we don't need on commerce, state, justice something dealing with doing away the environmental protection agency. there are many examples that we could use. but let's just get to doing appropriations bills the way we used to. i want to do that. we don't need to have a motion to proceed as long as my republican colleagues get rid of republican colleagues get rid of get rid of the foolish ideological rumors that have nothing to do with the bill for us. >> in the senate is expected to gavel back and momentarily working on legislation dealing with the budget and debt ceiling, an agreement between republicans and democrats with the house passed yesterday. mitch mcconnell hopes for a final passage but later tonight, expected to take up procedural vote at 1:00 a.m. eastern time, two-year budget proposal that includes raising the debt ceiling through 2017.

the chaplain dr. barry black will lead the senate in prayer. the chaplain: let us pray. eternal father, you hold victory in store for the upright. as we cross the threshold of another day, thank you for calling us to be your sons and daughters. bless our lawmakers. make them bigger in their thinking, in their praying, and in their outreach to the huddled masses yearning to breathe free.

may our senators find nourishment in your sacred word as they press toward the goal of becoming more like you. lord, lead them upon the byways and highways of service in a way that glorifies you. grant them grace to walk in your light and follow your guidance. thank you that your grace abides with us all hour by hour and day by day. we pray in your strong name,

amen. the president pro tempore: please join me in reciting the pledge of allegiance to our flag. i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. the presiding officer: the clerk will read a communication to the senate. the clerk: washington d.c., october 30, 2015. to the senate: under the provisions of rule 1, paragraph 3, of the standing rules of the senate, i hereby appoint the honorable cory gardner, a senator from the state of colorado, to perform the duties of the chair. signed: orrin g. hatch, president pro tempore.

the presiding officer: under the previous order, the leadership time is reserved. under the previous order, the senate will resume consideration of the house message to accompany h.r. 1314, which the clerk will report. the clerk: house message to accompany h.r. 1314, an act to amend the internal revenue code of 1986 to provide for a right to an administrative appeal relating to adverse determinations of tax-exempt status of certain organizations. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the time until 1:01 a.m. will be equally divided between the two leaders or their designees. mr. cornyn: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from texas. mr. cornyn: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent to waive the mandatory quorum call with respect to the motion to concur in the house message to accompany h.r. 1314. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection.

mr. durbin: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from illinois. mr. durbin: mr. president, earlier this week, the whitehouse and congressional leadership announced a budget deal that will avert a potential shutdown of the federal government and prevent a default on our country's obligations. this agreement would provide relief to the arbitrary sequester caps for two years and maintain the full faith and credit of the united states by extending the debt limit until march, 2017. for months, we have been calling on both sides to abandon any reckless budget cuts and work together to give the american people much-needed relief from this sequester. i applaud president obama and the leaders from both political parties for crafting a commonsense solution that protects the american people and our economic recovery. now, this measure passed the house of representatives and now it's our turn. this agreement calls for $112 billion in sequester relief, providing necessary

funding for critical programs that many americans depend on. with this additional funding, dramatic cuts in these programs can be avoided. yesterday, i spoke about the importance of biomedical research. funding for the national institutes of health can lead to medical breakthroughs that keep us healthier and save money in the long run. one illustration, mr. president, one american is diagnosed with alzheimer's every 67 seconds in america. one out of every five dollars spent in the medicare system is spent for those suffering from alzheimer's and dementia. the numbers are growing. the cost is growing. the research is imperative. and if we can find a way to delay the onset of alzheimer's, treat it, cure it, for goodness sakes, it not only will spare human suffering, but it will save our budget. so is medical research well

spent? of course. and yet, in past years, we've shortchanged it, in the name of budget relief. well, this is a moment where we can keep our promise to the n.i.h. and to the c.d.c. and many other agencies that are responsible for key medical research. thanks to bipartisan support -- and i want to especially note the senator from missouri, roy blunt, as well as the senator from washington, patty murray, we are going to see an increase in funding in the senate bill this year for n.i.h. if the senate number continues, and i hope that it does. but it shouldn't come at the expense of other programs like the centers for disease control which faces cuts in our version of the bill and receives better treatment in the house. we can't be the world leader in biomedical research by cutting funding for n.i.h. or c.d.c. we should also restore funding for community health centers and substance abuse and mental health programs. mr. president, as i travel around the state of illinois, our state like most states is

facing a heroin epidemic. we find that the overdoses and deaths associated with heroin are now striking a part of our population that they never struck before. the prevalence of death from heroin in america in the last 15 years has changed dramatically, and now most of the victims are white between the ages of 18-44, and that means we have to do something about it. not only in policing, which is, of course, our responsibility but also when it comes to treatment of those who are addicted. we can't cut back in substance abuse and mental health programs without paying a heavy price and inviting more human suffering. we need to ensure the f.d.a. has the funding to fully implement the food safety modernization act. the money in this budget agreement will help us reach these goals and many others. we can work together to chip away at the $850 million

underinvestment in programs helping our veterans, ensuring that those who put the lives on the line for america, the quality education they deserve. we will use some of the sequester of the budget deal to fund transportation programs and transportation, if necessary. i'm proud to represent the city of chicago. our mass transit is essential. we of course stand by our infrastructure as well when it comes to highways and bridges, rail service, but it's important that our mass transit systems across america be maintained. core capacity and tiger grants, popular grant programs that have benefited the entire nation were facing cuts in early investigators of bills. we can reverse it. senate republicans funded the home program at just $66 million. now, that was a 93% reduction in funding for this essential housing program. we can start to restore money in that area. without the sequester relief provided in the budget deal, $770 million would be cut from

america's schools. who in the world thinks that cutting spending on education is the best thing for america in the 21st century? we don't want to eliminate critical title one funding for the most vulnerable kids in america. in my home state of illinois alone, that amounts to a cut of about $40 million if we stuck with the original budget figures. now with this agreement, we can provide more money for education for the most vulnerable kids. this agreement also protects our seniors by preventing medicare part b premium increases and deep cuts to social security disability insurance that were scheduled to occur next year. it also extends ssdi solvency to 2022 and prevents a 20% across-the-board cut in disability benefits. the idea of sequester relief is not a new one. a similar agreement to the one we're voting on this morning was reached in 2013 between then-senator patty murray and congressman paul ryan who yesterday was sworn in as the new speaker of the house.

that had widespread bipartisan support. this should as well. it was the right thing to do then. it's the right thing to do now. government by manufactured crisis is no way to do the american people's business. after months of uncertainty, we have before us a plan to remove the seemingly constant threat of defaults and shutdowns. new speaker of the house paul ryan was very candid yesterday in acknowledging the broken system in the u.s. house of representatives, and i think he can point to our side of the rotunda as well that has a desperate need for more bipartisan solutions. our work is not done even with this agreement. i encourage my colleagues to continue in the spirit of compromise and a shared goal of growing our american economy and providing fairness to american citizens. let's pass appropriation bills free and ideological policy riders that seek to divide us. i look forward to joining my colleagues on both sides of the aisle in passing this bill. let's get back to work and face

the critical issues which american families face every single day. mr. president, i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from oregon. mr. wyden: mr. president, yesterday, chairman hatch and i began imagining this legislation on the floor of this distinguished body. it seems to me speaking for more than a couple of minutes at this point would just be excessive. but i think i want to summarize what the central question is at this late hour. it would be fair to say that we have spirited debates here, and fiscal battles that play out in this chamber take place at virtually every news cycle and certainly with every election. that's as it should be. that ensures that we have the vigorous debate about important issues that the founding fathers

wanted this senate to be part of, but that must never endanger the sterling economic reputation that our country has built over the generations, and passing this legislation in my view helps to preserve that reputation. with this bipartisan legislation, it is possible to avert a catastrophic default and a mindless sequester which would give an opportunity that the president of the senate and i care a great deal about, and that would be the opportunity to come up with smart, effective, targeted reforms like fixing the broken system of fighting wildfire in our country.

that system is just broken today, and with this legislation and the opportunity to bring a bit more flexibility to the cause of reforming our government, there will be an opportunity on a bipartisan basis to fix that broken policy which has consumed literally and figuratively so much of our land in the west. to me, having the opportunity to prevent a government shutdown and demonstrate once more that our country pays its debts and pays them on time is central to our obligations here in the senate, obligations we must meet on a bipartisan basis. the reality is that as it has been for decades, that america is the economic rock in tumultuous seas with this

legislation. once again, we preserve our status, our prestige with the ability to say to the world america pays its debts, our full faith and credit is intact. the reality is the cycle of fiscal crisis has gone on for far too long. so to me, the senate ought to view this legislation as, in effect, a springboard to go back to very different and robust and bipartisan budget debates. the people of this country, certainly the people of my sta state, expect senators on both sides of the aisle and differing philosophies to come together to solve the big economic challenges ahead. and the reality is, mr. president, if you count the votes here in the senate to get

the important work done, you've got to find some common ground. neither side can forge the progress we need here in this body all by itself. so let us tonight pass this bipartisan legislation, let us reaffirm our pledge to protect the full, faith and credit of the united states. i urge my colleagues, democrats and republicans this evening alike, to support this important legislation. with that, mr. president, i yield the floor, and i believe i'd note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: will the senator delay his request? mr. wyden: mr. president, i would ask unanimous consent that the time during the quorum call be allocated equally. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. mr. wyden: mr. president, i note

the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

quorum call:

mr. paul: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from kentucky. mr. paul: i ask unanimous consent that we vitiate the quorum call. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. paul: the number-one threat to our country's future is our debt. the number-one threat to our national security is our debt.this deal give. this deal gives the president the power to borrow unlimited amounts of money. this deal represents the worst of washington culture. the left and the right have come together in an unholy alliance to explode the debt. the left gets more welfare. the right gets more military contracts. and the taxpayer is stuck with the deal. this is a bipartisan busting of

the budget caps that will further indenture our next generation. i promised the voters of kentucky to oppose deficits, to oppose budgets that don't balance and to spend only that which comes in. i will not give this president any power to borrow unspecified amounts of money. our debt now equals our entire economy. not raising the debt ceiling means we would be forced to only spend what comes in, also known as a balanced budget. i could accept that. but i could also accept a balanced budget that brings us to balance over five years. the debt threatens us like never before and now is the time to take a stand. i have traveled far and wide

across america and i have not met one voter outside of d.c. who supports adding an unlimited increase to the debt ceiling. i hope my colleagues will listen and will listen very clearly to their constituents before voting for this terrible, rotten, no-good deal. the time is now to take a stand. the time is now to say enough is enough, no more debt. the very foundation of our country is threatened by the addition of debt. this is precisely the time when we should be using the leverage of raising the debt ceiling to exact budgetary reforms. in 2011, that's exactly what we did. we had the compromise that worked in the right direction. we had a compromise that said, we will set limits on both the

military and the domestic spending. instead what we have today is an unholy alliance of right and left. we wonder why the deficit grows no matter which party is involved, no matter which party is in charge. the deficit continues to grow because, frankly, many are not serious about reducing the debt. many up here are serious only about increasing spending for their sacred cow. the true compromise that is necessary in america is for both right and left to say, enough is enough. to say that the particular interest they have in spending money is hurting the country. it is time for the right to say, you know what? the country is not stronger by going further in debt. the country actually i believe is weaker. we do not project power from bankruptcy court.

i think the time is now. enough is enough. we shouldn't be adding more de debt. the left needs to acknowledge this as well. the left may say, this is for humanitarian purposes. we want to help people. and i don't doubt their motives but i do doubt whether you can help people from bankruptcy court. i think we are weakening our country. one of the reasons why we've been able to help so many people in our country is that we are the richest, most humanitarian country in the history of mankind. in the year 2014 alone, we gave away nearly $400 billion in private charity in this country. i fear that will not continue to last. i fear as this deficit mounts, as the debt mounts that it will drag us down. already some economists estimate that we're losing a medical yon jobs a year because of the burden of debt.

i think what we need to do is have compromise in washington but the compromise needs to be that the right and the left need to say we don't have enough money at this point. some say, well, we need to have military readiness, but this week in the defense committee and the armed services committee, they talked about $20 billion of waste in one program within the military. we've had secretaries of the cabinet departments, the secretary of the navy saying that, you know what? we can save money within the pentagon. but if we keep adding to the top line, if we keep adding more money, if we keep spending good money after bad, we're going to bankrupt the country. so i hope my colleagues will listen to their constituents because i've been in 40 of the 50 states and i have yet to meet a single voter who says keep adding to the debt, keep

spending more money. what i find is the opposite. they say, work together to save the country. work together not to add more debt. this debt ceiling vote does something that is unprecedented. it doesn't even add a certain amount to the debt. it adds an unspecified amount. over the next year, year and a half, we will add as much debt as can be crammed into the debt, as much money that can be spent. there will be no limits. we are giving an unspecified amount of borrowing power to the president. i don't care whether it's a democrat president or a republican president. it's unconscionable to give unlimited borrowing authority to the president. as we contemplate this decision, we need to think beyond the short term, we need to think beyond the short term of

self-constituencies on either side of the aisle and say enough's enough. we don't have the money. let's take a stand now and try to reform the process before it's too late. thank you, mr. president. the presiding officer: who yields time? the presiding officer: if no one yields time, time will be charged equally to both sides.

the presiding officer: the clerk will report the motion to invoke cloture. the clerk: cloture motion, we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate, do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the motion to concur in the house amendment to the senate amendment to h.r. 1314, the bill to amend the internal revenue code of 1986, and so forth, signed by 16 senators. the presiding officer: by unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum call has been waived. the question is, is it the sense of the senate that debate on the motion to concur in the house amendment to the senate amendment to h.r. 1314 shall be brought to a close. the yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule. the clerk will call the roll.

vote:

vote:

the presiding officer: on this vote, the yeas are 63, the nays are 35. three-fifths of the senators duly chosen and sworn having voted in the affirmative, the motion is agreed to. cloture having been invoked, the motion to refer falls. mr. paul: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from kentucky. mr. paul: can we have order in the senate chambers.

mr. paul: mr. president, the number-one -- the number-one threat to our country's future is our debt. the number-one threat to our national security is our debt. when admiral mullen was asked about the debt in the near recent future -- in the recent past, he said that it is, indeed, the debt that is the number-one throat our national security. -- threat to our national security. this deal gives the president the power to borrow unlimited amounts of money. this is extraordinary in the sense that we are not to specify how much money the president can borrow. we are to allow the president to borrow unlimited amounts of money. this deal represents the worst

of washington culture. one of the colloquial ways of doinputting this is guns and bu. what this deal allows is for one side to have more guns and the other side to have my butter. it is the old proverbial guns and but hear that is bankrupting this country. the presiding officer: the senate will be in order. mr. paul: often people want to point fingers in washington and out on the campaign hustings and they want to say, well, it's democrats' fault or it's republicans' fault. what this bill shows is, it's really the fault of both parties. there is an unholy alliance in washington between right and left, frankly, and it's the guns and butter caucus. on the right, they say, well, we need more money for military. on the left, they say, we need more money for welfare and so they get together, there's a secret handshake and we spend

more money on everything. and the country's going bankrupt as a consequence. we borrow a million dollars every minute. this threatens the very foundation of our country. if you asked people -- and i think if you asked people throughout america, republican, democrat or independent -- if you ask them whether or not it's a good idea to continue to borrow money without reforming what we do, to continue borrowing money at an alarming rate without saying, enough's enough, we should spend only what comes in. now, some have said we shouldn't negotiate over something like raising the debt ceiling, that it might potentially -- it might potentially cost us our bond rating. but the interesting thing is, in 2011 when we had this discussi discussion, in 2011 when we had

this discussion, what we found was that actual our bond rating went down and the s&p bond rating agency said that it went down because we failed to enact meaningful budgetary reform. mr. president, can we have order. the presiding officer: the senate will be in order. mr. paul: often people wonder why the deficit gets worse either under republicans or under democrats. under the previous republican administration, the debt doubl doubled, went from $5 trillion to $10 trillion. under this administration, it will go from $10 trillion to about $20 trillion, although we don't know the exact number because we are now letting the president borrow an unspecified amount of money. we are on target to add more debt under this president than all of the previous presidents combined. and people say, why does this go

on? where are the fiscal conservatives? and i guess i would maintain that there are very few fiscal conservatives on either side of the aisle. both sides of the aisle have what i would call sacred cows. on the right, they have the sacred cow of military contracts. and then the interesting thing is, they say, we don't have enough money to properly defend the country. but the interesting thing -- mr. president, can we have order. the presiding officer: the senate will be in order. the senate will be in order. mr. paul: but the interesting thing is, when you look at military spending, we actually spend more on our military than the next 10 countries combined. think about it. russia, china and eight more countries add up all of their military spending and it still doesn't equal what we spend on the military. since 9/11, we have increased our military spending by 50%.

how do we do that? how do we get the money for the military? it only happens by a compromise with the other side. the other side will sometimes resist excessive spending in the military but they say, you know what? we'll give it to you if you give us what we want. so the left wants more domestic spending. the left wants more welfare. the right wants more military spending. so what is the unholy alliance? what is the great compromise? this is being touted as a bipartisan compromise. well, it's a bipartisan busting of the budget caps. it's a bipartisan compromise that is ruining the country. the number-one threat to our national security is the debt. so for those who say oh, we just need more military spending and somehow we'll be safer, i think we are actually becoming less safe as we get further and

further mired in debt. we need to see something like the opposite of this compromise. we could have compromise, but i think the compromise would be that the right acknowledges that we don't have an unlimited treasury and that we actually are making the country weaker by hollowing the country from the inside out to this -- through this massive debt that we're accumulating. i don't think you protect power from the bankruptcy court. and to the left, i would say if your goal is humanitarian, if your goal is to help people who are in need, if your goal is to help the poor and help those who can't help themselves, to the left i would say we're doing a disservice to the country if we're going further into bankruptcy to do so. we have to understand what the contrast is -- mr. president, can we have order? the presiding officer: the senate will be in order. the senator deserves to be heard.

mr. paul: mr. president, we have to understand the contrast between our country and other countries. one of the great contrasts and one of the things about america that allows us to be the most humanitarian nation in the -- probably in the history of man is this engine of capitalism. the engine of capitalism, however, though i think is being drug down. the engine of capitalism is being burdened by this enormous anchor of debt. i think we really should be concerned whether we continue to do the good things we do to help our fellow man if we are burdened by this debt. so i think both the right and the left mistake their purpose here, and in the short run of saying well, we're going to get what we want, more money, more money, more money, frankly, we don't have any money. we're borrowing money at a

million dollars every minute. there has been much discussion as i have traveled around the country, there has been much discussion about education. people say they want free education for everyone. they say we should just give education to everyone. but the interesting thing is you know who we do give free education to? we give $15 million worth of free education to foreign students just for community college. the things that go and riddle through our government of what we're spending money on, the reason we never get reform is because we're doing this unholy compromise and we're not going through item after item after item of waste. i'll give you a couple of examples of the waste that exists in government. we spent $800,000 last year in afghanistan a televised cricket league. a televised cricket league for afghanistan. $800,000. they don't even have televisions in afghanistan. why does this go on?

why are we never able to fix any of these problems? because of the unholy compromise between right and left that skirts these issues and continues to blithely go on. we do not self-examine what is wrong with government because we bundle government into one large continuing resolution in which there is no self-examination of waste. mr. president -- the presiding officer: the senate will be in order. mr. paul: we spend $150,000 on yoga classes for federal employees. we spent a couple hundred thousand dollars last year studying whether or not japanese quail are more sexually promiscuous when they are on cocaine. the american public is outraged at the waste. even within the defense department, we have within the defense department hearings just

this week that said that we waste $20 billion on one program. this program's called the future combat systems. so we waste money but nobody's fixing it. people ask -- the american people are asking themselves why does it go on? why is there never any reform? why? because there is an unholy alliance between the right and the left. everybody gets what they want. the right will get more military money. the left will get more welfare money. guns and butter in abundance. who gets stuck with the bill? the taxpayer. the taxpayer is stuck and burdened with the bill, and we have made our future generations indentured servants. we are making the next generation bear the burden of our progressly gatt ways, and there is -- of our profligate

ways, and there is no sustain for us to say enough is enough. the presiding officer: the senate will be in order. mr. paul: when we look at waste in the military, former secretary of the navy john lehman, who is the youngest secretary of the navy under reagan, has said that he believes we do need to modernize our navy. he thinks we do need more ships. but he also says we should pay for it by reducing the costs in the pentagon, by reducing the bureaucracy of the pentagon. when john lehman was secretary of the navy, there were seven joint task forces. there is now 250 joint task forces. but here's what i would ask you. we have this program that was pointed out last week, future combat systems. $20 billion worth of waste in the pentagon. do you think it's going to get fixed if we raise the level of

money we spend? the only way waste is ever ferreted out is if we lower the amount. if you lower the top line number, if you lower the amount of money that is given, waste will have to be ferreted out. in fact, what we need are the constraints of the marketplace that ferret out waste within the private marketplace. the opposite hapts in government. -- happens in government. when you look at governmental spending and you look at it department by department, what really happens is the opposite. as each department gets to the end of their fiscal year, what do they do with the remaining money? they spend it. they try to spend their money at the end so they'll get it the next year. i proposed a budgetary reform which wouldn't fix the entire government but would actually do something i think to lead us in the right direction. mr. president. the presiding officer: the

senate will be in order. members will please take their conversations off the floor. mr. paul: i proposed legislation that i think would actually help to right the problem and have correct incentives in the way we spend our money, both on the military side and the domestic side. what i would do is give all federal employees bonuses based on cost savings. so the american people when they read about the waste, when they read about the waste throughout government, they say how come it never gets better? you want to know why congress has a 10% approval rating? because you guys just raise all the money. you blithely go on, rubber stamp, give the money, we have got to go for the weekend. but the thing is there are ways we could reform this. if you gave bonuses to federal employees for finding savings, then you would have the correct incentive. the same kind of incentive that you have in private business that tries to maximize profit by reducing cost.

in government, though, you never get that. in the government, people keep spending their money and spending their money. in fact, what we have discovered is as the fiscal year comes to a close, spending accelerates and multiplies. people spend more money in the last month than they spend in the other 11 months. they spend more money in the last week than they spend in the early weeks. and they spend more money in the last day of the fiscal year than any other day of the year. in fact, as the sun rises and as the sun sets, you can watch the spending accelerate on the last day of the fiscal year. as 5:00 approaches in the east, there is a fury to spend money, and as the sun continues into the west, when you get to federal agencies in california, they're spending it like crazy as 5:00 p.m. approaches. why don't we fix any of these problems? we don't fix them because we have become a rubber stamp and

we give everybody what they want. the right gets their money for guns. the left for butter. guns and butter is bankrupting the country. what we really need are fiscal conservatives. you can be liberal and be fiscal conservative. you can be conservative and be fiscal conservative. but the problem we have now is that there are people on the right who are actually liberal with military spending. i don't think that you can be a fiscal conservative if you're for unlimited spending for the military. mr. president, could we have order. the presiding officer: the senate will be in order. the senate will be in order. mr. paul: if you look at what we're spending on the pentagon, you look at what we're spending on military spending, we spend more than all the next ten countries combined. we have increased our defense spending by 50%.

perhaps we should look at the amount spent and try to ferret out waste and try to figure out what's working and what's not working. while we're doing it, we should think and we should think long and hard about whether or not we want to get back involved with another war in iraq. the first war in iraq cost us a trillion dollars. in afghanistan, we have now spent more than the entire marshall plan. we don't have a lot to show for it. many of the things that have been built in afghanistan have been wasted. much money has been stolen. there were stories repeatedly of the karzai family being involved in drugs and drug running and money being wasted and squandered. we have to decide what is our mission currently in afghanistan, what is the purpose of our mission in afghanistan, what is the purpose of our mission currently in iran and iraq. are we going to be back in iraq

with another half a million troops over there? are we prepared to spend another trillion dollars in another war in iraq? the message that i'm trying to get across tonight is that it is not the fault of one party or another. it's the fault of both parties. and i think the american people actually recognize this because essentially there is a universal disdain for all of those in office. and if you haven't missed this -- if you haven't noticed this or you have missed this, you're missing out on something big that's happening in america. what's happening in america is that people are very, very upset that nothing seems to improve, that the waste continues on, the spending continues on. if we look at projects that are wasteful, i'll give you another example of a project that really annoys people.

this project is one where we spent $250,000 bringing 24 kids from afghanistan and bringing them to space camp in alabama. there are hundreds and hundreds of these projects. we have american kids who can't afford to go to space camp in alabama. what in the world are we doing borrowing money from china to send it to pakistan to bring some of their kids to space camp? it's outrageous. we're bankrupting the country with this. and it goes on and on. one of the reasons there is never any reform in our spending is because we don't address spending the way we should properly. there are 12 different departments of government and about ten years ago was the last time was -- we actually passed appropriations bills. so there are 12 departments of government.

we should pass and exercise the power of the purse by passing the individual appropriations bills. if we were to do that, that's when we would begin to reform. that's when we would begin to say we don't have the money to spend on this. that's when we would ask tough questions. but congress has become a shell of itself. congress has become so minuscule as to be almost insignificant. this is with regard to almost all policy. the executive branch writes the regulations, the executive branch fights the wars and we do nothing. we have been at war almost constantly for the last 20 years, but we have been at war again in syria and now in iraq for over a year, and yet congress has not weighed in. congress has not voted to give the president any authority. some will say well, we gave him that -- them that authority on 9/11. well, go back and read the use of authorization of force from 9/11. read the use of authorization of

force and see what is in there. what you will find, what you will find is in there is that it was directed towards those who attacked us on 9/11. well, they didn't attack us from iraq and iraq had nothing to do with 9/11, and yet we used that same resolution from 15 years ago. think about the absurdity of this. think about the absurdity of using a resolution from 2001 to fight war forever. can really -- can a vote from congress that more than half of us were not part of this congress in 2001, can that vote really be used to bind generation after generation after generation in perpetual war? we find also that it is both sides really, both sides have supported the war in iraq. had you hillary clinton support the war when she was here.

she now runs away from this. but you also have hillary clinton who's still involved with wanting us to be back involved with syria, calling for a no-fly zone. before we get involved, shouldn't we have a debate in congress? there's an extraordinary amount of money that is spent. there's an extraordinary amount of lives that are lost. in the iraq war, we spent over a trillion dollars but we lost also nearly 5,000 of our brave young men and women over there. the problem in washington -- and this is i think an interesting point -- many in the media point out and they say the problem is incivility and not getting along. i guess i would argue the opposite, that we get along too much. that really -- that compromise actually comes too easy. and then when you look at whether or not there's enough discussion of whether or not the debt is harming us, there's actually too much agreement on both sides and lack of concern really for the debt.

so you have both sides coming together with this bill to basically say that we're going to give the president an u unamoununlimited amount -- an unspecified and unlimited borrowing power. mr. franken: will the senator yield for a question? mr. paul: i think i'd prefer to finish up. and you know what, i think each senator can have an hour and i would love it if you'd fulfill the next hour and make points about why we really are spending our country into oblivion. but i think i'm going to finish my hour. can the parliamentarian tell me how much time we have remaining? the presiding officer: the senator has approximately 38 minutes remaining. mr. paul: good. when we look at the problem he here, it isn't really a problem that involves a lack of compromise. what we have is both right and

left have come together and not just tonight. right and left have been coming together for a long time up he here. right and left have been saying, you scratch my back and i'll scratch yours. basically the compromise is we both get what we want. the right's sacred scow military spending. the left's sacred cow is domestic welfare spending. and both sides end up getting what they want. but as a consequence, we borrow a million dollars every minute. many economists have said that our debt is actually the biggest threat to our future. many economists have actually said that our debt is actually costing us about a million jobs a year. when kids ask me, what about a job, what are you going to do to create jobs, what are you going to do to keep america strong, to keep america producing and manufacturing and creating millions of jobs?

but i think it's the wrong thing to add more debt. i think it's the wrong thing to spend money you don't have. and so often up here, everybody looks and says, well, i'm going to do this with the money. when, indeed, the first thing we should be asking is, where's the money going to come from? we borrowed money from china often to send it to pakistan. we've sent billions of dollars to pakistan. and i'll give you an example of where we could save some money and yet there seems to be very little interest for saving money in washington. i put forward an amendment i think about six months ago in the foreign relations committee and my amendment said that any country that persecutes christians shouldn't get any of our foreign aid. and i've asked people about this in kentucky and across the country. should a country that shoots

christians get our foreign aid? i haven't met almost anybody who's for it that and yet almost everybody up here is for it. the vote was 18-2 in the committee to continue to send foreign aid to countries who persecute christians. and you say, well, how are he defining that, how do you define the persecution of christian? it's pretty easy. we define it as any country who puts a christian to death for practicing their religion. it is a death penalty if you convert from the state religion to any other religion. and yet we pour billions of dollars in there. when i tried to end the practice of sending money to countries that persecute christians, the response from the other side w was, well, this money isn't going to those who are persecuting christians, the money's going to the moderates to influence their behavior. the problem is, is that there's

no objective evidence that they are changing their behavior. if you look over the last dozen years, you look over the last two decades in pakistan, are they becoming more friendly to america, are they changing the laws so they don't persecute christians? well, it's actually probably the opposite. in some ways there's been moreddedded radicalization of pakistan -- more radicalization of pakistan. let me give you an example. asia bibi. he's a christian. there aren't many left in pakistan. but asia bibi went to the well in a small village to draw water. but as she was drawing water, they began to stone her. they stoned her and beat her with sticks until she was a bloody pulp. as she lay on the ground -- as she lay on the ground crying out for help and hoping that someone would show up, finally the police came. and as the police came, this christian woman, asia bibi, as

the police came, they didn't help her. they arrested her. she was arrested and accused of criticizing the state religion. what is our response? our response is to send more money to pakistan. we continue to send money, good money after bad, to countries that abuse their citizenry. you look at a country like saudi arabia, many people have forgotten that 16 out of the 19 hijackers were from saudi arabia. we still have come questions from the 9/11 report that do discuss saudi arabia's -- the possibility of saudi arabia's involvement. in the 9/11 attacks. but we also have a saudi arabia that has a horrendous human rights record. and this is a question that's been put forward as some have said that they're really -- their goal is to support women's rights, such as hillary clinton, and yet she's taken tens of

millions of dollars from saudi arabia. in saudi arabia, there was a young woman who's 17. they called her the girl of katif. she was raped, she was gang raped by seven men. when they finally brought about justice in saudi arabia, their idea of justice was that the girl that was raped was publicly whipped. she was whipped for income the car with an unmarried man. if you think foreign aid and selling weapons to a country like saudi arabia is going to change their behavior, you've got another thing coming. if you think selling weapons to saudi arabia or selling weapons to egypt is somehow changing their behavior or creating a warm, fuzzy feeling in the hearts of saudia arabians or egyptians for us. you've got another thing coming. we sent over a period of time $60 billion to egypt.

probably a third to a half of that was stolen from -- by one family, the mubarak family. we also sold a lot of weaponry to them and some of the weaponry they ended up using on their own people. as there was the protest that gathered in tahir square in cairo about a year ago, as thee protests were curling and hundreds of thousands of people -- were occurring and hundreds of thousands of people were showing up and mubarak was still in power, he attempted to stifle the protest, stifle the crowd by spraying tear gas on the crowd. and that's bad enough to try to quell protests with brute force. but what made it doubly force when the egyptians bent over and picked up the empty cartridge from the tear gas and it said, "made in pennsylvania." you see, i think america is a great country and i think by our example and by our trade and by

our diplomatic engagement with the world, we are the shining light for the world. but when we sell weapons to countries who then use those weapons to suppress their own people, i'm not so sure that helps american relations around the world. we should participate as a body more in how the money is being spent. i think this is one of the points of this resolution. when we see that we're giving an unspecified amount, an unspecified amount of borrowing power to the president. we've done it both ways in the past. we've done it this way in the past and i think it's wrong and was wrong then. but we've also done it when we've allowed the president to borrow a certain amount. many people have argued we shouldn't have a debt ceiling, we should never have this problem, it's too disruptive and we should just let them always borroborrow as much as they wan. i really think the opposite.

i think we need to keep a closer reigcloserrein on what happens n government. but i also think we need to specify and lay out the entire bug. a good example of this is when we were -- when we had the ebola outbreak and people were looking for money and they say, oh, there wasn't enough money. well, it turns out there was plenty of money but the money was being spent on a lot of bizarre things that come out of the n.i.h. we looked and we found that over $2 million was being spent on oragami condoms. well, i think we're fairly good on the science of condoms and an extra $2 million on oragami condoms was not the best use of money. but when you bring up these outrageous spending examples, you think, well, certainly we're going to fix it, right? every year i think for the past 20 years there's been a waste book produced. the waste book has hundreds and hundreds of items that should be eliminated. how come they're in there every year? how come we never fix any of

this? it's because we don't have individual appropriation bills, we don't look at the individual bills and say, this is how we would reform it. now, some have said we're not passing this appropriation bill because you're trying to tell the president how to spend the money. well, yeah, that's what we're supposed to do. that's what the power of the purse is. if you ask people around the country what is the thing they're most unhappy about? i know from talking to republicans -- or conservatives. the thing they're most unhappy about with us -- and i say "unhappy," i mean really unhappy we're not exercising the power of the purse. that basically we are a rubber stamp for big government. now, others will argue, they will say, we need to be the adults in the room and we need to govern. we need to govern seamlessly with no hiccups. but i would say there are two potential problems here.

you could argue that, well, by letting -- letting us get close to the brink on debt ceiling or getting close to running out of money, that that's disruptive and sends a bad signal to the marketplace. and you get to argue in the short-run that maybe that's disruptive. but you could also argue that it's incredibly disruptive to the country to keep borrowing money at a million dollars a minute. so i think you have to weigh which is worse. is it worst to keep borrowing money at a million dollars a minute? or is it worse to actually have a little bit of uncertainty about the debt ceiling? with regard to the debt ceiling, though, if you look at the debt ceiling and say, would we ever default? we bring in, in tax revenue about $250 billion a month. our interest payments lately have been averaging about $30 billion. there's actually no risk of defaulting at all and we should do the opposite. instead of scaring the

marketplace and saying that there is any chance of default, we should say we have no intention of defaulting. we should say that we won't default. in fact, we have legislation, i've actually introduced legislation that would -- and it's called default protection act. it says that we won't default. it says the first thing that we will spend out of our revenue would be our interest. it also says that out of our revenue, we would pay for social security, we would fully fund it. we would pay for medicare and fully fund it. we would pay for our soldiers' salaries. we would pay for veterans affairs. and people say, well, we can -- we have little else. and you know then maybe the question should be, maybe government shouldn't be doing much beyond interest, soldiers' salaries, veterans affairs, met care and social security, maybe that's what government should do and nothing else, at least until we got caught up again, at least until we had as much money

coming in. what would happen if we didn't raise the debt ceiling? if you don't raise the debt ceiling you've got a balanced budget. is it really so offer to conceive that we would only spend what comes in. every american family does it. every american family only spends what comes in. i think it would be gl good for the country to do that. but there's even a better way. when many conservatives have offered is called cut, cap and balance. this is a way we could raise the debt ceiling and we would temporarily raise it for about a five-year period. we would raise the debt ceiling in a gradual manner over about a five-year period. and the reason you would do that and the reason i would vote for that is i would vote for it because we would be balancing the budget. so cut, cap and balance would cut the deficit in half in one year. it's the best way to get