Sherrod Brown

Mr. BROWN

Mr. BROWN. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BROWN

Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. BROWN

Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, this past Monday I visited a senior center in Youngstown, OH, and met with seniors and others, talking about what they hear as threats to Social Security. They hear some of the wise people in this town, if you will--some of the people on television and the political pundits and the economists and the newspaper editorial boards--saying that we need to restructure entitlements or reform entitlements, and that scares them because they don't get very specific. They often, in those statements about reforming entitlements, don't--the people saying it and the reporters asking the questions don't really scratch underneath the surface and say: What does that really mean? It usually means cutting Social Security benefits, but more on that in a second. I spoke with a woman named Gloria, a 70-year-old widow, currently living in subsidized housing. She has lived on Social Security since her husband's death. Her benefits barely cover the costs of housing and groceries, not to mention health care. She told me that without Social Security, she would not know what to do to be able to get along in her life. We owe it to our children and our grandchildren to deal with this Nation's deficit. That means everything from eliminating farm subsidies--the directed payments we are doing in the farm bill, and Senator Thune and I wrote the language to do that. It means closing the carried interest loophole for Wall Street hedge fund managers. It means eliminating tax breaks for oil companies and stopping the idiotic--for want of a better term--practice of encouraging and enticing, through the Tax Code, companies to actually invest overseas, so that if you shut down a plant in Steubenville or Toledo and move it to Wuhan or Xi'an, China, you actually can get tax breaks to do that. I am a grandfather a couple of times and about to be a third time. I guess as we get older, we look at the world, not surprisingly, from a different perspective. I see, because of Social Security and Medicare, that hundreds of thousands, millions of Americans get to spend more time with their children and grandchildren. That is because of Social Security and Medicare. Forty-five years ago, before Medicare, 48 years ago, half of America's seniors did not have health insurance. Today, 99 percent have it. We know that means people live longer, healthier lives. It means not just that they get to see their grandchildren, which is the pleasure and the delight of almost all grandparents, it also means they get to impart their wisdom and knowledge and values to their grandchildren. Margaret Mead once said wisdom and knowledge are passed from grandparent to grandchild, because there is this sort of natural tension--or there might be--between children and parents, but between grandchildren and grandparents it makes for a richer society. Because of these two Social Security programs, Medicare and Social Security, we are a richer, better country. Today, 63 million Americans receive Social Security benefits. In my State it is 2 million. Let me give a couple of statistics, because this is really a moral question of what we do with our retirement system. For two-thirds of seniors, Social Security is more than half of their income in my State and in the State of the Senator from New Hampshire, who is sitting here. In the State of the Senator from Connecticut it is not much different. No State is much different from this. Social Security provides more than half of the income for about two-thirds of seniors. For more than one-third of seniors, Social Security provides essentially 90 percent, or all, of their income. For one-third of seniors, without Social Security, they would have zero or close to zero income. It lifts 15 million Americans out of poverty. In my home State of Ohio, if Social Security did not exist, almost half of seniors would live in poverty. Looking forward, improving Social Security's adequacy is the best way to address the retirement crisis. That is why I am working with Senator Harkin and Senator Begich and Senator Hirono and Senator Schatz on the Strengthening Social Security Act. My colleagues will talk about strengthening Social Security, but what do they mean by that? They usually mean that strengthening Social Security means we make cuts in benefits. Those cuts in benefits can be raising the retirement age, it can be something called the chained CPI, which is cutting the Social Security cost-of-living adjustment. It can mean some kinds of means testing, so people get less, if they are a little wealthier. It can mean a whole host of things, but each of them is a cut to Social Security. So the debate here seems to be not: How do we make seniors' lives better--when a third of seniors on Social Security get almost all their income from Social Security. And they are not doing that great with Medicare either. With some of the copays and the deductibles and all that, some get some help that way. But the debate should not be all about cutting Social Security--which it really is, this whole strengthening. We have to strengthen Social Security, is the way they talk about it. We have to reform entitlements. We have to worry about the sustainability of Social Security and Medicare, and I do worry about them. But the fix is not to debate cutting these programs and giving these seniors less. As the Presiding Officer knows, defined pension benefits are less than they used to be. Fewer and fewer people retiring now have defined pension benefits. Unless they have a government job or a good union job, fewer and fewer and fewer have retirement benefits. Fewer people are able to save money because we know in the last decade savings rates have gone down because incomes--while the wealthy have done better and better and better, profits have gone up and up and up, productivity in the workforce has gone up and up and up--wages have decoupled with that. They have not kept up. That means people are saving less. So originally as to Social Security, you would have Social Security, you would have a pension, and the third of the three-legged stool is you had savings. Well, now the savings and the pension--whether it is a 401(k) or a defined pension--are less than they used to be. So Social Security is more important. So why are we even discussing the whole idea of cutting Social Security? That is why we need a fairer COLA to start with. The Harkin bill would formalize a Consumer Price Index for the Elderly that calculates the Consumer Price Index, the cost-of-living adjustment, not the way it does now--a 40-year-old in the workplace--it calculates it based on a 70-year-old who is retired. A 40-year-old in the workplace has a very different set of expenses for their standard of living than does a 70-year-old. Obviously, the 40-year-old spends less on health care, on the average, than the 70-year-old, on the average, spends on health care. So we should calculate the cost-of-living adjustment that way. That is not what so many people in this body want to do. There is just something about a bunch of Members of Congress, who have good salaries, who have good taxpayer-financed health care, making decisions to cut Social Security and cut Medicare. I will close with this because I know Senator Shaheen is scheduled to speak and I will not take much longer. But I hear these self-appointed budget hawks, most of whom will not be relying--almost none of whom, colleagues here, will be relying--on Social Security to make ends meet in their retirement. I take a back seat to nobody in what we do about budget cuts because I have been involved with a lot of colleagues on both sides of the aisle on how we deal with budget deficits. But when you hear these self-appointed fiscal hawks, these so-called wise men--and they are mostly men-- talking about how we need to reform entitlements, scratch a little deeper. Ask them what they mean by that. They will probably say: Well, we can't sustain this. Ask them: Well, what do you mean by that? Then they will probably say: Well, we need structural reform. Ask them: Well, what do you mean by that? Ask them the question--what do they really mean? What is their idea? Their idea, almost always, is either raise the retirement age or cut benefits in some ways, cut the cost-of- living adjustment, something like that. I will close with this. As to that townhall I was attending in Youngstown, I was there 3 years ago at a townhall, and a woman stood up and said: I have two jobs, both $9 or $10 an hour jobs. I have worked all my life this hard. She said: Do you know what. I am 63 years old. I just have to find a way to stay alive until I am 65--just for another year and a half--so I can have health insurance. Imagine. This is a woman living right on the edge. She will not have much from Social Security. She has no savings. She just wanted to stay alive until she got health insurance. That is why it matters so much what we do on social insurance, why it matters that we protect Medicare--really protect Medicare, not protect it by privatizing it. And it really matters why we protect Social Security and not ``strengthen'' the program by cutting the benefits. That is why our work matters. That is why it is so important we pass the Harkin-Begich-Hirono-Schatz-Brown bill. Mr. President, I yield the floor to the Senator from New Hampshire.

Mr. BROWN

Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, I appreciate Senator Blunt yielding. I appreciate the opportunity to engage in this colloquy with the Senator from Missouri as well as the Senator from Delaware, both of whom have been leaders in manufacturing in Missouri and in Delaware. It is pretty clear what these public-private hubs can do in terms of a multiplier effect. When we look at manufacturing history in this country--and of course I will use an illustration in my State, as I understand my State better than I do any other--when Akron was the leading tire manufacturer and was sort of the center for tire manufacturing along the Ohio turnpike in northeast Ohio; to Toledo, where glass manufacturing was prominent and prevalent for decades; to autos in Cleveland; to steel; and then to rubber in Akron, we can see that once we have an innovative focus, then other kinds of manufacturing come out of that. As the tire industry declined over the decades, Akron is now one of the leaders in polymer. Toledo, which was a leader in glass manufacturing--plate glass for cars, bottles, and a lot of other kinds of glassware--has become a solar center. So the legislation Senator Blunt and I have come up with will help American workers and American business have the drive and the creative thinking and the determination to innovate ahead of the rest of the world. Before turning to Senator Coons, I wish to tell a quick story that tells me why it is so important that manufacturing take place here. We out- innovate the rest of the world. We are still the most creative. We are the best innovators. We lead in foundational research and in other kinds of research. The problem is that as we invent things in this country, if we then outsource the manufacturing, so much of the creativity and innovation, both in process and in product, takes place in that other country because it takes place in the shops. I will give a quick example. The largest yogurt manufacturer in North America is in western Ohio near the town where Neil Armstrong grew up, western Ohio near Wapakoneta. That yogurt manufacturer--I was there one day, and they used to bring in--the suppliers would send the plastic cups to the shop floor, to the manufacturer, and they would fill them-- in these big silver vats--they would fill these plastic cups with fermented milk, with yogurt, package it, and send it. A young industrial engineer and a couple of people who worked on the line for years said: We can do this a lot less expensively and save money for the company and be more productive and efficient. So the three of them developed something pretty simple to an engineer, not so simple, perhaps, to me, but they simply fed a roll of plastic, a sheet of plastic, it was slowly heated, and it was then extruded and then cooled and filled with yogurt. The line was about 75 feet, and it made for a much more efficient innovation. That innovation took place on the shop floor of an American manufacturing plant, making the productivity of that plant much greater. That is really how we need to look at this. If we are going to do this partnership with government and local manufacturers and local labor unions and local businesses and local suppliers, we can do the kind of work Senator Blunt mentioned with these manufacturing hubs, this network of manufacturing innovation initiative we have had. We introduced the bill this summer. We are working to build support. We welcome the support of our colleagues. Senator Blunt has already mentioned what it could mean in Missouri, and perhaps Senator Coons could tell us what it would mean in Delaware and in this country and what better manufacturing and more innovation means to our country. I thank my two colleagues. I have a conference committee I need to join, but I appreciate very much my colleagues opening this discussion.

Mr. BROWN

Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, I wish to thank Senator Durbin, the assistant majority leader, for his speech. One of the privileges of this job, as the Senator from Connecticut knows, is the learning experience, if you will, of sitting in the Presiding Officer's chair and listening to Senators speak. We hear a whole range of talks, a whole range of discussions, from a whole range of talents in this body. Sometimes we hear Senators with great charisma delivering very impressive political speeches and appealing to patriotism, and other times we hear Senators who just focus on the substance and the importance of an issue, bringing us down to Earth about what really matters. The speech of Senator Durbin was exactly that regarding what this health care law means. We can talk about repealing ObamaCare, and that sounds good to some crowds back home. But think of the tens of millions of Americans who will now have health insurance in Connecticut and in Ohio and Illinois and all over this country, through Medicaid, through joining the exchanges--so many of them have full-time jobs and have never had insurance. I spoke to a woman in Youngstown who was speaking at a townhall meeting. She said, I am 63 years old, I work two jobs, I have never had insurance. This was before we passed ObamaCare. She said, I just want to stay alive for the next year and a half so I can be on Medicare and have insurance. Imagine that a person's goal in life is to stay alive so they can have health insurance. This new law, as it is beginning to take effect, as people started signing up 3 weeks ago, means people such as the woman in Youngstown will have insurance--maybe Medicaid or maybe exchanges or some financial assistance. It may mean the $7,000 tax that Senator Durbin talked about, the $7,000 that all of us pay as a result of those who go to a hospital and can't afford to pay, get treatment, get care, and somebody has to pay for it and it is spread around to those with insurance. It means in my State about 100,000 people who are in their late teens and twenties are now able to sign on to their parents' health plan. It means close to a million seniors in Ohio have already gotten preventive care such as osteoporosis testing, diabetes, whatever preventive treatment, with no costs, no copays, no deductibles. It means all of that. It means more of our premium dollars will go to health care, not to executive salaries, not to marketing, not to insurance company profits. All of that is good news. While it may not sound as exciting as speaking to a Lincoln Day dinner or people at a political rally holding Confederate flags, we do know what it is going to mean to millions of Americans who may not be going to those rallies but who have worked hard all of their lives and are rewarded for it. I wish to make a couple of comments about how important the news is today that we can finally reopen the government. America is going to honor its debts and pay its bills as we have every day, every week, every month, every year for more than two centuries. We are finally going to do the right thing, and that is good news to people from Gallipolis to Chillicothe to Toledo and all over my State. It means that after this vote is done this evening in the Senate, and I hope later in the House of Representatives, the President will sign this law to pay our bills and reopen the government. It means we need to focus on what matters in this country. What matters in this country is jobs, and that means investing in infrastructure, whether that infrastructure is Sinclair Community College in Dayton or Owens Community College in Toledo, or whether that infrastructure is a water and sewer system in Napoleon or Bowling Green, or whether that infrastructure is a health care clinic in Zanesville, or a whole host of things that matter long term to the future of this country. I was speaking to Senator Coons from Delaware earlier today about the importance of manufacturing. We are working with a number of our colleagues on bipartisan legislation which focuses on manufacturing and infrastructure. Twenty years ago, thirty years ago in this country-- these numbers are not precise but estimated--about 25 percent of our GDP was manufacturing. Manufacturing was about 25 percent of our GDP. Financial services was less than 15 percent of our GDP. That has reversed in this country. We know what it means to cities such as Springfield and Mansfield and Lima in my State where manufacturing jobs have shut down far too often and those jobs have gone overseas. We still give tax breaks in this country, believe it or not, to companies that outsource, that shut down and move overseas. So a company that shuts down in Ravenna or shuts down in Portsmouth and moves to China gets tax incentives to do that. That has to stop. We have to work on that. We can support a whole host of legislation I have been working on with Senators Blunt and Collins and Graham and Sessions and Burr to deal with the issue of the Chinese gaming the currency system. That will mean literally hundreds of thousands of jobs in this country that can return or that will not be lost because they are gaming the currency system. On job training, the so-called SECTORS Act will match up skills locally determined by workforce investment boards and community colleges and local businesses and local labor unions with the needs of those businesses--match up the job skills with the needs of those businesses. Last, with Senator Blunt, I am working on a national network manufacturing proposal that will help companies and universities and technology come together in a way that can spur industries regionally in this country. We know that, for instance, glass in Toledo--the fact that Toledo has been, for decades, a major glass manufacturing center-- not just providing a lot of jobs in a variety of different kinds of glass, including everything from plate glass to windshields to drinking glasses, but it also evolved into the job-creating industry of solar panels. We know how that can work. This will be a partnership between Senator Blunt and myself and others, as well as with the administration, on how, in fact, we can help with manufacturing and continue to lead the world the way we have for the lifetime of myself as well as the lifetime of the Presiding Officer. We know what we have to do today to pay our bills and reopen the government. We know what we need to do in the weeks and months ahead. I look forward to working on those issues with my colleagues. I note the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BROWN

Mr. BROWN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. BROWN. Madam President, we still remain hopeful as the hours, unfortunately, click down towards what could happen in this country if we do not pay our debts. It has never happened in American history. I know when we woke up this morning, when America woke up, they saw Leader Reid, the Democratic leader, the majority leader, and Leader McConnell, the Republican leader from Kentucky, coming together in discussion, coming together on a plan, and they are pretty close to agreement. We know there are still problems in the House of Representatives. I think some of us in this body are fans of Abraham Lincoln, and many of us have studied a lot of things Lincoln said and did. Lincoln used to talk about--when his staff wanted him to stay at the White House to win the war and free the slaves and preserve the Union--he said: I have to go out and get my public opinion bath. I think some of my colleagues in the House could learn something from going out and listening to real people, not just going on talk radio, not just going to their country clubs, but to listen to people talk about their lives and what this government shutdown has meant. It has meant more than 50,000 jobs in my State--people who are furloughed. Madam President, 97 percent of NASA employees in Cleveland and Sandusky in northern Ohio have been furloughed. We know what it has meant to Battelle Memorial Institute, one of the great research facilities in the country. They run the energy labs. We know what it has meant to people who depend on Meals On Wheels and food stamps and depend on food safety and meat inspections and all that government does. We know long term what this shutdown or repeated shutdowns in the future do. That is why these negotiations are so important that Majority Leader Reid is insisting that every time somebody says: I am going to shut the government down, you do not repeal a law for them because then that is what becomes a matter of course. If you are a research scientist and you are funded by an NIH grant at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland or you are at Wright State University and are a medical researcher or you are doing aeronautics research at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base or at NASA Glenn, if you see these interruptions, if you are furloughed for 3 weeks in October 2013 and then again some time next year, and again, you--some of the most talented researchers--are going to walk away, and we are going to lose so much of the edge we have in this country. We are still the leading economy in the world. We are the greatest country in the world because, as the Presiding Officer knows in Wisconsin, we have built the kind of intellectual and physical infrastructure the world has never seen--whether it is the University of Wisconsin, which is a great university, not quite as great as a slightly larger one in Columbus, but whether it is a great university, whether it is medical research, whether it is building highways and public transit and aeronautics and all that we do as a nation and we have done together, we cannot lose that edge. These government shutdowns and threats are damaging not just to the economy today but to our long-term future as a nation. That is why I am hopeful, as Senator McConnell and Senator Reid have worked together and come close to an agreement, that the House of Representatives will understand how important this is to the future of our Nation. All we are asking is--once we get this agreement in the Senate--that Speaker Boehner simply go along; otherwise, it really is a betrayal of our values and our future and us as a great country. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BROWN

Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, I am privileged to represent the State of Ohio, as I know the Presiding Officer is to represent Connecticut, and the previous speaker is to represent Nebraska. We are home to several large research facilities--medical research facilities, aeronautics research facilities, military research facilities, some that are overwhelmingly represented to do research in pure science. All of them have a major impact in their communities in terms of employment with usually very good-paying jobs--scientists, engineers, physicians, chemists, and all kinds of people in the natural, medical, or aeronautic sciences and all of the support staff. These research facilities are always good for communities. And they not only provide employment, but they provide great wealth for our country. So much of this research helps people in their daily lives and is commercialized into businesses, and entrepreneurs take much of this research and applied science and create more economic activity, prosperity, and good-paying jobs. And that is where this shutdown is particularly problematic. There are 800,000 Federal employees that have lost jobs as a result of this ridiculous shutdown. I have spent much of the last several days on the phone talking to people running these institutions, talking to smalltown and big-city bankers, entrepreneurs, businesses, union officials, and people who represent or run many of these organizations. All of them think this shutdown is absolutely unnecessary. Just a moment ago the Presiding Officer and I had a conversation, and we both shake our heads: Why do radicals in the House of Representatives want to inflict this kind of pain--not just on the 800,000 Federal workers, but on the contractors near these facilities, the restaurants, hardware stores and businesses, and the school districts that are affected because people aren't bringing home the income and aren't paying as much taxes--all that happens when this willful government shutdown, orchestrated because a group of people want to attach their political platform, ideas, gimmicks, or statements to legislation we need to pass? It is pretty simple: Pass the continuing resolution. Keep the government open. That is not a Democratic or Republican platform. That is what we need to do. Don't go around attaching political statements in a political platform to a simple ``keep the government open'' resolution. The same on the debt ceiling. Nobody is wild about increasing the debt ceiling. Nobody is wild about passing legislation so we don't default. It is not a part of the 2012 Democratic platform to raise the debt ceiling, nor is it a part of the 2012 Republican platform. So when we have a vote, it is not negotiated: Let's add a bunch of 2012 Republican party platform rhetoric to something to raise the debt ceiling so the government of the United States pays its bills. It is not a Democratic or a Republican value to pay the bills this Congress ran up. It is our duty. We take an oath of office. I took the oath in January 2013. The Presiding Officer took his oath. We know running the government and paying our bills is what you do as an elected official. Those never used to be controversial, until some radicals in the House of Representatives decided that this is a political opportunity. We can accuse the President of not negotiating. We can tell the public the Democrats are willing to shut down the government. The Republican Governor of Nevada to the Democratic majority leader from Nevada this week called it a Republican shutdown. So it is clearly a group of radicals. Back to what I was saying about these great research facilities. The Presiding Officer has them in Connecticut, I have them in Ohio, and the Senator from Hawaii has them in her State. An administrator of one said it is asymmetrical, killing and building a major scientific endeavor. It is a lot harder and takes a lot longer for a group of engineers, doctors or scientists to construct a very important scientific endeavor than it does to kill one. Fifty years ago, Speaker of the House Rayburn from Texas at one time said--and I will clean this up: Any mule can kick down a barn. It takes a carpenter to build one. I will make it more personal. A dozen years ago I was involved in a car accident and broke my back. I was in good health and exercised, but for 3 days I didn't get out of bed. I remember the first day I got out of bed and tried to walk. My leg muscles had atrophied. It takes a lot of time to build up those leg muscles, and it took 3 days for them to atrophy. I was in my late 40s then and in good shape. That is also the way science is, in the same sense that it takes a long time and a lot of investment of public dollars and a lot of brain power and really high-quality, talented scientists, engineers, doctors, or medical researchers to do these projects. And then we are going to lay them off for 2 or 3 weeks because somebody has some political idea they want to attach to a continuing resolution. Somebody wants to take their political platform and put it on legislation that the government pay its bills for their political gain. A leader of one of these major institutions in Ohio told me he had to bring in many of his managers and employees and tell them there were going to be layoffs and furloughs. In some cases, with no end in sight because of this government shutdown, what are they going to do? Their scientific endeavors get interrupted and in some cases may not be repaired or rebuilt. So many of the best scientists and engineers are going to say: I am not coming back and doing this. So the radical Republicans in the House of Representatives say: OK, we can keep the government open if you repeal part of ObamaCare. If the President had done that and said: OK, keep the government open, and we will repeal this section of ObamaCare, what would have happened next? Then there would have been another continuing resolution or another end of the fiscal year or another opportunity these politicians would have seized to again threaten to shut the government down and gut something else, some other law they don't like. In other words, if there is a law they don't like, and they are in the position, then they are going to say: I am going to shut the government down if you don't change this law. If the President says yes to that, what happens the next time? Then, I am going to ask the President to get rid of two laws I don't like or I will shut the government down or I am going to block the government from paying its bills because I don't like a law passed back in 1993 or 2007. We can't operate the government like that. NASA Glenn Research facilities, one of the great NASA facilities in the country; Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, a major research facility near Dayton, OH; Battelle Memorial Institute in Columbus--thousands of employees, engineers, scientists, technicians, highly-skilled people, very educated, run eight of the national energy labs. Case Western Reserve University Medical School and Engineering School, Ohio State University, University of Cincinnati--I could name one after another. These places can't operate if every 6 months or 1 year they are subject to a potential government shutdown unless the President does what some radical Members of Congress want. So when people say: First, open the government; second, pay our bills; and, third, let's negotiate--we have already negotiated the dollar figure on the continuing resolution. Every time the continuing resolution expires or the fiscal year ends, every time we have to pay our debts when the debt ceiling limit is reached--if we have to play this game, it is going to mean a potential government shutdown or disruption at Battelle, NASA Glenn, Ohio State's medical school funding and research funding, and Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. If that is the way this crowd believes we should run a government, they don't have much regard for government. Every time they have had a chance, they tried to privatize Medicare, they tried to privatize Social Security. They don't like EPA, Head Start, or Meals On Wheels. They don't like these government programs. I understand that, but play it right. Don't threaten to close the government unless we change the law which Congress passed, the President signed, and the Supreme Court affirmed. But if it was my political platform in 2012--even though it was defeated in front of tens of millions of voters--and I don't like what you are doing, then I am going to threaten to shut down the government. Our country is too important and too big for that. On an international scale, the President of the United States didn't go to China for a major economic conference because he had to be here because the government was shut down. Other countries--particularly China--made fun of us. Other countries basically were asking: Is the United States abdicating its leadership role? And the Peoples Republic of China is not slowing down in their investment in scientific research or modernizing their infrastructure. If we allow this kind of government shutdown and this kind of activity by radicals in the House of Representatives, this is not good for our country. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. BROWN

Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, I rise today with a pretty simple message for House leadership: You can end this Republican shutdown today. Just simply let the House vote. On issue after issue after issue, when the House has acted, the Senate has responded with a vote, either with a vote for or against a tabling motion or a vote for or against legislation, but we have taken a vote. We simply ask the House to do the same. By scheduling a vote on the Senate-passed plan--the continuing resolution--Speaker Boehner can ensure that more than 800,000 workers, including tens of thousands in my home State of Ohio, can get back to work. By scheduling a vote on the Senate-passed bill, he can reopen the government without rehashing old political fights; then get down to business--deal with the debt limit--then get down to business and make decisions about immigration, make decisions about jobs, make decisions about what we are going to do with the budget. I do not think we have ever, Mr. Speaker, seen one faction of one party of one chamber of one branch of government hold the entire country and economic recovery of our Nation hostage--a faction of one party of one house of one branch of government hold the country hostage. Do not take my word for it. A Cleveland Plain Dealer headline said: ``Republicans need to quit the attack on Obamacare and agree to a clean continuing resolution.'' They called the actions of the far right attack on the 3-year-old health care law--the health care law that was passed overwhelmingly in both Houses, with 60 votes in the Senate and well over a majority in the House, affirmed in part by the Supreme Court--the Plain Dealer called the actions attacking the health care law ``bordering on the un-American.'' The Toledo Blade called the actions of the far right in the House ``GOP extortion,'' challenging Speaker Boehner to put America's economy over his own job, reminding him of his election night saying the 2012 election ``changes that,'' making the health law ``the law of the land.'' Finally, the Washington Post--no stranger to criticizing Democrats-- called out the ``House of Embarrassment'' and its ``heedlessness'' on the impact of its actions on ordinary Americans. I was home this weekend, and I spoke with all kinds of people. I spoke with Federal employees, some of whom have been furloughed, some of whom have not. I spoke with others in Avon Lake, OH, other places. I listened to what they had to say. People are frustrated. They cannot believe that, again, one group of radicals in one House of one branch of government can, for all intents and purposes, shut the country down and move us towards the precipice of what happens if the Congress does not pay the bills that we as a Congress ran up. These are real people facing a real and devastating impact. I did something else that I know the Acting President pro tempore, as a Senator from Maine, a former Governor, does also: get on the phone and just talk to people in your State about the impact this will have. I spoke to one of the leaders of an institution in Ohio that has a large R&D presence in the State. He talked about the irreparable damage to our infrastructure, similar to what happens in Senator Nelson's State--who just joined me on the floor--what could happen at NASA in South Florida, what happens at NASA in Cleveland, what happens at Batelle in Columbus, what happens at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton. This leader at one of these institutions--I do not want to call him out by name--he talked about the irreparable damage to our infrastructure as a nation. This is not just highways and bridges. This is scientific researchers, this is engineers, this is people working on some of the most top secret issues in our country and our government. He went on to say it is asymmetric: building and killing a scientific endeavor. Think about that. Killing a scientific endeavor you can do in a week or you can do in a month simply by stopping the research by an interruption like this, where many of the top scientists, the top engineers, at some point just say: I do not want to go through this again. I am not going to continue to do this important work for my country and then see it shut down because somebody has a political ax to grind, because somebody, on a continuing resolution, or one political party, as we approach the debt ceiling, wants to attach their political platform to one of these important pieces of legislation just to make the government run. What is happening in places like that is some of these engineers say: I am not sure I want to work for NASA anymore. I am not sure I want to stay in the military. I am not sure I want to be at a major research institution like Batelle. I can go elsewhere where my work will not get interrupted and people will show their appreciation simply by continuing to fund my research. When you think about this building and killing a scientific endeavor, it is a little bit like one old politician said, that it takes a carpenter a long time to build a barn, but any--I am not sure he used the word ``mule''--but any mule can knock down that barn in a day or so. I remember I was in a car accident years ago. I broke my back. I was in the hospital for a week. For 3 days I stayed in bed. I remember the first time I tried to walk how my muscles had atrophied. It took several weeks before I was back to full strength and could rebuild that muscle. That is really the way it is with these research institutions in our country, which we have so many of, that are so important, whether it is NASA, whether it is Batelle, whether it is Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, whether it is the National Institutes of Health. We have assembled some of the greatest scientists and engineers and technicians in the world at these institutions, but building a scientific endeavor takes days and weeks and months and years; killing one is a matter of an interruption of 2 or 3 or 4 or 5 weeks. That is why this is so dangerous, this shut down. That is why going up against the debt ceiling is potentially catastrophic for our country. It makes no sense. It is not good for our economy. It is not good for our people. It is not good for our Federal workforce that really can do the right kinds of things for our country.

Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, I would be glad to yield to the Senator from Florida.

Mr. BROWN. I would add, it is interesting: Three of the great NASA facilities are represented on the floor now by Senator Cornyn from Texas, Senator Nelson, and me. It is not just NASA employees at NASA Glenn in Cleveland.

Mr. BROWN. It is another 1,300 contractors who are doing work paid by taxpayers. They are actually private companies, as the Senator knows. It is the same in Florida, the same in Texas. And their work is important too. I just think these kinds of interruptions are so senseless. What I heard more than anything from people when I was home was how senseless this is, how ludicrous this is. I spoke to hospital administrators all over my State today. I was on the phone with a number of them from Williams County in the northwest corner of the State, to Columbus, to Cleveland, to all over, and it is senseless to them that they are in the midst of maybe a hospital expansion or maybe just doing the day-to-day work of the hospital, and they do not know what to think. I have heard many of my colleagues here for years talk about the unpredictability of this economy and that it is partly because of Washington and ObamaCare or maybe Dodd-Frank: We do not know what is happening next. The worst kind of unpredictability is shutting the government down or leading us right up to the debt ceiling. That is why it is so important that the House vote and then we get serious about doing the debt ceiling vote and then we move on to issues such as immigration and others that matter for our country. I yield the floor.

Mr. BROWN

Mr. BROWN. Madam President, I think the Senator from Rhode Island had it exactly right calling it a tea party shutdown. It is unnecessary, it inflicts pain on far too many Rhode Islanders and people from Massachusetts and Ohioans. It is all so needless. It is so simple: Open the government. I think Speaker Boehner needs to make a decision: Does he want to be Speaker of the far right wing of the Republican Party or does he want to be Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives? If he chooses to do the latter, it will mean putting what is called the continuing resolution to reopen the government on the floor in the House of Representatives down the hall, allowing all 430-something Members of the House to vote--Members of both parties, all duly elected in November, all sworn in on January 3 of this year--allow them to vote. If they vote, I am confident that Democrats and Republicans together will reach a strong majority, that legislation will then be sent to the White House, the President will sign it, and the government shutdown will end. It is irresponsible not to let the House of Representatives vote. Yesterday or earlier today the President said: One faction of one party of one House of one branch of government shut down the government. This whole lurching from one crisis to another by design, by sort of a manufactured crisis that we have seen over and over, is something that simply doesn't work for the American people. I come to the Senate floor from time to time and read letters from constituents. I won't read letters today because the Senator from Arkansas will be speaking in a moment, but I will tell a few quick stories. A number of working Ohioans--from the small business owner in Lima, in western Ohio, waiting for a loan, to the farmer in Chillicothe looking for help from the USDA, to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, employees on the base and contractors off the base--are all affected by this. Ninety-one World War II veterans who stepped off an Honor Flight in Washington, DC, on Tuesday to visit the World War II memorial--their memorial--are affected. I have been to those Honor Flights when they visit. They visit Arlington and the World War II memorial, which is a fairly new memorial on the Mall. Many of those soldiers and sailors and air men and women who have come from my State have never been to Washington before. This is their first trip. They are often in their eighties. Those 91 World War II veterans--many in wheelchairs, many with walkers--came anyway even though they heard the place was shut down. They weren't letting a government shutdown prevent them from paying their respects to their brothers and sisters who died during World War II or fought in that war and have died since. They persevered just as they had fighting in World War II. These organizations give back to the men and women who gave so much to our country. These 91 World War II veterans prevailed even though the memorial was shut down. They pretty much forced their way in, with help from a number of others. But too many Ohioans will be hurt. Sharon Purdy of Spencerville, OH, wrote to me, concerned about the status of this weekend's National Fallen Firefighters Memorial Service held each year in Emmitsburg, MD. Her husband Lee was killed in the line of duty in the year 2000 and was memorialized there 12 years ago. Sharon goes back every year to pay her respects. Two Ohio firefighters killed in the line of duty will be honored this year--Michael Burgan from the Sugarcreek Fire Department and Rocky Duncan from the Niles Township Fire Department. Thousands of firefighters and their families will be coming from across the country to pay their respects, but presumably the gates will be closed. That is how government is repaying them for their sacrifice because some people want to score political points instead of doing their job and are irresponsibly shutting down the government--the so-called tea party shutdown. I received a letter today from Judith Cowan, the president of the Ohio Energy and Advanced Manufacturing Center. She is building a state- of-the-art manufacturing center in Lima, OH--investing in new electromagnetic forming technology. She has been partnering with the Economic Development Administration to build the center. She received a notice today that her reimbursement check from EDA is on hold due to the shutdown. EDA is not allowed under the law to do that. Because they can't pay the bills, they must stop because of this irresponsible tea party shutdown of the government. Her project is in midconstruction, supplies have been purchased, concrete has been poured, and workers' time has been set aside. She told my office she makes an effort to hire local contractors and use small businesses in her supply chain. She is concerned that these small businesses that live paycheck to paycheck depend on her. Think of the people who poured the concrete. Think of the small companies that did the ironwork. Think of the other companies that have sold to her for this EDA-financed project and you realize some of these small businesses are going to face very hard times, again because of this hard-headed, far-right tea party shutdown which was simply unnecessary. Contrary to the political games the far right in the House, the radicals, are playing, this is not a game. These are real people facing a real and devastating impact. They do not deserve to be punished for the political ideology of a few. Remember, one faction of one political party in one House of one branch of government has held hostage the whole rest of the government and these hundreds of thousands of Federal employees and the millions of people affected by them. This is not about whether we will or will not agree to go to conference on the budget. This is about whether Congress in this country can continue to govern. Senate Democrats have compromised on funding levels. According to reports, the Senate-passed resolution comes at a level 18 percent below what the President proposed 5 years ago. It is 17 percent below what the Democratic Congress proposed 4 years ago. It is 10 percent below what Republicans proposed 3 years ago and 3 percent below the debt ceiling of 3 years ago. This is not about spending. This is not about fiscal issues. This is about attaching one party's--in this case the Republicans'--political platform--presumably out of the 2012 Republican Convention--to simple legislation to make the government work, to keep the government going. It is a waiting game they are willing to play. The American people are not willing to play. For some it is OK to hurt 1,000 small businesses as the SBA loan program is furloughed. For some it is OK to put 50,000 Ohio Federal employees and hundreds of thousands more around the country out of work. For some it is OK to deny senior citizens, in Mansfield or in Ravenna or in Youngstown, a new Social Security benefit. It is not OK with me. It is not OK with most of the Members of the Senate. It surely is not OK with the American people. It is time to stop these political games. It is time to put the American people first. I yield the floor.

Mr. BROWN

Mr. BROWN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. BROWN. Madam President, I urge leadership in the House of Representatives to simply schedule a vote on the Senate-passed bill. I understand a number of people in the majority party are going to vote no. I also believe that--and the Presiding Officer used to be in the House of Representatives, as I was years ago. It is a democratic House, and I mean ``democratic'' with a small ``d.'' They should schedule a vote. I believe a majority of Members of the House of Representatives would vote for the bipartisan continuing resolution that passed the Senate. I believe they would pass it in the House if the Speaker of the House would let it come to a vote. Is the Speaker of the House going to be the Speaker of the radical right of the Republican Party or is he going to be the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives? Fundamentally, that is the question. Is he going to be the Speaker of the radical right in the House of Representatives or is he going to be the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives? If he chooses the latter, if he chooses before midnight, there will not be a government shutdown because a majority of the House of Representatives--not necessarily a majority of the Republicans, but a majority of those who took the oath of office on January 3, 2013, who were elected in November of 2012, and then took that oath--I believe a majority of them will support it. I think it is always a good idea to look back in time a little to what happened in the past. We know that more than 30 times when President Reagan was President and President Bush Senior was President and President Bush Junior was President, the Congress raised the debt ceiling, even with a Democratic Congress, without preconditions, without threatening to shut the government down or without threatening default; and a number of times the same situation on continuing resolutions, passing budgets, all those things. But never really before in the House of Representatives or the Senate has there been a body of Members who have tried repeatedly to have their way to, in a sense, attach their political platform from the election of the year before to a continuing resolution, and if they do not get that political platform attached, they are simply going to shut the government down. That is really what is happening. There is all this talk about that the public does not like the Affordable Care Act. Some call it ObamaCare. The official name is the Affordable Care Act. There is some talk from the House of Representatives, really ad nauseam, that they do not like the Affordable Care Act and they say the public does not like the Affordable Care Act. But let's look at that. (Mr. DONNELLY assumed the Chair.) In 2012, the President of the United States was reelected--a strong supporter of the Affordable Care Act. In 2012, supporters of the Affordable Care Act were elected, including the new Presiding Officer, who replaced the Senator from Hawaii, who is a supporter of the Affordable Care Act. I was reelected--a supporter of the Affordable Care Act. A strong majority in the Senate support the Affordable Care Act, many of whom stood for reelection and were successful. In fact, two more were elected this time who held office prior to this election and who supported the Affordable Care Act. More people voted for House candidates who supported the Affordable Care Act. More people voted for Democrats in the House races than Republicans, even though redistricting made the outcome a little different, obviously, from that. So the point is, there is no public sentiment to shut the government down in order to defund or repeal or hold back or delay or emasculate or pull apart--or whatever--the Affordable Care Act. But let's go back a bit in history. In July 1965--48 years and a couple months ago--President Johnson signed Medicare into law. It passed bipartisanly, although a number of Republicans were strongly against it, especially the far right. In 1965, when Medicare passed, the John Birch Society did not like it. That was sort of the tea party of today. A lot of doctors did not like it. A lot of insurance companies did not like it in 1965. But a lot of people who were suspicious of government overall said they did not like it and opposed it, and a lot of them continued to oppose it after the election. But 5 years later, the country clearly was very happy with Medicare. Certainly 48 years later, the country is very happy with Medicare. I do not think there is much question that 5 years from now people will be happy with the Affordable Care Act. They know it will have worked for people in this country. Much of it already has worked, as the Presiding Officer knows. In my State, almost a million seniors have already received benefits. They have gotten free preventive care with no copays, no deductibles. Seniors from Youngstown and Toledo have had screenings for osteoporosis and physicals and all and there is no copay or deductible for those living on Medicare. People from Cleveland to Cincinnati, people in their twenties--100,000 Ohioans in their twenties--have been able to go on their parents' health care plan up until the age of 26. Because of a rule in the Affordable Care Act, we have seen thousands of Ohioans get a rebate check from the insurance companies because the insurance companies charged too much. We know a lot of those benefits have been out there. Families who have a child with a preexisting condition are no longer being denied coverage because of the Affordable Care Act. So we know much of it has taken effect and much of it has been to the public benefit. We also know come tomorrow, October 1, much more of the Affordable Care Act-- the rest of it--will be rolled out. Seniors have saved in my State--and I think in the State of Indiana-- an average of about $700. Those who are in the prescription drug plan have saved about that amount of money on their prescription drugs, again, because of the Affordable Care Act. We know that. Put that aside. Let's simply ask the House of Representatives to bring this bill up. We know what happens if we do not. A shutdown would hurt the financing of more than 1,000 small businesses per week in my State--from Hamilton to Chillicothe, to Mansfield, to Ashtabula. The Small Business Administration in 2012 approved nearly 54,000 applications through their credit loans program, supporting over half a million jobs. A shutdown would stop the ability of the SBA to loan to small businesses through this program. A shutdown would put 52,000 Ohio federal employees at risk of being out of work. Most of them would temporarily lose jobs. We know that is a drag on the economy. We know it would mean government services are not being rendered. It would mean those tens of thousands of workers would not get paid. It would mean a stumbling, a faltering, a sputtering of our economic growth and the economic recovery, because people are not making the money and putting money back into the economy. Senior citizens would be ineligible, if there is a shutdown, to apply for new Social Security benefits. The Social Security applications would not be taken as a result of Federal furloughs and service cuts. In 2012, more than 2.2 million Ohioans received--obviously many had been receiving for years--Social Security benefits. All we ask is that the Speaker of the House do what one should do in a democracy. Let the elected representatives of Congress have the opportunity to vote. Give them the opportunity to vote yes or no on the Senate-passed, bipartisanly passed continuing resolution. Speaker Boehner needs to make a decision. Is he going to be the Speaker of the radical far right Republican party or is he going to be the Speaker of the House of Representatives? That choice is clear. Bring that bill to the floor. Let all 435 Members of the House of Representatives who were elected last November and sworn in in January have the opportunity to vote. I think if they do, it will mean the President will sign the bill before midnight and keep this government operating. There is simply no reason for it, as we lurch from crisis to crisis, all created by a political agenda, that most of the people in this country have rejected at election time. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BROWN

Mr. BROWN. I ask unanimous consent that after my 5 or 6 minutes, the Senator from New Hampshire be recognized.

Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, I would remind my colleagues, after hearing Senator Cornyn's speech and also the very articulate words of Senator King talking about a personal story--that this is full of personal stories of people who get preventive care or they don't and the difference that makes in people's lives, the quality of their lives and their life expectancy. I remind my colleagues that in my State alone, about 1 million seniors have gotten preventive care and various kinds of tests, senior citizens in Medicare, at no cost, with no copay and no deductible. About 1 million Ohio seniors have gotten that benefit from the Affordable Care Act. About 100,000 Ohioans in their twenties have been able to join their parents' health plan until they are age 26 and get insurance. People in their twenties who do not have insurance otherwise have it through something called the medical loss ratio, which for every dollar of premium in health insurance you pay, 80 to 85 percent of that must go directly into patient care rather than profits and executive salaries and marketing. That has forced insurance companies to write refund checks to tens of thousands of Ohioans. A number of Ohioans have benefited in a whole host of other ways. So we know this health care law already is working, we know it will continue to work. When I hear people in Washington, DC, who dress like this, who all enjoy pretty darn good health insurance, paid by taxpayers, then I see my legislature in Columbus, legislators also who have health insurance, not even expanding Medicaid, not even allowing people, children especially and seniors and disabled people, and often people who have low-wage jobs--deny them health insurance, I think something is dreadfully wrong. Mr. President, I want to talk for a moment about something else in health care. Ancient cultures have been using plant extracts and other mixtures with antimicrobial properties to aid in healing for more than 2,000 years. We are probably most familiar as Americans with the Scottish scientist--I believe Scottish--Alexander Fleming who developed penicillin, which became a very common drug used kind of from the 1940s on. Last week the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention called antimicrobial resistance ``one of our most serious health threats.'' Antibiotics and other antimicrobials have been, in essence, a victim of their own success. We used these drugs so widely for so long and sometimes not always wisely, and sometimes indiscriminately, that the microbes they are designed to kill have adapted to them, making the drugs less effective or in some cases totally ineffective. I stand before you today to remind you of the need for a comprehensive strategy to address microbial resistance. Each year, about 2 million Americans contract bacterial infections in hospitals, and 20,000 of these people die because the microbes causing their infections are resistant to frequently used antibiotics. One of the most commonly reported antimicrobial resistant infections is something called MRSA, an acronym for methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus. MRSA is a strain of staph infection resistant to penicillin and other related antibiotics. Once thought to be contracted solely in hospital settings by older patients, MRSA is now affecting young, healthy people in our schools and communities. Within the last few years, we have heard far too many media reports of high school and college age students losing their lives to these infections. The statistics continue to be troublesome. A recent study from the University of Chicago revealed that more people are checking into hospitals with MRSA than those with HIV or influenza combined. We cannot ignore that. Molly Brudnick of Shaker Heights, a Cleveland suburb, contracted MRSA after back surgery. She should have been concentrating on recuperating from her surgery. Instead she spent 6 weeks on IV antibiotics in a nursing home. She had to complete 3 months of rehabilitation, with nursing care to tend her wounds. Molly's story is far too common in my State and the Presiding Officer's State of Connecticut and across the country. It does not have to happen. As this epidemic--if you call it that-- continues to spread, the financial costs and the loss of life will continue to rise. A 2012 study at Columbia found that each drug- resistant infection cost $15,000 more to treat than other infections which are not antimicrobial resistant. That is unacceptable. Curing MRSA is one piece of the puzzle in eradicating the superbugs that are resistant to antibiotics. In response to this health crisis, I join the CDC in urging enhanced attention and resources devoted to antimicrobial resistance. In 2008, I, along with Senator Hatch, the senior Senator from Utah, introduced the STAAR Act, Strategies to Address Antimicrobial Resistance Act. I thank Senator Hatch for his leadership as we begin to see the epidemic of antimicrobial resistance develop. The STAAR Act is a multiple-pronged approach to revitalized efforts to combat superbugs and prevent outbreaks of MRSA and other drug- resistant infections. The STAAR Act established a government task force to direct efforts to combat microbial resistance. The bill provides for more research on drug-resistant bacteria and explores strategies to ensure the development of new anti-infective drugs. It also ensures that antimicrobial drugs will be prescribed and used judiciously. We have made far too many advances in modern medicine to lose the fight against microbes. I look forward to working on measures to preserve our existing arsenal of antibiotic and other antimicrobial drugs and to ensure that new drugs are developed which can effectively fight superbugs. I plan to reintroduce the STAAR Act soon. I will work with my colleagues to see it moved to passage. I yield the floor.

Mr. BROWN

Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to be able to speak for up to 10 minutes in morning business.

Mr. BROWN. Thank you, Mr. President.

Mr. BROWN

Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, today, the House of Representatives is voting on legislation dealing with the farm bill and food stamps. Recently--this week--the House of Representatives broke with 40 years of tradition, precedent, common sense, and perhaps human decency when it bowed to partisan politics and passed a farm bill without a nutrition title. They pulled apart what traditionally urban and rural interests have done in this country: coming together to pass a farm bill, connecting it with a nutrition title, where it served rural America, it served urban America, it was good for hungry kids, it was good for economic development, it was good for conservation and the environment. The House leadership has announced that later today--sometime this afternoon--the House will vote on a bill that would cut the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, SNAP, by nearly $40 billion. They are taking up this bill because the $20 billion in punitive SNAP cuts they failed to pass earlier this year was not enough for the majority. They do not only cut $20 billion--$20 billion, $20,000 million--$20 billion in cuts, when the average family gets $4.45 per day. Cutting $20 billion was bad enough. That was not good enough for those Members of the House of Representatives who want to see cuts twice as big. Many of those Members of the House of Representatives--or at least some of them--are farmers themselves who get huge farm subsidies. It begs the issue a little bit. For some of my colleagues who have seen the movie ``Lincoln,'' at one point, President Lincoln--listening, but perhaps not entirely hearing his staff, who exhorted him to spend more time in the White House, winning the war, freeing the slaves, preserving the Union--President Lincoln said: I need to go out and get my public opinion baths. Well, I suggest that maybe more of us--those particularly who are voting to cut SNAP, to cut food stamps $40 billion--they may want to go out and listen to what people--not dressed like this, not working around here who get good benefits and decent salaries, not highly paid Congressmen and Senators, not the lobbyists who they may brunch with on Sunday when those Members do not go back home--but go out and talk to somebody at a labor union hall, go out and talk to somebody in a shopping mall, go out and talk to somebody at a school, where children--I heard a story today at my weekly coffee, where a woman told us that her daughter, who teaches in Columbus, has seen during the school lunch program children take some of the food and put it in their pockets so they can take it home for their brothers and sisters or for the weekend or for their moms or dads. In this still difficult economy--when people receive $4.45 per day, on the average, for SNAP, for food stamps--people in the House of Representatives want to cut it nearly $40 billion. It was not enough that 2 million Americans could lose SNAP benefits. It was not enough to them in the first bill that more than 200,000 children could lose access to the free and reduced-price lunch program. They want to make it harder, and they can say whatever they want. They can say: Well, people--I don't know. Do they get addicted to food stamps? Do they dig food stamps because they don't want to work? The fact is, as Chairwoman Stabenow points out, the chair of the Agriculture Committee, in the next 10 years, 14 million Americans will leave SNAP. Why is that? If we do not do this, why will 14 million people leave SNAP? Because they will get better-paying jobs because they do not want to be in SNAP. Most people who get stamps would rather not. They would rather have enough food on the table. They would rather have enough purchasing power to go to the grocery store and buy food with their own money that they have earned so they can bring that food home and serve their children. That is what most people want to do. I spoke to a woman in Hamilton, OH, some time ago who told me that early in the month she would occasionally take her 9-year-old son to McDonald's or to another fast food restaurant--maybe once in the first week of the month. The second week, she could maybe serve him a hamburger, she could serve him meat. The third week of the month, she began to scrape. This is a woman who had a full-time job, volunteered, taught Sunday School, volunteered with the Cub Scouts for her son, was a very devoted single mother. The fourth week of the month, what typically happened was--she looked at me with her blues and she said: You know, I say to my son--I was sitting there with my son that last week of the month. He said: Mom, how come you are not eating? She said: Well, I am just not hungry. Well, she was hungry; she just had to choose at the end of the month, does the money go for my son or does it go for me? Like most mothers and fathers, she chose to do it for her child. That is the backdrop. If more of my colleagues would follow the admonition of Abraham Lincoln and go out and get a public opinion bath and listen to what real people are saying--not people who dress like this, not people who sit in Congress, not lobbyists who may buy them lunch and come to their fundraisers, but really listen to what people have to say about what this means and understand, as Presiding Officer knows from the work he has done in his State of Connecticut, that most of the people getting benefits are children. Eighty-five percent of people receiving food assistance are children or their parents or people with disabilities or seniors. Many of them have jobs, but their jobs pay $9 an hour. Again, this is not something they do by choice in a great majority of cases; it is something they feel they have to do. They are mothers and fathers who get up in the morning and try to give their children a better future. These are millions of Americans who head out every day looking for work so they can pay their bills and put food on the table. As I said, almost 90 percent--80-some percent of SNAP households are made up of seniors and the disabled and families with children. One out of six Americans worries about where their next meal is coming from-- one out of six Americans. How many people in this body have ever really thought that way, have talked to people that way, have tried to put themselves in the place of the--that is 50, 60, 70 percent of Americans--one out of six who worries about where their next meal will come from. Then we have the body down the hall, the House of Representatives, who voted--$20 billion in cuts is not enough; let's do $40 billion. Maybe we will do more than that. My colleagues in the Congress suggest that SNAP participation has grown too big. They bemoan the state of our economy, the still-too-high unemployment rate. We all do. I share that concern. But we must do more to help jump-start our economy. I will work with anyone who seeks to do so. We know how important these benefits are to our brothers and sisters from Cleveland to Cincinnati, from rural Appalachia to farmlands in western Ohio, all across this country. It is important that we stand strong. We need a farm bill. We need a farm bill that serves agriculture. We need a farm bill that serves rural development. We need a farm bill that serves conservation and the environment. We need a farm bill that helps us provide energy. We need a farm bill that provides nutrition assistance. I yield the floor.

Mr. BROWN

Mr. BROWN. I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business for up to 10 minutes.

Mr. BROWN. I thank the senior Senator from Minnesota for her words and especially work on this bill and the consumer issues. She has made a real name in this body for her work. I rise today to discuss the most significant reform of our Nation's health policy in decades. The Affordable Care Act is a result of extensive policy discussions, late-night deliberations, 400 amendments that we considered in the Health, Education, Labor, and Pension Committee, more than 100 of those amendments that we adopted coming from Republican ideas and Republican Senators. There is a reason that people across the country, mothers and fathers and students and faith leaders and business owners and workers, are paying attention. It is because the law benefits all Americans, a wide range of Americans and especially in my home State, which I will discuss. More than 900,000 people in Ohio will be eligible for financial assistance to buy insurance that provides good coverage at a price they can afford. Ohioans suffering from preexisting conditions will no longer be denied coverage or charged higher premiums. Young Ohioans stay on their parents' plan until the age of 26, giving them a chance to finish school and secure a job that provides coverage. Those with the greatest need will get the greatest help. For years we have heard countless stories, story after story of Americans frustrated by and failed by our health system. Last fall my wife Connie was waiting in line at the local drugstore in an affluent community outside of Cleveland. The woman in front of her was, for all intents and purposes, negotiating price with the pharmacist to save money. ``What if I cut my pill in half and then take it twice a day,'' she asked. The very understanding pharmacist wanted her to take her full medication twice a day. ``But isn't it better, since I can't afford this, to take half a pill twice a day than the whole pill just once,'' she asked. After the woman left my wife asked how often does this happen? The pharmacist answered, ``Every day, every day all day.'' The tide is turning. I hear from constituents at roundtables, in restaurants, in letters and tweets and e-mails about their concerns for their family's health. A woman in Cuyahoga Falls, a community near Akron, explained to me she recently graduated law school. She is a type 1 diabetic. Without the health care law she would have been paying out of pocket for extremely costly lifesaving medication because she could not afford it on her own. I can imagine, she said, there are many Ohioans like me, working hard for my future but finding myself in a tough demanding spot while still needing to care for my health needs. Health care enrollment marks a milestone for millions of Ohioans, including myself. Twenty years ago I was running for Congress and made a promise in 1992 that I would not accept congressional health care; I would pay my own health insurance, until similar coverage was available to all Americans. I did that for well over a decade. I can now say I will be enrolling in the health care marketplace, alongside hundreds of thousands of people from Ohio. While millions will be able to enroll in benefits beginning in less than 2 weeks, the health care law has already provided measurable benefits. I wish to share how Ohioans are already helped by provisions in this law signed by the President 3 years ago. There are 97,000 young adults who are now able to stay on their parents' health insurance until their 26th birthday. We are closing the doughnut hole. The Senator from Pennsylvania mentioned what that means for his State. There are similar numbers in Ohio. Closing the doughnut hole for seniors' prescription drugs saves Ohioans an average of $774 a year on medication benefits. There are 6,300 Ohioans who receive rebates from their insurance companies because those companies failed to follow the new Federal law that required them to spend at least 80 to 85 percent--depending on the kind of insurance--of their premium dollars on health care. In other words, if these companies spend more than 15 percent of your dollar that you pay to these insurance companies on marketing, executive salaries, and various kinds of administrative expenses, they owe you money back because not a high enough percent--85 percent--of your health care dollar was spent on health care itself. There are 900,000 Ohioans who have received free preventive care, with no copays and no deductibles. Seniors have been tested for osteoporosis, diabetes, and all the other kinds of screenings that seniors should get. Children are no longer denied coverage for preexisting conditions. My wife was diagnosed with asthma at a young age--way before I knew her. She might have been denied coverage today. She, and young people like her at that stage in their life, cannot be denied coverage for preexisting conditions such as asthma, diabetes, cancer or whatever they might have. Soon all Ohioans will have access to quality, affordable health care. In 2014, we will see all aspects of this health care law fully implemented, which will make a huge difference for business--especially small businesses--families, and communities. From Ashtabula to Athens, from Bryan to Bellaire, from Mansfield to Middletown, middle-class families across Ohio have been in the horrible position of paying monthly premiums only to find they were stripped of coverage or that the coverage was so minimal as to be useless when they became sick. That worry will no longer exist. For students at Ohio State or Wooster, Youngstown State or Xavier, the choice between paying for another semester at school or health insurance will not be the concern it has been for so many years. For Ohioans from Cleveland to Cincinnati already covered, they can keep their current plan without lifting a finger. The only change they will see are new benefits, better protections, and more bang for their buck. For millions in my State, the new law will mean less worry, less anxiety, and more money in their wallets. For some Americans, the health insurance marketplace will lower premiums at least 10 percent more than previously expected. Work needs to be done. The system is not perfect, but this law is already bringing our health care into the future. It is a forward-looking law. I have been proud to support it. On October 1, frustrations, worry, and failed health care protections will soon become a thing of the past for millions in my State and tens of millions around the country. I yield the floor.

Mr. BROWN

Mr. BROWN. I ask unanimous consent to speak as if in morning business for up to 10 minutes.