mr. bennet: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from colorado. mr. bennet: thank you mr. president. i am delighted to be on the floor today with, among others, senator alexander who has worked so hard on the bill we're talking about today. through the chair, i want to wish him well in his new role as chair of the health, education labor committee on which i serve. he's quite right to have said this bill came out -- came to us as a result of testimony in front of that committee by a variety of witnesses but all of whom agreed that the current system is completely unwieldy. and the also like the other cosponsors, senators booker, burr isakson and king, for joining the efforts and for being here today as well. you know, i first became aware of this problem when i was superintendent of the denver public schools and we had a couple that very generously donated $50 million 5-0 million for scholarships for kids that were graduating from denver public schools and who had applied to college. and one of the things we learned in that process was how terrible the process was for fill

mr. bennet: i rise to oppose the daines amendment. while i respect my colleague from montana's respect perspective this does nothing to support the land and water conservation fund. if you want to support lwcf support the bipartisan burr amendment which we'll consider in a few minutes. instead of solving a problem the daines measure drats creates delay for delay's sake, says lccf should be a priority but undermines it by suggesting there's something wrong with the program. for once we have a program where with nothing wrong with it. it's one of the most conservation programs for 50 years funding projects in every state and literally every single county in the united states. these are projects that range from creating new parks for inner city kids to provide new access to sportsmen and protecting our historic battlefields. we don't need to overhaul lwcf. we need to reauthorize it and let the track record of success continue. i urge my colleagues to vote no on the daines amendment before us now but vote yes on the bipartisan burr amendm

bennet. we'll see who is here after that. >> thank you mr. chairman.i hope that wasn't as reluctant as it sounded. i, i read last week, others in the committee i'm sure did as well for the first time in the country's history a majority of our public schoolchildren in our country are poor enough they qualify for free and reduced lunch. that is a shameful situation that we find ourselves in and when no child left behind was passed we couldn't say. that the majority of our children weren't that poor. they are today. and in my view that's why this discussion is so important because the attempt at no child left behind was to create a system of accountability disaggragated data and showed us how kid were performing by income and by also their ethnicity and it has demonstrated the huge achievement gap that exists in this country and all of us have different policy issues that we focus on but, in my mind it you want to cure this problem, of poverty, in our country the way to do that is by making sure people can read when they're in the first grade. that is the

so thank you doctor west for being here today. >> senator bennet. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i often say that if we had a rally to get no child left behind the same on the capitol steps from gaza and the person in the country that would come to that. we are eight years overdue. we are long overdue. i'm honored to introduce my friend tom boasberg superintendent of the denver public school. no, joined dps as the chief operations officer in 2000 superintendent and then was appointed superintendent in 2009 by grateful school board who no longer have to deal with me. before joining dps tom served as group vice president level three commit cases where he was possible for the company's mergers, acquisitions and strategic partnerships. prior to level three as a legal advisor reed hundt chairman of the telecommunications commission at the fcc. he helped establish the rate program to he began his grin is a junior high school english teacher in hong kong's public schools. he claims to speak fluent mandarin and cantonese and since i guess they did i don't know whether that's true or not.

mr. chairman. >> lazar gets award for succinctness today. senator bennet will be next and then senator scott is he is lear. senator franken. we'll go to senator bennet and see who is here after that. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i hope that wasn't as reluctant as it sounded. i read last week and others in the committee i'm sure did as well for the first time in the country's history a majority of our public schoolchildren in this country are poor enough that they qualify for free and reduced lunch. that is a shameful situation that we find ourselves in and when no child left behind was passed, we couldn't say that. the majority of our children weren't that poor. they are today. and in my view, that's why this discussion is so important because attempt at no child left behind was create a system of accountability that disaggregated data and showed us how kid were performing by income and also their ethnicity and its demonstrate ad huge achievement gap that exists in this country. all of us have different policy issues that we focus on but in my mind, if you

and i want to thank senators bennet, senator carper, senator leahy, senator menendez, senator murphy senator warren and senator whitehouse for cosponsoring this amendment. mr. president, this amendment is extremely simple. it's about one page and i'll read it in a moment. but it raises a very, very profound issue as to how we do public policy not just on issues related to climate but on issues in general. and that is as we go forward tackling the very difficult problems facing our country and the world whom do we listen to? whose advice do we take as we proceed? and i would argue that historically and appropriately what we do as a nation is we listen to the experts. that is what we do. and i think that in this debate when we deal with the keystone pipeline when we deal with the issue of climate change, it is absolutely appropriate that we listen to what the overwhelming percentage of scientists are telling us. you know, mr. president i hear some of my colleagues say you know, this is complicated and i'm not a scientist. i don't know. but let me be very, very frank. i am not a scientist and i did not do terribly well in biology and physics in college but i

to do that today and will ask senator warren and senator bennet to introduce two other witnesses and i will introduce the others. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i am pleased to introduce dr. marty west, an associate professor of education at the harvard graduate school of education, and deputy director of the harvard kennedy school's program on education policy and governance. dr. west studies education policy and reform and its impact on student learning and develop a. he has authored many articles on this subject, including many pieces on no child left behind. now last year dr. west worked with this committee a senior education policy advisor to chairman alexander. i know there are areas where we agree in areas where we disagree but i've always very happy to welcome witnesses for massachusetts to testify before this committee. so thank you, dr. west, for being here today. >> i want to thank you and the ranking member following this hearing. i often say that if we had a rally to keep no child left behind the same on the capitol steps, there's not a single person in the country that would come to that. we are eight years overdue. w

mr. president i want to thank senators bennet and senators carper for cosponsoring this amendment. i hope we can have more cosponsors and look forward to seeing the passage of this important amendment. and with that, mr. president i would yield the floor. mr. nelson: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from florida. mr. nelson: mr. president i want to speak on the keystone pipeline but before i do, i want to alert the senate that i am filing today legislation to try to protect the average american from the breach of data in an individual company and therefore the loss of their personal identification. we have had a number of cases that there have been these wide data breaches in companies with hundreds of thousands of records being stolen and of course woe is you if, in fact, your personal identity is stolen, and it may manifest itself in so many different ways, not the least of which we have seen particularly in the tampa and the miami area of my state. the use of stolen social security numbers to file false income tax returns seeking refunds. and believe it or not, t

mr. sanders: thank you. madam president i rise today to speak on behalf of my amendment to the proposed keystone x.l. pipeline bill, and i want to thank senators bennet, carper, leahy, menendez, warren, and whitehouse for cosponsoring this amendment. madam president my amendment is extremely simple. it is about a page and a half, and i think it is easy understood by anyone who reads it. and this is what it says: simple straightforward. quote -- "it is the sense of congress that congress is in agreement with the opinion of virtually the entire worldwide scientific community that, one climate change is real; two climate change is caused by human activities; three, climate change has already caused devastating problems in the united states and around the world; four, a brief window of opportunity exists before the united states and the entire planet suffer irreparable harm; ans, five, it is imperative that the united states transform its energy system away from fossil fuels and toward energy efficiency and sustainable energy as rapidly as possible." madam president that's it. that is the entire amendment. and what this amendment does is simply ask the m

mr. bennet: thank you mr. president. i'd like to congratulate you for sitting in that chair. the presiding officer: the senate is in a quorum call. mr. bennet: i ask that the quorum call be vitiated. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. bennet: and i'd like to congratulate the presiding officer. mr. president, i'd like to speak about the fischer amendment that we're slated to vote on at some point around here, and while i respect my neighbor from nebraska where she is coming from with this effort, the proposal unfortunately misses the mark by a mile. the amendment would set up new and unprecedented process for protecting -- for protective land designations. it says the secretary of the interior or agriculture has to publish in the federal register two findings before any congressional protections on public lands would go into effect. first, the secretary has to find that new protected land would not adversely effect our efforts to administer existing protected land and then second, the department has to have sufficient resources whatever that is, to implement plans f

mr. bennet: thank you mr. president. i congratulate you sitting in that chair and i'd also like to say, through the president congratulations to chairman hatch for the unanimous vote that he got in today's markup of the finance committee. it was a great bipartisan start to our work, as he said, and i hope that we're going to continue to have these discussions in that manner. mr. president, i'd like to speak today about the burr-bennet amendment number 92 which we're slated to vote on later today and i'll be brief because it is pretty straightforward. the amendment simply reauthorizing the land and water conservation fund and ensures that a dedicated portion of lwcf funds go to provide new access for our nation's sportsmen and women and as many in this body know land and water conservation fund is one of the country's best and most important conservation programs. it's authorized to provide $900 million annually for efforts to preserve and increase access to our public lands and waterways. these resources historically hav