and shape history. mr. mccain: i would say that my friend from connecticut is exactly right. both he and i have visited lebanon recently, and the facts are that hezbollah basically controls the government. the prime minister, who is not hezbollah but was put into power by hezbollah, and their country is basically gridlocked as well. if syria goes, if bashar assad goes, that connection between iran and hezbollah will be severed. the people of lebanon will have a great opportunity to have what once was a very thriving democracy restored. and i just -- finally, i would like to mention to my friend, one of the things that surprised

me from time to time as i have traveled to places like burma who were recently free, when i met three men who were in prison, one for 18 years and the other for 22 years, and when i have been to libya as i was at the elections the other day, and even when i have been in egypt and met some of the young people who have made the revolution and we were in tunisia and we met the young people there and the new government there. much to my surprise to some degree, they pay attention to what we say. they pay attention. these three men that were in prison for over 20 years said thank you for what you said. we listened to you in prison. the people in libya on election night were waving little libyan flags and saying thank you, thank you, america, thank you, thank you, senator mccain, for saying it. the people in syria are listening and will find out what we are saying today here on the

floor of the united states senate. and does it matter much? i don't know, but if the people in syria know that there are some of us who are committed and will not rest until this massacre stops, these terrible atrocities cease, that we will continue to do everything we can to see that we provide them with the kind of moral assistance which is a vital ingredient in continuing their resistance and the material assistance which provides them with the wherewithal to gain their freedom. mr. lieberman: thank you, senator mccain. i just want to make clear as we finish what we're talking about. what are we asking our government to do? we're not asking our government to put american troops on the ground in syria. they don't need american troops.

they have got fierce patriotic fighters. what they need first from us is an open declaration that we're on the side of the syrian opposition. the second is that i believe they need us to organize a coalition of the willing. just as you said, president clinton did it in the case of kosovo without the united nations supporting it. again, it was a russian veto that stood in the way. mr. mccain: president clinton said his greatest regret was that we did not intervene, number one, to where some 800,000 people were massacred. mr. lieberman: absolutely, and so we have got to learn from those lessons of history. there is a coalition of the willing waiting to be formed here if only we in the u.s. will show the leadership. nobody is asking us -- you and i are not asking for unilateral american action. there is no question that we have allies in the arab world who are already involved in

supporting the opposition in syria, namely saudi arabia and qatar who will join us. i believe there are maybe one or more european countries that would join us, there are arab countries that would join us. and what are we asking? let's increase the flow of weapons and training to the opposition. i think it's time for us to use american air power, at least to impose a no-fly zone over syria because the syrians are now using gunships and i fear that they will begin to use fighters to attack their civilian population and create and spread the kind of fear that they now depend upon. so it's -- it's a coalition in support of the opposition. it's weapons and training. it's sanctuaries where they can be trained and equipped, and it's use of air power against this regime, which i think will -- will not only deal a

devastating blow to the regime but will make its -- the remaining supporters it has in the military and in the business community despair and see that the end really is near and abandon assad. have i stated correctly what the senator from arizona feels that we want this government of ours to be doing now in regard to syria? mr. mccain: i that i the senator is exactly right and described it well, and there is an element also that adds, again, more urgency, which i know the senator from connecticut is very well aware of, and that is published media reports talk about the fact that the weapons of mass destruction of apparently that -- that bashar assad has significant stocks of -- have been moved around. now, for what purpose those weapons have been moved around

is not known, but it is not an unbelievable scenario that in final desperation, bashar assad would behave as his father did, and that is use these chemical weapons and slaughter unknown numbers of people. again, that information lends urgency to bringing him down, to having it happen as quickly as possible, and that, of course, means the kind of engagement that the senator from connecticut just described. mr. lieberman: i thank my friend. i feel disappointed that we continue to have to return to the floor to make these pleas. i hope that we come to a day soon when we can come to the floor to celebrate the victory of freedom and the defeat of assad, the dictator. may it happen soon.

mr. mccain: i note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

mr. whitehouse: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from rhode island. mr. whitehouse: madam president, are we presently in a quorum call? the presiding officer: we are. mr. whitehouse: may i ask unanimous consent that the quorum call be lifted? the presiding officer: without objection. mr. whitehouse: may i further ask unanimous consent that for the next half-hour, myself, senator mikulski, senator blumenthal, senator coons and senator blunt and also should they come senator graham and senator kyl be allowed to engage in a colloquy. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. whitehouse: our topic, madam president, is the urgency of the need to protect our privately held critical infrastructure -- the power grid, the machines that process our financial transactions, the communications networks that connect our blackberries and our phones. and in this area no one is more

expert than senator mikulski, who is a senior member of the senate intelligence committee, helped draft the senate intelligence report on cyber, and has the pen as the cardinal for the budgets of most of the agencies that are relevant to this discussion. so let me lead immediately to senator mikulski who has been enormously helpful in ranging this. mr. mikulski: i want to thank the senator from rhode island, former member of the intelligence committee and activist in this area. you know, madam president,, colleagues, i'm happy to be on the floor with a bipartisan group of people who are really worried about our country and we're worried about its survivability in the event of a cyber attack. cyber attacks are not the work of science fiction though they were once written about. that was once science fiction, is now a hard reality that could cripple our country and bring our country to the ground.

you know, we've got to come up with a legislative framework to be able to protect dot com and also be able to protect critical infrastructure. i'm talking about something that could create catastrophic economic damage, severe degradation. why am i obsessed about it? let's take the grid. there are those who say america runs on oil. barb mikulski says it runs on electricity. you cannot have a community without electricity. look at what happened to us in this north capital region when two weeks ago we had this freaky storm. we nearly came to our knees. metro couldn't function, stop lights were out, communication went down, people didn't have access, you know, to many communication. their homes were without electricity, food went bad,

tempers rose. we could not function as a community. now, the good news is no matter how late the utilities were in coming in to respond, they could turn the light back on. they could turn the electricity back on. but i will tell you in a cyber attack, that predator, that international predator will fix it so that we won't be able to turn it back on or not turn it on for days, for hours, days, or days. do you know what that means? they want to humiliate us, want to intimidate us and want to terrorize us. we have it within our hands to pass legislation that would bring the appropriate sources together for our privately owned critical infrastructure to be able to make the significant effort for which i believe we need to incentivize them to be

able to protect us. i don't want to wake up one day and find out america has been hit because of gridlock here. and i will tell you if we are hit, we will overreact, we will overspend, we will overregulate and go over the top. i want to listen to my other colleagues but i'm telling you, we've got to get off of our pet peeves here and move america to a safer zone. a senator: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from connecticut. mr. blumenthal: thank you, madam president. i am very, very honored and proud to 2308 the senator from maryland, who has been such an extraordinary leader in so many areas and most prominently and recently this one that involves the future of our country. i thank the senator from rhode island for his leadership and my colleague, senator coons of

delaware, because he has been at the forefront and this issue trawl triewl is bipartisan. senator blunt has played a leading role as have senator graham and senator kyl and of course senators lieberman and collins, senator mccain, who was on the floor before, and senator chambliss. this kind of a massing of sanerrial consensus, if i may put it that way, reflects the urgency and immediacy of this problem. our nation is under attack. i came today from a meeting with one of the major accounting and consulting companies in the united states whose name would be immediately recognizable to you. and by happenstance, sheer coincidence, he said to me that his company is attacked literally 1,000 times a day. this company has information that is intensely valuable and

private, and has taken steps to safeguard itself. but the magnitude of this attack on this single company and others like it that may have intellectual property lost to this country when it is stolen by hackers and by other nations reflects the seriousness and importance of this issue. time is not on our side. we must act immediately. the senate must follow its duty and make sure that we meet the challenge, number one, of bringing together all the stakeholders to enhance the the resiliency of our drilling infrastructure. much of this lies beyond the purview of the federal government. cybersecurity is a concern of both the government and the private sector. there must be a partnership between them. it is not for either to do alone. today the computers that control energy and manufacturing, water

and chemical facilities across the country are connected via the internet. none of them is an island. no one is an island in the internet age. we are all under attack when any one of us is under attack. i believe that we have a path forward to strengthen protection of our nation's network industrial control systems without heavy-handed regulation, and in partnership with the businesses that own these systems. many are already pursuing best practices. many already are addressing this threat, and my hope is that the legislation coming forward as a result of the leadership by my colleagues here today will make sure that these best practices become common practices, and uniform to every industry so that access to controls and audit and monitoring is done

systemically. and finally let me emphasize -- and this point i think is especially critical to many who are watching this process today -- we can make progress in strengthening the privacy and civil liberties protection in cybersecurity while preserving its underlying goals of safeguarding the nation. americans have become aware of the need to protect online privacy as i've seen personally in my contacts with the citizens of connecticut, they are outraged and fearful about frequent reports of massive data breaches and the theft of personal authorization as a result of very -- the very hacking that threatens private industry and the government. hacking and spear phishing attacks that have become a daily

occurrence in our lives. threaten our privacy, our financial integrity and our security. a recent united technologies national journal poll found 63% of repond ents believe that government and businesses should not be allowed at all to share information because it would hurt privacy and civil liberties. that same poll found 67% of those surveyed said they were either very or somewhat concerned about threats to the country's computer networks. the two anxieties go hand in hand. they fit together, and we must find a path forward on this legislation, reconciling these views. i personally believe that this cybersecurity is compatible with privacy protection and with the liberties, including the liberty to go to court and protect individual rights that is so integral and fundamental to our constitutional

protections and american civil liberties. we can make sure adequate protections are in place and, again, this task is one that we must address and address it now. i thank again the senator from rhode island and i yield to him. mr. whitehouse: let me welcome senator blunt to the discussion and invite him to chime in now. he has been a very important voice in the bipartisan discussions on how we can find a proper way to protect american privately owned critical infrastructure. he's a consummately experienced legislator from the house and has been a great addition to the senate and we welcome him to the discussion. mr. blunt: thank you, senator, for those kind comments. i want to comment on a couple things that have been said one by my friend from connecticut. you know, there are competing concerns here and they don't need to be mutually exclusive at all. when we talk about cybersecurity we're not talking about the

government somehow securing everything that happens in the cyber world. we're talking about what are the things we can identify and agree on as critical infrastructure, there's a lot of security about what happens on military cyberspace dot mill and a lot of comfort about what happens in the government parts, dot gov. what we're concerned about is what happens outside those networks that doesn't have the kind of protection those networks have. not about controlling everything. in fact, about defining specifically in the most limited way possible what is critical to the ongoing daily operation of the country. and senator mikulski talked about that. she also said that if something happens, there's no telling what kind of legislation we'll pass and i couldn't agree more with that comment in -- in every way i can think of. we're going to pass a cybersecurity bill at some

time, i believe in the not too distant future. it will be either in the kind of environment that the four senators along with me here on the floor have been working to create where we do this in the most thoughtful way, we do this in the way that has taken time to bring people together and have a discussion, or in a post-cyber attack moment like a post-9/11 moment and who knows what we might do. i think senator mikulski said wisely and rightly it will go further than it should go and will cost more than it should cost because then we're reacting. and that's what we need to we void here. we can do this in the right way or the wrong way, and the wrong way will be waiting too long. the right way is to do this now. you don't have to be well read into the intelligence community, i have a chance to be on that committee with senator mikulski, i served on the house committee when senator whitehouse was on the senate committee and know they have long been advocates of -- of securing this part of our

vulnerability but you don't have to be on the intelligence committee or even in -- have access to the information that all senators have to know that this is believed to be our greatest area of vulnerability. and why is it? because it involves everything. it involves how we communicate, it involves how we get gasoline, it involves how we power the -- everything from the drinking water system to the electricity at home and just a wind storm created all kinds of problems. 30 minutes, two different 30-minute or so stops on the metro system in washington and the washington area because the screen went blank, caused all kinds of problems. imagine that multiplied by whatever multiple you want to use and the country would quickly not be functioning in any way. traffic in washington, traffic

anywhere in the country, trying to get from one gas station to the other only to find out that ballet the gas pumps don't work because the electricity is out and your car has not got enough gas. this is a huge problem. how do we define that critical infrastructure and how do we do that in a way that's the most responsible as senator blumenthal said, protecting civil liberties at the same time that we're carefully carving out that spot where government does have some obligation to make that area secure and if we can do that in a way that encourages people to get into that environment. and one of the things that senator coons has been talking about, a former local government executive who knows all of the impact of police and fire and -- and the court system and everything else that he had to be responsible for as well as his private sector work, has brought real value to this discussion and somebody told me the other day if you're

in almost any kind of business, you either have been attacked or are going to be attacked or you're being attacked right now as people are trying to figure out how they can maybe -- maybe for malicious purposes, maybe just to see if they can do it, if they can get into your system. senator coons, you've been so heavily in those -- helpful in these discussions, i'd like to hear be a what you're thinking. mr. coons: thank you for helping to contribute to the bipartisan, positive tone of our deliberation. i want to thank the senator from rhode island for pulling together the language and the partners, and senator mikulski who started off our conversation today by reminding us as you commented senator blunt, that it was a terrible storm in this area that knocked out power for a couple of days that gave a bracing reminder to the community around washington, d.c. just how much we relied in this modern economy of ours on

continuous uninterrupted power. that storm was an act of god. that storm was just a random meteorological event. but as all of us have spoken -- senator blumenthal also commented on this -- we know as members of the united states senate that there are daily efforts at attacks on the united states far more devastating, far more far-reaching than that transitory storm. and for us not to act, for us to fail to act in a bipartisan, thoughtful and responsible way would be the worst sort of dereliction of duty. all of us have been in skier briefings with folks -- in secure briefings with folks from four-star and three-letter agencies with the most central roles in our national security agencies. but this isn't something that only those of us in the congress know or only those at the higher reaches of the executive branch agency know. this is publicly, broadly well known. the water is rising, the storm is coming and we need to

incentivize. the private sector responsible for running most of our essential infrastructure demand the barricades to fill the sandbags and to take on the responsibility in a thoughtful, balanced and responsible way of preparing for the wave of highly effective cyber attacks that are kurpbdly -- currently underway and that will crescendo soon. we've heard public remarks that are remarkable. the chairman of the joint chiefs said an effective cyber attack could literally stop society in its tracks. senator blunt mentioned as a county executive, i was responsible for emergency response and all over this country, cities, counties and states are trying to understand how to prepare for the consequences of a cyber attack. we're not talking about trying to craft legislation that would deal with every possible cyber harm, every possible cyber crime. we're talking about those few incidents that would likely be driven by a nation-state or by an incredibly advanced and sophisticated terrorist group

that would strike at the very heart of what makes our modern society vibrant and that would have mass casualty consequences, dramatic impact on our economy or wipe out whole sectors for days or weeks, such as a failure of the power grid. this isn't exotic. we just had another public hearing on the energy and natural resources committee and were warned yet again of what the department of homeland security documented back in 2007 in their aurora exercise that our power grid nationally interconnected, vital to the modern economy, is fragile, is vulnerable to cyber attacks. we've seen this unfold overseas. estonia was the victim of a comprehensive cyber attack. and they saw also in 2007 banks, media outlets, government entities that collapsed. bank cards, government phones, mobile services over a three-week period completely shut down. is there a real threat? absolutely. are we doing enough to face it?

i don't think so. i don't think we've yet done enough. there's legislation that's been brought forward by a whole group of senators, led by senators lieberman and collins, that i hope this body will turn to in the days ahead and find ways to balance. as senator blumenthal said previously, we live in a country where we must continue to respect the powerful, passionate commitment to individual privacy and civil liberties. but i think we can, with narrowly targeted, appropriately crafted legislation that incentivizes and encourages the private sector to take on the role, appropriately formed by those throughout federal government, to strengthen their defenses against these coming attacks. i don't think we have to make a choice between privacy and security. and i do think we can give the private sector the tools to make our country safe and strong. but those who view new cyber regulations as onerous, as

burdensome, as overly expensive for the private sector or as threatening needlessly our privacy have an obligation to come forward with a credible alternative before it is too late. today we are, frankly, leaving our country wide open to attack. as we recently heard in a floor speech by both senator blumenthal and senator whitehouse, when private-sector companies, even the most technically sophisticated, are contacted by our government and told they have been the victim of a successful intrusion and attack, in nearly 90% of the cases they were utterly unware. we need to strengthen information sharing. we need to develop robust standards of defense. we need to help invest in building up the infrastructure protection of this country. and it is the most vital thing i can think of, senator whitehouse, that this count could turn to. let me close with this for my moment if i could. i had a chance to have lunch last week with senator daniel

inouye. that was for me a great honor, a chance to sit with him and visit and ask his advice. he made one comment to me in closing. he is the only member of this body who was at pearl harbor. he shared with me that in his view, the next pearl harbor, the next unexpected massive attack that could really hurt the united states will come from cyber. it is our obligation to take that lesson seriously and to legislate in a bipartisan, thoughtful but swift and effective way. and so, senator whitehouse, i am grateful for your leadership of our efforts in this regard. whitehouse would you i agree with you. more important than me agreeing with you, the secretary of defense of the united states of america, agrees with you. he said the next pearl harbor we confront could very well be a cyber attack. that is an exact quote. i'd like to turn back to senator mikulski for a moment, as the person who is in charge of the appropriations for these key

agencies, because there is a sense in some quarters that if you leave the private sector on its own to do this, they'll be fine. and i think the evidence that we have heard in a series of hearings that senator mikulski, blunt, myself and senator kyl cochaired, bipartisan hearings, and to their great credit, senator lieberman and senator collins came to virtually all of them, the testimony we heard was that that wasn't the case. and some of the public commentary says our deputy secretary of defense, ash carter, there is a market failure at work here. companies aren't willing to admit vulnerabilities to themselves or publicly to shareholders in such a way as to support the necessary investments or lead their peers down a certain path of investment and all that would follow. that's a bipartisan sentiment. mike chertoff said the marketplace in this area is likely to fail in allocating the correct amount of investment to manage risk across the breadth

of the network on which our society relies. senator coons pointed out nine of the ten of companies advised that they were attacked had no idea they were attacked. i will turn to senator mikulski to make her comment on this. it is a public-private partnership here. ms. mikulski: i want to thank senator whitehouse for what he said. the fact that we really had a great study group on both sides of the aisle, eager for information, eager to come up with the best policies. and much has been said about the private sector. i talked to the private sector a lot because of our work on the committees, and the private sector is looking for leadership. they're looking for a framework. now, they worry that overregulation could be both costly and strangulating would we be so prescriptive that we mandate that we, first of all, that we mandate, and that we

essentially mandate technology. this is a fast-moving, evolving field. but they're looking for us to give a legislative framework where they could work with their government on what they want to bring to the table and feel free because of certain proprietary concerns to do it. i talked to people who really have responsibility for delivering power in maryland, and they are working. and the edison institute, which represents the, essentially the electric companies and the grid, they really would like us to have a framework. and they want to be at the table. they want to know who's in charge. who do you call? what do you do in the event of an attack? when you say how can we prevent the attack, they say, well, that's where we need government to tell us where you think we're

heading to bring the great federal labs to bear with their ideas, and how do you do this in a way that really encourages not whatever government's going to do, but voluntary efforts. but voluntary efforts with some teeth, some standards to be met, standards that are not prescriptive, that could be dated. but, again, the ever-evolving of the best, the state of science and this. i think we have the elements. where the problem is is not do we know what to do, but the problem is are we going to do it? and can we put aside where we make the perfect the enemy of the good? can we just -- colin powell had a great phrase called america always needs to seek the sensible center. that's what i'm talking about here. i want to protect civil

liberties. i certainly do want to protect civil liberties. but you know, the first civil liberty is that you can turn your lights on. and when you go to bed, you know your refrigerator is going to be working, the stoplights are going to be working when you wake up the next day. or if your child is at school or at camp, you're going to be able to get to that child and that 9/11 is going to be working if you call 911. that's civil liberty. it means you can function in a free and democratic society, but that you are not terrified that you are literally in the dark, you are literally in the cold. you have no power politically, you have no power with electricity. and it's all because we failed that. i think we can do this. and i really think senators lieberman and collins have given us a great not only starting point. i think, to use our future, the language of our future super bowl champions, the ravens,

which will happen next year, we're beyond the 50-yard line. we can do this. i would hope in the spirit we come here today, we need a sense of urgency. we need a bipartisan effort. and we need the will to serve america and put that interest first. thank you. mr. blunt: senator mikulski has made the case so well here too. when we've looked at this, when we've gone through exercises, the power grid is where you go first because it's the most dramatic, i suppose. but there's so many other places you can go. the disruption of the financial network, suddenly business stops. i was making a list here as we were talking of the kinds of things that could be at risk through some kind of cyber attack, everything from electromagnetic pulse attack to literally a cyber attack that comes in to these various networks. there are 111 power plants in

missouri, in our state alone there are 111 power plants. they are all in some way or other hooked into the grid that can be disabled in a significant way. i was talking to a friend of mine who during the last few days was in west virginia, and their family driving to west virginia, the electricity was out, and they were, began to see abandoned cars because nobody could get to a gas station. and if they could get to a gas station, it was closed. and so there were cars all over the place. that's assuming you could even get out of traffic mess that you would be in in more urban areas, but where would you go? what would you do? the desperation, we understand -- and it would be something that is preventable if we prevent it. and it's something that's preventible in ways that, particularly senator whitehouse has been thoughtful in putting together ideas of how you encourage people to voluntarily want to get into this space,

where they have assistance that they wouldn't otherwise have, where they have assurances that they've done everything they could do to prevent this from happening. and, frankly, if we do everything we can do to prevent this from happening, there's a chance it won't happen. but if we don't, there is certainty that it will happen, and we know that. i'm glad my colleagues are here. i hope the senate turns to this issue and we have a full and free debate. because if we're united on this in a bipartisan way, that finds that sensible answer that senator mikulski was talking about. senator whitehouse. mr. whitehouse: i thank the senator from missouri. i'll wrap up by giving three points and i'll make them briefly. my position on this i think is pretty clear. one is protecting our critical infrastructure. the privately owned systems that our way of life depends on is

the weak point we need to address. we do well with dot.mill. we do well with dot.gov. the government has the authority to protect those. we don't particularly care about ordinary web sites, about chat rooms. we don't want to interfere with those in any way. it's just the critical infrastructure that's important, the privately held critical infrastructure. we really need to work on that and the warnings from our national security leaders are across the board. secretary of defense panetta, n.s.a. director and cyber commander general keith alexander, director of national intelligence clapper, janet napolitano, attorney general holder and chairman of the joint chiefs of staff martin dempsey have all expressed the threat. n.s.a. director mike mcconnell

says "the united states is fighting a cyber war today. we offer the most targets of significance, yet our cyber defenses are woefully lacking. with cybersecurity, the time to start," he says, "was yesterday." former assistant secretary for policy at the department of homeland security baker, "we must begin now to protect our critical infrastructure from attack. a great number of national security officials, bipartisan, wrote a letter to us in the senate saying "the threat is only going to get worse. inaction is not an acceptable option." and protection -- "protection of our critical infrastructure is essential." "essential in order to effectively protect our national security from the growing cyber threat." as i said earlier in introducing senator mikulski again, there is indeed a market failure that has been identified in a bipartisan fashion. the facts prove it because so often when either public or

private-sector folks respond to an intrusion they find that 90% of the time the company had no idea it had been hacked. even the u.s. chamber of commerce had been hacked and the chinese had full access to its computers for months. when the aurora bug hit google and others, only three other companies a wear of it. soy the private sector really do need the support of government. we in turn need to make sure that the burden is not unreasonable. 10 make sure that we are doing this as light, as sensible, as voluntary a way as is possible, consistent with the mission of actually protecting our cybersecurity. in the bush administration, assistant attorney general was jack goldsmith, who is now at the harvard law subchapter he wrote, "the government is the only institution with the resources and incentives to ensure that the critical infrastructure on which we all

depend is secure. and we must find a way for it to meet its responsibilities." i thank senator mikulski and senator blunt, senator blumenthal, and senator coons for participating in this colloquy today. i thank our group -- the group i just mentioned and, in addition, senator kyl and senator graham and senator coats for the bipartisan work that is done to try to find a way forward to protect critical infrastructure. and, again, i thank senator blunt and senator kyl, senator mikulski for the series of private briefings, classified briefings that have helped build the momentum toward this effort. think we can get this done. it is essential that we do, and i appreciate the work of my colleagues in making this happen. mr. president, i yield the floor. and i would note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from rhode island. mr. whitehouse: might i ask unanimous consent that the quorum call be lifted. officer without objection. mr. whitehouse: mr. president, i come to the floor most every week to discuss the issue that i think is the one that members of congress in this era are most likely to be judged on in the future, and that is the relentless carbon pollution of our atmosphere that we are engaged in and our the changes in our climate and in our oceans

that are very sis visibly happening -- that are very visibly happening as a result. i know that there are many interests in washington that would prefer us to ignore this issue, but just because they ignore it and just because they want us to ignore it doesn't mean it is going anywhere. the country, as we've heard in the last weeks, has baked in record heat. i think it was bloomburg news that described the midwest farmers as having to be farming in hell. it's been scorched by drought, driven by unprecedented wildfires, and that has resulted in an increasing amount of chatter in the news and even some conversation here on the senate floor about climate change. some have tried to say that there is no relation, but i want to talk a little bit about the science of what we see happening around our country and around the world.

and there is an interesting report that i would mention, "a special supplement to the bulletin of the american meteorological society." what we see is that 2012 is shaping up to look a lot like 2011. 2011 is a year which deputy noaa administrator sullivan called "a year of extreme events," both in the united states and around the world. the report that i just showed is a peer-reviewed report, compiled by 378 scientists from 48 countries, and as explained by dr. sullivan, "every weather event that happens now takes place in the context of a chan changing global environment." this annual report here provides scientists and citizens alike

with an analysis of what has happened so we can all prepare for what is to come." that ends dr. sol advantage's quote. here are some of the highlights from the american meteorological society report. the first generally is that warm temperature trends are continuing. four independent data sets show 2011 was one of the 15 warmest years since record keeping began in the late-19th century. and yet one of the coolest since 2008. the average ten for 2011 was higher. the arctic continued to warm at about twice the rate compared with lower latitudes. on the opposite pole, the south pole station recorded its all-time ever highest tetch of

9.9 degrees fahrenheit on december 25, christmas day. break the previous record for warm weather around the south pole by more than two degrees. so the warm temperature trends continue. greenhouse gases continue to climb is the other major finding of the report. major greenhouse gas concentrations, things like carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide continue to rise. the yearly global average exceeded 390 parts per million for the first time since instrumental records began. this represents an increase of 2.10 parts per million over the previous year. i would note that the arctic sampling stations have for the first time in history recorded concentrations over 400 parts per million.

that's an ominous number because the arctic tends to be the leading edge for these indicators. there is no evidence that natural emissions of methane in the arctic have increased slug during the last -- significantly during the last second so they have not yet contributed to the steady increase but there could be significant increases of methane in the future as the tundra thaws and as methane captured the permafrost is released. arctic sea ice is decreasing. arctic sea ice extent was below average for all of 20011 and has been since june of 2001, a span of 127 consecutive months through december of 2011. both the maximum ice extent, which was 5.65 million square miles on march 7, and the minimum extent, 1.67 square

miles on september 9, were the second-smallest measurements for maximum and for minimum of the satellite era. a fourth find something that sea surface temperature and ocean heat content continue to rise, even with la nina conditions occurring most of the year, the 2011 global sea surface temperature was among the 12 highest years on record. ocean heat content measured from the surface down to 2,300 feet deep continued to rise since records began being taken in 1 1993 and ocean heat content was at a record high. in addition to putting 2011 into the conbe text of these longer trends and time larynx the researchers from noaa and the u.k. meteorological office also examined the link between

climate change and extreme weather events that occurred in 2011. here's what they say. this is a quote. "in the past, it was often stated that it simply was not possible to make an attribution statement about an individual weather or climate event. however, scientific thinking on this issue has moved on and now it is widely accepted, widely accepted that attribution statements about individual weather or climate events are possible, provided proper account is taken of the probablistic nature of attribution." so, let me be clear. it is still not correct to say that any weather event specifically is or is not directly caused by climate change. however, what these researchers have done is evaluate methods to see if the probability of this event occurring has changed by a particular percent, given the changing climate. have we in effect loaded the

dice in our atmosphere to make extreme weather events more likely? and not only have we loaded the day, but how loaded are the dice? how are the odds changing? this paper evaluated six events from last year and here are some of those findings. la nina-related heat waves like that experienced in texas in 2011 are now 20 times more likely to occur during la nina today than during la nina years 50 years ago. so we've loaded the dice for these events to happen during the la nina years by a factor of 20. that's a pretty heavy karaism ie increase. researchers note add very warm november that the united kingdom experienced in 2011. they found that warm novembers are now 62 times more likely for the region. again, not only are the dice

loaded for unusual weather events, think you're loaded with -- they're loaded with big numbers. the next month, december 2011, was very cold. researchers found that cold decembers were 50% less likely to occur now versus 50 years ago. coming on to 2012, i want to mention another event that happened in week. on monday, researchers at the university of delaware and the canadian ice surface reported that a 46 square-mile chunk of ice broke off from a glacier on the northwest coast of greenland. this peeves ice is two times the size of manhattan. in august 2010, a piece four times the size of manhattan separated from the glacier. this most recent break off of the peterman breaker puts the brazier's end point where it has not been for 150 years. andreas munchou said "the

greenland ice sheet as a whole is shrinking, melting and reducing in size as the result of globally changing air and ocean temperatures and associated changes in circulation patterns in both the ocean and the atmosphere." when you change the temperature, you change the circulation patterns. those go hand in hand. recently, a -- an article published in "science" magazine examined data from not the arctic areas but the tropaic areas, from coral reefs. sea levels during the last warming period, which is most similar to today's climate, were roughly 18 to 30 feet higher than today. and that is abouts six to ten feet higher than previous estimates. the likely culprit? more melting of the greenland

and antarctic ice sheets that was previously aside. all of this evidence -- these changing trends and emerging science evaluating increased probability of extreme weather events -- ought to be enough for us to consider limiting our greenhouse gas emissions. it ought to be enough of a warning for us to stop what is presently an uncontrolled experiment that we are conducting on our planet. we should do this while we still can. yet, unfortunately, there are special interests in washington who deny that carbon pollution causes global temperatures to rise, who deny that melting ice caps destablize our climate so that regions face extreme drought or outsized precipitation events, who deny they have any responsibility to do anything about this. and these special interests have a strong grip on washington and

on congress. they pretend to us and to -- they portend to us and the american public that the jury is still out on climate change caused by carbon pollution. that we should wait -- we should let them continue with business as usual and wait for the verdict to come in. well, they're wrong. the jury is not still out. the verdict is indeed in. and their claims to the contrary are frankly outright false. this is a pattern actually that has manifested itself with other industries in the past. the lead paint industry, the tobacco industry and others have all had legions of scientists who have been willing to manufacture enough doubt about the danger of the product -- tobacco is safe to smoke, lead

paint won't hurt children, that sort of thing -- so as to delay public safety action that would protect the public from their product. they obviously have a motive in doing that because they want to keep selling the product and keep making profits but the cost has been terribly high to the public when we've listened to that kind of science. and you feel -- and unfortunately we're listening to that again. we should not be fooled. the vast overwhelming bulk of scientists agree that climate change is happening and that human activities are the driving cause of this change. when i give these talks, i often refer to a paragraph from a letter we received in congress in october of 2009. and the letter was very powerfully stated, particularly when you consider the cautious way in which scientists ordinarily couch their findings.

here's what the letter said. "observations throughout the world make it clear" -- clear is the word they use -- "that climate change is occurring." the declarative "is." ."." and rigorous scientific research determines that greenhouse gases emitted by various activities are the primary driver. these conclusions are based on multiple independent lines of evidence." and they close with this. "and contrary assertions are inconsistent with an objective assessment of the vast body of peer-reviewed science." ie., if you look at the peer-reviewed science, the body of science objectively, you cannot reach those conclusions. those contrary assertions are inconsistent with an objective assessment. clearly, subjective assessments are different, but subjective assessments we should discount because of the motives that lie

behind them. the letter that i just quoted from signed by an enormous number of very prestigious scientific organizations, from the american association for the advancement of science, to the american chemical society, geophysical union, meteorological society, society of agronomy, plant biologists, statistical association, the botanical society of america, ecological society of america, organization of biological field stations, soil science society of america, and an immense group of very respectable organizations not gathered together for the purposes of arguing about climate change but who have a responsibility to their scientific communities to be accurate. these are highly esteemed scientific organizations. they know the jury is not still out. they know that the verdict is, in fact, in and that it's time that we did something about it. it is really irresponsible and nonsensical for us not to.

the science on this goes back to the civil war. it was a scientist named john tyndall, an irish scientist practicing in england, who determined that carbon dioxide and water vapor when they were trapped in the atmosphere had a blanketing effect and would trap heat in the atmosphere, the basic principle of global warming. in 1955, the year i was born, a textbook called "our astonishing atmosphere" had the following quote -- "nearly a century ago, the scientist, john tyndall, suggested that a fall in the's month the fear i can carbon dioxide could allow the earth to coocialtion whereas a rise in carbon dioxide would make it warmer." if that was century-old information the year that i was born, then i think it's entitled to some credence around here. and, of course, we are observing these changes. let me put one into context and then i'll yield the floor.

that one is that 390 parts per million figure that i alluded to earlier. for the last 8,000 centuries -- 800,000 years -- we've been able to measure what the range was of carbon dioxide in the earth's atmosphere. and for all that period, 800,000 years, it's been between 170 parts per million and 300 parts per million. 170-300 is the range. so when we're out of that, not by a little but by a lot -- we're all the way to 390 -- in the arctic we've hit 400. this is measurement, by the way, not theory. that's something to be worried about. because when you look back in history, before 800,000 years ago, back into geological previous events, you find that

these high carbon concentrations are associated with really dramatic dieoffs, very hostile environments for human occupation. of course, we've never had that experience because we've really only been around on this planet for probably less than 200,000 years. we only started scratching the soil, planting things and developing agriculture 10,000 years ago. so 800,000 years ago is a long time. and the safe bandwidth that our species has developed within during that 800,000 years is something that we should not be so frivolous about flying outside of to the tune of now hitting 390 parts per million. there will be consequences that will be grave. we are already seeing consequences that are grave. our ocean is acidifying in unprecedented ways. if we're looking for a first catastrophe to ensue, it is as likely to be through the

asidification of ou oceans as is through our climate, and the thing that an asidific ocean to the creatures. it is a hard thing for an animal to succeed and survive in an environment, a physical environment, in which it is soluble. so i see a colleague on the floor and i will yield to him. i appreciate the attention of the senate to this issue and i hope that the day will come soon when we can wrench ourself free of the grip of the special interests and do something serious about this looming threat. i thank the presiding officer. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the

senator from north dakota. mr. hoeven: thank you. i rise today to discuss the need for pro--growth tax reform. i've been down last week and this week on the subject and i'm here again today to talk about the need to get started and get going right now on pro-growth tax reform that will unleash the private investment in this country and help us grow our economy and create jobs for the more than 13 million people that we have unemployed today. now, the current tax code changes at the end of the year. if we fail to act, the current tax code changes. that's a fact. simply put, tax rates go up. the income tax rates rise, capital gains taxes go up, the death tax goes up. now, today we voted on a measure regarding outsourcing. its goal was to encourage u.s. companies to invest and hire

workers here in the united states rather than overseas. but at best -- at best -- that's a piecemeal approach. the reality is the taxes increases which will occur at the enof the year will do far more to -- end of the year will do far more to drive investment and employment overseas than any measure like the one that we considered today. those increases in the tax rates on small businesses across this country will have a much bigger impact than any single measure like the one that was offered up today. so think of it. think about it. by not extending the current interest tax rates, we will have a business climate that makes it harder to do business in this country. it seems to me that makes the solution here pretty simple. let's extend the current tax rates for one year and let's set up a process to engage in pro-growth tax reform that will

empower small business, millions of small businesses across this country to do what they do best, and that's to invest and hire people, to put americans back to work. and the question is why are -- aren't we doing it, why aren't we doing it? by setting up a process to undertake comprehensive pro-growth tax reform over the next year, everyone has a chance to provide their input, provide their ideas to offer up their legislation, republican and democrat alike. in fact, formats have already been proposed, formats like simpson-bowles, domenici-rivlin, groups like the gang of six and others that have put forward different concepts. so there is absolutely no reason to wait. and the question isn't are we or are we not going to do it. the reality is we have to do it. the reality is we have to do it to get our economy going, so

let's get started. and president obama needs to join with us in this effort. look at our economy. look at the statistics since president obama took office. unemployment. we have 8.2% unemployment. unemployment has been over 8% for 41 straight months. we have 13 million people in this country unemployed, 13 million people in this country looking for work. and we have another 10 million that are underemployed. that's 23 million people either unemployed or underemployed. middle-class income, middle-class income has declined from approximately $55,000 to $50,000 since the current administration took office. food stamps, food stamp usage has increased dramatically. from 32 million recipients to

46 million recipients. home values. home values have dropped. home values have dropped on average from $169,000 to $148,000. economic growth, g.d.p., gross domestic product, is the weakest for any recovery since world war ii. the weakest growth for any recovery since world war ii. job creation last month, 80,000 jobs were created but it takes 150,000 jobs each and every month just to keep up with population growth to actually reduce the unemployment rate. so these facts speak for themselves. these are the facts. the president's approach to our economy is making it worse, and his failure to join with us to extend the lower tax rates and engage in pro-growth tax reform is sitting on our economy like a big, wet blanket. but we can change that. we can change that. we can change that right now,

and we can change it by extending the current tax rates and by together on a bipartisan basis, with the administration, joining in a process to put in place pro-growth tax reform and at the same time getting control of our spending. business investment and economic activity would respond immediately. look at the latest information from the congressional budget office, from the c.b.o. the c.b.o. projects that the economy will contract lsh will contract by -- will accurate by 1.3% on an an annualized rate fr the first six months of next year, meeting the definition of recession if the fiscal cliff that we now face is not addressed. overall, the economy, based on c.b.o. projection for next year, would grow by only .5% for the entire year. that compares to a 4.4% growth

rate for next year if the fiscal cliff is avoided. now, granted, that fiscal cliff includes not only addressing the tax increases that would go into effect but also sequestration. but we have put forward ideas to address sequestration as well, and clearly the tax increase is a huge part of what drives that difference in economic growth, the difference between .5% and over 4% economic growth next year. think what that means in terms of employment to the people that are looking for a job. think of what that means in terms of growth in the economy and revenue growth to help address our deficit and our debt. and all that just stands to reason, because business needs certainty. business needs certainty to invest, to grow, to hire more

people. and with legal tax and regulatory certainty, not more government spending, but with legal tax and regulatory certainty, business in this country will invest in growth and will put people back to work. there is more cash, there is more private capital on the sidelines now than ever before in our history, and with the uncertainty about what the task was going to be, that investment will continue to be sidelined rather than deployed in ventures that will create jobs. the longer we go, the longer we go, the more uncertainty. that means slower economic growth, that means higher unemployment, that means more people out of work rather than finding a job, and it means less revenue to help reduce our deficit and our debt. clearly, that is not the way to go. that is not the way to go.

president obama, however, says well, wait a minute, everyone needs to pay their fair share. everyone needs to pay their fair share, so he is proposing tax increaseses on that basis. of course, everyone needs to pay their fair share, but the way to assure that gets accomplished is with pro-growth tax reform and closing loopholes, and that's exactly what we have proposed. not by raising taxes on more than one million small businesses across this country, which is what the president has proposed. let's extend the current tax rates for one year. let's set up a process to pass comprehensive pro growth tax reform that lowers rates, closes loopholes, that's fair, that's simpler, and that will generate revenue to reduce our deficit and our debt through economic growth rather than through

higher taxes. the reality is that is the only way we will get our economy going and that along with controlling our spending, we will reduce our deficit and our debt, and it will put americans back to work. leadership is all about finding common ground. and president obama needs to join with us to find common ground on this issue. we have offered it. we have offered it. we're offering it right now. i hope that the president will join with us in this endeavor. it's simple, it's straightforward, it's what the american people want and what they need, and we need to get started right now. with that, mr. president, i yield the floor and i note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll.

quorum call: