way. now, if they are serious -- and we have heard this discussion for years going back, the decades about -- in fact, the initial debate on medicare, the evils of socialized medicine. i'm sure in the days of the discussion, the criticisms of this growing central government, but to seriously take away these programs i think would cause the american people to stand up, since most if not every american fundamentally depends on them. particularly as they get to the point where they are retired or they are approaching retirement. so now the story has shifted as they have gotten closer and closer to what seems to be some of the real motivating factors. shrinking dramatically the government. not just those parts that are popular.

when you go around, and this is a reality in delaware as well as rhode island. you ask about the state department. it's trillions of dollars a year when in fact it's a very small fraction. now they're beginning thoint that no, this is about something more fundamental. this is about the basic social contract that people have worked all their lives, paid into social security, will get social security benefits. this is about the social contract that if you've worked, you've paid into the medicare system, you'll get medicare benefits. so now the story's shifted totally and now it's all about negotiations, that we have not negotiated. that's why they have to shut the government down and default on the debt of the united states. and the irony, of course, is that we have been indeed trying to go to serious negotiations about a budget for many, many months. indeed, months ago, in march, as i recall, the senate, after taking 47 roll call votes,

passed a solid, passed and sensible budget and asked to negotiate with the other body in a conference. indeed, at the beginning of the year, the speaker called for following the budget process, the regular order of budgets. at one point, the other side even demanded that senators and congresswomen and men should not be paid if there's no senate budget resolution and a conference. but, sadly, months later, after we had passed ou our budget, a handful of colleagues in this house have been blocking us on the republican side from going to that conference. insisting in some respects that, as any precondition of a conference, that we couldn't talk about taxes on the wealthiest americans, on actions that would ensure the government would be able to pay its bills, but essentially stopping the regular order. for his part, the speaker of the house refused to appoint conferees for months as well.

apparently fearful that republicans might have to actually vote on some of their proposals that have been incorporated over the years in various republican budgets with respect to medicare, medicaid and other programs. but now, as we approach default, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are saying, it's time to negotiate on the bug. it was time months ago when we asked to go to conference. it was time weeks ago. now it's time to ensure that we pay our bills and we keep the government open. that is not the way to conduct the business of this government.

it's not the way to provide the confidence that our economy needs to go forward. it's not the way to provide families the confidence they need to face the rigors of daily life, of educating children, of taking care of their health care, of contributing to their community. we've had a consistent and constant attempt to frustrate our ability to go to conference and negotiate over many, many, many months. but after all the other rationales, defund obamacare, delay obamacare, defund the personal mandate, now it's come down to let's negotiate. when, indeed, that approach has been rejected 21 times by republicans o on the floor of te senate. and it's getting more difficult each other to bear.

it's time to open government and pay our bills. and we can do that by bringing to the floor very quickly and they can procedurally as, as what everyone now knows, a clean c.r. a term of art that was washingtonspeak until a week or two ago but now everyone knows. it is simply setting for a few weeks the amount of money we can spend that will allow us to open up the government. americans are being hurt by the shutdown and they will be hurt i think even more grievously if we default on our debts. and it is continually amazing to me that this situation continues. you have a response by the other side particularly that is consistent with what we hear -- what we've heard during their primary campaign for the presidency. let's shut some government agencies down. well, now it's the other side of the coin. we'll just open a few government agencies.

not the whole government but the one and they change or they increase each day that we think are important. each day they seem to have another idea about, well, we've got to open this. it will be a good headline. it will be a good talking point. for example, they've talked about opening the national parks, smithsonian and other museums, but let's remember in the house, republicans have proposed in their budget allocation to cut $5.5 billion from the agencies that fund -- from the functions that fund these agencies. so we have to go forward and we have to resolve the situation. we cannot allow this lockout to continue. we have to do what leader reid has said quite succinctly. open the government. pay our bill, go to conference on the budget. negotiate everything that's within our realm to negotiate.

let's do that to the american people. we're ready to do it. i hope our colleagues are ready to do it also. with that, mr. chairman -- mr. president, rather, i would yield the floor. mr. coons: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from delaware is recognized. mr. coons: mr. president, i'd like to start today by reading a letter that i received this

week. so many of us here in the senate are operating with furloughed staff and we're doing our best to read and respond to the letters we're getting from home, the calls that are coming in to our -fss. this one -- into our offices. this one touched me in particular. my name, it began, is master sergeant corey p. deluzio, an airport technician at dover air force base in dover, delaware. i served this nation for 12 years without question or reservation. every time i've been called upon i answered the call, left my family behind and served proudly as maintainer for a c-17 aircraft. i know you understand the mission and requirements for such an aircraft and i tell you this not for thank you or acknowledgement. i tell you this, he writes, because i am also a husband to a woman who has stood by my side in support of every deployment. i tell you this because i'm the father of a three-year-old boy

who doesn't even question when the answer is "daddy's at work." i understand a man in your position has made sacrifices as well. however, today i had to tell my family i am unable to work. not because of anything i have control of, but because of decisions made by individuals who will not miss a paycheck, individuals who will always know when the next check is coming. i write this understanding that it will fall on deaf ears. and i'm usually one that remains quiet and follows orders for those appointed above me. however, enough is enough. please do your part in resolving this issue so i can simply get back to serving my country and my family. sincerely yours. master sergeant corey deluzio. mr. president, it pains me that the master sergeant thought his letter would fall on deaf ears, that no one here, that neither i nor any of my colleagues would

hear or care about the concerns of a man, his waoeufr, his family -- his wife, his family who has served his country and who stands ready to continue serving his country but whose family is being harmed by the mindless, purposeless shutdown of the government that is now in day nine. this first government shutdown in 17 years -- and by all indications one that will continue into another week. mr. president, i start today by saying to master sergeant deluzio i'm sorry. i'm sorry for the needless pain and difficulty that this shutdown is imposing on your family and so many other families across this country, roughly 800,000 federal employees have been furloughed at different times in the last nine days. and while some may be returning to active service, they will be getting i.o.u.'s rather than regular paychecks. and all over this country private contractors, as we've heard from other colleagues

today, are also laying people off because they can't get the permits or the work permission or the site access they need to move forward. this shutdown is continuing to harm our country, our reputation, our economy, our families. it is a needless, manufactured, self-imposed wound. i wrestle with this, mr. president, because we are facing twin manufactured crises, as senator reed of rhode island said, hobbled government due to the shutdown on the one hand and the steadily increasing risk of default on the other, these twin manufactured crises seeking some purpose that is unclear from day to day when it started, this government shutdown seemed to be aimed at what, repealing the affordable care act, so-called obamacare. and then a day later seemed to be aimed at delaying the affordable care act. and then when that clearly was unsuccessful, it seemed to be aimed at seeking some partial

repeal of the affordable care act. and now it is an ongoing crisis in search of a purpose. the menu of potential demands is growing, and the impact on our families and our communities is growing as well. the house has been wasting its time on many microappropriations bills in an attempt to give reporters and folks back home the sense they're actually doing something when it's just misdirection. they think all the activity will keep the american people from noticing that speaker boehner isn't bringing up the one bill that could reopen this government in a matter of minutes. a so-called clean continuing resolution, a simple extension of current spending levels. now i know to all who watch, master sergeant deluzio and many, many others, we sometimes speak in language that is opaque, difficult to understand. we talk about sequester and continuing resolutions and so forth. so i'm going to try and work through these issues in a way

that is accessible and direct. let's be clear. this government is shut down right now because the house wouldn't pass a six-week extension, an extension to november 15 of what's required to keep us open. today that would be just over four weeks. we're literally fighting over a four-week funding bill. how absurd is it that all of this is over a measure that would only have funded the government in the first case for another four weeks from now. there's frankly, nothing about this situation that isn't absurd. every day the house republicans show up with a new strategy, a new press conference, a new message. and as i said, all the while not really explaining exactly why the government is shut down. initially it was shut down to prevent the implementation of the affordable care act, but that's moving forward, as it was always going to be, because it's an enacted program. so what's the current message from the house? they say they are the only ones ready to negotiate. that they're alone at the table sitting there with jackets off

and their bright starched white shirts waiting for senate democrats to meet them at the table and negotiate. another farce. another fantasy. i'm frankly tired and frustrated with the games that seem to be played here, and i'd like to highlight, if i could, a few of our real efforts to work collaboratively to answer the question, why won't you negotiate by saying, we have been negotiating? once the house votes to keep the lights on and to pay our bills, we will continue to negotiate. i have a simple question, mr. president. does the house want us to continue to be a closed-door nation, a nation where we have locked out hundreds of thousands of federal workers? and does the house want to threaten that we will become a deadbeat nation, a nation that fails to meet its obligations built up over many administrations and many congresses republican and democrat? or are we going to reopen the government, become an open-door nation? and are we going to pay our bills and become a responsible

nation as we have been in the past? how did we get here? as a member of the budget committee, let me first start, if i could, with the budget resolution. that's how our rules work. we are supposed to begin with a budget resolution that sets the framework for what we're going to spend in the next fiscal year. for the last three years that i have been serving here as a senator over and over on this floor the call was, why won't the senate pass a budget. well, this year this senate passed a budget resolution with significant republican input. between this floor, where we ultimately passed it and the committee on which i serve, the senate adopted more than 40 amendments offered by my republican colleagues. we compromised. we worked towards a shared goal. week after week, as i said, republicans asked in past years when is the senate going to pass a budget? yet we did more than six months ago. 200 days ago, to be precise, we passed a budget in this senate. and our chair, senator murray of washington, chair of the senate

budget committee, has tried to take our budget to conference with the house budget to do as the rules provide, to reconcile and to responsibly negotiate over our fiscal differences 18 times. she has tried over and over and over to take us to conference and responsibly open formal talks with the house to resolve our fiscal differences. every time that motion has been blocked. denied. barred by a very small group of tea party republicans in this chamber who have refused to let us go ahead and negotiate as the rules say we should. i also serve, mr. president, on the appropriations commit. once the budget is framed, once the budget is rye solved, we're then supposed to move to aeption pros and sit our spending bisms as a member of that committee, i have ban part of a process in which we have in fact passed 11 spending bills out of committee, eight of them with bipartisan support. and mured t in order to try to t

process forward, we brought the transportation, housing, and urban development bill to this floor. it passed out of committee by a vote of 22-8 with six republican votes, a strong bipartisan bill to be hashed out here on the floor. and what happened? it was blocked. again, a small number of the other party came and objected and blocked the passage of that bill, a bill that would put americans to work and strengthen our infrastructure and help support the housing recovery. a bill that would have moved us forward. despite every attempt to fund this gocht throug government the call here "regular order," we even after that came to the table ready to compromise on this continuing resolution. the senate budget calls for a topline spending number of $1.058 trillion, a balanced approach that reduces federal spending, in some areas; raises revenue in others.

that's the budget that we passed in the senate and it would call for spending $1.058 trillion. the house budget instead calls for $988 billion. and as you've heard our leader, senator harry reid, say on the floor this week, he compromised. he agreed to a short-term funding bill at $988 billion, a $70 billion cut pou for this fil year year, a painful concession for democrats, particularly those of us on the budget committee who had not voted for a $988 billion number. we've already slashed spending. people are already suffering through the sceforts. another thing that was -- through the sequester. another thing that was enacted through tactics the last time there was a near default in 2011. the sequester has resulted in across-the-board spending cuts that have been dangerous and painful and about which i've spoken on this floor repeatedly, reading letters from people who have commented about how it is not the smart way to make cuts,

it is an irresponsible way to make cuts. that same air force barricks dover air force base, suffered furloughs for hundreds of airmen and their families. we've worked out a budget that was have replaced it and avoided those sequester cuts. but instead, mured to compromise, our -- in order to compromise, our majority leader agreed to ads 70 billion cut. when i see house republican leaders go on tv and say, democrats won't negotiate, democrats won't compromise, i have to say that's not the case. that's not the facts i have before me. we have compromised. we have negotiated. and in fact we have tried for months on this floor, more than six months, to get to compromise, to get to negotiation, to move this thing forward. instead, would fin we find whenn inch, they take a yard. there are some in the other party suggesting if they aren't

granted a great big wish list, they'll force us to default on our debt. we keep hearing from the other side about the need to compromise and negotiate. i couldn't agree more. the whole way this body is supposed to work is by following the rules, following the process, going to conference, negotiating and achieving a responsible result. we have repeatedly solicited republican input, accepted republican amendments, and made painful compromises. now my message is simple: we should be following the rules. we should be following the process of this body. we should turn on the lights, we should pay our bills, and i would be happy, honored to continue working with republican colleagues to find real solutions to our fiscal problems the way we're supposed to -- in a conference negotiating over the budget that was passed here more than six months ago. so, to the colleagues that i share this chamber with but with whom we have some differences over why in government is shut

down today, i hope you'll listen to master sergeant delusio and his family and to the thousands and thousands of other americans who are writing in and calling in to our offices. they deserve better. this country deserves better. we need to show that we can be the model of democracy that achieves responsible, principled compromise. to my colleagues and my friends in the other body, stop blocking progress. let's go to conference on the budget. let's negotiate. but, first, let's get our folks back to work. let's get the government open and let's move forward in a way that honors the best of our traditions and our rules. with that, mr. speaker, i yield the floor. mr. nelson: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senior senator from florida is recognized. mr. nelson: thank you, mr. president. before my remarks, i'd like to ask unanimous consent for the period of morning business to be

extended until 7:00 p.m. and that all provisions of the previous order remain in effect. the presiding officer: without objectiowithoutobjection, so or. mr. nelson: mr. president, i want to add my remarks now for the third time about this shutdown. i want to say that this is not the way that we ought to be running our government and enough ought to be enough. for example, as you know, the secretary of defense has figured out a way that he could bring most of the furloughed civilian employees back. there's still maybe a quarter of them that are still on furlough,

but most of them by a law that passed here, it's almost unintended consequences, but there was a little part of the law that he was able to bring back for the national security and defense of this country of the but there are still gaping holes. for example, although the active duty national guard is not furloughed, a lot of the civilian force and the reserve force of the guard is furlough furloughed. mr. president, i just talked to an f-22 pilot of the virginia national guard. this is a longtime fighter pilot in the united states air force. f-15's, now f-22's.

he has transitioned to the national guard, went to a unit that has the f-22's, which is the virginia national guard, and all of those reserve national guard pilots are still coming in and flying because we still have to protect the air defense of this country. they're flying but they're not getting paid. and some of their technicians are there still supporting the maintenance of the aircraft and some of them are not getting paid. and all of the ancillary support staff is on furlough. now, is this not another example

that in the protection of the national security -- in this case providing for our air defense through an air national guard unit -- is this the way that an air guard unit ought to be run? instead, it's not being run according to how it should be because of a political tantrum by certain people trying to get their way instead of allowing the government to be functioning through its appropriations. mr. president, there is now a sam knelsalmonella outbreak, 18s including my state of florida.

the centers for disease control which monitors, at one time in the case now, 30 different diseases operating in this country, 68% of the centers for disease control have been furloughed. and so because of the salmon saa outbreak that has occurred -- and it may be in the presiding officer's state as well; i'll look it up afterwards and tell the presiding officer. it is in my state. i know it started in california, where most of the cases are. but, mr. president, had the c.d.c. been there in full force instead of 68% of them being laid off, maybe we wouldn't have had this outbreak or they would have been able to spot it and stem it quickly before it spread

to 17 other states. i'll give you another example. nasa. this little agency is the one that has the most people furloughed as a percentage of the work force. 97% of the nasa employees are furloughed. since most of the nasa work is done by contractors, without the nasa supervisors there now, the contractors are being laid off. you take a place like the presiding officer's state of ohio, the glenn nasa research center, look at the impact to the people in that community. you take a major space center

elsewhere, such as the johnson space center in houston, the kennedy space center in my sta state, look what it's doing to the lives of people. but remember that we have a mission that is going to mars that has a unique one time in two years launch window starting the middle of november into the first part of december. if that narrow three-week launch window is missed because of the lack of preparation of this spacecraft to launch, there's not another launch window for two years. because of that, we were able to get nasa to recall that team.

they're there continuing to prepare the spacecraft and they're not getting paid. but at least we're not going to cause all of the additional delay of two years and all of the additional expense of keeping that team of scientists together along with the safing of the spacecraft for another two years. now, there are three examples. the national guard and the defense of this country, the salmonella outbreak because of the layoffs of the c.d.c., the centers for disease control, and nasa. this should not be. enough is enough. the political tantrum ought to

stop and let's get back to the business of governing. mr. president, i yield the flo floor. i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

mr. johnson: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senior senator from south dakota is recognized. mr. johnson: mr. president -- the presiding officer: the senate is in a quorum call. mr. johnson: i move that the quorum call be vitiated. the presiding officer: without objection, so ordered. the senator from south dakota recognized. mr. johnson: mr. president, i rise today to talk about the devastation that has been inflicted on many in my home state. an early season snowstorm has put a foot of snow and hilly winds in much of western south dakota. the thoughts and prayers of barbara and i are with those affected by this disastrous storm. communities and residents are wrestling with the damage caused

by trees and utility companies are facing power outages. emergency officials have shared with my office numerous stories of volume tears stepping up to help to transport medicines and oxygen to residents stranded in their homes. neighbors are helping assistant -- assist each other with cutting down tree limbs, with snow removal and getting essential food items and medical supplies to the he would editorial and disabled residents. there are countless reports of people helping to move stuck drivers out of snowdrifts or helping to shovel the roofs and snow from the home a senior citizen or disabled resident. when people are in need, south dakotans step up. one of the most significant impacts of the storm has been on

my state's livestock producers. tens of thousands of cattle killed in friday's blizzard proclaims thedjourn rapid city journal headline. the south dakota stockyard association has shared with me gut-wrenching stories of ranchers who've lost their herds. she said that a man found his cows had pushed themselves and their calves over a badlands wall and killed many of them. he estimates he's lost 50% of his total herd. and a young man east offer havet of that estimates that he lost 30% of his brooding cows. he found some in a pile covered

with snow. he saw the heads and hooves sticking from the snow. "i'm young, but i always thought i was a good rancher," he said. "i thought i'd taken care of them, but i guess i should have done more." he hung up the phone with an apology as his voice broke. our cowboys are resilient people but this blizzard comes on the heels of a devastating drought last year from which ranchers still haven't fully recovered. i'm very proud of our state and local officials, who are taking immediate action to assist those in need. the national guard is conducting life saving safety operations to ensure folks without power are okay and open roads.

the state is working with the local company to assist in identifying and dealing with livestock that have been killed. our aid organizations in the state are providing help and guidance to ranchers that were hit. the one place where help is lacking from the federal government. because of the government shutdown, producers can't rely on the f.s.a. offices for assistance. and since congress hasn't finished a farm bill, our ranchers may have to wait for disaster assistance. the 2008 farm bill included several critical disaster assistance programs including the livestock indemocratty program -- indemnity program which provides help to producers

affected by natural disasters. unfortunately, that program expired in 2011 and because congress hasn't yet completed a comprehensive farm bill, there continues to be no funding available for them. we've passed a good farm bill here in the senate, twice in the past two years. i worked to include funding for these livestock disaster programs, which is in both the senate and house bills. the senate is ready to negotiate the farm bill but the house hasn't appointed conferees. the longer they delay, the longer my constituents will suffer without disaster aid. the house needs to pass a clean continuing resolution, and they need to appoint conferees so that we can finally finish the farm bill. it will take many months for the

black hills communities to clean up from their october blizzard, for ranchers who lost livestock it may take years to recover. but whatever mother nature has to deliver, it cannot dampen the spirit of south dakotans. mr. president, i yield the floor and 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 nebraska is recognized. mrs. fischer: mr. president, i ask that the quorum call be vitiated, please. the presiding officer: without objection, so ordered. mrs. fischer: thank you, mr. president.

i rise today to give voice to frustrated nebraskans. i rise to testify to the simple truth that a government should not intentionally make life harder for its people. i rise to say enough, enough press conferences, enough brinksmanship, enough dividing people of goodwill against one another. i'm still pretty new here, but i can tell you that in nebraska and in so many other states across this nation, we actually work together and not just on small bills, but also on the big issues. i urge my colleagues, let's remember where we came from. while i served in the nebraska legislature, we dealt with a major budget shortfall. we didn't go on tv or twist twit -- or twitter or fight.

we legislated and we fixed the problem. that's the nebraska way. we roll up our sleeves, we cut through the talking points, and we get to work. nebraskans are pragmatic, they are well informed, and they expect results. and so when nebraskans look at the dysfunction that we have here in washington, they're frustrated, and i am, too. i'm very frustrated, mr. president,. i'm frustrated that this congress can't pass appropriations bills that comply with the law. i am frustrated that this congress cannot agree on a budget. i'm frustrated with crisis management instead of responsible governance. i am frustrated with being told

one thing, only to learn that it's just not true. i'm frustrated with the willful ignorance that goes on in washington when it comes to our debt. and i'm frustrated with the lack of solutions. the american people do not want us to just stand in opposition. they want us to put forth constructive ideas to solve problems. as a result of congress' failure to agree on a spending plan, the government is shut down. the result: well, in yesterday's "omaha world herald" there was a report that nebraska farmers are unable to cash checks when they bring their grain in after harvest. the article noted -- quote -- "state law requires elevators to

include a lender's name on a check when a farmer has a loan against the grain. with no one as farm service agency offices because of the shutdown, checks can't be cashed when the lender is the f.s.a. we've got millions of dollars of grain checks out there that farmers need, said dan poppy, president of the archer cooperative credit union with locations in archer, danenrog and central city. he said entire rural economies count on the money. it impacts not only our farmers who are relying heavily on the money but also the local grocery store, hardware store, the feed and seed, poppy said. it's not just farmers and ranchers, it's also our manufacturers and our investors. a constituent from waco, nebraska, wrote "i'm a dow employee living in your district. this impasse is beginning to

threaten dow's investment in new u.s. manufacturing. not only will it continue -- a continued delay push back dow's plans to create thousands of new american jobs, it will harm dow's competitiveness and directly impact me and my family." greater economic certainty will help dow, its employees, and our state to thrive, he concluded. the wife of the federal law enforcement officer from gretna wrote, "we are a single-income family, we have a 2- and a 3-year-old and one more on the way, i am due in november. this shutdown will leave us unable to pay our bills. a 23-year department of agriculture employee emailed me saying -- quote -- "my wife works two jobs to help make ends meet, but we still live paycheck to paycheck. if this shutdown is not resolved within the next few days, we

will be devastated financially." a u.s. air force veteran wrote to tell me that i applied for social security disability assistance on the 15th of august and my claim had gone from medical review on the 26th of august. i have no money, and i just found out yesterday that because of the shutdown, s.s.a. claims are on hold. a furloughed federal worker from omaha called my office to say "we're all tired. we're tired of not getting a budget till the last minute, we're all tired. you guys need to do your job." i agree. i hear these same messages over and over and over again. nebraskans are tired of the name calling and the blame games. they want to see government work

and they want to see it work well. they are not fooled by the rhetoric, and they expect us to govern responsibly. i agree. that's why i'm talking with my colleagues. not publicly in front of the cameras, but privately to see if we can forge a way forward. but i believe we have to do more than just open up the government. that's just the basics. we've got to address our $17 trillion in debt. it is smothering this country. it is jeopardizing our national security and it is a threat to our children's future. congress will soon vote on increasing the debt ceiling. the sixth debt limit increase in the past five years.

our national debt has almost doubled since 2006, and our debt limit has grown twice as much as our economy in the past two years. shouldn't the opposite be true? meanwhile, our economy's lethargic recovery continues sluggishly along at a rate of 1% to %. this is unacceptable -- to 2%. this is unacceptable. but instead of growing our economy by reducing spending, cutting regulations, and overhauling an outdated tax code, congress has continued to spend money that we just don't have. i didn't run for office to shut down the government. i ran for office to help hardworking americans get back to work. i ran for this office to stand up for middle-class families who

aren't asking the government for a hand up. they're just asking the government, stop holding them down. nebraskans want to know that they can provide for their families, and i don't think that that's asking too much. make no mistake, high public debt depresses economic growth, which in turn dampens job creation. ironically, our country's debt crisis comes as the congressional budget office is predicting that tax revenues will be at an all-time high, $2.7 trillion in tax revenues. the problem isn't that we have too little revenue. the problem is that we are spending too much. part of why nebraskans are

frustrated is that our problems are so clear. we know exactly what they are. there's no mystery here. the american people know you can't keep spending twice what you make. they live within a budget, a budget that must balance, and they expect government to do the same. our government is a long way from a balanced budget, but we can work at a minimum, he we can try and get there. despite these realities, we aren't moving forward. for the past several weeks, members of congress, the president, and the press have been participants in a circus. after nine days, there is still no end in sight. let me repeat that. after nine days of a government

shutdown, there is still no end in sight. that's not to say there aren't some good ideas out there. several of my colleagues have offered a number of commonsense proposals that do have broad support. these ideas include repeal of the medical device tax, which was adopted by the senate as an amendment to its budget resolution by an overwhelming vote of 79-20. this happened in march. other ideas include a commitment to reducing spending, as required by current law, but we would increase the flexibility for federal agencies to make smarter cuts. we all agree that sequestration is a very clumsy way to cut spending. that's why we need to provide

program managers with the ability to determine which programs are wasteful or less efficient. it is a matter of setting priorities, and we set those priorities so that we can make wise decisions. that's the n -- the nebraska way, and that's what we need to do in washington as well. senator collins' sequestration proposal would also allow congress to continue to exercise oversight on all spending and related cuts. that's important. even the president has put forth ideas to cut spending by $400 billion over the next ten years. these offers could give us a framework for a real discussion, yet we remain at an impasse.

we are unable to move forward. a nation of movers, thinkers, innovators and entrepreneurs should not be caught in neutral. we should move forward, always forward and always building a better future. we are the single greatest nation that the world has ever known. we have stood as a sentinel of liberty and economic prosperity for over 200 years. yet we find ourselves no longer able to conform to even the most basic functions of government. that is not acceptable. our forefathers, our constituents and our children and our grandchildren deserve better.

i am ready to move forward. i am tired of waiting, and i am willing to work with any of my colleagues to find a reasonable solution, so let's get to work. i yield the floor.

mrs. fischer: mr. president, i would suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: mr. brown: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from ohio. mr. brown: thanks, mr. president. i ask unanimous consent to dispense with the quorum call. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. brown: thank you, mr. president. i represent a state -- i'm privileged, as i know the presiding officer is, to represent connecticut and the previous speaker is to represent nebraska. i'm privileged to represent my state, the state of ohio, and we are home to several large research facilities, medical research facilities, aeronautics

research facilities, military research facilities, some that are overwhelmingly represented to do research in pure science. all of them have a major impact in their communities, a major impact in terms of employment directly, majoring in usually good-paying jobs, scientists and engineers and physicians and chemists and all kinds of people in the natural or the medical or the aeronautic sciences and all the support staff with them. always good for communities. these research facilities not just provide employment, obviously, but they provide great wealth for our country. so much of this research helps people in their daily lives. so much of this research is commercialized into -- into businesses and entrepreneurs take much of this research and applied sciences and create more

economic activity, prosperity and good-paying jobs, and that's where this shutdown is particularly problematic. i know that people -- there are 800,000 federal employees that have lost jobs as a result of this ridiculous shutdown. i have spent most of the last couple of days this week, really all three days this week on the phone talking to people running these institutions, talking to bankers, small town bankers, big citibankers, talking to entrepreneurs, talking to businesses, talking to union officials, talking to people who represent or run many of these organizations. all of them think this shutdown is absolutely unnecessary. just a moment ago, i had a conversation with the presiding officer, and we both shake our heads, why, why do radicals in the house of representatives want to inflict this kind of pain on not just these 800,000 federal workers but the

contractors near these facilities, the restaurants and the hardware stores and the businesses and the school districts that are affected because people aren't bringing home the income and aren't paying as much taxes. all the things that happen when this willful government shutdown orchestrated because a group of people want to attach their political platform or their political ideas or their political gimmicks or statements to legislation that we need to pass. i mean, it's pretty simple -- pass the continuing resolution, keep the government open. that's not a democratic or a republican platform. that's what we need to do. you don't go around attaching political statements in a political platform to a simple keep the government open resolution. the same on the debt ceiling. nobody wants to -- nobody's wild about increasing the debt ceiling, nobody is wild about passing legislation so we don't default. it's not part of the 2012 democratic platform to raise the debt ceiling nor is it part of

the 2012 republican platform. so when we have a debt ceiling vote, it's not negotiated that let's add a bunch of 2012 republican party platform rhetoric to something to raise the debt ceiling so the government of the united states pays its bills. it's an american or democratic value to pay the bills that this congress ran up. it's what our duty is. we take an oath of office. i took the oath in january, 2013. the presiding officer took his oath in january, 2011 -- 2009. and he -- 2011. he knew at that time that things like running the government, things like paying our bills were what you do as an elected official. those didn't used to be controversial until some radicals in the house of representatives decided this is a bill opportunity. we can -- we can accuse the president of not negotiating. we can say to the public that the democrats are willing to

shut the government -- it's obvious. the republican governor of nevada told the majority leader of nevada, a democrat, today, this week, that -- called it the republican shutdown. it is clear that a group of radicals in the house of representatives. but let me get back, mr. president, to what i was saying about this -- these -- these great research facilities. you have them in connecticut, i have them in ohio. the senator from hawaii has them in her state. i was talking to an administrator of one of these. he said something really interesting. he said it's asystemmette rickal that the -- it's asystemrickal. if you have a group of engineers or doctors or scientists putting together a very important scientific endeavor, constructing one, it's a lot harder, it takes a lot longer to construct one than it does to kill one. it's -- speaker rayburn, 50

years ago, speaker of the house from texas, who is -- after whom one of the buildings in the house is named after, one time said -- and i will clean this up a little, any mule can kick down a barn. it takes a carpenter to build one. i will make it more personal. i was a dozen years ago involved in a car accident where i broke my back. i didn't get out of bed for three days. i was in good health and exercised and all. but during those three days, i remember the first day i got out of bed and tried to walk, how my legs had -- my leg muscles had atrophied. it takes a lot of time to build up those leg muscles. it took three days to see them atrophy. i was in my late 40's then. i was, as i said, in good shape. that's the way science is in the same sense that it takes a long time and a lot of investment in public dollars and a lot of brainpower and a lot of real high quality talented scientists or engineers or doctors or medical researchers to do these projects, and then we're going

to lay them off for three weeks -- two weeks or three weeks because somebody has some political idea that they want to attach to a continuing resolution, somebody wants to take their political platform and put it on -- on legislation that the government pay its debts, the government pays its bills, all because for their political gain. what does that do? you know what that does? this leader of one of these major institutions in ohio told me you know what it does? he had to bring in people, many of his managers and employees and tell them there were going to be layoffs, there were going to be furloughs, and in some cases with no end in sight because of this government shutdown, what are they going to do? first of all, their scientific endeavors get interrupted. in some cases maybe to not be repaired or rebuilt, and many of the best scientists and engineers are going to say i'm not coming back and doing this. you know what? if the president had said okay, so we can keep the government open to the radical republicans

in the house of representatives, their deal was okay, we'll keep the government open if you repeal part of obamacare. so if the president had done that and said okay, keep the government open, the duty of all of us, we will repeal this section of obamacare, you know what would have happened next? then there would have been another continuing resolution or another end of the fiscal year or another opportunity that these politicians would have seen to again threaten to shut the government down and get something else. so in other words, if there is a law you don't like, if there is a law you don't like, it could be five years old or 20 years old and you're in the right place, maybe you're in a position to do this, maybe you're going to say, you know, i'm going to shut the government down if you don't change this law. you know if the president says yes to that, what happens the next time? then i'm going to ask the president to get rid of two laws i don't like unless you shut the government -- unless -- or i'll shut the government down. or i'm not going to pay our

bills, i'm not going to vote -- i'm going to block the government from paying its bills because i don't like this law you passed back in 1993 or in 2007 or whatever. i mean, you can't operate a government like that. and you know what? if these facilities in ohio -- i will just name some of them. nasa-glenn research facility, wright-patterson air force base, the major research facility and many other things in dayton, ohio, right near dayton, ohio. battelle memorial institute in columbus. scientists, technicians, highly skilled people, very educated, runs eight of the national energy labs. case western reserve medical school and engineering school, ohio state university, university of cincinnati, i could name one after another. these places can't operate if they have got to -- if they are subject every six months or every year to a potential government shutdown unless the president does what some radical members of congress wants. that's why when -- when people

here say first open the government, second pay our bills and third let's negotiate, that's the right order. we have already negotiated the dollar figure on the continuing resolution. we just can't have -- every time there is a potential -- every time the continuing resolution expires, every time the fiscal year ends, every time there is a time when we have got to pay our debts when the debt ceiling limit is reached, every time if we -- if we play this game that some here want to play, it's going to mean a potential government shutdown and a disruption at battelle and a disruption at nasa glenn and a disruption at ohio state and their medical school funding, research funding, a disruption at wright-patterson air force base. is that the way this crowd believes you should run a government? they don't have much regard for government. every time they have had a chance, they have tried to privatize medicare, they have tried to privatize social security, they don't like the e.p.a., head start, meals on wheels, they don't like these government programs.

i understand that, but play it right. don't threaten to close the government unless we change the rules, change the law where the government passed it, the congress passed it, the president signed it, the supreme court affirmed it but because i don't like it, my political platform in 2012, even though that political platform was defeated in front of tens of millions of voters, if i don't like what you're doing, then i'm going to threaten to shut down the government. mr. president, our country's too -- too important and too big for that. and on an international scale, and i will close in a moment, and i believe the senator from hawaii will speak next. on an international scale, the president of the united states didn't go to china for the major economic conference because he had to be here because the government was shut down. other countries, particularly china, made fun of us. other countries basically were saying is the united states advocating its leadership role. and you can bet the people's republic of china that they're not slowing down in their investment in scientific

research. they're not slowing down in their investment of modernizing their infrastructure. but, you know, we do -- if we allow this kind of government shutdown and this kind of activity by radicals in the house of representatives, this is not good for our country. mr. president, i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from texas. mr. cornyn: mr. president, amid all the rhetoric and the blame games, and yes, even theatrics, i want to make sure that the american people actually understand what president obama and the majority leader are asking us to do. their position is that congress should raise the debt limit -- or actually suspend the debt limit through the end of 2014 and increase our national debt by another $1.1 trillion without

doing anything to solve our underlying fiscal problems, including the $17 trillion in debt we've already run up. i can't imagine there's anyone in this chamber or within the sound of my voice who thinks that that's a good idea. at some point if we keep maxing out our credit card and rather than dealing with our debt problem, our spending problem, we just come back to the bank, so to speak, and ask for our debt limit to be increased another $1.1 trillion, where will this end? well, i can tell you where i think it will end. it will end in disaster. we will have ultimately at some point our creditors who will lose confidence in our ability to repay that money. at some point, interest rates are going to not be zero or next to zero. they'll be up around the

historic average, 4% or 5%. and we'll have to pay china and our other creditors more and more of our federal budget just to pay interest on the national debt. at some point, that becomes unsustainable. it will hurt our national security. it will hurt the safety net programs that we all care back to protect our most vulnerabl vulnerable -- that we all care about to protect our most vulnerable. well, unfortunately the president and the majority leader remain dug in notwithstanding the charts that we've seen on the floor that talk about negotiations. there's been no real negotiation. the president called speaker boehner last night just to tell him, in case you missed the message, mr. speaker, from when you met at the white house last week, we're still not negotiating. what -- what's that all about? the president could have sent him a text message with as much information as that conveyed. well, now i'm told that the president has invited the

republican members of congress to the white house to meet with him tomorrow. i hope that meeting's more productive than the meetings he's already held for the phone conversations he's had with the speaker. i can only hope that the president has reconsidered his unsustainable position that he's not willing to negotiate. you know, the founders of this great country created a constitution for us with coequal branches of government. congress is not better or worse than the executive branch. we are coequal. we can't function without one another. we can pass a law but it can't become the law unless the president signs it. the president can't pass a law without congress. and so we have to learn to work together. and in the context of the recent history that i want to recount for everybody, the president's

refusal to negotiate is simply unsustainable and quite remarkable. over the last 30 years, virtually every major domestic policy reform has involved at least some kind of bipartisan compromise. in 1983, a conservative republican president worked with a liberal speaker of the house and senate leaders from both parties to save and preserve social security. that was in 1983. at the time those social security amendments were signed into law, republicans had the same senate majority the democrats now have today, 54 republicans then, 46 democrats. meanwhile, the democratic house majority was significantly larger than the republican house majority today and yet both sides did what so far we've been unable to do and that is come

together, negotiate and reach an outcome. and ronald reagan back in 1983 then signed that negotiated outcome into law. in the end, a majority of senate democrats voted for those social security amendments, as did a majority of senate republicans. three years later, 1986, liberal democrats and conservative republicans joined together to enact another landmark reform bill. once again, the president's party controlled the senate but not the house. once again, there wasn't a refusal to negotiate. rather, there was a negotiation and a bipartisan outcome notwithstanding the normal partisan rivalries that will always exist. in june 1986, 97 members of this chamber, a massive, overwhelming supermajority, voted in favor of

the tax reform act which lowered federal income tax rates and broadened the base. the final version of that bill was supported by a majority of senate democrats and a majority of senate republicans as well. that was the kind of historic accomplishment that seems slipping through our fingers today by virtue of the refusal to negotiate. that was a historic accomplishment that dramatically simplified the u.s. tax code and made it more conducive to economic growth. a lesson we could well recall and emulate today. but fast forward a decade to 1 1996. a democratic president, bill clinton, joined together with a republican house and senate and despite partisan pressure enough to go around and all sorts of heated rhetoric, democrats and republicans joined together and

reformed our welfare system. helping millions of disadvantaged people to get welfare rolls and make the transition from dependency to work, dignity, and self-reliance. that was a great accomplishment. in the end, 78 senators, including most senate democrats, and every single senate republican voted for that. one more prominent example, in 2001, a conservative republican president worked with a prominent liberal democrat to enact a major overhaul to our education laws. indeed, the no child left behind act was a direct result of president bush's negotiations and collaboration with the late senator ted kennedy. the final legislation -- 87 senators voted for, including a majority of senate democrats and a majority of senate republicans.

now, i'm not necessarily saying that every single one of those pieces of legislation was something that was perfect in every way. i think we've learned that there are things that still needed to be done, particularly when it came to education reform. but the three presidents that i mentioned -- two republicans and one democrat -- worked together to make substantial compromises in order to pass social security reform, tax reform, welfare reform, and education reform. but they also understood that politics is the art of the possible. the art of the possible. and they didn't treat the word "negotiate" like a dirty four-letter word. i want to emphasize just one more time that republicans stand ready to work with president obama in addressing our country's most serious fiscal and economic challenges, yet

rather than to pursue serious, good-faith negotiations over things like entitlement reform and tax reform -- things that would actual be good for our --d for our country and good for our economy -- president obama decides to erect and then knock down strawmen. for example, when republicans talk about entitlement reform, he says we want to eliminate the safety net. when republicans talk about tax reform, he says we want to just give tax breaks to rich people. well, that's campaigning. that's not governing. here's the reality, though. republicans don't want to eliminate the safety net. we want to improve the safety net, particularly medicare and social security. we don't want to give special tax breaks just to the wealthy. we want to give all americans a simpler, flatter, fairer tax code that's more conducive to economic growth.

the type of tax code and recommendation that the president's own bipartisan fiscal commission, simpso simpson-bowles, the recommendations they made in 2010, yet the president ignored it, walked away and has done nothing to contribute to that debate. we understand, being elected officials ourselves, that all elected politicians have to campaign for office. it just goes with the territory. you can't get here unless you run for office and you win an election. but at some point, the campaign has to end. at some point, we have to gove govern. at some point, the partisan rhetoric has to give way to actually accomplishing things and solving problems. at some point, america's elected leadership needs to demonstrate

real leadership and a willingness to govern. mr. president, president obama has now reached a critical point in his presidency, in his second term, and he will be remembered for one thing or another. he will be remembered either as a president that was willing to step up when america needed that kind of leadership, when congress needed bipartisan cooperation in order to solve our nation's biggest challenges, or he will leave a legacy, if he does not do that, of a president that refused to do his job in order to try to win the partisan battles. we need something better and america deserves better. we need a president who will govern and not just campaign perpetually. mr. president, i yield the floor.

a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from hawaii. mrs.ms. hirono: mr. president, r distinguished republican whip referred to negotiations that occurred regarding welfare reform, tax reform, education reform, the no child left behind, and these negotiations occurred, yes, but they certainly occurred not in the context of a threat of a government shutdown or the threat of government defaulting on our obligations. very big difference the context in which these negotiations occurred. that is not what we have before us today. mr. president, this past saturday i came to the floor to share some thoughts on the impact of this government shutdown on hawaii's federal employees and in those remarks,

i tried to remind my colleagues that we have to think beyond the most recent news cycle. shutting down government hurts the american people's confidence in our institutions, it drives people away from public service, and it undermines our national security and our economy. if we are going to live up to the legacy of our nation as the world's indispensable nation, we have to rise above zero-sum politics. we have to show our allies and our adversaries that our political processes can withstand grave disagreements. our process is intended to allow for vigorous debate but to ultimately find common ground. over six months ago the senate passed a budget. so did the housemen house -- ho. a little over six days ago, the u.s. government shut down. how did this happen? the reason is that republicans

have blocked now 21 attempts to negotiate a federal budget agreement in a timely fashion. that is how negotiations are supposed to happen, not with the threat of a government shutdown, not with the threat of defaulting on our obligation and debt. so instead, after six months of failing to come to the table, tea party republicans are housing the u.s. government and if we default on our debts, the world economy, hostage. enough is enough. the senate is prepared to negotiate on fiscal issues. the president is ready to negotiate on fiscal issues. we can find a path forward so we can all agree. on the path. but first congress needs do its job, it needs to reopen the

government and make sure that the united state its bills. these are fundamental responsibilities. just to be clear, defaulting on our debt would be the most irresponsible action i can imagine. it is the most easily avoidable catastrophe in history. we are not talking about a natural disaster. we're talking about a totally avoidable catastrophe. yet, some republicans in the house believe that default would not be a big deal. in fact, one member of the house actually said that a default would -- quote -- "bring stability to world markets." end quote. that is an opinion that no one outside of the tea party bubble agrees with. in fact, economists, small businesses, bankers, big businesses, realtors and nearly everyone in between has been clear. default will be a catastrophe for our economy. not just our economy either.

our currency, our bonds and the full faith and credit that they are backed by are the linchpin of the global economy. how a default from the world's most trusted nation could possibly bring stability to world markets is incomprehensible. we have to stop the ideological games and irresponsible rhetoric. then we can negotiate on fiscal issues and other policies mindful of the work we were elected to do and mindful of the people, families, and communities that elected us to serve them. today i'd like to share some more stories from hawaii families and businesses about how the government shutdown is impacting one of the key drivers of hawaii's economy: tourism. each year millions of people

from all over the world flock to hawaii. our state has so much to offer. they come to enjoy our blue oceans and sandy beaches. they come to visit our breathtaking national parks and wildlife refuges. they also come to learn and pay respect at our historical attractions like pearl harbor. last year hawaii welcomed over eight million visitors. a record number. combined, these visitors spent $42 million per day, $5 million of it support state and local government activities that benefit our communities. in 2012, about 20% of our state's gross domestic product was generated by tourism. that economic activity supports 175,000 jobs in hawaii. due to our location in the center of the pacific ocean, hawaii's tourism industry relies

on critical government services to keep people moving and commerce flowing. these include the work done by our air traffic controllers, our customs and t.s.a. personnel and agricultural inspectors. and many of these workers are on the job, but they are not getting paid right now. thanks to them, our transportation systems are operating safely and effectively. as a result, visitors are still flocking to our resorts, our beaches, and other attractions. even with the tea party shutdown, 2013 is on track to be another strong year for tourism in hawaii. unfortunately, at the same time there are small businesses around the state that are being impacted by the shutdown. for the last seven days, our national parks, wildlife refuges and historical sites have been closed to the public. these federal sites are critical to many small businesses, particularly in our rural

communities. over the past week, i've heard from many people, especially small business owners, whose livelihoods are being impacted by the closure of these federal sites. one tour operator wrote to me our tours are losing money as do our tour guides. we have to return the money to a lot of our clients because their tours have to be canceled. our tour guides are losing income as well, as they will not be able to do the tours. national parks are some of the main attractions in hawaii. people travel thousands of miles from all parts of the world, spend a lot of money to come and visit, and then the main things that attract them are closed and they are not able to see them. for a lot of people, these trips are once in a lifetime, and if they don't see them now, they will never be able to see them again.

a restaurant owner from hawaii island wrote, "we are in a small town on the big island of hawaii. our economy is totally tourist-driven. we are dependent on people going to the national park and stopping at our place to eat. since the shutdown, our revenue has dropped a lot and we have had to cut hours for employees to compensate for the lack of business. i'm tired of all this republican childish actions and wish all politicians would drop the partisan nonsense and do what is right for the american people. thank you for your concern." one gentleman from maui reminded me that private businesses don't get to pause on meeting their commitments when the government is closed. he wrote, "my daughter and son-in-law have a tourist-based clientele for their bicycle tour business on maui. when national park was closed down, they lost their income and are still having to pay office

expenses, et cetera, as well as their home expenses, but nothing is coming in and everything is going out. they are losing hundreds to thousands of dollars a day. their employees have families who are not able to work. tourists who tomorrow to maui to have a good time part of which was to bike down in our park are angry and disappointed and some even think this is maui's government's fault. he goes on to say my daughter has six children, mortgage payments, money is going out, none is coming in. my family are diligent middle-class people who work hard, pay their taxes, vote in every election, responsible citizens who do their part always. if this ridiculous federal government shutdown continues for any length of time, my family will lose their business and be at the poverty level at no time as will all their

employees. everyone i know on either side of the political spectrum think the shutdown is ridiculous and unnecessary. mr. president, i've also heard about the impact of the shutdown on visitors themselves who come to hawaii. one person from hawaii whose family members have traveled to hawaii to visit wrote, "my family has traveled 6,000 miles on a once-in-a-lifetime trip. sorry, no pearl harbor. dad was a lifer navyman. no volcano national park. no polakuhola. it is just ridiculous over a law that has been declared constitutional. their antics changed nothing. just hurt our country. mr. president, another local veteran breakfast owner on the big island shared the perspective of some of her international guests. aloha. i have a bed and breakfast in

helo and feel sorry for our guests who saved for a once in a lifetime vacation to hawaii. they have come from all over the world to see our beautiful volcano national park. these guests do not understand how the government can close and deny them access to the park. this week i have guests from montreal, canada; singapore, germany, france and japan. they may never have the opportunity to visit here again. this is shameful for our country. not only is this behavior bad for our country but bad for the world." mr. president, the tea party shutdown is also impacting hawaii visitors to our nation's capital. yesterday i met with 81 students from millinilani middle school from ou what you hugh, hoping --

oahu, hoping to see historical sites and learning about our democracy. the trip was saved for and planned for months in advance. the sights and museums were scheduled, tickets and reservations were already paid for. they couldn't rebook their travel, even though the shutdown has closed many of the sites they planned to visit. i took them on a tour of the capitol myself because it was the only way they could see these halls of government. these students are here to learn about our democracy. many of them ask me about the shutdown and how we were going to get government back on track. what kind of message will they take home with them about how our government operates? these are just some of the stories that illustrate the real impact of the tea party shutdown on communities, families, and people in hawaii. so many of the folks whose letters i've shared work hard to earn an honest living. they go to work each day, striving to somehow our visitors

aloha while building something for themselves and their families to be proud of. they play by the rules, meet their commitments and do what they can to be good community members. yet, through no fault of their own, many of these hawaii small businesses are losing income and their livelihoods are being affected. it's past time for the house to take the responsible action to pass the senate bill to keep government running and services going. it's not fair to our veterans, our students and their families when they can't visit our nation's historical and national treasures just because a small minority in congress has chosen recklessness over responsibility. and it's not fair that this shutdown and senseless default threats have gone on for weeks -- for a week. this behavior is harming our economy, undermining our credibility around the world. we need to stop the tea party

temper tantrum. we need to open the government. we need to pay our bills. then we can negotiate on other matters. i yield the floor. i note the absence of a quorum, mr. president. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll quorum call:

a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from oklahoma. mr. coburn: thank you. i appreciate being recognized. i wanted to spend a little time -- the presiding officer: senator, the senate is in a quorum call. mr. coburn: i ask the quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. coburn: thank you, mr. president. i appreciate the time to be on the floor. i want to continue talking about what i think are the real problems with where we are today. what you're hearing in the press is that there's no agreement on a continuing resolution, that there's conflict and the lack of discussion in washington. and that the debt limit is coming up, and that yet washington isn't capable of solving its problems. i made some points yesterday about the reason we're not capable of solving our problems is it's in absence of

leadership. we're not only bankrupt financially. we're bankrupt in terms of of when it comes to our leadership. but i i dispel the rumor that or problems aren't solvable. they're imminently solvable. we have $126 trillion worth of unfunded liabilities that americans are responsible for. we have $17 trillion worth of debt. and we have $94 trillion of total assets in this country. that's if you add everything else everybody owns, the federal government owns and everybody else. so the difference between 128 and 94 is 34 and then another 17. that's $51 trillion that we're going to have to account for. and what is in front of us -- and, by the way, obamacare is going to add over $16 trillion

net of any tax increases or revenues that it collects. so what are we to do? what are the american people to think? they see impasse. they see lack of conversation, lack of compromise. lack of resolution and no reconciliation. so i want toed to spend a few minutes today -- so i wanted to spend a few minutes today, kind of give a little history, first of all, and then outline a what is possible. not saying we must do it, but what is possible over the next ten years that we could do that would put us on a pathway to where we would be solving the problems and not leaving our children and inheritance of debt. and i made the point yesterday that the median family income in this country today on real

terms, in terms of real dollars, is exactly where it was in 1989. we're going backwards. we're going to go backwards this year. and what that really means is standard of living is declining. the american public is getting further and further behind. and one of the quotes that i use -- and it's been attributed -- and i don't know if it's accurate -- is it's been attributed to ajohn tyler, a scottish historian. "a domes is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. it will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury, from that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will

finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship." where are we in that line? is $50 trillion in negative net worth not a sign we're going there? is declining median family income not a sign that we're going -- what we've seen in this last so-called recovery is the wealthy have done very well, but nobody else has. so what we're seeing is history repeat it is in terms of what has been outlined and observed in the past. john tyler was also accredited with this, but nobody can prove it: "the average age of the world's greatest civilizations from the beginning of history has been about 200 years. during these 200 years, these nations always progressed through the following sequence:

from bondage to spiritual faith; from spiritual faith to great courage; from courage to liberty; from liberty to abundance; from abundance to comply seinecy; from complacency to apathy; from apathy to dependency; from dependency back into bondage." now, i think we're somewhere in here. if the history speaks accurately or at least his observation of history. so what we ought to be about is making sure we cheat history -- all of us together, liberals, conservatives, democrats, republicans, we ought to be about cheating history. so how do we do that? are the problems that we have in front of us so big that we can't solve them? i don't think so. are positions so hardened that

we can't think in a long-term about solving the problems that are in front of our country? and so when we talk about the debt ceiling -- you know, i have been accosted a lot in the news media the last 48 hours because i don't believe the debt ceiling equals default on our obligations in terms of our sovereign debt. and it just so happens moody's, the rating agency, agreed with me today. that in fact they're not the same thing and they say there should be no effect, if we were to go over there. that doesn't mean we should. i'm not proposing that we should. but the scare tactics of saying that the earth is going to collapse if we somehow fail on time to raise the debt limit is not true. the earth will collapse for americans if we don't address the underlying problems facing our country -- this $50 trillion in unfunded liability and negative net worth.

and here's what we know has happened in the last two years. and it proves the point -- it's why median family income is going down, is our debt is growing twice as fast as our economy. here's our g.d.p. increase over the last two years, $1.19 trillion. and here's our debt, it went up $2.405 trillion. all right to say that another way, that's 2.4 billion millions. it's hard -- these numbers are unfathomable. but the graph shows it all. our g.d.p. has increased. so what's happening is for every dollar in debt we go into, we're getting a decreasing return in our economy. and it's continuing to go down. so the more we borrow, the less well off we are in terms of

being able to grow our commitment oeconomy.the problem, and what we see is what i would say us careerists don't want to solve the problem. because the thipg that comes to the careerist mind is, how does that affect the next election? you know, i don't care what happens in the next election in this country. what i care is whether or not we're really going to address the real problems and secure the future for the country. whether they be democrats or republicans, liberals or conservatives, i don't care. we're all in this together. and when our living standard goes down, we all go down toct. -- we all go down together. so the mess we're in today -- so how do you solve that problem? the first thing -- any addiction, which we have an addiction to spending, is to recognize you have an addiction. we have an addiction to spending. we have an addiction to not living within our means. we just passed $600 billion in

january of increased taxes on the american economy, most of that going for the people that are doing much better during this tepid recovery. welwill that solve our problems? can we tax our way out of this? can we have confiscatory tax policies that will not hurt our economy and get us out of that? and the answer is "no." and everybody recognizes it. so what else does everybody recognize? they recognize that a big portion of the problem is entitlement spending, and no political party wants to be blamed for being the person that -- quote -- "fixed entitlement spending" unless they do it together. so we have a great opportunity to together modify our mandatory spending programs and make significant savings. but having spent the last nine

years with my colleague who is on the floor oversighting the federal government, i can tell you, there's more we can do in things other than mandatory. so i thought i'd spend a few minutes just kind of going over a publication that i put out a couple of summers ago. and it is called "back in black." and i.t. not perfect. i'll be the first to -- and it's not perfect . i'll be the first to admit it. i know we won't pass over $9 trillion of savings over ten years. but here's $9 trillion worth of options that we could look at and take half them and actually get on the road to halt. -- on the road to health. what would getting on the road to health look like? it would be rising personal incomes, not declining personal incomes, like we're seeing today. it would be rising median family incomes. it would be faster economic

growth. do you realize there's $3 trillion -- mr. president, am i out of time? the presiding officer: the senator has used his ten minutes. mr. coburn: my request was for 30 minutes when i came to the floor. evidently, that wasn't made. is the order of the day ten minutes? the presiding officer: it is. mr. coburn: wcialg i would ask for just a very short additional time, if my colleague from delaware would allow it, and then i'll finish up? the presiding officer: the sphror delaware. mr. carper: [inaudible] the presiding officer: without objection. mr. coburn: so, anyhow, i'll spend some time tomorrow then on going through what this is. but solving our problem, solving our problem in such a way that it doesn't kick the can down the road, which is what we're getting ready to do, and what i

would say in finishing, by increasing the debt limit, we let the politicians off the hook. because then they don't have to make the hard choices that are required for us to live within our means. mr. carper: mr. president, parliamentary inquiry, if i may. the presiding officer: the senator from delaware. mr. carper: mr. president, i have no objection. i can stay ten minutes, 20 minutes. i would like for dr. coburn to have a chance to finish what he is prepared to saivment i a say. mr. coburn: mr. president, i would just inquire if we have other speakers after senator carper? the presiding officer: senator, there is no apparent order of speakers. if there is no objection, the senator from oklahoma can take an additional 20 minutes. mr. coburn: well, i thank you. i will try -- i really appreciate my colleague. he's great colleague to work with. people always hear the stories about people who don't work together. i can tell you tom cobur carperi work together.

he helped dig up most of this information. what i would just say is we have an opportunity to do things. i mean, we have an opportunity for democrats and republicans to come together, forge a compromise, make major changes that are necessary and absolutely required if we're going to have a secure future, and i think we ought to look at it. and so what we did is we put together a plan that had a $3 trillion -- that's $300 billion over ten years in discretionary spending. that's nonmandatory. we had $1 trillion in defense spending, which is about what we've already gotten. health care entitlements, $2.7 trillion. and we can go into the details of that. tax code simplification, $1 trillion to come back to the federal government. interest payment savings of $1

.3 trillion and social security reform that says it will be healthy for the next 75 years. that comes to $9 trillion that our kids aren't going to have to pay back. that's $9 trillion in money we're not going to borrow. so even if you just took half of that, $4.5 trillion, and said, we're going to get on the path to health, we're going to float that $3 trillion that's setting in cash in the americans' bank account and give them the confidence back to invest it in our country, it would make a massive difference in our country because p what's really going on right now is a crisis of confidence. the american people don't trust the congress. i think we got a pretty low rating this week, deservedly so. presidenpresident obama's pprove something at his -- president obama's approval rate something at his all-time low. so how do we fix that? we don't fix that individually.

we don't fix that by pointing out what's wrong with the other person. we fix that by coming together and solving real problems that gives the american people the confidence that we have their best interest at heart, not in the short term like alexander tyler was talking about, but in the long term. that in fact we want to secure the future fof ou for our kids d grandkids. so i think we ought to be about cutting up the credit card. and i know i'm in a minority in the senate. i don't believe we should have another debt limit. -- debt limit increase. i think the thing to force us to make these hard choices, because that'there's certainly not the political will to do it, is to put us in a position where we're forced to make the hard choices. we're going to make them eventually. everybody agrees to that. we're eventually going to make these changes. because there will come a time

-- there will k come a time when we won't being able to borrow more money, no matter what interest rate we pay. so we're not about talking -- talking about defaulting on our sovereign debt. we're not talking about not paying interest on our sovereign debt. we're talking about forcing ourselves into a position where we have to prioritize what we spend. what does the g.a.o. reports tell us? it tells us -- in the last three years the g.a.o. has given congress wonderful information with which congress has not acted on. what have they told us? they've told us we've got 91 different health care workforce training programs, 91. they've told us we've got 679 renewable energy initiatives, none of which have a metric on them. they've told us that we have 76

different drug abuse and prevention programs run by the federal government. they've told us that the department of defense has 159 different contracting organizations, none of them being held accountable. they've told us that at the homeland security, where senator carper, the senator from delaware, and i are chair and vice chair of the committee, they have six different r&d facilities, three of which are doing exactly same thing. we have 209 science, technology, engineering, and math programs, 209. 200 different crime prevention programs, 160 homeowners and renters assistance programs.

94 green building -- private-sector green building assistance programs, none with a metric, and the agencies don't even know how much money they're spending on them. 82 teacher quality programs run by the federal government. laugh halhalf of which are not n department of education. i won't continue it but you get my point. what have we done about that's things? nothing. where's the oversight on them? not. so the whole idea from me as somebody i'm thinking more about the future than i am a political career, is i think we ought to be working on those things. i think the american public expects us to be working on them. i will finish up just by saying that we've been running the credit card for a long time. and do