i can tell you who is not patting us on the back. it's the american people. they aren't happy. they aren't pleased with our progress, and there is good reason. they're actually seeing their take-home pay go down as the deficit goes up. and as the president talks about a better economy. 50 years ago, the united states declared a war on poverty, and yet poverty is still a major problem. the goal was noble but the tools we used were not up to the challenge. since the recession began, nine million more americans have fallen into poverty, and the median household income is down more than 8%. poverty rates have increased during this administration with the policies we've got. it's time for a change. for decades we've exported these principles that allowed us to enjoy so much prosperity and success. we've said following the american way, the free enterprise system works, we preach this gospel as well as our relief -- belief removing the shackles whether it's

overregulation or overspending, as u.s. trade representative i had the opportunity to travel around the world, it was an honor, telling people the benefit of knocking down barriers, to increase growth and opportunity. it works. interviewers and job creators have lifted more people out of poverty around the world over the past few decades than any government program ever could could because the free enterprise system does work. we need to get back to that. let's do something we can be proud of in this chamber today. let's empower the american people instead of the american government. let's not kick the can of spending down the road any longer. let's take some vote -- not all easy votes and shouldn't be. after all, that's what we're elected to do, take tough votes. these votes we take today, though, can make a real difference in people's lives. let's start today, let's pay for this legislation, let's use these pay-fors we talked about that are bipartisan, that are sensible than that can be

supported on both sides of the aisle and in both he bodies. let's ensure we put in place the pro-growth policies so we aren't giving people insurance for a few months but giving them the opportunity to get the dignity and self-respect that comes with that. i urge my colleagues to pay for this legislation and put politics aside and get to work for the american people. i yield back my time, mr. president.

a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the republican leader. mr. mcconnell: are we in a quorum call? the presiding officer: the senate is not in a quorum call. mr. mcconnell: mr. president, over the past several years, those of us who are fortunate enough to serve here have engaged in many fierce debates. some have been forced upon us by external events, including a searing financial crisis, while others were brought about by an unapol jetally liberal president who promised dramatic change and

who has worked very hard to follow through on that pledge. in some cases, even in the face of legal obstacles and widespread public opposition. so change has indeed come. despite the daily drumbeat of headlines about gridlock and dysfunction in washington, the truth is an activist president and a democratic controlled senate have managed to check off an awful lot of items on their wish list one way or another. and yet just as important as what they did, my colleagues, is how they did it. because that's also been at the heart of so many of the fights we've had around here over the

past few years. now, these conflicts haven't stemmed have personal grievances or contempt as some would have it. they are, instead, the inevitable consequence of an administration that was in such a hurry, such a hurry, to impose its agenda that it neglected to persuade the public of its wisdom and then cast aside one of the greatest tools, one of the greatest tools we have in this country for guaranteeing a durable and stable legislative consensus, and that tool is the united states senate. remember -- i think we all know partnership is not some recent innovation here,

invention. american politics has always been more or less divided between two ideological camps. today, that's reflected in the two major parties but it's actually always been there. on one side are those who proudly place their trust in government and its agents to guide our institutions and direct our lives. on the other are those of us who put our trust in the wisdom and the creativity -- creativity of private citizens working voluntarily with each other and through more local mediating institutions guided by their own sense of what is right, what is fair, and what is good. now, recent polling suggests, by the way, that most americans fall squarely into the latter camp. people are generally confident in their local governments but

lack confidence in washington. and yet despite -- despite the political and ideological divides which have always existed in our country, we'ves almost always managed to work out our differences not by humiliating the other side into submission but through simple give and take. it is the secret of our success. the same virtues that make any friendship or marriage or family or business work are the ones that have always made this country work. and the place where it happens, the place where all the national conflicts and controversies that arise in big -- in this big,

diverse, wonderful country of ours have always been resolved, always been resolved right here in this chamber. right here. now, i realize it may not be immediately obvious why that's the case. but the fact is every serious student of this institution from de tocqueville to our late colleague robert byrd has seen the senate as uniquely important to america's stability and to its flourishing. in their view, it's made all the difference. and here's why: because whether it was the fierce early battles over the shape and scope of the federal government, or those that surrounded

industrialization or those that preceded and followed the nation-rending civil war, or those surrounding the great wars of the 20th century or the expansion of the franchise or decades long, or the war on terror, we have always, always found a way forward. sometimes haltingly, but always steadily. and the senate is the tool that has enabled us to find our footing almost every time. i mention this because as we begin a new year, i think it's appropriate to step back from all the policy debates that have occupied us over the past few years and focus on another debate we've been having around here and the debate we've been having around here is over the state of this institution. what have we become?

it's not a debate that ever caught fire with the public or with the press. but it's a debate that should be of grave importance to all of us. because on some level, on some level, every single one of us has to be at least a little bit uneasy about what happened here last november. but even if you're completely at peace about what happened in november, even if you think it was perfectly fine, to violate the all-important rules that says changing the rules requires the assent of two-thirds of senators elected and sworn, none of us should be happy with the trajectory the senate was on

before that day, even before november. or the condition that we find the senate in 225 years after it was created. i don't think anybody is comfortable with where we are. i know i'm not. and i'll bet even though there is nobody here at the moment, i'll bet almost none of them are, either. so i'd like to share a few thoughts on what i think we've lost over the last sench years -- seven years and what i think can be done about it together. now, together obviously requires the involvement, you would think, of some people on the other side of the aisle. and even though they're not hear to listen, they have been invited. so let me state at the outset, it's not my intention to point

the finger of blame at anybody. though some of that is inevitable, i don't presume to have all the answers, either, and i'm certainly not here to claim that we are without fault. but i'm certain of one thing. i'm absolutely certain of one thing. the senate can be better than it is. many of us around here have seen a better senate than we have now. no matter who was in the majority. this institution can be better than it is. and i just can't believe that on some level everyone in this chamber, including the folks on the other side, doesn't agree. it just can't be the case that we're content with the theatrics

and the messaging wars that go on here day after day. it just can't be the case that senators who grew up reading about the great statesman who made their name and their mark here over the years are now suddenly content to just stand in front of a giant poster board making some poll-tested point of the month day after day after day. and then run back to our respective corners and congratulate each other on how right we are. i just can't believe we're all happy with that. on either side. don't misunderstand me. there's a time for making a political point, even scoring a few points. i know that as well as anybody. but it can't be the only thing we do here. i mean surely we do something other than scoring political points against each other.

it cheapens the service we've sworn to provide to our constituents. it cheapens the senate. which is a lot bigger than any of us. so hopefully we can all agree that we got a problem here. now, i realize both sides have their own favored account of what caused it. we've got our talking points, they've got their talking points. we all repeat them with great repetition and we all congratulate each other for being on the right side of the debate. look, i get that. the guys over there think republicans abuse the rules, and we think they do. but as i said, my goal here isn't to make converts on that front. my purpose is to suggest that the senate can do better than it

has been and that we must be if we're to remain as a great nation. and i think the crucial first step of any vision that gets us there is to recognize vigorous debate about our differences isn't some sickness to be lamented. vigorous debate is not a problem. when did that become a problem? it's actually a sign of strength to have vigorous debates. you know, it's a common refrain among pundits that the fights we have around here are pointless. they're not at all pointless. every single debate we have around here is about something important. what's unhealthy is when we neglect the means that we've always used to resolve our differences. that's the real threat to this

country o, not more debate. when did that become a problem? and the best mechanism we have for working through our differences and arriving at a durable consensus is the united states senate. an executive order can't do it. the fiat of a nine-person court can't do it. a raucous and pregarious partisan majority in the house can't do it. the only institution that can make stable and enduring laws is the one we have in which all 50 states are represented equally and where every single senator has a say in the laws that we pass. this is what the senate was designed for. it is what the senate is supposed to be about. and almost -- almost -- always

has been. just take a look at some of the most far-reaching legislation of the past century. look at the vote tallies. medicare and medicaid were both approved with the support of about half the members of the minority. the voting rights act of 1965 passed with the votes of 30 out of the 32 members of the republican minority. all but two republican senators. there weren't many of them. that was the year after the goldwater debacle. only two senators voted against the social security act and only eight voted against the americans with disabilities act. now, none of this happened, by the way, none of it happened by throwing these bills together in a back room and dropping them on the floor with a stopwatch running.

it happened through a laborious process of legislating, persuasion, coalition building. it took time and it took patience and hard work and it guaranteed that every one of these laws had stability. stability. now, compare that -- compare that, if you will, to the attitude behind obamacare. when democrats couldn't convince any of us that the bill was worth supporting as written, they decided to do it on their own and pass it on a party-line vote and now we're seeing the result. the chaos this law has visited on our country isn't just deeply tragic, it was, my friends, entirely predictable. entirely predictable. and that will always be the case if you approach legislation without regard for the views of the other side, without some

meaningful buy-in, you guarantee a food fight. you guarantee instability and you guarantee strife. it may very well have been the case that on obamacare, the will of the country was not to pass the bill at all. that's what i would have concluded if republicans couldn't get a single democratic vote for legislation of that magnitude. i'd have thought, well, maybe this isn't such a great idea. but democrats plowed forward anyway. they didn't want to hear it. and the results are clear -- it's a mess. an absolute mess. the senate exists to prevent that kind of thing, because without a moderating institution like the senate, today's majority passes something and

tomorrow's majority repeals it. today's majority proposes something. tomorrow's majority opposes it. we see that in the house all the time. but when the senate is allowed to work the way it was designed to, it arrives at a result that's acceptable to people all along the political spectrum. that, my friends, is the whole point. we've lost our sense for the value of that, and none of us should be at peace with that. because if america is to face up to the challenges we face in the decades ahead, she'll need the senate, th the founders in their wisdom intended, not the hollow shell of the senate we have today. not the hollow shell of the senate we have today. first, one of the traditional

hallmarks of the senate is a vigorous committee process. it is also one of the main things we've lost. there was a time not that long ago when chairmen and ranking members had major influence and used their positions to develop national policy on everything from farm policy to nuclear ar arms. these men and women enriched the entire senate through their focus and their expertise. just as importantly, they provided an important counterweight to the executive branch. they provided one more check on the white house. if a president thought something was a good idea, he'd better make sure he ran it by the committee chairman who'd been studying it for the past two decades. and if the chairman disagreed, well, then they'd have a serious debate and probably reach a better product as a result.

the senate should be setting national priorities not simply waiting on the white house to do it for us. and the place to start that process is in the committees. with few exceptions, that's gone. with very few exceptions, that's gone. it's a big loss to the institution. but most importantly, it's a big loss for the american people who expect us to lead. and here's something else we've gained from a robust committee process over the years. committees have actually served as a school of bipartisanship. and if you think about it, it just makes sense. by the time a bill gets through committee, you would expect it to come out in a form that was a

a -- generally, broadly acceptable to both sides. nobody got everything but more often than not, everybody got something. and the product was stable because there was buy-in and a sense of ownership on both sides, and on the rare occasions when that's happened recently, we've seen that work. the committee process today in the united states senate is a shadow of what it used to be. thereby marginalizing, reducing the influence of every single member of the senate on both sides of the aisle. major legislation is now routinelroutinely drafted not in committee but in the majority leader's conference room and then dropped on the floor with little or no opportunity for members to participate in the amendment process, virtually guaranteeing a fight.

now, there's a lot of empty talk around here about the corrosive influence of partisanship. well, if you really want to do something about it, you should support a more robust committee process. that's the best way to end the permanent sort of "shirts against skins" contest the senate has become. bills should go through committee. and if republicans are fortunate enough -- republicans are fortunate enough -- to gain the majority next year, that will be done. second, bills should come to the floor and be thoroughly debated. we've got an example of that going on right now. and that includes a robust amendment process.

in my view, there's far too much paranoia about the other side around here. what are we afraid of? both sides have taken liberties and abused privileges, i'll admit that, but the answer isn't to provoke even more. the answer is to let folks debate. this is the senate. let folks debate. let the senate work its will. and that means bringing bills to the floor, it means having a free and open amendment process. that's legislating. that's what we used to do here. that's exactly the way this place operated just a few years ago. the senior senator from illinois, the democratic assistant majority leader, likes to say, or at least used to say, that if you don't want to fight fires, don't become a fireman.

and if you don't want to cast tough votes, don't come to the senate. i guess he hasn't said that lately. when we used to be in the majority, i remember telling people, look, the good news, we're in the majority. the bad news is, in order to get the bill across the floor, you've got to cast a lot of votes you don't want to take. and you know, we did it and people groaned about it, complained about it. the sun still came up the next day. and everybody felt like they were a part of the process. well, senator durbin was right about that when he said it and i think it's time to allow senators on both sides to more fully participate in the legislative process, and that means having a more open amendment process around here. as i said, obviously, it requires you from time to time

to cast votes you'd rather not cast. but we're all grownups. i mean, we can take that. there's rarely ever a vote you cast around here that's fatal. and the irony of it all is that kind of process makes the place a lot less contentious. in fact, it's a lot less contentious when you vote on tough issues than when you don don't. because when you're not allowed to do that, everybody is angry about being denied the opportunity to do what you were sent here to do, which is to represent the people that elected you and to offer ideas that you think are worth considering. we had a meeting we just came out of. senator cornyn was pointing out there were 13 amendments that people on this side of the aisle would like to offer on this bi bill. all of them related to the

subject and important to each senator who seriously felt there was a better way to improve the bill that's on the floor right now. but, alas, i expect that opportunity will not be allowed because one person who's allowed to get priority recognition can prevent us from getting any amendments or, even worse still, pick our amendments for us. to decide which of our amendments are okay and which aren't. i remember the late ted stevens telling the story about when he first got here. senator mansfield was still the majority leader and he tried to offer an amendment, senator stevens did, and the -- a member of the majority who was managing the bill prevented it, in effe effect. and senator mansfield came over to senator stevens, took his

amendment, went back to his desk and sent it to the floor for h him. sent it to the floor for him. that was the senate not too long ago. if someone isn't allowed to get a vote on something they believe in, of course they're going to retaliate. of course they're going to retaliate. but if they get a vote every once in awhile, they don't feel the need to. voting on amendments is good for the senate and it's good for the country. our constituents should have a greater voice in the process. since july of last year, there have been four republican roll call votes.

in the whole second half of 20 2013, members on this side of the aisle have gotten four roll call votes. stunning. that's today's senate. so let me say this. if republicans are fortunate enough to be in the majority next year, amendments will be allowed. senators will be respected. we will not make an attempt to rain controversy out of -- wring controversy out of an institution that expects, demands, approves of great debates about the problems confronting the country.

now, a common refrain from democrats is republicans have been too quick to block bills from ever coming to the floor. what they failed to mention, of course, is that often we have done this either because we have been shut out of the drafting process -- in other words, had nothing to do with writing the bill in the first place -- or it's been made pretty clear that there won't be any amendments, which is in all likelihood the situation we're in this very day. in other words, we already knew the legislation was shaping up to be a purely partisan exercise in which people we represent wouldn't have any meaningful input at all, and why would we want to participate in that? is it good for our constituents? does it lead to a better product? of course not. all it leads to is a lot more acrimony. so look, i get it.

if republicans had just won the white house and the house and had a 60-vote majority in the senate, we would be tempted to empty our outbox, too. but you can't spend two years emptying your outbox and then complain about the backlash. if you want fewer fights, give the other side a say. and that brings me to one of the biggest things we have lost around here as i see it. the big problem, my colleagues, has never been the rules, never been the rules. senators from both parties have in the past revered and defended the rules during our nation's darkest hours. the real problem, the real problem is an attitude that views the senate as an assembly line for one party's partisan legislative agenda, rather than

as a place to build consensus to solve national problems. we have become far too focused on making a point instead of making a difference. making a point instead of making good, stable law. we have gotten too comfortable with viewing everything we do here through the prism of the next election instead of the prism of duty, and everyone suffers as a result. as i see it, a major turning point came during the final years of the bush administration when the democratic majority held vote after vote on bills they knew wouldn't pass. now, look, i'm not saying republicans have never staged a showboat when we were in the majority. i'm not saying i don't even enjoy a good messaging vote from time to time. but you've got to wonder if that's all you're doing why you're here.

it's become entirely too routine , and it diminishes the senate. i don't care which party you're in. you came here to legislate, to make a difference for your constituents, yet over the past several years the senate seems more like a campaign studio than a serious legislative body. both sides have said and done things over the past few years we probably wish we hadn't. but we can, we can improve the way we do business. we can be more constructive, we can work through our differences. we can do things that need to be done, but there will have to be major changes if we're going to get there. the committee process must be restored. we need to have an open amendment process. and finally, let me suggest we need to learn how to put in a

decent week's work around here. a decent week's work. you know, most americans don't work three days a week. they would be astonished to find out that that's about it around here. how about the power of the clock to force consensus? the only way 100 senators will be truly able to have their say, the only way we would be able to work through our tensions and disputes is if we're here more. not too long ago -- and a number of you will remember this -- when thursday night was the main event around here. remember that? thursday night was the main event. and there is a huge incentive to finish on thursday night if you want to leave on friday.

it was amazing how it worked. even the most eager beaver among us with a long list of amendments that were good for the country, maybe ten or 12, around noon on thursday, you would be down to two or one by midnight on thursday. it was amazing how consent would be reached when fatigue set in. all it took was for the leader, the majority leader, who is in charge of the agenda, to say look, this is important, there is bipartisan support for this, it came out of committee, we want to have an open amendment process, but we want to finish this week. and we can finish on thursday afternoon or thursday night or friday morning. i mean, we almost never get worn out around here. whatever happened to the fatigue factor to bring things to a

close? amendments voluntarily go away. but important ones still got offered. and everybody feels like they have got a chance to be involved in the process, no matter which side of the aisle they are on. this is thick effective on bills that have come out of committee with bipartisan support so there is an interest actually in passing it. we almost never do that anymore. almost never. on those occasions, we work late, sometimes well into the morning. i know that sounds kind of quaint to people who haven't been around here very long, but it actually worked. and there is nothing wrong with staying up a little later and getting to a conclusion i can remember the majority leader himself when he was whip walking around late at night on thursdays with his whip card,

making sure he had enough votes to do whatever he wanted to do. when you finish one of those debates, whether you ended up voting against the bill or for the bill, you didn't have the feeling that unless you chose to go away with your amendment, you would have been denied the opportunity to participate and to be a part of the process and actually make a difference for your constituents. that's how you reach consensus, by working and talking and cooperating through give and take. that's the way everyone's patience is worn down. not just the majority leader's patience. everyone can agree on a result, even if they don't vote for it in the end. using the clk to force consensus is the greatest proof of that, and if republicans are in the majority next year, we'll use the clock. everybody gets an opportunity,

but we use the clock, we will work harder and get results. restoring the committee process, allowing the senators to speak through an open amendment process, extending the workweek are just a few things the senate could and should do differently. none of it would guarantee an end to partisan rancor. there is nothing wrong with partisan debates. it's good for the country. none of it would cause us to change our principles or our views about what's right and what's wrong with our country. partisanship itself is not the problem. the real problem have been a growing lack of confidence in the senate's ability to mediate the tensions and disputes we have always had around here. there are many reasons some have lost that confidence, and ultimately both parties have to

assume some of the blame. but we can't be content to leave it at that. for the good of the country, we need to work together to restore this institution. america's strength and resilience has always depended on our ability to adapt to the various challenges of our day. sometimes that's meant changing the rules when both parties think it's warranted. and when the majority leader decided a few weeks back to defy bipartisan position -- there was bipartisan opposition to what happened in november by changing the rules that govern this place with a simple majority, he broke something. he broke something. but our response can't be to sit back and accept the demise of the senate. this body has survived mistakes and excesses before, and even after some of its worst period,

it's found a way to spring back and to be the place where even the starkest differences and the fiercest ideological disputes are hashed out by consensus and mutual respect. indeed, it's during periods of its greatest polarization that the value of the senate is most clearly seen. so let me wrap it up this way. you know, we're all familiar with the lyndon johnson reign around here. robert carroll has given us that support in great detail. and some look at l.b.j.'s well-known heavy-handedness as a kind of mastery. that's the way some look at it. personally, i have always believed the leader that replaced him was a better fit for this place, and evidently so did johnson's colleagues who elected mansfield upon johnson's departure with overwhelming

enthusiasm. they had had it up to here with l.b.j. they were excited that he was gone. in fact, carroll reports that he tried to come to the first lunch after he became vice president and was going to act as the sort of de facto majority leader even though he was now vice president. that was, shall i say, unenthusiasticcally received. he was almost thrown out of the lunch, never to return. and mansfield was, as i said, enthusiastically closen to replace him. now, the chronicles of l.b.j.'s life and legacy usually leave out what i just told you, but by the time he left the senate, as i indicated, his colleagues had had enough of him, right up to here.

they may have bennet -- bent to his will while he was here, but when they got a chance to be away from his iron-fisted rule, they took it. mike mansfield would restore the senate to a place of greater cooperation and freedom, and as we look at what the senate could be, not what it is now but could be, mansfield's period gives us a clue. there are many well-known stories about mansfield's fairness and equanimity as leader, but they all seem to come down to one thing and that was his unbending belief that every, every single senator was equal. that was mansfield's operating mode, every single senator was equal. he acted that way on a daily

basis, conducted himself in that way on a daily basis. the unbending belief that every senator should be treated as equal. so look, both sides will have to work to get us back to where we should be. it's not going to happen overnight. we haven't had much practice lately. in fact, we're completely out of practice at doing what i just suggested are the first steps to get us back to normal. but it's a goal that i truly believe we can all agree on and agree to strive toward together, and it takes no rules change. this is a behavioral problem. it doesn't require a rules change. we just need to act differently with each other, respect the committee process, have an open amendment process, work a little

harder. none of that requires a rules change. because restoring this institution is the only way we'll ever solve the challenges we face. that's the lesson of history and the lesson of experience. and we would all be wise to heed it. mr. president, i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from tennessee. mr. alexander: i want to congratulate the republican leader for his remarks and i think without being presum shus i can express the hope that all of us feel that he will help us restore the senate to the role that it -- the american people need for it to play in this country. there's a new history of the senate, "the american senate" written by the late neil

mcneil who wrote the best book about the house of representatives and the former historian of the senate and i suspect this book is likely to become the best chronicle of this body. and it speaks of the united states senate as the one touch of authentic genius in the american political system. and it needs to be restored to that, to that position. the republican leader is absolutely right, this doesn't require a change of rules. this requires a change of behavior. some behavior on our part, on this side of the aisle, but a great deal of behavior on the part of whomever the majority leader of the united states senate is because that is the person who sets the agenda. and the debate for this year really is will this year be the end of the united states senate, which is what the

distinguished majority leader said it would be if we ever changed the rules in a way that allowed the majority to cut off debate, or will it be the year in which the united states senate is restored, restored to that role of authentic genius in the american political system? i'm hopeful it can be that way. it would be fine if it started tomorrow because it could start as quickly as tomorrow because it causes no change of rules, only a change in behavior. only a change in behavior. and that could happen as soon as tomorrow. but we know it can happen after november if we have six more republican senators on this side, and we've heard your commitment on the floor today. about how the committees can operate, about how amendments should operate, we've heard that before and in our own meetings in private lunches and i'm glad you took the occasion in this really eloquent way to say to the american people and to all of us what we expect out of service in the united states

senate. i had the privilege, as the senator from kentucky did, of seeing senator mansfield as the leader of this body. i haven't served in the senate as long as others who are here, but i came here, it seems hard to believe, 47 years ago as a young aide to a senator who eventually became the majority leader of the senate, howard baker. those were the days of mansfield and dirksen. those were the days when barry goldwater and john tower and hubert humphrey would engage in hours of debates here and hug each other at the end of their -- end of their discussion. those were the days when the majority leader would offer an amendment of a republican senator whose amendment had been denied unfairly, he thought. those were the days of committees who did their work and republicans and democrats who came to the floor and together offered bills. i saw the senate in the 1970's when i came back and senator baker was the republican leader and i saw it in the 1980's and

1990's. i saw what the republican leader said, let's take the panama canal debate. senator baker, senator byrd. they would run this senate in the way the republican leader suggested, in the way most majority leaders have suggested. they would come to the floor, they would put a bill on the floor that a republican and a democratic senator agreed on, let's say senator mccain, senator levin, senator inhofe, senator levin, they would ask for amendments. they might get 300 amendments. they would then ask for unanimous consent to cut off all the amendments and, of course, they would get it because everyone had a chance to have his or her amendment, and then within that unanimous consent agreement would be a procedure for how to vote on them and they say we're here on monday, and we're going to finish this week. just as the republican leader has said. and it didn't work perfectly. there was a senator from

alabama, and then a senator from ohio and they did all they could to put glue in the works but the majority leader had all the tools he needed to run the senate in that way. everybody got a say. everybody got a say. and senator byrd in his last remarks before the rules committee and i was there to hear it, said we should never tear down this necessary fence, he meant the filibuster that protects us from the excess of the executive and runaway popular passions but he said one other thing. senator byrd said in 2010 that any majority leader had the tools he needed already in the rules to operate this senate in the way it should be run. so we need to change the behavior, not changes of -- of the rules. and one more example that goes to the point that the senator from kentucky made. how important are the -- is it to be able to offer an amendment? well, the people of

tennessee -- serving in the senate today is like being invited to join the grand ole opry and not being allowed to sing. people of sen tennessee expect me to have an opinion on their behalf about obamacare, about iran, about all of the -- how to help unemployed americans get a job, about the minimum wage or the lack of it. they expect me to have a say about that not because they want to hear me but because i'm their voice. senator byrd wrote eloquently about that in his book. he talked about the panama canal debate. there was a tough debate. i mean they didn't just bring the panama canal treaty and flop it on the -- plop it on the floor and say we're going to oat-vote next monday. think it would have gotten 67 votes? how did it get 67 votes? the democratic leader, senator byrd and the republican leader, senator baker, red david

mccullogh's book and changed their minds and supported the treaty and allowed every single amendment and reservation anybody wanted to offer. senator byrd wrote many of those were killer amendments, killer amendments. in other words, they were designed to kill the treaty. but he said we allowed every one of them, 200 of them. he said we beat them all. we tabled them or defeated them all but if we had not allowed that to happen, and the senators hadn't had a chance to have their say we'd have never ratified the treaty. so, mr. president, i know there may be others who want to speak but we've gone down a trail in the last several years just a few years, that i never thought imaginable. we have 43 new members of the senate, 43 members of the senate who are in their first term. plus one, the senator from indiana, who is in his first term but served before so he has a broader view of this.

those senators have never seen this body operate properly. most of them are on the other side. so it's not anybody's fault that this is happening, but this is not the way the united states senate earned the reputation as the most unique deliberated in world -- deliberative body in the world. no one would recognize it as that today, as the authentic touch of creative genius in the american system of government. so my hope would be that the democratic leader would recognize this and have a change of behavior tomorrow or maybe later this afternoon. but if he does not, i hope the american people take this seriously and take it into account when they cast their votes in november, and put six more republicans on this side of the aisle so the republican leader can restore this body to the luster that it deserves and the american people deserve as the authentic touch of genius in

the american political system. thank you, mr. president. mr. wicker: mr. president, i note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from south dakota. mr. thune: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent the quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. thune: mr. president, we just heard a very eloquent speech given by the republican

leader here in the senate about the history of the senate, the role that it's played in our democracy, its past and what could be its future if we can restore it to where it once was. the leader talked a lot about things that used to be taken for granted around here, the committee process working and functioning where committees reported legislation out and worked on it, brought it to the floor. an amendment process where when legislation got to the floor it could actually be debated, amendments offered, amendments voted on, individual senators having the opportunity to offer amendments. and to be the voices that our people elect us to be here in the united states senate. and unfortunately, in many respects the current senate, the wheels have come off. we find ourselves with the process typically the amendment tree is filled which blocks amendments from being offered.

and perhaps the best fact toyed with regard to -- factoid with regard to that is there have only been four republican amendments voted on since july. a half a year. a half a year in the united states senate, four republican amendments voted on in the united states senate. in any institution where you have any form of open debate and open amendment process, you're going to have a lot more votes than that. and i think that's very telling about where we are. i was here as a young staffer back in 1985 and 1986. at that time senator bob dole was the majority leader in the united states senate, and it was a very different place. the boss i worked for, i worked on some issues for him, and he had his opportunities, as did other senators at that time, to come down here in the senate, offer amendments to be able to speak out on behalf of his constituents on issues that were important to them, important to him. and that's something that has become a bygone era. i also had the opportunity prior

to being elected to the senate to serve in the other body, the house of representatives, where things are very structured. all of rules committee that basically regulates what legislation comes to the floor, what amendments will be made in order, how much time is allowed for debate on each amendment. that is the way that institution is structured. the senate is, as senator mcconnell, the republican leader, pointed out earlier is a very different institution by design. our founders want it to be be different. senator alexander in his remarks talked about an author who described it as a touch of authentic genius, the united states senate. we've gotten very far away from that in terms of its historic role and what should be its role today as we debate major policy, major legislation that impacts over 300,000 americans. mr. president, today i come to the floor to discuss an issue that was debated here a few years ago which was an example,

a by-product if you will, of one party rule. a big piece of legislation is jammed through in a partisan way, and that's obamacare. my colleagues on the democrat side recently spent a lot of time talking about income inequality. after five years of stagnation in the obamacare economy in an ever growing gap between rich and poor i think it's high time for us to be talking about that. but part of that discussion, a critical part democrats don't want to have has to be the ways in which obamacare is contributing to the problem. as the last few months have made clear, obamacare is making things worse for millions of americans. huge premium increases and soaring out-of-pocket costs means families will have to take money they would have taoufd pay for a home or college instead. crippling mandates on employers means fewer jobs available or

reduced hours for workers. as if the economic problems caused by the law weren't enough, recent weeks have made clear that the quality, quality of care is likely to diminish thanks to the president's health care law. contrary to the president's promise that you can keep the doctor you had and like millions of americans are discovering that they will be losing their doctors this year and that their choice of replacement is limited. why? because obamacare provides an incentive for insurers to limit the pool of doctors and i might add hospitals as well, that you can visit. the president's health care law placed a number of new burdens on insurers from new taxs to a new requirement that everyone with preexisting conditions be covered at the same rate as healthy individuals. on top of that the law gives states the authority to tell insurance companies how much they're allowed to charge for their health plans. as a result insurance companies are facing new ways to pay for

increases. that is limiting their network of doctors and hospitals. in california, for example, as a "time" magazine article recently reported, blew -- blue shield offered doctors a choice, be reimbursed or be eliminated. the "time" article goes on to report that among the providers who declined to accept the lower rates for some of the state's most prestigious and expensive hospitals including cedar sinai medical center in los angeles and hospitals affiliated with the university of california, end quote. there's a reason these hospitals are prestigious and expensive. they are on the cutting edge of medical research in offering break through treatments that are unavailable at many other hospitals. people come to these hospitals when other treatments have failed and they often find hope. these kinds of hospitals, world-class, cutting-edge

facilities, are the hospitals most likely to be excluded from exchange plans. "time" reports a december 13 mackenzie study found two-thirds of a.c.a. plans analyzed had narrow or ultra narrow networks with at least 30%, 30% of top hospitals excluded for coverage. end quote. the consequences of these narrow or ultra narrow networks are many. first, of course, these networks may not include your doctor. if you've been forced off your health plan into a new private plan or exchange plan, your new plan may not cover the doctor you've been seeing for years, the doctor you like and who knows your medical history. this is detrimental to any patient. for someone being treated for a serious illness this could be devastated. switching doctors midstream while being treated for cancer

or other serious illness could have a detrimental impact on the patient. in addition to the doctors you have and like, narrow networks mean a choice of replacement will be limited, time severely limited and the same quality of care may not be available in the new network. still another consequence, as "time" points out, is the distance you may have to travel to get to your doctor or hospital. excluding hospitals from an insurance network may not prevent a huge travel problem for urban residents, the article notes, but residents in rural areas may be forced to drive a long way to reach a hospital in their network. "time" quotes kaiser family foundation senior fellow car reupb pollitz notes customers in main may have -- in maine may have to drive two and a half hours, not exactly ideal if you're having a baby or serious

health crisis. let's suppose that you do somehow find an affordable plan on the exchanges that does cover your doctor. you still, still may not be able to get care. a recent fox news article focused on experts warnings that the health change system may start to look a lot like medicaid, the federal health insurance program for the poor. like the exchanges it, features narrow networks as many doctors refuse patients altogether or limit the number that they see because of medicaid's low reimbursements. what is the result? medicaid patients generally face worse outcomes than patients with private insurance. they wait longer for doctors when they can get in to see them at all. a survey published in the "new england journal of medicine" found 66% of children on medicaid were denied appointments with specialists compared to just 11% of children covered by private insurance.

patients or medicaid are more likely to suffer complications and spend longer in the hospital and they are more likely to die from cancer, surgical complications and other problems. unfortunately this could scene be the future of those forced into narrow networks on the exchanges. patients will be denied access to top doctors and hospitals will be forced to compete with other patients for access to a limited number of health care providers. even those americans whose plans cover their preferred doctors will not necessarily be able to get in to see their doctor if he is forced to start limiting the number of exchange patients that he taifntle analyspatienttakes. analysts emphasize that having health insurance won't necessarily translate into access to health care. end quote. let me repeat that, mr. president. analysts emphasize that having health insurance won't necessarily translate into access to health care. this is what the grand promise of obamacare has come to.

even those who have managed to make their way through the broken exchange web sites and find an affordable plan still may not be able to get health care. is this the rosy future that we were promised? obamacare was supposed to fix our health care system. the president promised that it would reduce cost and expand access to care. every american was supposed to benefit. instead, millions of americans have lost their plans, health insurance costs have soared. there are parents who now can't afford to ensure their children and cancer patients who are losing their doctors and hospitals. those few who have gained cofnlg are face -- gained cofnlg are facing a system well on its way to becom becoming a copy of med. surely we can do better than this. we have got to do better than this. it is time to abandon the failed

obamacare experiment and move on to real health care reform. mr. president, we can do that, we should do that. i yield the floor. smore senato ms. warren: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from massachusetts. ms. warren: i rise in a support of the truth in settlements act. this legislation which i introduced earlier today with my colleague from oklahoma, dr. coburn, will help the public hold federal agencies accountable for the settlements they make with corporate wrongdoers. i am honored to partner with dr. coburn on this bill. he has been a leader in the fight for greater government transparency. dr. coburn and i do not agree on every issue, but we strongly agree that citizens united is a crit -- that sunlight is a critical component of good

government. i am proud tophyt to fight alone dr. coburn to advance this legislation. when companies break the law, federal enforcement agencies are responsible for holding theme accountable. in nearly every instance, agencies choose to resolve cases through settlements rather than going to a public trial. the government agencies defend this practice by arguing that their eagerness to settle is in the best interests of the american people. but their actions paint a very different picture. if agencies were truly confident that these settlements were good deals for the public, they would be enthusiastic about publicly disclosing all of the key details of those agreements, hang it right out there so fen can see what a great -- so fen can see qua a great job they did on behalf of the american people. so that what they do? no. instead, time after time, agencies do the opposite, hiding

critical details about their settlements in the fine print or rworse hiding those details entirely out of public view. even the basic fact facts aboute agreements are not easily accessible online. many agencies regularly deem agreements confidential without any public explanation. when agencies do make public statements about these agreements, they often trumpet large dollar amounts of money for the taxpayers. what they don't trum met is that the companies often pay dramatically less than this sticker price through credits or engaging in routine activities or through potentially huge tax deductions. add up all of these tricks and you end up with a predictable result. too often the american people only see what the agencies want

them to see about these agreements. these hidden details can make all the difference. when you dig below the surface, settlements that seem tough and fair can end up looking like sweetheart deals. for example, last year federal regulators entered into a settlement with foreclosure. the sticker price was $8.5 billion. that's a really nice headline. but $5.2 billion of the settlement was in the form of credits, not in cash outlays. these credits were described in the government's press release as covering what they called -- quote -- "loan modifications and forgiveness of deficiency judgments." so what does that mean? well, it turns out that the servicers could rack up those

credits by forgiving mere fractions of large unpaid loans. so, for example, if a servicer wrote down $15,000 of a $500,000 unpaid loan balance, that servicer doesn't just get a $15,000 credit for the amount they wrote down, they get a credit for the only $500,000, the full value of the loan. that method of calculating credits buried in the fine print could end up cutting by more than half the overall value of the $8.5 billion settlement. another way to hide the ball is to omit the upfront determination and disclosure whether the settlement will be tax deductible. several years ago the justice department announced a $385 million settlement with veri f

cinios medical care. when the agreement was originally announced, the justice department touted the sticker price as the agency's largest civil recovery to date in a health care fraud case. but the d.o.j. didn't say a word about the tax treatment. the agency's failure to even consider that issue was a very costly mistake. by the time the company finished claiming awful its tax deductions from the settlement, it ended up paying $100 million less than originally advertised. in other words, the taxpayers picked up more than a quarter of the tab. it takes a lot of digging around to uncover these unflattering details, but at least it was possible to do so in these cases because of public information about these two agreements.

for settlements that are kept confidential, the public is completely in the dark. so just last year, wells fargo agreed to pay the federal housing finance agency $335 million for allegedly fraudulent sales of mortgage-backed securities to fannie mae and freddie mac. that's about 6% of what j.p. morgan paid in a public settlement with fhfa to address very similar claims. so in what ways do the actions of wells fargo differ from those of j.p. morgan? well, we'll never know because the j.p. morgan settlement is public, but the much smaller wells fargo settlement is confidential. the american people deserve better. government enforcement agencies work for us, not for the companies they regulate.

agencies should not be able to cut bad deals and then hide behind embarrassing -- and hide their embarrassing detaism emba. the public deserve nose what's going on. the truth in settlements act requires transparency. it requires agencies making public statements about their settlements to include explanations of how companies get credits and whether the wrongdoers will be eligible for tax breaks for their settlement payments. the bill also requires agencies to post text and basic information about their settlements online. and while the legislation permits confidential settlements, it requires agencies to disclose how frequently they're invoking confidentiality and to explain their reasons for doing so. if we expect government agencies to hold companies accountable for breaking the law, then we, the public, must be able to hold agencies accountable for

enforcing the law. we can't do that if we're kept in the dark. the truth in settlements act shines light on these agencies' decisions and it gives the american people a chance to hold agencies accountable for fairly and effectively enforcing our laws. i urge my colleagues to join us in supporting this bill. thank you, mr. president. i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: is the senate in a quorum call. the presiding officer: it is. mr. reid: i ask that it be terminated. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. reid: mr. president, the republican leader and i don't agree on everything, but we do agree on some things, and there is one thing no one can dispute that we agree on, and that's our love of baifnl baseball. we both love baseball season. p it gives us an opportunity when we go home after working here to turn on tv and watch a few innings of a baseball game. for some people, baseball is a really slow, boring opportunity to watch people moving slowly. but senator mcconnell and i love it and we talk about baseball. we love the nationals, and we -- and he an i have a great affectr

the nationals because of bryce harper, a las vegas aght leevment the reasoning i mention that, mr. president, is today nevada's greatest baseball hero -- in fact one of the greatest baseball heroes of all time -- was inducted into the baseball hall of faivmen fame. greg maddocks is an extremely nice man, a man of humility. i have gone out to dinner with him and his lovely wife a few tiesmtimes. i know his brother well. and he would be the foyers tell you, what he was -- and he would be the first to tell you when he was playing baseball and even today how average he was. i'm not a great athlete. but, mr. president, one of the best of all-tiesm he started his career with the chicago cubs and went on to win 355 professional major league baseball games.

and four consecutive cy young adownwarayardawards.today he red highest tally in the history of hall of fame voting. so i crater this goo congratula. a man of humility, a man who has probably the greatest control in the history of baseball of being able to throw a ball to a spot that he wanted. not a big man. that's an understatement. not a big manage. but he was precise in where he could throw that baseball. and i have such fond memories of greg moddocks, the last election was hard one. i scold greg, called him on his cell phone p.

i said, i want you to be a republican for me. he said, i will dethat. he i said, what are you doing? he said i'm playing golf. can you break 80. if you leave me alone, i'll break e7 0. i'm sure this is one thing that senator mcconnell and i agree on. mr. president, this afternoon the republican leader came to the floor to explain about the minority's ability to offer amendments. on this occasion, offer amendments on the three-month extension, the legislation now before this body. but, you know, it's interesting. during the republican leader's remarks, there wasn't a word uttered about jobs, about unemployment compensation or the economy. not a word.

so it's very clear what went on here today with my republican colleagues. remember, the republican leader came here and the republican senators came and sat here with him. it's impossible for my republican colleagues to explain to the american people their callous opposition to the plight of 1.3 million americans, about 20,000 of them live in nevada. two very fine senators on a bipartisan basis have this legislation before this body, jack reed of rhode island, who is tied as we speak -- rhode island's tied with never for the highest unemployment in the country. the other senator is my friend, republican senator from nevada, the junior senator from nevada, dean heller. an important move they made on

behalf of their states and the american people. republicans, though, mr. president, don't want to talk about the problems facing the middle class, as evidenced by what went on here this afternoon. they don't want to talk, these republicans, about the solutions to falling wages and job shortages. mr. president, in america today, the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer and the middle class is being squeezed. during the last 30 years, the top 1%, wealth and income has increased by triple numbers. triple. what has happened to the middle class during that same 30 years? their wages have gone down 10%. tripling to going down 10%. so they don't want to talk about this. they don't -- and that's why

they plan to vote against the extension of these emergency unemployment insurance benefits. the vast majority of them voted to not even let us get on the bill and have a debate, but a few stepped forward and said no, we should have a debate on this and a debate we are having. my republican colleagues are looking for a distraction, a diversion, a phony process meant to steal attention away from their unconscionable stand on the issues that matter most to the middle class. madam president, this issue of unemployment insurance isn't some -- wasn't developed by some political science professor from harvard or yale or stanford. it's something to help people who are in desperate shape. so, mr. president, i repeat, they're looking for a distraction, a process argument to steal attention away from their unconscionable stand on

the issues that matter most to the middle class. you have to give them credit, they're doing their best to divert attention away from this issue. this is opposition and it's cold-hearted, to extending unemployment benefits. it's a very tough position to defend, especially when republicans around america support what heller and reed from rhode island are trying to do. democrats support it, independents, but republicans in congress don't and they've said so. republicans complained that the majority never allows the minority to offer amendments is, mr. president, false. it's not true. it's another diversion. during my tenure as majority leader, it's -- there have been volumes of stuff written about the obstruction we've had with my republican colleagues during the last five years with the

obama administration. think of the obstruction that took place when barack obama decided to run for reelection. well, that was a little interesting because the republican leader said his number-one goal as a united states senator and leader of the republicans is to make sure he wasn't reelected. well, he fell real short on that because he was elected overwhelming. so during that period of time, obstruction, obstruction, obstruction, obstruction. and after he was reelected, it continued. during my tenure as majority leader, the senate has voted on minority amendments at a higher rate than it did during either of my republican predecessors. the largest number of minority amendments probably in the history of the senate. but let's just talk about republican leader frist, republican leader trent lott, both friends of mine.

i still am in touch with them all the time. they're people i will always admire and have great respect for. since i've been leader, 7-10 amendments on which the senate has voted have been, mr. president, republican amendments. under senator frist's leadersh leadership, certainly there weren't that many, i'll tell you that, that were offered by the minority. under senator lott's leadership only 54% of the amendments considered by the senate were offered by the minority. and during my leadership of the 111th congress, minority amendments represented a greater share of all amendment votes than during any single congress during either leader frist or leader lott's tenure. facts. in fact, often the minority is prevented from offering amendments. why? their own senators won't allow amendments. how many times has the presiding officer and others come to this floor and wanted to offer an

amendment? objection on the other side. because they want to offer an amendment that has nothing to do with anything that we're debating on the floor at a given time. last year, just a handful of republican senators held up any legislation. the best example was the legislation that we tried to do dealing with energy efficiency. energy efficiency. couldn't get it done because of republican obstruction. often a particular republican will prevent any senator from offering an amendment unless he gets a vote on what he wants voted on first, a little unusual, so let's not revise history. let's talk about history as i know it and as the books report how we should know it, what the -- what the facts are in the "congressional record."

we know how under my friend, the republican leader's, leadership there have been obstruction in the way of filibusters. you know, mr. president, filibusters isn't some right that was placed in the constitution. it's a privilege. it was granted under the senate rules, and that has been abused big time. their obstruction has continued to be unprecedented over the last five years. half of all filibusters waged in the history of the country -- that's 230-plus years -- half of them have been waged against president obama's nominations. half of them. in five years compared to 230 years. last year republicans mounted the first-ever filibuster of a secretary of defense. now, by the way, a former

republican senator. they even filibustered him. so i understand republicans don't want to talk about how we can create jobs, how we can boost the economy or any of the other issues that matter most to the middle class. and i understand the republicans are struggling to explain turning their backs on 1.3 million unemployed america americans. but i do wish they would stop trying to justify their opposition to helping americans in need with false claims and distortions of the truth. finally, as i leave the floor, mr. president, i prefer not to pay for these emergency -- this emergency situation where we have long-term unemployed. this is an emergency and it should be considered accordingly and should not be paid for in the normal course around here. now, we believe in reducing the debt. in the senate chambers with me now is someone that i had the pleasure of appointing to the

bowles-simpson commission, the senior senator from the state of illinois, assistant majority leader. he worked hard on that. but, mr. president, we haven't followed bowles-simpson as a bible but it's certainly been a guide that we have followed. and while we could have done better, we've done pretty good. we're approaching having reduced the debt by some $3 trillion right now as we speak. we could reduce it another trillion dollars if we could get comprehensive immigration reform done. now, the goal of bowles-simpson was $4 trillion. so when i say this is something that hasn't been paid for ordinarily in the past, that's true. but that doesn't take away from the fact that we all are -- we're going to continue to work on this side of the aisle on reducing the debt. but i do hear that some of my republican colleagues want to pay for this. i disagree with them but that's

what they want to do. so for -- so far, all we've heard from republicans pay-fors is this -- take a big whack out of obamacare. there are 9 million people, approaching 10 million now, who will benefit from obamacare. they want to damage every one of those 9 million-plus people. or they've got another one, go after children, children, with the child tax credit. ha-ha. those are their two pay-fors at this point. a little scary, i would think. so i'm waiting, we're waiting for republican suggestions how to pay for the full year extension of unemployment insurance. let's hear from them. how do they want to pay for it? they say they want to pay for it. let's hear what they want to do. the presiding officer: the senator from illinois. mr. durbin: mr. president, i want to thank the majority leader for his comments and i'll be very brief because i know the senator from iowa has a

statement that he wants to make. let me just say that the statement made on the floor earlier this afternoon by the republican leader never once addressed the issue pending before the senate. pending before the senate is an emergency unemployment insurance bill that will provide benefits to 1.3 million americans who are out of work and for eight days now have been receiving no assistance whatsoever. imagine the struggles they are facing. that's why we called this bill first when we returned from our hole holiday recess. we consider it a priority. we were heartened yesterday when six republicans joined us to move this bill forward. it really gave us hope that we were going to do something to get this done in a timely way to help a lot of deserving people all across the united states. and we hope today when the republican leader from kentucky -- hoped today when the republican leader from kentucky came to the floor that he would address the urge and necessity of this bill. he did not. as senator reid has said, he

wanted to talk about the senate rules. the senate rules are important, make no mistake, but they're certainly not as important as providing essential benefits, essential relief and help to 1.3 million unemployed america americans, people who are trying to pay their utility bills, avoid eviction, put gas in the car and go out and find a job. that is a higher priority, and i had hoped that the republican leader would address it. instead he wants to talk about the rules. what the senator from nevada, our majority leader, has said is a matter of record. it is still amazing to consider this. nearly half of all the filibusters waged on nominations in the history of the united states of america have been waged under the leadership of republican senator mcconnell during the obama presidency. more than half. in the history of the united states, 168 nominees have been filibustered.

82 occurred under the leadership of the republican senator from kentucky under the obama administration. in the history of the united states, 23 district court nominees have been filibustered. in our entire history. 20 have been filibustered under the leadership of the republican senator from kentucky during the obama administration. 20 out of 23, more than half of all the nominations that have been filibustered under this senate republican leadership. is there any wonder why the rules needed to be changed? and we look at the wait time of those who finally get out of committee and sit on the calendar waiting indefinitely. it breaks my heart to think of the fine women and men who were willing to offer their lives in public service, go through extensive background checks, make the necessary personal sacrifices and languish on our calendar for no earthly reason. in the end, many of them have been approved with overwhelming

votes and yet they've been subjected to these incessant republican filibusters. the case involving our colleag colleague, congressman mel watt of north carolina, is one of the most egregious. it's the first time i believe since 1843 that a sitting member of congress has faced a filibuster in the united states senate when appointed to a presidential nomination. finally we broke that after the rules change and i was heartened to see that congressman watt was sworn in yesterday to this position dealing with america's housing challenges. but that was an example of an outrageous filibuster against a colleague, a fellow member of congress, a member of the united states house of representatives. the coup de grace, of course, was the d.c. circuit court of appeals when we offered three well-qualified nominees to fill obvious vacancies on that court, and they were stopped by republican filibusters one after the other without any complaint

about their qualifications. well qualified for this position to serve on the d.c. circuit court. it wasn't until senator reid led us in changing the senate rules that we finally found this necessary relief. mr. president, it's time for us to return to the issue at hand. pending before the senate is emergency unemployment benefits for 1.3 million americans. as important as a rules debate may be to some in this chamber, there is nothing more important than to deal with in a timely way. i hope the republicans will take the advice of the leader that he gave at the end of his remarks, produce for us your pay-for if that's the course you want to follow for us to pay for these unemployment benefits for the coming year. we're waiting for your response, and in the meantime, i hope that some will come forward and join us in what has traditionally been a bipartisan effort to help those in america seeking work. mr. president, i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from iowa. mr. harkin: first,

madam president, i want to thank our leader and our assistant leader for their great leadership and for their eloquence here on the floor today and for correctly stating what the issue is. it's not rules. it's justice. i am going to speak about that myself. mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that gregory shanihan and leni telahune and myself be granted floor privileges for the duration of today's proceedings. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. harkin: mr. president, 50 years ago today, president lyndon johnson came before congress and spoke these bold words -- this administration today here and now declares unconditional war on poverty in america. lyndon johnson, as we all know, was born and raised amidst stark poverty in texas hill country, coming of age during the great depression. from hard personal experience,

he understood how poor schools, empty stomachs and bad health make a mockery of america's promise of equal opportunity for all. when president johnson delivered that historic state of the union address, our nation was enjoying unprecedented post-war prosperity. we had become, in john kenneth dalbraith's famous words, the affluent society. however, in the midst of this nation of prosperity and plenty, there was also quote, the other america, as author michael harrington called it. fully 1/5 of our population trapped in poverty. across appalachia, in urban ghettos, in large swaths of rural america, millions of american children were being raised in shacks and slums, going to bed hungry, attending grossly substandard schools.

worse, experts described this poverty as intractable. experts warned that despite the nation's overall prosperity, poverty was growing more widespread because, as one study put it, the poor were -- quote -- "not part of the economic structure." a then-report by the president's council of economic advisors asserted that -- quote -- "future economic growth alone will provide relatively few escapes from poverty. end quote. economic growth alone, they said, will not solve the issue of poverty. of course i must add it's very much the same today. aeconomic growth alone will

provide few escapes from poverty today if 91% of income gains will top 1%, and if the rewards of productivity gains go to shareholders and not to the workers. so it was in this context that president johnson -- keep in mind, less than two months after he assumed the office after the terrible assassination of president kennedy. it was in this context that he summoned the nation so that the unconditional war on poverty could be waged. for l.b.j., this was both an economic challenge and a profound moral challenge. it was about doing justice. in his speech to congress, he said very often a lack of jobs and money is not the cause of poverty, but the symptom. the cause may lie deeper in our failure to give our fellow

citizens a fair chance to develop their own scwafts and a lack of education and training, and a lack of medical care and housing, and a lack of decent communities in which to live and bring up their children. president johnson continued -- our chief weapons will be better schools and better health and better homes and better training and better job opportunities, to help more americans, especially young americans to escape from squalor and misery and unemployment woes, where other citizens help to carry them. mr. president, in the months that followed the state of the union address, president johnson proposed specific programs to attack poverty and inequality, and he articulated his broader vision for what he called the great society.

there is no better place to appreciate the boldness and the accomplishments of this era than at the lyndon baines johnson library and museum in austin, texas. my favorite part is a room. i have been there several times, commemorating the great society with blacks and pins, signing pins all along the wall listening -- listing, listing the incredible array of legislation that president johnson had passed into law. listen, listen to these. the great civil rights act, the voting rights act, job corps, vista, upward bound, the food stamp program, legal services for the poor, the community action program, community health centers, head start, the elementary and secondary education act, the higher education act, medicare,

medicaid, the national endowment for the arts and humanities, public broadcasting, the national mass transportation act, the cigarette labeling act, the clean air act, the wilderness act. mr. president, it takes your breath away. to think about all that was done. these great society programs have defined the modern united states of america as a compassionate, inclusive society, a genuine opportunity society where everyone can contribute their talents and abilities. last month, on december 4, in his landmark speech on inequality, president obama noted that these and other initiatives have helped to reduce the poverty rate by 40% since the 1960's. have helped reduce the poverty rate by 40% since the 1960's.

president obama said -- quote - "these endeavors didn't just make us a better country, they reaffirmed that we are a great country." however, mr. president, on this 50th anniversary of president johnson's great address to congress, i must acknowledge that there are some who profoundly disagree with this assessment on the war on poverty and the great society. they insist it was a great failure. indeed, i have -- i have heard this claim from many of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle since i first came to congress in 1975. this supposed -- quote -- failure of the war on poverty, this failure of the great society has indeed become almost an article of faith and dogma among conservatives. it is truly the triumph of

belief over reality. as president reagan said on may 9, 1983 -- quote -- "the great expansion of government programs that took place under the aegis of the great society coincided with an end to economic progress for america's poor people." wow, that's quite an assertion by president reagan. so, mr. president, allow me on this 50th anniversary to take a few minutes to point out many of the -- quote -- failures of the war on poverty in the great society. perhaps a good place to start is by pointing out the -- quote -- failure of medicare. at the bill-signing ceremony for the social security amendments act on july 30 of 1965, president johnson enrolled former president harry truman as the first medicare beneficiary

and presented him with the first medicare card. you know, these days we talk about life after 65 as the golden years. well, i'll tell you, life after 65 used to be the nightmare years, with tens of millions of americans unable to afford even basic medical care. condemned to live out their senior year in the misery of untreated or poorly treated illnesses. in 1959, the poft rate among older americans was 35%. since the great society program started, the poverty rate among seniors has fallen by nearly two-thirds. what a failure. what a failure. and medicare is especially personal to me. i remember my father who was then in his late 70's, he never

had access to any regular health care in his life. my father only had a sixth grade education. worked in coal mines most of his life. suffered from what they then called coal miner's lung. they always called it coal miner 's lung. he would get sick all the time. if it weren't for the compassion and the generosity of the sisters of mercy, who would take care of him when he got sick and nurse him back to health, i don't know -- i don't know what would have happened to him. but i can remember coming home from the military on military leave in late 1965 and my father had his medicare card, and for the first time in his life, for the first time in his life -- and now he was approaching almost 80 years of age. for the first time in his life, he could go see a doctor.

he could go see a doctor, without begging, without taking charity. it gave him the dignity and the security of knowing that he could see a doctor if he needed to. the great society also gave birth to community health centers. as long as i'm talking about health care. community health centers to provide essential medical care to the poor. the first two community health centers were opened in 1964, one in boston, massachusetts, and one in rural mississippi. this model of providing basic health services to the uninsured and underserved was an enormous success. listen to this. from that modest beginning of two in 1964, community health centers have expanded to include more than 1,200 community health centers in more than 9,000 locations, serving more than

22 million patients annually. what a failure. what a failure. well, i guess another failure of the great society was the elementary and secondary education act. we call it esea. you know, since brown versus board of education decision by the supreme court in the mid 1950's, americans acknowledged that we had two school systems, one more the middle class and the welloff and a grossly inferior one for the poor. esea said that all children, regardless of their background and their circumstances at birth, can learn, and the federal government will provide resources to help create equity, equity among our schools. now, education -- educating children in poverty will always be challenging. we'll still have large achievement gaps that still

persist, but title 1 assistance to america's neediest schools has made a dramatic difference for the good of millions of low-income children. if it's been such a great failure, i would ask any senator, any senator who wants to repeal title 1 and defund it, please step forward, speak up here on the senate floor. say that you want to do away with title 1 and defund it. i'll bet i don't get any takers. and what about the failure of the higher education act, in 1965 it was rare for young people from disadvantaged and low-income backgrounds to go to college. so president johnson and congress passed the higher education act, creating need-based grants and loans with reduced interest rates. today pell grants c