al qaeda, we are crazy as a nation not to use the law of war to gather intelligence. i am not for torturing anyone. i have been a military lawyer for 31 years. i believe in the geneva convention. i believe that my country is special. i believe in the international regimes about how you interrogate prisoners who you hold. i know what al qaeda does to their prisoners. i do not want to be like them. i want -- i want to be the united states, but the united states has a right under the law of war to gather intelligence. the last thing a member of al qaeda should hear when they're captured is "you have a right to remain silent. here's your lawyer." i don't want them to remain silent. i want them over time to provide us with whatever intelligence is available. why was he moved off the ship? apparently he had a medical condition that could not be treated on the naval vessel. i believe in providing quality

health care to prisoners of war simply because i want that standard to be available to our soldiers in future wars. the standard we set today could follow us into the next war, and unfortunately, there will be. but having to take him off the ship because he was sick is no excuse to stop the interrogation to gather intelligence. putting him on the ship because you don't want to use guantanamo bay is an ill-conceived and designed strategy that it's not changed or replaced is going to come back to haunt this country. this man possesses an enormous amount of intelligence potential. he is now in federal court. he will be given a lawyer. and once he's charged with a crime, he should be given a lawyer. but before that, we have the right under the law of war to hold him, to gather intelligence, treat him humanely, but question him about what he knows about al qaeda,

because they're still out there lurking. so i would end with this. i would like to work with the senator from new hampshire and anybody on the other side who would like to try a detention and interrogation policy that is more rationally based. guantanamo bay in its early years did hurt the image of this country. some of our interrogation techniques right after 9/11 hurt us as a nation. guantanamo bay has been reformed. it is geneva convention compliant. the treatment act that i helped author along with senators levin and mccain is the gold standard of how you treat somebody under the law of war. i am proud of the system we have created over the last several years in a bipartisan manner, and i would urge this administration to create a vehicle to interrogate under the law of war people like al-libi so that we can be prepared for the next attack and the policy

they have in place today is going to deny this country the ability to gather valuable intelligence. and when it comes to defeating al qaeda, the more you know about how they behave and what they're up to, the safer we will be, because they will not be deterred by the threat of death. you cannot deter them. you have to stop them. you have to hit them before they hit you. and the best way to do that is to gather intelligence when you find someone like al-libi. and i am very disappointed that we have blown it when it comes to intelligence gathering with this target. and i'm very sad to report to the military members and their families that the bravery you have demonstrated and shown just a few weeks ago has been

undermined, in my view, by an irrational political decision that denies our country the ability to learn from a high-valued target that you risked your life to capture. so i don't know how to fix this in the current political environment, but i know as a military lawyer it needs to be fixed. and i know that we're not elevating our country by diminishing our ability to use legal systems that have been around for hundreds of years at a time when we need them the most. so i look forward to working with the senator from new hampshire, who has become one of the leading voices when it comes to detention interrogation under the law of war. ms. ayotte: i thank the senator from south carolina. and let me just make a correction for the record. i used the name al-alwaki. it is al zawahiri who is the current head of al qaeda. and the point is this, if we capture stkau -- if we capture

zawahiri tomorrow is he going to be on a ship? and is he only going to be on the ship for a week before -- and then we're going to give him a lawyer and tell him he has the right to remain silent? no. what makes sense is that we have a detention and interrogation policy that with people like al-libi, we make sure we take as much as time we need to find out we know everything they know. and we make sure we protect america and find out everything he knows. that's what we're worried about and that's what we need to do for our country. mr. graham: would you yield. we're throwing around names. i think zawahiri took bin laden's place. can you tell us a little bit about this individual called al-libi? why do we believe he would be such a treasure trove?

what is his background? how long haes he been -- how long has he been involved in al qaeda? and what have we missed here? what opportunities have we lost by only holding him as an enemy combatant for less than two weeks? ms. ayotte: mr. al-libi is someone who is alleged to have been involved in al qaeda for decades. he is someone who is as earlies as the -- as early as the 1990's was working with osama bin laden. he was alleged to have been involved in the 1998 bombings in the kenya and tanzania embassies that killed 224 people, including 12 americans. he reportedly played a critical role as the intermediary between stkau -- saw hery, who -- took over for bin laden in an effort

to establish an affiliation network in libya where our ambassador was murdered along with three brave americans last september 11. he has been reported to be an al qaeda computer intelligence and operation security expert. and he is alleged to have been involved in al qaeda strategic planning. this is one of the most important captures we had in years of al qaeda. mr. graham: would you hold? he was captured in tripoli, libya; isn't that right? ms. ayotte: yes. mr. graham: we believe he was in libya before the attack on our consolate in benghazi; right? ms. ayotte: we do. mr. graham: we also know him to be one of the higher-level al qaeda operatives roaming the planet. he was involved in bombing our embassies in 1998 in kenya and tanzania; is that correct? ms. ayotte: that's right. mr. graham: what are the odds that he was in tripoli before the benghazi attack, had a record of bombing embassies in the 1990's and had nothing to do

with the consolate attack in benghazi? you know, you're a prosecutor. what do you think the odds this have guy not having any knowledge or involvement in killing our ambassador in benghazi and being involved in the attack on our consolate that was organized by al qaeda affiliates? and what have we learned, if anything, about his potential involvement in benghazi? how can you learn everything this man has done in 11 or 12 days before you give him a lawyer? i would argue you can't. the presiding officer: senator, your time has expired, sir. mr. graham: could i have one minute? the presiding officer: without objection. mr. graham: thank you. ms. ayotte: thank you. mr. graham: i would argue you can't possibly understand all he knows about benghazi and the last 20 years of terrorism by holding him on a ship for less than two weeks.

he should be held at gitmo for as long as it takes to find out what he knows. then he should be tried. do you agree with that? ms. ayotte: i agree with the senator from south carolina. we need to protect our country. that means a lot longer than a week-long interrogation. thank you, mr. president. mr. leahy: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from vermont. mr. leahy: mr. president, if i might for a moment, we've had dozens and dozens of these people that have been arrested. we had the so-called underwear bomber. we had a recent one, a number of osama bin laden's family and others. they were given their miranda warning. they won't shut up. they keep talking on day after day after day. in my experience, if you're going to talk, you're going to talk, if you have a miranda warning or not. wouldn't it be nice if we demonstrated to the rest of the world that we're not afraid of these people?

that we have the best court systems in the world and we're going to use them. we have had three or four convictions of military commissions on terrorism cases. we've had several hundred in courts. senators, it's really not responsible to talk about, oh, my gosh, we just took him straight to gitmo. gitmo by itself is damaging the interest of the united states and the image of the united states. but the fact of the matter is these people who we arrested and went through our court system, they usually will talk ad nauseam, whether they have had the miranda warning or not. so let's be real. it might be a nice talking point to scare people. but the people who are actually involved in prosecution know it works. mr. whitehouse: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from rhode island. mr. whitehouse: mr. president, we, yesterday heard very

optimistic news about steering away from the brink of american default before it became too late. majority leader harry reid came to the floor and gave very optimistic reports. minority leader mitch mcconnell came to the floor, gave very optimistic reports. they hinted very strongly that a deal was close. time was scheduled at the caucuses presumably to make a presentation of the deal. and then what? and then what? we have had some very interesting speeches and colloquies from our republican colleagues on the floor. i found the debate as to whether our defense and law enforcement experts had kept an al qaeda captive in the right location to be interesting. i found the earlier discussion

about the insurance exchange web sites to be a very interesting discussion. i found the discussion earlier this morning about iran, very interesting discussion. but what's even more interesting is what they're not talking about. what they're not talking about is that today the republican leader pulled out of those very productive negotiations, of those very optimistic negotiations, of those negotiations that promised an end to this crisis. i find that absolutely stunning. i'm amazed that we are in a situation where we're that close to resolving a crisis and avoiding the catastrophes that have been predicted, one side would simply walk away. and i don't blame the minority leader. the information that i have is that he was asked to do so.

but the message came from the other side, from the speaker, that speaker boehner torpedoed the bipartisan productive negotiations that were at the brink of solving this crisis. instead of the bipartisan successful process, speaker boehner has wanted to interrupt and bring in the same partisan house process that has been a disaster for us over and over again. 100% partisan, 100% politics. we have sent bills over to the house. those bills have never been brought up for a vote. they have been monkeyed with before they have been brought up, but house members have never had the chance to vote on a senate-approved measure, which would have ended it. that's the speaker's choice. it's the so-called hastert rule.

unless a strong majority of republicans is for something, he won't give democrats a chance even to vote, let alone to be a part of the negotiations. so here in the senate you have bipartisan negotiations with the leaders from both sides still with optimism and hope. on the other side, you have a leadership that won't talk to the democrats, has purely partisan decisions about whether something shall come to the floor, and has not yet brought a senate bill to the floor for a clean vote. it is a nightmare over there. and the strategy hasn't worked, in case they didn't get the memo. holding the economy hostage was a terrible choice for the speaker. causing the shutdown was a terrible choice. holding the credit of the united states government hostage has been a terrible choice. to use a word that was used on the floor this morning by one of our republican friends, it was a

fool's errand. it was a fool's errand that put the party in a ditch. in a ditch was the quote. well, unfortunately, because he's the speaker, it's not just the republican party that's in the ditch. the whole country is in the ditch. as this default looms. some of them are trying to get out of the difficulty that they find themselves in by pretending that the default isn't real. we have default deniers now side by side i guess with the climate deniers and other deniers. they deny that october 17 is the real date when anything might go wrong. they deny that anything bad will actually happen if the united states government defaults. they deny that if we just pay

the treasury bills and leave other things unpaid, anything bad will happen. treasury bills get sold in an auction, in a market. if you're going to that auction to buy treasury bills and you see a government that isn't paying social security recipients on time, that has massive liquidity and cash flow problems as a result of the debt limit failure, we may say, yeah, we'll pay you first, but are you really going to pay the same rate for that security of that country while that country is facing all of these other problems? it is a preposterous notion. it is the type of notion that you can only believe when you absolutely need to believe it for your ideological purposes. reality simply does not support a notion like that.

if you are living in a cocoon world of extremist ideology, you can come up with thoughts like that, and if you are only talking to other people who think the same way, you can kind of agree that that thought makes sense. but there is a little problem. reality wins. real always wins. they're playing with dynamite over there, and they're pretending that it's not even dangerous. it would be one thing if we understood that they respected how very dangerous the stunts are that they are pulling in the house republican leadership. it's even more dangerous when they don't appear to know the danger that they are causing for our economy. i hope that we will get back to work here in the senate right away with a bipartisan solution to this rather than allowing the

house and the speaker to wreck the opportunity we had just as late as yesterday in order to play dangerous partisan games. we don't have the time for that, and it's the wrong thing. it's the wrong thing in a very immediate way in terms of the damage that it will do to our economy, to the world economy, to people across this country whose interest rates are pegged to treasury bills, to anybody who depends on an economy where people have confidence that the united states is a solid investment and have confidence that our economy is going to grow. the default puts all that at risk. it creates real economic hazards for our country. but the method of getting us here has additional hazards, and i'd like to close by talking about them. from the very founding of this republic, we have prided

ourselves on our distinct american system of government. we have fought for it, we have protected us -- protected it. it has seen us through world wars, civil wars, great depressions, great recessions, all types of calamity. and what it fundamentally is, the phrase we use probably as much as any other about our country is that it is a government of laws, it is a government of laws, and it risks being turned in by a very small faction in one party, in one house, in one branch of government, and it being turned into a government not of laws but of threats. a government where the person who can make the scariest threat

wins. it doesn't matter that what you're objecting to was passed in the regular order, passed by both houses of congress, signed into law by the president, approved by the supreme court. it doesn't matter that it was the center of the last presidential election and that their point of view lost convincingly. what matters to them is if they can make dangerous enough threats, they may be able to try to get their way anyway, anyway. that is not the way a government of laws behaves. that is the way a government of threats behaves. and if we go down the road of a government of threats, we are taking a very big step away from our american heritage, away from the procedures of our american constitution and away from the values that have seen us through hundreds of years of growth and

of pride. it is a dangerous point, and the fact that they're willing to do that, the fact that they're willing not only to wreck the economy but to wreck the status of this country as one that is run by a government of laws and turn it instead to a government of threats shows how shallowly they wear their patriotism on their sleeves. it is buncum patriotism to put the real values of this country into the hopper into a government of threats instead of a government of laws. a great judge, a supreme court justice once said the procedure is the bone structure of a democratic society. breaking those bones to make your point is no way to enhance our democratic society. so i hope that the majority leader and the minority leader will resume their negotiations

right away. i hope, frankly, it's begun already and i just don't know about it yet, but we have got to get going. and if the minority leader is unwilling to tell speaker boehner no, knock it off, you have done enough damage already, we're going to solve this in the senate and we're going to sit down and have a bipartisan compromise, if he is unwilling to say that, then we need to come back to the floor and we need to bring up the bill that the republicans filibustered on saturday that would have gotten us out of this pickle. time is short. we have got to get moving. and if our colleagues on the other side then want to filibuster, to filibuster the solution to this debt limit crisis, they will have shown their hand in a very dangerous way. i yield the floor and i note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

mr. vitter: mr. president,? the presiding officer: the senator from louisiana. mr. vitter: thank you, mr. president. mr. president, i ask unanimous consent to end the quorum call. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. vitter: thank you, mr. president. mr. president, a couple of hours ago i was here on the senate floor urging and encouraging the house to act on a compromise proposal to deal with the current fiscal issues before us that included the no washington exemption from obamacare language. as i said, i think that's very, very important for two reasons.

one, the principle. i think the first rule of american democracy should be that washington lives by the same rules as it imposes on america. under obamacare, under everything. and secondly, a very practical consideration. i think the quicker we do that, the quicker we start getting things right. the quicker we start understanding in a gut, personal way the real challenges and burdens of obamacare and the quicker we start changing that. i returned just a couple hours later to congratulate the house because apparently they're moving in exactly that direction. and all indications are that they'll be going to the rules committee very, very soon with a package that features that really has as its centerpiece that no washington exemptions from obamacare language. again, i think it's important for all the reasons i said. i also want to point out that

assuming the house passes that, i think they're going to tonight, that no washington exemptions language will be the only thing, the only substantial thing in that proposal that hasn't been essentially agreed to by senate democrats. everything else are details, a date here, minor provisions, the only major difference between what the house is hopefully passing tonight and what's been agreed to in discussions by senate democrats is that no washington exemption language. so the question will be, is this perceived crisis, is this stand-off really going to continue over that, over members protecting their wallets, their special elite status, demanding that they're treated differently than other americans under obamacare? is it really going to continue and not be resolved over that?

i think that's what it will all be about, again, assuming as i hope it does, the house passes this proposal tonight. again, mr. president, the obamacare language, the statute itself does not allow for this special exemption or special subsidy. that is nowhere in the statute. and because of that, it was sort of an example of what nancy pelosi said about the obamacare statute in general, we have to pass it to figure out what's in it. well, it passed with language in it that said clearly members of congress and their staff would have to go to the obamacare exchanges for their health care. no provision for any special subsidy. and then after it passed, many folks on capitol hill read it to figure out what was in it. when they got to that section, they said, oh, you know what, we can't live under this.

we can't stand for this. so then a fierce lobbying campaign started to get the administration to fix obamacare but not to fix it for america, to fix it for congress. and that resulted in a special obama administration rule that was conveniently issued right as congress was leaving washington for the august recess, right as congress was fleeing the scene of the crime. that rule really did two things, neither of which is in the statute. and that's why it's a completely illegal rule, contrary to the statute in my opinion. first of all, the rule said when the statute says that members of congress and their staff have to go to the exchanges for their health care, well, we don't know who official staff is. we can't figure that out, the administrative agency said so we're going to leave that up to each individual member of

congress. that's absurd. the language is clear. all official staff are covered. the administration should have demanded in the rule that all official staff are covered and not leave it up to individual members. but under this cozy relationship, an individual member can exempt any staffer that he or she likes, in fact, in theory that member can exempt all of his staff and say it's up to me, they are not official staff for purposes of this provision of obamacare. that's absurd on its face. and then the second thing is special rule for congress only did is say, well, for those who go to the exchanges, including members, they get to take a huge temporary-funded subsidy with them, a subsidy available to no other american at that income level, no other

american. that's not in the obamacare statute. and that is made up out of thin air in terms of this rule. so we need to correct that situation and we need to make sure that washington is treated like america. first, because it's the right thing to do, it should be the first guiding principle of american democracy. second, for the practical reason i stated, the quicker we do that on obamacare, and across the board, the quicker washington, congress, the president will start getting important matters, including impact of obamacare right. mr. durbin: will the senator yield for a question? mr. vitter: i will in just a moment. again, i congratulate the house for doing exactly that, for doing exactly that. and, again, i would point out assuming the house does that and passes that tonight, the only significant difference between

their package and what senate democrats have agreed to in discussions here will be this no washington exemption language from obamacare. there will be other very minor differences, a date here, language regarding how income verification is handled, very, very minor compared to this central issue. so that's what it's coming down to, and that will be what senate action on that house proposal is about. i'll be happy to yield to my distinguished dweeg from illinois. mr. durbin: since the senator from louisiana, i'd say through the chair, has raised on the floor many times the issue of health insurance of members of congress, i will volunteer that i'm under the federal employees health benefit program, some eight million federal employees including members of congress and their staff are currently under the same health insurance program across the nation. i have the same health insurance policy as the park ranger at the lincoln home in springfield, illinois. i would ask the senator from

illinois what is your health insurance policy? mr. vitter: i'm under exactly the same program and what i'm suggesting is merely that we follow the law. the distinguished senator and many of his democratic colleagues constantly make the point that obamacare is the law of the land. he's right. i want to change that largely, you don't, it is the law of the land as we speak. mr. durbin: if the senator will yield? mr. vitter: let me finish. and that law of the land is crystal clear. it has a specific provision about this, and it says every member of congress and all of their official staff can no longer stay in that plan, have to go to the obamacare shakes, the so-called fallback provision for the american people. i think there was a reason for that. i think there was thinking behind that and it's simple. that we should live under that same scenario that millions of americans have to live under, eight million plus who don't

want to have to go to the exchanges, who like the insurance plan they have right now, who heard the president say if you like the plan you have now, you can keep it, and who found out after the fact that that just wasn't true for them. eight million plus who are being forced off coverage they like to go to the obamacare exchanges. they don't get -- mr. durbin: would the senator yield for further question? mr. vitter: they don't get the special treatment and i'm suggesting we should not as well. mr. durbin: would the senator yield for a further question? mr. vitter: gentlemeney. mr. durbin: i hope the senator will concede that are, because a express, offered by republican senators coburn and grassley. secondly, what we're dealing with here is a strange situation. obamacare doesn't force anybody into the insurance exchange. it is available for those who have no health insurance or

those who are on individual health insurance plans and want to buy something different. mr. vitter: if i can respond and reclaim my ciem time, i don't think that's true at all. i think obamacare absolutely forces millions of other americans into the exchanges. now, it's -- i've reclaimed my time. it's not the same mechanism that it is for members of congress. it's not an express provision. but it's forcing eight million plus americans into the exchanges against their will nonetheless. because there are many, many americans who want to keep the coverage they have. mr. durbin: if the senator -- mr. vitter: they heard over and over from president obama if you like the coverage you have, you can keep it. then they found out for them, that was a lie. they did like the coverage they have, they are losing it dependence their will, and i don't think that's by accident, i think that's by design because the obamacare statute creates

clear incentives for many, many employers to get out of the health insurance provision business and to just let their workers go to the exchanges. and so i completely disagree with the statement from the senator from illinois when he said no other american was forced on to the exchanges. millions of other americans were forced onto the changes shaings. in a different way but absolutely millions of americans were forced onto the exchanges against their will. mr. durbin: since the senator is under the federal employees health benefit program, his monthly premiums for his health insurance and my health insurance receive an employer contribution. that's how most americans who work get their health insurance. the employer contribution he receives and i receive, about 72% of the premium. the senator from louisiana has characterized an employer

contribution as a government subsidy. i would like to ask the senator from louisiana is he prepared to disclose the government subsidy as he calls it that he has personally received for his health insurance as a member of the united states senate? mr. vitter: absolutely. reclaiming my time and reclaiming the floor, that is absolutely public information. that is true. what i'm merely suggesting is that obamacare mandates a change and that is the law of the land, as you and your democratic colleagues make the point many, many times and we should live by the law of the land. and as the distinguished senator from illinois absolutely knows, there is no provision in the obamacare statute for that subsidy to transfer to the exchanges, for members or congressional staff. no provision whatsoever. and, in fact, having that happen is inconsistent with the law, because the requirements of

exchange policies are different than the requirements for fehbp policies so it is completely inconsistent with the law for that subsidy to follow members of congress to the exchanges. it's nowhere mentioned in the statute. it's made up out of thin air under this illegal obama administration rule with no sufficient statutory basis in the law. mr. durbin: will the senator yield for a question? mr. vitter: yes. mr. durbin: if the senator is stating that no one under an insurance exchange, no one, can receive employer contribution for health insurance, he is wrong, flat wrong. mr. vitter: reclaiming my time, i did not say the that and i will not state that. what i did state is that there is no subsidy available for members of congress and congressional staff under the obamacare statute. there is no provision in the statute for that old fehbp

subsidy to magically re-do itself as an exchange subsidy. there is absolutely no provision of that whatsoever. and, folks, these 8 million americans who are forced out of the plans they liked, they're not getting a subsidy. they're going to the individual exchange and they're getting no comparable subsidy. now, if they're a low enough income, they get a subsidy. mr. dus durbin: will the senator yield further? the presiding officer: the senator from louisiana's time has expired. mr. vitter: thank you, mr. and i would urge again that the senate stand tall, stand with the american people, not stand for washington elites. thank you, mr. president. i yield the floor. mr. durbin: mr. president? the presiding officer: the saysent majority leader. mr. durbin: mr. president, i'm glad to have that exchange with my colleague, because you see he comes to the floor repeatedly and says things which aren't altogether accurate. that why i wanted to speak to him today and he yielded for a question and i thank him. i'm sorry he's left because i'd

like to further engage in dialogue. there's a reason why he left. there are questions he can't answer. and if he tries to answer them, his whole case explodes in front of him. we created these insurance exchange for 40 million or 50 million americans who have no health insurance or had rotten health insurance. they were paying a fortune for bad health insurance policies. when he says -- he says 8 million people were forced in the exchanges, here's what he's really saying. 8 million people had health insurance policies that were so bad that those policies, frankly, had to be rewritten. here's what we said is the law now under the obamacare. you offer a health insurance policy to my family or the senator from connecticut's family, you cannot discriminate against a perc person applying r health insurance because of preexisting conditions for anybody in your family. anybody have -- anybody in their family with preexisting conditions? we all do. and we decided that was fundamentally unfair. if you have a child with asthma, a wife with diabetes, mental

illness in your family, for goodness sakes, you shouldn't be discriminated against. that's one of the provisions of obamacare, which many on the other side of the aisle want to repeal. secondly, we said we can have no lifetime limits on your health insurance policy. what does that mean? in the old days, you'd buy a policy that says we'll give you great coverage up to $100,000; then you're on your own. $100,000? that ought to be just great. until you end up in the doctor's office the next day, or someone in your family, with a serious cancer diagnosis, with surgery, chemo, radiation going on for a long period of time that goes way over $100,000. and it can happen. i had a routine surgery three years ago -- routine -- and it turned out just fine. it cost over $100,000. if i had one of those limited policies, i would have had to start paying out of my pocket. so we eliminated that and said you can't have a cap on insurance policies. they want to repeal that. they want caps on insurance policies. it turned out that 60% of the

family insurance policies in america did not cover maternity benefits. how about that? how about that? love families and love children? well, how about making sure health insurance covers them? that's in obamacare and they want to repeal it. the list goes o. here's the point i want -- the list goes on. here's the point i want to get to. members of congress are now going to be covered by the same insurance policies offered by obamacare, and our staff will too. that's acceptable to me. i've taken a look at what's available. it's as good as anything members of congress receive today. i'm not worried about the quality of coverage for myself and my wievment it will be just fine -- and my wife. i t will be just fine. i can live with that. but currently the senator from louisiana, this senator and of other senator when it comes -- and every other senator when it comes on health insurance has the same health insurance as federal employees, 8 million federal employees. same basic coverage i think it's pretty darned good. i've said that on the floor. people have corrected me saying, "senator, you may have a policy

worth, yorntion $15,000 a year -- i don't know, $15,000 a year. there are people who have policies worth $40,000. so i'll just leave it at this. i think i have good coverage for myself and my wife. i can match that coverage in terms of the quality of the coverage on the insurance exchanges without fear of interruption in service and protection for me and my wife. so i feel good about that. here's what the senator from louisiana's upset about. when i go on the insurance exchange, which is required by law -- not voluntary, righ requd by law -- he doesn't want the employer to make any contributions for the health insurance for myself and my family. and he says our staff should be under the same restriction. well, people who get their health insurance through their imar cross america, vitter -- health insurance across america, virtually all of them have employer contribution. this is common. there's nothing sinister or sneaky about it. so now he calls it a government subsidy, the employer contribution. so you'll a say is this, i'll go

on the insurance exchange. treat me the same way when it comes to employer contribution for my health insurance and my staff health insurance as every other federal employee, just that simple. he says no. that's special treatment for members of congress. well, the senator from louisiana is just plain wrong. and he stands here on the floor and talks about special privileges for members of congress. let me tell you what i'm prepared to do. i'm prepared to put a specific provision in the law which says no member of congress or member of any congressional staff shall receive any special privileges or additional rights not available to every other person under the shop or insurance exchange program. how's that? i could live with that. because, as he almost acknowledged, currently employer contributions can be made for those who are on the insurance exchanges. it's there. we're not getting anything too unusual. it's already there. and so this argument about some special treatment for members of

congress? no way. and i'll tell what you bothers me the most about this, mr. president, the senator from con, what bothers me most about this is it doesn't take an act of political courage to take money away from somebody else, in this case, away from our staff people. you know, i started out here as an intern a long, long time ago when i was in college and i worked around the hill all my life. there are some extraordinary people here. people go to work every darn day to make me look good, to answer the phone, try to satisfy the needs of the people of illinois, to deal with some pretty serious cases that involve life-and-death sometimes or federal benefits. they work long hours. they do great work. and because of their great work, they cover me in glory with regularity. i can't thank them enough. what a thanks this is to say to them, we're going to eliminate your employer's contribution for your health insurance. you're on your own. that's what the senator from louisiana wants to do.

if he thinks employer's contribution for health insurance is something that is sinister, shouldn't be allowed for members of congress and their staff, hang on tight, because we have 150 million people in america who have health insurance through their work with employer contribution. is that his next target? his he going after them? well, he's in for a fight. because people can't afford health insurance without employers helping to pay. we put it in the tax code. we've got it protected in the tax code. we've got to beat the vitter amendment. think about this for a second. we started this debate two weeks ago. a senator from texas took the floor for 21 hours, stayed up all night. his goal -- let's defund obamacare. what happened? his side ended up shutting down the government and putting us now within 36 hours of defaulting on our national debt for the first time in history. over the issue of defunding obamacare. haven't heard that recently, have a you? they stopped talking about it. because something's happened.

over 12 million people are now going on the internet trying to find whether they can get eligible for an insurance policy, health insurance policy. the pop layerity of -- the popularity of obamacare has gone up as the republicans have criticized because there are an awful lot of people out there who don't have health insurance or they have health insurance they can't aformed. oh, i'm not going to make -- can't afford. oh, i'm not going to make excuses for the problems with the computer and the internet as the program kicks off. it better improve and it will. but it shows you when you're overwhelmed with people who want health insurance, what happens? the system broke down. well, we've got to get better. but during this period of time when the other side was railing against obamacare, the numbers of approval for obamacare were going up across america. didn't work. they gave up on defunding obamacare. i haven't heard that phrase in a long time. two weeks ago from the senator from texas but not since. and so now they've decided that instead of defunding obamacare, they're going to follow the senator from louisiana who wants

to take the health insurance away or make it prohibitively expensive for members of congress and their staff. that's it. that's what this has been all about? we have shut down the government and we have run the risk of defaulting on our debt for the first time in history over whether or not our employees, the people on our staff, are going to get a federal government contribution for paying their health insurance? that's pathetic. that is pathetic, that we've reached that pointed. i believe -- that we've reached that point. i believe health insurance is a right, it isn't a privilege. and i believe employer-sponsored health insurance is a good thing, that we ought to protect it. and i believe members of congress ought to play by the same rules as everybody else in the insurance exchanges and our staff should as well. and if he accepts those as premises, his amendment goes away, disappears. but if he's out to get the employer contribution on health insurance -- maybe that's his goal -- have at it. i think he's going to find it's

a very lonely battle. most americans, democrats and republicans, value health insurance, need to have it at times in their lives to give them peace of mind they're getting the best care. and this war on insurance for individuals, the uninsured, even members of congress and their employees is mindless. it is mindless and petty. we've got to do better. we need to expand the reach of health insurance across america. we're going to. and this effort to defund obamacare and now this vitter amendment, we have to defeat both of those efforts. once this program is in place and splernz this protection -- and americans have this protection, you're never going to take it away. once you have that piec peace od with affordable health insurance, and 6 out of 106 the people who go into the health insurance -- 6 outer of 10 of the people who go into the health exchanges, will pay less than a cable bill for health insurance. finally they get health insurance. that's what it's all about. once it happens, once it moves forward, it will become one of the basic things in america that

we count on to protect ourselves and our families. we've got to defeat this vitter amendment. it is just pathetic that we've reached this point, the shutdown of the government and the idea of defaulting on the debt, that it's come down to this amendment. it really is sad. it doesn't speak well for those on the other side who started off with this lofty goal to defund obamacare and in the end all they want to do is to raise the cost of health insurance for the people who are working night and day for them in their offices across america. i hope the people in this country understand what this debate has finally descended to and will join us in defeating this vitter amendment. mr. president, i yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

quorum call:

a senator: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from south dakota. mr. thune: madam president, i ask unanimous consent the quorum call be suspended and i be able to talk for up to 15 minutes. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. thune: madam president, we're now in the third week of a government shutdown. we're facing an imminent debt limit crisis, and it just seems like it's become the pattern around here that we live from crisis to crisis. i hope we do something about that. we obviously have to deal with the immediate issues in front of us in the next day or so. hopefully no more than that. and there have been a lot of

discussions that have occurred over the course of the weekend, in the last few days to try and bring to a conclusion at least this chapter of this particular crisis that we're dealing with. and, you know, i'm encouraged when i hear our colleagues on both sides of the aisle have meeting and having discussions. and we've had a number of those that have gone on. and i think so far without result, there have been meetings that have occurred between our two leaders. and they also have been working very, very hard to try and get a result, something they can take back to their respective caucuses and present and hopefully voted on. there are discussions going on in the other body, in the house of representatives, and have been for some time, trying to find a way, a pathway forward that could get the necessary votes to pass in the house of representatives and then here ultimately in the united states senate. and i heard some of my colleagues and democratic leadership get up on the floor this morning and denounce some of those efforts in the house of representatives, which came as a

surprise to many of us because i don't think it should be any shock to anyone that the house of representatives created in article 1 of the constitution might decide to perform some things that are consistent with its constitutional role. and so they have been working on legislation. we had the leader get up here this morning and make some comments on the floor with respect to what was happening in the house of representatives. and he described it as a partisan attempt to appease a small group of tea party republicans. he described it as an extreme piece of legislation which, by the way, most of the elements of which have been things that have been part of the bipartisan agreement here in the united states senate. he said it was a blatant attack on bipartisanship. he went on to say that he felt blind sided by the news from the house and that extremist republicans in the house of representatives were trying to torpedo -- torpedo -- the senate's bipartisan progress

with a bill that can't pass the senate. he went on to lament the fact that he was disappointed in the speaker of the house. it was just -- i guess, again, a big surprise, madam president, to many of us because i don't think it should -- we should feel blindsided when the house of representatives tries to find the necessary votes to move legislation that's so important to this country. in fact, it would appear at least that perhaps the tkhaoerpls in the senate -- here in the senate, the white house which said it was going to veto the proposal from the house of representatives, of course before it had ever seen it -- there had never been anything in print with respect to that. the senate democrats hadn't seen it. the prowess hadn't seen it. -- the white house hadn't seen it. the president said he was going to veto it. it was an attempt to torpedo bipartisan discussions. it would appear at least that some of the democrats around here are a lot more concerned about the political consequence and the political advantage and

having the opportunity to dance on the political graves of republicans than actually solving a problem that's important to the future of this country and to the american people. and so i think it's unfortunate that that's where we are. i hope that in the course of the next few hours -- and that's about all we have left -- that we'll come to some agreement. and whether that originates in the house of representatives or originates here in the senate, one way or the other both are going to have to vote on it. both are going to have to find the necessary votes to pass something that will avoid the disaster that's facing us if we don't take steps to do that. so i just -- i guess i'm one of many who, when i heard those comments this morning, was more than just a little bit surprised to think that we here in the united states senate would be shocked and surprised and disappointed that the house of representatives and blindsided would decide to do some work and

try to solve this problem as well. ultimately, madam president, we have to have the house and the senate agree and concur. and i'm glad to see that the house of representatives is proceeding in a way that will solve this problem. i hope that we will continue in the senate to try and find a solution in the next few hours, something that we can actually pass through both houses of congress and put on the president's desk, and something that he might be able to sign into law. when you talk about the various elements of those proposals, most of those things that were denounced and rejected here this morning by the democrat leaders when they came to the floor were the very things that a bipartisan group here in the senate had been working on for several days. but i hope that when we get through this immediate crisis, madam president, and, hopefully, create the process by which we might address the real problems the country faces. because this living from crisis to crisis is not a way to govern the country and it's certainly

not a way to provide certainty to our economy, and it's certainly not a way to get the economy growing and expanding again. many of us on this side of the aisle think that we ought to have a discussion when we're raising the debt limit about how we're going to fix the debt. what are we going to do to reduce the debt? what are we going to do to ensure that we don't continue to pile trillions and trillions and trillions of dollars on the future generations of this country? and we don't seem to get serious about that. i hope that we will. and i hope that when we get past the immediate crisis that we'll take a look at the long term and say what can we do to put this country on a more sustainable fiscal path. and i think we all know what that entails. it means we've got to get spending here in washington, d.c. under control, particularly the areas of some of the mandatory spending parts of the budget. if you look at what the congressional budget office says, over the next ten years discretionary spending, which is that small part of the budget that is impacted by the sequester, is going to grow at roughly 17%. during the same period mandatory

spending is predicted to grow by roughly 79% or $1.6 trillion over the course of the next decade. so spending on mandatory programs continues to grow. and this c.b.o. report underscores that reforming entitlements is absolutely necessary if we're going to get and so it's -- we know what the issues are, madam president. we clearly -- it's not like it's a big secret. the congressional budget office gives us insights into this on a regular basis. we have had lots of commissions that have studied these issues, they have presented their findings, they put forward recommendations about how to address these long-term crises the country faces, and yet there seems to be the lack, i guess if you will, of the political will here to try and actually solve the problem. now, my own view is that if we can get through this immediate crisis, that over the course of the next couple of months, which is basically what we have to work with, that we can actually

sit down, hopefully with the president engaged in this process, and negotiate in a way that would allow us to fix and to put in place solutions that actually do put us on a more sustainable fiscal trajectory for this country's future. we have seen in the course of the last four and a half years the publicly held debt of this country literally double. it took 230-some years of american history and the first 43 presidents to get to the first $6.3 trillion in debt. that's literally been doubled in the last four and a half years under this administration. and so we have got a huge debt problem. added a trillion dollars a year for the first four years. this year, everybody is patting each other on the back and saying gee, the deficit is down to $650 billion or $700 billion, like that's some sort of major accomplishment. that's the fifth largest deficit literally in history. behind the first four years of this administration, which were

the four largest deficits in american history. we have an out-of-control debt. we have out-of-control deficits that are growing as a percentage of our economy and getting to the point where they are literally going to drown our economy if we don't do something about it. and so they are controlling the spending part of the equation, madam president, is essential. the other thing that's essential is to get the economy growing and expanding again. when the economy is growing and expanding, it means that people are working, people are investing, people are making money, people are paying taxes, government revenues go up. and that makes a lot of these problems look much smaller by comparison, too. but you can't have an economy that's growing at 1% to 2% and an unemployment rate that's chronically at about 7.5%, and when you factor in the people who have quit looking for work or are working part time that would rather be working full time, that unemployment rate gets up into the double digits. so we have got chronically high unemployment, massive amounts of

debt and a sluggish economy. those are all things that we ought to be focused on here. and in order to get the economy growing and expanding again, we have got to make the -- create the economic conditions for small businesses to invest, to hire more people, to put their capital to work and to try and get that economic growth rate back up to where it would allow us to deal not only with our deficits but also to do something that would really improve the quality of life and the standard of living for people in this country. a growth rate in the 3% to 4% range is significantly different, dramatically different than a growth rate in the 1% to 2% range. and that means a big difference in the take-home pay for middle-class americans. if you want to see middle-class americans do better in this economy, we have got to get the economy growing again, and that means reforming our tax code, broadening that tax base, lowering those marginal income tax rates. we have the highest business tax in the world. it makes us noncompetitive in the global environment.

we lose jobs every single day to countries, other countries around the world. we need to do things that would lessen the cost of doing business in this country, make it less expensive and less difficult to create jobs, not more expensive and more difficult. and one of the things that many of us have been concerned about with respect to obamacare is that it is making it more expensive and more difficult to create jobs. we have got higher taxes. we are seeing higher insurance premiums. obviously, that means fewer jobs, that translates into fewer jobs. and so getting the cost of regulations to a more reasonable level, keeping the tax rates at a more reasonable level and doing those things that are necessary to unleash this economy, madam president, is the way that we will -- we will improve the fiscal picture of this country, coupled with good fiscal discipline and descrients on federal spending, and that means that we have to tackle the mandatory part of the budget, that part that was not affected by the -- or at least not very much affected by the sequester.

those are the -- those are the ingredients, those are the components, those are the elements, if you will, that will lead us to a -- a situation where we're not having a crisis every few months where we're trying to worry about debt limit increase or how we're going to fund the government, and we ought to get to a place where we are in a more systemic -- systematic way doing the things we should have done in the first place. passing the appropriation bills. we didn't pass a single appropriation bill this year which is why we are here at the 11th hour trying to come up with a continuing resolution to fund the government. those are the things we need to be doing if we're going to get this fiscal situation improved for our country and get the economy up and growing again and creating jobs and doing the things that are necessary to improve the lives of the american people. that's what i think the public wants to see, and actually if you look at public opinion polls -- and there has been a lot of discussion of that lately -- by a 2-1 margin, people in this country believe that if you are going to raise

the debt limit, you ought to do something about the debt. in fact, i saw a survey just last week by cbs news, i think it was, that said that 55% of the people in this country believed that when you're going to raise the debt limit you ought to do something to reduce spending. i think there were only 23% of the people surveyed who said that they supported a clean debt limit increase. the american people get it, madam president. the people in my state of south dakota understand that you can't spend money you don't have. you have to live within your means. and that we have to as a federal government do the same thing that families across this country have to do on a regular basis. so they -- they get this. they understand what this is about. and i hope that in the next few weeks and months that we will be able with the involvement and the engagement of the president of the united states sit down and negotiate the sorts of resolutions, if you will, the sorts of proposals and solutions to this debt crisis and get this country on a more sustainable

fiscal path and a place where the economy is growing at a faster rate, creating the types of jobs, good-paying jobs that will help middle-class americans in this economy prosper. if you look at what's happened to take-home pay or to household income over the past several years, it's gone down, not up. we have seen household -- average household income go down by $3,700 since the president took office, and it is time that we change that and got the american people back to work, incomes coming up and jobs that are -- that will keep the -- the young people in this country not only employed but looking with confidence and optimism toward their future, which is something that we don't see today. so let's deal with the immediate crisis, but let's work together on that, and instead of coming over here and denouncing what's happening in the house of representatives or using extreme language to characterize what's happening in the house of representatives, understand that we have to function together, we are the congress of the united

states. in order for anything to get done here, we have to move legislation through both the house and the senate, and it seems to me at least there ought to be a recognition of that here in the united states senate, and i, as i listened this morning to the comments of some of our leaders on the other side when they came down here and denounced what was happening in the house of representatives, it struck me at least that that's not a constructive nor productive way to get where we need to go in the next few hours. so i hope we can do that, and i'm looking forward to -- to the kind of bipartisan cooperation that will solve this problem. madam president, i yield the floor. mrs. boxer: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from california. mrs. boxer: i want to ask that i could use as much time as i might consume. the presiding officer: without objection. mrs. boxer: madam president, the senator from south dakota has pointed out how concerned he is about jobs, about economic growth. he's concerned about our not

doing enough appropriations bills. he's concerned that we haven't resolved our differences in the conference. i want him to know, since he asked for partisanship, -- asked for bipartisanship, i'm concerned as a democrat, about pay and jobs and economic growth, and i'm concerned that we haven't had any appropriations bills, and i'm concerned that we haven't gone to the budget. but i need to speak the truth. and the truth is in the record. why don't we have appropriations bills? because the republicans filibustered our very first bill, and when we tried to get it done, they wouldn't give us the votes, and it was taken off the floor. and senator murray and senator collins, our moderate republican colleague, were very upset about that.

the republicans filibustered the very first appropriations bill that we tried to get through, and it was clear they were going to continue to filibuster each one. so to come down here and lament the fact that we didn't take up appropriations bills flies in the face of recent history. now, my friend laments the fact that we haven't had a chance to discuss what he now sees is the target for cuts, medicare and social security, causing entitlement programs. that's their new thing now. they want to cut those programs. well, you know what? we have said, madam president, open up the government, pay our bills, we'll negotiate, we'll listen, we'll talk. 21 times our friends on the republican side stopped us from going to a budget conference, and now they have shut down the

government, and all you have to do is understand why. they were very clear, they don't like the affordable care act. so i have come to the floor, as i have before during this government shutdown that's in its 15th day, to raise the alarm about the harmful, terrible, hurtful impacts on america and its people as a result of 15 days of not having access to their government. who are they punishing, madam president? the people of this nation. this is their government. open up the door, let them in, let them talk to us, let them tell us about the legislation they want us to proceed to.

let them not suffer, as they are in my state and in many states, because the government is shut down, and i will talk about some of the ways my people are hurting. so they shut down the government because they didn't like the affordable care act. and i'm going to say -- can i have those statistics -- i am so happy to say that coveredca.com, which is our web site, has had more than 1.5 million unique visits to the site. the call volume to the service centers, 104,000-plus. the average call wait time now is a minute and 55 seconds. the average call handling time from the time you get on to the

time you get off and get your questions answered is less than 15 minutes. and our cumulative applications are approaching 100,000. tens of thousands have already completed the signups. so this is why they shut down the government. they don't want this to move forward. i'll tell you some stories about health care reform in my state. rakish rickey of san jose is now paying $950 a month to insure himself, his wife and two children with kaiser permanente. according to an nbc station in the bay area, rakish was stunned to learn that through covered california, he can get a similar kaiser plan for his family for

$400 less a month. so when my friend stands here and says premiums are going up, ask, ask rakish. he's getting a plan for his family for $400 less a month. so he quickly did the math. he found out when he hung up the phone and signed up, he's saving $5,000 a year. why do the -- why do the republicans want to shut down the government and stop somebody like that from getting a plan? i think they have to look into their hearts. rakish owns an auto repair shop. he has four employees. he is hoping with the savings he will be able to offer his workers medical insurance. he cannot wait to sign up, complete the application. and he looks forward to feeling relief from the financial pain of skyrocketing insurance costs. then there is laura hunt of

modesto. she lost her husband's employer base coverage when he was killed in a car crash in 2006. she is suffering from income loss and painful loss of a spouse. she contacted covered california and found out she can have an anthem blue cross policy for a net cost of $23 a month. why do my friends on the other side of the aisle want to stop laura hunt of modesto, who lost her husband's employer-based coverage when he cause killed in a car crash, why do they want to stop her from getting affordable health care? kevin burke, an assembly worker, he told the fresno bee he'd been out of work for two years, now he qualifies for medicaid. and he's going to be okay, and he's not going to wait till he's

rushed to an emergency room. why do my colleagues on the other side of the aisle want to stop kevin burke of fresno from getting affordable health insurance? they need to look into their hearts. then there's rafino arongo, a diabetic. at vista health center he filled out an application for coverage through a significant expansion of medicale. they lost their insurance when they are husband was laid off for 22 years. she said it's so great, it's going to help so many of us. if not for obamacare, many of us would not qualify for health insurance. i could go on and on with these stories. i don't have the time to do it but i'm going to keep on adding these stories to the congressional record so someday

when people look back at this moment in history and they realize that we stood up for the people and their right to have affordable health care, that we did it for a very good reason. and someday in the future people say you mean there was a time when we had 40 million people without insurance? are you kidding? but that's the moment we're in now. we're either going to stand sentry as my friend barbara mikulski always says, for a law that's going to help people or we we're going to walk away. and no law is perfect, of course, there are glitches. we're very happy to talk about making it happy. the president is as well. he said as much. and i just want everyone, madam president, to read an opinion piece that ran in "the washington post" recently, a couple of days ago, by one of my constituents. her name is janine urbaniak

reed. she's a writer and so she has a beautiful way of expressing herself. and she talks about her loving son, maven --, mason, who has brain cancer and had to undergo multiple surgeries. listen to this. he would have hit his lifetime limit on the policy and the family would have been driven into -- her words -- the financial abyss if it wasn't for the affordable care act. she writes that the family -- -- and i quote -- "thanks god and whoever else would listen for our good fortune to have coverage. and she ends her piece with this line. "if i could get those trying to repeal this law on a conference call, i would explain this to them: i would tell them that while they were busy trying to derail the affordable care act over the past two years, mason

has again learned to walk, talk, eat, and shoot a three-point basket" -- end of quote. why would anyone want to hurt that family and reverse our law, the affordable care act -- it's everybody's law -- that says no more lifetime limits, and no more annual limits, madam president. i mean, you have to ask the republicans why they want to do it. they come to the floor and they say health care costs are rising, these things, the sky is falling but then you look at the facts and the facts are tens of thousands of people are signing up, millions of people, young people are now able to stay on their parents' policies till they're about 26, no more preexisting condition bar if you have a preexisting

condition you still can get insurance, there are so many good things. women are no longer discriminated against. we used to pay twice as much as men. being a woman was considered a preexisting condition, can you imagine? really. because, yes, we could have babies and yes, we had certain needs. that's over now. we have equal rights in this affordable care act. so i have to just say the reason for the shutting down of the government was to stop the affordable care act. the affordable care act is now signing up tens of thousands of people, it's saving a lot of our families, and if the republicans want to make improvements in it, that's fine. we're ready to do it. we'll sit down with anyone and make this law better. absolutely.

but don't stop a law that passed almost four years ago, that was upheld by the supreme court, and may i say, there was a big election about it. remember what mitt romney said. the first thing i'll do when i am your president is to repeal obamacare. that is my promise and boy, i believed him. it was a big issue. and people decided, you know, that wasn't a good enough reason. and they reelected our president not in a small way but in a big way. so since there's no more reason to shut down the government because the affordable care act can't be stopped, it's funded by a separate stream of funding, not yearly appropriations, we begged the republicans don't shut the government down over this. it's starting, it's happening, and we're not going to repeal a law that took -- well, i'd say decades to pass.

so they didn't listen and now they stopped talking about the affordable care act pretty much. now they have a whole different reason for shutting down the government and bringing us to the brink of default, and that reason is deficits. deficits. i want to talk a little bit about default. because we're hours away from a default. the first time in this nation's great history. if we don't take action, we'll be unable to pay the bills that have been incurred in the past. it's important to note, we've gone through so many crises in our nation, tough, tough, tough ones, civil strife, world wars, the great depression, we always followed the constitution that says -- and i quote -- "the validity of

the public debt of the united states authorized by law shall not be questioned"-- unquote. that's in the constitution. and yet from the people who say they're constitutionalists, they seem not to read that part and they are flirting for the first time with allowing us to get to the point where we can't pay all our bills and that is a default. and i want to just say this: some of our colleagues come to the floor and they say, well, it's not a default if you pay interest on the bonds. i'm an old economics major, but i don't pretend to know everything about economics. but i can tell you this: the definition of a default in whack's law dictionary is the failure to make a payment when

due. it doesn't say the failure to make an interest payment when due. the failure to make a payment. that means to our contractors, that means to our workers. that means to our social security recipients. that means to our medicare recipients. i got to say i've never seen such creative license taken when it comes to the default. a party that says it's fiscally conservative says it's not a default when you don't pay your bills as long as you pay china the interest we owe them? you've got to be kidding. take that to a town hall, i say to my friend who represents so many wonderful seniors in the great state of florida, my friend, senator nelson, who is

on the floor. so we have never gotten to this point, never gotten to this point. yes, i would be delighted to yield. mr. nelson: if the senator would yield on that point. mrs. boxer: i can yield for as much time as you wish. mr. nelson: since the senator has so eloquently posed this question, since this senator has the privilege of being the chairman of the aging committee and since the senator from california has just pointed out that seniors are at risk, i want to remind the senate that on october 23 there is a due bill to be paid of $12 billion to social security recipients. october 23. shortly thereafter, on november

1, there is another bill due, $67 billion for social security recipients, for medicare recipients, and for s.s.i., which is for social security for low-income seniors. in addition to the default that the senator from california has talked about, defaulting on interest payments on u.s. treasury bills, we're talking about default to real people with real needs, and this is just a drop in the bucket of the total amount that's coming due. i thank the senator for letting me share that in this discussion

and i might say that the presiding officer, the junior senator from massachusetts -- or now the senior senator from -- mrs. boxer: senior now. mr. nelson: is one of the most prominent and active measures of the abling committee which has not pointed out statistics like this over and over again. mr. boxer: i want to say to my friend i hope we can have these conversations, i thank you so much for recognizing my friend so he could make his point. we are, as leader pelosi said, we're playing with fire. we're playing with lives. one of our colleagues, senator casey from pennsylvania, read the most amazing letter he got from a constituent who said she's so worried about their parents, they're in their 80's and the fear, just the thought of maybe not getting a check on

time, that's making her parents physically ill. why are we doing this? there's no reason to do this. this is a self-inflicted wound. the government shutdown is self-inflicted. playing with the full faith and credit of the united states of america, self-inflicted wound. and here's the thing: we know one of the heroes of the republican party and a hero to many democrats is ronald reagan, and let's see what he said. i have it here. when it comes to the debt. i have it. the full consequences of a default or even the serious prospect of a default are impossible to predict and

awesome to contemplate. denigration of the full faith and credit of the united states would have substantial effects on the domestic financial markets and on the value of the dollar in exchange markets. the nation can ill afford to allow such a result. that is wrong. i was here during most of his presidency. i was over in the house. i think my friend was, too. and lord knows we didn't agree with ronald reagan on everything. we agreed with him on some things, not all things. and we may have cast a vote or two to say we object, but no one ever brought down the full faith and credit of the united states. he got 18 increases in the debt ceiling during his presidency. 18 over eight years. so, you know, there are two paths that we can take.

one path is a road that's a little bit bumpy and curvy and dusty, but at the end of the day it gets us where we want to go, into a budget conference with our bills paid and our government open to the people and that's the bipartisan road. it's not easy. and i'm so proud of senators reid and mcconnell for working on a plan that is something we can accept. no one on either side is thrilled about it but we can accept it. it gets us out of this mess. that's the road we should take. the bipartisan road that gets us into the conference, that opens up the doors of government and pays our bills. the other road is the road that the house republicans are taking. that road is straight over the cliff