mr. bennet: i would ask unanimous consent for seven more minutes. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. mr. bennet: i appreciate the indulgence of my colleague from louisiana. thank you. in a significant demonstration of leadership around here, you stopped me right when i was about to praise people so here we go. in a significant demonstration of leadership around here chairman alexander and senator murray have told us they intend to write a bipartisan bill. their process has the potential to be a rare exception to the gridlock that has gripped this senate. along with our bipartisan work on the farm bill and immigration immigration. senators alexander and murray have both expressed a willingness to work together because they appreciate the importance of this task. they understand the consequences of failure. they know enough about this issue. they care enough about the it. in january of 1941, during one of the nation's most difficult times the height of the great depression and on the eve of our entry into the second world wa

mr. bennet: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from colorado. mr. ennet: i ask the quorum call be rescinded. the presiding officer: without objection, so ordered. mr. bennet: mr. president i rise to talk about our schools really to talk about our values and our morality, what we stand for as a country to ask whether we are able to look forward and create a better future for our children and to set the record straight let me be clear when it comes to our children, i have fallen short, you have fallen short, this body has fallen short, and let me explain why. we learned in the last couple of weeks that over half of the public school children in this country are now poor enough that they qualify for free and reduced lunch at school, children who through no fault of their own are reaping the whirlwind of 15 years of stagnant middle-class family income and the effects of the worst recession since the great depression. by many measures, as the presiding officer knows colorado's economy leads the nation, but even in our home state we see more children livin

mr. bennet: thank you, mr. president. i wanted to come to the floor to thank my friend from north carolina or his -- for his efforts and to echo a lot of points that he already made so well especially about how, you know as we stand here today having this very reasonable unanimous consent request that the senator from north carolina has asked for especially standing here today when attention essentially what we're talking about is a promise that has been broken by this congress to the american people for 50 years. and i want to thank through the chair my colleague from north carolina for trying to rectify that. i'm disappointed that our consent request was objected to but i know this measure has plenty of support. as mentioned we led an amendment on the floor last week with the exact same text as the bill we're talking about today but that amendment received 59 votes but i have a hunch it would comforteddably clear the 60-vote thrilled were it to be -- threshold were it to be considered again and it should be considered a

mr. chairman. >> senator bennet. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you very much to you and the ranking member for holding this hearing. it strikes me listen to the testimony that we have been victimized by two things. one, a generation that has not experienced these diseases because of vaccines and have lost sight of what they look like. and interestingly, dr. sawyer's point, the unedited content on the internet, more affluent families i guess are reading. i wonder dr. sawyer, and then ask the other panelists, 11 also say, dr. jacks, thank you for your testimony. i hope maggie is getting a chance to watch you or maybe doing something something more interesting ago but they get for being a. dr. sawyer, could you use this opportunity to tell us what the biggest falsehoods are that are being trafficked on the internet and what the answers to those falsehoods are? if the other panelists would like to join that would be great as well. >> as has been mentioned several times today, autism remains one of the major concerns of parents, even though as d

mr. chairman, thank you. >> senator bennet. >> thank you, mr. chairman. antifolate a hearing. mr. secretary, thank you for being here. just when things couldn't possibly get worse congress distinguished itself at the end of the last congress by passing a tax incentive though, include an extension of the wind production tax credit or two and half weeks. you have just, and in that context and understand the context, in your answer to senator brown you, the specter of the treasure of the united states of america, described our tax code as broken and ridiculous. and there isn't anything in any person on this committee who doesn't agree with that characterization of the tax code. either been around for a long time and no i think quite a lot of wisdom over that period of time. i think the people of colorado what they would like to know is what are the conditions that are required to actually fix this tax code to reform the tax code? what do we have to do to put this committee in the position to actually do the people's business, do not do this insanely mine and ridiculous legislating, b

mr. chairman. >> lazar gets the award for succinctness today. senator bennet and then scott if he is here and then senator franken. well, let's just go to senator bennet and we'll 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 that for the first time in the country's history, a majority of our public children 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 it was to create a system of accountability that showed us how kids were performing by income and also their ethnicity and it's demonstrated a huge achievement gap that exists in this country. and all of us have different policy issues that we focus on but, in my mind, if you want to cure this problem of poverty in our country,