Sherrod Brown

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of S. Res. 455, submitted earlier today.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the Senate proceed to a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. President, I rise to speak about a dear and trusted friend, not just for me and my family but for the people of Lorain County, OH. John Hatcher was a man of conscience and courage. His commitment to the highest ideals is unwavering, even in the face of criticism and attempts to silence him. In large and small ways, John Hatcher has done more for the working men and women of Lorain County and organized labor than anyone else I know. John is a retired United Auto Workers member from the Ford Motor Company Ohio assembly plant in Avon Lake. For generations, the plant helped build Lorain's middle class--the same way that American manufacturing built America's middle class. He has long held a position of leadership in the labor movement, and his loyalty to his fellow workers and to those who champion them has never wavered. He is still president of the Lorain County UAW CAP Council and a board member of the Lorain County Labor Agency. He has chaired the Lorain County Labor Day Festival Committee for several years--an event that attracts thousands of Lorain County families to celebrate the accomplishments and heritage of organized labor. And every month, John finds time to deliver food to the elderly through the Lorain County Office on Aging. For the many years I have known John--two-and-a-half decades, perhaps--he has been a fighter who is not afraid to stand up for what he believes. And as he battles cancer, John is displaying the same vigor, the same fighting spirit. Yesterday, hundreds of friends, families, and elected officials joined in honoring John with the Lorain County AFL-CIO Lifetime Achievement Award. John said--and I was standing with him--``I haven't been out in the community much the past few months, but as the warm weather comes, I will be back out soon.'' In many ways, John's presence is always felt in Lorain--through the workers he has helped and for the causes which he has championed. He is a tireless champion for working men and women. He has made an invaluable contribution to the labor movement. You never wonder where you stand with John Hatcher. He is the best kind of friend. He stands sturdy at your side in the highest winds, but is also willing to rein you in if you are getting too full of yourself. He is one of the kindest people I know, always greeting his friends with a twinkle in his eye and the hug of a man twice his size. Of all his accomplishments, the hours of labor spent at the factory, in the union hall, or on the picket line fighting for others, if you asked John, his proudest achievement is being a devoted husband to Carol--one of my favorite people--and a loving father to 6 children, 13 grandchildren, and 7 great-grandchildren. Thank you, John, for your service to the working men and women of Lorain County, for your service to the State of Ohio, and for your service to our Nation. Connie and I are honored to consider you our dear friend.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

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

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Madam President, I came to the floor to talk about a young woman in Cincinnati, OH, but I guess I am just amazed at the amnesia in this body. I hear colleagues on the other side of the aisle say Democrats vote for spending to keep that gravy train going; that Democrats believe that job creation is always the government; that Republicans believe we have to get spending under control and how politically unpopular it is to vote to cut spending. I hear these things over and over, and I hate cliches but, you know the Yogi Berra line: ``It's deja vu all over again.'' I was in the House of Representatives for the first 6 years of this decade, and I saw what happened. What happened was my colleagues on the other side of the aisle--when one bird flies off the telephone wire, they all fly off the telephone wire--voting on issue after issue to bankrupt this country and to drive our economy into the ditch. In 2001, tax cuts for the rich, George Bush's tax cuts which went overwhelmingly to the richest taxpayers and, as the Presiding Officer from North Carolina knows, using reconciliation to drive these tax cuts through in 2001, 2003, 2005, bringing Vice President Cheney in so they not only used reconciliation, they had to bring the Vice President in, who is almost never here, as the Presiding Officer knows, to vote in passing that with 51 votes. We had a surplus in those days. We had a surplus, and they took that surplus and they enacted tax cuts for the wealthy. Then they started the war with Iraq but did not pay for it. I disagreed with going to war. I voted against it. But at least we should have paid for it. They didn't pay for the war in Iraq and still have not. Then they did this huge, tens of billions of dollars in giveaways to the drug companies and insurance companies, all in the way of privatization of Medicare. So when I hear them preaching to me about Democrats want to spend money on unemployment compensation, or Democrats want to spend money on health care--such as COBRA, for those people who have lost their health insurance--or Democrats want to spend money on reimbursing doctors at a fairer rate for Medicare, they attack us for doing that yet they took a budget surplus and ran this economy into the ground by deregulating Wall Street, by cutting taxes on the richest people in this country, by turning the surplus into deficits to the tune of hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars. We had projected in 2000 a budget surplus--projected--of $1 trillion. One trillion dollars is 1,000 billion dollars. We now have a projection of $1 trillion in budget deficit. They come here and they preach that Democrats should quit spending money on unemployment compensation because all these workers, they do not want to work, they want to receive their unemployment benefits. Well, what somebody needs to explain to them, and perhaps my friends on the other side of the aisle do not know anybody who is exactly getting unemployment compensation because they spend too much time with people similar to us, wearing suits and hanging around places such as this and not enough time in places in Charlotte and Dayton and Winston- Salem and Cleveland, with people who have lost their jobs and talking about it. But it is not unemployment welfare, as they would like to say it is, it is unemployment insurance. That means when you are employed, you pay into a fund, and when you lose your job you get money out of that fund. It is called insurance, unemployment insurance. They should remember that. remembering esme kenney Madam President, I would like to commemorate the life of Esme Louise Kenney of Cincinnati, OH, whose life was tragically cut short 1 year ago this past Sunday. Esme was a bright, inquisitive, and spirited young girl with many talents and a limitless imagination and a boundless love for life. She was an artist, a musician, an avid reader, an expressive writer, and a budding water-skier. The beloved daughter of Tom Kenney and Lisa Siders-Kenney, the caring sister of Brian, Meghan and Frances, and a loyal and loving friend to so many, Esme touched many hearts in her short time with us. From all accounts, Esme's compassion and enthusiasm always warmed the room and lifted the spirits of everyone she met. Her loving brother described her as a real ``people person,'' one who loved meeting people, talking with them, learning about them, and sharing her life with them. For all of those whose days were brightened by Esme's radiant joy and love of life, this week marks an anniversary filled with sorrow and heartache. One year ago, Esme's life was taken from her under tragic and horrifying circumstances. The 13-year-old left the house one day to go for a jog, and would never return. One man's rage and delusion resulted in the brutal and senseless murder of an innocent, virtuous, and loving child. Perhaps most disturbing is the fact that Anthony Kirkland, the confessed murderer, was already a convicted killer and registered sex offender when he committed this atrocity. He had served 16 years in prison for the sadistic assault and murder of another young woman. My wife Connie and I extend our deepest sympathy to Esme's family, friends, and community during this unthinkably difficult time. We lost Esme a year ago, but I know she will be part of our lives always. The recurrence of these horrible acts underscores the urgent need to review our criminal justice system, and that is why I join the Kenney family in support of legislation introduced by my colleague, Senator Webb: S. 174, the National Criminal Justice Commission Act of 2009. This bill would establish the National Criminal Justice Commission to undertake a comprehensive review of the current system and submit a report to Congress and the President that outlines findings and recommendations for changes in criminal justice policies. Such action is vital to keeping our children safe. We must not be complacent in the face of such inconceivably violent and destructive acts as the crime that took Esme from us.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to address the Senate for about 10 minutes under morning business.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. President, right now there is a meeting at the White House that is being covered extensively by the media live. There has been much anticipation about the meeting between the President and a number of Members of Congress, equally divided between the two bodies, the House and Senate, and the two political parties. It is a chance for both sides to listen to each other. The media has decided that by and large this is going to be unproductive. I watched a good bit of it today. At least people are being open with what they believe and what they want. There clearly are major differences between the two parties when it comes to health care. It goes back a couple, three generations. It certainly goes back to the mid-1960s, to 1965 especially, when the Senate and the House and President Johnson signed the Medicare bill. An overwhelming number of Republicans opposed it and an overwhelming number of Democrats supported it. It wasn't as partisanly charged as this, but it had the same interest groups around it, including the same insurance company opposition, the same accusations by--it was the John Birch Society then. Today it is the tea parties who oppose it. They didn't talk about death panels back then. Perhaps the John Birch Society wasn't as creative as are the tea party people, but they said it would be a takeover by big government of health care; the government would stand between the patient and the doctor. None of that has happened with Medicare. The kinds of accusations and charges and scare tactics used by the insurance industry and mostly Republican opponents in the 1960s to Medicare are very similar to the opponents to health care today. So I say, setting the table, that there are major differences between the two parties. I was speaking to a couple of school groups recently, one from Lakewood, OH, and one from the University of Miami in Oxford, southwest Ohio. They asked about partisanship. One woman said: I am neither a Republican nor Democrat--a young person, a 19- or 20-year-old college student. She said: I don't understand why they are blocking appointments, why you can't even agree on that, to even have a vote. So the partisanship is surely more charged today than it has been. I explained to them it is not so much party as ideological differences; that Democrats are believers by and large in things such as Medicare, and the Republicans think: Let the insurance industry do it. That is fine. That is a legitimate philosophical difference. The Republicans side with the insurance industry, and the Democrats believe government can play a positive role--not an overreach but a positive role in people's lives by running programs such as Medicare, by running programs such as Social Security, by running programs such as student loans, agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency which has made our country significantly safer and people's neighborhoods significantly safer. There are some people on the other side of the aisle who just want President Obama to fail. I don't think that is a majority of Republicans; I think it is some number. Let's ignore that for a moment and just think there are philosophical differences between the two parties. I say that because I think there is something more going on, and that is that on a lot of these issues there has been bipartisanship on this bill. I sit on the Health Education, Labor and Pensions Committee. We did our work on this bill back in May. Clearly, this hasn't been rushed through the Congress or rushed through with reconciliation. The Bush administration, on their big initiatives, pushed them through quickly without nearly as much debate as we have had, but, nonetheless, we sat in the HELP Committee and--the Presiding Officer knows this--we accepted, I believe, 163 Republican amendments. I voted for probably 155 of them. I agreed with most of them. At the same time, the Finance Committee had negotiations with three Republican and three Democratic Senators. I think they took too long-- that is my opinion--but the fact is, they had negotiations for months. There were discussions in May and June and July and August and September. Finally, Chairman Baucus, in frustration, said: Let's move forward. This doesn't seem to be working. So there has been plenty of Republican input into this bill. There has been plenty of bipartisanship. As I said, there have been Republican amendments which have given the bill a Republican flavor and certainly a bipartisan flavor. There were a couple of specific matters. They wanted to allow health insurers to sell across State lines. We did that in the bill. The bill has provisions that allow a company in Indiana to sell insurance to residents of Ohio. A company in Indiana can sell in Ohio, and a company in Ohio can sell insurance to somebody across the line in Fort Wayne or in Richmond or in Indianapolis or in Gary or anywhere else in that State. So we listened to that, and we included that in the bill because that is one the Republicans always talk about: If you would only let us sell across State lines, that would be a great thing. That is what we did. We agreed to that. The second big issue the Republicans talk about is allowing individuals and small businesses and trade associations to pool together so they can acquire health insurance at lower prices, much the way the large corporations and unions do. We did it. We set up exchanges that are basically clearinghouses of companies so that individuals can go into these exchanges and buy insurance and spread the risk out among millions of people. Or small businesses can take their employees--for a company that may have 25 employees, if one or two of them get sick from cancer, let's say, that small business will either--at best, that small business's premiums will go up and at worst they will get their premiums canceled. If two or three or four employees are sick and it costs tens of thousands or maybe hundreds of thousands of dollars, you can be in a risk pool with millions so your rates don't spike up. So the Republicans were right about that: Let them go into pools, and we did that. So my point is, there is Republican flavor to this bill. There is Republican input--not just input, negotiations and successes--in this bill. There are 160 Republican amendments out of the HELP Committee in this bill. There have been almost unending discussions surrounding the bill. Yet the Republicans, to a person, oppose the bill. The only reason I can figure that out--not that it doesn't have bipartisanship to it--the only reason I can figure it out is what my colleague, Senator DeMint from South Carolina, said: If this bill goes down, it is the President's waterloo. I don't want to accuse my colleagues on the other side of the aisle of wanting this to fail in order to have the Democrats fail or wanting this to fail to damage Barack Obama's Presidency. I don't think that. I am not accusing them of that. I just wonder. I note the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Armed Services be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on February 25, 2010, at 9:30 a.m.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on February 25, 2010, at 10 a.m.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on February 25, 2010, at 10 a.m., in SD-226 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building, to conduct an executive business meeting.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Contracting Oversight of the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on February 25, 2010, at 2:30 p.m. to conduct a hearing entitled ``Interagency Contracts (Part I): Overview and Recommendations for Reform.''

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Select Committee on Intelligence be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on February 25, 2010, at 2:30 p.m.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Subcommittee on Aviation Operations, Safety, and Security of the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on February 25, 2010, at 9:30 a.m. in room 253 of the Russell Senate Office Building.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Subcommittee on Water and Power be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on February 25, 2010, at 10:30 a.m., in room SD- 366 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Indian Affairs be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on February 25, 2010, at 2:15 p.m. in room 628 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on February 25, 2010, at 9 a.m., to conduct a hearing entitled ``The Semiannual Monetary Policy Report to Congress.''

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. President, I object.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. President, I come down to the floor and I hear the Senator from Louisiana saying he has been in the Senate for years and he cannot believe we cannot debate these things. I have watched over the last 13 months since President Obama took the oath of office-- 13 months and less than a week--and I am incredulous the Senator from Louisiana would say what he says; that we, in fact, do not allow debate in this institution, when more than 100 times, just in the last 13 months--I think maybe 110 times; I cannot keep count because we add a few every day or every week--more than 100 times the other party, the Republicans, have obstructed, have delayed, have stopped us from moving forward. We have had plenty of time to debate. We will stay here weekends. We will stay here evenings. But when it is not debate they want, it is to block things--maybe talking things to death is the way they block things; maybe they just object to things--but time and time again we have had the ``slow walk'' on health care, so we have not been able to put a bill on the President's desk. That is not because people do not have ideas. It is not because people want to shut down debate. It is because they have tried to stop these bills on issue after issue after issue. I remember something so simple as the children's health insurance bill, which President Bush vetoed but many people in both parties supported. They tried to slow that down. They tried to slow the Lilly Ledbetter legislation which we passed to try to make sure women doing the same job in the same place are paid as much as men doing the same job in the same place. I could stand here, Mr. President, as you could, representing your constituents in Santa Fe and Taos and all over New Mexico--you could do the same as I can do, representing my constituents in Toledo and Dayton and Galion and Saint Clairsville--and point out that when we have tried to get things done, they have blocked it. We do want bipartisanship. But the public, more than anything, wants us to get things done. The Senator from Louisiana has been one of the leaders, in conjunction with one of his other regional Senators, who has said health care could be President Obama's Waterloo. There are people in this institution on the other side of the aisle--not all of them; the senior Senator from my State, George Voinovich, has cooperated a lot of times on a lot of things, unlike some of his colleagues, but there are senior Senators on that side of the aisle, where their goal is to see the President of the United States fail. If the President of the United States fails, this country does not move forward. We are in the worst economic times of my lifetime, brought on by terrible policies in the last 8 years: bank deregulation, tax cuts for the rich, a war not paid for, a giveaway to drug companies and the insurance companies in the name of Medicare privatization, causing all these problems that we inherited a year ago, and all they want to do is stop the jobs bill. They voted last night--the Senator who just complained about not being able to debate voted last night not to even allow the bill on the floor, as he did on health care, as he has done on issue after issue after issue. It is not personal to me what they are doing, but it is certainly wrong when they try to block issue after issue, bill after bill. We can disagree on what we need to do to bring this country forward. We can disagree on the jobs bill. We can disagree on the health care bill. But we ought to be able to agree we can have full debate, move forward, work on this legislation, and pass it in a reasonable time so every Senator does not talk it to death in the way of stopping it, in the way of obstructionism. I yield the floor.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate now recess until 2:15 p.m., as provided for under the previous order.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 10 a.m. on Tuesday, February 23; that following the prayer and the pledge, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour be deemed expired, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, and the Senate proceed to a period of morning business for 1 hour, with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each, with the time equally divided and controlled between the two leaders or their designees, with the Republicans controlling the first half and the majority controlling the final half; that following morning business the Senate resume consideration of the House message with respect to H.R. 2847, the legislative vehicle for the jobs bill; that time during any period of morning business, recess, or adjournment count postcloture; finally, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate recess from 12:30 until 2:15 to allow for the weekly caucus luncheons.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Madam President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask unanimous consent that it adjourn under the previous order.

Mr. BROWN of Ohio

Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Madam President, I thank Senator Dorgan, who has led with Senator Durbin on all kinds of job creation efforts, understanding that although the private sector creates these jobs, it is a partnership with the private and public sector and State and local and Federal governments. He had it right. We need to follow his suggestions and those of Senator Durbin as we move forward, including what was on the floor earlier this evening. There are in my State some 640,000 unemployed people, in a State of about 11 million. There are hundreds of thousands more who are underemployed. There are tens of thousands of small businesses across Ohio. There are hundreds of thousands of Ohioans who help ensure that roads and bridges and transit systems serve the best interests of residents and businesses. The bill we voted on today would help those Ohioans. These Ohioans didn't bring about our Nation's economic crisis. It wasn't people who work every day in Zaynesville and Lima or Findley who brought this on, but they are paying the price for it every day. Too many people are losing health insurance. I was just on public television with the senior Senator from New Hampshire. I pointed out that 390 Ohioans every day lose their health insurance. This economy has squeezed more and more people, people who have jobs, let alone the anxiety of people who have jobs and are afraid that they will lose those jobs. Small businesses in my State have everything it takes to thrive, but they are undermined by this perilous economic climate. Construction workers, manufacturing workers, small businesses, other hard-working Ohioans who keep our State going are losing jobs, not because they are not good employees, not because they don't show up, not because they aren't working hard, but because the dollars aren't there to pay them because employers are laying them off, whether in the private or public sector. Unemployed workers are remaining that way not because they don't have the drive or the skills to succeed. Majority Leader Reid has introduced a bill based on proposals from Democrats and Republicans alike that would give tax breaks to small businesses and ensure dollars continue to flow into the highway trust fund. It is a bill designed to cut businesses a break. It is a bill designed to sustain our roads and bridges and transit systems to prevent massive job loss among the millions of Americans who work to ensure the safety and the effectiveness of our transportation infrastructure. If they are working, if people are working construction, if our bus drivers in the cities who are getting particularly the elderly and low-income people to their doctors' appointments or to their workplace, if they are working, if the bus drivers and the transit workers and the construction workers and the highway builders, if they are working, then there is more money in the economy and more people are working. It is a bill, unfortunately, most Republicans in this Chamber, for whatever reason--they always have a reason to be obstructive literally 100 times in this session, more than 100 times--it is a bill that most of my Republican colleagues are determined to kill. I thank Senator Voinovich, the senior Republican in my State, for his support. I thank the other four or five Republicans who voted at least to let us debate this bill, something in the past they haven't even been willing to do on other legislation. So at least we have made progress that way. But if the press is right, the Republican leadership and their lobbying friends gathered together. They have been working 24/7 to convince the public that a bill solely focused on small businesses and middle-class jobs is a bad bill. You may have seen news reports that 100 lobbyists sat down with Republicans and figured out a strategy to try to kill this jobs bill. It is the same story, it is the same movie we watched last year on health care. It is the same story again that we have seen, that they are doing whatever it takes to kill this legislation. Fortunately for the American people, fortunately for these hundreds of thousands of Ohioans who are unemployed or underemployed, they did not get away with it today, that enough Republicans broke with their leadership and supported efforts to move forward on jobs legislation. Earlier today, I met with 200 to 300 Ohioans to unveil a report on how to get our State's economy back on track. This was a group of Democrats, Republicans, and Independents, and it was a group that had everyone from the mayor of Mansfield and the mayor of Marietta, to small businesses, to large companies, a couple of executives, American Electric Power Company, to a whole host of citizen activists who want to do whatever it takes. They want to fight for made-in-America legislation that Senator Dorgan mentioned. They want a manufacturing industrial policy in this country. We are the only country in the developed world that does not have a real plan on how to do manufacturing, on how to build an industrial economy, on how we begin to lead the world not just in the technology, which we have done in solar and wind turbines and biomass and fuel cells--we lead in technology; we do not lead in industrial development and making those products. We developed the wind turbine technology in Sandusky, OH, about 30 miles from where I live, but most of the wind turbines, the components--a lot of components are made in Ohio, but most of the wind turbines are manufactured and assembled overseas. It is the same on solar technology, the same on biomass, the same on fuel cells. Our scientists, our engineers, our professors, and our researchers develop a lot of this technology, but we are not making it in Ohio and New Hampshire and States around the country. So today, as I said, all couple hundred, 250, 300 Ohioans--Democrats, Independents, Republicans--gathered to figure out how to do this, to move our State forward. As I said, there were a lot of Republicans. But Republicans in Washington look at the world differently. Many of them are trying to demonize a bill that provides tax breaks, that saves jobs. They need to take a step back, the Republicans in this body who I believe are very out of step with Republicans and everybody else in States such as mine. They need to take a step back and remember for whom they work. Opposition for opposition's sake is not working for the American people. On the Senate floor, we need to work together to save small businesses, to help these small businesses get credit, to help these small businesses work with local communities to provide jobs. That is what they want to do. We can do this if we work together. Madam President, I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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