mr. whitehouse: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from rhode island. mr. whitehouse: i know the senator from rhode island wishes to speak very shortly, and i will yield to him very shortly when he is present on the floor, but i did want to react to two points that were made by the very distinguished senator from utah, and i say that with true sincerity. he has been a friend to me since i have been in the senate. he sets a very valuable standard in this institution for collegiality and dignity and bipartisanship and scholarliness, and he comes from an extremely distinguished career prior to his distinguished career in the senate as a lawyer, a leader of the utah bar. so -- but i do think that as much -- as easy as it is to make fun of a 2,074-page bill, the house bill, which is not significantly different in scale from this bill, was reviewed, and if you look at the substantive language in it. in a bill, of course, there is a lot of language that simply connects things into place and is ta

mr. whitehouse: mr. president, may i ask unanimous consent that the distinguished senator from iowa be recognized for 20 minutes and that i be recognized following the conclusion of his remarks also for up to 20 minutes. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection, so ordered. mr. whitehouse: i thank the chair and yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from iowa. mr. grassley: mr. president, the senator from illinois is still on the floor. last week i pointed out the plans that republicans have introduced right here. the only way that the senator from illinois can have an out is he was cute -- he was cute in modifying it that it hasn't been scored by the congressional budget office, but here's the fact on what the congressional budget office can do and not do. they were busy since may with the senate health bill, getting it scored. they were busy working with us in the group of six to try to get a bipartisan bill scored. and since october 2 until now, they have been working

mr. whitehouse: mr.resident, may i now call up amendment number 2870, an amendment to protect the social security surplus and class program savings in this act and ask for the amendment's immediate consideration. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: the senator from rhode island, mr. whitehouse, proposes an amendment number 2870 to amendment number 2786. at the appropriate place -- mr. whitehouse: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from rhode island. mr. whitehouse: may i ask unanimous consent that further reading of the amendment be dispensed with? the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. mr. whitehouse: i yield to the distinguished majority leader. mr. durbin: i have listened to the profound and eloquent statements of my friend and colleague from new hampshire, senator judd gregg. he has frequently invoked the name of the ponzi family, and although i'm not personally familiar with them, i believe they have had some skeletons in their closet by vir

mr. whitehouse: i think it does. mr. baucus: with health insurance market reform and with the rating reforms, et cetera. mr. whitehouse: all those and a public option. all of that adds to a better environment. one of the interesting things about this is that you really only have a good and fair market. america is founded on market principles. we all believe in market principles. one of the things about a market is people will cheat on it if there aren't rules around the market. if you don't make sure that the bread is, you know, good, honest, healthy bread, then some rascal will come and they'll sell cheap, lousy, contaminated bread in the market. you have top discipline in walls to protect the integrity in the market. that is what the health insurance market has lacked. i think it will enliven the market in health insurance and animate the market principle. mr. baucus: i ask my colleagues: is there anything in this legislation which will interfere with the doctor-patient relationship? that is today people choose their o

mr. whitehouse: if i could ask the assistant majority leader to yield for a question. it would appear then that not only is there this subsidy that goes to the private insurance industry funded by a tax on all other medicare recipients, but that those private insurance companies are actually doing their level best to try to pick out a disproportionately healthy medicare-eligible population. so what we end up doing is not only paying more for the medicare advantage but also for a healthier population. and so it's really a double subsidy. mr. durbin: make it triple whammy, because the third impact, of course, is that the healthier people are not part of medicare. those left in medicare are sicker and more expensive. so the government-run program ends up being more expensive because those private health insurance companies cherry pick out the healthiest people that they can find. there are those who want to defend medicare advantage, who really think it's great that we would pay $170 billion in subsidies to these companies over a ten-year period of time. this bill moves u

mr. whitehouse: thank you. i would love to interject a question to the distinguished senator from michigan at this point. we are in a situation in which the other side is repeatedly coming to the floor to ask us to delay, to stop, to slow down, to start over and i'm curious, as somebody who's watched this debate closely, what the senator from michigan thinks about where we would be if we acceded to that wish, bearing in mind that one of the sort of ideological fire brands who seems to be leading a measure of the debate on the other side has indicated that this isn't about health care and people. this is about giving president obama a waterloo, this is about creating a political defeat for the president of the united states on their side. nothing to do with health care. entirely about creating a defeat for this new president and when in the face of all of the obstruction that the distinguished senator from michigan described so eloquently, this recordbreaking, unprecedented in the history of the senate, obstruct

mr. whitehouse: 50%, 5-0. half of the staff of the community health center was dedicated to fighting with the insurance industry and the other half was actually providing the health care. in addition, they had to have a contract for experts, consultants to help fight against the insurance industry. that was another $200,000. $200,000 for a little community health center plus half their staff. and what you've seen in the past -- i think it's eight years -- is that the administrative expense of the insurance industry has doubled, and that's what they're doing. it's like an arms race. they put on more people to try to prevent you from getting care because it saves them money when they do. they have a profit motive to deny you. in the case of my -- the member of my family who they tried this on, he had the fortitude to fight back and eventually they caved. but for every person like him who fights back and actually gets the coverage that they paid for, that they're entitled to, there are going to be some who are to

mr. whitehouse: mr. president? mr. president, i will just speak for a moment because i know the distinguished senator from pennsylvania wishes to speak, and when he comes to the floor, i will quickly yield to him, but while there is a moment in between, i did want to speak to some of the arguments that we have heard. there is the question always of the substance of an argument. there is also the question of the credibility of an argument, and i think as people who are watching this debate discuss the credibility of the concern expressed by our friends on the other side of the aisle about the deficit impact of the class act, it's worth considering a few facts just to evaluate that. the first thing is that the class act is required to be actuarially self-sustaining. people pay into it and from those funds under the insurance principle, funds come back out. it is required to be self-sustaining that way. second, it is voluntary. nobody has to contribute. if you want to contribute, then you become eligible for the benefit o

mr. whitehouse: thank you, chairman baucus. the presiding officer: the senator from rhode island. whitehouse as we are here today, -- mr. whitehouse: as we are here, washington rests under a blanket of snow, reminding us of the christmas spirit, the spirit of bringing families together for the holidays. unfortunately, a different spirit has descended on this senates. the spirit that has descended on the senate is one described by chief justice john marshall back in the burr trial, those malignant and vindictive passions which rage in the bosoms of con tending parties struggling for power. two-time pulitzer prize winner captured this in an essay called the paranoid style. vindictive passions often arise, he points out when an aggrieved minority believes that america has been taken away from their kind. though they are determined to try to repossess it and try to prevent the final destructive act of subversion. does that sound familiar, madam president, in this health debate? 40 years ago he wrote that. hoffstetter continued those aggrieved fear what he described as the now familiar

mr. whitehouse: would the senator from illinois yield for a question? mr. durbin: i will. mr. hitehouse: i'm interested in the parliamentary situation that took place earlier whereby one of our members was actually obliged to withdraw an amendment that was going to be voted on by all of us because of an insistence on part of the other side, that 800 pages, be read by our poor clerk, before that vote should take place. and i -- i have also heard the other side say that we want to get going and we want to move toward votes. and i would be interested in the distinguished majority whip's reflection on the extent to which a procedural objection to force the clerk to read 800 pages of an amendment and deny one of our colleagues his vote fairly represents a desire to move forward and get through our votes. mr. durbin: i'd say in response to the senator from rhode island, that we have heard repeatedly that people want debate, amendments, and vote. and, yet, what happened on the floor today when the senator from oklahoma, senator coburn, refused to give consent to suspend the reading of

mr. whitehouse: thank you, chairman baucus. the presiding officer: the senator from rhode island. s we are here today, -- mr. whitehouse: as we are here, washington rests under a blanket of snow, reminding us of the christmas spirit, the spirit of bringing families together for the holidays. unfortunately, a different spirit has descended on this senates. the spirit that has descended on the senate is one described by chief justice john marshall back in the burr trial, those malignant and vindictive passions which rage in the bosoms of con tending parties struggling for power. two-time pulitzer prize winner captured this in an essay called the paranoid style. vindictive passions often arise, he points out when an aggrieved minority believes that america has been taken away from their kind. though they are determined to try to repossess it and try to prevent the final destructive act of subversion. does that sound familiar, madam president, in this health debate? 40 years ago he wrote that. hoffstetter continued those aggrieved fear what he described as the now familiar conspiracy.

mr. president, i rise today with my colleagues, senator lieberman and whitehouse, who are on their way, to offer an amendment to strengthen and improve the independent medicare advisory board included in the underlying bill. i firmly believe that creating an independent authority to help congress make informed decisions about reimbursing medicare, getting away from the fee-for-service system and making it based upon the costs which is occurred but also quality which now has to be required, evidence-based outcomes. that's the direction medicare and all of health care has to go. these are not just cost decisions but also quality decisions. i think it's critical to sustaining our program and the promise that we made to millions of seniors that we would do right by them and still keep medicare afford -- you know, keep it the trust fund solvent. it's meant to go broke in 2017. that doesn't help hospitals, doctors, medicare beneficiaries or anybody else. so that's -- we have to keep that in mind as we talk about this. i applaud leader reid for his bold leadership in including this advisory board

mr. redding, about -- and senator whitehouse touched on it -- this national databases and how comprehensive they are. i know in your written testimony you talked about how wisconsin discovered that it had 12,000 convicted offenders who were, nevertheless, not in the convicted offender database. and this, i don't think, was an issue of the testing as much as the data wasn't thumped in, right? >> that's correct. again, my understanding is that some of this is reaction to an unfunded mandate. some of the lowalties are -- localities are required, of course, to collect kits from all the particular offenders in a county. and i'm aware that that costs money to the counties, and it's somewhat of a burden to counties which are strapped. and as a result, those counties are not as vigorous as they should be in collecting that data. so i'm sure that wisconsin is not alone in this, that there is a problem of uncollected -- >> so you're not just picking on them because of the packers. >> i'm not picking on them because of the packers. [laughter] >> you say you believe this happens in other states and tha

mr. secretary, thank you for being her. i'm actually going to follow up on senator whitehouse's comments on cybersecurity. it was rather sobering, the vulnerability of america. we know that there are nation states that are actively trying to compromise our cybersecurity in the united states. we know that these efforts could lead for -- to soldiers or terrorists or criminals invading our country through cyberspace. and one of the sobering numbers that came out of that hearing, madam secretary, is that when they ask how effective are we in preventing this, the 80% number came out, which would, i think, be very damaging to think that there's a 20% success rate. now, a lot of it is private resources not government resources that are being attacked but it means we're losing billions of dollars a year through cyberattacks. it does mean we are vulnerable a hostile force trying to come in and interfere with our cyberinformation and compromising our energy sources, our financial systems, our military. so in your response, you talked about the fact that we have a review going forward. and there's an issue now as to

. >> senator whitehouse, senator kyl, i see him standing there and he is actually supposed to be next. >> mr chairman he is the senior member of our class of senators who came in two years ago so i owe him-- >> i appreciate the courtesy and i am prepared to wait for senator whitehouse and senator cornyn's and i will be prepared to testify. >> senator, go ahead. >> on cyber we had a hearing and it is good that senator cardin is here. he held that in his judiciary subcommittee. your deputy undersecretary from dhs was there, associate deputy attorney general james baker was there, and a senior official from nsa and the fbi were there and i asked them if any of them were satisfied with the existing legal structure within which the cyberdefense effort currently operates, and i got a unanimous the array of no from each of them. there is understand an interagency process that is led by or through the national security council, but given all the responsibilities of the national security council, i am not entirely comfortable that that is a good and lasting government-- government structure for cyber

. >> senator whitehouse, senator kyl, i see him standing there and he is actually supposed to be next. >> mrchairman he is the senior member of our class of senators who came in two years ago so i owe him-- >> i appreciate the courtesy and i am prepared to wait for senator whitehouse and senator cornyn's and i will be prepared to testify. >> senator, go ahead. >> on cyber we had a hearing and it is good that senator cardin is here. he held that in his judiciary subcommittee. your deputy undersecretary from dhs was there, associate deputy attorney general james baker was there, and a senior official from nsa and the fbi were there and i asked them if any of them were satisfied with the existing legal structure within which the cyberdefense effort currently operates, and i got a unanimous the array of no from each of them. there is understand an interagency process that is led by or through the national security council, but given all the responsibilities of the national security council, i am not entirely comfortable that that is a good and lasting government-- government structure for cybers

whitehouse, and specter. please join us in voting for this. i yield the floor. mr. kaufman: mr. president, i ask consent to speak in morning business for up to 15 minutes. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. kaufman: my colleagues have heard me speak in recent weeks about the troubling trends in our financial markets. the growing use of dark pools and high-frequency trading, increasing market fragmentation and looming potential regulatory gaps in the securities and exchange commission. today i want to talk about an economic threat that encompasses these developments and why i think they are negatively affecting the long-term health of our economy. after suffering through the most severe recession in decades, we are now in the midst of the most fragile of roeufrs. mr. president -- recoveries. mr. president, it's evident to all that we are in a jobs crisis. we need a laser-like focus on innovation policies that encourage industry to create jobs. this challenge comes not just from the financial crisis and the recession that followed, the american economy has slowed in its

whitehouse, on fiscal responsibility. also pending is a motion to commit by the senator from utah on medicare advantage. it would be my hope that the senate would vote on these matters today. mr. president, i ask consent that the following staff be allowed on the senate floor for the duration of the debate on the health care bill: cynthia alan, ryan naulty. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. baucus: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from montana. mr. baucus: i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: the presiding officer: the senator from montana. mr. baucus: i suggest further proceedings under the quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. under the previous order, the time until 11:30 a.m. will be for debate only with the time equally divided and controlled between the two leaders or their designees, with the majority controlling the first portion of time. mr. baucus: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from montana. mr. baucus: mr. president, experts and economists of every political stripe agree that preserving america's long-term economic secu

mr. sessions: its a he very distressing that senator stabenow couldn't finish her remarks and that other senators like senator whitehouse and levin and lieberman have been shorted of time. why? because for some reason the majority leader feels like that we shouldn't go past 5:30 tonight. well, that is defense bill, and it is important, and we need to be talking about the good things that are in it and the things that have been added to it that are not so good. and i don't think working a few extra hours is going to hurt anybody, and i think about, as we -- as i hear colleagues complain that they can't work a weekend, they can't work up to christmas, they can't work at night, well, what about our men and women who serve in iraq and afghanistan seven days a week, 12 hours a day, christmas and whholidays they're there away fm their families. so i don't have any sympathy for any member of the united states senate that feels like this is too hard a work for them. and i do not appreciate the fact that we are shut off in debate tonight to be able to talk about this issue that's before us. i see no reason for that to have to oc