i'll finish up by saying this: whru sewhen you see this poll t% of the country thinks the biggest problem in the country is us, the government, the corruption, the abuse of power, the poor leadership -- that's the specific things that were mentioned in this poll -- what we ought to do is look inside, say, why is that? and that is because we concentrate on the political and not on the people. we use them as pawns to advantage our own political careers, our own elections, and the good long--term, best interests of the country get sacrificed. what this poll shows is the american people are pretty darn smart. they're pretty darn smart, because they see the problem, they know what it is, and they

know what's going to happen. and so we're going to pass a bill that's going to spend trillions of dollars -- over $1 trillion, with all sorts of favors in there, not truly earmarks, but, biomarkers as clos--but, boy, as close to thes you can come. with new programs by the appropriators, instead of the authorizing committee. that's in this bill. and we're going to pass this bill, and this number is going to jump from 21% to% to 25%. the jig is up. you can no longer come down here and say, with honesty, here's what we're doing, because what we're doing is not honest. and when the american people say

-- and what the american people people say is, what they're saying with this is integrity matters. straightforwardness matters. truth-in-budgeting and spending matters. at least if we're going to do this let's own up to what we're doing. let's not be dishonest with the american public about the numbers. mr. president, i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from washington. mrs. murray: mr. president, thank you. i want to start by thanking my friend, the distinguished senator from maryland, as well as her counterpart in the house, chairman rogers. they have shown great leadership in working across the aisle to accomplish this mammoth task that we have give inthem on a very tight -- geffen the given a

very tight time line. i am hu here to talk about why t is important that we pass this omnibus appropriations bill and continue to build on the bipartisan steps that we have taken so far. last week i spoke at a press --t week i speak at a press conference on employment. listening to james, he was very hardworking and ambitious, but he explained to me that he was still living at home with his parents because, despite a lot of searching, he has not been able to find a job. well, what was clear to me from james' story and from a lot of others, frankly, across the country, that even though the economy has made progress, far too many americans still aren't feeling the benefits. too many of them are working more hours and earning less or wondering whether they can afford to send their kids to college or worrying that they won't be able to save enough to real estate tire. -- to retire. those are the kinds of problems

that we need to be thinking about here and solving. so i hope our work this session, this year, will be entirely focused 0e on doing everything e can to create more jobs and more opportunity for all americans, especially those who are struggling in what is still a very tough economy. there is a lot we need to get done. and if one lesson came out of the constant crises last year, it's that in a divided government, the only way to get things done is through compromise and bipartisanship. the budget deal that chairman ryan and i worked together on and reached is a good example. it wasn't the bill i would have written on my own. it wasn't the bill that chairman ryan would have written on his own, either. but after hearing from communities in my home state, i knew that we needed to restore

the critical investments that were being lost because of sequestration. and we needed to break out of the gridlock. i worked with chairman ryan to reach a compromise, and i'm pleased that our agreement rolled back some of those automatic across-the-board cuts to priorities that were important to all of us, like education, infrastructure, and research, and we don't that in a balanced way without relying on spending cuts alone. and importantly, in reaching to deal, we were able to lay some groundwork so chairman mikulski and chairman rogers could now move afford on the important work of funding the government. mr. president, families and communities across the country will be better off as a result of their leadership. their legislation invests in starting our children off strong by expanding access to early head start for infants and for families. it expands access to pell grants

to help more of our young adults ford higher education, and -- young adults afford higher education. in my home state of washington, i know awful these investments as well as others like funding for the columbia river crossing project and for repairs and improvements at joint base louis mcchord are going to are make a huge difference. so, mr. president, i want to make just a few minutes as chair of the subcommittee on transportation and housing to talk about some of the important parts of that bill. that -- that's within this omnibus. mr. president, that bill that's in this addresses critical challenges on everything from homelessness, affordable housing, traffic congestion, transportation safety. this bill represents a very firm commitment to providing housing and supporting services to families in need. it actually increases funding for the section 8 program which provides income for our -- or

provides housing for our low-income families in this country. if funding had remained at the sequester level, more than 100,000 families today would be at risk of losing that assistance and becoming homeless. under our bill, that will not happen. i'm also very proud that the bill includes $75 million for vouchers for the joint h.u.d.-veterans affairs supportive housing programs and, as a result of that funding, an additional 10,000 homeless veterans and their families will have access to housing and supporting services. mr. president, our housing and transportation bill prioritizes job creation and economic growth by investing in transportation. it includes $600 million in tiger funding, which supports projects that improve transportation safety and reduce traffic congestion, and that by the way, is in addition to the $41 billion in much-needed funding to repair our nation's

roads and bridges. but our bill isn't just about roads and bridges. americans are increasingly relying on public transit, so i'm especially pleased that our bill provides more than $10.7 billion to support our public transit system. also, mr. president, last year across-the-board spending cuts known as sequestration forced the federal aviation administration to enact a hiring freeze, which meant employees, like our air traffic controllers, left the agency and when they did no one was hired to replace them. so our bipartisan bill ensures the f.a.a. has the resources it needs to end that hiring freeze and hire and critically train new employees who can help our air travel be safe. this bill fully funds the essential air service and contract tower programs, which so many of our communities depend on. and we also included reforms to

improve the programs w. we fund important section 8 programs. in short, i'm very pleased with what my colleagues and i in the senate and house have been able to accomplish together on housing and transportation investments in this bill. and i want to take a moment and especially thank my colleague on the senate transportation and housing appropriations bill, senator collins, for all of her great work and support during this entire process. i'm very proud to be part of the tireless effort of chairwoman mikulski. she has worked very hard to make sure we have a full appropriatioappropriation act t. just like chairman ry ryan and i said when we finished our deal, i'm pretty sure that chairwoman mccull scad and chairmachairwoms would say this is not perfect.

but because they were willing to compromise, they're delivering far more for the american people than either could have done if they had refused to work together. mr. president, if this legislation is passed into law, which i strongly believe it will be, we will have a choice to make. we can build on the bipartisan work that's been done so far and continue reaching agreements through compromises, like people across this country do every day, or we could see more of the all-or-nothing approach which caused so much damage last year. i was in fact really disappointed that yesterday my colleagues rejected a good-faith offer to provide relief to workers and families who are still struggling in this country to get back on their feet, even after democrats time and time again offered promises to try to get a deal. we tried hard to reach a fair agreement that both sides could support, and we're going to keep trying. so i hope, mr. president, today

that our republican colleagues will thift manwill think of thes out there that need this lifeline and look at the great bipartisan work done on the appropriations bill, and i hope they will reconsider their return to all-or-nothing return to political tactics. but i know there are fundamental differences between the two parties. i know compromise is never easy. but we can't afford to let the challenges get in the way of delivering for the families and communities we serve. and, you know what? we don't have to. the legislation chairwoman mikulski and chairman rogers just completed is proof that there is a much better way to get things done. if both sides, both sides, are willing to continue to make some tough choices, there's much more we can do together to create jobs, strengthen the recovery, and build a foundation for stronger, broader growth in the future. so, mr. president, i want to thank chairwoman mikulski and chairman rogers again for their leadership. and i really hope that we can all build on their bipartisan step afford by choosing to work

together and find opportunities for compromise and continue to deliver for the american people. thank you, mr. president. i yield the floor. mr. roberts: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from kansas. mr. roberts: mr. president, thank you. today i would like to -- [inaudible] -- address the problems of the affordable care act, what is called obamacare, is having on kansans and for that matter patients and people all over the country. i think it bears repeating -- i know some of this has been repeated over and over again. but the problem is, the administration continues, it seems to me, to turn a blind eye, unfortunately, to some very egregious problems that plague the president's legacy program. perhaps the title of my remarks should be "programs mad "promisd

promises not kept." i have seen when i travel home to kansas and talk to people involved in the rural health care delivery system -- not only rural but in urban areas as well -- and now just folks that come to the town hall meetings. they were worried about obamacare to begin with. they were concerned. that concern turned to frustration. and then it turned basically to fear. and now it's switched back into anger. and it's , what on earth can we do to address some of these problems that are directly affecting people in such an egregious way? i think everybody understands now that the rollout of the health care exchanges was a debacle. i think that's the favorite word of the people that are writing

or providing news about this. but the point is that the administration has failed to hold anyone at the department of health and human services accountable for the complete failure of the exchange and the rollout, the waste of taxpayer dollars, the confusion, and the headaches that this has caused. and i know that the only thing that has been held accountable or terminated, if you will, fired, is the current contractor, and they have hired a new contractor. there is news, and we'd have to confirm this, but that the new contractor was recently fired by the national health service in great britain for being $2 billion over on the contract. that doesn't bode well if we are going to actually fix this web site. at the time of the rollout, the refrain was that obamacare is certainly more than a web site.

similar to nancy pelosi's words prior to passage, we were all told just to wait and see. and that is still what the refrain is with the presumption that continuation are just going to work -- that things are just going to work out. but unfortunately what i and many of my colleagues have said as coming true and what a lot of people in kansas told me is coming true and what they're going through and it is the polar opposite of what was promised by this president. again, promises made, promises not kept. estimates are that over five million people have received cancellations on their health care policies, and that's just in the 35 states for which we have estimates. so much for the promise if you like your plan, you can keep it, which has been highly publicized. the president proposed a so-called fix to this problem

which caused insurance companies to really scramble to delay things until after the midterm election. and the only person in america for whom this was convenient was the president. and it's still not working. what about the promise of less cost, a specific promise made by the president of those people forced into the exchanges. we continue to get reports, firsthand reports, i know to everybody here in the senate and the house as well, reports that have received a lot of coverage with regard to the news media that the premiums are going up, not down, as promised by the president. that with reports of obamacare more than doubling people's costs and increasing deductibles by sevenfold -- sevenfold. i'm not sure that's the average

but that's at least the high one with regards to some of the reports that are still coming in, obviously becoming more than people can afford. it is really no surprise that only 2.2 million have signed up and two to one on that goes to medicaid as opposed to the new program. so you can see where we're headed in regards to medicaid and some of the challenges we face there. and that's according to the department of health and human services recent estimates. that's far below, far below what was expected. of those enrollees, only a quarter of them are young and healthy individuals, and that's the problem. without younger and healthier people in the exchanges to offset costs we can only expect premiums to rise even higher. once people are enrolled, that is not the end of their problems, however. some folks in kansas are reporting that when they go to the doctor, they only discover they don't have the insurance they thought that they

purchased. some have had to cancel planned appointments with their doctors because their exchange coverage was not in order or could not be confirmed. and in some of the worst cases, patients in the emergency room were forced between getting care they desperately needed or leaving to avoid high costs when their coverage could not be verified. now that is exactly opposite of what the president promised. again, promises made and promises not kept. emergency rooms will face more problems in the future. recent studies have shown that instead of reducing emergency room utilization as the president promised, which has been identified as a crowning achievement, people with coverage are actually increasing increasing -- pardon me -- actually accessing the emergency room more than their uninsured

counterparts. some weeks ago i spoke about one of my favorite topics, and that as a member of the help committee, health, education, labor, pension and the finance committee, it dealt with rationing and the worry of rationing or at that time called pepaca now known as obamacare or the affordable care act depending on which side you're on. these rationing boards represent some of the more frightening aspects of the law. i have always referred to them as the four rations. i think a colleague of mine who is an expert on health care actually said that they are the four horsemen of the obamacare apocalypse. let me just go down these four rationers. it gets a little involved, but

patients and people worried about their health care coverage have every reason to worry about these folks. the first one is the c.m.s. innovation center. we all know what c.m.s. stands for. it's become a four-letter acronym with folks back home in the health care delivery system. but the c.m.s. innovation center, that allows c.m.s. to use taxpayer dollars to invest in ways to reduce patient access to care that they may want. what this really means for patients is that c.m.s. has a new and expanded power over and above what they're already doing to cut payments to medicare beneficiaries with a goal to reduce program expenditures, but the reality is, the reality being that they will reduce patient access to health care, to their doctor. second rationing -- second rationer, the new authorities

granted to the u.s. preventive services task force -- that is a mouth full. uspstf. i don't know how on earth you would pronounce that acronym but it is the u.s. preventive services task force. these folks are to determine what should and should not be covered by health insurance. some unelected group of bureaucrats deciding what should and should not be covered by health insurance. now what this means for patients is that if the uspstf, the mouth full acronym, doesn't recommend it, it won't be covered by your health care plan and you will bear the cost of the procedure. here's the third rationer. the patient-centered outcomes research institute. that's the pcori, if you're discussing health care policy

with c.m.s. or the department of health and human services, which does comparative effective research. remember that, comparative effective research, c.e.r.. to me, that is a slippery slope that i tried to amend back during consideration within the help committee and the finance committee, unsuccessfully on a party-line vote that will lead to the government deciding whether the care or a treatment, or treatment a patient wants is worth paying for. now, what this means for patients is that research could be abused, could be abused to arbitrarily deny patients access to treatments or -- and treatments by age or by gender or by race or services to save the government money. and if that wasn't enough, finally the fourth horseman. there is everyone's nemisis,

ipab, the independent payment advisory board. the independent payment advisory board. you want to saddle up on this horse. this is a board made up of 15 unelected bureaucrats who will decide what gets to stay, what gets to go in medicare coverage. we used to do that here in this body and over in the house. it was alleged during debate that we couldn't make those decisions because we were too close to the people involved. what is that all about? isn't that what we're supposed to be doing in terms of representing the folks we represent? no one's got to go to this 15 unelected board who will decide what gets to stay and what gets to go in medicare coverage. they'll decide what treatments and services will be covered and which will not. the primary reason is to save money. goodness knows, we're all for saving money in the health care system or saving money, period, given our national debt and all that that involves.

this board has no accountability. there is no confirmation process. they are appointed. and there's no real transparency. and we can't do anything about it. i think the provision of the bill is that you can say, well, wait a minute, they made the wrong decision on medicare payments to hospitals or to any part of our health care delivery system that we could by a supermajority, 67 votes, maybe we could change it. maybe not. i've been talking about the four rationers for a long time and what it means to patients. i intend to continue to talk about that. we'll come to the floor after next week and see if we can't put this together in a little bit better way so people are alert what is going on and people are alert what dangers lurk for them in regards to their availability to their doctor and their current way of

treating themselves and their family. it's really scary about this as i watch all the other warnings and the broken promises come true is what is going to happen to kansas constituents back home and those across the country when these new warnings about obamacare continue to come true. the bottom line? we need to protect -- we really need to protect the all-important relationship between the doctor and the patient, which now is at risk. and in order to do that, it seems to me that small fixes are not going to do this. we need to repeal. most importantly, replace obamacare with real reforms that work not only for kansans, but everybody across the country. the whole program needs to be repealed, replaced, defunded, delayed. not just the parts n.r.a. politically convenient for the -- the parts that are

politically convenient for the president or the parts yet to be decided by the president as the lizzie borden ax falls in regards to those decisions. i know kansans and the american people certainly deserve better. mr. president, i'm going to come back and talk about the four rationers again in more detail. this only serves as a warning and alert about promises not made, promises not kept. but people have to understand who these four rationers are, what they intend to do and what the dangers are and why amendments to prevent rationing were not successful in the beginning when this bill was passed. i yield back the floor, and it appears to me that we do not have a quorum, mr. president. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

mr. cornyn: i ask unanimous consent that the quorum call be dispensed with. fer sph without objection. mr. cornyn: the gallo goal up pl released a poll, what do you think is the most important problem facing the country today? well, the results should not shock anyone. 21% of the american people think that the federal government is the problem. quote -- "dissatisfaction with

government/congress/politicians, poor leadership, corruption, and abuse of power." 18% of the american people say the economy is the most important problem or the biggest problem facing the country. so 21% say it's washington and the federal government, 18% say it's the economy. i would point out that not coincidentally "politico" has a story this morning that highlights one of the sources of this dissatisfaction. it cites senior white house first of all, describing the senate democrats meeting with the president at the white house this afternoon to talk about their 2014 playbook, and some of it's going to be to cover the themes that the president is going to talk about at his state of the union speech. according to "politico," the aim is to highlight the differences with the g.o.p. and to provide

fodder for the democrats along the campaign trail, even though these measures stand a little -- stand little chance of passing in congress. now, there's nothing wrong with our democratic friends having philosophical difference with the republicans or political differences, for matter. and it's logical that there would be different approps to a- approaches to solving our nation's problems. but this calculated approach with the president having a team meeting with our democratic friends saying how can we contrast our agenda with that of the republicans is, it strikes me, a shallow and cynical effort to distract people from what are the fundamental problems facing our country. we know that the president has been in office five years now. the economy -- the economic

recovery, after 2008, has been anemic. after the federal government has paid out almost a quarter of a billion dollars in deficit spending for unemployment benefits on an extended basis, you would think that the kind of meeting the president would want to have, not just with democrats but with republicans, is to figure out what can we do together to deal with this anemic economic growth and to get america back to work? and as the president's promises about obamacare, one after another, have proven to be untrue with regard to whether if you like what you have, you can keep it the price of your health care will go down an average $2,500 a family, if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor -- none of that has proven to be true. so why in the world can't we work together to try to address the problems -- the problem about lack of access to health care isn't going to go away, but

it looks like all of this has been put on the shelf in an effort to try to drive a wedge between americans for no other reason than to try to shore up his political base leading up to the 2014 mid-term elections. why else would the president use his bully pulpit to stump for legislation that has no chance of passing in congress? you know, this last exercise -- actually very sad exercise -- starting with about a week ago, the majority leader brought to the floor a bill that would extend long-term unemployment benefits. it wasn't paid for. in other words it would add $billion to the national debt -- it would add $6 billion to the national debt, and it would be for three months. well, monday a week ago when we had that vote, you'll remember, president, we had a the love bad weather and -- we had a lot of

bad weather and 17 senators were not able to be here for that vote. so it was at if the majority leader intended to go afford knowing 17 members of the senate weren't going to be here because he really wanted the bill to fail, not t to succeed. wcialtiowell, i and others encod had i am to have the bill the next day. thankfully he did. and we got on the bill a week ago. but the president ought to be bringing americans together, not pitting them against one anoth another. of course, the president isn't the only one to blame for the people's dissatisfaction with government. i'm sure there's plenty of blame to go around. but the majority leader -- majority leader reid has to accept a major part of the responsibility for the dysfunction of the united states astronaut ansenate and for the f

the unemployment extension bill. the republicans in an act of good faith, filed 36 amendments that we believe would have made that bill a better bill. and the majority leader said, no, no amendments, no votes, take it or leave it what we have offered. and then later on he came back and said, well, we'll make these other changes, but these are the only changes we're going to make, and we're not going to have an open amendment process and vote. so instead of allowing the senate to function, the majority leader filled the amendment tree and blocked every single member of the senate, democrats and republicans alike, from offering even the most reasonable amendments. senator coburn, for example -- senator toomey was down here talking about this today. but senator coburn had an amendment which would have ended unemployment compensation for

millionaires and billionaires. now, what could be more common sense than that? why can't the senate -- republicans and democrats alike -- come together to vote on such amendments? you'll have to ask the majority leader about that. because the senate voted on a similar amendment in 2011 and voted 100-0 -- 100-0. but still the majority leader decided to block this amendment on this bill, even though it would have improved the integrity of the unemployment insurance program. many others of my colleagues worked in good faith with the majority leader through the weekend to try to come up with another option. senators collins, hatch, inhofe, paul, scott, thune, and portman all filed amendments which would have created jobs in a variety of ways and help grow the

economy. what better way to deal with the problem of unemployment than to help grow the economy and create jobs? the alternative seems to be, wlg, let'well, let's just give m unemployment compensation and they'll be happy. well, i dare say that there are very few people who are unemployed that are happy accepting unemployment compensation. they would much prefer the dignity and self-respect that comes along with working, if they could simply find a job to do. but, irrespective of this demonstration of good faith by republicans to try to improve the bill and help grow the economy and get people back to work the majority leader's response was to block every single vote, choosing politics over commonsense proposals that would help get americans back to work. i must say, mr. president, this is a stark contrast to -- this is in stark contrast to what

we've seen happening in the house of representatives. this is a shocking figure, but the house of representatives has passed 170 pieces of legislation, many of which deal with the poor growth of the economy and the need to create jobs that, that the majority ler has ignored. 170 pieces of legislation have passed the house, many if not all -- well, basically all of them on a bipartisan basis. but the majority leader of the united states senate has ignored them. these include things like the northern route approval act which approves the keystone x.l. pipeline, something that the president would decide whether to approve this connection between the pipeline in canada all the way down to port arthur,

texas, where th the refineries exist. the house passed a piece of legislation called the "keep the i.r.s. off year health care act" which prohibits the i.r.s. from implementinimplementing obamaca. i understand that's controversial. the majority leader wants to try to protect obamacare with awful its flaws, which are -- with awful its flaws, which are becoming apparent on a daily basis. but here's another one, something called the skills act, which eliminates and consolida consolidates federal job-training programs. well, there are over 40 different job-training programs in the federal government. can you imagine what might happen if they were consolidated and the money that's now used for overhead in administration could be used actually to train people, to provide them the skills they need in order to qualify for many high-paying jobs that go without trained

workers? well, if senator reid was serious about that he would have taken up that bill, allowed democrats and republicans to improve it with their amendments. but yet he refused to allow it even to be considered. and then there's the reins act -- r-e-i-n-s. one of the biggest frustrations back where i come from in texas when i go home every weekend, they say, well, how come nobody seems to be held accountable? when things don't work, how come nobody gets fired? how come it just sort of -- congress and the president kick the can down the road? well, of course, one of the biggest challenges we have when it comes to accountability is the regulatory state, the bureaucracy, the people who are appointed by the president who have the authority to issue

regulations. well, as the presiding officer knows, this isn't legislation people vote on. these are regulations that are promulgated by administrative agencies. but when they have an impact of over $100 million on the economy a year, doesn't it make sense that congress, the only people that the american people can hold accountable, that we would get a chance to actually vote on whether they should be approved or not and have a discussion oononthe cost-benefit analysis r than have the regulatory agencies run amok and have litigation as our only recourse? wcialg you gewell, you get my p. the majority leader has shut down every effort by the house of representatives to pass legislation, to come over here to the senate, to try to improve our anemic economic recovery since the great recession of 2008. that's the reason economists say this is an atypical, an unusual

recovery from a recession. because usually it's kind of v-shaped. but we've got is a u-shaped recovery, which has almost flat-lined with economic growth not fast enough to keep up with the population increase, and so we have not only 7% or higher unemployment, we have an historic -- wcialg at least for- --well, at least for the last 30 year, an historic number of americans actually participating in the workforce. one reasoning why the unemployment figures are coming down is not because the economy is getting that much better. but because people are giving up. they're quit look for work. that is an american tragedy. well, the house is acting, not only to try to earn the american people's trust and confidence but to get the government out of the way and to let the private sector create more jobs.

conversely, the senate, under the iron rule, some might say the dictatorship of the majority leader, the senate is neither forwarded the opportunity to -- afforded the opportunity to actually consider this legislation passed by the house nor to offer amendments an improve legislation that's on the floor of the senate, like the unemployment insurance -- long-term unemployment insurance bill that was on the floor this last week. that's one reason why, mr. president, i think gallup says that the american people, 21%, cite that as the biggest problem facing the american people today. dissatisfaction with government, poor leadership, and abuse of power. it doesn't have to be that way. and it won't if the american

people give our side of the aisle the majority in november. it will be different. senator mcconnell, the republican leader, i thought gave a really important speech just last week talking about if the voters give us the responsibility for leading in the united states senate, we will return the senate to its prior reputation as the world's greatest deliberative poed. and whether you're a democrat or republican, whether i like your amendment or not, we'll all have an opportunity to offer our ideas and we'll have a chance to vote them up or down. that's the way the senate used to work. that's the way i think most americans think it should work. and that's the way it will work if we're given that opportunity. mr. president, on another topic, we learned that the health care

exchanges that opened up on october 1 under obamacare, that the first reports about the composition of the pool of people who signed up for obamacare has sent, has caused reasons for grave concerns, that the vast majority of people who signed up under the exchanges are older and sicker, which, of course, is their right. but that many young people necessary to provide the actuarial stability and success of these exchanges, they've chosen to take a pass. and we've asked for those numbers to be released on a weekly basis. as a matter of fact, the house is going to take up a bill that will increase transparency in these insurance exchanges so congress and the american people can be better informed about what is exactly happening with

the implementation of obamacare. but i remember it was five years ago, i was out on the capitol steps when the president in his inaugural speech told the american people, he said these words: transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency. close quote. those were stirring words. as an advocate of open government and transparent government and freedom of information, i thought that was a very positive statement by the president. but today, in light of what's happened since that time, they seem like a bad joke. obamacare is the most recent skpapl pell. it's -- example. it's been three and a half months since these federal exchanges officially came online and the administration still won't provide the american people with reliable, detailed information on exchange enrollment numbers and the problems with the web site.

now i don't have any doubt that the web site problems are going to be and have been substantially repaired. the one problem that the house has pointed out is there's still no guarantee that if you put your personal information into that web site that it will be protected against cyber attacks and identity theft, something that ought to concern everybody. you would think if the majority leader was concerned about that too, that he would give us a chance to vote on the legislation that passed the house earlier this week. but in order to help americans to get better information about obamacare, the senior senator from tennessee, senator alexander, has introduced legislation that would require the administration to provide weekly updates on exchange enrollment as well as medicaid enrollment as well as web site problems and other issues. the cost of this legislation, according to the congressional budget office, which is the gold

standard when it comes to scoring the cost of legislation, the cost of it is zero. it's a big goose egg. i'm proud to be a cosponsor of that legislation, but unfortunately, the white house has already issued a statement saying it would veto the legislation it passed because it would be -- quote -- "too costly." too costly. so the majority leader and the president have been pursuing legislation this last week that would have increased the deficit and the debt by $6 billion. but they're unwilling to consider this transparency legislation that would cost zero because it says it's too costly. but it's true that the problems with obamacare go well beyond just a lack of transparency, as we all know. for starters, the president continues to treat obamacare as a law that means whatever he

wants it to mean. whenever it's convenient for him because he continues to change the law by executive waiver. you know, this is another common question i get back home. people say how can the president delay the employer mandate while the penalty against me as an individual, the individual mandate remains the law of the land? how can he carve out or exempt certain parts of the population from the application of the law? how can he claim executive privilege when it comes to cooperating with oversight investigations by the congress? how can he do all of these things in a country that is founded on the rule of law and where no man and no woman is above the law and no man and no woman is below the law? we are all entitled to equal protection of laws. how can the president choose which laws to enforce and which

laws to ignore? well, sadly, i don't have a good answer for that. the congress has the authority to pass the law, but the executive branch under our constitution is the one that is supposed to enforce the law. but when the executive branch refuses to enforce the law or ignores the law or purports to waive the law, there isn't a lot of recourse other than private litigation, which takes months and years to conclude. but from my perspective, these waivers reflect an utter disregard for the constitutional duties of the executive branch of government. if the president feels like certain aspects of obamacare have become unworkable, it is his duty to come to congress and say work with me to change it. but he refuses to do that. i think some of the most popular

words out of his mouth is "i'll go it alone. i'll issue an executive order. i'll ignore congress and the constitutional coequal branches of government, and i'll do it alone." well, the president knows just how unpopular his signature legislative achievement -- obamacare -- has become, even among many democrats. and i talked about accountability a little earlier. many democrats who walked the plank with him on obamacare and actually believed and indeed repeated the promises that he himself made about how the law would work, they're going to be up for election in 2014. he won't be on the ballot. he's serving -- he's been through his last election. there is no way to hold president obama accountable for his broken promises on obamacare. but there is a way to hold the

people who supported the president and who repeated statements which have proven to be false about how obamacare would work. but if the president feels like the law isn't working the way it should, or if our democratic colleagues feel like not withstanding their hopes and their aspirations for how it might work, that it didn't turn out that way, then what we ought to be doing is working together in order to fix the problem. not to perpetuate it. we know the president is acting as if he is above the law. he's acting as if he can selectively enforce the law based on political expediency. and i don't think it's an exaggeration to say that this behavior is undermining our democracy and making the american people even more cynical about washington, d.c.. again, i don't think it's any

coincidence that the gallup poll cites the government as the single biggest problem in america today, according to the people polled in this gallup poll published january 15, 2014. this administration was supposed to be defined by transparency and the rule of law. that's not what i said. those aren't my words. those are the president's words. in reality, it's become an administration defined by obstruction, deception and partisan power grabs. and that's a sad, a sad development. one of these power grabs, of course, is obamacare itself, which passed on a party-line vote in 2010. but amazingly wasn't really implemented until 2013, starting in october. and people are just now beginning to see what obamacare

really is like. but we know as an historical fact that it was muscled through on a party-line vote despite major public opposition. thus far it's been a complete disaster on just about every level. first, the administration wanted us to believe it was all about the web site. yeah, we got a bad -- we got a bad web site contractor, but we're going to fix that. these are glitches that can be repaired. and you know what? everything's going to turn out just fine. but the reality is far different. much of the regulatory confusion surrendering the president's health care law was the result of conscience -- conscious decisions and politically motivated delays. you don't have to take my word for it. "the washington post" reported last month that the white house systematically delayed -- those are their words -- key provisions of obamacare.

and this, again, is another quote from "the washington post" -- quote -- "to prevent them from becoming points of contention before the 2012 election." close quote. a conscious decision to delay the implementation of obamacare until after the president ran for reelection. and now we've seen many aspects of obamacare unilaterally delayed until after the 2014 midterm elections. what about accountability? well, while the white house is trumpeting a recent increase in signups for obamacare -- as i said, they're unwilling to release on a real-time basis what the facts are, the number of signups is still dwarfed by the number of people who have had their health coverage canceled because of obamacare. and if you look back in 2010, it

was the very regulation that would result and the estimate by the congressional budget office that tens of millions of americans would lose their existing coverage under obamacare primarily because of the mandate in terms of the coverage. for example, you have grandparents who are required to buy health insurance that has maternity coverage that they don't need and they don't want, so why should they have to pay for it? obamacare says you have to. young people, why should they have to pay more for their health insurance when it doesn't really cost that much for them to get the medical care they need? well, because they've got to subsidize the older generation. well, perhaps no one other than the president has maneuvered more to cover up obamacare shortfalls than the person at the head of the department of health and human services, kathleen sebelius. recall back in 2010, secretary

sebelius threatened to ban certain insurance providers from obamacare if they communicated with their own customers they wanted to tell their customers what would happen to their existing insurance coverage if this law passed, and they were threatened, threatened by the secretary of health and human services, saying if you communicate with your own customers, you're going to be punished. well, last year it came out that secretary sebelius later on was shaking down private insurance companies to help fund obamacare's implementation. for that matter, when americans began to lose their existing coverage because of obamacare regulations, the president initially blamed it on what he called bad apple insurers, even though this administration knew

years ago that the law would force millions of people to forfeit their existing krofrpblg. -- coverage. and yet, the president -- i think it was almost 30 times, certainly more than 20 times, said if you like what you have, you can keep it. but he said that knowing that tens of millions of americans would lose their existing coverage, and many of them would lose the ability to continue to be treated by a doctor of their own choosing because they would no longer be a part of their plan. well, i submit that -- what i have just recited has contributed a lot to this poll which has said that people think the government is the biggest problem facing the country today. i have just a few final

thoughts, and i see the senator from missouri here, and i will turn -- i will yield the floor back. i just want to conclude by saying that the core conceit of obamacare, indeed the most offensive part of it, is that the folks who supported it, from the president who those who voted it into law, understand that the health insurance needs of individuals are better decided by those individuals and their families and the doctor they trust, but as a result of this arrogance, millions of health plans have been canceled, millions more will be in the future. the premiums, the costs of health care coverage have skyrocketed, together with huge deductibles which essentially would leave people self-insured. many people have been forced into obamacare plans that have

$5,000 deductibles, so for all practical purposes, people are self-insured. well, we know that health care providers have also been forced to deal with enormous uncertainty. i hear it every day from the physicians and hospitals and health care providers in texas. and americans -- we also know that america's already weak recovery has been made even weaker. that's the reason as i said earlier historically a rebound after recession is sort of v-shaped. after you hit the bottom, you bounce back and get a spurt of economic growth. but not this time. not with the obamacare recovery or lack thereof. well, the national bureau of economic research has said that obamacare may eventually cause substantial declines in employment, and that seems very intuitive in what we are seeing happening today. you know, this didn't have to

turn out this way. how is obamacare sold to the membership? well, under false pretenses. we know that because 90% of people polled said they like their current coverage. that's why the president said if you like what you have, you can keep it, which proved out -- has proven to be false. but the premise of obamacare was everybody gets covered. but even under the congressional budget office estimate, obamacare will leave 31 million people uninsured by 2023. so not even the underlying premise of universal coverage under obamacare is true. republicans believe that expanding health care choice and health care portability are important ways to reduce costs across the board, and really what we need -- the reason why people are uninsured is because they can't afford it and we need to bring down the cost, not to raise the cost which has

happened under obamacare. and i believe and i believe my colleagues believe that by adopting sensible, targeted reforms, not to undermine the coverage for 90% of the people who like what they have, but to deal with the 10% who don't like what they have or don't have coverage they can afford. so we need those kinds of targeted reforms to help the uninsured and help those with preexisting conditions without disrupting everyone else's existing coverage, without throwing out the baby with the bath water. we believe that families understand better than the bureaucracy what health care needs are in each family, and if given the opportunity, we will start over once obamacare collapses of its own weight, when finally there is a universal recognition in the halls of congress that we've got to start over and to do better,

and to do it better by replacing obamacare with patient-centered reforms that i know the american people want and they deserve. mr. president, i yield the floor. mr. blunt: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from missouri. mr. blunt: mr. president, i want to follow right along with what my good friend, the senator from texas, is talking about. first, i want to say one of the philosophies of government that i thought was so well stated in such a succinct way by abraham lincoln at coopers union in new york in 1860 was he said government should do for people only those things that people cannot better do for themselves. and there are some things in health care that government actually could do to then let people do things better for themselves. that's why our side, beginning in 2009 and before that, advocated things like buying across state lines, a bigger

marketplace. organize the marketplace, don't try to operate a system. don't try to create an environment where people can't make decisions about what they want and somehow we think the government can make those decisions better. we all talk to people every day who had coverage, as the senator from texas said, that they were happy with that met their needs, and now they are told by the government, well, your new coverage is better. it doesn't matter if you don't have any children. you have pediatric dental care. it doesn't matter if you're retired and plan not to have children. you now have maternity coverage. it doesn't matter if you have always had insurance. this covers people with preexisting conditions. the american people have figured this out, and they don't like it. you know, the system we had at the workplace-based insurance was largely a system that developed by accident after world war ii, but interestingly 85% of the people that had insurance got it at work and 90%

of them were happy with it. i think that's going to be the next thing we find out as we walk down the road, how many people are no longer going to get their insurance at work, but now we know the impact on people who generally didn't have insurance at work or have insurance for the first time. i have got some stories here i want to share that people have contacted our office in the last few days and talked about, the few days since i was here a week ago to talk about some things that -- some stories i had then to tell that people are telling me, but just earlier today, another anecdotal evidence, somebody who at 27 left their family policy to get their own first insurance policy ever with the biggest insurance company in the country, went to the doctor they had always gone to, and the doctor says well, we don't -- the -- not the doctor but the people, the receptionist, the people dealing with her said we don't take that insurance here

anymore. and then her request was well, i want to see the doctor i've always seen. can i just pay cash? and the answer was no, you can't pay cash because we now know you have insurance, so under the new federal requirements, you can't pay cash to see the doctor you want to see. you've got to go somewhere that will take your insurance. now, surely that's not what we all really intended to do. those people here who voted against the bill, even those who like me spoke -- voted for the bill, even those who like me spoke against it would not have anticipated that one of the prohibitions would be that you couldn't pay cash to see the doctor you want to see because you find out that your insurance doesn't cover your doctor. this is -- this is actually a step beyond if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. this goes to if you like your doctor, you can't even pay your doctor to see your doctor if the

policies available to you didn't let you see your doctor. but, mr. president, here are some letters i got just this week and some email messages and some text messages, but all from missourians, and even though i'm not going to give anybody's last name, these all happen to be missourians that i think my staff has called and said do you mind if we tell your story just in case your neighbor figures out this must be you if you're christina from lees summit, missouri. christina says she is a single mother of two. she is working her way through school as a waitress, working 25 hours a week. she previously received insurance through her employer but was not allowed to renew that plan and now the cost of her daughter's deductible will go up from $100 a year to $2,500 a year, a 2500% increase. as the senator from texas said earlier, some of these

deductibles for most families are like you don't have insurance at all. i don't know what christina's situation is, but i know somewhere there is a 25-hour a week waitress with two kids that if they are told their deductible is $2,500, that means they really don't have any coverage, because they don't have $2,500, and they are not going to figure out how to get $2,500 can't get insurance that makes that difference. or gina from kansas city had a birth defect that eventually resulted in having to have her hip replaced and another revision to that. she has had health insurance every year of her life until -- until this year. her previous blue cross/blue shield policy is no longer available and policies on the exchange were just too expensive she says at this rate we won't be able to afford health insurance in our current

situation. i want to go back to the old system. at least i know i have insurance, and then i have my doctors, too. my primary doctor, she says, retired due to the new health care plan. i have always had health insurance for me and my family after 2014 -- and my family. after 2014, i won't. now, i wish that was an unusual letter, but it's not. surely, there have got to be people benefiting from the system. the law of averages would catch up with you. somebody has to be having coverage they didn't have before that maybe they couldn't get in the state high-risk pool. by the way, we could have expanded those. that was one of the proposals i made for people who had a preexisting condition. no, the biggest challenge to reality i think of this whole debate has been that nobody else had any other ideas, that this

was the only set of ideas out there. i have brought a list to the floor the other day of the 10 or 12 bills that i introduced as a house member. the biggest one was 75 pages long. one that according to harry reid, senator reid, the majority leader, has accounted for a third of the people that went on insurance because they were able to join their family's policy. i introduced that bill in the house. it was four and a half pages. 2004 and a half pages. i guess it might have been really good at this. i could have come up with a bill that was about 12, 13 pages and just got everybody. we didn't need 2,700 pages of legislation. if four and a half pages get a third of the people that are now covered. here is mitchell in weston, missouri. he still has insurance. his premiums go up over $40 a

month. frankly, that's one of the best stories i have had, somebody that still has insurance and it's $40 a month higher, but he says this is not the answer for americans with or without health insurance. this is now a national problem. he says my health insurance is going up only $40 a month starting in january, but that's still -- the insurance now costs costs $120 a week for he and his wife. said most of my friends' rates are going up $100 and more a week. now, i don't know that that's a scientific survey, but that's mitchell's view of what's happening with most of his friends. tony is a former owner of a hardware store. when he closed his store, he wasn't able to find insurance. tony is from west plains, missouri. he enrolled in the missouri state insurance pool, the high-risk pool, but when it was

terminated, he was told to enroll in the federal health exchange. i think he's finally gotten that done. he just says it happens to cost him more than it cost him before. remember, the high-risk pool. here is what tony says in his letter. when national health care became available, the legislature -- this would be the missouri legislature. i think this is what happened in most states -- voted to end the missouri high-risk pool, effective december 31, 2013, and sent me a letter saying i would have to enroll in the federal program. i got on the web site the first week of october and made some attempt to enroll every day through october and november. i was finally successful in assessing the policy plans available just before december 1. now, here's another point i want to make, too. the rollout itself has had negative consequences on the makeup of people who have insurance. now, i have -- i think there are many reasons that young, healthy

people will decide not to buy insurance. one is that it costs them relatively more than it ever has before under the law. in december, in fact, if you were in your early 20's, you were paying about 1/5 of what somebody was paying for health insurance in their early 60's. but in january, you had to pay at least a third of what somebody was paying in their early 60's. and people's insurance in the early 60s didn't go down. people's insurance in their early 20's went up. and i just had a dad today tell me -- and beside that you tell young people and you can get insurance if you have a serious health care problem because there's no prohibition if you have preexisting conditions, some so if you're a young person, your insurance, this is the most uninsured group, young, healthy people who think they're young and healthy and probably don't need insurance because they're young and healthy, who should worry about an accident, i mean i'm a dad, i understand how you have these

discussions with, now wait a minute, that doesn't cover all your potential problems, but still this is the biggest uninsured group, mr. president. and they are not signing up and part of why they're not signing up, one of the smaller reasons, there are fundamental problems with the plan itself but believe me, if you're on the -- if you're wondering if you should get insurance every day, you're not going to do what tony did, you're not going to be on the web site every single day from october 1 until december 1 until you get insurance. at some point you're going to say i didn't really think i needed this anyway. i'm not going to keep beating my head against the wall to sign up for something that all my friends tell me is a bad deal and for sure is a worse deal than i would have gotten in december of last year because the law insisted that it be a worse deal for young, healthy people. and the white house said last

week that the number of people -- when they were challenged about how the number of people signing up wasn't nearly enough they said really i think the white house spokesman said it's not the number of people, it's the mix of people that really matters. and i think the number they've had out there is about 40% of the people that sign up need to be under 35 and hopefully healthy, and that number is about 25%. so the mix isn't working, the number isn't working, the cost isn't working. according to sean from independence, his premiums for his private policy went up 40%. if he elected to drop his private policy and sign up on the exchange according to him his premiums and deductibles would more than double and he wouldn't qualify for any subsidies. so for sean the best deal was the 40% increase. he had more than 100% increase if he went to the exchange and

higher deductibles. lynn from farmington, missouri, says at at mineral area regional medical center premiums increased even more than usual to the affordable care act requirements. we have increased the employee's portion of the health insurance premium in order to increase deductibles and co-pays due to the a.c.a. required new coverage that every plan has to include. barbara at fulton, missouri, where winston churchill gave the famous iron curtain speech at westminster college in mullton, says her husband's blue cross/blue shield plan was canceled because it was deemed -- this is her quote -- illegal per the affordable care act. her family, her husband and two

daughters is now paying more money for health insurance. my husband had insurance he liked and when we received a letter from blue cross/blue shield that his plan was going to be discontinued due to requirements of the affordable care act, they were disappointed. i was also told that my 4-year-old child could apply for state medicaid and my 9-year-old child earned too much to qualify for insurance through healthcare.gov. they qualify for neither of these programs, she says, because of her -- her quote, because of obamacare, we as a family are paying much more for insurance for our children and my husband and my husband is not currently fully insured. my last letter, mr. president, is from scott in independence, missouri, who says his employer dropped his retiree health plan for 2014 due to increased costs associated with a.c.a.

i don't see here who his employer was but we've seen big employees, i.b.m. drop their plan, u.p.s. dropped their health care for all the spouses and dependents of their employees in both cases saying now you've got somewhere to go, go go to the exchange rather than the plan you had as part of being a retiree or part of being a spouse of someone who worked here. scott looked at plans for -- on the exchange and for a plan that is worse than what he had under his employer, he will pay 280% more in premiums and his out of pocket expenses -- i guess that means deductibles -- will quadruple. four times the deductibles, 280% the premiums. he says essentially, -- let me

read one other thing here. he talks about being a disabled veteran. since i'm also a disabled veteran and exempt from the a.c.a., i went to see what my cost would be for a policy for just my 9-year-old daughter. unfortunately, i can't enroll here unless unless i enroll so my costs go from $159 for a cadillac policy to $459 per month for, his description, a horrible a.c.a. policy this year. essentially i was forced to buy a policy i neither want or need. it will cost me far more and provide far less than my canceled employer plan. bigger marketplace with more choices, more ways to ensure you can take your insurance from one place of work to another, more ways to ensure that expanded high-risk pools would let people join those high-risk

pools and, by the way, if you're an insurance company and you have to participate in that in some way, at least you know that all the other insurance companies are, too, and everybody in that group is somebody who had a preexisting condition as opposed to having to assume you're going to get less healthy people than hopefully you get. mr. president, i'd just say that everybody in the country and everybody in the congress knows more about health care than most people did five years ago. i think that would be a good time for us to take all that new knowledge about health care and see if we couldn't look at this again and do a better job. and, mr. president, i yield back. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from rhode island. mr. whitehouse: i ask unanimous consent to speak as if in morning business for about 15

minutes. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. whitehouse: thank you very much, mr. president. i'm back now for the 55th time that the senate has been in session, each week to urge my colleagues to wake up to the toll that carbon pollution is taking on our atmosphere, our oceans and our people. while climate change deniers continue to gin up phony doubt to mislead the public, top american businesses and corporations recognize the risks posed by climate change. they are preparing for the economic fallout. members of congress bury their heads in the sand like the proverbial ostrich hoping the issue will go away, wondering in some cases recently whether the recent cold front disproves decades of research and an

overwhelming scientific consensus. well, business leaders in the real world, not the political world, not the polluter paid phony doubt world, business leaders in the real world are doing what they do best and that is taking stones protect their bottom line and maintain their relationships with their customers. major corporations, even those with large carbon footprints are taking voluntary action to lower their own carbon output. some are joining broader efforts to support policies that reduce carbon emissions, some of our largest and most sophisticated companies are even fact organize the burden of climate change into their own accounting and their own long-term planning by -- guess what -- assigning an internal price to carbon. this bicameral task force on climate change which i lead with congressman waxman wrote to over

300 businesses and organizations seeking their views on actions the federal government could take to reduce cawrp and to -- carbon pollution. the response from the business community was very encouraging. some examples: coca-cola, headquartered in georgia, wrote this, -- i quote -- "we recognize climate change is a critical challenge facing our planet. with potential impacts on biodiversity, water resources, public health, and agriculture. beyond the effects on the communities we serve, we view climate change as a potential business risk, underring that -- understanding it could have direct and indirect effects on our business. that's coca-cola. texas and maryland-based lockheed martin told the task

force of the major headway it has made in reducing its greenhouse emissions and i'll quote from lockheed martin. from 2007 through 2011, lockheed martin reduced its absolute carbon emissions by 30% and continues to focus on carbon emission reductions by championing energy conservation and efficiency measures in our facilities. lockheed martin. let's look at wal-mart. founded and headquartered in arkansas, wal-mart wrote we're committed to reducing our carbon footprint and we're working with our suppliers to do the same. indeed i met yesterday with the general counsel from apple doing exactly the same thing, working to reduce their carbon footprint, working with their suppliers to push for reductions on the part of their suppliers. wal-mart's 2009 sceanability --

sustainability report shows its long-standing commitment to fighting climate change. here's what wal-mart said. climate change may not cause hurricanes but warmer ocean water can make them more powerful. climate change may not cause rainfall, but it can increase the frequency -- frequence and severity of flooding. climate change may not change droughts droughts but it can make droughts longer. every company has a responsibility to reduce greenhouses as quickly as it can. that's wal-mart. that's why we are working at a number of areas, they continue, to reduce our company's carbon footprint and also working with our suppliers and customers to help them do the same. currently we are investing in renewable energy, increasing energy efficiency in our buildings and trucks, working with suppliers to take carbon

out of products, and supporting legislation in the u.s. to reduce greenhouse emissions. that's wal-mart. i also want to commend the wal-mart family foundation for the work they're doing on oceans as well as on the atmospheric aspects of carbon. let's look at mars, the virginia-based candy company. mars states we are committed to reducing our greenhouse emissions in absolute terms because this is the right thing to do. as climate change has implications for the production of agricultural ingredients, addressing it requires changes to the way we source materials and manufacture our products. mars, maker of the famous mars bars and m&m's. north carolina's v.f. corporation which makes major apparel grandz brands like lee and wrangler and north face says

this, we seek to conduct our business with the highest levels of honest, -- honesty, integrity and respect. these values are embedded in our approach to sustainability which reflects our commitment to operating our business so future generations can live with cleaner water and air, healthier forests and oceans and a stable climate. toymaker hasbro from rhode island has issued its energy pledge. climate change mitigation is a pressing global issue, it reads, and we aim to reduce our corporate carbon footprint by improving energy efficiency and reducing greenhouse emissions at our sites. hasbro was awarded a climate leadership award by the e.p.a. in 2012 for excellence in greenhouse management. these companies and their products are household names in this country. they're major players in the american economy.

lockheed martin had annual revenue in 2012 of over $47 billion. we trust them with some of our most important defense contracts. coke topped $48 billion and may be the most recognizable corporate franchise in the world. wal-mart is the world's second largest company with 2012 revenue of more than $443 billion. mr. president, these are serious companies, and they are serious about their products and they are serious about their returns, and in part they earn their impressive returns by being serious about science, and they understand the harm that carbon-driven climate change causes. they see the unfair advantage that big polluters get when those big polluters don't have to factor in the costs of their carbon pollution into the price of the coal or oil. that's why more and more leading

businesses are calling on congress to wake up and set new ground rules to even the energy playing field. mars and v.f. corporation, along with ebay, gap, levi's, nike, starbucks and others name brand american corporations are members of the business for innovative climate and energy policy coalition, bicep, which is pushing for energy policies that will draw down carbon emissions and boost economic growth. bicep is just one of the impressive initiatives organized by a nonprofit organization that helps to mobilize investors and business leaders to build a sustainable global economy. if we in congress are willing to take on these special interests, the polluting special interests that keep congress barricadeed,

bicep member companies and others will have our back. what we need to do is to price carbon properly to get a right price for carbon. that means making the big carbon polluters pay a fee to the american people to cover the costs of dumping their waste into our atmosphere and oceans. that's a cost they now push off happily onto the rest of us. well, because of the political control of the polluters over congress, conditions do not presently allow us to price carbon, so senator boxer and those in our new senate climate action task force are pushing to change those political conditions. while we do that, -- and we will

do that because we have the public and the facts and the science and the imperative, both moral and practical on our side -- but while we're doing that, these companies, these big name brand american companies have begun to assess their own internal prices on cashon. a recent report by the climate disclosure project which gauges carbon emissions and energy use of major corporations has identified 29 large companies that use internal carbon prices in their operations or their long-term planning. some of these companies price carbon to drive energy efficiency. others see it as a smart way to prepare their business practices for the likelihood of a national american carbon fee. among those companies are some of the world's largest oil and gas companies, as well as major energy consumers.

some examples -- exxonmobil estimates that a price of $60 per metric ton of carbon dioxide will be assessed on carbon by 2030. b.p.'s figure is $40, and devon energies is $15. some of the biggest carbon emitters in history are preparing for a price on carbon. let that sink in for a second. the emitters have already baked into their planning a price on carbon, among other reasons because they know it's the right outcome. who else is using internal carbon pricing? well, google assesses an internal carbon fee of $14 per metric ton that it uses to invest in green initiatives. likewise, microsoft charges each of its organizational divisions

a quarterly carbon neutral fee of $6 to $7 per metric ton. the revenue from those divisions for that carbon fee goes very similar to google to a central fund to support carbon offset projects. microsoft even published a carbon fee play playbook as a guide for businesses looking to establish their own internal carbon fees. walt disney company -- talk about a name plate company -- walt disney charges its subsidiary businesses a carbon fee based on their share of the company's overall footprint. the higher the carbon footprint, according to a company statement, the more they pay. we have built this into our capital planning process as well, says disney, so businesses have to take the price of carbon into account while planning new

projects. the additional operational cost, disney says, has started to incentivize businesses to seek methods to reduce their impact. wal-mart ran the numbers assuming an economywide carbon fee of $18 per ton. the company finds, and i quote -- "wal-mart's early action on emission reductions represents a competitive advantage." wal-mart says their action on emissions gives them a competitive advantage over other retailers that have not performed such projects. investors who are behind a lot of these companies are also voicing concerns about the exposure of their portfolios to the effects of climate change, and they are pushing for climate action. the carbon asset risk initiative, also coordinated by series, is a coalition of 70

investors worth nearly $3 trillion. they have pressured 45 of the world's top fossil fuel companies to disclose the climate risks that are facing their investments in those companies. should the oil and gas interests prove evasive in answering, well, investors may soon have other resources at hand to evaluate the climate risk to their portfolios. bloomberg news, for example, has developed for its readers the bloomberg carbon risk valuation tool, a model which can describe the potential effect of carbon regulations on fossil fuel company earnings and share price. mr. president, investors and corporate executives take climate change seriously because of how they see it will hurt the bottom line and because of how it will affect their relationship with their customers. they get it, mr. president.

big nameplate american corporations get it, unlike this building and this institution and the one down the hall, the congress of the united states, the house of representatives, which remain under the control and thrall of the polluting interests and won't tax action like these big leadership name plate american corporations already have. we can work with those big corporations. we have got to work with them to break the campaign of polluter paid denial that has congress barricadeed. that campaign of denial is as poisonous to our democracy as the underlying carbon pollution is to our atmosphere and oceans. we need to clean them both up. we need a democracy that is clean of polluter-paid denial and we need atmosphere and oceans that are clean of polluter-emitted carbon.

it is time to push back on the misleading propaganda of the polluters. it is time to recognize that our allies are out there to work with us. it is time for us to wake up. mr. president, i thank you and i yield the floor.

a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from alaska.

ms. murkowski: mr. president, i had an opportunity early last week to give a speech at the brookings institution about the united states' significant opportunity when it comes to energy production and our opportunity as a nation to expand our energy trade, and i was able to present this speech based on a white paper that i have recently released. it's entitled a signal to the world, renovating the architecture of u.s. energy exports. this builds on a document that i presented to this body, to my colleagues, to really folks who cared about any aspect of what's going on within the energy industry within our country and our energy opportunities.

it's a argument that i entitled energy 2020. it was 115 pages of not legislation but really concepts, discussion points, areas where i feel that we as a nation have an opportunity to lead when it comes to our energy poe tension, and when we talk about energy in our country, it's really easy to talk about an all of the above, but i really did make a very concerted effort to address all forms of energy that we in this country are blessed to have, whether it's our traditional fossil fuels, our oil, our natural gas, our coal resources, whether it's the enormous potential that we have with our renewable fuel sources, such as wind and solar and geothermal and ocean energy, marine

hydrokinetic, our hydropower, the opportunities that present themselves with our biofuels, the importance, the great significance of nuclear within our energy portfolio. and so i didn't want that document to just be yet another document that somebody produces and other good ideas that are thrown out there to just founder. so i have been working to present a series of these white papers. i had an opportunity to present one several months back on natural gas. now this week it is a paper on the act tech tour again of u.s. energy exports. in several weeks, i plan on introducing yet another. so i come to the floor this afternoon to share my thoughts on energy exports with the

senate, all energy exports, and to enter my recommendations on this important subject into the congressional record. my point again is not to trot out legislation in one area or another. but as a nation, to have us focus on our energy poe tension and again all of our energy poe tension and our opportunity to utilize this energy potential to share this amazing wealth that we have, whether it is in our traditional fuels or whether it is in our renewables or our nontraditional. but to really focus on what it means as a nation to be a nation that enjoys energy abundance rather than a nation that faces energy scarcity. and i think it's fair to say

that for far too long, the conversation has been based from a position of energy scarcity. it's time to change that focus. it's time to shift that dialogue, that debate to how do we perform, how do we operate, how do we take advantage of our relative abundance. now, before i start my comments and kind of summarize my -- my white paper and the speech that i gave, i'd like to pause for a quick note. this is the cover of my white paper which will form the basis of my remarks today. i chose a u.s. navy photograph that was taken aboard the u.s.s. carl vincent, by mass communication specialist james r. evans. i want to make sure he gets

proper credit for the photograph. it gives me the sense of optimism that i think we should all have about the future of our energy trade. i think that future is bright, i think it's promising. let's start the discussion by looking exactly at the opportunity that we do have before us. simply put, the united states is both producing and exporting more energy now than ever before. we are producing and we are exporting more than we ever have before. net energy imports are at a 20-year low, and projected to fall below 5% of total consumption by the year 2025. to put this into perspective when i came here to the united states senate we were importing about 60% of our oil at that time. net energy imports now at a 20-year low, projected to fall

below 5% total consumption by 2025. so this is all energy imports. energy exports are reducing our trade deficit, they're boosting american commerce around the world. we've been talking all this week and last about unemployment insurance, how we can work to really improve the economy for those that lack jobs or are underemployed. let me tell you, mr. president, the this is an area of opportunity when it comes to our energy production. so energy exports are representing us helping us with our trade deficit and boosting commerce and jobs. but the regulatory architecture, the framework that we're operating in that governs energy exports is really antiquated. it goes back to acts passed in the 1930's and 1950's and 1970's and furthermore, they're

applied unevenly across the sector. so my white paper proposes a series of recommendations to renovate our nation's approach to energy trade and strengthen america's global posture. and i know, mr. president, that around here when you put an idea out on the floor, you also put a target on your back. but i think this is an important discussion for us to have. so, again, we're not proferring legislation, but what i am pushing, what i am going to edge my colleagues towards is a greater discussion about energy and energy exports. now, the first resource that i wrote about in my white paper was coal. i think we have to acknowledge these are uncertain times for what truly has been the backbone of the u.s. energy supply. coal is projected to remain the top source of electricity for the next two decades, but we

know that it faces competition from other energy sources, there's clearly a regulatory effort that will make the construction of new plants an extremely difficult endeavor. but i think you can see here net exports of coal though they're at their highest level on record and as a share of their production, they're really at their highest level in 30 years here now. exports of coal are presently free of burdensome regulations, i think that they should remain so. i think that our federal regulatory agencies should not require climate change studies in the course of their permitting process for any proposed facilities and i say this because coal is going to be consumed around the world regardless of u.s. trade policy. we know that, we see that, we can point to the countries where they're seeing increased coal imports. the only question here, the real question that we're talking

about is whether or not the coal is produced here in north america. and if it's produced here in north america, the environmental standards are going to be high, higher than they will elsewhere. so the real question is do you produce it where you have stronger environmental standards or are you going to get it from countries where their virginia standards are held to a lower level? the next resource that we're talking about is natural gas. a great deal of discussion of late about natural gas. north america is quickly emerging as one of the world's most important hubs for the natural gas trade. record levels of flowing to mexico and canada via pipeline. the buildout of sea borne export capacity which requires the liquefaction of gas for onloading onto ships is proceeding too slow under the department of energy's watch.

other nations are securing financing, they're building projects and they're contracting with commerce. they're -- customers. they're making these long-term contracts ahead of the united states. so a little more in-depth on this particular resource area, building on the white paper here. i think that d.o.e. should expedite its review process for applications to export l.n.g. to nonf.t.a. countries. the last time an application was approved was back in mid november, it's over two months ago now. i just don't -- i don't see the reason for continued delay here. i do think that we have to monitor the role of the other agencies that are involved in this, we have the fishing, the -- the ferc, the maritime 34-7bgs administration, it's important to understand whether or not this process is as streamlined and as functional as it should be. now, there are some who are suggesting that there needs to

be a pause button pushed here, whether it's at d.o.e., at the ferc or any other agency. new study should be commissioned as the nearest study from 2012 i think is more than twad qawt, d.o.e. has access to all the latest e.i.a. and the market data when it issues its orders. our allies overseas and american workers here at home i think have waited long enough. we can do more and do it in an expedited manner. the third area are natural gas liquids. a variety of fuels are produced alongside oil and gas as part of the energy renaissance underway here in this country. have you butane, propane, pentanes plus, known as natural gas liquids. they've got various uses. they've not typically represented a major source of either revenue or volume to american exporters.

and since the energy renaissance has begun, we have seen exports of more of these products on the uptick. we've seen them surge. the regulatory structure that surrounds n.g.l. export i think are working pretty well, they're working smoothly. i don't think that they require modification. trade in these products plays a valuable role in reducing volatility and creating additional demand to stimulate production. next is the issue of crude oil and condensates. obviously generates a little more interest and discussion and that's okay because, again, i want to have this discussion. we are producing more oil in this country today than at any point in the past 20 years. and what has happened is this increase has resulted in a plethora of what's known as light tight oil. and this is coming from the

eagle ford and other places around the country. this crude is lighter and sweeter than the u.s. refinery system was really built to accommodate. so existing capacity, upgrades to existing refineries, and logistical feats to transport that light crude to appropriate refiners on the east coast instead of over on the gulf coast where you have the heavy refining capacity, where that dominates, these have allowed for new volumes of light crude to be refined and brought to global markets as product. so you have a situation where under existing regulations the department of commerce may license the export of crude oil under certain conditions, most notably if that oil is destined for canada. but in addition you have large amounts of condensate, height

row carbon that cannot be -- hydrocarbon that cannot be exported along with crude and natural gas. many producers fear that rising light crude production will soon exceed not only our light refining capacity but also the ability of our refiners to adapt to the new production slate. and so when this point is reached, when this mismatch occurs, the u.s. oil resurgent i think collides with the de facto ban that we have on crude oil exports. now, you're going to hear people say, you're going to the hear the opponents argue that lifting the ban is somehow or other going to increase the price of gasoline. well, coming from a state where we have probably some of the highest gas prices at the pump anywhere, that's not my interest. that's clearly not my interest. but i think that there's a number of sound economic reasons

why this is not going to be the case. first, gasoline is a petroleum product and petroleum product are subject to global pricing just like crude oil. so to the extent that greater u.s. production of crude oil puts downward pressure on the international oil prices, then production increases have benefited u.s. consumers by marginally lowering the gasoline and the crude oil prices. american consumers are already generally paying a global price for petroleum products including gasoline and would also benefit to the extent that lifting the ban on crude oil exports would send a positive signal to oil producers to then increase production. second point here is the cost of inaction. prohibitions on the free trade of any product with all things being equal increases the

prices, it creates market distortions, it leads to misallocation of capital and it has a deleterious impact on job creation. so to the extent that the crude oil export ban contributes to supply disruptions and decelerating oil production, which affects unemployment, then the american consumer suffers these consequences. so i have taken the position that the status quo does not benefit the american consumer, in fact, not acting could actually negatively impact the nation. all sectors of the u.s. oil industry are global leaders. upstream you have american technology and expertise that enables the growth this production. midstream you have a complex network of pipelines that transports that oil across the country safely every day. and then, of course, downstream you have american refiners who

are among the most advanced in the world. so lifting the de facto ban will strengthen this system by protecting jobs, boosting production, and enhancing efficiency and specialization. now, i mentioned the commerce department earlier. they may retain sufficient statutory authority to lift the ban on its own as part of a larger swap. some have suggested trading u.s. light crude for mexican heavy which sounds interesting but it's a little more complicated than that. the president may also make a national interest determination that the present regulatory structure which generally prohibits crude oil exports is unnecessary and counterproductive. white house action on this matter is, of course, the shortest way from point a to point b and if the president is so inclined, he can call me, embg count on my full support on this.

if the white house disagrees with this interpretation of its authority or it chooses to maintain the prohibition on exports, then i think it would be appropriate for this body, for the senate to update the laws to reflect 21st century conditions. now, after crude oil and condensates is the glowing growing success story of our petroleum products and their exports. an enormous expansion of the american export profile in global petroleum product markets has accompanied the crude oil resurgence. crude oil exports must continue without burdensome regulations. the u.s. refining industry is the global leader and delivers gasoline, diesel and other fuel to american friends and allies around the world. these fuels will be consumed whether or not they're imported from the u.s. which, again, uses the strictest environmental standards. and, of course, when we're

talking about energy production and our opportunities for exports, there is our renewable energy resource. there is renewable technology. producers of wind turbines, solar panels and other technologies also reduce our trade through our exports. so when we're talking about energy exports, let's truly talk about all of them, including our renewable technologies. i think that the general lack of trade restrictions on renewable energy technology products doesn't immediate to be modified. if renewable technology is the future, then it needs to be competitive. and then finally, the last area is nuclear technology. the united states has been the undisputed leader of nuclear technology throughout the world. we produce more nuclear power than any other nation. and as the global nuclear trade